On to the outrage du jour. So Congress passed a bipartisan housing bill. Yes, it actually did something intended to be useful. The bill would have done some good. But Trump is refusing to sign it, naturally.
As near as I can tell, the main virtue of the 21st Century ROAD to Housing bill is that it would have restricted large institutional investors from buying single-family homes to turn into rentals. In some cities, especially in the South, investors have bought up as much as 25 percent of the single-family homes. They drive up rental rates and also make it harder for regular people to buy a house. The bill also made changes to federal rules to make it easier and cheaper for developers to build more housing. The bill is far from a quick fix, but over time it could have done some good. And it was genuinely bipartisan.
There was supposed to be a signing ceremony this afternoon. But Trump called it off.
“Today’s Housing News Conference and Signing is hereby cancelled until such time as we pass the desperately needed SAVE AMERICA ACT, which I consider to be a National Emergency,” Trump said in a post to Truth Social.
You remember the Save America Act. It is intended to disenfranchise large numbers of people by creating a ridiculous documentation hurdle for voting. This is to cure the (nonexistent) in-person voter fraud problem. It also mandates that all states submit their voter lists to a Department of Homeland Security tool that has been found to erroneously flag U.S. citizens.
The bill passed in the House, but it stalled in the Senate, five times. It wasn’t just that it couldn’t clear the Senate’s notorious 60-vote threshold. Some Republican senators actually voted with the Democrats. I suspect they recognized that the barriers would impact their voters as badly as Democratic ones, a point lost on Trump. See also Some Republicans dumbfounded over Trump’s housing bill move: ‘What a s— show’.
Apparently news that Trump refused to sign the housing bill reached Congress as a bunch of congress critters were giving a press conference about the bill and how much help Trump had been in getting it passed. Hah.
So is the housing bill dead? It can still become law without Trump’s signature, a couple of ways. As I understand it, as long as Trump doesn’t actually veto it, and if Congress stays in session for the next ten days (excluding Sundays), the bill automatically becomes law. And that’s probably what will happen. The other way is for a supermajority of both the House and Senate vote to pass it again, and I don’t see that happening.
And I don’t see the Senate passing the Save America bill. Trump seems to think that if he can throw a big enough tantrum he can get whatever he wants. But the Senate math hasn’t changed. The votes aren’t there.
A couple of hours after announcing he wasn’t signing the housing bill, Trump had a closed-door lunch meeting with Senate Republicans. Yelling was reported. I wrote yesterday that there appears to be a growing tension between Trump and Senate Majority Leader John Thune, and I think if Trump isn’t careful this could turn into a rift with other Senate Republicans.
Sen. Thom Tillis, a retiring North Carolina Republican who hasn’t been shy about leveling criticism toward Trump, said he didn’t understand why the president was “holding a bill that’s ready for signature hostage, [for] a bill that will never pass in this Congress. Makes no sense to me.”
Also, this happened today:
A federal judge on Wednesday permanently barred President Donald Trump’s administration from implementing most of his first executive order on elections, part of which sought to require people to show documentary proof of citizenship when they register to vote.
Trump had tried to change election laws through executive order, but that is way outside a president’s actual constitutional power. But speaking of not having constitutional power, today the Postmaster General said that U.S. Postal Service could refuse to deliver mail ballots in states that fail to turn over voter rolls to the Trump administration.
But here’s an idea I agree with:
Sen. John Hickenlooper (D-Colo.) is calling on President Donald Trump to personally pay back taxpayers for the millions he spent revamping the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool, which is now a cesspool of algae and chunks of blue sealant.
Why stop with the Reflecting Pool? Someday I want Trump to personally pay for restoring the Rose Garden, and the East Wing, and demolishing the Marie Antoinette Memorial Airplane Hangar and the garish Arc de Trump. He didn’t get authorization or go through proper channels for any of that, so the cost of putting stuff back as it should be shouldn’t fall on taxpayers. It should fall on him, or his estate. Whichever applies. And if he refuses, the feds can seize his properties.
In-person voter fraud is the PR story Rs tell in public. As Jamelle Bouie said a week ago (gift link), vote fraud for Rs means voting for Ds or voting while not a white man.
I guess the rebuke of DJT over the Iran war was reversed. One wonders if POTUS will have a similar change of heart over the housing bill. Not related, of course.
IMO, the reversal by the Senate indicates a firm commitment was made to Congress by the administration that we are getting out of Iran. Period. If the Senate was/is convinced that a rebuke over Iran is not essential, they can withdraw. Trump is talking out both sides of his mouth about escalating the war and about the end of the war (with a return to previous obscene, but lower, prices at the pump.)
