The Show Notes: Biden's Unpopularity, Putin's Surgery, & Misinformation on Disinformation
Welcome! Vladimir Putin is undergoing cancer surgery and will briefly transfer power to someone else.
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Clip of the day: 😳
Biden’s Warning
For over a year, Biden’s personal pollster has been warning the President of the United States that inflation and immigration would drag his polling numbers down. The exclusive story from the New York Times is shocking, to say the least. Here’s an excerpt:
“Immigration is a growing vulnerability for the president,” John Anzalone and his team warned in a package of confidential polling, voter surveys and recommendations compiled for the White House. “Voters do not feel he has a plan to address the situation on the border, and it is starting to take a toll.”
Within a month, there was another stark warning. “Nearly nine in 10 registered voters are also concerned about increasing inflation,” said another memo obtained by The New York Times.
The series of confidential polling data and weekly memos presented to Mr. Biden’s inner circle from April of last year to January of this year provides a road map of the declining support of a president whose initial legislative proposals spurred comparisons to the New Deal or the Great Society.
The Disinformation Board
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas admitted on Sunday that his department could have done a better job explaining the role of the controversial Disinformation Board. Mayorkas then failed to define disinformation or clarify how the Disinformation Board would functionally operate. Here he is on CNN:
Update: Ukraine Sinks Russian Ships
Ukraine claims to have sunk two vessels in Russia’s navy near Snake Island in the Black Sea over the weekend. Heavy fighting continues in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine near the Russian border. Here are more Ukraine headlines:
Putin to undergo cancer surgery, transfer power to ex-FSB chief: report. - NY Post
Russia has lost over 23,800 soldiers and 2,500 combat vehicles. - Yahoo
How the ‘jack-in-the-box’ flaw dooms some Russian tanks. - Washington Post
Israel lashes out at Russia over Lavrov's Nazism remarks. - AP
A push to prosecute Putin over Ukraine war crimes. - WSJ
Finland has walked a political tightrope between Moscow and the West for decades. But that could be about to end. - CNBC
Mariupol evacuation is underway. - USA Today
Pelosi traveled to Kyiv to meet Zelenskyy. - NBC
Seriously, WaPo?
The Washington Post is deeply worried about injuries illegal immigrants might suffer from falling off of Trump’s border wall. You can’t make this up:
In the trauma wards of this city’s major hospitals, patients from the border have arrived every day with gruesome injuries: skull fractures, broken vertebrae and shattered limbs, their lower extremities twisted into deranged angles.
The patients have fallen from new 30-foot segments of President Donald Trump’s border wall, a structure he touted as a “Rolls-Royce” that “can’t be climbed.” His administration built more formidable barriers in the San Diego area than anywhere else along the southern border, with miles of double-layer steel fencing, but that has not stopped more and more migrants from trying to scale it.
Bonus clip: Biden official says “never let a crisis go to waste.”
The rest of the news:
COVID cases surge in New York City. - New York Times
China’s economy appears to be stalling. - WSJ
Rachel Levine says pediatricians all agree on importance of 'gender-affirming care' for children. - Fox News
Meet Nashville's transqueer Latinx neurodivergent theologian. - Tennessean
Manchin endorses W.Va. Republican in latest slam of Biden’s Build Back Better. - NY Post
Supreme Court says Boston should have allowed Christian flag on city property. - CNBC
Strength in numbers – maybe? House liberals mull their future. - Politico
Biden considering income stipulations on student loan cancellation: report. - Yahoo
China meets banks to discuss protecting assets from US sanctions. - Financial Times
The Bitter Fruit of Inflation: Dow 29500 (Arthur Laffer) - WSJ
Snapchat is selling a drone that serves as a selfie stick. - The Verge
Tweets that caught my eye: