Trump Has Early Stage Alzheimer’s?  It’s as plain as the orange makeup caked on his hand:

Trump’s deteriorating physical and cognitive condition stopped being a punchline somewhere around the moment he fell asleep in a Cabinet meeting (23 times this week alone), got angry when asked about his MRI, and sent his entire comms team out to claim he had a “preventative MRI” — a procedure that, like his inauguration crowd size, exists only in his imagination.

But now?
It’s not just neurologists and psychiatrists whispering behind closed doors.

A certified medical professional with 14 years of experience treating dementia patients may have just cracked the whole f***ing code — complete with a specific drug, specific side effects, and specific behavioral symptoms that perfectly match what we’re all watching happen to Donald J. Trump in real time.

The video transcript lays it out plainly:

“This dementia patient keeps having bruising on his hand because he’s most likely getting a monthly infusion of a drug called Kisunla… roughly once a month, you see his hand bruised, covered with makeup, and in this case covered with two band-aids, because his veins are suffering repeated trauma from the infusion.”

Trump’s mysteriously bruised hand — the one photographers have caught, caked with orange makeup and concealer — is exactly what patients look like after repeated IV infusions of Kisunla (donanemab), a monoclonal antibody drug for early symptomatic Alzheimer’s disease.

And here’s where it gets nuclear:

👉 Kisunla requires monthly infusion.
👉 Kisunla commonly causes ARIA (brain swelling/bleeding).
👉 Kisunla requires repeat MRIs to monitor the bleeding/swelling.

Suddenly Trump’s secret MRIs — the ones Leavitt tried to spin as “preventative” — make perfect sense.

In other words, the diametric opposite of what the so-called ‘opposition party’ has to say.  Which is nothing.  Repeat after me:  He is unfit to serve and must leave office.

Mortgage Fraud Is OK When The President Does It:

For months, the Trump administration has been accusing its political enemies of mortgage fraud for claiming more than one primary residence.

President Donald Trump branded one foe who did so “deceitful and potentially criminal.” He called another “CROOKED” on Truth Social and pushed the attorney general to take action.

But years earlier, Trump did the very thing he’s accusing his enemies of, records show.

In 1993, Trump signed a mortgage for a “Bermuda style” home in Palm Beach, Florida, pledging that it would be his principal residence. Just seven weeks later, he got another mortgage for a seven-bedroom, marble-floored neighboring property, attesting that it too would be his principal residence.

In reality, Trump, then a New Yorker, does not appear to have ever lived in either home, let alone used them as a principal residence. Instead, the two houses, which are next to his historic Mar-a-Lago estate, were used as investment properties and rented out, according to contemporaneous news accounts and an interview with his longtime real estate agent — exactly the sort of scenario his administration has pointed to as evidence of fraud.

Mortgage law experts who reviewed the records for ProPublica were struck by the irony of Trump’s dual mortgages. They said claiming primary residences on different mortgages at the same time, as Trump did, is often legal and rarely prosecuted. But Trump’s two loans, they said, exceed the low bar the Trump administration itself has set for mortgage fraud.

“Given Trump’s position on situations like this, he’s going to either need to fire himself or refer himself to the Department of Justice,” said Kathleen Engel, a Suffolk University law professor and leading expert on mortgage finance. “Trump has deemed that this type of misrepresentation is sufficient to preclude someone from serving the country.”

More Than 200 Environmental Groups Demand Halt To New US Data Centers.  Will any of the shadowy co-conspirators on NCC Council read this, or have someone read it to them?:

A coalition of more than 230 environmental groups has demanded a national moratorium on new data centers in the US, the latest salvo in a growing backlash to a booming artificial intelligence industry that has been blamed for escalating electricity bills and worsening the climate crisis.

The green groups, including Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, Food & Water Watch and dozens of local organizations, have urged members of Congress halt the proliferation of energy-hungry data centers, accusing them of causing planet-heating emissions, sucking up vast amounts of water and for exacerbating electricity bill increases that have hit Americans this year.

“The rapid, largely unregulated rise of data centers to fuel the AI and crypto frenzy is disrupting communities across the country and threatening Americans’ economic, environmental, climate and water security,” the letter states, adding that approval of new data centers should be paused until new regulations are put in place.

When asked about his criminal record, Atkins said his past is almost a decade behind him now, which has given him time to mature and apologize to his former constituents.

