Vox Sentences: "You down with TPP? Yeah you know me" - Senate Finance Committee

1. Fast track? More like slow track

Treasury Secretary Jack Lew, center, poses for photographs with Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch (R-UT), right, and ranking member Sen. Ron Wyden (D-OR). (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

• Despite an effort by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) to prevent the Senate Finance Committee from considering legislation to give the Obama administration "fast track" trade negotiating authority, the committee is expected to clear the bill later this evening.

  [The Hill / Jordain Carney]

• A deal reached between the administration and Republicans in Congress would give legislators months to review the huge Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal Obama is negotiating with a number of Asian countries, delaying passage until October or even later.

  [NYT / Jonathan Weisman and Michael Shear]

• In committee markup, an amendment cracking down on currency manipulation by other countries was approved, receiving heavy backing from Midwest senators who feel manipulation harms US exports.

  [AFP / Michael Mathes]

• Secretary of the Treasury Jack Lew had pleaded with Congress to not pass such an amendment, saying it would "likely derail the conclusion of the TPP."

  [The Hill / Vicki Needham]

• Many congressional Democrats, most notably Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, are strongly opposed to fast track authority.

  [Huffington Post / Laura Barron-Lopez]

• Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) has emerged as the leading critic of TPP and fast track authority in the Senate, with President Obama criticizing her by name for her opposition.

  [Vox / Danielle Kurtzleben]

• Not big on trade policy? This explainer should get you up to speed on all of this.

  [Vox / Danielle Kurtzleben]

2. Gitmo? More like Gitless

(Carl Court/Getty Images)

• The Pentagon is hoping to transfer 57 inmates from Guantanamo Bay, cutting its current population of 122 nearly in half.

  [Washington Post / Missy Ryan and Adam Goldman]

• Already this year, five Yemeni inmates were transferred, four to Oman and one to Estonia; that came shortly after four detainees were sent to Afghanistan and five to Kazakhstan in late 2014.

  [MSNBC / David Taintor]

• Administration officials have said that the goal is to "deplete the Guantanamo prison to the point where it houses 60 to 80 people and keeping it open no longer makes economic sense"; if 57 more inmates are transferred, that'd leave 65 detainees, right in that range.

  [NYT / Helene Cooper]

• President Obama has been trying to close the prison for his entire presidency, but has been blocked by Congress.

  [Miami Herald / Carol Rosenberg]

• In case Congress moves to freeze Guantanamo's population, the administration is "exploring options for the unilateral closure of the prison and moving detainees into the United States."

  [Washington Post / Missy Ryan and Adam Goldman]

• The administration has drafted up options for closing it without congressional approval for months, which would spark a massive legislative fight.

  [WSJ / Carol Lee and Jess Bravin]

3. Google Fi? More like … no, Google Fi works

• Google is unveiling its own cellphone coverage plan, known as Google Fi.

  [Google / Nick Fox]

• Rather than relying on cell towers, the plan mainly uses existing wifi networks and only uses cell networks (Sprint's and T-Mobile's, specifically) when wifi isn't available.

  [Vox / Timothy B. Lee]

• The plan would be as cheap as $30 a month for 1 GB of data; comparable plans from traditional carriers cost $50 to $70 (although they also provide family plans, which Google Fi won't).

  [The Verge / Chris Welch]

• Initially, the plan is only available on Google Nexus 6 phones, so iPhone users and people with Android phones from Samsung or HTC are out of luck, at least for now.

  [WSJ / Ryan Knutson and Alistair Barr]

• Google isn't the first company to think of this; Republic Wireless has been operating wifi-based plans since 2011.

  [Vox / Timothy B. Lee]

4. Misc.

• Welfare reform was supposed to push people into the workforce. A new study finds it did the opposite.

  [Mother Jones / Kevin Drum]

• One big problem for restaurants trying to abolish tipping: sticker shock from the menu mark-ups.

  [Washington Post / Maura Judkis]

• A+++ headline: "Ray-Ban Bans Rand Paul’s Ray-Bans over Brand Ban"

  [Mediaite / Evan McMurry]

• It's trendy to worry about hyper-intelligent robots. But dumb bots can be just as dangerous.

  [Slate / Adam Elkus]

• Do the best arguments for gun rights imply that we should give guns to prisoners?

  [Practical Ethics / Jeff McMahan]

• If you're a fan of the directors Anderson (PT and Wes), this supercut on how they learned from Jonathan Demme's close-up shots is really edifying.

  [Slate / Forrest Wickman]

5. Verbatim

• "How often does he really connect with his interviewees? 'Have you seen the show? Mostly, I’m not even listening.'"

  [Jon Stewart and The Guardian / Hadley Freeman]

• "The sense that having children is the most worthy of human activities is questioned by the writer Tim Kreider, who argues that it’s 'a pretty low-rent ultimate purpose that’s shared with viruses and bacteria.'"

  [The Atlantic / Sophie Gilbert]

• "Arch-conservative Mississippi, in other words, is actually home to some of the most vocal Amtrak supporters in the country. (Former Republican Senator Trent Lott, another rail fan who now lobbies for freight companies, was persuaded to fight against cuts to the Crescent when Smith called him up and told him, 'The Yankees are after our trains again.')"

  [National Journal / Simon van Zuylen-Wood]

• "When I first started making tons of money, it freaked me out. I would always get 10 grand in cash every show because I needed to touch the money."

  [Louis CK to Hollywood Reporter / Lacey Rose]

• "At that time, the only thing airing on AMC was a show called Broderick Names Them Roderick, which was a reality show about Matthew Broderick holding divorced men at gunpoint and forcing them to change their legal name to Roderick against their will."

  [Clickhole]

• "'It was sort of a haters going to hate, to quote Taylor Swift.' 'Never do that again.'"

  [PBS NewsHour / Tamara Keith and Gwen Ifill]

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