February 14 2024
February 14 2024
Tsar train
FLASH House GOP impeach Homeland Security Secretary Mayorkas, will go nowhere in Senate
1 Senate passes military aid bill without border reforms, fate in House uncertain
2 US budget deficit widens
3 Super Bowl most watched live event since moon landing
4 Biden campaign joins TikTok
5 Ukraine update
Today in history
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1 Senate passes military aid bill without border reforms, fate in House uncertain
The Senate passed a $95 billion national security package to aid Israel, Ukraine and other U.S. allies early Tuesday after a months-long debate that has deeply divided congressional Republicans. The bill passed 70-29, after 22 Republicans joined Democrats in approving the aid. But House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) preemptively rejected the legislation on Monday night, saying in a statement that the package’s failure to address U.S. border security makes it a nonstarter in the House.
There are efforts underway to go around Johnson and pass the bill through a Democratic-led discharge petition. Democrats need to gather at least four signatures from Republicans supportive of Ukraine funding to be able to introduce the petition, which probably wouldn’t happen until the end of the month given the congressional calendar. Its path would still be tricky in the House, given that some Democrats have objected to the Israeli government’s handling of the war in Gaza, where most homes have been destroyed or damaged, more than 12,300 Palestinian children have been killed, and a quarter of the population is starving, according to the United Nations. Enough Republicans would need to support the bill to make up for those Democrats who would not vote for the bill over the aid to Israel.
WaPo
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/02/12/house-ukraine-johnson-senate/
2 US budget deficit widens
The US budget deficit widened in the four months through January, as debt-servicing costs climbed further. The deficit for the first four months of the 2024 fiscal year reached $532 billion, or 16% more than recorded in the same period in the prior year, Treasury Department data released Monday showed. Interest costs in the four months through January were $357 billion, a 37% jump from 2023. The Federal Reserve’s aggressive interest-rate hiking campaign has made debt more expensive, increasing the burden for the US budget. The weighted average interest rate on outstanding US interest-bearing government debt was 3.15% at the end of January — the highest since May 2010 and marking a roughly 70 basis point increase from a year before.
Bloomberg
3 Super Bowl most watched live event since moon landing
A record 123mn US households watched Sunday’s Super Bowl game, making it one of the biggest broadcasts in the country’s history and underscoring the enduring pull of live sports even as the television landscape craters beneath it. The number includes viewers across all platforms — including CBS, Nickelodeon, Univision and streaming services such as Paramount+ and NFL+ — who watched the Kansas City Chiefs defeat the San Francisco 49ers. It compares to the 115mn who tuned in to last year’s Super Bowl between the Chiefs and the Philadelphia Eagles. Sunday’s game in Las Vegas is the second most-watched US television broadcast in history, behind only the Apollo moon landing in 1969, which is estimated to have drawn between 125mn and 150mn US viewers when the country’s population was just over 200mn.
FT
4 Biden campaign joins TikTok
President Joe Biden’s re-election campaign has joined TikTok, even though sources had said the campaign wouldn’t formally use the social media platform.
Eleven percent of all voters in the most recent NBC poll are ages 18-34 and say they use TikTok at least once day. They disproportionately identify as being Democrats over Republicans (47% Democrats to 30% Republicans), and they overwhelmingly prefer Democrats over Republicans in terms of control of Congress (56% to 40%). Yet in a hypothetical general election matchup, those Democratic-leaning young voters narrowly break for Donald Trump over Biden, 44% to 42%. Though the result is well within the margin of error for the 108 total voters (plus or minus 9.4 percentage points), the difference in level of support between Biden and congressional Democrats is significant. Meanwhile, just 23% of those voters approve of Biden’s job as president.
NBC
5 Ukraine update
Ukraine considers expanding draft
Soldiers fight in freezing, muddy trenches bombarded by artillery, or in warrens of burned and blown-up houses in urban combat. Casualty rates are high, and dangerous missions, like storming enemy-held tree lines, abound. As they planned for a renewal of Ukraine’s military under extreme conditions, both the country’s former top commander and his replacement have emphasized the same looming problem: a need to relieve exhausted, battered troops whose combat tours have stretched nearly two years. In a tumultuous week for Ukraine’s war effort, President Volodymyr Zelensky removed his commanding general, Gen. Valery Zaluzhny, on Thursday, while aid from the country’s largest source of weapons and ammunition, the United States, hung in doubt in Congress. While Ukraine relies on allies for weaponry, replenishing the ranks is a domestic challenge. Small protests have broken out in opposition to a Parliament proposal to expand the draft to include younger men, but so far, lawmakers have slow-walked the measure.
NYT
Russia builds defensive wall from train cars
Russian forces in occupied Donetsk Oblast are assembling a barrier of train cars that stretches 30 kilometers long, the Institute for the Study of War (ISW) wrote in its Feb. 11 report, citing satellite imagery and Ukrainian Telegram channels. The barrier, nicknamed the "tsar train," may be intended to serve as another defensive line against advancing Ukrainian troops.
Kiyv Independent
2/14/270 St. Valentine beheaded
Happy Valentine’s Day!