“Circumstances change,” he said. “I was in a very unsettling, bad relationship. That’s been over with for years, and I’m on the right path.”

In a Facebook comment responding to skepticism about his potential run, Atkins wrote that his former wife admitted she “wasn’t 100% truthful” in her statements in the 2014 case.

“I understand firsthand how destructive toxic relationships can be,” he wrote. “Many men like me do.”

Why ‘The Charlie Brown Christmas Special’ Resonates:

My parents were atheists; I knew almost nothing about Christianity as a child, although I got the lay of the land when I was sent to Catholic school in sixth grade. Before that, my parents—especially my mother—actively worked to keep me and my sister free from religion, Christianity in particular. But we had our gods. Santa Claus and the Easter Bunny reigned over us, with great kindness and generosity, and if we came, eventually, to a crisis of faith, we dealt with it privately. My sister and I understood that our feelings about Christmas were very important to our parents. The brief—transmitted in the silent language of the family—was to be happy, because our parents had had terrible childhoods, and instead of working out their pasts in psychoanalysis or “involvement,” they threw themselves into these perfect Christmases. It was the most wonderful, extremely tense time of the year.

My earliest grasp of how Christianity worked came from the Charlie Brown Christmas special—funny, cool, beloved by all. The special was first broadcast in 1965, when Charles Schulz’s Peanuts cartoon strip was in the initial flush of its stupendous popularity (the characters had been on the cover of Time magazine that spring), syndicated in hundreds of American newspapers. Millions of children knew and loved it, so half of the work was already done: We knew that Lucy was crabby and Sally was romantic and Schroeder was single-minded. In that time, television was not an endless range of possibilities, every watcher a Prospero, conjuring up visions on command. In those days you had three networks, and if one of them was broadcasting a show for children at night, you can bet that the news had been shouted down school stairwells and across playgrounds, and you can bet that all of us were in position, sitting on family-room carpets and living-room couches, breathing as one, soaking it all in.

Charles Schulz had what Maurice Sendak had: respect for children. He understood the way they think and feel, not the way adults want them to think and feel. He understood that there’s a point in children’s growing up when Christmas doesn’t work its magic as reliably as it once did. Schulz let them explore a taboo subject, Christmastime unhappiness, while still reassuring them that Christmas is a good and fun and wonderful thing. He also insisted that there be no laugh track, saying that if the children found it funny, they would laugh. And he insisted that children, rather than adult voice actors, read the dialogue.

One more thing:

Another reason A Charlie Brown Christmas has staying power is because it’s cool. That’s because in 1963 the producer, Lee Mendelson, had an experience that many people had that year. He was listening to the radio when a song came on that wasn’t like any other. It was the B side of a single from a jazz album called Impressions of Black Orpheus. The song was “Cast Your Fate to the Wind,” by the Vince Guaraldi Trio, and if you’ve never heard it, you should play it right now. It’s a song that comes over you in a powerful way, somehow expressing the way that melancholy and happiness can combine into an intense emotion. Mendelson heard it on the radio and thought it would be perfect for a documentary he was then making about Schulz, whose work had a mid-century sophistication. The documentary never aired, but when the animated special came around he decided—what the hell?—to use the same music. That was the genius decision, the force that keeps the show from being dated:

The Word Of The Year Is Two Words:  ‘Rage Bait’.  Definition:

As the wordsmiths explained in their Dec. 1 press release, rage bait is “online content deliberately designed to elicit anger or outrage by being frustrating, provocative, or offensive, typically posted in order to increase traffic to or engagement with a particular web page or social media content.” While they never use the term “MAGA,” there can be no doubt that they’re talking about the decentralized, mostly online propaganda that has created the movement and given so much power to Donald Trump.

Oops, I’m veering too close to the ‘political’ on what is normally my Sunday ‘politics-free’ zone.

‘Solar-Punk’ Sustainability: Featuring ‘no pets’:

Bill Smart has never heard the word “solarpunk”. But the softly spoken 77-year-old lights up when given the definition from Wikipedia: a literary, artistic and social movement that envisions and works towards actualising a sustainable future interconnected with nature and community.

Solar refers not just to renewable energy but to an optimistic, anti-dystopian vision of the future. Punk is an allusion to its countercultural, do-it-yourself ethic.

“That’s us!” says Smart, a retired mechanical engineer. “I never knew there was a word for it. I guess I’ve been a punk all along.”

