VP Harris tested positive for COVID-19. She doesn’t have any symptoms and is working from home, according to her press secretary. She’ll be back in the White House when she tests negative.
Coincidentally, the most careful person I personally know also tested positive recently, with mild symptoms. She and Harris will be fine. They’re relatively young and healthy, and both have access to great healthcare.
In other news, things are going to shit in Florida so fast I am just shaking my head in amazement and no longer have the heart to talk about it.
Turning once again to national news, I mentioned this WaPo article in the morning thread, “Fears mount inside White House that Manchin won’t agree to any deal.” An excerpt:
White House officials are confronting the “real fear” that they will fail to reach any deal with Manchin — even one that leaves out most of what Biden had initially hoped to accomplish, according to three senior administration officials and three outside advisers in communication with the White House, who all spoke on the condition of anonymity to comment on internal talks. A year after Biden introduced his climate and social spending plans, the White House is running out of time to get Manchin onboard, with many lawmakers in Congress viewing July 4 as a crucial deadline for action.
Maybe there’s some upside to this. Perhaps the paucity of legislative achievements to tout despite holding a (not really) power trifecta will inspire Democrats to focus more on the global struggle between authoritarianism and democracy, explicitly laying claim to their role as the good guys and saying out loud who the bad guys are, abroad and at home.
I think it’s a pretty compelling story: Republicans’ de facto leader kissed Putin’s authoritarian ass for four years, corruptly attempted to extort Ukraine, then banded together with Republican lawmakers and assorted kooks to do a coup. The upcoming January 6th hearings could be an opportunity to start banging this drum and keep right on banging it until November.
The kitchen table issues consultants say Dems should focus on will either take care of themselves or they won’t. Since we don’t really have a governing majority, we can’t do a whole lot to fix them. But we’re the only party left that still believes in democracy. That’s a big fucking deal, and I’m hoping to hear more about it in the months ahead.
Open thread!
On The Road – way2blue – Massi Mara, Kenya in July 1 of 6
Betsy
Five of my extended family members in three different households up and down the inland of the East coast have tested positive in the last week.
These are some of the most educated, careful, strict, vaccinated people I know.
I know this account is “anecdata,” but literally no one else in my extended family had gotten Covid, except one college student, in the first two years of the pandemic.
The fact that these three households popped up with Covid in different states all in one week says to me that 1) mask un-mandating was premature and 2) the virus is circulating *under the radar* because of widespread home tests that don’t get reported unless someone ends up in the hospital or other reporting entity.
In effect, many officially low-risk areas are not that at all.
Be careful out there!
dmsilev
I got flagged as a “possible” for COVID on surveillance testing last night (spit-test PCR), so this morning it was time for the good old nasal probe thing and wait nervously for the results. So, like Madame Vice President, work-from-home for the time being.
Joy.
Her house is definitely nicer than my place though.
Jeffro
sign me up!
burnspbesq
Cawthorn got caught—again—trying to carry a handgun through a TSA checkpoint. Charlotte this time.
StringOnAStick
To stave off despair at the level of absolute inability to get out of bed each morning, I am telling myself that the need to cut off Putin completely will force investments in renewable energy at a faster rate than was previously possible. We’re probably past the global climate change tipping point, but every bit we do to push off any of it is a cause for hope. Ukraine may be doing more than saving democracy, they might get us on the path to save the planet too.
CaseyL
If Manchin won’t agree to anything, they can stop taking his calls. At least deprive his attention-seeking ass of the focus he likes so much.
eclare
@CaseyL: Exactly. And no more press hanging on his every word. He has one word, no. Let him host his little parties on his houseboat.
burnspbesq
Of course this creep is a Republican. You had to ask?
https://www.wtrf.com/ohio/watch-ohio-school-board-president-wants-to-be-called-grandpa-by-11-year-old-girl-he-allegedly-tried-to-meet-for-sex/
eclare
@burnspbesq: Groomer for real
John Revolta
Did I pick a bad time to move to Jacksonville? Do you think the nice lady in Omaha will sell me my house back?
Omnes Omnibus
Paucity of legislative accomplishments? The Recovery Act and the Infrastructure Bill are nothing to sneeze at. Did everyone want more? Yes, of course. But there are legislative achievements to tout.
lowtechcyclist
The sooner we start, the better. The old days of nobody paying attention to politics before Labor Day are long gone.
Maybe they aren’t paying attention, in the sense we generally use the term, but they still see and hear a lot of stuff, and by the time Labor Day rolls around, their views have solidified, maybe without them really thinking about it much, and it’s too late to un-harden them.
If we’re going to sell this election as being about good versus evil – and we should! – then we need to start getting that out there where people can start absorbing it, whether or not they actually think about it.
eclare
@lowtechcyclist: I don’t have any data to back up my opinion, but I bet a lot of voters have forgotten that the first impeachment was over TFG’s attempt to extort Ukraine.
wvng
@Betsy: The fact that VP Harris is asymptomatic is one of the core issues with this virus. She tests a lot (daily?) and would never have known she was positive if she didn’t test. Most of us don’t test frequently and increasingly at all. There is no way to know how much covid is out there.
wvng
@Omnes Omnibus: There are legislative accomplishments and good governance accomplishments (managing covid anyone) and great economy in most ways accomplishments and astonishing leadership of NATO through the Ukraine tragedy and most of our fellow Americans have no idea and what they have an idea of is more often than not wrong. 56% of our fellow Americans think Biden has been weak on Ukraine? Really? Inflation is Biden’s fault, even as it is a worldwide thing?
I really despair that the media does such a poor job conveying reality.
VOR
I see Dr. Birx is trying a redemption tour. Yes, she froze when TFG suggested injecting bleach and pumping sunshine into bodily orifices. I can forgive that as just being stunned at the stupidity. But in March 2020 Dr. Birx went full suckup:
Damned at Random
I’m still curious about the classified documents Trump took from the White House. Were they evidence of the coup planning (or other criminal activity) or something he planned to sell to MBS or Putin? My guess is the later, as the former are more likely clogging the DC sewage system
Damned at Random
@burnspbesq:
He belongs on the no-fly list
Tenar Arha
@Betty Cracker Do you listen to podcasts, I heard about this one on the bird app, but haven’t been able to bring myself to listen to it yet. Anything political is dicey when I’m both down & cranky. Anyway maybe people here want to listen, lessee if this copy paste works, nope.
Maybe this?
Rachel Bitecofer on the midterms,
THE BOB CESCA SHOW, APR 20 ⋅ 53:10
mrmoshpotato
@burnspbesq:
Again? For fuck’s sake, NC-11.
jonas
@Damned at Random: You’re forgetting Trump’s Razor — the stupidest answer is usually the correct one. They were probably docs relating to some military project he thought was cool or something, like satellite images of Kim Jong Un’s patio, or pictures of a new missile system he thinks he was responsible for building.
jonas
@VOR: Yeah, she still owes me a new keyboard from when I read that the first time a year or two ago…
Ohio Mom
Sigh. A BFF was very involved in the effort to change the Florida law to allow ex-cons to vote, and very proud and thrilled when that effort succeeded.
