♪ judy: good evening. i'm judy woodruff. on "the newshour" tonight... at the extreme -- the death toll rises as already catastrophic flooding worsens in kentucky and other parts of appalachia. then... imprisoned in russia -- the sister of an american sentenced to 14 years for cannabis possession discusses his exclusion from a proposed prisoner swap. >> as the deal currently stands, yes, we're very worried he's going to be left behind and i worry that there will not be another opportunity like this. judy: and it's friday... david brooks and jonathan capehart weigh in on the climate and health care deal in congress and consequences of the economy's uncertain direction. judy: all that and more on tonight's "pbs newshour."

♪ >> major funding for the "pbs newshour" has been provided by -- >> pediatric surgeon. volunteer. topiary artist. a raymond james financial advisor tailors advice to help you live your life. life, well planned. >> the john s and james l knight foundation, fostering informed and engaged communities. more at kf.org. ♪

>> and friends of "the newshour." ♪ this program was made possible by the corporation for public broadcasting, and by contributions to your pbs station from viewers like you. thank you. judy: eastern kentucky is the epicenter tonight of the nation's latest extreme weather disaster. at least 16 people have died in flooding that re-wrote the record books and ravaged neighboring states as well. amna nawaz has our report. amna: the town of garrett, kentucky is hardly recognizable -- inundated by torrents of rainwater that flooded streets and wiped out homes and businesses. rachel patton was caught in the deluge. rachel: it's gone. everythi is gone. everything is gone. our whole life is gone. amna: her mother also had to be

rescued. rachel: we had to put her on a door to get her out of her trailer because she was flooded in and couldn't get out. she's on oxygen. amna: search and rescue teams backed by the national guard are still searching for missing people. but determining the exact number of missing has been a challenge, as many people were stranded without cellular service. and, many are in areas still inaccessible to the crews. judge williams: we know we got folks now that we can't get to. they've got water in their homes and are trapped and we can't get to them because the water is so swift. amna: the historic floods struck in some of the state's smallest and poorest areas. as much as a foot of rain has fallen in eastern kentucky in the last week, in counties near the borders with virginia and west virginia. by this morning, more than 33,000 people had no power, and many also lost water service. gov. beshear: hello everybody. amna: today, kentucky's governor andy beshear prepared his state for more grim days ahead. gov. beshear: right now it looks like it's gonna rain a lot

monday, maybe tuesday. so we will continue to watch that. but everybody out there, have a safety plan for when that comes, we don't want you to go through this twice. amna: in the meantime, the rescue effort goes on around the clock. beshear predicted the damage will take at least a year to rebuild. meanwhile, a similar story in parts of western virginia and southern west virginia, where flooding overtook roads and brought down trees. leading both governors to issue emergency declarations in the hardest hit areas. and more rainfall in st. louis last night and into today, just days after a storm topped a daily rainfall record set back in 1915. >> our boat has arrived, miri. amna: this mother and her 9-month-old daughter had to be rescued fromheir home and pulled through what was once their neighborhood in hazelwood, missouri. the missouri department of transportation closed down four highways as well as several other roads.

back in kentucky, president biden declared the situation a "major disaster," dering federal aid to 13 counties that will assist in recovery efforts. sec. jean-pierre: our hearts break for the families of those who have lost their lives or are missing and to all those who have been impacted. unfortunately, kentucky is no stranger to catastrophic climate events and the federal government will continue to provide assistance. amna: more rain and storms are expected to continue into the weekend. for the pbs newshour, i'm amna nawaz. judy: in the day's other news -- stifling heat across the pacific northwest kept temperatures at or above 100 degrees again. the extreme conditions could last through the weekend. if so, seattle could set a record topping 90 for 6 days in a row. officials say the heat may have

caused 4 deaths so far. there's a new revelation in the january 6th investigation. "the washington post" reports text messages from the department of homeland security are missing from the period before the attack on the u.s. capitol. the texts were sent by then-acting homeland security secretary chad wolf and acting deputy secretary ken cuccinelli. the department says the messages were deleted after the officials turned in their phones. the chair of the january 6th committee, bennie thompson, says it's extremely troubling that the same thing happened at dhs and the secret service. the u.s. house of representatives headed toward a vote this evening to restore a ban on semi-automatic weapons, often used in mass shootings. democrats and republicans split down party lines amid claims and counter-claims on the merits of a ban. rep. fishbach: my colleagues are proving yet again that they want to strip law-abiding citizens of their second amendment rights.

