The Progressive Wing

Thursday tip jar…

Good morning Benny.

I sure hope Neera’s nomination falls apart. But it probably will go through.

It will be a close vote. I’m not certain if Bernie will be the deciding vote or not. I suspect Bernie will allow her through.

All Dems will vote for her. Possibly a few Republicans. Tanden is a nasty piece of work but there are worse cabinet nominees than her, e.g., Vilsack for Agriculture and Raimondo for Commerce

I can’t agree. Tanden is as disqualifying for OMB as Trump was for the presidency.

1000%. Or as Petey is for Transportation post.

Petey does have Polly from NYC as his second in command so all well be well.

Actually Pete has more analytical skills than Tanden. He has to be mindful of ensuring that the policies are inclusive.

Torabs

We know his policies won’t be though – he didn’t give a damn about inclusion as Mayor.

Buttigieg is probably Biden’s worst cabinet pick for this reason, though neoliberal stooge Tanden is not far behind. Both should be rejected.

Ugh and triple ugh!💩🤮

Yeah we will have to disagree. I think Trump (and his appointees) are exponentially worse than Tanden who will just be implementing whatever budget policy the Biden administration comes up with. (That’s where the problem will lie.) He may not like her, but Bernie will be able to work with her.

FYI. Here’s the departing OMB director and what Bernie thought of him.

During the confirmation hearings for Vought’s nomination to the OMB, Senator Bernie Sanders questioned Vought about a statement that “Muslims do not simply have a deficient theology. They do not know God because they have rejected Jesus Christ his Son, and they stand condemned.”

After Joe Biden won the 2020 election, Vought hindered the Joe Biden administration transition by refusing to allow incoming Biden officials to meet with OMB staff. Experts say that Vought’s refusal to give the Biden transition team access to career OMB officials is unprecedented, and will hamper the incoming administration. Typically, career OMB staff would provide an incoming administration with cost estimates and details on existing programs. Vought defended his action, saying the OMB would not help the incoming Biden administration “bankrupt America.” Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank referred to him as a “Trump saboteur” who is “sabotaging national security, the pandemic response and the economic recovery.”

Just another religious freak dimwit for Jesus. 🤮💩

so frustrating.

Biden Administration Urges Supreme Court to Uphold Affordable Care Act

In an unusual letter to the Supreme Court in a case already argued, the Biden administration told the justices on Wednesday that the federal government was switching sides in a challenge to the Affordable Care Act. Disavowing the position of the Trump administration, a Justice Department official urged the court to uphold the law.
The move was largely symbolic and will not end the case, which was brought by Republican state officials. When it was argued in November, a majority of the justices appeared inclined to uphold the bulk of the sprawling law, which was President Barack Obama’s defining domestic legacy.
“Following the change in administration,” the deputy solicitor general, Edwin S. Kneedler, wrote to the justices, “the Department of Justice has reconsidered the government’s position in these cases. The purpose of this letter is to notify the court that the United States no longer adheres to the conclusions in the previously filed brief of the federal respondents.”
The case, California v. Texas, No. 19-840, was brought by Republican officials who said the law’s mandate requiring health insurance coverage became unconstitutional after Congress in 2017 eliminated the penalty for failing to obtain coverage because it could no longer be justified as a tax.
The argument was based on a 2012 ruling in which Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr., joined by what was at the time the court’s four-member liberal wing, said the mandate was authorized by Congress’s power to assess taxes.
The challengers went on to argue that without the mandate, the entire law must fall.
The Biden administration reversed course on both positions. The mandate, Mr. Kneedler wrote, was constitutional without a tax penalty.
“Rather than imposing a new burden on covered individuals,” he wrote, “the 2017 amendment preserved the choice between lawful options and simply eliminated any financial or negative legal consequence from choosing not to enroll in health coverage.”
In any event, he wrote, the balance of the law should survive. Its other provisions, he wrote, were severable from the mandate.
Mr. Kneedler wrote that the government’s new position did not require new briefs or another hearing.

