9/13: A Shocking Attempt by Louis DeJoy to Foul Up Mail-in Voting

9/13/2020

Colorado isn't even considered a battleground state in this election. Nevertheless, the U.S. Postal Service had already sent out pre-election postcards with false information to Colorado voters when federal judge William Martinez stopped the process with a temporary injunction on Saturday.

Many had already been delivered on Saturday, when the Colorado Secretary of State, Jena Griswold, sued and was granted the injunction because the USPS mailer said that voters should:

-- Request their mail-in ballots by 15 days before the election. This is false because Colorado voters don't have to request mail-in ballots.

-- Mail them back in by 7 days before the election. This is false because Colorado voters can turn in the ballots on election day itself.

There seems to be little question that foul play was involved. Griswold, a Democrat, had asked DeJoy to let her preview the election information to make sure it was correct. DeJoy refused. Griswold then asked that the mailers not be sent to Colorado voters. They were mailed anyway.

I'm not sure how many states were involved, but Colorado wasn't the only one. "Secretaries of State asked @USPS Postmaster General DeJoy to review a draft before election information was sent to voters to ensure accuracy. But he refused. Now millions of postcards with misinformation are printed & being mailed to voters," she tweeted, according to CNN.

It's not clear which secretaries of state were run over by DeJoy's actions. The judge demanded that the named defendants -- Louis DeJoy (Postmaster General), Samarn Reed (Regional Postmaster), and Chris Yazzi (Albuquerque and New Mexico Regional Postmaster -- account for every mailer by September 17 by providing a list of zip codes where they were sent and when.


Should Biden speak up about this event? Do the Democrats have the moxie to take action? If so, what action would they take?

https://www.cnn.com/2020/09/13/politics/colorado-temporary-restraining-order-voter-mailers/index.html?fbclid=IwAR2dYg236BjqF_xkBwtLy3X2qbq6yIR0KzZg-Ja1HpADrT332_7M9jqzooo

9/15: Do Doulas Keep Moms Alive?

 9/15/2020 

Preventing maternal death is something of a holy grail for physicians treating patients of color.

About 700 women die each year in the U.S. from complications during pregnancy (31%), at delivery (36%), and up to a year afterward (33%), the CDC says.

Disproportionately, the 700 women who die each year are Black women or other women of color. Black moms are three to four times more likely to die from pregnancy or childbirth-related causes than white mothers.

One strategy for dialing back these numbers is to pair pregnant Black women with Black doulas, who assist women throughout pregnancy, childbirth, and post-delivery issues.

Doula care makes for happier moms, according to Katy Backes Kozhimannil, a professor at the University of Minnesota School of Public Health. Doulas lead to shorter labors, more vaginal births, fewer preterm births or epidurals, higher rates of breastfeeding, and "higher maternal confidence and satisfaction." Confidence matters because Black and indigenous women often face racial discrimination in medical treatment.

Even so, there's no evidence that shows that doulas prevent maternal death, Kozhimannil says. With the benefits she cites, it's hard to imagine why. But the good professor says that it's not something that we can lean on doulas to fix.

'We cannot put the maternal mortality crisis at the feet of doulas and tell them to solve it when they're the least paid member of any care team," Kozhimannil says.

That is, so far, there are no cheap fixes to this ongoing public-health problem.

https://www.cdc.gov/vitalsigns/maternal-deaths/index.html

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/doulas-black-maternal-mortality-rate-crisis/?fbclid=IwAR00xO4qAdb1V4qRAyRnvb93SwqiUQqgqUg1SSb3G-FLcLnBKxVu2Ztzumg

9/12: Fighting Back Against Ugly Memes

9/12/2020 

It seems to me that Democrats have generally taken a hands-off approach to the bizarre memes that have ricocheted around the web since the Trump presidency began. On the West Coast, since the wildfires have gotten virtually apocalyptic, the memes are saying that Oregon's fires were deliberately set by Antifa and other left-wing "terrorist" groups. Along with them are memes blaming the fires on right-wing terrorists.

Neither antifa nor right-wing groups are under investigation, and local law enforcement and the FBI are both actively fighting back against these rumors.

----From the Douglas County, Oregon, Sheriff's Office, on Facebook: “Our 9-1-1 dispatchers and professional staff are being overrun with requests for information and inquiries on an UNTRUE rumor that 6 Antifa members have been arrested for setting fires in DOUGLAS COUNTY, OREGON .... THIS IS NOT TRUE!”

