I mentioned yesterday on Twitter that a “heist” is a better label for the GOP tax plan than “GOP tax scam” or whatever Democratic activists are calling it. The people mobilized against this legislation have done a great job. It doesn’t look like they’ll stop the bill. But they have clearly cemented in the public mind that the tax bill is a brazen giveaway to the richest Americans and corporations. So my point isn’t to criticize. But I think we need a better sense and description of what is happening. Read More
Here’s the transcript of what amounted to a prayer from the Vice President this afternoon to the President. To President Trump. You really have to see and read the words to absorb it. It’s something out of 1930s Russia or perhaps North Korea. Transcript starts after the jump … Read More
But I’ve spent recent weeks thinking through what we at TPM want to do next year, specifically how we can use our resources, our talented staff and our time most effectively in this news, business and technological environment. So I wanted to share a few thoughts with you on that front. Read More
This is a tweet from the GOP Majority’s Communications Director at the House Ways and Means Committee, the main tax writing committee.
AT&T ✅
Wells Fargo ✅
Boeing ✅
Fifth Third Bancorp ✅
Raises, bonuses – and real change in people’s lives.
TAX REFORM.— Emily Schillinger (@ELSchillinger) December 20, 2017
I am not a fan of the new tax bill that the Republican Congress passed. It will widen the gap between the wealthy and everyone else and increase the likelihood over a decade or so of another crash. And it contains all kinds of unpleasant ancillary provisions, such as the one killing the Affordable Care Act’s mandate. But I don’t buy the argument – voiced by Democratic pundits, political consultants, and even a few economists – that the bill will doom the Republicans to defeat in 2018 and even 2020. Like many things I read or hear these days from liberals, it’s wish fulfillment disguised as analysis.
Let me gently dissent from John Judis’s argument that we’re missing the impact the GOP tax bill will have over public opinion over the next year. Read More
Last month I posted this list of holiday book recommendations. They’re all works of high quality popular history, with some verging in a more academic direction, because that is all I read. This was inspired by, part of, an idea I’ve been percolating for some time of starting a TPM Book Club as part of TPM. For now, as we’re at the tail end of the year I wanted to add a few more recommendations.
Unlike that other list I want add a short review in each case. This is just a list of books, most published in the last few years which I considered very good.
Before adding my list I thought I should say something about the criteria I apply to recommendations. The critical one is quite subjective. If a book doesn’t hold my attention I usually stop reading. You can learn a lot of information page by page. You don’t always need to read it from cover to cover. So a critical part of my judgment about a book is whether it engages me enough, sufficiently engrosses me that I finish reading it. That is only a threshold criteria. But it’s a key one. The engagement, though, is a particular one: does the book bring me into an unfamiliar world, which is past always is, and make me need to understand and absorb the story I’m being told and the questions and problems it raises. Read More
A feel good story of one of the GOP tax cuts top beneficiaries, Dalton DeVos, nephew of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos, son of Amway President Doug DeVos and grandson of Amway co-founder Richard DeVos. Sailing is a tradition in the DeVos family and Dalton has just returned from a two year trip circumnavigating the globe on the 76 foot Reliance along with a small crew. From Michigan Live: “He was still a student at Grand Valley State University when he approached his parents about the idea in 2013. The following year he bought the boat and hired a captain. Nine months after graduating with business and marketing degree in December 2014, he began the journey.”
Note that the calls for a “purge” of the FBI and DOJ are becoming more explicit, actually using the word “purge” and moving from the right-wing publications to sitting members of Congress. A small part of this is simple partisanship, what threatens the leader of your political party is bad and needs to be attacked. But what we’re seeing goes far, far beyond that and can only be explained by the Republican right’s broader embrace of authoritarianism, which both predates Trump, accounts for his rise and has in turn been accelerated by his presidency. Read More