7 votes

Weekly US politics news and updates thread - week of January 24

Automatically posted
Tags: usa, politics, recurring.weekly

This thread is posted weekly - please try to post all relevant US political content in here, such as news, updates, opinion articles, etc. Extremely significant events may warrant a separate topic, but almost all should be posted in here.

This is an inherently political thread; please try to avoid antagonistic arguments and bickering matches. Comment threads that devolve into unproductive arguments may be removed so that the overall topic is able to continue.

8 comments

  1. HotPants
    Link
    Why young women aren’t smiling for you any more When Grace Tame met Prime Minister Scott Morrison at the Morning Tea for 2022 Australian of the Year finalists, she did the one thing that appears...

    Why young women aren’t smiling for you any more

    When Grace Tame met Prime Minister Scott Morrison at the Morning Tea for 2022 Australian of the Year finalists, she did the one thing that appears to drive the public berserk. As a young woman she dared not to mask her true feelings and paint on a smile.

    The backlash was swift. Journalist Peter van Onselen described her as “ungracious and rude” and Queensland Liberal Senator James McGrath criticised Ms Tame for her “childish” behaviour, suggesting she should hand back her award.

    Anyone criticising Grace must have forgotten why she’s Australian of the Year and what she had to go through to stand where she is today.

    In a powerful acceptance speech for the award last year she said: “I lost my virginity to a paedophile. I was 15, anorexic; he was 58, he was my teacher.

    “For months he groomed me and then abused me almost every day. Before school, after school, in my uniform, on the floor.”

    from Grace Tame had every right not to smile

    7 votes
  2. HotPants
    Link
    Christian nationalism is still thriving — and is a force for returning Trump to power

    Christian nationalism is still thriving — and is a force for returning Trump to power

    The Sunday service at the Patriot Church in Lenoir City, Tennessee starts out like a lot of evangelical worship: hands aloft, Bibles in laps, full-throated singing about Jesus.

    When Rev. Ken Peters picks up his wireless mic, the service takes a sharp rightward turn.

    "Don't let the mainstream media or the left tell you that we were not a Christian nation," he intones.

    6 votes
  3. [5]
    psi
    Link
    "Republicans Don’t Need to Win Elections. They Already Won the Supreme Court." Slate. The Court's likely next target is affirmative action.

    "Republicans Don’t Need to Win Elections. They Already Won the Supreme Court." Slate.

    The Court's likely next target is affirmative action.

    On Monday, the nation’s most powerful policymaking body signaled that it will soon decide the fate of race-conscious admissions policies in higher education. The nearly guaranteed outcome, a ban on affirmative action in colleges and universities, will reverse 44 years of precedent, affect thousands of schools across the country, and upend the admissions process for millions of students. This new policy will not be enacted by elected representatives in Congress, or the president, or state legislatures. It will, instead, be imposed by six justices of the Supreme Court—policymakers whom no one elected and no one can vote out.

    5 votes
    1. [4]
      Omnicrola
      Link Parent
      This is what's infuriating. GOP isn't playing "nice" anymore, and hasn't been for a long time. Meanwhile we have 2 democrats in Congress who are afraid of the "precedent" repealing the filibuster...

      Second, the GOP has elevated the Senate filibuster as a sacred guardian of democracy, but it does not apply to judges. (Democrats repealed the filibuster for lower court judges in 2013; Republicans repealed the filibuster for Supreme Court judges in 2017.) As a result, the Senate can confirm judges with 50 votes, but can only enact most legislation with 60 votes.

      This is what's infuriating. GOP isn't playing "nice" anymore, and hasn't been for a long time. Meanwhile we have 2 democrats in Congress who are afraid of the "precedent" repealing the filibuster would set, and don't want to be more "divisive". That ship sailed a loooong time ago.

      8 votes
      1. [3]
        skybrian
        Link Parent
        The Democrats might be needing the filibuster again as early as next year, so I think it’s worth worrying about? That ship hasn’t sailed yet. Meanwhile Biden seems to be appointing lots of judges:

        The Democrats might be needing the filibuster again as early as next year, so I think it’s worth worrying about? That ship hasn’t sailed yet.

        Meanwhile Biden seems to be appointing lots of judges:

        In his first year, just 19 of Trump’s judicial nominees had received Senate confirmation. For President Barack Obama, that number was 13; for Presidents George W. Bush and Bill Clinton, it was 28. Biden, by contrast, has seen 40 of his judges confirmed already—the most since President Ronald Reagan. Eleven of Biden’s judges sit on the powerful U.S. Court of Appeals, where most federal cases are resolved. (For comparison, Obama placed just three judges on the Court of Appeals in his first year.)

        3 votes
        1. [2]
          Omnicrola
          Link Parent
          But do they really? Do we really? I understand it's a useful tool and works both ways, but objectively, should it even exist in the first place? The particular way that filibustering works in the...

          The Democrats might be needing the filibuster again as early as next year

          But do they really? Do we really? I understand it's a useful tool and works both ways, but objectively, should it even exist in the first place? The particular way that filibustering works in the US is an oddity, and is now used as a weapon giving a single party or person outsized power over the legislative process. So while there are downsides to getting rid of it, I'm not convinced it wouldn't be better overall in the long run.

          3 votes
          1. skybrian
            Link Parent
            In the short term, there is a tactical question of whether whatever laws they're making are important enough to change it now. Since the Democrats already have difficulty passing laws that only...

            In the short term, there is a tactical question of whether whatever laws they're making are important enough to change it now. Since the Democrats already have difficulty passing laws that only require a bare majority (via the reconciliation loophole) I don't think they would get much bang for the buck?

            Maybe with a more comfortable majority it might be worth it.

            3 votes
  4. HotPants
    Link
    Prince Andrew: Lawyers demand US jury trial in Virginia Giuffre case He faces a grueling deposition. Watch out for his US trial attorneys unexpectedly quitting. When a US defense attorney quits,...

    Prince Andrew: Lawyers demand US jury trial in Virginia Giuffre case

    He faces a grueling deposition.

    Watch out for his US trial attorneys unexpectedly quitting. When a US defense attorney quits, it's often because they know a client is about to take the stand and perjure themselves.

    4 votes