the latest so-called assault weapons ban is unconstitutional and will impact other aspects of american life. rep. mcgovern: you have the right to keep and bear arms but you don't have the right to ow weapons that are used to mow people down indiscriminately. rights come with responsibilities and we have the responsibility to try and stop mass shootings. judy: a ban on assault-style weapons was enacted in 1994, but expired in 2004. previous attempts to renew it have failed, and the bill that passed today is expected to stall in the senate. another major inflation gauge is pointing to price hikes for some time to come. an index watched by the federal reserve shows a june increase of nearly percent from a year ago. and, employee wages rose 1.6 percent. that could fuel new inflation if employers pass the cost to consumers.

more oil companies have reported record profits for the second quarter at a time when gas prices soared. exxonmobil made nearly $18 billion, and chevron took in almost $12 billion. at the same time, oil production fell slightly from april to may. the industry h suffered widespread bankruptcies and layoffs in the first year of the pandemic. in ukraine, shelling in the donestsk region today killed scores of captured ukrainian fighters, and each side blamed the other. the russians said at least 53 ukrainian prisoners died and 75 were wounded. the attack left burned rubble where jail cells had been. meanwhile, president volodymyr zelenskyy visited a black sea port, where ukrainian grain shipments are set to resume. pres. zelenskyy: our side is fully prepared. we sent all the signals to our

partners, the u.n. and türkiye, and our military guarantees the security situation. as soon as the turkish side and the u.n. signal that they believe they are ready to receive cargo and we are ready to export, everything will begin. judy: zelenskyy said he believes the first shipments could sail by tomorrow. u.s. secretary of state antony blinken and russia's foreign minister spoke about a possible prisoner swap in a phone call today. blinken says he again urged that moscow release wnba star brittany griner and paul whelan, a corporate secuty executive. the secretary did not say how the russians responded. pope francis has closed out his 6-day visit to canada with a final apology to indigenous peoples. in quebec city today, members of his audience shed tears as the pontiff said church missionaries helped oppress native peoples for centuries. later, he flew to the arctic circle to meet with survivors of residential schools. the pope returns to rome

tonight. on the pandemic -- the u.s. government agreed today to buy 66 million updated covid vaccine doses from moderna. the upgraded boosters will target the highly contagious omicron variant. they'll be stockpiled for the fall, when health officials say a new wave of infections may strike. and, on wall street -- stocks closed out a winning month, buoyed by strong corporate earnings. the dow jones industrial average gained 315 points to close at 32,845. the nasdaq rose 228 points. the s&p 500 added 57. for the month, the dow gained more than 6.5%. the nasdaq rose 12%. the s&p 500 jumped 9 percent -- its best showing sce november 2020. judy: still to come on "the newshour"... how a potential senate deal could lower americans' health care costs. far-right supporters of former

president trump's election lies vie for office in arizona. the sister of an american detained in russia discusses his exclusion from the proposed prisoner swap. plus much more. >> this is "the pbs newshour" from weta studios in washington, and in the west from the walter cronkite school of journalism at arizona state university. judy: the u.s. senate is set to vote on president biden's proposed budget package next week after democrats struck a deal on health care and climate provisions. some key proposals in the bill aim to lower the cost of prescription medication for seniors. laura barron-lopez has our look. laura: for the first time, the federal government could have the power to negotiate prices for some of the costliest drugs covered under medicare. the proposed legislation would also help medicare recipients by capping out of pocket drug costs

at $2000 a year, imposing financial penalties on drug manufacturers who raise prices faster than inflation, and removing the 5 percent co-pay beneficiaries must pay when they max out on coverage for high-cost drugs. drug companies have fought these types of drug pricing reforms for years. if the bill passes, it could provide relief to millions of americans. for more on all this, i'm joined by julie rovner of kaiser health news. thank you for being here. julie: thank you for having me. laura: democrats have been trying to allow medicare to negotiate drug crisis for some 20 years. what impact will this have? julie: it is a big deal. as you say, democrats have been trying to allow medicare to negotiate drug prices since the 1980's. they have been fighting about

this ever since. it would start with just a few drugs really just 10 the first , year and it would not expand very much, but some of the most expensive drugs are an enormous part of what medicare spends on drugs so it could have an outsized impact. laura: this is for 20 of the costliest drugs, correct? but does this apply to any new drugs and one company start? julie: it does not apply to new drugs, at least initially, they have to have been on the market for quite some time without generic competition. so these are for drugs that are very expensive, but don't have anything that helps bring those prices down. the government would sp in to do that and eventually it would be 20 drugs. at the beginning it would only be 10 drugs. it's a very small number that the negotiation applies to. laura: as you knowinflation is high. people are really worried about all of their expenses. so what kind of savings will people see from the cap on copays? julie: people could see significant savings. people right now, there is, as you mentioned, there's a catastrophic portion of the medicare drug benefit where if you go over that, you only have

