Question for Democrats: What is a ‘Green New Deal’?

Protestors — Liberal activists contend that Democrats need bold ideas — both to tackle the urgency of the climate crisis and to drum up the voter excitement to oust President Donald Trump. | J. Scott Applewhite/AP Photo

Ambitious proposals for tackling climate change and transforming the economy are setting up one of the party’s most crucial debates heading into 2020.

Democrats are rallying to turn the “Green New Deal” into a centerpiece of their Capitol Hill agenda and the party’s 2020 platform — as soon as they decide what exactly it is.

The term has become a potent brand name for a slate of ideas for transforming the economy and fighting climate change, championed by progressives like Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) and embraced, at least cautiously, by potential presidential nominees including Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and Beto O’Rourke.

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But not all Democrats have signed onto the full agenda that Ocasio-Cortez and her activist allies have rolled into their Green New Deal platforms — which encompasses proposals such as a complete switch to clean energy by 2030, big tax increases on the wealthy, retrofits of every building in the U.S. and a federal guarantee of a well-paying job to everyone who wants one. And some leading Democrats on the Hill already are criticizing some of those planks as unrealistically ambitious and politically polarizing.

That means one of the Democrats’ most crucial debates of 2019 will be defining what their Green New Deal entails. Dozens of suggestions are already emerging, including smaller-bore, middle-of-the-road ideas such as cleaning up polluted sites or offering new tax breaks for electric cars.

Liberal activists contend that Democrats need bold ideas — both to tackle the urgency of the climate crisis and to drum up the voter excitement to oust President Donald Trump.

“I think it is a fantastic idea and I think it is the secret, or one of the secrets, to winning 2020,” Celinda Lake, a Democratic pollster who has worked with progressives like Ocasio-Cortez, said of the Green New Deal. “It combines an issue that Democrats are way ahead on — the environment — and an issue they need to desperately get ahead on — the economy.”

But Republicans says the leftward push on climate change and the economy benefits them by moving Democrats away from centrist policies.

“There are certainly places in America, like where I come from, where those ideas further isolate Democrats from political success,” said North Dakota Republican Sen. Kevin Cramer.

Progressives and environmental groups are working to line up a suite a bills that could serve as an environmental policy road map for Democrats, breaking the agenda into pieces that they see defining the Green New Deal over time.

“I don’t even think it’s possible to reach the full scale of what we’re talking about with one piece of legislation,” said Varshini Prakash, co-founder of Sunrise Movement, which organized protests at Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s office to push for aggressive green policies. “It’s not going to be necessarily one bill or one piece of legislation or one level of government that makes this possible.”

Environmental organizations like Sunrise, 350.org and Data for Progress are working to bring “standard setting marker bills” to the floor and to draw out more details from the potential Democratic presidential candidates, said Julian NoiseCat, policy analyst at 350.org, which is already discussing legislation with lawmakers.

“The term Green New Deal entered into the public discourse before a lot of the white papers, and think pieces of how you would achieve that were really out in the mainstream,” NoiseCat said. “The same could be said of the original New Deal, of Medicare for All. The same was obviously true of [President Donald] Trump’s border wall.”

Many of the ideas that could comprise an eventual Green New Deal have been circulating for years, and while there’s little chance that the Republican Senate or Trump will take up any environmental measures, the groups are hoping the ideas will germinate over the next two years and provide some ready-made policies Democrats can act on if they win White House in 2020.

Liberal research group Data for Progress has identified 31 bills introduced last Congress that could be part of the Green New Deal, including Rep. Marc Veasey (D-Texas)’s bill, H.R. 2830, to eliminate methane leaks from natural gas infrastructure, as well as Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii)’s measure, H.R. 3671, to electrify transportation and shift to renewable sources by 2035, end subsidies and exports of fossil fuels and permanently extend renewable energy incentives.

And it could even include Republican Sen. Jim Inhofe’s (R-Okla.) plan, S. 822 (115), to expand grants for cleaning up and reusing brownfield sites, as well as various carbon pricing proposals. State-level policies in Washington state, Rhode Island, Hawaii and Maine may also be considered.

Data for Progress expects lawmakers to float bills with national targets for generating electricity from renewable sources, infrastructure packages that include climate change provisions and new tax credits for electric vehicles and renewable energy. Some measures might hitch a ride on spending bills or must-pass items, while others will be seen as “marquee bills” that try to advance the Green New Deal’s most ambitious elements, like job guarantees or nationwide building upgrades.

The most prominent bill from last Congress came from Green New Deal supporters Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Cory Booker (D-N.J.) and Sanders, which called for getting 100 percent of U.S. electricity from renewable sources by 2050. All three are considering a presidential runs.

But Sunrise’s Prakash said the statements from the likely presidential candidates have “been real fuzzy,” mostly consisting of support for the general concept or idea of a Green New Deal. Her group will be meeting with staff for Merkley, Booker, Sanders and Warren to draw them out on what Prakash sees as the three core principles: ending emissions-generating energy by 2030, guaranteeing good-paying jobs for everyone and providing economic and racial justice for all.

The green activists are hoping their policies will play a prominent role in the 2020 contest, when they want Democrats to rally around the progressive cause.

“Policy details are going to matter and be very important,” said Sean McElwee, co-founder of Data for Progress. “But the actual meta politics question is how do we make sure, in a roughly two-year period, … Democrats create an agenda? How do we make sure that the Green New Deal and the environment take up a substantial share of that floor time when we have a bunch of competing interests?”

The newly formed think tank New Consensus will be tasked with doing some of that legislative legwork. Founded by Abdul El-Sayed, the progressive activist and physician who last year lost the Michigan Democratic primary to now-Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, the group plans to meet with various constituencies to discuss elements of the Green New Deal and help shape it into a platform.

Historians say there are some parallels between what activists are doing with the Green New Deal and how President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal was formed. FDR merely mentioned giving Americans a “new deal” on the campaign trail and came into office working on “mostly good intentions and to be active … without much in the way of specifics,” Robert McElvaine, a history professor at Millsaps College and Great Depression expert, said in an email.

Many of the policies that became the New Deal were bouncing around Democratic circles for decades, said David M. Kennedy, a history professor emeritus at Stanford University. Correspondence between FDR and lawmakers in the 1920s showed them planting the seedlings that eventually grew into Social Security, unemployment insurance, farm relief and the Tennessee Valley Authority.

“The level of concept, of high-altitude level definition of what the landscape looks like, the Green New Deal has some generic resemblance to the way Democrats — and believe it or not there were some progressive Republicans — were thinking,” Kennedy said.

The green groups say they are wary of bills that would dilute the aggressive agenda at the center of the Green New Deal — a real possibility given the somewhat skeptical reception some top House Democrats have given it. Energy and Commerce Chairman Frank Pallone (D-N.J.), who is planning to make climate change the first item on his agenda, said in a radio interview on Tuesday that the goal to “decarbonize” the U.S. economy by 2030 is unrealistic.

“Some of the countries that have been a lot more progressive on this, like in Western Europe for example, they’re moving towards carbon-free or carbon-neutral, but it’s going to take more than 10 years,” he told WNYC. “This is something that we should take a look at, but some of it may not be technologically or politically feasible.”

That type of lukewarm support makes Green New Deal advocates nervous.

“There’s a million and one ways that this could get watered down,” Prakash said. “I could totally see a lot of Democrats not pushing for the scale of ambition that we need. The fossil fuel industry hasn’t even gotten all of its firepower behind fighting a Green New Deal.”

One of Congress’ most conservative Democrats, House Agriculture Chairman Collin Peterson of Minnesota, expressed even more skepticism about the push to advance a national strategy to fight climate change. The issue does not appear on a list of priorities for House Agriculture Democrats this year, according to a committee document obtained by POLITICO.

“What is our goal? Planting all those trees? I’m actually cutting down the forest,” Peterson told reporters recently, shortly after he began logging his own land to spur regrowth.

Still, some industry voices are already seeking to claim to a slice of a Green New Deal. Western Energy Alliance, an oil and gas industry group, noted in a press release this week that switching from coal to natural gas in power generation has driven carbon emissions 14 percent lower since 2005, citing figures from the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

“When it comes to climate change, do we care about actual results, or do we just care about virtue signaling?” Kathleen Sgamma, the organization’s president, said in a statement that slammed Green New Deal proponents for criticizing natural gas.

Catherine Boudreau contributed to this report.

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‘Not just horror and crime’: Parallel worlds in Berlin’s Neukolln

Berlin, Germany – It was a sunny Sunday afternoon in early September on Tempelhof Field, a former airport that was closed in 2008 and converted into a vast public park. Joggers and cyclists circled the track, once a runway, and families spread out across the plane of picnic and grilling space.

At a far end of the park, gunshots rang out. A man was hit with eight shots before his attackers fled. It quickly emerged that the victim, 36-year-old Nidal R, was a member of Berlin’s deeply entrenched organised crime scene – large, powerful, often Arab families that control drug rings, people trafficking and money laundering operations, sometimes out of Neukolln, the borough that flanks the western and southern edges of the park.

A few days later, under the careful watch of hundreds of police, some 2,000 people, including top crime bosses, streamed into a graveyard in western Berlin to pay their respects to the deceased.

That week, locals were offered a brief glimpse into an underworld that rarely emerges in the light of day.

The scenes sent shock waves across the city, but they reverberated most strongly in the neighbourhood where the shooting took place.

Parallel worlds of cultures and classes

Amelie Fischer lives a few streets away. She moved to Neukolln in 2013 for the affordable rents and spacious apartments. When she learned what had happened, she says she was surprised, but not shocked. She pointed out another outburst of violence a month later at a nearby convenience shop where two men were shot.

