Good morning.

Monday in Whitewater will be partly sunny with a high of forty-one.  Sunrise is 7:25 AM and sunset 4:36 PM, for 9h 11m 19s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing gibbous with 80.2% of its visible disk illuminated.

The Whitewater United School District’s board meets at 6 PM.

On this day in 1941, Pres. Roosevelt delivers his Four Freedoms speech (officially the 1941 State of the Union address).

Recommended for reading in full —

Courtney Subramanian reports Trump again threatens to target Iranian cultural sites amid mounting tensions over Qasem Soleimani killing:

President Donald Trump on Sunday repeated a threat to target Iranian cultural sites, which critics say could amount to a war crime, if Tehran retaliates for a U.S. drone strike that killed its top military general.

“They’re allowed to kill our people. They’re allowed to torture and maim our people. They’re allowed to use roadside bombs and blow up our people,” Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One on his way back to Washington, D.C, from his Mar-a-Lago resort in Palm Beach, Florida. “And we’re not allowed to touch their cultural site? It doesn’t work that way.”

Trump’s comments appeared to contradict Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who earlier on Sunday vowed the administration would “behave lawfully” in regards to a list of targets the U.S. would strike if Iran launched a retaliatory attack for the death of Gen. Qasem Soleimani, the leader of Iran’s elite Quds Force.

….

The 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict makes it a war crime to target cultural sites. The international treaty, created in the aftermath of World War II, says, “Damage to cultural property belonging to any people whatsoever means damage to the cultural heritage of all mankind.”

And, according to the International Red Cross, because such sites are “normally civilian in nature, the general provisions of humanitarian law protecting civilian property apply.”

See also John Bellinger, Attacking Iran’s Cultural Sites Would Violate the Hague Cultural Property Convention.

  Jennifer Rubin writes Why lying about an ‘imminent’ attack would matter:

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and State Department subordinates vigorously argued Friday that the justification for killing Iranian general and terrorist leader Qasem Soleimani was intelligence that an attack was “imminent.”

It is easy to understand why such a rationale would be advanced. An imminent threat would arguably obviate the need for a declaration of war from or even prior consultation with Congress. Exercising the right of self-defense, an established principle of international law, would satisfy allies and sidestep nasty questions about violation of an executive order in place with only minor changes since 1976 that prohibits assassination.

….

Americans have every reason to be skeptical of anything and everything coming out of this administration. The president has lied more than 15,000 times on matters small and large. Pompeo misled the Congress and American people in suggesting there was not convincing evidence of Mohammed bin Salman’s involvement in the slaughter of journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Pompeo repeatedly misrepresented to Congress that progress was being made in talks with North Korea. Moreover, given Pompeo’s own fiery rhetoric that essentially demands regime change in Iran (if not using that term), it is logical to assume this was not a defensive action nor one intended to de-escalate violence. Pompeo needs to come before Congress and testify under oath.

Science in Pictures aboard the International Space Station:

Good morning.

Sunday in Whitewater will be intermittently cloudy with a high of forty-one.  Sunrise is 7:25 AM and sunset 4:35 PM, for 9h 10m 12s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing gibbous with 72.5% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1781, British troops led by Benedict Arnold burn Virginia’s capital of Richmond.

Recommended for reading in full —

Hope Kirwan reports Wisconsin Egg Producers Set New Records As Demand For Cage-Free Continues:

The latest data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture shows Wisconsin farms produced 193 million eggs in November. That’s about 19 percent higher than in 2018 and the second month in a row that the state’s producers have set a new record high.

….

Scott Schneider owns Nature Link Farms in Jefferson and has produced cage-free eggs for the last 15 years.

“It seems to me anyway that that will be sort of the standard in the future, whereby most egg production will be cage-free,” Schneider said. “The big purchasers of eggs, the McDonald’s, the mayonnaise companies, those types of uses for eggs and egg products, those will be the ones that will start leading the pack. And I think it will take a little bit longer for the retail consumer to really start making those decisions to purchase cage-free eggs when they go to the grocery store.”

