Paul Krugman, writing on his Substack email, has a useful analogy to what Musk is currently doing to our government.

Last month SpaceX carried out a test launch of its in-development Starship rocket. Liftoff was achieved, but as the company later announced, “Starship experienced a rapid unscheduled disassembly during its ascent burn.” In other words, it exploded.

It would be wrong to think of this explosion as a disaster; new products often experience failures during testing. That is, after all, why we test them. Still, the euphemistic language reeks of unwillingness to take responsibility and admit that things didn’t go as planned. But then again, what would you expect from a company owned by Elon Musk?

And here’s the thing: If a rocket blows up, you can build a new rocket and try again. “Move fast and break things” is sometimes an OK approach if the things in question are just hardware, which can be replaced. But what if the object that experiences “rapid unscheduled disassembly” is something whose continued functioning is crucial to people’s lives — say, something like the U.S. government?

This isn’t a hypothetical question: Musk, with backing from Donald Trump, is blowing up significant parts of the U.S. government as you read this. And we can already see the shape of multiple potential disasters.

The Muskenjugend — the mostly very young people Musk has hired to work at the Department of Government Efficiency, which isn’t actually a government department in any legal sense but which Trump has effectively given huge and probably unconstitutional power to remake federal agencies — generally seem to share three characteristics.

He goes on to explain exactly what Musk and his group are doing, why they are incredibly ignorant, stupid, and likely racist, and the consequences therein. I must admit I had to look up where “Muskenjugend” came from. If you don’t know, Krugman is playing with Hitlerjugend which is the German word for the Hitler Youth. So, there’s that lovely image.

The last week has shown not only how destructive this administration is, but also how incompetent. Elon doesn’t understand how COBOL works, the DOGE team doesn’t know how to secure their own website, and Trump accidentally fired the people safeguarding the country’s nuclear weapons.

If you need a short video, Hank Green describes the situation perfectly.

Basically, a lot of people are going to die from preventable mistakes in the next four years.

John Gruber has some smart insight into the reason for the meaningless renaming of the Gulf of Mexico.

It’s the smallness, the relative unimportance, the spiteful pettiness of the renaming in the first place — down to the fact that until Trump’s executive action, there was no controversy, zero, none, nada, anywhere in the world, amongst any group of people, regarding the name of the Gulf of Mexico — that makes it interesting to examine in detail how Google and Apple have chosen to deal with it. It’s only because this particular issue is so spectacularly piddling that we can consider it in full.

The motivation behind the name change is simple as well. Trump didn’t change the US’s officially recognized name of, say, the Atlantic Ocean or the continent of Africa. He just as easily could, but he won’t. And it’s not like “Gulf of Mexico” was on a list of “debatable or controversial names” until he created this controversy out of thin air. It’s just the one name on the globe that a president of the United States can change to stick it to Mexico, a country Donald Trump has objectively racist feelings toward. Trump never campaigned on building a wall at our northern border with Canada, nor has he (yet?) attempted to rename Lake Ontario. It’s about Mexico, and asserting power by fiat. Trump has a lifelong history of putting his name on buildings he didn’t own. He’d rather have his name emblazoned on a building he doesn’t own than own a building that doesn’t bear his name. To Trump, the name on the sign is more important than the deed. So too, now, with the name on a map. The Gulf of Mexico is an international body of water that belongs to no nation, but declaring this new name implies that it heretofore belonged to Mexico, and now belongs to us, which is to say belongs to him, our unquestioned dear leader. That Trump took it from Mexico, without firing a shot — when in fact all he did was order a string to be changed in a government database.

Trump is all id with an underdeveloped and fragile ego and no superego.

Warren Ellis on the news —

Dunno about you, but for me this year quickly became The Year Of I’ve Had Enough. I turned off a bunch of news service notifications, unsubbed from a few news provisions entirely, and now I skim the papers on my phone over coffee in the morning and then check out of the news entirely until the evening, when I catch up with newsletters and read some longer articles.

