LIVE BY RECONCILIATION, DIE BY RECONCILIATION: Senate Republicans just introduced an Obamacare repeal plan Democrats can’t stop.

Senate Budget Committee Chair Michael Enzi (R-WY) introduced a budget resolution Tuesday that includes “reconciliation instructions” that enable Congress to repeal Obamacare with a simple Senate majority. Passing a budget resolution that includes those instructions will mean that the legislation can pass through the budget reconciliation process, in which bills cannot be filibustered.

That means Republicans will only need 50 of their 52 members in the Senate, and a bare majority in the House, to pass legislation repealing the Affordable Care Act. According to the Wall Street Journal, the budget resolution could be passed by both houses as early as next week.

To be clear, passing the budget resolutions does not itself repeal Obamacare. But it’s the necessary first step if Republicans are to do that this year, and unless three or more Republican senators defect (or 24 House members do), it’ll be smooth sailing for the repeal effort from there on out.

First day of business, too.

Updated with this flashback: “Reid: Dems will use 50-vote tactic to finish healthcare in 60 days.”

The move would allow Democrats to essentially go it alone on health reform, especially after losing their filibuter-proof majority in the Senate after Sen. Scott Brown’s (R) special election victory in Massachusetts.

Republicans have protested the maneuver as a hyperpartisan tactic to ram through a health bill, and have said that plans to use the reconciliation process make moot a bipartisan summit at the White House this week, where both GOP and Democratic leaders are supposed to present their ideas on healthcare.

They honestly bought into that “permanent Democratic majority” stuff.

SPACE: SpaceX concludes accident investigation, targets return to flight on Sunday.

Four months after a fueling accident led to the loss of a Falcon 9 rocket and its satellite payload, SpaceX said Monday morning that it has concluded an investigation into the incident and submitted its findings to the Federal Aviation Administration. The company also announced a target date of January 8th for a return to flight.

The SpaceX investigation, in concert with the FAA, US Air Force, NASA, and the National Transportation Safety Board, concluded that one of three composite overwrapped pressure vessels, or COPVs, inside the rocket’s second stage liquid oxygen tank failed. “Specifically, the investigation team concluded the failure was likely due to the accumulation of oxygen between the COPV liner and overwrap in a void or a buckle in the liner, leading to ignition and the subsequent failure of the COPV,” the company stated in an update. . . .

The investigation identified several “credible causes” for this failure, all of which can be avoided in the short term by changing the COPV configuration to allow for the loading of warmer helium, and returning helium loading procedures to a “prior flight proven configuration.” Presumably this means prior to December 2015, when the company began using supercooled liquid oxygen and kerosene fuels to increase the performance of its rocket, known as the Falcon 9 Full Thrust vehicle. Since the accident did not involve the rocket fuels themselves, Ars understands that the new procedures will not substantially affect the performance gains of the full thrust Falcon 9 for upcoming launches.

Good.

STEPHEN KRUISER: 10 Almost Already Forgotten Celebrity Deaths of 2016.

Make it 11 and include Angus Scrimm who passed away in January, famous for playing Phantasm’s “Tall Man.”

Actually, Kruiser has a twofer for you today. You also won’t want to miss the latest Must-C TV.

(That’s C for Carlson, Tucker.)

CHANGE: Ford cancels plan to build new Mexican plant, adds US jobs.

YUGE: How Big Can A Tsunami Get?

ABOUT FACE: Republicans back off gutting of House ethics office after critical Trump tweet.

NEWS YOU CAN USE: Petroleum Jelly Could Reduce Risk of Eczema.

THE BREXIT IS COMING! THE BREXIT IS COMING! Prime Minister Theresa May to Trigger Article 50 Before EU Summit in March.

BREAKING: Megyn Kelly Jumping from Fox News to NBC.

BROKEN?

THE SILK RAIL: China launches freight train to Britain.

The train will travel from Yiwu West Railway Station in Zhejiang Province, Eastern China to Barking, London, taking 18 days to travel over 7,400 miles.

