babylonsister
babylonsister's JournalBloomberg donates $2 million to register black voters in key states
Bloomberg donates $2 million to register black voters in key states
By Tim Perry and Stefan Becket
March 9, 2020 / 12:02 PM / CBS News
Washington — Fresh off his departure from the race for the Democratic presidential nomination, former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg has poured $2 million into efforts to boost turnout by African-American voters in eight key states, an indication of his intention to continue bankrolling Democratic causes ahead of November's elections.
The $2 million donation, as first reported by The Washington Post, will go to the group Collective Future. A Bloomberg aide said the former mayor signed off on the donation before he exited the race following Super Tuesday last week, and the funds were transferred to the group on Friday. The donation has been in the works for six weeks, the aide said.
Collective Future is the nonprofit arm of The Collective PAC, whose mission is to "fix the challenge of African American underrepresentation in elected seats of power throughout our nation."
Collective Future said in a release that the funds will be used to partner with civic groups and hire field organizers to boost voter registrations in Alabama, Georgia, Florida, Michigan, North Carolina, South Carolina, Texas and Wisconsin, with the goal of registering 500,000 black voters.
more...
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/michael-bloomberg-donates-2-million-boost-black-voter-registration-key-states/?fbclid=IwAR2XIhIIzzEtipWtNs71scU60eBrhh5AGkFOsT0URAplcMfXp5MF3F3RAHg
Presidential tweets can't paper over Trump's coronavirus failures
https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/presidential-tweets-can-t-paper-over-trump-s-coronavirus-failures-n1153346Presidential tweets can't paper over Trump's coronavirus failures
A question about Trump has lingered in the background: what would happen when the nation's first amateur president faced a genuine crisis? Now we know.
March 9, 2020, 12:47 PM EDT
By Steve Benen
As Donald Trump's focus remains on public-relations considerations, the president's current goal appears simple: he wants Americans not to believe their lying eyes. Indeed, Trump seems to have convinced himself that he can make the coronavirus crisis fade simply by force of will.
snip//
For three years, a question about Trump has lingered in the background: what would happen when the nation's first amateur president faced a genuine crisis? One he couldn't overpower with spectacle and nonsense? One that required him to listen, learn, and lead with a steady hand?
Such a crisis has arrived and Trump is making clear that he's not up to the task. The president's go-to moves are familiar -- lie, divert blame, contradict experts, tout a personal expertise that exists in his imagination -- but they are a poor fit for the dangerous circumstances.
We Are Watching the Probable Demise of Trump's Reelection in Real Time
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/03/were-watching-trumps-probable-election-demise-in-real-time.htmlthe national interest 12:27 P.M.
We Are Watching the Probable Demise of Trump’s Reelection in Real Time
By Jonathan Chait
snip//
Trump seemed totally oblivious to the danger of hardening his public image as the national-level equivalent of the mayor in Jaws, blithely ignoring reports of a gigantic shark because he didn’t want to hurt the tourism season.
Enough of the debacle has played out in public to supply Democrats with a campaign’s worth of damning video clips. Trump appeared in public insisting that the virus was “contained,” and that the number of cases “within a couple of days, is going to be down to close to zero.” Trump and his surrogates kept advising people to buy stocks after every dip. The strategy made no sense except as a desperation gambit to prop up the stock market on an hour-to-hour basis with dumb money from Trump’s marks.
For all the apparent durability of Trump’s personality cult, it is worth recalling that George W. Bush was once a figure of nearly equal stature on the right. He was the swaggering, flight-suit-wearing alpha male who had conquered Afghanistan and Iraq. The conservative media slathered over him in almost erotic terms. When things went south for Bush, after his failed attempt to privatize Social Security was followed by Hurricane Katrina and the unraveling of the Iraq occupation, they went south very fast.
It is possible that the public-health and economic catastrophes that loom so large at the moment will be gone by autumn. It is even possible that they will remain and Trump will somehow survive anyway. (After all, the mayor in Jaws had somehow retained his position in Jaws 2. And he was still minimizing shark risks!)
But it seems more likely that Trump has finally made his unfitness for office so blatant that even his own supporters will notice. The American economy, its health infrastructure, and perhaps more are plunging into foreseeable crisis. And every step Trump has taken along the way seems almost calculated to expose him to maximal blame. Trump is now quite likely to lose his reelection, and we will look back at the last few weeks as the time when he sealed his own fate.
Report Claims Trump Owns Stock In Company That May Play A Major Role In Providing COVID-19 Kits...
Report Claims Trump Owns Stock In Company That May Play A Major Role In Providing COVID-19 Kits, Helping POTUS To Profit From Testing
I'd say this surprised me, but it doesn't.
