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      Biden Makes His Business Case in the State of the Union Address

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      The president took credit for strong job growth and his legislative agenda that’s boosted investment in infrastructure and clean energy projects.“I will make no apologies.”Pool photo by Jacquelyn Martin-Pool/Getty Images.Biden picks his battles President Biden delivered a State of the Union address to Congress on Tuesday night that was filled with dramatic moments, meant in part to jump start his 2024 re-election campaign.He also used the speech to press his economic priorities, from bolstering American manufacturing to extending his climate efforts. How far he advanced his causes, however, remains to be seen.Mr. Biden defended his record on the economy. He took credit for falling inflation and strong job growth, and listed promised benefits from his sweeping legislative agenda, including infrastructure, clean energy (even if he did acknowledge, “we’re still going to need oil and gas for a while”) and manufacturing laws that will pour trillions into the economy.He also urged Congress to back initiatives including raising a billionaires tax on the wealthy; expanding a measure in the Inflation Reduction Act that caps the cost of insulin at $35 a month; renewing the expanded child tax credit; and expanding Medicaid and affordable child care.He baited Republicans over social welfare programs. Mr. Biden accused some Republicans of threatening Social Security and Medicare, implying they wanted cuts in exchange for a deal to raise the debt ceiling. (That claim requires a bit of context.) Several lawmakers shouted in response; one, Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia, yelled “Liar!”Mr. Biden responded that he had somehow gotten unanimity on the issue. “We all apparently agree, Social Security and Medicare is off the books now, right?” he said, leading a bipartisan round of applause for seniors.He kept up pressure on ripe political targets. Though Mr. Biden didn’t directly address the Chinese spy balloon incident, he pledged to make America more competitive and less reliant on China. “I will make no apologies that we are investing to make America strong,” he said. “Investing in American innovation — in industries that will define the future, and that China’s government is intent on dominating.”Mr. Biden also called out tech companies, demanding stricter limits on their collection of personal data, and oil giants, which he accused of raking in record profits from high energy prices instead of using their huge coffers to increase domestic production.How much cooperation Mr. Biden will get from Republicans and business is unclear. In Republicans’ rebuttal, Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders of Arkansas accused him of perpetrating a culture war. Corporate America was more circumspect: Suzanne Clark, the head of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, reiterated her group’s support for the infrastructure law, but urged Biden to focus on striking more trade agreements and pulling back from what she said was overregulation.HERE’S WHAT’S HAPPENING The U.S. trade deficit balloons to $948 billion. The export-import gap jumped 12 percent in 2022, to a record, as Americans continued to spend more on imported goods than travel and entertainment. Trade data also showed growing deficits in goods with the likes of Mexico and South Korea, as manufacturers seek bases outside China.Microsoft announces A.I.-powered consumer internet tools. The tech giant promised versions of its Bing search engine and Edge browser that incorporate chatbots, drawing on a partnership with the ChatGPT creator OpenAI. Microsoft’s ambitions may be bigger: It’s reportedly planning to create software to let companies make their own ChatGPT-powered chatbots.Zoom plans to lay off 15 percent of its staff. The videoconferencing company acknowledged it had hired too many people during its pandemic boom, and needed to retrench as growth has slowed. Its C.E.O., Eric Yuan, said he plans to cut his salary for the coming fiscal year by roughly 98 percent and forgo a bonus.A former Coinbase employee pleads guilty to insider trading. Ishan Wahi, who was a product manager at the crypto exchange, had been accused of tipping his brother and a friend about tokens it planned to list, bringing about $1.5 million in illegal profit. He’s the first crypto insider to admit insider trading.Chobani’s founder urges U.S. companies to fund recovery efforts for the earthquake in Turkey and Syria. Hamdi Ulukaya, a Turkish immigrant, has partnered with the Turkish Philanthropy Funds to aid in recovery from the quake, which has a death toll above 11,000. He told DealBook that he has personally donated $2 million to the cause.Jay Powell sees a “bumpy” path ahead America’s red-hot labor market suggests that the world’s biggest economy may yet avoid recession. But this same dynamic has also thrust the Fed into a policy conundrum, with pressure for higher interest rates to tamp down inflation.In a question-and-answer session at the Economic Club of Washington on Tuesday, the Fed’s chair, Jay Powell, said he could see “the very early stages of disinflation,” but added that the easing in prices was likely to follow a “bumpy” path, particularly with hiring and wage growth proving strong.January’s jobs data surpassed the Fed’s forecasts. Mr. Powell said last Friday’s knockout nonfarm payroll report, which announced that employers added 517,000 new jobs last month, was “certainly strong — stronger than anyone I know expected.”Other data offered more encouraging signs for the U.S. economy. The Atlanta Fed’s GDPNow tracker forecasts that the U.S. will grow by 2.1 percent in the first quarter; it was predicting 0.7 percent a week ago. And even bearish economists are dialing down their gloomy expectations: “A potential recession in 2023 will likely be short and shallow,” Jeffrey Roach, the chief economist for LPL Financial, wrote to investors on Tuesday, while Goldman Sachs economists this week lowered their estimate of the likelihood of a U.S. recession to 25 percent.Investors were relieved that Mr. Powell gave no hint of a sudden shift in the Fed’s strategy. He reiterated that the central bank planned to keep raising borrowing costs to rein in consumer spending. That was enough to reassure investors that no big policy changes were coming soon: The S&P 500 rallied after his comments, snapping a two-day losing streak.A hedge fund catches meme fever Hudson Bay Capital Management has emerged as the mystery backer of Bed Bath & Beyond’s bold plan to cash in on its meme-stock cachet to raise $1 billion in emergency funds and avert bankruptcy.The hedge fund’s involvement in the deal highlights the meme-stock frenzy’s pull on big institutions. Shares in the struggling retailer, which has closed 400 stores in the past year as revenues slide, are up nearly 86 percent in the past month in extremely volatile trading that’s been largely influenced by day-traders betting on its survival. But the stock nearly halved on Tuesday, after the company announced it would sell a flood of new shares, which will dilute existing shareholders.Hudson Bay has underwritten the initial $225 million worth of shares that Bed Bath & Beyond is selling. It plans to underwrite another $800 million over time, if certain unspecified “conditions are met.” Hudson Bay also receives warrants to buy further stock at an advantageous price, which could prove lucrative if the retailer were to turn its business around.The deal with Hudson Bay came together within the past several weeks, two people familiar with the negotiations told DealBook. Late last month, JPMorgan Chase, which gave Bed Bath & Beyond a lifeline last summer by expanding its credit line, froze the retailer’s credit accounts after deeming the company in breach of the terms of its debt. As Bed Bath & Beyond raced to find cash to pay its debts, it had also been preparing for a bankruptcy — and possible liquidation — if the needed funds didn’t arrive.Whether this only buys Bed Bath & Beyond a temporary reprieve remains to be seen. “The fundamental story for Bed Bath & Beyond is so broken at this point,” said David Silverman, a retail analyst at Fitch Ratings. “I don’t know that a short-term cash infusion that could buy them a few months, a couple of quarters, is going to change their fate.” The Wedbush Securities analyst Seth Basham seconded that opinion, cutting the stock price target to zero.“U.S. hog farmers look at the pictures of those farms in China, and they just scratch their heads and say, ‘We would never dare do that.’” — Brett Stuart, founder of the research firm Global AgriTrends, is worried about disease risks from China’s high-density pig farms, which in some cases pack the animals into tower blocks.Adam Neumann opens up about his next act Since leaving WeWork, Adam Neumann has (largely) kept quiet about his future plans, including Flow, a venture that Andreessen Horowitz invested $350 million in last year. But he is finally revealing more about the start-up, via a talk he gave to an Andreessen Horowitz-organized conference in November.The main — if still vague — takeaway is that Flow owns and operates apartment buildings that aim to persuade tenants to stay longer by making them “feel” as if they’re owners rather than renters. (How is left unsaid.) Mr. Neumann used plumbing to illustrate the business advantages of this approach, according to Bloomberg:An important element of the business proposition is that renters who stay longer are more profitable, Neumann said. His theory is that people who feel a sense of ownership will stick around.The plunger factor would be an added benefit for Flow. “If you’re in an apartment building and you’re a renter and your toilet gets clogged, you call the super,” he said. “If you’re in your own apartment, and you bought it and you own it and your toilet gets clogged, you take the plunger.” That’s the difference, he said, “when feeling like you own something.”THE SPEED READ DealsApollo is reportedly in talks to buy a stake in CS First Boston, the investment bank that will be spun out of Credit Suisse. (WSJ)Carlyle is said to be in negotiations to buy Cotiviti, a health care tech company, from Veritas Capital for nearly $15 billion. (Bloomberg)Oaktree Capital and other hedge funds have snapped up Adani Group bonds in recent days, restoring investor confidence in the beleaguered Indian conglomerate. (Bloomberg)PolicyMarty Walsh, the U.S. labor secretary, reportedly will step down to lead the N.H.L. players’ union. (Daily Faceoff)Senator Josh Hawley, Republican of Missouri, said he wants to make 16 the minimum age to be allowed on social media in the U.S. (NBC News)Russia’s government is said to be pressuring the central bank to loosen fiscal policy as it enters the second year of its invasion of Ukraine. (Bloomberg)Best of the restAmerican start-ups laid off over 3,000 workers last month, up 1,700 percent from a year ago. Relatedly, Washington now has more tech vacancies than Silicon Valley. (Insider, WSJ)“The Secret Saudi Plan to Buy the World Cup.” (Politico)Voice actors say they’re increasingly being asked to sign away the rights to their voices — so they can be duplicated by A.I. (Vice)How Nestlé’s bet on a breakthrough treatment for peanut allergies went south. (Bloomberg Businessweek)LeBron James now owns the N.B.A.’s scoring record. (NYT)We’d like your feedback! Please email thoughts and suggestions to dealbook@nytimes.com. More