The route runs through Kazakhstan, Russia, Belarus, Poland, Germany, Belgium and France, before arriving in London. The UK is the eighth country to be added to the China-Europe service, and London is the 15th city.

The railway is a major strategic development to assist Xi Jinping’s multi-billion dollar ‘One Belt, One Road’ strategy, according to the China-Europe Freight Rail Development Plan released in October.

The strategy was launched in 2013 and is an infrastructure and trade network connecting Asia with Africa and Europe along old Silk Road trading routes.

Most interesting? China’s infrastructure improvements planned for East Africa and Arabia to create the corresponding “Maritime Silk Road,” which would leapfrog India’s position in the Indian Ocean.

WELL, THIS IS THE 21ST CENTURY, YOU KNOW: These brothers built a mine-sweeping drone.

AN OPEN APOLOGY TO EVAN MCMULLIN: “I’m writing to tell you how much I regret my part in making you someone who sucks up to Shaun King.”

Heh. Read the whole thing.

THE DIVERSION OF LEFTY ENERGY INTO POINTLESS SOCIAL-MEDIA OUTRAGE MOBS HAS BEEN A BOON FOR THE RIGHT: The Left has absolutely lost the plot.

The blood-soaked terror attack in Istanbul swiftly confirmed any glimmer of belief we held in remaining safe and secure was premature.

In the face of such horror, the insipid Left has launched a new comedy show. They’re squealing to boycott publisher Simon & Schuster as it confirmed Milo Yiannopoulos, far right journalist and speaker, has signed a book deal reportedly worth $US250,000.

Yes, this cat and mouse cartoon is how they choose to expend their energy.

It’s entertaining already. Pre-orders have pushed his autobiography, Dangerous, out in March, to the top of Amazon’s bestseller lists in America and Canada.

Leftie howling has managed publicity as slickly as their outrage over screenings of Cassie Jaye’s The Red Pill documentary secured awareness.

Really, this is win/win.

Related: Tom Kratman’s Strategy For Victory: Troll The Left Mercilessly! “Now, I don’t want you to think of Trigglypuff as merely another Social Justice Warrior who needs a diaper change. Oh, no, she’s much more – much more valuable – than that. Indeed, the whole country’s population of SJWs has become a resource for us. . . . the left is largely a bunch of self-willed, albeit unintelligent, bombs, just like Trigglypuff, waiting to go off at the slightest emotional jar. And we – yes, we right wing knuckle-draggers – control those bombs because we can emotionally jar them.”

GLENN KESSLER: Fact-checking John Kerry’s speech on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

REMEMBER THE PEACE DEAL IN CONGO?: I linked to the peace deal report late last week. That report struck me as overly optimistic. Well, now there appear to be problems in implementing it.

StrategyPage ran a report over the weekend that saw this coming. We Maybe Might Have A Peace Deal. The StrategyPage report has useful background.

Here’s AFP on January 1.

Congo and sub-Saharan Africa tend to be well off the mainstream media radar. (Re: off mainstream radar. I’ll link to StrategyPage’s “Wars Update” later today.) Congo, however, was a slaughterhouse. The last Congo civil war killed between three and five million people. The death toll estimates include exposure (due to displacement) as well as combat and just plain mass murder. Displacement often leads to malnutrition which increases the risk of disease. That’s why the higher death toll estimates may be correct.

WITH FIRE: To Fix the Department of the Navy; Kill the Mabus Legacy.

Global warming and political incorrectness are the greatest threats to the United States, and it is the job of America’s Navy to protect us from those threats. For the past eight years, that has been the strategic legacy of Navy Secretary Ray Mabus, and the primary goal of his successor should be to ensure that Mabus has no legacy. The traditional mission of the US Navy has been to deter potentially hostile navies, or failing to do that, defeat them. Getting the US naval services back to that philosophy is going to be a big job for the new administration.

The Mabus priorities have been making the naval services more caring, inclusive, and environmentally protective. Discipline, combat effectiveness, and readiness have been secondary goals at best. Under Mabus, the Navy has sunk to readiness levels approaching those of the post-Vietnam Carter era.

