Biden Facing Defeat, Vaccine Works
Thursday, February 25, 2021
Vol. 10, No. 47
Advise & Consent: President Biden is facing his first major defeat with his nomination of Neera Tanden to be director of the Office of Management and Budget. Two hearings on her nomination have been postponed, a possible signal that the nomination might be pulled.
The Republicans are unhappy about unflattering things Tanden has said about them over the years. All basically true, by the way.
With the Senate split 50-50, Tanden has lost the vote of West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin. Biden’s people are hanging their hopes on Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski, who has not declared her intentions.
The Republicans are using opposition to nominations as a rallying point for a party shattered by Donald Trump. Sen. Rick Scott of Florida, the head of the National Republican Senatorial Committee, declared in a memo that “The Republican Civil War is now cancelled.” He said, “The hour is late, the Democrats are planning to destroy our freedoms, and the threat in front of us is very real.”
Political Toast: New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, sometimes mentioned as a potential Democratic presidential candidate, is under scrutiny for possibly fudging the number of Covid-19 deaths in nursing homes, but things suddenly got worse. Much worse.
Lindsey Boylan, former Chief of Staff at the state economic development agency and now a candidate for Manhattan borough president, wrote a blistering essay about being the target of sexual harassment by the governor. The married mother of two tells one story about flying with the governor on the state jet and he says, “Let’s play strip poker.”
Donald Trump might be able to get away with this sort of thing, but no Democrat can.
Boylan tells of Cuomo touching her inappropriately and remarking on her looks. Other women in state government told her they had similar experiences. And Boylan tells of what Cuomo did at the end of a meeting. “As I got up to leave and walk toward an open door,” she wrote, “he stepped in front of me and kissed me on the lips. I was in shock, but I kept walking.”
There’s more. But yesterday Cuomo’s press secretary Caitlin Girouard told the press that “Ms. Boylan’s claims of inappropriate behavior are quite simply false.” Girouard wasn’t there when it didn’t happen.
Viral News: Research out of Israel says that the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccine works as well in actual use as it did in clinical trials. The vaccine was found to have reduced symptomatic cases by 94 percent a week after the second dose, and reduced severe disease by 92 percent.
Israel has national healthcare and a third of the population has already had two doses, so their numbers are reliable.
In another vaccine development, the shot developed by Johnson & Johnson has been found to be good, but not as good as the Pfizer. J&J’s efficacy is 72 percent overall in the US, compared to 95 percent for Pfizer. Still, it’s been approved for emergency use by the FDA.
Bunker Shot: Golfer Tiger woods faces a long recovery from his car accident after having a steel rod inserted in his lower right leg to stabilize fractures in his tibia and fibula that had broken through the skin. He also had to have screws and pins put in his foot and ankle. Ouch. He’ll probably need more surgery as well.
J’accuse: In a case that dates back to 2018, French actor Gérard Depardieu has been charged with rape and sexual assault of a woman who was a 22 year old actor at the time. Depardieu is 72.
Depardieu was accused of committing the assault in his Paris home in 2018, but prosecutors dropped the case for lack of evidence. Under French law, Depardieu’s accuser can claim to be an “injured party” and have her case investigated by a magistrate.
The Obit Page: Fanne Foxe, the stripper once known as “the Argentine Firecracker” in a notorious 1974 Washington sex scandal, has died at age 84.
After a night of carousing in DC, the limousine occupied by 65-year-old Rep. Wilbur Mills, chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, was pulled over by the cops. Foxe leapt from the car and jumped into the tidal basin, only to be retrieved by the police. Mills was drunk and bleeding from his nose and facial scratches. Foxe had two black eyes.
Mills ended up resigning from Ways and Means, going to rehab, and two years later ending his 38-year run in Congress. It was a turning point for politicians. From then on, their private lives have been fair game for public scrutiny.
It changed life for Foxe as well. She went from being a $500 a week dancer at the Silver Slipper to commanding $3,500. She changed her moniker to “The Tidal Basin Bombshell.”
In the USA: Bruce Springsteen pleaded guilty yesterday to a misdemeanor for drinking two shots of tequila with fans then driving his motorcycle. Charges of reckless driving and DWI were dropped.
Word Politics: In recent Washington history when the party controlling the White House changes, so do the words.
The term “climate change” has been reintroduced to government documents and websites. It was expunged during the Trump and George W. Bush administrations along with the whole notion of human influence on climate. The more hostile label “illegal alien” is being replaced with “noncitizen.” Also acceptable now is “undocumented immigrant.”
The contact form on the White House website asks people what pronouns they use for themselves: she/her, he/him or they/them.
The words any administration uses to refer to common issues have become the tools of political mind shaping. What was true last year under Trump is no longer true or correct under Biden.
As George Orwell wrote in “1984,” “The past was alterable. The past never had been altered.”
-30-
Leave a Reply