In the 13 years since he and his wife, Susan, moved in, Smart says all kinds of people have made their home here at one time or another. There are retirees like themselves, young families, movie stuntmen, journalists, children from wealthy families, Buddhist monks, composers and the odd recluse looking for privacy.

“This is the way people should be living,” says Smart. “You know, you can live in a suburb and you don’t know your neighbours. People drive into their homes, lock the garage door. Here everyone knows each other. Everyone helps keep an eye on the kids.”

It takes all types to make a village, he says. Just about the only creatures not welcome in this one are cats and dogs. Currumbin Ecovillage was conceived as a wildlife sanctuary and corridor for native Australian animals. A cat or dog may be another member of the family but they are also hungry carnivores, lethal predators and territorial animals that have significant environmental and climate impacts. For a community built around meeting the needs of humans and nature, there was no room for feline and canine friends, even on a temporary visit. Smart says: “Dogs are nice and very loyal and everything. We do miss having a dog but that’s the price we’re prepared to pay.”

RIP–Steve Cropper:

How ‘Green Onions’ was created pretty much by accident:

Play It, Steve:

Gotta make this quick–it’s Claymont Parade Day…

CDC Goes All-In On Anti-Vax:

ATLANTA — For decades, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has fought attempts by the anti-vaccine movement to sow doubts in the safety and efficacy of the shots that marked a triumph of public health. This week, the agency instead provided a powerful platform for the cause.

Common anti-vaccine talking points were on display in presentations and discussions during a two-day meeting of federal immunization advisers at the CDC headquarters in Atlanta. It culminated Friday with the end of a long-standing recommendation for every newborn to receive a hepatitis B vaccine and President Donald Trump directing a broader probe into whether American children receive too many shots.

One panel member likened taking vaccines to flying on an airplane that hadn’t been sufficiently safety tested. One speakerincorrectly citeda study about the level of protection afforded by the birth dose of hepatitis B vaccine. Multiple panelists questioned whetherimmigrantswere toblame for the spread ofvaccine-preventable illnesses, with one calling it “the elephant in the room.”

An outspoken attorney for the anti-vaccine movement — whose law firm has filed numerous vaccine-related lawsuits — delivered a jargon-laden presentation for more than 90 minutes about the history of childhood immunization and accused the CDC of recommending shots with insufficient research on potential harms.

Such moments at the two-day meeting of the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP) prompted incredulity from some vaccine experts, medical associations and Democratic elected officials. They argued that the panel, which for decades has guided access to immunizations, has lost all credibility under Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a longtime vaccine skeptic who has appointed a raft of anti-vaccine activists or critics of immunization policy to federal health positions. After telling senators during a confirmation hearing that he supports the childhood immunization schedule, Kennedy has since taken steps to beginoverhauling the series of vaccinations that he has long blamed as a potential cause of childhood illness.

Corrupt Supreme Court OK’s Corrupt Texas Gerrymander.  Did you expect any other result?:

The Supreme Court was simply hamstrung, Justice Samuel Alito wrote, unable to knock down Texas’ hyper-partisan, likely racial gerrymander because the election it would govern is so close.

Said election, though, is a whopping 11 months away. Yet that near year of time — plus a March primary, which Texas could delay — counts as the “eve of an election,” Alito wrote in his concurrence, so close to voting that changing the maps risks confusing voters. He’s referring to the Purcell principle, which stems from a 2006 case that concerned a change in Arizona photo ID laws “weeks away” from the election.

This isn’t the first time the Supreme Court’s right wing has invoked Purcell to uphold Republican maps, even when they’re being litigated comically far out from the election. In 2022, the Court blocked a district court order requiring that Alabama draw new maps, even though the state had nine months to draw new ones before the general elections.

Making the invocation of Purcell even flimsier in Thursday’s case — Abbott v. League of United Latin American Citizens — Texas only produced its new maps in August, under pressure from the Trump administration to eke out a few more Republican seats. The plaintiffs challenging the maps and the district court, Justice Elena Kagan wrote in dissent, worked as quickly as they possibly could — meaning that the Court just wrote a roadmap for illegal gerrymanders. Just wait to pass them until the “eve” of the election, and no one can stop you.

“And even supposing it is now the ninth or tenth hour, whose choice was that?” she wrote. “It was of course the Texas legislature that decided to change its map six months before a March primary.”

Logic didn’t enter into this 6-3 decision.  It was pure partisan politics masquerading as jurisprudence.

