#ushousing

[todayonglobe]

Robert Shiller Predicts End of Housing Rally

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[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Steve Brodner

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LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

April 18, 2024

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

APR 19, 2024

I will not spend the rest of 2024 focusing on Trump and the chaos in the Republican Party, but today it has been impossible to look away.

In Trump’s election interference trial in Manhattan, Judge Juan Merchan this morning dismissed one of the selected jurors after she expressed concern for her anonymity and thus for her safety. All of the reporters in the courtroom have shared so much information about the jurors that they seemed at risk of being identified, but Fox News Channel host Jesse Watters not only ran a video segment about a juror, he suggested she was “concerning.” Trump shared the video on social media.

The juror told the judge that so much information about her had become public that her friends and family had begun to ask her if she was one of the jurors. Legal analyst Joyce White Vance noted jurors’ fear for their safety was a concern normally seen only “in a case involving violent organized crime.”

Nonetheless, by the end of the day, twelve people had been chosen to serve as jurors. Tomorrow the process will continue in order to find six alternate jurors. 

It is a courtesy for the two sides at a trial to share with each other the names of their next witnesses so the other team can prepare for them. Today the prosecution declined to provide the names of their first three witnesses to the defense lawyers out of concern that Trump would broadcast them on social media. “Mr. Trump has been tweeting about the witnesses. We’re not telling them who the witnesses are,” prosecutor Joshua Steinglass said. 

Merchan said he “can’t blame them.” Trump’s defense attorney Todd Blanche offered to "commit to the court and the [prosecution] that President Trump will not [post] about any witness" on social media. "I don't think you can make that representation," Merchan said, in a recognition that Trump cannot be trusted, even by his own lawyers.

An article in the New York Times today confirmed that the trial will give Trump plenty of publicity, but not the kind that he prefers. Lawyer Norman L. Eisen walked through questions about what a prison sentence for Trump could look like.

Trump’s popular image is taking a hit in other ways, as well. Zac Anderson and Erin Mansfield of USA Today reported that Trump is funneling money from his campaign fundraising directly into his businesses. According to a new report filed with the Federal Election Commission, in February and March the campaign wrote checks totaling $411,287 to Mar-a-Lago and in March a check for $62,337 to Trump National Doral Miami.

Experts say it is legal for candidates to pay their own businesses for services used by the campaign so long as they pay fair market value. At the same time, they note that since Trump appears to be desperate for money, “it looks bad.”

Astonishingly, Trump’s trial was not the biggest domestic story today. Republicans in Congress were in chaos as members of the extremist Freedom Caucus worked to derail the national security supplemental bills that House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) has introduced in place of the Senate bill, although they track that bill closely. 

The House Rules Committee spent the day debating the foreign aid package, which appropriates aid for Ukraine, Israel, and Taiwan separately. The Israel bill also contains $9.1 billion in humanitarian aid for Gaza and other countries. A fourth bill focuses on forcing the Chinese owners of TikTok to sell the company, as well as on imposing sanctions on Russia and Iran. 

At stake in the House Rules Committee was Johnson’s plan to allow the House to debate and vote on each measure separately, and then recombine them all into a single measure if they all pass. This would allow extremist Republicans to vote against aid to Ukraine, while still tying the pieces all together to send to the Senate. As Robert Jimison outlined in the New York Times, this complicated plan meant that the Rules Committee vote to allow such a maneuver was crucial to the bill’s passage.

The extremist House Republicans were adamantly opposed to the plan because of their staunch opposition to aid for Ukraine. They wrote in a memo on Wednesday: “This tactic allows Johnson to pass priorities favored by President Biden, the swamp and the Ukraine war machine with a supermajority of House members, leaving conservatives out to dry.”

Extremists Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) and Thomas Massie (R-KY) vowed to throw House speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) out of the speakership, but Democrats Tom Suozzi of New York and Jared Moskowitz of Florida have said they would vote to keep him in his seat, thereby defanging the attack on his leadership.

So the extremists instead tried to load the measures up with amendments prohibiting funds from being used for abortion, removing humanitarian aid for Gaza, opposing a two-state solution to the Hamas-Israel war, calling for a wall at the southern border of the U.S., defunding the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), and so on.