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      Seven Surprises

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      After a four-month book leave, I’m looking at what changed during that time.This is my first newsletter after a four-month book leave, and I want to try something a little different. As I prepared to come back, I spent time talking with Times colleagues and outside experts about how the world has changed while I was gone.Which news developments will have lasting import? What has been surprising? What do we know now that we didn’t before?As I was making the list, I realized that it would be worth sharing it with readers. It helps give some perspective to a dizzying news environment in which all of us struggle to distinguish between stories that are ephemeral and those with lasting significance. During a cynical time in American life, the list also offers a reminder that there has been good news along with the bad.In descending order of significance — and, yes, this ranking is subjective and weighted toward the U.S. — here are the seven biggest stories of the past few months.The list7. A.I. arrives. Artificial intelligence felt theoretical to many people until November, when OpenAI, a technology company in San Francisco, released ChatGPT. Since then, millions of Americans have experimented with the software or read some of its output.“ChatGPT is still young — only 2 months old! — and yet we’re already getting a glimpse of the many ways these A.I. chatbots could change our lives,” my colleague Kevin Roose says. Some of the implications seem scary: A.I. can write a solid college essay. Other implications are exciting: Surely, a computer can learn to write more comprehensible instructions for many household gadgets than is the norm today.6. A milder Covid winter. In each of the past two winters, the country endured a terrible surge of severe Covid illnesses, but not this winter.Chart shows a seven-day daily average. | Source: U.S. Department of Health and Human ServicesIt’s a sign that the virus has become endemic, with immunity from vaccinations and previous infections making the average Covid case less severe. If anything, the best-known Covid statistics on hospitalizations and deaths probably exaggerate its toll, because they count people who had incidental cases. Still, Covid is causing more damage than is necessary — both because many Americans remain unvaccinated and because Covid treatments are being underused, as German Lopez has explained.5. Milder inflation, too. The pace of consumer price increases has declined more in recent months than most economists expected. Why? The pandemic’s supply-chain disruptions have eased, and the Federal Reserve’s interest-rate increases are starting to have their intended effect. “Inflation is still very elevated, so it’s not mission accomplished for the Fed by any means,” said Jeanna Smialek, an economics correspondent based in Washington, “but we are finally headed in the right direction.”It remains unclear whether the Fed can engineer the soft landing — reducing inflation further without causing a recession — that is its goal. The strong job market captured in Friday’s employment report suggests that the economy may still be running hot enough to require significantly higher interest rates.4. Peak China? China’s ruling Communist Party has had a rough few months. It abruptly abandoned its zero-Covid policy in December, effectively acknowledging a huge failure (without actually acknowledging it). Weeks later, China released data showing that its population had peaked, which creates a major economic challenge. The number of workers relative to retirees will be declining for the foreseeable future.Of course, China has long been preparing for this challenge and has defied repeated predictions of looming decline in recent decades, my colleague Max Fisher points out. It would be a mistake to assume that decline has now begun. But Xi Jinping’s government will need to do a better job of managing the situation than it has of managing the pandemic.(The spy balloon isn’t hugely significant on its own, but it adds to the sense that Beijing’s competence has been exaggerated. Here’s the latest.)3. The final days of affirmative action. When the Supreme Court heard arguments about race-based affirmative action in October, the six Republican-appointed justices seemed ready to ban it. A ruling is expected by June.One big question is how colleges, the military and other organizations will try to replace the current programs. A focus of this newsletter in 2023 will be the future of class-based affirmative action. It is unquestionably legal, yet many colleges do relatively little to take into account economic class, as measured by income, wealth, neighborhood conditions and more. There are large racial gaps in those indicators.2. Russia’s miscalculation. The overall situation in Ukraine has remained similar since late last year: Russia controls parts of the east and the south, but far less than its strategic goals, and both sides are hoping for a breakthrough soon. Elsewhere, though, the war has shifted geopolitics.Japan and western Europe have been spooked enough by Russia’s invasion to increase their military spending after years of largely outsourcing military power to the U.S. If the trend continues, the global alliance of democracies will be strengthened. And the U.S. might be able to shift some of its own military spending to invest in technologies of the future.Donald Trump and Kari Lake during her campaign for governor of Arizona in 2022.Rebecca Noble for The New York Times1. Democracy won. The biggest surprise of the past four months to me was the defeat of nearly every major election denier who was on the ballot this year. “A critical segment of the electorate is not interested in Trumpism,” Nate Cohn, The Times’s chief political analyst, said.Nate estimated that Trump-aligned candidates performed about five percentage points worse than other Republicans, with the effects seeming to be largest in states where Trump tried to overturn the 2020 result, like Arizona and Pennsylvania. It happened even as many other conservative Republicans fared well.That is a big deal. A democracy can survive intense policy disagreements over taxes, government benefits, abortion, affirmative action and more. But if the true winner of a major election is prevented from taking office, a country is not really a democracy anymore.What’s missingI recognize this list omits several important subjects on which the big picture has not changed much lately. The planet keeps warming. The U.S. immigration system is a mess. Police violence has continued. Crime, though down slightly, is far above its pre-Covid levels. We will cover all these stories — and any promising solutions — in 2023.Give us feedback: What did I overlook, and what other stories do you want us to cover this year?RelatedCan you tell the difference between text written by A.I. and text written by a fourth grader? Play our game.I learned a lot from Ezra Klein’s recent podcast with Yuen Yuen Ang in which she described how Xi Jinping ended China’s era of reformist policy.Times photographers are documenting the war in Ukraine. See their latest work.THE LATEST NEWSTurkey EarthquakeSearching for survivors in Turkey today.Ilyas Akengin/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesAn earthquake has killed more than 1,200 people in Syria and Turkey. The toll will almost certainly rise.The epicenter was in southern Turkey, as this map shows. The region was experiencing aftershocks.Syria, still scarred from its civil war, will be ill equipped to recover.PoliticsPresident Biden plans to call for bipartisanship tomorrow in his first State of the Union address since Republicans took the House.The Chinese balloon incident shows how little Washington and Beijing communicate, The Times’s David Sanger writes.Kamala Harris made history by becoming vice president, but she has struggled to define her role.The Koch network, an alliance of conservative donors, is preparing to get involved in the 2024 presidential primaries to fight Donald Trump.Other Big StoriesA raid by the Israeli Army in the West Bank killed at least five Palestinians. The army said it had been seeking to arrest gunmen accused of attempting an attack.Rather than banning ChatGPT to prevent cheating, some teachers are asking their students to think critically about advances in artificial intelligence.The chief executive of Goldman Sachs has a side gig as a D.J. He says it’s a hobby, but it could pose conflicts of interest.OpinionsGail Collins and Bret Stephens discuss tomorrow’s State of the Union.Many cystic fibrosis patients thought they wouldn’t live past 30. A new treatment has drastically changed life expectancy, Dr. Daniela Lamas writes.MORNING READSJill Kortleve, a midsize model, made her runway debut for Alexander McQueen in 2018.Melissa Schriek for The New York TimesSize 8 to 10: Midsize models are rarely cast in glossy brand campaigns. Why not?Mystery: He disappeared after going to Alaska in 1976. Now, a skull may provide answers.Metropolitan Diary: Spotting an ex across the subway tracks.Quiz time: Take the latest news quiz and share your score (the average was 9.5).Advice from Wirecutter: Warm up with a space heater.Lives Lived: Charles Kimbrough was nominated for an Emmy Award for portraying the comically rigid news anchor Jim Dial on the sitcom “Murphy Brown.” He died at 86.SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETICOn the move: The Nets traded Kyrie Irving, whose Nets run was marred by scandals, to the Dallas Mavericks. First and last? The announcers Greg Olsen and Kevin Burkhardt are calling their first Super Bowl together on Sunday. It could also be their last, because Tom Brady is joining the Fox booth soon.ARTS AND IDEAS Beyoncé accepting the award for best dance/electronic album.Valerie Macon/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesHighlights from the GrammysBeyoncé made history last night: She now holds the record for the most Grammy wins. But she didn’t win any of the top prizes. Those went to Harry Styles, who won album of the year for “Harry’s House,” and to Lizzo, who won record of the year for “About Damn Time.”Other top prizes: Song of the year, which honors songwriting, went to Bonnie Raitt for “Just Like That.” Samara Joy, a jazz singer from the Bronx, won best new artist. (Here’s the full list.)The centerpiece: A joyous performance celebrated five decades of hip-hop. The Times’s Jon Caramanica called it “unexpectedly emotional.”Fashion: See Styles’s sparkling harlequin jumpsuit and other red carpet looks.PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookChristopher Simpson for The New York TimesBarely salted chips, melted cheese and pickled jalapeños: Make classic nachos.Five Minutes …… that will make you love 21st-century jazz.What to Read“An Assassin in Utopia” links President James Garfield’s killer to an atmosphere of free love and religious fervor that gripped Oneida, N.Y., in the late 1800s.Now Time to PlayThe pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was mothball. Here is today’s puzzle.Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Glossy (five letters).And here’s today’s Wordle.Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — DavidP.S. King George VI died 71 years ago today. His daughter succeeded him, becoming Queen Elizabeth II.Here’s today’s front page.“The Daily” is about the Chinese balloon.Matthew Cullen, Lauren Hard, Lauren Jackson, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Tom Wright-Piersanti and Ashley Wu contributed to The Morning. You can reach the team at themorning@nytimes.com.Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. More

