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6/25-26 Weekend News and Open Thread

The Progressive Wing Posted on June 25, 2022 by BennyJune 25, 2022

Hello Birdies, This is the Rachel Maddow show from last evening. It’s about 42 minutes, but she lays out the potential reverberations from the Dobbs ruling. https://youtu.be/jw8LDDfTY2c More news in the comments. This is also an open thread. See you there.

Continue reading →
Posted in 2022 elections, 2024 Elections, abortion, Activism, anti-choice, Bernie Sanders, Black Lives Matter, Common Dreams, DemocracyNow!, Democrats, DownBallotCandidates, Elizabeth Warren, grassroots, Healthcare, Immigration, Indigenous/Native American, Jeff Merkley, Keith Ellison, Medicare For All, MSNBC, Nina Turner, Open Thread, Privacy, Progressive Media, The Rational National, U.S. Congress, War, Womens Rights

6/28-29 News and Open Thread

The Progressive Wing Posted on June 28, 2021 by BennyJune 29, 2021

Update:

.@AyannaPressley endorses @ninaturner for Congress.

“If we are going to make real progress on the urgent crises facing all of our communities, we need lawmakers who are committed to legislating boldly – that's Nina.” pic.twitter.com/HXRyVxSAZV

— Daniel Marans (@danielmarans) June 29, 2021

Nina Turner Is Running to Join the Squad

Before there was the Squad, or even the glimmer of a movement by insurgent progressives to challenge incumbent congressional Democrats, a progressive Black woman legislator in Cleveland contemplated what to many Democrats was unthinkable at the time: challenging a respected Black congresswoman from the left in a primary, in this case Representative Marcia Fudge of Ohio, in 2012.

In the end, Nina Turner didn’t run against Fudge, but even announcing she was considering it made her an outsider to establishment Democratic Party politics. In a way, she’d always been one. She had come up as a college professor, city council member, and state senator, always a Democrat. But one of her earliest moves was backing a 2009 ballot initiative to reorganize the Cuyahoga County government that many local Democrats strenuously opposed. It passed overwhelmingly.

Turner again made establishment enemies when she went from publicly supporting the Ready for Hillary super PAC—the unofficial stalking horse for the presidential candidacy of the former senator and secretary of state—to becoming a top surrogate for Senator Bernie Sanders in his 2016 primary campaign.
The Political Revolution Comes to… Buffalo?
Now Nina Turner may be poised to actually join the Squad. In her run to fill the seat vacated when Fudge became the Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, the former Ohio legislator has the endorsement of Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, Ilhan Omar, and Cori Bush, four women of color who either defeated an incumbent or ascended after an incumbent stepped down. She’s also backed by Progressive Caucus chairs Pramila Jayapal and Katie Porter, Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison—and, of course, Bernie Sanders.

One of 13 Democratic candidates in the race, Turner is leading in campaign funding—her campaign announced in mid-June that she had raised over $3 million—thanks largely to her ability to tap into Sanders’s movement. Her volunteer events often brim with die-hard supporters of the Vermont senator. At almost every gathering, Turner tells her audience that her focus is on “‘the least of these’—the poor, the working poor and barely middle class.” She’s running on Medicare for All, free college, a $15 minimum wage, criminal justice reform, and voting rights.

The key to this race, though, will be winning over her district’s many Biden supporters—the president won roughly 80 percent of the general-election vote here last year, as did Clinton four years earlier—without losing her admirers on the Sanders left. She’s already drawn fire from a leftist fringe for her perceived betrayals, most notably for defending members of the Squad who declined to “force the vote” on Medicare for All earlier this year. “For the love of God, do not throw away the Squad members!” she told a lefty podcaster. Meanwhile, her leading rival, Cuyahoga County councilwoman and Democratic Party chair Shontel Brown, is running on her ties to the president. A recent ad includes a photo of Brown with Biden and features a cable host telling Turner, “You’ve been highly critical of President-elect Joe Biden.” The ad closes with: “I’m Shontel Brown, and I’ll work with Joe Biden.” (By press time, Clinton had endorsed Brown.)

“Highly critical” of Biden might be an understatement. A July 2020 Atlantic feature on how Trump could win in November featured this colorful quote from Turner about how, despite Sanders’s endorsement, she still wasn’t keen on voting for Biden. “It’s like saying to somebody, ‘You have a bowl of shit in front of you, and all you’ve got to do is eat half of it instead of the whole thing.’ It’s still shit.”

Turner has praised Biden as president, especially his Covid response. But will those earlier attacks hurt her? “I think it hurt her in the beginning, but I think people have gotten past that,” says Turner backer Samara Knight. “People are hungry for change. Nina brings hope.” Knight, an executive vice president of SEIU 1199, is a Biden supporter and also backed Clinton in 2016. Her union endorsed Turner after interviewing both her and Brown. “She’ll fight for us,” Knight says.

Brown has recently floated tributes to Israel at the top of her campaign website, as she’s welcomed support from the PAC Democratic Majority for Israel, which spent $1.4 million on ads attacking Sanders in 2020. The group is attacking Turner now for past statements conditioning US support for Israel on justice for the Palestinians.