Schneider said smaller farms like his will need to find new ways to differentiate their products, like using free-range production or transitioning to organic.

  David Corn and Matt Cohen write With a War Against Iran Brewing, Don’t Listen to the Hawks Who Lied Us Into Iraq:

Shortly after the news broke that a US airstrike in Baghdad ordered by President Donald Trump had killed Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani, the leader of Iran’s Quds Force, Ari Fleischer went on Fox News and proclaimed, “I think it is entirely possible that this is going to be a catalyst inside Iran where the people celebrate this killing of Soleimani.”

Here we go again.

Fleischer was press secretary for President George W. Bush when the Bush-Cheney administration deployed a long stretch of false statements and lies—Saddam Hussein was in cahoots with al Qaeda! Saddam had WMDs! Saddam intended to use WMDs against the United States! Saddam’s defeat would lead to peace and democracy in Iraq and throughout the region!—to grease the way to the March 2003 invasion of Iraq. In that position, Fleischer was a key spokesperson for the war. Prior to the invasion, he promised the war would lead to a bright future: “Once the Iraqi people see that Saddam and those around him will be removed from power, they’ll welcome freedom, they’ll be a liberated people.” Instead, Iraq and the region were wracked with destabilization and death that continues to this day. About 200,000 Iraqi civilians lost their lives in the chaos and violence the Bush-Cheney invasion unleashed, and 4,500 US soldiers were killed in their war.

Before Beatlemania, There Was Lisztomania:

Good morning.

Saturday in Whitewater will be mostly cloudy with a high of thirty-two.  Sunrise is 7:25 AM and sunset 4:34 PM, for 9h 09m 07s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing gibbous with 63% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1923, Milton College president A.E. Whitford bans dancing by students in off-campus, semi-public places such as confectionery stores.

Recommended for reading in full —

Fred Imbert reports Manufacturing economy weakest in a decade as December ISM index comes in at 47.2:

Manufacturing activity in the U.S. contracted to its lowest level in more than a decade last month even as China and the U.S. showed progress on the trade front.

The Institute for Supply Management said Friday that its manufacturing index fell in December to 47.2. That’s its lowest level since June 2009, when it hit 46.3. Economists polled by Reuters expected a reading of 49 for December. Anything below 50 represents sector contraction.

December also marked the fifth straight month of contraction for the U.S. manufacturing sector.

Jack Goldsmith writes The Soleimani Strike: One Person Decides:

The U.S. drone strike in Iraq against the commander of Iran’s Quds Force, Qassem Soleimani, raises once again the question of legal constraints—under domestic and international law—on the president’s power to use force unilaterally. I have written a legal opinion in government and many, many pieces out of government on this issue, and over the years I have grown very cynical about the supposed legal constraints on those war powers. The general thoughts that follow, which build a bit on this Twitter thread, are born of that cynicism.

First, with the exception of the 1973 War Powers Resolution, which has always been a very weak constraint, practically all of the law in this area has been developed by executive branch lawyers justifying unilateral presidential uses of force. Unsurprisingly, executive branch lawyers view unilateral presidential power very broadly. The three most recent published opinions concern Libya (2011), Iraq (2014) and Syria (2018).

Second, Congress has done practically nothing since the War Powers Resolution to push back on these ever-broader constructions of executive power. Indeed, it has gone along with these constructions through appropriating for an ever-bigger and more powerful military. It has consistently and specifically appropriated money in support of the military operations under the 2001 Authorization to Use Military Force (AUMF) with the full knowledge that the executive branch (starting under President George W. Bush and continuing under President Obama) was using the AUMF as a justification for uses of force in multiple countries—and the knowledge that Obama interpreted the AUMF to apply to the Islamic State. Congress has continued to appropriate in support of U.S. military operations in several Middle Eastern countries even as those operations increasingly bumped up against Iranian proxies.