These, she says, are indicators of something she already knew: That parallel worlds run through the streets of her neighbourhood, side by side but rarely together.

We met on a raw mid-morning in November in a warm restaurant; grey mist curdled in the air every time the door swung open, revealing a quiet plaza and neatly trimmed balconies. Fischer, 30, and her two-year-old son coloured shapes on paper as they waited for friends to arrive.

“There really are parallel worlds here, of cultures and classes,” she said. “I can’t say it’s not dangerous but within the white middle class, it’s not. In the world right next to it, it can be.”

Neukolln stretches across a long, jagged slice of land at the southeastern edge of the capital; the northern half lies within the inner city and is stitched together by a few “kiezes” or neighbourhoods. On the whole, the borough reflects the front lines of the very battleground issues dividing German political opinion, from integration and refugees to crime and gentrification.

Amelie Fischer moved to Neukolln in 2013 for the affordable rents and spacious apartments [Sumi Somaskanda/Al Jazeera]

There are no easy narratives to describe Neukolln.

To some, it is a working-class district where retirees with meagre pensions can comfortably remain within the city; to others, it is a loud, crime-ridden ghetto sinking under piles of rubbish and discarded furniture; to others still, it is a playground of endless possibilities, where the cost of living is relatively modest and tourists and hipsters can while away the days in third wave coffee shops and the nights in fashionable bars.

According to city statistics reported at the end of 2017, nearly 20 percent of Germans living in Neukolln come from immigrant families and a further 25 percent hail from another country. More than 160 countries are represented here.

There are various layers of social challenges in Neukolln. The unemployment rate lies just above 12 percent (the national average is under five percent). Local drug addicts and dealers congregate in the underground subway stations, discarding needles, and rubbish of all sorts piles up in the stations and on the streets.

For Fischer, who grew up in a pretty, medieval city in southern Germany, her early days in Berlin were a heady buzz of bars, clubs and cheap eats. She also met Ali, a Libyan who escaped his country’s civil war in 2011 and arrived in Berlin; they are now expecting their second child. The neighbourhood features myriad kindergartens, family centres and playgrounds that have made it a magnet for young families like theirs.

There really are parallel worlds here, of cultures and classes. I can’t say it’s not dangerous but within the white middle class, it’s not. In the world right next to it, it can be.

Amelie Fischer, Neukolln resident

But Fischer returns often to the subject of how communities here live alongside each other but separate – the isolated pensioners, the hipsters, the students, the Polish, Turkish, Arab and Bulgarian families, the gangs.

“The only time worlds meet is when the party crowd is looking for drugs, that’s it,” she said, brushing a wispy fringe out of her bright, brown eyes.

Fischer has glossy red hair and laughter that erupts in bursts. When she met Ali, she says he spent much of his time with fellow Arabic speakers in a park where drugs and money changed hands freely. He has since left that world behind, but Fischer says through him, she was tangentially linked to one of the parallel worlds she now laments.

A few days later, in a warmly lit cafe outfitted with Scandinavian wooden panels and hanging plants, Fischer admitted she was considering moving to another city entirely. Navigating Neukolln’s class, language and racial divisions has made her reconsider what she wants for her family.

“How well can integration really work in a neighbourhood like this, can it socially really work?” she pondered out loud. “If you did an experiment and put this cafe directly next to a classic Arabic tea house and ask why people went into one place but not the other, when both offer the same thing, what would they say?”

The new middle class

The Scandinavian design cafe is a symbol of another of Neukolln’s many complex narratives – gentrification. Long undervalued, apartments in the northern half of the borough have rapidly gained in value over the past decade.

The closing of the Tempelhof airport drew in newcomers, particularly on and around the wide, leafy Schiller boulevard next to the park. There, according to Berlin’s daily Morgenpost, the price per square metre of apartment space was 4.80 euros in 2006. Now, the average is 12.90.

Syndikat, a neighbourhood bar and gathering place for left-wing activists for more than 30 years, is being forced to close because its rental contract hasn’t been renewed. That has sparked fierce protests in the neighbourhood and among the Antifa community. At the same time, cafes and craft beer pubs have cropped up, catering to new residents who Ozgur, a community manager who runs a neighbourhood association called reSource, dubs the “new middle class”.

As property values rise in the neighbourhood, trendy cafes and bars have cropped up while some older ones struggle to stay open [Sumi Somaskanda/Al Jazeera]

Ozgur was born in Istanbul but grew up in what he describes as a battered ghetto on the outskirts of Arnhem in the Netherlands. He moved to Berlin nine years ago and embraced the freedom and space, the many services and the affordable quality of life Neukolln offers. In a way, he sees himself as part of the new middle class taking root here, but he is also concerned about segregation entrenched along lines of class,

culture and race.

