Wednesday News: “Senate Democrats float filibuster carveout for debt ceiling”; Facebook “digital monster…needs to be tamed”; “Glenn’s Mask”; “Why Taylor Swift’s Name Is Suddenly Popping Up in Virginia Governor’s Race”

by Lowell

Here are a few national and Virginia news headlines, political and otherwise, for Wednesday, October 6.

• Climate change: Voices from global south muted by climate science
• World Meteorological Organization Sharpens Warnings About Both Too Much and Too Little Water (“With global warming intensifying the water cycle, floods and droughts are increasing, and many countries are unprepared.”)
• ‘Eye-watering’: climate change disasters will cost Australia billions each year, study finds (“Catastrophes like fires and floods could set the economy back more than $1.2tn by 2060, even if action is taken”)
• Fossil fuel industry gets subsidies of $11m a minute, IMF finds (“Trillions of dollars a year are ‘adding fuel to the fire’ of the climate crisis, experts say” Insanity. In fact, not only should the fossil fuel industry not get a penny in subsidies – direct OR indirect – it should be heavily taxed, to incorporate its massive “negative externalities” such as pollution, damage to human health, etc, etc.)
• A Scary Energy Winter Is Coming. Don’t Blame the Greens.
• Nobel Prize in chemistry goes to Benjamin List and David MacMillan
• Nobel Prize in chemistry awarded to duo who made a tool to build molecules in an environmentally-friendly way
• Australia’s accelerating energy transition: Renewables leap to 35.4 pct in September
• Pope expresses ‘shame’ at scale of clergy abuse in France
• It’s Time for Some Country to Use Secular Law to Disestablish the Institutional Catholic Church (“This organization has been marinating in cruelty and scandal for so long that investigating it feels like archaeology.”)
• Biden says he and China’s Xi agree to abide by Taiwan agreement
• China could mount full scale invasion of Taiwan by 2025, island’s defence minister says (“Comments come as Biden and Xi agree to stick to Taiwan agreements amid rising tension in the Indo-Pacific”)
• ‘Everyone here hated the Americans’: Rural Afghans live with the Taliban and a painful U.S. legacy
• US deaths from virus in 2021 surpass 2020 total; Johnson & Johnson seeks FDA clearance for booster shots: COVID updates
• Fox has undermined vaccines nearly every day in the last six months
• Blacks, Latinos and Native Americans disproportionally killed by Covid-19 last year, study says
• Tip O’Neill’s “bipartisan” politics are long gone — but Democrats can still forge a path forward (“Some Democrats are still attached to a bygone political era — but Biden is actively trying to forge the future”)
• Biden Team Seeks to Pare Back Economic Agenda in Strategy Shift
• Democrats Wrangle Over How to Shrink $3.5 Trillion Proposal
• What Joe Manchin wants, decoded
• The Cocooning of Kyrsten Sinema
• It’s time for Democrats to choose between limited success and total failure
• Manchin and Sinema are hurting their party more than any Republican ever could
• Senate Democrats are making a fresh push to strengthen the Voting Rights Act
• Democratic Spending Bills Retain Majority Support, Quinnipiac University National Poll Finds; But Democrats In Congress Lose Ground
• Biden’s Approval Rating Isn’t Bouncing Back (Not yet, anyway. We’ll see.)
• Democrats insist they won’t back down on debt ceiling
• Democrats look to make debt ceiling a winning issue
• Senate Democrats float filibuster carveout for debt ceiling
• Biden says changing filibuster rules to raise debt ceiling is a possibility
• Democrats begin to narrow their differences on Biden’s social spending bill
• Biden Says ‘Real Possibility’ Senate Democrats Change Filibuster Rules To Raise Debt Ceiling
• In latest fight, Republicans embrace Trump ethos: Don’t pay debts (“Analysis: The real fight over the debt limit is about how much pain McConnell can extract from Biden and the Democrats.”)
• Biden has laced into McConnell on the debt ceiling. Now it’s time for an ultimatum. (“Get out of the way, Republicans, or Democrats will punch a hole in the filibuster.”)
• Mitch McConnell is making a terrific case for reforming the Senate
• Republicans Swear They Won’t Blink On Debt Limit (“They refuse to allow a straight up-or-down vote on lifting the debt ceiling, insisting on making the job as hard as possible with time quickly running out.”)
• Mainstream media put price before substance in coverage of Democratic negotiations over budget bills (“Mainstream outlets focused on political infighting rather than provisions, including historic investments in universal pre-K, expanded Medicare, and clean energy” The mainstream media to a large extent is lazy, shallow, pathetic, etc.)
