DIRS.INFO The most relevant business & tech news

☆ Harlan Crow says he's 'put away' his controversial Hitler paintings, even though he insists there's nothing wrong with displaying them
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-22 | by ( Rebecca Cohen | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Harlan Crow said he has "put away" his two controversial Adolf Hitler paintings. Crow insisted it's obvious that Nazis are bad, even though others might misunderstand his intentions in displaying Hitler's artwork, The Atlantic reported. Crow thought that Hitler's teapot and table linens, two more items in Crow's collection of memorabilia, remained on display, The Atlantic reported. They were replaced with a note that read "not to commemorate, but to remember, in hopes that it may never happen again," The Atlantic reported. After checking in another case that turned up empty, The Atlantic reported that Crow said, "I didn't know that.

☆ Biden officials see opportunity to hit DeSantis over abortion restrictions, Disney fight, and his gun record in a potential 2024 presidential matchup: report
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-21 | by ( John L. Dorman | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

A dozen Biden and Democratic officials laid out a plan to attack DeSantis in 2024, per a CNN report. The officials told CNN that DeSantis would be vulnerable on abortion, guns, and battles with Disney. Biden is making an early election push in Florida, a state that has turned sharply toward the GOP. Biden is making an early push to win Florida ahead of the 2024 presidential election, despite major Republican gains in the state over the past decade. "They've realized the outcome of their negligence," former Democratic Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell told CNN.

☆ Biden bets DeSantis’ ‘Florida blueprint’ will help him flip the Sunshine State and win reelection
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-21 | by ( Edward-Isaac Dovere | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +15 min

Shevrin Jones, a Florida state senator and member of the Biden campaign’s advisory board of elected officials, said he’s eager to tell the country the story of what he’s seen under DeSantis’ leadership. Biden and DeSantis and their wives walk to meet with local residents affected by Hurricane Ian in Fort Myers, Florida, on October 5, 2022. The voter registration advantage Florida Democrats had when President Barack Obama narrowly won the state in 2012 has flipped to Republicans. An adviser to the former New York City mayor told CNN that so far, there has been no outreach to Bloomberg’s operation from either the Biden campaign or the DNC. There was also a fleeting belief that they could push Biden over the top in Florida – though Trump ended up carrying the state by 3 points.

A main focus of Trump's attacks has been Social Security - the federal pension system - and Medicare. I will always protect Social Security and Medicare for our great seniors." Today, party leaders and many Republican voters oppose reforming Social Security and Medicare because so many Americans rely on the programs. They are reliant on Social Security and Medicare and they worry about this stuff," Feehery said. INSULTS KEEP COMINGThere is so far no clear polling on how Trump's attacks on entitlement spending have impacted DeSantis.

☆ Ted Cruz accused JD Vance of empowering 'the radical Green Movement' by aligning with Democrats on a bill to prevent rail disasters like the East Palestine crash
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-11 | by ( Ethan Dodd | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +7 min

JD Vance, a Republican senator from Ohio, proposed the Rail Safety Act in March. "All of us were moved by the testimony of the witnesses" from East Palestine, Cruz said. "We cannot undo the psychological, economic, and physical toll of the derailment in East Palestine," Vance noted, but "there will be another East Palestine in this country if we do not pass the Railway Safety Act." "I earnestly hoped that we would reach a bipartisan consensus," Cruz said, but "this bill is overly and needlessly prescriptive." Nonetheless, Cruz doubted the bill would pass the Senate with 60 votes, let alone the House.

Florida lawmakers sent DeSantis a bill that would let him stay governor while running for president. "I don't think we have seen a six-month stretch that has ever been this productive in the history of our state," DeSantis said at the Florida Capitol in Tallahassee on Friday. Should DeSantis be successful in a presidential run, he would follow in the footsteps of Democrat Bill Clinton and Republican George W. Bush. Ron DeSantis speaks during an election night watch party at the Convention Center in Tampa, Florida, on November 8, 2022. During a press conference in Panama City, Florida, on Thursday, DeSantis continued to play coy about his intentions.

☆ Here’s what the SEC will require under its strict new stock buyback disclosure rules
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-05 | by ( Christina Wilkie | In | ) www.cnbc.com time to read: +5 min

The new disclosure rules will begin to apply when U.S. corporations report earnings for the fourth quarter of 2023, and to foreign issuers on a slightly longer timeline. The new rules "will increase the transparency and integrity" of corporate stock repurchasing overall, and allow investors "to better assess issuer buyback programs," SEC Chairman Gary Gensler said in a statement about the updated disclosures. The changes approved Wednesday represent a softening of the SEC's initial proposed disclosure rules, which would have required public companies to report trades by corporate insiders on a daily basis. Public interest groups, many of which have become increasingly critical of widespread corporate buybacks, applauded the new rules. On Capitol Hill, bipartisan support for stricter buyback disclosure rules has been apparent since the start of the SEC's rulemaking process, more than a year ago.