“There are cafes here serving a cup of tea, from a teabag, for 3.50 euros, in a neighbourhood where the average salary is really low,” he remarked, weaving between fluent German and English tinged with a Dutch accent. In 2017, 26.8 percent of households across the entire borough of Neukolln were deemed to be at high risk of poverty: they earned less than 60 percent of the median income, or in other words, under 923 euros a month.

“You really have to live in your own bubble, to be ignorant of what’s going on around you, to do that. Because you automatically exclude a majority of locals. But when you’re hanging around the middle class the entire time, you don’t know how the others live,” Ozgur added.

He identifies with the Turkish community here and their frustrations over identity and what it means to be Turkish and German.

In 2015, Ozgur developed a late-night comedy quiz show called Turkish for Hipsters that played in bars and cafes across the city. It delved “into the idiosyncrasies of Turkishness” with humour and nostalgia, interweaving new and old culture with food and jokes.

For several months, it was a rousing success but then Ozgur says he started to receive angry phone calls and emails from Turks who rejected his take on Turkish culture. Ozgur recalls how one irate man berated him in person. He was forced to end the show in 2017 (and requested that his last name not be used in this article because of the backlash he received).

The role of the middle class here is decisive, how they act.

Ozgur, Neukolln resident

Ozgur believes gentrification has become an all-too-easy target for those generally frustrated with changing times. He thinks it is short-sighted to say the entire neighbourhood is being displaced and argues that some of the fresh services and businesses have brought new life to the area.

What is far more important, he says, is the responsibility of the well-heeled new arrivals to act in solidarity with the immigrants and other communities around them.

“A lot of the new people say they’re against racism – but you can’t say that and at the same time perpetuate the status quo and the structures that enable racism. It’s not enough to say you’re against something, you have to do something to fight inequality and to get to know the cultures around you.

“The role of the middle class here is decisive, how they act.”

Neukolln: A model for Germany?

Decisive for the immigrant community, but perhaps just as important for older residents who fear their space is dwindling. Michaela Hamann moved to Neukolln more than 20 years ago, attracted by the affordable rents, generous patches of green space and diverse families.

“Now there are all these young people with tight jeans and fancy backpacks and beards,” she said, folding her hands in mild exasperation.

At 66, Hamann is something of a fixture in this area. Her close-cropped hair is dyed bold green, and, on a wind-whipped Friday afternoon, she arrived at lunch wrapped in several shades of lime and hunter green, donning dangling earrings: In her right ear, the Cookie Monster, in the left, a slice of cake.

In 1989, Hamann crowded around a TV with friends in Hamburg to watch the Berlin Wall falling; she was swept up in the emotion and knew she wanted to live in the newly merged capital. Now, when she traverses the city for work – as a career coach for teenagers – and various social projects, she is viscerally aware of the cleavage where East met West and still marvels at it.

‘It’s not just horror and crime here – all in all, it’s fine,’ says Michaela Hamann [Sumi Somaskanda/Al Jazeera]

Hamann describes herself as open and curious, and is deeply rooted in her community, engaging with new Syrian families and her Turkish and Arab neighbours. She lives alone, so her community is her social infrastructure. Over a plate of steaming spaghetti, she explains that it’s the fate of the many elderly residents who subsist on limited pensions that worries her.

She says her landlord is renovating in a frenzy and angling to push out a friend in order to flip and rent the flat at a higher price. “She’s my age. Where is she going to go? Where would she find an affordable place to live in the city anymore?” asked Hamann. “We’re really worried because it’s all about money now.”

Later in the week, I met Hamann again as she joined a subsidised meal initiative sponsored by Morus 14, a non-profit organisation promoting integration through education and training for youth. She works the phones in the office and greets locals and visiting police. This particular corner of Neukolln is much maligned for its struggling schools, its drugs, its violence and its decaying infrastructure. But for Hamann, it is home.

She vehemently rejects the “no-go zone” label sometimes attached to Neukolln in German media, calling it nonsense. In fact, if Neukolln is a pressure cooker for the challenges facing Germany, it can also be seen as “a model for how things will be,” she said.

“It’s not just horror and crime here – all in all, it’s fine,” she said. “I feel safe here, I feel accepted.”

Across Europe, the far right is on the rise and it has some of the continent’s most diverse communities in its crosshairs.

To the far right, these neighbourhoods are ‘no-go zones’ that challenge their notion of what it means to be European.

To those who live in them, they are Europe. Watch them tell their stories in This is Europe.

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Dozens feared dead in Nigeria after leaking oil tanker explodes

An overturned oil tanker exploded in Nigeria while dozens of people were scooping up the leaking fuel, killing at least 12 people, police and witnesses said, with locals putting the number many times higher.

Hundreds of people have died in similar accidents in recent years in Nigeria, Africa’s largest oil producer, as impoverished people risk their lives to collect fuel leaking from pipelines or trucks.