You can’t even say, two steps forward, one step back, it’s now one step forward and a mile back. Florida’s new election police force gives new meaning to tne term Voter Intimidation.
Kelly
Sewage testing. Should be a national program.
wvng
@Kelly: good point. I stand corrected. But, of course, it needs to be done.
Soprano2
@wvng: Depends on whether your community does wastewater monitoring for Covid. The truth is that even when testing was robust, there was STILL no way to know how much Covid was really out there, because of so many asymptomatic cases. Wastewater monitoring picks up most of that, so for people who can look at it for their community it provides good information. Plus it shows a Covid uptick around a week before test rates go up.
brendancalling
I wish Joe Manchin would hurry up and die. Maybe he can fall on Krysten Sinema, and then it’s two birds with one stone.
debbie
@jonas:
They were deliverables: He delivered and got a suitcase full of cash in return.
Soprano2
@Kelly: 1,000 thumbs up on this notion. It’s the best way to gauge how high it is in the population. Everyone uses the toilet at some time!
Soprano2
@brendancalling: So you’re for Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and no more Biden appointments being confirmed, period. Because that’s this would mean. I wish people could understand that!
New Deal democrat
FWIW, if they are actually interested in winning this fall, Democrats have an excellent “elevator pitch;” namely,
“Hold the House,
Two seats in the Senate,
Everything gets done.”
As in
“Voting rights: passed in the House, filibustered in the Senate.[picture of McConnell]”
“$15 minimum wage: passed in the House, filibustered in the Senate.[picture of McConnell].
“Property tax relief: passed in the House, filibustered in the Senate.[picture of McConnell]…”
And so on.
With the tag line:
“Vote Democrat.
Hold the House,
Two seats in the Senate,
Everything gets done.”
Manchin and Sinema would get pissed off, but now that Breyer’s Supreme Court seat is taken care of, who cares?
JMG
Seeing as how the White House and Democratic leadership has on more than one occasion told Manchin, “write your own bill and we’ll support it” and he won’t even do that, I’d say it’s a waste of time to even deal with him. Let him submit his own legislation or else assume he’s against anything you want.
Ohio Mom
@burnspbesq: Goshen is in the next county over (east) from Cincinnati (Hamilton county). Mean Jean Schmidt territory.
She came out of retirement (remember when she was in Congress?) to run/serve as the state representative from that area; she’s sponsoring a Don’t Say Gay bill.
Which, needless to say, wouldn’t have prevented anything this creepy pedo school board member did.
Kelly
@Soprano2: Since most homes out here in the rural hinterlands are on individual septic systems there’s smallish hole in the data. Rural tends heavily reactionary red so the the hole will be skewed politically.
indycat32
@Ohio Mom: Goshen is in Elkhart county in northern Indiana.
Geminid
It’s not just consultants that advocate campaigning on “kitchen table” issues. Plenty of Democratic practical politiians succeed when they emphasize them. Of course there is a lot of disagreement over what kitchen table issues actually are. Pennsylvania Senator Bob Casey credited his 650,000 win in 2018 largely to the Affordable Care Act and his pledge to defend it from Republican ravages. This probably qualified as a something Pennsylvanians talked about at breakfast or dinner because it directly affected their and their loved ones’ lives.
In Texas, Beto O’Rourke may be able to make the freeze of 2021 and Republican neglect a kitchen table issue. Texans can be reminded of huddling in blankets around their kitchen tables not that long ago, and incited to gripe about it at October dinners.
This is not to say that Republican extremism and fascism can’t be used against them in the midterms. But “kitchen table issues,” broadly defined as matters that affect normal voters directly, will be pushed by candidates to good effect. I think the question is of proportion, that is the mix of bread-and-butter issues and more thematic but crucial ones like defending Democracy. Similarly, Democrats won’t choose between positive ads and attack ads but rather whether their ad mix will be 60-40 for one or the other.
trollhattan
Local news, this a.m.
IMO wastewater testing is genius in getting authorities and the medical community prepared for a wave that will initially overwhelm testing when it hits. Local example: the latest day for which there are data show about 1 thousand tests performed. At the end of December total tests were more than 12 thousand/day. The system can’t ramp tenfold in just a few days.
My appointment for Pfizer #4 is next week.
JoyceH
@Damned at Random:
It wasn’t the coup plot, that’s for sure. We don’t know much about the documents, but we know they were marked and marked SCI at that. As for the coup plot, these bozos have been yapping about it on television, they didn’t even have the brains to classify their treason.
Ruckus ??
@wvng:
I really despair that the media does such a poor job conveying reality.
The current day media, OK not all of it, but most of it, is big business and money is the news they want to speak to, and nothing else. They may not say the money part at the top of their lungs or in the big print on the front page, but the owners of most news companies, be they TV, newsprint or radio are far more interested in money than any other subject, just as are most of the people they write about. Being comfortable is no longer enough, one has to have a lot to have any power. One has to be able to purchase twitter to be able to shine. Don’t have to be a reasonable human being in any way, just have to be in the money. And no this is not just the US. And no this has not just been going on for the last 77 yrs. Money to some is more important that oxygen because money makes the world go round. Oxygen just gives you something to breathe and anyone can do that…There is no longer a race to improve anything other than a portfolio. Who has the most is the best. It’s a race to find the worst human being. Don’t think so? We have over 700 billionaires in this country. The people at the top that run Russia are all billionaires and in it for themselves. The average income level in Russia is $800/month, and the top people in government have super yachts costing upwards of $200 million or more and a million a month for upkeep. How many of our public officials are billionaires? Millionaires?
The point is money is the guiding light of business, which should be no surprise but it isn’t the money that is the problem, it is, as it always is, the level of greed. We have an entire business segment of making money off of money. IOW making money in place of making things or services. Money is the product. Business has monetized making money and everything else is secondary. Or worse.
matt
I’m with you on midterm strategy. Essentially Putin handed the Democrats and Biden a gift, and this is their chance to break out of the media+manchegma+GOP box they’re in where they’re not running things through Congress. Biden has gone all in on supporting Ukraine, and they’re holding off the Russian barbarian invaders with our help. We’re the good guys. Don’t let the baddies run this.
JoyceH
@mrmoshpotato:
What gets me about these ‘caught with a gun’ stories is that the gun humpers don’t see anything wrong with the standard ‘I forgot I had it with me’ excuse. Personally I consider it a problem that so many people are so used to lugging a gun around wherever they go that they don’t even remember it when they enter a place they’re not supposed to have it.
