"President Biden will announce a new effort on Monday to reduce or eliminate student loan debt for millions of borrowers, an election-year attempt to..."

So begins the first sentence of the NYT article by Michael D. Shear, "Biden Will Try Again to Wipe Out Student Loan Debt for Millions of Borrowers/The Supreme Court blocked President Biden’s first attempt at large-scale student debt relief last summer."

The sentence piddles out tautologically:

... revive his goal of providing large-scale relief for Americans struggling to pay off their college loans, a person familiar with the plan said Friday.

Biden is reducing or eliminating debt in order to reduce or eliminate debt. Noted, and thanks for mentioning that this is happening in an election year.

But the word "attempt" doesn't fit. If what he's attempting to do is to reduce or eliminate debt, then how is the reduction or elimination of debt just an attempt to reduce or eliminate debt? A reduction or elimination of debt is a reduction or elimination of debt. We have the modifier "election-year": It's an "election-year attempt." That's such an awkward way to avoid having to say that what's being attempted — with our money — is to win the election. 

Biden "will often snap" — says the NYT, based on interviews with "more than two dozen current and former Biden associates."

I'm reading "Beneath Joe Biden’s Folksy Demeanor, a Short Fuse and an Obsession With Details/As Mr. Biden settles into the office he has chased for more than three decades, aides say he demands hours of debate from scores of policy experts" by Michael D. Shear, Katie Rogers and Annie Karni. 

Before making up his mind, the president demands hours of detail-laden debate from scores of policy experts, taking everyone around him on what some in the West Wing refer to as his Socratic “journey” before arriving at a conclusion. Those trips are often difficult for his advisers, who are peppered with sometimes obscure questions. Avoiding Mr. Biden’s ire during one of his decision-making seminars means not only going beyond the vague talking points that he will reject, but also steering clear of responses laced with acronyms or too much policy minutiae, which will prompt an outburst of frustration, often laced with profanity.

Let’s talk plain English here, he will often snap....

On policy issues, Mr. Biden, 78, takes days or weeks to make up his mind as he examines and second-guesses himself and others. It is a method of governing that can feel at odds with the urgency of a country still reeling from a pandemic and an economy struggling to recover..... Those closest to him say Mr. Biden is unwilling, or unable, to skip the routine....

Mr. Biden is gripped by a sense of urgency that leaves him prone to flares of impatience, according to numerous people who regularly interact with him...

So... urgent and not urgent, simultaneously?

[S]everal people familiar with the president’s decision-making style said Mr. Biden was quick to cut off conversations.

So... long conversational journeys but also cutting off conversation? I'm not really seeing a big problem here. The President should control when things go long or need to be cut short. It's only a problem if he's reacting based on his temper rather than his degree of understanding. 

Three people who work closely with him said he even occasionally hangs up the phone on someone who he thinks is wasting his time.

Who cares?!

Most described Mr. Biden as having little patience for advisers who cannot field his many questions.

Fine!

“You become so hyperprepared,” said Dylan Loewe, a former speechwriter for Mr. Biden. “‘I’ve got to answer every conceivable question he can come up with.’”...

So? Well, maybe now I'm suspecting the NYT of making a bullshit show of critiquing him when they're really praising him.

“He hates blandishing fast-talk that sounds like double speak,” said Chris Jennings, a former health policy aide who engaged frequently with Mr. Biden when he was vice president. “Doesn’t trust it, and he’s certain voters loathe it.”...

Hmm. My hypothesis gathers steam. 

If you keep going in this article, you'll get to stuff about what he and Dr. Jill eat: "vanilla chocolate chip Haagen-Dazs ice cream, Special K cereal, one bunch of red grapes, sliced cheese, six eggs, sliced bread, one tomato from the garden, and at least two apples on hand at all times." Biden drinks Orange Gatorade, and Jill is “an oenophile of the first degree.”

That's like something W.C. Fields would say for a laugh: "an oenophile of the first degree."

Today's oral argument in Trump v. Hawaii — the "Muslim ban" case we now (pretty much) know Trump will win.

Here's Mark Walsh at SCOTUSblog reporting on the big oral argument on the last day of the 2017 Term — Trump v. Hawaii. I haven't read this yet, but from the short article I have read (at the NYT), I think everyone knows Trump is going to win.  I'll live-blog my reading, giving you snippets and comments.

