Mediaboss Marketing

Waterford The Democratic Town Committee invites all registered Democrats in town to caucus on Tuesday, Jan. 4,at 7:30 p.m. in the auditorium of Town Hall, 15 Rope Ferry Road.

Masks are required to attend. The snow/inclement weather date is Monday, Jan. 10, at 7:30 p.m. in the auditorium.

The caucus, under the rules of the Democratic Party and state election laws, is to be held for the purpose of endorsing members of the Waterford DTC to serve for a two-year term that begins in March 2022. The DTC, which typically meets on the last Tuesday of every month, recruits candidates to serve in various local elected and appointed positions, and also supports Democratic candidates at the local, state, and national levels.

For more information on the caucus or the committee, call Nominations Committee Chair Betsy Ritter at (860) 444-1700.

Read more from the original source:
The Day - Waterford Democrats invited to caucus next Tuesday - News from southeastern Connecticut - theday.com

Our focus has to be on making the funding for climate change solutions user-friendly and agri-friendly, Rep. Jim Costa (D-Calif.) said in an interview.

The farm bill, which is reauthorized every five years, touches nearly everything across the agricultural sector and rural economies. It funds programs spanning farm subsidies to food assistance and rural jobs programs. Strengthening the bills climate provisions would cement the Agriculture Department as a central player in government efforts to curb greenhouse gas emissions for years to come.

Democrats are aiming to secure support from agricultural groups that could then press Republicans to pay for farmer-friendly climate programs if the GOP takes control before the deadline.

I think this will be the first time we see some pretty impactful policies related to climate change, Rep. Ann Kuster (D-N.H.) said.

But Republicans have bristled at the Biden administrations move to have USDA take a big role in fighting climate change, largely through programs that provide direct payments and grants to farmers to voluntarily adopt greener practices.

Rep. G.T. Thompson (R-Pa.), the ranking member on the House Agriculture Committee, is poised to lead the panel if Republicans flip the House, giving him more power to decide what makes it into the final bill. In an interview, Thompson was noncommittal about Democrats interest in scaling up voluntary conservation and forestry programs.

I don't think anyone can determine whether that's appropriate or not without going through a transparent process on the farm bill, Thompson said.

Thompson, who supports addressing climate change through the agriculture sector, argued some of the climate money in Democrats spending package went to flawed policies and was thrown in without much oversight. Providing more oversight for existing farm bill programs is also one of his main goals for the upcoming talks.

Democrats arent convinced Republicans would be able to rapidly scale down their plans on contentious issues like climate and nutrition assistance, over which Democrats and Republicans have previously, and bitterly, clashed. About $10 billion in child food aid is stalled in Democrats spending bill.

If Democrats can hang onto control of the Senate, one House Democratic aide argued that any Republican effort to slash climate or nutrition funding is going to be D.O.A. If Democrats lose both the House and Senate, that would force President Joe Biden to decide whether he would sign or veto the final legislation.

The last two farm bills ended up in some pretty partisan disagreements. So it's not uncommon that we start off with some sort of gap about how we're thinking about it, Rep. Chellie Pingree (D-Maine) said, referring to conservation programs for farmers.

Lawmakers also acknowledge they will need to address how Congress funds disaster relief as extreme weather becomes more frequent and widespread. This year, lawmakers requested and Congress approved separate, immediate disaster relief for Western states and other regions hit by extreme weather. Requesting aid outside the farm bill is often quicker, but some lawmakers worry it undercuts the farm bills authority.

I think there's going to be a debate about if there is a way that we can tweak the existing programs so that ad hoc relief is not necessary to quite the same extent, said Rep. Dusty Johnson (R-S.D.).

USDA officials are also eager to overhaul disaster relief funding within the farm bill. Robert Bonnie, USDA undersecretary for farm production and conservation, said during a recent trip to drought-stricken Oregon that hes hoping theres an opportunity for a conversation going into the next farm bill about [disaster relief] and how we make sure programs work as intended.

Federally subsidized crop insurance is one key area some lawmakers are looking to beef up after extreme weather led to widespread crop losses across major parts of the West, upper Midwest and South. Producers pay into the program and can file claims if they experience significant crop damage or loss that year.

Rep. Cheri Bustos (D-Ill.), who chairs the House Agriculture subcommittee on farm commodities and risk management, said shes looking for more ways to get producers involved with crop insurance, as weather anomaly after weather anomaly is now becoming weather norms.

Rep. Cheri Bustos speaks on the floor of the House of Representatives at the Capitol on April 23, 2020. | House Television via AP, File

In 2020, only 14 percent of all farms participated in federal crop insurance, according to new data from USDAs Economic Research Service.

We've got to get risk management right, Bustos said. That will be critical.

