Yesterday’s news? It appears John Bolton thinks so. During an appearance on MSNBC, Bolton told Ali Velshi that Trump would soon be yesterday’s news. “I think Trump has been on a downward slope,” Bolton said soberly. “I think Trump has been on a downward slope within the republican party since the 2020 election — certainly since January the sixth.”

Bolton went on to say he’d spoken to many Republicans, and many of them blame trump as the primary cause they lost the midterms so badly. “I think it is like frankly turning a light switch off for Trump’s prospects,” he explained. “He certainly has not done anything to help himself since then.”

This is all true. I don’t like Bolton much, but he’s correct here. Trump has not put in any effort to keep himself relevant because Trump never puts any effort into anything.

Trump is the laziest person ever to hold office. Remember how he didn’t reportedly even get daily briefings, and when he did, they had to be explained to him? Reportedly he doesn’t read either. Trump is deeply afraid, it would seem of doing any work. He’s lazy, he’s slothful, and he’s indolent.

He’s like a slug and thinks that everything should just come to him instead of going out and putting any effort in. So not only does trump have a possible indictment (or indictments) to look forward to, but he can also be secure in the knowledge that most of his former allies don’t give a damn what happens to him.

With Trump’s announcement that he was running in 2024, it was his last sputter. It was the last sputter of a jester, a fool, a chump. And nobody cared. The world turned away from the Jester. His last sputter failed miserably — as does everything he puts his hands on.

The post Donald Trump’s last sputter appeared first on Palmer Report.

(NewsNation) — A seventh batch of internal Twitter documents was released Monday, further detailing how the FBI and broader intelligence community alllegedly sought to shut down a story about Hunter Biden, his laptop and business dealings with a Ukrainian company.

The author of the latest “Twitter Files” dump, Michael Shellenberger, argues the contents show that a congressional investigation is needed into the communications the FBI was having with Twitter executives leading up to the 2020 election.

“The FBI is of such importance … so if there is politicization within the FBI aimed at a particular goal, in this case to suppress and really spread misinformation around an important piece of evidence which has to do with the Biden family’s business dealings, that’s a real problem,” Shellenberger said Monday on “CUOMO.”

Watch a portion of his interview in the player above.

This is a developing story and will be updated.

(NewsNation) — The peak of the holiday travel season is nearly here, with more than 100 million Americans expected to travel 50 or more miles to try and get to their holiday destinations.

With a massive winter storm looming, threatening parts of the U.S. with blizzard-like conditions and artic temperatures, some travel plans are likely to be derailed.

And for Los Angeles travelers, there’s the added joy of construction traffic.

“I would say get here to have an early flight because I thought that would be better but I don’t think it is. This is my first time flying this early and I’ve never seen it so crowded,” Chloe Feldman, an LA traveler, said on NewsNation’s “Rush Hour” on Monday.

 Clint Henderson of The Points Guy joined NewsNation’s “Rush Hour” to discuss the overall impact he expects and where he thinks it will be felt the most.

“The timing is not great for the storm. It’s going to affect most of the country east of the Rocky Mountains. If you can, get an earlier flight home for the holidays,” Henderson said.

“Because, with travel the way it is right now, a big storm like this could have a pretty devastating domino effect for travelers across the country,” Henderson continued.

For some, crowds and traffic may seem inconsequential: On Sunday, a Hawaiian airlines flight hit severe turbulence, injuring 35 passengers, 11 seriously, in the process. 

And while thunderstorms are a factor in that region, a winter weather system is expected to bring even more significant travel troubles in the East: In Buffalo and beyond to the south and central U.S., the snow is about to pile on later this week, and it will arrive with bone-chilling, below-average temperatures. 

In addition, firearms have now become a holdup at airlines: There have a record 63,000 weapons intercepted at security checkpoints last year, compared to 59,000 last year, TSA reports. 

“86% of the guns that were detected last year were loaded. 86%. So that means a lot of people are telling us that you know, they forgot that they had their loaded gun with them. Interestingly enough, they seem to know where their keys are or where their mobile phone is. But not their deadly weapon,” Lisa Farbstein, from the TSA, said on “Rush Hour.”