to pay 5%, but that 5% can be a lot of money with some of these really expensive drugs. so the combination of not having to pay that 5% and not having to pay more than $2,000 a year on co-pays could save millions of medicare beneficiaries a lot of money. laura: democrats are also contemplating within this deal continued cost savings for people who have insurance under the affordable care act. what does it do in this bill? julie: basically, it continues a policy that congress put in place in 2021 that made larger subsidies for people buying coverage under the affordable care act, who were already eligible and made some people who have not been eligible -- those who earn about $50,000, a year or more had been ineligible for any subsidy. so it made those people eligible. those will expire at the end of 2022 if congress doesn't extend them. this would extend them three

years. it would be really important because if congress doesn't extend them, these people will start getting notices of premium increases and in some cases could be premium doublings right around the time they vote in early november. laura: right, they would have gotten those right before november. and that gets me to the politics of this. all the provisions that we just talked about that could potentially be passed. can you tell us a little bit about the potential political benefit for democrats if they if they succeed? julie: well, this is something that democrats have been promising for the last several presidential elections and something they haven't been able to do, partly because of the power of the prescription drug industry, and they're already fighting this tooth and nail. as much as people are saying this is such a small piece of what started out as president biden's big bill back better bill it's still really , significant when it comes to prescription drug spending. laura: also, democrats are considering a measure to lower the cost of insulin that could be a potential add in to this larger reconciliation bill. what do we know so far about that? julie: we know that there's been a lot of people who are

supporting this, they have said they want to add it. this has been a bipartisan effort to cap the price of insulin for people with diabetes. basically, at $35 a month. right now there's people who die because they can't afford their insulin. it's not ear exactly which provisions will make it in, but ere's certainly an effort to do something in specific about insulin. laura: and as we mentioned earlier, inflation is high americans are struggling to pay for groceries and other consumer goods. so when you look at this slew of health care benefits that could potentiay pass, how much difference do you think it could make for people's bottom line? julie: well, obviously for the affordable care act, it could make a difrence for them not getting a huge increase, which is not something that that's really that small, even though it won't change anything. if they don't do it, it would go up very much. but drug prices have been continuing problem. rising drug prices for americans. they've told pollsters for years doing something about drug prices is very popular even before we had this sort of spate of high inflation.

drug price inflation has been a problem going back many, many years. as i said, something both parties would like to do. president trump tried to do something and didn't get very much done. so this would be a big win for the democrats. laura: thank you so much, julie rovner of kaiser health news for joining us today. ♪ judy: arizona voters head to the polls tuesday to cast ballots in the state's primaries. and in some of the key contests, leading republican candidates have doubled down on far-right conspiracies denying the results of the 2020 election. stephanie sy has more on how these candidates are shaping the race. stephanie: republicans in arizona agree on a lot. dawn: i want to conserve traditional values, family values, first right amendment, second right amendment.

10th amendment, we the people. kathy: we need to move on to the issues that are also critical, like water and the border and the economy and maintaining the economy that arizona has been very lucky to have. stephanie: dawn and kathy are voters in maricopa county, one of the largest republican counties in america. both voted twice for donaldnd many primary voters here, whether the 2020 election was rigged for joe biden. you believe it was stolen? dawn: i do. kathy: that isn't true. it's not substantiated and there's no evidence for it. >> the fox news decision desk is calling arizona for joe biden. that is a big get. stephanie: on election night, fox news was the first news organization to project that biden had won arizona, shocking trump supporters, including dawn. as a poll volunteer in chandler, arizona, she says only an hour

earlier, she'd seen a truck carrying paper ballots away. dawn: fox news is on and they announce trump lost arizona. arizona's been called. how could they call arizona? they hadn't even gotten the votes from our location. stephanie: news organizations don't tally paper ballots to project election winners, but to dawn, e early call was enough to sow doubt. doubt that the former president, and those who still support him have exploited ever since. how successful that misinformation campaign is will be put to the test in arizona on tuesday. republican candidates for some of the highest offices in the state -- governor, u.s. senator, and secretary of state -- have not only repeatedly talk about election fraud, they've made it a keystone of their campaigns. moderator: you've called joe biden an illegitimate president, what does that mean?