Greene was especially active in opposition to aid to Ukraine. She tried to amend the bill to direct the president to withdraw the U.S. from NATO and demanded that any members of Congress voting for aid to Ukraine be conscripted into the Ukraine army as well as have their salaries taken to offset funding. She wanted to stop funding until Ukraine “turns over all information related to Hunter Biden and Burisma,” and to require Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelensky to resign. More curiously, she suggested amending the Ukraine bill so that funding would require “restrictions on ethnic minorities’, including Hungarians in Transcarpathia, right to use their native languages in schools are lifted.” This language echoes a very specific piece of Russian propaganda.

Finally, Moskowitz proposed “that Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene…should be appointed as Vladimir Putin’s Special Envoy to the United States Congress.” 

Many congress members have left Washington, D.C., since Friday was to be the first day of a planned recess. This meant the partisan majority on the floor fluctuated. Olivia Beavers of Politico reported that that instability made Freedom Caucus members nervous enough to put together a Floor Action Response Team (FART—I am not making this up) to make sure other Republicans didn’t limit the power of the extremists when they were off the floor.

The name of their response team seems likely to be their way to signal their disrespect for the entire Congress. Their fellow Republicans are returning the heat. Today Mike Turner (R-OH) referred to the extremists as the Bully Caucus on MSNBC and said, “We need to get back to professionalism, we need to get back to governing, we need to get back to legislating.” Derrick Van Orden (R-WI) told Juliegrace Brufke of Axios:  "The vast majority of the Republican Party in the House of Representatives...are sick and tired of having people who...constantly blackmail the speaker of the House.”

Another Republican representative, Jake LaTurner of Kansas, announced today he will not run for reelection. He joins more than 20 other Republican representatives heading for the exits.

After all the drama, the House Rules Committee voted 6–3 tonight to advance the foreign aid package to the House floor. Three Republicans voted nay. While it is customary for the opposition party to vote against advancing bills out of the committee, the Democrats broke with tradition and voted in favor.

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[ivygorgon]

An open letter to the U.S. House of Representatives

Cosponsor H.R.4052, the National Infrastructure Bank (NIB) Act.

587 so far! Help us get to 1,000 signers!

I am writing to urge you to cosponsor H.R.4052, the National Infrastructure Bank (NIB) Act.

The National Infrastructure Bank would provide $5 trillion in low-cost loans for a broad range of public infrastructure projects – including massive water systems – without the need for increasing taxes or any deficit budget spending. This has been done previously in US history—this bill is modeled on the successful Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC) started by President Herbert Hoover and used by President Franklin D. Roosevelt to build Hoover Dam and bring water and electricity to the Southwest.

Infrastructure investment is crucial in the US. We have an immense backlog of infrastructure needs including: affordable housing, total broadband coverage, bridge and road repair or replacement, lead service line replacement, high-speed rail, mass transit, etc. The NIB would finance all these projects—it picks up where the Bipartisan Infrastructure Act left off.

There is wide-ranging support for this. Twenty-seven state legislatures have introduced resolutions of support, and eight passed at least one chamber. Dozens of city and county councils have endorsed including: Chicago, Philadelphia, Seattle, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Detroit, Cleveland, and many more.

Please add your name to cosponsor H.R.4052. And, many thanks again for all your work on behalf of the citizens of our state and the Nation.

▶ Created on March 18 by Jess Craven

📱 Text SIGN PIUROM to 50409

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[undergroundusa]

LISTEN TO THE FULL PODCAST HERE:

https://www.undergroundusa.com/p/in-an-official-capacity-its-irresponsible

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[birdzflycom]