If it weren’t for the pre-existing conditions, I almost wish it would get thrown out. It would force Congress to rewrite a bill to include at the least a public option. Instead, Biden is pushing more subsidies for COBRA,which is a shite program. I remember I got laid off in the late 1980’s, and was offered COBRA. I refused it because it would have exceeded in premiums what I got for unemployment.

wi64

COBRA is useless to the middle class and lower most of us cant afford it.

New relief bill includes $20B for tribes

House Democrats muscled past Republicans on portions of President Joe Biden’s pandemic plan, including $20 billion for tribal governments.
Tribes will evenly split $1 billion and $19 billion will be split as determined by a formula from the U.S. Department of Treasury, said Holly Cook, Red Lake Ojibwe and partner at Spirit Rock Consulting. Similar to last time with the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security Act funding and that “hit some bumps in the road in implementation, obviously, that are still ongoing.” This is “why consultation is so important.”
However, the speaker’s office said “they weren’t allowed to include any requirements for consultation, but they are working closely with the administration to ensure that tribal consultation is completed before any distribution formal is finally put in place,” Cook said who has lobbied for tribes since 2001 and served in the White House Office of Intergovernmental Affairs.
“Tribal advocates, tribal leaders have done a tremendous job of conveying the priorities that ongoing need for relief in Indian Country given the disproportionate impacts in our communities,” Cook said.
Democrats hope to rush the bill to Biden for his signature by mid-March, using a special budget-related process allowing certain legislation to be approved by a simple majority.
The relief package also includes a proposed $130 billion in additional relief to help the nation’s schools reopen and a gradual increase of the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour.
Democrats on the Education and Labor Committee say schools won’t be able to reopen safely until they get an infusion of federal funding to repair building ventilation systems, buy protective equipment and take other steps recommended by federal health officials. The plan faces opposition from Republicans who want to tie new school funding to reopening.
The panel met Tuesday to craft its portion of a $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief package that tracks with Biden’s plan for battling the pandemic and reviving a still staggering economy.
Rep. Bobby Scott, chair of the Education and Labor Committee, dismissed complaints from Republicans who objected to use of the process.
“We must address the urgent needs of the people now,” said Scott, D-Virginia, “The multiple crises affecting our communities will grow worse every day if we do not act. We must recognize that we cannot afford to prioritize process over the urgent needs of people across this country.”
House Republicans attempted dozens of changes to the legislation at a hearing that stretched late into the evening. They proposed amendments to limit funding only to schools offering in-person instruction, or to steer aid to families if their schools continued operating online. On the wage increase, they sought to exempt small businesses or certain rural areas. It appeared all of the amendments would be defeated.
Biden has made reopening most of the nation’s K-8 schools within his first 100 days in office a key goal. The issue has become increasingly heated as some school districts face gridlock with teachers who have refused to support reopening until their demands are met. Biden’s plan for $130 billion in school funding is in addition to more than $8 billion from previous relief packages.
In a tweak to Biden’s plan, the Democratic proposal would require schools to reserve at least 20 percent of the funding for efforts to address learning loss, including after-school programs and summer classes. The bill also matches Biden’s proposed $40 billion for colleges and universities but, unlike the White House plan, makes private colleges eligible for relief.
Democrats also tucked in a new limit on for-profit colleges that the party has pushed for years. The proposal would prevent for-profit colleges from accepting more than 90 percent of their overall funding from federal sources. An existing federal law includes that cap for some federal sources but excludes funding from the GI Bill and other veterans programs.
Republicans blasted the legislation in its entirety, saying schools have already received billions in aid and are safe to reopen. They cited data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention showing that social distancing and wearing a mask significantly reduce the spread of the virus in school settings.
“Students are falling behind, and mental health issues are on the rise. We know the costs of keeping schools closed are high. So why are schools still closed?” said Rep. Virginia Foxx, R-North Carolina, the ranking Republican on the Education and Labor Committee. “Unfortunately, this bill is full of partisan policies disguised as COVID relief measures.”
The lawmakers’ dispute reflected the complexities and frustrations of the national debate over reopening schools. Republicans proposed several variations of the same idea: to limit funding to schools that don’t reopen. Rep. Gregory Murphy, R-North Carolina, sought to block funding from schools unless they bring at least high-needs students back to the classroom.
“We need to stop the excuses,” Murphy said. “We need to stop all the nonsense. We need to get our kids back in school. Stop ruining their futures and stop playing games.”
Scott countered that schools can’t make changes needed to reopen safely unless they get the funding in Biden’s plan.
Republicans also signaled a fight over standardized testing, backing a proposed change to prevent relief funding from being used on academic assessments. Republicans say states should be exempt from federally required tests this spring because of the pandemic, while some Democrats say it’s necessary to identify and help students who have fallen behind.
The $350 billion portion of the bill before the committee also includes Biden’s plan to raise the minimum wage from $7.25, where is has been since 2009. The proposal calls for gradual increases that would reach $15 over five years. It faces an uphill climb, however, and even Biden has said it likely won’t survive.
Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, told reporters Tuesday that Democrats were trying to overcome a potential procedural obstacle that could prevent them from including the wage increase in the COVID-19 relief bill.
“We’re trying to work as well as we can with the parliamentarian to get minimum wage to happen,” Schumer said.
Under Senate rules, provisions cannot be included in the special procedure Democrats are using if the language’s impact on the budget is only secondary to its main thrust. It is up to the chamber’s nonpartisan parliamentarian to determine that, though it would be possible for Democrats to vote to ignore that ruling. The fast-track process Democrats are using would let them prevent a GOP filibuster.
The minimum wage boost faces other significant challenges, including opposition from Republicans and a wariness by some Democrats arguing it would hurt small businesses, especially during a pandemic.
Also on Tuesday, Biden met with five business leaders, including the heads of JPMorgan Chase, Walmart, Gap, Lowe’s and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
Biden said the meeting was a chance to find common ground with the business community.
“We’re going to talk about the state of the economy, the recovery package. We’re going talk a little bit, God willing, about infrastructure down the road, and also about the minimum wage,” Biden said at the start of the meeting.
The president said he has been “exchanging correspondence and telephone calls with Republicans to see if we can follow up beyond where we are with members of House and Senate,” even as Congress is moving forward with a budgetary process that will enable them to pass the relief package along party lines.

