We discussed the jeans ad here when it came out. I deferred judgment until we could see the sales data. Turns out sales are mostly neutral—down slightly in Q2, possibly too early to reflect the ad’s impact—but up slightly in Q3/Q4. American Eagle appears pleased; sales had previously been declining.
The controversy continues. One thing is clear: Sydney Sweeney knows how to engage. She’s a master at not falling into leading-question traps.
NEW: Sydney Sweeney refuses to apologize for the American Eagle jeans ad after GQ's Katherine Stoeffel continuously tried to get her to cave.
Stoeffel: I mean, Trump tweeted about the jeans ad … that just seems like a very crazy moment…
Sweeney: It was surreal.
Stoeffel:… pic.twitter.com/F9ihaeMqeq
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) November 6, 2025
When asked about the U.S. President tweeting the ad, Sweeney picks up the interviewer’s cue of a “crazy moment” and replies simply, “It was surreal.”
The interviewer then frames a follow-up as if suggesting Sweeney might feel grateful that powerful people were on her side: “I wondered if you felt that way.” Sweeney pauses, looks thoughtful, and explains that she hadn’t been thinking about it—she was working 16-hour days and had put her phone away. She then discusses her busy schedule. When asked if she worries people might avoid her movies because of perceived political views, her answer is simply: No.
Throughout this exchange, Sweeney conveys the impression of being unrehearsed. Perhaps she truly hasn’t thought much about Trump tweeting her ad—and perhaps she has. Either way, it reads as authentic.
After that, Sweeney delivers a masterclass in handling leading questions. The interviewer tries to get her to discuss the criticism of the ad—the “genetic” controversy. Importantly, the question is framed as giving Sweeney an opportunity to respond rather than putting her on the spot. Sweeney ignores the leading part and engages the opportunity framing, answering:
I think that when I have an issue that I want to speak about, people will hear.
I have to say: Sweeney either has terrific media instincts, very good handlers, or both. Not delivering political analysis or commentary is precisely the correct move. There are plenty of people whose profession is to deconstruct these things. Defending or criticizing the ad herself would serve her no purpose. For now, she leaves the politics to others.
Her consistent refusal to answer also ensures continued interest from interviewers hoping to be “the one” to get her to engage politically. I predict that if she ever does, it will be in an autobiography decades from now—and entirely on her terms.
It’s hard to say for sure as you note (is it just her handlers?) but it might be that she breaks the stereotype of a dumb blonde well. Also as you noted, the ambiguity also serves her well, not just politically but. Is she a ditz? She doesn’t seem to be. Is she sharp? The uncertainty makes her interesting.
That and she’s got good jeans. 🙂
The journalist is being manipulative and comes across as quite disingenuous IMO. I’d prefer Sweeney just slap her, ha ha. That’s kind of a journalist’s job though, but done poorly here. I very much doubt the interviewer really thinks Trump having your back is something to be proud of.
Sweeney’s basic response of “I just do modeling for jeans and leave the smug condescending analysis to people like you” to be pitch perfect.
In another sign of the ending of the Woke Apocalypse GQ’s publisher Conde Nast recently folded “Teen Vogue” which was hyper-woke. The usual response:
https://nypost.com/2025/11/06/business/conde-nast-fires-four-staffers-who-confronted-hr-chief-over-teen-vogue-merger/
Mark,
My best guess: She is sharp. She is emotionally mature. And she honestly doesn’t feel the need to make “everyone” like her or to prove herself.
I suspect there is some work in the background. People casting her met her and figured out she was all of these things.
There are aspects of this interview that bring to mine Barbara Walters interviewing Dolly Parton. There are other aspects of Sidney Sweeney’s behavior that bring to mind Taylor Swift.
Dolly Parton knew how to answer loaded questions that contained veiled judgements and insults. ( Would people have called your family hill billies? or something similar.) In that one, Barbara was trying to “look” more serious but perhaps “kind”. Possibly acting as informal guidance counselor or something. Dolly’s happy, laughing answers were just right.
In this one, the interviewers seems to be trying to convey, “We’re just two girls having a chat vibes.” She smiles… tries to seem “concerned” when bringing up what is clearly a POV buried inside questions.
The context is different. But there are aspects of modern day interviews that strike me a bit like “Sea Lioning” or “JAQing off”. But give plausible deniability to the person Just Asking Questions. But there definitely is a POV in there.
I’m not sure if interviews were always this way. But Barbara Walters did it too.
Tom,
I like this in your link
Of course, insiders and employees could start their own magazine to do what is “needed the most”.
Maybe they did.
It stopped having a print edition in 2017. This is googles numbers on online traffic.
8.3 million unique viewers -> 3.1 million over 8 years might be part of the reason to fold it into regular vogue.
