Friday, May 30
Robert Reich
Friends,
Today ends Part 1 of the second Trump regime.
First, Elon Musk has departed the Trump White House, not altogether happily.
He signed off via X after 128 wild days of mayhem and havoc, but the damage Musk did to our government and its capacities to serve the people will be felt for years — although many of his cuts were swiftly reversed by the courts. His slash-and-burn tactics, his raids on government (and personal) data, and his almost cruel delight in firing government employees and closing entire agencies leave a horrific legacy.
Courts Play with Trump's Tariffs
It temporarily paused a ruling by the Court of International Trade, which determined on Wednesday that Trump did not have the authority to impose most of the economy-shaking tariffs he’s unveiled since January. That included his sweeping “Liberation Day” blanket tariffs of 10% or more on virtually all foreign goods, as well as additional duties on Canadian and Mexican imports—all of which Trump introduced under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA).
The White House is expected to ask the Supreme Court to decide whether this was fair game if lower appeals courts don’t ultimately preserve the tariffs.
But even if Trump loses, tariffs aren’t over
White House trade officials have derided the tariff-foiling decision by the Court of International Trade as a minor “hiccup” caused by “activist judges.” They insist that using the IEEPA to implement tariffs is just plan A, and Trump has plenty of other (albeit less powerful) legal options to impose duties:Federal law allows Trump to impose tariffs of up to 15% for up to 150 days in situations where imports exceed exports to a degree deemed a crisis.
He could also use a legal provision called Section 232 to impose industry-specific tariffs following an investigation into how imports affect national security, as he’s recently done with steel, aluminum, vehicles, and auto parts.
And then there’s Section 301, which allows the president to investigate a country for abusive trade practices—a rule he leveraged to put tariffs on China during his first term.
But...experts say that the uncertainty surrounding whether Trump’s current tariffs will pass legal muster might push some countries to adopt a wait-and-see approach to negotiating trade deals with the US. The Trump administration is currently in high-stakes talks with key economic partners, including the EU and Japan.—SK
Robert Reich
Don’t buy revisionist attempts to rehabilitate it. Instead, push for a bold progressive populism.
Friends,
I rarely ask you to look at charts. Today is an exception. This one is from the Economic Policy Institute. It compares the typical American’s pay starting just after World War II (light blue line) with the nation’s increasing productivity since then (dark blue).
The chart shows the widening divergence between the rise of pay and the yields from productivity.
In the first three decades after World War II, the typical American’s pay rose in tandem with the nation’s growing productivity. The benefits from higher productivity were broadly shared.
But then, starting in the late 1970s and dramatically after 1980, pay barely grew, even as productivity continued to soar. The benefits from higher productivity went increasingly to the top.
Why?
At A Glance
(5/21/25) The 30-second rule for conversations.
(5/12/25) Doctor gives science-backed advice for aging.
(5/16/25) Video captures "fog tsunami" rolling over Lake Michigan.
(5/5/25) The most beautiful English words, according to linguists.
(5/7/25) What's on the menu in the papal conclave cafeteria?
(5/19/25) US News ranks all 50 states.
(5/21/25) Newly discovered bright blue frog with copper legs.
(5/18/25) Airlines with the most (and least) complaints in 2024.
(5/13/25) Stonehenge-like structure found in Lake Michigan.
(5/6/25) Where US home prices are rising (and falling) the most.
Clickbait: World's first flying car prototype makes public debut. (w/video)
Historybook: Joan of Arc is executed (1431); Historian and philosopher Voltaire dies (1778); First Indianapolis 500 is held (1911); Lincoln Memorial is dedicated (1922); Crew Dragon Demo-2 becomes first commercial flight to International Space Station (2020).
