3 More Weeks of Phase 3 (Again)
Everything you need to know for Wednesday, Nov. 11: Is Obamacare actually safe? + Raleigh’s consultant says RPD is "darn good" + Dems' wishful thinking + Tony Tata's new gig
Wednesday, Nov. 11, 2020
15 days until Thanksgiving
29 days until Hanukkah
44 days until Christmas
51 days until this cursed year ends
70 days until this cursed presidency is over
Today’s Number: 130,553
New COVID cases reported in the US on Monday. The US has now exceeded 10.1 million COVID diagnoses, one-fifth of the world’s total, and is nearing 240,000 deaths.
North Carolina ranks 26th in deaths per capita over the last week.
It ranks 32nd in per-capita deaths since the start of the crisis, with 44 for every 100,000 residents.
ABOVE THE FOLD
—> The Supreme Court Might Not Kill Obamacare After All
Judging from yesterday’s hearing, even the right-wing Supreme Court thinks the Trump administration’s bid to kill the Affordable Care Act is a bridge too far.
The claim: The administration and 18 Republican attorneys general argued that when Congress eliminated the penalty for the law’s individual mandate in 2017, it rendered the entire law unconstitutional.
What? How? Without the penalty, the mandate is unconstitutional, the GOP says. If the mandate goes, the whole law has to go, because the mandate was central to the law.
But … The same Congress that eliminated the mandate penalty declined to repeal the Affordable Care Act, so it obviously wasn’t Congress’s intention to spike the law.
Most experts always thought this argument was weak. So far, in fact, only one federal judge has bought into it. Based on the justices’ questions, they seem unlikely to strike the law down, though they might rule the mandate unconstitutional. That won't have much of a practical effect.
“Enrollment in the law’s insurance markets has stayed relatively stable at more than 11 million people, even after the effective date of the penalty’s elimination in 2019. … An additional 12 million people have coverage through the law’s Medicaid expansion.”
“The legal argument could well turn on the legal doctrine of severability, the idea that the court can excise a problematic provision from a law and allow the rest of it to remain in force.”
Brett Kavanaugh: “It does seem fairly clear that the proper remedy would be to sever the mandate provision and leave the rest of the law in place.” John Roberts: “Congress left the rest of the law intact when it lowered the penalty to zero.”
—> THE COUNT: We can probably expect:
A 6–3 or 5–4 vote to end the mandate.
Anywhere from a 5–4 to 9–0 vote to sever the mandate from the rest of the law.
Of course, you know what they say about counting chickens based on oral arguments (or something like that).
If you want Tuesday’s play-by-play, here’s ScotusBlog’s live tweet thread.
LOCAL & STATE
—> Phase 3, 3 More Weeks, Again
Given the state’s rising COVID count—and if you’ll permit me cynicism, the fact that Governor Cooper no longer has to worry about re-election—this shouldn’t be a surprise: Yesterday, Cooper announced that we would remain in phase 3 of reopening, where we’ve been since Sept. 30, until (at least) Dec. 4. He also reduced the limit on indoor gatherings from 25 to 10, though the rule excludes churches and families who live in the same house.
The N&O: “Cooper and health officials have voiced concerns about seeing a new spike in cases that could overwhelm hospitals as more people gather indoors, people experience ‘coronavirus fatigue’ and don’t adhere to guidelines, such as wearing masks. But Cooper has said he does not want to go backward and reinstate certain restrictions. Quarantines are not being considered, he said.”
Noteworthy: Full-service restaurants are now eligible for state assistance for up to four months’ rent or mortgage interest, capped at $20,000 per location for up to two locations. Learn more at the link.
—> Consultant Says RPD Needs Better Tear Gas Policies
After the Raleigh police launched tear gas and “non-lethal” projectiles at mostly peaceful protesters following the George Floyd killing—and then the Raleigh City Council caught hell for it—the city did what cities do when they’re trying to look like they’re taking the matter seriously without actually doing anything about it: They hired a consultant.
The consultant reported to the council yesterday, saying the kinds of things consultants say under these circumstances.
