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[Possible payouts to senators of at least $500K unnerve some House Republicans ahead of shutdown vote]

#41

Off the Record / Re: What does a TRUMP presiden...

Last post by Tonitrus - November 12, 2025, 02:55:01 PM

Who was asking for that?

He (Sen. Rand Paul) and hemp industry insiders have blamed Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) for the inclusion of the hemp ban after he advocated for closing a "loophole" in the 2018 Farm Bill that allowed for the unregulated sale of the products.

And of course, some Senators want in on Trump's action of getting a payoff/bribe/moneygrab...

Possible payouts to senators of at least $500K unnerve some House Republicans ahead of shutdown vote
By David Lerman, CQ-Roll Call
Updated: 1 hour ago
Published: 1 hour ago

The U.S. Capitol last week. (AP Photo/Mariam Zuhaib)
WASHINGTON — A Senate provision in a major spending package to end the partial government shutdown has rattled House Republicans and given new political ammunition to Democrats seeking to defeat the measure.

A provision in the fiscal 2026 Legislative Branch spending bill, which is part of the package, would allow senators to sue for at least $500,000 each when federal investigators search their phone records in a judicially sanctioned probe without notifying them.

It would also apply retroactively, meaning at least 10 senators whose records were searched by former special counsel John L. "Jack" Smith in his probe of the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol would automatically be entitled to big payouts.

The eleventh-hour discovery of the provision, which apparently caught House leaders by surprise, became a new flashpoint on the eve of a critical House vote scheduled for Wednesday that could effectively end the longest partial shutdown in history.

It didn't appear the Senate language would be enough to derail the government-reopening package. But several Republicans who spoke at the House Rules Committee hearing on the bill late Tuesday made clear that they want to at least see separate legislation to fix the provision after the shutdown ends.

'A hard night'
Rep. Austin Scott, R- Ga., said he "had a hard night" when he first heard of the language's existence Monday. "And I've been struggling with what the right vote is, because of what the Senate did," he said.

Scott seized on the retroactive application of the provision, as well as the fact that not only would each senator receive a $500,000 payment for each violation, but that they'd receive payments for each account or device used. That could mean up to six separate violations for $500,000 each, given lawmakers' multiple phones and email addresses for their campaigns, business and personal use, Scott said.

"They're saying the executive branch shouldn't be checking up on the legislative branch. Well, there's some truth to that," Scott said. "When they made it retroactive, then all of a sudden it was no longer about good governance. ... There's actually a list of people that know they will get paid as soon as this thing is signed."

As it stands, there are at least 10 GOP senators whose data is said to have been collected as part of Smith's investigation, code named "Arctic Frost," that began in the spring of 2022: Marsha Blackburn and Bill Hagerty of Tennessee; Josh Hawley of Missouri; Lindsey Graham of South Carolina; Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming; Dan Sullivan of Alaska; Tommy Tuberville of Alabama; Ron Johnson of Wisconsin; Ted Cruz of Texas and Rick Scott of Florida.

Rep. Mike Kelly, R- Pa., was also named in documents, but as a House member he wouldn't be eligible for payouts.

"I do not think that this provision should have been inserted, it certainly shouldn't have been inserted at the eleventh hour," Rep. Chip Roy, R- Texas, said during the Rules meeting.

"I think there's going to be a lot of people, if they look and understand this, they're going to see this as self-serving, self-dealing kind of stuff, and I don't think that's right," added Roy, who is running for Texas attorney general. "It is beside my comprehension that this got put in the bill. And it's why people have such a low opinion of this town."

Democrats used up a good chunk of their time at the meeting, and at an earlier news conference, to call attention to the provision and blast GOP acceptance of it.

"I think it is outrageous, outrageous, for these Republican senators to effectively guarantee themselves million-dollar paydays," said Rep. Joe Neguse, D- Colo. He quizzed House Appropriations Chairman Tom Cole, R- Okla., who testified in support of the bill at Rules, about the provision.

Cole expressed support for the general idea of the provision, but said he didn't know anything about its inclusion in the spending bill.

"I am very concerned that anybody, whether they're in the House or the Senate, is singled out and not notified that their records are being subpoenaed. That concerns me a great deal," Cole said.

"Now, did I know about this provision in the bill? No. Do I think it needs to be in a funding bill? Not particularly," Cole continued. "But do I think getting the government opened is important? Yes I do."

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries, D- N.Y., who is pushing to defeat the bill in an effort to extend expiring enhanced health insurance subsidies, was quick to seize on the provision at a news conference Tuesday evening.

"We're going to tattoo that provision ... on the foreheads of every single House Republican who dares vote for this bill," he said.

Rep. Suhas Subramanyam, D- Va., spoke in favor of an amendment at Rules to strip the Senate provision.

