RealClearInvestigations'
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February 18 to February 24, 2024 In RealClearInvestigations, James Varney reports on the Biden-era resurgence of "sue and settle" -- a practice embraced by the Obama administration but rejected by Donald Trump and assailed by critics as an end run around democracy: -
The tactic is simple: An advocacy group sues a federal agency for failing to enforce the law. The two sides reach a private agreement ratified by the courts via a binding consent decree. -
Critics say the practice allows partisans to achieve results unattainable through normal democratic channels. -
Critic: “It’s not really an adversarial lawsuit. ... The EPA is anxious to increase its power and control; it’s always happy to expand that.” -
The practice is common at every level of government. But it is most prevalent in the environmental field, where well-funded groups sue the Enironmental Protection Agency or the Bureau of Land Management over, for example, alleged failure to enforce the Clean Air Act. -
“Sue and settle” is part of an even broader effort – called lawfare – in which partisans seek to achieve goals not through elections or legislation but the courts. This includes President Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election through the courts and the 91 indictments against the former president brought by authorities connected to the Democratic Party. -
One sign of how the practice has taken off under the Biden administration is the explosion in plaintiff’s legal fees as part of settlements – which means taxpayers pay for environmental lawsuits.
Waste of the Day
by Adam Andrzejewski, Open the Books Nebraska's Incredible 66-Hour Workday, RCI
Obamacare Subsidies Set to Explode, RCI
NJ Governor Scarfed Up Arena Snacks, RCI
'Digital TV Transition Ford' Was a Clunker, RCI
Pakistan to Study Gender Ties to Climate, RCI Biden, Trump and the Beltway As many corporate news outlets tried throw cold water on the Biden impeachment inquiry by blaming Republicans for trusting the FBI regarding a bribery allegation made by one of the bureau’s longtime, “highly credible” confidential informants, the House inquiry focused on Joe’s brother, James, this week. This article, which details the Biden family’s connection with a failed healthcare company, reports on “the many ways in which Jim Biden invoked his brother’s name and clout in the course of his work with Americore, which has since gone bankrupt, wreaking havoc in rural communities in the process.” Like his nephew Hunter, James sought a big payday in a field in which he had no experience and sought money from foreign sources (“investors in the Middle East”). In addition to having his name used as a chief selling point, Joe Biden also benefitted financially: POLITICO’s investigation did not find that Joe Biden involved himself in the firm or took actions on its behalf. However, Joe Biden did benefit indirectly from his brother’s work with the firm. On the same day Jim Biden received a $200,000 payment from Americore, he made out a check for his brother Joe. The White House has said the check was for repayment of a loan, but did not respond to questions about the circumstances of the loan, including whether Joe Biden was aware of his brother’s income from Americore. In a separate article, the Daily Mail reports that James Biden revealed to Republicans leading the impeachment probe into his brother Joe that he threw out a diamond his nephew Hunter Biden received as a gift from Chinese businessmen trying to 'entice' him to work with them. Hunter apparently gave the diamond to James to have it appraised, but he instead "threw it away," according to the source. That would be the second known diamond the Joe's son got from executives at the Chinese energy company CEFC. DailyMail.com previously reported that emails from Hunter's laptop showed he received $10 million a year for three years, and a diamond worth at least $80,000 in February 2017. In a separate article, Fox News reports that GOP lawmakers accused James Biden of contradicting himself during testimony when he said he was not part of a deal with his nephew Hunter Biden and business associates Rob Walker, Tony Bobulinski, and James Gilliar – a deal in which it is alleged the "Big Guy," Joe Biden, was promised 10% of the take. But when presented with an agreement with his signature on it, Biden changed his story, saying he did not recall signing the agreement, the source said. Other Biden, Trump and the Beltway Biden's Looming 'De Facto Electric Vehicle Mandate', Fox News
Slipping EV Demand Leads to Layoffs, Daily Mail
Biden Admin Cited 'Indigenous Knowledge' to Block Drilling, Free Beacon
Biden Administration Scrambles to Trump-Proof Its Policies, Politico