The travel crowds are only expected to get bigger throughout this week with a peak on Friday. LAX was the busiest in the country yesterday, with over 103,000 passengers heading out on flights.

North Korea on Tuesday condemned Japan’s planned military buildup outlined Tokyo’s new security strategy, vowing to show with action how dangerous it is, state media said.

The remarks by a spokesperson of Pyongyang’s foreign ministry came days after Japan unveiled its biggest military build-up since World War Two as regional tension with China and Russia’s Ukraine invasion stoke war fears.

Japan’s news security strategy effectively formalised a “new aggression policy” and would bring a fundamental change in East Asia’s security environment, the spokesperson said.

The spokesperson slammed the United States for “exalting and instigating Japan’s rearmament and re-invasion plan,” saying Washington no right to raise issue with Pyongyang’s efforts to bolster North Korea’s defence.

“We will continue to demonstrate through practical actions how much we are concerned and displeased with Japan’s unjust and greedy attempts to realise its ambitions,” the spokesperson said in a statement carried by the official KCNA news agency.

In a separate statement, Kim Yo Jong, the powerful sister of North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, said Pyongyang’s efforts to develop a spy satellite were a “pressing priority directly linked to our security,” and additional sanctions would not stop that.

South Korea would “cry out for some kind of international cooperation and try hard to impose additional sanctions on us,” she said in the separate KCNA dispatch.

“But with our right to survival and development being threatened, why are we afraid of sanctions … and why would we stop?”

Ukraine’s military said Russia had pulled some troops from towns on the opposite bank of the Dnipro River from Kherson city, the first official Ukrainian report of a Russian withdrawal on what is now the main front line in the south..

* Spain has stepped up security at public and diplomatic buildings after a spate of letter bombs, including one sent to Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez and another to the Ukrainian embassy in Madrid, where an official suffered minor injuries.

* Air raid alerts were issued across all of Ukraine following warnings by Ukrainian officials that Russia was preparing a new wave of missile and drone strikes. “An overall air raid alert is in place in Ukraine. Go to shelters,” country’s border service wrote on Telegram messaging app.

* Ukraine’s military said it had found fragments of Russian-fired nuclear-capable missiles with dud warheads in west Ukraine, and that their apparent purpose was to distract air defences.

* The recently liberated Ukrainian city of Kherson has lost its power supply after heavy shelling by Russian forces, the regional governor said.

* European Union governments tentatively agreed on a $60 a barrel price cap on Russian seaborne oil, with an adjustment mechanism to keep the cap at 5% below the market price, an EU diplomat said.

* Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on that big problems had accumulated in the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), accusing the West of spurning the chance to make it a real bridge with Russia after the Cold War.

* Lavrov said that discussions with Washington about potential prisoner exchanges were being conducted by the two countries’ intelligence services, and that he hoped they would be successful.

* The European Union needs patience as it sanctions Russia for its invasion of Ukraine, as most measures will only have an impact in the medium and long term, Lithuania’s prime minister said in an interview at  the  Reuters NEXT conference.

* Switzerland has frozen financial assets worth 7.5 billion Swiss francs ($7.94 billion) as of Nov. 25 under sanctions against Russians to punish Moscow for its invasion of Ukraine, the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (SECO) said.

* Russia said the German parliament’s move to recognise the 1932-33 famine in Ukraine as a Soviet-imposed genocide was an anti-Russian provocation and an attempt by Germany to whitewash its Nazi past.

* Ukraine sacked a top engineer at the Russian-occupied Zaporizhzhia nuclear power plant, accusing him of collaborating with Russian forces, and urged other Ukrainian staff at the plant to remain loyal to Kyiv.

* Russia must withdraw its heavy weapons and military personnel from the Zaporizhzhia plant if the U.N. atomic watchdog’s efforts to create a protection zone are to succeed, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said.

* In a grim sign of the energy crisis caused by Russian attacks on Ukraine’s electricity grid, nine people have been killed in fires over the past 24 hours as Ukrainians resorted to emergency generators, candles and gas cylinders in violation of safety rules to try to heat their homes after power outages.

* “Remember one thing – the Russians are afraid. And they are very cold and no one will help them, because they do not have popular support,” – Andriy Yermak, chief of Ukrainian presidential staff.

