Author: Trish

Trump’s Delay in Signing the December Relief Bill Cost $17.6 Billion That Should Have Gone to Those in Need

Trish
Photo by History in HD on Unsplash

Just because Trump is out of office, it’s too soon to stop hating him. Especially when we keep finding out more about how incompetent and self-absorbed he was as a president, including when it mattered most, toward the end. That was when the pandemic was out of control, thanks to his mismanagement.

A new report from the Century Foundation shows that by playing golf on Christmas Eve 2020 instead of signing the bill to extend pandemic relief to out of work Americans, he cost them — and all of us — about $17.6 billion.

One month after the law’s enactment, nearly a quarter of the states have not resumed paying out federal pandemic aid. Moreover, an additional twelve states took three weeks or more to start up the payment of PUA, and fifteen states needed three weeks or more to reup PEUC.

By our calculations, these delays have resulted in shortchanging jobless workers by about $17.6 billion in benefits for the first four weeks in January 2021—38 percent less than these workers were due to receive. This is money that these workers and their families needed to pay rent, put food on the table, stay out of poverty, and keep America’s economy running while they looked for work.

You probably remember Trump’s grandstanding about signing the bill. […]

Hilarious Twitter Posts on Trump’s Presser at the Other Four Seasons

Trish

As if you weren’t feeling great enough this morning following the incredible event last night featuring our new president-elect and the country’s first female vice president-elect. Maybe we’re still giddy but the posts on Twitter following Trump’s announcement of a big press conference at the Four Seasons — no, not THAT Four Seasons…well anyway, see for yourself.

[…]

Reporters are Starting to Probe Trump’s Covidgate and the Questions are Disturbing

Trish

Although the word has been used in other contexts, “Covidgate” is now the suspicion that the White House could be covering up that Pres. Trump himself is the one who spread the disease to so many in his inner circle, at Republican fundraisers, and countless numbers of those people’s contacts. The facts remain to be proven but reporters, who have also been exposed, are investigating.

There is no question that Trump continued to expose others after he had the virus.* The only question is did he mean to? When did he know he had COVID and how many lives did he choose to put at risk?

CNN’s Jake Tapper posted a Twitter thread that asks repeatedly when Trump last tested negative. This is a question the White House, and Trump’s medical team, including his osteopath, Navy Commander Sean Conley, is refusing to answer. It’s an alternate way of asking when Trump tested positive.

We know Trump arrived for the first debate too late to be tested before taking the stage with Biden. Was this on purpose to cover up because they already knew what the test results would be, or was it simply typical of his chaotic movements? And why is the White House refusing to do contact tracing after the superspreader event for Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett? Is it because they already know who the results will trace back to?

Trump had famously been tested multiple times a day, as had those allowed to enter his airspace at the White House. Why did this abruptly stop? Check out Tapper’s musings on the subject.

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Trump Got the Debate He Wanted, But Will it Help Him?

Trish

The day after the debate
Does it feel like something changed at that first presidential debate of 2020? Putting aside that it was exactly the kind of debate that the year 2020 deserved, it felt like during all that bellowing, bullying, heckling, and lying, Trump pushed a few more voters away.

I’m not a pollster. My observations are just that: the most elemental of research, what I see and hear around me.

The day of the debate, I heard Trump supporters talking about recording the show like it was a ball game their team was likely to win. I heard laughter about Biden. On a neighborhood walk, I saw mostly Trump/Pence signs. They appeared early and continued to outnumber Biden signs.

The day after the debate, I heard no chortling about how well Trump did. In fact no one mentioned the debate at all, the subject just too painful. When I came home, it seemed that my neighbors’ yards filled with Biden signs overnight. No matter where my eyes fell, there was a Biden/Harris sign in view.

The official polls reflecting post-debate sentiment won’t be out for awhile. But I’m cautiously optimistic they’ll back up what I’m seeing and show that Trump is sliding just a bit, losing support every time he opens that tight, pursed mouth to let all that anger out.

Watching Trump live-tweet Biden in person was hard. But it might be what it takes to turn enough Americans away from his nightmare presidency.

Trump in 2016: Us Against Them. Trump in 2020: Us Against Us.

Trish
Thanks to Janine Robinson for sharing their work on Unsplash.