kari: he lost the election and he shouldn't be in the white house, we had a corrupt election. i'd like to ask everyone on the stage if they would agree we had a corrupt stolen election. raise your hand. stephanie: kari lake is running for governor. her campaign posters show her side by side with the former president. >> we've got to make sure we don't end up with a rino. stephanie: at a recent rally in tucson, lake repeated the trump playbook, accusing her opponent karen taylor robson of getting ready to cheat in the primary. kari: i guess if you're counting people who are, you know, dead people who might be. but but she's not up at the polls. and it makes me think there might be trying to set the stage for another steal. stephanie: kari lake's campaign is nothing if not trump-inspired. a media personality with no political experience and a no holds barred style that speaks to the republican base. but the maga crowd alone can't give her victory in the general

election if she gets past the primary. biden won arizona by appealing to the sta's largest group of voters, independents, and many republicans crossed over. are you concerned that you have alienated those independents and some of those republicans who voted for biden in this state? with all the talk about decertifying the election. kari: i'm not going to change who i am. my whole campaign has been based on my understanding of arizona and the people of arizona. and we want honest elections. we want honest elections for our democrat friends, our independent friends, and our republican friends. stephanie: while lake has trump's endorsement, robson has the support of the republican establishment -- current arizona governor doug ducey, and trump's vice president, mike pence -- making the race a head to head fight between the two factions of the gop. stephen: i would say i'm sort of a libertarian minded conservative. stephanie: stephen richer is the maricopa county recorder, a

republican. he beat the democratic incumbent to become the county's highest election official in 2020. he says not only was the election honest, but that his republican colleagues who claim otherwise are challenging the underlying foundation of the united states. you're saying those voting machines were absolutely secure? stephen: that's a fact. every single test has worked. they were used in multiple elections that nobody ever challenged prior to the novemb 2020 election. they went through federal certification. they went through state certification. they went through tests before the election. they went through a hand count audit by the political parties themselves, and they always match 100%. stephanie: but that, spoken by a conservative who voted for trump, is still not enough for some voters, nor were the january 6th hearings that featured some of trump's closest allies, like former attorney general bill barr. mr. barr: the election was not stolen by fraud and i haven't seen anything since the election that changes my mind on that.

stephanie: you now have multiple people that were close to president trump saying there just wasn't evidence to show widespread fraud that would have changed the outcome. and multiple people have come out and said that they were trying to convince the president of this. dawn: i personally believe that there are people that were close to trump that were not close to trump in philosophies. stephanie: multiple investigations, court cases, and audits showed the election was clean, and that was before millions of dollars were spent on a republican-commissioned hand count in arizona that also found biden was the winner. but all of the stop the steal talk continues and has fallen on real people. former yavapai county recorder, leslie hoffman, is a republican who has worked in an overwhelmingly republican county as an elections officer for over a decade. leslie: we see who you are.

we see you. you better be nervous. you should lawyer up. you're as corrupt as the government you worked for. stephanie: that's what she finds almost every day when she checks her email. leslie: i do have concerns about certain people getting into office that will not believe in the work that we do and therefore certifying the canvass might become a challenge. stephanie: that's scary. leslie: it's very scary. what we're doing is so important. stephanie: hoffman resigned a week ago, ahead of tuesday's primary election. >> president trump-endorsed me because he likes to win. stephanie: in the senate primary, candidate blake masters is running for the gop nomination to challenge democratic senator mark kelly. he also got the blessing of former president trump, after he questioned the results of the 2020 election. why are you hitching your wagon to a one term president who lost

this state two years ago? blake: i'm not hitching my wagon. i would say i'm proud of president trump for what he accomplished. i not going to run from am president trump's successful term in the general election. absolutely not. do you know how many independents i meet who say we're sorry we voted for biden? please bring back the mean tweets because we want $2 gas. we want a border. we want to country that works. stephanie: kathy, a republican party organizer, wants many of those same things. but says she won't vote for any candidate who promotes election fraud claims. kathy: we can't have that kind of dangerous rhetoric and it cannot come from the top of the arizona executives. this is why i'm going door to door. i know the people on the ballot. i know the people who really have the heart and soul of arizona in their best interest here for our state. and that is why i will go every single day and knock doors until, you know, we can't.

