Excerpts from recent editorials in the US and abroad:
Washington Post on Congress closing Medicaid coverage gap
After months of doing nothing, Democrats in Congress finally seem to be getting something done — or rather, several things, from protections for gay marriage to tens of billions of dollars for computer chips to finally an economic package that has passed through reconciliation. There is still room for the majority to make this something as good as it can be.
The deal Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) appears to have struck with swing Sen. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.) primarily involves a popular bill to let Medicare negotiate the prices of a select set of substances – thereby reducing costs. The legislation is both a political and a political gain for the party. Better yet, it saves money that can be directed into other programs, allowing the provisions to collectively bypass a filibuster with the blessing of House parliamentarians. For now, it appears that Democrats will extend improved subsidies for the Affordable Care Act for at least two years, preventing a spike in health insurance premiums that could push millions out of the exchanges.
All this is more than welcome: it is important. The only problem is that while the expanded ACA subsidies will help low- to middle-income Americans stay insured, the poorest could be left behind. That’s because in 12 states that have refused to pass the landmark law’s Medicaid expansion, an estimated 2.2 million people, mostly people of color, languish in the so-called coverage gap: neither eligible for Medicaid nor subsidies in the ACA marketplace . Build Back Better, as originally envisioned, tried to correct this flaw by allowing people in non-expansion states to enroll in subsidized plans after all, but the provision has fallen by the wayside. That means the reconciliation package Democrats are putting together will continue to help those above the poverty line buy coverage, but keep those below the poverty line with an impossible bill.
Congress can still fix the problem. The numbers must be added up to satisfy Mr. Manchin, who wants to put much of the savings achieved through the prescription drug plan toward reducing the deficit. Another provision from the previous Build Back Better to strengthen the Internal Revenue Service’s auditing capacity could raise some revenue without the inflationary kickback that worries the West Virginian senator by pushing wealthy people to pay taxes legally owed — and is also worthwhile on the benefits. . But advocates argue that the math could work out even without the extra dollars from such a reform.
This is likely the last chance lawmakers have to prevent what is already a tragedy from causing more damage and taking more lives. Democrats, with leadership from a White House that says it is dedicated to the nation’s most vulnerable, cannot afford to miss it. The nation’s poorest citizens can afford it even less.
ONLINE: https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2022/07/26/close-medicaid-coverage-gap/
The New York Times on the climate crisis
The American West has gone bone dry, the Great Salt Lake is disappearing, and water levels in Lake Mead and Lake Powell, the two major life-giving reservoirs in the Colorado River basin, are falling at an alarming rate. Wildfires are burning crops in France, Spain, Portugal and Italy, while parts of Britain sweltered last week in temperatures above 100 degrees Fahrenheit.
Yet the news from Washington was only about the ability of a single U.S. senator, Joe Manchin, to destroy the core of President Biden’s plans to confront these very problems — some $300 billion in tax credits and subsidies aimed at greatly expanding wind, solar, electric car batteries and other clean energy technologies over the next decade. Had it survived, this would have been the largest single investment Washington had ever made to combat the ravages of a warming climate.
This was more than another setback for Mr Biden, who had already seen his climate ambitions threatened by the Supreme Court and rising oil and gas prices. It undercut American competitiveness in the global race for cleaner fuels and cars, and made a mockery of Mr Biden’s efforts to regain the climate change leadership squandered by Donald Trump.
Mr. Biden made bold promises to America and the world in his first months in office, designed to finally honor the US commitment at the 2015 Paris climate summit to keep global temperatures from rising 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. This is the threshold, scientists believe, beyond which wildfires, floods, loss of biodiversity, rising seas and human displacement will become significantly more destructive – and just a few tenths of a degree warmer than the world is today.
Reaching the 1.5 figure, or even staying below two degrees, would require a radical transformation of the world’s energy systems, replacing fossil fuels with low-carbon and ultimately zero-carbon energy sources, and doing so not on a leisurely glide path, but quickly, reduce greenhouse gas emissions by half before 2030 and effectively zero them in the middle of the century.
Sir. Biden matched his ambitions with those goals: a 50 to 52 percent reduction in U.S. emissions from 2005 levels by 2030 and net zero emissions by 2050. Along the way, he said he would eliminate fossil fuels from power plants by 2035. Manchin, who has strong ties to West Virginia’s coal industry and has received generous campaign contributions over the years from oil and gas interests.
