Good luck trying to close the tax loopholes, I’m unclear how much this would affect the wealth gap. I have a hard time caring.
I am obviously the problem.
--Jessica Gottlieb
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Please email your comments to editors@thehustings.news
Good luck trying to close the tax loopholes, I’m unclear how much this would affect the wealth gap. I have a hard time caring.
I am obviously the problem.
--Jessica Gottlieb
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Please email your comments to editors@thehustings.news
The Pandora Project was released this week, a years-long investigation by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), which examined more than 11.9 million financial records, private emails, secret spreadsheets and clandestine contacts to uncover politicians, business leaders and even celebrities who have tucked away billions of dollars’ worth of assets in tax shelters around the world.
So far, the fallout has not been severe. Billionaire-turned-politician Andres Babis, who is up for re-election as the Czech Republic’s prime minister in a vote held this Friday and Saturday, was revealed to have used offshore companies to buy a $17.7 million French mansion, according to one of the partners in the ICIJ investigation, The Guardian.
Former Prime Minister Tony Blair and his wife, Cherie, saved the equivalent of about $408.6 million in taxes by purchasing a London office building after acquiring part of an offshore, British Virgin Islands company co-owned by Bahrain minister Zayed bin Rashid Alzayami, The Guardian says in a separate news report. The office building was sold to them for $8.85 million, and it presumably will further bring in a tidy sum in lease revenues.
King Abdullah II of Jordan was another of the prominent names in the investigative data dump. His name grabbed its share of headlines early in the week, when the ICIJ report dropped, because he spent $106 million on 12 luxury homes, mostly in Malibu, California. But Jordan’s foreign minister, Ayman Safadi told the Associated Press there was “nothing secretive” about the purchases, and that the king used none of the billions of dollars-worth of international aid that has gone to Jordan in recent years.
What’s the big deal? It’s true that all of these transactions detailed appear to be completely legal. It’s also true that offshore accounts and numbered bank accounts can be a haven for money laundering and other illegal activities. To detractors of such bald-faced displays of wealth, the Pandora Papers serve as another coat of gold paint on the layers of the 21st century Gilded Age, obscene as the Gilded Age of more than a century ago. To those neutral on the use of offshoring, or even supportive of it, it’s simply another capitalistic defense against profligate taxing and spending by government bureaucrats addicted to ineffective social programs.
Opinions from some of our contributing pundits are adjacent in the left and right columns in a quick-take debate. To add your comment to one of these columns, please email editors@thehustings.news, and let us know whether you count yourself as part of the left or the right.
--Todd Lassa
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First, the terms. According to the IRS, “tax avoidance” is what someone or something does to “lessen tax liability and maximize after-tax income.” That is not illegal. But “tax evasion,” “the failure to pay or a deliberate underpayment of taxes”—that is where the proverbial line is crossed. According to the ICIJ, the documents it and its colleagues obtained includes “the creation of shell companies, foundations and trusts; the use of such entities to purchase real estate, yachts, jets and life insurance; their use to make investments and to move money between bank accounts; estate planning and other inheritance issues; and the avoidance of taxes through complex financial schemes. Some documents are tied to financial crimes, including money laundering.” So much of that is in the avoidance category. “Some” is criminal.
This rises to the incredulity of gambling in Casablanca.
--Stephen Macaulay
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Please email your comments to editors@thehustings.news
Scroll down past News & Notes for a quick-take debate on the controversy surrounding Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff regarding his portrayal in the book Peril, by Bob Woodward and Robert Costa.
As always, your comments are encouraged. To submit a comment, please email us at editors@thehustings.news. Include your name and location, and whether you consider yourself liberal or conservative (to determine column placement).
Also in this column …
•Pundit-at-large Stephen Macaulay, “The Seriousness of China,” on the building Cold War with the country.
•The California gubernatorial recall and the future of Trump’s GOP, by Jessica Gottlieb.
•Reader comment on the Biden Administration’s vaccine mandate.
•Macaulay on the vaccine mandate.
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Our Left Columnists on Whether Milley Should Resign
Taking the Opportunity to Do Right
Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Mark Milley did what he thought was right for the country, trying to deal with a president who was clearly unbalanced. Every once in a while, there comes to a military man the opportunity to do right, and he did it. I do not believe what he did constitutes a usurpation of civilian power. – Jim McCraw
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Milley’s A Hero
Nuclear weapons have the potential to change our history to a deleterious effect. If any country is to be successful, it must have its people’s security at the forefront of its interest, especially physical over fiscal. Milley is a hero in the same way Soviet Vasily Aleksandrovich Arkhipov is. Arkhipov prevented a nuclear strike during the Cuban Missile Crisis, though he was only second in command in his submarine’s operation. Requiring unanimous consent for a nuclear strike (three out of three men’s consent), and submerged too far down in the trenches of the ocean to receive radio communication, the Soviets in their B-59 had no idea of whether war had already broken loose. Two out of three men believed a nuclear strike against American enemies was an appropriate decision. One man did not — Arkhipov himself, a rogue, kept world history from the ashes. President Biden should not ask for Gen. Milley’s resignation. -- David Amaya
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What do you think? Should Gen. Milley be forced to resign as chairman of the Joint Chief of Staffs? Please email your comments to editors@thehustings.news
•A Senate Judiciary Committee interim report released Thursday morning gives new details on Donald J. Trump’s efforts to use the Justice Department to overturn the November 2020 election (WaPo). The report reveals “the extent to which government lawyers threatened to resign en masse” if Trump carried out his January 3 threat to replace acting Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen with Jeffrey Clark.
•Former President Trump’s Chief of Staff, Mark Meadows, Deputy Chief of Staff Dan Scavino, advisor Steve Bannon, and Kash Patel, chief of staff to Trump administration acting Defense Sec. Christopher Miller, are due to respond today to the January 6 House Select Committee’s subpoenas regarding its investigation of the Capitol insurrection, according to MSNBC. None are expected to comply, and Select Committee-appointed investigators have been unable to even find Scavino in order to serve him.
McConnell Will Not Block Short-Term Debt Limit Extension – Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY, reached a deal with Democratic leaders Wednesday to extend the federal debt limit into December, and avert an economic crisis without forcing Democrats to use budget reconciliation, or “nuke” the filibuster. McConnell has promised not to filibuster the debt limit increase and not use procedural tools to “drag out” the arduous reconciliation process, Roll Call reports, and instead “kick the can” a short month-and-a-half down the road.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-NY, said early Thursday that he and McConnell were still working out details. While Democrats initially pushed to extend the debt limit deadline through December 16, 2022, McConnell wants a specific dollar amount, which Senate Finance Committee ranking member Michael D. Crapo, R-ID, says could be about $300 billion.
Note: Who is the winner, who is the loser, here? Both Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-MA, and former President Trump suggest the loser is McConnell, according to Politico Playbook. “Looks like Mitch McConnell is folding to the Democrats, again,” said Trump, still miffed over the minority leader’s damning speech after he helped acquit the ex-president over his second impeachment. Common wisdom Thursday is that a potential threat by Democrats to “nuke” the legislative filibuster pushed McConnell into caving.
Don’t dismiss Wall Street lobbyists’ effect on this struggle. As reported Wednesday, Roll Call says K Street lobbyists for business and corporate interests were poised to push Republicans into caving on the debt ceiling in order to avoid almost certain economic calamity by the time the federal government would start defaulting, October 18, according to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellin’s warnings.
And while McConnell “lost” this battle, Schumer hasn’t quite won the war. Democratic leaders now have to extend the debt ceiling again in December, while bringing together the party’s progressives and moderates to pass the bi-partisan infrastructure bill and negotiate – and pass – a compromised version of the $3.5-trillion (a cut to $2.2-2.3 trillion seems likely) Build Back Better budget reconciliation bill. Happy holidays.
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Federal Judge Temporarily Blocks Texas S.B. 8 – U.S. District Judge Robert Pitman temporarily blocked Texas’ controversial law banning abortions as early as six months into pregnancy, The Texas Tribune reports. It’s far from certain the ruling by the Obama-appointed judge will open the state to abortions, as Texas quickly filed notice of appeal and will likely seek an emergency stay with the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, considered among the most conservative in the nation.
The law, S.B. 8, would subject violators to potential litigation, and the ACLU of Texas said in a press release that it’s unclear how Pitman’s ruling will affect abortion procedures in the state.
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COVID Cases Decrease … Sort Of — The number of new COVID cases has fallen by about 22% over the past two weeks, to approximately 102,000 new cases per day, according to stats from The New York Times. Still, 102,000 is a non-trivial number, given the number of people who have already been infected. While the decrease is certainly encouraging, there are still plenty of people who still need to be vaccinated —and perhaps not the people who you think. Axios Vitals, citing stats from the Kaiser Family Foundation, writes that while there is a general sense that people of color are lagging in jabs, it turns out that 64% of the unvaccinated are white compared with 14% Black and 16% Hispanic.
Note: Among the aforementioned unvaccinated, 59% are Republicans and 46% have a high school education. You can make your own assessment.
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World’s First Malaria Vaccine Approved – The World Health Organization has approved the world’s first malaria vaccine, The Washington Post reports. The vaccine took more than three decades to develop, because malaria is caused by a parasite, which is harder to target than a virus, the newspaper explains. Malaria kills more than 400,000 people a year globally, more than 260,000 of them children under age 5 in Africa.
--Edited by Todd Lassa and Gary S. Vasilash
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WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 6, 2021
•Bells at the National Cathedral in Washington, D.C., rang out 700 times – for more than an hour – Tuesday in memoriam of 700,000 U.S. deaths recorded during the COVID-19 pandemic Meanwhile, 700 white flags were planted on the grounds between the National Mall and the Lincoln Monument.
Reports Say Moderates, Progressives Closer on Budget Reconciliation – President Biden and Democratic leaders are ready to downsize the $3.5 trillion Build Back Better social infrastructure program to $2.3 trillion “or lower,” according to a report in The New York Times covering the president’s visit to Michigan Tuesday to promote the plan. Citing private meetings at the White House Monday with House Democrats, party leaders are looking at narrowing the reconciliation bill’s plans for free community college and child tax credits and universal pre-Kindergarten, for example.
Part of the discussion involves whether some programs should be scaled back or cut out of the budget reconciliation bill altogether.
Meanwhile, Sen. Joe Manchin III, D-WV, indicated to reporters Tuesday he is willing to consider a bill in the $1.9-trillion to $2.2-trillion range, up from his previous best offer of $1.5 trillion, according to The Hill.
“I’m not ruling anything out, but the bottom line is I want to make sure that we’re strategic,” Manchin said, “and we do the right job and we don’t basically add more to the concerns we have right now.” Reiterating the notion that the difference between the sticker price of $3.5 trillion and his best offers equals a shift from Reaganomics to more “socialism” in our economy, he added that he doesn’t “want to change our whole society to an entitlement mentality.”
Note: There has been talk, even among progressives, that the proposed programs could be scaled back in the number of years of coverage, rather than dollar amount, though that hasn’t come up here. As it stands during current intra-party negotiations, the range of $1.5 trillion to $3.5 trillion covers 10 years, and even at the top level would remain below annual defense spending.
