[guest post by Dana]

There is a new movement afoot. And while I get that these millennials are smugly convinced their cause is a worthy one, asking for a hand-out to pay for their hobbies activism is a bit embarrassing, no?

A group of millennial activists from across the country plan to open a “movement house” in Washington DC next month, which will serve as a permanent base to protest Donald Trump’s presidency.

The organizers are mostly women of color, many of whom campaigned for Bernie Sanders during the Democratic primary.

The house, which will be set up by inauguration day on 20 January, has been dubbed “District 13”, in a reference to a rebellious neighborhood in the Hunger Games books and films. [Ed: Rebel Alliance would have been a better choice.]

Activists told the Guardian that it will serve as a “space for the best kinds of troublemakers from around the country”. The property will be located in Capitol Hill, close to the White House and the Capitol building, and will enable activists to quickly mobilize against Trump should he court controversy during his presidency.

…

The groups launched a crowdfunding effort on Tuesday to support District 13. They aim to reach $50,000, which will cover the house’s rent for one year.

Anyway, remember when a popular radio commentator was excoriated for wishing that President Obama’s policies would fail?

So I’m thinking of replying to the guy, “Okay, I’ll send you a response, but I don’t need 400 words, I need four: I hope he fails.” (interruption) What are you laughing at? See, here’s the point. Everybody thinks it’s outrageous to say. Look, even my staff, “Oh, you can’t do that.” Why not? Why is it any different, what’s new, what is unfair about my saying I hope liberalism fails? Liberalism is our problem. Liberalism is what’s gotten us dangerously close to the precipice here. Why do I want more of it? I don’t care what the Drive-By story is. I would be honored if the Drive-By Media headlined me all day long: “Limbaugh: I Hope Obama Fails.” Somebody’s gotta say it.

Now, not only is hoping that a president not succeed, fashionable, it’s also admirable, and necessary:

“Ultimately it’s to make sure we hold him accountable,” said Moumita Ahmed, the founder of Millennials for Revolution, a group which span off from the Bernie Sanders-supporting Millennials for Bernie.

“Because his presidency is not normal at all. It’s our duty to make sure he doesn’t succeed.

“If he succeeds it’s a message that everything he stood for is OK. That it’s OK to get to power in the way that he did, and hurt all the people he’s hurt.”

District 13’s crowd sourcing page here. Because I know you want to give:

Millions of us took action this year to get Bernie Sanders into office – now we’re going to take the fight right to DC, up in Donald Trump’s orange face.

Try to destroy Medicare and the social safety net? In your face.

Try to roll back the Clean Air Act so we end up with China-style shelter-in-place warnings on bad air days? In your face.

Muslim registry and mass deportations of Latinos? In your face.

We’re going to take the fight to Trump by building a base right in the heart of Capitol Hill.

–Dana

[guest post by Dana]

This is unsurprising:

A 23-year-old Tunisian man sought as a suspect in the deadly truck attack at a Berlin Christmas market had been the subject of a terrorism investigation and slated for deportation, a top security official said.

…

The suspect had been on the radar of intelligence officials across Germany before Monday’s truck attack and was being investigated by state prosecutors on suspicion of planning an attack, said Ralf Jäger, the interior minister of the western German state of North Rhine-Westphalia.

The suspect’s application for asylum was rejected in June 2016, but he couldn’t be deported because he lacked a valid passport, Mr. Jäger said. German authorities sought to get a new passport, but Tunisia initially challenged whether the man was in fact a Tunisian citizen, Mr. Jäger said. The new travel documents happened to arrive on Wednesday, he said.

“This person attracted the attention of various security agencies in Germany because of contacts to a radical Islamist milieu,” Mr. Jäger said at a news conference.

At least there is now an acknowledgement of what so many already knew would be inevitable with taking in so many young, male refugees:

“There is clearly a connection between the refugee crisis and the elevated terror danger in Germany,” conservative lawmaker Stephan Mayer said after a closed-door briefing in parliament on the investigation. “The identity of this Tunisian also underlines this, since he clearly entered Germany…in the context of the refugee crisis.”

However, in spite of increasingly coming under fire for her immigration policies which allowed nearly one million refugees to enter the country, many of whom lacked identification, it appears that German Chancellor Angela Merkel will continue to put out the welcome mat anyway:

Ms. Merkel and other officials have emphasized that they did not want the attack to jeopardize Germany’s commitment to a free and open society, and Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier reaffirmed that idea on Wednesday. “We want to uphold this way of life, and not let it be destroyed by anyone, not even whoever was responsible for what happened here,” he told reporters.

In spite of this most recent terror attack, Merkel still has her defenders:

Merkel has established herself as the best and strongest voice of the values of a liberal Europe, and her steadfastness under pressure – at least her rhetorical steadfastness, for her policies have been modified to accommodate some of her critics’ concerns – is a beacon in a continent that is increasingly inward turning, nativist and afraid.

And every time she stands up for what postwar Europe represents, she consolidates Germany’s rebirth. When in her summer press conference, on 31 August last year, as thousands of refugees trekked northwards into Hungary, she told the world “We can do it”, and when a few days later she announced that no one would be stopped from seeking asylum, and when a few days after that she posed for a selfie with one of the refugees from the first train to draw into Munich station, for millions of people around the world she reset the image of her country.

As a reminder, Monday’s attack, considered one of Germany’s deadliest, left 12 dead, 48 wounded, and of the wounded, it is being reported that 12 of them remain in serious condition.

–Dana