Editorial: Oust Banana Republicans

 Joe Biden has widened his lead over Donald Trump to double digits in national polls, and he continues to lead Trump in most swing states after the Great Misleader’s disastrous performance in the first (and, most likely, only) presidential debate, followed by Trump’s four-day stay at the Walter Reed Medical Center, where he took experimental treatments and steroids for a touch of the coronavirus, which he now insists he has whipped, although prominent epidemiologists questioned his hasty return to the White House, where at least 34 staffers have tested positive for the virus. 

Hopped up on steroids, Trump has been raving since his return from the hospital. In a latenight Twitter blitz on Oct. 6-7, Trump wondered why Attorney Gen. William Barr had not arrested former President Obama and Biden, apparently because they allowed the FBI to monitor the Trump campaign’s contacts with Russian intelligence assets and government officials during the 2016 campaign, and Russian efforts to get Trump elected. Letting the FBI do its job is “the greatest political crime in the history of our country,” Trump said. And he still wants Hillary Clinton jailed because of her emails. 

Then, in a nearly hourlong interview with Maria Bartiromo on Fox Business Oct. 8, after the vice presidential debate, he called Sen. Kamala Harris a “communist” and a “monster.” 

“I thought that wasn’t even a contest last night,” Trump said. “She was terrible. I don’t think you can get worse. And totally unlikeable. And she is. She’s a communist. She’s left of Bernie. She’s rated left of Bernie by everybody. She’s a communist.” (Sanders ran to the left of Harris in the primary. Neither one is a communist — but Trump seems to enjoy hanging out with communists, current and former.) 

In a video released Oct. 7, Trump said he considered getting ill with a virus that has killed more than more than 215,000 Americans to be a “blessing” because he ended up taking an experimental antibody cocktail, still in clinical trials, that is produced by Regeneron under a $450 million contract with the government.

“To me it wasn’t therapeutic — it just made me better, OK? I call that a cure,” said Trump, who appeared to struggle to breathe at times. He then said everyone should have access to the not-yet-approved drug for “free” and that he would make sure it was in every hospital as soon as possible.

Trump also dropped the F-bomb on Rush Limbaugh’s radio show Oct. 9, warning Iran, “If you f*ck around with us, if you do something bad to us, we are gonna do things to you that have never been done before.” That was in case Iran struck back at the Trump administration for imposing sanctions on Iran’s banking sector, which European allies warned would stop imports of food and medicine, after Trump withdrew the US from the Iran nuclear deal in 2018. 

Then, after federal agents announced Oct. 9 they had thwarted a plot by Michigan militants to kidnap and possibly murder Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer — a conspiracy that allegedly included visits to her home in northern Michigan, training with firearms and explosive devices, and plans to storm the state capitol and take other hostages — Trump continued his criticism of Whitmer.

In April, Trump had tweeted in all caps, “LIBERATE MICHIGAN!” amidst the lockdown to control COVID-19. He urged Whitmer to negotiate with the militants who had stormed the capitol with assault rifles and tried to get into the legislative chambers. 

After the conspiracy was uncovered, Trump and state Republican leaders appeared to back up the domestic terrorists’ complaints. “Governor Whitmer of Michigan has done a terrible job,” Trump tweeted Oct. 9. “She locked down her state for everyone, except her husband’s boating activities.” 

He falsely claimed Whitmer had called him a white supremacist (although there is substantial evidence to make that case), and he again urged her to “open up your state, open up your schools, and open up your churches!”

Hours after the FBI announced the plot against Whitmer, Republican leaders of both chambers of the legislature joined a right-wing rally on the steps of the state capitol targeting the governor and her efforts to keep the state safe. Senate Majority Leader Mike Shirkey was forced to explain to the press that the people who attended the rally are not the same people who were involved in the plot to kill the governor, Allison Donahue noted at MichiganAdvance.com.

Whitmer said she’s asked the White House and Republicans in her state to decrease the level of inflammatory rhetoric they put out, which she said helped spark the alleged plot.

Trump closed the week with a rally Oct. 10 on the South Lawn of the White House, where he spoke from a balcony before a crowd of a few hundred attendees, where he spoke for only 18 minutes instead of the promised 30 minutes. The next day, he tweeted that he is “immune” to COVID and “can’t give it,” even though the White House has been fuzzy on details and the CDC recommends isolation for up to 20 days in severe cases, which would seem to cover someone who was hospitalized, administered supplemental oxygen and treated with the steroid dexamethasone, a drug typically used for serious cases. Instead, Trump embarked on a tour of “Super Spreader” rallies that started in Sanford, Fla. Oct. 12 and had rallies planned in Pennsylvania, Iowa, North Carolina and other swing states. 

Of course, Dems fear a repeat of 2016, where polls showed Clinton winning — and she did beat Trump by 2.8 million votes nationwide, but Trump eked out an Electoral College victory by fewer than 80,000 voters in Wisconsin, Michigan and Pennsylvania. This past week, Biden led Trump 51%-41% in Wisconsin and 48%-40% in Michigan in New York Times/Siena polls released Oct. 12 and Biden led 54%-41% in Pennsylvania in a Quinnipiac poll released Oct. 7. In other states Trump won in 2016, Biden was leading outside the margin of error in polls in Arizona, Florida and North Carolina; within the margin of error in Iowa and Ohio; and only 1.5 points behind Trump in the average of polls in Texas. 

Polls are only indicators, of course, but Trump isn’t sneaking up on us this time and Republican elected officials are starting to eye the exits. In Arizona, where Trump trails Biden, Sen. Martha McSally avoided several questions about whether she was proud of her support for Trump during her Oct. 7 debate against Democratic challenger Mark Kelly. She repeated that she was “proud to be fighting for Arizona” and she admitted that Trump’s disrespect of the late Sen. John McCain “pisses me off when he does it.” A recent New York Times/Siena poll showed McSally 11 points behind Kelly, an astronaut and husband of former Arizona congresswoman Gabby Giffords.

Even in Texas, where polls show a tight race between Trump and Biden, combat veteran M.J. Hegar is within single digits of Republican Sen. John Cornyn, and the high-ranking Republican appeared to be distancing himself from Trump when he told the Houston Chronicle Oct. 5 that Trump “let his guard down” on the coronavirus and has created “confusion” by trying to downplay the severity of the pandemic. He added, “[I]t is not easy to try to get things done working with him or the White House.”

Your job is not done when you vote against Trump and Pence. Go on down the ballot and vote against all of his Republican enablers in the Senate, the House and state legislators who also have conspired to make voting more difficult during this pandemic. — JMC

From The Progressive Populist, November 1, 2020

---

Populist.com

Blog | Current Issue | Back Issues | Essays | Links

About the Progressive Populist | How to Subscribe | How to Contact Us

---

Copyright © 2020 The Progressive Populist

PO Box 819, Manchaca TX 78652

Selections from the November 1, 2020 issue

COVER/Hal Crowther
Take a deep breath: Staring into the abyss

EDITORIAL
Oust Banana Republicans

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 

DON ROLLINS
The creepy parallels between Trump and Falwell, Jr. 