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With an Estimated 12 Days to Go on the Debt Ceiling – Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-NY, plans for the third time an attempt to pass cloture on the bill approved by the House of Representatives to suspend the debt ceiling through December 2022. Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY, has repeatedly said Democrats must go it alone on this matter, and voting down cloture would force Democrats to go through the arduous process of suspending or raising the debt limit via the budget reconciliation process. Schumer has urged Republicans to simply “get out of the way” and allow a simple majority vote on the debt limit.
They have until, maybe, October 18, the day Treasury Secretary Janet Yellin says the federal government would default on its debt. As a constant reminder: Raising or suspending the debt limit would simply allow the government to pay for programs it already has funded. Biden Tuesday night also floated the idea Tuesday the Senate could “nuke” the filibuster.
Note: Business groups, corporate interests, to the rescue? K Street lobbyists for such groups are “quietly weighing” whether to spend money to “urge Republicans to end the standoff with Democrats,” Roll Call says. Wall Street, like Democrats, fear what will happen to the economy if nothing moves forward before October 18.
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Haugen Unites Republicans and Democrats on Senate Panel – It took whistleblower Frances Haugen to testify Tuesday that Facebook’s corporate culture promotes “growing at all costs” over user safety to bring together Republicans and Democrats, at least those on the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee. Senators from both parties praised Haugen, a former data scientist for the social media monolith, for leaking internal Facebook documents to The Wall Street Journal and speaking out against its harmful effects.
Facebook consistently chooses “growth and virality over public safety,” Haugen told the committee.
Sen. Ed Markey, D-MA, went so far as to call Haugen a “hero.” Senators from both sides spoke of potential regulation against social media, with Facebook and its affiliated companies, including Instagram, the biggest target.
In an email to staff, Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote that “many claims don’t make sense,” and said the company cares about safety and public health, NPR’s Morning Edition reports. Zuckerberg said he doesn’t recognize the company portrayed by Haugen.
Note: Haugen suggested regulation of social media begin with abolishing Section 230, which gives such platforms immunity from libel laws that can be imposed on the authors who post on the social media platform.
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New Student Debt Policy Targets Public Sector Relief – The Education Department will unveil a revised Public Service Loan Forgiveness program Wednesday that targets student debt relief for about 550,000 borrowers, The Wall Street Journalreports. The planned changes would help less than half the 1.3 million individuals enrolled in the program get closer to forgiveness.
--Edited by Todd Lassa and Charles Dervarics
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TUESDAY, OCTOBER 5, 2021
•Facebook whistleblower Frances Haugen testifies before the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee today regarding her criticism of the social platform on 60 Minutes and leak of some of its documents and studies to The Wall Street Journal. The testimony comes a day after Facebook and its other platforms, including Instagram, went offline for several hours, costing the company billions of dollars.
•Johnson & Johnson has asked the Food and Drug Administration to approve extra shots of its COVID-19 vaccine to those 18 years old and up who have previously received its single-shot vaccine, the AP reports.
Schumer to Take Another Shot in Debt Ceiling Fight – Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-NY, says he will schedule another vote on the debt ceiling later this week. It will surely be sunk by his counterpart, Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY, Politico reports, the third such vote to be defeated by a Republican filibuster. McConnell has made it clear Democrats must go it alone in waiving the debt limit as they move to pass a budget reconciliation bill that currently has a $3.5-trillion price tag.
Schumer and President Biden have called on McConnell to step aside and let Democrats pass a bill to raise the debt ceiling, via a cloture vote. The Senate parliamentarian issued an opinion last week, however, that the Senate could pass a debt ceiling hike via budget reconciliation without endangering protections for the whole budget reconciliation package, according to Punchbowl News. Democrats would rather raise the debt limit without resorting to the complications of reconciliation.
Senate Democrats are in the process of using the fiscal year 2022 budget resolution to pass spending extensions and tax breaks likely in the $2-trillion-plus range, Roll Call reports, to be paid for by tax increases on wealthy households and corporations, chipping away at the Trump tax cuts.
Meanwhile, President Biden travels to Michigan today to promote that budget reconciliation bill, his Build Back Better plan with key provisions for family leave, child care and climate change mitigation. The White House this week will get surrogates out to cable news shows and other outlets to promote budget reconciliation and specifically target McConnell as the key foil to Biden’s sweeping social infrastructure proposals, according to Politico.
Note: The posturing between Schumer, who knows he will fail to get cloture on his third vote on the debt ceiling this week, and McConnell is all about next year’s midterm elections. It’s clear that neither party will budge on both budget reconciliation (as Democrats try to get its progressives and moderates on the same page) and the debt ceiling, so all that’s left is to convince voters that the other side has jeopardized the nation’s economic future with their intransigence.
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Biden Reverses Rule Banning Abortion Referrals – The Biden administration has reversed a 2018 rule that bans federally funded family planning clinics from referring patients for abortions, The Washington Post reports. Many of the clinics who received Title X funding simply declined it, after the Trump administration rule went into effect. Biden’s reversal takes effect November 8.
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NIH Director Announces Retirement – National Institutes of Health Director Francis Collins, 71, says he will retire by the end of the year, after more than 12 years in the chief position.
“No single person should serve this position too long,” Collins said in his announcement, according to Roll Call, adding “it’s time to bring in a new scientist to lead the NIH into the future.” Collins is the agency’s longest-serving director.
No interim director has been named. President Biden will nominate a replacement for Collins, who must be confirmed by the Senate.
Note: It’s important that Collins specified a “new scientist” to lead the NIH, which has given relatively low-key support to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s recommendations on masking, social distancing and vaccinations for the coronavirus. In normal times, Collins’ replacement would sail through Senate confirmation, but these are not normal times.
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Romania’s Center-Right Coalition is Out – Romania’s center-left Social Democratic Party (PSD) and far-right Alliance for the Unity of Romanians have joined to vote out Prime Minister Florin Citu’s center-right coalition government, Politico Europereports. The vote of no-confidence comes less than a year after Citu established his coalition. The PSD has demanded elections as soon as possible.
Note: So far, Romania’s government has avoided the authoritarian, nationalist tendencies that have plagued fellow former Eastern Bloc countries, Hungary and Poland. It’s somewhat reassuring that in the context of this short-lived center-right government, its foils combine the center-left PSD with the hard right.
--Edited by Todd Lassa and Charles Dervarics
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MONDAY, OCTOBER 4, 2021
•SCOTUS back in town: The Supreme Court’s 2021-22 term begins today.
•Democrats can pass an increase in the debt limit package via reconciliation with just a majority vote, the Senate parliamentarian has ruled, according to Punchbowl News, without any effect on the bigger ‘social infrastructure’ budget reconciliation currently stalled on Capitol Hill.
•See the left and right columns for our pundits’ comments on what should be the fate of Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Scroll down this column to read the facts behind the debate.
Pandora’s Box of Tax Dodges – Sioux Falls, South Dakota, has become a modern Swiss Bank, according to the Pandora Papers, analysis of documents exposing more than 29,000 offshore accounts belonging to heads of state, business executives and entertainment personalities, reports The Washington Post. The newspaper is one of 150 media outlets in 117 countries examining the documents uncovered by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), which has more than 11.9 million financial records, private emails, secret spreadsheets, clandestine contacts and other records, making it bigger than the Panama Papers.
“The files provide substantial new evidence, for example, that South Dakota now rivals notoriously opaque jurisdictions in Europe and the Caribbean in financial security,” with tens of millions of dollars tucked away in Sioux Falls, WaPo reports. Much of the billions of dollars in assets are hidden in trusts, according to the report, and would not otherwise be exposed without an apparent encroachment into those financial records. More than 130 people on Forbes magazine’s list of billionaires, and more than 330 public officials in more than 90 countries and territories have been uncovered by the ICIJ investigation.
It must be noted that none of this offshoring and placement of assets in trusts is illegal. The ICIJ is protecting its sources in this release of private documents.
Monday’s revelations entail the first of eight reports The Washington Post will publish in coming days. Prominent individuals named so far, the Associated Press reports, include King Abdullah II of Jordan, who has spent more than $100 million on luxury homes in Malibu, California, former Prime Minister Tony Blair of the United Kingdom, Czech Republic Minister Andres Babis, Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta, Ecuadorian President Guillermo Lasso, Pakistan’s Prime Minister Imran Khan and Colombian pop star Shakira. Oh, and a Russian woman rumored to have a child by Russian President-for-Life Vladimir Putin owns a waterfront home in Monaco, making Donald J. Trump’s payoff of Stormy Daniels a relative bargain.
Note: WaPo’s report – somewhat relievedly, we’d suspect – notes that billionaires NOT named in the Pandora Papers includes Amazon founder and Washington Post owner Jeff Bezos. Also not among them are Tesla’s Elon Musk, Microsoft founder Bill Gates and Berkshire-Hathaway chief Warren Buffett.
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Whistleblower Says Facebook Values Profits Over Safety – Facebook whistleblower and former research scientist Frances Haugen revealed herself on CBS News’ 60 Minutes Sunday night and said she secretly copied tens of thousands of pages of the social media site’s research forwarded for “at least eight” complaints her attorneys have filed with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Haugen worked for Facebook’s Civic Integrity department, which was dissolved between the time of Joe Biden’s defeat of Donald J. Trump in last November’s presidential election and the January 6 insurrection. She left the company in May.
Facebook’s own research shows the social media site amplifies hate, misinformation, and political unrest, but hides what it knows in favor of algorithms that reward such activity, Haugen told the news magazine show’s Scott Pelley. The Wall Street Journal first reported on revelations from Haugen’s copied documents in a series of reports last month but did not name its source. Facebook’s Instagram platform also has come under fire for its deleterious effects on teenagers, especially girls, and has postponed plans to launch Instagram for kids.
"Facebook makes more money when you engage more content," Haugen said.
Facebook turned down 60 Minutes’ request for an interview, and in a written statement defended its efforts to “balance the rights of billions of people to express themselves openly with the need to keep our platform a safe and positive place.” …
“To suggest we encourage bad content and do nothing is just not true.”
Note: Surely Facebook doesn’t “encourage” bad content so much as it pushes it to readers looking to confirm their biases and let them organize such action as the January 6 Capitol insurrection. As for not doing nothing, watch for Facebook’s already considerable financial support for Democratic and Republican politicians to thrive in the face of proposed regulation of the social media industry.
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When We Last Left the Reconciliation Bill – Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s, D-CA, September 27 deadline for the House of Representatives to vote on the $1.2-trillion infrastructure bill has come and gone, with President Biden calling on both sides – progressive and moderate Democrats – to work it out over the next month or so in order to get his Build Back Better proposal passed. Such negotiations amount to finding a pricetag somewhere between $3.5-trilllion over 10 years that would pay for family leave, child care and climate change, and the $1.5-trillion ceiling Sen. Joe Manchin III, D-WV, has stated is his top price.
Still no word on what Sen. Krysten Sinema, D-AZ, is willing to spend.
“I’m telling you we’re going to get this done,” Biden told House Democrats in a half-hour meeting at the Capitol Friday, according to Roll Call. “It doesn’t matter whether it’s in six minutes, six days or six weeks. We’re going to get it done.”
Note: C’mon, man. Six months drops this smack into the beginning of primary election season in many states. Conventional wisdom is that the House will sort this out in 30 days or so, but we’re going to bet on some late nights between the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays, along with a debt ceiling vote the Senate will have to sort out by December 3.