What a bunch of chickensh1t! These RWingers would be jumping up and down if all this funding was targeted at their beloved charter/private/religious schools.

Instagram took down the account of Robert F. Kennedy Jr., the prominent anti-vaccine activist and son of Robert F. Kennedy, the former U.S. attorney general, over false information related to the coronavirus. https://t.co/U8BGzzbSGa
— The New York Times (@nytimes) February 11, 2021

I guess RFK Jr didn’t take Facebook’s threat to ban all anti-vaxx posts very seriously. I wonder if he will take them to court?

How a leading anti-Trump group ignored a crisis in its ranks

The influential anti-Donald Trump group Lincoln Project is denouncing one of its co-founders after multiple reports that over several years he sexually harassed young men looking to break into politics.
The Lincoln Project in a statement on Sunday called co-founder John Weaver, 61, “a predator, a liar, and an abuser” following reports that he repeatedly sent unsolicited and sexually charged messages online to young men, often while suggesting he could help them get work in politics.
“The totality of his deceptions are beyond anything any of us could have imagined and we are absolutely shocked and sickened by it,” the Lincoln Project, the most prominent “Never Trump” Republican super PAC to emerge during the 45th president’s time in the White House, said in its statement.
The online magazine The American Conservative first reported the sexual harassment allegations earlier this month.
Days later, Weaver, a strategist who advised the late Republican Sen. John McCain and former Ohio Gov. John Kasich in their unsuccessful runs for the White House, acknowledged in a statement to the web site Axios that he had sent “inappropriate” messages he “viewed as consensual, mutual conversations at the time.”
The statement by Weaver came after several men had taken to social media to accuse him of sending sexually suggestive messages, sometimes coupled with offers of employment or political advancement.
The Lincoln Project made its most substantive comments about the mounting allegations against Weaver after The New York Times reported on Sunday that the paper had interviewed 21 men who said they had been harassed by Weaver.
One of the alleged victims told The Times he started receiving messages from Weaver when he was only 14. The messages became more pointed after he turned 18.
The Lincoln Project’s other founders included 2012 Mitt Romney presidential adviser Stuart Stevens, former McCain and George W. Bush strategist Steve Schmidt, and GOP ad maker Rick Wilson.
The group throughout the 2020 election cycle produced some of the most eviscerating broadsides against Trump, questioning the president and his aides’ morality and leadership.
The Lincoln Project said in its statement that at “no time was John Weaver in the physical presence of any member” of the super PAC.
Weaver took medical leave from the Lincoln Project last summer. He told Axios earlier this month that he did not plan to return to the group.
Weaver did not immediately respond to a request for comment from The Associated Press.