Third, the domestic-law basis for the killing of Soleimani is maddeningly complex, factually and legally. The law governing U.S. military operations throughout the Middle East rests on a combination of the 2001 AUMF; the 2002 AUMF, which authorizes force to address “the continuing threat posed by Iraq”; various appropriations; and Article II. And once we are there, Article II provides the president with very broad self-defense powers.

Why Food Tastes Different On Planes:

Good morning.

Friday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of thirty-four.  Sunrise is 7:25 AM and sunset 4:33 PM, for 9h 08m 09s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing gibbous with 53.1% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1957, the Hamilton Watch Company introduces the first electric watch.

Recommended for reading in full —

Kate Brannen reports Exclusive: Unredacted Ukraine Documents Reveal Extent of Pentagon’s Legal Concerns:

“Clear direction from POTUS to continue to hold.”

This is what Michael Duffey, associate director of national security programs at the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), told Elaine McCusker, the acting Pentagon comptroller, in an Aug. 30 email, which has only been made available in redacted form until now. It is one of many documents the Trump administration is trying to keep from the public, despite congressional oversight efforts and court orders in Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) litigation.

Earlier in the day on Aug. 30, President Donald Trump met with Defense Secretary Mark Esper and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo to discuss the president’s hold on $391 million in military assistance for Ukraine. Inside the Trump administration, panic was reaching fever pitch about the president’s funding hold, which had stretched on for two months. Days earlier, POLITICO had broken the story and questions were starting to pile up. U.S. defense contractors were worried about delayed contracts and officials in Kyiv and lawmakers on Capitol Hill wanted to know what on earth was going on. While Trump’s national security team thought withholding the money went against U.S. national security interests, Trump still wouldn’t budge.

Thanks to the testimony of several Trump administration officials, we now know what Trump was waiting on: a commitment from Ukraine to investigate Joe Biden.

But getting at that truth hasn’t been easy and the Trump administration continues to try to obscure it. It is blocking key officials from testifying and is keeping documentary evidence from lawmakers investigating the Ukraine story. For example, this note from Duffey to McCusker was never turned over to House investigators and the Trump administration is continuing to try to keep it secret.

Last month, a court ordered the government to release almost 300 pages of emails to the Center for Public Integrity in response to a FOIA lawsuit. It released a first batch on Dec. 12, and then a second installment on Dec. 20, including Duffey’s email, but that document, along with several others, were partially or completely blacked out.

Since then, Just Security has viewed unredacted copies of these emails, which begin in June and end in early October. Together, they tell the behind-the-scenes story of the defense and budget officials who had to carry out the president’s unexplained hold on military aid to Ukraine.

(Michael Duffey is the former executive director of the Wisconsin Republican Party.)

Maxwell Tani reports Manafort Said Hannity Served as His Trump Backchannel: Docs:

Paul Manafort said he used Fox News host Sean Hannity to receive backchannel messages from President Donald Trump while prosecutors investigated him for financial crimes, according to newly released memos from former special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation.

Among the several hundred pages of memos published by BuzzFeed News on Thursday, which contain summaries of FBI interviews with key Trump administration and campaign officials, the Fox News anchor’s alleged role as an unofficial messenger between the president and his former campaign chairman comes into sharp focus.

Tonight’s Sky for January 2020:

Good morning.

Thursday in Whitewater will be partly sunny with a high of forty.  Sunrise is 7:25 AM and sunset 4:32 PM, for 9h 07m 13s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing crescent with 43.3% of its visible disk illuminated.

Whitewater’s Landmarks Commission meets at 3:30 PM.