--Edited by Todd Lassa and Donna MacKeand
FRIDAY, OCTOBER 1, 2021
•A federal judge will consider Biden’s request today to block Texas’ SB8 abortion law, one of several lawsuits filed (WaPo).
•Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh has tested positive for COVID-19 but has no symptoms and has been vaccinated since January, the AP reports.
•Joint Chief of Staffs Chairman Gen. Mark Milley is under fire after revelations in the book, Peril. Scroll down this center column for details and read our pundits' opinions in the left and right columns. Join the conversation by emailing your comments to editors@thehustings.news
Spending on Goods and Services, Income, Rose in August – Personal Consumption Expenditures (PCE) rose by 0.8%, or $130.8 billion, in August, after an 0.1% drop in July, the Commerce Department’s Bureau of Economic Analysis (BEA) reported Friday. Disposable Personal Income (DPI) was up 0.1%, or $18.9 billion.
Accounting for Inflation, Real PCE was up 0.4%, with goods up 0.6% and services up 0.3%, and Real DPI actually fell 0.1%, the BEA says. The PCE price index was up 0.4%. Excluding food and energy prices, the PCE price index rose 0.3% in August.
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Biden Their Time – President Biden signed the temporary spending bill that keeps the federal government’s lights on to December 3, yesterday, after Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-NY, separated out a hike in the debt ceiling that would have expired in December 2022. The Senate then passed the bill 65-35, and the House of Representatives passed it 254-173, (per Roll Call).
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Pelosi Promises BIF Vote Today – Yes, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, withheld a vote Thursday on the $1.2-trillion bi-partisan infrastructure bill (BIF) and says she plans to bring it to the floor before the end of the day today. Last-minute talks “hit a wall” before midnight Thursday, according to Roll Call. One immediate result is that highway and transportation funding is suspended, resulting in the furlough Friday of Department of Transportation and Federal Highway Administration employees, The Hill reports.
No indication whether Pelosi is close to any sort of deal that would satisfy her party’s progressives in the House. Could Pelosi subvert the prog Dems? Numbers are against her, as the Congressional Progressive Caucus counts 95 House members, while the moderate Problem Solvers Caucus has 56 members, 28 of whom are Republicans.
One of the Problem Solvers, Rep. Fred Upton, R-MI, is confident Pelosi can pass the BIF before Schumer can reach some sort of compromise in the Senate that satisfies Manchin and Sinema, while also keeping Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-VT, in-check.
“I don’t think we’re going to go home until we get it done,” Upton told NPR’s Morning Edition.
Under Pressure: Schumer[GV1] is under pressure today to get Manchin and Sinema on board with negotiations over the $3.5-trillion budget reconciliation bill – which most prominently goes by the name “human infrastructure,” and is more formally, President Biden’s Bring Back Better plan.
Whereas Manchin told reporters yesterday that he gave Schumer his “final offer” of $1.5 trillion last summer, Sinema has enigmatically refused to tell anyone her ceiling price.
New Deal vs. Supply Side: Manchin says anything more than $1.5 trillion smacks of “entitlement culture,” which jibes with our take that the Biden budget agenda – Bidenomics – amounts to an attack against nearly 40 years of Supply Side/Laffer Curve Reaganomics (which was, in turn an assault on FDR’s New Deal Keynesianism).
If progressive Democrats want to get more than $1.5 trillion passed, Manchin suggested, they ought to go out and get more progs elected – which of course would take effect only after November 2022 midterms (and not coincidentally, about the time Schumer’s failed proposal to raise the debt limit would have expired). Most pundits expect Republicans to win that one, and potentially take back both the Senate and the House. And pro-Trump Republicans expect a large share of those GOP majorities thanks to a concerted effort in next year’s primaries.
•••
Potential Relief for Anti-Vaxxers? – If you can’t get everyone on board to prevent, there’s now a potential cure. Drug manufacturer Merck says it has an experimental version of a COVID-19 pill that cuts the risk of hospitalizations and deaths from the coronavirus in half, The Washington Post reports. If administered early in the infection the pill can cut the risk of a mild to moderate case from becoming something worse. The patient must take the pill twice a day for five days.
Merck plans to ask for emergency authorization as soon as possible.
Note: Merck’s breakthrough “could make a huge difference, especially in parts of the world where it’s hard to get vaccines,” WaPo concludes. No, they’re not talking about Florida. What’s more, this is not some sort of panacea: it reduces hospitalizations and deaths. Not the sorts of things that anyone really want.
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Everyone Talks About the Weather — Wildfires, hurricanes, flood and droughts will become more severe in the next five years, say 55% of adults surveyed by Morning Consult. Not surprisingly, there is a gulf between Democrats who think so — 69% -- and Republicans — 38% -- but it should be noted that 54% of independents think it will be the case.
When asked who they trust on the subject of climate change, scientists came out #1, with 36% saying they trust them “a great deal” and 34% “somewhat.” Environmental groups (24% and 37%, respectively) and the EPA (22% and 39%) come in second and third.
Note: One of the refrains that has been heard from Biden and his associates on the topic of COVID-19 has been “follow the science.” Seems that when it comes to climate change people believe in that. Those who have a fantastical sense of what reality is appear to be losing their significance on important matters.
•••
House Committee Advances Marijuana Legislation – Reps. Matt Gaetz, R-FL, and Tom McClintock, R-CA, joined Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee in approving a bill to decriminalize and deschedule marijuana, in a 26-15 vote, per Roll Call. The committee vote came after a two-day markup in which the panel also approved a bi-partisan measure to lower drug prices.
The marijuana legislation is based on a bill Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-NY, sponsored in 2020 that passed the House, but stalled in the Senate, then controlled by the GOP. In July, Sen. Chuck Schumer proposed similar legislation, though such a bill’s prospects on the Oval Office resolute desk are less clear, as President Biden has endorsed de-criminalization, but not full legislation, Roll Call says.
Happy 97th Birthday – To Jimmy Carter, 39th president of the United States.
--Edited by Todd Lassa and Gary S. Vasilash
THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 30, 2021
•Should Gen. Mark Milley resign as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff? Our pundits debate in the left and right columns. Join the debate with comments emailed to editors@thehustings.news.
•’Round Midnight: If Congress doesn’t pass a continuing resolution by then, the government runs out of money and a partial shutdown begins at the first ring of Friday. More on the budget, bipartisan infrastructure and $3.5 trillion worth of budget reconciliation social and green programs, below.
Schumer’s Hail Mary – Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-NY, began a process this morning to fund the government through December 3 with a continuing resolution, Punchbowl News says, that has been detached from raising the debt ceiling. Republicans refused cloture on the debt ceiling part of the bill twice this week, but the CR is considered a sure thing with both sides supporting an avoidance of economic calamity.
If for some reason Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY, doesn’t go along, mark your calendars for October 18, the day that Treasury Secretary Janet Yellin says the federal government would likely begin defaulting on its obligations.
Note: Said economic calamity would mean downgrading the federal government’s credit rating and a subsequent hike in the cost of borrowing money, as the Dow Jones Industrial Average slides and we plunge into a deep, potentially global, recession while still suffering the ravages of the coronavirus pandemic, Democrats and Republicans living together … No, wait, strike that last part.
Infrastructure and Budget Reconciliation: Progressive House members appear ready to torpedo the bipartisan $1.2 trillion infrastructure program, up until now the surest thing in President Biden’s agenda. Word on The Hill is that Speaker Nancy Pelosi won’t bring infrastructure to the floor of the House, as is her established practice, if she doesn’t have the votes necessary for passage.
Word in The Hill is that Sens. Bernie Sanders, I-VT, Krysten Sinema, D-AZ and Joe Manchin III, D-WV, each have their “proxies” in the House who are pushing their agendas on how to negotiate a passable budget reconciliation that would have support from progressive and moderate Democrats in the House while satisfying these three and securing 51 votes in the Senate.
Only Half of Manchema the Sticking Point?: One progressive House Democrat, Ro Khanna of California, told NPR’s Morning Edition Thursday that Manchin is not the problem, that the senator from West Virginia is willing to compromise on the $3.5 trillion Build Back Better program, but that Sinema won’t negotiate, won’t make statements or talk to the press and won’t even make an offer that is south of the package’s sticker price.
Stephen Colbert told The Late Show audience Wednesday night that whichever Washington pundit mashed up Manchin and Sinema’s names missed the opportunity to go with “Sineman.”
Or Perhaps it IS Manchema: Manchin told the conservative National Review that he would not support a Medicaid-like program that’s part of the budget reconciliation bill that does not keep the Hyde Amendment intact, according to Roll Call. Hyde for decades has banned federal dollars from going to abortion providers.
Don’t Forget K Street: Lurking in the background of all of this are the lobbyists, The Wall Street Journal reminds us. “Drug makers, oil and gas firms, tobacco companies and other U.S. industries are complicating President Biden’s efforts to move along his domestic agenda as intraparty divisions threaten its path in a narrowly divided Congress,” it asserts.
These include business groups trying to gut measures to raise billions in taxes from their industries, the energy industry lobbying Rep. Henry Cuellar of Texas and other Democrats from oil-producing states, trade group The American Petroleum Institute fighting tax hikes, The Business Roundtable pushing back against corporate tax measures to pay the bill, and a business coalition that includes AT&T, Home Depot and CVS running commercials in Arizona, New Hampshire and Virginia calling on Democrats not to raise the corporate tax rate.
This backs arguments by progressives, chiefly Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-VT, and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-NY, that moderates beholden to corporate lobbyists are the ones holding up the $3.5 trillion reconciliation bill, which is why they’re making the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill contingent on it.
The Meaning of All of This: If Schumer’s continuing resolution manages to suck all the air out of the Capitol all day Thursday, infrastructure and the budget resolution could slip into October as Congress lets out a sigh of relief over not having to shutter the federal government’s doors. Unless, of course, Pelosi pulls a rabbit trick.
•••
Not All White Men – The House select committee investigating the 1/6 pro-Trump insurrection at the Capitol has issued its second wave of subpoenas to 11 individuals involved in planning and organizing prior to the riots, Roll Call reports. Prominent among them are Amy Kremer and Kylie Kremer, founders of Women for America First, which organized the January 6 rally on the Ellipse preceding the move to Capitol Hill, and Cynthia Chafian, who submitted the application for the group. Chafian is also founder of the Eighty Percent Coalition, whose website describes the organization as “a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization dedicated to eradicating the socialist policies that harm all families, businesses, schools, and churches.”
Women for America First also organized rallies at Freedom Plaza in Washington, D.C., November 14 and December 12, according to Roll Call, as well as “March for Trump” bus tours across the nation, “which garnered interest for the D.C. rallies, according to the committee.”
The 11 subpoenaed are required to produce documents and testify in depositions.
•••
Pot to Kettle: ‘You’re Fired!” — Corey Lewandowski, who had been overseeing Make America Great Again Action, the leading pro-Trump super PAC, has been removed from his position, presumably because of a Politico report that Lewandowski “pursued a female donor, Trashelle Odom, during a charity event in Las Vegas” Sunday evening, including, according to Ms. Odom, “touching her repeatedly, including on her leg and buttocks, talking about his genitalia and sexual performance,” Politico reports today. Mrs. Odom and her husband, John Odom, had donated $100,000 to the super PAC prior to the evening event.
