;)
December 24, 2022
Emily Cochrane of the New York Times: "Congress on Friday cleared a roughly $1.7 trillion government funding package that would provide significant increases to national security and domestic spending and billions of dollars to aid Ukraine, sending the measure to President Biden's desk for his signature. The bill was the last major legislative accomplishment of the 117th Congress and set aside $858 billion in funds for the military that Republicans pushed for and more than $772 billion for the education, health and veterans programs Democrats have championed. The measure, approved just before Christmas Eve, is the second major government funding bill passed during the Biden administration and served as the final opportunity for congressional Democrats to shape the federal budget while they retain control of both chambers." (Also linked yesterday.) Politico's report is here.
Dana Milbank of the Washington Post: "Remember this moment: It might be the last time you see a competent government for at least two years. This will all come crashing down when -- if -- [Kevin] McCarthy assumes the speakership on Jan. 3. McCarthy himself is trying to make sure dysfunction will dominate. Not only is he fighting to defeat the bipartisan omnibus spending bill, but he has threatened that any bill sponsored by any lawmaker who votes for the omnibus -- Democrats and Republicans alike -- will be 'dead on arrival.'... McCarthy's threat would essentially shut down the House for two years and eventually bring the government to a halt.... Jewish lasers and phony credentials: For House Republicans, it's going to be a truly fabulist year." (Also linked yesterday.)
The January 6 committee has published transcript of interviews of 46 (if I counted right) more witnesses. The committee page that links to the interviews is here. (Also linked yesterday.) As Neal Katyal said on the teevee, he'd expect people at a stoners' convention to have better memories. At least that's what I think he said; like half the witnesses, I can't recall. ~~~
~~~ Turns Out All of Trump's Security Detail Are Stoners. Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "The House Jan. 6 committee's final report provides new details of its efforts to get to the bottom of one of the most explosive pieces of the public testimony heard by the committee -- an account of ... Donald J. Trump trying to grab the steering wheel of his S.U.V. just before the assault on the Capitol and lunging at a Secret Service agent -- but was inconclusive about the details of what happened.... The report said that 'another witness, a White House employee with national security responsibilities, provided the committee with a... description [similar to what Cassidy Hutchinson related in live testimony]: Ornato related [to the witness, as he had to Hutchinson,] the 'irate' interaction in the presidential vehicle to this individual in Ornato's White House office with [agent Bobby] Engel present.' [Tony] Ornato, when questioned by the panel, said that he had no memory of the conversations recounted by Ms. Hutchinson and the other witness, and that 'he had no knowledge at all about the president's anger.'... Mr. Engel said he did not recall the conversation with Mr. Ornato described by Ms. Hutchinson and 'indicated he did not recall President Trump gesturing toward him.' The driver, the report said, indicated that Mr. Trump was angrier than described by Mr. Engel in either interview, but 'testified that he did not recall seeing what President Trump was doing and did not recall whether there was movement.' Two other witnesses, a Washington, D.C., police officer and a Secret Service agent, confirmed that Mr. Trump was furious about the decision not to take him to the Capitol."
Washington Post reporters have some more lowlights from the newly-released transcripts.
Ryan Goodman & Justin Hendrix of Just Security write a good rundown of the major highlights of the committee's final report. If you don't think you'll ever have enough time or inclination to read 845 pages, this summary may prove a big help.
Tierney Sneed, et al., of CNN: "In December 2020, after then-Attorney General William Barr publicly refuted ... Donald Trump's claims that the election was rigged, White House staffers drafted a press release that would've called for the firing of anyone who disagreed with Trump's claims, according to a new transcript from the House select committee investigating January 6, 2021. The draft statement ended with, 'Anybody that thinks there wasn't massive fraud in 2020 election should be fired,' according to the deposition. The draft statement -- which was never sent out, and hadn't been revealed before Friday -- was brought up during the committee's deposition of Trump White House Counsel Pat Cipollone, according to the transcript. Congressional investigators told him that they likely obtained the statement from the National Archives, which turned over documents from the Trump White House."
Robert Draper & Luke Broadwater take a deep dive for the New York Times Magazine into the workings of the House January 6 Select Committee. With somber black-and-white photos to make it all look more paper-of-record weighty. (Also linked yesterday.)