…

Thing is, not only is the news all the bloody same, all about the same country and the same handful of main characters, and every news service reports all the incremental updates to the same bloody stories every sixty seconds: but that constant battering tide of zone-flooding shit compresses time and shrinks space to think. And I want this year to feel like a year and not three bloody weeks.

It’s not about “taking a break from the news,” which various newsletters have suggested is now A Thing. And, you know, if you live in certain places right now, taking a break from the news might feel a luxury at best and a wilful ignoring of alarm bells at worst. On a single evening last week I talked to three people setting plans to bug out of the US..

It’s more about putting the news in its damn place and creating more space to live in.

Ray Ratto, writing on Defector, has the story on Nike and Major League Baseball rolling back the new crappy uniforms they introduced this past season. He tells it in his unique style.

Nike and MLB have apparently walked back their shitty-uniforms-are-just-as-good-if-we-say-they-are stance of a year ago, when the 30 MLB teams were outfitted as shoddily as they have since the 1940s, back when the pants were flannel and could comfortably house a regulation-sized player in each pantleg. Those uniforms looked cheap, were occasionally worryingly translucent, and shredded on first slide. The players hated the uniforms, and the fans hated buying the Fanatics replicas of those jerseys. (Fanatics is a genuinely separate problem that reminds us that “let the buyer beware” is not just an old saying but a scream in the customer’s face.)

But now the fix is finally in after a year of MLB baseball being played in uniforms that landed somewhere between hand-me-down chic and Shein-grade fast fashion disposability. In fact, when Nike’s head of global grief-absorption Denis Nolan said, “We’re listening to the players and our fans; their input and opinions are important to us," the fact that he made it seem like the user experience was a brand-new concept that Nike just invented was a reminder that Nike and MLB would like credit for both the repair and the original blunder. They even called the rollout of the new quality duds a “remediation schedule,” which for all its Superfund vibe is finally just a loftier version of claiming victory in appalling defeat—a Super Bowl winner’s ring for the Kansas City Chiefs.

The repair, which for some reason isn’t going to be ready for home uniforms until 2026, supposedly includes the thicker pre-2024 fabric made by Majestic that actually holds up to breaking up double plays and diving catches in the outfield; jerseys will once again feature larger numerals, embroidered sleeve patches, and more professional-looking team fonts. There was no word on whether the MLB people who agreed to the Nike deal are going to be told that they urgently want to spend more time with their families, which would have been a more dramatic way of falling on the corporate sword.

I am envious of Ray Ratto’s writing. He’s so funny and sharp.

James A Reeves –

It’s a strange sensation, living a life divided between today’s liquid crystal and a youth defined by magnetic tape. Audio and VHS cassettes contained my first impressions of the world. Each unit of entertainment was bound in plastic that occupied space and respected the logic of time, its information deteriorating each time it was played until it dissolved into garbled images and hiss. Now the whole world feels like static. No orientation. No sense of time. Perhaps my generation is uniquely positioned to be disappointed by the humiliations of clicking and scrolling. After all, I still remember the optimism of world wide web and information superhighway.

I miss the reassuring kerchunk of buttons and punching out the plastic tabs on a cassette if the recording was good. Or taping them up again when better music came along. It was a tactile world of messing with limitations, a sensibility defined by the boundaries of the physical rather than a never-ending feed coming from god only knows. Was life better in the Era of Magnetic Tape, or am I suffering from the nostalgia of a man settling into middle age?

Paper Apps are pen-and-paper games cleverly disguised as small reporter-style notepads. They are marketed as a “fun, smart alternative to screen time.” Some games are themed around dungeons, space exploration, and golf.

Let’s say you had a bad day. You can’t dwell on it. That doesn’t help. You can only go forward. Tomorrow is another day.