It took almost four years but here we are.

Trump used to rally his base with innuendo about shadowy others who threatened America: Mexicans are rapists and members of obscure, violent gangs. A Muslim travel ban would keep out terrorists. Orphaning the children of parents fleeing Central America by locking them away and concealing them from their families would ensure that only Americans would receive benefits from paying taxes.

Where we are now was a gradual and incremental shift but it’s easy enough to look back and see it coming. After all, Trump made his mark on the political scene by questioning Pres. Obama’s legitimacy and refusing to acknowledge that Obama was born in Hawaii, not Kenya.

We know the cascading inflection points ever since. Good people on both sides. Pardoning Sheriff Joe Arpaio before he could be sentenced for what the U.S. Dept. of Justice called “sadistic punishments” of Latino inmates. Trying to shut down the NFL because Colin Kaepernick took a knee during the national anthem in response to police killings of Black people. Calling Elizabeth Warren Pocahontas. Labeling a free press the enemy of the people. Saying the members of “The Squad,” four Democratic congresswomen, should go back to their countries although all but one were born in America. Calling Jews who vote for Democrats “disloyal.” Retweeting white supremacists. The list is endless and neither of us has that much time.

Now, as Poltico’s Michael Kruse, Renuka Rayasam, and Myah Ward note, Trump is no longer talking about us versus them. He’s ginning up the base by making it us against us. […]

New Poll Shows Jacksonville’s Residents Unhappy with Mayor’s RNC Invitation

Trish

Jacksonville’s mayor, making his allegiances clear
When Jacksonville, FL’s mayor Lenny Curry offered his town for the Republican convention in August, it proved something many suspected. Curry is a Republican first and a mayor second. Because if the Democratic convention was looking for a new home, he would have never have volunteered Jacksonville. Most likely, he would have cited COVID-19 concerns and opted to protect his residents.

Like Trump, Curry is new to public office. Being mayor of Jacksonville is the former accounting consultant’s first public service gig. Before he took office in 2015, Curry was for three years the chair of the Republican Party of Florida. Yep.

A new poll shows most of Curry’s constituents disagree with his decision to flood the 15,000-seat arena that is home to the Jacksonville Jaguars with Republicans from across the country while a pandemic is running out of control in Florida. (More) […]

Their Lips are Moving Again

Trish
Trump claims he’s going off-label again

While denying he was using it but saying he’d be willing to, Vice President Mike Pence committed some other lies today about hydroxychloroquine sulfate, the drug Trump claims he is taking to prevent COVID-19.

Asked during the Fox interview if he had concerns about the message Trump’s use of the drug sends, Pence noted that the FDA approved the off-label use of the drug so physicians could prescribe it if they deemed it appropriate.

Yeah, no.

First of all, the Food and Drug Administration doesn’t “approve” drugs for off-label use. That’s an oxymoron. Here’s the FDA’s own explainer on the subject:

When you are prescribed a drug for its approved use, you can be sure:

    That FDA has conducted a careful evaluation of its benefits and risks for that use.

    The decision to use the drug is supported by strong scientific data.

    There is approved drug labeling for healthcare providers on how to use the drug safely and effectively for that use…

If you and your healthcare provider decide to use an approved drug for an unapproved use to treat your disease or medical condition, remember that FDA has not determined that the drug is safe and effective for the unapproved use.

Keep reading. […]

So This is What Living In a Failed State is Like

Trish
Marc Maron

I know most of you realize, I don’t need to tell you, that obviously we are living in a failed state.

And that our government’s reaction to this was too late, and that it was not enough. and a lot of what the federal government is supposed to do they’re not doing.

Because over the last few years — but certainly over the last 20 — whenever possible, Republicans tried to dismantle the government, everything they see as non-essential. And some of that being what was needed to respond to this properly.

So this is the goal: the failed state. This is the Republican vision. Let private enterprise take care of it. Great. So now we have people who need ventilators and masks and there’s a bidding war going on over who is going to make a profit on those items and which states they’re going to sell to. It’s all working out.

— Marc Maron, speaking on his WTF podcast about the COVID-19 pandemic, the death of Adam Schlesinger from the disease, the consequences and reality of running government like a business, and the catastrophe that is the Trump administration.