TRUMP TALKS AGAIN, BIDEN JUST YAWNS
WASHINGTON, D.C. (AFP) — Insisting that he won the US election and brawling with his own party’s top senator, Donald Trump was back to demanding national attention this week. President Joe Biden just yawned.
“I’m tired of talking about Donald Trump, don’t want to talk about him anymore,” Biden said during a CNN town hall in Wisconsin on Tuesday night.
Trump is doing his best to get talked about.
Since grumpily departing the White House on 20 January and ceding to Biden, he has largely kept to himself.
But on Wednesday he marked the death of right-wing radio host Rush Limbaugh by calling into Fox News and reupping his false claim that he was robbed of victory in the 3 November election.
“Rush thought we won and so do I by the way. I think we won substantially,” Trump said, adding how “angry” the country is about the supposed fraud, which no court has substantiated.
And on Tuesday Trump lit up the political landscape by firing a remarkable broadside at Senator Mitch McConnell, the senior Republican in Congress.
McConnell’s sin was to have ripped Trump in a speech after helping to acquit the former president in last Saturday’s impeachment trial.
McConnell did not join the seven rebel Republicans voting with Democrats to convict Trump for inciting insurrection at the Capitol on 6 January. He stuck to the party line and in doing so likely ensured that the number of defectors remained just a trickle.
I’m tired of talking about Donald Trump, don’t want to talk about him anymore.
But having done his duty to Trump, McConnell then let loose, blaming him for a “disgraceful dereliction of duty” and recalling that the mob attacking the Capitol was “carrying his banners... screaming their loyalty to him.”
Trump’s riposte was a humdinger.
“Mitch is a dour, sullen, and unsmiling political hack,” a statement from Trump’s Florida retreat said.
How Biden was going to deal with the specter of a vengeful Trump has been a question ever since his convincing victory in November. Typically, former presidents fade gracefully into the background, but Trump is different.
BEIJING, China (Xinhua) — China has accelerated its construction of major water conservancy projects with investments in projects under construction exceeding 1 trillion yuan (about $155.3 billion), said the Ministry of Water Resources.
Of the 172 planned major water conservancy projects, 36 have been completed and brought into full play, including the eastern and middle route of the South-to-North Water Transfer Project, the ministry added.
The major projects mainly concern flood control and disaster reduction, the optimal allocation of water resources, water-saving irrigation, water ecological protection and restoration, and intelligent water conservancy.
Flood control storage is expected to increase by 9 billion cubic meters and the annual water supply capacity is expected to grow by 42 billion cubic meters, said the ministry.
This year, the ministry will continue to accelerate the construction of major water conservancy projects with high standards, it added.