"This is our only chance to right this wrong and this is corruption," he told the committee. "It is theft in broad daylight. And anyone, anyone, voting against this amendment ... is complicit in that corruption."

But there was no sign that House Republicans were prepared to derail the bill, even as they expressed their concern about the Senate provision.

"I personally agree that it should be removed," Scott said. "The problem is, if we remove it ... it has to go back to the Senate, and then you're right back to where you were 40 days ago," he said, referring to the start of the partial shutdown that began Oct. 1.

Senate Appropriations Chair Susan Collins, R- Maine, had inserted the provision at the behest of Senate Majority Leader John Thune, R- S.D., according to House Appropriations ranking Democrat Rosa DeLauro of Connecticut.

Scott said his understanding was that Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer, D- N.Y., also signed off on the language, and that Senate leaders hadn't shared the information with House GOP leaders.

Republican senators were furious to learn that Smith had subpoenaed their phone records in 2023 without their knowledge. Smith, through attorneys, has defended the search as a lawful attempt to probe the actions of President Donald Trump and associates that led up to the Jan. 6 attack.

And some Democrats, for their part, fear what Trump's Justice Department might do to them without similar legal protections.

While Democrats agreed that an attempt to ensure notification may be appropriate, they said Senate leaders went too far by arranging for retroactive payments that would apply only to senators as opposed to House members or anyone else caught up in a probe.

"Regardless of anyone's opinion on what happened on Jan. 6, it should be unacceptable to every member of the House that the Senate can secretly add language to a bill without even notifying us," DeLauro told the Rules Committee.

Roy, a prominent voice in the ultraconservative Freedom Caucus, denounced the Senate provision but left his options open as to what he wanted to do about it.

"We need to fund the government and we need to get this passed, and I'm trying to figure out what we can do to force the Senate's hand," Roy said. "That provision needs to get fixed and we need to find a way as a body to get it fixed as soon as possible, and I'm continuing [to] explore the options."

Rep. Morgan Griffith, R- Va., piled on, saying he was "very concerned" about the "highly suspect" provision.

Griffith said amending the spending package to fix the provision would be a step too far.

"I will not vote for any amendments because the shutdown needs to end. It's been going on too long. Too many of my people are hurting," Griffith said. "We can't take any more suffering. I need to vote to open the government back up."

I like the pro-government GOP twist at the end. 

#42

Gaming HQ / Re: Europa Universalis V confi...

Last post by Valmy - November 12, 2025, 02:52:05 PM

Event/Mission trees are gone I believe someone said earlier. How are things like... historical events or missions or whatever? Is there some actual flavor you're seeing in the game popping up throughout the years?

Well I am still only in the 15th century but there are things like Poland and Lithuania getting a bonus to relations because of historical flavor.

During a brief goofing off game with Byzantium just to check it out I saw many events of doom threatening to fire if I didn't take dramatic steps.

#43

Gaming HQ / Re: Europa Universalis V confi...

Last post by Sophie Scholl - November 12, 2025, 02:47:43 PM

Event/Mission trees are gone I believe someone said earlier. How are things like... historical events or missions or whatever? Is there some actual flavor you're seeing in the game popping up throughout the years?

#44

Off the Record / Re: Brexit and the waning days...

Last post by garbon - November 12, 2025, 02:29:38 PM

I am not underestimateling Farage. Winning an election and being able to govern are two entirely separate things.

As Labour has amply demonstrated.

#45

Off the Record / Re: The Population Decline Thr...

Last post by Jacob - November 12, 2025, 02:10:27 PM

Again, source?  Keep in mind that the Christian writers had a penchant for demonizing non-Christians.

So my impression is a synthesis of reading I've done over the years, but doing a bit of quick internet search it certainly seems that infanticide being a practice has some support among scholars:

The abstract of the article A critical assessment of the evidence for selective female infanticide as a cause of the Viking Age states:

There currently exists in the study of Viking archaeology a strong support for the theory, popularised by Barrett (2015), that selective female infanticide in the Late Scandinavian Iron Age to Early Viking Age resulted in the sudden expansion of Scandinavian influence, through raiding, invading, and trading, across Europe that categorises the Viking age

To me that's sufficient to accept the fact that the idea that the vikings practiced infanticide has scholarly support.

It's an archeological fact that the remains of infants are often found buried in the floors of human dwellings. The author of Ritual Bones or Common Waste does not writing directly about whether the remains are the result of infanticide, but nonetheless states:

The reason behind the infant burials placed in the middle of settlements that usually lack human graves is intriguing. Several possible explanations including separate burial customs for very, small children, infanticide, sacrifice or magical rituals, can be envisioned.

