New Moon research yields tantalizing clues about its geological history

The Moon has a long, chaotic geological history almost as old as Earth itself. Every crater, rock and speck of dust on the Moon tells a story, but because it's not exactly close to our planet, this history is a little harder to study than say, the Grand Canyon.

Astronomers theorize that Moon craters were formed from celestial objects like asteroids and comets crashing into its surface. While this process also formed some of the rocks and dust — known as regolith — astronomers also know that the Moon was covered in this stuff before any impact events occurred. As such, astronomers and geologists have long dreamed of the day when they could analyze the regolith in great detail.

Now a recent study in the journal Matter and Radiation at Extremes is providing scientists with unprecedented information about the lunar regolith based on 1.73 kilograms delivered from a vast lunar plane known as the Oceanus Procellarum. In the process, they may have solved lingering mysteries about the history of the Moon itself.

Humans are trashing the Moon. Some scientists argue it's another sign of the Anthropocene

The sample — collected by the Chinese mission Chang'e, which was the first to visit the Moon since the Soviet Union's final Luna mission in 1976 — included the discovery of high-pressure silica polymorphs, or crystals formed from multiple molecules of the same compound. Specifically, the silica polymorphs in question were seifertite and stishovite, which are chemically identical to quartz.

At first glance this was puzzling, since high-pressure minerals like silica are rare among the lunar regolith, as the it was not believed to have experienced pressures high enough. Yet the scientists believe they solved this mystery by determining that the silica polymorph known as stishovite will turn into seifertite when experiencing high pressure before evolving into a third silica polymorph that was present in the sample: α-cristobalite.

“In other words, seifertite could form from α-cristobalite during the compressing process, and some of the sample transformed to stishovite during the subsequent temperature-increasing process,” author Wei Du of the Chinese Academy of Sciences said in a statement. As the study itself explained, the finding of high pressure silica polymorphs in that sample "highlights the potential of multiplying high-pressure minerals in lunar materials, which could provide new information about impact processes on the Moon and other planetary bodies in the early Solar System."

"New minerals discovered in lunar returned samples and lunar meteorites can also reflect their formation conditions."

The Chang'e's analysis yielded other interesting discoveries as well, such as shedding light on the development of rare silica polymorphs. The researchers also discovered a new lunar mineral, appropriately dubbed Changesite-(Y). It is transparent, colorless and made primarily of phosphorus formed as columnar crystals. The sample was sufficiently well-preserved that scientists could even measured the peak pressure and impact duration (between one-tenth of a second to a second) of the collision that created the sample of this new mineral. As a result, they believe the crater which created this sample was between 3 and 32 kilometers wide, depending on the angle at which struck the lunar surface.

"New minerals discovered in lunar returned samples and lunar meteorites can also reflect their formation conditions, providing key information about the magmatic activity, thermal evolution, as well as impact history of the Moon," the authors explain in their study.

Some of the samples were analyzed using a FEI Scios dual-beam focused ion beam/scanning electronic microscope equipped with an energy dispersive spectrometer. Other samples were studied using an electron probe micro-analyzer. The scientists hope this type of sophisticated equipment can be used to perform future scientific research on lunar geology.

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"New minerals discovered in lunar returned samples and lunar meteorites can also reflect their formation conditions."

"These new findings emphasize the significance of studies on high-pressure minerals in lunar materials and the special nature of lunar magmatic evolution," the authors conclude in their abstract.

Other This is not the only recent study to shed light on the mysteries of the Moon's composition. A study published last month in the journal Nature Geoscience looked at the magma deposits on the Moon's surface in order to understand why they have such high concentrations of titanium. While some scientists speculated they could have derived from the Moon's mantle, scientific analysis of the magma find they do not match the composition of the Moon's magma and are too dense to be capable of eruption.

Instead, the scientists theorized that the titanium-rich magmas exist on the Moon's surface because ilmenite-bearing cumulates (an igneous rock formed by magma) partially melted, then underwent extensive modification on an elemental and isotopic level while flowing through the fluids in the lunar mantle.

At the same time, the scholars acknowledged one potentially serious limitation of their study, namely that "this model does not fully replicate lunar melt–solid interaction." Yet the recent study is nevertheless important because, as explained in a statement to SciTechDaily by co-lead author Dr. Martijn Klaver, a research fellow at the University of Münster Institute of Mineralogy, "Until now models have been unable to recreate magma compositions that match essential chemical and physical characteristics of the high-Ti basalts. It has proven particularly hard to explain their low density, which allowed them to be erupted some three and a half billion years ago."

Not all of the recent Moon-related news has been positive. Earlier this month the first Moon-landing effort since the Apollo missions experienced a "critical loss." Peregrine Mission One failed after it experienced a critical technical difficulty in their propulsion systems, which made it impossible for the Peregrine lunar lander to touch down on the lunar surface. The scientists also struggled to generate electricity for the struggling spacecraft, making it a terrible disappointment for the first attempted commercial moon landing under NASA's Commercial Lunar Payload Services program.

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Of course Trump’s Supreme Court lawyer is the same guy behind Texas’ sadistic abortion ban

The big news that kicked off this week was that the Supreme Court set Thursday to hear oral arguments over whether or not Donald Trump should be kicked off the ballot per the 14th Amendment, which bars those who have "engaged in insurrection or rebellion" against the government from holding office. What got a lot less attention was the announcement of which lawyer would argue on Trump's behalf: former Texas solicitor general Jonathan Mitchell. Reproductive rights activists sure sat up and took notice of the mention of Mitchell. He is one of the most odious men in the entire anti-abortion world, which is quite an achievement, considering the misogyny that fuels that movement.

Mitchell earned this "worst of the worst" title by being the architect behind the Texas "bounty hunter" law, which adds a level of creative sadism to abortion bans that would make the villain in the "Saw" movies envious. There have been so many vicious abortion bans passed since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022 that readers could be forgiven for forgetting how ugly the Texas law is. To recap: Beyond just banning abortion, the Mitchell-penned law offers a $10,000 bounty to any person who sues someone who "aids and abets" an abortion.

It empowers every two-bit bully imaginable to stick their noses into other people's business. A nosy Karen who thinks her neighbor's daughter is a "slut?" She can sue that neighbor for taking her daughter to the abortion appointment. An angry incel can punish a more romantically successful classmate by suing him for paying for a girlfriend's abortion. Local church busybodies who find out a community member donated to an abortion fund can now sue for "aiding and abetting." And, as most feminists immediately predicted, abusive husbands and boyfriends can sue the friends of their victim, for helping with an abortion that helped a victim escape her destructive relationship.

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One of Mitchell's first big cases under the law looks exactly like what feminists predicted. Marcus Silva did not want his ex-wife to leave him. Witnesses and text messages paint a vivid picture of the cruelty he repeatedly inflicted on her that made her flee, however. He reportedly got drunk at her work party and called her a "slut" and a "whore" in front of her colleagues. He allegedly monitored her phone against her will and would follow her around the house, screaming invective. He reportedly threatened to release sexually explicit photos of her if she didn't return to do his laundry. According to court documents, Silva told his ex-wife to have sex with him or "you’re just gonna have your f*cking life destroyed in every f*cking way that you can imagine to where you want to blow your f*cking brains out."

In order to escape, Silva's ex-wife aborted a pregnancy. According to her and two friends, Silva found out about the abortion beforehand but did not say anything to stop her. Instead, they allege, he waited until she had the abortion — and then to punish her for leaving him, sued her friends under the Mitchell-penned law. He then told his ex-wife, according to the countersuit, that he would stop legally harassing her friends if she returned to him.

Mitchell didn't just write the law that Silva is allegedly using to blackmail his ex-wife. He's also representing Silva in a lawsuit to bankrupt two women whose only sin was helping a friend leave a toxic marriage.

Terrorizing women who leave bad marriages may be Mitchell's passion, but far from his only far-right interest. As Lisa Needham at Balls and Strikes wrote in April, "Mitchell’s caseload reads like a list of grievances read aloud at CPAC." He has sued to destroy Obamacare and called on the Supreme Court to end "rights to homosexual behavior and same-sex marriage." He has lamented court decisions legalizing abortion and contraception on the grounds that they assumed "the right to freely engage to sexual intercourse." And no shock, Mitchell is big on book banning, representing Llano County, Texas, in a court battle over the public library removing books that feature LGBTQ characters.

"I need a woman who looks like she got punched": Republicans become more openly pro-abuse

What links these various issues together, besides irrational hate, is obvious: These stances are all wildly unpopular with a majority of Americans. People like having health care, free speech, and the right to a private sex life. Mitchell no doubt understands that, if he put any of his preferred policies up for a vote, his views would lose big time.

There's a lot of talk in the media, correctly, about how Trump and the MAGA movement are a threat to democracy. But why the GOP has turned fascist is often lost in the discourse. Mitchell's presence on this case before the Supreme Court shows why: They know they cannot win with free and fair elections — so they are focused on destroying democracy itself.

Make no mistake: The argument for keeping a fascist insurrectionist on the ballot is deeply anti-democratic. "Democracy is not simply voting; it includes limits on how and under what circumstances political power can be disputed and wielded so that democracy itself can survive from generation to generation," Adam Serwer of the Atlantic recently explained. "There is no rule that says democracies must give endless and unlimited grace to those who used the public trust to conspire, for all the world to see, against them," Jamelle Bouie of the New York Times wrote, in a similar column.

The response of the legal world to the briefs submitted by Mitchell and the rest of Trump's team can be summed up as such: Are you kidding? The case for keeping Trump on the ballot is admittedly weak, but even so, it's astonishing how bad and lazy Mitchell's arguments are, including a claim that the Constitution only prevents insurrectionists from "holding" office, not from running for it. The words being tossed around on law Twitter are "bizarre," a "sign of weakness," and a "massive tactical blunder."

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But there's a likely reason Mitchell, who once clerked for Justice Antonin Scalia, barely bothers to argue his case: He doesn't care about the law and is betting the majority of the Supreme Court doesn't, either.

Many observers believe, for good reason, that what will determine this case is not the merits but the fact that the majority of Federalist Society-linked members are too corrupt and partisan to make the correct call. Why put forward the effort towards making a good argument, when standing on your head and yelling "MAGA forever!" would get the same result? Especially since there really aren't any good arguments for keeping Trump on the ballot?

Of course, this just underscores how much the GOP has become a fascist party. Facts don't matter. Law doesn't matter. Democracy doesn't matter. Basic public safety doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is power. Arguably, it's a fascist flex to scorch the Constitution in favor of an incoherent criminal who smells like a butt. It proves Republican power, at least at the Supreme Court, is totally disconnected from even basic common sense and decency.

