2/12 TGIF News Roundup & Open Thread
Greetings Birdies…it’s Friday!
Same Old Third Way
For a moment, it looked like the Democratic Party’s Wall Street-boosting think tanks might stop hawking austerity during the historic, deadly COVID-19 pandemic.
“Clearly, there’s a need,” Jim Kessler, an executive vice president at Third Way, told the Washington Post last month in response to President Joe Biden’s first coronavirus relief proposal.
“The new unemployment numbers are shocking,” Kessler said. “State and local aid has to be part of it. There will be additional stimulus checks. And you have to make sure unemployment benefits continue as well.”
Kessler’s remarks came as a shock to our team at The Daily Poster. We simply never thought we would see Third Way — one of the Beltway’s most reliable purveyors of let-them-eat-cake-ism — making the case for deficit spending, even when people are desperate and dying.
Unfortunately, everything has now gone back to normal: Third Way is boosting a campaign by billionaire-funded economists and millionaire TV pundits to deny $1,400 COVID survival checks to tens of millions of middle-class Americans. Meanwhile, its well-heeled executives are helping Republicans undermine the push to raise the minimum wage to $15.
A few years ago, Third Way admitted that most of its funding comes from finance industry donors. Its corporate donors include PepsiCo, Facebook, and chemical giant Dow, according to company filings.
Building The Case For Rationing Survival Checks
In late January, Third Way’s Kessler gave a ringing endorsement of a shoddy study by Opportunity Insights, a Harvard University think tank, that has been used to try to build the case for limiting direct payments to middle-class families.
3 of the smartest economists around say target stim checks to those <$75k @byHeatherLong writes. https://t.co/u6mwJvYnFK
— Jim Kessler (@ThirdWayKessler) January 26, 2021
Cutting off stimulus checks to Americans earning over $75,000 could be wise, new data suggests
President Biden is debating another round of $1,400 stimulus payments. Some in Congress have urged the president to target aid to lower-income families only.
wapo.stOpportunity Insights is funded by billionaire foundations, including one that has been a generous donor to Third Way — the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
In 2018, the Gates foundation pledged to donate more than $15 million to Harvard University to establish Opportunity Insights. The foundation contributed nearly $1.7 million that year to Third Way’s charitable arm, accounting for about 20 percent of the group’s revenue, according to IRS tax returns.
The Opportunity Insights study found that middle and upper-class families didn’t immediately spend the entire $600 survival checks authorized by Congress in December. The economists used their findings to argue that survival checks should be cut off for individuals earning more than $50,000 per year and couples earning more than $75,000 per year.
By comparison, the first two COVID survival checks of $1,200 and $600 were sent in full to individuals who made less than $75,000 per year and couples who made less than $150,000. The changes they recommended could deny or reduce aid to nearly half of Americans, according to census data.
Thanks to the study and an elite media propaganda campaign, the White House and Democratic lawmakers have considered phasing out direct payments for individuals making more than $50,000 or married couples making more than $100,000 — a change that could deny aid to 40 million Americans.
The Daily Poster interviewed several people who could be impacted by these changes — and they all said they do in fact need the money, no matter what a handful of economists toying with spreadsheets say.
As the American Prospect’s David Dayen and economist Claudia Sahm pointed out earlier this week, the study has massive flaws that were never disclosed in any of the articles hyping its findings.
“Not An Emergency”After The Intercept’s Ryan Grim said that Third Way wants to see government spending on survival checks become less popular politically, Third Way executive vice president Matt Bennett asserted that the survival checks “have to be means tested,” adding: “All we are debating is the line.”
When a Twitter user pointed out the checks don’t actually have to be means tested, Bennett replied: “You favor giving checks to the Trump kids?”
This is, of course, the same rationale that Democratic technocrats like Pete Buttigieg give to explain why college shouldn’t be free.
Third Way has made similar arguments against student debt forgiveness, claiming it “primarily benefits upper middle-class people who attended elite four-year colleges” — even though canceling student debt would in fact “greatly reduce the burden of student debt more for lower-income indebted households,” according to economist Marshall Steinbaum.