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Asian share markets were trading mostly in negative territory on Tuesday, as investors anticipated a somewhat rocky road for China’s unwinding of COVID restrictions and the prospect that U.S interest rates will rise higher than expected in 2023.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan (.MIAPJ0000PUS) was down 0.2% after U.S. stocks ended the previous session lower. The index is down 0.1% so far this month.

China is pushing on with easing restrictions after three years of COVID-19 lockdowns which is leaving to investors to question how financial markets will react to the reopening.

“The positive reaction to the reopening is starting to give way to the realisation that it’s going to be a lumpy path for China to get there,” JP Morgan Asset Management’s global market strategist Kerry Craig told Reuters.

“Once they do reopen, there will be positive sentiment and China will become a growth story for the world again.”

Australian shares (.AXJO) on Tuesday were down 0.72%, while Japan’s Nikkei stock index (.N225) rose 0.34%.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index (.HSI) was down 1% early in the session while China’s CSI300 Index (.CSI300) was off 0.34%.

In Asian trading, the yield on benchmark 10-year Treasury notes rose to 3.5993% compared with its U.S. close of 3.583% on Monday.

Yields rose 11 basis points in the United States on Monday, as investors shifted into bonds as a safe haven bet while they digested the Federal Reserve’s 50 basis point rate rise delivered last week.

“The subsequent hawkish Fed policy update remains fresh in the minds of investors,” NAB analyst wrote on Tuesday.

The two-year yield , which rises with traders’ expectations of higher Fed fund rates, was flat at 4.262%.

The shift higher in yields was helped after former Federal Reserve official William Dudley said on Monday it was likely rates could go higher even as U.S. unemployment started to creep higher.

In Asia, investors will be closely watching the Bank of Japan’s policy decision on Tuesday that will be the final central bank decision for the year.

The bank is expected to maintain its ultra loose monetary policy but any signs of a change of tone towards inflation, which has exceeded the 2% target for seven months, will be scrutinised.

Australia’s Reserve Bank considered leaving interest rates on hold at its Dec 6 policy meeting, accoding to minutes published on Tuesday, but delivered a 25 basis point hike.

The dollar rose 0.41% against the yen to 137.44 .

It is still some distance from its high this year of 151.94 late October.

The European single currency was down 0.1% on Tuesday at $1.0597, having gained 1.85% in a month, while the dollar index , which tracks the greenback against a basket of currencies of other major trading partners, was down 0.153% at 104.66.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average (.DJI) fell 162.92 points, or 0.49%, to 32,757.54, the S&P 500 (.SPX) lost 34.7 points, or 0.90%, to 3,817.66 and the Nasdaq Composite (.IXIC) dropped 159.38 points, or 1.49%, to 10,546.03. The three markets closed in the red for the fourth straight session.

“We might not get much of a Santa Claus stock market rally as Wall Street rushes to price in credit and earnings risks,” OANDA analsyt Edward Moya wrote.

The S&P 500, the Dow and the Nasdaq are on track to notch their largest annual percentage losses since 2008, the nadir of the global financial crisis.

U.S. crude ticked up 0.86% to $75.84 a barrel. Brent crude rose to $80.44 per barrel.

Gold was slight lower. Spot gold was traded at $1,785.41 per ounce.

Literary classics are timeless because they hold eternal and universal truths. Take the 1843 Charles Dickens masterpiece, A Christmas Carol. As the story goes, three ghosts arrive to rub the nose of a curmudgeonly Ebenezer Scrooge in his own Christmas Past, Present, and Future, like so much doggy doodoo, with the goal of changing his obstinate cynical ways.

So, can Republicans change? Apparently not. Despite being reminded of their own nobler past, the GOP remains unscrupulous for now and the foreseeable future, determined to destroy holiday cheer. Most recently, the Grinch-like creature Stephen Miller used strategically-installed conservative judges to thwart aid to underprivileged farmers and business owners.