Bustos plans to retire in 2023, when Republicans are on track to flip the chamber and take over leading the committee as well as the farm bill talks.

Lawmakers will also have to decide how much in federal subsidies they provide to farmers and ranchers after 2021 farm incomes jumped significantly, according to a recent USDA forecast.

Gains in commodity prices have pushed estimated farm incomes to their highest levels in close to a decade. The agency now estimates 2021 net farm incomes will hit $116.8 billion this year, up a stunning 23 percent from 2020.

That jump, along with a significant decrease in the amount of federal subsidies in 2020, could bolster arguments to pull back farm bill spending.

Some Republicans, like Sen. Mike Braun of Indiana, are especially interested in cutting back the farm bill as Democrats climate and social spending bill hangs in the balance.

I think it puts in jeopardy any of the other normal appropriations, Braun said.

But despite the significant jump in farm incomes, many lawmakers on the Agriculture committees said they are wary of slashing federal assistance amid the pandemic that has led to major disruptions across the industry.

You have to look beyond the ebbs and flows of the very cyclical commodity prices and not get distracted by that, Sen. Tina Smith (D-Minn.) said.

Sen. John Boozman (R-Ark.), the ranking member on the Senate Agriculture Committee, said hes hesitant to pull back on federal subsidies as rising inflation and supply chain bottlenecks continue to strain producers.

Boozman will remain a key player in upcoming farm bill talks, which hes argued Democrats have undermined by pushing their now-stalled spending bill. If Republicans flip the chamber in the midterms and if Boozman defeats a primary challenger, he could take over the Senate Ag Committees top spot when lawmakers begin writing the bill in early 2023.

When you look at the price of fertilizer, when you look at the price of diesel and all these kinds of things, I think we're going to see significant increases next year also, Boozman said.

Read the original:
The latest tug-of-war: Billions in farm subsidies and rural aid - POLITICO

The Young Democrats of Collin County have asked John Stafford to withdraw his bid for a county commissioner seat in a statement on social media.

Stafford, a Democratic political consultant in North Texas, is facing a criminal charge amid allegations that he sent misleading communications during the 2021 Plano City Council election.

About 44,000 text messages were sent to Plano residents during the race, many of them after 9 p.m., Plano police spokeswoman Andrae Smith previously said. Stafford has denied any wrongdoing.

The Young Democrats of Collin County is a political organization composed of Collin County members between the ages of 14 and 40. The group confirmed its statement Tuesday, calling on Stafford to withdraw from the November 2022 election as a candidate for office. We need representation that stands up for Democratic values, not someone who consistently goes against those values.

The groups statement also read: John Stafford has finally stepped down as the fundraising officer of the party. The reference refers to Staffords resignation from that position to run for the commissioners seat.

Stafford said Tuesday that he resigned because state law requires he cannot run for office and hold the position simultaneously.

Staffords attorney, Kyle Therrian, responded Tuesday to the groups statement.

It would be disingenuous to not defend CCYDs right to say what they wish about Mr. Stafford a person we are defending to protect the First Amendment rights of everyone, Therrian said in a written response. That said, we will remain focused on matters pertaining to the District Attorneys unprecedented and unconstitutional prosecution.

The Collin County Young Democrats seeks to influence the political process and elect Democratic leaders throughout the state, according to its website. The group is also a local chapter of YDA (Young Democrats of America).

One of the text messages Stafford allegedly sent read, in part: Make Plano Great Again. Vote for Donald Trump co-chair Lily Bao for mayor. The message also named other candidates, including some who ran in the Plano ISD school board race.

Former council member Lily Bao, who made an unsuccessful run for mayor in the May 1 election, called the messages disinformation and said that sending them later in the evening appeared to be an attempt to further anger the recipients.

He really negatively affected the Plano council race, Bao previously said.

Read more from the original source:
Collin County Young Democrats call for John Stafford to withdraw from commissioner race - The Dallas Morning News

Will Jan. 6 be our next new national holiday? Perhaps it won't go so far as that. But there's been a campaign to make next week's anniversary of the Capitol riot the most important date on the calendar.

Democrats and a tiny cohort of their Never-Trump former (or soon to be former) Republican allies hope the day will live forever in the American memory. As far as they are concerned, every day since then has been Jan. 6. They have never stopped talking about it and the perfidy not only of the rioters but also of former president Donald Trump and, by extension, everyone who supported him. Almost all Americans felt outraged at the appalling spectacle of a mob breaking into the Capitol. But Democrats are now seeking to inflate the events of that day out of all proportion to what actually happened in order to distract the country from their own disastrous conduct since assuming control of the White House and both Houses of Congress.