RURAL ROUTES/Margot McMillen
Where you gonna run to?

DISPATCHES
Trump returns to stimulus talks, but Republicans balk. Let the court decide if it needs packing. President engaged in pay-for-play scams. Dems have plenty of targets in Senate field. Trump-appointed judge smacks down Trump efforts to suppress vote in Pennsylvania. Pope Francis’ encyclical could shake up election. Democrats are swelling early vote, In Florida, despite constitutional amendment, few felons likely to vote. Repubs set up illegal drop boxes in California ...

ART CULLEN
As anxiety turns to madness, we vote

JOHN YOUNG
Oh, so now virus is serious matter

JILL RICHARDSON
The surprising history of marriage in the US

DICK POLMAN
Take a break from typhoid Donny with Uncle Joe’s Gettysburg Address

BOB BURNETT
Biden-Trump: What happens next?

NORMAN SOLOMON
The man who would be president: Mike Pence, corporate theocrat

TOM CONWAY
Weaponizing the Supreme Court

SAM PIZZIGATI
How taxpayers funded ‘consulting fees’ for Ivanka Trump

BILL JOHNSTON 
As Veterans Day approaches, vets deserve better than Trump

SETH SANDRONSKY
Small businesses reeling from COVID-19

SARAH ANDERSON
For laid-off workers, Trump’s lies about trade and jobs are hard to swallow

ROBERTO Dr. CINTLI RODRIGUEZ 
If white supremacists secede, will POC follow?

GENE NICHOL
North Carolina’s battle for democracy and decency

HEALTH CARE/Joan Retsinas 
The no-choice election

SAM URETSKY
Safe vaccines can’t be rushed

GEORGE NEWMAN and ROB CAUGHLIN
The next pandemic 

WAYNE O’LEARY
The dark shadow descends

JOHN BUELL
Abolish the debate commission

THOM HARTMANN
Trump’s destruction of America started with Ronald Reagan

N. GUNASEKARAN
In Asia, collapsing health systems and economies call for regional cooperation

SATIRE/Rosie Sorenson 
Kavanaugh, collared

BOOK REVIEW/Heather Seggel 
Truth, fiction, and freedom

ROB PATTERSON
LBJ’s great society survives

MARK ANDERSON
Others on the ballot seek attention

MOVIE REVIEW/Ed Rampell 
The nobility of mobility: A road trip through racism

SATIRE/Frank Lingo
Old radical, new volunteer

and more ...

Editorial: Call the Republicans’ Bluff

It took less than 90 minutes after the death of Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on Sept. 18 for Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to affirm that he planned to push Donald Trump’s nominee onto the court as soon as possible.

Trump says Republicans need to rush a new justice onto the Supreme Court before the election because he expects the court, with another right-wing vote to reinforce the conservative bloc, will help him steal the election despite his trailing in polls that portend defeat if mailed-in ballots are allowed to be counted. 

“Now we’re counting on the federal court system to make it so that we can actually have an evening where we know who wins. Not where the votes are going to be counted a week later or two weeks later,” Trump said at a rally in North Carolina Sept. 19.

Trump and Republicans have accused Democrats of planning election fraud by voting by mail during a pandemic, when many jurisdictions have cut polling places. There is little evidence that voting by mail contributes to fraud. In fact, Trump has voted by mail and is expected to do so in this election. But Republicans don’t want to make it easier for Democrats to vote in these pandemic days, particularly when Republicans appear headed for a thrashing. So Republicans set about to sabotage the US Postal Service to reduce confidence that mailed ballots will make it to election officials in time.

The death of Ruth Bader Ginsburg was a blow, because it opened the possibility that Trump would get to replace her with a third right-wing justice on the Supreme Court. Republicans have abandoned the pretense that they should leave the filling of a Supreme Court vacancy this close to the election to the next president, as they solemnly claimed in 2016. 

After Justice Antonin Scalia died in February 2016, McConnell said President Barack Obama shouldn’t even bother to nominate a replacement in an election year. After Obama went ahead and nominated Merrick Garland, the respected chief judge on the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals in March 2016, eight months before the election, Republicans denied a hearing, agreeing with McConnell that it was too close to the election.

Sen. Chuck Grassley of Iowa, who was chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee in 2016, defended the rebuff then and reiterated his position this past July, “If I were chairman of the committee and this vacancy occurred, I would not have a hearing on it because that’s what I promised the people in 2016.” But on Sept. 21, he buckled, and said he would support McConnell’s decision to move forward to fill the vacancy before the election. 

Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, the current Judiciary Committee chair, said in 2016, in defending the rejection of Garland, the rule against seating new Supreme Court judges in election years should apply to Republican presidents, too. “I want you to use my words against me,” Graham said in 2016. “If there’s a Republican president in 2016 and a vacancy occurs in the last year of the first term, you can say Lindsey Graham said ‘Let’s let the next president, whoever it might be, make that nomination.’”

Trump explained the new rule on Fox “News”: “When you have the Senate, when you have the votes, you can sort of do what you want as long as you have it.” Pretty much the same as the old rule.

If Democratic Leader Charles Schumer can keep all 47 of the senators in his caucus in line, he would need four Republican senators to join the Dems in stopping a Supreme Court promotion this year, but only Sens. Lisa Murkowski (R-Alaska) and Susan Collins (R-Maine) have come out against filling the seat until after the election and, if Biden wins, they would let him name the new justice. 

Democrats should play hardball in the showdown over the replacement of RBG.

McConnell might be able to marshal the votes to confirm the sixth conservative for the high court, and form a bloc on the high court that Republicans hope will impede progressive legislation for a generation, but Democrats must play their own strong hand, redoubling efforts to not only beat Trump, but also regain a Senate majority. 

Sen. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) called for Senate Democrats to eliminate the filibuster if Republicans move to expand conservative majority on the Supreme Court by filling the vacancy.

“Mitch McConnell set the precedent,” Markey said. “No Supreme Court vacancies filled in an election year. If he violates it, when Democrats control the Senate in the next Congress, we must abolish the filibuster and expand the Supreme Court.”

Joe Biden is not promoting that alternative, but Josh Marshall, editor of Talking Points Memo, noted, “It is probably politically best that he not do so. Clearly the very idea of it cuts against every bit of his experience. But he also mustn’t rule it out. The optimal position for him is to focus on the wrongness of another corrupt nomination and say he hopes the President doesn’t force a future Democratic Senate to do so.”

Schumer said Democrats should keep all possibilities “on the table.”