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      Israel Moves Right

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      Israel’s new right-wing government is moving quickly to transform the country.Israel’s government, the most right-wing in its history, is barely three weeks old and already leaving its mark, quickly pressing ahead with legislation that critics fear will erode Israeli democracy. Benjamin Netanyahu has returned as prime minister, this time leading a coalition of conservative, far-right and ultra-Orthodox parties.I spoke with Isabel Kershner, a correspondent in The Times’s Jerusalem bureau, about the right’s push to transform Israel.Ian: What is the new government trying to accomplish?Isabel: The right-wing parties in the coalition are all extremely ideological, and Netanyahu has made a lot of concessions to them. The new minister of national security is an ultranationalist who has been convicted of inciting anti-Arab racism. He got more authority over the police. The new hard-right finance minister is claiming more authority over Jewish settlements and civilian affairs in the occupied West Bank. Ultra-Orthodox lawmakers want more autonomy and more funding for religious students and schools.The government is also moving to radically overhaul the judiciary. There’s a perception on the right that the Supreme Court is overly activist and sides with liberals on issues like settlements. Now the coalition wants to give parliament more power to select judges and override Supreme Court rulings. Critics say the coalition’s proposed changes would completely change the nature of Israel’s liberal democracy, which is dynamic but also fragile. Israel doesn’t have a formal constitution; it has basic laws that can be changed with 61 out of 120 votes in the parliament. Netanyahu’s coalition has 64.Netanyahu is on trial for corruption. Has that made him more reliant on the far right?Israel’s whole political morass — the deadlock that’s produced five elections in four years — is basically because Netanyahu has been indicted on corruption charges but won’t step aside. In the past, Netanyahu preferred to form governments with more centrist or even center-left parties. This time, the centrists refused to align with a prime minister on trial, so Netanyahu was at the mercy of far-right parties after the election. They were the only partners he could form a government with, and they knew that.How has the country reacted?What’s taken many Israelis by surprise is the dizzying speed and determination with which the new government has moved ahead. That’s really galvanized the opposition. Before the election, the liberal and centrist parties in parliament basically failed to cooperate with each other. Suddenly you’re seeing them sitting together, planning the next demonstration and making radical statements of their own. Yair Lapid, the centrist opposition leader, said the judicial overhaul constituted “extreme regime change” and could eliminate Israeli democracy.Israeli soldiers close off the entrance to a Palestinian neighborhood in the West Bank.Samar Hazboun for The New York TimesIt reminds me of the mood in the U.S. after Donald Trump got elected.There was a pro-L.G.B.T.Q. protest on the day the new government was sworn in, because Netanyahu’s coalition includes some extremely anti-gay lawmakers. There have since been protests, including a big one last night, in Tel Aviv, a more secular, liberal city about an hour from Jerusalem.Israel has seen big protests before. In recent years anti-Netanyahu demonstrators protested outside the prime minister’s residence in Jerusalem. But that was a much more grass-roots, bottom-up movement. What we’re seeing now is the leaders of the opposition parties calling on people to come out into the streets.What does the new government mean for relations with the Palestinians?The levels of confidence are below zero. One of the main concerns for the Palestinian Arabs who make up one-fifth of Israel’s citizens is a surge in crime, murders and criminal gang warfare. The previous Israeli government, which for the first time included a small Islamic Arab party in the governing coalition, prioritized fighting crime in conjunction with Arab local authorities. Now the minister overseeing the police has a history of being an anti-Arab activist and provocateur. Meanwhile, the situation regarding the Palestinians in the occupied territories was already tense, and things have quickly become confrontational.How has all this left Israelis feeling about the state of their politics?Things here feel more polarized than ever, and there’s a lot at stake. The country is split over what kind of democracy Israel should be and how it’s going to relate to Palestinians. Even among the half of the country that did vote for a right-wing party, not all of them are happy. It’s gone a bit further than some of them wanted. Some are throwing their hands up or switching off the news. Anecdotally, I’m hearing about more people applying for foreign passports. Among those who oppose the government, there’s a kind of doomsday feel.More about Isabel: She grew up in the United Kingdom, speaks Hebrew and studied Arabic at Oxford University. She spent a gap year in Israel, then another year in Egypt. An early obsession with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict led her to journalism.Related: Will the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem be built on confiscated Palestinian land?, Rashid Khalidi asks in Times Opinion.NEWSInternationalPatients arrive at the emergency room of a Shanghai hospital.Qilai Shen for The New York TimesChina reported nearly 60,000 deaths linked to Covid in the month since it lifted its strict pandemic restrictions.A plane crash in Nepal killed at least 68 people.Ecuador’s failure to curb some Amazon drilling shows how global financial forces drive biodiversity loss.War in UkraineA Russian strike destroyed an apartment building in Dnipro, Ukraine, killing at least 21 people in one of the largest losses of civilian lives away from the frontline.Britain said that it would give battle tanks to Ukrainian forces, breaching a Western taboo against sending such powerful weapons.Russia has looted Ukraine’s museums in what experts say is the biggest art heist since World War II.PoliticsPresident Biden’s aides found more classified documents at his Delaware home than previously revealed.The special counsel investigating the documents will have to reconstruct the frenetic last days of Biden’s vice presidency, The Times’s Peter Baker writes.Representative George Santos spoke under an alternate identity and encouraged transgender people to vote Republican at an L.G.B.T.Q. event in 2019.Other Big StoriesMore storms are soaking California, putting nearly 26 million people under flood watch.Someone in Maine won an estimated $1.35 billion in the Mega Millions lottery, its second-largest jackpot ever.Auburn University banned TikTok on campus Wi-Fi networks, but students are still using the platform on their phones.FROM OPINIONJoe Biden has a path back to political popularity — and to winning re-election, says Ross Douthat.Prince Harry’s memoir is about hunting and being hunted, Maureen Dowd writes.Sexual violence remains a global scourge we haven’t done enough to fight, Nicholas Kristof writes.The Sunday question: What do Biden’s classified document revelations mean for Donald Trump?Prosecutors are now less likely to charge Trump for keeping government records at Mar-a-Lago, The Wall Street Journal’s editorial board writes. Good, says The Washington Post’s David Von Drehle: Indicting Trump would reinvigorate his support in a moment of weakness.MORNING READSA dog at Pitti Uomo, the men’s clothing trade fair in Italy.Clara Vannucci for The New York TimesDesigner pet apparel: A multibillion-dollar market includes dog accessories.Based on a true story? Historical dramas are flourishing — but are taking liberties with the facts.Vows: The universe brought them together twice.Sunday routine: Rachael Price, the singer of Lake Street Dive, combs old journals for lyric ideas.Advice from Wirecutter: Get ready for usernames and passwords to disappear.BOOKSPeople place offerings in the Ganges River in Varanasi, the Indian “city of the dead.”Rebecca Conway for The New York TimesSecular seeker: Pico Iyer studied the supernatural in cultures around the world.By the Book: The novelist Patrick Modiano says good books make good people.Our editors’ picks: “A Heart That Works,” a deeply moving and darkly funny memoir by the comedian Rob Delaney, and eight other books.Times best sellers: Danielle Steel’s “Without a Trace” is one of four new thrillers, all written by women, on the latest hardcover fiction list.THE SUNDAY TIMES MAGAZINEPhoto illustration by Andrew B. MyersOn the cover: The Fed may finally be winning the war on inflation. But if it leads to a recession, those on the margins will feel the most pain.Ethicist: An ex-husband sexually abused his sister as a child. Should his partner have been warned?Eat: Add miso and pecans to your banana bread.Read the full issue.THE WEEK AHEADWhat to Watch ForThe N.F.L. playoffs continue with wild-card games today and Monday.The World Economic Forum’s annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, convenes Monday.Monday is Martin Luther King’s Birthday, a federal holiday. Financial markets will be closed.Tennis’ Australian Open begins Monday.Jury selection begins Tuesday in a lawsuit by Tesla shareholders against Elon Musk, accusing him of costing them billions with his tweets.The Sundance Film Festival begins Thursday.What to Cook This WeekDavid Malosh for The New York TimesAfter the holiday break, you might feel ready to try new things. Emily Weinstein felt that way, too, so she chose five weeknight meal recipes that excited her. Melissa Clark’s new Green Curry Salmon gets even better when you cook it in a pot with coconut rice. Crispy pepperoni chicken uses crushed pizza crust, inspired by the chefs at Don Angie in New York. And Yewande Komolafe recommends serving roasted mushrooms in ata din din, a Nigerian red-pepper sauce.NOW TIME TO PLAYThe pangrams from yesterday’s Spelling Bee were cardigan and carding. Here is today’s puzzle.Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Worked for the C.I.A., maybe (five letters).Take the news quiz to see how well you followed the week’s headlines.Here’s today’s Wordle.Thanks for spending part of your weekend with The Times.Lauren Hard, Lauren Jackson, Claire Moses, Tom Wright-Piersanti and Ashley Wu contributed to The Morning. You can reach the team at themorning@nytimes.com.Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. More