Every new day is a new day to start over, start fresh, and start again. Yesterday is in the past. You went to bed and did a soft restart. No need to jump out of bed but get moving. Roll out of bed as refreshed as you can be. Wipe the sleep from your eyes. Do a little exercise. Have a little coffee. Enjoy that hot shower.

Your eyes will open a little wider. The day may even look a little brighter. The sun will shine. And if it’s raining… eventually the sun will shine. That’s what it does.

It’s a new dawn. It’s a new day. No need to dwell on the past. Go forward.

I recently stumbled onto Kenning Hu as I surf the information highway. Writing at her site, she has some interesting thoughts about building worlds on the Internet.

in this digital age where everyone wants to “monetize” something, you constantly find yourself inside a marketing funnels — filled with shiny things, and quick-fix promises, and slippery slopes.

**marketing funnels are everywhere. **

**digital worlds are rare. **

so here is my strategy:

instead of “building an audience,” build a world. build a digital garden-ecosystem, that exists — first and primarily — for itself. a world that doesn’t need likes, traffic, subscribers, or clicks — in order to validate its existence.

build a world that the RIGHT people — your kindred people — will discover, will gravitate towards, and fall in love with. build a world that no one else can replicate, except you.

build a world expansive enough to HOLD your work, your multi-faceted spirit — and your audience.

I kinda love this.

Remember the asteroid with a 1-in-77 chance of ruining everyone’s 2032 Christmas plans? Scientists now say there’s a 1-in-43 chance it will hit the Earth. The good news? Scientists like Scott Manley are tracking it and creating YouTube videos explaining it. The bad news? They won’t know for sure where it might hit until they get more data.

Right now, the potential impact zone stretches from India across Africa to South America, with a bonus splash zone in the Atlantic. Fun.

Heidi Gardner, Chloe Fineman, and Ego Nwodim, three current cast members of Saturday Night Live, welcomed Architectural Digest to give a rather comprehensive tour of the legendary Studio 8H in Rockefeller Center.

Well worth the time.

Warren Ellis shared some of his flash fiction. These stood out to me.

So tall, so somehow unreal, the unfathomable adults standing over us when we were small, and now they are all dead, and we look in old mirrors and see how tall and unreal and unfathomable we are now.

Even to ourselves.

The first ever time someone takes your hand, and the first thought you have is “this is everything” and the second is “what happens when it’s gone?” The space of time between those thoughts defines the shape of your life.

He put the old, cold gun to the back of her head and the treasure of her memories became scattered rubies on the snow.

I was born into the generations who lived with constant low level planetary fear. Every unexplained flash in the night sky could have been the start of nuclear war. Life seems duller now. And that’s why I bought the bombs. To brighten your nights. Smile.

Super Bowl 2025 may have been more of a beatdown than an exciting football game, but luckily, Kendrick Lamar was around at halftime to provide some much-needed drama. You probably need some backstory, too. From “Uncle” Samuel L. Jackson providing a preemptive critique of the show from “mainstream” America, to Serena Williams crip walking for more total yards than the Kansas City offense (also, when your ex-girlfriend dances to the tune of the guy publicly humiliating you, it’s never a good thing), to all the Drake-baiting, plus some provocative, timely questions about what “America” means anyway, all of it performed in front of the sitting president himself, it was a lot. Here are some of the easter eggs/hidden meanings in the show. Apparently, MAGA had a meltdown?

I loved the scope of the choreography, but I honestly don’t find Lamar particularly musical.

For those of you who watch the Super Bowl for the commericals: The best (and worst) Super Bowl commercials this year. It’s missing the Nike So Win ad that was in my top three.

Lastly, the new scorebug was bad in so many ways.