Michael Gold & others at the New York Times report on what Rep.-elect George Santos (R-N.Y.) was really doing in the years he told voters he was a college grad & financial whiz kid. (Also linked yesterday.)
Laurie McGinley & Lenny Bernstein of the Washington Post: "The Food and Drug Administration approved a change in labeling for the Plan B 'morning after' pill on Friday to clarify it does not prevent a fertilized egg from implanting in the uterus -- language that had been cited by abortion opponents to argue the medication causes abortions and should be restricted. For years, the FDA-approved label for Plan B One-Step and its competitors said the medication works mainly by stopping the release of an egg from the ovary or possibly by preventing fertilization of an egg by sperm. But it also suggested that if an egg is fertilized, the drug may prevent it from attaching to the wall of the uterus. That was revised on Friday to say 'Plan B One-Step works before release of an egg from the ovary. As a result, Plan B One-Step usually stops or delays the release of an egg from the ovary. Plan B One-Step is one tablet that contains a higher dose of levonorgestrel than birth control pills and works in a similar way to prevent pregnancy.'" The AP's report is here.
Beyond the Beltway
Arizona. Judge Rules Against Election-Denier. Isaac Stanley-Becker of the Washington Post: “An Arizona judge on Friday ruled from the bench against Abe Hamadeh, the unsuccessful Republican candidate for state attorney general who claimed that improper adjudication of ballots and other errors cost him the election and who had asked to be declared the winner. Hamadeh lost to Democrat Kris Mayes by 511 votes, a narrow margin that triggered an automatic recount, the results of which are expected later this month. But the ruling against Hamadeh in his lawsuit all but guarantees that Mayes will be inaugurated next year. Judge Lee F. Jantzen of Mohave County Superior Court told Hamadeh's lawyer, Timothy La Sota, 'You just haven't proven your case.'"
Iowa. Remi Tumin of the New York Times: Mark “Woodley, a sports anchor and reporter for KWWL, an NBC News affiliate in Eastern Iowa, was pressed into service as the massive storm system moved across the plains. Temperatures plunged to 12 degrees in the morning and continued to drop, and it was snowing -- heavily at times -- as Mr. Woodley broadcast live from the streets of Waterloo for more than three hours.... As [a local anchor, ensconced in a warm studio,] continued to check in over the course of the morning, Mr. Woodley became increasingly annoyed." MB: Pretty funny. Unless you're Mark Woodley, I guess. ~~~
Way Beyond
Ukraine, et al.
The Guardian's live updates of developments of Russia's war on Ukraine are here. The Guardian's summary report is here.
Mary Ilyushina & Francesca Abel of the Washington Post: "Despite heavy combat losses over ten months of brutal war, Russia now has more than double the number of troops poised to fight in Ukraine as it did when it invaded in February, including thousands of convicts released from prison and conscripts from a controversial mobilization drive this fall. According to a new U.S. assessment, the Wagner mercenary group, which fights alongside regular Russian troops in Ukraine, in recent months recruited 40,000 prisoners from all over the country into its ranks. Together, with 300,000 new conscripts and 20,000 volunteers, Russia's force is now more than double the 150,000 initially allocated to what President Vladimir Putin termed a 'special military operation.'"
News Lede
The New York Times is liveblogging weather conditions throughout the U.S.: "A swath of the United States is waking up Saturday to the continuing effects of a winter storm that is battering the Northeast with blizzard conditions and keeping temperatures around record lows in parts of the country where freezing cold is rarely a fact of life. The storm and the Arctic air mass will continue bedeviling most of the central, eastern and southern states for a fourth day with frigid cold and blinding snowstorms, forecasters said. There have been at least a dozen deaths, and tens of thousands of holiday travelers and motorists have been stranded. At one point, more than 1.5 million households were without power."
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Our Xmas eve family get together was cancelled–-moved to New Year's eve–––because of the impending storm. But here the skies are clear, no snow or sleet; yes, bloody cold but the sun is out. I had joked we were like orphans in the storm ( a line from "Brideshead Revisited) but now looks like we are just plain orphans.
