“Increasingly, the President has become convinced that the Dow Jones Industrial Average is not on his team,” one aide said. “Seeing the negative Dow numbers in the corner of the TV screen has been wrecking eleven hours of every day for him.”
Reportedly, Trump is mulling replacing the Dow with a new system, in which Sarah Huckabee Sanders would appear every day at 4 P.M. to announce how high stocks had skyrocketed.
Source: Trump Considering Firing Dow Jones Industrial Average | The New Yorker
What You’ll Learn:
When: Tuesday, February 20, 2018 • 2:00 p.m. ET
Where: Online
Source: Reducing Lead Times and Costs on the Factory Floor with 3D-Printed Jigs and Fixtures – 1177930
Roll up your sleeves and spend three catalytic days with public servants, technologists, entrepreneurs and vendors at the seventh Code for America Summit.
2018’S SUMMIT WILL TACKLE BIG PROBLEMS:
▸ Strengthening digital capability in government
▸ Designing policy with tech at the table
▸ Shaping the government technology market to make it work better for everyone
▸ Using the community as capacity by building government as a platform and engaging the public
When: May 30 – June 1, 2018
Where: Oakland, CA
Source: Code for America Summit 2018 – Event Summary | Online Registration by Cvent
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| 1. | H.R.1 [115th] | An Act to provide for reconciliation pursuant to titles II and V of the concurrent resolution on the budget for fiscal year 2018. |
| 2. | H.R.38 [115th] | Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act of 2017 |
| 3. | H.R.3364 [115th] | Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act |
| 4. | H.R.4760 [115th] | Securing America’s Future Act of 2018 |
| 5. | S.2311 [115th] | Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act |
| 6. | H.R.36 [115th] | Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act |
| 7. | H.R.392 [115th] | Fairness for High-Skilled Immigrants Act of 2017 |
| 8. | H.Res.718 [115th] | Condemning the actions taken by the Government of the Republic of Cameroon against Patrice Nganang and others, and for other purposes. |
| 9. | H.R.2810 [115th] | National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2018 |
| 10. | H.R.109 [115th] | Mortgage Insurance Tax Deduction Act of 2017 |
WEEK OF FEBRUARY 5TH
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 5TH
On Monday, the House will meet at 12:00 p.m. for morning hour and 2:00 p.m. for legislative business. Votes will be postponed until 6:30 p.m.
Legislation Considered Under Suspension of the Rules:
2) H.R. 2371 – Western Area Power Administration Transparency Act (Sponsored by Rep. Paul Gosar / Natural Resources Committee)
3) H.R. 2888 – Ste. Genevieve National Historical Park Establishment Act (Sponsored by Rep. Jason Smith / Natural Resources Committee)
4) S. 1438 – Gateway Arch National Park Designation Act (Sponsored by Sen. Roy Blunt / Natural Resources Committee)
5) H.R. 2504 – To ensure fair treatment in licensing requirements for the export of certain echinoderms (Sponsored by Rep. Chellie Pingree / Natural Resources Committee)
6) H.R. 219 – Swan Lake Hydroelectric Project Boundary Correction Act (Sponsored by Rep. Don Young / Natural Resources Committee)
7) H.R. 2646 – United States-Jordan Defense Cooperation Extension Act, as amended (Sponsored by Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen / Foreign Affairs Committee)
8) H.R. 1997 – Ukraine Cybersecurity Cooperation Act of 2017, as amended (Sponsored by Rep. Brendan Boyle / Foreign Affairs Committee)
9) H.R. 3851 – War Crimes Rewards Expansion Act, as amended (Sponsored by Rep. Virginia Foxx / Foreign Affairs Committee)
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 6TH AND THE BALANCE OF THE WEEK
On Tuesday, the House will meet at 10:00 a.m. for morning hour and 12:00 p.m. for legislative business.
On Wednesday, the House is scheduled to meet at 9:00 a.m. for legislative business.
H.R. 772 – Common Sense Nutrition Disclosure Act of 2017 (Subject to a Rule) (Sponsored by Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers / Energy and Commerce Committee)
H.R. 1153 – Mortgage Choice Act of 2017 (Subject to a Rule) (Sponsored by Rep. Bill Huizenga / Financial Services Committee)
Consideration of Legislation Making Further Appropriations for FY 18
Additional Legislative Items are Possible
Committee activity for the week of February 5 can be found here.
As wealth inequality reaches unprecedented levels, we are increasingly looking to the world’s billionaires to save us and our broken institutions.
Bill Gates is using his fortune to cure diseases that have long been out of reach of governments and the World Health Organization. Elon Musk’s SpaceX aims to supplant NASA, and commuters frustrated, with the state of American infrastructure, look to Musk’s Boring Company to whisk them from city to city via hyperloop.
Bezos has already swooped in to save the Washington Post, restoring the once-struggling news organization into a vital journalistic enterprise, and dozens of beleaguered American cities hoped he would transform them into prosperous tech hubs by bestowing them with Amazon’s second headquarters (alas, the honor will likely go to a city that doesn’t need the help.)
Source: Gerrymandering and how to fix it
While we may not be able to pinpoint why certain countries tend to be generous both at home and abroad, what we do know is that spending money on poverty programs, whether domestic or international, requires an empathy and understanding that public resources are well spent on such activities. The arguments underlying these programs therefore apply equally to all kinds of social spending.
Furthermore, one must consider the proportional trade-offs between domestic social spending and international aid.
According to OECD data, the average developed country spends 60 times as much on domestic social spending as on aid. So halving aid would still not yield enough money to increase domestic social spending by even 1 percent.
Source: The link between foreign aid and domestic social spending
On January 30, 2018, rather than elevate and build upon this history of bipartisanship in a State of the Union address that rhetorically stressed unity, Trump asked for legislation to ensure aid always serves “American interests,” implying that aid should go only to those countries at the United Nations that vote in alignment with the U.S., echoing policy proposals that have irregularly surfaced through the years.
The U.S. makes aid available for political, economic, and moral reasons. By implying that aid is not always serving U.S. interests, the president seems to be suggesting that politics should hold sway over any other considerations.
The U.S. public disagrees.
The American public overwhelmingly favors an altruistic dimension to U.S. aid. Large majorities support humanitarian aid and economic aid to people in needy countries, without limiting such aid only to places where the U.S. has security interests. While Americans recognize and strongly support the importance of the security and economic imperatives of aid, they also uphold American values and ideals at its core.
Source: Trump’s SOTU: Why pegging US foreign assistance to countries’ UN votes is a bad deal
It says that “whoever accuses, publicly and against the facts, the Polish nation, or the Polish state, of being responsible or complicit in the Nazi crimes committed by the Third German Reich … shall be subject to a fine or a penalty of imprisonment of up to three years”.
But it adds the caveat that a person “is not committing a crime if he or she commits such an act as part of artistic or scientific activities.”
The country has long objected to the use of phrases like “Polish death camps”, which suggest the Polish state in some way shared responsibility for camps such as Auschwitz. The camps were built and operated by Nazi Germany after it invaded Poland in 1939.
Source: Poland’s Senate passes controversial Holocaust bill – BBC News