Attempted DOJ Persecution Of Letitia James Fails:

The Justice Department failed Thursday to secure a new indictment against New York Attorney General Letitia James after a judge dismissed the previous mortgage fraud prosecution encouraged by President Donald Trump, according to people familiar with the matter.

Prosecutors went back to a grand jury in Virginia after a judge’s ruling halting the prosecution of James and another longtime Trump foe, former FBI Director James Comey, on the grounds that the U.S. attorney who presented the cases was illegally appointed. But grand jurors rejected prosecutors’ request to bring charges.

It’s the latest setback for the Justice Department in its bid to prosecute the frequent political target of the Republican president.

Prosecutors are expected to try again for an indictment, according to one person familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss the case.

Have you noticed lately (I have) that certain news organizations are no longer mincing words about what Trump, DOJ, and other rogue agencies are doing?  If only the feckless D electeds would follow their lead…

What’s Wrong With This Cartoon?  It’s funny, but has one fatal flaw.  What is it?:

Speaking of asleep on the job, what exactly was Delaware’s Worst Governor Ever doing when this stuff went on with the Port Of Wilmington?

Standing outside Legislative Hall on Thursday, Delaware State Auditor Lydia York braced against a chilly wind and even chillier reception from state officials after she presented findings from her office’s audit of the Port of Wilmington.

Published that morning, the audit report stated that Delaware’s port oversight board had failed during a recent four-year period to sufficiently supervise and inspect operations at the Port of Wilmington, which York described as the state’s largest public asset.

Among several specific findings, the report claimed that the board of the Diamond State Port Corporation had improperly held meetings in secret; had misled the public about the port’s true condition; did not hold sufficient oversight meetings with the port’s current and past private operators; and relied on outdated jobs projections for a planned port expansion. (Hmmm, sounds like a random jobs projection for the data center to me.  But, I digress.)

The audit also followed years of acrimony at the Port of Wilmington under its previous operator — Emirati-based Gulftainer.

In 2023, the Diamond State Port Corporation ousted Gulftainer from Delaware, by voiding its 50-year operating contract and installing Massachusetts-based Enstructure in its place.

Over the next year and half, state officials and Enstructure pushed forward plans to expand the Port of Wilmington at the site of a former Edgemoor chemical plant, north of Wilmington. As part of the effort, then-Gov. John Carney announced last year that he would pull $195 million out of a little-known government fund to pay for about a third of the construction cost for what was to be a new Edgemoor container terminal.

Then, days before Gov. Matt Meyer came into office in January, state finance officials rushed through the actual transfer of that money to the Diamond State Port Corporation.

The Board’s excuse?:

In the official response to the findings, which also was published in the audit report, Diamond State Port Corporation officials indicated that there was no way to force Gulftainer to pay its delinquent bills, after the company “soured on the business opportunity at the Port.”

That’s not an excuse, it’s an admission.

The usual suspects (Senate D’s, the current Secretary of State and her failed predecessor) are taking umbrage.   Take Jeff Bullock.  Please:

Beyond current port officials, the Diamond State Port Corporation’s previous board chair, former State Secretary Jeffrey Bullock, also defended decisions made during his term, which ended in January.

He said his port board had to discuss certain topics in secret executive sessions in the past because of a potential for legal action against the port’s operator.

“In executive session, we had also discussed the ongoing financial difficulties of Gulftainer, and their refusal to resolve them, resulting in likely legal action with their lenders,” Bullock said.

Jeff?  We can see how totally fucked-up your decisions on the Port were.  Were there a Delaware Peter Principle Hall Of Fame, you’d be first-ballot.

Here’s the literal bottom line:

Beyond its findings about operations, York’s audit also tallied the total amount of taxpayer dollars that have flowed through the state-owned Diamond State Port Corporation between 2021 and 2025 to support the Port of Wilmington.

Between COVID relief money, transfers from a little-known state purse, forgiven debt, and other dollars the port corporation held, the public supported the Port of Wilmington with as much as $265 million during the four-year period, according to the report.

“In 2018, past DSPC leadership promised the State of Delaware was ‘out of the port business,’” York said. “The reality is, since then, our state has almost doubled its financial commitment to the port.”

Besides the public money that has already flowed to the Port of Wilmington is another $180 million in federal grants that have been committed for the facility’s expansion in Edgemoor.