However, there have been hints of GOP hearts growing. Hard-right Republican Ted Budd, who defeated much more qualified Democrat Cheri Beasley in the red state of North Carolina, sat with the newly elected Democratic Senator Jeff Jackson during the Capitol Christmas Tree Lighting. Also, Spencer Cox, the Republican governor of Utah, vetoed an anti-trans bill similar to the one evildoer Ron DeSantis signed his into law in Florida. Cox even wrote a thoughtful letter to the Statehouse proving that “GOP politician” and “hateful asshole” are not always synonymous.

The most interesting thing about A Christmas Carol is that it’s a tale of critical thinking, of becoming enlightened, or “woke.” Mr. Scrooge awakens from his Three Ghosts nightmare to face the reality of his own misguided beliefs. In another timeless classic, How the Grinch Stole Christmas! by Theodor “Dr. Suess” Geisel, the Grinch attempts to break the spirit of the townsfolk by “stealing” Christmas. The climax of both tales is the villains get a wake-up call upon seeing the subjects of their vitriol happily celebrating, despite the holiday being stripped bare. In the denouements, both villains scramble to save Christmas.

And yet, today’s Republicans mostly remain small minded, with teeny tiny hearts of coal, trying to destroy America. When they see the majority of their fellow citizens celebrating democracy by voting them out – God bless us, everyone – the GOP still doesn’t get it. What will it take for Republicans to wake up?

The post SCROOGED appeared first on Palmer Report.

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday said COVID-era restrictions at the U.S.-Mexico border that have prevented hundreds of thousands of migrants from seeking asylum should be kept in place for now, siding with Republicans who brought a legal challenge.

The restrictions, known as Title 42, were implemented under Republican former President Donald Trump in March 2020 at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic and gave border officials the ability to rapidly expel migrants to Mexico without a chance to seek U.S. asylum.

U.S. President Joe Biden, a Democrat, had campaigned on overturning Trump’s hardline immigration measures before taking office in 2021 but kept Title 42 in place for more than a year. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said this year that Title 42 was no longer needed for public health reasons, and the Biden administration has said it wants it to end but will abide with any court rulings.

A federal judge last month ruled Title 42 was unlawful in response to a lawsuit originally brought by asylum-seeking migrants represented by the American Civil Liberties Union. The judge set the restrictions to be lifted on Wednesday, Dec. 21.

But a group of 19 states with Republican attorneys general sought to overturn that decision by intervening in the case and on Monday took their request to the conservative-leaning Supreme Court.

Hours later, Chief Justice John Roberts in a brief order issued a stay that will leave Title 42 in place until further notice from the court. The parties in the legal dispute have until Tuesday at 5 p.m. ET (2200 GMT) to respond, the court said.

After Robert’s action, U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said Title 42 “will remain in effect at this time and individuals who attempt to enter the United States unlawfully will continue to be expelled to Mexico.”

The Biden administration had been preparing for Title 42 to end on Wednesday and press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre said on Monday that the White House was seeking more than $3 billion from Congress to pay for additional personnel, technology, migrant holding facilities and transportation at the U.S.-Mexico border.

The push for additional resources came as U.S. authorities had been preparing for the possibility of 9,000 to 14,000 people per day trying to cross into the United States if Title 42 was lifted, Reuters and other outlets have reported, around double the current rate.

The Biden administration has been weighing plans to prepare for Title 42’s end, with government officials privately discussing several Trump-style plans to deter people from crossing, including barring single adults seeking asylum at the U.S.-Mexico border.

DHS last week updated a six-pillar plan that calls for the expanded use of a fast-track deportation process if Title 42 is terminated. The revised DHS plan also suggests there could be expansion of legal pathways for migrants to enter the country from abroad, similar to a program launched for Venezuelans in October.

Since Biden took office in January 2021, about half of the record 4 million migrants encountered at the U.S.-Mexico border have been expelled under Title 42 while the other half have been allowed into the United States to pursue their immigration cases.

Mexico accepts the return of only certain nationalities, including some Central Americans and, more recently, Venezuelans.

For months, El Paso, Texas, has been receiving large groups of asylum-seeking migrants, including many Nicaraguans who cannot be expelled to Mexico. On Saturday, the city’s mayor declared a state of emergency to move migrants from city streets as temperatures had dropped below freezing.

