MORNING MESSAGE
Billionaires Celebrate Their Own Social Security Freedom Day
Every
year you hear a lot about Tax Freedom Day. This is the day the public supposedly
has “earned enough money to pay its total tax bill for the year.” ... Let’s see
how this “Tax Freedom Day” formula can be applied to framing America’s
retirement crisis ... [Social Security] taxes are paid until we reach a “cap” of
$127,200 in a year so the maximum anyone pays is $7,886 ... “Social Security
Freedom Day” never arrives for most of us. But how early does “Social Security
Freedom Day” arrive for some of us?
Republicans Reveal Their Priorities...
GOP
to rush cabinet confirmations. Politico: “Senate Majority Leader Mitch
McConnell’s conference has scheduled six Cabinet-level confirmations hearings
for next Wednesday, Jan. 11, the same day the chamber will likely slog through
an all-night vote-a-rama on a budget and the president-elect will give his first
press conference in six months … Republicans insist their intention is not to
obscure the confirmation hearings [but] it may tank Senate Democrats’
long-planned strategy to systematically attack Trump’s cabinet and wound the
Republican Party.”
And
regulatory rollback. The Atlantic: “…one obscure legislative tool is
suddenly getting scads of attention: a rarely used oversight measure called the
Congressional Review Act… Folks on the Hill estimate that CRA will be used to
nix somewhere between 8 and 12 rules. (Which ones should get the axe, and in
what order, remains a subject of energetic internal debate. Those mentioned to
me include the Fair Pay and Safe Workplaces executive order, greenhouse-gas
emissions standards for heavy-duty trucks, and the Stream Protection Rule.) Not
that there aren’t plenty of others they consider worthy of takedown. It’s
largely a question of floor time…”
But
“slow-walk” infrastructure. Politico: “The president-elect’s bold talk about
creating millions of jobs while making America’s roads, bridges and airports
‘second to none’ is turning into an afterthought for congressional Republicans …
Republican leaders have scarcely mentioned anything besides Obamacare since
being sworn in Tuesday … not even Trump has spelled out whether his $1 trillion
proposal would actually boost federal spending on transportation projects, as
opposed to drawing in money from the private sector .
You,
not Mexico, will pay for the wall. Politico: “Republicans are considering
whether to tuck the border wall funding into a must-pass spending bill that must
be enacted by the end of April … The plan appeared to be an implicit
acknowledgment by Republicans and the incoming administration that Mexico will
not pay for the border wall. But in a tweet Friday morning, Trump denied that,
saying he still plans to force Mexico to pick up the tab on the back end … The
cost of a border wall is potentially enormous, with estimates ranging from a few
billion dollars to $14 billion.”
The
Nation’s John Nichols explains, “Why Workers Everywhere Should Be Scared by
Kentucky’s Assault on Unions”: ” Until this year, Democrats controlled the
Kentucky House of Representatives and were able to block anti-labor legislation
that was advanced by Republican Governor Matt Bevin … But in November
Republicans won a majority in the Kentucky House … Union busting is on a fast
track … It suggests that, upon grabbing the reins of power, Republicans [will]
move immediately to undermine unions…”
...BUT Stuck IN Obamacare Vise
Republicans
won’t promise to actually cover people in their health care plan. The Hill:
“Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) on Thursday declined to commit when asked at a press
conference if the Republican plan would allow everyone covered through ObamaCare
to remain insured … He instead called for a system ‘that gives us access to
affordable healthcare in this country without a costly government takeover.’ …
Larry Levitt, a health policy expert at the Kaiser Family Foundation, said[,]
‘It will be very hard for any replacement plan that spends less than the ACA to
cover as many people, and scaling back rules for required benefits will lead to
skimpier coverage.'”
Sen.
Tom Cotton off the bus? The Hill quotes: “I think it would not be the right
path for us to repeal ObamaCare without laying out a path forward … I think when
we repeal ObamaCare, we need to have the solution in place moving forward. … I
do not think we can just repeal ObamaCare and say we’ll give the answer two
years from now.”
Americans
don’t want “repeal and delay.” LAT: “Just two in 10 Americans support the
GOP strategy to quickly vote for repeal and work out details of a replacement
later, according to the poll by the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation … There
is also widespread skepticism about Trump’s ability to guarantee better
healthcare at lower costs, as the president-elect has said he will do. Slightly
more than half of Americans say they are not confident…”
“Republicans
Want Revenge for Obamacare and It’s Making Them Do Stupid Things” says TNR’s
Brian Beutler: “Republicans must now choose between walking onto what they
acknowledge is a political minefield and reneging on the political promise that
has defined them—that became their organizing principle as an opposition
party—during the Obama years. In a more sane environment, they would accept
Democrats’ offer to improve Obamacare in ways that Trump voters say they want,
and then claim victory in the repeal fight … Naturally, such a remedy is under
consideration by nobody.”
Progressive
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