Karl:  I apologize for exceeding Fair Use.  I’m upping my monthly Spotlight Delaware subscription as of today. (All of our readers should subscribe, BTW.)  Please forgive me.

What do you want to talk about?

Trump Knows That Tariffs Will Be Ruled Illegal By Supreme Court:

Since oral arguments on Nov. 5, Trump has removed or otherwise modified IEEPA tariffs for myriad goods imported from at least seven  countries. Coffee and beef from Brazil, pharmaceutical products, aerospace equipment, and key commodities from Malaysia, and textiles and apparel from El Salvador are all coming into the U.S. at a 0% tariff, for instance.

It appears Trump is rushing to close deals in case the administration’s tariffs leverage is taken off the table by the Supreme Court, Inu Manak, senior fellow for international trade at the Council on Foreign Relations, told TPM.

“We’ve seen a focus on the conclusion of negotiations that were sort of started because of the imposition of tariffs,” said Manak. “And I think part of the reason for that has been the fear that if the tariffs go away, that there’s gonna be no incentive for each country to sit down and negotiate with the United States.”

The Supreme Court usually releases decisions in June, but the tariffs case is on an expedited timeline: international trade law firms expect the Court to issue a decision on this case as soon as this month, or early next year.

Only question is which Justice(s) have leaked the likely outcome to Trump.

Hegseth Clinging To Burning Boat.  Which strike will do him in?:

WASHINGTON (AP) — Pete Hegseth barely squeaked through a grueling Senate confirmation process to become secretary of defense earlier this year, facing lawmakers wary of the Fox News Channel host and skeptical of his capacity, temperament and fitness for the job.

Just three months later, he quickly became embroiled in Signalgate as he and other top U.S. officials used the popular Signal messaging application to discuss pending military strikes in Yemen. A Pentagon inspector general’s report delivered to lawmakers Wednesday found his actions posed a risk to personnel and mission.

The scrutiny surrounding Hegseth’s brash leadership style is surfacing what has been long-building discontent in Congress over President Donald Trump’s choice to helm the U.S. military. And it’s posing a potentially existential moment for Hegseth as the congressional committees overseeing the military launch an investigation amid mounting calls from Democratic senators for his resignation.

Since working to become defense secretary, Hegseth has vowed to bring a “warrior culture” to the U.S. government’s most powerful and expensive department, from rebranding it as the Department of War to essentially discarding the rules that govern how soldiers conduct themselves when lives are on the line.

During a speech in September, he told an unusual gathering of top military brass whom he had summoned from all corners of the globe to the Quantico Marine Corps Base in Virginia that they should not “fight with stupid rules of engagement.”

“We untie the hands of our warfighters to intimidate, demoralize, hunt and kill the enemies of our country,” he said. “No more politically correct and overbearing rules of engagement, just common sense, maximum lethality and authority for warfighters.”

He’s toast.  Only question: Will Fox take him back?

Steve Bannon:  Ubiqitous and Omnipresent.  Add Epstein’s Image Consultant to the list:

IF YOU FOLLOWED THE TWISTS AND TURNS of the Jeffrey Epstein saga over the last few weeks, you already know that several prominent names emerged from the tranche of emails that the Epstein estate released. But there is one big name that has so far received very little attention.

Let’s set the stage. To be unmasked as an Epstein crony is about the most embarrassing revelation for a public figure one can imagine at this moment, and sure enough, former treasury secretary and Harvard president Larry Summers, who exchanged scores of emails with the convicted pedophile, has seen his reputation shredded. The emails disclosed that Summers consulted Epstein for dating, or rather bedding, advice. Summers apparently thought Epstein was the guy who could help him to “get horizontal” with a woman mentee, though Summers was a married man and remains so. At the same time, he sought financial contributions from Epstein for an online poetry project his wife was launching.

Exit Summers.  Enter:

ALL OF WHICH RAISES A QUESTION: Why has there been no similar accountability for another of Epstein’s pen pals—Steve Bannon?

Trump’s consigliere, strategist, propagandist, and former senior counselor at the White House was on very friendly terms with Jeffrey Epstein. He exchanged hundreds of emails with the convicted felon and conspired to whitewash his public image.