In The NEWS
Sports, Entertainment, & Culture
> Oklahoma City Thunder top Minnesota Timberwolves 4-1 to advance to NBA Finals for first time since 2012 (More) | Defending champs Florida Panthers beat the Carolina Hurricanes to reach the NHL Stanley Cup Final for a third straight year (More)
> Broadway hauls in $1.9B across all productions for the 2024-25 season, an all-time record and 23% jump from last year (More)
> Women's College World Series kicks off today with eight teams vying to become the NCAA softball national champion (More) | Onosato Daiki becomes first Japanese sumo grand champion, or yokozuna, since 2017; six of the last seven yokozunas were Mongolian (More)
Science & Technology
> Astronomers discover unexplained celestial object emitting both X-rays and radio waves roughly every 44 minutes; candidates—including a strongly magnetized neutron star and a white dwarf—fit some, but not all, of the data (More)
> Researchers successfully extract proteins from 200-year-old brain tissue, opening a new way to study the biology of deceased communities; technique relies on urea, the main component of urine, to break open cells in recovered tissue (More)
> New fuel cell design stores three times the energy of best-in-class battery technology; prototype uses liquid sodium metal as fuel, may have applications in electric planes (More)
Business & Markets
> US stock markets close lower (S&P 500 -0.6%, Dow -0.6%, Nasdaq -0.5%) (More) | Federal court blocks Trump administration's reciprocal tariffs, saying president exceeded authority in using 1977 law to justify imposing duties (More)
> Nvidia beats estimates with 69% year-over-year Q1 revenue growth (More) | GameStop shares down nearly 11% after purchasing over $500M in bitcoin (More) | Elon Musk's xAI to pay messaging app Telegram $300M to integrate xAI's Grok chatbot for one year (More) | Anthropic appoints Netflix cofounder to board (More)
> Joby Aviation shares rise nearly 29% after electric air taxi maker receives $250M from Toyota (More) | Hailey Bieber's skincare brand Rhode to be acquired by e.l.f. Beauty in up to $1B deal (More)
Politics & World Affairs
> Justice Department opens investigation into decade-old California law allowing transgender athletes to compete in sports teams aligning with gender identity (More) | Transportation Department moves to end program carving out $37B for women- and minority-owned businesses in highway, transit contracts (More)
> European Union lifts all non-security-related sanctions on Syria, following US decision to lift sanctions earlier this month (More) | See previous write-up (More)
> Swiss glacier collapses, burying almost the entire village of Blatten; 300-person town had evacuated earlier in the month at geologists' warning (More)
SOURCE: 1440 NEWS
Simplicity of Life
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Life for some is simple, for others it is complicated. Life is only complicated if you try to make it be what you want it to be, rather than just letting it happen and enjoying what happens around you as it unfolds.
For example, many people think that money, power, influence, position, assets will make you happy... It may provide you with a better lifestyle than others, but it will not make you happy.
My brother told me once that he was not retiring until he earned every last dollar that he could, then there would be nothing left for him to do except die.
IS THAT HAPPINESS?
Never being satisfied with how much money you have earned, always wanting or needing more...
That, in my opinion, is living a complicated life.
Life needs to be simple.
Earn what you can as best as you can - get whatever training you can afford...
then base your lifestyle on what you can afford...
Accept what you have - NOT WHAT YOU WANT.
Accepting what you have is YOUR CHOICE...
No one can make that decision for you and once you accept what you have, you will instantly realize you are happy... if you are still unhappy, then you have failed to accept what you have...
IT'S JUST THAT SIMPLE...
Physicists confirm the incredible existence of "time mirrors"
For decades, theoretical physicists tossed around the idea that time reflection, also known as “time mirrors,” might one day be demonstrated in a real-world experiment. This idea seemed too big and wild, yet it kept popping up in serious discussions of quantum mechanics where equations hinted at surprising behavior.
A team led by Hady Moussa from the Advanced Science Research Center at the CUNY Graduate Center (CUNY ASRC) in New York City has now confirmed that these mysterious events actually exist.
They pulled off a successful test by changing the properties of a device in a quick, uniform way so that signals reversed direction in time.
Understanding time mirrors
This sort of time flip has been described as looking into a mirror and spotting your back instead of your face. It sounds like science fiction, but it has a basis in real physics.
Researchers had predicted for more than 50 years that sudden shifts in a wave’s environment could trigger such reversals.
This sort of time flip has been described as looking into a mirror and spotting your back instead of your face. It sounds like science fiction, but it has a basis in real physics.
Researchers had predicted for more than 50 years that sudden shifts in a wave’s environment could trigger such reversals.
Thursday, May 29
Ponderings
We don't walk this way often, in fact, we only walk this way ONCE in our lifetimes that I know about... maybe you know about others... iffen you do, pls to let me know...
As I understand it, we have three branches of government...
- the executive
- the judicial
- the legislative
and one branch cannot tell the other branch how to execute its authorities... however, the supreme court is the final authority when it comes to whether something is constitutional or not.
Normally, the supreme court has a strict interpretation of the constitution, or it does not. If it is a strict interpretation then the court is believed to be conservative, if it is not then it is believed to be liberal.
We typically fail to understand that INTERPRETATION is what it is which mean a ruling might only be temporary.
What has got my feathers up is how part of the country, not really half no longer, hate DONALD TRUMP so much that they would hurt their own country to destroy him.
My feeling is that no group of people such as our founding fathers would have created or wanted our country to end up like this... but unfortunately, it has; we are at a crossroads in our evolution that could ultimately determine our future role in the world.
China and Russia, along with Iran and North Korea are waiting for us to FALL AND FAIL...
They are playing the LONG GAME while many of us here in the good ole US of A are playing the MICROWAVE GAME of instant gratification.
Change things now without worry about any UNINTENTIONAL CONSEQUENCES...
Personally, I think it is time for us old folks to let these youngins have their way so that they can begin to learn like we did from our mistakes... providing that is what they do these days.
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