“We have recovered 12 corpses and taken 22 persons with serious burns to hospital,” police spokeswoman Irene Ugbo told The Associated Press on Saturday.

She said the blast occurred Friday evening in Odukpani in Cross River state in the southeast.

But some residents put the death toll closer to 60.

“The police only recovered a few corpses, many of the other dead were burnt to ashes,” witness Richard Johnson told the AP news agency.

He said about 60 people were inside a pit scooping fuel when the explosion occurred. “It is not likely that anyone inside the pit survived as there was a lot of fuel in the pit,” Johnson said.

He suggested the blast was caused by an electrical generator that had been brought to the scene to help pump out the fuel for people’s containers.

It was not immediately clear what caused the truck to overturn.

About a year ago, more than 30 residents in the same locality were burnt to death while scooping fuel from an oil tanker involved in an accident.

Nigeria’s worst such accident occurred in 1998, when more than 1,000 people died as the leaking oil pipeline from which they were scooping fuel exploded in the town of Jesse.

SOURCE:
News agencies

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Large explosion hits central Paris

Paris's ninth district was rocked by a large blast at a bakery, injuring several people [@croissandeau/Twitter] — Paris’s ninth district was rocked by a large blast at a bakery, injuring several people [@croissandeau/Twitter]

Paris police say several people have been injured in an explosion and fire at a bakery suspected to be caused by a gas leak.

A Paris police spokeswoman said firefighters were at the scene of the explosion on Saturday morning at the bakery on Rue Trevise in the 9th arrondissement of north-central Paris.

She said several injuries have been reported to police but no deaths. Not authorised to be publicly named, she provided no further details.

French television showed emergency vehicles surrounding the area. Images shared on social media showed the area around Rue De Montyon covered in debris with a fire raging in at least one building.

The explosion took place amid heavy security in Paris and around France in the wake of yellow vest protests expected later on Saturday.

Destruction for blocks after an explosion on rue de trévise pic.twitter.com/GsrLqyasQA

— Emily Molli (@MomesMolli) January 12, 2019

Emergency workers and firefighters put out the fire at the bakery on the corner of the streets Saint-Cecile and Rue de Trevise in central Paris [Thomas Samson/AFP]

SOURCE:
Al Jazeera News

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Saudi teen Rahaf Alqunun due to arrive in Canada for asylum

An 18-year-old Saudi woman who fled her family saying she feared for her life, was due to arrive in Canada on Saturday, after being granted asylum in the North American country.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Friday that Canada had accepted a request from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) to take in Rahaf Mohammed Alqunun, who grabbed international attention this week after she barricaded herself in a Bangkok airport hotel room to resist being sent home to her family, which denies any abuse.

“Canada is a country that understands how important it is to stand up for human rights, to stand up for women’s rights around the world, and I can confirm that we have accepted the UN’s request,” he told reporters.

The decision is likely to exacerbate Canada’s already poor relations with Saudi Arabia, which last year barred the Canadian ambassador to Riyadh after Ottawa criticised Saudi authorities for detaining female activists.

Saudi teen detained in Thailand fears deportation (1:31)

Alqunun arrived in Bangkok on Saturday and was initially denied entry, but she soon started posting messages on Twitter from the transit area of Bangkok’s Suvarnabhumi airport saying she had “escaped Kuwait” and her life would be in danger if forced to return to Saudi Arabia.

Following a 48-hour stand-off at Bangkok airport, some of it barricaded in a transit lounge hotel room, she was allowed to enter Thailand and was then processed as a refugee by the UNHCR.

The UNHCR welcomed Canada’s decision and also acknowledged Thailand had given Alqunun temporary refuge.

“Ms. Alqunun’s plight has captured the world’s attention over the past few days, providing a glimpse into the precarious situation of millions of refugees worldwide,” UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said in a statement.

Alqunun has accused her family of abuse, and has refused to meet her father and brother who arrived in Bangkok to try take her back to Saudi Arabia.

“It was her wish to go to Canada,” Thailand’s immigration chief Surachate Hakparn told reporters. “She still refuses to meet with her father and brother, and they are going to be traveling back tonight as well … They are disappointed.”

Her case has drawn global attention to Saudi Arabia’s strict social rules, including a requirement that women have the permission of a male “guardian” to travel, which rights groups say can trap women and girls as prisoners of abusive families.

A Korean Air flight carrying Alqunun left Bangkok for Seoul on Friday night at 11:37pm local time (16:37 GMT), an airport official told Reuters news agency .

Alqunun was expected to board a connecting flight to Toronto from Seoul’s Incheon airport before arriving in Canada on Saturday morning.

Trudeau brushed off a question as to whether Canada’s move might make it harder to repair ties with Saudi Arabia.

“Canada has been unequivocal that we will always stand up for human rights and women’s rights around the world,” he said.