Inside the Tense Roundtable to 'Define' Jill Biden’s Legacy, Vanity Fair Other Noteworthy Articles and Series From the Annals of You Want the Government to Run Health Care? this article reports on an inspector general report that found that during the Obama and Trump administrations the White House Medical Unit widely dispensed sedatives and stimulants, failed to maintain records on potent drugs including fentanyl, and provided care to potentially hundreds of ineligible White House staff and contractors, while flouting other federal regulations: The inspector general’s report sparked significant public alarm. But a Washington Post review found problems with the unit’s conduct were even more pronounced than the Pentagon’s latest findings, according to administration documents and interviews with former White House staffers and medical unit members, who spoke on the condition of anonymity. ... Four former members of the White House Medical Unit confirmed that in both the Trump and Obama White Houses, the team passed out sedatives such as Ambien and stimulants such as Provigil without proper prescriptions, provided complimentary medical equipment and imaging to ineligible staffers, and used aliases in electronic health records to disguise the patients’ identities and deliver free care in cases where the recipients wouldn’t be eligible. The article tries to lay much of the blame on Ronny Jackson, an emergency medicine physician turned GOP congressman, who led the team under President Obama, who continued to exert control over the medical unit as President Trump’s personal doctor. He was reportedly nicknamed “Candyman” and “Dr. Feelgood.” Jackson’s office argued that he should not be blamed for events that took place after December 2014, when he stepped down as the medical unit’s director while remaining in the influential role of physician to the president. Despite the insistence of Democrats and much of the mainstream media, this article reports that the economy is not roaring back at, least in regard to one important item -- food: The last time Americans spent this much of their money on food, George H.W. Bush was in office, “Terminator 2: Judgment Day” was in theaters and C+C Music Factory was rocking the Billboard charts. Eating continues to cost more, even as overall inflation has eased from the blistering pace consumers endured throughout much of 2022 and 2023. Prices at restaurants and other eateries were up 5.1% last month compared with January 2023, while grocery costs increased 1.2% during the same period, Labor Department data show. The article reports that relief isn’t likely to arrive soon. “Restaurant and food company executives said they are still grappling with rising labor costs and some ingredients, such as cocoa, that are only getting more expensive.” On of the key financiers of Russia’s war effort in Ukraine is a little-known trader from Azerbaijan named Etibar Eyyub. As war sanctions led many Western buyers to seek a retreat from Russian oil, Eyyub has helped the country find new markets to keep its most important industry afloat, generating billions of dollars of revenue through a company called Nord Axis: [Eyyub has] assembled a clandestine trading and shipping empire that now moves vast quantities of oil to buyers in China, India and other new markets, according to people who have worked with or done deals with him. He cobbled together a fleet of aging tankers and disguised the trading by using a maze of companies registered in Dubai and Hong Kong, those people said. … Subterfuge appears to be integral to the operation. Working out of offices in Moscow and Dubai, traders routed transactions through Nord Axis and the other companies, making it difficult to determine who is profiting. Eyyub flies to and from Moscow by private jet, according to senior oil officials in the Middle East. This article reports that Eyyub may be working with an ostensible ally of the U.S.: One of the questions U.S. officials monitoring the trading have examined is whether it involves employees of Coral Energy, a commodities trader based in the United Arab Emirates for which Eyyub once worked. Coral continues to do business in Western nations where many companies have pledged not to buy or finance Russian oil. A Coral spokeswoman said that the company had stopped doing business with Eyyub in early 2022 when it decided to exit from the Russian market, and that it had no relation to Nord Axis or the other firms affiliated with Eyyub. Many details about the last months of Aleksei A. Navalny, the Russian opposition leader found dead in his gulag prison cell this month, remain unknown. This article draws on previous statements from him and his aides, his appearances in court, interviews with people close to him and excerpts from private letters that several friends, shared with the Times to provide some insight into his final months: The letters reveal the depth of the ambition, resolve and curiosity of a leader who galvanized the opposition to President Vladimir V. Putin and who, supporters hope, will live on as a unifying symbol of their resistance. They also show how Mr. Navalny – with a healthy ego and incessant confidence that what he was doing was right – struggled to stay connected to the outside world. … He boasted of reading 44 books in English in a year and was methodically preparing for the future: refining his agenda, studying political memoirs, arguing with journalists, dispensing career advice to friends and opining on viral social media posts that his team sent him. The letters and other material show that Navalny retained his three greatest gifts: his moral clarity, his courage and his sense of humor: Confined to cold, concrete cells and often alone with his books, Aleksei A. Navalny sought solace in letters. To one acquaintance, he wrote in July that no one could understand Russian prison life “without having been here,” adding in his deadpan humor: “But there’s no need to be here.” “If they’re told to feed you caviar tomorrow, they’ll feed you caviar,” Mr. Navalny wrote to the same acquaintance, Ilia Krasilshchik, in August. “If they’re told to strangle you in your cell, they’ll strangle you.” |
