Our Father, who art in heaven, hallowed be thy Name. Thy kingdom come. THY WILL BE DONE, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread. And forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation, but DELIVER US FROM EVIL.
For Thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory, forever and ever. Amen †
In the largest measure, the basic problem is in 2009 Harry Reid passed the ObamaCare legislation in the Senate with 60 votes. The House then passed the exact same bill, and the Democrats moved to immediate reconciliation to remove the House concerns (Gator-Aid, Cornhusker Kickback, Louisiana Purchase etc.).
In 2017 the Republican congress are attempting to repeal and replace that ObamaCare legislation with only 52 Senate votes available, well, maybe.
Unfortunately for the GOP there are not even 52 votes for repeal. Portman, Thune, Collins, Murkowski, Graham, McCain, Blunt, Cochran, Cornyn, Hatch, McConnell and others, are not necessarily on board; that’s 11. (Leaving only 41).
No amount of byzantine rule changes surrounding “reconciliation” are going to overcome that factual vote hurdle. In 2009 Senator Reid started with 60 votes. In 2017 Senator McConnell starts with 52.
So anything coming from the House of Representatives has to keep this reality in mind. Even if support or opposition is based on ideological principle, it still has to pass – or it’s moot.
There’s no doubt the Paul Ryan proposal holds the worst U.S. CoC aspects demanded by Tom Donohue. Heck, Donohue poured a lot of lobbying money into the entire architecture in ’09/’10 and he’s paid republicans in congress hundreds of millions to make sure his interests in keeping ObamaCare around are protected. Ryan is big GOPe and he’s supported by the Big Club.
And, as much as Paul Ryan is beholden to Donohue to retain some form of ObamaCare, so too are the Rand Paul / Ted Cruz types paid by billionaires like Cary Katz (Conservative Review); who want an abject repeal without compromise. (more…)
You can tell who holds the leverage by the nerves and twitches. Mexico says they would prefer trilateral trade talks including both Canada and the U.S.; Mexico also wants the talks trade talks to begin ASAP.
Secretary “Wolverine” Ross says bilateral is preferred and there’s no immediate hurry as he intends to notify congress over the next few weeks. {spit}
Ok, well, he really didn’t spit, but still. This is exciting stuff. By mid-summer we shall feel like kids peeking through the fence holes at the O.K. Corral….
(Via CNBC) Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said Friday he hopes to start the formal process of renegotiating the North American Free Trade Agreement in coming weeks.
Under U.S. law, the government must tell Congress 90 days before it signs any new trade agreement. Ross said he wants to take the step of notifying lawmakers “sometime in the next couple of weeks.”
“We are now in the very early stages” of having the talks to change NAFTA, he said in a joint press conference with Ildefonso Guajardo Villarreal, Mexico’s economic minister.
(more…)
Oh man, I can’t stop laughing. I hope this video embed works (watch it without audio):
Shia LaBeouf moved his anti-Trump protest to an “undisclosed location” – and trolls accepted the challenge https://t.co/pwTj7U0ahP pic.twitter.com/ABHeZBB3fs
— New York Post (@nypost) March 10, 2017
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Shia LaBeouf moves his flag to an undisclosed location. But the trolls found it. The video of the skullduggery was put to epic music below, and I’m sorry – but I just cannot stop laughing.
(more…)
Reposting part of a previous outline by request. The repost is requested as an outcome of the latest wage rate news within the February labor report. The wage rate increase is not being highlighted, and in some reports downplayed, by media. However, the measurable matrices inside the space between two economic engines is responding according to prior outline on the new economic dimension.
First the recap of the day’s news on labor rates:
WASHINGTON DC – With the labor market near full employment, wage growth could speed up as companies are forced to raise compensation to retain employees and attract skilled workers. A proxy for take-home pay rose a solid 0.5 percent in February.
The annual wage increase is close to the 3 percent to 3.5 percent range that economists say is needed to lift inflation to the Fed’s 2 percent target. Inflation is already firming, in part as commodity prices rise.
Earlier today President Trump and Vice President Pence held a meeting with key congressional committee leaders to discuss the ongoing healthcare reform.
[Transcript] 11:50 A.M. EST – THE PRESIDENT: Hello, everybody. I want to thank each of the House committee leaders for being with us today. Your devotion and leadership has been amazing, and I want to just applaud you and the diligent work of your committees to advance the Obamacare repeal-and-replacement legislation that we’ve been talking about for a long time, and that we’ve been running with and I ran with, and I can tell you. And that’s what people want, they want repeal-and-replace. The bill passed just now through Ways and Means, and it will — I think the committee just voted recently, right?
(more…)
WASHINGTON (AP) — Attorney General Jeff Sessions is seeking the resignations of 46 United States attorneys who were appointed during the prior presidential administration.
In a statement Friday, the Justice Department said the request was similar to ones made in past presidential transitions. The department said many federal prosecutors appointed in the Obama administration have already left their positions, but that Sessions is now seeking the resignations of 46 holdovers. (read more)
(more…)
In the latest Bloomberg News report on the labor market, Bloomberg buried the lede:
[…] Goods-producing industries, which include mining, construction and manufacturing, added 95,000 jobs in February, the most since 2000.
This is critical for many reasons. However, before going further, again we must remind everyone about the Magic Wand. WATCH:
(White House Release) JUMPSTARTING JOB CREATION: President Donald J. Trump is looking out for the American workers who Washington has left behind.
White House press secretary Sean Spicer delivers the press briefing for March 10th 2017.
Live Stream Link – Alternate Live Stream #1 – Alternate Live Stream #2