It's unlikely that Mitchell is taking this case just because he wants a piece of Trump's campaign cash. He will want far-right policy wins in return. His involvement gives lie to media nonsense about how Trump is "moderating" on the issue of abortion. On the contrary, it looks like the radical anti-choice movement is offering Trump help, and they will expect him to pay them back. That will almost certainly come in the form of a national abortion ban. Yes, it will be unpopular. But neither Trump nor Mitchell will care, because the end game is putting Trump's power entirely out of the reach of the voters.

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MAGA burnout and the health risks of a second Trump term

When Joe Biden reportedly calls Trump a “sick f**k” he is correct in a way he likely does not intend — and one that has a much more profound meaning than some harsh truth-telling about a political rival. Trumpism, the MAGA movement and the larger neofascist project — and today’s right-wing and “conservative” movement more broadly — have had a demonstrably profound negative impact(s) on the literal health of the American people.

As Politico recently reported, Biden is less than “presidential” when he discusses Trump in private. Biden’s candor is good and necessary — and there needs to be much more of it in public if he is to win re-election. But it is not just that Trump is a “sick f**k." Trump the individual is of little importance; he is more a signifier and symbol than a human being. What he represents and has enabled across American society is a type of collective pathology.

For example, a range of experts recently told the Atlantic’s Jennifer Senior that Trump’s return to power will unleash an “epidemic” of killer stress and other negative health outcomes on a massive scale:

What will happen to the American psyche if he wins again?" [one source] asked rhetorically. "What will happen if we have to live in fight-or-flight mode for four more years, and possibly far beyond? Our bodies are not designed to handle chronic stress. Neuroscientists have a term for the tipping-point moment when we capitulate to it — allostatic overload — and the result is almost always sickness in one form or another, whether it’s a mood disorder, substance abuse, heart disease, type 2 diabetes, or ulcers."

Neuroscientist Robert Sapolsky explained to Senior how Trump and other such demagogues impact our collective health: "Increase your blood pressure for a few minutes to evade a lion — a good thing … increase your blood pressure every time you’re in the vicinity of the alpha male — you begin to get cardiovascular disease.”

Booting Trump from the ballot is the best way to prevent a second Jan. 6

In the same essay at the Atlantic, Senior also highlighted how stress and an inability to think and focus would greatly worsen under a second Trump regime:

Another major component of our allostatic overload, notes Gloria Mark, the author of Attention Span, would be “technostress,” in this case brought on by the obsessive checking of — and interruptions from, and passing around of — news, which Trump made with destructive rapidity. Human brains are not designed to handle such a helter-skelter onslaught; effective multitasking, according to Mark, is in fact a complete myth (there’s always a cost to our productivity). Yet we are once again facing a news cycle that will shove our attention — as well as our output, our nerves, our sanity — through a Cuisinart.

One might reasonably ask how many Americans will truly care about the constant churn of chaos, given how many of us still walk around in a fog of political apathy. Quite a few, apparently. The American Psychological Association’s annual stress survey, conducted by the Harris Poll, found that 68 percent of Americans reported that the 2020 election was a significant source of strain. Kevin B. Smith, a political-science professor at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, found that about 40 percent of American adults identified politics as “a significant source of stress in their lives,” based on YouGov surveys he commissioned in 2017 and 2020. Even more remarkably, Smith found that about 5 percent reported having had suicidal thoughts because of our politics.

In a deeply personal op-ed at CNN, Dr. Rob Davidson explains what will happen to the American people if Trump returns to office and follows through on his promise to end the American Care Act (“Obamacare”):

Until 2010, when the Affordable Care Act (ACA) was signed into law, many of my patients were uninsured, which meant that serious illnesses often went untreated. That’s why, of all the alarming changes former President Donald Trump has threatened if he returns to America’s highest office, none scares me more than his pledge to do away with Obamacare.

In the rural county in Michigan where I’ve practiced medicine for more than 20 years, many of the patients I see are barely getting by financially. The most impoverished among them used to scrimp to pay for preventative care visits at the doctor’s office. They would struggle to pay for the prescription drugs they needed for even common and treatable ailments.

If the cost of an inhaler or insulin did not fit their budget that month, they might end up in the emergency room with completely preventable complications. Those same cash-strapped patients would often find themselves saddled with a massive bill because of that visit to the ER.

That finally started to change with the passage of the ACA, a life-changing bill that more patients I treat have enrolled in with each year since its enactment. Many can better manage their chronic disease because the ACA prohibits insurance corporations from denying coverage based on pre-existing conditions. A good number of my patients could end up uninsured again if Trump, as threatened, gets rid of the Affordable Care Act. That would have potentially devastating consequences.

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Dr. Davidson continues:

I worry about a return to the days when so many more of my patients delay or even forgo potentially lifesaving care because they lack health insurance to pay for it. One patient whom I treated prior to the enactment of the ACA sat home for five days with chest pain instead of seeking immediate medical treatment because he didn’t have insurance. By the time I saw him, we learned that a heart attack had left him with one-third of his normal coronary function.

Had he had health coverage that would have allowed him to come in when his pain started, the blockage that led to his condition might have been relieved and he might have retained normal heart function. With the ACA, I see patients every day in similarly dire health situations who are able to get the treatment they need because they qualify for expanded Medicaid, or at least significant subsidies that allow low- and middle-income working families to buy quality health coverage at affordable costs….

Undoing the ACA would set American health care back a generation or more and make our shared goal of a more affordable, more accessible and more patient-centered health care system even less attainable.

In an op-ed at the Chicago Tribune, SaraKay Smullens, a clinical social worker, issues this warning about what she describes as “societal burnout” in the Age of Trump:

Are you waking up with a lump in your throat that never used to be there? Is there an ache in your chest — best described as heartache — relatively new to you? Do you look at your children, fearing for their future and well-being? Do your eyes fill with tears, but you are not sure why?

If so, I join you. We are experiencing societal burnout. We are overburdened by a perfect storm of threatening societal challenges and a fiercely divided electorate. We are overwhelmed by moral distress due to those in positions of power and influence who, rather than address grave challenges, skillfully work to pit citizens against each other, intensify fear and anxieties, and undermine the rule of law to gain control and power.

In 1974, psychologist Herbert Freudenberger was the first to identify the burnout syndrome: Due to excessive demands on energy, strength and resources, a person becomes overwhelmed, exhausted and “inoperative.” Although they did not use the term burnout in their groundbreaking 1970 book “Future Shock,” Alvin and Heidi Toffler predicted that the breathtaking pace of our technological revolution would bring unsettling change, challenge and increased crime. They warned that the illiterate of the future would no longer be those who can’t read or write but rather those unable to keep up with the demands of rapid change.

To cope, the Tofflers stressed preparing for the future with insight and creativity, implicitly calling on leaders to bring us together rather than exacerbate division.

That we as a society have failed in this effort became shockingly clear before the 2016 presidential election when client after client told me that America had forgotten them. This anger and frustration played an enormous role in the victory of Donald Trump, who was, and continues to be, seen as an ally of those who feel discarded and invisible…

Smullens adds:

Many such “adults” become bullies and dictators. In democracies, they may assume positions of power and dominance in professional settings, on boards, and in elected or appointed office. Those without confidence or character cling to the perks their positions of power offer. Some may cling to pure fantasy: They wish to turn the clock back to a time that can never return. Still others, longing for a quality of parenting they never received, become fiercely devoted followers.

Eliminating societal burnout requires recognition of the essential link between personal development and trustworthy leadership, necessary in democracies for the survival of all we hold dear.

At the core of all trustworthy leadership is the ability to love. Dignity makes it possible.

Past behavior, especially with pathological individuals, groups, and movements, is an excellent if not near certain predictor of future behavior. As such, with Trump and Trumpism and the larger neofascist movement here in America and around the world, what comes next will almost always be worse. Abusers almost never stop until they are made to.

The first Trump regime was responsible for hundreds of thousands of avoidable deaths from the COVID pandemic. Many experts believe that the number is actually much higher, and that Trump and the other members of his regime are guilty of democide. It is estimated that ending the Affordable Care Act would lead to the deaths of at least 68,000 Americans each year and shorten the lives of many more from untreated chronic illnesses and preventable diseases.

Trump promises to continue to take away women’s reproductive rights and freedoms if he returns to power. It is estimated that 64,000 women have been forced to give birth after being raped in the two years since the Supreme Court overturned the Roe v. Wade decision. When access to abortions and other reproductive rights are made illegal or otherwise denied, the deaths of women and girls will increase. In fact, this suffering and death is intentional, functioning as a type of patriarchal deterrent and punishment against women's agency, freedom and social equality.

Hate crimes and other forms of right-wing political violence increased at historic rates during the first Trump regime. Violent crime across a number of categories also increased during Trump's time in office.

The Trump regime and the larger neofascist movement’s plans for a de facto dictatorship as described in the Agenda 47, Project 2025, the Red Caesar scenario, and other documents will involve martial law, occupying America’s nonwhite cities with the military and other federal forces, the creation of mass detention centers and concentration camps, mass deportations of illegal aliens and other “undesirables” i.e. “enemies” of the Trump regime, the further militarization of the US border, a massive expansion of the surveillance society, and other violations of civil rights and the Constitution. If these plans are put in place, there is the potential for the deaths of tens of thousands if not more many more people in the United States.

A large number of Americans will also die if a second Trump regime succeeds in further demolishing the social safety net and giving corporations, which instinctively and by design value profits over human life, even more power to operate with impunity. A second Trump regime will also push the world even closer to irreversible global climate disaster and ecocide.

“Red state” America has much higher rates of poor health outcomes and deaths from gun violence and so-called “deaths of despair,” as well as a range of other preventable causes, compared to Democratic-led "blue state" regions. Trump and the other Republican fascists and “conservatives” want to impose the misery of red-state America and its “freedom” on the rest of the country.

For a majority of Americans, a second Trump regime will be a retraumatizing and life-shortening event. The American people weathered Trump’s first regime and the horrors it unleashed. Many of those same people will not be able to endure a second one and what will come next.

“The personal is the political” is a cliché because it is true.

The campaign commercials, talking points and speeches almost write themselves. It is now up to Joe Biden and his representatives to show the American people where the bodies are buried if they want to defeat Trump, his MAGA followers and the larger neofascist movement.

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Three “junk science” abortion pill studies were just retracted. Will the Supreme Court notice?

This week, the peer-reviewed science publisher Sage Journals retracted three controversial abortion studies, two of which have been frequently cited by plaintiffs in an upcoming case that could restrict access to the abortion pill nationwide.