Some Democrats are wary that threatening to expand the court will make the final month of the election a battle over abortion rights, but you can bet abortion opponents already are planning to vote for Trump. But Democrats should raise the alarm that a 6-3 conservative court is likely to overturn the Affordable Care Act in its entirety, including the requirement that insurance covers pre-existing conditions. The conservative bloc might be emboldened to overturn Medicare, Medicaid and even the 85-year-old Social Security Act, which Trump already is trying to defund through his own executive orders suspending the payroll tax that fund the retirement plans. 

If Republicans achieve their dream of overturning Obamacare during the lame duck session, Democrats should get the gumption to expand the court in February with four more liberal justices who will go along if Congress decides to expand Medicare to cover everybody. A new Democratic Congress could remove the ceiling on payroll tax collections (which now stop after $137,700 in earnings). That will prevent the Social Security fund from becoming insolvent in 2035 and also allows expansion of benefits. With a liberal court majority, Congress also can restore the Voting Rights Act and reverse the Census-rigging that the Trump administration has been attempting to enable another decade of Republican gerrymandering.

Republicans will screech that Democrats are trying to pack the court, but Congress has changed the size of the Supreme Court seven times, from the original six justices to as many as 10 in 1863. After the Civil War, Congress in 1866 reduced the number of justices to seven to prevent President Andrew Johnson from appointing new members to the court. In 1869, after Johnson left office, Congress raised the number of justices back to nine, which the court has numbered ever since. 

During the Great Depression, conservatives on the court struck down several New Deal programs during President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s first term. After his sweeping re-election in 1936, Roosevelt proposed in 1937 that Congress increase the number of judges to as many as 15 members. FDR relented when one of the justices moderated to allow the laws to take effect, and another conservative judge retired, prompting a humorist to quip, “A switch in time saved nine.”

Maybe it’s time for another switch. — JMC

By the way, press critic Eric Boehlert has noted, in his Press Run newsletter, that more than 100 of the nation’s newspapers called for Bill Clinton to resign because he lied about an extramarital affair, but none have called for the resignation of the Great Misleader, Donald Trump. For the record, Trump should quit, or be fired.

From The Progressive Populist, October 15, 2020

---

Populist.com

Blog | Current Issue | Back Issues | Essays | Links

About the Progressive Populist | How to Subscribe | How to Contact Us

---

Copyright © 2020 The Progressive Populist

PO Box 819, Manchaca TX 78652

Selections from the October 15, 2020 issue

 COVER/Bob Cesca

Trump wants to be President of just the Republican states: But they’re a total mess

EDITORIAL
Call the Republicans’ bluff

SATIRE/Frank Lingo 
Your vote: Democracy or dictatorship

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 

DON ROLLINS 
Changing the trajectory of race

ART CULLEN 
Drought, plague, fire: The apocalypse feels nigh. Yet we have tools to stop it.

DISPATCHES 
A.G. Barr threatens to cut off federal funding to three Democratic cities. 
Democrats have a clear shot at Senate majority. 
Postmaster General has rough day in court, in multiple wins for democracy. 
Federal government didn’t try to stop COVID-19.
Trump applauds fed task force for killing Portland killing suspect ...

JIM GOODMAN 
The party formerly known as Republican

JASON SIBERT 
Nuclear arms will have to be addressed

JILL RICHARDSON 
I’m still mad about COVID-19. We all should be. 

JOHN YOUNG
More damning than Nixon’s tapes

TOM CONWAY 
A dire shortage of poll workers imperils American democracy

BOB BURNETT 
Ten potential game changers

SAM PIZZIGATI 
Killing someone is not like missing a golf putt

ROBERTO Dr. CINTLI RODRIGUEZ  
The end times, Walter Mercado and the orange madman

JAMES A. HAUGHT
Watching religion die

HEALTH CARE/Joan Retsinas  
To the pharmaceutical industry: Thank you

SAM URETSKY
Robbing Peter to pay Paul

WAYNE O’LEARY
Cancelling Wilson

JOHN BUELL 
In praise of public debt 

SETH SANDRONSKY 
Federal pandemic aid oversight adequate?

MARY GREEN SWIG, STEVEN L. SWIG, DAVID A. BERGERON and RICHARD “RJ” ESKOW 
How were 46 million people trapped by student debt?

BOOK REVIEW/Heather Seggel  
Keep it on the square

ROB PATTERSON
Homeland and heartland

THOM HARTMANN 
How big money controls the stories the media tells

MOVIE REVIEW/Ed Rampell
Unlocking the trauma shall set ye free

SATIRE/Rosie Sorenson  
The commander in chief knows best

NAKIYA WAKES 
What the Flint wanter crisis meant for my family

and more ...

It is what it is

 

Art by Kevin Kreneck

Editorial: Make Trump the 'Loser'

 Can anything budge the 40% to 43% of Americans who think Donald Trump is doing a good job, despite all the evidence to the contrary?

Trump hasn’t resorted to trying to shoot someone on Fifth Avenue in New York City to see if he could shake his supporters’ loyalty — at least not yet — but the latest test was a report by Jeffrey Goldberg in The Atlantic magazine Sept. 3 that accused the president of calling fallen American soldiers “suckers” and “losers,” and ducking out of a trip to a cemetery to honor US marines who died in World War I, during a 2018 trip to Paris, because it was raining and he didn’t want to muss his hair. Trump also reportedly questioned the sacrifice of retired Gen. John Kelly’s son, Marine 2nd Lt. Robert Kelly, and others who died in Afghanistan, when Trump accompanied Gen. Kelly to the son’s gravesite in Arlington National Cemetery on Memorial Day 2017. Trump reportedly said of the fallen service members, “I don’t get it. What was in it for them?”

Trump also asked his staff not to include wounded veterans in military parades, on grounds that spectators would feel uncomfortable in the presence of amputees. “Nobody wants to see that,” he said.

Trump denied making the statements, despite the Associated Press, the New York Times, the Washington Post and even Fox News confirming the story. The Post also found a “former senior administration official” who said Trump had “told senior advisers that he didn’t understand why the US government placed such value on finding soldiers missing in action because they had performed poorly and gotten caught and deserved what they got.” 

Significantly, Kelly declined to speak on the record. When Pentagon officials in a position to know declined to back up Trump, he called military brass “war profiteers.” He claimed enlisted personnel support him, but a survey by Military Times of active-duty military in late July and early August found 49.9% have an unfavorable view of Trump and only 38% have a favorable view. Soldiers support Joe Biden over Trump by four points, which would be an extraordinary turnaround from 2016, when a poll using the same methodology showed Trump led Hillary Clinton by nearly 2 to 1. Sixty percent of veterans voted for Trump in 2016.