Sure, maybe 3.1 million viewers is enough reason to keep it operating. But maybe not. Viewers may or may not drive enough revenue. Maybe regular vogue brings in more revenue for the same amount of work. I can’t claim to know.
Tom,
Also, not actually saying “and leave the smug condescending analysis to people like you” is genius on her part. I suspect she is very aware that this will get picked up on twitter, x, youtube.
This is longer– 19 minutes
More than viewers it will be advertisers forcing the change, although those are linked. It’s harder selling ads for woke rage nowadays.
Tom,
Yes. I could get viewer numbers by googling. I couldn’t get ad revenue as easily. Presumably it would be in quarterly reports– but it’s possibly not reported as much online.
Lucia,
Wikipedia supports your thinking about her. Valedictorian, math club, robotics team; she’s smart. Kickboxing and martial arts from early on; she’s tough.
Good for her, as far as I am concerned. I’m sure she’ll continue to do very well.
lucia wrote: “My best guess: She is sharp. She is emotionally mature. And she honestly doesn’t feel the need to make “everyone” like her or to prove herself.”
I think that is right. It’s not handlers. I don’t think that any handlers can make their product sound authentic. Usually just the opposite.
MikeM,
I watched the full interview in the link I put in comments. She is very smart. Also, it looks like she feels no need to prove she’s smart to anyone. Also, at least as far as the “feels” of the interviewer go, she seems to feel no need to “fix” what other people might “feel”. At the end, the interviewer starts on something like (19:10): “You are giving us permission to keep projecting.” “We’re going to keep taking what you do and putting it on our board,. A little bit.”, (hand gestures). “‘What does Sidney think’ “. Sidney, “I can’t wait to see what the board says.”
They interviewer is obviously very, very eager to know what Sidney thinks… and Sidney doesn’t feel the need fill that interviewers wish. Sidney also doesn’t say, “You wanting that doesn’t mean I need to give it to you.” If she had, that would be true. But “”I can’t wait to see what the board says.” is perfect. Not rude.
Much of the interview is just delightful. Sidney is happy, thoughtful, elaborates ideas that are clearly hers. One of those is she wants to let her art speak for itself. (She is producing her new movie Christie, not just acting in it.) I think this likely is her honest to goodness reason to not discuss theories about what different scenes in the movie “mean” or “communicate”. My guess is she knows other people– for example movie critics or bloggers vbloggers acting as movie critics– can do that. She doesn’t need to do that just because someone invites her to.
I’m honestly very impressed by her.
Indeed. Ms. Sweeney seems to be most impressive.
Mark Bofill,
Valedictorian….. yes, but a senior class of maybe six! The entire (exclusive) private school has about 75 students in all grades. I am sure she is smart….. but exactly how smart we can’t say.
She is very attractive; of that we can be certain. 😉
Rich too.
SteveF wrote: ” about 75 students in all grades”.
That does not seem plausible. Wikipedia says 350 total with 130 students in grades 9-12. So 30-35 in graduating class. And it sounds like it is very selective academically, so valedictorian would be significant.
darn, was too good to be true….
SteveF,
Well.. I was high school valedicgtorian…. of 67. I knew it was a small class. The thing is, you can’t get higher.
And no it was not a school for “smart kids”. Private schools…well… they occasionally are for smart kids. Often more “protective”.
I wasn’t basing my impression based on her class rank. I was basing it on her interview. Is she Albert Einstein? Heddy Lamarr? Probably not. Few are. But she is smart.
Mike M,
The school you looked at is where she attended grade school. Her high school was Brighton Hall (Burbank, Ca) where the total enrollment is “75 -100” for all grades K-12. Looks like a school people in show business, or who want their kids to be in show business, send their kids. Look at the alumni list in Wikipedia.
There is no information on the class size the year she graduated, but very small for sure.
Lucia,
No doubt the lady is exceptional in many ways.
SteveF
These types of schools definitely exist. I’m familiar with other very small schools people send their kids too– and there is also home schooling. Obviously, it’s not hard to have the best grades out of 5 kids. Extracurriculars? Well, stupid kids rarely pick math club if they can avoid it. But also, small schools usually aren’t going to have a vast array of choices.
But listening to her– she is composed, avoids falling in traps… yada, yada. I’m not saying “smartest person who ever walked the earth”. That’s highly unlikely. Even if she was no one could tell that from interviews! But we can often see “dumb” when some people interviewed– she’s smart. I suspect she’s much smarter than Tucker Carlson!!
Lucia,
” I suspect she’s much smarter than Tucker Carlson!!”
As loopy as Tucker seems to have become, no doubt that is true. Alien spacecraft are common?!?! Yikes!
