Get real, people An online acquaintance once belonged to the Democracy Alliance, a gaggle of liberal millionaire/billionaires formed in 2005 as a lefty counterpart to the Koch donor network. Yes, they’ve done some things to advance the cause, as Michael Tomasky notes below. But conservative moneybags are long-term political investors willing to sink hundreds of millions in media outlets to bend the country’s will over time to theirs. Rich liberals tend to eschew deferring gratification in favor of near-term electoral wins. They want trophies they they can show off to friends the way congressman pose for photos in front of new destroyers. IIRC, my friend left Democracy Alliance in frustration over that, and later the country. Michael Tomasky opines on David Smith’s purchase of The Baltimore Sun at The New Republic: But this column isn’t about the Sun and Smith. In fact, I applaud Smith and Sinclair in one, and only one, respect. They get it. They understand how important media ownership is. They are hardly alone among right-wing megawealthy types. Of course there’s Rupert Murdoch, but there are more.
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Removed from reality Somewhere over the last day or so someone remarked that the Masters of the Universe meeting in Davos, Switzerland seem utterly unremarkable. That is, judging by the lack of fresh ideas floating around the ultra-rich conclave. On what to do about fanatical populism spreading across the globe, they’ve got worries but otherwise nothin’, according to Nahal Toosi, Politico’s senior foreign affairs correspondent: In conversation after conversation here, I detected resignation and helplessness among business executives when it came to their counterparts in government. There’s a desperate desire to see the world’s political leaders appeal more to moderates instead of capitalizing on extremes, but there’s also recognition that the political market doesn’t easily reward the people in the middle. C-suite types fear the polarization will only deepen as half of the global population, in more than 60 countries, votes in 2024 — everywhere from South Africa to the United States.
Philip Bump did a necessary deep-dive into James Comer’s mendacity about those transcripts. It’s truly astonishing that they are able to get away with this: One of the arguments offered by attorneys for President Biden’s son Hunter when responding to a subpoena from the House Oversight Committee for a closed-door deposition was that the committee had shown a pattern of cherry-picking what would be presented to the public. This is unquestionably true. Over and over and over and over and over, committee Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) has made debunked and unsubstantiated public statements that cast the president and/or his son as dishonest or has rushed to release unsubstantiated claims or information that similarly collapse under scrutiny. The first year of his investigation into the Bidens made extremely little progress as a result — except where it matters, in the right-wing media universe. Clearly, though, this has not gone unnoticed by those enmeshed in Comer’s sprawling investigation. There was that letter from Hunter Biden’s lawyer Abbe Lowell in November.
It should be good news for Biden. Generally presidents benefit from good economic “vibes.” But who knows? He’s old so they may just hate him no matter the reality. It appears Americans are finally feeling better about the economy. Consumer sentiment, a window into the nation’s financial mood, jumped 13 percent in January to its highest level since mid-2021, reflecting optimism that inflation is easing and incomes are rising, according to a closely watched survey by the University of Michigan. Since November, consumer sentiment has risen 29 percent, marking the largest two-month increase in more than 30 years. Gas prices, often a key driver of sentiment, have fallen 40 percent since June 2022, to just over $3 a gallon. Weekly jobless claims are at their lowest level in more than a year. Sales of cars, clothing and sporting goods all picked up during the holidays, as consumers felt confident enough to keep spending. Meanwhile, the stock market is surging to new records, with the S&P 500 closing at an all-time high on Friday.
There are exceptions:
Roger Stone must be proud In case you were wondering who the guy is who’s pushing this scandal about Fani Willis having an affair with her co-prosecutor, it’s this guy. (Article from 2016) Donald Trump’s “election protection” effort will be run by Mike Roman, a Republican operative best known for promoting a video of apparent voter intimidation by the New Black Panthers outside a polling place in 2008. Roman is to oversee poll-watching efforts as Trump undertakes an unprecedented effort by a major party nominee by calling into question the legitimacy of the popular vote weeks before election day. The Republican nominee has insisted, without evidence, that dead people and undocumented immigrants are voting in the United States. Trump has long claimed that the 2016 election is rigged but has amplified his claims of voter fraud in recent days. On Monday he tweeted: “Of course there is large scale voter fraud happening on and before election day. Why do Republican leaders deny what is going on?
MAGA Republicans don’t want to fix the border Republicans no longer have abortion to run on in 2024 thanks to Donald Trump and his SCOTUS appointments. They’re running away from abortion. With good cause. They have lost everywhere abortion rights have been on the ballot in election after election since SCOTUS overturned Roe in June of 2022. So they’ve latched onto scare-mongering about brown-skinned immigrants, the real ones at the southern border and the even scarier Others they can conjure in the minds of their voters. Immigration is too good a campaign weapon to lose before November. Laura Ingraham claimed on her show Wednesday that she’d spoken with Trump and he’s adamant that House Republicans reject the bipartisan immigration bill passed by the U.S. Senate. Republican House Speaker Mike Johnson is on board (Meidas Touch): Republican Speaker Mike Johnson admitted to Laura Ingraham on Fox News Wednesday night that he has been talking to Donald Trump “pretty frequently” about a possible deal being negotiated to fix problems at the border.
Biden bridges it in N.C. President Joe Biden visited North Carolina on Thursday to remind Tar Heel State citizens what his infrastructure plan has already delivered: Who remembers, you know, during the pandemic when schools were shut down and … the kids weren’t able to attend schools. They had to go online. How many of you spent time in McDonald parking lots tapping into their Internet so you could do the homework with your kid? Look, think of all the workers who need Internet to do their jobs when they’re working from home. So many are working from home — have to work. Small businesses need Internet to reach more customers here at home and literally around the world. And our seniors who need it in connection with their doctors through telemedicine because they can’t make it to the doctors in person. High-speed Internet isn’t a luxury anymore, it’s an absolute necessity. It’s an absolute — (applause) — no, it really is. And yet, when I became president, around 24 million Americans didn’t have access to affordable high-speed Internet. And for millions more, their Internet connection was limited or unreliable.
The relentless wail of Donald Trump How dare Nikki Haley use his own strategy to beat him: Former President Donald Trump might owe Sen. Ted Cruz an apology. And no, it’s not about the long list of things Trump has said about Cruz and his family. Rather, it’s about how Cruz and his allies complained in 2016 about how non-Republican voters helped hand the nomination to Trump. They even tried to formally change the party’s rules to incentivize states to move away from elections that allowed independent and possibly even Democratic voters to weigh in on the Republican presidential race. Trump ran away with the 2016 Republican presidential nomination in part due to his sheer dominance in these so-called “open primaries.” While at the same time, Cruz struggled to keep up by winning in closed primaries and caucuses. Now, Trump is sounding the alarm at the possibility that former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley could use his old playbook against him.
I know you’ll be shocked to hear this, but it turns out that corporations have been massively profiteering over the pandemic. A new report claims “resounding evidence” shows that high corporate profits are a main driver of ongoing inflation, and companies continue to keep prices high even as their inflationary costs drop. The report, compiled by the progressive Groundwork Collaborative thinktank, found corporate profits accounted for about 53% of inflation during last year’s second and third quarters. Profits drove just 11% of price growth in the 40 years prior to the pandemic, according to the report. Prices for consumers rose by 3.4% over the past year, but input costs for producers increased by just 1%, according to the authors’ calculations which were based on data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis and National Income and Products Accounts. “Costs have come down substantially, and while corporations were quick to pass on their increased costs to consumers, they are surprisingly less quick to pass on their savings to consumers,” Liz Pancotti, a Groundwork strategic advisor and paper co-author, told the Guardian.