In the least shocking news I’ve heard this week, it turns out that there may have been a slow rollout of testing for the deadly coronavirus strain that’s been gathering steam around the world — so that President Donald Trump could source the tests from companies that he may have a financial stake in.
more...
https://politicaltribune.org/report-claims-trump-owns-stock-in-company-that-may-play-a-major-role-in-providing-covid-19-kits-helping-potus-to-profit-from-testing/
Congress Considering Emergency Shutdown Over Coronavirus Threat to Aging Members
https://www.thedailybeast.com/congress-considering-emergency-shutdown-over-coronavirus-threat-to-aging-members?ref=homeCongress Considering Emergency Shutdown Over Coronavirus Threat to Aging Members
NO PLACE FOR OLD MEN
Barbie Latza Nadeau
Correspondent-At-Large
Published Mar. 09, 2020 5:30AM ET
Jonathan Ernst/Reuters
Coronavirus Update: Cuomo Calls For Private Testing To Match Demand...
Coronavirus Update: Cuomo Calls For Private Testing To Match Demand, Wife Of New Rochelle Victim Speaks, Schools Close
March 8, 2020 at 10:19 pm
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) — Gov. Andrew Cuomo said on Sunday the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention should immediately allow local labs with the correct equipment and kits to begin testing for positive coronavirus cases due to the federal government’s lack of keeping up with outbreak demands.
His goal is to minimize the fear surrounding the coronavirus outbreak and demand more action from federal agencies, a day after Saturday’s state of emergency declaration that allowed certain funds to be unlocked and health positions to be filled faster.
As of Sunday evening, there were a total of 105 confirmed cases in New York State:
New York City: 12 cases
Nassau County: 5 cases
Rockland County: 2 cases
Saratoga County: 2 cases
Suffolk County: 1 case
Ulster County: 1 case
Mayor Bill de Blasio said he believes New York City is about to get a big reality check. All city school trips have been canceled and there is no non-essential international travel for city workers.
more...
https://newyork.cbslocal.com/2020/03/08/coronavirus-cuomo-testing-kits-connecticut-new-jersey-outbreaks-new-york-cases/
Trump Is Withholding Coronavirus Testing Kits From Governors
https://www.politicususa.com/2020/03/08/trump-coronavirus-testing-kits.htmlPosted on Sun, Mar 8th, 2020 by Jason Easley
Trump Is Withholding Coronavirus Testing Kits From Governors
Two governors requested coronavirus testing kits for their states, and the CDC wouldn’t commit to providing them.
Andy Slavitt tweeted:
·
1h
I talked this afternoon to 2 governors who told me the CDC will not commit to getting them tests.
Whether because they don’t want the numbers known or incompetency, state & local governments feel abandoned.
Quote Tweet
Justin Hendrix
@justinhendrix
· 2h
106 people in New York have confirmed cases of Coronavirus. But- "As of Saturday only about 120 people in New York City had been tested for the virus. And it has been become clear that the new coronavirus was spreading faster than testing was increasing."
https://nytimes.com/2020/03/08/nyr
Trump is trying to hold the number of coronavirus cases down by not providing an adequate number of test kits so that people can be tested. If people can’t be tested, they also can’t be added to the number of confirmed cases in the United States.
The administration is trying to cover up their bungled coronavirus response by underreporting the number of people who test positive for the virus.
There is no reason for the CDC not to immediately give testing kits to any state that requests them. South Korea has demonstrated that widespread testing is the best way to contain and control the outbreak. If the United States doesn’t provide an adequate number of testing kits, it could be facing a public health catastrophe.
The CDC has been politicized and is doing Trump’s bidding.
At a time when America needs a rapid response, governors can’t get coronavirus test kits.
The U.S. Isn't Ready for What's About to Happen
The U.S. Isn’t Ready for What’s About to Happen
Even with a robust government response to the novel coronavirus, many people will be in peril. And the United States is anything but prepared.
7:00 AM ET
Juliette Kayyem
Former Department of Homeland Security official and author of Security Mom
For the professionals who try to manage homeland-security threats, reassuring the public after a natural disaster or terrorist attack—or amid a coronavirus outbreak like the one the world now faces—is just part of the job. I am a former federal and state homeland-security official. I study safety and resiliency issues in an academic setting, advise companies on their emergency-response plans, and trade ideas with people in public health, law enforcement, and many other disciplines. Since the beginning of the disease now known as COVID-19, I’ve also been receiving more and more text messages from nervous relatives and friends. The rash decisions that panic breeds have never made any emergency better. So like many others in my field, I’ve been urging people, in as calm a tone as I can muster, to listen to experts and advising them about concrete steps they can take to keep their families, communities, and businesses safe. Wash your hands. Don’t touch your face. Avoid large gatherings. Don’t panic, and prepare as best you can.