Taylor Budowich, a Trump spokesperson, Tweeted Lewandowski’s removal: “Corey Lewandowski will be going on to other endeavors and we very much want to thank him for his service. He will no longer be associated with Trump World.”
Note: This could be a sign that there are fissures forming in the crust of “Trump World” (really: do they call it that?). This isn’t, Politico points out, the first time that Lewandowski has been alleged to touch women who weren’t at all interested in the 48-year-old’s advances (creepy advances, if Mrs. Odom’s reported comments about what Lewandowski said are accurate). Yet Lewandowski, who had previously been released from the gravitational pull of Trump World, had been brought back. But now, again, exiled.
Clearly the denizens of Trump World realize that while the Access Hollywood tape was one thing at one point in time, it is too perilous to keep someone who is accused of sexual misconduct on the payroll, especially when the accuser is the wife of a prominent contributor.
Another associated crack in the surface of Trump World is a report in a conservative website, American Greatness, that Republican South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem “is having an extramarital affair with Corey Lewandowski,” The Washington Postreports.
Gov. Noem, a conservative, denied the allegation in a Tweet.
It seems that there are some minor seismic tremors rumbling in Trump World.
--Edited by Todd Lassa, Gary S. Vasilash and Nic Woods
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Should Gen. Milley Resign?
Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chief of Staffs (JCS), attracted negative attention from the right wing when he apologized for appearing in military fatigues in front of St. John’s Episcopal Church with President Trump in a photo op June 1, 2020. This was about an hour after the National Guard used teargas to disperse Black Lives Matter protesters at nearby Lafayette Park, across the street from the White House.
What’s more, earlier this year, Milley took issue with Rep. Matt Gaetz’s, R-FL, description of military colleges’ teaching of Critical Race Theory as “woke.”
So it was the last straw for some conservatives, particularly those in the MAGA wing of the GOP, when a new book by Washington Post reporters Bob Woodward and Robert Costa described the JCS chairman as intervening in President Trump’s authority to launch a nuclear strike as he rejected his re-election loss last November.
Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, ranking Republican member of the Senate Intelligence Committee, called for Milley’s resignation after excerpts of Peril were reported ahead of its September 20 release date. According to the Woodward/Costa book, Milley warned his Chinese counterpart, Gen. Li Zuocheng of President Trump’s potential plans last year to launch a military attack on China and told officers in the Joint Chiefs of Staff to consult with him before executing any such command by the lame-duck president.
President Biden pushed back on calls he resign, saying he has “great confidence” in Milley, whose four-year term as Joint Chiefs’ chairman ends in October 2023.
Milley told the Senate Armed Services Committee Tuesday, in testimony mostly involving the Biden administration’s chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan, that his call to Gen. Li was among his duties as Joint Chiefs’ chairman.
“I assured Li that President Trump did not plan to attack,” Milley said.
Peril further reports that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, called Milley prior to the January 20 inauguration about her concerns regarding Trump’s state of mind, particularly after the January 6 Capitol insurgency. Milley told the Senate committee Tuesday he assured the Speaker that he was part of the official process, on missile launches.
Should Gen. Milley resign or be removed as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff? We asked our pundits what they think.
--Todd Lassa
Please email your comments on what you think should become of Gen. Mark Milley to editors@thehustings.news
Scroll down past News & Notes for a quick-take debate on the controversy surrounding Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff regarding his portrayal in the book Peril, by Bob Woodward and Robert Costa.
As always, your comments are encouraged. To submit a comment, please email us at editors@thehustings.news. Include your name and location, and whether you consider yourself conservative or liberal (to determine column placement).
Also in this column …
•Right-column pundit Bryan Williams, “New Competition May Do Us Some Good,” on the growing Cold War with China.
•Williams again, on the California gubernatorial recall and the future of Trump’s GOP.
•David Iwinski on the Biden administration’s vaccine mandate.
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Our Right Columnists on Whether Milley Should Resign:
Resign or be Court-Martialed
It is crystal clear that for reasons of decency, competence and military law, that Gen. Mark Milley should immediately resign, if not be court-martialed and tried for treason. If one should disagree with the commander in chief, there are methods to express that concern and he certainly had every opportunity to simply resign in protest and make his thoughts known. Instead, he retained his position and very cynically and cowardly went behind the back of the President Trump outside the chain of command. He should resign in disgrace. –David Iwinski
•••
Intercepting the Nuclear Football from a 10-Year-Old?
“I don’t want to be your friend anymore if you don’t do this.”
(Trump’s words to his vice president, Mike Pence, on blocking the official Electoral College count in Congress, January 6, according to Peril.)
Is that the most powerful person in the world?
Or you, about age 10?
That should scare the stuff right out of you.
Remember: the slang for the container of the nuclear codes is “the football.”
And you know how petulant children deal with those. —Stephen Macaulay
•••
Trust Milley
Gen. Mark Milley told the Senate Armed Services Committee that his actions during the final days of the Trump administration was within the scope of his official duties. There has been much criticism about how Milley allegedly grabbed control as in described in the book, Peril, but I don’t take him to be a liar, as those in uniform tend to take being under oath seriously. Let's not get all bent out of shape from Bob Woodward's reporting -- he's been proven to obfuscate and inveigle in the past.
--Bryan Williams
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What do you think? Should Gen. Milley be forced to resign as chairman of the Joint Chief of Staffs? Please email your comments to editors@thehustings.news
Scroll down past News & Notes for a debate on the question of whether we are in a new Cold War with China, and whether we should be. Pundit-at-large Stephen Macaulay, in the left column, and Bryan Williams, in the right column, find more common ground than disagreement.
Also in this column …
•The California gubernatorial recall and the future of Trump’s GOP, by Jessica Gottlieb.
•Reader comment on the Biden Administration’s vaccine mandate.
•Stephen Macaulay on the vaccine mandate.
Scroll down past News & Notes for a debate on the question of whether we are in a […]
•President Biden has cancelled a trip to Chicago today in order to push his budget agenda forward as deadlines loom. Biden continues to negotiate with Sens. Joe Manchin III, D-WV, and Krysten Sinema, D-AZ, to get the $3.5-trillion budget reconciliation bill passed, Politico reports. Sinema said after negotiations Tuesday that she was “not there” on the Biden’s Build Back Better plan, though a senior White House official says much progress was made, according to Politico.
Senate Dems to Forward a ‘Clean’ Two-Month Funding Bill, Report Says –Senate Democrats will propose a “clean” federal funding bill that will keep the government open to December 3 and avoid potential economic calamity Friday, according to Punchbowl News. The bill will contain no language regarding a suspension of the debt limit, the sticking point that prompted Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY, to block an extension twice in the last two days. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellin estimates that without an extension, the federal government will run out of money by October 18.
Note: To recap, the Senate must extend federal funding by tomorrow to avoid a potential partial shutdown; the House of Representatives also has until Thursday to pass the $1.2-trilion bi-partisan infrastructure plan, per Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s, D-CA, self-imposed deadline. Meanwhile, Pelosi has promised House progressives that the $3.5-trillion Build Back Better Plan budget reconciliation will get a vote first, then must also pass the Senate, which needs the support of Senators Manchin, D-WV, and Sinema, D-AZ, in order to get to the necessary 51 filibuster-proof votes. Sure, could happen.
•••
Generals Contradict, Support Biden on Afghanistan – Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Gen. Kenneth “Frank” McKenzie advised President Biden to keep 2,500 troops in Afghanistan past the planned withdrawal last summer in order to maintain “substantial gains” made in the country over the last 20 years, they told the Senate Armed Services Committee Tuesday. This contradicts statements Biden made to ABC News’ George Stephanopoulos last August, though both generals refused to discuss specifics of their private discussions with the president.
“If Biden didn’t take your advice, why didn’t you resign?” Sen. Tom Cotton, R-AR, asked Milley. It would have “been a political act” if he had, Milley responded.
The two generals, who testified along with Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, admitted that while there was every expectation Afghanistan would fall to the Taliban following the U.S. military withdrawal, no one expected it to happen in 11 days.
Afghan President Ashraf Ghani’s quick flight before the Taliban captured the capital of Kabul sealed the country’s fate, McKenzie said.
Note: This hearing stood out most for its relative civility, a rare quality even in the Senate these days. The Senate committee’s Republicans and Democrats were largely in agreement over mistakes made in the Biden administration’s chaotic withdrawal, while resolved to the reasons for the withdrawal. While the Pentagon officials lamented loss of “substantial gains” made in trying to prop up the country for nearly 20 years, Milley said, in response to a question by Sen. Joe Manchin III, D-WV, that while the “outcome in which the enemy is in charge of the country upon our withdrawal is not the failure of days, weeks or even years, it is the cumulative effect of the entire war.”
Milley, McKenzie and Austin are scheduled to testify to the House Armed Services Committee today.
•••
About Milley and Our Nation in Peril – The subject of Gen. Mark Milley’s calls to his Chinese counterpart, and his apparent efforts as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff to prevent then-President Trump from potentially launching missiles on China as he tried to remain in the White House after his November 2020 defeat, as described in the book Peril, did come up during Tuesday’s Senate Armed Services Committee hearing.
The call with Chinese Gen. Li Zuocheng was within his duties as Joint Chiefs chairman, Milley said.
Milley was not trying to undermine President Trump, he said. According to the book by Bob Woodward and Robert Costa, both of The Washington Post, Milley told other top military officials they were not to carry out any request by the president for such a strike without first consulting him. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, was also concerned that Trump might try an attack before Joe Biden’s inauguration January 20.
“I assured Li that President Trump did not plan to attack,” Milley said, and he “assured Pelosi that (I was) part of the official process. …”
•••
Omarosa Beats Trump — Former presidential aide of uncertain portfolio and The Apprentice contestant Omarosa Manigault Newman was taken to arbitration by former president Donald Trump (through his campaign) for what the ex-president claimed was a violation of a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) that Manigault Newman signed, with the violation taking the form of a book she published in 2018, Unhinged. The arbitrator, T. Andrew Brown, rejected Trump’s claim, according to The Washington Post. Brown’s finding says the Trump NDA defined “confidential” much too broadly, as in “all information . . . . that Mr. Trump insists remain private.”
Note: This could be the start of something big. As has been the case from the start of Trump’s 2016 campaign straight through to right now (actually before the campaign, but as we are considering this all from a political POV, we’ll go with that), Trump and his acolytes have imagined that whatever they said is true and whatever they don’t like that other people have said is lies or somehow wrong. This finding by the arbitrator indicates that that ain’t necessarily so. Conceivably this — along with the legal travails that will be experienced by the likes of Lindell, Powell, Giuliani, and Trump himself —will be effective in bringing back what has long considered to be (1) informed opinion and (2) non-alternate reality.
•••
New Leader for Japan – Former Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida won his Liberal Democratic Party’s leadership election Wednesday setting him on course to become Japan’s prime minister. Next Monday, Kishida will replace Yoshihide Suga, who has served as prime minister for only one year, in which the country suffered a spike in coronavirus cases as it prepared for the Summer Olympics, already delayed by a year (per Associated Press).
•••
North Korea Tests Hypersonic Missile – North Korea confirmed Wednesday that it successfully tested a hypersonic missile, implying it would be nuclear-capable, Forbes reports. “Hypersonic” means it can travel at least five times the speed of sound, or Mach 5.
