memeorandum: Hoodie-loving, shorts aficionado John Fetterman makes New York Times most stylish people list (Ryan King/Washington Examiner)

3:45 PM ET, December 12, 2022

Top Items:

Max Tani / Semafor:

Why The White House isn't stressed about Elon Musk's Twitter — Joe Biden's White House is less concerned about Elon Musk's takeover of Twitter than many Democrats, officials said in recent interviews. — That's because Biden's team believes Twitter is largely valuable for just two things:

Discussion: Vanity Fair and Praxis Of Evil

Semafor:

Media Newsletter 12/11 — Of course the “Twitter files” are a story. Elon Musk's selective release of internal correspondence has shed some light on how Twitter clamped down on voices it deemed extreme and misleading, mostly on the right and far right. Less interesting leaks from Facebook made front pages for years.

Discussion: Mediaite, IJR and NBC News

Miranda Devine / New York Post:
The media's silence on the ‘Twitter Files’ is shameful

Discussion: Power Line and HotAir

CBS News:

White House: Marjorie Taylor Greene's latest Jan. 6 comments a “slap in the face” to law enforcement, victims' families — Washington — The White House is reacting sharply to comments made over the weekend by Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and how the insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021 …

Discussion: Fox News, NBC News, Washington Examiner, PoliticusUSA, The Mahablog, Raw Story, Washington Post, Slate, Forbes, Mediaite, The Hill, HuffPost and New Republic

Zach Schonfeld / The Hill:
Greene says Jan. 6 remarks were ‘sarcasm’

Discussion: HuffPost, CNN, USA Today, ABC News, Washington Post, New York Post, Patterico's Pontifications, Raw Story, The Wrap, IJR, CBS News, Insider, LGBTQ Nation, Boing Boing, Political Wire, TMZ.com, Rolling Stone and The Daily Beast

Politico:
What the Jan. 6 select committee's final report will look like

Discussion: New York Times, Washington Examiner, RedState, Talking Points Memo, Raw Story, HuffPost, The Hill, Bloomberg and Election Law Blog

Matt Novak / Gizmodo:

Elon Musk Gets Viciously Booed by Stadium Crowd at Dave Chappelle Show — “You shut the fuck up,” Chappelle said as the crowd booed the billionaire. — Alerts — Elon Musk, the billionaire who wants nothing more in life than to be adored by legions of fans, was loudly booed by a crowd …

Isaac Stanley-Becker / Washington Post:

Kari Lake was unflinchingly loyal to Trump. Then her campaign unraveled. — Interviews, internal documents and audio show how Lake squandered a chance to become Arizona's governor — a defeat that carries warnings for the GOP in 2024. — By Isaac Stanley-Becker and Yvonne Wingett Sanchez

Discussion: New Republic, Vanity Fair, Election Law Blog, Raw Story, New York Daily News, Political Wire, In Broad Daylight and The Hill

Ryan King / Washington Examiner:

Hoodie-loving, shorts aficionado John Fetterman makes New York Times most stylish people list — Big shorts and hoodie-loving Sen.-elect John Fetterman's (D-PA) unique fashion has landed him on the New York Times's list of the 93 most stylish people of 2022.

Discussion: Twitchy

New York Times:
Styles's 93 Most Stylish ‘People’ of 2022

Discussion: The Hill, IJR and The Daily Caller

Amy Gardner / Washington Post:

Special counsel sends Trump subpoena to Ga. secretary of state Raffensperger — State or local officials in five of the six contested battlegrounds where former president Donald Trump tried to reverse his defeat have received similar subpoenas — Special counsel Jack Smith has sent …

Discussion: Associated Press, CNN and The Western Journal

CNN:
Special Counsel Smith speeds ahead on criminal probes surrounding Trump

Discussion: Washington Examiner and Raw Story

Nicholas Fandos / New York Times:

Scott Stringer Sues for Defamation Over Sexual Assault Claim — Mr. Stringer, the former New York City comptroller, said that a woman's claims of sexual assault were lies and caused “irreparable harm” as he ran for mayor. — Nearly 20 months after allegations of unwanted sexual advances derailed …

Discussion: New York Magazine and New York Post

Karen Matthews / Associated Press:
NYC politician sues woman who accused him of sexual assault

Discussion: Bloomberg

Associated Press:

Young voters' enthusiasm for Democrats waned during midterms — Young voters who have been critical to Democratic successes in recent elections showed signs in November's midterms that their enthusiasm may be waning, a potential warning sign for a party that will need their strong backing heading into the 2024 presidential race.

