Trump renews assault on SNAP

The state of Nevada is not a potted plant. A couple stories in the Current today, one on energy prices and the other on Hegseth, touch on the insanity and the intractability of the Iran war.

Nobody, evidently including Trump himself, knows what if anything Trump is going to do vis-a-vis Iran. As perhaps reflected in his assertion Tuesday that the war is “effectively over,” one of the more likely scenarios is he’ll just walk away from it, pretend everything is fine, and leave it to everyone else to clean up after his omnishambles.

He’s already pronounced the war over countless times of course. But maybe now he feels that enough time has passed that he can declare victory while effectively surrendering, having enhanced Iran’s global influence and hardened its commitment to maintaining its nuclear programs, and people won’t notice.

Yeah, the price of gas has dropped some in the week since Election Day. “As the great Trump foretold,” Trump would say. But it’s still a lot more than it was in February before he launched his catastrophically ill-conceived military adventurism. The costs of weapons depletion is ginormous, and that doesn’t include the gajillions worth of infrastructure Iran blew up in U.S. installations in the Gulf and the similar costs of damages inflicted on our (erstwhile?) allies in the region. Most long-term outlooks expect prices will remain elevated at least well into next year.

And of course energy prices aren’t the only pressure driving higher costs throughout the economy.

When Democrats take control of Congress after the first of the year, there will be no easy fixes to bring down costs, and even the most effective of those would have to be signed into law by Trump (or enacted by overriding Trump vetoes; it’s remotely possible, s’pose, that there might be enough Senate Republicans for maybe one or two of those). 

To reiterate a suggestion that was atop yesterday’s newsletter: Astonishing though it may seem, by cutting taxes paid by working households and compensating for the lost revenue by raising taxes on the hotel-casino industry and creating a tax on millionaires, Nevada’s new governor and his fellow Democrats controlling the state Legislature may be able to do more — and more quickly — to make life more affordable for Nevadans than the new Congress can or will.

IN THE NEVADA CURRENT

What are they trying to prove and who are they trying to prove it to? The Trump administration moved Tuesday to cut millions of Americans from the nation’s largest food assistance program even after voters signaled grocery costs were a major concern during the midterm elections. Jeniffer Solis reports: Nevada braces for more SNAP cuts proposed by Trump administration

The aforementioned price of gas. In Nevada it’s less than it was a month ago, but still more than a buck higher than it was before the Iran blunder. The D.C. bureau’s David Lightman surveys the prospects for energy prices lightening up someday: ‘No magic wand’ for bringing down energy prices

Arizona, California, Hawaii and Nevada accounted for more than half of the nationwide increase in vagrancy arrests, a trend linked in part to the U.S. Supreme Court’s 2024 decision in City of Grants Pass v. Johnson, which gave local governments greater latitude to enforce restrictions on sleeping outdoors. Via Stateline: Low-level arrests are rising despite national crime declines

Absurd peacock protected by lame ducks. Nevada Rep. Steven Horsford told the RJ he wasn’t around for this vote because of a personal emergency,  but that he’ll vote to impeach the tragicomic figure when Democrats re-up the move after their big fat new House majority is sworn in. Via the D.C. bureau: Republicans save Hegseth from impeachment, for now

Good luck