DL Open Thread: Tuesday, March 24, 2026

Former State Senator Nancy Cook Has Passed Away.  No legislator exercised more control over Delaware’s annual budgeting process than Nancy Cook. For decades. Making her one of the most influential legislators in Delaware history.  As of this morning, I could find no obituaries.  There’s an article in Bay To Bay, but I’m not a subscriber.  If any of you can find links to share, please do so.  I’ll do the same.

Delaware Looks To Sell Out For Crypto Business.  I wrote about how this stinks last week.  The so-called ‘regulation’ being drafted will be drafted mostly by corporate interests with skin in the game.  Meaning, not the ‘rubes’ who would be taken to the crypto-cleaners:

The state’s proposal would create regulations allowing Delaware’s banking commissioner to issue licenses to cryptocurrency companies that take deposits and hold them in the form of stablecoins – which are digital currencies pegged to the dollar.

The proposed rules build on efforts by lawmakers nationally, and in a handful of other states to formalize the cryptocurrency industry within the American financial system. Supporters say that could unlock massive flows of money to the industry and therefore democratize financial tools for everyday people. 

But critics argue it could boost a shadowy industry that too often facilitates money laundering and tax evasion. 

For Delaware, proponents hope the legislation will bolster the state’s reputation as a financial technology center.  

You know, like Delaware did to pave the way for usurious interest rates.

In a press conference at the University of Delaware on Monday, Gov. Matt Meyer said the regulations, if passed, could become as consequential to the state as its 1980s-era financial reforms that convinced credit card company executives to move thousands of jobs to the Wilmington area.  (Like I said…)

Also speaking at the press conference — held at UD’s FinTech Innovation Hub — was Karyn Polak, president of the Delaware Bankers Association, who said she was proud to stand alongside Delaware officials pushing for the “critically important” reforms.

“The financial landscape of today … looks very different from the environment that shaped our current statutes decades ago,” Polak said.

Her comments were noteworthy because banks have ferociously opposed other draft legislation in front of Congress that they say would allow cryptocurrency companies to encroach on their business.

To oversimplify my position, when the ‘Forces Of Evil” join together in rapturous praise of a government initiative, it’s time to hold on to your e-wallet.  Let me state it another way:  No good will come of this.

ICE Agents Boost Coffee Sales At Airports.  Do nothing to shorten wait-time in line.  You simply must watch that Bluesky video of Houston travelers in an endless line while, wait for it, Lee Greenwood’s ‘God Bless The USA’ blares over the loudspeakers.  Can anyone think of a more fitting snapshot of America right now than that?:

President Donald Trump’s impulsive decision to send Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents into U.S. airports has not impressed the millions of travelers stuck in long lines due to the Republican Party’s failure to fund the Department of Homeland Security.

Trump’s rejection of Democrats’ proposals to fund the Transportation Security Administration has created chaotic travel conditions across the country, and travelers have begun pointing out the irony of it all. What could be more fitting than listening to MAGA music hero Lee Greenwood’s “God Bless the U.S.A.” while going nowhere fast?

And what are Trump’s ICE goons doing to alleviate the mess he’s created? Not much, it seems. In fact, many ICE agents are dealing with their fear of cameras—and running away from travelers. (There’s also video of unmasked ICE agents high-tailing it from cameras.)

Democratic Sen. Cory Booker of New Jersey nailed the cynicism behind Trump’s move, calling it an “outrage.”

“He’s taking the very same agency that has been bursting into our schools, into our churches, into our hospitals, into our courts, and even into the homes of Americans,” Booker said at a press conference Monday. “He’s taking that agency that is recklessly out of control and bringing them to our airports under the lie that somehow this is going to help deal with the long lines that he created in the first place.

Trump Orders Rethugs Not To Pass TSA ‘Compromise’ Until/Unless…:

On Sunday, Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R-S.D., discussed an off-ramp with President Donald Trump to reopen TSA and end the long lines and delays at airports.

It would fund all of the Department of Homeland Security except for ICE, which Democrats have refused to support without new limitations on immigration enforcement operations, two sources with knowledge of the conversation told NBC News.

ICE would be funded separately by Republicans in a party-line “reconciliation” bill that can pass without the need for any Democratic support later in the year.

Republicans believe that the off-ramp Trump and Thune discussed would win support from Democrats, who have offered to fund noncontroversial parts of the Department of Homeland Security on the Senate floor while the two parties continue to negotiate on immigration.

But Trump rejected it — as he made clear in a Truth Social post Sunday night.

“I don’t think we should make any deal with the Crazy, Country Destroying, Radical Left Democrats unless, and until, they Vote with Republicans to pass ‘THE SAVE AMERICA ACT,’” Trump wrote, while instead calling on Republicans to “Kill the Filibuster, and stay in D.C. for Easter, if necessary.”

Well, they’re not killing the filibuster.  So all that Trump has done is to make sure that he and the Rethugs own the long lines at airports.  Sad.

Explosion At Texas Valero Refinery.  This won’t help lower oil prices.

Everything Falls Apart–Including The Climate:

A stunning heatwave that shattered records in the US west is threatening to rapidly melt the sparse snowpack and ramp up wildfire risks in the seasons ahead.

March has already been historically hot, but the early onset of summer weather across the region may be here to stay. There’s little reprieve in forecasts, which show more heat records may fall this spring.

Extreme heat is exceptionally dangerous, especially so early in the year, when bodies and systems are not prepared for it and when it lingers over a long period of time. This heatwave is also posing significant threats to the water supply. After one of the warmest winters in the west, the snow that feeds streams, reservoirs and soil moisture as it melts through the summer season is already dismally scarce in key watersheds.

“Drought conditions worsened or developed for much of the Great Plains, Lower Mississippi Valley, and south-east US due to warmer and drier than normal conditions this winter,” said Jon Gottschalck, chief of the Operational Prediction Branch at NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center, in a spring outlook published on Friday. The agency said drought is expected to persist and expand across the west due to the unrelenting heat.

Heat also bakes more moisture out of landscapes, amplifying wildfire risks and extending the seasons when ignitions can quickly become infernos.

FWIW, ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ came out in 2006.

What do you want to talk about?