Figures.

US jobless claims fall slightly to 793,000 with layoffs high

The number of Americans seeking unemployment benefits fell slightly last week to 793,000, evidence that job cuts remain high despite a substantial decline in new confirmed viral infections.

Last week’s total declined from 812,000 the previous week, the Labor Department said Thursday. That figure was revised higher from the previously reported 779,000. The numbers point to a still-elevated number of layoffs. Before the virus erupted in the United States in March, weekly applications for jobless aid had never topped 700,000, even during the Great Recession.

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/02/11/medicare-all-only-way-forward-concludes-lancet-panel-study-detailing-death-and

One recommendation: M4A

A panel of policy experts and medical professionals convened to examine the healthcare legacy of Donald Trump concluded in a detailed report released Thursday morning that the former president’s sweeping regulatory rollbacks and full-scale assault on America’s already decimated public health infrastructure severely undermined the nation’s fight against Covid-19 and caused tens of thousands of preventable deaths.
Described as the first comprehensive look at the consequences of the former president’s four years of corporate-friendly privatization efforts, deep cuts to public health programs, and abandonment of international cooperation in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic, the new study by the Lancet Commission on Public Policy and Health in the Trump Era argues that while the Republican’s tenure was in some ways uniquely destructive, his agenda built upon years of “damaging neoliberal policies” pursued by his predecessors.
“The disturbing truth is that many of President Trump’s policies do not represent a radical break with the past but have merely accelerated the decades-long trend of lagging life expectancy that reflects deep and long-standing flaws in U.S. economic, health, and social policy,” reads the report, the product of years of research by dozens of leading health experts from the U.S., U.K., and Canada.

The Trump administration’s sprawling attack on America’s public health programs helped set the stage for the White House’s disastrous response to the coronavirus pandemic, which hit the nation after many of the former president’s healthcare rollbacks had taken their toll, leaving millions of additional Americans vulnerable to the virus and its widespread economic consequences. As of this writing, the virus has killed more than 471,000 people in the U.S.
“Instead of galvanizing the U.S. populace to fight the pandemic,” the report states, “President Trump publicly dismissed its threat (despite privately acknowledging it), discouraged action as infection spread, and eschewed international cooperation. His refusal to develop a national strategy worsened shortages of personal protective equipment and diagnostic tests.”
Stressing that the Trump administration impacted public health through a variety of means, the Lancet panel’s study estimates that the former president’s gutting of environmental regulations was responsible for 22,000 excess deaths in 2019 alone.
Trump’s massive tax cuts for the rich and corporations, moreover, contributed to decades of soaring income and wealth inequality, a trend that has further stratified U.S. society and left large segments of the population unable to afford the basic necessities of life—including adequate healthcare, food, and housing. The commission also pointed to the president’s racism, xenophobia, and attacks on women’s reproductive rights as immensely damaging to U.S. public health.