Amid increasing domestic political pressure, Trudeau said last month that his Liberal government was looking for a way out of a multibillion-dollar arms deal with Riyadh.

Alqunun’s flight has emerged at a time when Riyadh is facing unusually intense scrutiny from its Western allies over the killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi consulate in Istanbul in October and over the humanitarian consequences of its war in Yemen.

Canada has repeatedly said Khashoggi’s murder was unacceptable and demanded a full explanation.

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Jimmy Butler Disagrees with Ben Simmons Calling 76ers ‘Too Soft’ vs. Hawks

Philadelphia 76ers' Ben Simmons in action during an NBA basketball game against the Atlanta Hawks, Friday, Jan. 11, 2019, in Philadelphia. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)

Matt Slocum/Associated Press

The Philadelphia 76ers lost to the Atlanta Hawks 123-121 at home Friday evening.

While the 76ers were without center Joel Embiid, OddsShark listed Philadelphia as a 10-point favorite entering the night.

Looking at the box score, it’s clear why the significant underdog won. Not only did Atlanta win the battle of the boards 44-30, but the Hawks also poured in 62 points in the paint sans Embiid.

After the game, tensions ran high as point guard Ben Simmons said the team was “too soft,” per ESPN:

“I just don’t think we’re physical enough. I think defensively, we’re not taking it personal enough when guys score on us. It should be a pride thing when somebody scores; you should be frustrated every time. … I think we have to expect more from each other to get better and get to that next level. ‘Cause I know once playoff time comes, it’s another level.”

The remarks were in response to a query about whether Simmons thought “physicality” was the problem. Teammate Jimmy Butler, however, had a different take when informed about Simmons’ comments.

“I don’t like the word ‘soft.’ I just don’t think that we did what we were supposed to do,” he said. “I’m not gonna say that anybody’s soft. I just think that we got beat in every aspect of the game. They came out from the jump and did what they wanted to do, and they did that for 48 straight minutes.”

Jessica Camerato @JessicaCamerato

Jimmy Butler on his assessment of the Sixers https://t.co/rIoJLGNuNp

Head coach Brett Brown was not impressed by the team’s defensive effort:

Jessica Camerato @JessicaCamerato

Brett Brown on the Sixers defense: “It is so disappointing. It is so disappointing. You know, we have to own it, I have to own it, and we have to find a way to generate more of a commitment on that end.”

Philadelphia has lost two straight games and allowed an average of 120.3 points in its last three. Despite the losing streak, the 76ers (27-16) are in fourth place in the Eastern Conference, while the Hawks (13-29) sit in 12th and have the fifth-worst record in the NBA.

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Stephen Curry Passes Jason Terry for No. 3 on NBA All-Time 3-Point List

OAKLAND, CA - JANUARY 11: Stephen Curry #30 of the Golden State Warriors shoots a 3-point shot against the Chicago Bulls on January 11, 2019 at ORACLE Arena in Oakland, California. NOTE TO USER: User expressly acknowledges and agrees that, by downloading and or using this photograph, user is consenting to the terms and conditions of Getty Images License Agreement. Mandatory Copyright Notice: Copyright 2019 NBAE (Photo by Noah Graham/NBAE via Getty Images)

Noah Graham/Getty Images

Golden State Warriors superstar Stephen Curry just moved one step closer to the top spot on the NBA‘s all-time three-pointers list.

Curry entered Friday night’s game against the Chicago Bulls two treys behind former Dallas Mavericks guard Jason Terry for No. 3 all-time. After hitting just one in the first half, he came out of the locker room ready to make history.

He matched Terry with a triple 93 seconds into the third quarter, and he then claimed third to himself on his next trip down the court.

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This comes less than one week after he passed Kyle Korver of the Utah Jazz for fourth place.

Curry now has 2,283 career three-pointers, putting the two-time NBA MVP behind only Ray Allen (2,973) and Reggie Miller (2,560) in NBA history.

Bleacher Report @BleacherReport

Steph joins the top-3 already and he’s only 30 https://t.co/JfBcBzpDMa

Since being drafted seventh overall in 2009, Curry has been the leader in the transformation of the NBA into a three-point league. Not only did he lead the league in three-pointers for five straight seasons (2012-17), but he owns four of the top five single-season performances from beyond the arc, including the top three spots. He is the only player in NBA history to hit 300 triples in a season—and he has done so twice.

The 402 three-pointers he drained in 2015-16 remain an NBA record.

Since his breakout his 2012-13 campaign, Curry has made 200-plus three-pointers in each of the past six seasons. He is well on his way to doing so this season, even having been sidelined early on this season by a groin injury. The 30-year-old entered Friday ranked second in the league with 151 treys despite appearing in just 30 games.

If the five-time All-Star stays healthy, he is on pace to finish the season with approximately 357 three-pointers. That would not be enough to catch Miller this season, but it would put Curry in position to move into second during 2019-20. Curry could also potentially catch Allen next season, but as he sits nearly 700 makes behind, the 2020-21 season appears to be a more realistic target.

But with Curry’s shooting, you never know.

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Watch: Luka Doncic Drops 29, Hits Clutch Go-Ahead 3 in Win over Timberwolves

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Luka Doncic‘s Rookie of the Year campaign continued with another big-time performance Friday night against the Minnesota Timberwolves.

Doncic led his Dallas Mavericks to a 119-115 victory by going off for 29 points, 12 assists and eight rebounds. It was his three-pointer with 22.9 seconds remaining that gave the Mavs the lead for good.

He came up huge in the clutch, giving his team the lead three times with a go-ahead bucket in the final 90 seconds. That is a feat no rookie had accomplished in nearly two decades, according to ESPN Stats & Info:

ESPN Stats & Info @ESPNStatsInfo

Luka Doncic is the first rookie with 3 go-ahead field goals in the final 2 minutes of regulation since Vince Carter against the Pacers on April 1, 1999. https://t.co/BlIrMbAdHa

It also marked Doncic’s third consecutive game with 27-plus points.

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Bears Hire Ex-Colts HC Chuck Pagano as New DC After Vic Fangio Takes Broncos Job

INDIANAPOLIS, IN - DECEMBER 31: Head coach Chuck Pagano of the Indianapolis Colts looks on against the Houston Texans during the second half at Lucas Oil Stadium on December 31, 2017 in Indianapolis, Indiana. (Photo by Stacy Revere/Getty Images)

Stacy Revere/Getty Images

Former Indianapolis Colts head coach Chuck Pagano has agreed to become the Chicago Bears defensive coordinator:

Chicago Bears @ChicagoBears

We have hired Chuck Pagano as our defensive coordinator.

Welcome to Chicago, Coach!

#DaBears https://t.co/WnkuXLkf3I

The 58-year-old was the Colts head coach from 2012 through 2017 and amassed a 53-43 record.

His first year was eventful to say the least, as he missed 12 games while he had leukemia. The Colts rallied behind their coach, though, and improved from 2-14 to 11-5 and a divisional-round appearance.

Pagano led Indy to three straight postseasons and 11-5 records in his first three years, culminating in a 2014 AFC Championship Game berth against the New England Patriots.

That would prove to be the apex of his Colts tenure, though, as the team went 8-8 in each of its next two seasons before bottoming out in 2017 at 4-12. Quarterback Andrew Luck missed the entire 2017 campaign as he tried to work his way back from a shoulder injury, which in part led to the down season.

However, Pagano’s decisions were strongly questioned on numerous occasions.

He called for a botched trick play in 2015 against the New England Patriots, and Mike Wells of ESPN.com noted a few play calls in a crucial game against the Houston Texans that the Colts lost 22-17.

Warren Sharp of Sharp Football Stats also noted the 2017 Colts were the only team since 1990 to lose at least seven games they led at halftime. He also noted they were the only team since 1997 to hold a fourth-quarter lead in nine games but win four at most.

Sharp pointed to a variety of factors, most notably predictable play-calling and an excess of unsuccessful first-down runs in the fourth quarter.

The Colorado native will replace ex-defensive coordinator Vic Fangio, who was named the Denver Broncos‘ new head coach.

He’ll have a lot of talent to work with in Chicago. Namely, edge-rusher Khalil Mack accrued 12.5 sacks in just 14 games. Rookie linebacker Roquan Smith amassed a team-leading 121 tackles, and cornerback Kyle Fuller defended 21 passes.

There’s talent outside that trio on all three levels, as the team allowed the fewest points in the league despite Mack missing two games and playing with an injured ankle in several others.

Pagano could be a welcome addition to the Bears staff, as he brings a wealth of experience that started in 1984 as a USC graduate assistant.

The Wyoming alum was also the Ravens secondary coach from 2008 through 2010. Baltimore was No. 3 in fewest net yards per pass attempt allowed in his first year and No. 9 in his final season. He was promoted to defensive coordinator in 2011 and led the NFL‘s No. 3 scoring defense.

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White House warns shutdown could carry on after emergency declaration

President Donald Trump’s allies say the president is reluctant to hand Democrats a “win” by reopening the government after he’s invoked emergency powers. | Jacquelyn Martin/AP Photo

government shutdown

Trump may tap his emergency powers without reopening the government, a move some allies say could ‘screw’ Democrats.

White House officials are warning congressional Republicans not to expect an immediate end to the government shutdown even if President Donald Trump declares a national emergency at the southern border.

The warning came during Trump’s Thursday visit to the southern U.S. border, according to three sources with knowledge of those conversations.

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Many Democrats and some Republicans have grown hopeful that a national emergency declaration, which would allow Trump to tap Pentagon funds for a border wall, might end a political standoff that has partially shut down the government for three weeks.

