Music: Till Brönner — ‘Your Way To Say Goodbye’
Trump presents his own impeachment defense
Politico reports: On the eve of his likely impeachment, President Donald Trump has opted to act as his own defense lawyer. In a six-page, stream-of-consciousness diatribe sent to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and released by the White House on Tuesday afternoon, Trump denounced the Democrats’ two articles of impeachment — abuse of power and obstruction of Congress — as “not recognizable under any standard of Constitutional theory,” engaging with a process the White House had until now spurned in protest….
We are Republicans, and we want Trump defeated
George T. Conway III, Steve Schmidt, John Weaver and Rick Wilson write: Patriotism and the survival of our nation in the face of the crimes, corruption and corrosive nature of Donald Trump are a higher calling than mere politics. As Americans, we must stem the damage he and his followers are doing to the rule of law, the Constitution and the American character. That’s why we are announcing the Lincoln Project, an effort to highlight our country’s story and values,…
More than 750 American historians call for Trump to be impeached
Historians on Impeachment write: We are American historians devoted to studying our nation’s past who have concluded that Donald J. Trump has violated his oath to “faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States” and to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.” His “attempts to subvert the Constitution,” as George Mason described impeachable offenses at the Constitutional Convention in 1787, urgently and justly require his impeachment. President Trump’s numerous and flagrant abuses of power…
The U.S. Senate is a huge — and growing — source of bias in the political system
Matthew Yglesias writes: Democrats have a Senate problem, and not just in the sense that Republicans currently hold the majority or that the prospect of that changing in 2020 is relatively slim. The problem is that the odds of ever changing it are slimmer than is generally realized. Data for Progress, a progressive think tank and advocacy organization, is trying to raise alarm bells about the issue. In a new memo, co-founder Colin McAuliffe writes that “the Senate is an…
Mike Bloomberg has a plan to clean up electricity and it doesn’t need Congress
David Roberts writes: Billionaire Michael Bloomberg is a problematic presidential candidate for all sorts of reasons. Progressives are irritated that he is attempting to brute-force his way into the Democratic primary by spending more on ad campaigns than the rest of the primary field combined. .@MikeBloomberg has officially passed the $100 million mark. In total, we have tracked $100,407,009 in advertising from Bloomberg since November 25. That's an average of $3,718,778 per day. #Election2020 — Advertising Analytics (@Ad_Analytics) December 10,…
Zero-carbon ships on horizon under fuel levy plan
The Guardian reports: Shipping companies would have to pay a small levy on every tonne of fuel they use under proposals aimed at developing zero-carbon vessels within 10 years, transforming the high-carbon global shipping business. Ships running on hydrogen or ammonia as fuel are thought to be technically possible, but more research and development is needed to bring forward the development of prototypes. The International Chamber of Shipping (ICS), which represents 80% of the global shipping industry, is proposing a…
The real trouble with Silicon Valley
Derek Thompson writes: How should we tell the story of the digital century, now two decades old? We could focus, as journalists tend to do, on the depredations of the connected life. As Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube have devoured the online world, they have undermined traditional media, empowered propagandists, and widened America’s political divides. The smartphone, for all its wonder and utility, has also proved to be a narcotizing agent. But what if, instead of focusing on Big Tech’s sins…
Music: Bill Laurance — ‘Prologue: Fjords’
I headed the FBI and CIA. There’s a dire threat to the country I love
William Webster writes: The privilege of being the only American in our history to serve as the director of both the F.B.I. and the C.I.A. gives me a unique perspective and a responsibility to speak out about a dire threat to the rule of law in the country I love. Order protects liberty, and liberty protects order. Today, the integrity of the institutions that protect our civil order is, tragically, under assault from too many people whose job it should…
Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders have a problem: each other
The New York Times reports: Diane Chojnowski and Denyce Rusch were among the Iowans who braved light snowfall and temperatures in the teens to see Senator Bernie Sanders on Sunday afternoon, a few hours before Senator Elizabeth Warren was also due in this liberal pillar of eastern Iowa. But after Ms. Chojnowski and Ms. Rusch praised Mr. Sanders, they turned to a predicament far more bothersome than the winter weather: choosing between the two progressive candidates. “You worry about Bernie…
Judiciary Committee impeachment report alleges Trump committed ‘multiple federal crimes’
Politico reports: President Donald Trump committed criminal bribery and wire fraud, the House Judiciary Committee alleges in a report that will accompany articles of impeachment this week. The report, a 169-page assessment of the case for Trump’s removal from office, contends that Trump committed “multiple federal crimes” — ones that Democrats addressed under the broad umbrella of “abuse of power,” the first article of impeachment against the president. “Although President Trump’s actions need not rise to the level of a…
Russia’s state TV calls Trump their ‘agent’
Julia Davis reports: Sometimes a picture doesn’t have to be worth a thousand words. Just a few will do. As Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov returned home from his visit with President Donald Trump in the Oval Office last week, Russian state media was gloating over the spectacle. TV channel Rossiya 1 aired a segment entitled “Puppet Master and ‘Agent’—How to Understand Lavrov’s Meeting With Trump.” Vesti Nedeli, a Sunday news show on the same network, pointed out that it…
Barack Obama: Women are better leaders than men
BBC News reports: If women ran every country in the world there would be a general improvement in living standards and outcomes, former US President Barack Obama has said. Speaking in Singapore, he said women aren’t perfect, but are “indisputably better” than men. He said most of the problems in the world came from old people, mostly men, holding onto positions of power. He also spoke about political polarisation and the use of social media to spread falsehoods. Speaking at…
The eastern Mediterranean is dying
Peter Schwartzstein writes: Most of the world’s seas are in some kind of environmental trouble, but few have declined as quickly or from such precipitous heights as the Mediterranean’s eastern edge. Although it midwifed some of history’s greatest civilizations, the eastern Med has become a grubby embodiment of the current littoral states’ failures. Where the ancients sailed, many of their successors now junk industrial waste. The accomplishments of the Greeks, Phoenicians, Romans, and pharaonic Egyptians, among others, have only accentuated…
Swiss central bank’s $800 billion could be enlisted in climate push
Reuters reports: The Swiss central bank could be required to pull its $800 billion balance sheet out of investments in fossil fuel companies in a move by one of the world’s biggest reserve banks to tackle climate change. Swiss lawmakers are preparing a campaign that would make targeting climate change one of the policy objectives of the Swiss National Bank, alongside the traditional monetary targets of ensuring price stability and fostering economic growth. The drive will begin this month with…