Republicans are now openly boasting of their plot to win the House through extreme gerrymanders. This alone should dissuade Biden and Dems from negotiating down the stimulus to secure bipartisanship. Dems may have only 2 years. Make them count. My latest: washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/…
Media is getting snowed by the GOP proposal. It's a double-whammy of bad faith. It's meant to create the impression that Rs are willing to do *something* amid two major crises while also creating a bogus way to claim Biden is reneging on "unity" promise:
One more point about this: The fact that it's even an open question whether Dems will use reconciliation even as Republicans race forward with extreme gerrymanders itself demonstrates the deep asymmetries here:
News --> Clarence Thomas still won't clarify whether he repaid the principal on a $260,000 loan from a rich friend that he used to buy his RV, Sens Wyden and Whitehouse say. If loan was forgiven, they argue, it should have been reported as taxable income: newrepublic.com/article/181627…
Clarence Thomas' lawyer sent a letter to Sens Wyden and Whitehouse saying the loan agreement between Thomas and Anthony Welters (valued at $80 million) has been "satisfied."
That's not good enough. As Wyden says: "Did he ever repay the principal?"
“Your client’s refusal to clarify how the loan was resolved raises serious concerns regarding violations of federal tax laws,” Wyden/Whitehouse write to Thomas' lawyer.
If loan was forgiven, they say, it should have been noted on financial disclosure.
NEWS --> Sen Sheldon Whitehouse tells me Dems are likely to investigate revelations about Trump soliciting $1 billion from Big Oil execs while corruptly vowing to fulfill their biggest policy demands.
“The phrase that instantly came to mind as I was reading the story was ‘quid pro quo,’” Sen Sheldon Whitehouse tells me about WaPo report on Trump's $1 billion Big Oil shakedown.
This would be extension of Budget Committee hearings into oil industry. 2/
In this response to NYT/Joe Kahn fiasco, I try to pinpoint five conventions of political reporting that obscure the Trump threat and work against Kahn's own stated goal of informing voters.
First, the "two different realities on democracy" fallacy:
Second, the failure to clearly describe Trump's plan to cancel prosecutions of himself and other elements of his legal strategy as threats to the system itself, that is, as efforts to put himself above the law:
As an example of number 2, look how @nytpolitics today describes Trump's plan to end prosecutions of himself. NYT editors: Do you really think casual readers will grasp how abnormal/threatening to the system this is? Tell them what the stakes truly are.
Dems could also use the hearings to voice core principles: It's possible to call out antisemitism while also insisting it's not antisemitic to criticize Israel's war conduct. Or that one can call out violence while also condemning police overreaction.
Fox News propaganda about Trump's trial has taken on some serious North Korea vibes: It absurdly portrays him as exerting total mastery over the proceedings and even depicts his dozing off as an act of heroic defiance.
Trump has been posting video of Fox personalities gushing about what a huge winner the trial has been for him. But privately, NYT reports, he's raging at his lead lawyer, which suggests he doesn't actually think things are going too well for him. 2/
One Fox News personality even tried to push the idea that Trump's trial is good for him because it means he can't do rallies, denying the media an opportunity to "twist Trump's words."
Trump is Owning The Media and the media doesn't even know it! 3/
NEWS --> Prominent conservative Michael Luttig excoriates the right wing SCOTUS justices as "radical," predicting that in the 1/6 case, they'll protect Trump entirely.
“I now believe that it is unlikely Trump will ever be tried," Luttig tells me.
Also in our interview: Michael Luttig, who has strong conservative credentials, is harshly critical of the lines of questioning from Samuel Alito and the other right wing justices.
Luttig says a grant of immunity would "license all future presidents to commit crimes against the United States while in office with impunity."
Michael Luttig predicts that either a delay will enable Trump to cancel Jack Smith's 1/6 prosecution if he wins the election, or that SCOTUS will grant Trump immunity so he never even gets tried.