Your Tuesday Cheat Sheet 12-3-13
So you think you know your world geography? Tuesday brings a challenge worthy of a “Jeopardy!” champ, while the White House once again goes into hyperactive sales mode on, well, you can probably guess.
1. The House is expected to vote Tuesday to extend for 10 years a ban on undetectable guns, including those that can now be made via 3D printers. New York Democratic Rep. Steve Israel and Sen. Chuck Schumer have alternative bills to end what they call a loophole in the law: A gun isn’t banned even if it’s got a small metal component that can possibly be removed. But the early odds are that Congress will only pass the straight 10-year extension, which both lawmakers call better than nothing. Given House rules, it needs a two-thirds approval to The Senate returns to work Dec. 9, the day the ban expires. They'll thus have just a day to act.
2. The cabinet flavor of the month (for D.C. media), Secretary of State John Kerry, splits on a three-day trip to Belgium, Moldova, Jerusalem and the West Bank. Tuesday he attends NATO meetings in Brussels. Current Washington C.W. on Kerry: not only hitting the road more than Hillary Clinton but getting more done.
3. President Obama spends a chunk of his day with the president of Colombia and then accepts the credentials of a bunch of new international ambassadors. They include the ambassador from the Democratic Republic of São Tomé and Príncipe. Bzzzzzz, time’s up. Answer: It’s a Portuguese-speaking island nation in the Gulf of Guinea, off the western equatorial coast of Central Africa, with a population of 170,000, meaning the whole nation could call Healthcare.org on the same day and it wouldn’t break down.
4. The House Foreign Affairs Committee Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, Global Human Rights and International Organizations will hold a hearing on U.S. response to last month’s typhoon in the Philippines.
5. The National Academies releases a new report from the National Research Council on the abrupt impacts of climate change, assessing the likelihood of Earth’s climate system to undergo major and rapid changes this century.
6. Military booster-actor Gary Sinise and his group, The Lt. Dan Band, will perform a USO concert for Washington Navy Yard employees and their families. Navy Secretary Ray Mabus will also appear.
7. Former Vice President Dick Cheney and Dr. Jonathan Reiner will discuss their new book “Heart: An American Medical Odyssey” at the National Press Club. Cheney is presumably taking time off from refereeing a spat between his two daughters over gay marriage. Liz, 47, is seeking the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate in Wyoming, while Mary, 44, is a lesbian who isn’t happy with older sister’s opposition to same sex marriage.
8. And two White House officials will brief House Democrats on the Obamacare website. It’s part of the first day of a three-week charm offensive in which it’s clearly assumed that minds can be changed. It’s the same conceit that drives the burgeoning influence-peddling sector in the capital: All you need to is properly “message” a topic and everything will go your way. Or so folks tend to think.
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