The Biden Presidency is underway.

[138]

@Thrag

Looking for a link.

BILLS-117HR5376RH-RCP117-17.pdf

[scottagibson]

Hey, there’s money in there for sweeping the forest.

(3) $1,000,000,000 for vegetation management
projects carried out solely on National Forest Sys- tem land that the Secretary shall select following the receipt of proposals submitted in accordance with subsections (a), (b), and (c) of section 4003 of the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009 (16 U.S.C. 7303); etc.

[Thrag]

Thanks for finding that. Not just a framework as I was assuming, this looks like the full language.

Whew! 1684 (double spaced and super margined) pages.

[138]

Thanks to The Guardian. Their daily live feed is quite good.

[Thrag]

A quick skim through the endless line items of appropriations shows a lot of this:

“…to remain available until September 30, 2026”.

That date is referenced 77 times in the bill.

So as seemed likely a lot of the amount reduction is implemented through a timespan reduction.

For those interested in the climate change related provisions, on page 407 the part about Department of Energy loans and grants starts.

Minor pet peeve. I can’t help but notice this stamp on the pages: “G:\M\17\MISC\RECON_RCP.XML”. I wish they’d release the xml file. This no table of contents, no index, pdf printout is insulting when it’s clear there’s a more parsable format. Plus they probably could have easily at least generated a table of contents to go with it.

Also in regards to climate change down on page 1338 is PART 8—INCENTIVES FOR CLEAN ELECTRICITY AND CLEAN TRANSPORTATION

[Papageno]

We’re going to remain the only major, advanced world economy with no paid family and medical leave in the law, because the fatcats just don’t give a shit. They hire 24 hour nurses for that sort of thing, why doesn’t everyone else???

I am sick to death of the growing gulf in this country (and elsewhere) between the rich and literally everyone else over the last 40 years.

[Timex]

They you need to get a majority that’s greater than 0 senators and 8 members of the house.

Seriously, if you want to fix everything, you need a real majority.

[CraigM]

Which is great, except there is fuck all I can do about that. Yay I have 2 dem senators, and a Dem house rep. All I can do is hope that Pennsylvania fixes their shit.

So get on that Timex.

[Papageno]

The Senate is fucked by design, from the the get-go. As long as “huge tracts o’ land” in Wyoming and Alaska have the same number of votes as the tens of millions of people in California (and Texas!) we’re not going to make the progress we need to make (or even start to reverse the harm that’s been done). And then add the filibuster turd to the top of that shit sundae.

So basically all of my adult life has been/will be spent despairing about this shit. Yes we’ve made some progress on the social stuff, but even that is being whittled away because the fascists feel icky about it. And now they’re going to start overturning election results they’re not happy with, because they can.

[Rock8man]

Oh wow, Timex is in Pennsylvania? And he’s been telling the rest of us to do something this whole time? How dare you Sir!

[Enidigm]

The problem with the Senate isn’t the concept. The problem with the Senate is the arbitrary construction of the states. Especially after 1860 there’s little coherent idea that these states are going to be independent and viable things outside of a Federal system. States like Hawaii make perfect sense. There’s literally no reason why you need a North and South Dakota, a Rhode Island and Connecticut still separate today, or an Idaho.

There’s a huge amount of effort spent in gerrymandering House districts, but the Senate is basically gerrymandered by history. The US political system is basically hobbled by the random and arbitrary decisions about territorial boundaries many and hundreds years ago by land commissioners and settlement companies.

[Papageno]

So should Idaho be part of Montana, or “Cascadia” (Washington+Oregon+Idaho). I’m sure the people in Idaho’s college towns would be happy with the latter but hoo boy, no one else. We already get no end of griping in Oregon from all the folks who don’t live in Portland/Corvallis/Eugene.

[Enidigm]

If you create political divisions, those divisions will be fruitful.

Build two high schools and your community will divide between which high school teams they support. Build three, and there will be three groups of supporters. There aren’t going to be a large group of people conscious that they’re operating in a political environment that was chosen for them; not going to be protesting that they want two high schools, and not three. And if there were, eventually the third school would have enough grads that they’d reject even the framing. Of course there should be three high schools!

There’s no going back from those divisions now. But in being arbitrary we’re now stuck with an even more sclerotic system.

[CraigM]

@Papageno

We already get no end of griping in Oregon from all the folks who don’t live in Portland/Corvallis/Eugene.

And for the 50 people in the state that don’t live in either the Wilamette valley or Bend can shove it up their ass with their thinly veiled white supremacy and anti environmental TimberUnity stuff too.

The high desert is a beautiful area, with absolutely zero people worth listening to. Fortunately even when you are there, there isn’t any people anyhow so its not a problem.

[Papageno]

@Enidigm

we’re now stuck with an even more sclerotic system.

Which is why I think the nation may just be fucked, that despite all the optimistic speeches by politicians our best days ARE behind us. If Hitler 2.0 arose and started taking over surrounding countries and rounding up people into death camps we couldn’t possibly come together the way we did back then. There’d be 40% of the population thinking “more power to that guy” just like we have a non-negligible proportion of Americans who think it’s no big deal if Putin’s minions interfered in our 2016 election, because he runs a “White Nation” and “strongly.”

[scottagibson]

@Papageno

If Hitler 2.0 arose and started taking over surrounding countries and rounding up people into death camps we couldn’t possibly come together the way we did back then.

That wasn’t enough last time either. It took a colossally stupid attack by Japan and an equally stupid declaration of war by Germany to get us into that fight. Otherwise we probably sit it out.

[Timex]

Progressive caucus derailed the vote again.

[138]

Does anyone know if an infrastructure extension has been filed? I don’t really know how that works, but funding runs out this weekend.

[Papageno]

All that’s missing are the “Harry and Louise” ads now.

[Papageno]

Per an article on Politico:

House liberals said they want to review the legislative text of $1.75 trillion social spending legislation the White House outlined Thursday and get a commitment of support from centrist Sens. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) and Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) — something the two have not outright given.

So the Progressive caucus has not given a definitive no, and they don’t want “Manchinema” to be Lucy pulling away the football at the last minute either. I think that’s reasonable.