Trump threatens surprise COVID bill veto: Pelosi agrees, relief checks should be $2,000

 https://chicago.suntimes.com/columnists/2020/12/22/22196626/trump-threatens-surprise-covid-bill-veto-pelosi-agrees-relief-checks-should-be-2000

 Trump’s central complaint in a video he posted on Twitter is that Congress should send folks $2,000 checks, not the “ridiculously low” amount of $600 his own Treasury Secretary, Steve Mnuchin, wanted.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi found herself in rare agreement with Trump.

Game on.

“Republicans repeatedly refused to say what amount the President wanted for direct checks. At last, the President has agreed to $2,000 — Democrats are ready to bring this to the Floor this week by unanimous consent. Let’s do it!” Pelosi said in a tweet.

Pelosi called Trump’s bluff.

Trump Slams COVID-19 Relief Bill, Asks For Changes After Bitter Negotiations- Trump supports Domocrats against Republicans

 https://www.npr.org/2020/12/22/949421102/trump-calls-relief-bill-a-disgrace-asks-for-changes-after-bitter-negotiations

President Trump is threatening to derail a $900 billion COVID-19 relief package passed by Congress on Monday after months of bitter negotiations.

In a video released on his Twitter feed Tuesday evening, Trump said he wants Congress to "send me a suitable bill or else the next administration will have to deliver a COVID relief package."

Trump said the bill was a "disgrace" and called the $600 payments to individuals in the current bill "ridiculously low." He said he wants that boosted to $2,000 per individual and $4,000 for couples — despite the fact that it was Republicans who stood in the way of higher payments for months.

Forcing wife beater to divorce wife

 

Binyamin Ze’ev (88). Concerning a husband who regularly beats his wife and she cries and groans from the abuse. How can the matter be corrected? You ask me my dear friend that since he doesn’t listen to the local rabbis whether the halacha is that he can be forced to divorce her if it can be shown that he is the instigator and not his wife? I found in the name of Rabbeinu Simcha who said in a similar case to force the husband to give a divorce since a woman marries for life not for suffering and every time he hits her he is committing a sin which is worse than if he was beating another man.  But it is best to make peace between the husband and wife by placing two or three people to mediate with them and ensure they keep their commitments to each other. If this doesn’t stop his abuse then it is agreed that the court will utilize non-Jews to force him to divorce her and tell him he must do as the Jews have said. Otherwise there is a problem that this will be an invalid divorce (get me’usa). Rabbeinu Simcha writes if nothing stops his abuse he is forced to divorce even through the use of non-Jews because in such a case the forcing is valid even though our Sages (Gitten) say that normally the use of non-Jews would make it invalid. But if they say “do as the Jewish judges have said” as we see from the Semag (50). Nevertheless the husband needs to say at the end of being forced that he is really doing it from his own free will. We can rely on this ruling of Rabbeinu Simchah to force the husband to divorce. .

Netanyahu’s Coalition Government Collapses After Budget Bill Failure – Triggering Israel’s 4th Election in 2 Years

 https://time.com/5924341/israel-netanyahu-government-collapses/

Israel’s brittle governing coalition collapsed after just seven months, sending the election-fatigued country to its fourth vote in two years.

The campaign will feature a new challenger who might win enough support to dethrone the long-serving Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, polls suggest. The ballot is to take place on March 23 after parliament failed to approve a national budget for the second year in a row.

The grudging alliance between Netanyahu and Defense Minister Benny Gantz had been formed expressly to avoid another vote after three inconclusive matchups, and to combine forces to contain the coronavirus outbreak. A fourth race, after long months of policy paralysis, will be especially bruising as the virus defies efforts to tame it, talk of a third national lockdown is percolating, and unemployment is a steep 15%.

Cuomo: This is a very bad situation the President is creating

Orthodox leaders back calls for mass vaccination

 https://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/293523

 At the beginning of his weekly video Torah lesson, Rabbi Asher Weiss let his viewers know he was about to broach a contentious topic.

“I know that not everybody will like what I say,” said Weiss, a leading Orthodox Jewish legal authority in Israel with a large following in the United States, peppering Hebrew terms into his speech. “But if I won’t speak my mind I think it would be a sin.”

The sensitive subject of his lesson?

The COVID-19 vaccine. After an hourlong class packed with rabbinic sources, Weiss gave his verdict: “When we deal with the question [of whether] to take the vaccine: Yes. Definitely yes.

'Sociopathic': GOP Presidential Speechwriter Blasts Trump’s Scheme To Overturn Election He Lost

Barr rebukes Trump's baseless election fraud claims

'This is not a drill': Berman breaks down actions Trump is considering

Election prevention bill fails, Israel headed to elections on March 23

 https://www.jpost.com/breaking-news/gideon-saar-blasts-netanyahu-gantz-budget-deal-652786

A bill proposed to avoid Knesset dispersal and the fourth elections over the last two years has failed to pass on Monday night, sealing Israel's fate.

47 MKs voted for the bill, while 49 voted against. The 23rd Knesset will be dissolved automatically at midnight on Tuesday night.

 

Barr says he has 'no plan' to appoint election, Hunter Biden special counsels

 https://www.foxnews.com/politics/barr-no-special-counsel-election-hunter-biden

Attorney General William Barr on Monday said he has "no plan" to appoint a special counsel to take over the federal investigation into Hunter Biden’s "tax affairs," or one to probe allegations of widespread voter fraud in the 2020 presidential election. 

 "I think to the extent that there's an investigation, I think that it's being handled responsibly and professionally," Barr said Monday about the investigation into Hunter Biden. "To this point I have not seen a reason to appoint a special counsel and I have no plan to do so before I leave."

 

How voters rank Trump a historically bad president

 https://edition.cnn.com/2020/12/20/politics/trump-presidency-history-analysis/index.html

 A new Fox News poll finds that 42% of voters say history will remember President Donald Trump as one of the worst presidents ever.

An additional 8% say he will be remembered as below average, while 22% say one of the greatest, 16% say above average and 10% say below average.

Inside Trump’s pressure campaign to overturn the election

 https://www.politico.com/news/2020/12/21/trump-pressure-campaign-overturn-election-449486

 Trump’s efforts to cling to power are unprecedented in American history. While political parties have fought over the results of presidential elections before, no incumbent president has ever made such expansive and individualized pleas to the officials who oversee certification of the election results. Trump even used his presidential perch to compel officials to talk with him, summoning state officials to the White House on a few-hours notice and insisting that his outreach was simply part of his presidential duties.

 “There was always this feeling of supreme confidence that no matter how it looks it’s all going to work out for him, something will happen and it will all work out for him because it did once before,” said Scott Jennings, who worked in the George W. Bush White House and is close to Trump’s team. “I think that sort of magical confidence or magical thinking, persisted right through Election Day and right through this post-election.”

Trump's bizarre defense of Russian hacks becomes dangerous - comment

 https://www.jpost.com/american-politics/trumps-bizarre-defense-of-russian-hacks-becomes-dangerous-comment-652730

 US President Donald Trump’s statement on Saturday contradicting all his cyber and law enforcement agencies, as well as his loyal Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, about Russia’s massive cyberattack on the US, has probably crossed into dangerous territory.

That danger is that the Trump is refusing to name the country that has escalated cyber war against America to unprecedented proportions.