As far as Democrats and their media cheering section are concerned, what happened on that day wasn't a riot. Within days they hit on the idea of reimagining it as an "insurrection," a term that has become standard usage in many fora. From that point on, it has been variously described as the moral equivalent of the Confederates firing on Fort Sumter and even the 9/11 attacks. Indeed, in the view of some, recalcitrant Trumpists of all sorts amount to "domestic terrorism."

Many now tell the story of Jan. 6 with the same reckless determination that for years characterized the ultimately debunked claims that Trump colluded with Russia to steal the 2016 election.

The House of Representatives' Jan. 6 Committee has similarly embraced the "insurrection" idea. The events of that day unfolded live on television so there isn't really much doubt about what happened. But that hasn't stopped the committee from turning it into fodder for a new set of conspiracy theories in its ever-widening fishing expedition for "evidence." It has now resorted to issuing subpoenas for persons wholly unconnected to the riot, so as to give credence to the notion that Jan. 6 must have somehow been orchestrated by the Trump White House, Republicans in Congress or even Fox News Channel personalities.

The rioters were inflamed by speakers at a "Stop the Steal" rally in Washington largely predicated on conspiracy theories about Democrats stealing the 2020 presidential election. The rally, at which Trump spoke, included a protest against the congressional certification of the Electoral College vote. Trump and others encouraged the attendees to think that there was some legal method of halting or rejecting the votes that had already been cast by the states.

That was both incorrect and deeply wrong. There was much to criticize about the way the election was held, and how Big Tech oligarchs and certain media companies sought to help Joe Biden beat Trump. But by Jan. 6, 2021, the outcome was settled. While many Republicans planned to make a symbolic protest by voting not to accept the certification of the vote, some who came to Washington that day believed the election was literally stolen.

A group of those people broke away from the rally once it concluded and then stormed the Capitol. Some engaged in violence against the police while others were, inexplicably, allowed in, sending members of the House and the Senate scurrying for safety. That discredited the otherwise peaceable Trump rallyas did the former president's slowness to condemn the riot.

Yet contrary to the misleading reporting about the incident, those who entered the Capitol did not have actual plans to kidnap or harm anyone. They wandered about the premises like misplaced tourists. Their conduct was inexcusable and all those who participated deserve to be punished for any violence they committed and for breaking and entering into America's shrine of democracy.

Yet as awful as that was, it wasn't an attempted coup d'etat. After a year of investigations, not a shred of proof has been produced to the contrary.

Nor, despite claims from some Democrats and media outlets, did they commit murder. The only person who was actually killed as a direct result of the riot was one of the rioters: Ashli Babbitt, an unarmed 35-year-old Iraq War veteran who was fatally shot by a Capitol policeman despitebased on video of her killingposing no direct threat to anyone.

Had Babbitt been a Black Lives Matter protester at any one of the hundreds of "mostly peaceful" convulsions of violence and lootingincluding attacks on police and assaults on government buildingsthat took place in America's cities last year, she would have been acclaimed as a martyr and her killer would have been indicted. Instead, she was widely derided as a "traitor" and the investigation into her shooting was quickly dropped.

The BLM riots are a useful analogy because, only months earlier, the same people who have embraced the insurrection myth shrugged their shoulders or rationalized away far more violence when it was done on behalf of a cause they liked.

Jan. 6 has become the focus of a new set of conspiracy theories in which Trump and Republicans can be presented as the foes of democracy. These theories allow the Left to categorize resistance to either the Biden administration's pandemic policies or woke doctrines as another version of the insurrection, similarly deserving of federal investigation.

Even as inflation rages out of control and the pandemic continues on Biden's watch, for liberals, the only thing that matters is that their political opponentsand not just an unruly mobare proto-authoritarians who must be discredited and defeated at all costs. That's why the narrative surrounding Jan. 6 is so important to them.

What really happened on Jan. 6 was bad enough. But by transforming it into something that it clearly wasn't, Democrats have overplayed their hand and convinced even many on the Right who were ready to blame Trump for his behavior that the goal of this exercise is to cast all dissent as treasonous. This has injected another toxic meme into our already poisoned political discourse and made it all the harder to imagine any future election being accepted by the losers regardless of which party wins. That's a big lie that will do as much damage in the long run, if not far more, as anything said or done on Jan. 6.

Jonathan S. Tobin is editor in chief of JNS.org, a senior contributor for The Federalist and a columnist for the New York Post. Follow him on Twitter at: @jonathans_tobin.

The views expressed in this article are the writer's own.