>> how are you? i'm going door to door. stephanie: knocking on those doors, she's as undeterred by the extreme at of the arizona summer as she is by the extreme views dividing her political party. for the pbs newshour, i'm stephanie sy in phoenix. ♪ judy: amid the back and forth between russia and the u.s. over the fates of two americans detained in russian jails, one american has not been part of those intensifying negotiations. amna nawaz is back now with his story. amna: russia's foreign minister lavrov said today he'll soon propose a date for talks with u.s. secretary of state blinken, as russia weighs a prisoner swap to free detained americans brittney griner and paul whelan.

but there's a third american, also held by russia, and detained now for almost a year. his name is marc fogel. he's a 61-year-old teacher who's lived and worked in russia for nine years. and in a ce strikingly similar to griner, fogel was arrested when russian airport authorities found vape cartridges and cannabis buds in his luggage in august 2021. he was accused of intending to sell to students, convicted, and sentenced to 14 years of hard labor. fogel's family says he suffers from chronic pain, and the marijuana was medicinal. they want the u.s. government to bring him home. joining me now, from missoula, montana, is his sister, anne fogel. welcome to the newshour and thank you for joining us. tell us how is your brother doing, have you been able to communicate with him in any way? anne: no one has talked to him. we've been able to write some

letters through the russian prison system. it is a bit of a convoluted system because while sometimes he can get our lette in english, sometimes he gets them in russian and they get translated into english. then we get a photocopied picte of the handwritten letter. and then we have to find a translator where we are. there's a lot lost in translation. amna: i'm sure you are watching secretary blinken announcing this week they've put forward a deal, a proposed deal to russia. secretary blinken mentioned brittney griner. he mentioned paul wheelan. he didn't mention your brother's name. and i just wonder what you thought in that moment. anne: it was a gut punch. it was a gut punch. we've been trying to raise our voices. we were advised by the state department to keep a low profile through sentencing, which we did. and we've been really trying to

follow the rules and really give the russian judicial judicial system a chance to work. over the past year, of course, things have gotten so much -- the relationship has gotten so much worse. so that became apparent that time was not playing in our favor at all. it is hard to hear secretary blinken talk about brittney griner and whalen and not include marc. amna: do you believe that the us government is right now doing everything it can to free your brother? anne: no, i don't, because he has not been deemed wrongfully detained. we need that moniker in order to move him into the the potential negotiations for the swap. no, i don't think so. i'm hopeful. i'm hopefuthat things will come right. i think that we've gotten a lot of letters sent to the state department. there's a petition now that's

going about, and of course we're on the newshour. so this is a very positive thing. luckily, we've had some coverage from the other networks as well. so we're very, very thankful for that. amna: tell us a little bit about your brother. he chose to go there. he'd been living in russia for nine years. he was teaching at what i understand to be sort of international school where u.s. and british and canadian diplomats sent their kids. why was he there? why did he choose this work? tell us about him. anne: marc had always had a had a wanderlust and chose to join the international community. 36 years ago. he has lived in, i think, seven different countries with his wife and kids. they raised their kids overseas. he comes home every summer and every christmas, but their life has been overseas and they love that. they love russia. they love the russian people. so he is a true blue history teacher.

he's an extremely passionate person. he was really able to make that work in his life where he got to do his passion. and i don't think he's ever worked a day in his life. i think his students would say the same thing. he has inspired a lot of people, including the son of the former ambassador, michael mcfaul. his son was in marc's class as well. amna: and we know ambassador mcfaul has been among those publicly calling for your brother's release. your family has said publicly he suffers from chronic pain. that's why he had the medicinal marijuana with him, a 14 year prison sentence. what do you worry that would do to him? anne: he is meant to go to a work colony. i don't see how that would be possible.

his first back surgery was at 30 years of age. he's had one failed back surgery after another, which then culminated in hip replacements and shoulder surgeries. he's not able to do manual work at this point. limps, one leg is appreciably smaller than the other. he's got very significant scarring on his back. i just don't understand h the the russian courts didn't look at the stack of medical files that we sent and sent him home. it's crushing. he will not survive this. he will not survive 14 years in a work colony. i think it is inhumane for the u.s. government to leave him. that's how i feel. amna: and have you or anyone in

your family asked to speak directly with president biden? anne: yes. president biden, i want to talk to you, please. he's a school teacher. your wife's a schoolteacher. he has done amazing things. he doesn't belong in a russian jail. i would love to speak to president biden, he is my president. but no, we have not as of yet. amna: if this deal goes through, are you concerned your brother will be left behind? anne: as the deal currently stands, yes, we're very worried he's going to be left behind. i worry that there will not be another opportunity like this. the thought of never seeing him again is terrifying. amna: is there anything else you wanteople to know about your brother? anne: he's an extort in person, he's an extra ordinary teacher and he needs to come home. he just needs to come home.