On this day in 1918, Wisconsin troops depart for Europe: “the Wisconsin 127th and 128th Infantries departed for France from their training facility at Camp Arthur in Waco, Texas. Initially, these divisions were assigned to construct depots and facilities for troops that would follow. On May 18, they were assigned to the frontline at Belmont in the Alsace where they faced three German divisions. In the following months, 368 troops were killed, wounded or missing.”

Recommended for reading in full —

The Associated Press reports Trump Plans Milwaukee Rally In January (‘Campaign Event Set For Same Night As Democratic Presidential Debate’):

President Donald Trump will hold a campaign rally in Wisconsin next month, countering a Democratic presidential debate set for the same night in Iowa.

Trump’s campaign says the rally will be Jan. 14 at the UW-Milwaukee Panther Arena. It’s the same night that CNN and The Des Moines Register are sponsoring the first Democratic debate of 2020 at Drake University in Des Moines.

The Milwaukee rally will also be Trump’s second in less than a week. The Republican president’s campaign has said he’ll hold his first 2020 rally in Toledo, Ohio, on Jan. 9.

Republican Stuart Stevens writes Wake up, Republicans. Your party stands for all the wrong things now:

Republicans are now officially the character doesn’t count party, the personal responsibility just proves you have failed to blame the other guy party, the deficit doesn’t matter party, the Russia is our ally party, and the I’m-right-and-you-are-human-scum party. Yes, it’s President Trump’s party now, but it stands only for what he has just tweeted.

A party without a governing theory, a higher purpose or a clear moral direction is nothing more than a cartel, a syndicate that exists only to advance itself. There is no organized, coherent purpose other than the acquisition and maintenance of power.

Trump didn’t hijack the GOP and bend it to his will. He did something far easier: He looked at the party, saw its fault lines and then offered himself as a pure distillation of accumulated white grievance and anger. He bet that Republican voters didn’t really care about free trade or mutual security, or about the environment or Europe, much less deficits. He rebranded kindness and compassion as “PC” and elevated division and bigotry as the admirable goals of just being politically incorrect. Trump didn’t make Americans more racist; he just normalized the resentments that were simmering in many households. In short, he let a lot of long-suppressed demons out of the box.

….

Having ignored the warning signs for years myself, I know the seductive lure of believing what you prefer while ignoring the obvious truth.

Which is this: We are a long way — more than a half-century — from 1968, much less 1952. The United States is now a diverse, chaotic collection of 330 million people, a country of immigrants and multiculturalism that is growing less white every day. It is not some gauzy Shangri-La of suburban bliss that never existed.

Why Don’t We Have Electric Planes Yet?:

Good morning.

A new year and new decade in Whitewater begin with sunshine and a high of forty.  Sunrise is 7:25 AM and sunset 4:31 PM, for 9h 05m 34s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing crescent with 34.9% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1863, the Emancipation Proclamation takes effect in Confederate territory.

Recommended for reading in full —

Aubrey Whelan reports Study: Counties that lost auto plants suffered spike in opioid overdoses:

U.S. counties that weathered the closure of auto assembly factories saw a spike in opioid overdoses in the five years after the plants were shut down, a new study from the University of Pennsylvania has found.

The findings are a window into how economic instability can drive a public health crisis, said lead author Atheendar Venkataramani, an assistant professor of health policy and medicine at Penn’s Perelman School of Medicine.

Factory closures “are a culturally significant shock to the economy, which has a real effect on depressing economic opportunities for people over a long period of time,” he said. “When there is a contraction of economic activities — when people feel the economy and society is shifting in a way that it reduces their chances of upward mobility and happiness, you see this despair set in.”

The study, published in JAMA Internal Medicine, looked at overdose mortality rates among 18- to 65-year-olds in 112 manufacturing counties — places where most workers are in the manufacturing industry, primarily in the Midwest and South — that were home to at least one auto assembly plant.

Between 1999 and 2016, overdose rates in counties that lost their auto plants were 85% higher than in counties that retained their factories.