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      Could Congressional Gridlock Lead to More Government Shutdowns?

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      Congressional gridlock brought on by far-right Republicans now seems more likely to lead to government shutdowns.The House speaker elections last week turned a typically routine government procedure into a dramatic affair. They also exposed a major vulnerability in Congress: A small segment of lawmakers can stop the process of basic governance to obtain what it wants, with potentially big ramifications for the country.In the speaker fight, the immediate consequences were relatively small. A Republican speaker, Kevin McCarthy, is leading a majority-Republican House.More critical is how Republicans got there. McCarthy made concessions that will weaken his power, make it easier for lawmakers to oust him and give the right-wing rank-and-file greater input in legislation and in lawmakers’ assignments to committees, where Congress does much of its work.The graver consequences will unfold months from now if the ultraconservatives who prolonged the speaker selection again withhold their votes until they have their way on looming spending bills. Congress must pass such legislation to keep the government open and avoid economic calamity. If deadlines for these bills come and go without a resolution, the government could be forced to shut down or, worse, default on its debt obligations, likely triggering a financial crisis. (More on that later.)The right flank has already connected its opposition to McCarthy to such spending bills. In speeches during the four-day speaker battle, far-right Republicans cited a $1.7 trillion spending bill Congress passed last month to argue that establishment figures, including McCarthy, have failed to reduce government spending. Among the concessions that ultraconservatives drew from McCarthy was a promise that any increase on the country’s debt limit, a congressionally set cap on the federal debt, will be paired with spending cuts.Some hard-liners have been clear that they would take drastic action again to have their way on spending. “Is he willing to shut the government down rather than raise the debt ceiling? That’s a nonnegotiable item,” said Representative Ralph Norman, a Republican critic of McCarthy who ultimately voted for him.Representative Matt GaetzHaiyun Jiang/The New York TimesDeliberate gridlockThe ultraconservatives have said that one of their main goals is to shrink the size of government. “If you don’t stop spending money that we don’t have to fund the bureaucracy that is undermining the American people, we cannot win,” said Representative Chip Roy, a Republican who voted against McCarthy in 11 ballots.One way to achieve this goal is by pushing Congress toward inaction. Consider some of the assurances the holdout Republicans received from McCarthy: more time to read and debate legislation, as well as to propose unlimited changes to it.In theory, these changes might sound like common sense, since legislators should, ideally, be taking time to understand and finalize bills. But in practice, these kinds of allowances have slowed Congress’s work, if not halted it altogether, by giving lawmakers more chances to stand in the way of any kind of legislation.This roadblock is especially likely in a closely divided Congress. Since House Republicans have a slim majority of 222 votes out of 435, they must rely on their right-wing faction to reach a majority in any vote (absent unlikely support from Democrats). Last week, that faction showed it will wield its leverage.“It’s all about the ability — empowering us to stop the machine in this town from doing what it does,” Roy said.Coming deadlinesIf the ultraconservatives use these tactics in future legislative debates, Congress could miss deadlines to keep the government open and avoid a financial crisis.Among the looming fights is one over the debt limit. If the government ever reaches this limit, it can no longer borrow money to pay off its debts, potentially forcing a default. That could cause serious damage to the global financial system, which relies on U.S. Treasuries as a safe investment.The government is expected to hit the current debt limit in late summer. Republicans have already suggested that they will try to use negotiations over raising it to draw spending concessions from Senate Democrats and the Biden administration, a tactic that conservatives used during Barack Obama’s presidency. But Democrats have said that they will not negotiate over the debt limit this time.If both sides stick to their word, the government could be on track for the most treacherous debt-limit debate since 2011, my colleague Jim Tankersley reported. That year, Obama and a new Republican House majority nearly defaulted on the nation’s debt before reaching a deal.Similarly, the government will have to pass a spending bill in September to remain open. Republicans have, again, suggested that they will use their control of the House to reduce government spending. Democrats have said that they will push back. If both sides fall short of an agreement, the government will shut down, halting or slowing functions like the payment of military salaries, environmental or food inspections and the management of national parks.The battle over the speaker, then, is potentially a preview of what’s to come: a Congress unable to perform even its basic duties because a small segment of lawmakers are willing to say no.More Congress newsHistory suggests that House Republicans’ plans are likely to bring more gridlock and instability, Carl Hulse writes.House Republicans are preparing to investigate law enforcement and national security agencies.THE LATEST NEWSBrazil RiotsSupporters of Jair Bolsonaro in Brasília yesterday.Evaristo Sa/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesThousands of supporters of Brazil’s former president, Jair Bolsonaro, stormed the country’s Congress and presidential offices over false claims of a rigged election.Brazilian authorities cleared the government offices and arrested at least 200 people, an official said.These videos show how rioters stormed government buildings in protests that resemble the Jan 6., 2021, attack in the U.S.Bolsonaro is believed to be in Florida after spending months promoting the myth of a stolen election.InternationalTwo buses collided in Senegal, killing at least 40 people.Ultra-Orthodox politicians in Israel are pushing to cement their community’s special status under Benjamin Netanyahu’s new government.Noma, the Copenhagen restaurant rated the world’s best, will close next year. Its chef says its style of dining is unsustainable.Other Big StoriesPresident Biden made his first visit to the southern border since taking office.Winds knocked out power for hundreds of thousands of people in Sacramento. More storms are coming to California this week.A new Korean War memorial has many names of American service members misspelled or missing.An avalanche buried and killed two snowmobilers in Colorado, emergency responders said.The Phoenix police are investigating their detention of a Black journalist for The Wall Street Journal who was reporting outside a Chase Bank.OpinionsNoncompete clauses lower wages and decrease competitiveness across the economy, says Lina Khan, the Federal Trade Commission chair.Gail Collins and Bret Stephens discussed the speaker chaos.Our society is failing visual thinkers, to everyone’s detriment, Temple Grandin writes.Damar Hamlin’s injury was serious but rare. Head trauma, heart disease and other more common conditions pose greater dangers to football players, Chris Nowinski writes.MORNING READSChatham, N.Y.Lauren Lancaster for The New York TimesExpensive, treacherous, beautiful: The battle over dirt roads.A $17,000 delay: A check-in agent’s mistake made her miss an Antarctic cruise.Metropolitan Diary: Food never tasted as good as it did at 3 a.m.Quiz time: Take our latest news quiz and share your score (the average was 8.7).A morning listen: 2022 was Bad Bunny’s year.Advice from Wirecutter: Stop killing houseplants. Try Lego flowers.Lives Lived: Russell Banks brought his blue-collar background to bear in novels that vividly portrayed working-class Americans. He died at 82.SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETICBears’ conundrum: Chicago will pick first overall in the 2023 N.F.L. Draft. Should they take an elite college quarterback or continue building around Justin Fields?N.F.L.: The Bills, in their first game since Damar Hamlin’s collapse, beat New England. Detroit’s win over Green Bay sent the Seahawks to the playoffs and cemented postseason seeding. An injury: Kevin Durant injured his right knee in last night’s Nets win over the Heat. ARTS AND IDEAS Kathleen FuThe man behind the memoirOne name you won’t find on the cover of Prince Harry’s memoir, “Spare,” is J.R. Moehringer, the book’s ghostwriter. That’s because the job of ghostwriters — even the famous ones, like Moehringer — is to put ego aside and disappear into their subject’s voice.Michelle Burford, who has written books for several celebrities, explains to her clients that they provide the materials to build a house and she puts it together. “You own the bricks,” she tells them. “But you — and there should be no shame in this — don’t have the skill set to actually erect the building.”Moehringer, a Pulitzer Prize-winning former reporter, is known for his intense process. “He’s half psychiatrist,” said the Nike co-founder Phil Knight, who collaborated with Moehringer on his memoir. “He gets you to say things you really didn’t think you would.”Related: Prince Harry appeared at ease and at times emotional in high-profile interviews.PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookRomulo Yanes for The New York TimesBroccoli and Cheddar soup has a following on the internet.What to ReadIn “The Edge of the Plain,” the journalist James Crawford asks whether good fences really make good neighbors.The PlaylistSeven songs we nearly missed last year, including tracks by Flo, Becky G and Karol G, Monster and Big Flock.Now Time to PlayThe pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was judicial. Here is today’s puzzle.Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Vernon Dursley, to Harry Potter (five letters).And here’s today’s Wordle. Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow. — GermanP.S. Sapna Maheshwari, a Times business reporter, will cover TikTok and emerging media.Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about Speaker McCarthy.Matthew Cullen, Lauren Hard, Lauren Jackson, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Tom Wright-Piersanti and Ashley Wu contributed to The Morning. You can reach the team at themorning@nytimes.com.Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. More