Historic Debt Ceiling Agreement: US House Overwhelmingly Passes Bill

Historic Debt Ceiling Agreement A crucial deal that allows the United States to increase its borrowing limit has taken a significant step towards becoming law, just days before the world's largest economy faces the risk of defaulting on its debt. The bill passed through the House of Representatives with an impressive vote of 314-117, despite some defections from both sides. Currently, the Senate is convening in preparation for a vote that the bill must successfully pass before President Joe Biden can sign it into law. According to predictions, the government is expected to reach its borrowing limit on June 5, creating a very narrow margin for error as lawmakers rush to prevent a potential default on the massive $31.4tn (£25tn) debt that serves as the foundation of the global financial system. A default scenario would mean that the government cannot borrow any additional funds or fulfill all its financial obligations. This situation would also pose a severe threat to the global economy, impacting prices and mortgage rates in other nations. What Does the US Debt Ceiling Deal Entail, and Who Emerged Victorious? A comprehensive guide to understanding the US debt ceiling On Wednesday evening, 165 Democrats joined forces with 149 Republicans in granting their approval to the 99-page bill that aims to raise the debt ceiling. This approval allowed the bill to pass the House, meeting the required simple majority. With Republicans holding the majority in the lower chamber of Congress and Democrats wielding power in the upper chamber and the White House, reaching a compromise had proven challenging for weeks. However, President Biden and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy were able to establish a bipartisan agreement over the weekend. President Biden expressed his gratitude to Speaker McCarthy in a statement, acknowledging his good-faith negotiations. The president stated, "Neither side obtained everything they wanted. This is the essence of governing." A Triumph for Speaker McCarthy Analysis by Anthony Zurcher, North America Reporter Kevin McCarthy successfully pushed Joe Biden and hesitant Democrats to the negotiation table by passing a bill that raised the debt limit while incorporating a range of conservative priorities. Furthermore, he managed to maintain party unity as he negotiated a less ambitious deal with the president, one that moderately reduced federal spending growth and introduced additional conditions regarding aid for low-income Americans. Although a faction of staunch conservatives indicated they might challenge Mr. McCarthy and push for a new Speaker election, even the most fervent opponents gradually softened their stance by Wednesday. When it was time to vote, the majority of Republicans supported Mr. McCarthy's agreement. While the hard-liners may grumble, it is evident that they lack the necessary support to replace Mr. McCarthy, or even a clear alternative candidate. The agreement temporarily suspends the debt ceiling, the spending limit established by Congress to determine the government's borrowing capacity, until January 1, 2025. The Congressional Budget Office, a non-partisan entity, estimates that the legislation will result in $1.5tn in savings over a decade, as announced on Tuesday. However, the bill faced potential jeopardy due to opposition from lawmakers on both sides of the aisle. Ultra-conservative Republicans argued that they had received insufficient concessions in exchange for raising the debt limit. Democrats objected to certain provisions, such as stricter work requirements for Americans receiving federal food aid and the resumption of student loan repayments. Despite his reservations, Emanuel Cleaver, a Missouri Democrat, announced his intention to vote in favor of the bill, albeit comparing it to "the second serving of Satan's sandwiches." Hakeem Jeffries, the House Democrats' leader, expressed that his party had politically bailed out the Republican Speaker. He stated, "Once again, House Democrats come to the rescue to avert a dangerous default," emphasizing the actions taken by the New York congressman. Eli Crane, an Arizona Republican who had previously vowed to prevent the bill's passage, tweeted, "More Democrats voted for this so-called 'historic conservative victory' than Republicans. What a joke." Although Republicans hold a narrow 222-213 majority in the House, Mr. McCarthy garnered support from political centrists on both sides of the aisle to secure the bill's passage. Mr. McCarthy presented the package as "the most substantial spending cuts and savings that this Congress has ever approved." The bill's fate is not yet assured, as it now proceeds to the Senate, where a combination of Democratic and Republican votes may be necessary once again. Mike Lee, a conservative Republican senator from Utah, has already threatened to employ "every procedural tool" available to impede the bill's consideration. On Wednesday, Senator Bernie Sanders, a prominent progressive, announced his opposition to the bill, citing his inability to "in good conscience" support it. However, he assured CNN that he would not obstruct its passage. Leaders from both the Democratic and Republican parties in the Senate are working diligently to ensure that the bill reaches President Biden's desk for his signature before a default can occur. The last time the US approached its debt ceiling in 2011, the credit agency Standard & Poor's downgraded the country's rating—a decision that has yet to be reversed. Before Wednesday's vote, the US stock markets experienced a slight decline, with the Dow closing 0.4% lower, while the S&P and Nasdaq both dipped by 0.6%. Read the full article

[noticiasleal]

🇺🇸 MAGA vs RINO - Republicanos divididos votan para elegir al Presidente de la Cámara (6 enero 2023) [en directo] 🎥 https://youtu.be/gKefthJr-RM La Cámara de Representantes se reúne en la 4ª Jornada del 118º Congreso para que los Congresistas del Partido Republicano, divididos entre MAGA y RINO, voten para elegir al Presidente de la Cámara. #KevinMcCarthy #MattGaetz #DonaldTrump #SpeakerOfTheHouse #USHouse #118thCongress #GOP #HouseofRepresentatives #MAGA (at Washington, DC) https://www.instagram.com/p/CnFptuArmNc/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

[taddixon-blog]

Can’t we all just get along?

