https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/03/25/sanders-demands-trump-rescind-truly-outrageous-decision-hand-gilead-exclusive-rights?cd-origin=rss

Sen. Bernie Sanders late Tuesday demanded that the Trump administration immediately rescind its decision to grant pharmaceutical giant Gilead Sciences exclusive rights to the antiviral drug remdesivir, one of many drugs currently being tested as a possible treatment for the novel coronavirus that is rapidly spreading and taking lives across the globe.

In a statement, Sanders said it’s “truly outrageous that after taxpayers put tens of millions of dollars into developing remdesivir, Trump’s [Food and Drug Administration] is exploiting a law reserved for rare diseases to privatize a drug to treat a pandemic virus.”

“The Trump administration must rescind this corporate giveaway to Gilead and make any treatment and vaccine free for everybody,” added the Vermont senator.

The Intercept reported Tuesday that the FDA earlier this week granted Gilead “orphan” drug status over remdesivir, which was developed with the help of at least $79 million in taxpayer funds.

The designation, according to The Intercept, “allows the pharmaceutical company to profit exclusively for seven years from the product” and “could block supplies of the antiviral medication from generic drug manufacturers.”

After characterizing the FDA’s decision as “insane and unacceptable” in a tweet Tuesday afternoon, Sanders later said that “now is not the time for profiteering in the pharmaceutical industry.”

“Now is the time to bring our scientists together to develop and produce the best treatment for the coronavirus as quickly as possible,” said Sanders.

“When Jonas Salk developed the polio vaccine 65 years ago, he understood the tremendous value it would have for all of humanity, and he refused to patent it,” Sanders continued. “Right now, we must put human life above corporate profit. We cannot give pharmaceutical corporations a monopoly on treatments that could save millions of people during this crisis.”

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/dont-use-coronavirus-to-bail-out-oil-and-gas-companies-2020-03-23?utm_campaign=Hot%20News&utm_source=hs_email&utm_medium=email&utm_content=85232421&_hsenc=p2ANqtz–8BcNdcac_ciPIdeNQTKGUgug_MijXr0v7DR2fS2vD9QyT12pUCxBZoDlDsLJ5RPhyaslr76Xabfv2Cphq6hVZv6pLNQ&_hsmi=85232421

But Trump administration and Republican Senate, which have taken huge sums from the fossil fuel industry, are using the possibility of a recession to bail it out. The proposals include a purchase of 30 million barrels of oil (an amount that could go up to 77 million barrels) for the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, an emergency stockpile of oil held by the U.S. Department of Energy.

The current oil price slump is occurring at a time of already low prices, for which U.S. overproduction is largely to blame. The U.S. is now the world’s largest producer of both oil and gas, and is expected to account for 70% of the increase in global oil production and 75% of the growth of liquefied natural gas trade over the next 5 years.

And much of this oil and gas production binge has been fueled by debt, based on promises of future profit that haven’t materialized.

So let’s not blame a virus, or Russia, or Saudi Arabia. If U.S. oil and gas producers are in trouble, they are the ones at fault, and it takes nerve on their part to ask the government for a handout. While oil and gas workers facing layoffs deserve assistance, their undeserving bosses do not.

Then, consider what science tells us about this industry. A healthy future for oil and gas inevitably means a bleak future for most humans and for ecosystems. At precisely the time that scientists say we should be phasing out oil and gas production, a bailout to this destructive industry is a giant step backwards.

A much smarter use for stimulus funds would be major investments in renewables and energy efficiency, industries that employ far more Americans than fossil fuels without harming the planet. If fossil-fuel workers are being displaced, they can be fast tracked into jobs growing these industries that are vital for our future.

Let’s not repeat the mistakes of 2008. Emergency funds should be freed up for direct assistance to those workers and communities who need it most. In the longer term, stimulus funds should be used to build just and effective solutions for the other looming crisis humanity faces: the climate crisis.

https://progressive.org/public-school-shakedown/edtech-industry-profit-from-covid-19-lahm-200323/

But here’s another concern: What if this sudden disruption is actually a golden opportunity for those invested in market-based education reform?

Could this be the moment many well-heeled investors and politicians, from Netflix CEO Reed Hastings to Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, have hoped for, when public education becomes less democratic and more individualized?

After Hurricane Katrina ravaged New Orleans in 2004, the city’s school system received a makeover, courtesy of market-based education reform entities such as Teach for America and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

Today, there are no traditional public schools left in New Orleans. Instead, the city is a patchwork of privately run charter schools, along with the swath of private schools that have long drawn the city’s wealthiest, and whitest, students.

