DL Open Thread: Tuesday, February 18, 2025
Fascism On The March: These massive cuts only make sense if you’re executing a government coup. Examples:
Getting rid of a new generation of scientists and public health experts:
At the National Institutes of Health, the nation’s premier biomedical research agency, an estimated 1,200 employees — including promising young investigators slated for larger roles — have been dismissed.
At the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, two prestigious training programs were gutted: one that embeds recent public health graduates in local health departments and another to cultivate the next generation of Ph.D. laboratory scientists. But the agency’s Epidemic Intelligence Service — the “disease detectives” who track outbreaks around the world — has apparently been spared, perhaps because of an uproar among alumni after a majority of its members were told on Friday that they would be let go.
President Trump’s plan to shrink the size of the federal work force dealt blows to thousands of civil servants in the past few days. But the cuts to the Department of Health and Human Services — coming on the heels of the coronavirus pandemic, the worst public health crisis in a century — have been especially jarring. Experts say the firings threaten to leave the country exposed to further shortages of health workers, putting Americans at risk if another crisis erupts.
The firings have also excised the next generation of leaders at the C.D.C., the N.I.H., the Food and Drug Administration, and other agencies that the department oversees.
“It seems like a very destructive strategy to fire the new talent at an agency, and the talent that’s being promoted,” said Dr. David Fleming, the chairman of an advisory committee to the C.D.C. director. He added, “A lot of energy and time has been spent in recruiting those folks, and that’s now tossed out the window.”
Hey, just don’t get sick.
Phony Poor Performance Reviews:
The Trump administration will not disclose how many workers it cut since last week ahead of its Tuesday deadline, but the government employed more than 200,000 probationary workers as of last year. The firings have extended to touch employees at almost every agency, including map makers, archaeologists and cancer researchers, The Post found, in choices that some workers said contradicted a U.S. Office of Personnel Management directive to retain “mission-critical” workers.
The Federal Aviation Administration let go hundreds of technicians and engineers just weeks after a midair collision a few miles from the White House killed 67 people, eliciting promises from Trump officials to improve air safety, workers said in interviews. FEMA, which handles the nation’s natural disasters, is preparing to fire hundreds of probationary employees, according to four people familiar with the situation who, like others interviewed for this report, spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation. The agency is already stretched thin responding to fires in California and floods in Kentucky. And the administration terminated scores of employees who work to bolster the nation’s nuclear defense, only to realize its error and start reversing the firings.
The termination letters hitting inboxes all struck the same note: Probationary workers were getting the ax for poor job performance. But many of those fired had just received positive reviews, or had not worked in the government long enough to receive even a single rating, according to interviews with federal employees and documents obtained by The Post.
It’s, of course, illegal. Until the Supreme Court dictates otherwise:
Firing employees en masse with the same claim of poor performance is illegal, said Jim Eisenmann, a partner at the Alden Law Group, a law firm specializing in litigation by federal employees. It violates federal law covering career civil service employees, he said.
“It can’t be true,” Eisenmann said. “They’re clearly not articulating this on an individual basis, which is what makes it so suspect.”
First they came for your tax returns, now they’re coming for your Social Security:
Now news just broke that the DOGErs appear to have busted their way into the Social Security Administration, forcing the resignation of the acting commissioner, Michelle King, when she resisted their demands to give DOGE access to the Agency’s most sensitive government records.
According to the Post, the DOGErs or, nominally, President Trump had to pass over “dozens of other senior executives who sat higher on the agency’s leadership hierarchy” until they found a guy named Leland Dudek who had apparently been talking up DOGE on social media and thus seemed up for playing ball.
DOGE’s apparent entry into the Social Security Administration comes after Elon Musk repeatedly and falsely claimed that a substantial amount of the $1.6 trillion Social Security pays out every year goes to fraud or dead people.
Something that Democrats could/should do, but haven’t/won’t. The only problem with a daily opposition press conference is the fact that there currently is no Democratic opposition of note.
Let’s take a break from Fascism. Until tomorrow.
Yo, It’s A Propaganda Tank, Not A Think Tank. Guess who doesn’t want any more education funding:
Delaware Gov. Matt Meyer has made higher education funding a key goal of his administration, but a Newark-based think tank is not convinced more money will solve the state’s scholastic ills.
The Caesar Rodney Institute (CRI) issued an open letter to the governor Feb. 14 saying increased educational spending has not been accompanied by better academic results.
“Our worst performing schools — those in which less than one in 10 students can read or do math at grade level — often spend twice as much as our best performing schools,” Ms. Hettler wrote.
Well, yes, because they’re dealing with the most challenged students. These fucking people.
For Completists Only–The Delaware Rethugs’ battle for State Chair. Actually, it’s a cool read:
Now in office for 14 years, (State Senator Dave) Lawson says he’s grown increasingly dismayed by the state of Delaware Republicans.
So Lawson is running to become the state GOP chair. He’s facing incumbent Julianne Murray, who won the two-year unpaid post in 2023. Murray is a lawyer and former candidate for governor (2020) and attorney general (2022).
“I’m running because I’m tired of losing. We’ve gone backwards and backwards,” the 78-year-old Lawson said last week.
He says one problem is that “we have no platform, we have no planks” for candidates to draw from in their campaigns.
“We have a kind of a word salad and you can call it a platform, but it’s more a mission statement,” Lawson said. “It’s got to be believed by the candidates and it’s got to be believed by the investors because right now, why would you invest in the Republican party? It’s in such disarray.”
(Julianne) Murray, 54, said she welcomes Lawson’s candidacy but argues that she’s already begun that transformation, despite the November losses and the registration deficit.
She said the party is in better shape financially since she took over, and has a new statewide headquarters in Wilmington.