Kelly
@New Deal democrat: I’m puzzling my best “Hold the House” move. My Blue Dog Rep Schrader has a credible progressive challenger Jamie McLeod-Skinner. County Democrat orgs are backing Jamie. Biden is backing Schrader.
guachi
The White House won’t do it but they could let the blame entirely on Manchin. “He refuses to say what he wants so there’s no deal and now the government is shut down”
ian
@brendancalling: They are both from states with Republican governors. Their demise would mean an end to our majority and the ability to confirm judicial and executive branch appointments.
trollhattan
@brendancalling: I have faith (well-placed, I’m sure) Arizona can replace Sinema with a non-kook Dem, but West Virginia replace a proposed daisy-pushing Manchin with not-a-Republican? There’s not enough LSD to make that happen.
rikyrah
Justice Jackson!![]()
(@DrVirgo1981) tweeted at 7:41 AM on Thu, Apr 21, 2022:
Many states have decriminalized cannabis and guess what, black people still sit and jail and white people have made themselves rich selling it.
They always use us as a shield to gain more white privilege.
Y’all need to quit being bamboozled by people with no black friends.
(https://twitter.com/DrVirgo1981/status/1517121253425008642?t=wYZakcAxyrryg_m5qnJfGg&s=03)
WaterGirl
Didn’t the VP just have Covid a few weeks ago?
rikyrah
Florida was all about taking away two Democratic districts with Black Democrats as the representatives.
Senator Gary Farmer (@FarmerForFLSen) tweeted at 3:32 PM on Wed, Apr 20, 2022:
To everyone focused on Disney vs. DeSantis, don’t take the bait! Ron DeSantis has launched a direct assault on Black representation in Florida and is picking a fight w/ Disney so that voters look the other way! Don’t let him sweep this under the rug! #DeSantisDestroysFlorida
(https://twitter.com/FarmerForFLSen/status/1516877411064946691?t=U4g18uXKd9G4soS7InULfA&s=03)
brendancalling
@trollhattan: I’d almost rather have a Republican, who would tell me “fuck you” to my face than that flabby-ass, lying, delaying piece of shit who’s making my president look bad.
The Moar You Know
@burnspbesq: His constituents will send that nice young man ten more. Great scam he’s got going there.
brendancalling
@Soprano2: it doesn’t have to happen in 2022. 2023 would be fine.
rikyrah
No lie told
Courtney Welch (@cw4emeryville) tweeted at 9:50 PM on Wed, Apr 20, 2022:
The real energy behind “If you can’t afford to live here then leave” is really people thinking low income folks don’t deserve to make demands about their community. You’re poor, you don’t get to demand the community build and preserve affordable housing.
(https://twitter.com/cw4emeryville/status/1516972694293516289?t=QG1hJTRk-E5gfUmvTkj-XQ&s=03)
Betty Cracker
@Omnes Omnibus: Okay, how about relative paucity given the scale of the need and expectations? Yep, the Dems/Biden admin have some accomplishments to tout, which they definitely should. My point is this won’t be an election where they can simply run on those accomplishments because there’s a lot left undone and we’re facing an existential challenge to our form of government.
The media is what it is, and I don’t think we can expect acknowledgement of how much has been accomplished and an explanation of why more hasn’t been done (i.e., Republicans + 2). That sucks, but it falls to elected Dems and affiliated orgs to pick up the slack.
The Jan 6th committee seems to get that and has been providing a drip of damning info in advance of their upcoming hearings. Individual senators have hammered their GOP colleagues for lying and hypocrisy. I hope to see more of this.
Scout211
Sorry, Betty C, but election police?
This is just so disturbing. I feel so sad for Floridians. ☹️ My sister is ready to move but her husband was born and raised there so they will stay.
Martin
Thinking the attacks on Ukrainian train stations immediately after Blinken and Austen left the country by train was a bold and stupid move by Russia.
jonas
@debbie: As far as we know, he didn’t deliver anything to anyone. My bet is they were there so he could show people how cool top secret documents were or whatever. Again, I’m just assuming the stupidest, most “Trump” scenario possible.
jonas
@Scout211: In a normal country with an normal SCOTUS, this shit would be DOA. But here we are.
Dangerman
Police force to fight non-existent crime? Sweet deal for those police. What about a police force to look for Zombies? You can’t be too careful.
Nelle
I’ve been the most careful in my circle of family and friends. I’m the only one that tested positive. I only checked because I was having what was exactly a huge allergic reaction (quite familiar to me). Mostly eyes and sneezing. South wind with pollen blowing. But I thought, heck, I have enough tests to check and I was startled to find that I was testing positive. Used a second test. Still positive. I was no more uncomfortable than during any other seasonal allergic attack (which, yes, is uncomfortable but still…). I even wonder if I was positive for allergy and asymptomatic for Covid. All around me tested negative, though. Edit – I’m fully vaxed, including the second booster. 70 y.o.
Benw
Ok this is totally inconsequential but The Fifth Element has Milla Jovovich billed fourth!? WTAF
Another Scott
@Omnes Omnibus: Almost 220,000,000 Americans fully vaccinated, also too (257M+ with at least one dose).
It’s amazing the amount of good things that Biden has been able to get done in roughly 461 days.
Forward!!
Cheers,
Scott.
The Thin Black Duke
@rikyrah: If white people aren’t allies, they’re enablers who are watching the lynch mob getting the noose ready.
Nelle
Wastewater reports in Des Moines are still very low. My son posts the reports so he’ll give us a heads up if and when it rises, if I forget to check.
Ruckus ??
@JMG:
I’d say it’s a waste of time to even deal with him.
It is but. There really is no other choice. Not dealing with him is worse. Dealing with him is at least a possible reasonable outcome, not dealing with him ends almost any chance.
Our government was built around the senate – the states having say over the people. And even there the people have been strangled by limiting the size of the house as the population has grown. Our entire government was based around the people with money who controlled everything. And it has gotten a lot worse, as I’m sure we’ve all noticed. And it’s not the worst, we just have to recognize the issues and work to fix those. But anytime one person can have the outsized control that Manchin has over 330 million people, that’s bad.
The Thin Black Duke
@Benw: Chris Tucker used to be a big Star but he lost his mind, so he’s not anymore.
wetzel
Blue and Molly playing football today. Next time Blue will be Georgia, and Molly will be Alabama.
Blue Wearing Cone Catches Hail Mary To Tie Game
Omnes Omnibus
@Betty Cracker: I would still say that that it is buying into the RW and media frame. I don’t think we should poor mouth Democratic accomplishments. I don’t think it is helpful and I think it leads to depressive thinking. I know my opinion is out of sync with that of many here. I still hold it. Sue me.
TonyG
Another anecdote … so far a total of 13 people in my extended family (including my two adult sons and their partners) have gotten covid after having been fully vaccinated. All of them are recovering, or have already recovered, just fine. Meanwhile, one of my relatives caught covid more than a year ago, before vaccines were available, and he died. Anecdotes are not data, as the saying goes, but this corresponds to the widely reported fact that vaccination drastically reduces the likelihood of hospitalization and death from covid.