Many observers, including parents of color who did not appreciate the overhauling of their city’s schools, have documented the way a crisis—Hurricane Katrina—was used to usher in a new era of disaster capitalism for New Orleans.

The push to privatize education in New Orleans, post-Katrina, can also be tied to similar efforts in Puerto Rico, following the destruction of Hurricane Maria.

Now, some observers are predicting that the COVID-19 crisis will provide yet another disaster capitalism-style intervention in America’s public schools.

https://www.cbs46.com/news/atlanta-mayor-says-icu-units-are-at-full-capacity/article_495755b8-6e92-11ea-b9ba-5ff9aadecb3b.html

Atlanta Mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms offered some dire news on Tuesday, telling CBS46 that intensive care units across the city are at “full capacity.”

Still trying to find out what further oversight there will be for the $500 billion corporate loan fund.

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/03/25/new-senate-stimulus-bill-would-ban-companies-owned-trump-or-his-children-receiving

A massive coronavirus stimulus plan that the Senate and White House agreed to in the early hours of Wednesday morning would bar any companies owned or controlled by President Donald Trump, the president’s children, Vice President Mike Pence, or members of Congress from receiving any taxpayer bailout money, according to a summary of the legislation circulated by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer.

The sprawling $2 trillion bill, which has not yet been released in full, would “prohibit businesses controlled by the president, vice president, members of Congress, and heads of executive departments from receiving loans or investments from Treasury programs,” Schumer’s summary states.

“The children, spouses, and in-laws of the aforementioned principals are also included in this prohibition,” the document adds.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/25/us/politics/biden-sanders-coronavirus-june-2.html

Think of it as Super Postponed Day.

June 2 had been an afterthought on the Democratic primary calendar. Ever since Joseph R. Biden Jr. seized the mantle of front-runner, voters in New Jersey and a few other states scheduled to vote that day assumed the Democratic horse race would be over before their primaries rolled around.

But with numerous states pushing back voting to June 2 because of the coronavirus pandemic, the date has gained sudden prominence. It now confers a huge bounty of delegates, second only to Super Tuesday in early March, with Indiana, Pennsylvania and others now moving to hold their primaries the first Tuesday in June.

Although Mr. Biden has built an all but insurmountable lead, June 2 — which is a long 10 weeks away — will be his first chance to clinch the presidential nomination. Only then would the former vice president have a definitive reason to press for the withdrawal of Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, who has shown no inclination to leave a race that feels frozen in place.

Some Democratic strategists see possible perils in the delay. Having to wait until June 2 for the next major chapter in the nominating race largely deprives Mr. Biden of a chance to rack up interim victories that would bring media attention; President Trump, meanwhile, is promoting his leadership in a global pandemic. A Monmouth University Poll on Tuesday showed Mr. Biden with a three-point lead over Mr. Trump among registered voters nationally, 48 percent to 45 percent, an edge the pollsters called “negligible.”

Delaware and Pennsylvania would bring to six the number of states to move primaries to June 2, including Connecticut, Indiana, Maryland and Rhode Island. The newcomers join the five primaries originally scheduled that day: New Jersey, Montana, New Mexico, South Dakota and the District of Columbia. (Inevitably, the date seems destined to be stamped the “Acela Primary” for its new regional tilt.)

Ohio, which canceled its primary scheduled for March 17 because of the coronavirus, also has its sights on June 2. The date is one week before the June 9 deadline that the Democratic National Committee has set for states to hold primaries.

Election officials in New York, which is emerging as a hot spot of infections, are considering delaying their presidential primary from April 28 to June 23. A group representing New York’s election commissioners on Tuesday called for the primary to be moved to June 23, the date of another statewide vote, and to allow all voters to request absentee ballots. As the D.N.C. rules currently stand, New York could forfeit some delegates at the national convention for voting so late.

With the coronavirus outbreak, the Vermont senator has turned away almost entirely from conventional campaigning, instead converting his campaign apparatus to rally his liberal supporters around fighting for his vision of health care during the emergency. On Tuesday night he streamed a “coronavirus town hall” featuring health experts, a musical guest and Representative Pramila Jayapal of Washington, a chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus.

Four years ago, Mr. Sanders never formally dropped out of the primary race even after Hillary Clinton became the presumptive nominee on June 7. (Mr. Sanders endorsed Mrs. Clinton a month later, just before the national convention.)

Mr. Biden has struggled to adapt to the new political landscape in which there are no more scheduled debates or live rallies, and Mr. Trump has seized the national spotlight with daily briefings from the White House. A Biden appearance from his Delaware basement on Monday, in which he criticized Mr. Trump for not acting like the “wartime president” he claims to be, was not picked up in real time by any of the major cable news channels.