“I’m a Democrat,” Turner tells me flatly. She runs through her party bona fides: as a city council member and state senator representing the city of Cleveland; as a Barack Obama delegate, twice, to the Democratic National Convention; as the Democratic nominee for Ohio secretary of state in 2014; as the engagement chair of the Ohio party. No one can take that away from her just because she supported Sanders, she says. “Sometimes, challenge isn’t pretty.”

Democratic voters will decide in an August 3 primary. An internal poll released on June 1 showed Turner at 50 percent and Brown at 15 percent, trailing “undecided.” But observers say the race could tighten, given Brown’s access to outside money.

Not a lot of news as the Senate and Congress are on recess. But still plenty of things to discuss! Place your comments below.

Posted in grassroots, Justice Democrats, News, Open Thread | Tagged Nina Turner

6/26 Pride Weekend and Open Thread

The Progressive Wing Posted on June 26, 2021 by BennyJune 26, 2021

Happy pride day #DublinPride #Pride2021 #FreeBritney pic.twitter.com/gPCmvhAxfX

— liamo🇮🇪☘️ (@liamo35) June 26, 2021

Happy Trans Pride London to everyone attending and supporting from home. Loving your protest signs, shirts and smiles 🏳️‍⚧️🌟 Photos thanks to @ChrisJepson & Joe Jones #londontranspride #Pride2021 pic.twitter.com/GRehIr0twu

— My Genderation (@mygenderation) June 26, 2021

I’m posting tweets from parades around the globe. Europe was far more tolerant of gay culture than the US for decades. Then Stonewall happened – and now Pride is a worldwide celebration.

More tweets, news, perspectives in the comments. Happy Pride Weekend!

Posted in News, Open Thread | Tagged World Pride Day

6/24-25 News Roundup and Open Thread

The Progressive Wing Posted on June 24, 2021 by BennyJune 24, 2021

Just 294 votes separate longtime Harlem leader Bill Perkins and newcomer Kristin Richardson Jordan, a democratic socialist backed by @AOC’s political action committee. https://t.co/Pat9eRW5iP

— THE CITY (@THECITYNY) June 24, 2021

More tweets, news, perspectives, etc in the comments. Sure Happy It’s Thursday!

Posted in News, Open Thread

6/19 Juneteenth and Open Thread Weekend

The Progressive Wing Posted on June 19, 2021 by BennyJune 19, 2021

1st annual Juneteenth holiday in the US. Of course, post office will be delivering mail, but next year, they will get a day off…along with the bankers.

https://www.texastribune.org/2020/06/19/juneteenth-texas-emancipation-day/

Setting the pace for Fort Worth’s Juneteenth caravan on Friday is 93-year-old Opal Lee. The activist and educator will lead her community on foot for two and a half miles — a distance that represents the number of additional years it took before enslaved people in Texas were informed of their freedom after the signing of the Emancipation Proclamation.

Lee has pushed for Juneteenth — celebrated every year on June 19 — to be recognized as a national holiday for more than 20 years. She’s too persistent to give up now, and this year in particular, she has the wind at her back as people across the country echo her calls.

“I have persistence in my DNA. There’s absolutely nothing that I start that I don’t want to finish. I gotta finish this,” said Lee, who added that she wishes she was young enough to be out there protesting in the streets against the police brutality that has taken the lives of so many black Americans. “I just gotta see it be a national holiday.”

Opal Lee in February during the Las Vegas leg of her walk from her Fort Worth home to Washington, D.C. The months-long walk …
Opal Lee in February during the Las Vegas leg of her walk from her Fort Worth home to Washington, D.C. The months-long walk was an effort to get Juneteenth named a national holiday. Credit: Courtesy of Opals Walk 2 DC Team

Juneteenth, also known as “Black Independence Day” and “Texas Emancipation Day,” has taken on additional meaning this year as Texans head into almost a month of protests against police violence and racial injustice following the deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Atatiana Jefferson and Mike Ramos at the hands of police.

The fight to make Juneteenth a national holiday has gained additional momentum this year from the corporate world. Some businesses have decided to give employees the day off, while prominent employers from Twitter to the National Football League have declared Juneteenth a permanent company holiday.

On Thursday U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, Texas’ senior Republican senator, announced that he will introduce bipartisan legislation to make Juneteenth a federal holiday. But he’s not the first Texas lawmaker to propose commemorating the emancipation of enslaved people in Texas.

On Monday, U.S. Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee, a Houston Democrat, introduced a resolution — as she has for the past eight years — with the same goal. With 202 cosponsors, the bills’ supporters quadrupled this year compared to previous years. While Jackson Lee has been one of Juneteenth’s fiercest congressional advocates in recent years, similar legislative attempts date back to at least 1996.

In 1980, Texas became the first state to adopt Juneteenth as a state holiday. Today, it’s officially recognized in all but three states: Hawaii, North Dakota and South Dakota.


More tweets, videos, songs, news, etc in the comments. See you there.