It must be said that Mr. Manchin was hardly alone in his opposition to Mr. Biden’s plans. His recent appearance owes much to Mitch McConnell and other Senate Republicans, not one of whom came forward to support the president or offer a plausible alternative. Had enough Republicans joined Democrats to construct a bipartisan climate bill, Mr. Manchin’s long-standing, entrenched opposition to necessary action on climate change has been irrelevant. Instead, it was crucial. He became a necessary swing vote to get Mr. Biden’s program approved in an evenly divided Senate during a process known as a budget vote.
Without the backing of Congress, Mr. Biden has fewer tools to achieve his goals, which now seem out of reach. His best course is to take the same regulatory path that President Barack Obama was forced to follow after the Senate’s last colossal climate failure — a cap-and-trade bill that passed the House in 2009 but died in the Senate the following year. Using his executive authority, Mr. Obama secured major improvements in car efficiency and ordered reductions in power plant emissions that did not take effect, even though utilities managed to achieve them on their own by burning cleaner natural gas and closing inefficient coal-fired plants.
Major new improvements in the electricity sector, which still accounts for about a quarter of US greenhouse gas emissions, may be limited by the recent Supreme Court decision limiting the Environmental Protection Agency’s regulatory flexibility, but Mr Biden could devise a more modest and legally acceptable rule. He can and must push ahead with new rules he has already ordered to control emissions of methane, a potent greenhouse gas, as well as a series of new mileage standards for cars and light trucks that would force automakers to redouble their efforts to sell fully electric vehicles. The Interior Department may also continue its efforts to promote wind and solar energy, which were launched under Mr. Obama’s Secretary of the Interior, Sally Jewell. Mr. Biden embraced that course in a speech Wednesday in Massachusetts.
The president and his secretary of the interior, Deb Haaland, could help further by bringing clarity to the administration’s policies on oil and gas drilling, which are currently confusing. Mr. Biden promised in his campaign to stop new oil and gas leasing on federal lands, which is a major cause of greenhouse gas emissions. That promise seems long ago and far away. Interior’s latest five-year offshore drilling plan opens up the possibility of leasing in parts of the Gulf of Mexico, while a recent environmental impact statement does not rule out, as environmentalists had hoped, the Willow Project, ConocoPhillips’ proposed development of oil and gas resources in the fragile western Arctic.
ONLINE: https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/23/opinion/biden-climate-change.html
Wall Street Journal on the “chips plus” subsidy bill
The Senate voted 64-32 on Tuesday to advance a $280 billion “chips plus” subsidy bill, and as always in politics, there’s a lot of plus. Money from Washington always comes with strings attached, and we hope the semiconductor executives know what they signed up for.
That message couldn’t have been clearer from President Biden on Tuesday, when he told business and labor leaders on a conference call that the bill’s $52 billion in subsidies to Intel and other chipmakers would not be “a blank check to businesses.” The president said he will “personally have to sign off on the biggest grants.”
Tip for companies applying for money: Find the new plant in a swing state with more than a handful of electoral votes. Sir. Biden or the vice president might want to stop by during the 2024 election campaign.
The president also emphasized that the law requires companies to pay prevailing wages to build the semiconductor manufacturing facilities funded by the bill. Communications Workers of America President Chris Shelton said this will ensure “there is not a race to the bottom.” Translation: Construction will become more expensive, and non-union contractors will not benefit.
Some companies that lobbied for the bill have nevertheless expressed frustration that it prohibits recipients of federal largesse from expanding production of advanced chips in China. But what did they expect? Politicians are selling the bill as a national security imperative to compete with China to ensure more chips are made in the US in case of conflict with Beijing.
Mr. Biden also made it clear that his administration will impose its own conditions on the money. For example, “we will not allow companies to use these funds to buy back shares or issue dividends.” Mr. Biden threatened to claw back subsidies from those who do. This means that companies that take federal money are not allowed to reward shareholders if the investments succeed.
The president also noted that companies whose future innovations derive in part from the bill’s $200 billion in authorized research and development spending in areas such as green energy and artificial intelligence will be required “to implement that technology” and invest “in a facility here in America.” This requirement will cause CEOs to add a political calculation to their investment choices.
