happy new year. In celebration of Epiphany, welcome to the Beltway Brief. Today we commemorate the visit of the wise men. The wise men were the first Gentiles to worship the Lord in a stable, and the first Gentiles to come by faith alone. Please remember. There is no doubt that Mary, Joseph, and the shepherds believed that this infant was the Son of Christ, but they were all clearly told so by an angel. In contrast, the wise men followed the Star of Bethlehem and just seemed to know that the time had come. Of course, the Feast of the Epiphany also marks the end of Christmas, so unfortunately, it's past time to take the pine needle fire hazard to the curb and box up your lights and ornaments until next year.
And speaking of ending…
Welcome to January 6, 2025. Everything is different. From Washington to Los Angeles, celebrities are unafraid to engage with the 45th and 47th US presidents, and corporate money is flowing once again to the populist disruptors that were shunned just a year ago. .
Four years ago, on January 6, 2021, angry Republicans, serial agitators, street performers, and frustrated and forgotten Americans rioted at the Capitol. Within two days, Twitter banned the US president from communicating with his 90 million followers on its platform. The move marked a major escalation in corporate America's war against Trump, but for no other reason than to censor dissident ideas, Amazon, Apple, and Google colluded to create Parler, a popular competitor of Twitter. ) was quickly overtaken in an attempt to crush it.
Today, everything is different.
It was the culmination of four years of strong left-wing pressure in Hollywood, college campuses, newsrooms and television studios, as well as corporate boardrooms and advertising departments.
It started shortly after Donald Trump won an unexpected victory on November 8, 2016. The nonpartisan exchange in D.C. ended almost immediately. The casual good times between liberal and conservative newsrooms stopped, never to resume. In the words of Democrats dressed as anti-Nazi resistance fighters, socializing was about working together.
The atmosphere at the inaugural party in January of the following year was noticeably quiet. Typically, this is a time when companies and business people compete for the attention of incoming appointees, politicians and staff, but that wasn't the case this year. One of the few events, co-sponsored by the Daily Caller and Facebook on the rooftop of the swanky Hay-Adams Hotel, featured one of the city's best views of the White House and the Washington Monument. By all accounts, the night was a huge success with a great turnout. But the internal backlash from Facebook's liberal employees was swift and brutal. It would be Hitler's last “celebration” in orange.
That feeling has spread. That was obvious on cable news, but the spread at news media propaganda conferences was much stranger. Traditionally, anyone who makes a living selling advertising is a capitalist, regardless of their barroom political stance. However, after President Trump's victory, trade with the enemy is cooperation with the occupying forces, and strictly speaking
Prohibited. The entire session was dedicated to “resistance” in the business world. The situation worsened during the 2020 morality movement, when companies like Bank of America pledged to donate $1 billion to Black Lives Matter. Just four years ago, this radical movement was fully engulfed in rioting and looting that claimed black lives. Five Dallas police officers killed.
Today, everything is different. The man who once faced censorship on social media and sparked protests in nearly every highest chamber in the country is back in the White House after being confirmed by the U.S. Senate, becoming the first Republican in 20 years to win the popular vote. It is expected that The president's inaugural committee has more than $150 million in pledges (and more than $140 million in the bank), far exceeding the planned budget for the day. Multi-million dollar donors include Meta, Amazon, Amazon's Jeff Bezos, Apple's Tim Cook, Toyota, Ford, General Motors, hedge fund manager Ken Griffin, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, Banks -Includes America, AT&T, and Goldman Sachs.
Four years ago, many of those companies
swore Don't give Trump or his allies another dime. Apple and Amazon, in particular, helped bring down Parler simply by providing social media platforms that did not ban the president. Now they're all raising millions of dollars for his return. “People just want to move on and move on,” a representative of one company that pledged opposition after the Capitol riot told the Wall Street Journal. “The election results were very clear.”
Rather than being unsure, companies are confused by the new environment. Once a trusted link between corporations and the Republican Party, it has lost credibility in recent years as it resists the tide of populism. “American companies and big NGOs” [(non-governmental organizations)] “They are scared and have no idea what to do,” one consultant between Republicans and business clients told Blaze News. “Some people have contacted me saying that none of their trusted contacts are aware of the policy shift, and traditional allies in some areas are of no help.'' They have no understanding of the new group or appointees and are panicking.”
Similarly, governors and mayors who have developed reputations as anti-Trump politicians have met with the president-elect and indicated they will work together in the future. Meanwhile, across the ocean, European leaders are realizing that Trump's brand of populism, far from being a frustrating aberration, is a long-lived force that must be considered responsibly.
Of course, the global left's disorientation and peaceful retreat will not continue. The relative calm on the streets, in newsrooms, and in Hollywood is likely to end by the time the first deportations begin. There is no doubt that it will be a long march. But for now, the “resistance” is losing momentum. Read more: Corporate patience, support and capital, once in endless supply, is running dry. This alliance was strange, but also very dangerous. This turn is indeed very good.
Popular information: Zuckerberg, once a champion of illegal aliens, embraces Trump
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Fires Up: Wall Street Journal: What Happens When Entire Generations Don't Grow Up?
They used to say that young people are lagging behind previous generations of American adults. It now appears that many of them will fail to launch completely and end up living with roommates rather than spouses. Despite earning more money than their parents at the same age, they still manage to make ends meet. The problem is deeply cultural, but The Wall Street Journal's Rachel Wolf looks at some of the social and economic causes (and symptoms) of the problem.
This mass arrested development:
Americans in their 30s never look like adults.
In the midst of a rapid decline, home ownership, marriage and birth rateEconomists have long warned that young people are struggling to reach the milestone of adulthood. While some people in their 30s consciously choose non-traditional paths, many say these goals remain out of reach.
“I feel like the instructions for living a good life no longer apply,” said Cody Harding, 38, a single man who lives with three roommates in Brooklyn. “And no one is updating.”
Now, with a combination of social and economic factors holding back entire generations, what researchers once called lag is beginning to look like a permanent state of arrested development…