Betty
@New Deal democrat: I agree. We all know Manchin and Sinema are the problem. With two more Senate seats, much is possible. This may no longer be relevant given that times change, but I was just reading an account of Truman’s run against Dewey where a similar situation led to people underestimating Harry. Keep hope alive.
Benw
@The Thin Black Duke: yeah it’s a bummer what happened to him. He’s billed 5th after Jovovich, when his performance totally carried the movie
MomSense
@Tenar Arha:
Listen! It’s really good. Yes, she scared the crap out of me AND she also has great ideas for what we can do.
Another Scott
@Scout211:
No, I haven’t clicked the link yet.
I hate sentences like that. Why is it so hard to say how many? Are there others besides Florida? If so, why have we heard about them as much (if at all)?
Grr…,
Scott.
Scout211
@Another Scott:
I guess they are hedging their bets for the next few months.
From The Brennan Center for Justice.
Mike in NC
We spoke to our friends in Tampa this past weekend. They’re both retiring in a few months and moving to Asheville, NC where they grew up. They’re planning to visit us here in July, which means at this point we never have to set foot in Florida ever again.
Ohio Mom
@Ohio Mom: Oops, it’s Goshen, *Indiana.* Not Ohio.
But still my question stands, how do the “Don’t Say Gay” bills prevent this sort of actual “grooming”? They work against it, obviously, by preventing kids from learning how to recognize improper advances.
Soprano2
@Kelly: Sure, this is true, but it’s a small number. What you see in sewer systems will tell you what the trend is. Testing has MORE holes in it than sewer monitoring does.
Geminid
@Ohio Mom: This could be a feature and not a bug.
Chief Oshkosh
@Omnes Omnibus: AGREED! These alone are Big Fucking Deals!
Ksmiami
@brendancalling: he makes the Democratic Party look weak and feckless. We need to cut his mike and no I don’t care if he goes Red. He’s not worth the cost
Betty Cracker
@New Deal democrat: I like that approach. It’s honest because it points out exactly where the obstacles are. It sets goals and tells what’s needed to accomplish them. It isn’t bullshit happy talk that’s out of place at a time like this.
Villago Delenda Est
If there were to be some sort of Maserati accident between DC and WVA, I would not be terribly upset.
UncleEbeneezer
I hope the relative paucity of legislative achievements will wake voters up to the fact that they need to elect more Democrats because a 49-49 tie in the Senate guarantees nothing, but a couple more Dems opens up the possibilities for major legislation on: Voting Rights, Democracy Reforms, Abortion, Climate, Gun Control, Police Reform, etc., etc….EVERYTHING!!
Villago Delenda Est
@wvng: The inability of the MSM to accurately related reality is a feature, not a bug, to their corporate overlords and oligarch paymasters.
sab
@Omnes Omnibus: I completely agree with you.
Kelly
Race for Oregon’s new 6th Congressional District has taken a weird turn. Some very big money appears to be trying to grab it. Big money’s Democratic candidate is sympathetic to Timber Unity one of Oregon’s anti-environmental right wing orgs, staffed by a Jan 6 insurrectionist.
https://www.opb.org/article/2022/04/25/what-does-a-crypto-tycoon-want-with-oregons-new-congressional-district/
https://www.wweek.com/news/state/2022/04/25/democratic-congressional-candidate-carrick-flynn-says-he-has-an-emotional-affinity-to-timber-unity/
Kay
@Ohio Mom:
It’s Goshen Ohio.
He was arrested in Indiana, where this is also a Goshen, but nowhere near Indianapolis :)
Geminid
@Kelly: What is Kurt Schrader’s new district like? A solid Democratic challenger would likely do as well as Schrader in a general election even if she is “liberal” and Schrader is “moderate.” (I’m assuming that the local Democratic leadership who endorse his challenger are not a bunch of Democratic Socialists of America, like in parts of Nevada).
I’ll be happily voting for Blue Dog Abigail Spanberger this fall for VA 7th Representative. But if she were in the moderate New Democrat Caucus or even the Progressive Caucus I think her chances would be just as good. When I look at the members of these respective caucuses I sometimes think their differences are mainly in branding.
But Schrader doesn’t seem like he is irreplaceable.
Matt McIrvin
@Soprano2: Wastewater monitoring requires there to be municipal wastewater. In the next town out from here, everyone’s got a septic tank.
Matt McIrvin
@Ohio Mom: It’s just the old “gays are all child rapists” bullshit, nothing more to it.
Well, with a side of the same kind of logic that makes them think any kind of sex education will make your kids have sex. These people are very big on “innocence” requiring ignorance.
taumaturgo
@Kelly: Yep. The typical pretend liberal. “McLeod-Skinner has criticized Schrader for his legislative record. “He’s fought negotiating lower drug prices, raising the federal minimum wage, and forgiving debt for college loans,” McLeod-Skinner said. “When he does vote with Democrats, it is often after working to water-down the original ideas.”[
debbie
@jonas:
“Deliverable” in that the document he took with him would deliver cash or other reward to him.
raven
Huh, Biden pardoned a local dude.
JaySinWa
@Damned at Random: My guess, since the classified documents hadn’t been otherwise disposed of and were found, is that they were things that got misplaced or squirreled away and forgotten about. Possibly by accident, definitely negligently, maybe with malicious intent. If they were supposed to be insurance or potential blackmail material they might have been better concealed but then this is Trump we are talking about.
Kelly
@Geminid: Redistricting Schrader’s 5th should be a bit of a wash. Democrats moved the blueish coastal areas around Newport to the 4th which should shore it up, a good move since Defazio is retiring. The new 6th picked up the state capitol Salem a relatively blueish town although adjacent Keizer has elected some real reactionary nut balls. Schrader’s 5th picked up blue and getting bluer Bend which in the long run should make for a solidly blue 5th. They also moved very red Linn County from the the 4th to the 5th which is my biggest worry.
Jamie won the Bend area when it was still in the very red 2nd. Got shellacked overall but won convincingly in Bend. She lives just outside the the new 5th district which could be the basis for some chickenshit attacks.
The Moar You Know
@Kelly: not likely an actual Democrat. About half the people running for governor and the one Senate seat on the June ballot here in CA are, on even cursory examinations, Republicans who recently switched parties because they cannot get elected as Republicans
This is going to make voting in actual Dems much harder, as voters just want to punch a ticket and be done. I certainly haven’t met a lot of them who actually research the people running.
Matt McIrvin
@TonyG: My aunt got COVID most likely unvaccinated, died. My cousin got COVID just a couple of weeks before she’d have been eligible for the vaccine, ended up on oxygen in the hospital, has been struggling with long COVID issues ever since.
Everyone I know who got it while fully vaccinated (most of them, during the big Omicron wave) has recovered nicely, though one of them had a persistent cough that went on for a couple of months. I’m still wary of breakthrough infections but the difference seems dramatic.
Old School
@Benw:
Who has her billed fourth? Her name was on the movie poster.