I read that the reflecting pool is entirely walled off with a construction barrier you can't see through. I'd guess they are in the process of draining the sludge to ease the stench. The judge is questioning why there is a canvas block of the front of the Kennedy Center, which hides the removal of Trump's name. And Taylor Swift may grab the spotlight on the 4th with a wedding celebration in NYC. Could we have a 4th celebration without Trump's ugly mug?
The days are getting shorter as the solstice has come and gone. The artificial slow learner function on this computer is fighting this comment awfully hard. This is my second attempt, as it ate my first one. Today it is being quite over-helpful in the wrong direction. Let me see if it lets me get back on topic. So, Summer has officially started.
Not for Crypto though. Republicans (of the super con modern camp) have attempted to make it respectable. Sort of like barbarian styles of human cock fighting, but in the world of finance. Of late they have been claiming Crypto has entered winter.
The implication here is that Spring is coming. Crypto is by and large designed as a zero-sum game. Those eventually run out of bigger fools. Winter here might indicate a coming ice age for Crypto too. It will happen eventually in any zero-sum game. The lessor Bernie of NASDAC leader fame ran out of fools with his. He died before the era of the super-con and did not get a pardon. His zero-sum game got the Ponzi label named after a con artist. Poor Madoff. Just ahead of his time with the wrong zero-sum game.
Don't blame me if Spring for Crypto comes and you missed out. One can always underestimate the number of bigger fools and the sly ways of the new breed of super -cons. Then again, do not say you were not warned of a possible ice age for Crypto.
Someone had to still be buying tulips when it topped out, and the tulip business was not a zero-sum game. Its glory days just caught a bad case of speculative fever.
A federal judge in MA struck down the main provisions of an executive order that would have required the USPS not to deliver mail-in ballots in certain states. Guess which states. The ones who won't go along with Trump federalizing elections.
I t could get advanced to the USSC but not likely in time for the midterms.
As long as I'm being annoying… this from Huffpost
Judges Rules In Favor Of Journalist In Epstein Files Lawsuit, Directs Blanche To Produce Documents By July 2
A federal judge on Thursday ruled in favor of journalist Katie Phang in her lawsuit against Attorney General Todd Blanche, alleging he violated the Epstein Files Transparency Act by redacting emails and withholding certain documents pertaining to the late sex offender.
The ruling gave Blanche's office a July 2 deadline to unredact certain emails, release additional FBI interviews and produce Justice Department documents with potential co-conspirator names unredacted, or show cause for why he cannot do so.
Blanche must also provide a redaction log, including written justifications for each redaction, in the Federal Register, something that was supposed to be completed more six months ago under the act.
Bitcoin keeps breaking below 60K. Dogecoin can't hold at a dime but stays well above a nickel. Both have lost support levels once considered as solid. So far bigger fools must be in short supply. We will see what today brings for the weakening Crypto market.
It is not the only thing wobbling. We'll see what makes it to the weekend.
Iran 'droned' a ship passing through the Straight of Hormuz yesterday. The Revolutionary Guard claimed responsibility. The ship was hit in the bridge – no report of injuries. What I read is that Iran is claiming ownership of the Straight. DJT can dispute with military power, which means closing the Straight again OR allow Tehran to declare the terms for safe passage. I noticed the dispatch from Tehran specifically said the ship had NOT followed Iran's instructions and was not eligible for insurance compensation. I read that as a shot fired across the bow of the insurance companies to REQUIRE the captains of ships in firing range of Iran concede Iran's authority.
IMO, this play lays the groundwork for future 'fees' that will be paid to ? the Gulf States. Historians may use this as the primary benchmark that answers the question, "Who won the war?" The 300B in reparations should be the benchmark but I don't think anyone will pay it and everyone at the adult table know it. IMO, the violation of that provision will give Tehran the excuse to keep the nuclear fuel.
Doug – source(s), plz, for the claim that "The Revolutionary Guard claimed responsibility"?
I've spent a LOT of time trying to find solid reporting on what actually happened there, and I haven't seen that anywhere. Closest is a loose interpretation of an Iranian (non-IRGC) warning that ships crossing the straits outside their rules are not guaranteed safe passage, which is NOT a statement of responsibility for any specific incident.
I agree that Iran is the most likely culprit in the attack on Ever Lovely, but I've seen no convincing evidence, so there are still other possibilities (false flag, presumably Israeli but maybe US/CIA; or maybe a random recon drone just ran into the ship by mistake, etc).