Avert your eyes! My Sunday morning look at incompetency, corruption and policy failures:
• Trump’s Sleight of Hand: Shouting Fraud, Pocketing Donors’ Cash for Future With breathless, often misleading appeals, the former president promised small donors that he was using the money to fight the election results, but in fact stored much of it for future use. As Trump raked in cash denying his loss, little went to his actual legal fight. (New York Times)
• How Europe fell behind on vaccines The EU secured some of the lowest prices in the world. At what cost? (Politico)
• After Capitol riot, desperate families turn to groups that ‘deprogram’ extremists The de-radicalization groups preach guidance and reform, as experts call on the Biden administration to invest more in preventing and reversing the kind of radicalization that was on display in the attack on the Capitol, not just prosecuting individuals when the danger escalates to violence and destruction. (Washington Post)
• The Coming Alzheimer’s Crisis—and What to Do About It The hours to come would pit the insurgent conspiracists against a handful of White House lawyers and advisers determined to keep the president from giving in to temptation to invoke emergency national security powers, seize voting machines and disable the primary levers of American democracy. (Barron’s)
• The Boogaloo Bois Have Guns, Criminal Records and Military Training. Now They Want to Overthrow the Government. Fixated on attacking law enforcement and violently toppling the U.S. government. Researchers say the movement began coalescing online in 2019 as people — mostly young men — angry with what they perceived to be increasing government repression, found each other on Facebook groups and in private chats. In movement vernacular, Boogaloo refers to an inevitable and imminent armed revolt, and members often call themselves Boogaloo Bois, boogs or goons. (ProPublica)
• Spurred By The Capitol Riot, Thousands Of Republicans Drop Out Of GOP The number of people changing parties spiked immediately after the Capitol breach. The same phenomenon is playing out nationwide. News outlets documented about 6,000 defections from the party in North Carolina, 10,000 in Pennsylvania and 5,000 in Arizona. (NPR)
• After Record Turnout, Republicans Are Trying to Make It Harder to Vote The presidential election results are settled. But the battle over new voting rules, especially for mail-in ballots, has just begun (New York Times) see also After Trump failed to overturn 2020 election, Republicans are trying to steal the next one This is the most concerted effort to roll back voting rights in decades. (Mother Jones)
• How neo-Nazis used the internet to instigate a right-wing extremist crisis The number of active hate groups in the US is falling as they find new places to hide (Vox)
• Off the rails: Inside the craziest meeting of the Trump presidency White House staff had spent weeks poring over the evidence underlying hundreds of affidavits and other claims of fraud promoted by Trump allies like Powell. The team had done the due diligence and knew the specific details of what was being alleged better than anybody. Time and time again, they found, Powell’s allegations fell apart under basic scrutiny. (Axios)
Be sure to check out our Masters in Business next week with Kevin Landis, Firsthand Funds. The firm’s Firsthand Technology Opportunities Fund (TEFQX) was created in 1999, and has gained 21.1% annually over the past 10 years vs 13.9% for the S&P500 and 18.5% for the Nasdaq Index. It gained 102% over the past 12 months.
The National Debt Increased Under Trump Despite His Promise to Reduce It
Source: ProPublica
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