Sunrise — 6:54 and midday — 1:41.

"It is certain that the war will end sooner with the policies of the team that will now lead the White House."

Said Volodymyr Zelensky, quoted in "Trump’s victory means war will end sooner, says Zelensky/Ukrainian president said he had had a ‘constructive’ conversation with the US president-elect and he had heard nothing ‘that goes against our position'" (London Times).

He added that Ukraine “must do everything so that this war ends next year, ends through diplomatic means.”

"Of course, Harris might make a third bid for the White House, though her loss to Trump after raising over $1 billion will weigh heavily on many Democrats’ minds."

"On the flip side, Harris was within a few swing-state percentage points of the presidency after spending just over 100 days in the race and battling economic headwinds that have sunk parties in power around the world. Whether Harris is up to another campaign is a different question, a senior aide noted, and the answer will only come with time. 'We’re barely a week after the election,' the person said."

From "Democratic jockeying for the 2028 presidential election is already underway/Nearly two dozen Democrats are seen as possible contenders ahead of an invisible primary that will be shaped partly by Trump and his second term" (NBC News).

From this, I will avert my eyes.

"The rise of Bhattacharya — from being scorned by the nation’s NIH director to possibly occupying his office four years later..."

"... reflects how the backlash to coronavirus policies has helped reshape conservative politics and elevate new voices..... [W]hile many public health experts issued dire warnings about the need to shutter schools and businesses, Bhattacharya coauthored an April 2020 study that drew a different conclusion: The coronavirus was far more widespread than previously assumed, suggesting its risks were overstated.... [T]he study’s key contention — that many Americans were unknowingly infected and showing no symptoms — was hailed by some conservative leaders eager to end lockdowns.... Then came the Great Barrington Declaration, drafted with Martin Kulldorff, then a professor at Harvard Medical School, and Sunetra Gupta, an infectious-disease epidemiologist at the University of Oxford.... 'Our goal should therefore be to minimize mortality and social harm until we reach herd immunity,' the trio’s open letter read. Public health groups swiftly condemned Bhattacharya and the other authors, saying their proposal would imperil the most vulnerable Americans. While the declaration called for focused protections, such as delivering groceries to older Americans, it urged that younger Americans return to work, allowing them to slowly build immunity against the virus...."

From "Jay Bhattacharya, an NIH critic, emerges as a top candidate to lead the agency/The Stanford physician was excoriated by NIH’s director in 2020 for his 'fringe' ideas on covid. Four years later, he’s poised for power in Trump’s Washington" (WaPo).

"A mom in Georgia is speaking out about being arrested for reckless conduct after her then-10-year-old son was found walking alone."

 ABC News reports.

During the arrest, [Brittany] Patterson...said to one of the deputies, "Last time I checked, it wasn't illegal for a kid to walk to the store."

But the deputy replied, "It is when they're 10 years old."... 

Authorities said they would drop the charge against Patterson if she signs a safety plan that involves the use of a GPS tracker on her son's phone but... "I just felt like I couldn't sign that and that in doing so, would be agreeing that there was something unsafe about my home or something unsafe about my parental decisions and I just don't believe that," Patterson said.

"The words 'chronic illness,' as far as I know, never came out of the Harris campaign's mouth. And I think that was a real misstep..."

"... because Americans are, I think, tired of being gaslit about the fact that there's not a problem right now. And when we look around us, we know there is. And Trump has asked RFK to do three simple things. He's asked to get the corruption out of the U.S. health agencies, produce uncompromised evidence-based research for our health guidelines, and reverse the trends of the chronic disease epidemic in two years for children and adults so that we can show up for our 250th anniversary of America stronger than ever. That sounds pretty good to me."

Dr. Casey Means Wows Liberal Audience and Gets Them to CHEER for RFK Jr.'s HHS Nomination

“If we were crushing it [at health], we would not be spending 2x every other country in the entire world and have the lowest life expectancy of any developed country in the entire world.”

pic.twitter.com/160GKOHQMh

— The Vigilant Fox 🦊 (@VigilantFox) November 16, 2024

That's Dr. Casey Means on Bill Maher's show last night.

"The boys in our liberal school are different now that Trump has won."

This is an article by "Anonymous" in The Guardian, ostensibly written by a girl who is a senior in a high school in New York's Hudson Valley — a "mostly liberal" place, we're told. She purports to be capable of perceiving and reporting how boys have changed since 10 days ago. I have no idea how accurate any of this is, but I'm interested in the text that was published, which says something about The Guardian's attitude, if nothing else:

When we walked into school on the morning of 6 November, we exchanged quick glances with the other girls in our social circle – looks filled with uncertainty and dread about the future.... [A]s we walked to our first period classes... we noticed a very different attitude among our male peers. Subtle high-fives were exchanged and remarks about the impending success of the next four years were whispered around. It didn’t make much sense.... 

