crickets
crickets's JournalWell said.
[Biden] is doing the right thing. And if it seems he is not doing it at the right time, that it is because all the other better times came before now and were passed over by others who lacked his courage, the courage to see what really is, accept it and find the best way forward.
And there is the crux of the matter.
Newsom is trying to give them places to go.
https://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory/california-spending-billions-house-homeless-hotels-79273222Newsom's office said $800 million — most of it federal Coronavirus Aid, Relief and Economic Security Act money — was spent on Homekey in 2020 to provide shelter for 8,200 people. Now the administration plans to go even bigger: California will spend $5.8 billion of state and federal funds over two years to expand the program and create an estimated 42,000 housing units. [snip]
In California, Homekey is an outgrowth of Project Roomkey, a temporary effort during the coronavirus outbreak to find shelter at hotels, which Elliot said provided beds for 42,000 homeless people 65 and older or others susceptible to COVID-19. It has been extended through June 2022.
Under Homekey, the state buys the properties, covers all construction and conversion costs, then hands them over to cities or counties that contract with local service providers.
There is also counseling, treatment for addiction and/or mental illness, and assistance in eventually finding employment. Ambitious to say the least, but he seems to be trying hard to go beyond the shelter paradigm to getting people back into real homes.
Amazing article.
Cuomo wanted ethics investigations for everyone but himself and his buddies. He spied on the commission, pushed back against any leads that led to entities related to his own activities, threatened and hamstrung actual efforts at almost every turn. It was a "feel-good" exercise that ultimately resulted in legislation that sounded effective, but really didn't accomplish what it should have.
The Wikipedia page alone is eye-opening.
Another good article written at the time:
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/07/23/nyregion/governor-andrew-cuomo-and-the-short-life-of-the-moreland-commission.html
JUL 2014 (no paywall)
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2014/07/23/nyt-ny-governor-hobbled-state-ethics-commission-n1865054
Ugly.
So, where's the money? Where does it come from? Where does it go?
https://www.opensecrets.org/political-action-committees-pacs/winred/C00694323/summary/2020The treasurer for WinRed PAC is Benjamin Ottenhoff. A web search of Benjamin Ottenhoff shows he's involved with (often treasurer of) scads of other PACS and has been for quite some time. For instance:
https://georgiarecorder.com/2020/11/13/georgias-u-s-senate-runoff-elections-lure-big-pacs-ready-to-spend-cash/
They’ve both run numerous super PACs that have aided Republicans. Ottenhoff worked as treasurer for a super PAC called DefendArizona that in the 2018 election cycle took in more than $10 million from the Senate Leadership Fund, another super PAC that supports Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell.
Here's a doozy:
https://www.tampabay.com/investigations/2019/03/13/a-zombie-campaign-spent-thousands-on-dinners-and-a-trip-to-disney-watchdog-group-says/
“It appears to be another example of a former member of Congress thinking they can use leftover campaign funds as personal slush funds,” said Brendan Fischer, the center’s director of federal reform. [snip]
The committee, “Ander PAC,” was organized to benefit numerous candidates according to a 2017 filing. However, it collected just a single $450 donation before it was shut down two years later. During that time, the committee spent tens of thousands of dollars on phones, meals and travel around the country.
Neither Crenshaw, nor Ander PAC’s treasurer, Benjamin Ottenhoff, returned requests for comment. Ottenhoff is the former chief financial officer of the Republican National Committee and a political consultant who works with dozens of D.C.’s biggest PACs, as well as Rick Scott’s 2018 Senate campaign.
https://www.hannapub.com/ouachitacitizen/opinion/columns/edward-oboyle-money-rules/article_e2881ebe-dcd5-11ea-a87b-8bfb6a4f5f77.html
And? Nothing came of this? There seems to be a clear pattern here. What gives, FEC?
Link to Guardian article
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/aug/08/america-children-unvaccinated-covid-schoolsFinally, someone in media is using the word "immoral" to describe this fiasco. More like this, and louder, please.
It doesn't sound as though the committee doesn't plan to do it,
but that they may want to do so carefully. The article linked in the tweet gives a lot more info than the headline. It's unclear at this time, but the request may already be in the pipeline.
https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/06/politics/january-6-committee-investigation-white-house-phone-logs/index.html
The Biden administration has formally declined to assert executive privilege over testimony related to January 6, telling former Justice Department officials in a letter they were free to provide “unrestricted testimony,” but it remains unclear if that view also applies to records and documents from the Trump White House.
Trump can also assert executive privilege if the committee does ultimately request the records, though Biden would still have the opportunity to overrule him, according to federal regulations for presidential records managed by the National Archives. [snip]
“The [White House] Counsel’s Office conveyed to the Department that President Biden has decided that it would not be appropriate to assert executive privilege with respect to communications with former President Trump and his advisors and staff on matters related to the scope of the Committees’ proposed interviews,” Associate Deputy Attorney General Bradley Weinsheimer wrote in a letter last month.