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      Your Wednesday Briefing: Chaos in the U.S. House Speaker Race

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      Also, China threatens countermeasures against travel restrictions.The 118th Congress took office on Tuesday.Kenny Holston/The New York TimesMcCarthy twice fails Speaker voteKevin McCarthy lost both the first and second vote to become the House speaker as the 118th U.S. Congress took office yesterday. It was the first time the House has failed to elect a speaker on the first roll call vote since 1923. The third vote for new leadership is about to begin as we send this newsletter. You can follow live updates here.In the second vote, the existing anti-McCarthy votes consolidated behind Jim Jordan of Ohio, a founding member of the ultraconservative House Freedom Caucus. (Jordan is supporting McCarthy.) McCarthy did not pick up any votes.The mutiny was waged by ultraconservative lawmakers who, for weeks, have held fast to their vow to oppose McCarthy. The defection by 19 Republican lawmakers in both votes was a chaotic display of disunity within the party as it embarks on its first week in power in the House.Context: McCarthy, a California Republican, was once the favorite for House speaker, one of the most powerful positions in the U.S. government. But a hard-right faction of his party opposed him, even as he made a series of concessions.What’s next: House precedent dictates that successive votes continue until someone secures enough supporters. But if McCarthy falls short, there is little modern precedent to govern the chaos that could ensue.Democrats: The party has a slim margin in the Senate. In the House, representatives voted unanimously for Hakeem Jeffries. He would be the first Black man to be minority leader. Nancy Pelosi, the outgoing speaker, leaves a legacy that will be difficult to match.China is dealing with a surge of Covid cases after it abruptly abandoned its “zero Covid” strategy.Alex Plavevski/EPA, via ShutterstockChina denounces travel restrictionsBeijing lashed out yesterday against Covid testing requirements imposed by more than a dozen countries on travelers coming from China, and threatened to take countermeasures.China’s foreign ministry labeled the entry requirements — including those set by Canada, the U.S., France, Spain, Japan and Britain — as unscientific and “excessive.” The ministry accused the countries of introducing restrictions for political reasons and said that China may take reciprocal measures.The restrictions on travelers from China include requiring a negative Covid test or mandatory testing upon arrival. But it’s unclear if China will change its own Covid policy. Even after it eases travel restrictions this Sunday, China will still require incoming travelers to show a negative P.C.R. test taken within 48 hours before departure.Justification: Some countries have cited concerns about Beijing’s perceived reluctance to share coronavirus data with the world and the potential risk of new variants emerging from China’s surging outbreak. However, many health experts have said that travel restrictions will not stop new variants.Cases: Bloomberg reports that crematories in China are overflowing as people die of Covid.Itamar Ben-Gvir visited the site under heavy guard yesterday morning.Ammar Awad/ReutersA provocation in IsraelItamar Ben-Gvir visited the Temple Mount yesterday, two days after he took office as Israel’s national security minister. Palestinian and Arab leaders reacted with fury and condemnation.The Temple Mount, a frequent flash point in Jerusalem, is a sacred site to both Muslims and Jews. But Palestinians and many Muslims view such visits, particularly by Israeli politicians with a nationalist and religious agenda, as part of an effort to alter its status and give Jewish worshipers more rights. (Muslims can pray there; Jews are not supposed to do so, though they are permitted to visit.)Ben-Gvir’s visit, the first by a high-level Israeli official in years, defied threats of repercussions from the Islamic militant group Hamas. So far there has been no violent reaction. Ben-Gvir is an outspoken ultranationalist, and religious nationalists have increasingly demanded equal prayer rights for Jews.Background: Tensions at the compound set off fighting between Israel and Gaza in 2022 and 2021. Ariel Sharon’s visit to the site in 2000, when he was Israel’s right-wing opposition leader, has been widely credited as a factor that set off the second Palestinian intifada.THE LATEST NEWSAsia PacificFor the Philippines, a deeply Catholic nation, the timing heightened the sense of tragedy.Bureau of Fire Protection/EPA, via ShutterstockThe fatal Christmas Day floods in the Philippines have displaced thousands.Japan’s plan to raise its ceiling on bond purchases sent a jolt through global markets, which have long relied on its ultralow interest rates.Japan is offering families one million yen — about $7,600 — to move from Tokyo to regions with aging and declining populations, The Guardian reports.South Korea and the U.S. are discussing joint nuclear planning to counter North Korea, Reuters reports.From Opinion: Ajai Shukla, a strategic affairs analyst and former Indian Army officer, explains why China and India are fighting in the Himalayas.The War in UkraineUkraine said it shot down all of the exploding drones Russia launched this year as it grows more able to resist the assault on its infrastructure.Russian military bloggers have avoided criticizing President Vladimir Putin for Ukraine’s attack in Donetsk. Instead, they targeted incompetent officials and the West.National gas prices in Europe fell to pre-invasion levels, thanks to warm weather, alternatives to Russian gas and a buildup of storage.The U.S. Army’s 101st Airborne Division has deployed to Europe for the first time since World War II. Troops are stationed in Romania, a seven-minute rocket flight from Russian stockpiles of munitions in Crimea.Around the WorldSofiane Bennacer, center right, is under police investigation on rape charges.Guillaume Horcajuelo/EPA, via ShutterstockThe César Awards, France’s top film honors, will bar nominees convicted of or under investigation for sexual assault from next month’s ceremony.Brazilian officials estimate that 230,000 Brazilians paid their respects to Pelé at a stadium in Santos, the city he made famous as the star of its soccer club.Damar Hamlin, a 24-year-old football player, is in critical condition after going into cardiac arrest during a game. Fans are complicit in the violence of the lucrative sport, Kurt Streeter writes in an analysis.A Morning ReadDr. Behija Gasri struggles to hold onto the surge of hope she had felt during the revolution.Zied Ben Romdhane for The New York TimesTunisia’s road to democracy began with a self-immolation. These days, frustrated young people still light themselves on fire, but their acts of protest change nothing. Instead, they fill the country’s top hospital burn ward as Tunisia’s march toward democracy and prosperity fails.ARTS AND IDEASJon HanThe happiness challengeThe Times has a new seven-day happiness challenge, which offers advice on a crucial element of living a good life: your social ties and relationships.The series is based on the longest-running in-depth study on human happiness in the world. For the past 85 years, researchers at Harvard have been tracking 724 participants, and, now, three generations of their descendants, asking detailed questions and taking DNA samples and brain scans.From all the data, one very clear finding has emerged: Strong relationships are what make for a happy life. More than wealth, I.Q. or social class, it’s the robustness of our bonds that most determines whether we feel fulfilled.To get started, take this quiz to assess the strength of your current relationships. Then, take stock of your current relationships and reach out to someone you love for a quick call.Sign up for the rest of the challenge, here.PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookDavid Malosh for The New York TimesOvernight oats are a creamy and easy breakfast.What to WatchOn the Netflix show “Mind Your Manners,” Sara Jane Ho brings practicality, and an East-meets-West perspective, to etiquette.PhotographyA French photographer documented Los Angeles’s video game parlors.AstronomyExpect solar eclipses this year. (Sync your calendar to never miss one.)Now Time to PlayPlay the Mini Crossword, and a clue: Per person (four letters).Here are the Wordle and the Spelling Bee.You can find all our puzzles here.That’s it for today’s briefing. See you next time. — AmeliaP.S. Myanmar gained its independence 75 years ago today.“The Daily” is on Kevin McCarthy’s bid for U.S. House Speaker.You can reach Amelia and the team at briefing@nytimes.com. More