Industrial policy and the political allocation of capital invariably distort investment. Don’t be surprised if the conditions imposed by Congress and the administration on these companies make the companies and the United States less competitive with China.
ONLINE: https://www.wsj.com/articles/semiconductor-subsidy-strings-attached-senate-bill-chips-president-biden-11658873210
Los Angeles Times on whether Trump should face criminal charges:
Impeaching a former president with crimes would be an extraordinary development in American history and risks forever reshaping our politics as well as the future of the nation itself. It should not be done lightly.
But former President Trump’s multifaceted attempt to overturn the results of the 2020 election, culminating in him inciting violent mobs to attack the Capitol on January 6, 2021, when Congress confirmed Joe Biden’s victory, was also an extraordinary development in American history – one that nearly destroyed our democracy. The country is already in uncomfortable, uncharted waters, navigating the wreckage Trump left in his wake.
What is needed now is not a mild respect for political norms, but an unwavering pursuit of justice. Over the past two months, the House committee investigating the January 6 attack has painstakingly presented, with video clips and first-hand testimony, ample evidence that the former president led a dangerous, lying scheme to block the peaceful transfer of power and keep firmly in the presidency despite being voted out of office. At a minimum, the Justice Department should prosecute him for conspiring to defraud the United States and conspiring to obstruct an official process, the counting of electoral votes. These crimes carry maximum penalties of five and 20 years in prison, respectively.
Of course, prosecutors may have evidence the public hasn’t seen that merits additional charges, and the House panel looks set to reveal more in the coming months. But already the first eight hearings have shown that Trump was told many times, by several close and well-informed advisers, that there was no evidence of voter fraud or ballot irregularities that would have changed the outcome of the election. “Bull–” is what Atty. General William Barr called Trump’s claim that the election was stolen.
And yet Trump continued to perpetuate the lie, using the misplaced trust of many Americans to continue the deception. He fled his supporters for $250 million, ostensibly to fight his bogus lawsuits (but actually sent to a political action committee). He invited them to come to Washington for a “wild” demonstration, where he gave an inflammatory speech to a crowd he knew was armed – and then instructed them to march on the Capitol.
And then, for three hours after he left the rally, Trump refused to take steps to quell the violence as rioters battled police, stormed the Capitol and disrupted the vote count. As the House panel demonstrated in painstaking detail during Thursday’s hearing, Trump watched the rampage unfold on television from a comfortable White House dining room, rejecting pleas from aides who wanted him to publicly condemn the violence and call off the mob. He never called for any law enforcement or military support, even as members of Congress feared for their lives. In the end, more than 100 police officers were injured, four people in the crowd died, and five police officers who served at the Capitol on January 6 died in the days and weeks that followed.
“We cannot abandon the truth and remain a free nation,” said committee Vice Chairman Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) in her closing remarks Thursday.
Trump knew there was no legitimate reason to challenge the election results, but pressured officials at many levels of government to take illegal actions to maintain his power. Fortunately, they did not agree to his demands, but the testimony of how Trump bullied officials at the US Department of Justice, state legislatures and local elections offices was truly chilling.
An election worker described facing racist death threats after Trump baselessly accused her of processing fake ballots. Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger testified that Trump called him and said, “I need 11,000 votes, give me a break.”
And then there is the overwhelming evidence that Trump is threatening his own vice president. As the violence escalated on January 6, Trump sent a tweet saying Vice President Mike Pence “didn’t have the guts to do what should have been done” by denying electoral votes to Biden. The tweet further incited the frothing crowd, who chanted, “Hang Mike Pence.” Secret Service agents protecting Pence at the Capitol described being so scared they called loved ones to say goodbye. However, Trump thought Pence deserved it and didn’t think the rioters “did anything wrong,” White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson testified she heard Trump’s chief of staff say.
Overall, it demonstrates a tyrannical pattern in which Trump exercised the power of the presidency to work numerous channels to overturn the will of the electorate. It is evidence of criminal behavior that must be assessed in court.
One of the arguments against impeaching Trump is that it violates American norms because impeachment by Congress is the proper place to hold a president accountable, not a criminal courtroom, and the Senate failed to muster the two-thirds majority required to find him guilty of incitement. a rebellion. This is a flimsy argument. Trump’s misconduct occurred in the period between losing the November election and inciting the January 6 riot. At the time, there were only two weeks left in his presidency, so Congress did not have time to launch a thorough impeachment trial using the evidence the House panel has gathered over the past year and a half. Moreover, Trump’s entire political persona—from his campaign through his presidency—was about breaking norms. Why would it be taboo now to take an unprecedented step in response to unprecedented behavior? It is not.