#Congress #republicans #nytimes #USHouse #SpeakerOfTheHouse @nytimes @GOP #KevinMcCarthy @thehill

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/02/opinion/kevin-mccarthy-house-republicans-shutdown.html?smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare

[movingwithmotivation]

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[sounder50]

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

October 3, 2023

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

Wow.

Today, House Republicans made history by being the first to throw out their own Speaker of the House, while the frontrunner for the 2024 Republican presidential nomination made history by being the first candidate to be gagged by a judge after threatening one of the judge’s law clerks by posting a lie about her on social media. 

Ever since Representative Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) made a deal with the extremists in his conference to win the speakership after Republicans took control of the House of Representatives in January 2023, he has catered to those extremists in an apparent bid to hold on to his position. From the first, he gave them key positions on committees, permitted them to introduce extreme measures and load up bills with poison pills that meant the bills could never make it through Congress, and recently to open impeachment hearings against President Joe Biden.

But the extremists have continued to bully him, especially since they opposed a deal he cut with Biden before McCarthy would agree to raise the debt ceiling, threatening to make the United States default on its debt for the first time in U.S. history. When their refusal to pass either appropriations bills or a continuing resolution to buy more time to pass those bills meant the U.S. was hours away from a government shutdown, McCarthy finally had to rely on the Democrats for help passing a continuing resolution on Saturday. 

A shutdown would have hurt the country and, in so doing, would have benefited former president Trump, to whom the extremists are loyal. Led by Representative Matt Gaetz of Florida, they were vocal about their anger at McCarthy’s pivot to the Democrats to keep the government open, 

Yesterday, Gaetz challenged McCarthy’s leadership, apparently with the expectation that the Democrats would step in to save McCarthy’s job, although it is traditionally the majority party that determines its leader. According to Paul Kane of the Washington Post, McCarthy did reach out to Democrats for votes to support his speakership. But Democrats pointed to McCarthy’s constant caving to the MAGA Republicans—as recently as Sunday, McCarthy blamed the threat of a shutdown on the Democrats—and were clear the problem was the Republicans’ alone. 

“It is now the responsibility of the [Republican] members to end the House Republican Civil War. Given their unwillingness to break from MAGA extremism in an authentic and comprehensive manner, House Democratic leadership will vote yes on the pending Republican Motion to Vacate the Chair,” minority leader Hakeem Jeffries wrote to the Democratic caucus.

And so, when the House considered blocking Gaetz’s motion to vacate the chair, the measure failed by a vote of 208 to 218. Eleven Republicans voted against blocking it. And then, on the voting over the measure itself, 216 members voted to remove McCarthy while 210 voted to keep him in the speaker’s chair. Eight Republicans abandoned their party to toss him aside, making him the first speaker ever removed from office. 

The result was a surprise to many Republicans, and there is no apparent plan for moving forward. House Rules Chairman Tom Cole (R-OK), who released a statement supporting McCarthy, called the outcome “simply a vote for chaos.”

Speakers provide a list of people to become temporary speakers in case of emergency, so the gavel has passed to Representative Patrick McHenry (R-NC), who has power only to recess, adjourn, and hold votes for a new speaker. McCarthy says he will not run for speaker again. The House has recessed for the rest of the week, putting off a new speaker fight. 

Until then, Republicans seem to be turning their fury at their own debacle on the Democrats, blaming them for not stepping in to fix the Republicans’ mess. One of McHenry’s first official acts was to order former speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) to vacate her private Capitol office by tomorrow, announcing that he was having the room rekeyed. Pelosi was not even there for today’s votes; she is in California for the memorial services for the late Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA). 

McHenry’s action is unlikely to make the Democrats more eager to work with the Republicans; Pelosi noted that this “sharp departure from tradition” seemed a surprising first move “[w]ith all the important decisions that the new Republican Leadership must address, which we are all eagerly awaiting….” Pelosi might have been sharp, but she is not wrong. The continuing resolution to fund the government runs out shortly before Thanksgiving, and funding for Ukraine has an even shorter time frame than that. The House cannot do business without a speaker, and each day this chaos continues is a victory for the extremists who are eager to stop a government that does anything other than what they want from functioning, even as it highlights the Republicans’ inability to govern. 

Phew. But that was not the end of the day’s news.