An outside consultant hired by the Raleigh City Council to review police actions during violent protests last spring said the Raleigh Police Department needs more specific policies on the use of force on crowds, including when and how to deploy tear gas. … Sean Smoot, a partner with 21CP, said the recommendations “should not be interpreted as indictments,” saying Raleigh has “a darn good police department.”
—> TO BE CLEAR: This was not an investigation. Read the report.
It should be noted that 21CP was not charged with conducting any independent investigation, factfinding, or statistical analysis for the present report. This report is not an independent after-action report, nor does it make specific findings about the particular actions or performance of officers or supervisors. …
21CP conducted a series of interviews and focus groups with city management and police department personnel. … Three officer focus groups were also conducted. Participants volunteered for the focus groups and were RPD members of varying ranks, from lieutenant to officer.
The firm also reached out to 38 stakeholders “provided by the city” and ended up speaking with 20 of them—though not, it seems, about the actual events of May 30–31.
—> COLOR ME SKEPTICAL: I wasn’t in DTR those nights. But the reporters who were, and other people I talked to, told a starkly different story than the Official RPD Narrative. I’m not quite sure what the value is of a report that purports to assess RPD use-of-force policies without taking stock of what actually happened.
—> Raleigh’s Housing Bond Won’t Solve the Problem
I’m sure I’ve said this before—if not, I’ve sure as hell thought it—but now that the TBJ did a story saying as much, I’ll repeat myself: Raleigh’s $80 million affordable housing bond, which will generate fewer than 1,800 new units over five years, was nowhere near big enough.
DHIC president Yolanda Winstead: “It will definitely add much needed affordable housing to the stock. The city is thinking they’ll add 1,766 units to the city. ... In Wake County, we have 55,000 affordable units of housing gap.”
—> The Local Roundup
As the pandemic lingers, local food pantries are more in demand than ever.
Cal Cunningham conceded, but since you read this newsletter, you knew he was a dead duck a week ago.
The NCGOP, not at all beclowning itself, is advertising a petition to “Keep Sleepy Joe and Radical Kamala Out of the White House” while demanding that “all LEGAL votes must be counted!”
Guess who gets to finish out the Trump era as the Pentagon’s top policy chief? Fired Wake schools superintendent/terrible novelist/conspiracy theorist Tony Tata, that’s who!
With Frank Stasio retiring, WUNC is pulling the plug on The State of Things.
The ACC men’s basketball schedule has finally been released, some details TBA.
—> Weather
Showers and thunderstorms this afternoon, high of 77.
NATION & WORLD
—> The Lede: The Myth of Compromise
Democratic Senate candidates came up short in several Trump states last week where they thought they had a shot. The moderates who ran think the party has a messaging problem.
Joe Manchin: “Chuck has to understand we need to take a strong look at ourselves. I’ve watched the last three elections: 2016, ‘18, and ‘20. We truly should have been in the majority and it didn’t happen. Whatever our message is, it hasn’t worked.”
About that: Now, as in 2016, as in 2018, Democratic senators represent far more Americans than Republicans do—at least 20.3 million, in fact.
—> THEN AGAIN: This is the system we have, which means Democrats need people like Manchin to build governing majorities. Unfortunately for them, Manchin ruled out eliminating the filibuster or adding seats to the Supreme Court should Dems win the two runoffs in Georgia in January.
With the Court as is, any far-reaching health care or climate change legislation that gets through Congress is likely to be struck down.
But with the filibuster intact, that won’t matter. Nothing will make it out of the Senate. Mitch McConnell will run the show.
—> WHY IT MATTERS: McConnell’s obstruction will likely block another stimulus measure, which means another long, slow economic recovery looms on the horizon.
—> WHAT MITCH WANTS: The Georgia runoffs. To win, the NYT reports, McConnell is “keeping alive the possibility that Mr. Trump might have legitimate claims [to the election].”
It’s really that cynical: “Top Republicans in Washington are reluctant to call Joe Biden the president-elect publicly, fearing a rebellion by grassroots conservatives loyal to President Trump that would sink the party’s Senate majority.”
—> RELATED: The very mature White House has instructed its agencies not to cooperate with the Biden transition team. It has also told them to proceed with Trump’s 2021 budget, like he’ll still be there.
If this is making you nervous, maybe the headline du jour might help.