Walsh begins with the weather — "warm but drizzly day" — and observations of who's in the gallery — Orrin Hatch and "a touch of true celebrity and talent when Lin-Manuel Miranda, the author (and original player of the title role) of the Broadway hit 'Hamilton'" and Josh Blackman (who tweets a photo of the autograph he got from Miranda on his pocket copy of the U.S. Constitution) — so this is chronological and grandiosely whimsical.

Walsh calls the argument a "fast-moving, hard-hitting hour" and clues me in that there's another post at SCOTUSblog that's the "main account" of the substance of the argument. I'll get to that. I continue with Walsh.

The NYT preports the firing of General McMaster.

"But in the nine months since [he introduced his Cabinet as a 'phenomenal team of people'], Mr. Trump has fired or forced out a half-dozen of the 'incredible, talented' people in the Cabinet Room that day: his secretaries of state and health, along with his chief strategist, his chief of staff, his top economic aide and his press secretary.... ''There will always be change. I think you want to see change,' Mr. Trump said, ominously, on Thursday. 'I want to also see different ideas.' That could include replacing Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster, the national security adviser. Three people close to Mr. Trump said that he has concluded that he should remove General McMaster, but that the time and successor were not yet something he had disclosed to others.General McMaster has often been at odds with Mr. Trump on policy. But unlike last year, when General McMaster tried to conform to please the president, he is now ready to leave and is merely waiting for Mr. Trump to ask, two people familiar with the adviser’s thinking said...."

Write Michael D. Shear and Maggie Haberman.

ADDED: Even stronger preporting at WaPo by Ashley Parker, Josh Dawsey, Philip Rucker and Carol D. Leonnig:

President Trump has decided to remove H.R. McMaster as his national security adviser and is actively discussing potential replacements, according to five people with knowledge of the plans, preparing to deliver yet another jolt to the senior ranks of his administration.

Trump is now comfortable with ousting McMaster, with whom he never personally gelled, but is willing to take time executing the move because he wants to ensure both that the three-star Army general is not humiliated and that there is a strong successor lined up, these people said.

"Senate consideration of a nominee under these circumstances is not fair to the president, to the nominee, or to the Senate itself."

"Where the nation should be treated to a consideration of constitutional philosophy, all it will get in such circumstances is partisan bickering and political posturing from both parties and from both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue."

Said Joe Biden in June of the election year 1992, when he was chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee, and the President was the Republican George H.S. Bush.

I didn't need that quote to know that it's a partisan power struggle — wrapped up in legal mystification — and if the parties were reversed the Democratic Senators would be saying what the GOP Senators are saying and the Republican President would be saying what the Democratic President is saying.

But I think it can help some people focus on reality... even as I believe that current political interest is a far stronger force than the search for the truth.

ADDED: The NYT front page highlights the Biden remarks as a "potential disaster":



Notice how the Times assumes the reader is on Obama's side on this, as it fails to add "for Obama" or "for Democrats" to "potential disaster." The link goes to a forum titled "Battle for the Supreme Court: Our Insiders’ Guide," and with comments by various NYT reporters. Michael D. Shear says:

For President Obama, it is a potential disaster. He and his Democratic allies had been carefully executing a pressure campaign aimed at shaming Republicans for vowing to block consideration of a nominee to replace Justice Scalia, but the emergence of a 24-year-old video on Monday throws into doubt the effectiveness of that strategy.

Carl Hulse says "Democrats may have taken one on the chin over the old video of Mr. Biden," but once Obama comes out with an actual nominee, the subject will change. That seems like a concession that Democrats have lost on the abstract point that the Senate has a duty not to obstruct.

"Considering Which Head or Heads May Roll for a Troubled Website Rollout."

A NYT headline... head- or heads- line.

Is severed head covered in the Obamacare-conforming plans?

The article, by Michael D. Shear, begins:

For weeks, the president and his aides have said they are not interested in conducting a witch hunt in the middle of the effort to rescue the website.

But they've gotten interested. Apparently, a witch hunt is just the right distraction for the holiday season. But heads are rolling, so the image is a guillotine — a reign of terror. But feel free to picture hangings (witch execution, American-style) or burnings at the stake (if you want to go medieval).