As Amanda Marcotte noted at Salon, we know Trump was lying in his denial of The Atlantic’s story because it follows his pathological pattern of telling lies. In his tweeted denials, Trump even claimed he never called the late Sen. John McCain a “loser” for being captured during the Vietnam War, even though there’s a recording of him doing so in July 2015, in the same rant during which he declared, “I like people who weren’t captured.” Trump was so proud of this smear of McCain that he tweeted it out at the time. 

Trump’s other “tell,” Marcotte noted, is that he falsely accuses others of doing what he himself has done. In this case, Trump has spent years bashing athletes who kneel during the national anthem, falsely accusing them of dishonoring veterans and war dead. In truth, the tradition — started by former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick — was formed with input from a former Green Beret as a way to speak out against racism and police brutality while still honoring the troops.

Trump’s contempt for the sacrifices of soldiers and their families was shown in 2016 when he smeared the family of Army Capt. Humayun Khan, who was killed in action in Iraq in 2004, when Khan’s parents spoke at the Democratic National Convention, and in October 2017, when he told a grieving widow of US Army Sgt. La David T. Johnson, who was killed in in action in Niger, that “he knew what he signed up for.” Trump then accused Rep. Frederica Wilson, D-Fla., who was with widow Myesia Johnson when she spoke with Trump, of lying when she spoke out about it. 

We can add these lies to the 20,055 falsehoods Trump already had claimed as president, by the Washington Post’s tally as of July 9, when Trump was telling an average of 23 false claims a day. They are reflected in polls that show Trump with 43.2% approval, in an average compiled by FiveThirtyEight.com, while 52.6% said they disapproved of Trump, as of Sept. 8. Some 43.1% said they would vote to re-elect Trump, but 50.6% said they would elect Joe Biden. Trump has never had more than 47.8% approval in the poll averages since he’s been president. Disapproval only dipped below 50% briefly in April before Trump’s inability to control the corona virus became apparent. Biden has never trailed Trump since March, and Biden also leads by amounts greater than the margin of error in key swing states Arizona, Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin, along with a narrow lead of 2-3 points in Florida. 

Democrats are justifiably nervous after the disastrous results in 2016, but this time Trump will not be sneaking up on his opponent. Voters have had a good look at Trump, and a majority of them don’t like what they’ve seen. In the 2018 election, Democrats made inroads into the suburbs, which Republicans have counted on to offset Democratic majorities in cities, and Democrats regained control of the House of Representatives. 

As polls this year have shown Biden leading among suburban voters, and Republican control of the Senate is at risk, an increasingly desperate Trump has tried to scare suburbanites with warnings that if Biden is elected, Blacks will start moving into their neighborhoods. But racism doesn’t appear to be moving the needle for Trump. 

If anything, the share of Americans who say racism is a “big problem” in society has increased eight percentage points in the past two years, and has roughly doubled since 2011, Samantha Neal reported for Pew Research Center Aug. 29. 

Overall, 58% of Americans say racism is a “big problem in our society,” while 29% say it is “somewhat of a problem.” Just 12% say racism in the US is a small problem or not a problem, according to a Pew survey, conducted Aug. 15-21. And despite Trump administration attempts to link the Black Lives Matter movement to riots, arson and looting, some of which has been traced to right-wing provocateurs and other opportunists, the Pew poll found 55% of Americans say they support BLM, while 34% oppose the movement. Biden traveled to Pittsburgh, Pa., Aug. 31 to underline that he supports peaceful protests that call for police reform and equal rights, but said those who engage in violent activities or looting should be prosecuted. He also accused Trump of stoking violence in American cities. Biden noted America was unsafe under Trump, with COVID-19 killing thousands of people a week and an economy in tatters.

Biden also traveled to Kenosha, Wis., Sept. 3 to meet with the family of Jacob Blake, a Black man who was gravely wounded after a white policeman shot him seven times in the back. Biden spoke with Blake by phone before meeting with community leaders and again opposed violence and looting, but pledged to “go down fighting for racial equality, equity across the board.”

With Trump’s approval stuck in the low-to-mid 40s, and Dems targeting Senate Republicans in Alaska, Arizona, Colorado, Georgia, Iowa, Kentucky, Maine, Montana, North Carolina, South Carolina and Texas, along with an open seat in Kansas, Republicans are trying to prevent opponents from voting, reducing the number of pollling places and casting doubts on voting by mail. Many states allow early voting for several weeks in October. Check your early or absentee voting options at Vote.org or call your local election official (usually the county clerk) for details. Don’t wait for Nov. 3. — JMC 

From The Progressive Populist, October 1, 2020

---

Populist.com

Blog | Current Issue | Back Issues | Essays | Links

About the Progressive Populist | How to Subscribe | How to Contact Us

---

Copyright © 2020 The Progressive Populist

PO Box 819, Manchaca TX 78652

 

Selections from the October 1, 2020 issue

COVER/Bill Blum 

How Donald Trump has constructed a legal infrastructure of fascism

EDITORIAL 
Make Trump the “loser”

WARREN ALAN TIDWELL  
We need more than disaster recovery — we need green jobs

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR 

DON ROLLINS 
Neocons on the outside looking in

RURAL ROUTES/Margot McMillen  
The urban-rural divide

DISPATCHES 
Set the record straight on unions. 
Six months into recession, economy is still down 11.5 million jobs. 
US debt will overtake GDP next year.
Social Security’s future hangs in the balance. 
Trump administration plans $250 million ad buy to persuade you not to worry about the pandemic. 
Dems urge probe of fundraising fraud allegations against postmaster general.
Trump campaign, GOP have spent nearly $60M on lawyers for Trump
US goes it alone on COVID vaccine ...

ART CULLEN 
Anxiety is a hard sell in a catastrophic run-up to the election

JOHN L. MICEK 
Donald Trump and Republicans, in their own words

JILL RICHARDSON 
Where have I heard these Trump lines before?

JOHN YOUNG 
Trump spread his lies on my lawn

ROGER BYBEE 
Kenosha reveals ongoing police violence, growing menance of white militia forces

JOSEPH B. ATKINS
Organizing labor in the pandemic south

JAMES A. HAUGHT
Conservatives lose — and lose

ROBERTO Dr. CINTLI RODRIGUEZ
Memory, COVID-19 and sequelae violence

CINNAMON JANZER
Heartland tenants who beat the odds

HEALTH CARE/Joan Retsinas
Trump’s virus strategy: Blinders

SAM URETSKY
Trump seeks immunity from COVID repercussions

SAM PIZZIGATI 
Within healthcare USA, risk and reward have never been more out of kilter

WAYNE O’LEARY
Donkey Kong

JOHN BUELL
Who is calling the tunes at CDC and why care? 

JAMES E. VARNER
Trump’s Postmaster General should be returned to sender

JOEL D. JOSEPH 
How to fire the Postmaster General

JEFF COHEN and NORMAN SOLOMON  
Four years ago, we warned that Trump could win. Now, we’re warning again. 