—> The Brief: 4 Stories to Read Today
Pope John Paul II ignored sexual abuse allegations for decades. “A highly anticipated Vatican report found on Tuesday that Pope John Paul II had rejected explicit warnings about sexual misconduct by Theodore E. McCarrick, now a disgraced former cardinal, choosing to believe the American prelate’s denials and misleading accounts by bishops as he elevated him to the highest ranks of the church hierarchy.”
Scientists believe dogs may offer a model of human aging. “Researchers in Vienna have found that dogs’ personalities change over time. They seem to mellow in the same way that most humans do. … Another recent paper came to the disturbing conclusion that the calculus of seven dog years for every human year isn’t accurate. To calculate dog years, you must now multiply the natural logarithm of a dog’s age in human years by 16 and then add 31. Is that clear?” (By this calculation, my Cavalier King Charles Spaniel, who turned 12 a month ago, is 70.8 human years old.)
QAnon’s believers face a crisis of faith. “President Trump’s election loss and the week-long silence of ‘Q,’ the QAnon movement’s mysterious prophet, have wrenched some believers into a crisis of faith, with factions voicing unease about their future or rallying others to stay calm and ‘trust the plan.’ [Ed. note: There is no plan.] … Some QAnon proponents have begun to publicly grapple with reality and question whether the conspiracy theory is a hoax. ‘Have we all been conned?’ one user wrote Saturday on 8kun.” [Ed note: Sigh.]
Intelligence officials are terrified about what ex-President Trump will reveal. “No new president has ever had to fear that his predecessor might expose the nation’s secrets as President-elect Joe Biden must with Trump, current and former officials said. Not only does Trump have a history of disclosures, he checks the boxes of a classic counterintelligence risk: He is deeply in debt and angry at the U.S. government, particularly what he describes as the ‘deep state’ conspiracy that he believes tried to stop him from winning the White House in 2016 and what he falsely claims is an illegal effort to rob him of reelection.”
—> Et Cetera
Coup Watch: Asked about the State Department’s cooperation with the Biden transition, Mike Pompeo assured reporters, “There will be a smooth transition to a second Trump administration.” He then berated a reporter for asking about how Trump’s refusal to concede squares with the US’s statements encouraging free and fair election abroad and for losers “to respect the results”: “That’s ridiculous. And you know it’s ridiculous. And you asked it because it’s ridiculous. … You asked a question that is ridiculous.”
Trump’s lead lawyer in Pennsylvania, Linda Kerns, wrote an op-ed for a conservative blog earlier this year arguing that the city’s plan to eliminate fines for late library books is part an ongoing “coddling of lawbreakers,” akin to sanctuary cities and the decriminalization of drug possession.
The GOP found voter fraud! (Okay, it’s one guy in rural Pennsylvania who filed an absentee ballot request for his dead mother and was quickly caught. Bonus: He’s a Trump supporter.)
The Pennsylvania postal worker who claimed a postmaster tampered with ballots admitted to federal agents that he had lied.
As Facebook cracks down on election disinformation, conservatives are turning to Twitter’s right-wing cousin, Parler.
Tucker Carlson came close to admitting that voter fraud—which is definitely real!—won’t change the election results.
Florida—a state with lots of old people—is testing out Trump’s herd immunity theory for the rest of us. What could go wrong?
Mississippi state representative Price Wallace, responding to Biden’s victory, tweeted, “We need to succeed [sic] from the union and form our own country.” It feels like they tried that before, and it didn’t go so well.
On Monday, EU regulators slapped $4 billion in tariffs on US products, retaliation for Trump’s trade war. Yesterday, they announced antitrust charges against Amazon.
The rich idiots who pointed guns at Black Lives Matter protesters in St. Louis (and then got charged for it) have sued the photographer for taking pictures of them pointing guns at BLM protesters.
Contrary to the musical’s mythology, Alexander Hamilton appears to have been an enslaver.
Beyond Meat’s shares dropped 22% on Tuesday after missing sales forecasts, despite (or because of) some weird arrangement with McDonald’s for something called McPlant, its answer to Burger King’s Impossible Burger.
Thanks for reading. I’m taking tomorrow off to finish a project. I’ll see you on Friday.