THE SHOW NOTES: White Man, CDC Panel, Tiny Cars, Netflix Deal, Manhattan Institute, Obamacare Extension, & $10 Billion

Welcome! The US government is spending $10 billion per week servicing the national debt.

🚨 BREAKING: CDC vaccine panel votes to stop recommending birth dose of hepatitis B vaccine - CBS

🗑️ TANKING NYC: Zohran Mamdani to stop all homeless encampment sweeps as NYC mayor - NY Post

🚗 LOSING THE PLOT: Donald Trump has approved “tiny cars” to be built in the United States. - X

🇷🇺 FASCINATING: How Russia keeps raising an army to replace its dead - Politico

💵 THOUGHTFUL: Why Do People Feel Like They Are Falling Behind? - PPP

👀 BAD DAY: A Navy warship mistook US fighter jets for enemy missiles and opened fire. The targeted pilot saw his life flash before his eyes. - BI

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The Republican Party

The Manhattan Institute conducted one of the most exhaustive studies of the Republican Party and the coalition assembled by Donald Trump in 2024. I am starting the second hour of my radio show on this.

The findings point to a coalition that is divided into two broad segments. The majority segment—longstanding Republicans who have backed the party for many years—are consistently conservative on economic, foreign policy, and social issues. They favor lower taxes, take a hawkish view of China, remain firmly pro-Israel, and are highly skeptical of progressive agendas on transgender and DEI issues.

But a sizeable minority—new entrants to the GOP coalition over the past two presidential cycles—look markedly different. Younger, more racially diverse, and more likely to have voted for Democratic candidates in the recent past, this group diverges sharply from the party’s core. They are more likely, often substantially more likely, to hold progressive views across nearly every major policy domain. They are more supportive of left-leaning economic policies, more favorable toward China, more critical of Israel, and more liberal on issues ranging from migration to DEI initiatives. A significant share also report openly racist or antisemitic views and express potential support for political violence. Yet they overwhelmingly identify as Republicans today and voted for Donald Trump in 2024.

Go read the full breakdown at the Manhattan Institute.

Explained: The Netflix Deal

Netflix has announced a landmark deal to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery — including its iconic film and TV studios, HBO, and HBO Max — in what may be the most consequential media merger in years.

The details: Netflix’s $83 billion bid beat out Paramount and Comcast, but the acquisition still faces significant regulatory scrutiny. If approved, the merger is expected to close at the end of 2026.

What changes now? Surprisingly little.

• CEO Ted Sarandos says Netflix does not plan to alter Warner Bros. Pictures’ theatrical release strategy and will continue putting major films in theaters. Warner Bros. will also keep producing content for outside partners, even though Netflix itself generally does not.

• HBO Max will remain a standalone streaming service for the foreseeable future, though select HBO titles will begin appearing on Netflix as the companies integrate.

So why make the deal? One word: synergies. Netflix expects the merger to generate between $2 and $3 billion per year in cost savings and operational efficiencies once fully realized.

BREAKING: Not “A White Man”

Obamacare Extension

A growing group of congressional Republicans are increasingly open to the idea of extending Biden-era Obamacare subsidies to prevent rate hikes when the subsidies expire at the end of the year.

• Yesterday, a bipartisan group of 35 House Republicans and Democrats unveiled one of the first written frameworks, which included a two-year extension plan, including some income caps.

• SEMAFOR reports that Sen. Susan Collins is pitching a similar two-year package that would include a $200,000 income cap and eliminate zero-dollar premium packages. She said she’s talked to Democrats about it, calling the cap “very generous.”

The New York Times reports that premiums could increase up to $1,000 per month for millions of Americans and that voters overwhelmingly would blame Republicans.

The pain point for most conservatives is the continued funding of abortion services, as Mike Pence notes here:

WSJ: U.A.E.’s Ransom Payment for Kidnapped Prince Bolsters al Qaeda in Mali

One of the U.S.’s closest allies in the Middle East, the United Arab Emirates, paid more than $20 million to secure the freedom of an Emirati prince kidnapped by al Qaeda’s West African affiliate, according to Western officials.

The ransom package also included the release of dozens of Islamist extremists imprisoned in Mali, where the prince was abducted in September and where al Qaeda-backed militants are threatening to seize control of the entire nation.

The infusion of money and muscle into al Qaeda’s powerful West African branch, Jama’at Nusrat al-Islam wal-Muslimin, or JNIM, comes as the militants are besieging Mali’s capital, Bamako. Should they succeed in ousting the government, Mali—home to 25 million people in an area almost twice the size of Texas—would become the first country in the world governed by adherents of the terror group that blew up American embassies in Kenya and Tanzania, brought down the Twin Towers and drew the U.S. into a 20-year war in Afghanistan.

Full story at WSJ (paywall).

Tweets that caught my eye:

Trending news:

• For the first time, more kids are obese than underweight - Vox

• Olympian and other Eritreans freed after 18 years without trial - BBC

• Transformative AI is coming, and so are the risks - Axios

• A single hostage remains in Gaza after identification of Thai worker’s remains - Politico

• A ‘K-shaped’ economy has investors on edge. BofA says it may hold up. - Yahoo

• US stocks gain on belief Fed will cut interest rates - SEMAFOR

• Do You Really Know What’s Inside Your 401(k)? - WSJ (free)

• Chinese Forces Battle Dizzying Altitudes to Expand Military Footprint - WSJ (free)

• Putin and Modi Deepen Relationship That Has Drawn Trump’s Anger - WSJ (paywall)

Market snapshot: