Manchin calls for ‘enormous’ infrastructure package paid for with new taxes  —  WASHINGTON — Sen. Joe Manchin said Wednesday that he favors a large infrastructure package that would be paid for in part by raising tax revenues — a point of contention between the two parties.

Sidney Powell's defense in defamation suit could put her in legal jeopardy  —  (CNN)Sidney Powell, President Donald Trump's former lawyer, filed an eye-popping brief this week that could potentially doom her chances of dismissing a $1.3 billion defamation suit and provide ammunition in a separate lawsuit seeking her disbarment.

Top health officials told to prioritize COVID testing for Cuomo's relatives  —  High-level associates also benefited from program in early days of pandemic  —  ALBANY — High-level members of the state Department of Health were directed last year by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo and Health Commissioner …

A Cargo Ship Drew a Giant Dick Pic in the Ocean Then Got Stuck in the Suez Canal  —  Just before blocking one of the world's busiest waterways where 10 percent of world trade flows, the unfortunate Ever Given sailed an even more unfortunate course.  —  MC  —  The Suez Canal has been blocked …

Officer Brian Sicknick Died After the Capitol Riot.  New Videos Show How He Was Attacked. … New videos obtained by The New York Times show publicly for the first time how the U.S. Capitol Police officer who died after facing off with rioters on Jan. 6 was attacked with chemical spray.

Rachel Levine, historic transgender nominee, confirmed as assistant health secretary  —  Levine is the first openly transgender official ever confirmed by the Senate  —  The Senate on Wednesday voted 52 to 48 to confirm Rachel Levine as the nation's assistant secretary for health …

Asian Grandmother Who Smacked Her Attacker With A Board Donates Nearly $1 Million  —  Xiao Zhen Xie, the 75-year-old woman who was punched by a white man in San Francisco - and then fought back by smacking him with a board - will not keep the nearly $1 million that has been donated for her medical expenses.

POLITICO Playbook: What the Duckworth-AAPI episode revealed  —  DRIVING THE DAY  —  For months, Sen. TAMMY DUCKWORTH (D-Ill.) had been nudging the Biden administration to appoint more Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders to the Cabinet — to no avail.  When she brought up the issue again …

Biden's New Deal: Re-engineering America, quickly  —  President Biden recently held an undisclosed East Room session with historians that included discussion of how big is too big — and how fast is too fast — to jam through once-in-a-lifetime historic changes to America.

Trumpists Still Pushing Election Fraud Claims and Conspiracy Theories  —  Regent University livestream gets bonkers.  —  Because I am a masochist, I subjected myself to a cavalcade of crazy yesterday.  I watched / listened to much of the seven hours of a nutso livestream …

Republicans Fear Flawed Candidates Could Imperil Key Senate Seats  —  Races in Missouri and Alabama, with others to come, reflect the potential risks for a party in which loyalty to Donald Trump is the main criterion for securing nominations.  —  The entry of two hard-right candidates …

Trump let OANN in the White House.  Now it's Biden's problem.  —  Welcome to POLITICO's 2021 Transition Playbook, your guide to the first 100 days of the Biden administration.  —  DONALD TRUMP is longer in the White House, but his favorite cable news network, One America News Network …

Yellen: Treasury faces ‘thorny questions’ about restrictions on state tax cuts  —  Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said on Wednesday the department has “a host of thorny questions” to work through before it can give states guidance on a provision in the $1.9 trillion Covid relief package …

Rob Bonta named California attorney general, would be first Filipino American in role  —  Gov. Gavin Newsom on Wednesday appointed Democratic Assemblyman Rob Bonta as California attorney general, picking a leading advocate for criminal justice reform who has campaigned to abolish the death penalty …

Dollar Shave Club has laid off all of its staff at men's lifestyle site, MEL, and is looking for a rescue buyer  — Dollar Shave Club laid off MEL Magazine's editorial team on Wednesday.  — The site became a media industry darling despite being owned by a razor brand.

Biden should fact-check the White House press corps  —  The White House press corps, ginned up by Republican hype, has for weeks hounded White House press secretary Jen Psaki and anyone else from the Biden administration who comes into the briefing room about what is happening at the border.

Videos show ally of Marjorie Taylor Greene among mob inside Capitol during January 6 riot  —  These are the key moments from the US Capitol riot  —  (CNN)Footage from the January 6 riot at the US Capitol shows a close ally of Georgia Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene inside the building.

Bad News Bias  —  The U.S. media is offering a different picture of Covid-19 from science journals or the international media, a study finds.  —  Bruce Sacerdote, an economics professor at Dartmouth College, noticed something last year about the Covid-19 television coverage that he was watching on CNN and PBS.

Democrats Say Agency Run By Trump Holdover Is Delaying Stimulus Checks  —  The IRS hasn't received the payment information it requested to send checks to Social Security recipients.  —  Millions of disabled and retired Americans are still waiting for their $1,400 stimulus payments …

42 Million Want to Migrate to U.S.  —  Here are questions every leader should be able to answer regardless of their politics: How many more people are coming to the southern border?  And what is the plan?  —  There are 33 countries in Latin America and the Caribbean.  Roughly 450 million adults live in the region.

The Biden presidency — already transformative for the worse  —  President Biden is using his entire administration to impose “woke” precepts about race, class, and gender on a public that recognizes them as mostly pseudo-intellectual rubbish masking intolerance.

How Trump is exposing the ugly truth about the GOP plan to retake power  —  Opinion by  —  The Republican strategy for retaking power depends in no small part on undertaking maximum voter suppression and other anti-majoritarian efforts all over the country — while piously pretending …

Politico quoted Stephen Miller on immigration issues without noting his white nationalist background  —  Playbook offered a case study in access journalism  —  Politico's morning Playbook on Wednesday discussed “a tale of two immigration messages,” contrasting the Biden and Trump administrations' media accessibility at the border.

Human penises are shrinking because of pollution, warns scientist  —  Dr Shanna Swan has found that chemicals called phthalates are causing human babies to be born with malformed genitals.  —  Created with Sketch.  —  Penises are shrinking and genitals becoming malformed because of pollution …

Hundreds Of Far-Right Militias Are Still Organizing, Recruiting, And Promoting Violence On Facebook  —  When Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg faces Congress on Thursday, to testify about extremism online, he will do so as hundreds of far-right militias, including some whose members were charged …

We didn't help get Kyrsten Sinema elected so she could ensure Senate gridlock  —  Opinion: We asked voters to support Kyrsten Sinema so she could make progress on big issues, not stand in the way of it by supporting the filibuster.  —  View Comments  —  Arizonans accomplished something truly historic …

A Proclamation on National Equal Pay Day, 2021  —  Equal Pay Day is a reminder of the work that still remains to advance equity and ensure that all Americans have the opportunity to reach their full potential.  This day is a symbolic representation of how far into this year women must work …

Trump and Don Jr. Lawyer Up for Eric Swalwell's Jan. 6 Riot Lawsuit  —  The former president and his eldest son have tapped a familiar “Stop the Steal” attorney. … Former President Donald Trump, as well as his eldest son Donald Trump Jr., have retained attorney Jesse Binnall to represent each …