One study, published in the journal Health Services Research and Managerial Epidemiology in 2021, claimed that mifepristone — one of two pills used in a medication abortion — increased the risk of women going to the emergency room following a medication abortion compared to surgical abortions. The second study concluded that people who go to the emergency room after taking mifepristone are frequently misclassified as miscarriages, suggesting that mifepristone complications are wrongfully being concealed.

U.S. District Judge Matthew Kacsmaryk, who was appointed by former President Trump, cited both studies in the April 2023 ruling that invalidated the FDA’s approval of mifepristone in the case U.S. Food and Drug Administration v. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine.

"Impossible to enforce": Attempts to ban abortion travel are scare tactics, legal expert says

But as experts have told Salon before, the case which is set to go in front of the U.S. Supreme Court on March 26 for oral arguments is based on “junk science.” Kacsmaryk’s ruling read like “anti-abortion talking points,” Seema Mohapatra, a health law and bioethics expert at Southern Methodist University, told Salon.

In a retraction statement, Sage said the authors of the articles had undeclared conflicts of interest.

A ruling in favor of Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine, an organization of anti-abortion activists backed by the Christian right-wing lobbying group Alliance Defending Freedom, could result in eliminating access to mifepristone by telehealth and by mail, and shortening the timeframe that it could be used for in a pregnancy from 10 weeks to seven weeks. Not only will this restrict access to mifepristone in abortion ban states, but those residing in states where abortion care remains legal.

It will also, as one doctor previously told Salon, force American mothers to accept “substandard care for miscarriage management” as mifepristone is frequently used in the miscarriage management process.

In a retraction statement, Sage said the authors of the articles had undeclared conflicts of interest. Indeed, the lead author of all three studies was James Studnicki, a vice president at the Charlotte Lozier Institute, a leading anti-choice group. Sage also said that the authors used unreliable methodologies to misrepresent their conclusions.

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As one social scientist pointed out to Wired, the 2021 conflated emergency department visits with serious adverse events. Since a medication abortion causes bleeding, it’s not uncommon for some people to go to the emergency room after taking the pill. Using an independent investigation after Sage issued an “expression of concern” about the 2021 paper, the journal found that the studies “demonstrate a lack of scientific rigor that invalidates or renders unreliable the authors’ conclusions,” according to the retraction statement by Sage. Studnicki gave Wired a 10-page rebuttal addressing the retractions.

Numerous amicus briefs signed by organizations representing the country's leading researchers and physicians have emphasized there is “ample scientific evidence” to support widespread use and availability of mifepristone, which the FDA approved in 200 for the medical termination of pregnancy. Indeed, the drug has a well-established safety profile. But the lawsuit filed in November 2022 bringing forth the case alleged that the longstanding approval should be revoked because it was allegedly based on incomplete data. Alliance for Hippocratic Medicine claimed that the FDA failed to protect women when it approved the drug.

“I don’t see these two studies being retracted being the tipping point that makes the difference with any justice moving from one camp to the other.”

As history has shown before, it only takes one discredited study to make a real-world lasting impact. In 1998, former British doctor Andrew Wakefield authored a study that turned into a claim that MMR vaccines could cause autism, prompting an international panic. But it wasn't until 2010 when The Lancet fully retracted the paper revealing that the paper was riddled with scientific errors and that the authors had many conflicts of interest. Today, the paper can still be attributed to driving a rise in measles outbreaks after being eradicated in the United States. But can revealing the flaws in these studies now cited by Kacsmaryk influence the outcomes of the Supreme Court’s ruling?

Lawyers aren’t exactly optimistic. Not because the studies didn’t hold influence, but because the case is not only about mifepristone, but it’s also about the FDA’s power and influence on medication which is simultaneously revealing flaws in the U.S. justice system.

“I don’t see these two studies being retracted being the tipping point that makes the difference with any justice moving from one camp to the other,” David S. Cohen, a professor of law at Drexel Kline's School of Law, told Salon. “For justices who already think the FDA shouldn’t be second-guessed and should be trusted to evaluate the science, this will just be further proof, and for justices who already think the FDA acted in a way unsupported by the science, they’ll find other reasons and studies, and these two won’t change anything.”

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Just because the studies have been retracted, Mohapatra said, doesn’t mean that Kacsmaryk will re-issue another opinion. And his opinion is in the Federal Register. She added that it’s not uncommon for justices and the courts to seek out studies that bolster their opinions.

“I think that when the Supreme Court considers the same issue, this term, they will at least know that the studies are not to be relied upon. But I don't know if that's going to make a difference in terms of use,” Mohapatra said, adding that the fact the the Supreme Court is going to decide on the fate of a drug that has a better safety record than some over-the-counter drugs, two decades after its FDA approval, is “shocking” and could set a bad precedent. “If we start overturning, long-settled and approved medications, what's next?”

Mohapatra said this is a lesson for science journals, as more legal cases are leaning on peer-reviewed studies.

“I hope that this will make people more careful about when they cite studies, but I’m not sure it will,” she said. “I don't think that Kacsmaryk was actually going through and reading these studies.”

Trump’s motion for mistrial in E. Jean Carroll defamation case shot down by judge

In response to Trump attorney Alina Habba requesting a mistrial in the defamation case brought upon her client by E. Jean Carroll, arguing that messages of a threatening nature had been deleted that could have aided in Trump's defense, Judge Lewis A. Kaplan calls the motion "pointless."

According to NBC News, Kaplan handed down a a 30-page decision on Wednesday stating that "while Carroll admitted she deleted some of the purported death threats, the details of the deletions remain unclear," adding that "Trump’s team failed to demonstrate that any of the missing messages would have aided his defense, which would have been necessary to show that her deletions were prejudicial."

“The motion made no sense,” Kaplan wrote in a quote obtained from AP News, with the outlet furthering his explanation that "Habba had known for more than a year that Carroll had said that she deleted some emails making death threats against her and yet waited until trial to act surprised and request a mistrial."

“Granting a mistrial would have been entirely pointless,” Kaplan says in an additional comment on the denial.

“Disney sucks”: Elon Musk weighs-in on buzz over Ayo Edebiri in rumored female-led “Pirates” reboot

Rumors of a female-led "Pirates of the Caribbean" movie have been circulating for years now after Jerry Bruckheimer — who produced all five “Pirates” movies starring Johnny Depp — stated in 2022 that the Captain Jack Sparrow actor would not be returning to the franchise in the wake of the Depp v. Heard controversy.

In an interview with Variety, Margot Robbie made it seem like the reboot she was initially attached to star in was dead in the water, saying, “We had an idea and we were developing it for a while, ages ago, to have more of a female-led — not totally female-led, but just a different kind of story — which we thought would’ve been really cool . . . But I guess they don’t want to do it.” But buzz of the project is resurfacing, with rumors of "The Bear" star Ayo Edebiri being eyed for the lead role, and Elon Musk (of all people) has something to say about it.

On the same day that Salon reported on the news that Musk is funding Gina Carano's lawsuit against Disney, claiming she was wrongfully fired from her role in “The Mandalorian" after making Nazi comments, Musk shared the rumor of Edebiri being tapped for "Pirates 6" to his account on X, along with his take on the matter: "Disney sucks."

"Elon, you should buy Disney!" @ImMeme0 said in a reply to Musk's grievance against Disney, Edebiri, female-led reboots or all of the above.

"It's clear he just hates black people," writes @Esqueer_ in another reply.

“Finding Your Roots:” “The View” host Sunny Hostin learns Spanish ancestors owned slaves

"The View" host Sunny Hostin is known for her legal analysis and quick-witted rebuttals on the hot topics morning show. However, this time, the former lawyer turned journalist was astounded at what she uncovered about her family lineage.

Tuesday episode of "Finding Your Roots" revealed the depth of Hostin's lineage which was traced back to the American Civil War-riddled South in Georgia and also Spain. Hostin, who is both African-American and Puerto Rican, got clarity to her identity as a person with multiple ethnic backgrounds.

The 55-year-old was stunned to learn through host Henry Louis Gates Jr. that her maternal Puerto Rican roots were traced back to reveal Spanish ancestry. A quarter of her background is from the Iberian Peninsula. But the most surprising revelation was that her fourth great-grandfather was a merchant "who was likely involved in the slave trade” in 1800s Spain, and his son, her third great-grandfather, “owned at least one human being," Gates said.

"Finding Your Roots": Bob Odenkirk learns he's related to royalty, including King Charles III

"Finding Your Roots" went further back in Hostin's Spanish ancestry and found a link to Spain's colonial history.

"Wow, I'm a little bit in shock. I mean I've always thought of myself as half Puerto Rican. I didn't think my family was originally from Spain and slaveholders." She continued, "I guess this is a fact of life that some people made their living on the backs of others."

Still shocked by the back-to-back revelations, Hostin said to Gates, "I had no idea the Spanish roots to this extent. I'm still sorta shocked at the depth of the ties."

"What do you think all these white people came right out of the ground? They had to come from somewhere!" Gates joked.

"My mother's family does look white so . . ." She trailed off.

"What you got against Spain?" Gates said.

"Just the colonization of other people!" she said. "My mother certainly identifies as Puerto Rican and non-white actually. So I hate this for her."

Gates also shared that Hostin's paternal African-American side had ties to the South. Her third great-grandfather Dean Harris was likely born into slavery in Georgia around 1835 and was emancipated after the Civil War. He changed his name to Cummings and with all the legal, political and social cards stacked against Black people in the South during the 1800s — he registered to vote in 1867. Immediately, Hostin was overcome with emotion.

"That's amazing! In 1867? To vote?" Hostin exclaimed.

"He couldn't even write his name," Gates said.

"He signed an X," Hostin said in shock.

Despite emancipation and the end of the Civil War, the South was still an incredibly unsafe place for newly freed people to live. The KKK beat and terrorized Black people in the town Hostin's ancestors lived in a post-Civil War Georgia. But this didn't stop Cummings from voting; he registered to vote nine times regardless of the terror inflicted by the KKK.

When Gates asked what Hostin thinks she inherited from her ancestors, she said, "Certainly, the determination to be involved in societal politics. I'm such a fighter when it comes to that."

She continued, "I've actually never understood why it was so important to me. They say in Puerto Rico, 'el sangre llama' the blood calls you — maybe that's a part of it."

During a recent "Salon Talks," Hostin shared how being mixed-race impacts her writing.

“Finding Your Roots” airs Tuesdays at 8 p.m. ET on PBS.

about "Finding Your Roots"

Trump could face “draconian remedy” if CFO’s possible perjury deal goes through

Judge Arthur Engoron, who is overseeing Donald Trump’s New York civil fraud case, has questioned whether a key witness, former Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg, committed perjury during his testimony at the former president’s trial, The New York Times reported.

Engoron sent an email to Trump’s lawyers on Monday asking them to provide more information about a possible perjury deal that Weisselberg may be negotiating with the office of the Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg.