BOOK REVIEW/Heather Seggel
See you at the movies

ROB PATTERSON 
Don’t feel bad about ‘Guilty Pleasures’

SETH SANDRONSKY 
Report: COVID-19’s impacts on Hispanic workers

MOVIE REVIEW/Ed Rampell
What is happening in Trump’s brain?

SATIRE/Rosie Sorenson  
Battle Hymn of the Trumpublic

SATIRE/Frank Lingo 
America’s marriage on the rocks

and more ...

Editorial: Who's Rigging the Vote?

 Democrats had a successful virtual convention, which showcased the fights for racial justice, health care and restoring human decency on the way to nominating Joe Biden for the presidency. The selection of Kamala Harris as his running mate eased anxieties of Democrats, who were encouraged by solid speeches by Harris, and Michelle and Barack Obama. Biden’s acceptance speech refuted ludicrous claims by Trump and his minions that the former vice president was losing his mental faculties (yet another case of Trump projecting his own flaws onto others). 

The following week, Republicans confirmed that their party has become Donald Trump’s personality cult. The Republican National Convention showed no concern about police abuse of Black people, or the working poor losing their access to health care, or uniting the nation for the common good, as Trump seeks four more years to end American carnage. The GOP didn’t even bother to adopt a platform outlining the party’s policy agenda. Instead, it resolved, “That the Republican Party has and will continue to enthusiastically support the President’s America-first agenda,” followed by a rehash of the 2016 platform, which mainly criticized the Obama-Biden administration.

The RNC speaker list was marbled with members of the Trump family and featured warnings of apocalypse if Dems take over. The opening night’s slate featured speaking roles for Don Jr., his girlfriend, shouty Kimberly Guilfoyle, and Mark and Patricia McCloskey, the St. Louis couple who face felony charges of unlawful use of a weapon for waving their guns at peaceful Black Lives Matter protesters who were passing by their mansion in a gated community.

The Trump campaign was rattled after a week that saw Steve Bannon, the mastermind of the 2016 election, charged with mail fraud alleging he fleeced donors to a private border wall; the Senate released a bipartisan report on Russia’s efforts to help Trump win in 2016; a government agency concluded the top two members of the Department of Homeland Security were serving in violation of the law; a federal court rejected Trump’s effort to keep his tax returns secret; and unemployment claims were ticking back up.

In remarks on the first afternoon of the convention, after a roll call delivered his nomination for a second term, Trump warned Biden would pursue a radical leftist agenda — which is hilarious to actual leftists, particularly after former Ohio Gov. John Kasich and other disgruntled Republicans endorsed Biden the week before. The Great Misleader claimed the only way Democrats can win the election is if it is rigged. Of course, Trump is projecting his own predicament. Nearly all polls show Biden leads Trump nationally and in key battleground states. Trump is stalled at approval rates in the low 40s, while disapproval rates have been above 50% for the past 3-1/2 years — even before he botched the pandemic response.

With the current unemployment rate above 10%, and businesses around the country going belly-up because the Trump administration has failed to control the coronavirus pandemic, it will be hard to overcome that public disapproval in the remaining 2-1/2 months until the election. That apparently is one of the reasons Louis DeJoy was brought in to sabotage the Postal Service and cause delays in deliveries that reduce the public confidence in voting by mail. Even after the public backlash forced DeJoy to stop pulling out the automated mail sorting machines from post offices (which would also send business to the private mail processing business DeJoy has a financial interest in), DeJoy has refused to reinstall the mail sorting machines. 

The Postal Service is supposed to be independent of political influence. The postmaster general is appointed by a Board of Governors, with seats reserved for members of both parties, who are nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate for seven-year terms. But after Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell blocked the confirmation of five postal governors nominated by President Obama in 2015, Trump ended up with six appointments when he took over. The New York Times reported Aug. 22 that Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin was a key player in selecting the board members who hired the Trump megadonor now leading the Postal Service. Mnuchin made clear to the Board of Governors of the USPS that “he wanted the governors to find someone who would push through the kind of cost-cutting and price increases that President Trump had publicly called for and that Treasury had recommended in a December 2018 report as a way to stem years of multibillion-dollar losses.”

DeJoy testified at a hearing of the House Oversight Committee Aug. 24 that he did not order the major overhauls that included taking mail processing machines out of post offices or removing postal collection boxes. He added that he did not know who ordered the removal of the processing machines, but he would not commit to reversing their removal.

House Democrats produced internal US Postal Service documents showing widespread drops in the agency’s performance started in July, about a month after DeJoy took over as postmaster general. 

According to the documents released by lawmakers, first-class mail service dipped 8.1% below its baseline, marketing mail saw an 8.42% decline from baseline service, the delivery of periodicals saw a 9.57% decline, while priority mail service saw a 7.97% decline compared to its baseline number, Business Insider reported.

While graphs indicate service fluctuations due to hardships imposed by the coronavirus pandemic, USPS performance sharply declined in July, a month after DeJoy, a former Republican megadonor who made contributions to President Trump, assumed his role as postmaster general on June 15.

One of DeJoy’s recent policy changes at the USPS requires trucks to leave on time, preventing them from waiting even five minutes for other mail shipments to arrive before they depart. In some cases, Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.) said, mail trucks were forced to leave, even when they were empty.

Despite the economic collapse nearing Depression-era levels, Republicans are resisting further COVID-19 stimulus measures because they think the economy is recovering. They point to 9.3 million workers who were called back to their jobs from May through July. But as long as the coronavirus remains unchecked, it will remain hard for businesses to get customers out like they were in February, before the lockdowns. 

Republicans celebrated when the claims for unemployment compensation for the week ending Aug. 8 fell below one million, but that still left 971,000 people newly out of a job and seeking assistance. The following week, 1.4 million applied for unemployment benefits, which made the seasonally adjusted unemployment rate 10.2% with 29.1 million workers either getting unemployment benefits or waiting to see if they will get benefits. And many businesses, particularly in retail, personal care services and recreation and entertainment, won’t be hiring until an effective vaccine and/or cures are widely available so that people are comfortable going out in public again.

That won’t win Trump re-election, unless he can keep Democrats from voting. Make sure you’re registered (see Vote.org for information) and your registration matches your photo ID. Vote early if you can; if you need to vote by mail, request your ballot as soon as you can, fill it in and send it back at least two weeks before the election, so even Louis DeJoy can’t mess it up. — JMC

From The Progressive Populist, September 15, 2020

---

Populist.com

Blog | Current Issue | Back Issues | Essays | Links

About the Progressive Populist | How to Subscribe | How to Contact Us

---

Copyright © 2020 The Progressive Populist

PO Box 819, Manchaca TX 78652

Selections from the September 15, 2020 issue

COVER/Amanda Schupak

Corporate America is becoming a powerful ally for clean energy

EDITORIAL
Who’s rigging the vote?