Original post:
Democrats' Own 'Big Lie' Will Be the Focus of Jan. 6 Hoopla | Opinion - Newsweek

The nation is facing a retirement income crisis.Social Security is unquestionably the nations most importantsource of retirement income. But the last time Congress expanded Social Security was when Richard Nixon was president. Unless this Congress addresses the crisis by expanding Social Security, too many Americans will be unable to retire without a drastic and precipitous drop in their standards of living.

As the wealthiest country in the history of the world, America can afford to protect and expand Social Security if we require those at the top to contribute their fair share. The good news is that this Congress is poised to take action.

Rep. John Larson John Barry LarsonDemocrats should make Social Security a top issue in the midterms here's how and why It shouldn't be this hard to grow old in America House Democrats reintroduce Social Security reform bill MORE (D-Conn.), chair of the House Social Security Subcommittee, just held ahearingon his legislation,Social Security 2100: A Sacred Trust. The 2100 Act isco-sponsoredby 90 percent of House Democrats and incorporates all of the expansions that President Joe Bidenpromisedduring his winning campaign.

The legislation increases Social Securitys modest benefits both across the board and also in long overdue ways. It adds a caregiver credit, restores student benefits, improves benefits for widow(er)s, and much, much more. It pays for every penny by requiring the highest paid earners to contribute to Social Security at the same rate as the rest of us.

Although no Republican politician has co-sponsored the expansion legislation, protecting and expanding Social Security has strong bipartisan support among those who count most the American people. Largemajoritiesof Republicans, Democrats, and independents overwhelmingly support Social Security expansion. But Republican politicians are listening to their corporate donors, not their voters.

Now is the time for Democrats, who currently control both houses of Congress and the White House, to bring Social Security expansion to a vote. Theres no better way to show constituents the difference between the two parties on this essential, bread-and-butter issue.

Social Security is a priority for voters. A Public Policy Polling survey conducted in 2018found that56 percent of those who voted for Donald TrumpDonald TrumpNews networks see major viewership drop in 2021 Man who told Biden 'let's go Brandon' goes on Bannon's podcast, touts Trump Democrats should make Social Security a top issue in the midterms here's how and why MORE and 55 percent of those who identify as Republican would be more likely to vote for a candidate who supported expanding and increasing Social Security.

Expanding Social Security, while requiring those at the top to contribute more, will help to reverse income and wealth inequality an issue President ObamaBarack Hussein ObamaDemocrats should make Social Security a top issue in the midterms here's how and why How American conservatives normalize anti-Semitism VP dilemma: The establishment or the base? MOREcalledthe defining challenge of our time. That inequality not only exacerbates the retirement income crisis; it also costs Social Security billions of dollars of revenue every year.

Because the earnings of high-income workers have increased much more rapidly than the average over the last several decades, an increasing amount of their earned incomefalls above the current $142,800 cap on which Social Security contributions are assessed.That cap has slipped from covering 90 percent of nationwide wages, as Congress intended, to 83 percent today.As a result of that seemingly small slippage,those at the top paid $84.4 billion less to Social Security justin 2020 alone. Those are billions of dollars that should have gone to Social Security but instead stayed in the pockets of the wealthiest among us.

Moreover, congressional action on legislation which both expands benefits and reduces Social Securitys projected shortfall by more than half, as the 2100 Act does, will begin to restore the intangible benefit of peace of mind that Social Security is intended to provide. Too many Americans have lost that sense of security because they have heard, erroneously, that Social Security will disappear and they will never receive their earned benefits. A vote on safeguarding and expanding Social Security will restore the American peoples confidence that Congress is a responsible steward of their earned benefits.

Expanding Social Security willstrengthen the economyand create jobs.Because the vast majority of Social Securitys 65 million beneficiaries are low or moderate income, they tend to spend their benefits immediately in the local community in which they live. Social Security is especially important to rural communities, which tend to be older.

In short, Social Securityis a solution. Protecting and expanding Social Securitys modest benefits is wise policy and represents the will of the people. It will improve the economy, create jobs, and add substantially to the security of working families.

It is imperative that this Congress vote on Social Security. Democrats must make Social Security their next top priority. They must force Republicans to stop hiding and make their views clear in an up-or-down vote. If they do, voters will reward the party that created Social Security and continues to protect and improve it.

The Democrats will then be following the vision of President Franklin Roosevelt who proclaimed, when he signed Social Security into law, that he was laying down a cornerstone in a structure whichis by no means complete. President BidenJoe BidenFauci says CDC cut isolation time so people return to work faster Overnight Health Care CDC cuts isolation time for the asymptomatic Energy & Environment 2021's weather disasters cost 0B MORE, Chairman Larson, and the Democratic Party are poised to take the next step in completing this essential structure.

Nancy Altman is president of Social Security Works.

See original here:
Democrats should make Social Security a top issue in the midterms here's how and why | TheHill - The Hill