Note: North Korea tends to escalate missile testing at times when Supreme Leader Kim Jong-Un craves a new round of attention from the West. But the Hermit Kingdom has been particularly bellicose lately, and its potential ability to build hypersonic missiles means we’re in for a fresh round of posturing.
--Edited by Todd Lassa and Gary S. Vasilash
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TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 2021
•Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, told her caucus Monday night – progressives be damned -- she will not make a House of Representatives vote on the $1.2 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill contingent on a vote on the $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation bill, Politico says, even if the latter is simply a vote to advance its framework. Pelosi yesterday moved the deadline to vote on infrastructure – the only ‘sure thing’ in President Biden’s agenda so far – from Monday to Thursday.
Pelosi v. The Squad – Pelosi doesn’t have the votes without the Congressional Progressive Caucus, which will tank the infrastructure bill Thursday without the reconciliation bill, says caucus chairwoman, Rep. Pramila Jaypal, D-WA (per Politico). Speaking after Monday’s Democratic caucus meeting, Jaypal said, “we are going to vote for both bills after the reconciliation bill is done.”
•••
Well, This Was Quite Predictable – Democrats “may drop [the] debt fight” so they can pass funding of the federal government past this Thursday, Politico says, following Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s, R-KY, blockage of a House-passed bill that coupled the two together. No Senate Republicans voted for cloture when a bill to extend short-term funding to December 3, while it would also have raised the debt limit through December 2022.
Yes, that’s right, Senate Democrats had hoped to get at least 10 Republicans on board to raise the debt limit through next year’s midterms. McConnell, who has been blocking Democratic legislation since the beginning of the Obama administration, was having none of it. To be fair, Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-NY, was perfectly aware Monday that the bill would go nowhere.
Seems like a busy time to make a point, what with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, having moved back the promised vote on the $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill from Monday to Thursday, with attention in the two days in between diverted to the Senate and House armed services committees and our disastrous military withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Note: Former U.S. Rep. Donna Edwards, D-MD, argues in a recent Washington Post column that the vote against cloture gives Democratic senators the excuse they need to kill the legislative filibuster. Democrats might have the bare minimum of a majority in both chambers; progressives do not.
Edwards writes that the “deadbeat Republican party” is “unwilling to pay the bills and ready to turn off the lights in America.” Yes, they are, Ms. Edwards. And whatever happens, Democrats will take the blame.
Eighteen-day Margin? – Treasury Secretary Janet Yellin Tuesday offered in a letter to Congress a quite specific date for when the federal government will default on its debt (per The Hill). “We now estimate that Treasury is likely to exhaust its extraordinary measures if Congress has not acted to raise or suspend the debt limit by October 18,” Yellin wrote. “At that point, we expect Treasury would be left with very limited resources that would be depleted quickly.”
•••
WSJ Scoop Says Putin Offered U.S. Central Asian Military Bases – Gen. Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, discussed with his Russian counterpart an offer by President Vladimir Putin to use Russia’s military bases in Central Asia to respond to terrorist threats from Afghanistan, The Wall Street Journal reported in a scoop late Monday. Milley discussed the offer at a meeting in Helsinki last Wednesday with Russia’s Chief of General Staff Valery Gerasimov at the request of President Biden’s National Security Staff, the newspaper reports.
The Senate Armed Services Committee is holding a hearing Tuesday with Milley, Defense Sec. Lloyd Austin and Marine Gen. Frank McKenzie, who leads the U.S. Central Command. They are scheduled to testify before the before the House Armed Services Committee Wednesday. All will testify about the United States’ chaotic withdrawal from Afghanistan. Milley also will answer questions about phone calls during the late days of the Trump administration to a Chinese counterpart that the U.S. was not going to attack his country.
Note: It says something about the desperation of the Biden administration following the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan that the president would now be ready to trust a government known to have meddled in our last two presidential elections (at least) with hosting our military intelligence in its Central Asian military bases.
--Edited by Todd Lassa and Nic Woods
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MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 27, 2021
•Cold War with China? Scroll down this page with the trackbar on the far right to read commentary by Stephen Macaulay and Bryan Williams.
•Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, has pushed back today’s deadline for the House of Representatives to vote on the $1.2-trillion bi-partisan infrastructure bill to Thursday, when a number of surface transportation bills expire, Politico reports. The House begins debate on the infrastructure bill later today.
•The Senate, meanwhile, is set to vote on a cloture motion today to move forward a short-term funding bill, passed by the House, that would keep federal agencies funded to December 3 and suspend the debt limit to December 2022, according to Roll Call. The cloture motion will not pass, as Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY, has rallied his caucus to oppose it.
Merkel’s Conservatives are Narrowly Defeated – German voters Sunday gave the center-left Social Democratic Party (SDP) a narrow victory over outgoing Chancellor Angela Merkel’s center-right Christian Democrats, The Wall Street Journal reports. But the parliament will have to form a coalition government, with the Greens coming in a “strong second” in votes and the pro-market Free Democratic Party finishing third in the vote.
Germany’s next chancellor could “possibly” be the GDP’s Olaf Scholz, says The Washington Post.
•••
Abbott Will Hire Border Agents Under Investigation – Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, R, says he will hire U.S. Border Patrol agents under investigation after they were photographed charging migrants on the border near the Del Rio bridge, the Republican governor told Fox News Sunday’s Chris Wallace (per Politico). At least one border agent was photographed wielding a whip on undocumented migrants who crossed the Texas-Mexico border, which has prompted President Biden to call for an investigation.
“You have a job in the state of Texas,” Abbott said. “I will hire you to help Texas secure our border.”
Note: Welcome to the latest volley in the Culture Wars, as pro-Trump Republican governors like Abbott and Florida’s Ron DeSantis potentially move on from anti-vaxxer, anti-mask mandate issues as their hospitals overflow with patients.
•••
Two Dead in New Mexico After Using Ivermectin – New Mexico’s health department has reported that two patients, aged 38 and 79, have died after apparently attempting to use ivermectin to treat themselves for the coronavirus, The Hill reports. The state’s acting health department head, Dr. David Scrase, said that one of the two patients died of kidney failure.
Ivermectin is primarily used in animals but may be administered to humans in small doses to treat internal parasites.
Note: The drug had become an alternative to FDA-approved COVID-19 vaccines by anti-vaxers last summer after being promoted by conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and political podcaster Joe Rogan, The Hill notes. To reiterate the obvious: Ivermectin is NOT safe for treatment of the coronavirus in humans.
•••
NTSB Investigates Montana AMTRAK Derailment – The National Transportation Safety Board is investigating an Amtrak passenger train derailment near Joplin, Montana, Saturday, about 200 miles north of Helena, near the Canadian border, in which three people were killed and up to 30 were injured, The Washington Post reports. Eight of 10 passenger cars with an estimated 141 passengers and 17 crew members aboard derailed in the accident. The NTSB holds a briefing today.
Edited by Todd Lassa and Donna MacKeand
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Please email your comments to editors@thehustings.news
Scroll down past News & Notes for a debate on the question of whether we are in a new Cold War with China, and whether we should be. Pundit-at-large Stephen Macaulay, in the left column, and Bryan Williams, in the right column find more common ground than disagreement.
Also in this column …
•The California gubernatorial recall and the future of Trump’s GOP, by Bryan Williams.
•David Iwinski on the Biden administration’s vaccine mandate.
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Please email your comments to editors@thehustings.news
By Stephen Macaulay
China is the fourth biggest (geographically speaking) county in the world. The biggest is Russia, then Canada, and in third is the U.S. We ought to keep relations with Justin Trudeau good, if geography is destiny. Population? With about 1.4-billion people, the People’s Republic of China is number one.
It is a communist party-led state, with the head of the government being Premier Li Keqiang. Who? Exactly.
The chief of state is President Xi Jinping. Yes. The president (and veep) are indirectly elected by the National People’s Congress. Xi was reelected with all 2,970 votes.
According to nothing less than the CIA World Fact Book, “all broadcast media are owned by, or affiliated with, the Communist Party of China or a government agency; no privately owned TV or radio stations; state-run Chinese Central TV, provincial, and municipal stations offer more than 2,000 channels; the Central Propaganda Department sends directives to all domestic media outlets to guide its reporting with the government maintaining authority to approve all programming,” and according to nothing less than HowToGeek, although China has the greatest number of internet users, “Unlike, for example, the United States or European countries, China has placed its internet behind a strict screen of censorship dubbed the Great Firewall. It’s a highly sophisticated system that can block connections from Chinese IP addresses to ones that are considered harmful to the Chinese public. . . . The Chinese Communist Party tightly controls information flow and prefers that its people not read sources that haven’t been vetted by the regime.”
So what do we have here?
A big place.
Lots of people.
Controlled by a communist government.
Led by a man who got 100% of the votes.
Little in the way of free information as we know it.
Oh, and another thing to think about: it has been around since about 1200 BC.
(Some Americans are all excited about Jamestown Island. In China they were kicking around some 2,800 years by the time the Brits landed in what became Virginia.)
Xi isn’t just interested in 3,705,407-square miles under his control.
There is the Belt and Road Initiative that is making investments in countries from Europe to Africa, providing monies to build out infrastructure, which is clearly thought to benefit not only the countries in question, but China.
The country has committed to taking leadership position in everything from electric vehicles to artificial intelligence.
Did COVID-19 escape from a lab in Wuhan?
None of your damn business.
Taiwan?
Part of China under the “One China Principle.”
Hong Kong?
A “special administrative region”—of China.
One of the things that tends to be overlooked by those who are involved in chest thumping and Stars-and-Bars flag waving are some of the simple facts enumerated above about China. A big place with lots of people and a GDP second only to the United States and leaders who are interested in expanding the influence of China around the world.
Too many people think the U.S. exists in a bubble -- or think we should exist in a bubble. The world doesn’t work that way.
When there are politicians — in both parties — who can’t even agree on something as simple as funding to fix roads and how to respond to the Chinese building a space station, there really needs to be some serious consideration of how long before the Chinese are what the Americans once were.
It isn’t looking good because when there are people who are serious up against people who are delusional, guess who dominates.
This is in no way to suggest that the activities in China are to be emulated (I like the fact, for example, that you can read The Hustings), but that unless we truly make America great again — and not in the context of a disgraced real estate hustler — the future for the country isn’t particularly bright.
To quote a piece recently published by the International Monetary Fund, “Global Clout, Domestic Fragility”:
“In 2012 the Chinese government set a long-term goal: build China into a fully developed and prosperous country by 2049, 100 years after the founding of the People’s Republic. Given its success since the beginning of economic reform in 1978, this kind of transformation is certainly possible. But it is difficult and not guaranteed.”
America used to take on things that are difficult and not guaranteed.
Today?
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Please email your comments to editors@thehustings.news
By Todd Lassa
This is the Chinese Century. Or so admirers and detractors alike say about the biggest authoritarian communist country extant, which has managed to harness 1.4 billion people into a quasi-capitalist powerhouse that is the world’s second-biggest economy and catching us quickly.
[The debt crisis at Evergrande, China’s second-largest property developer, seems to be affecting financial firms worldwide because it’s run like an American real estate development company.]