And as I write that I think of all the Ukrainians and immigrants who are suffering in the cold who will spend their days just trying to survive. Sometimes we forget just how fortunate we are even in the midst of those who seem determined to kill our democracy.
And within this ramble I wish all of you warmth and family love–– it's the one thing we can cling onto.
P.S. A big slap on the back to Akhilleus who braves the cold in order for Rocket to get some walk abouts.
"In his career as a New York real-estate shyster and tabloid denizen, then as the forty-fifth President of the United States, Trump has been the most transparent of public figures. He does little to conceal his most distinctive characteristics: his racism, misogyny, dishonesty, narcissism, incompetence, cruelty, instability, and corruption. And yet what has kept Trump afloat for so long, what has helped him evade ruin and prosecution, is perhaps his most salient quality: he is shameless. That is the never-apologize-never-explain core of him. Trump is hardly the first dishonest President, the first incurious President, the first liar. But he is the most shameless. His contrition is impossible to conceive. He is insensible to disgrace." David Remnick
Funny you should bring up that shame business, P. D.
A conversation earlier this week circled around shame as its pre-Christmas dinner center-piece.
We were eating with friends and the subject or the Pretender's taxes arose.
My friend, an alum form an elite university, smart as a whip, now a retired labor attorney, objected to their release to the public. Light years away from a Trumpist, he nonetheless thought a person's taxes, all people's taxes, even those of a clearly crooked ex-president, should be absolutely private.
Why, I wondered. What's this privacy fetish all about? I thought it might have something to do with shame. Is it possible that we're so wrapped up in money as a measure of all that revealing what we have or don't is equivalent to revealing too much about who we are?
Not just how much we have, but where and how we got it? How we stand compared to others? Whether we're selfish or generous. Honest or not... Is revealing our taxes baring too much of ourselves to others, of going naked before the world?
When trying to plumb all the possible sources of shame, what is it about money that makes me think of Adam, Eve and the fig leaf? If we're ashamed of our money or its lack, doesn't that tell us something about ourselves that we need to know?
Perhaps recent calls for every candidate for public office to reveal his or her taxes makes perfect sense, for to the degree they display who we are, we diminish the chance voters will elect a fraud.
I left the conversation with a question: How different would our society be if everyone's taxes were open to public view?
I haven't all the answers to the question, but I suggested that in society that supports rampant inequality such widely distributed knowledge might well do more good than harm.
@Ken Winkes: I think you friend is wrong about Trump's taxes. Your tax returns & his are none of my business. But voters have a right to know whether or not people who are running for president are crooks. It's true that Trump might have won in 2016 even if his returns had been released, because so many of his voters want a president* who's a scoundrel.
But Trump calculated, and he probably was right, that not releasing his taxes could win him the presidency, because his tax returns would reveal him to be the Big Fraud (and Big Tax Cheat) he is. It is not David Remnick's concept of shame or disgrace that has motivated him, as it might you or me. It is not even reticence to set himself up as wealthy, as you and I also might feel. Rather, it is his own advantage that inspires him to hide and lie about his true financial worth.
He was given great wealth and he squandered it. That was a secret he meant to take to the grave -- and past it.
@Marie
Three questions here.
The Pretender's taxes. I do have a right to see them, tho frankly I don't care. From the moment he arrived in (my) view, I pegged him as such an obvious mountebank more proof was hardly necessary.
Does he feel shame? Probably not. Narcissists don't. That's why they (and he) are considered sick. They shouldn't be allowed to run loose.
But how about the rest of us? Your taxes? Or mine? I know we don't have the right to see them, but I'm still wondering if that is a sign of national mental health or illness.
Lately, my thoughts on that tend toward the latter.
@Ken Winkes: I don't think you have to be mentally ill to want to keep your tax returns private. Even if you have a union job & everybody in the union knows exactly how much you make, it is still reasonable to want to keep your deductions private. I might not want the neighbors (or even my extended family) to know what my giving patterns are or how much I pay in mortgage or other credit interest. How do you think Uncle Fred would like it if he found out you were giving to the ACLU & Planned Parenthood? Of course you can just tell him, but why piss him off so he raises a stink at the holiday table?