The judge cited a recent Times article which reported on Weisselberg's alleged talks with prosecutors about a potential guilty plea to perjury charges. Engoron asked the former president's lawyers to submit letters “detailing to me anything you know about this that would not violate any of your professional ethics or obligations.”

Immunity ruling boosts chances of a speedy Jan. 6 trial for Trump

“I do not want to ignore anything in a case of this magnitude,” Engoron said, suggesting that he might use the plea negotiations as grounds for excluding Weisselberg's testimony entirely.

Bragg's office is not directly handling the fraud case, which was brought by New York Attorney General Letitia James, but is overseeing a different hush-money case involving Trump and the adult-film actress Stormy Daniels. But as Manhattan prosecutor, Bragg would oversee perjury charges relating to the fraud trial.

Earlier this month, the Times reported that Bragg’s office had initiated negotiations on a deal under which Weisselberg would admit to lying under oath during that trial. Trump's CFO could be facing additional time in prison after his earlier guilty plea on unrelated charges, according to Bennett Gershman, a former New York prosecutor and law professor at Pace University. If Weisselberg now agrees to tell the whole truth about Trump’s “fraudulent financial behavior,” Gershman said, that could “further incriminate” Trump and his family in connection with the charges brought by James in the civil fraud trial.

“It is entirely possible that new information that Weisselberg discloses about Trump’s conduct could heavily impact Judge Engoron’s decision on the appropriate remedy," Gershman said, which might be "to dissolve Trump’s businesses entirely" or to bar him from conducting further business in New York state, as well as imposing a severe financial penalty.

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In the civil fraud case, James has accused Trump, along with his two eldest sons, the Trump Organization as a whole and two company officials of inflating valuations on financial statements for personal gain. She has asked that Engoron order the Trump businesses to pay a $370 million penalty and block Trump and his family from doing business in the state.

Weisselberg is a key figure in both of Trump’s New York cases, as the one person outside the family who has been closely connected to Trump’s finances for decades, The Guardian reported. He abruptly concluded his testimony in October, after a Forbes report suggested that he had lied under oath about his involvement in valuing Trump’s penthouse apartment.

On the witness stand, Weisselberg claimed to have minimal knowledge of how Trump’s penthouse at Trump Tower came to be valued at $200 million on his financial statements, based on figures indicating it was three times its actual size.

“I never even thought about the apartment. It was de minimus, in my mind,” Weisselberg said. “It was not something that was that important to me when looking at a $6 billion, $5 billion net worth.”

Engoron has no direct way to punish Weisselberg for his alleged perjury, beyond referring the matter to the district attorney for prosecution. But he may choose “incorporate” his findings into his decision on the merits of Trump's case, given the potential impact of Weisselberg's false statements on the outcome, said Syracuse University law professor Gregory Germain,

“Judge Engoron could also use the false testimony as evidence to support his conclusion that the Trump Organization is an uncontrollable fraudulent enterprise that must be put out of business,” Germain told Salon.

Effectively, all the judge must do is rule that Weisselberg's testimony was not believable, Germain added. Furthermore, if Engoron can cite “conflicting evidence,” his "credibility determinations will be binding" on an appellate court.

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Weisselberg pleaded guilty to an unrelated tax fraud case in 2022 and served about 100 days in New York's notorious Rikers Island jail complex. It's unclear whether any potential perjury deal would involve further incarceration.

Engoron noted that although the Times article focused on the valuation of Trump's penthouse, Weisselberg's testimony on "other topics" could also come under scrutiny.

If Engoron decides to discount Weisselberg's testimony entirely, Gershman said, that “could dramatically alter [his] analysis and decision, and cause him to impose the most draconian remedy of all: dissolution of all of Trump’s properties, order that he no longer can do business in New York State, and impose a massive financial penalty."

In his email, Engoron asked lawyers for Trump and James to respond to him by 5 p.m. Wednesday. His ruling is expected within days.

from Areeba Shah on Trump and the law

“He’s a very charming antisemite”: Bill Maher refuses to air podcast episode featuring Kanye West

Bill Maher said he will not be releasing his two-hour interview with Kanye West due to the infamous rapper’s antisemitism. In a Feb. 5 episode of “TMZ Investigates,” Maher explained how he thought West’s appearance on his “Club Random” podcast “was going to be a learning moment.”

“We were here for two hours. By the way, we had an amazing, fun time,” Maher added. “He’s a very charming antisemite. And by the way, he’s not the only one in America who feels that way. It’s not like the Jews are universally loved except for Kanye West.”

Elsewhere in his interview, Maher shared his thoughts on why West’s influence is so problematic, especially for the younger generation: “The problem, I think, is that he appeals mostly — of course he’s a rock star — to young people. They don’t know much and they surely don’t know much about the Middle East or Jews. So the combination of Kanye out there — I feel like he was helpful for spreading the fertilizer, and I do mean fertilizer, for this idea that Israel and the Jews are the worst people in the world.”

Maher also agreed with TMZ founder Harvey Levin, who suggested that West’s brash remarks are giving other people permission to say the same: “Yes, exactly,” Maher said. “That’s why I wouldn’t air that episode, because I’m not going to contribute to this.”

West’s antisemitic comments have run rampant across social media, notably on X/Twitter where he once said he would go “death con 3 on Jewish people.” In his recent song “Vultures,” West rapped, “How I’m antisemitic? I just f**ked a Jewish b**ch.” In December 2023, West issued a Hebrew-written apology to the Jewish community.

How “Fast Car,” a 1988 hit, became the vehicle that travels between cultural divides in 2024

Consensus is the rarest gem in a time defined by division. If Tracy Chapman’s recent Grammys rendition of “Fast Car” struck an uncharacteristically harmonious chord across our culture, that alone explains why. “Fast Car” is one of those songs most of us not only know but associate with a cherished memory.

The 1988 original came out in April of that year, setting it up to be a summertime driving anthem – which it became in August, hitting sixth place on the Billboard Top 100 and retaining a place in playlist rotations for many warm seasons after that. That is how country music star Luke Combs fell in love with it, he told his Charlotte, N.C., audience in July.

His recollection involves riding in a brown 1989 Ford F-150 with a camper top and his father playing Chapman’s self-titled debut album. “Listening to that album with my dad meant a lot to me and kind of sparked my love for music and kind of landed me where I am today,” Billboard quoted him as saying.

Combs’ "Fast Car" tribute has been a mainstay of his live sets for years, making its inclusion a natural for his fourth album “Getting’ Old.” But he may not have predicted the extent to which his faithful version would cross over. His cover rocketed to the top of Billboard’s Country Airplay charts in July 2023, peaking at No. 2 on Billboard’s Hot 100 and hitting No. 1 on the U.S. Adult Top 40 charts.

When will Black women stop being snubbed for Grammys' album of the year?

The success of Combs’ version also made history, with Chapman becoming the first Black woman to top the country charts as a solo songwriter. “Fast Car” went on to win single of the year at the 57th annual Country Music Association’s awards ceremony, along with song of the year, which made Chapman the first ever Black woman to earn that accolade. But she didn’t show up to the CMAs or make any appearances with Combs before Sunday’s duet.

At the 66th annual Grammy Awards, where Combs’ version of the song was nominated for best country solo performance, it could not be clearer who was driving as those telltale chords rang through the initial dimness. Microphones picked up the cheering and applause that swelled as the lights came up, showing Chapman strumming her acoustic guitar, her face brightened by a wide, unforced smile. Combs, standing nearby left his guitar offstage. He looked to Chapman for cues, mouthing the lyrics he knew by heart, trying to match her intonation, never seeking to draw focus.

“Fast Car” speaks to and for anyone who can relate to its protagonist, hence its multigenerational staying power.

This was Chapman’s first TV appearance in nearly a decade, and her fellow musicians in that room recognized what a gift they were witnessing. Taylor Swift stood up and sang along, eventually joined by other attendees with the best seats at Los Angeles’ Crypto.com Arena. When the two finished, Combs bowed to Chapman, a singer who doesn’t tour or play live much due to her discomfort with the spotlight. That probably won’t change after this, although demand to see more from her likely will.

We may never know whether Chapman suspected this performance would hold weight beyond reasons related to scarcity. Combs’ “Fast Car” became a hit during the same summer in which Jason Aldean’s “Try That in a Small Town” debuted at No. 2 on Billboard’s Top 100 and right-wing conservatives rushed to declare Oliver Anthony’s “Rich Men of North Richmond” as their resentment anthem.

“Fast Car” speaks to and for anyone who can relate to its protagonist, a young woman "starting from zero, got nothing to lose," hence its multigenerational staying power. At the same time, the song’s revival through Combs highlights a longstanding feature of the music industry: white artists have a long track record of re-recording songs first popularized by Black artists to greater success than the songs' originators. Often when that happens, the first performer’s contributions are downplayed if not entirely erased.

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Another ‘80s hit that predates Chapman’s album debut by seven years serves as a prime example of that – Soft Cell’s cover of “Tainted Love.” The fact that “Tainted Love” is a cover is still news to many people who never heard the original 1964 B-side soul recording by Gloria Jones.

Jones didn’t compose “Tainted Love,” which means she doesn’t receive songwriting royalties from the single that inspired Soft Cell.

Chapman, though, owns the writer's and publisher’s share of “Fast Car” which means she receives most of the hundreds of thousands of dollars in royalties Combs’ version has generated. (Chapman also won Grammys for best new artist, and best contemporary folk album in 1989, while “Fast Car” earned her a Grammy for best female pop vocal performance that same year.)

Receiving one’s due financially is one way of considering a cultural debt settled. Chapman’s success also highlights other debts still owed to Black artists largely sidelined in the country music industry. Chapman is categorized as a folk artist although the appeal of “Fast Car” is malleable. But it hasn’t been lost on Black fans and musicians that the firsts Chapman secured in the country music genre as a Black queer woman resulted from a white man expressing her work with few stylistic changes – not even altering Chapman’s line about “[working] in a market as a checkout girl.”

Combs, one of country music's biggest stars, reverently explained that he did not wish to revise Chapman’s flawless art. His marveling at sharing the Grammys stage with Chapman, a superior and underappreciated musician, reflected that view. That itself may have been healing to witness and explains why so many of us were moved by these five minutes of sublime TV.

Full performance of Fast Car by Tracy Chapman with Luke Combs at the Grammys.

Her smile at the beginning is the best. pic.twitter.com/Eo8aw15Snf

— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) February 5, 2024

We shouldn’t discount the way that image melds with the meaning of “Fast Car” and its story about naïve dreams smashing against indifferent reality. In 1988 “Fast Car” plaintively voiced one woman’s lament at being unable to break the cycle of poverty, while speaking to widespread disillusionment at watching the so-called American dream slip away. In 2023 and 2024 those same lyrics speak to our frustration with being unable to escape debt and better our financial circumstances, contributing to a society that's fraying the seams.

