The challenges ahead (Biden's America)

[N.E. Brigand]

Not sure where this should go, but in as much as it reflects public opinion that the Biden administration may need to consider:

The Case for a Better Way to Poll

The argument, backed up by some new very specific polling responses, is that most issue polling paints a picture of the United States as more progressive than it actually is (or than voting results, in which Republicans run neck-and-neck with Democrats, would suggest). For example, Planned Parenthood likes to claim that 79% of Americans favor keeping Roe v. Wade in place, but if when specifically asked whether abortion should be legal in the second trimester (which Roe protects), only 27% of Americans say yes. Of course, it's possible that if these same respondents were told that Roe v. Wade protected abortion rights during the second trimester, then that number could be higher.

The poll also finds that a majority of Americans favor the death penalty (clearly for murder cases and marginally for rape cases), that they favor requiring drug testing for welfare recipients, and that they want the government to reduce spending so that taxes can be cut, among other things.

This is still just one poll, but I appreciate that it offers a different and possibly important perspective.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Not sure where this should go

There is nothing that says that you can't start a new thread when something doesn't clearly fit in the existing threads.

Just sayin'.

[N.E. Brigand]

I believe Joe Manchin's assertion here is false:



Also Joe Manchin, in his first year in the Seante ten years ago, complained that "We have become paralyzed by the filibuster".

It was around that same time that Kyrsten Sinema, then a state representative, was calling for the filibuster to be abolished.

[N.E. Brigand]

President Biden today held a press conference that wnet longer than any given by either Presidents Barack Obama or Donald Trump. (Edited to add: PBS anchor Yamiche Alcindor says this was the longest presidential press conference ever.) Washington Post reporter Seung Min Kim notes that none of the scores of questions today concerned immigration, which, as she notes, "dominated" the first presidential press conference that Joe Biden gave ten months ago.

So I guess Biden has solved all the immigration issues he faced then?

[Voronwë the Faithful]

This opinion piece by Eric Levitz pretty much expresses my views.

Give Manchin What He Wants Already

[N.E. Brigand]

Yeah. More than a year ago, I was saying here that Manchin would be able to get whatever he wants. It's just that, for much of the past year, it's been unclear what Manchin wants -- at least to the public. And I think it was also unclear to a lot of the people who were actually crafting legislation to deliver on Joe Biden's agenda. Remember how in the fall we learned that Chuck Schumer had made a deal with Manchin months earlier about the size, timing, and content of BBB? What a waste of everyone else's time and effort.

Or maybe not. As with the voting rights legislation that Manchin and Sinema tanked last night, maybe it was necessary to go through those motions to prove that every effort had been made to pass the largest possible version of the President's agenda. Regarding voting rights specifically, while it has seemed like a hopeless case for some time due to Manchin's and Sinema's bizarre love of the filibuster, apparently there were major funders who were telling Schumer that if there was no vote, they would stop donating.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Politics are so weird.

[N.E. Brigand]

Amen. Also Joe Manchin tells Business Insider that his previous offer for BBB is no longer on the table and that discussions on the bill will had to start "from scratch."

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Yeah, he said that earlier as well, after he blew the bill. Which gives credence to the supposition that it was all a ploy and he never intended to support any part of the bill that includes genuine energy reform that would impact the bottom line of the coal industry.

[N.E. Brigand]

I enjoyed this essay by Alex Pareene: We're All Trying to Find the Guy Policing Our Behavior, which captures something about the disconnect between reality and the public perception of Biden and the Democrats regarding the pandemic. Pareene, who lives in New York City, describes a typical day from the past week, and notes that it's the same as a typical day before the pandemic. He concludes as follows:

What most of the restrictions on our behavior (and the behavior of most other Americans) have in common is that they are not being imposed on us by power-grabbing authority figures. They are largely decisions we made, or decisions made for us by other private actors, in response to the inescapable fact that a dangerous and highly transmissible virus is spreading rapidly throughout the city, and the state, and the country, and the world.

This is why I find the tenor of discussion around Covid-19 restrictions genuinely bewildering. There basically aren’t any. The United States is powering through the Omicron wave with its usual enforced individualism. The hard restrictions on our activities are, for the most part, not mandated or enforced by the state, acting at the behest of liberals who refuse to go back to normal because they are addicted to panic and quarantine; the limits are imposed by the virus that isn’t going away. My kid’s school class went remote for a while because people had Covid-19. He’s back in school now even though his principal has Covid-19. As usual in the United States, the people who won the political argument are now complaining the loudest that they’re dissatisfied with the results, and, apparently, it’s all the fault of the losers.

