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4:30 PM ET, December 17, 2020

memeorandum

 Top Items: 
Washington Post:
Biden picks Rep. Deb Haaland (D-N.M.) to be first Native American interior secretary  —  Tribal and progressive activists lobbied hard to put an indigenous leader in charge of a department that helps oversee Indian County  —  President-elect Joe Biden has tapped Democratic Rep. Deb Haaland …
RELATED:
Alan Feuer / New York Times:
Dominion demands that Sidney Powell retract ‘baseless and false allegations’ about voting machines.  —  Dominion Voting Systems sent a blistering letter on Wednesday night to the right-wing lawyer Sidney Powell, demanding that she publicly retract her “wild, knowingly baseless and false accusations” …
Emily Cochrane / New York Times:
Transition Live Updates: Stimulus Deal Appears Within Reach, but Final Product Could Limit Biden in the Future
Discussion: NPR
Jonathan V. Last / The Triad:
Where Is the President of the United States?  —  Donald Trump is AWOL.  And his disgrace is hiding in plain sight.  —  Before we start: Tonight we're doing a livestream that I'm hoping will go down in legend as The Bulwark version of the Star Wars Holiday Special.  The first 12 minutes will be entirely in Wookie.
RELATED:
Thomas P. Bossert / New York Times:
I Was the Homeland Security Adviser to Trump.  We're Being Hacked.  —  The magnitude of this national security breach is hard to overstate.  —  Mr. Bossert was the homeland security adviser to President Trump and deputy homeland security adviser to President George W. Bush.
us-cert.cisa.gov:
Alert (AA20-352A)  —  Advanced Persistent Threat Compromise of Government Agencies, Critical Infrastructure, and Private Sector Organizations  —  Summary  —  The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) is aware of compromises of U.S. government agencies …
Washington Post:
Federal investigators find evidence of previously unknown tactics used to penetrate government networks
Discussion: NPR and Volexity, more at Techmeme »
Quint Forgey / Politico:
Top Biden aide walks back expletive description of Republicans  —  Jen O'Malley Dillon, President-elect Joe Biden's campaign manager and incoming White House deputy chief of staff, walked back comments she made in a recent interview suggesting that congressional Republicans were “a bunch of f—ers.”
RELATED:
Karen Tumulty / Washington Post:
Republicans suddenly discover they don't like naughty words  —  Could someone please find Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) a cold compress and a place where he might lie down for a few minutes?  —  The senator, whom you might recall from the time he implied during a presidential campaign …
Greg Sargent / Washington Post:
Kelly Loeffler's latest nonsense exposes the worst of GOP nihilism  —  Our country confronts two of its most monumental crises of the modern era.  More than 3,300 Americans died of the coronavirus on Wednesday alone.  The latest weekly jobless claims are a shocker, totaling nearly 900,000.
Sabato's Crystal Ball:
Georgia Senate Runoffs: Breaking Down November, Looking to January  —  Dear Readers: This is the last issue of the Crystal Ball this year.  We wanted to finish off our 2020 publishing schedule by taking a deep look at the Georgia Senate runoffs, which will decide control of the Senate on Tuesday, Jan. 5.
RELATED:
David Wickert / Atlanta Journal-Constitution:
Judge dismisses GOP lawsuit challenging Georgia's absentee ballot rules
Discussion: The Hill
Jennifer Horn / USA Today:
Texas lawsuit was the last straw.  I'm leaving the Republican Party: Former NH GOP chair  —  The GOP has ransacked our Constitution and attempted a coup.  The Republican Party of Lincoln is no more.  I'm switching my registration to independent.  —  My mother spent a lifetime trying to teach me to stand for what is right.
RELATED:
Washington Post:
Biden picks top North Carolina environmental official to run EPA  —  Michael Regan has forged a multibillion-dollar clean up of coal ash and worked with the state's GOP legislature  —  President-elect Joe Biden will choose to nominate Michael S. Regan, who heads the North Carolina Department …
The Bulwark:
Uninstalling Stephen Miller  —  How one man's mastery of the dark bureaucratic arts made life a living hell for immigrants and refugees.  —  In November 2019, a former staffer from Breitbart leaked emails from 2015 in which White House advisor Stephen Miller recommended The Camp of the Saints …
Discussion: Bulwark+ and R Street
RELATED:
Jean Guerrero / Jezebel:
No Country for Brown Sinners
Discussion: Washington Examiner
Politico:
Pence prepares to oversee Trump's loss — and then leave town  —  On Jan. 6, Vice President Mike Pence will oversee final confirmation of President-elect Joe Biden's victory.  —  Then he'll likely skip town.  —  As vice president, Pence has the awkward but unavoidable duty of presiding …
Natasha Bertrand / Politico:
Nuclear weapons agency breached amid massive cyber onslaught  —  The Energy Department and National Nuclear Security Administration, which maintains the U.S. nuclear weapons stockpile, have evidence that hackers accessed their networks as part of an extensive espionage operation that has affected …