The People’s Republic of China is expanding its reach into third world countries the capitalist West let go fallow, with its Belt and Road initiative. The Belt and Road will run through Afghanistan, which means China is ready to take over there after the United States’ messy withdrawal from 20 years of war.
It will have to forge a careful relationship with Afghanistan’s Taliban leaders, even as the Chinese government continues to suppress its own Uyghur Muslim population.
For years, China’s Navy has tested encroachment on Japan’s territory in the South China Sea. Beijing has more recently cracked down on Hong Kong, essentially tossing out an agreement China had with Great Britain to maintain a form of democracy there after Great Britain handed it to China in 1999.
The Chinese government continues to claim Taiwan and Tibet are part of the PRC.
And yet, China has had benefits for Western economies in the decades since President Nixon opened relations with its communist government. Western corporations, mostly from North America, Europe, Japan and South Korea must generally partner with a “local” government to do business there, but that hasn’t done much to dissuade these companies from risking their intellectual property by making and assembling everything from computer chips and electronic devices to battery packs and cars and trucks in those factories. The reason? The massive population, read: market.
The trade situation vis-à-vis China became a major campaign plank for Donald J. Trump and attracted the support of many American factory workers who lost their jobs, or feared losing their jobs, to cheap Chinese labor. When he became president, Trump waged a trade war against China, imposing tariffs that ultimately hurt the American consumer (the Trump argument was that tariffs were a “tax” on the Chinese companies when, if fact, importing American companies were willing to eat the tariffs in order to keep prices low).
So far, President Biden hasn’t backed off, much, from Trump’s attitude toward China, at least in the case of economic and trade issues. But now, with China continuing to cover up whatever it knew about early transmission of the coronavirus, with its reliance on coal as a power source [though it has just agreed to stop building new coal-fired projects for its Belt and Road], even as it arguably leads the world in electric vehicle development, and especially with its continued bellicosity toward Hong Kong, Taiwan and the South China Sea, the U.S. and NATO allies may be entering a new kind of Cold War, with the Chinese government.
That Cold War came into world view earlier this month when Australia cancelled a diesel submarine contract with France (angering that country, as well) and joined the U.S. and the U.K. in a partnership to supply nuclear subs to its part of the world, which is obviously in the same general direction as China’s part of the world.
The Hustings has asked two of our contributing pundits to consider whether we are entering a cold war with China. And whether we should be. Pundit-at-large Stephen Macaulay’s commentary is on the left and contributing pundit Bryan Williams’ commentary is on the right.
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By Bryan Williams
I have felt for quite some time that after "winning" the Cold War with the Soviet Union, the United States hasn't had that sense of national rivalry and competitiveness that existed from 1945-1991. I mean … look at what we achieved! Putting a man on the moon and showing the world that America had "The Right Stuff." For much of my life it seems America has remained Number One in the world, but we have been lacking in that competitive spirit, laced with the threat of annihilation and total war. This drove us to innovate, succeed, strive, and know in our hearts that we deserve to tell the world we are Number One. We are the good guys, after all.
In comes China, which looks just as dangerous as the old Soviet Union and then some. China has a peculiar form of communism that embraces capitalism and the ownership of private property (or perhaps, more appropriately put, the embrace of materialism, as I don't believe anything in China is private). The Soviets would blush at what modern day China has become because of its capitalistic development. Comrades in ideology they are not.
Much has been said about the interconnectedness between China and the rest of the world. The West needs China to produce goods cheaply and in quantities to meet our voracious demand, and China needs us to keep their factories humming and workers employed. On this, I think most of the world can agree: making money and keeping stomachs filled and material desires met is important. Chinese people want nice cars, the latest phones, and luxurious vacations just as much as Americans do. The missing link, however, is our guaranteed freedoms given to us by God, and written down by Thomas Jefferson and James Madison. The Chinese do not have the freedom of speech, of movement, to protest, etc. Our freedoms and our very culture, I believe, will allow us to win this new Cold War.
In some ways this Cold War will be more challenging than the Cold War with the Soviets because technology has advanced and, well, because China has more than four times our population. We lead China is many important ways, however. We still have the most advanced and powerful military in the world (China only has one aircraft carrier), and China, though flexing its muscles in the South China Sea, is boxed in by our allies Japan, South Korea, the Philippines, Australia, and India. China's theft of the West's intellectual property, and its other industrial espionage enterprises (Huawei anyone?) should give us all concern. China and Russia appear to have more advanced cyber warfare capabilities, and they are not afraid to use them against us. And what about space? China already has plans to put a men on the moon and have sent probes to Mars.
China's emergence as our key 21st Century rival, I think, will be good for us. The chances of it turning into a “hot” war are nil. Just as MAD (mutually assured destruction) protected us from nuclear war with the Soviets (who wanted to avoid nuclear annihilation as much as we did), our economic interconnectedness will keep us from bombing Beijing. If we want to win this new Cold War, we need to increase our soft diplomacy and ramp up efforts like Radio Free Asia, and exchange student programs, and help enlighten 1.4 billion Chinese on what it is like to be truly free.
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Please email your comments to editors@thehustings.news
Jessica Gottlieb writes for the left column on how the failed California recall of Gov. Gavin Newsom, D, is a bellwether for former President Trump’s Republican Party.
Scroll down with the trackbar on the far right to read it. TIP: Read the center column before reading the left and right columns.
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Please email your comments to editors@thehustings.news
FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 24, 2021
•Germany holds national elections this coming Sunday as Chancellor Angela Merkel steps down as the country’s leader after 16 years.
•President Biden leads a meeting of “The Quad” today at the White House, along with leaders of Japan, India and Australia. Their big issue for discussion is over China’s military dominance in the Asia-Pacific region.
•The CDC last night gave green light to Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine booster and added health care workers and others whose job puts them at risk, as eligible, along with seniors 65 and older, and those 18 and older with a high risk of illness.
Pelosi, Schumer Announce ‘Framework’ on Social Infrastructure – House Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-NY, have announced a “framework” that is to bring moderate and progressive Democrats together on the $3.5-trillion “social infrastructure” budget reconciliation package, Politico reports. But progressives want to delay the September 27 vote deadline on the $1.2-trillion infrastructure bill that Pelosi has attached to the bigger reconciliation bill, while moderates want to stick with next Monday’s deadline on what they see as a sure thing and rare win for President Biden.
Note: The Pelosi-Schumer announcement has left most pundits scratching their heads over whether this framework means anything substantial at all. Regardless, there are going to a whole lot of people spending the first weekend of fall crunching numbers in their offices and others twisting arms. Politico reports Friday that Pelosi plans to meet her obligation to hold a vote on infrastructure Monday, so with this framework she can also call for a vote on the $3.5 trillion spending bill framework without forcing a final vote on the bigger package.
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House 1/6 Committee Subpoenas Four Trump Aides – The House select committee investigating the January 6 insurrection on the Capitol Thursday subpoenaed three Trump White House officials and advisor Steve Bannon, the Associated Press reports. The committee has “also requested a trove of records from the White House,” which the AP says President Biden has authority to decide whether to release.
Subpoenas went to Trump’s chief of staff, Mark Meadows, deputy chief of staff for communications, Dan Scavino, Defense Department official Kashyap Patel, and Bannon. All are believed to have close contact with Trump January 5 and leading up to the pro-Trump riots January 6. Democrats cite Bannon’s January 5 prediction, “All hell is going to break loose tomorrow.”
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Dog Bites Man in Arizona — The six-month, $6-million audit of election results in the 2020 presidential election conducted by Cyber Ninjas in Maricopa County, Arizona, found that Joe Biden had 99 more votes than had been originally tabulated and Donald Trump had 261 fewer votes, according to a draft report of the review that had been obtained by The New York Times. Yes, Biden won Arizona.
Maricopa County, Arizona’s Twitter account put it this wayt: “The #azaudit draft report from Cyber Ninjas confirms the county’s canvass of the 2020 General Election was accurate and the candidates certified as the winners did, in fact, win.” … In a second tweet, it added; “Unfortunately, the report is also littered with errors & faulty conclusions about how Maricopa County audited the 2020 General Election.”
Note: It should come as no surprise that Texas, which Trump won, will conduct an audit of the results in four countries (Collin, Dallas, Harris and Tarrant,” TheNYTreports, in response to Trump’s request to Republican Gov. Greg Abbott for a “Forensic Audit of the 2020 Election.” As is sometimes said in the Lone Star State, “He don’t know nothing from nothing.” And the pronoun could apply to either of the individuals.
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Bush Backs Cheney – No, it’s not a long-lost headline from 2000. Former Republican President George W. Bush will hold a fundraiser October 18 in Dallas for the re-election campaign of his vice president’s daughter, Rep. Liz Cheney, R-WY, the Associated Press reports. While this might seem uncharacteristic of the 43rd president, who has kept a low political profile, the AP quotes Bush’s spokesman Freddy Ford as saysing, Bush “has historically helped a few key candidates and friends each cycle, so this one shouldn’t come as any surprise.”
Cheney has ticked off former Republican President Donald J. Trump by voting for his second impeachment last January and joining the House select committee investigation into the January 6 Capitol attacks.
Trump is leading the “primarying” of Republican congress members “disloyal” to him in next year’s midterm election and backs Wyoming attorney Harriet Hageman’s challenge next year.
Underscoring how much the GOP has changed in just the last decade, Trump called Bush 43 a “RINO,” in a statement, and accused Cheney of being “warmongering,” and being “so bad for Wyoming.”
Note: Which is to say Cheney is “so bad” for Wyoming’s blindly diehard Trump supporters.
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Primary Challenge Unlikely Here – Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-IA, announced early Friday on Twitter he will run for an eighth term, The Hill reports. Grassley managed to stay in Donald Trump’s good graces while not closely aligning with the former president. Grassley, already the oldest U.S. senator, turned 88 last Friday, which means should he win re-election – a good bet as he beat a Democratic challenger five years ago by 25 points – he will be 94 at the end of his next term as senator.
--Edited by Todd Lassa and Gary S. Vasilash
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THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 23, 2021
•Leaders of African countries will speak before the UN General Assembly today about global inequity in COVID-19 vaccine supplies, NPR reports.
•The FDA may sign off as early as today on Pfizer BioNTech booster shots for its COVID-19 vaccinations, but only for those 65 and older and those at high risk. The booster shots could be available next week, The Washington Post reports.
Special Envoy to Haiti Resigns Over Biden Policy – Daniel Foote, appointed special envoy to Haiti following the assassination of the country’s president, Jovenel Moise, has resigned, citing the Biden administration’s “inhumane, counterproductive decision” to send Haitian refugees from Texas back to their native country, The New York Times reports. Since its president’s assassination in July, Haiti has also been hit by a deadly earthquake.
Note: An estimated 14,000 Haitian refugees had gathered under the Del Rio International Bridge in Texas over the last several days, and the White House came under criticism from advocates who say President Biden is simply continuing Donald Trump’s draconian immigration policies. It should be noted, however, that most of the Haitian refugees are being identified as having come from South American countries, gathering in southern Mexico in recent weeks, according to a report on NPR’s Morning Editon.