Their thinking is that such an effort by Trump would allow him to declare victory and strike a deal with Congress to reopen the federal government, even though his extreme legal move would then face severe court challenges.

But Trump’s allies say the president is reluctant to hand Democrats a “win” by reopening the government after he’s invoked emergency powers. They claim that in such a scenario, Trump’s political opponents would avoid making a single concession and potentially score a major victory if the administration were to lose in federal courts as many legal experts predict.

“He could say, ‘Look, I’m going to get what I want and then I’m still going to screw you,’” a former White House official told POLITICO.

“It’s making Democrats feel pain instead of declaring a national emergency, opening the government up, and making it so they don’t have to give anything,” the former official added.

Trump said on Thursday that he would “probably” use executive authority to build a border wall if Democrats won’t relent and provide funding for the project. On Friday, he said such a move wasn’t imminent — “What we’re not looking to do right now is national emergency,” Trump told reporters — even though the option remains under serious consideration inside the West Wing.

The White House did not respond to a request for comment on Friday.

It is not clear whether Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) would join the president to keep federal agencies shuttered while negotiations continue and his emergency declaration made its way through the courts. Such a process could take months.

And the move would infuriate Democrats, and even some members of the president’s own party, who oppose efforts to construct a barrier without congressional approval and want Trump to reopen the government as soon as possible.

Talks between the White House and Democratic leaders collapsed mid-week when Trump walked out of his latest meeting with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.). Trump has held fast to his demand for $5.7 billion in funding for a wall, which he sometimes also calls a fence or barrier, while Democrats say they will not support a penny for the project.

There’s no guarantee that Pelosi or Schumer would grow more open to a deal if the shutdown outlasts an emergency declaration. And Trump would likely also encounter opposition from within the Republican caucus, where some members have already raised concerns about the potential use of extreme presidential powers to bypass Congress and build a wall.

“I think the president will have problems on his own side of the aisle for exploiting the situation in a way that enhances his power,” Pelosi said at a Thursday press conference.

The National Emergencies Act of 1976 allows the president authority to invoke unusual legal powers at his discretion. The act has been invoked dozens of times over the past 40 years, including several times by Trump himself. Administration officials say that Pentagon accounts that Trump would access with emergency powers contain enough money to meet his $5.7 billion demand.

Inside the White House, Trump has been consulting with advisers on the various paths forward and the impact an emergency declaration might have on his re-election bid. A majority of Americans — 51 percent — now blame the president for the shutdown, according to a Reuters/Ipsos poll released Tuesday, three days before hundreds of thousands of federal employees were scheduled to forego their usual paychecks.

In a concern over the plight of the 800,000 federal workers who are missing paychecks — and perhaps also the political damage that comes with it — the Office of Management and Budget is working with payroll providers on a “special mid-cycle pay disbursement for impacted agencies” to ensure that employees are paid as fast as possible once the shutdown ends, according to a senior OMB official.

“We expect that once appropriations are available and time and attendance is submitted, employees will receive a paycheck for all excepted work as soon as possible,” the official added, saying that could happen within “2-4 business days.”

“When legislation is passed for back pay, furloughed employees would likely receive a paycheck on the same schedule,” added the official

Several sources close to Trump said senior White House policy adviser Stephen Miller has steadily urged him to use executive authority to get a wall built, and that acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney is also warming up to the idea.

Meanwhile, Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner is holding out hope that a bipartisan agreement can be struck. Kushner has been in near-constant contact with several GOP members. (“He is easily the best at returning my calls,” said one Republican congressman.) Kushner was pushing for a compromise involving the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program as recently as Thursday afternoon.

Some of Trump’s advisers are also saying that he can win the shutdown battle without invoking emergency powers by digging in for the long term and maintaining an aggressive message. Some fear that Trump’s conservative supporters — determined to see Congress bend to Trump’s will on a border wall — might see the use of emergency powers as a cop-out.

“We’re trying to figure out what the best of the bad choices are,” said a Republican close to the White House. “And the best of the bad right now is to keep fighting this fight, but to refocus the messaging onto our playing field.”

Seeking to do just that, the president on Tuesday dined with anchors from several cable networks before describing a “growing humanitarian crisis” at the border during an Oval Office address in front of millions of Americans.

On Thursday, Trump and an entourage that included Homeland Security Secretary Kristjen Nielsen and White House counsel Pat Cippollone, met with immigration officials near an existing border barrier in McAllen, Texas.

Outside advisers described Trump’s border trip as a positive step, but said he should now take his case around the nation, potentially by staging immigration-focused events in congressional districts that recently flipped from red to blue.

Some also argue that Trump would benefit from agreeing to sign spending legislation immediately after declaring a national emergency.

As one Senate GOP aide put it: “The president could reopen everything and basically declare himself the bigger guy.”

Nancy Cook contributed reporting to this story.

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