Among the panel’s list of policy recommendations is Medicare for All, a system that would “cover all residents under a single, federally financed plan providing comprehensive coverage” at a lower cost than the current fragmented, for-profit system. President Joe Biden opposes Medicare for All and has instead proposed more incremental reforms like a public option, an approach the commission warns would leave many with “onerous co-pays… and deductibles, and millions of people would remain uninsured.”

https://jacobinmag.com/2021/02/media-larry-summers-covid-relief-stimulus-checks-congress

Julia Rock/Andrew Perez/David Sirota

WaPo is a main culprit here. No surprise given its owner

It is not a revelation that elite media outlets bake ideology into their news coverage and manufacture consent — in fact, a new poll shows Americans sense the scam and are well aware that something is deeply rotten in the news industry.
However, the press-driven discourse about promised $2,000 survival checks offers something new and rare: an unvarnished glimpse of exactly how this consent-manufacturing process works in real time. When you follow the money behind the process, you invariably find yourself where most truth seekers end up in American life — staring into the deadened eyes of billionaires who like things just the way they are.
In 2016, Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) sounded an alarm about so-called cognitive capture, warning that the information ecosystem in Washington has been systemically corrupted, allowing unseen interests to use think tanks and media to manipulate the assumptions upon which policy decisions are based.
A few years later, that is exactly what is playing out. Millionaire pundits paid by billionaire media moguls are once again trying to protect millionaire politicians bankrolled by billionaire donors. Marshaling studies produced by billionaire think tanks, they have a goal: denying survival aid to middle-class thousandaires now facing an economic apocalypse.
The whole episode conjures Charles Foster Kane boasting that people will think what he tells them to think, because he who pays the piper calls the tune — and in this case, the song is that golden oldie called “nothing will fundamentally change.”

Nova Land

One of these “manufactured consent” items which has particularly annoyed me in recent weeks is the repeated assertion in numerous mainstream news sources that 67 votes are needed to convict Trump in the impeachment trial and that unless Democrats get 17 Republicans to vote for conviction Trump will be again be acquitted.

For example, here’s a non-paywalled quote from USA Today:

A vote on impeaching Trump is expected to take place late Wednesday – and pass – in the Democrat-controlled House… Once it passes, Pelosi would then decide when to take it to the Senate, where at least 67 of the 100 members would have to support conviction.

There are many more examples out there of the media saying this, and it is not correct. It does not require at least 67 members to support conviction for Trump (or anyone else) to be impeached.

There are currently 100 members of the senate, so if the requirement were that 2/3 of the senate membership needed to vote for conviction then the number would indeed be 67. But neither the constitution nor the senate rules on impeachment say that it takes 2/3 of the senate membership to convict.

What the constitution says is that it takes 2/3 of the members who are present. And there is no requirement, either in the constitution or in the senate rules on impeachment, that all members be present for the trial. (Senate leadership can choose to require members to be present, but they do not have to do so and are free to permit members not to attend.)

For example, there are many Republican senators who claim they believe the current impeachment trial is unconstitutional. I think they should have been encouraged to boycott the trial on grounds of conscience. No one should take part in or be forced to take part in an something they believe to be unconstitutional. And if, say, 19 GOP senators had chosen to boycott the trial (or chosen to be absent for other reasons, such as health or feeling a need to quarantine) there would have been 81 senators present, meaning the number of votes needed to convict would then be 54.

I don’t think many people realize that if the vote had been taken back in January immediately after the house voted to impeach that the number of votes needed to convict would not have been 67. It would have been 66 (because, prior to confirmation of the Georgia senate run-off election results, there were only 99 senators).

Similarly I don’t think most people realize that if several senators are absent on the day of the conviction vote due to Covid or other reasons that the number needed for conviction would be less than 67. And that’s due to the media repeatedly misrepresenting the number of votes needed to convict as being 67, i.e. 2/3 of the entire senate membership, rather than the actual requirement which is 2/3 of the members present.

The media getting that fact wrong once or twice due to carelessness (and an assumption that all 100 senators will be present for the vote) might be understandable; the media consistently getting it wrong is shameful and to me it’s a glaring example of what’s wrong with the mainstream news media today. I have not seen a single mainstream media news article which correctly reports that the number of votes required for an impeachment conviction is 2/3 of the members present.

For those who’d like to check the accuracy of what I’m saying, the relevant section of the constitution is in article I, section 3 of the US constitution:

The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments. When sitting for that Purpose, they shall be on Oath or Affirmation. When the President of the United States is tried, the Chief Justice shall preside: And no Person shall be convicted without the Concurrence of two thirds of the Members present.

And here is a link to the senate rules on impeachment. Rule XXIII is the rule concerning the trial vote, and like the constitution it repeatedly refers to “Members present”, not to the entire senate membership.