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Highway Bill Becomes a Bargaining Chip – The law that allows federal highway and transit spending expires September 30, three days after Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s, D-CA, date for a House of Representatives vote on the Senate’s bipartisan $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill, Roll Call says. Pelosi continues to insist the House will get the $3.5 trillion “soft infrastructure” budget reconciliation bill and the bipartisan bridges-and-roads infrastructure done in time, while nearly everyone else on Capitol Hill is panicking.
Note: However, several progressives making the rounds of media outlets insist they have a mandate on the bigger reconciliation bill and appear confident that their priority – the “soft infrastructure” bill that includes environmental and child-welfare programs – will get passed in time.
“We are on schedule. And we’re calm and everybody’s good and our work is almost done,” Pelosi said. House progressives seem to have left some room to negotiate the $3.5 trillion down to placate Sen. Joe Manchin III, D-WV. Also worth noting is that the House will have completed its work, per Pelosi, if it passes the $1.2 trillion infrastructure bill and sends it to President Biden’s resolute desk, while approving the $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation bill and then sending it back to the Senate. Pelosi’s task is to make sure that both moderate and progressive Democrats vote in favor of the reconciliation bill.
Furthermore: Biden extracted a concession from moderates in a five-hour meeting with 23 legislators in the Oval Office, ending 7 p.m. Wednesday, according to Politico Playbook. “Moderates agreed that they need to coalesce around an offer to the liberals,” a senior White House official told Politico, to which the online publication added; “The White House views the commitment from the Manch-ema wing as ‘a real breakthrough.’”
What Would it Take to Get You Into this Reconciliation Bill Today?: Biden remains frustrated, however, that the Manch-ema wing, which includes Manchin, Sen. Krysten Sinema, R-AZ, Rep. Stephanie Murphy, D-FL and Rep. Josh Gottheimer, D-NJ, would not give him a specific “this is my final deal” number anywhere south of the $3.5 trillion price tag.
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Coal & Climate & West Virginia — It’s not all about the price tag for Sen. Joe Manchin III, D-WV. After leaving the Oval Office meeting with President Biden yesterday evening, Manchin said of the climate provisions that are part of the infrastructure package, “I have big problems” and added, “Probably [the president] and I are in a different place on that,” Politico reports. There is some $150 billion in the package for “clean energy,” which doesn’t mean coal.
Note: Think what you may about Manchin’s intransigence, coal is hugely important to West Virginia’s economy. According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration, based on 2019 data, it is the second-largest coal producer in the nation, accounting for 13% of total U.S. coal production, and more than one-third of the 93 million short tons of coal mined is exported to foreign markets. In terms of consumption of coal vs. other fuels, it consumes 621.7 trillion BTU from coal and 238 trillion BTU from second-place natural gas. Manchin does represent a state that has a huge amount riding on coal.
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Federal Reserve to ‘Taper’ Bond Purchases – The Federal Reserve indicated it would begin to “taper” – that’s the technical economic term – off its $120 billion monthly purchase of bonds and other assets at the end of its rate-setting committee’s two-day meeting Wednesday, The Wall Street Journal reports. Such tapering would help alleviate inflation in the U.S., although the Fed believes the current inflation rate of 5.3% annually is “transitory,” and will come down as workers return to factories and production ramps up to normal again. The Fed’s target rate for inflation is 2%
“The purpose of that language,” Fed Chairman Jerome Powell said, referring to the signal of a tapering, “is to put notice out that that could come as soon as the next meeting,” which is scheduled for November 2-3, the WSJ says.
Note: Federal bond purchases, industrial production and delivery (freight ships are stacked up in the waters outside most of the nation’s ports, thanks to a shortage of truck drivers and rail capacity, PRI’s Marketplace reports), and the inflation rate will affect the success of whatever combo of President Biden’s infrastructure program and reconciliation bill gets signed in the next couple of months. Although “tapering” will start to relieve inflationary pain, it will take months, at best, to reduce the inflation rate from 5.3% to just 2%. It’s yet another issue that will affect the November 2022 midterm elections.
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Senate Compromise on Police Overhaul Stalls – Months of negotiations between Senate Democrats and Republicans on police reform legislation came to an abrupt halt Wednesday, Roll Call reports. Efforts to negotiate a package that would placate Republicans in their opposition “ran out of steam,” Sen. Cory Booker, D-NJ, said.
Rep. Karen Bass, D-CA, lead sponsor of a bill the House passed in March criticized Senate Republicans for being “unwilling to compromise.” The House bill includes a ban on chokeholds by federal officers, would end qualified immunity for police departments against civil lawsuits and create a national standard for policing, Roll Call notes. Bass has been negotiating with Booker and Sen. Tim Scott, R-SC, on the bill.
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EPA Regulates Hydrofluorocarbons – The Environmental Protection 0Agency is issuing a new rule that cuts use and production of hydrofluorocarbons found in refrigerant and air conditioning by 85% over the next 15 years, The Washington Postreports. The regulation implements a law Congress passed last year, although it has broad bipartisan support as a likely job source from the production of green alternatives
--Edited by Todd Lassa, Gary S. Vasilash and Nic Woods
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WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 22, 2021
•As if budget reconciliation, infrastructure, the debt limit and next Thursday’s federal budget deadline aren’t enough, the House of Representatives has begun debate of the $778-billion fiscal 2022 defense spending bill, with 476 amendments proposed, Roll Call reports.
•More than a dozen shots were fired at a car carrying Serhiy Shefir, principal aide to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelinsky, Politico reports, via Ukrainian media. Shefir was unhurt, but his driver was injured, and hospitalized. Speculation is that the assassination attempt stems from Zelinsky’s campaign to punish corruption in Ukraine. He is best-known in the U.S. as the recipient of the “perfect call” that led to President Trump’s first impeachment, in 2019.
•The Taliban wants to send a high-ranking official to the UN General Assembly being held in New York City this week, The Washington Post reports. The Taliban has sent the request to UN Secretary Gen. Antonio Guterres asking that Mohammed Suhail Shaheen be named the group’s permanent representative. A State Department official told reporters that such requests take time to deliberate.
End of Month Showdown on the Debt Limit – Let’s make sure we’re all on the same page regarding the federal budget and the debt limit. Without a vote on a budget, federal agencies run out of funding and shut down after September 30 –a week from tomorrow. Meanwhile, if Congress fails to raise the federal debt limit, we run out of funds for federal programs in October, according to Treasury Secretary Janet Yellin.
The House of Representatives last night passed a short-term funding bill that would keep federal agencies open through December 3, while raising the debt limit through December 2022, Punchbowl News reports. The 220-211 vote was along party lines, with Rep. Debbie Lesko, R-AZ, not voting. The House bill goes to the Senate today where Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-NY, will call for cloture (to subvert a filibuster), but that vote won’t happen until Friday, the Capitol Hill newsletter says.
Republican senators are expected to vote to keep the federal government open, but Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY, has made it clear budget reconciliation with the debt limit increase is dead on arrival, even as Democratic senators complain they voted for such an increase when the Trump tax cuts passed. The question, according to Punchbowl News, is whether Democrats continue to push the budget reconciliation bill, all $3.5-trillion of it, with the debt limit increase attached or “find another path”?
Note: The “other path” comes down to the months-old issue of how to get progressive House Democrats on board and pass the $1.2-trillion infrastructure bill separately from the budget reconciliation bill. Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, has scheduled September 27, which is next Monday, as deadline for House passage in order to send it to President Biden's desk for signature. The $3.5-trillion “social infrastructure” budget reconciliation bill simply will not get through the Senate as-is, without removing the legislative filibuster, and Sens. Joe Manchin III, D-WV, and Krysten Sinema, D-AZ, are not going to vote for the filibuster suspension.
As several news outlets have pointed out, the ongoing fight between moderate and progressive Democrats threatens to “derail” Biden’s agenda.
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Trump Family Feud – Donald J. Trump has filed suit against his niece, Mary L. Trump, The New York Times and three of its reporters, accusing them of conspiring on an “insidious plot” to improperly obtain the real estate developer, former president and reality TV star’s tax records “and exploit their use in news articles and a book,” the Times reports. The lawsuit filed in New York Supreme Court in Dutchess County was first reported by the DailyBeast Wednesday morning.
Trump’s lawsuit claims the reporters “relentlessly” sought out his niece – a psychologist and frequent cable news pundit the last four years who criticized the ex-prez and her family in the 2020 book Too Much and Never Enough – and “persuaded” her to smuggle the tax records out of her attorney's office. This breached a confidentiality agreement that was part of a litigation settlement involving the will of Trump’s late father, Fred C. Trump, who died in 1999. The lawsuit says Times reporters Susanne Craig, David Barstow and Russell Buettner, and Ms. Trump “engaged in an insidious plot to obtain confidential and highly-sensitive records which they exploited for their own benefit and utilized as a means of falsely legitimizing their publicized works.”
The suit follows scheduling by a Manhattan criminal judge’s scheduling Monday of the trial of the Trump Organization and its longtime chief financial officer, Allen Weisselberg, who are accused of dodging taxes. The trial is set for late summer of 2022 and alleges Weisselberg avoided $1.7 million of taxes on fringe benefits received from the Trump Organization.
Note: The AP reports that Susanne Craig, reacting to this claim of an “insidious plot,” tweeted, “I knocked on Mary Trump’s door. She opened it. I think they call that journalism.” Drop the mic.
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Biden Says Government Will Buy Half-Billion Vaccines for Developing Nations – Following his speech to the United Nations General Assembly Tuesday, President Biden announced the U.S. will buy a half-billion COVID-19 vaccine doses from Pfizer BioNTech to be donated to developing nations in need. The announcement comes after Biden re-committed the U.S. to re-engage with the global community, which comes after four years of Trump administration nationalism.
“Instead of continuing to fight the wars of the past, we are fixing our eyes on devoting our resources to the challenges that hold the keys to our collective future: ending this pandemic; addressing the climate crisis; managing the shifts in global power dynamics; shaping the rules of the world on vital issues like trade, cyber, and emerging technologies; and facing the threat of terrorism as it stands today,” Biden said.
“We’ve ended 20 years of conflict in Afghanistan. And as we close this period of relentless war, we’re opening a new era of relentless diplomacy…”
Note: Of course, Biden’s words glossed over an end to the Afghan war largely criticized for its poor organization. Meanwhile, the French government is still reeling – and has called its ambassador back to Paris from Washington, D.C., over the U.S.-U.K.-Australian nuclear submarine deal.
And as for the vaccines, according to the BBC, only 4% of the African population, for example, have been vaccinated -- there are some 1.3-billion people who live there. As the Pfizer vaccination requires two shots, half-a-billion doses doesn’t go too far in a place like that.
--Edited by Todd Lassa and Gary S. Vasilash
TUESDAY, SEPTEMBER 21, 2021
•President Biden is scheduled to lead off the United Nations General Assembly in New York City Tuesday with a speech expected to address climate change, the coronavirus pandemic and the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.
•Johnson & Johnson is promoting its COVID-19 vaccine as an efficacious booster, announcing that it prompts a strong response months after patients have received the first dose. “A booster dose of the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine further increases antibody responses among study participants who had previously received our vaccine,” said the drugmaker’s research & development global chief, Dr. Mathai Mammen (per the AP).
•Jessica Gottlieb On the Left and Bryan Williams On the Right comment on the lessons for last week’s recall election of California Gov. Gavin Newsom to the Republican Party. Scroll down to the next file using the trackbar on the far right of this page to read news analysis in the center column, and then their commentaries to the left and right.
