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Energy
End the Ethanol Rip-Off
NEW YORK TIMES
Robert Bryce
Federal law currently requires fuel retailers to blend about 13 billion gallons of corn ethanol per year into the gasoline they sell to the public, making the gas more expensive. This year, that mandate, known as the Renewable Fuel Standard, will impose about $10 billion in additional fuel costs on motorists.
The GOP’s Renewable Evangelists
WALL STREET JOURNAL
Editorial
Some of our media friends gripe that Iowa is the wrong state to start the GOP presidential race because it’s full of social conservatives. The real reason it’s a bad place to start is because it’s the heartland of Republican corporate welfare.
Florida’s Gov. Rick Scott denies muzzling global warming talk
POLITICO
Marc Caputo
Florida Gov. Rick Scott on Monday denied an investigative report that his environmental protection agency muzzled workers from talking about global warming – but he also made clear that he didn’t want to talk about the issue at all. The controversy erupted Sunday after the nonprofit Florida Center for Investigative Reporting published an account quoting former Florida Department of Environmental Protection staffers who said agency leaders under Scott pressured them to not mention “global warming,” “climate change” or “sea level rise.”
Republicans criticize climate change cost accounting
THE HILL
Timothy Cama
Led by Environment and Public Works Committee Chairman Jim Inhofe (R-Okla.), 11 senators wrote to the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs (OIRA) Monday to investigate the administration’s social cost of carbon. The administration uses social cost of carbon to calculate the societal benefits of regulations that reduce greenhouse gas emissions that are believed to cause climate change. The Obama administration currently pegs the cost of carbon emissions — and the benefit of reducing them — at $37 per ton.
Technology
Obama Opens U.S. Effort to Fill High-Paying Tech Jobs
NEW YORK TIMES
Peter Baker
President Obama kicked off an initiative on Monday intended to train more people for higher-paying jobs in high-technology services as he seeks to counter wage stagnation in an economy that has otherwise been improving.
Net Neutrality Has Sparked an Interagency Squabble Over Internet Privacy
NATIONAL JOURNAL
Brendan Sasso
As part of its net neutrality regulations, the Federal Communications Commission is assigning itself the power to ensure that Internet providers such as Comcast and AT&T protect their customers’ privacy. The problem is that another agency already had that job. The Federal Trade Commission is the main federal regulator for consumer protection and online privacy issues. And it isn’t happy about being replaced by the FCC in the broadband industry.
Senate approves former Google executive for patent chief
THE HILL
Jordain Carney and Mario Trujillo
The Senate on Monday approved a former Google executive to lead the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, which has been without a confirmed leader for more than two years.
Finance
Tea Party Divided by Export-Import Bank
NEW YORK TIMES
Jonathan Weisman
For conservatives, frustrated by their failure to overturn the Affordable Care Act or stop President Obama’s immigration policies, killing the Export-Import Bank has taken on enormous importance. They do not have to overcome a presidential veto or beat a Democratic filibuster. They simply have to refuse to bring it to a vote. Republicans have no excuse, warned Michael A. Needham, chief executive of Heritage Action for America, one of the groups demanding the bank’s demise. “All Congress has to do is nothing, which they have proven themselves to be pretty good at,” he said. The business leaders who seek a reprieve, many of them Republicans, are in disbelief and are promising retribution.
Fed Broadens Scope of Stress Tests
WALL STREET JOURNAL
James Sterngold
Conceived in 2009 by the Federal Reserve as narrow, once-a-year snapshots of bank health, the tests have morphed into protracted top-to-bottom examinations that have required firms to revamp their balance sheets, hire thousands of staff and spend hundreds of millions of dollars on preparations. In the latest reflection of this shift, Fed officials tell The Wall Street Journal the process is being integrated into their year-round supervision of banks, rather than being squeezed into a monthslong sprint each year.
Study: Consumers come up short in disputes
USA TODAY
Kevin McCoy
Mandatory arbitration clauses restrict U.S. consumer relief in disputes over credit cards and other financial products by limiting access to class-action lawsuits against the providers, the summary of a new government study shows. Millions of Americans are covered by arbitration clauses, according to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau summary issued today. Yet more than 3 out of 4 consumers surveyed didn’t know it, and fewer than 7% realized the provisions restricted their right to sue.
Protect savings from predatory brokers
USA TODAY
Editorial
Putting everyone under the “best interest” standard, as Obama suggests, would go a long way toward eliminating predatory brokers and confiscatory fees. Yes, investors would still pay fees, and some 401(k)s would still have maddeningly high and opaque fee structures, even without the brokers. Nonetheless, investors would be spared of the biggest scams. And their retirement nest eggs would not be hit so hard.
Don’t make it harder to save
USA TODAY
Kenneth E. Bentsen Jr.