Birdies…please read NL’s insight here. ^^^^^

NL is precisely correct. +100! Don’t get me started about the malfeasance of the craporate media! 🙁

I feel like Roberts gave air to the illigetimacy of the trial by not presiding. I understand the technicality but that very technicality is a talking point used far and wide to dismiss the whole trial.

Pot Stocks Are the Next GameStop. It Won’t End Well.

First, there was GameStop. An investment from a successful tech investor led to an epic short squeeze—and then a lot of pain for anyone buying shares above $400, as GameStop stock slipped to $51.
Now marijuana companies are surging, or getting squeezed, or becoming Reddit-fied, or whatever. Canadian grower Tilray is up 148% this week after jumping more than 50% Wednesday, while Sundial Growers has gained 161% this week after an 80% Wednesday climb. The stocks are rising again on Thursday morning.
A Reddit fueled frenzy is part of the story. Tilray, for instance, is a heavily shorted stock and has ended up on message boards.
But there was plenty of positive news as well. Tilray and Aphria are merging, bringing consolidation to the industry. More U.S. lawmakers are willing to legalize weed, another positive. And Canopy Growth stock popped 12% after reporting earnings and predicting profitability by 2022.
That’s all good news to be sure, but it probably doesn’t justify weekly doublings. Ultimately, the wild trading in pot stocks will end in pain for someone. Just like it did with GameStop.

This is from Barron’s.

All of the pot stocks are non-US.

This one is actually annoying and not the same as the Gamestop shortsqueeze. I had cashed in on my little AMC throw in and put those ‘earnings’ into a couple of those tickers as long term ‘investments’ and now everything is being pumped and dumped. Before the word got out was up 300%, now along will come more intervention.

polarbear4

don’t know who’s OT to post to. here’s one.
https://twitter.com/davidsirota/status/1359872516521488387?s=20

One in Four of New York’s New Luxury Apartments Is Unsold

This one is more of an open thread. Mine is an essay.

polarbear4

yours says open thread, though, an interesting lead, and it was up first. no matter, this is the one. :o)

magsview

I wasn’t able to reply or leave a comment on your essay, but, from your essay:

you:

“Here’s the Real Story: Housing being built in NYC now is not housing meant to be lived in. 25% of all housing built since 2013 has never been sold, let alone inhabited.”

This NYT article focuses on the fact that the new construction projects are luxury condos (me: as opposed to the affordable housing that is needed):

Already the prices at several new towers have been reduced, either directly or through concessions like waived common charges and transfer taxes, and some may soon be forced to cut deeper. Tactics from past cycles could also be making a comeback: bulk sales of unsold units to investors, condos converting to rentals en masse, and multimillion-dollar “rent-to-own” options for sprawling apartments — a four-bedroom, yours for just $22,500 a month.

The analysis, a compilation of both public and proprietary listing and building data, is one of the most sobering looks yet at the city’s flagging condo market, which peaked about three years ago amid a glut of inventory. Now the market could face new obstacles, from growing fears of a recession, to changes in tax law and political instability heading into an election year.
For an industry accustomed to selling apartments years ahead of completion and skilled at concealing the pace of sales when the market falters, further headwinds could force more drastic measures.
Moreover, a growing share of condos sold in recent years have been quietly re-listed as rentals by investors who bought them and are reluctant to put them back on the market. Of the 12,133 new condos sold between January 2013 and August 2019, 38 percent have appeared on StreetEasy as rentals.

by NeoDem logic Biden could get away with just padding the first two Trump stimulus checks to 2k.

Torabs

Don’t give them any ideas 😉

Such a scammy bait and switch. Biden already had zero credibility with me, but how can believe a thing he says after this? Talk about tripping on the starting line.

Benny, I’ve been getting your messages. I emailed back that it was my inbox they were landing in.

Is there anything else I should do?

I haven’t been sending any to you. @liepardestin can you help out?

Apparently not. The message I emailed to him came back.

Hello all, Ive had this issue in the past but cannot recall how it was resolved, Ill do some digging around and see if theres something I can do!