On Thursday, Bennett told Politico thaRelat increasing the minimum wage to $15 — as Biden has proposed doing in his COVID relief bill — isn’t an “emergency.”
“Raising the minimum wage is important but it’s not an emergency,” Bennett said, arguing instead that renewing expanded unemployment insurance “is an emergency.”
Of course, there is no reason that Democrats have to only do one or the other. Pitting these items against each other is a form of austerity.
After his comments generated blowback on Twitter, Bennett responded: “I totally agree that no one should have to work for $8/hr.”
But he questioned whether Democrats in Congress will be able to raise the minimum wage under the budget reconciliation process, and argued again that “we simply must not allow [unemployment insurance] to run out.”
Related:
The most influential Democrat you never hear from
Kyrsten Sinema doesn’t often make big policy pronouncements. But when she does, Democrats had better listen.
Take the $15 hourly minimum wage that Democratic leaders want to add to a $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief package. Sinema, who became the first Democrat to win a Senate race in once deep-red Arizona in 30 years, is crystal clear: She’s against including it.
“What’s important is whether or not it’s directly related to short-term Covid relief. And if it’s not, then I am not going to support it in this legislation,” Sinema said in a telephone interview this week. “The minimum wage provision is not appropriate for the reconciliation process. It is not a budget item. And it shouldn’t be in there.”
Sinema’s opposition is a blow to Democrats’ hopes of bumping up the federal minimum wage through budget reconciliation to avoid a GOP filibuster, complicating follow-through on a campaign promise from Democrats and President Joe Biden. And her defense of the Senate’s age-old rules is likely to frustrate progressives eager to use every tool at their disposal to advance their priorities in a Senate where one wayward Democrat can mean the difference between a policy breakthrough and utter failure.
Her breaks with her liberal colleagues are both a reflection of her state, which she won by a narrow margin in 2018, and her temperament. But the former state legislator, House member and now first-term senator has literally never served in the majority before — so she feels the minority’s pain.
It’s just one of the things that makes the 44-year-old Democrat one of the most quirky and interesting members of the stodgy Senate. She often wears a bright-colored wig to vote, drawing wide eyes from her colleagues. She waits for a single elevator most of the time, once peeking into a jam-packed vessel and declaring it a “Covid elevator.” The walls of her office are a loud purple, accented by leopard patterns.
And though she’s more attentive to Democratic Caucus meetings than she was in the minority, she still keeps Republicans at least as close as members of her own party. She was a pretty lonely Democrat during former President Donald Trump’s last State of the Union speech, standing and applauding at times. Now she talks to President Joe Biden’s team just about every day.
More news, commentary, tweets, videos, in the comments section.
Fire away…
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Craporate crooks like Cuomo look around and know they won’t face jail or any sort of accountability. Look at Sick Rott. The two party system here has turned into a major corrupted feeding trough. I don’t know if it will ever change. 🙁
The NY daily News front page cover is of King Cuomo attempting to steal the MTA’s money from NYC and give it to the State.
NYC is a Colony of NY State and the Governor of the State is a rapacious bully.
The News has this story on it’s cover and inside as well.
The Chamber embraces Biden. And Republicans are livid.
This explains Bernie’s line of questioning, and why some centrist Dems are against $15 min.
LOL. Nader actually thinks witnesses would change Republican votes? The Republicans are still using unconstitutionallity as an excuse. Witnesses ain’t gonna change that. I watched most of the trial and I think the House managers actually did a great job. In a few instances, witnesses may have been good emphasis but there’s definitely enough presented to convict and to convince anyone open minded or on the fence that Trump is guilty as hell.
I have more respect for dog poop than I do for Nader. He is still living off his 1960s laurels. They have wilted over the last 40 years.
I think more, but not enough GOPers would vote to convict. I’ve seen other former prosecutors on TV say the House Impeachment managers should have had a real witness, not just narrative.