SATIRE/Frank Lingo 
Mailing my ballot

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

DON ROLLINS
Trump, misogyny and a tell-all bestseller

RURAL ROUTES/Margot McMillen
Social distancing has a long history in the movies

DISPATCHES
House adopts bill to roll back Postal Service sabotage.
Trump tries (and fails) to separate himself from newly indicted border wall fraudster. 
Trump speech attacking Biden on immigration instead shows Trump’s own extremism. 
Republican voters say COVID-19 death rate ‘acceptable.’ 
Tennessee will strip vote from protesters.
Pentagon weighing $2 billion cuts to military health care.
Trump proposes capital gains cut to help rich ...

ART CULLEN
An ill wind blew 14 million acres to smithereens, a mark of the new normal

JIM VAN DER POL
Evangelicals vs. Christians

JILL RICHARDSON
Colleges are still in uncharted territory

JOHN YOUNG
Not only is she from America, she IS America

TOM CONWAY
‘I don’t trust him’: How Trump abandoned workers when they needed him the most

JOEL D. JOSEPH  
It is time to boycott Russian products

HAL CROWTHER  
A McCarthy moment for Trump?

THOM HARTMANN
If Biden wins, get ready for Trump to punish America

HEALTH CARE/Joan Retsinas  
The dirtiest trickster of them all

SAM URETSKY
Postal Service heading for winter of our discontent

SARAH ANDERSON
The fox is still in the henhouse at the post office

WAYNE O’LEARY
Why we can’t defeat the virus

JOHN BUELL 
Lessons from Beirut/Hiroshima

ROBERTO Dr. CINTLI RODRIGUEZ  
Is there room for red-black-brown voices in the national conversation on race?

JASON SIBERT
US should stop rattling sabers with China

BOOK REVIEW/Heather Seggel  
Every day is like survival

ROB PATTERSON 
JFK assassination still fascinates

SETH SANDRONSKY
Teaching in a pandemic: An interview with Mercedes K. Schneider

MOVIE REVIEW/Ed Rampell
The killing that awakened the city that never sleeps

SATIRE/Rosie Sorenson  
Vaccinate this!

GENE NICHOL
In moment of national consecration Obama call out North Carolina

and more ...

Editorial: Trump’s COVID Relief Con

 After his own negotiators refused to strike a deal with House Democrats to provide aid for pandemic victims, Donald Trump announced a series of executive orders — some of them plainly illegal — to substitute for congressional action and trick the public into believing that he was acting boldly when, in fact, he was accomplishing little. 

In the clubhouse of his Bedminster, N.J., golf course, with an audience of millionaires cheering him on, Trump on Aug. 8 announced he would suspend collection of payroll taxes through the end of year; extend the unemployment “booster” at $300 a week (down from the previous $600 Congress authorized from March through July); help families “stay in their homes”; and waive student debt payments through the end of 2020. 

There is considerable fine print, however. Mainly, he lacks the authority to do most of it, as the US Constitution gives Congress the power of the purse and any changes to taxes or spending are supposed to come through Congress.

Trump blamed Democrats for obstructing congressional action, forcing him to take matters in his own hands, but that is the opposite of reality: House Democrats in May passed a $3.4 trillion bill that included $437 billion to keep the $600 weekly boost for the jobless until January, and $413 billion to send a second round of stimulus checks to all families. The Democrats also proposed to bolster rental and mortgage assistance, help small businesses and provide other safety net protections, as well as $430 billion to help schools safely reopen, $1 trillion to help cash-strapped cities and states pay essential workers and prevent layoffs, and $25 billion to bail out the US Postal Service. Trump is dead-set against assisting the Postal Service and Democratic cities and states. 

Senate Republicans took no action on the House bill until late July, when they countered with spending in the range of $1 trillion, including $200 a week for unemployment through September; one-time stimulus checks of $1,200; $105 billion for schools and nothing for cities and states, but $1.75 billion for a new FBI headquarters and nearly $30 billion for military spending. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell also insisted in immunizing employers from liability for failing to protect their workers against COVID-19.

After hitting an impasse with the Dems, Senate Republicans left town; the Dems tried to negotiate with Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, who were not much interested in making a deal, either, even after the Democrats offered to split the difference and cut their bill to a $2 trillion price tag. The White House stuck to $1 trillion, tops.

After Mnuchin and Meadows packed it in, Trump issued his proclamations, the most troubling of which was his instruction to the Treasury to stop collecting workers’ payroll taxes for the rest of the year, which would defund Social Security and Medicare. 

Payroll taxes may be deferred, but they will still be due in full next year. It won’t help people who have lost their jobs, because they’re not on the payroll, and it won’t help employers, because Congress already deferred their portion of the payroll taxes through 2021 in the CARES Act, which passed in March, but Democrats made sure the Social Security and Medicare trust funds were replenished for that lost revenue. 

Trump gave away the game when he went off script to explain that if he is re-elected, he would “terminate” those payroll taxes permanently. Right wingers have been promoting such a “payroll tax holiday” in their continuing effort to defund Social Security and Medicare, which rely on the payroll taxes to pay for seniors’ monthly benefits and medical care. When resulting deficits appear, Republicans will step up their demands that the programs be privatized.

Trump used the same scam in his attempt to dismantle the Postal Service, using the collapse of business mail revenue due to the pandemic as an excuse to appoint a major donor as Postmaster General to sabotage the Postal Service. At a time when many election officials are finding it difficult to staff polling places during the pandemic, Trump fears making it easier to vote by mail would ruin his re-election chances.

Nancy Altman, president of Social Security Works, said Trump’s executive order, which seeks to defer Social Security contributions, is bad enough. “But his promise to ‘terminate’ FICA contributions if he is reelected is a full-on declaration of war against current and future Social Security beneficiaries,” she said.

“Every member of Congress must speak up now to denounce Donald Trump’s unconstitutional raid on Social Security. Voters should treat any Senator or Representative who is silent as complicit in destroying Social Security. Furthermore, every American who cares about Social Security’s future must do everything they can to ensure that Trump does not get a second term.”

Trump also proposes to continue unemployment assistance at $300 a week, without involving Congress. Under his plan, the aid would only go to people who receive at least $100 a week in state unemployment comp, which would leave out those who have exhausted their state unemployment assistance. The feds’ share would come from $44 billion in Homeland Security’s Disaster Relief Fund. But that would cover less than five weeks of payments for 30 million unemployed Americans. That isn’t enough money to make it to October, unless the number of people on unemployment falls dramatically. And God help those in the path of hurricanes, tornadoes and massive fires, because FEMA will be tapped out.

Trump is instructing federal officials to “consider” whether there should be a ban on evictions, and to look for more funds to help renters, but he doesn’t promise anything.

