GIVING
ITEM: In this season of thanks and giving, please support the daily production of Wide World of News by becoming a voluntary paid subscriber or contributor.
What the second smartest person will say on your final pre-Thanksgiving Zoom: Become a voluntary contributor by sending an email to markhalperintalk@gmail.com and asking how you can arrange to give any amount of your choice.
What the smartest person will say on your final pre-Thanksgiving Zoom:
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FEDDING
ITEM:
Politico’s super sage Ben White:
In the end, Biden did what many close to him expected: He took a longer-than-anticipated amount of time to arrive at a reasonable, moderate decision that thrilled few but carried limited risk.
What the second smartest person will say on your final pre-Thanksgiving Zoom: What strange bedfellows – Donald Trump, the Wall Street Journal ed board, and Elizabeth Warren all oppose Powell being renominated.
What the smartest person will say on your final pre-Thanksgiving Zoom: What strange bedfellows -- Pramila Jayapal and the establishmentarian Gang of 500 (per spokesman David Ignatius) all support Powell being renominated.
“My only question is, who is our bigger enemy, Jay Powell or Chairman Xi?”
-- Donald Trump in 2019
After a rocky few months in which President Biden sometimes seemed captive of the progressive wing of his own party, he took a solid step back toward the center Monday in renominating Jerome H. Powell as Federal Reserve chair….
Biden’s standing with the public won’t be affected much, one way or another, by who runs the Federal Reserve. But this week he seemed to recover a bit of authority to do what makes sense for the country, regardless of bickering on the left and right.
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FUELING
ITEM:
The Biden administration is expected to release oil from the Strategic Petroleum Reserves in coordination with other nations in the coming days in a bid to tamp down the recent increase in gasoline prices, people familiar with the effort said Monday.
The U.S. release is expected to be between 30 million and 35 million barrels and would be carried out over time, one of the people said. The administration is currently trying to coordinate concurrent releases with foreign governments, including those in China and Japan, a process that has complicated the timing for an announcement, two of the people added.
“I expect there will be a major move quite soon,” said one of the people familiar with the plan.
A release of that magnitude would represent about three day's worth of U.S. crude oil production.
What the second smartest person will say on your final pre-Thanksgiving Zoom: This quote in the Washington Post is one of the funniest things I have ever read:
“Politically, it’s easier to say ‘we’re going to make things cheaper for you’ than ‘we’re going to make things more expensive for you,’ ” said one senior White House official, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal dynamics.
What the smartest person will say on your final pre-Thanksgiving Zoom: As any White House press secretary can tell you, gas prices, like a president’s approval ratings, will go up and gas prices will go down. As any old Washington hand can tell you, presidents are no more able to control the former than they are the latter.
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BADGERING
ITEM: With the Tucker Carlson interview, the Rittenhouse verdict still smolders hotter than Waukesha burns.
What the second smartest person will say on your final pre-Thanksgiving Zoom: Maybe Thanksgiving will keep Waukesha from blowing up the nation the way Halperin feared on Monday.
What the smartest person will say on your final pre-Thanksgiving Zoom: Read Gerard Baker to understand how very strongly Red America feels about Blue America’s reaction to the Rittenhouse verdict; read Nancy Rommelmann to understand how all of America should being reacting to the verdict.
If the left’s reaction to this case doesn’t scare you, I am afraid you don’t understand what it represents, or how rapidly and how far the poison of this subversive and illiberal dogma has already spread through a political movement and ideology we once called liberal.
If there is any hope that last week’s not-guilty verdict might do any good, might bridge the divide so many seem to prize and which every day gets an assist from the press, it is that we realize we need not continue this battle, that we can make Mr. Rittenhouse the last example of this particular war. Some on the right have sought to valorize Mr. Rittenhouse with in-your-face theatrics. Yet there has been little to no violence since the verdict; protests in Kenosha have been peaceful. I hope that this might be the moment we admit that our fear of the other birthed the events we claim to despise, that we created them and they have brought misery, and that we might now summon the courage and curiosity to look toward one another and say, we see how this happened, what can we make happen next?
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TRAVELING
Item:
Widespread flight cancellations. Excruciating waits for customer service. Unruly passengers.
And that was all before the holiday travel season.
Even in normal times, the days around Thanksgiving are a delicate period for the airlines. But this week is the industry’s biggest test since the pandemic began, as millions more Americans — emboldened by vaccinations and reluctant to spend another holiday alone — are expected to take to the skies than during last year’s holidays.
A lot is riding on the carriers’ ability to pull it off smoothly….
The Transportation Security Administration said it expected to screen about 20 million passengers at airports in the 10 days that began Friday, a figure approaching prepandemic levels. Two million passed through checkpoints on Saturday alone, about twice as many as on the Saturday before last Thanksgiving.
What the second smartest person will say on your final pre-Thanksgiving Zoom: Leave for the airport three hours before your flight.
What the smartest person will say on your final pre-Thanksgiving Zoom: You know what a “magazine” is? Bring one or two of those with you. And remember: Be nice to others (including airline employees) and they will be nice to you.
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(UN)SURPRISING
ITEM:
What the second smartest person will say on your final pre-Thanksgiving Zoom: Try a bus or a bike.
What the smartest person will say on your final pre-Thanksgiving Zoom: What President Kennedy said in his second-best joke is still all-too-true: Washington is a city of Northern charm and Southern efficiency.
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ENJOYING
Item: Peter Jackson’s six-hour documentary “The Beatles: Get Back” streams Thursday, Friday and Saturday on Disney+.
In segments screened for USA TODAY, John Lennon and Harrison snicker like schoolboys when engineers pause the recording to announce McCartney’s bass is out of tune. Lennon cracks a lewd joke about “I’ve Got a Feeling” as The Beatles fumble and bumble through unfamiliar material, and no one can remember the title of “The Long and Winding Road.” Ringo Starr chummily shares a piece of gum with Yoko Ono, who does needlework at John’s side. Arms are thrown around shoulders and lunch plans are made. The beloved rooftop concert at their Apple Corps. headquarters plays out in full, running 42 minutes. The grainy look of the first movie has disappeared, replaced by crisp footage with lifelike clarity.
What the second smartest person will ask on your final pre-Thanksgiving Zoom: Who has a Disney+ login I can use?
What the smartest person will say on your final pre-Thanksgiving Zoom: OMG OMG OMG OMG.
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