☆ Why Ron DeSantis Is Struggling
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-05 | by ( Nate Cohn | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Mr. DeSantis will probably never be an entertainer like Mr. Trump, an orator like Ronald Reagan, or someone to get a beer with like George W. Bush. It let him channel the passions of the Republican base and get on Fox News without offending bourgeoise conservative sensibilities on race, immigration and gender. In the last presidential primary, in 2016, Mr. Trump held the center of the Republican electorate and left his opposition split on either side. After all, there’s plenty of room to line up to the right of “woke” without alienating anyone on the right. Trying to be to the right of Mr. Trump, on the other hand, involves greater risk regarding both the general electorate and his relatively moderate supporters.

☆ Opinion | How Donald Trump and Tucker Carlson Upended the G.O.P. Foreign Policy Apparatus
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-03 | by ( Rosie Gray | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +3 min

Mr. Trump has a talent for the populist art of reflecting supporters’ instincts, feeding off them and intensifying them. Mr. DeSantis, instead of intuiting this potential, merely mirrored a position to an audience already primed to accept it. Mr. Trump, with his bloodhound’s nose for potential weakness in his competition, dismissed Mr. DeSantis as a copycat who is merely “following” him. “Whatever I want, he wants,” Mr. Trump said in March after Mr. DeSantis’s initial statement on Ukraine. Ms. Haley, Mr. Trump’s former ambassador to the U.N., who is herself running for president this cycle, also accused Mr. DeSantis of “copying” Mr. Trump.

☆ Trump's Senate backers are fine with him skipping 2024 primary debates: 'Most of it's for entertainment anyway'
▼ + stars: | 2023-05-02 | by ( Bryan Metzger | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +4 min

Trump is threatening to skip 2024 primary debates, and his Senate backers are just fine with that. In brief interviews with Insider at the Capitol on Tuesday, some of the 11 Republican senators who've endorsed Trump backed him up on those arguments. He famously skipped a primary debate before the 2016 Iowa caucus, allowing other candidates to criticize him without him being able to respond. Ronna McDaniel, the chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, announced in April that the first GOP primary debate would be held in August in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. On Sunday, when asked about Trump's threat to skip the debates, she said simply that it was "his choice."

☆ The 10 Senate seats most likely to flip in 2024
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-30 | by ( Simone Pathe | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +19 min

The GOP needs a net gain of one or two seats to flip the chamber, depending on which party wins the White House in 2024, and it’s Democrats who are defending the tougher seats. Jim Justice announcing his Senate bid in West Virginia – the seat most likely to flip party control in 2024. In a presidential year, the national environment is likely to loom large, especially with battleground states hosting key Senate races. Two businessmen with the ability to tap into or raise significant resources could be in the mix – Eric Hovde, who lost the GOP Senate nomination in 2012, and Scott Mayer. Still, unseating Cruz in a state Trump won by nearly 6 points in 2020 will be a tall order.

☆ Florida Lawmakers Clear a Potential Presidential Roadblock for DeSantis
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( Nicholas Nehamas | Patricia Mazzei | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Although legal opinions varied, it might have compelled Mr. DeSantis, if he became a presidential candidate, to resign as governor in 2025 with two years still left in his term. Democrats countered that Mr. DeSantis was getting special treatment from his legislative buddies. “In November, December and January, Republicans all around the country were looking to DeSantis as the future of the party,” said Alex Conant, a Republican political strategist who worked as communications director for Senator Marco Rubio of Florida during his 2016 presidential campaign. “He was really hot coming off the midterms. But now it’s not so clear that Republican voters are ready to move beyond Trump.”

☆ Rubio warned politicians against going after companies for 'political purposes' after Disney sued DeSantis
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-28 | by ( Sinéad Baker | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +3 min

Marco Rubio said lawmakers should avoid looking like they are going after companies for "political purposes." Disney has sued Florida Republican Gov. Fox host Brian Kilmeade asked Rubio about comments by some Republicans, who criticized DeSantis for targeting the company. Disney sued DeSantis, who is widely expected to run for president, on Wednesday, saying that the governor was trying to "weaponize government power" by targeting the company. But when it comes to Disney, Rubio said he doesn't think the company is going to leave Florida.

