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The Real-World Impact of Our Reporting [Bari Weiss, The Free Press]

By Spencer Chen
In [The Free Press]
February 15, 2023
270 views
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• The House Oversight Committee summoned four former Twitter executives to answer questions about The Free Press’ Twitter Files reporting.
• Jamie Reed, a whistleblower from inside an American pediatric gender clinic, spoke out publicly about her experience in an article published by The Free Press.
• The story generated a major reaction among law enforcement and policy makers, including Senator Josh Hawley’s office and Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey.
• The Free Press is launching a new audio documentary, The Witch Trials of J.K. Rowling, hosted by Megan Phelps-Roper and premiering on February 21.
• Jennifer Sey, who wrote about leaving a top job at Levi Strauss & Co. in order to speak her mind, is hosting an FP Forum tonight.
• The Free Press is driving the political and cultural conversation in the U.S. and beyond, and readers can join the community with a 25% discount for their first year.

Published February 15, 2023
Visit The Free Press to read Bari Weiss’s original post The Real-World Impact of Our Reporting

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The truth about Biden, the GOP, Social Security, and Medicare [Judd Legum, Popular Information]

By Spencer Chen
In [Popular Information]
February 14, 2023
250 views
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• President Joe Biden has been criticized by major media outlets and Republican officials for his claims that Republicans are proposing cuts to Social Security and Medicare.
• The Republican Study Committee (RSC) proposed a 2023 budget that would cut Social Security and Medicare benefits by increasing the retirement age and changing the benefit formula.
• Congressman Buddy Carter (R-GA) and Senator John Thune (R-ND) have both called for cuts to Social Security and Medicare.
• Senator Rick Scott (R-FL) proposed a plan to “sunset” all programs after five years, including Social Security and Medicare.
• Biden’s real vulnerability on the issue stems from his own efforts to cut Social Security and Medicare years ago.
• However, Biden has since changed his position and proposed to increase Social Security benefits, not freeze them.

Published February 14, 2023
Visit Popular Information to read Judd Legum’s original post The truth about Biden, the GOP, Social Security, and Medicare

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February 11, 2023 [Heather Cox Richardson, Letters from an American]

By Spencer Chen
In Heather Cox Richardson [Letters from an American]
February 12, 2023
266 views
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• President Biden’s statement during the State of the Union address that some Republicans want Medicare and Social Security to sunset every five years was true.
• This statement was based on Florida senator Rick Scott’s 11-point plan, which promised that all federal legislation would sunset in 5 years.
• Republicans have a long history of calling for cuts to Social Security, including Trump, Mike Pence, Ron Johnson, and the Republican Study Committee.
• Biden’s statement comes from the “reality-based community,” which was famously dubbed in 2002 by a senior advisor to George W. Bush.
• Trump’s campaign hired a consulting firm to try to prove that the election had been stolen, but the firm could not find anything that would have changed the outcome.
• Representative George Santos and Anna Paulina Luna have both been accused of fabricating their biographies.
• Political decisions that are not based on reality rob us of our right to make informed decisions about our government and what it will do.
• Social Security and Medicare can be stabilized by cutting benefits, raising taxes, rearranging government funding, or by some combination of the three.
• Voters need fact-based information to elect people who will enact the policies a majority of us want.

Published February 12, 2023
Visit Letters from an American to read Heather Cox Richardson’s original post February 11, 2023

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Who Will Replace Dianne Feinstein? [Ronald Brownstein, The Atlantic]

By Spencer Chen
In [The Atlantic]
February 3, 2023
272 views
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• Senator Dianne Feinstein has not yet announced whether she is retiring, but the race to replace her has already begun.
• The 2024 contest will be the first wide-open Democratic Senate primary in California since 1992, when Feinstein was first elected to the seat.
• The field is quickly getting crowded with U.S. Representatives Adam Schiff, Katie Porter, and Barbara Lee expected to join.
• The contest will offer voters a choice between three distinct eras of Democratic thinking: Porter, Schiff, and Lee.
• A Democrat is almost guaranteed to win the Senate seat in 2024, as California hasn’t elected a Republican senator since 1988.
• Female candidates have often had an advantage in California Democratic primaries due to women accounting for close to 60% of Democratic voters.
• Porter and Schiff have similar voting records, but Porter is seen as a more committed progressive and crusading champion.
• Lee may further hinder Porter’s ability to consolidate liberal voters due to her uncompromising liberal profile.
• Geography is also a factor, as candidates from Northern California have often beaten those from the south in statewide Democratic primaries.
• All candidates will need to expand beyond the MSNBC/Democratic Twitter base to reach millions of voters who are not paying attention now.
• Most California experts give Schiff a slight edge, but all expect a dynamic and unpredictable contest.