Do you have friends who can send a private jet to retrieve you when your flight has been delayed? Epstein apparently did that for Bannon in 2018. On a trip to Great Britain, Bannon was greeted by protests. He emailed Epstein: “Protesters slowed down speech don’t think I can make the flight we r enroute to heathrow.” Epstein replied that he could fix it: “There. Is a gulf air that leaves at 950 with a stop in Bahrain.” Bannon was appreciative, joking that “U r an amazing assistant.” Keeping up the theme, Epstein emailed a few days later asking how it feels “to have the most highly paid travel agent in history.” Bannon responded “U r pretty good asst.” Epstein in turn replied “Massages. Not Included.” Yes, you read that correctly.

This is great and extensive reporting.  I’ll just give you a further taste to entice you to read the entire article:

Some weeks later, apparently planning some sort of public response, Bannon advises Epstein “If you do an interview it can’t be like ‘Johnnie does a utube’ – has to be amazingly professional and perfectly cut.”

One of those professionals was evidently going to be Bannon himself. He filmed fifteen hours for a documentary that would attempt to redeem Epstein’s reputation. When Epstein related that a “christian group” he had met with said the media were portraying him as “irredeemable,” Bannon responded, “Yes yes yes of course — but we must counter ‘rapist who traffics in female children to be raped by worlds most powerful , richest men’ — that can’t be redeemed — that why we let them blow up the argument while showing the 12 you redeemed. . . . Can’t redeem unredeemable — — you are a lot of things — which we will show — but you are NOT that.”

Bannon then coordinated with Epstein about the filming schedule. Epstein asked: “Did your guys prefer beard or no beard?” Bannon responded: “Slight growth.”

NCC Councilman Dave Carter: ‘Transparency For Data Center’.  I’m cut-and-pasting the entire release because I agree with every word of it:

Councilman Carter Calls for Full Transparency on Project Washington Tax Claims and Undisclosed Labor Agreements

 New Castle County, Delaware.  Councilman David B. Carter, in a correspondence sent last week, called on Starwood Digital Ventures to publicly disclose the assumptions, calculations, and agreements underlying their public claims about the economic benefits of “Project Washington,” a proposed 1.2 GW Data Center in Delaware City, Delaware.

Over recent months, New Castle County residents have been inundated with social media ads, text message blasts, and public statements that promote unusually high property-tax and economic-benefit projections for the proposed 1.2-gigawatt data center campus. They have also been bombarded by claims of high employment promises.  Despite the scale of these claims, Starwood Digital Venture has not provided any supporting methodology or documentation for the public to review and evaluate.

“New Castle County residents deserve transparency, not Facebook graphics, unverifiable talking points, or promotional claims that cannot withstand scrutiny,” said Councilman Carter. “When projected tax numbers exceed realistic estimates by more than an order of magnitude, it raises serious concerns about whether the public is being intentionally misled.”

Analysis, based on actual assessments from existing data centers in Delaware, including the JP Morgan facility in Bear, shows dramatically lower tax-revenue projections than those promoted by Starwood and its affiliated advocates. Without full disclosure of land-value assumptions, building assessments, tax-calculation methods, and the financial basis for the numbers being circulated, neither the public nor policymakers can evaluate the accuracy of these claims.  Similarly, without disclosure of any and all agreements with labor unions, neither the public nor our policy makers can determine the validity of the job creation claims or the durability of job creation promises made by Starwood.  Neither the public nor any public official should trust these claims unless they can be fully and accurately verified, a process that requires full public disclosure by Starwood Digital Ventures.

Call for Disclosure

In a letter to representatives of Starwood, Councilman Carter formally requests that:

1. Starwood Digital Ventures provide the full tax-benefit calculations and underlying assumptions used in all social-media ads, text messages, public statements, and economic-impact claims.
2. Starwood Digital Ventures disclose all agreements, letters of understanding, or MOUs negotiated with Starwood Digital Ventures; documents repeatedly referenced in public policy advocacy efforts but never shared with the residents directly affected.
3. Starwood Digital Ventures disclose the factual basis for their economic-impact assertions, including job-creation assumptions, valuation estimates, and any third-party models used.

“If these claims are accurate, there should be no hesitation in providing the data behind them,” Carter said. “If the information is withheld, it raises legitimate questions the public deserves to have answered.”

Delaware’s Economic Claims History with Insufficient Due Diligence

Delaware has experienced firsthand what happens when major economic-development proposals advance on the basis of promotional claims without rigorous, transparent, and data-driven due diligence.

