The challenges ahead (Biden's America)

[Voronwë the Faithful]

This discussion is based on a false assumption. When Janet Yellen refers to "full employment" she does not mean that there would be no unemployment. She is just referring to returning to pre-pandemic levels.

[Inanna]

No, not really. It is an ideal, theoretical aim of the financial arm of the govt - such as keeping inflation low. The discussion that is happening is that this ideal, theoretical aim has shifted to low employment from other goals. As explained in this WSJ article:

[Frelga]

Whatever is meant, is the economy being too strong really our biggest worry right now?

[Inanna]

No, it isn’t. And that’s why the focus on bringing unemployment low. Hard to do with the levers the govt has.

[RoseMorninStar]

If one wants to discuss unemployment as being 'good for everybody' we really should be looking at universal health care. If an employee felt free to move up/switch positions without the fear of losing health coverage, or employers only offering or cutting back part time so as to avoid paying benefits... that would be rather good all around and for the economy, I would think. Some people would be able to retire freeing up jobs for a younger work force. Health insurance is a HUGE issue.

[Inanna]

Absolutely. We have PhD students whose study schedule moves around health insurance from the university, as opposed to whether they want to take a break, are fit enough this semester or not. Ditto with Adjuncts - they get health insurance when they teach 6 credits- if a class doesn’t get enough students and ends up being canceled, it impacts the instructors SO much more than just the loss of earnings. It’s the loss of health access.

Insanity.

[River]

Dave, the happy place where unemployment is low enough to keep people fed and occupied but high enough for some healthy churn. The magic number quoted around is 4-ish%, which is what economists like Yellen are targeting when they talk about full employment.

The unemployment crisis is patchy. Obviously, certain industries have been hit very hard by the pandemic. Biotech, on the other hand, is doing just fine. And since everyone is completely freaked out, no one's all that inclined to jump ship if they have a job, which is why we're having a terrible time finding contractors for a couple projects (it's not uncommon for people to take temp positions while seeking something permanent after a lay-off or after finding their current situation untenable...and there are some pretty colorful situations in the local biotech scene).

[N.E. Brigand]

While Joe Biden is replacing most of Donald Trump's U.S. Attorneys --as new presidents generally do-- he's leaving in place the USA whose Delaware office is investigating matters related to his son Hunter, and he's also keeping John Durham, the special counsel investigating the Russia investigation (and thus potentially actions that Biden himself took as vice president in 2016-2017). In both cases, this is presumably to avoid the appearance of interfering with an investigation related to himself.

(In light of this decision, it has been noted that Donald Trump fired Preet Bharara, the U.S. Attorney for the southern district of New York (the office likeliest to have jurisdiction over anything Trump did prior to becoming president), despite having previously told Bharara that he would remain in that role. And then Trump never appointed anyone to replace him. It was acting USAs at SDNY for Trump's entire term.)

(Speaking of U.S. Attorney shakeups, one unexplained thing that happened in 2017 is that at the end of Barack Obama's term, he issued an executive order changing the order of succession at the Dept. of Justice so that the USA for the eastern district of Virginia, Dana Boente, was no longer in line to become acting attorney general as he previously had been. But then after Donald Trump fired Sally Yates, he made Boente the acting attorney general, and he issued a new executive order restoring the former line of succession. It was never clear why Obama and Trump made those moves. A month later, Boente was one of two U.S. Attorneys that Trump kept when he removed all the other Obama-appointed USAs. There's no evidence I know of to suggest Boente was particularly deferential to Trump.)

[Voronwë the Faithful]

(In light of this decision, it has been noted that Donald Trump fired Preet Bharara, the U.S. Attorney for the southern district of New York (the office likeliest to have jurisdiction over anything Trump did prior to becoming president), despite having previously told Bharara that he would remain in that role. And then Trump never appointed anyone to replace him. It was acting USAs at SDNY for Trump's entire term.)

To add a little context to this, after Trump fired Bharara, Joon Kim served as acting U.S Attorney from March 11, 2017 – January 5, 2018 and Geoffrey Berman served as acting U.S. Attorney from January 5 to April 25, 2018. But then Berman was appointed to an indefinite term by the judges of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York pursuant to their authority under 28 U.S.C Section 546(d). From that time until Berman was forced out by Trump and Barr on June 20, 2020, Berman was not really an "acting U.S. Attorney" he was a "court-appointed U.S. Attorney."

[N.E. Brigand]

(In light of this decision, it has been noted that Donald Trump fired Preet Bharara, the U.S. Attorney for the southern district of New York (the office likeliest to have jurisdiction over anything Trump did prior to becoming president), despite having previously told Bharara that he would remain in that role. And then Trump never appointed anyone to replace him. It was acting USAs at SDNY for Trump's entire term.)

To add a little context to this, after Trump fired Bharara, Joon Kim served as acting U.S Attorney from March 11, 2017 – January 5, 2018 and Geoffrey Berman served as acting U.S. Attorney from January 5 to April 25, 2018. But then Berman was appointed to an indefinite term by the judges of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York pursuant to their authority under 28 U.S.C Section 546(d). From that time until Berman was forced out by Trump and Barr on June 20, 2020, Berman was not really an "acting U.S. Attorney" he was a "court-appointed U.S. Attorney."

A fair distinction to make, but has there been another presidency in which a particular U.S. Attorney position never saw even the nomination of someone to fill that role in a non-acting capacity, not over the entire four years?

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Not that I am aware of.

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[Túrin Turambar]

One change I've noticed - over the past fortnight, I've given the President of the United States no more than a few minutes' thought. I was so used to the way that Trump just soaked up media coverage like nobody else that I had forgotten it was unusual. He was all over the New York Times, the BBC, the CBC, and the ABC, leading a headline story several times a week. I would see his picture half the time I checked on Le Monde or El Mundo. He would trend on Twitter constantly, and I would see his tweets being re-tweeted (usually with critical commentary) in my feed most mornings. It's really striking.

[RoseMorninStar]

I was just saying something similar to hubby. It's nice to wake up and not think, What is it today?
Twitter did everyone a HUGE favor banning his account.

[Sunsilver]

Yeah, waking up during the Trump era was like this:

[RoseMorninStar]

Yup.

[N.E. Brigand]

Politifact criticizes Kamala Harris with a fact check so bad it's good:

Vice President Harris told Mike Allen that 'there was no national strategy or plan for vaccinations' and that the Biden administration was 'starting from scratch.'

That’s wrong. The Trump administration had a plan to distribute to locations chosen by states and let them take it from there.

[River]

Hey, a crappy, ineffective, quarter-baked, sound-bite of a plan is still a plan, right? I mean, who really cares about the details, like whether or not it'll actually work.

[Frelga]

They have a plan like I have a fireplace. I haven't touched it since we bought the house, and if I try to use it without some professional intervention first, I am likely to regret it. But it would be inaccurate to say that I don't have a fireplace.

[RoseMorninStar]

I dunno. I think it's more like buying a lawnmower and expecting someone to make sure all of the grass in the neighborhood gets mowed, without giving them any extra funding for gas, or labor. Yeah, it's a plan, but not a very well thought out one.

[N.E. Brigand]

There was a regular joke among political journalists for the past four years about how we never seemed to get to "infrastructure week."

Maybe the conditions in Texas will help to finally make it happen.

In the meantime, enjoy this tweet Ted Cruz sent just eight months ago:

California is now unable to perform even basic functions of civilization, like having reliable electricity.

Biden/Harris/AOC want to make CA’s failed energy policy the standard nationwide.

Hope you don’t like air conditioning!

Hope you don't like heat, senator.