U.S. Representative Henry Cuellar, a Democrat whose South Texas district borders Mexico, has said U.S. border officials told him that an estimated 50,000 people are waiting in Mexico for the chance to cross.

“If Title 42 remains in place, we must continue waiting,” said Venezuelan migrant Lina Jaouhari, who said she had attempted to enter the United States from Ciudad Juarez on Dec. 1 but had been sent back to Mexico under Title 42. “It won’t do any good to try to cross again if we know they will send us back.”

In El Paso, shelters have struggled to provide for arriving migrants even as many ultimately are headed to join relatives in other parts of the United States.

Rescue Mission of El Paso, a shelter near the border, last week housed 280 people, far beyond its 190-person capacity, with people sleeping on cots and air mattresses in the chapel, library and conference rooms, said Nicole Reulet, the shelter’s marketing director, in an interview with Reuters.

“We have people where we tell them, ‘We have no room,'” she said. “They beg for a place on the floor.”

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President Joe Biden, hosting Jewish leaders at the White House for Hanukkah Monday evening, urged political and communal leaders to speak out forcefully against antisemitism and said he’s committed “to the safety of the Jewish people and the vibrancy of Jewish life.” 

The president’s remarks follow a series of steps the administration has recently taken in response to a surge in antisemitic hate crimes in major U.S. cities and rising openly anti-Jewish rhetoric on social media. A recent report by the Center for the Study of Hate and Extremism showed New York, Los Angeles and Chicago all saw more anti-Jewish hate crimes this year than in 2021, when incidents reached record levels.

Biden last week launched an interagency task force to develop a national strategy to combat antisemitism. And Doug Emhoff, the Jewish second gentleman, earlier this month hosted a roundtable with Jewish leaders to discuss ways to tackle the issue. 

“Silence is complicity,” Biden told the crowd. “We must not remain silent. And I made no bones about it from the very beginning: I will not be silent. America will not be silent.” 

President Joe Biden speaks at the White House Hanukkah event on Dec. 19. 2022. Photo by Screenshot/Youtube

Monday evening’s affair in the Gran Foyer of the White House was a return to the exuberant pre-pandemic White House Hanukkah parties that began in the George W. Bush administration, known for their trays of lamb chops and diversity of latkes. Last year’s party was smaller and more intimate. 

Special guests Monday included Bronia Brandman, a 90-year-old Holocaust survivor and retired public school teacher; Rabbi Charlie Cytron-Walker, the rabbi whose quick thinking ended an 11-hour hostage-taking at a Texas synagogue in January; Michele Taylor, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N. Human Rights Council and the daughter of Holocaust survivors; and Avi Heschel, granddaughter of Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, a leader in the civil rights movement. 

A new menorah was unveiled for the first time as the first-ever piece of White House judaica. In past years, presidents used borrowed menorahs for their Hanukkah receptions. This one was created by the White House’s carpentry shop with wood recovered from the foundation of the building during a 1950’s renovation and features handmade silver cups to hold the candles. “Its beauty reminds us of the Hanukkah miracle,” First Lady Jill Biden said in a statement, “and the joy it inspired.”

Introducing the president, Jill Biden said the menorah “is now a cherished piece of this home, your home.” 

In his remarks, Biden said the menorah conveys the permanence and resilience of the Jewish people. 

The celebration took place as Biden contemplates a reelection bid in 2024. He has said he will discuss the prospect of another campaign with his family over Christmas, but his allies have already lined up staff and discussed strategy. 

Vice President Kamala Harris and her husband, who is Jewish, hosted another Hanukkah party, on Sunday at their residence a few miles from the White House. With a Holocaust survivor and two rabbis, the couple lit the menorah, a loan from the Jewish Museum in New York. Made in Eastern Europe in the late 19th century, it bears a Hebrew inscription that dedicates it to a mutual aid society.

In his remarks, Emhoff said that anyone who fails to speak out and take action against antisemitism “needs to be called out.” He further implored some 300 guests to speak out “against those who praise fascist murderers, who would deny the Holocaust and who idolize extremists.” And he encouraged his guests “to live proudly, freely and openly as Jews without fear.”

The post At White House Hanukkah reception, Biden urges political leaders to speak out against antisemitism appeared first on The Forward.