[N.E. Brigand]

Not sure where this should go, but in as much as it reflects public opinion that the Biden administration may need to consider:

The Case for a Better Way to Poll

The argument, backed up by some new very specific polling responses, is that most issue polling paints a picture of the United States as more progressive than it actually is (or than voting results, in which Republicans run neck-and-neck with Democrats, would suggest). For example, Planned Parenthood likes to claim that 79% of Americans favor keeping Roe v. Wade in place, but if when specifically asked whether abortion should be legal in the second trimester (which Roe protects), only 27% of Americans say yes. Of course, it's possible that if these same respondents were told that Roe v. Wade protected abortion rights during the second trimester, then that number could be higher.

The poll also finds that a majority of Americans favor the death penalty (clearly for murder cases and marginally for rape cases), that they favor requiring drug testing for welfare recipients, and that they want the government to reduce spending so that taxes can be cut, among other things.

This is still just one poll, but I appreciate that it offers a different and possibly important perspective.

In connection with that study, this chart shows how various Democrat proposals from 2020-2021 have polled:



As Matt Yglesias notes, in response to demands from Krysten Sinema, Democrats unfortunately had to cut their most popular proposal (allowing Medicare to negotiate drug prices down) from legislation last year. And a Child Tax Credit (with a $50,000 threshold above which benefits begin to phase out) is somewhat popular, and Joe Manchin has blocked that too.

Joe Biden yesterday re-emphasized a point he'd made during the 2020 campaign, which is that he wants to increase not decrease funding for police. That is one of the least popular proposals Democrats put forth.

And today the Supreme Court agreed to hear challenges to affirmative action programs, and presumably the court's conservative majority will rule to end them. That actually could help Democrats, because such initiatives are the most unpopular in the polls.

[N.E. Brigand]

Donald Trump Jr., per an apparently drunk video he posted online, wants you to know that "Joe Biden is what stands between us and a nuclear capable China."

[Voronwë the Faithful]

The US economy grew at the fastest rate in 2021 since the Reagan administration

And yet:

Biden approval rating hits new low: poll

[N.E. Brigand]

Nikki Haley, the former governor of South Carolina who subsequently served in the Trump administration as the U.S. Ambassador to the U.N., last night said in an interview, and this morning repeated on Twitter, that she wants House Speaker Nancy Pelosi elevated to the Presidency:

[N.E. Brigand]

The U.S. economy grew by 6.9% in the final quarter of 2021, which means over all of 2021, the U.S. economy grew by 5.7%, making it the strongest year since 1984 (and the second-strongest year in my lifetime, just edging out 1973 for that spot).

Edit: Apologies for missing V's post that already noted this impressive growth.

[Voronwë the Faithful]

Um, see my post just above your Nikki Haley post.

[Frelga]

Why do people even bother repeating what Trump associates say?

[N.E. Brigand]

Yesterday a bridge in Pittsburgh collapsed, injuring a dozen people (fortunately no one was killed), just hours before President Biden was due to speak in Pittsburgh about the infrastructure bill that he signed into law in the fall. Biden made a separate stop to view the damage.



I hope the new federal infrastucture money comes with restrictions that will prevent it from being used for other expenses. A 2016 report from Pennsylvania's auditor general found that $4.2 billion in funding meant for bridge repair had been diverted to a state police fund.

[N.E. Brigand]

The hits keep coming for the formerly on the top of the world Cuomo brothers.

CNN suspends Chris Cuomo indefinitely

CNN has now terminated Chris Cuomo.

And now CNN's CEO, Jeff Zucker, has resigned.

During the Cuomo investigation, Zucker was asked about a personal relationship with a subordinate. He didn't answer truthfully, and that lie caught up with him.

Zucker has been at CNN since 2013. Prior to that, he was president of NBC's entertainment division starting in 2000 and then was CEO of NBC as a whole until 2010. In the former role, he signed Donald Trump for The Apprentice, which played a significant role in making Trump seem like a capable executive.

[N.E. Brigand]

Because of inflation, "there was no increase in the real national debt from Q3 2020 to Q3 2021." Mind you, I don't think the national debt is very important. But lots of people do, so they should be pleased by this news.

Also in 2021, bankruptcy filings in the U.S. declined to their lowest point in at least 25 years.