If you're a public figure and you contemplate running for high office, you probably adjust your giving & spending prudently, in case you must release your returns. But I view that "attention to taxes" as a sacrifice someone who would be president must make. And Trump didn't make it.
Full agreement on tax transparency for presidents (and other pols, especially at the national level. There is mush about Fatty that people know, or feel they know, but tax returns offer quantitative proof of certain positions. These offer data points that are irrefutable.
Of course, it’s true that a lifelong tax cheat like Trump knows ways of hiding income, of simply not reporting everything he makes, but smart tax attorneys know those tricks too, which is why a full audit by a reputable and non-compromised firm (ie, not the IRS, which has been hollowed out by Republicans to ensure that rich donors aren’t audited, and if they are, they’re assigned some kid just out of college who hasn’t the first clue of what to look for.
And even though a professional crook like Trump can still hide a lot, what he can’t hide is the bottom line. And this is important because Trump, and other Richie Riches running for office on the claim that their wealth proves their superiority (it doesn’t) and proves they can’t be bought (again, no).
The returns also demonstrate Trump’s proclivity for lying. Now, as has been suggested, that probably would not, in itself, be a problem for millions of confederate voters, who, after a couple of generations of being told how evil guv’mint is, believe it’s fine to cheat and steal from the federal government, but at least there’s no doubt about what’s going on.
@Marie
Yes, to the complications you suggest and to many you did not and no, those who have those reservations--as I do too--are not mentally ill, but my wonder is at the effects of such secrecy, whether rooted in shame or not, on society in general.
BTW, Happy Christmas Eve to all.
In local news, a library located in the county just north of us (the one
where Betsy lives in summer) was forced to close last week due to
threats to the workers by local 'Christian' groups.
This library had the nerve to stock LGBTQ themed books so the
'Christians' considered the library employees groomers.
The problem is, forcing one library to close in Michigan does absolutely nothing to stop anyone from reading any book in the
whole system.
I can go to our local library here and request a book that they don't
have and it might come from a hundred miles away.
Message to 'Christians': If you don't believe in LGBTQ themed
books, don't check them out.
Seems like threats to someones life and livelihood should be unlawful.
P.S. Merry Christmas to one and all. Don't have to cook tonite.
Pot lucks are a great invention.
Marie: You say: "It is not David Remnick's concept of shame or disgrace that has motivated him..." Isn't Remnick's point being that Trump IS shameless therefore he lacks the concept of shame or disgrace. Perhaps I misunderstood your point.
@P.D. Pepe: Yes, that's exactly what Remnick's meaning is, as far as I can tell. I was agreeing with him on that, then trying to explain what I thought Trump's purpose in hiding his taxes was.
To be fair to Trump in this season of peace, I would not disagree with someone who said that beneath his bravado, Trump is deeply ashamed of being such a non-stop fuck-up & that he's become a bastard & shed decency as a defense against his own inadequacies. I'm not sure that's right, but it's a possibility.
Regarding tax being private or public. The Scandinavian countries are more transparent for both personal tax and salary information. Here's a 5-year-old article explaining why that is. Also, it goes along with their tendencies as social democracies (not as democratic socialists as the Repugs say.)
Thanks, Unwashed.
Agnostic all my adult life, raised Catholic, guess I've been a closet Lutheran all along.
Forrest,
Quotation marks not needed around the word Christian. These people are not “quote, unquote” Christian, they ARE Christian. Hate and fear have replaced love and concern for others where tens of millions are concerned. Merry fucking Christmas.
Marie,
I tend to disagree that that fat fuck has in any way, shape, or form, any sense of his own debauched state or sense of shame. His terminal NPD allows him to attribute the most inconsequential fault (not putting the toilet seat down, eg) to someone else. His life tutors, Daddy Nazi Bigot and Roy (never admit you’re wrong) Cohn have prepped him for an existence completely bereft of any true decency and self-awareness. He is a terminal asshole.
Interestingly, your kindness smacks of far more actual Christian virtue than he or the vast majority of his hateful followers ever display.
@Akhilleus: Yeah, you're most likely right. Merry Christmas anyway.