----From the FBI, on Twitter: "Reports that extremists are setting wildfires in Oregon are untrue. Help us stop the spread of misinformation by only sharing information from trusted, official sources."

----From the police in Medford, Oregon, on Facebook, about rumors a right-wing group member had been arrested: “This is a made up graphic and story. We did not arrest this person for arson, nor anyone affiliated with Antifa or ‘Proud Boys’ as we’ve heard throughout the day.”

I'm glad to see these off-the-wall memes contradicted and corrected outright. It's high time we saw more action like that against Trump-friendly memes too.

https://thehill.com/changing-america/resilience/natural-disasters/516069-oregon-police-debunk-rumors-of-fringe-political?fbclid=IwAR0nUB9Zc5pdOg2KVa7H2glg0A4IV927YvN8eJRWEgF-xDsttWiH_5_ttks

9/11: Another Doomed-to-Fail Senate COVID-19 Relief Bill Has Both Parties Pointing Fingers

9/11/2020 

The latest (fifth) attempt at a coronavirus relief bill got shot down by Democratic senators today. They were so opposed to the "emaciated" bill that they figured it was better to have no bill at all than to pass the Republicans' plan.

The Democrats' strategy is to force everyone to come back to the negotiating table -- a strategy they've employed successfully several times this year.

Besides, today's Republican bill was foul. It wasn't just that the bill was for $500 billion rather than the minimum of $2.2 trillion that Democrats wanted; it was also lower than a $1.1 trillion bill that the Senate produced in July.

There were other provisions unacceptable to Democrats too. “It is laden with poison pills," said Charles Schumer, D-NY. "Provisions our colleagues know Democrats would never support to guarantee the bill’s failure."

Those poison pills include expanding school choice and corporate immunity from coronavirus-related lawsuits. "School choice" is political code for helping wealthy Americans pay for private schools in ways that deplete the funding for public schools. As for corporate immunity, one example is limiting the scope of workers' coronavirus-related lawsuits so that they can sue franchises, but not the larger company that granted the franchise. Poison pills indeed.

There was also language in the bill that would allow the federal government to recoup hundreds of billions of dollars doled out under the earlier relief bill passed in March. How would that work? I have no idea.

The vote lets Republicans say they tried to pass COVID-19 relief in the final weeks before the November election, and that Democrats thwarted their efforts. Politicians from opposing Parties love to make each other look bad.

The prospects for a new bill before the election are grim, not only because time is short, but because the White House and Congress are already thrashing out the federal budget for the next fiscal year.

It appears that the Senate Republicans deliberately put forth a bill that they knew couldn’t pass. It seems they cared more about harming Senate Democrats than about helping Americans who are hurting financially. Congressional Democrats aren't being very helpful to the American public, either. They’re aiming too high, and are demanding a level of aid that the Republicans will never agree to.

Do you think Congress has always been this ineffectual? Does it just seem worse now because so many Americans are hurting so badly, which shows the political games in a worse light?

Is it bad or good for Trump’s election chances that Americans won’t get the aid they need?

https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/515909-gop-senators-say-coronavirus-deal-dead-until-after-election?fbclid=IwAR0f-_ZQBUKqXUtUncQGskVHPypdV4s_Y_xWfiRn6XFNOgCVA8s0K1t7kI0

9/7: Biden Backs Unions, Potentially Restoring Working-Class Wealth

9/7/2020 

"The three richest people in America have as much wealth as the bottom half of all Americans combined," Robert Reich, labor secretary for the Clinton administration and a public policy professor at University of California, Berkeley, wrote Monday.

The wealth gap has been growing for a good while. Warren Buffet, the big-name investor, used to worry out loud about the shrinkage of the American middle class, that great driver of economic growth. Since Trump took office, a one-two punch from tax breaks for billionaires and blunders with COVID19 have sped up that shrinkage like soapy water on a cashmere sweater.

At the same time, the rocket economy that Trump crows about, the one he says will take the charts into a sharp V, hasn't happened yet.

Economics is not based on fairy tales. Some economists say now that our progress looks more like a K, with a waterline at the point where the K's lines meet. Above that line, you're doing well, and the stock market is your friend. Below that line -- well, you know. Down there, "essential workers" and the unemployed live and die and worry about eviction and food and COVID19 and getting through to Friday.