amna: that is anne fogel, joining us from missoula, non-tanner -- montana. she is the sister of marc fogel, who is currently detained in russia and has been for a year. thank you so much for your time. anne: thank you for sharing your story. ♪ judy: with flation at a 40-year high in the u.s., we're all spending more when we go to the store. but economics correspondent paul solman reports that there is another dimension of inflation these days -- shrinkflation. we'll let him explain. paul: so what is this? the rogue's gallery or shrink for asian? -- shrinkflation? edgar: these are some of the newer items. paul: in fact, items consumer

advocate and lawyer edgar dworsky had bought in just the past week. edgar: the first one here is kind of an egregious example. angel soft toilet paper used to have 425 sheets on a roll. the new one has 320. it's almost two full rolls in new sizing. look at the packages. don't they look almost identical? paul: do they ever. and that's the key to what's being called shrinkflation, says dworsky, who writes the online consumer world newsletter and has been tracking product downsizing for decades. edgar: i remember the charmin of the 1960's when mr. whipple came on tv -- >> please don't squeeze the charmin. edgar: it had 650 sheets on a roll. the biggest one today has 366. it's about 90% less. paul: it's not just toilet paper. ice cream tubs used to be a half gallon, or two quarts, then 1 and three-quarters quarts, they've now trimmed down to a svelte 1nd a half. because lately, it's been the incredible shrinking everything. edgar: shrinkflation tends to

come in waves. we happen to be in the middle of a tidal wave at the moment because of inflation. paul: that's because material and transportation costs have been soaring since the much reported supply chain snags. how best to pass them on to us consumers? edgar: manufacturers rely on both raising the price and shrinking the product. the difference is they know that consumers are price conscious and consumers will catch the fact if that container of orange juice went from $2.99 to $3.39 and they'll balk, they'll complain, maybe they'll switch to another brand. but they know consumers are not net weight conscious. they're not going to notice most of them if the product has gotten a little bit smaller. paul: especially not if the shrinkage is pretty much indiscernible. what is that, dishwashing detergent? edgar: this is dawn. the current seven ounce little bottle is now six and a half ounce. so you lost half an ounce. honest to goodness, i don't know how they did it.

the bottom line is you are getting half an ounce less. this is post honey bunches of oats. the old one was 14 and a half ounces. the new one is 12 ounces. look at the boxes. they look identical straight on. you got 17% less. that translates into two fewer bowls in the new box. and the price was the same. paul: now, the official inflation rate is 9.1%. the honey bunches rate, 17%. no wonder corporations are posting record profits. they can raise prices above the overall inflation rate, and we won't even notice. edgar: gatorade. forever it's come in 32 ounce bottles. the new one is 28. so you lost four ounces in every one. but you look at them, you say, they look the same height. what did they do? paul: they squeezed the midriff. edgar: they gave it a waistline. that's exactly right. and the company says, oh, now it's easier to hold.

well, thank you very much. i'd rather have the extra four ounces and i'll suffer holding pa apanies also rejigger the products themselves. edgar: folgers ground coffee recently reformulated. they said they fluffed up the beans so they could no longer put 51 ounces of ground coffee into their canisters. they could only fit in 43 and a half ounces. but they're still claiming it makes up to 400 cups with half a pound less of coffee. you'll have to decide as a coffee drinker, is it still the same cup that you used to get? paul: so the onus is on the consumer to be hypervigilant, says dworsky. in a supermarket, there's that unit price for everything, right? edgar: i don't know the statistics of usage of unit pricing. my sense is it's very low. paul: moreover, since the self-proclaimed mr. consumer -- edgar: where unit pricing

doesn't help is when the individual product changes. so unless you've memorized that your keebler cookies were 14.3 cents an ounce and now it's 16.7 cents an ounce, is not going to help you. paul: i would i would be totally overmatched. edgar: i mean, it's bad enough that i try to counsel people, look at the items you buy all the time, look at the net weight, the net count, memorize it. and when you go back to the store, double check that it hasn't changed. how else are you going to, you know, make a choice intelligently if you don't know what it used to be? paul: yeah, but that's almost impossible. who's going to keep track of that? you are either a professional or a lunatic. edgar: a little bit of both. paul: meanwhile, for the rest of us, inflation at the store these days turns out to be even more pronounced than we realize because of shrinkflation. for the pbs newshour, paul solman.

