https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/02/14/gop-refusal-convict-trump-clarion-call-eliminating-filibuster-says-ro-khanna

“If Democrats could not persuade 10 of their GOP colleagues to hold a former president accountable for provoking a coup attempt that left five people dead, progressives asked, why would they expect to convince 10 Republicans to join them in breaking the archaic 60-vote Senate filibuster that is standing in the way of crucial legislative priorities?

“The fact that we could not get even 60 senators to vote for the most obvious proposition of convicting Trump is a clarion call for eliminating the filibuster!” Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) tweeted, a sentiment that others echoed in the hours following the Senate’s second acquittal of the twice-impeached former president.

“Dear centrist Democrats, you couldn’t even get 10 GOP votes to convict the guy who sent a mob to kill you all. You think you can get them to vote on issues like immigration/climate? Come on,” immigrant rights activist Erika Andiola said Saturday. “You have to end the filibuster and use every tool at your disposal to get things done.”

“People sent you all to Congress to make their lives better,” Andiola added. “They sent you to keep your promises. Not to rely on the minority party. Not to rely on the party who defended a fascist with their vote today.”

From the Reverend Barber

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2021/02/13/fight-15-minimum-wage-fight-racial-justice

Sixty-two million people in the United States make less than $15 an hour. And here’s the truth: the fight to raise the minimum wage to a living wage of $15 is as important as the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. For Black people, it’s taken us 400 years to get to $7.25 an hour. We can’t wait any longer. People in Appalachia can’t wait any longer. Poor white people, brown people, we cannot wait any longer. And we won’t be silent anymore.

The low-wage workers, tipped workers, people making less than $15 were already in a kind of depression before the Covid-19 pandemic hit. This is deadly. Hundreds of people are dying a day from poverty. Many of them are low-wage workers, tipped workers, people getting sick unnecessarily. Meanwhile, tens of millions of people still lack healthcare.

When it comes to the $15 minimum wage, some politicians say they’re worried about small businesses. But we have to ask them, have they voted for universal healthcare for everybody? Because if they were really worried about small businesses and their costs, they would pass universal healthcare so that small businesses didn’t have to pay that money to cover their workers. If they were really worried about these businesses, they would pay people a living wage. Because guess what? The people with living wages are going to spend that money, and guess where they’re going to spend it? Back in the businesses.

We cannot get this close and then fall back. We say to President Biden, to Democrats, to Republicans, to senators, to all of them: don’t turn your back on the $15 an hour minimum wage. Listen: 55% of poor, low-wealth people voted for this current ticket. That’s the mandate. The mandate is in the people who voted, not in the back slapping of senators and congresspeople. It’s the people who voted. And if we turn our backs now, it will hurt 62 million poor, low-wealth people who have literally kept this economy alive, who were the first to have to go to jobs, first to get infected, first to get sick, first to die. We cannot be the last to get relief and the last to get treated and paid properly. Protect us, respect us, and pay us.

The truth of the matter is, there can be no domestic tranquility without the establishment of justice. That’s not what Rev. William Barber says — it’s what the Constitution says. The establishment of justice precedes domestic tranquility. And you can only hold domestic tranquility when you promote the general welfare of all people.

Now, some argue that a $15 wage can’t pass through budget reconciliation. That’s nothing but an excuse. The fact of the matter is, when Republicans wanted to pass tax cuts and cut welfare, they used reconciliation. One time, when the parliamentarian gave them the wrong answer, they fired the parliamentarian, and got another parliamentarian to give them the right answer. So there’s one set of rules that apply for corporations, and there’s another set of rules when it comes to poor and low-wealth people. And that’s why we’re saying to Democrats: Don’t play the reconciliation game. It only takes a simple majority of 51 votes to overturn what the parliamentarian says. Let’s be real about this. People turned out to vote and it’s time for this to happen.

Back during the New Deal, people said to President Roosevelt that the minimum wage was going to break to the country. You know what Roosevelt said to them? He said any business that doesn’t want to pay people the minimum wage does not belong in America. He said you don’t have a right to exist in this country if you don’t want to pay people a basic minimum wage.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/feb/13/andrew-cuomo-mini-trump-new-york-coronavirus

Bad news for all the self-proclaimed “Cuomosexuals” out there! Turns out your corona-crush isn’t quite the hero you once thought he was. Almost a year into the pandemic it seems that Cuomo-mania has finally subsided and the governor of New York’s pandemic response is getting some much overdue, and less than flattering, scrutiny.

Andrew Cuomo was practically deified by liberals in the early days of the pandemic because, let’s face it, anyone looked amazing compared to the train-wreck that was “try-injecting-bleach” Donald Trump. While Trump was in a state of dithering and denial, Cuomo took charge and was reassuringly direct: people across the US tuned into his daily press briefings. There was speculation Cuomo could be the next president.

Of course, being good on camera doesn’t mean you’re doing a good job on the ground. In recent weeks there have been calls for Cuomo to resign over allegations his administration tried to hide the scope of coronavirus-related nursing home deaths in New York. Two weeks ago, New York’s attorney general, Letitia James, released a report stating nursing home deaths were 50% higher than originally claimed. On Friday damning new allegations of a cover-up emerged. The New York Post reported it had obtained a recording of one of Cuomo’s top aides admitting the administration withheld data on nursing home deaths because it was worried the Department of Justice would investigate state misconduct.

It has always been obvious to anyone paying attention that Cuomo is a mini-Trump. He has the same appetite for authoritarianism as the former president: during the pandemic he has drawn scrutiny for cancelling special elections, issuing executive orders and consolidating power. Like Trump he has nothing but disdain for his detractors, particularly if they happen to be more qualified than he is. The New York Times recently reported that nine top New York health officials have resigned during the pandemic, with many of them telling the Times that Cuomo had asked them to match their health guidance to his decisions. But who needs experts, eh? Not the all-knowing Cuomo. “When I say ‘experts’ in air quotes, it sounds like I’m saying I don’t really trust the experts,” Cuomo said of pandemic policies in a recent news conference. “Because I don’t.”

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/02/14/fire-dejoy-he-burns-down-usps-postmaster-general-pushes-plan-slower-mail-higher

Undeterred by the backlash and widespread delays that followed his disruptive operational changes at the U.S. Postal Service last year, Postmaster General Louis DeJoy is reportedly planning to roll out another slate of policies that would significantly hike postage rates and further slow the delivery of certain kinds of mail.

While the plan has yet to be finalized, new details of the proposal—first reported by the Washington Post—intensified pressure on President Joe Biden to take decisive action before DeJoy inflicts any more damage on the most popular government institution in the country.

“Fire DeJoy before he burns down the USPS,” Zephyr Teachout, associate professor of law at Fordham University, tweeted Saturday. “Biden has the power to fill the board that decides his fate. That board should be full of people who believe in public postal services. And that board must be ready to fire him quickly.”

Biden should fire the governors of the USPS who appointed DeJoy, install new ones, and have them fire DeJoy. He should not be allowed to continue destroying the postal service. https://t.co/JLw3yUNHVe

— Robert Reich (@RBReich) February 13, 2021

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