Another argument against prosecution is that it could backfire and end up empowering Trump rather than imprisoning him. Trump will be in the spotlight as the case drags on. He would likely cast it as political retaliation from Biden’s Justice Department and use the process to develop a new arsenal of conspiracies with which to fuel his fans’ complaints. It is difficult to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. If the prosecution is unsuccessful and Trump is acquitted, he could gain more currency than he has now as a political loser.
This seems like a legitimate risk, but not a sufficient reason to back away from the pile of evidence pointing toward Trump’s guilt. Justice is much bigger than political considerations, and to extend this argument more broadly would be like saying that it is too risky to try someone who tells a lot of lies and has a solid fan base. This should not be how we decide which Americans should be held accountable for potential crimes. Being famous or hot shouldn’t protect anyone from justice.
The lesser-known players in this horrific plot are already being held accountable. Federal prosecutors have filed criminal charges against more than 850 people who participated in the Jan. 6 mob, including charges of assaulting police officers with a deadly weapon, entering a cordoned-off building with a deadly weapon, destroying and stealing government property and obstructing a former official . Three participants have pleaded guilty to seditious conspiracy. Around 99 January 6 rioters have been jailed.
Prosecuting the foot soldiers is only partial justice for this serious attack on American democracy. To restore the nation’s standing in the world and among its citizens, it is crucial that the leader of this shameful chapter in history is also held accountable. Prosecuting Trump will demonstrate that the basic principles of the United States remain firm: Voters determine who is in power, and no one is above the law.
ONLINE: https://www.latimes.com/opinion/story/2022-07-24/prosecute-trump-criminal-charges-jan-6
China Daily on US-China relations:
As part of its neo-Reds under the bed scaremongering, the former Donald Trump administration trumpeted that Chinese-made household appliances, such as refrigerators and televisions, were spies embedded in American households. It also claimed that the Chinese telecommunications company was “the biggest concern” for democracy.
The Joe Biden administration is unwilling to let that lie rest with sleeping dogs, proving the old adage that the more things change, the more they stay the same. In an unannounced investigation launched shortly after Joe Biden took office early last year, the Commerce Department is conducting an ongoing investigation into Huawei over alleged concerns that U.S. cell towers equipped with its equipment could capture information from military bases and missile silos and then transfer the data back to China.
In advancing to the forefront of 5G technology, Huawei has inadvertently become the victim of a US-led spy technology witch hunt. If it’s any consolation to the company, which has been subject to a seemingly endless cycle of voiced suspicions followed by prosecutions, no evidence has been produced to support the allegations. It has served to prove the professionalism of the Chinese company, which serves and operates in nearly 200 countries and regions without being tied into such problems.
On the contrary, it is the United States that has repeatedly been caught in the act of eavesdropping and cyber-snooping both on its own citizens and those of other countries. In fact, pretty much everyone. It has also been caught hacking foreign institutes and it is no secret that it forces companies to hand over their data and information under the pretext of protecting national security.
After subjecting Huawei and some other Chinese high-tech companies, which they consider a threat to American companies, not national security, to the most stringent scrutiny in the past few years, along with its allies, including Britain, without to find any evidence to substantiate its accusations, there must be a reason why the Biden administration has chosen to dish out the same old red threats at this moment.
And there is. On the one hand, news of the investigation has come amid complaints from telecom operators about a lack of funds to help them meet “rip and replace” deadlines to remove and destroy Huawei equipment, with federal reimbursements reaching only 40 % of the total amount requested. until now. So a practical purpose of the investigation is to help ease the resistance the administration faces in forcing the telecom operators to meet this deadline.
On the other hand, the probe offers a counter to complaints that the administration is too soft on China. With the midterm elections approaching and a bipartisan pro-China strategy becoming political correctness, the Biden administration does not want to be accused of discarding its predecessor’s anti-China legacy.
As such, the investigation is nothing more than a byproduct of partisan politics in the United States.
ONLINE: https://global.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202207/25/WS62de94a5a310fd2b29e6e46c.html