There could be 30 million to 40 million renters at risk of eviction in the coming months, according to report by the National Low Income Housing Coalition.

Trump apparently has the authority to waive interest on student loans held by the federal government through the end of 2020 and allow. people to delay payments until Dec. 31. But the bills will come due again in January.

Paul Waldman of the Washington Post noted that these executive actions will have little impact on the economic crisis Americans are facing. “But just as Trump claims that his handling of the pandemic itself has been a story of unmitigated success, when he performed a signing ceremony before a crowd of dues-paying members at one of his golf clubs, he said the executive orders ‘will take care of pretty much this entire situation.’”

Meanwhile, the nation continues to suffer from a lack of leadership on controlling the coronavirus. If the US had done a proper lockdown in March, with federal authorities providing vigorous testing and contact tracing, encouraging social isolation and providing enough financial aid to absorb the effects of business closures, we’d be back in business now, as are the European Union, South Korea, Japan, New Zealand and Canada. 

Instead, with Trump leaving it to each governor to deal with the coronavirus in their own states, and a lagging testing system that has prevented effective tracking of the virus, the US has recorded more than five million cases of COVID-19, 163,000 fatalities so far — about 22% of the world’s death toll — and an unknown number of survivors who may have chronic health problems even after their “recovery.” And Republicans are still in a rush to reopen schools. Good luck. And wear a mask. — JMC

From The Progressive Populist, September 1, 2020

---

Populist.com

Blog | Current Issue | Back Issues | Essays | Links

About the Progressive Populist | How to Subscribe | How to Contact Us

---

Copyright © 2020 The Progressive Populist

PO Box 819, Manchaca TX 78652

Selections from the September 1, 2020, issue

 COVER/Tom Conway 

A stronger labor movement is essential to fixing America’s unjust economy

EDITORIAL
Trump’s COVID relief con

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

DON ROLLINS
Black preachers, then and now

RURAL ROUTES/Margot McMillen
Schools reopening despite risks

DISPATCHES
Krugman: Trump exec orders are ‘hydroxychloroquine of economic policy.’
Trump tells states to restrict food assistance. 
Shortened census may shortchange marginalized communities for decades.
Lawmakers demand removal of new postmaster general over attempts to dismantle Postal Service. 
Trump: executive order on pre-existing is ‘a signal.’
Missouri is sixth state to expand Medicaid at ballot box.
Business owners call for increase in minimum wage.
Russia working to defeat Biden; China and Iran prefer Trump defeat.
Republican senators may be using Russian disinformation to smear Biden ...

ART CULLEN
Trump’s goose is cooked in the Midwest

JIM GOODMAN
We can’t deny our history — can it guide us to become anti-racist? 

JILL RICHARDSON
Happy 30th birthday, ADA. What’s next?

BOOK REVIEW/James McCarty Yeager
Journeys and gender

SETH SANDRONSKY
Rethinking fed lending to get help to working families

NANCY J. ALTMAN
On Medicare and Medicaid’s 55th birthday, let’s expand benefits — not cut them

JOHN YOUNG
Face coverings and ‘cancel culture’

ROBERTO Dr. CINTLI RODRIGUEZ
50 Years later: A state of war or a permanent state of insurrection?

BOB BURNETT
Plagued by two viruses

GRASSROOTS/Hank Kalet
Notes on John Lewis

FRANK LINGO
Keep gun laws in focus for 2020

HEALTH CARE/Joan Retsinas
The uninsured, redux

SAM URETSKY
A good mask is nothing to sneeze at

SOPHIA PASLASKI
The Supreme Court just made the case for Medicare for All

WAYNE O’LEARY
The pandemic’s winners and losers

JOHN BUELL
Why are Republicans self-destructing?

DAVID SCHMIDT 
Choosing when to give a s**t: Controversial language and the Trader Joe’s boycott

N. GUNASEKARAN
Neoliberalism failed; state activism needed to save people from crisis

GENE NICHOL 
Republican truth in advertising

BOOK REVIEW/Heather Seggel
The mess of life

ROB PATTERSON
Recording The Beatles

MARK ANDERSON
Small change is a big problem in the pandemic economy

MOVIE REVIEW/Ed Rampell
The ACLU’s fight for Constitutional Rights

SATIRE/Rosie Sorenson 
In the swamp where it happened

and more ...

Editorial: Desperation Breeds Fascism

As Joe Biden widens his lead over Donald Trump in polls, Trump has become increasingly unhinged. His talent for distraction is strained by the unavoidable public fixation on his disastrous incompetence in mishandling the coronavirus pandemic and the economic collapse that has resulted.

On Jan. 19, a Washington Post-ABC News poll showed Trump trailing Biden by 15 points — 55% to 40%. That’s the third national poll in a week that has shown Trump behind Biden by double digits. An NBC/Wall Street Journal survey had Biden up 11 while a Quinnipiac University poll pegged the margin at Biden +15. A Fox News poll released July 19 had Biden up 8. Biden’s lead in the Real Clear Politics average of all national polls is now over 8 points.

It’s hard for Trump to distract the public from more than 140,000 dead and 3.8 million confirmed cases of COVID-19 in the US — far and away the largest number of cases and deaths in the world — as well as 33 million unemployed, while Trump waits for the virus to magically disappear. But Trump gamely called a “news conference” July 14 in the Rose Garden, where he subjected White House reporters to a 52-minute harangue, making absurd claims about Biden’s plans if he is elected. Among other things, Trump claimed Biden would “abolish suburbs,” pursue an energy plan that “basically means no windows” in homes or offices by 2030, he said, and “cold office space in the winter and warm office space in the summer.” He would “abolish immigration enforcement,” “abolish our police departments” and “abolish our prisons, I guess.”

Biden’s party is even “calling for defunding of our military,” Trump said, extending his record of more than 20,000 false or misleading statements, as tallied by the Washington Post’s Fact Checker.

Trump continued the slander July 15, tweeting “Joe Biden and the Radical Left want to Abolish Police, Abolish ICE, Abolish Bail, Abolish Suburbs, Abolish the 2nd Amendment — and Abolish the American Way of Life. No one will be SAFE in Joe Biden’s America!” In fact, Biden opposes calls to abolish police or US Immigration and Customs Enforcement, seeks new gun regulations under current judicial interpretations of the Constitution and sees the nation’s suburban voters, especially women, as a core part of his political base.

More alarming was Trump’s dispatching federal storm troopers to Portland, Ore., to occupy the downtown area and break up civil rights protests that have been going on since the May 25 death of George Floyd under the knee of a Minneapolis cop. The feds made the show of force in Portland under the pretext of protecting federal property from graffiti. The heavily armed storm troopers, who lack badges or agency insignia, refused to identify themselves and travel in unmarked vans to abduct people off the streets for questioning. The feds’ main function appears to be preserving disorder and impersonating a third-world despot’s shock troops.