• Supreme Court considers whether information widely known can be ‘state secret’ (The problem is, we can’t trust this far-right, largely illegitimate court to do anything right.)
• The Legal Architects of Trump’s Failed Coup May Finally Face Real Consequences (That should have happened immediately. Why is this SO hard?)
• Lawyers at last look ready to step up and defend the rule of law (“Defending democracy must be the primary responsibility of this profession.”)
• Trump True Believers Have Their Reasons (Very disturbing and dangerous.)
• Why Trump wants to tweet (“Donald Trump’s post-office online engagement is hitting new lows, according to exclusive data from SocialFlow provided to Axios. It helps explain why the former president recently asked a federal judge to have Twitter restore his signature account.”)
• House committee investigating January 6 can’t find Trump aide to serve subpoena
• Top Trump aides set to defy subpoenas in Capitol attack investigation (“Source says Meadows, Bannon and others will move to undercut House select committee inquiry – under instructions from Trump” Arrest them.)
• Norm Ornstein on the crisis of democracy: “This is the same roadmap we saw in Germany” (“Widening crisis means all Americans may see elections as illegitimate, Ornstein warns. That would be the end”)
• The GOP’s assault on voting continues unabated. Where are Senate Democrats? (“So long as the attacks on democracy persist, Democrats must respond.”)
• Renewable energy dominated new U.S. generating capacity (“Federal Energy Regulatory Commission data through September showed that solar now accounts for more than 5% of the grid’s total capacity, and is on pace to outshine nuclear power within three years.”)
• FBI probing ‘disturbing spike in harassment’ at schools following GOP anti-mask campaigns
• Why Democrats See 3 Governor’s Races as a Sea Wall for Fair Elections (“Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania all have Democratic governors and G.O.P.-led legislatures. And in all three battlegrounds, Republicans are pushing hard to rewrite election laws.”)
• Mike Pence and Nikki Haley struggle to escape the pull of the Trump vortex (“The challenge: Correcting for Trump’s failures while denying they ever existed at all.”)
• Mike Pence Should Go Away and Enjoy the Memory of Being One Clogged Artery Away From the Big Chair
• Mike Pence Is Conveniently Trying to Turn the Page on January 6 (Pence is pathetic.)
• “I Was Part of Something Unusually Evil”(“In Kansas with Stephanie Grisham, who does not believe she will be redeemed”)
• Democrats Lost the Most in Midwestern ‘Factory Towns,’ Report Says
• Facebook Enters a New Era of Existential Crisis
• ‘Congress will be taking action’: key takeaways from the Facebook whistleblower hearing
• Facebook whistleblower’s testimony could finally spark action in Congress (“Despite years of hearings, the company has long seemed untouchable. But Frances Haugen appears to have inspired rare bipartisanship”)
• Facebook Whistleblower Hearing May Be the Start
• Facebook harms children and weakens democracy: ex-employee
• The whistleblower came to advocate for humans over algorithms (“This digital monster that has taught the culture how to overreact and fly off the handle needs to be tamed. Regulate it. Open it up. Slow it down and make it more human.”)
• Zuckerberg Says Claims That Facebook Prioritizes Profit ‘Just Not True’ (Zuckerberg is clearly lying.)
• If Facebook is the problem, is a social media regulator the fix?
• The Facebook Whistleblower Finally Got Republicans to Stop Yapping About Anti-Conservative Bias (In fact, Facebook has a MASSIVE bias in favor of the right wingnuts.)
• Facebook’s whistleblower tells Congress how to regulate tech
• Facebook Enters a New Era of Existential Crisis
• Texans asked to turn off lights after bird ‘mass mortality’ event (Horrible.)
• A 13-inch tear in a pipe was likely the source of a California oil spill. Here’s how it may have gotten there (“A preliminary report indicates the partial tear could have been caused by an anchor that hooked the pipeline, the US Department of Transportation Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration said in a notice to Amplify Energy, the owner of the ruptured pipeline.”)