Published February 3, 2023
Visit The Atlantic to read Ronald Brownstein’s original post Who Will Replace Dianne Feinstein?

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February 2, 2023 [Heather Cox Richardson, Letters from an American]

By Spencer Chen
In Heather Cox Richardson [Letters from an American]
February 3, 2023
281 views
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• The Republican-controlled House of Representatives voted along party lines to remove Representative Ilhan Omar (D-MN) from her seat on the House Committee on Foreign Affairs.
• Earlier, House speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) used his own discretion to remove Democratic California representatives Adam Schiff and Eric Swalwell from the House Select Committee on Intelligence.
• The Democrats removed Gosar and Greene—both members of the far-right group—after they threatened violence against their Democratic colleagues, while Republicans removed Schiff and Swalwell over make-believe dangers and now have removed Omar allegedly over policy differences.
• McCarthy catered to far-right members in order to get the votes to become speaker; now he is giving those members what they want in order to keep them from ousting him and to get them on board for imperative legislation.
• The power the far-right representatives are getting is making them a force distinct from the rest of the Republican Party.
• Republicans in the 1980s made a deliberate decision to court voters with religion, racism, and sexism in order to hold onto power.
• The Republicans have created a group of voters and their representatives who are openly white supremacists and who believe that any attempt to use the government to hold the economic playing field level is socialism.
• The House voted to condemn socialism—another attempt to appease that far right—while Republicans then chided those Democrats who refused to vote in favor of that condemnation.
• Former president Trump “retruthed” the words of a person who warned that he and “80,000,000” were willing to fight for Trump and were “Locked and LOADED.”
• Some of the far-right group are wearing AR-15 pins, but have not, so far, introduced any gun bills.

Published February 3, 2023
Visit Letters from an American to read Heather Cox Richardson’s original post February 2, 2023

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The GOP Is Just Obnoxious [David Frum, The Atlantic]

By Spencer Chen
In [The Atlantic]
February 1, 2023
203 views
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• Mehmet Oz, a Republican candidate for the U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania, mocked his opponent’s affliction during the campaign, leading to his defeat.
• Many other unsuccessful Republican candidates in 2022 offered voters weird, extreme, or obnoxious personas.
• Ron DeSantis, the Florida Governor, indulged in obnoxious stunts in 2022, but was an incumbent executive with a record of accomplishment.
• James Poniewozik’s 2019 book, *Audience of One*, argues that Trump’s ascendancy was the product of a huge shift in media culture.
• Republicans have built career paths for young people that start on extremist message boards and lead to jobs on Republican campaigns.
• Republicans have endured four bad elections in a row, and have failed to flip a single chamber in any state legislature.
• Democratic candidates don’t try to energize their base by “owning the conservatives”; they don’t have an obvious “base” the way that Republicans do.
• The Republican Party needs to start with something more basic: at least pretend to be nice.

Published February 1, 2023
Visit The Atlantic to read David Frum’s original post The GOP Is Just Obnoxious

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January 28, 2023 [Heather Cox Richardson, Letters from an American]

By Spencer Chen
In Heather Cox Richardson [Letters from an American]
January 29, 2023
208 views
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• Representatives Jimmy Gomez (D-CA), Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), Daniel Goldman (D-NY), Andy Kim (D-NJ), Joaquin Castro (D-TX), Jamaal Bowman (D-NY), Joe Neguse (D-CO), Eric Swalwell (D-CA), Ruben Gallego (D-AZ), Colin Allred (D-TX), Mike Levin (D-CA), Josh Harder (D-CA), Raul Ruiz (D-CA), and Senator Rob Menendez (D-NJ) announced the formation of the Congressional Dads Caucus.
• The caucus was formed in response to the Republicans’ long fight over electing a House speaker, which highlighted the double standard that exists for working dads.
• The caucus is fighting for a national paid family and medical leave program, affordable and high-quality childcare, and the expanded Child Tax Credit.
• On Tuesday, January 24, the Women’s Bureau of the U.S. Department of Labor released its initial findings from the new National Database of Childcare Prices, which showed that childcare expenses are untenable for families throughout the country.
• The U.S. spends significantly less than other high-wage countries on early childcare and education, ranking 35th out of 37 countries in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).
• The formation of the Dads Caucus and the release of the childcare prices findings suggest a shift in the perception of childcare as a societal issue and a reworking of the role of the government.

