As President-elect Trump’s team is taking shape, we’re learning more about who will take the lead on energy, climate and the environment. The first announcement on that front is Lee Zeldin, a former GOP congressman who will head the Environmental Protection Agency. Trump has called climate change a “scam” and says addressing it hurts business. William Brangham discussed more with Coral Davenport.

• As we reported, president-elect Trump's new team will include a former Republican congressman to head the Environmental Protection Agency.

  William Brangham takes a closer look at the stakes for energy, environment and the climate.

• William Brangham:

Post mortemis….. Can angels lie? Or die?

Vaccines against small pox, measles and rabies

Round pills to calm violent schizophrenics

No cure for warmongering mad men

Hating hysterical freedom-loving loud women

Angels in heaven America that do not want babies

Have screwed-up the dying demographic dynamics

Humans of races and creeds are not that beautiful

Eight billion of us, one small per cent could qualify

From which women still have to perfect their looks

Cuticles, eyebrows, lashes and bright red lips

Men cut their beards, hair and muscle their nooks

Not to look like Neanderthals dumb and dark dips

Cave brutes nor brown bears that just awoke

In a world suddenly gone from carnivore to woke

For freedom-sake Orange Donald is vile we testify

Harry Truman, the 33rd president of the United States, once quipped: ‘Polls are like sleeping pills – designed to lull the voters into sleeping on election day’. And the truth of Truman’s thesis has been confirmed once again by the recently concluded US presidential campaign – the outcome of which contradicted the pollsters.

Donald Trump is back.

Anatomy of victory: The five reasons Trump won
The Republican candidate’s victory was total, and it was carefully – and expertly – planned....
By Maxim Suchkov

The climate crisis is much more severe than most people and politicians realise. Most information, education and media reporting around climate change (global heating) focuses on reducing our annual emissions to a target based on a ‘trajectory of progressive reduction’, and eventually ‘net’ zero annual emissions by 2050 or some other date.

But this ignores the reality that it is the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and their contribution to radiative forcing in real time that actually drive global heating.

The term “neoliberalism” is frequently invoked but often lacks a clear definition. The concept requires an in-depth examination that dissects its origins as a philosophy of governance and its transformation into a political and cultural project. Over the course of the twentieth century, powerful interests adapted the concept to consolidate their influence, reshape public perception, and embed market principles into all facets of society. Unraveling the complexities and varying interpretations of neoliberalism can shed light on its profound and deleterious impact on contemporary political and social structures.

The Dream and Nightmare of Neoliberalism

AN INTERVIEW WITH
ALEX HIMELFARB

US President-elect Donald Trump has promised that his team will work hard to resolve the Ukraine conflict to prevent further bloodshed.

Trump made the remarks at the America First Policy Institute gala at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Palm Beach, Florida on Thursday. “We’re going to work in the Middle East, and we’re going to work very hard on Russia and Ukraine.”

He went on to say that the conflict “has got to stop,” adding that he has seen a report claiming that “thousands of people… were killed” over the past three days. “They happen to be soldiers but whether they’re soldiers or they’re people sitting in towns, we’re going to work [on] it,” Trump said, without elaborating further.

Controversy has erupted in France over plans for a lavish VIP gala in Paris sponsored by Israel is Forever, an association of staunchly pro-Zionist groups.   

At €260 a head, the evening celebrating “the power and history of Israel” – the location of which has not yet been disclosed – has already drawn vocal opposition from French human rights groups, unions and leftist politicians.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-un oversaw a field trial of domestically produced kamikaze drones this week, state media reported on Friday.

The news agency KCNA released on Thursday images showing Kim and two other senior officials observing the deployment of several unmanned aircraft, which were blurred. The prototypes were developed by a research facility associated with North Korea’s Unmanned Aerial Technology Complex (UATC), the report said.

Boosters are used for the launch of the weapons, while engineers are exploring various types of air frames, with one model apparently designed with four wings in a cross configuration, according to the report. Photos also showed attacks on various targets, including a tank that was hit at a steep angle from above.

Forty years after they began the task – and nearly four hundred years after receiving their first commission – sages in Paris have finally produced a new edition of the definitive French dictionary.

The full ninth edition of the Dictionnaire de l’Académie Française was formally presented to President Macron this afternoon in the plush surroundings of the 17th century Collège des Quatre-Nations on the left bank of the Seine.

With Donald Trump as president-elect of the United States, it is not clear what exactly his Ukraine policy will look like in the future. NATO partners feel left in the dark about Trump's willingness to support Kyiv and its European allies in fighting back Russian troops from Ukrainian territory.

US President-elect Donald Trump will nominate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to be his Secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), declaring that the former Democrat will ensure that “everybody will be protected from harmful chemicals [and] pollutants.”

Trump announced his choice in a social media post on Thursday evening. “For too long, Americans have been crushed by the industrial food complex and drug companies who have engaged in deception, misinformation, and disinformation when it comes to public health,” he wrote.

A former and future U.S. president talked with Vladimir Putin on Thursday! At least that is what The Washington Post reported today. 

In a highly detailed account, the Post wrote: 

“During the call, which Trump took from his resort in Florida, he advised the Russian president not to escalate the war in Ukraine and reminded him of Washington’s sizable military presence in Europe, said a person familiar with the call, who, like others interviewed for this story, spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a sensitive matter.

Why did Harris lose? Fareed's take: Democrats blew it by making three big mistakes—not taking immigration concerns seriously enough, rallying around prosecutions of Trump, and elevating identity politics

https://www.facebook.com/fareedzakaria/videos/why-did-harris-lose-fareeds-take-democrats-blew-it-by-making-three-big-mistakes/

YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT.

“It’s hard to do cartoons without making mistakes…”

         Gus Leonisky

Donald Trump’s victory in last week’s election reinforced the impression that he and his followers have “taken over” the Republican party. The campaign saw Republicans like Liz and Dick Cheney switch sides and back the Democratic nominee, Kamala Harris. Now—after Trump won a second term—the right is locked in an impassioned struggle to pressure the president-elect to appoint some Republicans to important executive roles and to freeze others out of the administration entirely.

     BY Connor O'Keeffe    

REID: “The former and future president is moving quickly to fill the clown car and round out his cabinet before he changes his mind and fires them all. Moments ago, Trump announced that he has selected Fox weekend morning show host — you can’t make this up — Pete Hegseth to serve as secretary of defense, because why not?”

AND WHY NOT?

CAN PETE HEGSETH DO A BETTER JOB THAN LLOYD AUSTIN THE THIRD? SURE CAN....