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      The Pocket Chinese Almanac Sees Some Hope for 2023

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      A little book bases its forecasts on a geomancer in Hong Kong, and says next year will be “nowhere near as bad” as 2022.Good morning. It’s Wednesday. It’s time to venture into predictions for 2023. We’ll also look at how progressive Democrats and conservative Republicans are clashing on what may be the most ideologically diverse City Council ever.Hilary Swift for The New York TimesThis time last year, I asked Joanna Lee about predictions for 2022. She said, “My heart sank.”She had her husband, Ken Smith, have compiled and annotated the “Pocket Chinese Almanac” annually since 2010. So — after a year with a war in Ukraine, stubborn inflation in this country and a chronic housing shortage in New York — what do they see ahead?“It’s nowhere near as bad,” Smith said.Financial businesses and the travel industry will have “particularly rocky periods coming up,” Lee said — and it is not clear what will do well in 2023.They base the forecasts in their little book on the calculations of a geomancer, a Hong Kong architect named Warwick Wong. He said 2023 would be dominated by “wood and fire,” a shift away from “metal,” which had been dominant in recent years.Smith said “fire” includes energy — oil, natural gas and electricity — as well as what he called “high-energy fields” like public relations, marketing and the law.“At every turn, you have people who are trying to grab and control the narrative in some way that will offer some kind of clarity” as the pandemic fades, Smith said. He said the arts provided an example: “The initial story was going to be people are going to flock back to entertainment and into theaters, that two years of isolation would be over,” he said. Lee finished the thought: “Now that is not the case, or it is in some areas and not others. People are going out, but they’re more judicious.”Lee said it was less clear how to translate “wood” to modern life. It could be taken to refer to construction, but when I asked if there would be a construction boom, she said not necessarily. “When one place builds a lot, another place sees a lot of destruction,” she said. “We just don’t know where there will be the boom.”“The Pocket Chinese Diary” is an ultra-Reader’s Digest version of predictions in larger Chinese almanacs. Each page in their 128-page book measures a mere 4⅛ inches by 2½ inches. It is faithful to the original Chinese and, in turn, to the agrarian society that China once was. So, for each day of the year, there is an entry with two headings: “good” and “bad.”Some days are good for rituals, weddings, breaking ground or other pursuits like “building stoves,” “raising pillars and beams,” “placing doors,” “digging ditches” or “the maiden voyage of a boat.” Some days are bad for those things. Next Tuesday — Jan. 3, the first workday of 2023 — will be good for such things as “cleaning house” and “pest control.”It is not the day to make wine or distill alcohol. It’s also a bad day for “breaking ground.”All of those terms are metaphors. Lee said that “cleaning house” was about “paring down to the essentials, or at least what is useful.” As for “pest control,” the almanac notes that “pests today are hardly limited to insects and rodents.”Lee also said Jan. 3 was not the day to look to. It’s still in the Year of the Tiger. The Lunar New Year, ushering in the Year of the Rabbit, does not begin until Jan. 23, a day that has an unusually long list of “good” pursuits, including some that do not sound metaphorical: meeting friends, moving, starting new jobs, starting a business and “renovating warehouses.”WeatherThe sun will be shining and temps will be in the low 40s. At night, it will be mostly clear with low temps around the high 30s.ALTERNATE-SIDE PARKINGIn effect until Sunday (New Year’s Day).The latest New York newsLaylah Amatullah Barrayn for The New York TimesTeen shootings: Since Jan. 1, 149 people under 18 have been shot, according to Police Department data. Roughly one in every 10 New Yorkers struck by a bullet was a child.Blizzard deaths: The death toll from the storm in western New York continued to climb, with the mayor’s office in Buffalo reporting eight more fatalities.Santos comes clean: For a week, Representative-elect George Santos avoided answering questions from the media. Now, Santos is taking a new approach: creating the appearance of coming clean.On an ideologically diverse City Council, the G.O.P. gainsAhmed Gaber for The New York TimesAri Kagan used to be 1 of 46 on the New York City Council. Now, after doing the politically unthinkable, he is one of only six.Kagan was a Democrat, and Democrats have an overwhelming majority on the 51-person Council. But he switched parties, joining the Council’s five other Republicans.My colleague Jeffery C. Mays writes that the switch might help when Kagan runs for re-election next year, even if it means a loss of power and influence on the Council between now and Election Day. Kagan’s district in South Brooklyn is becoming more conservative. But Kagan said that was not the main reason he crossed the aisle. He said he believed that the Democratic Party, especially in New York, had drifted too far to the left.“It’s not me leaving the Democratic Party,” Kagan said. “The Democratic Party started to leave me.”There are other signs that Republicans are making inroads in New York City, where Democrats outnumber them seven to one. Every borough voted more Republican in last month’s elections than in the 2020 presidential year. Three Democrats in the State Assembly lost to Republicans in South Brooklyn.Lee Zeldin, the Republican nominee for governor, won Staten Island by 19 points more than Republicans won the borough by in the 2020 presidential election. Gov. Kathy Hochul, a Democrat, defeated Zeldin by the smallest margin in a governor’s race in more than 30 years, in part because of how well Zeldin did in parts of New York City.Some on the far left have accused Mayor Eric Adams, a moderate Democrat who is a former registered Republican, of serving as an unspoken ally to Republicans. Adams regularly criticizes left-leaning Democrats, including members of the Council, and has a working relationship with Joseph Borelli, a Republican who is the Council’s minority leader.On the Council, policy disagreements have underscored the gulf between liberals and the handful of Republicans.Tiffany Cabán, a Queens councilwoman who is on the progressive caucus and leads the Committee on Women and Gender Equity, received threatening emails and calls from the public, along with derogatory and vulgar comments about her Latina heritage and sexual orientation earlier this fall.The threats closely followed an appearance on Fox News by Joann Ariola, a Republican councilwoman, who called Cabán a “chaos inciter” for suggesting ways that small-business owners could deal with homeless or mentally ill people without calling the police.“What they’re doing is part and parcel of that far-right playbook,” Cabán said of Republicans on the Council. “You whip up fear and hatred of people of color, queer people, and you foment political violence. It’s what Tucker Carlson does every day. It’s what Marjorie Taylor Greene does.”METROPOLITAN diaryOwenEvery week since 1976, Metropolitan Diary has published stories by, and for, New Yorkers. Readers helped us pick the best Diary entry of the year, and Owen was a finalist in this year’s voting.Dear Diary:My mother died earlier this year. It was sudden and unexpected. In the weeks that followed, I was taking care of my father in addition to my children. I was so busy that I barely had a chance to cry.After about a month, I took a day off work to go to the Fotografiska Museum and then to meet my husband for lunch nearby.After viewing an exhibition of nude photography, I walked directly into one that was a chronicle of the life and death of the artist’s mother.The weight of the previous month and the unexpected connection to the artist hit me hard. I sat down in the mostly empty museum and sobbed.I tried to be quiet and inconspicuous there in the dark room, but before long a man approached me and asked if I was OK.I told him that my mother had died recently and that I just missed her so much.He sat down next to me, rubbed my back after politely seeking my consent and told me he would sit with me as long as I needed.I asked his name.Owen, he said.He asked mine.Suzie, I replied.And my mother’s?Stephanie.He said he would hold us in his heart and he asked if I needed a hug.I did. Even in heels, I stood on tiptoes to embrace a total stranger and sob into his shoulder. I thanked him with every fiber of my being.I skipped the final exhibition and ran to meet my husband. I don’t know why, but I couldn’t bear to see Owen’s face in the light.— Suzanna Publicker MetthamIllustrated by Agnes Lee. Send submissions here and read more Metropolitan Diary here.Glad we could get together here. See you tomorrow. — J.B.P.S. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword and Spelling Bee. You can find all our puzzles here.Morgan Malget and Ed Shanahan contributed to New York Today. You can reach the team at nytoday@nytimes.com.Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. More

