Good morning.

Wednesday in Whitewater will be cloudy with a high of forty-one.  Sunrise is 7:24 AM and sunset 4:27 PM, for 9h 02m 48s of daytime.  The moon is a waning gibbous with 79.8% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1944, elements of Patton’s Third Army arrive to break the Siege of Bastogne.

Recommended for reading in full:

Annie Lowrey asks What Was Steve Mnuchin Thinking? Three Possibilities:

Imagine having a runny nose, itchy eyes, congestion, and a sore throat, and your doctor telling you that you shouldn’t worry about cancer—she consulted her colleagues and they’re certain it is not cancer, and if it were, they could fight it.

This is roughly what happened on Sunday evening, when Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin put out a press release on calls he held with executives from the country’s largest banks. Mnuchin’s statement assured the public that they had not been having liquidity problems or “clearance or margin” issues—the sorts of things you would worry about if the country were on the brink of a financial crisis.

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Option one: The Treasury secretary was speaking to an audience of one. Mnuchin is under enormous pressure from President Donald Trump, who is upset about the market sell-off and mad at the current Federal Reserve chairman, Jay Powell. The press release was perhaps an attempt to show Trump that Mnuchin was doing something, anything, to talk the markets back into stability.

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Option two: The Treasury secretary believes that the market correction is due in part to animal spirits—animal spirits he could quiet by reminding everyone that the financial system is in fine shape. Perhaps he anticipated further declines in stock prices due to the government shutdown, and wanted to calm the markets.

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Option three: Mnuchin has some troubling insider knowledge, and he wanted to broadcast to the markets that he is aware and in charge. Maybe some financial firms are teetering? Maybe rising interest rates and falling asset prices are straining some important market participants, and it just has not yet become evident in public reports?

(A fourth possibility is that Mnuchin has no reasonable idea what he’s doing.)

Danielle Kaeding reports UW-Extension Sees Historic Faculty Turnover:

The University of Wisconsin-Extension, UW Colleges and UW-Stevens Point saw the greatest rates of faculty turnover in the 2018 fiscal year. About a quarter of faculty left UW-Extension, followed by UW Colleges at around 11.5 percent and UW-Stevens Point at roughly 10.5 percent.

UW-Extension had 45 out of 188 faculty either retire or resign in the last fiscal year, according to UW System’s fiscal 2018 faculty turnover report. Karl Martin, dean and director of Cooperative Extension, said the higher rate of turnover was due to faculty who took advantage of buyouts.

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UW-Extension has been dealing with a $3.6 million cut as part of the $250 million reduction in state funding to UW System under the 2015-2017 state budget. Approximately 90 percent of UW-Extension’s budget funds salaries for employees.

 Red Panda Meets Rock:

Good morning.

Christmas in Whitewater will see a morning dusting of snow on a cloudy day with a high of thirty-nine.  Sunrise is 7:24 AM and sunset 4:26 PM, for 9h 02m 26s of daytime.  The moon is a waning gibbous with 88.4% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1914, a series of informal ceasefires, now known collectively as the Christmas Truce, begin along the Western Front in the First World War.

Recommended for reading in full:

 Jason Horowitz reports Pope Francis, in Christmas Message, Emphasizes ‘Fraternity’:

ROME — As nationalist forces rise globally and populist leaders emphasize the primacy of their own people, Pope Francis used his annual Christmas Day address on Tuesday to voice his conviction that all humans are part of an extended holy family that has lost its sense of fraternity.

“My wish for a happy Christmas is a wish for fraternity,” Francis, 82, said during his “Urbi et Orbi” (“To the City and to the World”) benediction from a balcony above St. Peter’s Square in Vatican City.

“Fraternity among individuals of every nation and culture. Fraternity among people with different ideas, yet capable of respecting and listening to one another. Fraternity among persons of different religions.”

He added, “Our differences, then, are not a detriment or a danger; they are a source of richness.”

The pope, who has been an ardent defender migrants in a period when speaking in their defense has largely fallen out of fashion, specifically addressed the scars of war in Africa, where “millions of persons are refugees or displaced and in need of humanitarian assistance and food security.”

 Ruby Mellen describes What Christmas traditions look like around the world:

For some Venezuelans, it’s important to get to Christmas Eve Mass in style. That’s why they strap on roller skates and barrel down the streets to church.

It’s not clear how this tradition started, but some say it’s a warm-weather alternative to sledding or ice skating. It’s so popular in the heavily Christian country that the government has closed down streets in the past to ensure families can skate safely.

