The relief bill heads to Biden to sign into law

A short while ago, the House of Representatives passed the $1.9 trillion relief bill known as the American Relief Plan. It now heads to the president who will sign it into law. The relief package is going to help many people.

We project that key elements of the American Rescue Plan would reduce that annual poverty rate to 8.7 percent. The policies would reduce poverty by more than half for children and for people in households experiencing job loss. Poverty would fall about 42 percent for Black, non-Hispanic people, 39 percent for Hispanic people, and 34 percent for white, non-Hispanic people, reducing the disparities in poverty rates for Black, non-Hispanic people and Hispanic people relative to white, non-Hispanic people.

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Money fight between Trump and the RNC

In an amusing development, Trump has sent cease-and-desist letters to the Republican National Committee (RNC), the National Republican Senatorial Committee, and the National Republican Congressional Committee, telling them that they should stop using his likeness and name in their fundraising efforts because he wants all the money to go to his personal Save America PAC. He referred to these other groups as ‘RINOs’ (Republicans In Name Only).
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How Kyrsten Sinema went from progressive to Washington swamp dweller

How Kyrsten Sinema went from progressive to Washington swamp dweller

When Kyrsten Sinema was first elected from Arizona to the House of Representatives back in 2012 and later to the Senate in 2018, she broke through several barriers

Freshly elected to the Senate, Rep. Kyrsten Sinema (D) represents a slew of “firsts.” She will be Arizona’s first female senator. She was the first openly bisexual person elected to Congress and carries that first with her to the Senate. And the former Mormon was the first person sent to Congress to claim no religion. After winning her congressional seat in 2012, she was sworn in on the Constitution, forgoing the Bible chosen by Christians – the dominant religion for members of Congress, especially those from Arizona.

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The bogus outrage about Dr. Seuss

(This Modern World)

This cartoon gets it exactly right. Fox News and the other members of the nutty right wing echo chamber go on and on about the estate of Dr. Seuss withdrawing six of his earlier books because they have offensive images but they never show the images they are defending. If you want, you can find these images on the internet, like here.

This is so obviously offensive by today’s standards that even the whitest Fox News viewer would cringe at seeing it. And that would ruin the whole schtick. If Fox viewers realized that the images in question actually were offensive, and not just the fever dreams of some lefty social justice warriors, they’d realize that Fox was duping them.

So no pictures for Fox! Much better to rail endlessly and let their audience assume that this is just some ridiculous liberal freakout over nothing. That’s much better for ratings.

QAnon shaman and his lawyer in trouble with the judge

The weird guy known as QAnon shaman who was part of the insurrection in the US Capitol and sat the Senate president’s chair and even said a prayer is now in jail. The past weekend, he gave an interview to the CBS show 60 Minutes+. Without his makeup and regalia, he cuts quite a different figure. It appears that he lives with his mother who was also interviewed and she seems to be an enabler of his idiocy.

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Where is Trump’s book deal? His paid speeches?

One of the features of American political life is that after leaving high office, politicians cash in by publishing books. Another lucrative activity is giving highly paid speeches to big corporations, Wall Street firms, and other wealthy organizations, with the Clintons and the Obamas being notable examples of how to become spectacularly rich doing so. These speech gigs are really a form of legalized bribery, for the sponsors of these events to gain access and curry favor wit, people who can do favors for them through their contacts in government or when they cycle back into government after the next election. Other people who served in administrations, such as current treasury secretary Janet Yellen and secretary of state Anthony Blinken, went the same route during the Trump era and can make even more money when their current time in office ends.
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The coronavirus relief bill on the way to becoming law

The $1.9 trillion stimulus package proposed by Joe Biden is on the way to becoming law. The US senate passed by a strict partisan 50-49 vote a version of it that was different from what the House of Representatives passed earlier in the week. One Republican senator was absent which meant that vice-president Kamala Harris did not have to cast a tie-breaking vote. Republicans delayed the process as much as they could by introducing amendment after amendment that was defeated, with one senator even invoking a rule that resulted in aides reading aloud the entire text of the 628 page bill, a futile process whose only effect was to waste 11 hours of time.
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TV review: Amend: The Fight for America (2020)

I just finished watching this excellent six-part documentary series that tells the story of the Fourteenth Amendment to the US constitution. It is arguably the most important amendment as it has enabled great strides towards equality in the US. It was enacted in the aftermath of the Emancipation Proclamation of January 1, 1863 that freed all the salves in the south.

President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation on January 1, 1863, as the nation approached its third year of bloody civil war. The proclamation declared “that all persons held as slaves” within the rebellious states “are, and henceforward shall be free.”

Despite this expansive wording, the Emancipation Proclamation was limited in many ways. It applied only to states that had seceded from the United States, leaving slavery untouched in the loyal border states. It also expressly exempted parts of the Confederacy (the Southern secessionist states) that had already come under Northern control. Most important, the freedom it promised depended upon Union (United States) military victory.

Although the Emancipation Proclamation did not end slavery in the nation, it captured the hearts and imagination of millions of Americans and fundamentally transformed the character of the war. After January 1, 1863, every advance of federal troops expanded the domain of freedom. Moreover, the Proclamation announced the acceptance of black men into the Union Army and Navy, enabling the liberated to become liberators. By the end of the war, almost 200,000 black soldiers and sailors had fought for the Union and freedom.

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The massive injustices that go unpunished

The litany of stories of police, prosecutors, and even judges sentencing people to long terms in prison despite being innocent continues to grow. ProPublica reposts one such person Fred Steese who has just been awarded $1.4 million from the state of Nevada for wrongfully convicting him of murder. After having a court rule that he was actually innocent, he was released in 2012 after serving 17 years, with the state just letting him go without even an apology.
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