Talking about that K shape, one economist mentioned the Titanic. People above the waterline don't know what icebergs might be below, he said. Fact is, what's down there are people who are no longer part of the middle-class economy. Many of them are, indeed, underwater.

Yesterday, when Biden vowed to be the “strongest labor president you’ve ever had” in an event with AFL-CIO chief Richard Trumka, he was returning to one of the big drivers of middle-class wealth in the 20th century. The union movement tackled terrible living conditions and low wages and brought income growth to lower-wage Americans.

We've all heard arguments that unions are corrupt and unreasonable and are dragging down ... well, the stock market, wealth of the well-to-do, which has ballooned on Trump's watch.

The sins of unions are not the biggest concern for Americans right now.

Biden said, “If I’m in the oval office, guess who’s gonna be there with me? Unions, labor, you.”

Are unions really an answer to bringing back the middle class today? When cheap labor is so easy to find overseas, will unions have the power to create meaningful change? Would you join a union for your own profession?

https://thehill.com/regulation/labor/515386-biden-vows-to-be-strongest-labor-president-youve-ever-had?fbclid=IwAR23gKnWnDPPjIG3TO8zpm1qpSHIg7OuLlL-

9/5: Trump to Feds: "No More Sensitivity Training for You!"

9/5/2020 

It's un-American! That's the reason Donald Trump gave when he asked OMB director Russell Vought to stop any and all racial sensitivity training in federal agencies.

"The President has directed me to ensure that federal agencies cease and desist from using taxpayer dollars to fund these divisive, un-American propaganda training sessions," the memo read.

Ya’ gotta save a buck somewhere, at least if you've led America into the worst coast-to-coast epidemic in more than a hundred years and in doing so, plunged America into its deepest debt since 1945. Why not start by cutting an Obama-era program that aims to make peace break out in a racially divided nation?

"Propanda training sessions" means any sessions that "discuss 'white privilege' or 'critical race theory,' and any that suggest that America is an 'inherently racist or evil country,'" Vought wrote.

Critical Race Theory says that "racial inequality emerges from the social, economic, and legal differences that white people create ... to maintain elite white interests," the Encyclopedia Britannica says, "giving rise to poverty and criminality in many minority communities." The theory bubbled up in white law schools in the '60s and '70s, and made its academic debut in 1989. It's the theory underlying the "1619 Project" in the New York Times.

The divisiveness may be a function of how much emphasis is put on deliberate planning by whites to subjugate others. For every liberal who thinks critical race theory is just a tad over the top, there may be 50 conservatives who get angry just thinking about it. They feel they've been accused, and that deliberate planning has never happened, not even during the rise of Jim Crow. That's just my hunch.

Have you ever had diversity or sensitivity training? Was it worthwhile or a waste of time? Does it make sense to sweep away all such training? Has the time for such training passed?

https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/515239-white-house-tells-federal-agencies-to-cancel-divisive-racial?fbclid=IwAR1DQ0P582D9MWdmstGLtl57r_O3YrdMslTDsFP2rgjETRMN2ut-9dfODTI

9/2: Untruth is a Doctored Video

9/2/2020

Some Republican politicians are like good soldiers for a bad general. You'd think they'd think twice about crooked campaign videos, but no.

Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA) was called out over one last week. That video misrepresented a disabled activist, Ady Barkan, to make it look as if Joe Biden wanted to "defund police." Barkan demanded an apology, and Scalise, a Republican from Louisiana, put himself in danger of censure by the House.

Scalise was part of a Trumper-troop tactic of misrepresenting Biden's position on "defunding" to make it look like Biden's position is far more progressive than it is.

Two million people watched the video before Scalise took it down.

One of Trump's White House staff retweeted an even more brazenly doctored video that intercut footage of Biden with his eyes closed with an interview of Harry Belafonte in which Belafonte fell asleep. It's made to look as if "sleepy Joe" dozed off -- and snored loudly -- instead.

Remember, this was retweeted by the *White House.*

We need to shoot down these and other dirty tricks by Trump's troopers. I can barely stand to read Trump crazies' comments and memes -- most recently, it was a drawing of Jesus standing behind Trump at the Oval Office desk with his hands on Trump's shoulders. But if we don't watch out, if we leave it to the DNCC to monitor the ads, we could be letting Trumpeters brainwash an unwary public.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/elections/2020/08/31/steve-scalise-defends-doctored-video-biden-and-defunding-police/5678334002/

Also: Frank Bruni newsletter from NYTimes.com on 9/2/2020