Andrew Heavens / Reuters:
Sweden's king says ‘we have failed’ over COVID-19, as deaths mount  —  STOCKHOLM (Reuters) -Sweden's king said his country had failed in its handling of COVID-19, in a sharp criticism of a pandemic policy partly blamed for a high death toll among the elderly.
Chuck Ross / The Daily Caller:
Peter Strzok's Declassified Messages Give Insider View Of FBI's Trump Campaign Probe  — The Justice Department declassified a batch of internal FBI messages from Peter Strzok, the former counterintelligence investigator who oversaw Crossfire Hurricane.  — The messages provide a real …
Discussion: TheBlaze and The Gateway Pundit
RELATED:
Jordan Davidson / The Federalist:
New Strzok Texts Show FBI Was Investigating Trump Before Crossfire Hurricane Was Opened
Politico:
Congress faces ‘fork in the road’ on stimulus  —  Negotiators on Capitol Hill and at the White House have still not wrapped up talks over a nearly $1 trillion coronavirus relief package ahead of a Friday deadline, as Republicans and Democrats spar over tens of billions of dollars in government spending.
RELATED:
Washington Post:
Congressional leaders try to clear final hurdles in sprint to finish coronavirus relief package
Edmund Lee / New York Times:
Axios Buys Charlotte Agenda, a Digital Start-Up, as Part of Push Into Local News  —  The site focuses on service journalism for North Carolina's largest city.  Now it has been scooped up in a deal valued at nearly $5 million and will be a partial model for other cities.
Miriam Berger / Washington Post:
Man really did hack Trump's Twitter account by guessing password, ‘maga2020!,’ Dutch prosecutors say  —  Six years ago, Dutch hacker Victor Gevers logged into President Trump's Twitter account by guessing the password: “yourefired.”  —  Then he did it again.
Discussion: The Verge, The Root, Raw Story and Vox
xkcd.com:
2020 Election Map  —  Permanent link to this comic: https://xkcd.com/2399/  —  Image URL (for hotlinking/embedding): https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/2020_ election_map.png  —  Comics I enjoy:  —  Three Word Phrase, SMBC, Dinosaur Comics, Oglaf (nsfw), A Softer World, Buttersafe …
Discussion: CNN
Zeynep Tufekci / The Atlantic:
Hang On for Three More Months  —  Hunkering down to wait out the coronavirus isn't easy.  The costs of isolation are steep.  Quarantine fatigue is real.  The chance to gather with extended family and friends this holiday season is particularly alluring to those of us battling loneliness.
Grady Means / The Hill:
Joe Biden's looming disaster  —  Pity Joe Biden.  He is the dog that finally caught the bus and he is soon to be political roadkill.  While he celebrates his victory in the Electoral College, powerful forces already are engaged to doom him and his presidency.
Washington Post:
States report confusion as feds reduce vaccine shipments, even as Pfizer says it has ‘millions’ of unclaimed doses  —  Officials in multiple states said they were alerted late Wednesday that their second shipments of Pfizer-BioNTech's vaccine next week had been reduced, sparking widespread confusion …
Discussion: Talking Points Memo
Roger Sollenberger / Salon:
This hedge-fund billionaire is a huge fan of Sen. Kelly Loeffler — but why?  —  Finance mogul Ken Griffin gave big chunks of cash to Kelly Loeffler's PAC — and the timing is intriguing  —  On Oct. 9, billionaire Ken Griffin, the head of a multinational financial services company …
Joe Concha / The Hill:
For NY Times, no news is fit to print about Rep. Swalwell and a spy  —  If you're a New York Times subscriber who also watches the broadcast network evening news and considers that your news diet, there's a very good chance you haven't heard about Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Calif.) and his ties to an accused Chinese spy a few years ago.
Oshrat Carmiel / Bloomberg:
NYC's Plummeting Real Estate Sales Cost City $1.2 Billion  —  The pandemic's slowdown in real estate deals has cost New York City $1.2 billion in lost revenue so far this year.  —  Sales of commercial and residential properties — everything from office buildings to hotels and condo units …
U.S. Department of Justice:
Federal Grand Jury Charges Six With Conspiracy To Kidnap The Governor Of Michigan  —  GRAND RAPIDS, MICHIGAN — United States Attorney Andrew Birge announced today that a federal grand jury has indicted six men on a charge of conspiracy to kidnap the Governor of Michigan, Gretchen Whitmer.
Bloomberg:
Amazon Has Turned a Middle-Class Warehouse Career Into a McJob  —  Amazon.com Inc. job ads are everywhere.  Plastered on city buses, displayed on career web sites, slotted between songs on classic rock stations.  They promise a quick start, $15 an hour and health insurance.
Jacob Silverman / New Republic:
The New Language of Forever War-Making  —  “History, unfortunately, is a forever war,” according to Clifford D. May and Bradley Bowman, who seem never to have encountered a war they don't like.  This faux profundity comes midway through an essay in a collection published earlier this week …
 