Betty Cracker
WaPo:
Thanks, Senator Warren’s Mean Tweets! :-)
PaulWartenberg
DeSantis’ Brute Force. The Polls Police. A criminal unit in search of crimes that don’t happen. Just watch as laws get bent and innocent people get harassed for shit so that these guys can get scalps to show off at the next trump rally.
Doc Sardonic
Just going to throw this out here regarding inflation and upcoming midterms. The number one driver of inflation right now is price gouging, the supply chain arguments and Putin are minor players in it. It is time for Democrats to start banging that drum loudly now. Case in point, filled up my vehicle today at Costco after picking up a coffee at Wawa. Gas at Wawa was $4.20, the same regular unleaded at Costco was $3.90(gas prices round up 1/10th of a cent)
Kelly
@taumaturgo: Schrader was one of the guy’s working to oust Nancy Pelosi which is the thing I hold against him the most. Also he inherited $7 million of big pharma money which bankrolled his congressional career. I don’t think he’s gonna help control drug prices. He did vote for Obamacare and some other things when we really needed the vote.
I think he should find a new hobby.
JCJ
@Betsy: another measure besides positive tests is hospitalizations. In the health care system where I work there are 8 people with Covid in the hospital. A few months ago there were 96 (omicron wave). The first peak had about 85 before dropping to single digits last summer. Everyone was happy until the Omicron wave. Will there be another spike?
Brachiator
I disagree with this. Biden needs support from the Democrats both in supporting Build Back Better and in coming up with new plans to deal with inflation.
As of April 1 the IRS has issued more than 63 million refunds worth over $204 billion. The average refund is $3,226, an increase of 11.5 percent over last year. Much of the increase is due to enhanced credits which will expire this year unless the Democrats can get Manchin to come around.
Manchin and conservatives love to push outmoded economic ideas that stimulus payments and other benefits increase demand and fuel inflation. But the pandemic underscored the degree to which lower income workers and the middle class were falling behind in terms of wages and wealth. It’s absurd to measure the success of the economy solely in terms of GDP, the stock market and corporate profits.
The Republicans were happy to stop with tax cuts for corporations and upper income families. It’s a shame that Manchin and Sinema are equally willing to support these vile policies.
Inflation is severely impacting most countries and there are multiple causes and no simple answers. Again Biden needs strong support from the Democrats to deal with this.
Soprano2
@Matt McIrvin: Oh good grief, I know this, it’s the industry I’ve been in for almost 30 years! I know there are holes in it, lots of communities aren’t doing it, at least not yet. What I’m saying is that for trends in a region, it’s better than testing because for the people who use it everything is captured, not just the people who got a test. People are wringing their hands because testing is getting less accurate, “how will I know now what the Covid level is in the places around me?” they cry. Well, testing was never that good at telling us how much community spread there really is because it mostly didn’t capture asymptomatic cases. In a community that has wastewater treatment, wastewater sampling is MUCH BETTER at telling you about the community Covid trend than testing.
For example, in our wastewater you can see that the Covid peak from July – December 2020 is MUCH HIGHER than the peak from Omicron, even though Omicron is much more contagious than Covid Alpha.
geg6
Well, I just mailed my primary ballot and I went for Fetterman. I liked Lamb just fine as my rep in a district that was trending red, but I don’t have to settle for warmed over, younger Manchin. Which is what he is turning out to be. Apparently, his PAC is filled with Wall Street and fossil fuel types and the only reason he’s on the airwaves at all is that they are paying for all his ads. Which also explains why they’ve been so disgusting. I’m so disappointed in him. He could have stayed a Rep for years and years, even though the new map has made my new district a bit more Dem friendly. Oh well. We have two good candidates on the Dem side running for his now open seat and, since I went all out leftie voting for Fetterman, I went with the more establishment candidate for that. Though I’m not sure you can call a gay veteran who worked for Mike Doyle “establishment.”
danielx
@burnspbesq:
“Cawthorn” rapidly becoming a synonym for “little asshole”.
oatler
@danielx:
“histrionic personality disorder”. Five cents, please.
James E Powell
@Betty Cracker:
How about relative to what’s possible?
danielx
@oatler:
No way, he’s not worth more than two cents.
Betty Cracker
@Brachiator: I don’t know what else Manchin has to do to convince you he’s a “no.” Shit on the Resolute Desk? He’ll probably get around to that eventually.
Old School
@WaterGirl:
Nope. Her Communications Director did though. (So the VP was a close contact.)
Other recent COVID-positive people include Merrick Garland, Adam Schiff, Joaquin Castro, and Nancy Pelosi.
Damned at Random
@JaySinWa:
What’s shocking to me – after 20 years in DoD- is how casually the WH – and State Dept treats their classified documents. I had to produce secrets from my safe on demand – no warning of inspection. And SoS Clinton didn’t know a (C) in front of a paragraph flagged it as confidential? Weren’t they read into programs? Why treat the working stiffs as potential threats and let upper levels run amok?
Sure Lurkalot
@Scout211: I recall DeSantis bragging about how well the elections went in 2020, in terms of no evidence of fraud. So why the extraordinary measures of SB 90 and election police?
Patricia Kayden
@CaseyL: Manchin only cares about receiving attention from people he respects. They’re called Republicans.
Brachiator
@trollhattan:
It bothers me that so many people are just tired of Covid and think that ignoring it will make problems go away and get us back to normal. And it greatly concerns me that so many people are getting Covid as rules are relaxed. It’s very fortunate that we have boosters and some effective treatments. But still.
Is there a consensus on how to best implement ventilation measures to help with Covid? Is work actually being done in businesses and schools? Winter is coming and more people will be inside again.
It’s nuts to see how stubborn and stupid some people can be. And who knows whether a highly virulent strain of the virus might develop.
Matt McIrvin
@Soprano2: I’ve been wondering about those long-term comparisons as applied to Massachusetts. Like most of the Northeast, MA had a horrendous wave of death in spring 2020 that’s been unequalled since–even the winter 2020-21 wave was not as deadly. But the case rate back in spring 2020 was much lower, and I’ve always assumed that was just an artifact of undercounting, because there was nothing like mass COVID testing at the time.
But if you look at the MWRA/Biobot wastewater counts, they look just like the case-rate curves. The deadly spring 2020 wave is tiny compared to the later ones. The Omicron wave dwarfs all the others. Going by that, it seems like there wasn’t much of an undercounting problem in spring 2020–COVID was just that much more deadly during that wave.
I could almost believe it just given that a lot of what happened in the first pandemic wave in MA was that it ripped through all of our nursing homes and senior care facilities. Maybe it really was that deadly because a large fraction of the people who got it in the first wave were very old.
But it’s really contrary to what I assumed was happening, that cases were massively undercounted in early 2020 and the counts caught up later.
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
@Matt McIrvin: I get it. But those septic tank only areas are mostly populated with people who aren’t going to alter their behavior based on a surging virus anyway. However, you can get a good sense of what is coming by tracking it in the nearest smallish metropolitan area.