Sunrise — 6:57.

"So what happened in this campaign is Donald Trump said to the American people, you are angry. You're really pissed off."

"And I know that, and you're right. And then he gave his explanation and his explanation, which was obviously nonsense and false and racist, et cetera, was that millions and millions of undocumented people were coming across the border. They were invading. America, we're an occupied country. They were taking your jobs, taking your benefits, eating your cats and your dogs. That is why you are hurting. Now, that is a crazy explanation, but it is an explanation. Now you tell me what the Democratic explanation was.... Well, the Democratic explanation was, hey, we have passed some good things, very important things in the Biden administration, which happens to be true.... There was no appreciation — no appreciation — of the struggling and the suffering of millions and millions of working class people.... You know, you can't fight something with nothing. You gotta have an alternative vision. Trump had his vision. It was incorrect, it was dishonest. It was in many cases racist and sexist. He had a vision, he had an explanation. To my view, Democrats really did not."

Said Bernie Sanders, in the new episode of the NYT "Daily" podcast, "Bernie Sanders Says Democrats Have Lost Their Way."

Rocky says Trump is George Washington.

BREAKING: Sylvester Stallone just made a surprise appearance with President Donald Trump here at Mar-a-Lago! @A1Policy

“No one could have done what this man has done. He’s the 2nd George Washington” pic.twitter.com/j8F53EVhvL

— Jack Poso 🇺🇸 (@JackPosobiec) November 15, 2024

"The Onion’s Decision to Buy Infowars Started As a Joke/It’s their most expensive gag yet."

Headline at New York Magazine.

Does anyone find this funny?

Last June, the satirical website’s new CEO, Ben Collins, saw that a federal bankruptcy judge had ordered Alex Jones to liquidate his assets at auction to pay off the millions he owes to Sandy Hook families he defamed. “That’d be one of the funniest jokes of all time if we pulled this off, if the Onion bought Infowars,” Collins said on Thursday afternoon. “Then I was like, ‘What if we actually did it?’”

There's nothing funny in the vicinity of the Sandy Hook massacre. It's not a playground for anyone. To the extent that the pain the victims' families have experienced through Alex Jones can be converted into a dollar amount, he's obligated to come up with the money, but I guess this is more about disabling him from continuing to speak to the world. What good is the website to anyone else? The Onion thinks it's funny if the URL goes to a page that isn't him but people who hate him? 

"That is something that I have not heard before — someone say that," said the little girl to Mike Tyson.

Mike Tyson definitely forgot he was talking to a kid while answering that question 😭pic.twitter.com/WDHvtoVnnj

— Happy Punch (@HappyPunch) November 14, 2024

"When we're dead, we're dust. Absolutely nothing.... You're dead!... I want somebody to think about me when I'm gone? Who the fuck cares about me when I'm gone!"

"John Thune Says Recess Appointments 'On the Table' To Get Trump Picks Through."

Newsweek reports.

"I think that all options are on the table, including recess appointments. Hopefully, it doesn't get to that but we'll find out fairly quickly whether the Democrats want to play ball or not," [Thune] said on Thursday during an interview....

If Trump were to use recess appointments at the start of his term, those appointees could remain in their positions until the end of the next Senate session, or until 2026.

Per the Congressional Research Service, former President Barack Obama made 32 recess appointments, ex-President George W. Bush made 171 and former President Bill Clinton made 139 while the Senate was on recess....

"Any Republican Senator seeking the coveted LEADERSHIP position in the United States Senate must agree to Recess Appointments (in the Senate!), without which we will not be able to get people confirmed in a timely manner," Trump posted to X, formerly Twitter, on Sunday. 

"Democrats lost because everyone except for whites moved in the direction of Donald Trump this cycle."

Said the sociologist Musa al-Gharbi, quoted in David Brooks's new column, "Why We Got It So Wrong" (NYT).

I thought that was a good quote, but I don't care about this column otherwise, because if you were "so wrong" before, why would I look to you for right answers now? I skimmed it. I get the impression Brooks thinks we should move beyond identity politics... now that the identity groups have trended toward Trump.

At the Thursday Night Café...

... you can talk about whatever you want.

(Photo by Meade/sunset/November 10th.)

Trump picks RFK Jr. to head Health and Human Services.

The NYT reports.

Sample text: "In addition to his outside-the-mainstream views about medicine and health, he has been associated with a number of peculiar activities, like dumping a dead bear in Central Park and supposedly decapitating a whale. In interviews, some Republican senators said Mr. Kennedy gave them pause, but none ruled out voting for him."

What an exciting cast of characters in the new Trump administration. I hope it works out okay!