Robert Sterling —

I don’t want to connect my coffee machine to the wifi network. I don’t want to share the file with OneDrive. I don’t want to download an app to check my car’s fluid levels. I don’t want to scan a QR code to view the restaurant menu. I don’t want to let Google know my location before showing me the search results. I don’t want to include a Teams link on the calendar invite. I don’t want to pay 50 different monthly subscription fees for all my software. I don’t want to upgrade to TurboTax platinum plus audit protection. I don’t want to install the Webex plugin to join the meeting. I don’t want to share my car’s braking data with the actuaries at State Farm. I don’t want to text with your AI chatbot. I don’t want to download the Instagram app to look at your picture. I don’t want to type in my email address to view the content on your company’s website. I don’t want text messages with promo codes. I don’t want to leave your company a five-star Google review in exchange for the chance to win a $20 Starbucks gift card. I don’t want to join your exclusive community in the metaverse. I don’t want AI to help me write my comments on LinkedIn. I don’t even want to be on LinkedIn in the first place.

I just want to pay for a product one time (and only one time), know that it’s going to work flawlessly, press 0 to speak to an operator if I need help, and otherwise be left alone and treated with some small measure of human dignity, if that’s not too much to ask anymore.

Last week, Democratic Governor JB Pritzker of Illinois shared a video titled “A Special Announcement from Governor JB Pritzker.” In the video, Pritzker made fun of some of President Donald Trump’s more absurd proclamations in the weeks since he was confirmed as the 47th president. Obviously, Lake Michigan should be Lake Illinois. More of this.

Speaking of Illinois governors, Trump pardons disgraced former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich. Sigh.

What a week. I don’t know about you, but we could all use some female power hip-hop in this joint. The Tiny Desk Concert from Doechii fits the bill. Featuring a full band, horns, and two background singers, the performance is a masterclass in creativity. I’m not even a huge fan of hip-hop, but this jazz-influenced mini-show is amazing. The girls with the cornrows… they got all the talent.

Need more? This Jazz musician reacts to the Tiny Desk concert.

Will Leitch, writing for New York Magazine, has a smart piece on the Super Bowl and how it’s trying to keep the outside world outside and how the Super Bowl itself is an escape from the outside world.

The Super Bowl is the most American of unifying traditions. But it’s happening with the country in a nearly unprecedented state of confusion — not even the people in charge seem to know who’s in charge — when nothing is unifying and tradition lasts as long as you can rip the copper wiring out of the walls. What does a country do when it is transmogrifying itself into something more unrecognizable by the second? Well, it does the one thing it has always done together: It watches the Super Bowl and pretends that everything is just fine.

That is to say, it handles it the New Orleans way. The New Year’s terrorist attack was only 38 days ago, yet it seemingly happened several decades in the past, or in a different universe. But it didn’t. It happened in the same area where I had dinner last night and saw countless colleagues, like I do every year at the Super Bowl, which is as close to a national sportswriter convention as anything in the business. It happened in New Orleans, and in America. But so much has shifted since then, so much will continue to shift, that lingering too long on one incident, one more speck of random violence in an ever-elevating spate of them, can’t help but leave you in the past. It all morphs together anyway. The terrorist truck driver, the plane crash, the January 6 pardons, the California fires, the Luka Dončić trade, some techie teenager bro with your Social Security number — it’s just one thing after another.

Combined, they just give more impetus to escape, to turn your mind off, to watch football, to pretend, for three hours, like none of this is happening. It can only work for so long. The illusion can never last. But that’s the promise of the Super Bowl, and of the city that is hosting this year’s game. This is what sports has always done. I’m not sure it’s ever tried to do it harder than it has this week in New Orleans. I suspect it will still not be enough. But New Orleans, and the Super Bowl, will do its best regardless. If you keep the party going and make sure not to look too far in any direction, you can almost convince yourself everything is fine.

I would not cut to Trump in his suite at the Super Bowl at any point in the game. Then again, I wouldn’t cut to Taylor Swift, either.

Every night, my wife and I sleep to reruns of The Golden Girls. It has become our ritual.

I was in college when The Golden Girls was on television. I never watched it. The demographic they were looking for did not include me. I was too busy watching Star Trek: The Next Generation and MTV.