NotMax
@Sure Lurkalot
MAGA theater.
Lapassionara
Rick Scott has given the Democrats a gift: he wants to tax poor people more and to do away with Social Security and Medicare. This is the Republican Party platform, and it is poison.
The only issue is what words to use to talk about these ideas.
rikyrah
We gotta vote in November 2022. Make that azz from West Virginia irrelevant.
NotMax
@Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
Wow. Takes two hands to wield that broad a brush?
Two separate septic tanks on the property upon which I sit (one for each habitable structure). Fellow lifelong liberal friend here, residing even further in the boonies, still has to trot across the great outdoors to the outhouse on his property.
Matt McIrvin
@Brachiator: Part of the problem is that there’s no sign of an offramp. It seemed for a while as if vaccination would be that. But since it’s not, if you really want to stop transmission, as the virus gets more and more contagious, the only real answer is “everyone has to isolate forever”–many types of public social activity simply have to end, for the rest of our lives–no restaurants, no shows or concerts, no parties, etc.–and I think there’s a general perception that that is not going to happen.
West of the Rockies
DeSantis (DeHeartless)…
Remember when Republican politicians would at least acknowledge that they served people in their state who didn’t vote for them, when they didn’t just use their power to shit all over those people?
frosty
@geg6: Interesting to hear. I’ve been on the Fetterman train since the race where he lost the primary and Toomey won. I’ve been wavering thinking Lamb is more in the Casey mold and might do better. After reading your opinion I’ll be voting for Fetterman after all.
Brachiator
@Betty Cracker:
Ha! Manchin is a problem, but I still have to hope that Biden and congressional leaders have some negotiating skills.
Some commenters have suggested that Democrats simply point out their accomplishments, but it is tough to rest on your laurels when inflation is kicking up and some of your most successful programs will expire at the end of the year.
And while the Republicans want to blame Democratic Party programs for crippling the economy, all around the world the government in power is taking heat for not dealing with inflation and a slowing economy.
France has parliamentary elections in June. The UK has local elections on May 5. How voters there react to domestic issues may give some clue about voter expectations here.
But either way, Biden is going to have to find ways of either working with Manchin or going around him.
Fair Economist
@Damned at Random: SoS Clinton’s documents were classified *retroactively*. She couldn’t read a (C) from the future.
Chris T.
@NotMax: Well, Hawaii itself is a statistical outlier, and you’re a statistical outlier who lives on Hawaii. ?
Omnes Omnibus
@Brachiator: I don’t think anyone has suggested that Democrats simply run on their accomplishments. I, for one, was pointing out that Democrats have legislative accomplishments that the can tout. That is far fucking different to saying do that and nothing else.
Fair Economist
@Matt McIrvin: Omicron also produces much higher virus levels in those who have. So more virus for each case.
Geminid
@Kelly: Abigail Spanberger now lives 20 miles outside the redrawn Virginia 7th District. She hasn’t said she’ll move, but I’m guessing she will after her children’s school year is over. The Republican candidate will certainly attack her on these grounds if she doesn’t. The 7th stretches from the Blue Ridge to the southern DC suburbs. So her family can pick a new home within easy commuting distance from DC. Spanberger worked for the Postal Inspectors and then the CIA before she ran for Congress in 2018 and became the first Democrat to win the 7th in 40 years. The Washington area has been her home and work nexus for most of her adult life..
The three Virginia woman who flipped Republican seats in 2018 have not faced significant primary opposition since then. Virginia Democrats are conditioned by their state’s history as a red, then purple state and don’t engage much in the “progressive” versus “moderate” debate that seems to get Democrats elswhere riled up. My joke is that if I took a typical 7th District Democrat aside and whispered, “you know, Abigail Spanberger is a Blue Dog,” they’d reply, “What’s a Blue Dog? And why are you whispering?”
Brachiator
A federal tax tidbit. The average refund received in West Virginia this year was $2,963, a bit smaller than the average of other states. But according to one analysis,
I will bet that the average citizen in West Virginia is happy to get a refund and have Biden on their side.
Another Scott
@geg6: +1
Thanks for the report!
Cheers,
Scott.
Matt McIrvin
@Geminid: Virginia politics has a peculiar quality that I never fully perceived until I moved out of the state. Part of it is that even their liberals have sort of an aesthetically stodgy quality, even if their policy preferences are quite progressive.
Brachiator
@Omnes Omnibus:
Fair enough. What else should Democrats do?
NotMax
@Chris T.
The
Moonbell curve is a harsh mistress.:)
VOR
@danielx: Josh Marshall at TPM is using “#FeralManBoy” for Cawthorn on Twitter.
Kay
The List of Grievances
Apparently “celebrating” didn’t last long and they’re back to screeching complaints about everyone and everything.
NotMax
@VOR
#OdiousNutcase too vague?
//
Omnes Omnibus
@Brachiator: I think there were a bunch of good suggestions in this thread. But I wasn’t addressing that. My point in this thread was that talking as though Democrats had no significant accomplishments is both wrong and unhelpful.
ETA: Would it help if I rejected the broccoli mandate?
Geminid
@Matt McIrvin: Virginia’s Democratic Senators are typical of the party here. Tim Kaine is moderately liberal, and Mark Warner is liberally moderate. They are both popular with Democrats, who (as I noted before) have seen the state go from red to a blueish purple over the last 20 years.
Some groups find Kaine and Warner deficient. Recently the Progressive Punch rating service gave Kaine a “D” and Warner an “F.” I think that most Virginia Democrats would find this laughable.
Another Scott
@burnspbesq: Seems he was involved in some hinky insider-trading pump-and-dump crypto stuff, also too. Going for the
goldorange??(The Washington Examiner is generally a RWNJ-ish outlet.)
Cheers,
Scott.
Betty Cracker
Kay
@Another Scott:
He’s a treasure. My only regret is he’s incredibly dumb and not at all dangerous so when conservatives succeed at getting rid of him it won’t matter at all. But the entertainment value will go with him.
Omnes Omnibus
@Betty Cracker: I would amend my comment to “paucity of” instead of “no” in front of achievements, but my time to edit has passed. Happy now?
Kay
@Another Scott:
LGB is for Lets Go Brandon.
Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
@NotMax: I did say MOSTLY populated with people who aren’t going to alter their behavior. I said MOSTLY because pretty much every rural area (aka broad locations that are septic tank only) in America is majority Republican. However, even the deepest red rural areas aren’t exclusively Republican.
Another Scott
Re Twiter:
Point!
Cheers,
Scott.
Danielx
@Kay:
Hey, he’s building his personal brand – he will never starve. Much like MTG or Matt Gaetz, he regards actual legislative work or constituent service as a waste of time. But he does have entertainment value.
Kay
Latest chapter of Madison Cawthornes one and only business venture.
Ford v. Koutoulas et al.