 
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 More Items: 
Bloomberg:
Hackers Hit at Least Three States in Attack Tied to Russia
Nick Reynolds / Casper Star-Tribune:
Wyoming lawmaker apologizes for tweet about Wyoming's first Black sheriff
Discussion: The Root and Raw Story
The Hill:
McConnell getting much of what he wants in emerging relief deal
Discussion: HotAir
Kurt Schlichter / Townhall:
Pardon Everyone  —  Power is wasted if you don't use it, especially when exercising your power …
Sam Mellins / The Appeal:
The Election That Could Thwart New York City's War On Drugs
 Earlier Items: 
Mother Jones:
A Top Trump Fundraiser Asked the FBI for Help. Big Mistake.
Discussion: Bulwark+
Suzanne Hirt / USA Today:
Florida blames mothers when men batter them - then takes away their children
Christopher Bedford / The Federalist:
This Series Of Fact-Checks On America's Mission To Defeat COVID Exposes Media Hatred
Discussion: HotAir and Twitchy
Michelle Ruiz / Vogue:
How Savannah Guthrie and Kristen Welker Won the 2020 Election Coverage
Discussion: Newsbusters
Neal Rothschild / Axios:
Trump states shut out COVID headlines as virus rages
 

 
From Techmeme:

Mishaal Rahman / Android Authority:
Source: Google has canceled the development of a second-generation Pixel Tablet, planned for release in 2025, due to concerns that it wouldn't sell very well

Mark Gurman / Bloomberg:
Sources: Apple is testing a more conversational version of Siri, dubbed “LLM Siri”, with plans to release it in spring 2026 as part of iOS 19 and macOS 16

Hannah Lang / Reuters:
Sources: a16z, Ripple, Kraken, and Circle are jostling for a seat on Trump's promised crypto advisory council, which is expected to set up a bitcoin reserve

 
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