Read the whole thing — although Instapundit readers have long known that Jimmy Carter was Obama’s best-case scenario.

FASTER, HOTTER, PLEASE: Chillies could help beat cancer as research finds capsaicin destroys diseased cells.

RADIO FREE EUROPE/RADIO LIBERTY: What ever happened to Saddam’s “Most Wanted”?

This is a graphic and worth the look. According to RFE/RL, seven thugs are still at large. A handful were captured and released. Otherwise they are dead or remain in detention.

I picked up a “Most Wanted” deck of cards when I was on active duty in Iraq. I saw it in a drawer about six months ago.

TAXPROF ROUNDUP: The IRS Scandal, Day 1134.

WAPO CLIMBDOWN: Russian government hackers do not appear to have targeted Vermont utility, say people close to investigation.

Plus: “Other than that, we stand by every word of our previous article claiming exactly the opposite.”

SINCE THEY’RE LIFERS IN THE FEDERAL BUREAUCRACY, VERY LIKELY YES. NEXT QUESTION? Roger Simon: Do Our Intelligence Agencies Suffer from Trump Derangement Syndrome?

ONE EMPATHIZES: NATO Allies ‘Desperate For Leadership’ Under Obama.

COULDN’T ANYBODY SEE THIS COMING? Leaving for Las Vegas: California’s minimum wage law leaves businesses no choice.

Here’s what the math looks like: I pay my employees $10.50 an hour, plus productivity bonuses. In addition, I pay payroll taxes and one of the highest worker compensation rates in the state. Even still, I could likely absorb a minimum wage as high as $11.50 an hour. But a $15-an-hour wage for my employees translates into $18.90 in costs for me — or just under $40,000 a year per full-time employee.

When the $15 minimum wage is fully phased in, my company would be losing in excess of $200,000 a year (and far more if my workforce grows as anticipated). That may be a drop in the bucket for large corporations, but a small business cannot absorb such losses. I could try to charge more to offset that cost, but my customers — the companies that are looking for someone to produce their clothing line — wouldn’t pay it. The result would be layoffs.

When Los Angeles County’s minimum wage ordinance was approved in July, I began looking at Ventura County, Orange County and other parts of the state. Then, when California embraced a $15 wage target, I realized that my company couldn’t continue to operate in the state. After considering Texas and North Carolina, I’ve settled on moving the business to Las Vegas, where I’m looking for the right facility. About half of our employees will make the move with us.

There’s no repealing the law of supply and demand.

MEGAN MCARDLE: Hacking Democratic Rules Isn’t Good Government.

Before the election, the Senate’s refusal to hold a vote on the appointment of Merrick Garland, President Obama’s nominee to the Supreme Court, seemed destined to be a footnote in history. Hillary Clinton would win the election, a different and even more liberal nominee would be put forward (quite possibly to a Democratic-controlled Senate), and after decades of conservative dominance, the Supreme Court would once again tilt leftward.

Trump’s surprise election upset this. Particularly, it upset progressive activists, who thought that Antonin Scalia’s death in office had finally given them a chance at a more activist liberal judiciary. Having written the lede on the way to the ballpark, some of them were not quite ready to tear up their story and start over.

Enter the procedural hacks. What if Democrats went and confirmed Garland anyway?

You may be a bit confused. Republicans hold the majority in this Senate. They will also control the next Senate. How are Democrats supposed to bring the thing to the floor for a vote, much less get enough votes to actually confirm him?

That’s a very good question! The answer some progressives have come up with is that there will be a nanosecond gap between when the outgoing senators leave office, and the new ones are sworn in. During that gap, there will be more Democrats left than Republicans. So the idea is to call that smaller body into session, vote on the nomination, and voila! — a new Supreme Court justice. Alternatively, President Obama could use that gap to make a recess appointment.

Sure. Harry Reid’s breaking the filibuster is going to work out great for them. Why not throw all the other norms out the window, too! Make it all about raw power! Trump won’t be able to handle that!