FILED: APRIL 1, 2022 ◆§ 6:22-CV-00652
• Read Complaint
A class action alleges the creators of the “Let’s Go Brandon” token and several other individuals have misleadingly promoted the crypto asset to artificially inflate its value before selling their portions for personal gain.
Mike S (Now with a Democratic Congressperson!)
Why Are Puppy Eyes So Irresistible?
From SciShow on YouTube
Brachiator
@Omnes Omnibus:
Totally agree and don’t think that people here were saying that the Democrats had no significant accomplishments.
Origuy
Here is the wastewater dashboard for Santa Clara County. They’ve been monitoring since October. The six-week charts show an increase in three of four cities, but the six-month charts show much lower values than the peak in January.
Kay
@Danielx:
Not him. He’ll never make any money. I don’t know about the rest of them but the job he has is the best and highest paying he will ever get close to again.
He should have put in a minimum effort. The bar’s really low on the Right. He could have quietly coasted there for decades.
Chris T.
@Matt McIrvin: I never lived in Virginia (lived on the other side of the Potomac, in MD, specifically PG County; Steny Hoyer was my rep back then) but I gather that a lot of VA politics is driven by the fact that the state capitol (Richmond) hates northern VA even though most of the population of VA is in northern VA. That makes things weird.
(Worked in Reston VA for a while, long commute from Greenbelt MD.)
lashonharangue
@Kay:
The defendants include Candace Owens and NASCAR.
NotMax
@Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony
Have hung my hat in several rural areas on the mainland over the years. Would posit the presence of a small college (or one close nearby) a better indicator of mood indigo than are septic tanks alone an indicator of scarlet.
Kay
@lashonharangue:
Not really fair to NASCAR. I think the creators lied and said a NASCAR employee “signed off” to pump up value – one random employee doesn’t “sign off”. I don’t even know what that means.
NASCAR publicly stated they wanted to no part of it almost immediately. There was no misunderstanding- the creators lied.
Omnes Omnibus
I am obviously too cranky to be here right now.
Soprano2
@Matt McIrvin: It would be like trying to get rid of the common cold. If the death rate was 50% like the Black Death the calculation would be different, but with Covid I’d say the amount of people willing to do what you suggest to avoid it forever is probably 0.0001% or less.
zhena gogolia
@Omnes Omnibus: Aw, stick around. We need optimism and support for Dems.
Raven
@Matt McIrvin: I mean I’m going deep sea fishing next week risky or not. I don’t know how much longer I’m going to be able to do it and I don’t have the time or inclination to go to the bunker.
Geminid
@Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony: Rural areas in the South, from Delaware to Texas, have a lot of Black Democratic voters. I’m not sure everyone understands this. When the Infrastructure bill passed I saw a lot of people deriding it’s funding of rural broadband expansion as casting pearls before swine. Also lost in this disparagement was the fact that a lot of the money would go to underserved urban communities like public housing projects.
Kathleen
@JoyceH: You may have already heard about this but DOJ will be investigating:
https://www.npr.org/2022/04/07/1091431136/justice-department-investigating-trumps-possible-mishandling-of-government-secre
wetzel
I think we have reached a moment when we can say certainly the evidentiary case is strong that a seditious criminal conspiracy of a fascist nature occurred which involved President Trump, his personal lawyer, former campaign manager, personal fixer, former National Security Advisor and also at least 1000 other individuals up to and including Republican figures in Congress and as well as the National GOP Committee Members including the fraudulent electors, accomplices and interlocutors.
I think this whole thread is very reflective of the positive spirit of Democratic activism, gearing up for the next bruising campaign battle. I think that is what our availability heuristic teaches us to expect, our normalcy bias.
There has to be a point where we say this. It has been established the GOP was involved in a criminal conspiracy to overthrow the U.S. Constitution. If the U.S. Constitution is subverted. The only way a new constitution would have been found would have been through terror. A plot to murder Nancy Pelosi attaches from the Oath Keepers to Roger Stone to Trump himself.
We cannot debate these people, spouting their GOPAC Memo vocabularies , their Language as a Mechanism of Control, until the coup plotters are held accountable, and the GOP cleans house.
They left the plane of debate for violence. We can only return to normal business until full criminal accountability. No Democrat should consent to debate any Republican this season if the GOP candidate will not go on record supporting the full accounting and accountability for Jan 6. In anything else, they are subverting the very peace under law democratic debates are premised on. A candidate who refuses to go on the record in t is normalizing fascism. We must highlight this is happening. Doing otherwise is a form of cognitive priming. We are normalizing fascism in America if we play along like let’s just get back to kitchen table issues.
Regular readers of Marcy Wheeler know that there is an unstoppable process which will land upwards of a thousand indictments over the next couple of years. This will all occur through justified discovery and due process. Our party should be crying ‘shame shame shame’ to the highest mountaintops. We should shame every single member of the GOP until they change their name back to the Whigs. They tried to steal our birthright as Americans to choose our own government!
Democrats don’t like to sit in the seat at the tribunal, but we need to get the stomach for it if the country is going to get out of this mess, and it’s not as though this is bad politics either. You tell me if half of the Democratic party leadership were about to be indicted, the GOP would not be taking electoral advantage. We need to win ten elections in a row or we’ll become fascist anyway if the GOP is not reformed.
debbie
@Lapassionara:
It’s Reaganism for Idiots. The idiots who will support those ideas and then be shocked when they’re the ones who get hurt.
Geminid
@Chris T.: The major metropolitan areas of Virginia are Northern Virginia, Richmond, and the Hampton Roads area, down near the coast. They used to be very distinct socially and politically but they are becoming more homogeneous.
Virginia is different from the U.S. norm in that it’s Black residents constitute 20% of the whole, compared to the national average of 11%. That community is a major factor in Democratic politics. Also, Virginia has an unusual concentration of federal employees both civilian and military, and a lot of them retire there.
Virginia also has a higher level than average of college educated people; also, more first and second generation immigrants. These two demographic factors contribute to it’s Democratic trend over the last 25 years.
Anyway
@Geminid:
Delaware is NOT the South …
For one, it has state income taxes and no sales tax — pretty progressive. No southern state would be that non-regressive.
Kathleen
@wetzel: David Pepper, for chair of Ohio Democratic Party, started an organization called “Blue Ohio”. We pay a monthly fee (ranging from $1 to whatever) and the money goes to people running for Ohio Legislature/Senate. I’m not a David Pepper fan but I signed up. I feel it’s “something” I can support.
Geminid
@Anyway: Delaware was a slave state and it still has a lot of Black people living in rural areas, especially in it’s portion of the “Delmarva” Peninsula.
RobertS
@JMG: I’ve come to the same conclusion. He could have had a bill anytime he wanted one. The fact that he’s even talking about a bill suggests that he wants one now for whatever reason.
Hopefully the White House won’t let him waste their time. If he’s serious he can propose a bill and he can do it publicly.
japa21
A few points, from a generally confused individual who is almost never correct in his prognostications.