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But Chapman’s chorus is the perfect intersection of dream and remembrance, descending from aspiration into a litany of disappointments before stubbornly flashing back to a youthful aura of invincibility: “So I remember when we were driving, driving in your car/ Speed so fast, I felt like I was drunk/City lights lay out before us/ And your arm felt nice wrapped 'round my shoulder . . .”

Then comes the iconic and universally heartbreaking line. “And I-I had a feeling that I belonged/I-I had a feeling I could be someone, be someone, be someone. . .”

If we were and are moved by that Grammy moment, those words hold a clue as to why. On that stage, Chapman received her flowers from Combs, from the onlookers seated close to the stage and the tens of millions watching at home. Two artists who move in disparate circles reminded us of what it means for a song to capture a common forlornness.

Reality’s squeeze will send us retreating to our corners soon enough. But this moment and the music that precipitated it are reminders of how yearning to belong is part of the human condition, a thread to mend our sense of separation.

about this topic

Experts say ruling in Trump’s business fraud trial could spell financial ruin: Report

As Donald Trump's New York civil fraud trial nears its conclusion, it appears likely that he could face many millions of dollars in financial penalties. It further seems that two New York laws could damage Trump's business empire even further. A new report from The Daily Beast explains that Trump could be required to make an enormous payout immediately, rather than spreading the penalty payments over time.

The Beast reports that the impending judgment expected from Justice Arthur Engoron will be subject to a 9% interest rate that could make the sum significantly larger, and that an additional penalty of 10% to 20% could result if Trump decides to appeal Engoron's ruling. Though Trump has routinely boasted about his wealth, it's not clear how much ready cash he actually has available, and he remains inprecarious financial territory as a direct result of his numerous legal woes — in addition to the fraud trial, Trump was recently ordered to shell out $83.3 million to writer E. Jean Carroll for defamation.

“It’s not often that there are cases like this where the person’s financial ability to pay is really in question,” N. Alex Hanley, an expert in corporate appeals, told the Daily Beast. “The subject of the case is whether the values of his properties are what he says they are. He may have some trouble with that.”

“There is nothing left”: Experts say ruling “dismantled” Trump argument so bad SCOTUS won’t touch it

Other experts noted the irony in Trump's current standing as the prospective 2024 Republican presidential nominee; during his first term in the White House, Trump used his executive power to block or delay civil cases against him. Given those circumstances, sources told the Beast, it seems unlikely that Trump can find a lender willing to offer him millions if they fear they could have to wait until 2029 for any repayments to begin.

“Sureties require an indemnification agreement, a contract for the bond. Now a concern would be: How do you perfect an indemnity of the person that could be the next sitting president? How do you take that person to court?” said Neil Pedersen, who leads an appellate bond agency in New York.

“These companies are pretty conservative by nature," Hanley said. "They're not likely to get involved in something that they think will get dragged on for a long time — and potentially not get paid for it. This has never been done, so it's completely unprecedented."

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Trump is likely to appeal whatever ruling Engoron hands down. Experts told the Daily Beast that his options are either to pay a large appellate bond directly to the court or to find a surety company that would guarantee the funds on his behalf. Trump's position is complicated, in the words of the Beast report, by the fact that he needs "to prove that he’s trustworthy — in the midst of a trial that proved he’s anything but."

Engoron's forthcoming ruling could also allow New York Attorney General Letitia James to seize some of the Trump Organization's real estate assets, rendering the former president unable to sell buildings to generate cash. Long Island criminal defense attorney Evans D. Prieston explored several hypothetical scenarios in an interview with the Beast, observing that the court could decide to "denude him of his assets … and those assets are the very thing he'd need as collateral” for a loan.

In the recent past, Trump has seemingly funneled money donated by his supporters toward his legal expenses, and Trump-aligned super PACs have paid lawyers representing alleged MAGA co-conspirators. Experts have already cautioned that it would be illegal for Trump to use 2024 campaign funds to pay Carroll the damages he now owes her. Trump's financial future may rely on “his friends and how much money he has,” as Prieston told the Beast. “Jared Kushner knows Saudi Arabia. Who knows what’s going to happen?”

about Trump as the walls close in

NASA lays off 530 workers at Jet Propulsion Lab, endangering future space missions

NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory said in a memo Tuesday that it is laying off approximately 570 workers because it still does not have a federally approved budget for the 2024 fiscal year for its Mars Sample Return mission. JPL Director Laurie Leshin said the lack of Congressional appropriations has also endangered the agency's (MSR) missions. 530 staff employees will be cut, accounting for about 8% of the lab's workforce, along with 40 contractors. The announcement follows a wave of previous contractor cuts earlier in the month. The JPL said it dealt with a lack of funding approval ahead of the Tuesday layoffs by anticipating a 63% decrease from its FY2023 MSR budget (roughly consistent with Congressional markups), per NASA direction, and cutting costs elsewhere: a hiring freeze, reduced MSR contracts, and cuts to internal "burden budgets."

"Unfortunately, those actions alone are not enough for us to make it through the remainder of the fiscal year. So in the absence of an appropriation, and as much as we wish we didn’t need to take this action, we must now move forward to protect against even deeper cuts later were we to wait," Leshin said in a memo to staff. "To adjust to the much lower MSR budget levels in NASA’s direction to us, we must reduce our workforce in both technical and support areas of the Lab, and across different organizations …. Given the challenge and scale of this workforce action, our approach has prioritized minimizing stress by notifying everyone quickly whether they are impacted or not."

Layoffs will take place Wednesday during a mandatory remote-work day. In the memo, employees were informed that after a company-wide virtual workforce update meeting, each individual would receive an email telling them whether they had been laid off. Leshin advised laid-off workers to "forward this email to their personal email account immediately, as NASA requires that access to JPL systems be shut off very shortly following the notification."

This story has been updated to clarify the specific portion of JPL's budget awaiting Congressional approval.

Immunity ruling boosts chances of a speedy Jan. 6 trial for Trump

Good things, as the English proverb reminds us, come to those who wait. That proverb aptly describes Tuesday’s 3-0 decision the United States Court of Appeal for the District of Columbia which artfully and emphatically rejected former president Donald Trump's claim that he is immune from prosecution for alleged criminal Acts he carried out while President.

Let’s not bury the good news: The panel took the time to write an opinion whose quality could render unnecessary Supreme Court review which would cost additional months of delay. The new ruling, which some legal experts worried was too long in coming, was actually speedy compared to ordinary timelines for resolving appeals.

And it delivered what The Atlantic’s George Conway called an “airtight” and devastating rebuke to the former president.

Importantly, the order accompanying the decision reinforced its message that Trump’s attempts to delay his election interference trial with untenable appeals may be short-lived. That order said that the stay of Trump’s trial in the district court would remain in effect only through February 12 unless Trump files a petition in the Supreme Court by that date. In other words, the court was whispering loudly in Trump’s ear, “We’re onto your game of delay, and we’ll have no part of it.”

That message is enormously significant to the health of American democracy. Voters have a right to know before they cast their November ballots whether one of the major party’s presidential candidates committed crimes as he sought to destroy the peaceful transition of power after his 2020 election defeat.

Cutting through the legalese in the court’s order, it shortens, potentially by months, the waiting time that ordinary appellate rules allow before a losing party must make its next move up the appeals court chain. The D.C. panel’s judges are, in effect, pressing Trump to appeal to the Supreme Court now and bypass a request for all the DC Circuit judges to hear his case.

Technically, Trump still has the option of asking the entire D.C. Circuit bench to extend the stay of the three-judge panel’s order beyond February 12, while he seeks the entire court’s review of the panel’s ruling. Ordinarily, the full court would almost certainly grant an “administrative” stay that extends only a couple more weeks while it considers his petition. That would give the full court time to quickly consider Trump’s petition, adding to the delay.

Trump’s lawyers may well figure, however, that the panel would not have issued their order without checking in with the chief judge of the full court. That could easily mean that February 12 is a date certain for the case to be returned to the district court for Trump to be tried, even if he petitions the full court for rehearing. His lawyers might be smart not to take that risk.

Before looking more closely at the calendar and what all of this means for the timing of Trump’s trial, it’s worth noting how total a defeat Trump suffered in the three-judge panel’s opinion. It rejected his contentions saying about each of them that they were “unsupported by precedent, history, or the text and structure of the Constitution.”

Most importantly, the panel cut Trump’s imperial pretensions down to size. “For the purpose of this criminal case,” they said, “former President Trump has become citizen Trump, with all of the defenses of any other criminal defendant.”

That echoes words from 1807 by the great Chief Justice John Marshall in a case involving former Vice President Aaron Burr: “[T]he president is elected from the mass of the people and, on the expiration of the time for which he is elected, returns to the mass of the people again.”

In other words, a former president gets no less legal protection than other citizens get, but also no more.

The D.C. appellate court noted that accepting citizen Trump’s claim that a president has “unbounded authority to commit crimes” would “neutralize the most fundamental check on executive power — the recognition and implementation of election results.”

It refused to “sanction his apparent contention that the Executive has carte blanche to violate the rights of individual citizens to vote and to have their votes count.” The court called him out for advancing a claim that “would collapse our system of separated powers by placing the President beyond the reach of all three Branches.”

And then the coup de grace: The judges threw Trump’s lawyers’ words during his second impeachment right back at him:

At Trump’s 2021 impeachment proceedings for incitement of insurrection, his counsel argued that instead of post-Presidency impeachment, the appropriate vehicle for “investigation, prosecution, and punishment” is “the article III courts,” as “[w]e have a judicial process” and “an investigative process . . . to which no former officeholder is immune.

New polling shows that that decision will find a receptive audience among the American public, with two out of 3 people agreeing that Trump should not get immunity.

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Meanwhile, here’s what we think will unfold in the weeks ahead.

It’s always dicey to project what the Supreme Court will do once Trump files his petition to the Court. Recall, however, that back in December, when Jack Smith sought early review of this matter, the justices took only 11 days to turn him down. (The Court clearly preferred to see what the D.C. Circuit would do.)

Let’s say it takes twice as long this time. That puts us into early March. It takes five justices to issue a further stay and only four justices to grant review. Still, we believe the odds are good that the Court may choose not to take the case.

The Court will just have decided the question of whether Trump’s engagement in an insurrection after the 2020 election disqualifies him from future office under section three of the Fourteenth Amendment. Given the irrebuttable reasoning and conclusion in the D.C. Circuit panel’s new ruling, the justices may well reason there is no need to involve themselves in the matter.