The lady knows how to succeed in a very competitive field… that takes a combination of smarts, looks, and effort. I am sure she is no dummy.
Since Lucia officially opened the thread to other subjects, a comment for programers:
I actually got real help from an AI Search Assistant a couple days ago. I was working with a computer routine (named “fullduplexserial.spin”) which handles simultaneous sending and receiving of serial data. In addition to a high level language, the program calls a machine language routine that is fast enough to actually handle ‘simultaneous’ sending and receiving (actually there is a ping-pong between send and receive modes, but so fast nothing is ever missed). The problem was the program had only 16 character (16 byte) send and receive buffers, and I needed much larger buffers. I searched for a couple of hours for any reference to expanding the buffers…. nope. But the search assistant found one, published three years ago, with a free license. Saved me a huge amount of time (days?) not having to learn enough of the assembly language to make the required modifications myself.
Interesting Steve. The small buffers sound like hardware UART buffers. Assembly language is a pain to write in unless you do it all the time and very few need to these days. I’m surprised that you had to resort to assembly to get the performance you needed; modern processors are generally fast enough to leave serial data transfers in the dust by several orders of magnitude even in C or C++. Of course, we run huge slow operating systems that waste almost all of the processor’s potential.
All this said, I’m glad your getting use out of AI. I am too. 🙂 The day doesn’t go by these days that I’m not using it for something or other.
You use Parallax propeller if memory serves, and I read those don’t have UARTs. My mistake.
I’ve never worked on those I’m afraid.
Tom to self every 6 months:
The normal way to handle this is for the communications port interrupt handler to store incoming / outgoing data in a temporary buffer and the main application / driver must check this buffer often enough it doesn’t overflow.
Shall we discuss my feelings on people putting in indefinite blocking code in embedded applications?
For the record I always make the size of this buffer definable but for small processors there can be real limitations. Generally I start with 256 bytes. Some libraries / API’s are indeed quite deficient.
Revealed: How an edited Trump speech exposed BBC bias
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EjPlfUt4S9U
This was inexcusable for whoever was responsible and the fact checkers failed. Very deceptively done. We have come to expect that from many media organizations lately but the BBC allegedly holds itself to a different standard.
Supposedly they are going to explain how that happened tomorrow.
Tom Scharf,
“…the BBC allegedly holds itself to a different standard.”
The left does not even recognize standards exist, unless they inhibit action by their political opponents. And the BBC is nothing if not a propaganda outlet for the left. All bias, all the time.
Mark Bofill,
No UARTs…. bit banging to look like UARTs. The 8 processors run at 80 MHz, not 3 GHz, and each has shared memory access only each 8 clocks, so effectively 10 MHz for memory access. Any process that needs to be really fast is handled as assembly language in a small (2 Kbyte) memory physically associated with each processor.
Tom Scharf,
No interrupts, all processes mind their own business (save for semaphores and passing variable values). Note to myself:
Looks like Senate Dems will cave on the shutdown, and vote for the ‘clean CR’ that extends spending at last year’s levels.
I do not doubt some of the covid related increases in Obamacare subsidies will be extended, especially for households making under $60K per year, but the increased subsidies for people who make north of $100K for sure will not, nor will funding for illegal aliens….. including millions the Biden administration gave temporary work permits ‘pending asylum claims’.
Passing the clean CR took 2 weeks longer than I thought it would.
The usual suspects have their hair on fire.
Many Dems have gone insane:
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2025/11/08/carville_democrats_will_win_in_2028_congress_will_increase_supreme_court_justices_from_9_to_13.html
And seem incapable of even understanding the fundamental problems the country faces:
https://quoththeraven.substack.com/p/an-open-letter-to-bill-maher
Stupid policies cause inflation and the ever growing disparity in wealth. Control price inflation (and especially inflation driven via artificial asset price inflation), and control illegal immigration, and there is a chance of making progress on wealth disparities.
SteveF
Phew! I fly to Columbus next week. If they pass, likely shorter lines. 🙂
Bit banging UART’s is psychotic, ha ha. It can definitely be done for low baud rates. You can run a timer interrupt and sample the GPIO and get it done but for higher baud rates that is upwards of a 100K+ interrupts per second and depending on how efficient the interrupt routine is that can cause a lot of overhead. If you have another interrupt that spends a bit of time doing something then you can miss bits.
Alternately you can generate edge detection interrupts that reference a timer and a little bit of math can do it more efficiently with less headaches on edge timing.
I just always use a hardware UART. Many bit banged serial ports end up with intermittent hardware problems that are difficult to debug. They tend to get designed out.
I tend to be a bit religious about COM reliability though. A single bit flip due to noise can generate big issues for safety.