Posted in Activism, grassroots, News, Open Thread, Video | Tagged Juneteenth, Richie Havens

6/17 SCOTUS Upholds ACA Again. 7-2; Open Thread & News Roundup

The Progressive Wing Posted on June 17, 2021 by BennyJune 17, 2021

Affordable Care Act survives third Supreme Court challenge, as case from Trump administration and GOP-led states is rejected

The Supreme Court on Thursday dismissed the latest challenge to the Affordable Care Act, saying Republican-led states do not have the legal standing to try to upend the law.

Justice Stephen G. Breyer wrote the court’s 7 to 2 decision that preserves the law that provides millions of Americans with health coverage.

Justices Samuel A. Alito Jr. and Neil M Gorsuch dissented.

The decision meant the attempt to derail President Barack Obama’s landmark domestic achievement met the fate of past legal challenges, in 2012 and 2015.

The key issue this time was whether a 2017 decision by Congress to remove the penalty for not buying health insurance — the so-called individual mandate — meant that the law was unconstitutional and should be wiped from the books.

That would end popular provisions such as keeping young adults on their parents’ insurance policies, and ensuring coverage for those with preexisting medical conditions.

But the court said the states did not have the legal standing to bring the challenge.

President Biden, in contrast to former president Donald Trump, has said he plans to build on the program to offer more Americans health care coverage.

The red-state challenge came to the Supreme Court at an inopportune time — endangering the health-care coverage of more than 20 million Americans during the country’s gravest health crisis in a century.

Even congressional Republicans who have targeted Obamacare in the past distanced themselves from the suit brought by the Republican state attorneys general and joined by the previous administration.

The case posed three questions: Do the challengers have legal standing to bring the challenge? Did changes made by Congress in 2017 render unconstitutional the ACA’s requirement for individuals to buy insurance? And if so, can the rest of the law be separated out, or must it fall in its entirety?

“We do not reach these questions of the Act’s validity, however, for Texas and the other plaintiffs in this suit lack the standing necessary to raise them,” Breyer wrote.

The cases are California v. Texas and Texas v. California.

Essentially, the R’s on the court, especially Roberts, found the case not to be compelling. The merits of the law, which is what was being argued by the plantiff, was not in consideration. It was more if the commerce clause still holds, and in this case it does. ACA lives to fight another day, but there will be more challenges in the future.

From Justice Breyer:

[W]e conclude that the plaintiffs in this suit failed to show a concrete, particularized injury fairly traceable to the defendants’ conduct in enforcing the specific statutory provision they attack as unconstitutional.”

and from Justice Thomas:

Although this Court has erred twice before in cases involving the Affordable Care Act, it does not err today.”

More news, perspectives, etc in the comments. Sure Happy It’s Thursday.

Posted in News, Open Thread | Tagged ACA, SCOTUS 2021

6/14 News Roundup and Open Thread

The Progressive Wing Posted on June 14, 2021 by BennyJune 14, 2021

BREAKING: An attorney for Reality Winner says the former NSA translator is out of prison for good behavior. She had been serving a sentence of more than five years for passing classified information to a news outlet. pic.twitter.com/lkUaewN2MI

— Democracy Now! (@democracynow) June 14, 2021

More news, perspectives, tweets in the comments.

Posted in News, Open Thread | Tagged Prison, Reality Winner, whistleblowing

6/13 Sunday Open Thread

The Progressive Wing Posted on June 13, 2021 by BennyJune 13, 2021

Winning auction bid to fly in space with Jeff Bezos: $28 million

An auction for a ride into space next month alongside Jeff Bezos and his brother ended with a winning $28-million bid Saturday.
The Amazon founder’s rocket company, Blue Origin, did not disclose the winner’s name following the live online auction. The identity will be revealed in a couple weeks — closer to the brief up-and-down flight from West Texas on July 20, the 52nd anniversary of Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin’s moon landing.

It will be the first launch of Blue Origin’s New Shepard rocket with people onboard, kicking off the company’s space tourism business. Fifteen previous test flights of the reusable rocket and capsule since 2015 — short hops lasting about 10 minutes — were all successful.

Saturday’s auction followed more than a month of online bidding that reached $4.8 million by Friday. More than 7,500 people from 159 countries registered to bid, according to Blue Origin. More than 20 bidders — the high rollers — took part in Saturday’s auction.

Bezos announced Monday that he and his younger brother, Mark, would be onboard New Shepard’s first crew flight; the news quickly boosted bidding. The winning amount is being donated to Blue Origin’s Club for the Future, an educational effort to promote science and tech among young people.

The completely automated capsule can carry up to six passengers, each with their own big window. Blue Origin’s top sales director, Ariane Cornell, said following the auction that the fourth and final seat on the debut crew flight will be announced soon.

Blue Origin has yet to open ticket sales to the public or divulge prices.

Someone tweeted a similar thought to mine:

We're giving Blue Origin a $10 billion bailout so its owner (who is worth $194 billion) can sell tickets to space for $28 million.

But yes the problem is $300/week in unemploymenthttps://t.co/qN1alN4pyi https://t.co/bLRNxU8GAC

— Dan Price (@DanPriceSeattle) June 12, 2021

More tweets, news, perspectives, etc in the comments section.

Posted in News, Open Thread | Tagged corruption, Jeff Bezos

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