A denial of certiorari could mean a DC trial before federal district court Judge Tanya Chutkan as early as mid-April. That would allow plenty of time for a jury to be empaneled, to hear evidence, and deliver its verdict months before people start voting for president.

Even if the Supreme Court decides to hear the former president’s case, the Court might follow the example of its predecessor’s expeditious handling of the 1974 case of U.S. v. Nixon, the Watergate tapes case – it took only three months. Here, unlike there, the D.C. Circuit has given the justices a roadmap, and a really excellent one at that.

A three-month decision would land in early June. The ruling is all but certain to affirm the D.C. Circuit holding that Trump is not immune from prosecution. Then the trial could start in early to mid-July.

Not optimal in light of the presidential campaign, but the Justice Department should be willing to proceed, given that the delayed start date would have been completely of Trump’s doing.

In the end, we think that what the D.C. panel has done makes a May or June trial a more probable scenario. Vitally, the ruling does so by sticking to precedent and logic like magnets to steel. And the decision states in no uncertain terms what Donald Trump does not ever want to hear: No one, not even a former president, is above the law

Caitlyn Jenner says Bud Light made “a huge mistake” partnering with trans influencer Dylan Mulvaney

On Tuesday, Republican commentator and reality television star Caitlyn Jenner sprung to the defense of Bud Light, saying that it was time for fellow conservatives to “move forward” from their boycott of the company. Jenner’s comments came after former president Donald Trump posted to Truth Social about the company, saying that the sponsored advertisement Bud Light made in collaboration with transgender influencer and activist Dylan Mulvaney was a “mistake of epic proportions” but that “Anheuser-Busch is a Great American Brand that perhaps deserves a Second Chance?”

Jenner, who came out as a transgender woman during a “20/20” television interview with Diana Sawyer in April 2015, jumped in to agree with Trump.

“As someone that worked for this incredible American company, and got to know them very well, I raced for @AnheuserBusch in the 80’s I agree with @realDonaldTrump,” wrote Jenner on social media. “Look at what the company does for so many Americans and their track record over the years. They made a huge mistake and have paid a large price. I think it is time to move forward – I am saying we should focus on big picture…agreeing with 45!”

However, some conservative commentators pointed out the unique irony of Jenner’s position. As Mediaite flagged, conservative journalist John Hasson wrote in response: “Bud Light screwed up by working with a trans influencer, but they’re not woke. To prove it, here’s a message from OUR trans influencer.”

Youth drinking is declining – myths about the trend, busted

Alcohol consumption among younger generations has been declining for years. And with many pubs and cocktail bars now catering to the sober and "sober curious", it's easier than ever to opt out.

Starting in the US in the late 1990s, and spreading to several other wealthy countries in the early 2000s, young people began to drink less than previous generations, or avoid drinking alcohol altogether.

The proportion of 16- to 24-year-olds who report drinking alcohol in the last week fell from 67% in 2002 to 37% in 2021. The decline was even steeper for younger teens. In England, the proportion of 15-year-olds who have drunk alcohol in the past week fell from 52% to 20% between 2001 and 2021, although some of this may be due to changes in the survey methods over that period.

We have been researching the decline in youth drinking in England and Australia, using both surveys and interviews with young people.

When we present our findings to other researchers and the wider public, we find that adults are often surprised to hear that young people today drink less. In our experience, their reactions suggest a belief in outdated stereotypes of young people as irresponsible and feckless.

They also sometimes jump to incorrect conclusions about the reasons why young people are drinking less, projecting adults' motives for abstaining onto young people.

Why are young people drinking less?

The reasons behind the decline are complex, but by analyzing survey data and interviewing young people in England and Australia, we can provide some answers.

The change reflects a general trend in young people's attitudes toward risk. From smoking to sex, young people – including those in early adolescence and in their early twenties – are generally more risk averse than previous generations.

This extends to where they choose to, or feel able to, spend time. Some young people have less independent access to public spaces, like parks, than past generations because of increased restrictions on their ability to access such spaces. There is also evidence that they view socializing in such spaces with alcohol to be unsafe and morally suspect.

Recent research shows that drinking has become less routine and expected for young people, while not drinking has become more socially acceptable. This could be due to more efforts by governments and businesses like supermarkets to make alcohol less available to young people.

However, it can't be the only explanation, as in some countries where there has been a decline in youth drinking, policies regulating young people's access to alcohol haven't changed.

Adolescents' attitudes toward drinking have generally become more negative, while their attitudes toward non-drinking have become positive and accepting. Researchers argue that this stems from a longer, more protracted transition into young adulthood, as well as young people's concerns about the future and feeling a strong sense of pressure to succeed in life, including economically.

We found most of the young people we spoke to didn't consider peer pressure to be an important factor in their decisions to drink or not, except for a small number of university students who resented how alcohol-centric social life at university is.

Misconceptions about youth drinking

People we have spoken to about our research often assume that if young people aren't drinking, they must be doing something else instead that is equally (or even more) harmful, such as smoking cigarettes or cannabis.

In fact, the opposite is true: smoking and cannabis use decreased at the same time as alcohol. There were some signs of increases in cannabis use among schoolchildren before the pandemic and smoking among young adults after the pandemic.

But both of these – like the rise in teen vaping – occurred years after the decline in youth drinking was well-established. In other words, some groups of young people may be smoking cannabis or tobacco and vaping more, but they are unlikely to be doing so in place of drinking alcohol.

And while the rise of the internet and social media happened at the same time as the drinking decline, there is little evidence that young people are using technology in place of drinking. On the contrary, it is those who use the internet the most who also tend to drink the most.

It is important to note that the decline in youth drinking is not the same as the growing "sobriety movement". The latter has been behind temporary abstinence campaigns like Dry January, and helped by social media influencers, celebrities and online communities promoting sobriety as a way a of life.

Those who speak publicly about their decision to go sober usually describe how this decision was made after years of binge drinking. The sobriety movement is about adults reassessing their relationship to alcohol. This is very different from teenagers deciding, actively or passively, not to take up drinking.

Though at least one study has identified links between young people's decisions not to drink and their health consciousness, the general trend is not about giving up alcohol, but about not really developing a drinking habit in the first place.

Laura Fenton, Research Associate, Public Health, University of Sheffield; Amy Pennay, Research Fellow, Centre for Alcohol Policy Research, La Trobe University, and John Holmes, Professor of Alcohol Policy, Sheffield Alcohol Research Group, University of Sheffield

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Ron DeSantis opposes lab-grown meat and supports legislation to ban its production

Lab-grown meat has had its fair share of detractors. And now, as Rachel Tucker writes at The Hill, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis "has beef with lab-grown meat" and is advocating for two bills that would ban its production and sale.

Tucker notes that DeSantis is broadly opposed to ESG policies; ESG, which stands for "environmental, social and governance," in this case," is a framework that's used to assess an organization's business practices and performance on key sustainability and ethical issues. DeSantis, per Tucker, believes that this is a way of "trying to impose an agenda on society through the economy."

"They want to go after agriculture," DeSantis said while speaking in Florida last week. "They want to blame agriculture for global warming." While research has found that "livestock production is a significant contributing factor to global warming due to its contribution to greenhouse gases," Florida state Republicans claim not enough research has been done on lab-grown meat to ensure its safety for consumers.

A pair of bills, HB-435 and SB-586, would "ban the production of cultivated meat" and, if passed, would also put any restaurant that sells the product at risk of losing its license. While cultivated meat is not currently available in stores, it was recently approved by the FDA and USDA and has been sold in restaurants. Upside Foods, one of the companies producing the cultivated meat, stated that their company "strongly opposes" the legislation, which they state "threatens the free market, stifles innovation, and limits consumer choice"

Gina Carano sues Disney over her firing from “The Mandalorian” with lawsuit funded by Elon Musk

Gina Carano is suing Disney and Lucasfilm over claims she was wrongfully fired from “The Mandalorian” in 2021. The actor and former professional MMA fighter filed a lawsuit in California federal court Tuesday, alleging wrongful termination and discrimination. She’s also seeking a court order that would force Lucasfilm to recast her and at least $75,000, in addition to punitive damages.

Lucasfilm announced Carano’s firing from the hit series after she shared a social media post that read, “Most people today don’t realize that to get to the point where Nazi soldiers could easily round up thousands of Jews, the government first made their own neighbors hate them simply for being Jews. How is that any different from hating someone for their political views?” On Tuesday, Carano clarified her statement, saying her words “were consistently twisted to demonize & dehumanize me as an alt right wing extremist.”

Today is an important day for me–I am filing a lawsuit against @lucasfilm & @Disney

After my 20 years of building a career from scratch, and during the regime of former Disney CEO Bob Chapek, Lucasfilm made this statement on Twitter, terminating me from The Mandalorian: “Gina…

— Gina Carano 🕯 (@ginacarano) February 6, 2024

Elsewhere in her complaint, Carano claimed Disney and Lucasfilm failed to condemn her male co-stars in a similar manner after they allegedly made offensive remarks directed at Republicans. Carano specifically called out Pedro Pascal’s 2017 post comparing former President Donald Trump to Hitler.

Carano’s lawsuit is being funded by Elon Musk, who vowed to fund legal action for X users who faced discrimination due to their posts on the platform. Carano’s posts, however, were made on Instagram Stories, Variety noted.

“As a sign of X Corp.’s commitment to free speech, we’re proud to provide financial support for Gina Carano’s lawsuit, empowering her to seek vindication of her free speech rights on X and the ability to work without bullying, harassment, or discrimination,” said Joe Benarroch, head of business operations at X, in a statement.

Conservative watchdog group accuses Oreo of “grooming children” because of PFLAG partnership

The National Legal and Policy Center, a conservative watchdog group, has accused Oreo of “grooming children” because of the cookie company’s longtime partnership with PFLAG, the country’s first and largest organization dedicated to supporting, educating, and advocating for LGBTQ people and their families.

In addition to publishing a 30-second video titled, “Is Oreo…Grooming Children??” the organization writes: “NLPC owns stock in Oreo’s parent company, Mondelez International, and will sponsor a shareholder proposal at the annual meeting in May. The nonprofit corporate watchdog and shareholder activist initiated its campaign to highlight the cookie-maker’s inappropriate relationship with PFLAG after it noticed the brand’s social media accounts – primarily on X.com (formerly Twitter) – were heavily populated with posts in support of PFLAG’s various narratives, causes and social advocacy.”

This isn’t the first time Oreo has come under fire from conservative political groups and individual politicians for their support of PFLAG. As Salon Food reported in 2022, after the company and organization partnered on a tearjerker of a video about coming out called “The Note,” right-leaning pundits, including Ben Shapiro, called for a boycott of the brand. For his part, Newsmax host George Kelly tweeted a picture of Sesame Street’s Cookie Monster with a rant that read, in part: “I do NOT like GAY COOKIES. 'Sexuality' has NOTHING TO DO with the Cookie experience. Cookies are for ALL!”