1. Yes, the Dems actually have several accomplishments to run on. They also did in 2010 but ran away from them.
2. Biden is already going after the GOP as a whole. He’s already telegraphed that with his recent statement about this not being your father’s GOP, and how it is a MAGA party now. I did not sere any pearl clutching in the media about that and expect to see more Dems run on that as well as the accomplishments.
3. Looking back at 2010, Obama tried to sell a message about the GOP, “Don’t let them back in the driver’s seat!” No other Dems worked that way, however.
4. Use the sympathy for Ukraine as a means of pummeling the GOP. Point out they didn’t think Trump did anything wrong in trying to extort Ukraine and that even when he finally gave in and sent them weapons, he put conditions on it that made them useless for Ukraine.
5. Stand up for women, public schools, the LGBTQ community, the disadvantaged, etc. If a Dem candidate is religious, it’s perfectly okay to use that to justify this stance.
6. Call out the bigotry of the right for what it is. A precursor to even worse intolerance. Don’t pussy foot around and try to be nice. Call out that when they talk about grooming they are really describing themselves. Mock them. Make the3m de3fend their positions.
7. Support the right to vote. Point out that what the GOP is doing is saying people’s votes don’t really matter, because they are willing to throw them out. It may be a Dem’s vote today, but it could be an independent’s tomorrow.
Fake Irishman
@Geminid:
Also pledging to clean up all the lead pipes in the country is a pretty big deal. I remember hearing how no one cared about Flint…
Another Scott
Slovenia’s election was mentioned. DW.com:
Wow.
Amazing things can happen when people turn out to vote.
Cheers,
Scott.
wetzel
@Kathleen:
That’s cool, Kathleen.I was thinking how something like that would be cool for Georgia, but if the National Party tried to make it, the result would be some sucky WordPress template and just pay for another mansion in Alexandria.
There ought to be a Purple State Club where Democrats from Ohio could park their sites and database structures for a Georgia group to pick up and vice versa. Just a way to accelerate development through prototyping and sharing. Most people like volunteering and activism because it’s social. They don’t want to file papers and build websites.
Something like that could be fun and productive. The Democratic Party needs to figure out a way for regular people to socialize within its normal activities. People’s involvement in the party has devolved too much to be like a consumer choice.
I also wish there were some way the party could deliver Local News because it’s hard to run as a candidate when nobody is covering local issues in the press anymore. It’s hard to run for city or county government when it’s only insiders who know what’s happening. I don’t know how to solve that.
frosty
@Raven: I personally think anything outside is OK. As evidence I offer the NFL. Full stadiums fall and winter while Omicron was peaking and I didn’t read one thing about the games being superspreader events.
So tight lines!
Geminid
@Fake Irishman: There was a lot in the Infrastructure bill besides roads and bridges. The $60 billion for AMTRAK exceeds the investment in this passenger rail system since it was founded. There is a lot of money to be invested in other public transportation, $10 billion for New York City’s Metropolitan Transportation Authority alone. The Superfund program was reinvigorated and work will resume on 43 polluted sites with an emphasis on those in poor communities. The Energy Department’s program that weatherizes low income housing will expand tenfold.
This is not all of the non-highway investments the bill will fund, and we still need to do more in these areas. But this legislation is a good start.
randy khan
I refuse to accept the framing that Biden hasn’t been able to get things done. With historically narrow margins and Republicans trying to block everything, he got the largest infrastructure bill more or less ever passed this fall, before that he got a huge COVID relief bill passed, which likely is largely responsible for the speed of the recovery and provided crucial support for schools, COVID health care in general, and vaccination, and he’s been doing other important things like appointing judges at a record pace. Oh, not to mention the minor detail of shepherding the Western coalition to ensure that everyone is on the same page in opposing the Russian invasion of Ukraine and supporting the Ukrainian defense. All of this is in 15 months in office and, again, with razor-thin margins in both houses of Congress.
debbie
@japa21:
Additional to your #4: They’re still saying positive things about Putin, if not worse.
japa21
@debbie: Good point.
zhena gogolia
@randy khan: Right.
Kathleen
@wetzel: David also said there would be monthly gatherings (I’m sure he means online) and opportunities to talk strategies so there is a social component also.
I like your idea about getting information out about candidates so I think that’s one topic we should cover.
Matt McIrvin
@Chris T.: The three big population centers are NoVa, Hampton Roads and the Richmond area, and they’re all far bluer than the rest of the state, but there’s also a certain NoVa vs. everyone else opposition. Also, NoVa and Hampton Roads both have a large military presence which complicates things, especially when it comes to sort of political aesthetics.
Matt McIrvin
@Raven: Hell, I spent the past week in Seattle doing things most people here would probably consider unconscionably risky. Wore an N95 mask most of the time I was indoors, but I broke down and ate in indoor restaurants several times.
Matt McIrvin
@frosty: There was so much COVID around at that point that I doubt anyone would even have been able to detect a superspreader event. Life was a superspreader event.
Steeplejack
@Kay:
I was about to say this. Gray was confronted in Randolph County, IN, but he is from Goshen, OH.
Dan B
@WaterGirl: Wasn’t it the second gentleman who tested positive a few weeks ago? But Ukraine has overwhelmed my memory banks.
Geminid
@Geminid: I would add that Delaware’s schools were segregated until 1967, and that until 1950 Wilmington’s Hunter High School was the only secondary school for Black people in the entire state.
@Anyway:
lowtechcyclist
@Geminid:
I hope you’re right, but I also hope that democracy v. GOP fascism gets the 60. I’ve got nothing against running on kitchen-table issues in normal times, but these aren’t normal times.
If we believe that democracy itself is at stake, then we must emphasize that sufficiently to cut through the clutter. Voters need to know that the stakes are considerably greater than issues like infrastructure and student loan debt.
Brachiator
@Another Scott:
I had heard about the elections in Slovenia but had not followed the story at all. This is impressive and inspiring.
41 seats. I suppose they will have to form a coalition government.
Dan B
@Brachiator: Two things bother me:
1. There are millions of immunocompromised people in the US. The media almost never talks about their situation. They are our Covid Mariopol, invisible but feeling doomed.
2. With an endemic virus that mutates rapidly the question is not, Will there be a more virulent form but when? Then we will find out if more virulent strains can be as infectious as other mutations. And: How many will die or suffer for years?
Dan B
@Kay: What? I read Lesbian Gay Bisexual Coin!
Spread that around. Make it so!
Ramona Rosario
@New Deal democrat: I vote YEA on this!
Ramona Rosario
@Scout211: Mr Garland, is your eye on this?
Ramona Rosario
@Dan B: It’s as if they (MSM) know nothing about biological evolution!
PS: Of course, they don’t
billcinsd
@Brachiator: yes, but the two main members of the old coalition only got 35 seats between them, and with the Social Democrats the Freedom Movement Party would have over half. 41 is many more seats than Jansa’s party won in any of the last three elections. In fact this was their best year with 27 of 90 seats and they still got thumped.