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For many people, Christmas calls to mind roasted ham, eggnog and green bean casseroles. But in Japan, the menu is often centered on one food: Kentucky Fried Chicken. More than 3 million people each year celebrate the holiday with KFC. It’s gotten so popular that families have taken to ordering from the American fast-food chain weeks in advance to avoid having to stand in line for hours come Christmas.

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For centuries, Christmas in Norway was thought to coincide with the arrival of evil spirits and witches. Families still hide brooms during Christmas to keep witches from flying off with them.

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Possibly the most terrifying Christmas tradition is in Austria, Germany and other parts of Central Europe, where revelers dress up like a hybrid demon-goat called Krampus who scares children into being nice — and punishes the ones who refuse.

Celebrating Japanese Christmas in Portland:

Good morning.

Sunday in Whitewater will be mostly sunny with a high of thirty-one.  Sunrise is 7:23 AM and sunset 4:25 PM, for 9h 02m 07s of daytime.  The moon is a waning gibbous with 94.8% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1814, the War of 1812 ends:

On this date the Treaty of Ghent was signed, ending the the War of 1812 which was fought between the United States and Great Britain from June 1812 to the spring of 1815 (news of the treaty took several months to reach the frontiers of No. America). The treaty provided for the cessation of hostilities, the restoration of conquests, and a commission to settle boundary disputes. John Quincy Adams served as the chief negotiator for the United States. The treaty formalized U.S. possession of land which included present-day Wisconsin.

Recommended for reading in full:

 Susan Rice describes The Threat in the White House:

First, it appears that the national security adviser, John Bolton, rarely convenes his cabinet colleagues, known as the principals committee, to review the toughest issues. Instead, key players are cut out, as reportedly the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff was from the final, fateful meeting on Syria. Mr. Bolton has not named a replacement deputy national security adviser, leaving vacant a crucial position whose holder typically coordinates the national security agencies in drafting and carrying out policy.

Mr. Bolton has also taken over direct responsibility for managing everything from cyber and terrorist attacks to hurricanes and pandemics — tasks previously assigned to another top-level White House official. Mr. Bolton is also traveling abroad more than most of his predecessors, even as he is playing multiple all-consuming roles. These ill-advised choices alone would cripple national security decision-making.

But a second factor — Mr. Trump himself — has dealt the death blow to effective policymaking. The president couldn’t care less about facts, intelligence, military analysis or the national interest. He refuses to take seriously the views of his advisers, announces decisions on impulse and disregards the consequences of his actions. In abandoning the role of a responsible commander in chief, Mr. Trump today does more to undermine American national security than any foreign adversary. Yet no Republican in Congress is willing to do more than bleat or tweet concerns.

 David Frum describes The Self-Delusion of Paul Ryan:

a world of soaring deficits even at the top of the business cycle; a world of corporate tax cuts that have failed to deliver the promised investment boom; a world of trade wars and crashing financial markets—the worst December for U.S. equities since 1931, at the end of a year in which not one of the 15 asset classes measured by JP Morgan outperformed the consumer price index.

 These Geckos Can Run on Water (Sort Of):

Good morning.

Sunday in Whitewater will be mostly cloudy with a high of thirty-six.  Sunrise is 7:23 AM and sunset 4:25 PM, for 9h 01m 54s of daytime.  The moon is a waning gibbous with 98.8% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1865, the victorious 13th Wisconsin Infantry returns home:

The regiment lost 193 men during service. Five enlisted men were killed and 188 enlisted men died from disease.

Recommended for reading in full:

Eliot A. Cohen writes You Can’t Serve Both Trump and America:

The departure of Jim Mattis from government service is proof that you cannot have it all. You have to walk if you are to remain the human being you were, or conceived yourself being, before you went in.

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Henceforth, the senior ranks of government can be filled only by invertebrates and opportunists, schemers and careerists. If they had policy convictions, they will meekly accept their evisceration. If they know a choice is a disaster, they will swallow hard and go along. They may try to manipulate the president, or make some feeble efforts to subvert him, but in the end they will follow him. And although patriotism may motivate some of them, the truth is that it will be the title, the office, the car, and the chance to be in the policy game that will keep them there.

 Jennifer Rubin writes Republicans are responsible for the Trump fiasco:

Let’s put aside for the moment the question of whether President Trump committed crimes in obtaining the presidency (conspiracy to violate campaign finance laws by hush-money payments or receipt of assistance from a foreign power) or since his election (in obstructing justice, witness-tampering, etc.). Let’s for now not dwell on the closure of his foundation, which the New York state attorney general foundto have engaged in a “shocking pattern of illegality.” Let’s not argue whether attacks on the courts, the First Amendment, the FBI and the Justice Department violate his duty to “take care” that the laws are faithfully executed, nor on whether his receipt of foreign emoluments, ongoing conflicts of interest and hiring of a series of ethical miscreants have debased his office.