Ube: What does it mean when a traditional food becomes a trend?

Prior to the new year, California-based T. Hasegawa USA declared in its 2024 Food and Beverage Flavor Trends Report that ube will be the flavor of the year. The bright, purple tuberous root hailing from the Philippines has enjoyed a surge in popularity in recent years. But this isn’t the first time the ingredient has been superficially lauded — existing merely as something punchy and not anything more than that.

Back in 2014, Filipino cuisine as a whole was thrown around as the "next big thing” thanks to Andrew Zimmern. The “Bizarre Foods” host claimed the trend was “just starting” and would officially take off two years later in 2016.

“I think it’s going to take another year and a half to get up to critical mass, but everybody loves Chinese food, Thai food, Japanese food, and it’s all been exploited. The Filipinos combined the best of all of that with Spanish technique,” Zimmern told NBC’s Today at the time. “The Spanish were a colonial power there for 500 years, and they left behind adobo and cooking in vinegar — techniques that, applied to those tropical Asian ingredients, are miraculous.”

Industry trend forecasters soon began claiming the same. In 2015, National Geographic wrote, “The Filipino Food Wave Is Coming” while Mashable declared that Filipino cuisine would be a “huge food trend you'll devour in 2016.” When the trend failed to take off as anticipated, culinary personalities and industry professionals once again attempted to push it as the hottest trend in waiting. Anthony Bourdain jumped on the bandwagon and so did restaurateur April Bloomfield, who called Filipino food the "next big thing.”

How pistachio became the new "it flavor" of early winter

Much of the hype surrounding ube solely fixates on its aesthetics. Ube has a distinctive nutty, vanilla-like flavor profile, but praise is mainly awarded to its bright violet hue, which provides a pop of color in savory dishes, desserts and baked goods. That’s why ube has been called the “new IT Food on Instagram” and most recently, on TikTok. There’s minimal focus, however, on Ube’s rich history and its cultural significance. Many have failed to note that ube (which is not to be confused with purple sweet potato) comes from the yam's name in Tagalog, the national language of the Philippines.

Rarely will trend forecasters add that ube is not just a food, but also a symbol of Filipino resilience. Ube Halaya — a classic Filipino dessert made of purple yam, coconut milk, and butter — is commonly served during special occasions as an emblem of both celebration and togetherness.

Ube is also just a sliver of Filipino cuisine, which isn’t regarded as mainstream in the same way as Mexican and Chinese food. In fact, Filipino cuisine is regarded as a “monolithic cuisine,” said chef and former co-host of the “Racist Sandwich Podcast” Soleil Ho in a 2017 Thrillist report. Simply calling it a trend doesn’t do any justice to Filipino chefs or the greater Filipino community, Ho added. Food journalists and major publications aren’t supporting specific Filipino chefs, their cookbooks or their upcoming projects — they’re solely ogling at the cuisine. In 2017, when Scandinavian food (or New Nordic food) grew increasingly popular throughout the United States, the media’s treatment of the cuisine was vastly different:

“All of these stories about Filipino food being the next big trend — they don't tend to have lists of chefs of restaurants that translate into immediately benefiting the community,” Ho told the outlet. “But when you look at these New Nordic stories, there are links to Amazon pages for cookbooks chefs have written and info on how to get reservations at a chef's next project.”

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That’s all to say that in most cases, merely eating a specific cuisine isn’t an act of respect towards the people and communities behind it. Casting a specific cuisine — or key ingredients within a cuisine — as a trend signifies that it’s fleeting. One minute it’s hot, the next minute it’s not and pushed to the side, ultimately left to be forgotten. That’s not how traditional food should be regarded.

In recent years, there has been much discourse about using the term “ethnic” to describe food. The term itself means “characteristic of or belonging to a non-Western cultural tradition,” which isn’t overtly racist, but has become so covertly. “Ethnic” implies that food made by immigrants — particularly immigrants of color — is cheap and inferior. You’ll rarely see French, German or Italian food be labeled as such. But take a look at Indian, Ethiopian or Filipino cuisines and the “ethnic” label will more often than not be there.

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“Immigrants' identities are deeply tied to the foods we bring with us,” wrote Lavanya Ramanathan in her piece, titled “Why everyone should stop calling immigrant food ethnic,” for The Washington Post. “When we hear our cuisine described as exotic, hodgepodge, greasy or cheap, you might as well be remarking disdainfully about our clothes or skin color.”

Categorizing a traditional cuisine or food as both “ethnic” and a “trend” thus feels like a double-whammy. There’s also the issue of who determines what constitutes a trend. Typically, it’s white folks — white journalists, white foodies, white culinary experts — who are making such declarations. According to data obtained by Zippia, Inc., an online recruitment service, 67.3% of food writers are white, as of 2021. Comparatively, 12.3% of writers are Hispanic or Latino, 9.5% are Asian and 6.3% are Black. White approval and acceptance basically determines whether a food or cuisine is “trendy.” They also determine whether a food or cuisine is worthy of public acclaim, which is, well, wrong.

As for ube, the tuberous root is becoming more widespread in Western grocery stores and restaurants. Trader Joe’s notably sells a slew of ube-themed food items, including ube flavored ice cream, Ube Mochi Pancake & Waffle Mix and Ube Spread. Many online critics have complained about their lack of authentic ube flavor, saying it’s non-existent in some products and downright disappointing in others: "It's them trying to profit off of our culture without paying any tribute to us," wrote one user on Reddit. As for where folks can enjoy delicious, bona fide ube, many recommended checking out local Filipino bakeries, Filipino grocers and Asian stores.

about Filipino food:

“That was a lot”: MTG storms out of hearing after being called out over hypocrisy on “crime”

Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., dashed out of a House committee hearing on crime in Washington, D.C., Tuesday when a Democratic colleague called her out for hypocrisy, HuffPost reports.

The reprimand followed a lengthy complaint from Greene, a conspiracy theorist and avid supporter of Donald Trump, that covered crime rates in D.C., the former president and the Black Lives Matter movement, among other subjects.

“That was a lot,” said Rep. Robert Garcia, D-Calif., upon Greene finishing her statement, noting the irony in her concerns about crime in the capital city when she "coddled" the "insurrectionists" involved in the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack.

"I think it's quite interesting that my colleague wants to try to talk about the safety in D.C. when she literally supported an insurrection and attack on the Capitol, visited the prisoners," Garcia said, before recalling how he saw Greene "high-five folks that want to overthrow our government" during the visit.

Garcia's remarks prompted the Georgia congresswoman, who last month dubbed Hunter Biden a "coward" for leaving a hearing when she spoke about him, to flee from the meeting. Greene appeared to have shouted something as she exited the room, but it is unclear what.

“She’s insane,” Garcia posted afterward on X/Twitter. The California Democrat has previously admonished Greene for her support of those jailed in connection to the Jan. 6 riots.

“[T]he first thing she does when we walk in and meet them is greets them and hugs them and prays with them and apologizes and is treating them like heroes, and I’m sitting there going, this is disgusting,” Garcia told The MeidasTouch Podcast in November. “These people attacked our government, they tried to overthrow our government.”

“What the hell are they thinking?”: Furious Republicans erupt over “embarrassing” defeat

Emotions ran high among House Republicans on Tuesday following a double defeat on Homeland Security Secretay Alejandro Mayorkas' impeachment and an aid package for Israel.

The vote on Mayorkas ended in a 215-215 tie after three members of the House GOP — Reps. Ken Buck, Colo., Mike Gallagher, Wisc., and Tom McClintock, Calif. — voted against it.

The hotly debated proposed impeachment was the result of House GOP efforts to oust Mayorkas for perceived failure to enforce U.S. immigration policies at the border, violating public trust, and “willful and systemic refusal to comply with the law," per the Washington Post. Multiple hearings were held to discuss the impeachment proceedings, with many Democratic lawmakers claiming that they were baseless and politically motivated, also highlighting previous and ethically questionable border proposals made by former president Donald Trump, including building alligator moats along the border.

Axios described the recent Republican losses as part of an ongoing pattern in which the party fails to advance legislation due to their largely polarized conference.

"They have you on audio": Democrats bust Republican's glaring hypocrisy at impeachment hearing

"I knew that we would have … the ability to block the Democrat agenda," Rep. Ryan Zinke, R-Mont., told Axios. "We've exceeded my wildest expectations on blocking, because we not only block the Democrat agenda, we block the Republican agenda. We don't have command of the field."

Other House GOP members singled out their three colleagues for voting with Democrats — in recent times, the notion of bipartisan agreement has been treated as increasingly taboo by some GOP lawmakers, as seen with their heavy opposition to bipartisan-border related legislation only after Trump spoke out against it.

Rep. Troy Nehls, R-Texas, told Axios that that vote on Mayorkas was "shameful," adding, "I mean, what the hell are they thinking? We should have gotten this done."

Rep. Cory Mills, R-Fla., shared his frustration, saying "There's a plethora of reasoning and justification and evidence … I just don't understand why we can't do the one thing the American people want."

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"It's very frustrating as a freshman to realize that we don't have the cohesiveness and the fortitude to come together to vote what's right for America," said Rep. Mark Alford, R-Mo.

Conservative Rep. Marjorie Taylor-Greene, Ga., well-known for unabashedly speaking her mind, said she didn't have anything to say to Buck, Gallagher, and McClintock.

"I think they'll hear from their constituents," Greene said.

Still, others held out hope that Mayorkas will ultimately be impeached.

Rep. Eric Burlison, R-Mo., seemed to suggest that the absence of House Majority Leader Steve Scalise, R-La., who is recovering from cancer treatment, was the deciding factor in the tie vote.

"If Scalise comes in tomorrow then we've got the votes," Burlison said. "So I think it just delays it."

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Speaking about the Israel bill, which Axios referred to as "a GOP chess move against President Biden," Rep. Derrick Van Orden, R-Wisc., told Axios that "'Frustrating' is not the right word … it's maddening."

Rep. Max Miller, R-Ohio, called the Israel vote "embarrassing," claiming that "They're trying to save face and do the right thing that should have been done to begin with … No one has to wonder how we got here, the speaker did it."