♪ judy: the apparent senate deal to address health care costs and climate change is not everything president biden wanted but it does revive a sizable chunk of his legislative agenda. meanwhile, the economy is baffling experts as it lurches further into uncharted territory. to consider all this, we turn to the analysis of brooks and capehart. that's new york times columnist david brooks and jonathan capehart, associate editor for the washington post. hello to both of you. welcome on this friday night. it has been a full week. let's start with the democrats's deal. last friday we all felt the president's budget was dead, the package with climate and health care in it. little did we know that joe manchin was having secret talks with chuck schumer. they have cooked something up. what does it look like to you

and what do you think the prospects are? jonathan: i relearned a lesson in washington, which is never say die. when it seems like a deal is done, it is over, there's no movement, sometimes something happens, like saul this week. suddenly you realize these folks have been meeting behind closed doors and hammered out a deal. the fact that joe manchin, who killed what was called bill back manchin, and the president was owing to go his own way, he was the one to announce what has been renamed the inflation reduction act of022, and he declared that build act better is dead. but there's climate provisions, a prescription drug plan, the 50% corporate minimum tax. there are all sorts of incentives andebates and things aimed at clean energy.

it is not build back better, it is not the big, transformative bill the president wanted at the beginning of his term, but in the grand scheme of things, it is most definitely better than nothing. now, you asked me what are its prospects? the prospects are iffy. we've also been so focused on senator joe manchin that we forgot that in the senate, there's another senator who we haven't heard from, and that is senator kyrsten sinema of arizona. she is still keeping her cards close to the vest. we have no idea whether she supports this and that is imperative and important because democrats will need all 50 votes plus the vice president to pass it out of the senate and get it to the house, and that is a whole other problem. judy: it is a shrunken version, we just been hearing about shrinkflation, this is not that.

what do you make of this? it is a u-turn on the part of joe manchin. does it look like something that could be meaningful if they pass it? david: it is still a pretty massive bill, the biggest climate change bill in american history. joe biden was elected to give us a pragmatic centerleft, and the last couple of weeks, we've had the chips act, for chip production, and possibly sing the passage of the significant piece of domestic legislation. that's what joe biden ran on. his presidency to me is looking a lot more successful than a week ago. it is a pretty strong legacy going forward for him to say i achieved some things, and for structure bill and all this kind of stuff. -- infrastructure bill and all these kinds of stuff. what struck me is there was a big childcare piece, there was a big helping senior citizens and

the care economy, and there was a big let's invest in america. the former two have not passed. the last third appears to be on the verge of passage, and that is a significant achievement. judy: we don't know what's going to happen. we are waiting for kyrsten sinema. meantime, a number of republicans are really unhappy with mitch mcconnell, they think he didn't handle this very well. what do you think the political fallout from this will be? jonathan: senator mcconnell is the master of the dark arts, dark parliamentarian arts in the senate. if he feels played, as the wall street journal editorial page declared he was, that republicans were played, he will exact some sort of revenge against the democrats. it is just a matter of how is he going to do it? will he be able to do it? could he exact revenge maybe not on this bill but codifying a

burger fell and respect for marriages act that susan collins expressed concern that bill and passage of that bill in the senate could be victim to that? we were talking about that bill last week and there were five senate republicans that said they would vote for it, meaning all democrats needed were five more republicans to say they would vote for it and they would clear the 60 vote threshold and be able to get it passed. have not heard anything about it since last week and most definitely haven't heard anything about it since the inflation reduction act was revealed and the chips act has been passed. the political fallout at least in terms of the senate and what senator mcconnell will do remains to be seen. we have to remember something. just because there is a deal with joe manchin doesn't mean -- and let's say kyrsten sinema

goes along with it -- when it gets to the house, there was a whole new ballgame that gets played. you've got moderate democrats in the house who are upset that salt provisions are not in there, state and local taxes are not part of the inflation reduction acts. how do democrats handle that issue when the bill gets over to the house? that remains to be seen. judy: and david, again, on the republican disagreement over it, the message it to be, if you work with democra, you will be punished. david: that has been the message for a little while. macconnell does not control the senate. it is a democrat hold senate. what strikes me is how joe manchin looks skillful. he took a lot of heat, more than most human beings in the last year, but when we come to this deal at the end of the day, he gets the investments he wants, he gets expanded energy drilling and things like that, he gets

