President Musk is Mucking Around in Your Personal Data
Some quick hits to help you keep up with what we need to fight against…
They’re Mucking Around in Your Personal Data
From Heather Cox Richardson’s “letters from an American” blog… “…Vittoria Elliott, Dhruv Mehrotra, Leah Feiger, and Tim Marchman of Wired reported that, according to three of their sources, “[a] 25-year-old engineer named Marko Elez, who previously worked for two Elon Musk companies [SpaceX and X], has direct access to Treasury Department systems responsible for nearly all payments made by the US government.”
A couple of days later Elez resigned after a Wall Street Journal article disclosed that “he was linked to a deleted social-media account that advocated racism and eugenics.” Musk and JD Vance, who rushed to Elez’s defense, are seeing to it that Elez is reinstated so he can keep mucking around in your personal data. Not satisfied to reinstate the racist, he also wants the reporter fired (Elon Musk Demands Firing of ‘Disgusting and Cruel’ WSJ Reporter Who Uncovered DOGE Employee’s Racist Tweets).
Wondering where The Resistance is this time? It’s building, not cowering amid the “shock and awe” and attempt “to flood the zone with sh#t”….
…Protesters across the US rally against Trump administration policies …“…The protests, which took place largely in state capitals, were organized by an online movement dubbed 50501 -- meaning 50 protests, 50 states, one day. The grassroots effort has been organized across social media sites using hashtags #buildtheresistance and #50501, calling on Americans to "fight fascism." See more here.
From the Portland Press Herald “Angus King urges Senate to protect the Constitution, reject Trump budget nominee”…
Sen. Angus King of Maine delivered a floor speech on Thursday urging his Senate colleagues to stand up for the U.S. Constitution and reject President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the office that oversees federal spending. King said Russell Vought’s views of broad presidential authority, including the ability to withhold funding approved by Congress, and his involvement in drafting Project 2025, a collection of conservative policy proposals, reflect a coordinated assault by the new administration on the checks and balances that have made the United States an endurable democracy.
King called Vought “one of the ringleaders of this assault on our Constitution” hours before voting against his confirmation as director of the Office of Management and Budget…
You can watch him here. It’s worth the 20 minutes,,,or at least an intermittent browse-thru:
New Undersecretary for Public Diplomacy and Public Affairs Wants White Men to Run Everything
You can read more here Trump Once Fired Him for Palling Around with White Nationalists. Now, Darren Beattie Is Back.
…and to that end…”Trump orders U.S. to prioritize refugee resettlement of White Afrikaners”
…Trump on Friday directed government officials to prioritize the resettlement of South Africans of European descent through the U.S. refugee program, which he suspended during his first day in office. In an executive order, Mr. Trump accused the South African government of discriminating against Afrikaners, an ethnic group in South Africa made up of descendants of European colonists, mostly from the Netherlands, who first arrived there in the 1600s,[And U]ntil the 1990s…ruled South Africa, enforcing the brutal system of apartheid against the country's Black majority.
Might it be just a coincidence that Elon Musk and the anti-democracy billionaire Peter Thiel — the patron of JD Vance whose money got him elected to the Senate and whose influence got Vance the VP job — spent formative years in South Africa.
Speaking of 21st century book burning, The Washington Post’s Catherine Rampell illustrates just a handful of the web pages that have been disappeared...
See her A sample of the government webpages Trump doesn’t want you to see… “Not found: That was the resounding message across federal websites this week, as the Trump administration has disappeared thousands of taxpayer-funded websites. Though some pages have been restored, those still missing contain decades’ worth of information critical to scientists, physicians, urban planners, businesses and families….”