• Fisker Automotive received substantial state incentives and broad backing from Delaware business organizations. The promised jobs never materialized, and taxpayers were left responsible for tens of millions of dollars in losses.
• Bloom Energy, despite early assurances of economic growth, resulted in long-term costs for Delmarva ratepayers through a surcharge established to subsidize the project. These costs continue today and disproportionately affect working families and seniors.
• AstraZeneca’s Delaware Expansion was once promoted as a cornerstone of the state’s biotech and pharmaceutical economy, with $200 Million in incentives awarded based on projected long-term job growth and facility investment. Within a few years, the company dramatically downsized its Delaware operations, eliminating thousands of jobs, abandoning large segments of its campus, and leaving the state and New Castle County with vacant or underutilized facilities that had been expected to anchor economic activity for a generation.

These projects share a common pattern:

High-profile promises, limited transparency, strong advocacy by business groups, and ultimately negative financial consequences for Delaware communities.  They also all were pushed hard by public officials without conducting adequate due diligence review of the true costs and benefits, or even their viability.

Because of this history, New Castle County has an obligation to ensure that any economic-development claims, particularly those influencing land-use decisions, are fully transparent, verifiable, and grounded in independently reviewable data.

“Transparency is not optional, it is essential for any project of this scale,” Carter said. “New Castle County taxpayers should not be asked to accept massive industrial impacts based on unverifiable promotional claims made by the special interest who profit from this at the expense of our residents. We have a responsibility to learn from past failures and insist on full public disclosure before moving forward.”

Amen.

What do you want to talk about?

“Schumer:  Trump Is Clearly Demented And Needs To Step Down.”

Yes, it’s a fake headline.  You could put the name of any Democratic officeholder in there, and it would still be a fake headline.  Despite the fact that Trump is clearly demented.  Just days after calling Tim Walz the R word, he calls Somalis living in Minneapolis ‘garbage’.  This is 3 am-in-the-dementia-ward stuff.  Trump spends most nights pumping out this insanity on Truth Social, then falls asleep at official meetings during the day.  I’ll use a Truth Social mainstay here:  TRUMP IS CLEARLY DEMENTED!  HE IS AN ONGOING THREAT TO OUR COUNTRY!!  HE MUST BE PUT ON A GARBAGE SCOW AND TOWED  ENDLESSLY AROUND THE HUDSON UNTIL HE DIES!!!

My point, and I do have one, is that any elected D who fails to call out his unfitness for office is also unfit for office.  We can start with Delaware’s own Posse Comity of Coons, LBR and Sarah.  Chris, perhaps you heard this during your Bearded Marxist dalliance:  ‘If you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem.’

I can’t, for the life of me, understand why the D’s and, yes, the media, refuse to break out the megaphones on this, and state the obvious.  I do know that those who are part of the problem need to be primaried.

Rethugs ‘Win’ In Tennessee, Socialist Elected Mayor Of Jersey City.  From The Downballot:

Republican Matt Van Epps defeated Democrat Aftyn Behn 54-45 in Tuesday’s special election for Tennessee’s 7th Congressional District, a victory that represents a 13-point underperformance for the GOP compared to Donald Trump’s 60-38 showing here last year.

Republicans acknowledged that a victory alone would not alter the reality that the political environment has moved sharply against the GOP this year, and there may be worse to come.

“If our victory margin is single digits, the conference may come unhinged,” one unnamed House Republican told Politico just before Tuesday’s election.  Let the unhinging begin.

Jersey City:

Progressive Democrat Mikie Sherrill easily won the race for governor. Socialist Zohran Mamdani won the race for New York City mayor in a landslide.

That trend continued in Jersey City last night as voters rejected the old guard Democratic party and elected a Socialist liberal to the office of mayor.

Former Governor Jim McGreevey was once considered a front-runner (kinda like Chris Coons is now) as he attempted a political comeback. He outspent councilman James Solomon 2-to-1 in this race and had the backing of much of the Democratic party machine.

As polls showed Solomon leading in the day’s up Tuesday’s election, many party bosses abandoned McGreevey and either endorsed Solomon or stayed neutral.

This sends yet another message that is troubling to many mainstream Democrats: the socialist faction of the party is taking over.  (Actually, it’s the Democratic wing of the Democratic Party.  But why quibble?)

Addressing supporters who had gathered to watch returns and cheer him on, Solomon said: “Now the mission is clear, and the work begins tonight. And the work we have to do is making Jersey City affordable. So I say tonight, an affordable Jersey City starts now.”