I recently sat on a runway in SF for over an hour while they rerouted ground traffic. They didn’t say it was a shutdown thing but it probably was.
Tom,
Fortunately, I have a habit of flying in “early-ish” for things like competitions. I have a 10 am flight. I dance the following morning.
My pro usually cuts it tight but he and his wife were driving. He likes driving and with 2 people, it was much more economical than flying. Mind you…. it’s me this saves money for. The students pay expenses– it’s split over several, but still…. this wouldn’t have been money out of his pocket!
Yeah. I wrote a bit banger audio output driver (.wav playing essentially) once because there wasn’t another way to do it on the board we were stuck with, but bit banging is my method of last resort if I have a choice.
I’m not a money guy, but I think looking at the American Eagle stock progress since the ad is worthwhile.
When the ad come out in joy the stock had been hovering just over $10 for some time. By September, it was at $20 and now it’s at about 18.
Image:
https://x.com/rklier21/status/1987929748929126746?s=61
Overall trajectory for the for that time is up and remains up, indicating the peak may not be here yet.
Earnings were up 15% year over a year for the quarter and an additional thing that I think is important is not only the absolute value of the earnings, but how the earnings prefer performed versus the anticipated.
Gemini: “The Sydney Sweeney ad campaign was a major contributing factor to American Eagle Outfitters’ (AEO) significantly better-than-expected Earnings Per Share (EPS) for the second quarter of Fiscal Year 2025.”
Wall Street had been anticipating a earnings per share of $.20 in the actual earnings per year was $.45
Let’s say the ad campaign was a wowser from a money standpoint,but i’m not a money guy
Russell,
Stock prices is people’s anticipation of what will happen. Also, sometimes, they are wrong. In this case, there may be people who want to show “approval”. That’s a terrible way to invest, but it happens. Earnings area a better metric.
American Eagle seems pleased. I think the effect of the commercial on earnings seems generally positive, not negative. Brand visibility is probably a very important thing here.
Tom Scharf,
Bit-banging a SPI with a slow interpreted language (Spin) tops out at about 15 Kbaud, which is well over what I need for my most recent application (running a 24 bit A/D converter chip). Since the banging runs in a dedicated processor, the rest of the program is completely unaware/unaffected, no matter the speed. The same thing done in assembly would get to about about 150 Kbaud, but I only need a little under 3 Kbaud at the data rates I am using. Most of the time, the code is waiting for the next A/D conversion to complete. There is actually a compiler available that will generate assembly from the SPIN code, but I don’t see much point in that.
another metric is market capitalization increase…
ChatGBT:
“In summary, the Sydney Sweeney campaign catalyzed a market capitalization increase of roughly $0.8 billion”
wow!
after a series of very visible and very costly woke failures, like Bud Light, Snow Woke, Jaguar, cracker Barrel and a very visible anti-woke big money success, Sydney Sweeney, I wouldn’t be surprised to see a lot more anti-woke campaigns by business. It makes good financial sense apparently.
Russell,
Companies will realize they need to be cautious both with woke and anti-woke. Sidney Sweeney being a woman who does not want to air her every political view was very helpful here. Had she not been, things could easily have gone sideways fast.
Many actors and actresses would jump at the opportunity to air political views. Whether the commercial was woke or anti-woke, that could be a disaster for the brand. Sidney’s position about the ad is “It’s a jeans ad.” No more. No less.
Well, we win another one…..
“ BREAKING: Transgender athletes are to be banned from female competition at the Olympics following a review of evidence about the sporting advantages of being born male.
The new policy may also bar female athletes with ‘differences of sex development’, possibly including boxers like Imane Khelif”
it’s not a done deal yet, but it looks like it’s gonna happen, and it’s about damn time.
BBC in Crisis as Trump Threatens $1 Billion Lawsuit
https://www.wsj.com/politics/policy/bbc-chairman-apologizes-for-error-in-edit-of-trump-speech-0fe74118?st=N4fkmu&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
The BBC basically admitted it was an error today. Whether it was worth much is debatable since it was not in the US.
The people who created the Trump documentary are refusing to comment at all so we still don’t know how that mistake was made. It seems rather intentional and malicious.
https://nationalpost.com/opinion/terry-newman-bbcs-weak-excuses-for-selective-editing-and-systemic-bias
Tom,
The Trump effect. I think they fired those two people so quickly because they were afraid Trump was gonna sue them. He won a couple of therapeutic judgments against ABC and CBS and now they’re all quaking in their boots.
The grotesque bias by the BBC is at least a source of humor: (Wall Street Journal)
“U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer also defended the BBC, saying it wasn’t institutionally biased.”