Jose Pagliery of The Daily Beast, who is watching the New York trial of Trump, his two older sons, two of his associates, and the Trump Organization, wrote that New York Supreme Court Justice Arthur F. Engoron said today that he had warned Trump’s lawyer that Trump must not continue his attacks on the justice system. Rather than heed the warning, Trump today went after Engoron’s own law clerk, posting a lie about her with a photo on social media. “Personal attacks on members of my court staff are unacceptable, inappropriate, and I will not tolerate them under any circumstances,” Engoron said. 

Engoron ordered Trump to delete the post, and the former president did so. Engoron forbade “all parties from posting, emailing, or speaking publicly about any members of my staff” and warned there would be “serious sanctions” for those who did so. 

The New York case strikes close to Trump’s identity as a successful businessman by showing that he lied about the actual value of his properties, and by dissolving a number of his businesses by canceling their licenses. Adding to Trump’s troubles today is that he fell off Forbes’ list of the 400 wealthiest Americans, a status that in the past he has cared deeply about.

In the midst of the Republican chaos, the Biden administration announced that the manufacturers of all the ten drugs selected for negotiation with Medicare to lower prices have agreed to participate in the program, although they are pursuing lawsuits to stop it. Several of the pharmaceutical companies have complained of being “essentially forced” to sign on; one says it is participating “under protest” but feels it has no choice given the penalties their products would bear if they are unwilling to negotiate prices. 

According to the White House, the ten drugs selected for negotiation accounted for a total of $3.4 billion in out-of-pocket costs for an estimated 9 million Medicare enrollees in 2022. The negotiations were authorized by the Inflation Reduction Act, which passed without any Republican votes.

The Department of Justice announced eight indictments against China-based companies and their employees for crimes relating to street fentanyl and methamphetamine production, distribution of synthetic opioids, and sales resulting from precursor chemicals used to make street fentanyl. Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) administrator Anne Milgram noted that the supply chain that brings street fentanyl to the U.S. starts in China, from which chemical companies ship fentanyl precursors and analogues into our country and into Mexico, where the chemicals “are used to make fentanyl and make it especially deadly.” Milgram promised that the “DEA will not stop until we defeat this threat.” 

Finally, while the Republicans were making history on the House side of the U.S. Capitol, the Democrats were making history on the Senate side. Vice President Kamala Harris swore into office Senator Laphonza Butler to complete the term of Senator Dianne Feinstein, which ends next year. Before her nomination, Butler was the president of EMILYs List, a political action committee dedicated to electing Democratic female candidates who back reproductive rights to office, and has advised a number of high-profile political campaigns, including that of Harris in 2020.  

Butler is the first Black lesbian in the Senate. She and her wife, Nenike, have a daughter.

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[nbcnews]

undefined

"And no, I do not yield one second to you! Not one second!"

Heated exchange between Rep. Mike Kelly and Rep. Maxine Waters on the US House floor.

[glblctzn]

Before 2018, women had never been elected for more than 84 of the 435 seats in the House. Now, when the 116th Congress convenes in January, more than 100 seats will be filled by women from both political parties. Read more about the historic midterm elections here.

[cautionunicornplaying]

[brijeshtiwaripune]

Bill to Ban Assault Weapons Passes US House, But Is Likely To Fail In Senate

Following a string of tragic mass shootings, the US House of Representatives on Friday advanced a bill that would outlaw assault weapons for the first time in decades. The proposal passed the Democratic-majority House by a vote of 217 to 213 and now moves to the Senate, where it is almost certainly bound to fail. Despite the terrible epidemic of mass shootings, gun reform in the US remains incredibly controversial, with only two Republicans joining Democrats in supporting the assault weapons ban in the House. Democrats only hold 50 seats in the 100-member Senate, so 10 votes from Republicans are required to bring a bill to the floor for discussion. Congress enacted a ban on assault rifles and some high-capacity magazines in 1994 for a period of ten years, but politicians allowed it to expire in 2004, and sales of the weapons have since skyrocketed. The most recent legislation was hailed as "a significant step in our continued battle against the tragic pandemic of gun violence in our society" by Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Certain semi-automatic weapons, like those used in recent mass shootings in Buffalo, New York, Uvalde, Texas, and Highland Park, Illinois, would be prohibited from sale, import, manufacture, and transfer. In May, 10 African Americans were murdered in a Buffalo grocery by an openly racist individual. Read the full article