genuine deficit reduction, and no inflation. and i think one of the things that turned his mind is the realization that his idea that this was an inflationary bill was economically wrong. that if you raise taxes to pay for spending, it does not increase inflation. i think he had an intellectual awakening. it shows all members of the senate, and we pay too much attention to leadership, that it is 50-50, so any person willing to take the heat has power. mansion is -- joe manchin is willing to take the heat. judy: one of the measures that hit a bump in the road after this steel emerged was what is called the packt act, providing aid to military veterans who were exposed to toxic chemicals in the war in iraq, and -- these were veterans who came home with serious medical problems. this looked like it was on the

way to passage and republicans in this and in particular are saying wait a minute. it has caused a lot of reaction. jon stewart, this is what he had to say just outside the capital yesterday. >> these people thought they could finally breathe. you think their struggles and because the pact act passes? all that means is they don't have to decide between their cancer drugs and their house. their struggle continues. the people will not give up, they will not gi in and they will not relent. this is an embarrassment to the senate, to the country, to the founders and all they professed to hold dear. judy: he used much stronger language in going after republicans, pat toomey and others, who he says are holding this up. what about this argument he is making, that essentially they said yes and now they are saying no? david: at best it is a mystery,

at worst it is mind-boggling. the mystery is just a month ago, the vast majority of republican senators voted for this thing, a significant number have shifted and are against it. is it payback for what joe manchin and chuck schumer did? that would be mind-boggling. you have minnen women who serve the country -- men and women who served the country suffering from cancer and ailments and we will take that away because of legislative pique? who does that? i think pat toomey has some reasons to do with budget policy and that is one thing, but if the votes were change because mitch mcconnell said we need to screw somebody, that would be terrible. judy: jonathan, what you say about the so-called burn pits legislation? jonathan: in a word it is appalling. to what david was talking about, just in june, this bill passed

out of the senate with 84 votes. 84 went to the house. e house made a min change and that's why it was back in the senate for a vote. 25 republicans who had voted for it in june after senator pat toomey worked on them, opted to vote against the bill. pat toomey's arcane problem was finding was being moved from discretionary within the bill to mandatory. he was calling it a budget gimmick. you know who doesn't care whether it is a budget gimmick? those families jon stewart was talking about. the veterans who worked in the burn pits and are suffering the ailments. the families of those veterans who are sick and/or have died. it is their families who are dealing with the financial burdens of jon stewart was talking about. they could not care less about whether it is discretionary or

mandatory. the budget gimmickry going on. they just want to know that their government, that they went overseas to protect and defend, is going to protect and defend them now that they are back home. the fact that a bill passed in that chamber with 84 votes and then could not get out of there because 25 republicans changed their votes, it is on those republicans to explain to those families -- not jon stewart -- those families white was more important to vote against a bill that would help them right now than it was to do what they did, as david did it, legislative pique, because of budget nonsense. judy: they say will come up for a vote, be on the floor on monday and we will see what happens. i'm saving the last minute and have to ask you to clarify what is going on with the economy. david, inflation is rising.

the federal reserve is focused on that. dark signals about a recession. corporate earnings are way up in the stock market is up. what is going on? david: it is complicated, we need more than 90 seconds. inflation is truly terrible and i think the white house is being too gentle and to up eat -- too upbeat. gas prices are coming down. post-covid slowdown looks very different. the problem is it is hard for the fed to bring down inflation in a way that is a soft landing. the historical record is not good here. so we may see something bumpier. judy: jonathan, it is on you. what is your forecast? [laughter] jonathan: i don't know. everything is so contradictory. that pce number that came out,

the highest in 40 years, the inflation marker that the fed uses as a marker, 6.8%, that in that same report, it showed that wages are up. not as much as much as inflation but wages are up. explain that, inflation is up, we does her up, stock goods up my gas prices coming down, that are going into recession? judy: it is clear as mud. [laughter] we figured it out. thank you both. ♪ on the newshour online right now, some of the residents of california's mariposa county were evacuated earlier this week as the threat of the oak fire was nearing. listen to their reflections on the evacuation on our instagram.

for more analysis of president biden's week of set-backs and political wins, don't forget to join moderator yamiche alcindor and her washington week panel. that's tonight on pbs. and tomorrow on pbs news weekend, geoff bennett speaks to a texas woman caught up in the state's abortion laws after she suffered a miscarriage. why her story could become more common after the supreme court's decision to overturn roe v. wade. that's saturday on pbs news weekend. and that is the newshour for tonight. i'm judy woodruff. for all of us at the pbs newshour, thank you, please stay safe a we'll see you soon. ♪ >> major funding for the pbs newshour has been provided by -- ♪

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