As Axios observed, the package of aid for Israel — the final vote for which was 250-180 — served as a "House GOP counter-measure" in the Senate's attempts to pass a bill that would allocate funds toward Israel, Ukraine, Taiwan, and border security.

about the House GOP mess

Haley campaign complains about “rigged” election as she loses to “None of these candidates” option

Nikki Haley, former President Donald Trump's only substantial challenger in the 2024 GOP nomination race, lost Nevada's Republican primary Tuesday to a "None of These Candidates" option on the ballot, according to The Associated Press, marking an embarrassing defeat in a vote where she had no direct competition. Trump chose to forgo participation in the primary, which awards no delegates to the winner. He will, instead, participate in the party-run caucuses that award all 26 state delegates, a system implemented by Nevada Republicans that made the primary unimportant, The New York Times reports.

As the runner-up to "None of These Candidates," Haley is expected to be declared the winner, the secretary of state's office told the Times, noting a state election law that maintains “only votes cast for the named candidates shall be counted.” Haley did not campaign in Nevada, instead focusing her efforts on South Carolina, where the next primary will be held, following Trump's wins in Iowa and New Hampshire.

"The fact that a 'none of the above' option could overpower any enthusiasm from the supporters of Ms. Haley, the former governor of South Carolina, is another blow to her slim chances of winning the nomination over Mr. Trump, who maintains a commanding lead in polls," The New York Times notes. "It also blunts any effort of hers to demonstrate momentum or score at least a symbolic victory."

Critics of Nevada's caucus system, which include members of Haley's campaign, argue that the state's GOP established it for Trump's benefit, an allegation the party has denied. Haley's campaign dismissed the primary results Tuesday night, emphasizing its focus on South Carolina.

“Even Donald Trump knows that when you play penny slots, the house wins. We didn’t bother to play a game rigged for Trump,” Haley's spokeswoman Olivia Perez-Cubas told the Times in a statement. “We’re full steam ahead in South Carolina and beyond.”

Republicans royally botch their one election year play

On Tuesday night, after a long day of very important legal developments for Donald Trump, the former president posted on his Truth Social feed "ALL A PRESIDENT HAS TO DO IS SAY, "CLOSE THE BORDER" AND THE BORDER WILL BE CLOSED. A COSTLY NEW BILL IS NOT NECESSARY!" This came in response to the total collapse of the Senate's bipartisan border bill which had been painstakingly negotiated over the last couple of months to meet the demands of the hardline GOP. Republicans said they would not advance any funding for Ukraine, Israel or Gaza humanitarian aid unless immigration laws were changed to their specification.

But then President Biden and the Democrats called their bluff.

Republicans made utter fools of themselves — again — proving once more that they are inept and dysfunctional.

Agreeing to a set of cruel changes to the law and massive new funding for the border made the Republicans blink. Now they suddenly want to wait until the election to fix what they previously characterized as an existential crisis. All Trump and his MAGA sycophants are left with is this bizarre refrain that a president has magical powers to close the border yet refuses to use them.

The bill never had much of a chance to begin with. A few of the far right crazies in the House thought they could force their own bill, HR 2 (a ghastly, punitive measure designed to cause as much suffering as possible), down the throats of the Senate and then make Joe Biden crawl on his belly begging for the privilege of signing it. That was never going to happen and in any case, the original MAGA plan was for Senate Democrats to refuse to pass the bill so they could continue to bludgeon them as being weak on immigration and deny Ukraine any more funding. Now they have everyone from the Wall St. Journal to the Chamber of Commerce to the Trump-loving Border Patrol Union begging them to take the deal but they're hamstrung by their commitment to service their Dear Leader, who openly demanded that they kill the bill for his own purposes.

Republicans scramble to get Trump his payback — yet keep coming up short

Trump has been pushing this "the president can just order it done" line for some time, usually when he says that he wants to be a dictator "just for one day." And it raises the question, obviously, of why in the hell didn't Donald Trump do that when he was president then? Well, we all know why, and so does he. It's because the idea that the president can unilaterally "close the border" is complete nonsense.

There was a time when he would commonly exhort Congress to pass border legislation:

…Congress must immediately pass Border Legislation, use Nuclear Option if necessary, to stop the massive inflow of Drugs and People. Border Patrol Agents (and ICE) are GREAT, but the weak Dem laws don’t allow them to do their job. Act now Congress, our country is being stolen!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 2, 2018

The Speaker of the House sang the same tune just a few months ago as did many other Republican officials:

Republicans before our border deal: WE NEED LEGISLATION TO FIX BORDER!

Republicans after our border deal: KILL ANY BIPARTISAN DEAL TO FIX THE BORDER! pic.twitter.com/pNWWgXF4uM

— Chris Murphy 🟧 (@ChrisMurphyCT) February 6, 2024

In fact, for the first two years of Trump's presidency, he even had total control over the government and should have been able to pass the kind of legislation they demanded and they did zilch. Immigration actually soared in 2019 to historic highs that were only curbed when the whole world locked down because of COVID-19. Didn't anyone tell the president that he could have just "closed the border" with a wave of his tiny regal hand?

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In fairness, while it sounds as though he's exhorting Joe Biden to seize those imaginary powers to close the border, he really isn't. He reserves that privilege for himself. He's been much more explicit about what he really wants, telling everyone who will listen that the reason to reject the bill is because it would be a "gift to the Democrats." In other words, he thinks it will help him win the election to keep the crisis going.

They've proved themselves to be incompetent about the issue they want the country to take most seriously.

In fact, the opposite is true. The GOP's antics this week are the real gift to the Democrats. Republicans made utter fools of themselves — again — proving once more that they are inept and dysfunctional. Not only did the Senate Republicans abruptly decide not to vote for the GOP Holy Grail of a bill on Donald Trump's orders, but the House produced one of the biggest clown shows they've staged since they won the majority (and that's saying something.) Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., put the vote to impeach Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas on the floor late Tuesday . . . and he didn't have the votes.

How incompetent can you get? Evidently, they didn't even anticipate this:

Greene: Democrats hid one of their members trying to throw us off on the numbers pic.twitter.com/8Da16eNJcj

— Acyn (@Acyn) February 7, 2024

That's the designated "manager" of the Mayorkas impeachment complaining that the dastardly Democrats didn't tell the Republicans that Congressman Al Green, D-Tx., who was in the hospital, was planning to attend the vote. When he turned up at the last minute to cast his vote her plan was ruined. But it wasn't her fault! The Democrats cheated by having enough votes!

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President Biden gave a speech earlier in the day after the Senate border bill went down in flames and he made it clear that he was going to make sure the American people know exactly who is to blame for this debacle. He said, "every day between now and November, the American people are gonna know that the only reason the border is not secure is Donald Trump and his MAGA Republican friends."

I happen to think that this border bill is a draconian nightmare and I can't say that I'm sorry to see it fail. I understand that the Republicans were holding the fate of Europe hostage with their need to appease Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin by abandoning Ukraine, so I can see why the Democrats were willing to negotiate as they did. But giving in to hostage demands is never a good idea and it wasn't this time either.

But I do have to wonder if Joe Biden has some preternatural gift for seeing through GOP posturing in these situations. As I've noted before, back in 2011 he inserted himself into a negotiation with the Republicans by giving in to their demands for cuts to Social Security and they ended up walking away from that deal in a similar fashion to their refusal this week to take yes for an answer on this border bill. Is it possible that Dark Brandon saw this one coming too?

It doesn't appear that the economy is going to be the winning issue the Republicans hoped it would be and they certainly can't rely on abortion or the Supreme Court to motivate their voters anymore. Trump's favorite campaign strategy is immigrant bashing and they hoped it would be their ace in the hole. I guess we'll see how that shakes out but it certainly doesn't look as promising as it did last week. They've proved themselves to be incompetent about the issue they want the country to take most seriously.

And Joe Biden isn't going to let them forget it:

You got it. https://t.co/GOea1AC2oy

— Joe Biden (@JoeBiden) February 6, 2024

Republicans aren't the only ones who can use a wedge issue to hammer the opposition.

I would expect to see the president take this whole fiasco right to them at the State of the Union address in a couple of weeks. They will almost certainly act like the hooligans they are and show the American people exactly what they're being asked to vote for.

about this topic

“There is nothing left”: Experts say ruling “dismantled” Trump argument so bad SCOTUS won’t touch it

Tuesday’s appeals court ruling rejecting former President Donald Trump’s immunity claim is so “unimpeachable” that the Supreme Court is likely to avoid taking up the case, legal experts say.

A three-judge D.C. Circuit panel issued a 57-page ruling rejecting Trump’s claim of blanket presidential immunity for acts he committed while in the White House.

“For the purpose of this criminal case, former President Trump has become citizen Trump, with all of the defenses of any other criminal defendant. But any executive immunity that may have protected him while he served as President no longer protects him against this prosecution," the judges wrote.

Trump loses immunity bid as appeals court rules he’s just a “citizen”

Trump spokesman Steven Cheung said in a statement that the former president “respectfully disagrees” with the ruling and plans to “appeal it in order to safeguard the Presidency and the Constitution.”

"A President of the United States must have Full Immunity in order to properly function and do what has to be done for the good of our Country,” Trump himself wrote on Truth Social. “If not overturned, as it should be, this decision would terribly injure not only the Presidency, but the Life, Breath, and Success of our Country,” he added.

But legal experts say Trump may have trouble getting the Supreme Court to take up his case.

"Puts him in a box": Experts say immunity ruling may have doomed Trump's Supreme Court appeal

Trump’s lawyers “threw everything up in the air and every single argument was methodically and systematically dismantled by this court,” conservative attorney George Conway told CNN on Tuesday.

"There is nothing left," he said. "Even the court addressed all the bad arguments that Trump probably shouldn't have made to this court. And there's just nothing. There's just nothing left for the Supreme Court to clean up."

MSNBC legal analyst Chuck Rosenberg agreed that Trump may struggle to find the necessary four justices to hear the case.

"The court of appeals decision was thoughtful and forceful and, I think, solid, and forgive the pun, but unimpeachable," Rosenberg said. "I think that means it will not be reviewed by the Supreme Court, at least not right now. I don't really see a path there.

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"The only party who benefits from delay – the only party – is Mr. Trump, and so whether he gets five justices for a stay or four to grant a petition of certiorari for the Supreme Court to hear the case, that's Mr. Trump's path," he added. "I think whether you're a textualist or an originalist, or just a thoughtful, smart justice of the Supreme Court, you read the D.C. opinion. It denies absolute immunity. It counters the notion that double jeopardy was implicated in this case, and the best thing to do, the smartest thing to do, the lawful thing to do is to send this back to Judge [Tanya] Chutkan and let her try it.”

Harvard legal scholar Laurence Tribe called the court’s ruling “bulletproof” and “airtight” and predicted it will be “studied by law students for generations.” Tribe said the court “dismembered” Trump’s arguments “piece by piece, methodically in this historic opinion,” adding that the Supreme Court is not likely to take it up.

about Trump and the Supreme Court