☆ Biden should sanction Huawei Cloud, other Chinese firms -senators
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-25 | by ( David Shepardson | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

WASHINGTON, April 25 (Reuters) - A group of nine Republican senators on Tuesday urged the Biden administration to impose sanctions on Huawei Cloud and other Chinese cloud service providers, citing national security concerns, according to a letter seen by Reuters. The senators said Huawei Cloud launched its "Sky Computing Constellation" in co-sponsorship with Changsha Tianyi Space Science and Technology Research Institute also known as "Spacety China" in 2021. Alibaba Cloud, a subsidiary of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (9988.HK), did not immediately comment. Reuters reported in January 2022 that the Biden administration was reviewing the cloud business of e-commerce giant Alibaba to determine whether it poses a risk to U.S. national security. The letter said the Biden administration should consider further investigation or actions against China’s other cloud service providers including Baidu Cloud and Tencent Cloud which may impact U.S. national security.

☆ Ron DeSantis, facing challenges at home, will test presidential ambitions overseas
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-23 | by ( Steve Contorno | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

While in Israel, DeSantis will also keynote an event hosted by The Jerusalem Post and the Museum of Tolerance Jerusalem. The trip will spotlight DeSantis’ foreign policy credentials as he inches toward a White House bid. DeSantis’ predecessor, now-US Sen. Rick Scott, embarked on more than a dozen trade missions during his tenure as governor. Eleven Florida Republicans have endorsed Trump over DeSantis so far – including seven last week. State lawmakers have also balked at a provision in DeSantis’ immigration package that would eliminate in-state tuition for undocumented residents.

☆ GOP senators defend Clarence Thomas' billionaire benefactor's Nazi memorabilia collection: 'Harlan Crow's a terrific person'
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-19 | by ( Bryan Metzger | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

The GOP megadonor also keeps Nazi artifacts at his Dallas home, where he's hosted fundraisers. In interviews with Insider at the Capitol on Tuesday, several of them defended the Republican megadonor amid broad scrutiny of his taste in historical artifacts. The Texas senator argued that the media is "deliberately" mischaracterizing the nature of Crow's collection in order to tarnish Justice Thomas' reputation. 'He's not a drug dealer or cocaine trafficker'Crow also collects other historical artifacts, including thousands of documents, books, and historical artifacts pertaining to American history. But when asked about Crow's Nazi memorabilia and dictator sculptures, Ernst said she had "no idea" about it.

☆ Macron: France's 'tone deaf' president faces backlash over Taiwan comments
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-13 | by ( Luke Mcgee | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +6 min

In it, he said that Europe must not become “just America’s followers” when asked about the prospect of China invading Taiwan. One said that Macron is “simply tone deaf to everything happening in the world. They were surprised to see Macron’s comments so soon after that meeting. For all that Macron’s comments could be put down to a president under pressure at home doing things on the world stage to create a distraction, his comments on Taiwan have done real damage to the fragile transatlantic relationship. It might not have been his intention, but Macron’s comments have come at a yet unknown cost.

☆ Opinion: Amid fallout of Macron-Xi meeting, another world leader tries his luck
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-13 | by ( Frida Ghitis | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +8 min

Editor’s Note: Frida Ghitis, a former CNN producer and correspondent, is a world affairs columnist. She is a weekly opinion contributor to CNN, a contributing columnist to The Washington Post and a columnist for World Politics Review. Like most of China’s diplomacy, the country paints itself as champion of global peace, even as it launches menacing military maneuvers. French President Emmanuel Macron and Chinese President Xi Jinping shake hands at a signing ceremony at the Great Hall of the People, Beijing, April 6. Just hours after Macron left, China launched an alarming military operation, encircling Taiwan in a simulation of an assault.

☆ GOP's early 2024 pickle: Support 1 of 3 minority candidates for president or stick with the aggrieved white guy who could be a convicted felon by Election Day
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-12 | by ( Warren Rojas | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +5 min

Republican Sen. Tim Scott has inched closer to challenging Donald Trump in 2024. Current polling casts Trump, who is battling multiple investigations, as the odds-on favorite. Market research firm Morning Consult shows both Scott and Ramaswamy polling at only 1%, and Haley polling at 4%. And that's after he was arraigned on 34 counts of falsifying business records, charges Trump and his House GOP defenders assert are politically motivated. "Our divisions run deep, and the threat to our future is real," Scott said of the existential crisis at hand.