House to Vote on Short-Term Funding – Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-CA, has scheduled a House of Representatives vote on short-term federal funding that will extend the debt limit to 2022 to avoid a government shutdown. But the extension faces a wall known as the U.S. Senate, where Republicans are firmly with Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-KY, on filibustering the bill, notes Punchbowl News.
“Republicans, from Sen. Mitt Romney” of Utah, “to Shelley Moore Capito” of West Virginia are committed to following McConnell’s lead on opposing raising the debt limit, the online publication says. While Punchbowl News reports that Pelosi hopes a sufficient number of Senate Republicans will change their minds, it reports that Democrats have “No Plan B” so far.
Treasury Secretary Janet Yellin has warned in a guest editorial in The Wall Street Journal that the government could hit its debt ceiling by next month.
Note: Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-NY, was quoted on NPR’s Morning Edition that Democrats voted with Republicans to raise the debt limit for President Trump’s massive tax cuts for the rich and corporations a few years ago, suggesting there is room for Republicans to reciprocate … as if that would trigger any empathy from the minority leader. In addition to being the Republican leader who greeted the Obama administration by promising to essentially block everything he proposed, McConnell now has the potential to exert his partisan power and chip away control of the GOP from Donald Trump, with whom he has fallen out over the January 6 Capitol insurrection. The former president has said he wants to replace McConnell at the top of Senate Republican leadership.
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First Suit Filed in Controversial Texas Abortion Law – A self-described “disbarred and disgraced former Arkansas lawyer” has filed the first suit connected to Texas’ controversial abortion law, which calls on individuals to file suit against virtually anyone connected with delivering or accepting an abortion after the sixth week of pregnancy, The Washington Post reports. Plaintiff Oscar Stilley has sued San Antonio physician Alan Braid, who wrote an op-ed for the WaPo saying he performed an early abortion that nevertheless exceeded the parameters of the law, as his duty as a doctor, and “because she has the fundamental right to receive this care.”
Thus the next showdown for Roe v. Wade is set for the Supreme Court.
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Trudeau Wins Another Minority Government – Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau managed to hang on to his minority leadership in Monday’s snap elections, which he called two years early in an attempt to push his Liberal Party to a majority of Parliament’s 339 seats. The Globe and Mail calls the Liberal’s third straight win a “status quo” government, with the party having won or elected 158 seats as of Tuesday morning. Conservatives have 119, Bloc Quebecois 34, NDP 25 and the Green Party, two according to the early returns.
Some of Trudeau’s erstwhile supporters reportedly resented his calling the snap elections during the pandemic. He will have to continue to work with other parties in order to get legislation passed.
Note: Perhaps there’s a lesson here for progressive Democrats in our democratic republic?
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Customs Investigates Border Patrol on Horseback – The U.S. Customs and Border Protection’s Office of Professional Responsibility has begun an investigation regarding footage of Border Patrol agents on horseback “menacingly” using what appears to be whips on migrants at the U.S-Mexican border, Politico reports. The Department of Homeland Security also has dispatched personnel to oversee border patrol operations.
The investigation comes as an estimated 14,000-plus Haitian refugees gather in Del Rio, Texas. The Biden administration is extending use of a Trump-era policy to return refugees to the country from which they came on health concerns because they risk spreading the coronavirus. Many of the Haitian refugees reportedly have immigrated north from countries in South America, where they were most recently living.
Note: Monday’s News & Notes noted that the Senate parliamentarian ruled in favor of the Republican caucus to prevent Democrats’ plan to attach immigration reform to the $3.5 trillion budget reconciliation bill. In other words, it’s the White House’s problem, and there’s little relief in sight from either party in working to alleviate the ongoing border crisis.
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Kim Jong Un Unhappy — AUKUS, the defense pact created by Australia, the U.K. and the U.S. (see where the acronym came from?), has caused consternation in Pyongyang, North Korea, with the Korean Central News Agency (part of the government) quoting a Foreign Ministry official (part of the government) as saying “It is quite natural that neighboring countries including China condemned these actions as irresponsible ones of destroying the peace and stability of the region and the international nuclear nonproliferation system and of catalyzing the arms race,” The Washington Post reported.
Note: On the subject of stability, it is worth noting that North Korea is expanding its Yongbyon nuclear enrichment facility and has recently conducted long-range missile tests. Exactly the sort of thing that a country not at all interested in proliferation and arms races would do.
It also brings to mind Donald Trump’s bromance with Kim Jong Un, which was to lead to something — a treaty? a Trump Hotel in downtown Pyongyang? — that never materialized, just a photo ops between the two leaders with some of the most bizarre tonsorial looks on the planet. (We now learn from Peril that Trump reportedly described the man from whom he received “love letters” as a “f**king lunatic.”)
Which brings to mind that Trump really had a problem with accomplishment. While Biden is being raked over the coals for the seemingly bungled departure from Afghanistan, note how Trump had agreed to a May 1, 2021, withdrawal deadline that was set for after his single term in office – although he obviously figured the deadline would come during his second term in office.
And while we are seeing problems at the southern border of the U.S., not only did Trump not finish the big, beautiful Wall, but Mexico hasn’t ponied up the building costs like he said it would.
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U.S. COVID Deaths Surpass that of 1918-19 Influenza – The number of COVID-19 deaths in the United States has surpassed 675,000, which is roughly the number of deaths from influenza in 1918-19, The Washington Post reports, citing newly released CDC numbers. While it is the case that the number, 675,000, represented a much bigger percentage of the U.S. population a century ago – it reached 106 million in the 1920 Census versus 331 million last year (per Wikipedia) – the U.S. has recorded a much bigger share of global deaths for the coronavirus than for the influenza.
There were about 49 million influenza deaths globally, the CDC says, which means U.S. deaths equaled 1.4%. There have been 4.7 million COVID-19 deaths globally so far, with the U.S. taking about 14.4% of that.
Note: “A lot of people think that it goes away in April, with the heat.” – President Donald J. Trump in February 2020.
--Edited by Todd Lassa, Gary S. Vasilash and Nic Woods
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MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 20, 2021
•Scroll down using the trackbar on the far right, for debate on what last week’s California recall election means for the future of the Republican Party under Donald Trump. Jessica Gottlieb opines from the left, with Bryan Williams on the right. Tip: Read the center column first.
•Canada holds “snap” federal elections today. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called for the elections two years early, in hopes of building his Liberal Party’s numbers in Parliament, but Canadian polls say the party may actually lose strength and threaten Trudeau’s leadership.
•The United Nations 76th General Assembly holds its annual gathering this week in New York City, beginning Tuesday.
•Pfizer BioNTech reports Monday that its COVID-19 vaccine is safe for children 5 years old and up, says NPR’s Morning Edition.
Senate Democrats Can’t Attach Immigration to Budget Reconciliation – The Senate’s nonpartisan parliamentarian, Elizabeth MacDonough, has ruled that Democrats cannot attach to the $3.5 trillion “social infrastructure” budget reconciliation package an immigration plan that would give several categories of immigrants permanent residence and possible U.S. citizenship, the Associated Press reports. The ruling ends Senate Democrats’ hopes that immigration reform could be passed by a simple majority vote along with the rest of budget reconciliation. Instead, any separate immigration bill will need 60 votes, including 10 Republicans, to avoid a filibuster.
Note: Fate of immigration reform passes back to the Republicans, again. How has that worked out for the last 20 or so years?
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Politico Scoop: Sinema Hands Biden Ultimatum on Budget – Sen. Krysten Sinema, D-AZ, reportedly told President Biden last Wednesday she will not back his $3.5-trillion “social infrastructure” budget reconciliation package if the House fails to vote for, and pass, the $1.2-trillion infrastructure plan by Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s, D-CA, September 27 deadline, according to Politico. Sinema is one of two Senate Democrats – the other is West Virginia’s Joe Manchin III, of course – who could torpedo the filibuster-proof budget reconciliation bill, needing just 50 votes to pass.
Politico Playbook further notes there are at least 10 moderate Democratic House members playing hardball over infrastructure vs. reconciliation, including Rep. Kurt Schrader, of Oregon. “If they delay the vote,” Schrader told Playbook, referring to progressive House Democrats, “or it goes down – then I think you can kiss reconciliation goodbye. Reconciliation would be dead.”
Note: Finally, outward signs that moderate House Democrats are playing hardball with the progs. The White House’s weakened position on its agenda following the botched withdrawal from Afghanistan is almost certainly fortifying the moderates’ position.
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Cassidy Looks Forward—In an interview Sunday with Chuck Todd on Meet the Press, Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-LA, with Todd using the decision by Rep. Anthony Gonzales, R-OH, not to seek re-election and former President Trump describing the representative as “a grandstanding RINO, not respected in D.C. who voted for the unhinged, unconstitutional, illegal impeachment witch hunt” as the setup, Cassidy made several comments which seem to indicate that there are some in the Republican Party who are not focusing on grievances of days past, as these following quotes indicate:
Note: Cassidy was one of seven senators who voted to impeach Trump during his second impeachment trial. Cassidy was re-elected to the Senate in 2020 so he has no immediate concern vis-à-vis his own position.
It is interesting to note that statements like these, as well as reports that there are several Republican politicians who are grumbling that Trump won’t leave the stage, the deflated protest that was “Justice for J6,” and Gavin Newsom’s convincing showing in the recall election, may indicate that when the Republicans get serious about 2022 and 2024 Trump may not be the force to be reckoned with that he is now — or has been, up until now.
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And Yet, Trump Wants a New Republican Senate Leader – Flying in the face of Sen. Cassidy’s comments above, Donald Trump is shopping for a new Senate leader to depose Kentucky’s Mitch McConnell, The Wall Street Journal reports. Here’s a surprise: No one wants it. There’s “little appetite” to replace McConnell, even among such Trump sycophants as Sen. Tommy Tuberville, of Alabama, who has already declined, the Journal says.
McConnell, whose eighth term as GOP Senate leader runs to January 2023, voted against Trump’s second impeachment conviction. But his relationship with Trump has been frosty, to say the least, since the minority leader denounced the former president in an impassioned speech on the Senate floor. McConnell holds Trump’s constant repeat of his Big Lie responsible for his own demotion from majority leader after two Democrats took Georgia’s Senate seats, pushing Democrats into the majority, in the January runoffs.
Note: The WSJ piece notes that Trump has raised $102 million in political cash in the first six months of the year but hasn’t paid any of it off to GOP candidates. The newspaper also notes that Trump’s discussions “risk driving a deeper wedge” between McConnell and Trump. One of the savviest Capitol Hill strategists, McConnell must now be considering whether holding firm against President Biden’s agenda, or whether negotiating for better bi-partisanship is his better path to firming up his power. We’d bet on the former. And while Trump allegedly wants his previous job back, too, given how that’s been working out, odds are McConnell is not overly concerned.
--Edited by Todd Lassa and Gary S. Vasilash
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Scroll down with the track bar on the far right to read our three-column debate on implications of the California recall election results for ex-President Trump and the future of the GOP.
Bryan Williams writes for the right column on how the failed California recall of Gov. Gavin Newsom, D, has no significant implications for the future of the Republican Party.
Scroll down with the trackbar on the far right to read it. TIP: Read the center column before reading the left and right columns.
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