In their analysis, Venkataramani and his co-authors controlled for other factors that might have contributed to a rise in overdose deaths, such as national shifts in the availability of opioids and the onset of the Great Recession.

Shamane Mills reports The Reasons Behind Wisconsin’s Falling Birth Rate (‘Report Cites Following Reasons: Women Having Fewer Children At Later Age, Fewer Teen Births, Young Adults Leaving State’):

The reasons behind this pattern and what it could mean for a state with a rapidly aging population are outlined in “The Birth Dearth: Falling Fertility Rates, Fewer Babies,” a report prepared by Forward Analytics, the research arm of the Wisconsin Counties Association.

One reason is that women are delaying motherhood.

Instead of starting a family in their early 20s, they are waiting longer. From 2007 to 2017, the median age of a mother having her first-born child rose from 24 to 26. And many are holding off starting a family until their 30s, according to the report. That segment of mothers has actually increased.

However, that rise in births is countered by a large drop in teen pregnancies and millennials leaving the state. The latter could signal long-term challenges for Wisconsin and other states if the trend continues.

The report states this could have significant consequences for economic growth and for the funding of major federal programs such as Social Security and Medicare.

Rare Black Rhino is Born at Michigan Zoo:

Good morning.

Tuesday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of thirty.  Sunrise is 7:25 AM and sunset 4:30 PM, for 9h 05m 34s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing crescent with 25.7% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1967, the Packers triumph in the ‘Ice Bowl,’ defeating the Cowboys 21-17.

Recommended for reading in full —

Lee Bergquist reports Pollution cases involving ‘forever’ chemicals are growing across Wisconsin:

Often called “forever” chemicals because they do not break down in the environment, the substances have been used for decades in products like stain-resistant fabrics, nonstick cookware and firefighting foam. The chemicals have proven to be especially adept at smothering petroleum blazes and have been used extensively at airports and military bases.

PFAS compounds have highly desirable traits that can both repel water and oil.

“They can move freely in the environment and that’s why they end up everywhere,” said Christy Remucal, an aquatic chemist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. “We are going to be dealing with them for a really long time.”

They figure prominently in several pollution cases, including in Marinette, Madison and a cleanup project getting underway at Mitchell Airport.

Epidemiology studies suggest some PFAS compounds are associated with increased risk of pregnancy-induced hypertension, liver damage, thyroid disease, asthma, decreased fertility, some cancers and a decline in response to vaccines.

The Department of Health Service told the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel last week it is considering conducting a cancer cluster assessment in the Marinette and Peshtigo areas after residents reported their stories of having cancer and other serious illnesses at a public meeting on Dec. 18.

Patrick Marley reports Wisconsin Elections Commission deadlocks, keeps voters on the rolls for now:

The Wisconsin Elections Commission deadlocked Monday over whether to remove the voter registrations of more than 200,000 people in response to a judge’s order.

The commission’s inability to reach a consensus means the voters will stay on the rolls for at least the time being. An appeal in the case is ongoing and the commission faces a separate lawsuit that is trying to make sure people are not pulled from the rolls.

The three Republicans on the commission sought to take many of them off the rolls, but they were blocked by the three Democrats on the commission.

It was the second time in as many weeks that the commission broke down along party lines over the lawsuit, which has drawn national attention because of Wisconsin’s top-tier status in the 2020 presidential race.

Monday’s commission meeting came as election officials provided new estimates that suggested a smaller number of voters than originally believed — about 144,000 — could be at risk of being taken off the rolls.

Rare video shows a puffin using a tool to scratch an itch:

This was not some nesting behavior gone awry. Puffins collect soft grass for their nests, then hurry into their burrows with beaks full of bedding. The puffin in Iceland dropped the stick after it finished scratching. Hours later, the camera recorded the stick, still discarded, on the ground.

This behavior “fits all current definitions” of tool use, said University of Oxford zoologist Alex Kacelnik, who has studied toolmaking crows and was not a member of the puffin research team.