☆ Tim Scott is the most intriguing GOP presidential hopeful most Republicans haven't heard of
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-12 | by ( Brent D. Griffiths | Warren Rojas | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +8 min

South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott is far from well-known by Republican voters. But if he runs for president, Scott would be well positioned to break out if either Trump or DeSantis falter. "I hope he is considering jumping into the race," Iowa Sen. Joni Ernst recently told Insider while on her way back to her Senate office. But more than just his colleagues, Republican voters may also be just as effusive. It's difficult to find polling on Scott's national favorability, but a recent Monmouth University poll of self-identified Republican voters showed significant promise.

☆ Clarence Thomas' billionaire benefactor Harlan Crow has also spent thousands boosting Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio, and an anti-Trump super PAC
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-11 | by ( Bryan Metzger | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

They include Marco Rubio's 2016 presidential campaign, major Senate campaigns, and an anti-Trump PAC. The Texas billionaire also gave $50,000 in 2015 to "Right to Rise," a super PAC associated with Jeb Bush. Senate super PAC spendingIn addition to being a major super PAC spender at the presidential level, Crow has given thousands to outside spending groups supporting the party's Senate candidates over the years. He also gave $50,000 to "Show Me Values PAC," a super PAC set up to prevent the scandal-plagued former Gov. And in 2016, he gave $55,000 to "Let America Work," a super PAC boosting Sen. Ron Johnson against former Democratic Sen. Russ Feingold.

[1/4] Chinese President Xi Jinping and France's President Emmanuel Macron meet at the Guandong province governor's residence, in Guangzhou, China, Friday, April 7, 2023. Macron's comments came in an interview on a trip to China that was meant to showcase European unity on China policy, with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen also taking part, but highlighted differences within the European Union. A senior diplomat from Central and Eastern Europe, speaking on condition of anonymity, said: "President Macron is not speaking for Europe or the European Union. The French foreign ministry cancelled a planned debrief on the trip for foreign diplomats in Paris on Tuesday as officials scrambled to make sure they had a consistent message and to limit any fallout with Washington. But even some of those broadly supportive of Macron's agenda lamented the handling of the China trip, in which von der Leyen received a much more muted welcome than the French president.

☆ Macron criticised for saying Europe should take independent stance on Taiwan
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-10 | by ( ) www.reuters.com time to read: +2 min

PARIS, April 10 (Reuters) - French President Emmanuel Macron has caused a stir by saying Europe has no interest in accelerating the conflict in Taiwan and should become a "third pole" independent of both Washington and Beijing. Political actors on both sides of the Atlantic criticised the president's position as being too accommodating of China, just as it carries out military drills around Taiwan. China views democratically governed Taiwan as its own territory and has never renounced the use of force to bring the island under its control. He added that the French president was "increasingly isolating himself in Europe." If Europe doesn't "pick sides between the U.S. and China over Taiwan, then maybe we shouldn't be picking sides either [on Ukraine]," the Republican senator said.

☆ This former Trump White House official says Republicans are 'such nerds' for pushing a 'ridiculous' ban on TikTok
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-06 | by ( Bryan Metzger | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +6 min

But John McEntee, a former Trump White House official, thinks that's "ridiculous." But John McEntee, who worked as a top White House staffer when former President Donald Trump attempted to ban the app via executive order, says he's unabashedly "pro-TikTok" and insists the push from the right to ban the Chinese-owned app is "ridiculous." "I think Republicans are such nerds for even doing this," McEntee, the one-time Director of the Official of Presidential Personnel, told Insider in an interview on Thursday. In that job, he reportedly scrutinized White House staffers for their perceived loyalty and played a significant role in the effort to pressure Vice President Mike Pence to overturn the election results on January 6, 2021. In one widely-viewed TikTok, McEntee dances to Demi Lovato's "La La Land" while riffing on liberals attending their first protest, making hand-horns as Lovato sings the phrase "converse with my dress."

☆ Congressional Republicans gobsmacked by Trump arraignment fear America is now ruined: 'This is what banana republics do'
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-04 | by ( Warren Rojas | ) www.businessinsider.com time to read: +2 min

Former President Donald Trump was charged with 34 felony counts Tuesday in Manhattan. Congressional Republicans outraged by the court appearance likened it to "what banana republics do." "They hate him so much they don't care how much they harm our country & our justice system," Hageman wrote online. Rep. August Pfluger told Fox News that prosecuting polarizing political leaders is typical in "banana republics" and "failed states." "They're coming for President Trump because he stands in the way of what they want to do to you," the Arizona Republican wrote online.

Search resuls for: "MARCO RUBIO"

25 mentions found