The abstract of the article Sex Identification in Some Putative Infanticide Victims from Roman Britain Using Ancient DNA states:

Infanticide has since time immemorial been an accepted practice for disposing of unwanted infants. Archaeological evidence for infanticide was obtained in Ashkelon, where skeletal remains of some 100 neonates were discovered in a sewer, beneath a Roman bathhouse, which might have also served as a brothel. Written sources indicate that in ancient Roman society infanticide, especially of females, was commonly practised, but that females were occasionally saved and reared as courtesans. We performed DNA-based sex identification of the infant remains. Out of 43 left femurs tested 19 specimens provided results: 14 were found to be males and 5 females. The high frequency of males suggests selective preservation of females and that the infants may have been offspring of courtesans, serving in the bathhouse, supporting its use as a brothel.

My reading over the years has mostly been focused on pre-Christian Europe, but in searching for answers for you I came across Death Control in the West 1500–1800: Sex Ratios at Baptism in Italy, France and England - a suggestion that infanticide was quite widespread in early modern (1500-1800) Europe as well (you can read an article about it here).

So the scholarship on infanticide does not seem to be all about demonizing pre-Christian populations.

Like I said in my post, I'm not sufficiently educated to have an opinion on whether the interpretations are correct or not, but it seems pretty clear to me that there's scholarship that argues that infanticide was accepted practice.

#46

Off the Record / Re: Brexit and the waning days...

Last post by Tamas - November 12, 2025, 01:52:41 PM

I am not underestimateling Farage. Winning an election and being able to govern are two entirely separate things.

#47

Off the Record / Re: Brexit and the waning days...

Last post by Sheilbh - November 12, 2025, 01:46:08 PM

I totally agree.

My point is that doesn't happen external of politics. It is through the political process and the argument you make that you pin policy failures on the culprits (I think of Michael Foot's Guilty Men polemic) and make them bear the costs.

I think part of the problem is the expectation of external factors to cause political results in a sort of politically frictionless way. Or that too many people in the mainstream traditional view politics as a branch of technocratic management not convincing and argument-building. Having failed at the technical management but the bond markets or the currency traders or whatever else will do what they are no longer able/willing to do which is make the case of the political failure. It can happen (Truss and her budget, John Major and ERM) but over a shock, not a slowly deflating balloon.

And if you want to unwind it, then I think the slowly deflating balloon is too undramatic in most people's experience to be self-evident. You need to make the argument relentlessly - not just expecting deliverance that is not coming plus talking about "grown-ups in the room" and having at best a patronising attitude to the voters who let you down. Link the failures to the consequences and have an alternative.

Europe has never been settled in British politics and I don't think it ever will (for that reason I think the EU should just veto us forever). So there was an audience for an anti Europe message, but honestly if you're someone who really believes we need to re-join then there's no politician you should study more than Farage who spent twenty plus years, much of it as a joke but took his idee fixe from the fringes to victory.

Although I would add that I think there's an element of the harlot's prerogative about this. As Farage became an MP for the first time in 2024 - the Tories were in government over managing Brexit and it's fair to say that they have been roundly punished by voters. I think you'd see something similar with Scottish independence - the SNP would suffer the consequences of having to do it, while other parties (like the Greens) who back the principle would, I suspect, be fine and possibly even do better as they wouldn't be affected by the grubby compromises of power.

#48

Off the Record / Re: TV/Movies Megathread

Last post by The Minsky Moment - November 12, 2025, 01:38:27 PM

On the other hand Billy Preston wasn't in the band and he showed up and basically did the same thing. So it could just be that is just how musicians who are really good operate.

Still I was impressed by his talent and ability for what it is worth.

Billy Preston was also a very fine musician and IMO the one person who truly merits the label of "Fifth Beatle"

There's a school of thought that the role of the drummer is to play the time and get it right and not screw around with varying pulses or fancy fills and solos. I associate it with Lennny Tristano but that's a pretty obscure reference - Joe Morello who played with Brubeck also had the same view.

On that school of thought, Ringo was an A tier drummer: an experienced professional who could play a variety of beats and tempos and stay rock solid on time.  And in a band like the Beatles who became very experimental with composition and orchestration and where Paul and George became increasingly adventurous on bass and lead, having someone like that was exactly what the band needed. Play covers of Chuck Berry, no problem. Merseyside pop, sure. Adding in Indian influenced drones, go right ahead.  Mix in all the crazy studio effects you want, Ringo will keep in on track.  Insert an entire orchestra playing wild dissosnant chords?  He literally won't miss a beat.

So sure he might not have the full chops of a Ginger Baker, but that misses the point.

#49

Off the Record / Re: The Population Decline Thr...

Last post by grumbler - November 12, 2025, 01:32:57 PM

What is the argument being made regarding infanticide? That it occurred seems to me to be a truism.

#50

Off the Record / Re: TV/Movies Megathread

Last post by grumbler - November 12, 2025, 01:32:00 PM

Seriously. I thought it was John Goodman playing Goering at first.

More recent pictures show Crowe as having lost a lot of the weight he put on for the role. He's still pretty hefty, though.