At present let’s address “just” the obvious, frightening reality that this president is incapable of performing the basic functions of the office (e.g., keeping the government open), attending to our national security (e.g., not handing geopolitical gifts to our enemies) or truthfully relating intelligence (e.g., not lying about Jamal Khashoggi’s killers). He no longer has the advice of any respected, competent senior adviser nor the trust of members of his own party, who profess (suddenly!) to be worried about the conduct of foreign policy.

We have gotten to this sorry stage of events because Republican lawmakers shielded him from scrutiny and indulged his lies, racist rhetoric and attacks on democratic norms. To make matters worse, Republican senators refused to reject unqualified or extreme nominees.

 It’s Corgi v. Coyote:

Good morning.

Saturday in Whitewater will be mostly cloudy with a high of thirty-five.  Sunrise is 7:23 AM and sunset 4:24 PM, for 9h 01m 44s of daytime.  The moon is full.

On this day in 1989, the Brandenburg Gate reopens:

Thousands of people spilled on to the city’s streets cheering in the pouring rain to watch the historic ceremony which effectively ends the division of East and West Germany.

East German army engineers worked through the night to tunnel through one of two crossing points in the gate, which stands in the “no man’s land” on the eastern side of the Berlin Wall.

Recommended for reading in full:

The Committee to Investigate Russia writes of Putin’s Not-So-Secret Santa:

NYT:

First, President Trump blindsided his aides and the rest of the world by deciding to pull the full contingent of some 2,000 American troops out of Syria, helping the Kremlin to confirm Mr. Putin’s gamble that intervening in Syria would revive Russian influence in the Middle East.

Mr. Trump followed that up by declaring that the United States would pull half its forces out of Afghanistan; the combined withdrawals prompted the resignation of Jim Mattis, the respected general who leads the Pentagon.

All that followed Mr. Trump’s already substantial effort to undermine NATO and the European Union by weakening the American commitment to its traditional alliances.

“Trump is God’s gift that keeps on giving,” said Vladimir Frolov, a Russian columnist and foreign affairs analyst. “Trump implements Russia’s negative agenda by default, undermining the U.S.–led world order, U.S. alliances, U.S. credibility as a partner and an ally. All of this on his own. Russia can just relax and watch and root for Trump, which Putin does at every TV appearance.”

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Daily Beast:

Konstantin Kosachev, head of the Foreign Affairs Committee in the Upper House of the Russian Parliament, has said that “the departure of James Mattis is a positive signal for Russia, since Mattis was far more hawkish on Russia and China than Donald Trump.” Kosachev opined that Trump apparently considered his own agenda in dealing with Russia, China and America’s allies to be “more important than keeping James Mattis at his post,” concluding: “That’s an interesting signal, and a more positive one” for Russia.

 The New York Times editorial board writes Shutdown? More Like a Breakdown:

The president clearly believes that throwing everyone else off balance gives him an edge — that is, if he can make the turmoil fierce enough, those around him will give up and give in.

Better still, even when he doesn’t get his way, piling on the pandemonium keeps people from focusing on any one piece of it. The normal human mind can cope with only so much drama before it gets overloaded. Mr. Trump grasps better than most that a single scandal is cause for public outrage, while a million scandals is a statistic.

 The koala code — Secrets of the koala genome:

Good morning.

Friday in Whitewater will be mostly cloudy with a high of thirty-three.  Sunrise is 7:22 AM and sunset 4:24 PM, for 9h 01m 40s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing gibbous with 98.2% of its visible disk illuminated.

On this day in 1968, the Apollo 8 spacecraft begins its successful journey to become “the first manned spacecraft to leave low Earth orbit, reach the Moon, orbit it, and safely return.”

Earthrise as seen from Apollo 8.

Recommended for reading in full:

In July 2017, Charlie Savage reported Can the President Be Indicted? A Long-Hidden Legal Memo Says Yes:

WASHINGTON — A newfound memo from Kenneth W. Starr’s independent counsel investigation into President Bill Clinton sheds fresh light on a constitutional puzzle that is taking on mounting significance amid the Trump-Russia inquiry: Can a sitting president be indicted?

The 56-page memo, locked in the National Archives for nearly two decades and obtained by The New York Times under the Freedom of Information Act, amounts to the most thorough government-commissioned analysis rejecting a generally held view that presidents are immune from prosecution while in office.

“It is proper, constitutional, and legal for a federal grand jury to indict a sitting president for serious criminal acts that are not part of, and are contrary to, the president’s official duties,” the Starr office memo concludes. “In this country, no one, even President Clinton, is above the law.”

Asawin Suebsaeng and Lachlan Markay report Trump on Coming Debt Crisis: ‘I Won’t Be Here’ When It Blows Up:

Since the 2016 presidential campaign, Donald Trump’s aides and advisers have tried to convince him of the importance of tackling the national debt.

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“Yeah, but I won’t be here,” the president bluntly said, according to a source who was in the room when Trump made this comment during discussions on the debt.

 John Carlin writes The ‘Global Cybercrime Problem’ Is Actually the ‘Russia Problem’:

A series of explosive Department of Justice filings—outside the special counsel’s probe—makes clear that Russia is a rogue state in cyberspace. Now the United States needs a credible system to take action, and to sanction Russia for its misdeeds.

Consider what we learned from last month’s criminal charges filed by the Department of Justice against the “chief accountant” for Russia’s so-called troll factory, the online-information influence operations conducted by the Internet Research Agency in St. Petersburg. The indictment showed how Russia, rather than being chastened by Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s detailed February indictment laying out its criminal activities, continued to spread online propaganda about that very indictment, tweeting and posting about Mueller’s charges both positively and negatively—to spread and exacerbate America’s political discord. Defense Secretary James Mattis later told the Reagan National Defense Forum in Simi Valley, California, that Vladimir Putin “tried again to muck around in our elections this last month, and we are seeing a continued effort along those lines.”

Do People Who Get Knighted by the Queen Get Anything for It?:

Good morning.

Thursday in Whitewater will see occasional drizzle with a high of forty-one.  Sunrise is 7:22 AM and sunset 4:23 PM, for 9h 01m 40s of daytime.  The moon is a waxing gibbous with 94% of its visible disk illuminated.

Whitewater’s CDA is scheduled to meet at 5:30 PM.

On this month in 1941 and long afterward, Wisconsin military enlistments soar:

After the attack on Pearl Harbor, thousands of Wisconsin citizens volunteered to fight. Roughly 320,000 Wisconsin soldiers served in the armed forces during the WWII, including more than 9,000 women. Wisconsin’s National Guard formed a substantial part of the new Red Arrow Division, helping to maintain the respected reputation of its predecessor from World War I by remaining undefeated in the Pacific theater. The majority of Wisconsin soldiers were draftees who served in units comprised of men from around the country. More than 8,000 soldiers died and another 13,000 were wounded in combat. Fifteen Wisconsin men won the Medal of Honor during WWII.

Recommended for reading in full:

 Jennifer Rubin asks Why not indict the Trump Organization?:

Legal scholars debate whether a sitting president can be indicted or only impeached. If the latter, it’s not clear given the statutes of limitation on most crimes whether he could ever be prosecuted for certain crimes. That surely seems wrong; the framers certainly did not intend to give the president a get-out-of-jail free card for crimes he might commit in office. (One solution might be to indict under seal.)

What is clear, however, is that to the extent the president has a safe harbor for prosecution during his time in office, that protection is personal to him. His relatives and his business empire don’t get that benefit.

Indict a corporation (or a foundation or an LLC)? That’s what happened to the accounting firm Arthur Andersen in connection with the Enron scandal. The firm itself was indicted on a charge of alleged widespread obstruction of justice.

 As for Trump’s supposedly charitable foundation,  Shane Goldmacher reports Trump Foundation Will Dissolve, Accused of ‘Shocking Pattern of Illegality’:

The Donald J. Trump Foundation, once billed as the charitable arm of the president’s financial empire, agreed to dissolve on Tuesday and give away all its remaining assets under court supervision as part of an ongoing investigation and lawsuit by the New York attorney general.

The foundation was accused by the attorney general, Barbara Underwood, of “functioning as little more than a checkbook to serve Mr. Trump’s business and political interests,” and of engaging in “a shocking pattern of illegality” that included unlawfully coordinating with Mr. Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign.

In addition to shuttering the charity, her office has pursued a lawsuit that could bar President Trump and his three oldest children from the boards of other New York charities, as well as force the payment of millions in restitution and penalties.

“This is an important victory for the rule of law, making clear that there is one set of rules for everyone,” Ms. Underwood said in announcing the agreement.

How NASA Built the Fastest Spacecraft Ever: