Steve Kelman on politics, culture, and life June 9, 2025
Emergency powers for Trump executive orders
One fifth of Trump’s executive orders have relied on one or another, “emergency power,” a use of emergency powers for decisions that is far greater than in any other previous administration.
China electric vehicles
There are 115 electrical vehicle brands in China. What a change from the era of Mao, when there was often only one kind of each product. China’s electric vehicle manufacturer BYD now is selling more cars in Europe than Tesla for the first time.
Fox News viewer success
Fox News just had the most watched quarter in the history of cable news. I wonder whether anyone has commented on or studied why they are so much more successful than MSNBC or CNN. I don’t watch MSNBC. CNN has a very different feel from Fox, much straighter, with a much much wider range of viewpoints on air.
Shopping for groceries
According to a survey I saw on my AARP link, 36% of things people buy in grocery stores are unplanned purchases that were not part of any shopping list. I am curious how common unplanned purchases are among friends on this page. I would say on a typical grocery trip I buy zero or one thing that I did not originally plan to buy.
I should add two other things about my shopping routine. One, which will not surprise those who know me well, is that I shop very extensively from sales, using the weekly paper supermarket ad that I still get in the mail, thank God. I would say that 80 percent of what I buy is on sale. The second is that I like to buy at the store rather than online, partly to be able to come across things I was not planning to see and partly just to enjoy interacting with people at the checkout counter and in the aisles. I never use self checkout. The people doing the checkout are often but not always young, at the cash register usually girls and the baggers usually boys.
Fox like China on meaning of rule of law
Fox this morning is using the phrase “rule of law” in exactly the same way as it is used by the Chinese Communist Party, to mean, “obey the law!”
Israelis and humanitarian aid to Gaza
There have been some accusations about the Israeli defense forces firing on civilians in Gaza seeking to get humanitarian aid. The accusations seem quite implausible. Israel and the US are organizing the aid, why would they want to shoot people seeking to get it? Apparently, the Israelis were afraid that Gazans deviating from the established route to get the aid were a security danger. Israel says they fired at about 1 km from where the Gazans were.