Watching The Golden Girls today is like time travel. Certain shows are products of their eras. Unsurprisingly, it feels nostalgic, but it also makes me feel old. I am the age now the leads were on the show. Of course, they are permanently fixed in the late 1980s as much as the cast of Friends is stuck in the 1990s.

What will be the equivalent for today’s viewers? I have no idea.

There are several journalists putting together clear-eyed reports on what is currently happening in the Federal government. None of it is good. NONE. OF. IT. Seriously, read them all while you still can.

Here’s a few to get started: Jamelle Bouie, Elizabeth Popp Berman, Ezra Klein, Heather Cox Richardson, Heather Cox Richardson again, Timothy Snyder, Timothy Snyder again, Paul Krugman, David Roth, Joan Westenberg, Mike Brock, and David Frum.

These elected and unelected clowns think they’re smart, but really, they’re just Fredo flailing on the deck chair.

Additionally, here’s a long video from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez laying out what’s happening and what congressional Democrats and citizens should do about it.

This idea circulated around the blogosphere a month or so ago, and I decided to try it out a month later. Never say I don’t hop on trends.

I use these apps and services pretty much every day. Anything new to you?

Mail Client: iOS: Spark. Desktop: Gmail, Outlook

Notes: Notion and Apple Notes (I haven’t fully set it up, but I’m a fan of Forever Notes)

To-Do: Apple Reminders and Notion

Photo Shooting: iPhone 12 Pro Max. I probably need to upgrade this year.

Photo Editing: Mostly: Photopea. Sometimes: Photos

Calendar: Apple Calendar and Outlook Calendar

Cloud File Storage: Mostly: Dropbox. Sometimes: iCloud Drive (for apps that do it by default I don’t care that much about the file locations)

RSS: Inoreader

Contacts: Apple Contacts

Browser: Desktop: Chrome. iOS: Safari. I want to like Arc, but I can’t get into it.

Bookmarks: Notion Web Clipper and Instapaper Clipper

Read It Later: Instapaper, Notion

Rich Media: Iframely

Blogging: micro.blog, Medium

Word Processing: Mostly: Word and Ulysses. Rarely: Pages

Shopping Lists: Apple Reminders

News: Inoreader. Rarely: Apple News

Music: Spotify.

Podcasts: Overcast

Password Management: 1Password

VPN: NordVPN

Sleep Tracking: Sleep Cycle

Personal Site: Carrd

I watched most of the Grammys last night, and honestly? It was a mixed bag. I mean, sure, there were some cool moments, but nothing that’s gonna stick with me for long. It always feels so political, just like the Oscars.

Beyoncé winning Album of the Year for her country album Cowboy Carter was surprising. Over Taylor Swift, Billie Eilish, and the others? I don’t think so. Plus, beating Chris Stapleton for Best Country Album? No way.

Chappell Roan’s acceptance speech, in which she criticized the music industry, probably won’t get the response she thinks it will. Although it was bold, that feels par for the course for this artist.

The performances were where things got fun. Sabrina Carpenter brought the energy and fun. Benson Boone, with his ripped tux and crazy flips in a shiny bodysuit, was also entertaining. I can’t stand his song (especially that scream), but I’ll give him style points.

But Doechii? She was something else. I’d never heard of her before, but her performance was electric. She moved with incredible precision, switching between vocal styles like it was nothing, backed by dancers in matching suits. My wife and I were totally blown away.

Raye was another surprise. This UK artist performed an incredible hip-hop-soul fusion, scatting in front of an old-school bandstand. It was just phenomenal.

The thing about the Grammys is they’re basically a one-night wonder. Super entertaining while you’re watching, but by tomorrow? Completely forgotten. It’s like musical fast food - tasty in the moment, zero nutritional value afterward.

And seriously… The Rolling Stones and The Beatles winning again? Come on.