Disagree. Their minds are made up. The presentation was very good. Police witnesses would corroborate what was in the the videos. And we know that the Republicans do not give a shit about those policeman, except if it make them look bad. It would have been nice to have witnesses to what Trump was doing during the insurrection after the speech and before his ridiculous tweet but maybe there was nobody willing to testify truthfully.
I hear you. Good thing we disagree with respect in our nest.
Exactly Benny, we can disagree W/o getting into some shit shows . i’ve seen on other sites. it gets to personal attacks and name calling.
I have to agree with Jcity, that their minds are made up. The so called normal R’s are scared shitless of Cult -45s mindless racist minions that they’ll vote to acquit. Some are getting death threats against family members and its working. Their also afraid of losing their next election locally.
Witness testimony might not change Republican votes, but it would be something the news networks would want to include in their coverage and something which would likely make a large impression on people who watched it. It would deepen the belief of those who already believe Trump should be convicted, and it might move many of the people who aren’t yet sure he should be convicted into understanding how bad what he did was and how important it is that he be convicted. What witnesses said would stick in people’s minds for many years to come and would be an important part of the historical record for future generations reading about Trump’s impeachment.
Long speeches by lawyers can be powerful — to those who are interested in listening to and digesting long speeches by lawyers. Unfortunately there are many people who will tune that out because lawyer speeches are not what they’re really interested in or have time to digest. But witness testimony, when it tells stories in everyday language by the people who actually experienced those stories, is something many people are interested in hearing and can be deeply moved by. And it is therefore something most media outlets will want to present, prominently, in well-chosen and easily-viewable segments, because they know other outlets will be presenting it and viewers will be watching the outlets which do the best job of presenting it.
Winning more Republican votes in the impeachment trial would be nice. But even if we can’t, it’s worth getting out as much of the story of what Trump and his accomplices did leading up to the insurrection and during the insurrection as we can. Many people really don’t have a very clear picture of what he did and what resulted; the more of the story which the impeachment trial can bring out and impress into people’s hearts and minds, the better.
… And the more that the public becomes aware of the facts and realizes how horrific what Trump tried to accomplish was, the harder it will be for Republicans to justify votes for acquittal. It may be too late now to get them to change their votes, but presenting witness testimony could increase the chances they will have to pay a price for their cowardice and dishonesty later.
Exactly. To think that the reason to have witnesses is to persuade republicans completely misses the point.
This trial is one of the few ways to actually have some accountability for republicans for what happened on 1/6. They may not convict Trump, but the court of public opinion is what really matters here. Showing independent voters that republicans are in fact not respectable, contrary to what the useless media tells them, has merit.
Just maybe it will sink in with a few R voters as well but skeptical at this point in time
Don’t care about the fascists, it’s about the indies and sporadic voters.
Imagine it might be more for the public to see the Republicans faced with even more evidence and still vote the wrong way. Maybe
“quirky and interesting” Sinema. oh please. divisive and cruel.
t & r!
Tweets by AndrewYang
I’m reading that Year of the Ox lucky colors are white, yellow & green.
So here are some refreshing daisies 🙂
Thank you mags! They are lovely!
those look like my Shasta daisies, what my Shasta loop is named for.
bella in the shasta daisies. ❤️
But I’m also reading about other colors, and I love the color turquoise so:
Turquoise in Rasberry Yum
It will be harder for Booker (if he decides to run again) to take on Rand Paul, but things could change in a few months.
Do we know yet if a ‘moderate’ Dem will be in the mix to thwart Booker?
Not yet.
T and R, Ms. Benny!! 🙂 Sinema sure sounds like a Turd Way freak. Is Mark Kelly just as bad? He ought to know better as his wife was nearly killed by a FRightwingnut headcase!
Mark Kelly is very much a centrist.
specifically on $15 min wage:
He may well have committed murder, and we’ll never know if it was in self-defense. It sounds like he was unstable. But it does look like someone considered “dangerous” was executed on American soil. We knew this was coming and has happened before, most often with POC. All investigations have been quashed. good article.
Yah, Reinoehl does sound like he was unstable, but he was definitely executed. How many bullets were used to snuff his life?
That’s just a little over the top I’d say.