The Obama administration is proposing a retirement rule that could restrict access to information, limit investor choice and raise costs on American families saving for retirement. This isn’t about whether brokers and investment advisers should be subject to a fiduciary duty when doing the same thing. We agree with that. It’s a question of whether the administration should proceed, irrespective of congressional intent and in conflict with regulators, with a rule that will ultimately make it harder to save.
Politics
Poll Finds Big 2016 Field Divides GOP
WALL STREET JOURNAL
Patrick O’Connor
The two most recognizable figures in the 2016 presidential race start off in very different positions within their own parties, and with Americans overall feeling more positive toward Hillary Clinton than Jeb Bush . Those findings in a new Wall Street Journal/NBC poll reinforce the view that while the Democrats’ nominating contest now looks like a foregone conclusion, provided Mrs. Clinton enters the race, the Republican contest appears to be wide open, with no clear front-runner.
42 percent of Republicans can’t see themselves voting for Bush. That’s not as bad as it seems.
WASHINGTON POST
Philip Bump
A Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll released over the weekend offers some sobering news for former Florida governor Jeb Bush. A full 42 percent of respondents say that they couldn’t see themselves voting for him to be their party’s presidential nominee, vs. 49 percent who say they could. If Bush garnered only 49 percent of the vote in the caucuses, he could do as badly as John McCain in 2008 or Bob Dole in 1996. If he didn’t reach 49 percent of the total votes in the primaries? He could be another also-ran, just like Barack Obama in 2008. In other words: 49 percent of the vote might be enough.
Hillary Clinton to address email controversy
POLITICO
Glenn Thrush and Josh Gerstein
Hillary Rodham Clinton is likely to hold a press conference in New York in the next several days to answer reporters questions about a controversy surrounding her use of a private email account at the State Department, according to three people close to the potential Democratic frontrunner.
G.O.P. Senators Write to Iran About Nuclear Deal
NEW YORK TIMES
Peter Baker
The fractious debate over a possible nuclear deal with Iran escalated on Monday as 47 Republican senators warned Iran about making an agreement with President Obama, and the White House accused them of undercutting foreign policy. In a rare direct congressional intervention into diplomatic negotiations, the Republicans signed an open letter addressed to “leaders of the Islamic Republic of Iran” declaring that any agreement without legislative approval could be reversed by the next president “with the stroke of a pen.”
The Senate’s Iran Distraction
WALL STREET JOURNAL
Editorial
The security stakes couldn’t be higher if Mr. Obama enables a new age of nuclear proliferation, and Republicans need to keep focused on a critique of the deal’s substance. Giving Mr. Obama a meaningless letter to shoot at detracts from that debate.
For first time, the Senate will consider legalizing medical marijuana
VOX
German Lopez
Sens. Rand Paul (R-KY), Cory Booker (D-NJ), and Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) on Tuesday will introduce a bill that would legalize medical marijuana at the federal level.
Support for Gay Marriage Hits All-Time High — WSJ/NBC News Poll
WALL STREET JOURNAL
Janet Hook
Support for gay marriage has risen to an all-time high in the latest Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, reinforcing it as one of the fastest-moving changes in social attitudes of this generation. The new survey found that 59% of Americans support allowing same-sex marriage, nearly double the 30% support reported in 2004.
Health-care law will cost taxpayers less than expected, CBO says
WASHINGTON POST
Max Ehrenfreund and Sandhya Somashekhar
President Obama’s health-care law will cost taxpayers substantially less than previously estimated, congressional budget officials said Monday, in an upbeat note for a program that has faced withering criticism since its passage five years ago. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office attributed the savings to spending on medical care in coming years that will not be as great as previously forecast. As a result, the agency said, insurers are not expected to charge Americans as much for coverage, and the government will save on subsidies for low- and moderate-income people.
Obamacare exchange customers set for significant premium spikes, CBO predicts
WASHINGTON TIMES
Stephen Dinan
Obamacare exchange customers are about to see spikes in their premiums, the Congressional Budget Office predicted Monday, saying insurers that offer plans are facing twin pressures from the government and the marketplace that will mean hikes of more than 8 percent a year through 2018.
Unions Suffer Latest Defeat in Midwest With Signing of Wisconsin Measure
NEW YORK TIMES
Monica Davey
After a wave of Republican victories across the region in 2010, Indiana and then Michigan enacted so-called right-to-work laws that supporters said strengthened those states economically, but that labor leaders asserted left behind a trail of weakened unions. Now it is Wisconsin’s turn. On Monday, Gov. Scott Walker — who in 2011 succeeded in slashing collective bargaining rights for most public sector workers — signed a bill that makes his state the 25th to adopt the policy and has given new momentum to the business-led movement, its supporters say.
