Introduction
Welcome to the Newsletter. Each week, Cameron Lee Cowan wraps up the headlines with commentary that will make you sound smart to your friends and family. This week, we’re talking about Palantir’s surveillance movie, Elon Musk and Trump’s divorce and more.
The World is Hard, This is Not
Each week I send out the latest headlines, the latest videos from The Cameron Journal and commentary about the week’s events. If you’re new here, my name is Cameron Lee Cowan M.A. MFA, and I’m the Creative Director here at The Cameron Journal. You can learn more about me on the about page. I do research and commentary on politics, culture, and the world around us. Remember, The World is Hard, This is Not.
Updates
The attacks in Boulder, Colorado last week by Mohamed Soliman have not gotten nearly the press that they deserve. I’m very mindful of this attack because I have family in the area and my phone exploded with friends calling me in the moments after it happened. It makes the 2nd attack this year directly on Jewish people (the other being the shooting of two Israeli diplomats). 8 people were injured, and the attacker is being considered for terrorism charges and currently has 118 state charges. You can catch up on the details here.
Meanwhile, the cold and rainy weather has cleared up, and we have bright and sunny skies happening, but that also means heat. I am a wimp when it comes to heat after 10 years in Seattle. It was 92 yesterday, and I was nearly moribund in bed. Today is better, but I am truly grateful for air conditioning!
This week has been a busy week in the news and busy personally. One of the things I’ve been working on is taking more time to rest and relax. As someone who has been “burning the candle at both ends” since about 2007, my body has just slowly started to give out. 2 years of long covid certainly brought that directly to my attention. But I am starting to enjoy it, and it helps leave space in my life for other things instead of trying to always be trying to do more, be more, make more and such. Am I where I want to be in life? Not yet, but I am certainly learning to take breaks on my path and stay rested. So I’m encouraging everyone to take a much-needed breather this weekend.
Let’s dive into the headlines.
Sign up for CameronJournal+
If you love these newsletters and want to support my work at The Cameron Journal, please consider signing up for CameronJournal+. You will get exclusive content for CJ+ subscribers, access to our discord and special hang-outs with me. It’s the coolest club in town!
The Cameron Journal Academy is your home to write your book!
You can write a book in 2025 and I can help! My new writing courses are out now, and you can sign up for Fiction, Non-Fiction or both! To learn more, please visit The Cameron Journal Academy and check out my course: The Power of Story.
P.S. if you aren’t ready to do a full course and want to work with one-on-one, please check out my latest article about my writing coaching!
The Latest
Don’t forget to join me on Monday for The Cameron Journal Newshour to catch on everything happening in the world!
Palantir is Watching
I’m old enough to remember when we found out the NSA was tracking phone calls and listening in and how big a scandal that was well into the Obama years when the program was “ended.” I say ended in quotes because I don’t think anyone actually believes it had ended and now it doesn’t matter whether it did or not because the Trump administration has just hired Palantir to start a master database of all Americans included tax return info, financial information, credit card info, student debt, anything you could imagine.
Usually, there are several laws and regulations that keep this information private and siloed. In the olden times, you had to buy that sort of thing on the black market, but now, Palantir is going to gather it from all over the government and merge it all together into one master list for everyone. I don’t have much more data that what has been released from the House Oversight Committee. Reportage right now is limited, but this is a story worth tracking.
This time, your friend with the tin foil hat is not joking.
Elon and Trump are Breaking Up!
Elon has left the White House and in the time he has left, Trump has called him dishonest and a loser. Elon has retorted that Trump is ungrateful for helping him win, and that the reason they haven’t released the Epstein files is because Trump is too connected. We know that Trump was “friends” with Epstein, and we have photos of them together. Now there could be more than that, but it seems like the Biden administration would have released it to put Trump under for good. I think the real reason we haven’t seen the files yet is because it implicates too many people, and not just on American shores. Its release would be a major national security problem, but that’s just my view of things.
Back to Elon and Donald, we have our first big break up of the summer. The latest rumors from “Real World: the White House” maintains that, “Trump flatly refused to take Elon Musk’s call this morning, telling aides he won’t ‘speak to a guy who’s crazy and on drugs.” Brian Allen goes on to say that Trump has asked Pam Bondi to use the DoJ to shut Elon up. We have our first White House break up the 2nd term and tea is steaming hot folks.
There are too many rumors swirling around to say anything definitive but the real rift started over Trump pulling the EV subsidies on which Tesla depends and Elon being unhappy with the spending increases in the Big, Beautiful, Bill that undoes most of the cuts DOGE made in the first place. I think Elon is also shocked that Congress didn’t rubber stamp all the Executive Orders and cuts. So far, for his time in politics, the cost in his reputation has been staggering and the government remains chastened but not changed like he wanted.
Then there is what’s left of the government’s most unofficial department. We don’t know out about what all those young guys working for DOGE are doing or are going to do with Elon as their champion. I don’t even know if they are real government employees. We know they certainly didn’t go through any screening or vetting. My guess is that Trump will be quick to get rid of them. What’s even more impressive is that likely will be unhirable, so I hope Elon plans to take them back to Texas.
Shrinking Trade Deficits
Today in the Daily Upside (great newsletter, and shout out to Patrick Trousdale!) they had an excellent article about the shrinking trade deficit. From Brian Boyle’s piece in the newsletter he said, “After a record-breaking trade deficit in March, as businesses rushed to order goods ahead of a massive spike in import duties, data from the US Commerce Department on Thursday shows that April delivered a record-breaking decrease in the trade deficit. So, just how big was the drop? In April, the trade deficit narrowed to just $61.6 billion — way, way, way smaller than the record-setting, Grand Canyon-sized $138.3 billion chasm seen in March. That marks the largest month-over-month deficit contraction on record, according to the Commerce Department, and comes in below consensus expectations of approximately $66 billion. Overall, imports of foreign goods fell about 16% month-over-month to $351 billion, the report said. According to a data analysis by The New York Times combining figures from the Commerce Department and tracking by Moody’s Analytics, the decrease included importing fewer cell phones from China, pharmaceuticals from Switzerland and Ireland, and automotive parts from South Korea, Japan, Mexico, and Canada.”
So, has the Trump administration achieved its goals? Of sorts, yes, the goal was to reduce the trade deficit was part of the point but without new trade deals this may not be permanent and right now, the only big deal is the one with the UK. Deals with China and the EU, our two biggest trading partners, are still pending and from what I’ve been told, the Japanese are still holding on line 2.
As treasury secretary Scott Bessent stated early on, their goal was to devalue the dollar to make exports more attractive, reduce the trade deficit, and expand exports (which grew modestly so far). It appears that the plan may be working. It all depends on the upcoming trade deals with the EU and China.
Interesting Video of the Week
Sunshine Laws and the Myth of Government Transparency
In the 1970s, “sunshine laws” were a popular legislative move to make government more transparent and accountable to people. The thought was that if more government affairs were available to the public, then the increased scrutiny would improve democracy. The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) was launched at the federal level. Many states opened things up with these “sunshine” laws. However, the secondary effect of this may have made the government much less functional of all that transparency. Politics usually runs on the secret deal, the handshake, and the kickback (legal or otherwise). But if all that is public, then how do you get deals done. In this video, we learn that perhaps…..you don’t.
Articles of Interest:
This is the latest installment in the Plato Re-imagined Series from Daniel Sanderson:
Keep up with The Cameron Journal Podcast
The Interview:
The Cameron Journal Newshour:
Discover more from The Cameron Journal
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