Lemme see…. a screaming leftist prime minister who doesn’t think the BBC is biased! Is he really that stupid, or does he think the rest of the world is? Either way, he is a clown…. and the BBC is horribly biased against anybody or anything not firmly on the left.
Yes, you can kind of tell the bias by who steps up to defend an institution after it drops the ball. In this case The Guardian is running endless “conservatives pounce” articles and quoting lots of anonymous people inside the BBC who says it’s a motivated political attack yada yada.
SteveF
For the love of adjectives. It’s not institutionally biased. He wants this to be just a few bad apples. 😉
Well, I bet it is institutionally biased. I mean…their ethics committee— which would be part of the institution had a discussion about what is a flagrantly misleading edit of video. But they didn’t pursue that issue because ” it “had not received significant audience feedback.”
I don’t know how it would receive significant audience feedback unless the audience was so familiar with the reel video that they said, “Hey! Wait a minute! That’s not what happened!” Serious news reporters are supposed to be trying to give the audience true information about what happened. Not rely on the audience to correct the news!
Lucia,
Yes, if you willfully mislead your audience with false information, presented as fact, it is doubly dishonest to expect your audience to fact check your lies.
The whole point of the BBC program was to mislead British nationals about what Trump actually said, and that effort fails if the audience has an easy way to detect the dishonesty. The entire episode falls into the category of “We are so sorry…. that we were caught lying.”
But not sorry about the lies. The left is never sorry about lies, because they are lying for “the greater good”.
I’m gonna take an unfamiliar role and defend the liberal media.
I don’t think the BBC edited the video of Trump. I think they simply copied an existing video that had been floating around the Internet for months. I know I had seen it.
Trump is such a notorious pitbull about going after media errors that I don’t think they would have dared doctor the video so egregiously.
I think their error is in not checking a video they picked up from somewhere else. It fit the narrative too perfectly to need to be checked.
Today Trump said a letter to the BBC:
“This correspondence serves as a demand under Florida Statute § 770.011 that you immediately retract the false, defamatory, disparaging, and inflammatory statements made about President Trump, which were published in a Panorama documentary that was fabricated and aired by the BBC.”
AND:
“Accordingly, President Trump hereby demands that you: (1) immediately issue a full and fair retraction of the documentary and any and all other false, defamatory, disparaging, misleading, and inflammatory statements about President Trump in as conspicuous a manner as they were originally published; (2) immediately issue an apology for the false, defamatory, disparaging, misleading, and inflammatory statements about President Trump; and (3) appropriately compensate President Trump for the harm caused.”
NOTE: “appropriately compensate President Trump for the harm caused.”
Trump gave them till Friday to rectify the situation
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/donald-trump-bbc-letter-full-panorama-edits-b2862392.html?callback=in&code=NZYZNZG1YZUTMTVLOS0ZYMU1LTG1ZJMTY2Q2MDM3NJGXODYY&state=68889ea6501c40898c6620c628f4ca1d&utm_source=chatgpt.com
Russell Klier wrote: “I don’t think the BBC edited the video of Trump. I think they simply copied an existing video that had been floating around the Internet for months. I know I had seen it.”
Interesting theory. But the BBC program was broadcast on Oct. 28, 2024. Over a year ago. So they were likely the source of the clip that you saw.
Mike,
My comment is only a theory. I have no evidence for it so you may be right.
But, the speech that was doctored was given in 2021.
Many many Internet sources ran clips from it.
The Democrats were using them as proof that Trump was supporting an insurrection
The BBC documentary came out in 2024.
So there is definitely a chance that the BBC had picked up on one of these already doctored videos.
Ms. Sweeney is definitely intelligent and holds to her own values (in addition to being easy on the eyes). I don’t recall seeing any of her roles other than the commercial for the AE jeans so I can’t express any opinion on her acting talent. I’m not surprised the interviewer tried to bait her or that she was able to flip it around so easily.
It will be interesting to see where Hollywood goes with casting and her career opportunities compared with other, more left wing, celebrities. Does she get the Gina Carano treatment or does Hollywood recognize she’s bankable and hold their nose while trying to get people to watch their product?
I’m somewhat surprised AE didn’t respond to the manufactured outrage by running more “great jeans” commercials with other attractive models of varying ethnic backgrounds. Perhaps they figured there was an upper limit of how much more clothing they could sell under current economic circumstances?
Russel,
You’d think journalists would from a fine, reliable, fact checking news agency would compare whatever they found online to actual footage. You’d think…..
DerekH,
I also have no opinion on her acting talent. Honestly, I don’t think you can entirely tell until someone has been in lots of movies. If someone is cast in a cheesy role, the acting will reflect the role.
Running the commercial with actresses of different ethnicities and races would probably not sell more jeans. For people who hated the first one, it wouldn’t be enough. For people who liked the first one, it wouldn’t be better.
It doesn’t matter if they copy / pasted the video clip from another source (Note: They still continue to refuse to specify what happened here, red flag).
The difference between “real media” and the sewer of social media is that this type of willful misinformation is supposed to not happen. That’s where the trust, or lack thereof, comes from.
Additionally even after they were told about this, in writing, they did nothing about it. I would suggest the lack of “significant audience feedback” was the motivation that they thought they could bury it. And that worked for quite a while, until it didn’t. Heads rolling was the only viable option at that point.
Had this been something more mundane they would have corrected it. Because of TDS the feel is that correcting it serves the needs of Trump and that is forbidden by peers due to ideology. Everybody looked the other way because … bias.
This is about as clear an example of institutional bias as it gets. Undefendable. There is still a bizarre lack of curiosity on how exactly this edit happened whether it was copy / paste or straight out malicious.
The people who did it know what happened. The group silence is yet another example of bias but one could also argue its about liability at this point, but that is a foregone conclusion.
Lucia,
“ You’d think journalists would from a fine, reliable, fact checking news agency would compare whatever they found online to actual footage.”
Yes, particularly when they are attacking a bulldog like Trump.
That certainly is an argument for them having maliciously edited it themselves, or at least knew they were fabricating a story..
I read that the splicing was done professionally to make it seem like it was one continuous video, so that had to be done by some sophisticated actors, another indicator that BBC did it themselves
And another thing.
The BBC friendly media keeps using the term “allegation” of deceptive editing. It’s not an allegation, it is a proven fact.
The BBC reports on itself, awkward:
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0mx28vlp4wo
One of Trump’s superpowers is getting his opponents to beclown themselves. Integrity is easy if you aren’t ever faced with difficult moral dilemmas. They chose resistance over integrity.
An interesting take on how Trump won the shutdown fight:
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/democrats-were-never-going-win-211000665.html
“Trump has in recent days started pressuring Senate Republicans to abolish the filibuster — removing the tool Democrats used to cause the shutdown, and letting the GOP pass laws with the party’s votes alone. Senate Republicans initially stuck by their refusal to do this, but the longer the shutdown stretched on, the more the pressure on them would intensify.”
That makes sense. The original dynamic was: Will the Dems cave or will the Republicans cave in to the Dems’ demands? Trump changed that to: Will the Dems cave or will the Republicans cave in to Trump’s demand to eliminate the filibuster?
That created a no-win scenario for the Dems since eliminating the filibuster would let Trump do pretty much whatever he wanted. So once real pain started to be felt, the Dems had no choice but to cave.
It is only speculation since the author has no sources saying that is what actually caused the Dems to cave. But it makes sense.
Here is a list of the ongoing problems at the BBC with the hot topic issues.
https://www.bbc.com/news/live/cd9kqz1yyxkt?post=asset%3Acf8be344-ea2c-439a-bd08-d688ce9e7bf8#post
What is particularly funny is the short clip shown here of an issue where the BBC announcer uses the term “pregnant people, women”. This announcer was apparently later reprimanded for breaching editorial standards by inserting “women” because the script only stated “pregnant people”.
The difference between institutional bias and an error is when all the mistakes and overreach point in one direction.
Mike —
I’m somewhat skeptical of that take. I think the Dems had a conscious strategy of pushing the shutdown to motivate their voters to the election booths last week. That mission was accomplished so they have no incentive to prolong the shutdown now, especially since Trump has shown himself eager to to use the shutdown to cut parts of the government he couldn’t cut through the normal budget process.
The Democrats have always wanted to eliminate the filibuster because they assume they will rise to power again and they would be even happier if it’s the Republicans who do the elimination. The dynamic nature of control of the Senate is one reason Senate Republicans have resisted getting rid of the filibuster — they warned Democrats it was a bad idea when Reid dropped filibusters for judicial appointments in order to ram Obama’s more controversial appointments through.
I suppose Schumer thought Democrats would win the PR campaign on the shutdown because they always have in the past. The difference here is that Trump and some of the Republicans felt they had the stronger hand and weren’t going to cave.
Holding the administrative branch, Trump was also able to take measures to try to minimize the pain felt by the public (unlike past shutdowns where Clinton and Obama maximized pain by doing things like closing off open air monuments).
The media will still try to portray this as a Trump failure and a Trump shutdown but the new media makes it harder for ABC/CBS/NBC/CNN to monopolize the story.