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      $142,000 a Year: State Legislators’ Expected New Salary

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      Lawmakers are headed to Albany today to vote themselves a raise that would make them the best-paid legislators in the nation.Good morning. It’s Thursday. We’ll find out why the State Senate and the Assembly will convene today in an unusual special session. We’ll also look at why some New Yorkers say race shapes the criticism of Mayor Eric Adams.Tristan Spinski for The New York TimesState lawmakers are gathering in Albany today to give themselves a raise. If only a salary bump were that easy for everyone. The bill before the lawmakers, who already get six-figure base salaries for a five-month scheduled session in Albany, would boost their pay to roughly twice the median family income in the United States and slightly more than five times what lawmakers in neighboring Connecticut make. I asked my colleague Jesse McKinley for details.How are lawmakers in New York paid in comparison with other state legislators?Pretty darn well. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, New York lawmakers rank No. 2 in the nation in base pay, thanks to a raise they received in 2018. California, which has a habit of besting New York in all kinds of categories (population, economic output, number of professional baseball teams) is No. 1 for the moment.Won’t this make lawmakers in New York the best-compensated in the nation?Yes, with Thursday’s anticipated pay hike, Albany’s 213 lawmakers will now have the highest base salary of any in the country: $142,000 a year, from the current $110,000 a year. State lawmakers in California will still be taking home $119,702 a year.What’s the catch?The concession made by lawmakers to get that $32,000 raise is that they will agree to a $35,000 cap on outside income, something that good government groups have long pushed for (though some would like an even lower threshold for such nongovernment earning).The concern is the potential for corruption and conflicts of interest that could arise from, say, working in a law firm. Legislative leaders say this is a big step toward wiping out Albany’s well-deserved reputation for money-driven malfeasance. But the $35,000 limit won’t take effect until 2025, unlike the raise, which will take effect on Jan. 1.Why did they go back to Albany for one day just to give themselves a raise?Albany loves leaving things till the last minute, including its budgets, which used to be chronically late and now are only periodically late.The more germane answer, however, is that the bill authorizing the raise has to be approved before the new session of the Legislature begins in January. Lawmakers cannot vote themselves a raise that takes effect during the same session as the vote. It says so in the state Constitution. Obviously time is running out between now and January — hence, a lot of people descending on the capital for a one-day-only session.Will Gov. Kathy Hochul sign the bill raising their compensation? What happens if she decides not to sign it?The governor hasn’t explicitly said she’ll sign the bill to hike the lawmakers’ pay, but she’s expressed support for such an increase in the past. Also, it seems unlikely to me that the legislators would go all the way back to Albany without an implicit understanding that Hochul — a Democrat, like the leaders that control both houses of the Legislature — is cool with higher salaries.If she decided not to sign the bill, my best guess is that she would get very few Christmas presents from legislative leaders this year.What has the reaction been?Giving yourself a raise is always a bad look for politicians, even if many outside groups agree that it’s not unjustified. Republicans have lambasted the raise — and its timing during a “special session” — and some watchdog groups have said it doesn’t go far enough to limit outside earning.But legislative leaders stand by it, including the speaker of the Assembly, Carl Heastie. “I don’t think there’s enough money in the world,” he said recently, “that could compensate you for being away from your families.”WeatherPrepare for wind gusts and rain persisting through the evening. Temps will be steady around the low to mid-50s.ALTERNATE-SIDE PARKINGIn effect until Dec. 26.The latest New York newsJohnny Milano for The New York TimesCrimeSuffolk cyberattack: The malicious cyberattack that forced the county government offline for weeks this fall began more than a year ago, officials revealed.Brooklyn subway shooting: The man accused in a shooting spree on an N train has told his lawyers he wants to admit to the April attack. He is expected to plead guilty to terrorism as well as a firearms charge.Councilman’s home invaded: Protesters descended on the home and the office of a gay member of the New York City Council, vandalizing the walls with homophobic graffiti and attacking one of his neighbors, over his support for Drag Story Hour events at libraries.More local newsA fall triathlon: The New York City Triathlon will move to the fall, with a race date of Oct. 1, following years of interruptions from extreme summer heat.Seasonal staples are back: After one holiday season lost to the pandemic and another curtailed by Omicron, “The Nutcracker” is being danced, “A Christmas Carol” is being performed and “Messiah” is being sung again.“Almost Famous” closing: “Almost Famous,” a stage adaptation of the acclaimed 2000 film, will close on Broadway on Jan. 8 after facing soft ticket sales in a competitive market.Race and criticism of the mayorDavid Dinkins in 1988.Joyce Dopkeen/The New York TimesThe end of the year is in sight — the end of Mayor Eric Adams’s first year in office. It has been a difficult 12 months in which he faced the challenges of moving the city past the pandemic, reinvigorating a weakened economy and tempering heightened fears of crime.Some New Yorkers have questioned whether he moved fast enough to address intractable problems like homelessness and a lack of affordable housing. Complaints have also focused on his hiring practices, his response to the crisis at the Rikers Island jail complex and how he handled the influx of migrants from Texas.But my colleagues Jeffery C. Mays and Emma G. Fitzsimmons write that several Black leaders are raising concerns that criticism of the mayor has been shaped by race. They suggest that implicit racism undermined Mayor David Dinkins, the city’s first Black mayor, a generation ago, and could undercut Adams now.Adams himself said that he was accustomed to criticism, but that when some people “look at these two Black mayors, Dinkins and my role now, there are those that wish we fail.”“Look at all the mayors,” he said. “Dinkins and I are the only two mayors that people talk about how we went out at night. They used to say he had a tuxedo in his car all the time because he went out to different galas and balls and what have you. That’s the role of the mayor.”Adams’s allies may be hoping to discourage criticism at a time when his popularity appears to be waning: In a recent Siena College poll, 50 percent of voters in the city viewed him favorably and 35 percent unfavorably.Adams, a former police captain, has sought to have a better relationship with the police than Dinkins did: He brought back a controversial plainclothes police unit. He has also dispatched waves of officers to address crime on the subway and protected police funding in his budget while often standing by officers accused of misconduct.Adams said he had drawn two lessons from Dinkins’s loss to Rudolph Giuliani in 1993: Focus on making “real changes in office” and do not allow your political coalition to erode. He has made sure that his base feels heard after winning the mayoralty with a coalition of Black and Latino voters and moderates outside Manhattan.“My secret sauce is everyday working-class families,” he said, adding that he had met some of those families on a recent visit to the Rockaways in Queens. “They’re just not complicated. They just want a safe place to raise their children and families. Those are my folks.”METROPOLITAN diaryRock, rock, rockDear Diary:“Rock, rock, rock,” I heard a voice repeating. “Rock, rock, rock.”I was walking up a trail into the Ramble in Central Park when I came upon the voice’s owner: a tall, slender man with a twist of silver hair over one eye.I waited, not wanting to interrupt whatever it was that he was doing.“Rock, rock, rock,” he said again in a monotone. “Rock, rock, rock.”Two minutes later, a red cardinal flew down from a tree, landed on a large flat rock and did the hokey pokey, hopping tentatively toward the middle of the rock.That was when I noticed a single peanut in the shell sitting there. The cardinal grappled with how to lift the nut. After finally securing it, the bird flew off.The man turned to me.“The wife is much smarter,” he said in a serious tone. “I’ve known the family for years. I never have to wait when she’s around.”— Sharyn WolfIllustrated by Agnes Lee. Send submissions here and read more Metropolitan Diary here.Glad we could get together here. See you tomorrow. — J.B.P.S. Here’s today’s Mini Crossword and Spelling Bee. You can find all our puzzles here.Melissa Guerrero, Morgan Malget and Ed Shanahan contributed to New York Today. You can reach the team nytoday@nytimes.com.Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. More