The possible targets include Kathleen Sebelius, the health and human services secretary; Marilyn Tavenner, the head of the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services; Mike Hash, the head of the health and human services health reform office; Michelle Snyder, the chief operating officer at Medicaid and Medicare; Henry Chao, the chief digital architect for the website; Jeanne Lambrew, the head of health care policy inside the White House; David Simas, a key adviser involved in the rollout; and Todd Park, the president’s top adviser on technology issues.

Don't pick all women. That would look bad. Maybe Mike Hash and Todd Park, I'd say, just going on the optics of the names. You just need heads. Which heads would look best on a pike?



Ha ha ha. Remember George Bush's head on a pike? Those were the days! Oh, the distractions of yore! What would distract the folks today? Will Obama traipsing about the country for 3 weeks, right up until Christmas Eve eve, do the trick? Think of all the pretty, empathetic people that can be lined up behind him. Just like a choir of Christmas carolers... bringing good tidings of great joy. But heads must roll! It's execution time. More apt for the Easter season, but Christ, you know it ain’t easy/You know how hard it can be/The way things are going/They’re gonna crucify me.

No, no, no. Our modern Messiah must survive. The metaphorical executions must be directed somewhere lower down. I say Mike Hash and Todd Park and then throw in a lady too. Kathleen Sebelius. No, make it Marilyn Tavenner.

That's a nice array of heads. Enough of a purge to settle you down until the new year?

"Inside the West Wing, where junior researchers monitor Twitter and other social media, officials knew the political controversy had moved beyond the broken website."

"Now it was about a broken promise. But for Mr. Obama, the mounting criticism was more than political. It felt personal."

From somewhere deep within the NYT front-page article "Inside the Race to Rescue a Health Care Site, and Obama," by Sheryl Gay Stolberg and Michael D. Shear. Even further down, this tickled me:

"On Friday, the president’s Chicago campaign team sent a message that little is off limits..."

"... using a searing video to raise doubts about Mr. Romney’s toughness in a national security crisis. They followed that up on Tuesday with a hard-hitting, kitchen-sink television commercial accusing Mr. Romney of sending jobs overseas and of sheltering his personal wealth in Swiss bank accounts. And then, in a seamless transition, Mr. Obama was in Afghanistan on Tuesday afternoon, vividly reminding Americans of the weighty responsibilities that he shoulders as the nation’s commander in chief and — by way of the one-year anniversary — of his decision to approve the raid that killed Osama bin Laden."

From a NYT opinion piece called "Romney Confronts Power of the Presidency," by Michael D. Shear. An alternate headline might be "Obama Embarrassingly Deploys the Power of the Presidency for Campaign Purposes."

When they shift back into campaign mode on Saturday...

Back?

Mr. Obama and his wife, Michelle....

A silly locution, found only in the New York Times.

... will bring to a close the first week of the general election campaign with a pair of huge campaign rallies in Ohio and Virginia that are intended to rekindle memories of his 2008 campaign.

I think this is a terrible mistake, going huge as a way to bring back the hugeness of 4 years ago. It's huge already to be President. You can't pile hugeness on top of that. And the hugeness of the past was something that built up, beginning from an unlikely underdog position, marked by the word "hope." This actually could work. How do you bring that feeling back? It's an intimate feeling, a sense that this new person has emerged. But a President holding 2 giant rallies? Going small is what would remind us of the past.

But the NYT's Shear is promoting the idea that Romney's in trouble, Romney's going to get it, because the President has the power of the Presidency to unload on the candidate who's so far only had to fight off midgets (or as Shear puts it — apparently without much knowledge of Bible stories — Romney's been "the Goliath in a field of Davids"). This appropriation of the power of presidency becomes an issue. It's an ugly thing when we can see it. Shear ends his piece with what is obviously going to be the Obama side of that issue:

The weaving of campaign and official business is the hallmark of presidential reelection campaigns, perfected by previous administrations of both parties. And Mr. Obama’s team will be no different in making use of the trappings of his office.

Mr. Obama’s team will be no different? Other's have "perfected" the "weaving"? I'm not seeing perfect weaving (or "seamless transition"). I'm seeing really crude and clumsy weaving and seams all over the place.