How can you top a new HQ in Wilmington? You know, the Home Of The Delaware Republican Party.
Does Stephanie Hansen Read This Blog? Probably not, but she’s doing what I recommended:
On Friday, Sen. Stephanie Hansen (D-Middletown) told Spotlight Delaware that she and her Democratic colleagues are considering “a package of energy legislation” that would include a provision that directs regulators to deny requests for power rate increases unless they deem them to be legally prudent.
Such rate increases typically are requested to allow a utility company to recoup costs of building new energy infrastructure. Currently, regulators will examine whether those investments are good business judgements – a lower threshold than “prudent” – when deciding whether to approve an increase.
“It may be a good business judgement that you make that expense, but is it a prudent spending of the money?” Hansen asked.
What do you want to talk about?
Democrats in the Senate need to get on top of this QUICK.
A disastrous start for them this year, the port debacle, the Delmarva power bill issue and a sqaut with how these specials were handled.
This Delmarva thing though, is HOT, they better get a handle. The whole “its your fault” narrative is prob not the best.
Notice to Senate Dems…GET A HANDLE ON THIS….turn your ire on Delmarva, not usage rates.
Talk about “power rate” is disingenuous. My Delmarva bill has 12 different line items for electricity charges, 11 of them based on the amount I use. Which of these 12 “power rates” does Hansen propose to limit?
“Prudent” is not what is on the minds of sticker-shocked customers.
Prudence would mean diversifying energy sources, increasing renewables, and approving new regional wind and solar generating projects.
Prudence would mean new major incentives for home solar installation and weatherproofing.
Prudence would mean making Delaware energy infrastructure more resistant to the more violent weather driven by climate change. Burying overhead power lines, upgrading switches, meters, and transformers. etc.
None of these prudent directions seem like electoral winners right now.
The point is that Delaware is one of a few states that don’t have this measure. Without it, the rate setters at the Public Service Commission are basically forced to rubber-stamp anything Delmarva proposes.
That’s why the change, in my opinion, makes sense and is needed.
Okay, but 90-95% of the issues driving up rates are not due to Delmarva, but the energy markets where Delmarva has to purchase energy. Those markets are run by PJM Interconnection (our regional transmission operator, or RTO, which controls transmission in 13 states and DC). PJM has been slow to connect new generation for quite some time now, which is a problem in and of itself, but becomes more pronounced when we’re retiring fossil fuel plants. Add that to increased electrification and the massive and sudden uptick in AI data centers and we have a perfect storm of energy deficiency. That drives market prices up and, since Delmarva isn’t allowed to own generation assets (because DE took that right away), they are at the mercy of the markets. It’s also going to get worse before it gets better, but FERC did force them into submission, to a degree.
Above commenters and Senator Hansen are correct: We must get renewables (which is mostly solar and energy storage here in DE) connected to the grid for three reasons:
1. They can be installed and connected much more quickly than natural gas plants in most cases.
2. They’re quickly becoming cheaper to get up and running than a combined cycle gas plant and maintenance costs are lower. They’re also WAY cheaper and safer than nuclear.
3. They can be more strategically placed to help out the grid where it’s needed most, often without needing PJM approval (speeds up the help we need).
Additionally, Delmarva is investor-owned, which means it’s driven by profits. It’s also a regional entity, which means it’s less shielded from this market crap than DEC and DEMEC.
That said, Delmarva/Pepco/Exelon can’t say they aren’t part of the problem when their profits keep increasing and executive salaries are at least $300K.
This problem is much bigger than Delmarva, but Delmarva isn’t necessarily helping.
There’s another hearing coming up next week where PJM will be in attendance. I highly recommend tuning in.
I have to ask. Why are you ignoring nuclear? The French seem to have concluded it is a viable option.
The French concluded that decades ago. And who’s going to make the $20 billion investment?
There are newer models coming, but not in my lifetime and, depending on your age, yours either.
Seems Ginger hasn’t done any research on nuclear. If people are upset about energy bills now, nuclear would be a literal melee because costs are astronomical. Additionally, try putting a nuclear reactor anywhere in the state and see what people’s reactions are. Besides the fact that a huge swathe of the state is protected from further production via the Coastal Zone Act, residents would rage against living near another nuclear reactor (much of the state is close to Jersey’s Salem plant). Even small modular nuclear reactor projects are getting canceled because the costs are absolutely prohibitive. Nuclear is a non-starter for Delaware.
Speaking of the Delaware Senate.
https://delawarecall.com/2025/02/17/deldems-roll-over-for-musk/
That article is a must-read.
I’ll highlight it in tomorrow’s Open Thread.
Townsend is quickly becoming quite the disappointment
There is virtually unanimous consensus (which doesn’t necessarily make it right) that protecting Delaware’s corporate law hegemony is vital to the state’s future. If you look closely, the sponsors of the two bills are all of Delaware’s legislative leaders.
And Townsend could lose his kush “of counsel”
Role with a corporate law firm if he pushed back. Can’t support the fam on that legislative 49k a year
I like Bryan, but it sure looks like a potential conflict-of-interest to me.
Don’t know how he can carry the water for the corporate bar if his practice is engaged in litigation his legislative side is sponsoring in Dover.
Getting traction on Bluesky:
https://bsky.app/profile/ryanlcooper.com/post/3lihyts5yl22v
(Also hi, sorry I haven’t been visiting here much. I’m busy.)
You have fallen beneath the acceptable quota for posts.
We have no choice but to terminate you for poor performance.
😿
Plus, you used an emoji.
And the e-paper-clip was incorrectly applied, causing e-confusion. Must be your first performance review…
Huh. Lawson is 78. I thought that was too old to be a leader?