Obama jokingly calls Biden ‘Vice President’ upon his return to the White House
Barack Obama visited the White House on Tuesday in his first public event at the Executive Palace since leaving office. Join the celebration of the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, as Joe Biden announced changes to the health care program that could make up to 200,000 uninsured Americans eligible for new coverage.
The visit is hoping many Democrats will take advantage of Biden’s still-high approval rating for his former boss among the Democratic base. Biden has recently struggled to raise his poor standing in the polls, and there are serious concerns that apathy and disillusionment among Democratic voters may give Republicans a chance in this year’s midterm elections. To win the midterms, Obama says, Democrats have a story to tell, “they just have to tell it.”
Meanwhile, on Capitol Hill, the Senate Judiciary Committee voted yesterday 11-11 to nominate Justice Kitangi Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court. The result would not prevent Mrs. Jackson’s nomination from advancing to the Senate floor; It appears she has already had the support of 53 senators, with Republicans Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski and Mitt Romney all breaking ranks to support her.
After KBJ questioning, Republicans struggle to identify the woman
HuffPost He was trying to select Republican members of the Judiciary Committee to give their definitions of women. Ms. Brown Jackson refused to answer that question on the grounds that she was not a biologist – but some GOP members who criticized her for regression had trouble answering the same question.
Here’s a particularly messy answer from Josh Hawley. The full piece is well worth a read…
Andrew NottiApril 6 2022 14:20
Terrible economic warning from major banks
Deutsche Bank has issued a stark forecast for the immediate future of the US economy, predicting that the country will enter a recession next year. Stocks will be down 20 percent by next summer, the bank says, and unemployment — at a noticeably low level currently — will rise by more than a percentage point in the next two years.
Coming from the bank, these specific forecasts are unlikely to break through the news cycle for ordinary Americans, but voters’ attitude to the economy is hardly as optimistic as things stand.
Andrew NottiApril 6 2022 13:51
State Department details $100 million in new funding for Ukraine
The Biden administration is ramping up its supply of lethal aid to Ukraine, allocating hundreds of millions of dollars in new funding to the country’s government and military as they resist the Russian onslaught.
Below, State Department spokesman Ned Price announced a new package of “security assistance” directed at a US ally in Eastern Europe.
Andrew NottiApril 6, 2022 12:50
Kyle Rittenhouse on Hunter Biden
Teen shooter Kyle Rittenhouse, who killed two people at the Black Lives Matter protest in Kenosha in 2020, has long complained that Joe Biden has bracketed “white supremacists” in his campaign ad — and is now criticizing the president over the intense investigation into misconduct The alleged money of his son.
Andrew NottiApril 6 2022 12:18
Biden begins his long-running Covid study efforts
Yesterday, the White House announcedFull government effort to prevent, detect and treat Long Covid‘, with plans to include research into the causes and effects of the condition not only on individuals but across populations. Long Covid has affected so many people who were previously able to work that they already have a new disability, meaning they may be entitled to new rights of which they were not aware .
Andrew NottiApril 6, 2022 11:42
ICYMI: Obama talks about the midterms
Barack Obama was in awe during his visit to the White House yesterday, including when asked about Democrats’ prospects for what could be a punitive midterm election year. In an unusual Obama-style response, he told the journalist the following:
Andrew NottiApril 6, 2022 11:00
Biden nominates the first woman to head a branch of the US military
Joe Biden has nominated a new US Coast Guard chief: Admiral Linda Fagan, who, if confirmed, would become the first woman to head a branch of the US military.
Maria Cantwell, chair of the committee that will hold her hearings, noted that “the nomination of Admiral Fagan will inspire generations of American women to seek service at the highest level in the armed forces.”
Gustav Killander’s story:
Andrew NottiApril 6, 2022 10:32
Will Prince Obama and Biden do anything to the Democrats?
independentHolly Baxter took a look at Barack Obama’s appearance at the White House yesterday, writing that he provided at least some welcome emotional warmth in a very negative moment…
At the same time, though, she questions whether the visit can really do much for Democrats as the president struggles around the 40 percent approval mark and his agenda faces persistent obstructions in Congress.
Andrew NottiApril 6, 2022 10:01
Analysis: KBJ’s worst hearings
As Kitangi Brown-Jackson’s confirmation approaches, Andrew Feinberg takes a look at the depths raised in hearings by the Judiciary Committee’s Republican Unit and their colleagues on the Senate floor.
He writes that “Republican senators spent most of their speaking time in both areas expressing their grievances regarding the Democrats’ treatment of former candidates going back to the Senate’s rejection of Justice Robert Burke more than three decades ago. They also subjected Jackson, a Harvard Law School graduate who has been confirmed three times by the Supreme Chamber (twice for benches of the court and once for a seat on the U.S. Judgment Committee), to some of the most unusual inquiries ever directed to a candidate for the highest court on earth.”
Read his full summary below.
(None of the stories he tells are in the same category as Marjorie Taylor Greene’s declaration that the three Republican senators vote to confirm Mrs. Brown Jackson.”Pro-pedophilia“.)
Andrew NottiApril 6 2022 09:25
Obama and Biden’s apparent affection is clearly visible
After years of tense atmosphere in the White House, the sight of Barack Obama flirting with Joe Biden and Kamala Harris yesterday was a flashback to what appears to be a different era.
Here’s how the former president introduced his former vice president.
Andrew NottiApril 6, 2022 08:47
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