Turd wayers weigh in, which is what Tyson is referring to.

‘Raising the minimum wage is not an emergency’ said this this guy being paid $300,000 a year by Wall Street to attack anything progressive pic.twitter.com/WKnJ43tWnY
— tyson brody (@tysonbrody) February 11, 2021

Good morning all, stay safe out there! Dallas is a mess, i went sideways a couple times on the way to work due to ice, apparently there is a 100+ car pileup in Ft Worth.

NEW: Video of the devastating and disastrous 100+ car pileup in North Fort Worth, TX. Three fatalities have been confirmed.
📷: @NorthTXWeather pic.twitter.com/h6eJsiCef8
— The Weather Channel (@weatherchannel) February 11, 2021

Please be very careful, LD! Snow and cold don’t bother me. Ice is another story. It can not be emphasized enough how destructive and dangerous it is!

magsview

We’re due to get heavy sleet on Tuesday and I am not going to leave the house! Ice is the only thing that gives me the scares while driving.

wi64

In a previous job i had to drive all size box trucks that didnt need a CDL to drive and have driven thru all road conditions in WI. The only one that scared me was freezing rain, i tried to avoid going out at all costs in that crap its down right dangerous.

OMG.

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/02/11/biden-minimum-wage-increase-468565

Literally no one in the real world will care if the parliamentarian gets overruled. So Republicans will scream. Who gives an F. $15 is wildly popular. Let Manchin explain to his voters in WVa why they don’t deserve a $15 minimum.

Progressives, union leaders and activists are demanding that the Biden administration use every tool available to make sure its massive coronavirus relief package includes an increase in the minimum wage.
But, already, there’s one place the White House has hinted it won’t go.
Biden’s team is leaning heavily against the idea of having Vice President Kamala Harris use her powers as president of the Senate to keep the minimum wage provision inside the relief package. She could do so if the Senate parliamentarian determines that hiking the minimum wage to $15-an-hour does not jibe with budgetary rules that allow a bill to pass with just 51 votes in the Senate. Harris, at that point, could be the tie-breaking vote to bypass the parliamentarian.
The White House’s reluctance to consider that step has set up the possibility of an early confrontation between the president and a progressive base that has — to this point — been pleased with his work in office.
“It’s a test for how we use the power of having all three, the House, the Senate and the White House,” said Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.). “Let’s not hand wring over this … We should use every tool in our toolbox.”
Early in his presidency, Biden has taken a historic amount of executive actions. But the president still views himself as an institutionalist, and advisers and allies say he is wary of using the Harris nuclear option. A vice president hasn’t overruled a parliamentarian in more than 40 years. And while the White House is not completely ruling out the idea, officials are skeptical that enough Democrats would vote to keep the wage provision in the relief package even if they deployed the option, a person familiar with the White House’s thinking said.
Biden has already said that increasing the minimum wage might turn into a “separate negotiation” from the relief package. But the administration has not been clear on how and when that separate negotiation might take place, save to affirm their commitment to it.

Behind the scenes, the White House is asking for patience. A minimum wage hike is a priority to Biden, advisers and allies say, and they’re working to build support that would aid a future negotiation, if one is needed. They note that Biden advocated for a minimum wage increase in an Oval Office meeting with business leaders on Tuesday.
The White House is insistent it has maintained open communication with progressives, including lawmakers and activist groups, on both the $15-an-hour minimum wage provision and, more broadly, the Covid relief plan. A White House official specifically cited a briefing last week with 17 progressive groups. And Jayapal said she’s been in multiple conversations with the administration in the days after Biden said he didn’t believe a minimum wage hike would end up in the reconciliation bill.
Jayapal and other progressive lawmakers, including Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), are optimistic that the parliamentarian will rule that the minimum wage hike is germane to the budget process. And they are also beginning to lay the predicate for the parliamentarian to be overruled if that determination isn’t made.
“The parliamentarian is not an elected representative of the people,” said Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.). “I’ve never heard us put everything on the balance of what the Senate parliamentarian says when it impacts, especially, a once in a century pandemic relief bill.”
The recent Congressional Budget Office finding that a $15 minimum wage would substantially impact the federal budget was seen as a boon to progressives’ argument for its inclusion, even as the agency found that a hike could lead to 1.4 million jobs lost over ten years. The CBO analysis also found that the wage increase would lift 900,000 Americans out of poverty.
Lawmakers are wary, however, that if Democrats don’t find a way to pass the wage increase in the first relief package, it may never be passed. Jayapal bluntly said she sees no chance of attracting Republican support for the measure, making it imperative to pass it through reconciliation.
Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.), a Biden ally, agreed. “If it cannot be in reconciliation, if that’s the determination that’s made and that stands,” he said, “it’s really difficult to see it passing and getting 60 votes.”