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      in Elections

      The End of a Presidential Launchpad

      by

      Democrats stripped Iowa of its first-in-the-nation status.It was an inauspicious debut, to say the least. In February 1975, a little-known governor from Georgia named Jimmy Carter showed up in Des Moines, Iowa, to kick off an improbable campaign for president. His team rented a hotel ballroom and bought enough food for a crowd of 200 people. Three showed up.So Carter started working the streets and stores. Gerald Rafshoon, who was his media adviser, recalled the other day a story that later became famous. “Carter walks into a barbershop and says, ‘My name is Jimmy Carter and I’m running for president,’” Rafshoon told me. “And the barber said, ‘Yeah, the boys and I were just laughing about that.’”From that modest start, however, something really big grew. Over the next year, Carter practically lived in Iowa and beat every other candidate in the caucuses that followed, propelling him to the White House. Now, nearly a half-century later, the Iowa launchpad is about to close down. With it will go the romance of the long-shot candidate who goes door to door in farm country to emerge from obscurity and reach the heights of American politics.At President Biden’s behest, the Democratic National Committee is moving around its presidential primary schedule to end Iowa’s marquee first-in-the-nation status. The party’s Rules and Bylaws Committee on Friday approved a schedule putting South Carolina first, followed by New Hampshire and Nevada and then Georgia and Michigan, dropping Iowa from the early lineup. For the changes to be adopted, the full D.N.C. still must sign off early next year.It is unclear whether Republicans will follow suit, but as my colleague Trip Gabriel wrote, “one of the most idiosyncratic and consequential pageants in American elections has come to its likely end.”‘The Big Mo’The Carter breakthrough in 1976 gave birth to generations of campaigns by little-known candidates hoping to replicate his stunning success. Iowa had never been a force in primary politics until then, but Carter’s team, which had noticed that George McGovern got a bounce out of a second-place showing in the state in 1972, decided to invest time and resources there.It was a humbling experience. Just getting a reporter to show up for an event was a major victory. “Anyone with a scratchpad and a tape recorder would send us into ecstasy,” Carter recalled to Jonathan Alter for his biography “His Very Best.” But, from nowhere, Carter got 28 percent of the vote on Jan. 19, 1976, placing him second behind “uncommitted,” with 37 percent, but ahead of all the flesh-and-blood candidates. He went on to win the New Hampshire primary that came next.Iowa was a proving ground for most candidates who followed. When George H.W. Bush beat Ronald Reagan there in the 1980 Republican contest, he ecstatically declared that he had “the Big Mo,” or momentum, only to fall in New Hampshire afterward. In 2008, Barack Obama upset the front-runner, Hillary Clinton, demonstrating that a Black candidate could win in a predominantly white state and giving credibility to his underestimated campaign.Joe Biden in Iowa in 2020.Hilary Swift for The New York TimesThe winnowingIowa picked the ultimate Democratic nominee all but two times since that original 1976 contest, the exceptions being 1988, when Richard Gephardt won the caucuses only to lose the nomination to Michael Dukakis, and 1992, when Iowa’s own Senator Tom Harkin was running. On the Republican side, it has been less influential. Putting aside incumbents running for re-election, no Iowa winner has gone on to win the G.O.P. nomination since George W. Bush in 2000. But it has always played a role in winnowing the field.One candidate who did not particularly like getting winnowed was a senator and later vice president named Joseph R. Biden Jr. In 2008, Biden drew less than 1 percent of the vote in Iowa and dropped out. In 2020, he finished in a humiliating fourth place when he was the presumed front-runner, though he ultimately bounced back.No surprise, then, that Biden might not feel too committed to Iowa’s claim to the first vote. South Carolina, his choice for opening contest in 2024, is where he turned around his 2020 campaign.It did not help that the Iowa Democratic Party’s new app-based counting in 2020 was so botched that the winner did not emerge for days. (Under its complicated rules, Pete Buttigieg barely edged out Bernie Sanders for the most state delegate equivalents, the key metric.)And so that is the end of the Jimmy Carter scenario, at least for the Democrats. “When we decided to do it, it was one of the smartest things we did,” Rafshoon told me. Now, that is just a story in the history books.Related: The Democrats’ new primary calendar indicates that Biden plans to seek re-election.THE LATEST NEWSPoliticsThe Supreme Court will hear a case on a Christian graphic designer who is opposed to working for same-sex couples.Georgia’s Senate candidates delivered their final campaign pitches before tomorrow’s runoff election. (These could be the most competitive precincts.)Donald Trump called for a “termination” of the Constitution, drawing some bipartisan criticism.Eric Adams, New York City’s mayor, is close to twin brothers with dubious financial pasts, a Times investigation found.InternationalA protest in Tehran in October.via Associated PressIran abolished its morality police, an official suggested, after months of unrest incited by the death of a woman they arrested.A Korean pop group is accusing an executive at its agency of abuse, reviving worries about exploitation in the industry.War in UkraineEurope and the United States started enforcing a price cap intended to limit Russia’s oil income. Russia threatened to cut off supplies.Germans are using heat pumps to warm their homes, an alternative to expensive Russian natural gas.War and sanctions are pushing Russia’s economy back in time.Other Big StoriesInternal documents from Twitter revealed how the company handled an unconfirmed news report about Hunter Biden.Gunfire at two substations knocked out power for tens of thousands of people in North Carolina in what an official said was an “intentional” attack.A shipwreck or a piece of an old pier? An 80-feet wooden object emerged on a Florida beach.OpinionsGail Collins and Bret Stephens (already) discuss presidential primaries.Georgia’s runoff election has big implications for judicial appointments, the 2024 election and more, Ross Barkan argues.North Carolina has been ground zero for Republican attempts to manipulate elections. Now they want to do the same nationwide, Gov. Roy Cooper, a Democrat, argues.MORNING READSAlessandro Michele’s fall 2018 collection for Gucci.Valerio Mezzanotti for The New York TimesFreaky, geeky Gucci: Alessandro Michele changed how people dress.Vows: They met in study hall.Quiz time: Take our latest news quiz and share your score (the average was 9.8).Metropolitan diary: Choosing a special park bench.A Times classic: The colleges where graduates are most (and least) likely to get married.Advice from Wirecutter: Check yourself for signs of hearing loss.Lives Lived: Bob McGrath was an original “Sesame Street” cast member who played an advice-giving music teacher for nearly half a century. He died at 90.SPORTS NEWS FROM THE ATHLETICInjury: The San Francisco quarterback Jimmy Garoppolo broke his foot in the 49ers’ win over Miami yesterday, a blow for the team’s Super Bowl aspirations. Brock Purdy subbed in. Elected: Fred McGriff earned entry into baseball’s Hall of Fame yesterday by a unanimous vote from the Contemporary Era Committee. He hit 493 home runs across 19 seasons.College Football Playoff: Georgia, Michigan, T.C.U. and Ohio State will decide this year’s national champion, arguably the toughest decision the playoff committee has had to make.WORLD CUPRound of 16: France beat Poland, 3-1, and England won 3-0 against Senegal.Suriname: The tiny country is responsible for some of soccer’s greatest players.Lionel Messi: This is how a team could stop him.Spot the ball: We removed it from these photos. Where do you think it was?Today: Japan plays Croatia at 10 a.m. Eastern, and Brazil faces South Korea at 2 p.m.ARTS AND IDEAS A gift that goes back millenniumsBooks are, in many ways, the quintessential gift: They offer infinite variety, are easily wrapped and can be tailored to the recipient. So it makes sense that they have been a favorite of holiday giving for as long as people have had holidays, Jennifer Harlan writes.A Roman gift guide for the celebration of Saturnalia by the first-century poet Martial included several texts on parchment, including works by Virgil and Cicero and Ovid’s “Metamorphoses.” In December 1851, just a few months into The Times’s existence, the paper declared a “season of Book-blossoms,” adding, “The Holidays act upon books like April upon trees.”To this day, the holiday book-buying rush continues. In Iceland, it is called the jolabokaflod, or the “Christmas book flood.”PLAY, WATCH, EATWhat to CookJoe Lingeman for The New York TimesThese sesame-brown butter udon noodles are slurpable and quick.What to WatchStream the year’s best Christmas movies.What to ReadJohn le Carré was one of the last great letter writers.Now Time to PlayThe pangram from yesterday’s Spelling Bee was conjoined. Here is today’s puzzle.Here’s today’s Mini Crossword, and a clue: Tea variety (five letters).And here’s today’s Wordle. After, use our bot to get better.Thanks for spending part of your morning with The Times. See you tomorrow.P.S. Lauren Leatherby, who has contributed to this newsletter, will cover Europe and the Middle East as a visual reporter in London.Here’s today’s front page. “The Daily” is about Ukraine’s winter. Lauren Hard, Lauren Jackson, Claire Moses, Ian Prasad Philbrick, Tom Wright-Piersanti and Ashley Wu contributed to The Morning. You can reach the team at themorning@nytimes.com.Sign up here to get this newsletter in your inbox. More