Arms sales to Latin America rarely rise above the threshold requiring congressional notification. But here's an April 1 notification of a $64 million sale of M4A1 rifles and related items to #Ecuador:

Democratic candidates' percentage-point margins were +24 and +16 better in Florida's 2 special House elections today than they were for Harris in November.

If I'm a Republican who won their seat by 10 points or less, I'm feeling vulnerable—and less attached to the Trump agenda—this evening.

Today in the House Intelligence Committee, agency chiefs presented their "Annual Worldwide Threats Assessment."

But here's something weird: Their 31-page doc forgot to mention the "predatory incursion" from Venezuela that, the White House says, forced it to invoke its 1798 Wartime Renditions Act.

The Trump Administration Accidentally Texted Me Its War Plans U.S. national-security leaders included me in a group chat about upcoming military strikes in Yemen. I didn’t think it could be real. Then the bombs started falling.

This is a startling and concerning story about national security that seems more like the plot of a spy thriller.

www.theatlantic.com/politics/arc...

The reality here is very simple: Trump thinks there is no limit on his power, that he can spend money how he likes, jail who he likes, rule by fiat, criminalize criticism of himself. He is breaking the law and ignoring the Constitution. And we can either acknowledge that or keep pretending he isn’t.

So we’re clear: this is what Pinochet did to justify the persecution of opposition parties - declared Chile “at war” to target those he did not like

YouTube video by The New York Times The First Signs of Tyranny, From People Who Missed Them | NYT Opinion

"You want to think it's not happening, because otherwise you might have to do something about it." @shengwuli.bsky.social youtu.be/X_D-yW8v0Jo

Primary Every Democrat It’s exhausting to watch poll-tested, donor-beholden congressional Democrats continue to be too old, too cloistered, and too bumbling to do anything as the government burns.

It’s a new time in America and it’s time to refresh, energize, and focus Democraticparty leadership newrepublic.com/article/1909...

WAIT! Those images say "CST", which I read as US Central Time, 1 hour behind US Eastern Time.

But no: look up actual CST, it's 2 hours behind Washington, where the court convened.

So that first plane didn't land until 8:02pm, and the other two were 12:05 and 1:03am.

WAY after the judge's ruling.

Tony Wood · Why did he turn? Mario Vargas Llosa in Moscow People​ love to talk about writers who once had radical sympathies but drifted rightwards with age. But the political...

‘It would be to Vargas Llosa’s credit if the sources of his disenchantment with the left were the crushing of the Prague Spring and the worsening intellectual climate in Cuba. Why, then, did he make the Moscow trip seem more decisive than it was?’

www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

“The White House has traded a message of ‘prosperity now’ for a message of ‘prosperity soon,’” @annielowrey.bsky.social writes: theatln.tc/gErzC8LE

What the World Will Look Like Without a ‘West’ The global order has faced challenges before, but Trump 2.0 is different.

Europeans are coming to terms with the necessity to rearm, and this will have wide-reaching consequences, columnist Howard W. French writes.

The Alien Enemies Act, Explained This detention and deportation power poses an alarming risk of abuse and rights violations in both wartime and peacetime.

If the Aliens Enemies Act is newly on your mind today, I recommend this Brennan Center explainer: www.brennancenter.org/our-work/res...

Judith Butler · This Is Wrong Any effective response to the anti-gender movement will entail a critique of the new forms of authoritarianism and the...

‘Any effective response to the anti-gender movement will entail a critique of the new forms of authoritarianism and the passions they exploit.’

NEW: Judith Butler on Trump and ‘gender ideology’.

www.lrb.co.uk/the-paper/v4...

“In the long run, a more normal kind of American administration will return. With it will also return productive and predictable relationships,” writes @eliotacohen.bsky.social.

“But after the past two months, there cannot, and should not ever be, trust.” theatln.tc/gZ7STJIs

Steel Prices Continue to Rise Even Before New Tariffs Take Effect If President Trump is truly interested in boosting American manufacturing, fueling the long-running price disparity between US and global steel prices through misguided and demonstrably ineffective…

The Trump administration’s 25% steel tariffs are in full force—and so are the price hikes. Instead of protecting domestic producers, protectionism is making steel even more expensive. Consumers pay more, businesses struggle, and domestic steelmakers cash in.

reminder of where trump’s tariffs stand as of now

Today's reality check.
Thanks to tariffs: Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs both lowered their US economic growth forecasts t.co/7B9PHsnJQs

It’s amazing to find out at this late date how much the rule of law depended on people simply deciding, on a voluntary, daily basis, not to break the law.

Arms Transfers and Arms Trafficking in the Americas: Some Links from the Past Month

Links to 14 articles about recent weapons deals, legal or illicit, to countries in Latin America and the Caribbean.

DHS has begun performing polygraph tests on employees to find leakers DHS Secretary Kristi Noem and border czar Tom Homan have blamed lower-than-expected ICE arrest numbers on recent leaks about planned operations.

NBC: The Department of Homeland Security has begun performing polygraph tests on employees to determine who might be leaking information to the media about immigration operations, according to four sources familiar with the practice.

First reported by Bloomberg.

www.nbcnews.com/politics/nat...

Time for a new NAFTA? A North Atlantic Free Trade Agreement between Mexico, Canada, the UK and the EU? In extreme times, extreme thinking (and measures).

Washington now ‘largely aligns’ with Moscow’s vision, Kremlin says

Trump Brings a Day of Historic Shame for the United States Over the course of a single contentious meeting, the president departs the world stage and cedes the century to Russia and China.

We’ll be able to trace it all to this disgraceful moment, this day of historic shame for the United States. We’ve changed teams.

Opinion | This Never Happened With an American President Before Trump’s behavior in the Oval Office with Zelensky was an unparalleled break with American foreign policy.

Nailed it

www.nytimes.com/2025/02/28/o...

As usual, @hcrichardson.bsky.social has a succinct and comprehensive and accurate description of this historic moment in the White House yesterday.

February 28, 2025 Today, President Donald Trump ambushed Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky in an attack that seemed designed to give the White House an excuse for siding with Russia in its war on Ukraine.

February 28, 2025

Not a stable genius at dispute resolution.

If the market continues to trend down, and the Atlanta Fed turns out to be right, the midterms will be very interesting.

The battle between republican self preservation and MAGA will be intense

When You’re MAGA, They Let You Do It Why Trumpworld is just fine with Andrew Tate’s violent misogyny.

“Indulging the Tate brothers to own the libs is an act of pure nihilism,” Helen Lewis writes. “Denouncing them should be the easiest test of moral seriousness imaginable, and yet it’s a test that many online influencers are failing in real time.”