Advice like mine is meant to be empowering, but now I fear it may also be misleading. If Americans conclude that life will continue mostly as normal, they may be wrong. The United States is far less prepared than other democratic nations experiencing outbreaks of the novel coronavirus. Low case counts so far may reflect not an absence of the pathogen but a woeful lack of testing.
Disruptions are almost certain to multiply in the weeks to come. Airlines are scaling back flights. Conferences, including Austin’s signature event, South by Southwest, are being canceled. The drop in imports is hurting global supply chains. Corporations are prohibiting their employees from traveling and attending mass gatherings. Stanford University just canceled its in-person classes for the rest of the winter quarter, and other institutions are likely to take similar steps. Government agencies and private companies alike will activate continuity-of-operations protocols, as they are called in my field. Get used to it.
Aggressive steps are essential to protecting the public from a deadly virus. Last week, the World Health Organization assessed the fatality rate at a shocking 3.4 percent, much higher than previously believed. Early on, many American medical experts withheld judgment about the limited data coming out of China, but information from around the world has now confirmed how severe COVID-19 is and how rapidly it is spreading. As Dr. Margaret Bordeaux, my colleague at the Security and Global Health Project at Harvard’s Kennedy School, told me, “None of us want to be Chicken Little, but there is too much consistent data to not begin to rattle the cage pretty loudly.”
Even if the United States were far more ready for COVID-19, the consequences could still be grievous. In my field, adequate preparation means having the plans, money, equipment, and expertise in place to avert all but a tiny percentage of the harms that might otherwise occur. Yet because of the nature of pandemics, even a level of preparation that looks robust to homeland-security experts could still fail to prevent thousands of deaths.
more...
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/03/us-isnt-ready-whats-about-happen/607636/
Mulvaney Out of Town When Trump Ousted Him
Yep, still a POS
https://politicalwire.com/2020/03/07/mulvaney-out-of-town-when-trump-ousted-him/
Mulvaney Out of Town When Trump Ousted Him
March 7, 2020 at 7:40 am EST By Taegan Goddard
” Trump had vented about Mulvaney being out of town during the coronavirus crisis… One White House official said the president used Mulvaney’s absence to pull the trigger on a change he had long been contemplating but had resisted.”
Said one source: “Anybody who knows Donald Trump knows that if you’re on a slippery slope you shouldn’t leave town.”
Tim O'Brien Promises 'Scorched Earth' Attacks On Trump Family Corruption
https://crooksandliars.com/2020/03/tim-o-brien-promises-scorched-earth?utm_source=social&utm_medium=facebook&utm_content=28021
3/07/20 11:55am
Tim O’Brien Promises ‘Scorched Earth’ Attacks On Trump Family Corruption
Bloomberg campaign adviser Tim O’Brien hinted the former candidate will put big money toward hammering the Trump family corruption “unlike anything they’ve experienced thus far in the media.”
By NewsHound Ellen
1 hour ago by Heather
In an AM Joy discussion this morning, Reid pointed out that Republicans are throwing stones from glass houses if they use Hunter Biden to go after Joe Biden in the presidential campaign.
She ran down a very lengthy list of Trump family corruption. It's not as though this has not previously been reported. We saw a graphic of an LA Times headline, “Trump’s children take in millions overseas as president slams Biden’s son,” e.g.
But O’Brien promised the scrutiny will be dialed up to new levels:
“There’s a lot of ads you could make on something like that,” Reid said, pointedly. And it just so happens that Bloomberg is putting his fortune to work with a new organization dedicated to attacking Trump and supporting the Democratic nominee. That organization will include hundreds of Bloomberg’s former campaign staffers.
O’Brien laughed without confirming or denying whether Bloomberg might be planning any such ads. But you don’t have to strain to read the tea leaves here.
O’BRIEN: I think it’s an important moment for the American people to be woke about how rampant the financial conflicts of interest are among Trump’s children and the president himself. They’re an absolute failure to distance themselves from the Trump organization and all the deals they’ve continued to pursue while in the White House, whether it’s the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C.; 666 Fifth Avenue, which has a long and ugly history with Jared and the Chinese government; and Jared and the Russian government; and Jared and his family’s struggling finances at the time – all of this stuff will become, I think, food for thought for everyone.
But wait, there’s more!
Reid noted that Trump's corrupt ties go well beyond his own family. She cited the family of Trump cabinet member Elaine Chao (aka Mrs. Mitch McConnell), Rudy Giuliani’s family, Newt Gingrich’s wife, Wilbur Ross, Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos, Attorney General William Barr’s son-in-law, Eric Trump’s brother-in-law - all of whom have profited from having Trump in the White House.
This looks very promising, indeed.
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