DerekH wrote: “so they have no incentive to prolong the shutdown now,”
But they have several interconnected reasons. One was expressed by a number of Senators, as well as many others, after Tuesday’s results: “Don’t quit now. We are winning!” Another related reason was that polls showed more people blaming Republicans. I have not seen anything about this, but I suspect the shutdown was good for Dem fund raising. Finally, there was avoiding the wrath of their base, which has now been unleashed. Schumer might or might not survive as majority leader. And he might well be heading into his last year as a Senator.
Yes, Republican Senators are reluctant to get rid of the filibuster. To change their minds would take something really drastic. Like the prospect of a quarter or more of all flights being cancelled over Thanksgiving weekend.
Here is another data point as to Dem motivations for continuing or ending the shutdown. Of the 8 Dem Senators who voted to end the shutdown, zero will face re-election in 2026. Two are retiring, the other six won’t be up for re-election until either 2028 or 2030.
Russia entered the human like AI robot market.
At the introduction, the robot did a face plant as it walked on to the stage.
I suppose next we will see how well it jumps out of upper story windows or what happens when it drinks, radioactive tea.
https://x.com/Gerashchenko_en/status/1988301955584897142?s=20
Derek H
“ Perhaps they figured there was an upper limit of how much more clothing they could sell under current economic circumstances?”
–
Surprised,
Does Sydney have an upper limit?
angech,
“Does Sydney have an upper limit?”
Yes, 309 meters above sea level.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sydney_Tower
I’ve read a couple of stories now explaining that Iran is facing a catastrophic water crisis due to their mismanagement, on a timescale of months. I wonder if it will be successfully spun as an indicator of climate change, or if those days are done.
Angech,
Evidently, her movie flopped. Too bad.
Confirmation of falling iguanas in Florida… TODAY:
https://x.com/MattDevittWX/status/1988226650908332196?s=20
Posted by meteorologist Matt Devitt of WINK NEWS
Waking up LATER
https://x.com/xMaryannM/status/1988262797801623841?s=20
Lucia,
Don’t feel too bad for her, she owns a $13 million estate in the Florida Keys.
Mark Bofill,
It is mostly California where climate change causes droughts, except when it rains/snows a lot; but that is climate change too. Most everywhere else precipitation and droughts are not due to climate change. 😉
Gotcha.
SteveF,
Climate change also causes droughts here in New Mexico. Probably in Colorado as well. 😉
Here on the eastern shore of the Gulf of America, global warming heats the waters to a temperature above historic norms…… always.
Mike M,
Climate change is so all-powerful that it went back in time to cause the famous droughts of the dustbowl era. That was a warning from the climate gods to return to caves and mud huts, where we belong.
And don’t forget hurricanes, tornados, and flooding. All climate change, all the time.
Mike M,
The effects of climate change in New Mexico and Colorado, while often visible, are not as strong as in California. But they can be strong in Massachusetts, where abnormally cool autumn temperatures this year were definitely due to climate change. And the four inches of sea level rise on Cape Cod since I was in diapers: climate change too. And don’t forget the spread of tropical diseases…. OK that hasn’t happened…. but it will: climate change.
As ‘smart’ people like Bill Gates (and many others!) come to the very belated conclusion that warming from increased greenhouse gases is modest in scale and effect, and far down on the priority list of humanity’s problems, it is nice to poke a little fun at the lunacy.
But the madness has already wasted many $trillions, which could have been better spent, and there remain many people who still embrace the lunacy. They will return to the bad old days of crazy waste, and revoke personal liberties, if they have the political power to do so.
A number of studies have shown the long term warming trend in the waters of the Gulf of Mexico. Here’s one from NOAA that covers a 70 year stretch ending in 2020:
https://repository.library.noaa.gov/view/noaa/48181
I’m liking Sen. Fetterman more and more to head a centrist party. Bari Weiss interviews him at https://www.thefp.com/p/is-there-still-room-for-john-fetterman
BW: Let’s just take the other side of the argument. Because the Republicans control all the branches of government, most people thought it was the Republicans’ fault. And there’s some amazing footage of journalists going out and interviewing people on the street, and they broadly perceive it as the Republicans’ fault, because they control the House, the Senate, and the presidency. And so the Democrats, I think, perceive themselves as winning the blame game, and feel like we could go on with this, because public perception is so very much blaming the Republicans. What do you say to that?
JF: Effectively, it’s a wash in terms of the blame. But for me, it’s not a blame game–it’s not a game.
The USS Ford has entered the SOUTHCOM (U.S. Southern Command) theater of operations. It hasn’t arrived at its battle location. I do not know where that location will be.
“From the United States Congress, I can confirm that our largest aircraft carrier, the USS Gerald R. Ford, has entered the area of control of the Southern Command in the Atlantic”
https://x.com/RepCarlos/status/1988267943893889074?s=20
Russell,
So surface warming in the Gulf of America of about 0.8 C over 70 years. About the same as overall global warming, which nobody sensible denies is happening. But that is nowhere near as much as models predict and not enough to be a serious problem. Although as least some of the warming is due to CO2, some might also be natural.