Published January 29, 2023
Visit Letters from an American to read Heather Cox Richardson’s original post January 28, 2023

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The Logic Behind Biden’s Refusal to Negotiate the Debt Ceiling [Ronald Brownstein, The Atlantic]

By Spencer Chen
In [The Atlantic]
January 27, 2023
247 views
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• President Joe Biden is refusing to link increasing the debt ceiling with cutting federal spending, a decision rooted in the Obama administration’s experiences in 2011-15.
• In 2011, Obama and his team negotiated with House Republicans to link a debt-ceiling increase with spending cuts, but the negotiations failed and proved so disruptive to financial markets that Obama and his team emerged determined never to repeat it.
• In 2013, Obama declined to negotiate with House Republicans and the GOP eventually raised the debt ceiling without conditions.
• In 2011, Obama and Boehner came close to a “grand bargain” to control the long-term debt, but their negotiations foundered when they could not agree on the balance between tax increases and spending cuts.
• In 2013, House Republicans returned with a new set of demands for raising the debt ceiling, including unraveling Obama’s greatest legislative achievement, the Affordable Care Act. Obama declined to talk with Republicans.
• Biden and his team have taken from the Obama years the lesson that if they don’t negotiate against the debt limit, a sufficient number of Republicans will eventually back down because the economic consequences of default would be so catastrophic.

Published January 27, 2023
Visit The Atlantic to read Ronald Brownstein’s original post The Logic Behind Biden’s Refusal to Negotiate the Debt Ceiling

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Republicans can’t even explain what they’re trying to do with the debt ceiling [Matthew Yglesias, Slow Boring]

By Spencer Chen
In [Slow Boring]
January 26, 2023
175 views
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• Republicans are instigating a debt ceiling drama without any real interest in the national debt or deficit reduction.
• Trump, Vance, and Mace have all ruled out cuts to Social Security and Medicare, and the Freedom Caucus rejected Manchin’s proposal for a bipartisan commission.
• There is an established process for cutting discretionary spending, but Republicans have not taken advantage of it.
• Ryan and Trump wanted to cut Medicaid, but the ACA expansion put a stop to that.
• A bipartisan commission could be a good idea, but it would require Republicans to agree to tax increases.
• The Chicago Model of issuing high-coupon bonds could be a promising way for the executive branch to keep the country running.

Published January 26, 2023
Visit Slow Boring to read Matthew Yglesias’s original post Republicans can’t even explain what they’re trying to do with the debt ceiling

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January 25, 2023 [Heather Cox Richardson, Letters from an American]

By Spencer Chen
In Heather Cox Richardson [Letters from an American]
January 26, 2023
251 views
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• Democrats are staying out of the way while House Republicans make a spectacle of themselves, giving power to extremists like Marjorie Taylor Greene and facing financial improprieties from George Santos.
• Senate Republicans are staying out of debt ceiling negotiations until the House Republicans come up with a viable plan.
• President Joe Biden has signed an executive order to promote competition in the economy, reclaiming the country’s long tradition of opposing economic consolidation.
• Biden’s executive order has resulted in a sharp drop in mergers and acquisitions, and the December jobs report showed strong job growth and a decrease in unemployment.
• The CHIPS and Science Act has attracted multibillion-dollar private investments and created jobs accessible to those without college degrees.
• The Inflation Reduction Act has capped the cost of insulin for those on Medicare, made hearing aids available over the counter, and expanded subsidies for the Affordable Care Act.
• Biden is taking to the road to tout his successes to the country, especially to those places most skeptical of the government.

Published January 26, 2023
Visit Letters from an American to read Heather Cox Richardson’s original post January 25, 2023

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