Discussion: Forbes, New York Post, The Daily Caller, Washington Examiner, FiveThirtyEight, The Hill, HotAir, Just The News and Washington Times

CNN: CNN Poll: Americans are split over confidence in incoming House GOP majority or Biden

Washington Post:

How a Trump-allied group fighting ‘anti-white bigotry’ beats Biden in court — America First Legal was founded last year by Stephen Miller, the architect of Trump's immigrant family separation policy — The deal in early 2021 was hailed by advocates for Black farmers as the most significant piece …

Discussion: Raw Story

Jon Gambrell / Associated Press:

Iran execution: Man publicly hanged from crane amid protests — Iran executed a second prisoner on Monday convicted over crimes committed during the nationwide protests challenging the country's theocracy, publicly hanging him from a construction crane as a gruesome warning to others.

Discussion: Washington Free Beacon, The Guardian, New York Times, middleeastmonitor.com, Semafor, Just The News, Raw Story, Al Jazeera, The Hill, Insider, UPI, Radio Free Europe/Radio …, Bloomberg, Associated Press and Voice of America

Washington Post:

Cause of death: Washington faltered as fentanyl gripped America — During the past seven years, as soaring quantities of fentanyl flooded into the United States, strategic blunders and cascading mistakes by successive U.S. administrations allowed the most lethal drug crisis in American history …

Discussion: Insider, Progress Pond, RedState, Erick Erickson's Show Notes and American Everyman

Ariel Zilber / New York Post:

Sam Bankman-Fried to testify before Congress remotely: ‘Quite overbooked’ — Disgraced FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried said Monday he will testify remotely rather than in person before Congress because he's “quite overbooked” and has security concerns about “paparazzi” if he were to travel to Washington, DC.

Discussion: Politico, Bloomberg, The Daily Caller, The Block, Raw Story, TechCrunch and Quartz

Jonathan Chait / New York Magazine:

Red-Pilled Elon Musk Still Loves the Chinese Communist Party … A decade ago, Elon Musk was an object of contempt for conservatives. Tesla was “a prodigious harvester of government favors and handouts,” complained Phil Kerpen of the Committee to Unleash Prosperity.

Discussion: Fortune, KTLA and Axios

Washington Post:

U.S. to announce fusion energy ‘breakthrough’ — Scientists hit a key milestone in the quest to create abundant zero-carbon power through nuclear fusion. But they still have a long way to go. — The Department of Energy plans to announce Tuesday that scientists have been able …

Eric Lichtblau / The Guardian:

Biden faces growing pressure to drop charges against Julian Assange — Biden faces a renewed push, domestically and internationally, to drop charges against Assange, who is languishing in a UK jail — The Biden administration has been saying all the right things lately about respecting …

Discussion: The American Conservative

Matt Maytum / GamesRadar:

Christopher Nolan: “Oppenheimer is one of the most challenging projects I've ever taken on in terms of scale” — By Matt Maytum Contributions from Jack Shepherd published — Exclusive: Christopher Nolan tells Total Film about recreating the first-ever nuclear weapon detonation without the use of computer graphics

Discussion: Variety

Jose Pagliery / The Daily Beast:

Judge Cannon Forced to Toss Trump's Special Master Bid for Mar-a-Lago Docs — Judge Aileen Cannon dismissed the case Monday morning. — Former President Donald Trump's clumsy attempt to halt the FBI investigation into the way he hoarded classified documents at Mar-a-Lago has reached its inevitable end …

Discussion: CNBC, Talking Points Memo, Miami Herald, One America News Network, Raw Story, Roll Call, Insider, Washington Examiner and Boing Boing

Marianne LeVine / Politico:

Trump who? GOP senators rave over a potential Tim Scott presidential run. — Joni Ernst is “very excited” about a potential Tim Scott presidential run. John Cornyn would “advise him to go for it.” And John Barrasso said it “doesn't get any better than Tim Scott.”

Discussion: Mediaite, Raw Story and New York Post

Nick Schwellenbach / Project On Government Oversight:

Hundreds of Oath Keepers Have Worked for DHS, Leaked List Shows — Homeland Security Secretary Says Violent Extremists Should Have “No Place” in Department — This investigation was produced in partnership with the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project.

Discussion: Rolling Stone

Zach Montellaro / Politico:

Inside the secret $32M effort to stop ‘Stop the Steal’ — A pair of progressive organizations operating in complete secrecy spearheaded a $32 million campaign during the midterms to push back against former President Donald Trump's “Stop the Steal” movement.

Discussion: Raw Story

Ronald J. Deibert / Foreign Affairs:

The Autocrat in Your iPhone … In the summer of 2020, a Rwandan plot to capture exiled opposition leader Paul Rusesabagina drew international headlines. Rusesabagina is best known as the human rights defender and U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom recipient who sheltered more than 1,200 Hutus …

Thomas Catenacci / Fox News:

Pete Buttigieg often flies on taxpayer-funded private jets, flight data show — Biden Cabinet member has taken at least 18 flights on taxpayer-funded private jets, despite calls to curb carbon emissions — Pete Buttigieg: We will be proud when America ‘leads the way’ into EV future