Good morning.
Saturday in Whitewater will be sunny with a high of ninety-three. Sunrise is 5:20 AM and sunset 8:37 PM, for 15h 17m 01s of daytime. The moon is a waning gibbous with 95.3% of its visible disk illuminated.
Whitewater’s 4th of July festival opens today at noon, live music begins at 2 PM, and there will be fireworks at 10 PM.
On this day in 1775, the Continental Congress establishes sixty-nine Articles of War to govern the conduct of the Continental Army.
Recommended for reading in full —
Heather Long writes ‘Not what we expected’: Trump’s tax bill is losing popularity:Reid Wilson explains Foxconn deal raises concerns of taxpayer giveaways:In a packed arena in Fargo, N.D., this week, President Trump’s most ardent supporters roared with approval when he talked about protecting the U.S. borders, beating the Democrats and “respect for our great, beautiful, wonderful American flag.” When Trump pivoted to the tax bill, his top legislative accomplishment, the crowd clapped — but without the fervor they had shown for many of his other applause lines.
Trump signed the tax cut legislation just before Christmas. Six months later, it is losing popularity.
American families are unsure whether they are benefiting from the tax cut, and small businesses say they are confused by the complex changes affecting them. A recent poll from Monmouth University found 34 percent of adults approve of the tax cut now, a slide from January when adults were about evenly split between approving and disapproving. And about a third of families say they are better off because of the cuts, according to polls by Politico and the New York Times.
“The state is grossly overspending on a very risky deal. Even by its own math, the state says it won’t break even for 25 years. In high tech, that’s three lifetimes,” said Greg LeRoy, who heads Good Jobs First, a watchdog group that tracks lavish incentive packages states and cities give to corporations.
The incentive package passed by Wisconsin’s GOP-controlled legislature, during a special session last August, will offer the company $1.5 billion to offset payroll costs and another $1.35 billion for capital expenditures. The state will give Foxconn $150 million in sales tax exemptions on construction materials, and it plans to spend a quarter of a billion dollars on road improvements near the new factory.
The town of Mount Pleasant, where the factory will be located, will offer $763 million to help pay for the project, and Racine County gave the company $50 million to acquire the land.
In total, Wisconsin, Racine County and Mount Pleasant gave the company nearly $4.8 billion in tax breaks, incentives and taxpayer dollars for improvements. If Foxconn delivers all 13,000 jobs it has promised, that works out to about $370,000 per job.
“Foxconn is a great deal for Foxconn and an absolutely terrible deal for Wisconsin,” said Richard Florida, an urban planning expert who heads the University of Toronto’s Martin Prosperity Institute. He called the deal “a complete and total waste of taxpayer money.”
(The national press knows and reports what a waste Foxconn is; it’s only some of the state and local press, or local business leagues, etc., that sell a different – and false – story to the desperately gullible or profoundly ignorant.)
Tiffany Hsu reports G.M. Says New Wave of Trump Tariffs Could Force U.S. Job Cuts:Kathryn Dunn Tenpas writes With the revelation of Marc Short’s impending departure, President Trump has lost the vast majority of Tier One staff members:General Motors warned Friday that if President Trump pushed ahead with another wave of tariffs, the move could backfire, leading to “less investment, fewer jobs and lower wages” for its employees.
The automaker said that the president’s threat to impose tariffs on imports of cars and car parts — along with an earlier spate of penalties — could drive vehicle prices up by thousands of dollars. The “hardest hit” cars, General Motors said in comments submitted to the Commerce Department, are likely to be the ones bought by consumers who can least afford an increase. Demand would suffer and production would slow, all of which “could lead to a smaller G.M.”
The president has promoted tariffs as a way to protect American businesses and workers, aiming at dozens of nations with metal tariffs, as well as bringing broader levies against Chinese goods. But companies, which rely on other markets for sales, production and materials, have been increasingly vocal about the potential damage from his policies.
The warning by G.M., echoed in comments by trade groups and other automakers, could test the president’s aggressive approach to trade and his commitment to business. In the past, Mr. Trump has lauded General Motors for its job creation and vowed to defend the auto industry.
Sometimes, one confronts aIn the whirlwind of staff departures that has characterized the first year and a half of the Trump administration, Marc Short’s recent announcement struck me as particularly noteworthy for a few reasons. Unlike many senior aides, Mr. Short has not drawn the ire of his boss via Twitter, nor does it appear that he is resigning under any pressure. Instead, his tenure has been marked by the passage of tax reform and the ability to maintain ongoing support among most congressional Republicans. Perhaps more importantly, however, his departure marks the further erosion of the most senior-level staff members within the Trump team.
To analyze the impact of Short’s impending departure, I relied on the National Journal’s series “Decisionmakers.” (Published at the beginning of each administration from Reagan through Obama, this special issue identifies the most influential aides to an incoming president.) An inventory of these many positions revealed that twelve were mentioned in every single edition (I call these “Tier One”), and presumably reflect the “crème de la crème” within the ranks of presidential advisers. This sub-sample includes the following positions: Chief of Staff, Deputy Chief of Staff, Press Secretary, Assistant to the President for Public Liaison, Assistant to the President for Legislative Affairs, Assistant to the President for Intergovernmental Affairs, White House Counsel, Staff Secretary, Cabinet Secretary, National Security Adviser, Deputy National Security Adviser and Chair of the Counsel of Economic Advisers.
Of these twelve positions within the Trump Administration, a full two-thirds have left the White House, and with the recent revelation that the Legislative Affairs Director, Marc Short, will be leaving this summer, 75 percent of the president’s most senior aides will have departed within the first 18 months of the administration. In some instances, a single position has turned over a full two times or more (e.g., Deputy Chief of Staff, Deputy National Security Adviser, and National Security Adviser). The three remaining Tier One aides within the Trump team are White House Counsel Don McGahn (who has reportedly threatened to leave), Cabinet Secretary Bill McGinley and the Chair of the Council of Economic Advisers, Kevin Hassett.