American Politics from 2019 on

[Tero]

McCarthy to put an end to the nanny state!
https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/26/politics ... index.html

Here is McCarthy leading his troops in July.

[Tero]

Congress to halt 80 000 IRS commandos ("agents!") and give itself more power to control executive orders

As part of the 320-page bill, the GOP also proposes to block Biden’s plan to grant student loan forgiveness, repeal green energy tax credits and kill new Internal Revenue Service funding enacted as part of the Inflation Reduction Act. The measure would also impose new proposals to give Congress more power to halt regulations from the executive branch. The plan would also expedite new oil drilling projects while rescinding funding enacted to respond to the Covid-19 pandemic.

https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/26/politics ... index.html

[JimC]

Is the Democrat Party so bereft of talent that they have no credible alternative to an aging Biden?

[Strontium Dog]

Biden identifies as a man in his 30s, so it's all good.

[Tero]

Biden bankrupts third bank
https://www.cnn.com/business/live-news/ ... index.html

[Tero]

Elsewhere:
Regardless, our modern Debt Ceiling is clearly unconstitutional.It was created by accident during World War One as a way to make borrowing money easier for the Congress, by setting up a single source of debt spending, rather than having to authorize each instance of debt spending individually. As the national debt grew and expanded, Congress saw no particular need to get rid of it, as it provided politicians on both sides of the aisle a regular opportunity to pontificate about the debt (rather than actually fix the debt).

It was only in the modern era that people realized that the debt ceiling could be used as a source of extortion. But the Constitution is clear. Congress may get to decide what to put on the national credit card, but the 14th Amendment says we must pay the credit card bIll.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fourteent ... nstitution

Section 4. The validity of the public debt of the United States, authorized by law, including debts incurred for payment of pensions and bounties for services in suppressing insurrection or rebellion, shall not be questioned. But neither the United States nor any State shall assume or pay any debt or obligation incurred in aid of insurrection or rebellion against the United States, or any claim for the loss or emancipation of any slave; but all such debts, obligations and claims shall be held illegal and void.

[macdoc]

Full Faith and Credit
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Full_Fait ... %20thereof.

[Tero]

the Democrats will go with this process for the debt ceiling, courts are not involved
needs weeks of paperwork and steps, apparently
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discharge_petition

[rasetsu]

the Democrats will go with this process for the debt ceiling, courts are not involved
needs weeks of paperwork and steps, apparently
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discharge_petition

According to who?

[Tero]

the Democrats will go with this process for the debt ceiling, courts are not involved
needs weeks of paperwork and steps, apparently
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Discharge_petition

According to who?

NYT. I was able to get some screen shots. I did not quite get how it works. But they have done it many times.

[Tero]

If you have a NYT account, the story is
House Democrats Move to Force a Debt-Limit Increase as Default Date Looms
House Democratic leaders who have been quietly planning a strategy to force a debt ceiling increase to avert default began..
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/05/02/us/p ... ition.html

[L'Emmerdeur]

Cool. An archived version:

'House Democrats Move to Force a Debt-Limit Increase as Default Date Looms'

The only clue to the gambit was in the title of the otherwise obscure hodgepodge of a bill: “The Breaking the Gridlock Act.”

But the 45-page legislation, introduced without fanfare in January by a little-known Democrat, Representative Mark DeSaulnier of California, is part of a confidential, previously unreported, strategy Democrats have been plotting for months to quietly smooth the way for action by Congress to avert a devastating federal default if debt ceiling talks remain deadlocked.

With the possibility of a default now projected as soon as June 1, Democrats on Tuesday began taking steps to deploy the secret weapon they have been holding in reserve. They started the process of trying to force a debt-limit increase bill to the floor through a so-called discharge petition that could bypass Republican leaders who have refused to raise the ceiling unless President Biden agrees to spending cuts and policy changes.

“House Democrats are working to make sure we have all options at our disposal to avoid a default,” Representative Hakeem Jeffries, Democrat of New York and the minority leader, wrote in a letter he sent to colleagues on Tuesday. “The filing of a debt ceiling measure to be brought up on the discharge calendar preserves an important option. It is now time for MAGA Republicans to act in a bipartisan manner to pay America’s bills without extreme conditions.”

An emergency rule Democrats introduced on Tuesday, during a pro forma session held while the House is in recess, would start the clock on a process that would allow them to begin collecting signatures as soon as May 16 on such a petition, which can force action on a bill if a majority of members sign on. The open-ended rule would provide a vehicle to bring Mr. DeSaulnier’s bill to the floor and amend it with a Democratic proposal — which has yet to be written — to resolve the debt limit crisis.

The strategy is no silver bullet, and Democrats concede it is a long shot. Gathering enough signatures to force a bill to the floor would take at least five Republicans willing to cross party lines if all Democrats signed on, a threshold that Democrats concede will be difficult to reach. They have yet to settle on the debt ceiling proposal itself, and for the strategy to succeed, Democrats would likely need to negotiate with a handful of mainstream Republicans to settle on a measure they could accept.

[Tero]

Activists from the right and libertarians are preparing to oppose vaccines in courts by the next pandemic
https://www.npr.org/2023/05/04/11736973 ... al-network

[JimC]

If idiots don't take vaccines and subsequently die, then at least the gene pool is improved...

[Brian Peacock]

If idiots don't take vaccines and subsequently die, then at least the gene pool is improved...

The issue of course is, in the event of a pandemic, the impact mandated non-mandatory vaccinations might have on public heath in the broader sense. Passing laws making participation in vaccination and delivery programs (designed to grant a certain level of herd immunity within a population) a matter of individual discretion, rather a matter of protecting or enhancing public health and well-being, has potential consequences for everyone's health regardless of one's personal political persuasions.

There's recently been a run of measles and diptheria outbreaks in the UK directly linked to the reduced uptake of childhood immunisations in the early 2000s after the Wakefield Affair.