I had to snip a lot to winnow down to four paragraphs just to address this one aspect of the article. Definitely worth clicking through to read the whole thing.
Great article that blows away all of the lies.
Summing up, for those who can't get to WaPo articles:
The biggest contributing factor to outbreaks right now is politics. Highest numbers of cases are occurring in places which have little masking and low vaccination rates. What do these places have in common? Lots of Republicans. Fox is trying to both change the subject with racism, as well as find a way to blame Biden instead of themselves.
They do this by:
1. Misunderstanding the migration numbers
There are two types of detention, Title 8 and Title 42. Title 8 is the usual 'caught at the border and placed into detention' that most of us are familiar with. Title 42, implemented under the former guy, uses COVID as an excuse for expulsion, even for those seeking asylum.
https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/research/guide-title-42-expulsions-border
Numbers showing up at the border are high, but so are the numbers of those being immediately or nearly immediately turned away. Most being expelled are adults, and roughly 40% of those are repeats who've shown up at the border again within 12 months of first expulsion. More than 100,000 of the 170,000 who showed up at the border in June were turned away. The majority of those who are allowed to stay remain in custody of federal, state, or local officials. Only about 11% are allowed "humanitarian release" with notice for hearings within six months.
2. Misunderstanding how migrants are released
Incoming migrants (given the numbers not always, but usually) are given masks and dropped off by CPB at local testing centers in places such as McAllen, TX. Those who test negative go to respite centers where staff helps coordinate travel, often to where other family is already living. Those who test positive are not released but given a hotel room to quarantine. They go on their way after recovery and/or negative test results. It's thought that migrants may be the most tested population in the country, which is why 1,500 positives a week sounds so high in comparison to the rest of the US. Many are asymptomatic, and therefore as part of the general US population likely would never have been tested. Huge numbers of passenger cars and trucks are legally crossing the Mexican border all the time with no one testing their occupants at all.
Which seems like a more likely conduit for new coronavirus infections?
Indeed.
3. Misunderstanding where the pandemic is surging
All it takes is a quick look at a map. COVID surge locations are not overlapping with where migrants eventually land. Migrants are choosing to go to places where they can stay with friends or family, not being sent to government chosen destinations. The surge is not along the Mexican border, but in the South. The places with the highest case numbers have a predominantly white population, not Hispanic.
Migrants are callously being used as a political scapegoat to deflect the blame from the unvaccinated, shifting that blame to Biden and migrants from Mexico. Ted Cruz, Sean Hannity, and Fox: big ol' racist liars.
THE END.
Democrats unveil bills to protect election officials, prevent election subversion
Democrats are pushing back against Republicans' recent changes in state and local election laws. YES!
Protecting Election Administration from Interference Act
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/senate-democrats-unveil-bill-to-protect-election-officials-prevent-election-subversion/ar-AAMZfoz
The bill, titled the Protecting Election Administration from Interference Act, would extend existing prohibitions on threats to election officials to include individuals involved in ballot-counting, canvassing and certifying election results.
The legislation also calls for strengthened protections for federal election records and election systems to "stop election officials or others from endangering the preservation and security of cast ballots," and allowing the Justice Department to bring lawsuits to enforce compliance with election records requirements.
Democratic Sens. Alex Padilla (Calif.), Jon Ossoff (Ga.) and Jeff Merkley (Ore.) joined Klobuchar in announcing the proposal Thursday.
Preventing Election Subversion Act
https://www.salon.com/2021/06/26/gop-using-new-laws-to-drive-out-local-democratic-election-officials--and-not-just-in-georgia/
"The dangers of the voter suppression efforts we're seeing in Georgia and across the nation are not theoretical, and we can't allow power-hungry state actors to squeeze the people out of their own democracy by overruling the decisions of local election officials," Sen. Raphael Warnock, D-Ga., the bill's lead sponsor, said in a statement. "This legislation is critical to ensuring the federal government has the tools to make sure every eligible voter's voice is heard and their ballot is counted to help decide the direction of our country."
Warnock's office noted in a statement that at least 210 bills giving legislatures more power over election officials have been introduced in 41 states, according to the States United Democracy Center, a nonpartisan group promoting fair elections. At least 24 have already been enacted into law. [snip]
In Georgia, at least 10 county election officials, most of them Democrats and half of them Black, have been removed or had their positions eliminated, or are expected to be replaced by Republicans under local ordinances and a bill signed by Gov. Brian Kemp earlier this year, The New York Times reported last week.
Kudos to CNN for using 'coup' in the headline
and for the extensive internal links, particularly to the timeline of what went on in Georgia. Yikes. But I will quibble with their statement that, "it’s very easy to get tired of thinking about it." NO. No it is not. We are not tired at all of thinking about what happened and what needs to be done about it.
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