Night Owls is a themed open thread appearing at Daily Kos seven days a week.
3 days until JOE BIDEN AND KAMALA HARRIS TAKE THE OATH OF OFFICE
Clive Thompson at Wired writes—Climate Change Needs an Operation Warp Speed. If the COVID-19 vaccine push has proved anything, it’s that big government works.
IN THE DISMAL early days of the pandemic, a vaccine seemed depressingly far off.
The massive undertaking underscores fears that some of the very people assigned to protect Washington could threaten the incoming administration.
American historian Timothy Snyder is the author of On Tyranny. The slim volume from February 2017 presaged what we could expect from the Trump administration as it became obvious almost immediately that the forthcoming four years would be among the most tumultuous and stressful this country had ever experienced.
Marjorie Taylor Greene has been locked out of her personal account for 12 hours for “multiple violations of our civic integrity policy,” the platform said.
It’s another Sunday, so for those who tune in, welcome to a diary discussing the Nuts & Bolts of a Democratic campaign. If you’ve missed out, you can catch up any time: Just visit our group or follow the Nuts & Bolts Guide. Every week I try to tackle issues I’ve been asked about. With the help of other campaign workers and notes, we address how to improve and build better campaigns, or explain issues that impact our party.
“I remember when Lincoln delivered the Gettysburg Address via tweet,” one critic said of Hogan Gidley’s comments about Trump’s social media ban.
Statehouses ramped up security in anticipation of planned protests across 50 states, though there were no reports of major clashes by nightfall.
The Republican attempt to overthrow this nation’s government is ongoing. Propaganda attempts continue in an attempt to delegitimize the outcome of the last election; even after an assassination attempt targeting top national leaders, over 100 Republican officials continued to promote the same hoax claims that stoked the violence.
Daily Kos Elections is pleased to bring you our calculations of the 2020 election results for Illinois’ 18 congressional districts, where yet another surge in ancestrally Republican territory helped Democrats hang on to a seat in the Chicago exurbs that they flipped in 2018. You can find our detailed calculations here, a large-size map of the results here, and our permanent, bookmarkable link for all 435 districts here.
“Where was Nancy Pelosi?” the Republican senator asked during an appearance on Fox News.
“There’s no doubt about it that that can be done,” Dr. Anthony Fauci said.
He is worried that this is the beginning of a “downward spiral” for me into a messy, slobby woman with permanent razor stubble.
Parenting advice on grandparents, gifts, and naptime.
In “On Statistics,” Wisława Szymborska takes the language of data, with its air of easy certainty, and uses it to measure some of the messiest, most complex aspects of human nature. The result is absurd, and it underscores how ill-equipped those quantitative measurements are for answering the biggest questions in life.
The report from the Argentine Forensic Anthropology Team included 20 photos of my half sister’s bones—nearly as many photos as I had ever seen of Isabel herself. The ones of the bones punctured by bullets—her rib, her pelvis, her humerus—did not move me as much as those of her skull. It was so old-looking, like one of those prehistoric craniums of Homo sapiens, the nose bashed in, some of the teeth missing, that earthen coloring.
What do I do now? COVID-19 diagnoses start with a barrage of grueling decisions and paralyzing worries. Did I infect anyone else? Whom will I tell? Where can I isolate? Should I go to the hospital? Will I be okay?Millions of Americans have fallen sick with this virus, and we’ve seen the full kaleidoscope of ways people react and cope with illness. Some have dutifully rung up contact tracers and locked themselves in total isolation.
Born as a second Manhattan Project, the Trump administration vaccine program actually achieved most of its goals – until distribution problems marred its success.
The decision cuts scientists at the Food and Drug Administration out of the process.
Public officials from Vice President Mike Pence on down have sung a consistent refrain since a mob attacked the Capitol on January 6: Those involved should be prosecuted to the “fullest extent of the law.” For those implicated in the murder of the Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick, the penalties are obviously severe. Murdering a federal official carries a life sentence and, depending on what is proven at trial, could carry the death penalty.
Armed insurrectionists stormed the Capitol, chasing Congress members into hiding and threatening to hang Vice President Mike Pence and shoot House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Congress impeached President Donald Trump for the second time. White nationalists promised further acts of terrorist violence. The COVID-19 daily death toll hit 4,000. Payrolls declined. And in response, the markets rose a touch, with the Nasdaq and the Russell index of small-cap stocks hitting record highs.
He can’t possibly expect the GOP to go along with this—but that might be a good thing.
Or his ability to help Americans will be doomed from the start.
What was the point of Fortress D.C.
This is why so many of us spent the late summer and fall screaming our heads off for Congress to pass some sort of new coronavirus relief bill.
Wildly overvalued Tesla stock? Jeff Bezos’ divorce? Take your pick.
Biden condemned anti-mask lawmakers while unveiling his Covid-19 vaccination plan.
Rollout also takes aim at vaccine skepticism and misinformation.
David Kessler will replace Moncef Slaoui, who will take on a limited advisory role with the government’s vaccine accelerator.
The regulation, which the Department of Health and Human Services could issue as a direct final rule within days, would mandate job reviews every five years for career federal scientists.