HaroldW,
Fetterman is no centrist. He is not even left-of-center. He is very liberal. But he is neither nuts nor spineless, which makes him seem centrist compared to almost all Democrat politicians.
Who is responsible for the shutdown?
Most Dems are angry the shutdown is over and all Republicans are happy it is over. That tells us which party wanted the shutdown.
Harold, Your comment on the shutdown:
“But for me, it’s not a blame game–it’s not a game.”
For me too it’s not a game- it’s a war.
The war is about maintaining control of the House and Senate in next year’s elections.
Who can be saddled with blame for the shutdown is a major skirmish in that war.
It doesn’t really matter who caused the shutdown or who was responsible for it. What matters is who the Independent voting public perceives as responsible for it.
Mike,
“About the same as overall global warming, which nobody sensible denies is happening.”
I agree. I just think it’s important that in our exuberance over our victory over the climate change mob we shouldn’t forget that the climate actually is changing.
Be very careful on graphs portending to show trends. I find it very convenient that graph goes back 70 years, i.e., starts at what was a local minima (anyone remember the Frozen Chosin?).
Winters in the 1940s and 1950s were bitterly cold if I am to believe contemporaneous accounts of soldiers during World War II and the Korean War.
DerekH,
There was a local maximum in both global and US temperatures in the 30’s. Then there was a minimum in the around 1970. There is a natural cycle of about 60-80 years duration. You can see some of that in the paper Russell linked. Gulf surface temperatures declined slightly from 1950 to 1970, then started trending upward. The authors put ignored that interval in their trend line which was only applied to 1970-2020.
Winters will, of course, seem unusually cold to soldiers who are out in the elements 24/7.
I don’t think most people care at all about the shutdown and it will have zero affect on 2026 elections. Mostly it is a sign that the parties are more interested in fighting each other.
11 years of no US major hurricane landfalls from 2006 to 2017 = statistical anomaly. The previous record before that was 6 years. Florida went 10 years with no hurricanes, that seems like a distant memory, ha ha.
1 year of above average hurricane landfall activity = Climate change and we need to add a Cat 6 level.
COP30 is ongoing in Brazil right now. Shockingly the Trump administration decided to skip it. These always devolve into protracted negotiations on a cash grab by developing countries for the alleged climate damage by developed countries. The media is ignoring it all for a change.
COP30: Trump and many leaders are skipping it, so does the summit still have a point?
https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c205jvyg3wjo
Another strange thing is the usual climate suspects never bring up the gargantuan amounts of energy the AI boom requires. It’s almost like climate policy is just a political tool …
A tale as old as time …
The Sierra Club Embraced Social Justice. Then It Tore Itself Apart.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/11/07/us/politics/sierra-club-social-justice.html?unlocked_article_code=1.zU8.8xEt.dr6WmitI-P0o&smid=url-share
This isn’t exactly new. I like the environment but I very much don’t like environmentalists. I wouldn’t even consider going to a Sierra Club meeting because you would be expected to support the rest of the religion. It’s an opportunity lost. Stop hiring lawyers and clean up some garbage for a change.
Tom S —
I am more surprised that the NYT published this. I’m not used to the NYT admitting faults on the Left unless it’s to push an even more leftist cause or to cover up for something.
Mike M,
The current GISS temperature history indicates the WWII era was actually a little warmer than just before and just after. I think you are right about soldiers being exposed to winter conditions.
If you squint hard and believe the temperature histories are reasonably accurate, you can conclude the world is about 1C warmer than in 1880. I would not be surprised if it approaches 2C warmer than 1880 by 2100. I won’t be around but I am a lot less worried for my children and grandchildren about climate change than about a long list of other problems and potential problems… the rise of the loony left at the top.
SteveF angech, “Does Sydney have an upper limit?
Yes, 309 meters above sea level.
lucia “Evidently, her movie flopped. Too bad.”
Ta, both.
Humor, unlike Iran’s water supply, is obviously freely flowing at this site.
HARRISFAULKNER, @HARRISFAULKNER
Alert: White House press was called to gather at the briefing room doors at 9:40p ET. President Trump bill signing to end the government shutdown
@lucia —
I think I heard somewhere Sweeney’s new movie was basically award bait. There certainly doesn’t appear to be a lot of audience for a biopic on an unknown female boxer, lesbian or otherwise.
I do have to give her some credit for taking on a picture that didn’t play to her … strengths … Wonder of wonders, perhaps she’s actually serious about acting and doesn’t want to just be another pretty face?