• Carlos Watson and Ozy Might Be in Real Legal Jeopardy
• “It’s just inexcusable:” Sen. Warner says he’ll keep pressuring USPS
• Sen. Warner: U.S. must “rethink” how it invests in human capital
• Senator Warner “very disappointed” with post office management and area mail issues
• Courtesy of Political Data Gurus Dave Wasserman and Ryan Brune, Here Are Some Numbers to Watch on Virginia Election Night 2021 (11/2)
• Glenn Youngkin Campaigned with Far-Right Candidate Who Wrote About the “coming Civil War,” Asked, “Can we live with our conscience when we actually take human life?” (She also called millennials “depraved and demonic,” “brats and thugs who are burning down their own community”)
• White House badly needs win in Virginia
• Terry McAuliffe Releases New Plan to Address Barriers Facing Women in the Workforce
• Video: Top Youngkin Surrogate Speculates About “pervasive infiltration by Communist China” in the VA General Assembly (Also, supposedly Republicans who vote for ‘Democrat stuff’ are doing so because they’re being paid off by the Chinese government? LOL)
• Youngkin’s China Trade Deal Falls Apart
• Why Taylor Swift’s Name Is Suddenly Popping Up in Virginia Governor’s Race
• How Taylor Swift and her master recordings play into the Virginia race for governor
• Virginia GOP candidate tests school fight message for 2022
• Democrats cry foul over Republican flyers depicting Black lawmakers in ropes (“A series of eight flyers the Republican Party of Virginia mailed out in competitive House of Delegates races deride Democratic incumbents as ‘radical puppets’ under the control of national party leaders.”)
• Youngkin calls for audit of voting machines in Virginia (He’s crazy.)
• Youngkin wants to move the Dept. of Elections away from the governor’s office (“During the event Monday, Youngkin also said he wants to conduct audits of voter machines across Virginia. ‘I think we need to make sure that people trust these voting machines'”)
• Youngkin is attempting to mobilize parents against McAuliffe over school involvement (Demagoguery.)
• Youngkin’s walk along the tight rope continues (“…with less than one month until election day in a state that voted for Biden by 10 points last year, it appears that that conservative base remains with him as their de facto leader, Sen. Amanda Chase, continues to campaign for Youngkin when she is not pushing for an audit of the 2020 election.”)
• New TV/Radio Ad: Del. Hala Ayala, Everytown Announce New $200,000+ Campaign on Gun Violence Prevention
• Jason Miyares Silent as His Endorser and Ally, Ken Cuccinelli, Doubles Down on Anti-LGBTQ Positions in Washington Times Article
• ‘Things don’t look that bad’: Princeton experts offer roadmap for a Va. redistricting compromise
• Tribalism threatens Virginia’s new bipartisan redistricting commission (The WaPo has been and continues to be completely clueless on this issue.)
• Demographers: Census Data Shows Virginia’s Urban-Rural Divide Is Growing
• Tuesday (10/5) Virginia Data on COVID-19: With Delta Now Dominant, Hospitalizations (1,807) Near Highest Level Since Mid February, 10-Day New Cases (+28,653) Near Highest Since Mid February
• Chris Kavanaugh appointed U.S. Attorney for Western Virginia
• Broadband expansion a common theme for Appalachian region officials meeting in Southwest Virginia
• Anthem, UnitedHealthcare, other major insurers are running billions behind in payments to hospitals, doctors
• Fairfax collective bargaining measure protested by labor unions
• Culture wars rage in Loudoun County, with dueling parent groups and school board recalls
• Editorial: An all-too-familiar scenario in handling of domestic violence cases (“How badly does the criminal justice system mishandle domestic violence cases? A Loudoun County case offers an ugly — and all-too-common — example.”)
• Virginia’s federally recognized tribes begin drafting a sovereignty accord
• State still deciding whether to reopen circle around remains of Lee Monument
  
• Police officers will remain in Richmond Schools, despite school-to-prison pipeline effect
• Fairfax Co. aquatics instructor facing 30 felony child porn, solicitation charges
• Pharrell Williams, upset about city’s response to cousin’s killing, says he won’t bring Something in the Water back to Virginia Beach
• Pharrell Williams cites ‘toxic energy’ in Virginia Beach as city leaders scramble to save Something in the Water
• A cargo ship illegally dumped oily waste before arriving in Hampton Roads — then whistleblowers stepped in. (“Raj Parekh, acting U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Virginia, said the government ‘will not tolerate conduct that pollutes our water, imperils natural ecosystems, and endangers our wildlife.'”)
• Longtime journalist Mike Allen named Roanoke Times editorial page editor
• Middleditch, activist who fomented change in state and region, died at 92. (“His most recent 8-year effort to change the way Virginia draws its district boundary lines for the General Assembly and the House of Representatives resulted in a state constitutional amendment approved by voters last November.”)
• D.C.-area forecast: Not ideal, but not bad the next few days, with an isolated shower at times