Byedone is a RWinger. Progressives will have to muscle up and kick his butt on certain issues. Obviously, the $15 minimum wage is one of them.

Torabs

Delay, delay, delay. That is clearly part of the strategy, prolong the suffering to the point that people will take whatever shit is shoveled. Progressives must apply as much pressure as possible to get things done now.

https://www.salon.com/2021/02/11/the-rights-hatred-of-aoc-isnt-just-racism-and-sexism-it-sums-up-the-entire-toxic-trump-era/

Last week, on the verge of Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial, Republicans and their hate media launched a coordinated attack on Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the New York progressive Democrat. Why?
Because she publicly shared the emotional trauma that she and many others suffered during and after the Jan. 6 mob attack on the Capitol — and because she compared that to her personal history as a survivor of sexual assault.

Donald Trump is now being tried in the U.S. Senate for the crime of encouraging an insurrection and a lethal coup attack on the Capitol. In all likelihood, Republicans will not convict Trump despite the abundant evidence of his guilt. In fairness, why should they? Whatever their personal or aesthetic objections to Trump may be, they agree with Trump’s policies, including the use of political terrorism and other forms of violence to win and keep power. In that context, the Age of Trump is best understood not as an aberration or derailment in the right wing’s embrace of anti-democratic extremism but as part of a long campaign to radically remake American society.
As seen with the attacks on the humanity of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the world the white right is trying to fully create is even more racist, white supremacist, woman-hating, pathological, anti-human and anti-democratic than this one.
In the America that exists today such values are increasingly rejected. Much of the white right wants to elevate those noxious values, because it sees them as virtues.
Ultimately, Donald Trump’s second impeachment trial is much bigger than a decision about the crimes of one man — who happened to be the worst president in American history. It is a referendum on the future of American democracy.

Imagine storming the US Capitol, murdering a cop, beating one until he had brain trauma, crushing another’s cervical, causing one to lose 3 fingers, stabbing one with a metal stake, causing one to lose an eye, and 2 more to commit suicide——after claiming that #BlueLivesMatter.
— Bishop Talbert Swan (@TalbertSwan) February 10, 2021

State and local GOP committees attack any Republicans who dare turn on Trump https://t.co/t9I84FUL8u
— The Washington Post (@washingtonpost) February 11, 2021

https://www.npr.org/2021/02/11/966498544/a-scary-survey-finding-4-in-10-republicans-say-political-violence-may-be-necessa

The mob that attacked the U.S. Capitol may have been a fringe group of extremists, but politically motivated violence has the support of a significant share of the U.S. public, according to a new survey by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI).
The survey found that nearly three in 10 Americans, including 39% of Republicans, agreed that, “If elected leaders will not protect America, the people must do it themselves, even if it requires violent actions.”
That result was “a really dramatic finding,” says Daniel Cox, director of the AEI Survey Center on American Life. “I think any time you have a significant number of the public saying use of force can be justified in our political system, that’s pretty scary.”
The survey found stark divisions between Republicans and Democrats on the 2020 presidential election, with two out of three Republicans saying President Biden was not legitimately elected, while 98% of Democrats and 73% of Independents acknowledged Biden’s victory.

AEI is RW to the max. You can bet they will back the FRightwingnut fringe!

polarbear4

what the founders said, iirc.

magsview

Yet if someone fighting for social justice spray paints a wall they should be gassed, shot and thrown into unmarked vehicles and spirited away, and that okay with those people I’d bet.