PUNCHING DOWN

TOP OF THE NEWS:

- Donald Trump insulted a union leader on Twitter. Then the phone started to ring. (WaPo) "'Chuck Jones, who is President of United Steelworkers 1999, has done a terrible job representing workers. No wonder companies flee country!' — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 8, 2016. 'This guy [Chuck Jones] makes pennies for what he does,' Voorhies said. 'What he has to put up with is just crazy. Now he’s just got the president-elect smearing him on Twitter.'" and The art of punching down (WaPo) "Trump has said that, by his nature, he is 'a counterpuncher.' Fair enough. But it is one thing to pick on a multibillion-dollar corporation or a cable host. It’s something else entirely to go after individuals. Idle talk happens in every campaign. When you actually hold power, though, it starts wars and moves markets. 'Lesson number one for Donald Trump: Commenting on regular folks is fraught with danger, no matter what they say,' [Bill] O’Reilly said. 'All powerful people have to know that calling folks out has to be done surgically. If a family has lost a son fighting for America, you simply cannot hit them with a broadside — no matter what they say. You have to let it go. If you punch down, as the saying goes, the media will label you a bully or worse.… Not always fair, but that's the reality.… Final lesson: … If he fights everyone who comes after him, he will lose.'" and Donald Trump Needs to Stop Attacking Ordinary Americans (National Review) "Donald Trump owes Chuck Jones an apology. I’m sorry, but this is pathetic. The president-elect’s words have power, and when he turns that power on ordinary Americans who dare to criticize him, he’s not only abusing his office, he’s creating a target for an avalanche of scorn, vitriol, and intimidation. But this is of course a pattern with Trump. If someone irritates him, he’ll punch back no matter their status and no matter the consequences. That’s not leadership. It’s bullying. the president-elect needs to grow up and take criticism like a man."

"The next president of the united states went to twitter war with a guy who uses a flip phone. The guy with the flip phone won #ImWithChuck"

— Brett Banditelli (@banditelli) December 8, 2016

HEALTH:

- U.S. life expectancy declines for the first time since 1993 (WaPo) "Rising fatalities from heart disease and stroke, diabetes, drug overdoses, accidents and other conditions caused the lower life expectancy revealed in a report released Thursday by the National Center for Health Statistics. In all, death rates rose for eight of the top 10 leading causes of death. According to the new report, males could expect to live 76.3 years at birth last year, down from 76.5 in 2014. Females could expect to live to 81.2 years, down from 81.3 the previous year. Experts cautioned against interpreting too much from a single year of data; the numbers could reverse themselves next year, they said." and Life expectancy in the US has dropped for the first time in more than a decade (Vox)

BUSINESS:

- After Meeting Trump, Japanese Mogul Pledges $50 Billion Investment in the U.S. (NYT) "But the $50 billion investment pledge is not an entirely new initiative that SoftBank is undertaking. Instead, the money is projected to come from the Japanese company’s previously announced Vision fund, a $100 billion vehicle for investing in technology companies worldwide. The fund — which includes Saudi Arabia, a target of Mr. Trump’s ire during the presidential campaign, as a key partner — was always expected to strike a significant portion of its deals in the United States." and Donald Trump’s deal to create 50,000 jobs in America looks a lot different on Day Two (WaPo)

- One of Disney’s most popular brands has investors really worried (WaPo) "But mounting subscriber losses at the sports network have dragged down Disney's share price. In 2013, ESPN's subscriber count topped out at 99 million; Disney's latest regulatory filings last month show it has lost 9 million subscribers since then. Reports this year by the ratings company Nielsen seemed to punctuate those losses, suggesting that ESPN lost a record-breaking 621,000 customers between October and November."

NEWS:

- South Korea’s political crisis could become a trigger for bigger change (WaPo) "Young Koreans complain about a two-tier society where those born with a 'golden spoon' in their mouths get into the best universities and secure the plum jobs, while those born with a 'dirt spoon' work long hours in low-paying jobs without benefits. This sense of unfairness is one of the key factors that have been sending people here out onto the streets to call for Park’s resignation. To explain the anger to an American audience, Kim Ou-joon, the host of a hugely popular political podcast, explains it this way: 'Imagine how angry and betrayed [Donald] Trump’s supporters would be if they found out that he was gay, Muslim and broke at the same time. How would his supporters react if everything they believed in him turned out to be false?'"

- American Dream collapsing for young adults, study says, as odds plunge that children will earn more than their parents (WaPo) "The research from a group led by Stanford's Raj Chetty, and also including economists and sociologists from Harvard and the University of California at Berkeley, estimates that only half the children born in the 1980s grew up to earn more than their parents did, after adjusting for inflation. That's a drop from 92 percent of children born in 1940. The fall-off is particularly steep among children born in the middle class, and for those born in several states in the industrial Midwest. The researchers say rising concentration of income among the richest Americans explains 70 percent of what has been a steady decline in absolute mobility from the baby boom generation to millennials, while a slowdown in economic growth explains just 30 percent."

- Obama Urges Soldiers to Question Trump's Authority, 'Criticize Our President' (Breitbart) "Obama told the troops, 'each of us has…the universal right to speak your minds and to protest against authority; to live in a society that’s open and free; that can criticize our president without retribution.'"

POLITICS:

- The Electoral College Is Great for Whiter States, Lousy for Cities (Wired) "More than half U.S. cities are majority nonwhite, and Latinos represent the largest group of nonwhite urban residents, according to the Brookings Institute. Slightly more African-Americans, meanwhile, live in the suburbs than in city centers. Overall, the U.S. population is becoming less white and population growth in cities outpaces that of rural areas. As a result of these demographic trends, political scientists say the urban vote will increasingly carry less proportional weight in the Electoral College. By that same math, whiter states will become more disproportionately powerful in presidential elections. In practice, that means votes from large states with sizable nonwhite populations like California count less in presidential elections than those from small, predominantly white states like New Hampshire. 'If you’re a person of color in California, you’re screwed,' says Stanford University political scientist David Brady."

- The right has its own version of political correctness. It’s just as stifling. (WaPo) "But conservatives have their own, nationalist version of PC, their own set of rules regulating speech, behavior and acceptable opinions. I call it 'patriotic correctness.' It’s a full-throated, un-nuanced, uncompromising defense of American nationalism, history and cherry-picked ideals. Central to its thesis is the belief that nothing in America can’t be fixed by more patriotism enforced by public shaming, boycotts and policies to cut out foreign and non-American influences. Insufficient displays of patriotism among the patriotically correct can result in exclusion from public life and ruined careers. It also restricts honest criticism of failed public policies, diverting blame for things like the war in Iraq to those Americans who didn’t support the war effort enough."

TECHNOLOGY:

- The Future of Bitcoin Is Not as a Digital Currency (Wired) "In other words, like Circle, Coinbase is moving away from bitcoin as a digital currency and towards a world where it serves as the underpinning for other financial services."

BOTTOM OF THE NEWS:

- The 100 Greatest Innovations Of 2016 (Popular Science)

- BMW uses remote locking to trap car thief suspect inside stolen vehicle (WaPo)

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