Local and state officials have demanded that Trump withdraw the federal agents, who are believed to be from the Department of Homeland Security, Custom and Protection’s Border Patrol Tactical Unit and the US Marshals Special Operations Group, but otherwise are unaccountable. Among their handiwork:

• Donovan LaBella, 26, was holding a large speaker above his head across the street from the federal courthouse July 11 when a federal agent fired a “less than lethal” round that fractured his skull, which required surgery and facial reconstruction.

• Mark Pettibone, says he was confronted by armed men dressed in camouflage who took him off the street early July 15 as he was walking home from a protest. He was pushed into a van, held down and taken to a building, believed to be the Mark O. Hatfield US Courthouse, where he was put into a cell and read his Miranda rights, but was not told why he was arrested, nor was he provided with a lawyer. He says he was released without any citation, or record of his arrest. It’s unknown how many may have been similarly abducted.

• The next weekend, dozens of women, who said they were mothers seeking to protect demonstrators, chanted ”Feds stay clear! Moms are here!” They were tear-gassed and flash-banged by the feds. Some mothers were treated for exposure to chemical irritants.

• A 53-year-old Navy veteran, Chris David, wearing a Navy shirt July 18, was beaten with batons and pepper-sprayed by federal thugs when he challenged them to live up to their oath of office.

“I was hoping they wouldn’t shoot me, because one had a weapon pointing it right at my chest. I’m relieved that I only got hit by batons and pepper spray,” David told CNN. “The baton hits weren’t the issue, but when they used pepper spray it was over. It felt like they dumped a gallon of burning gasoline on my head.”

David said bones in his hand were broken in the confrontation and he needed surgery.

Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler (D) said “the actions of federal officers escalated, rather than de-escalated, already heightened tensions in our city.”

A memo obtained by the New York Times showed the officers were deployed, even though they do not have “training in riot control or mass demonstrations,” but Trump liked the optics coming out of Portland enough that he told reporters July 20 he was considering sending federal officers to crush protests in cities such as New York, Chicago, Philadelphia, Detroit, Baltimore and Oakland, where he said “weak” local politicians are “afraid” of demonstrators, whom he described as “anarchists” who “hate our country … We’re not gonna let this happen in our country. All run by liberal Democrats.”

While Democrats are right to be wary of polls, Republican who will be on the ballot with Trump are getting worried about what his underperformance means for their chances.

Senate Republicans are negotiating on a new coronavius stimulus bill, which includes spending in the range of $1 trillion, compared with the $3 trillion bill the House passed in May, but Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is demanding a five-year liability shield against coronavirus lawsuits and he is resisting another round of $600 weekly boosts in unemployment compensation, which expired at the end of July. Regular state unemployment compensation averages $333 nationally but ranges from a low of $101 in Oklahoma to $531 in Massachusetts, according to the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. Republicans think nothing of offering billions to keep corporations in business but argue the $600 boost on top of the state compensation is a disincentive for the jobless to go back to work. But without the federal boost, jobless workers in most states would plunge below the poverty level for a family of four and leave them hard-pressed to make their rent payments, with employment prospects not good for the immediate future, until the coronavirus is resolved.

The House bill also included $75 billion for testing and tracing to try to get a handle on the virus spread, $100 billion to help schools safely reopen and $1 trillion for cash-strapped states to pay essential workers and prevent layoffs. The Democratic measure would give cash stipends to Americans, and bolster rental and mortgage and other safety net protections.

Trump, who promised to protect Medicare and Social Security when he ran for president in 2016, threatened to veto the new stimulus bill if it does not include a cut in payroll taxes — which would reduce revenue for Medicare and Social Security. Just another broken promise for Trump. He also wants to cut cut $25 billion from COVID testing and tracing, without which public health officials cannot control the virus until a vaccine is ready for wide distribution. Republicans must decide whether they want to die on that hill. — JMC

From The Progressive Populist, August 15, 2020

---

Populist.com

Blog | Current Issue | Back Issues | Essays | Links
About the Progressive Populist | How to Subscribe | How to Contact Us

---

Copyright © 2020 The Progressive Populist PO Box 819, Manchaca TX 78652

Selections from the August 15, 20 issue

COVER/Paul Kiel and Jack Gillum
How big businesses got government loans meant for small businesses

EDITORIAL
Desperation breeds fascism

FRANK LINGO
Rainbows and lollipops

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

DON ROLLINS
Who’s in charge: Trump’s revolving door

RURAL ROUTES/Margot McMillen
Slow the rush back to school

DISPATCHES
Trump continues to slander Hunter Biden, but he’s unconcerned about his son-in-law.
Trump crony begins Postal Service sabotage.
Trump still bragging about passing dementia screening test.
Trump promises to replace Obamacare by executive order.
Bahamas joins E.U, Canada and Mexico in banning US visitors.
Memories of a hedge fund gone bad may haunt Republican Senate nominee in Alabama.
Fox News COVID-19 coverage misinforms.
Asheville, N.C. approves reparations plan that focuses on long-term systemic change.
Kentucky demonstrators on Ky. AG's lawn charged with felonies.
'Bridgegate alum' gets top job in Trump campaign shakeup ...

ART CULLEN
Keep your edginess within bounds in a boundless digital anxiety dump

JOHN YOUNG
Make America what again?

JILL RICHARDSON
What if we actually listened?

ELIZABETH COOK-LYNN
Art IS politics

SETH SANDRONSKY
We must protect essential workers

TOM CONWAY
Why relentless enforcement will make or break the new NAFTA

JIM VAN DER POL
Show repect for working people

THOM HARTMANN
The Trump Administration and the GOP are death cults. Come November, we can reclaims our lives. 

HAL CROWTHER
In the line of fire: Badges, bullets, breaking points

RICHARD D. WOLFF
COVID-19 exposes the weakness of a major theory used to justify capitalism

HEALTH CARE/Joan Retsinas
Conceit of exceptionalism: Do we need the World Health Organization? 

SAM URETSKY
Virtual life goes on. Some not so lucky

GRASSROOTS/Hank Kalet
Housing needs to be a human right

WAYNE O’LEARY
The new vandalism

JOHN BUELL
Who benefits from Pentagon largesse? 

ROBERTO Dr. CINTLI RODRIGUEZ
Extreme cognitive dissonance: A 2020 ball of confusion

JASON SIBERT
Examine military and prison spending in light of George Floyd’s killing

BOOK REVIEW/Heather Seggel
Journeys and gender

ROB PATTERSON
Taylor Swift earns respect

BOB BURNETT
Searching for optimism

MOVIE REVIEW/Ed Rampell
Covering Vietnam: ‘Dateline-Saigon’ gets down into the trenches with war reporters.

SATIRE/Rosie Sorenson
The dog ate my intelligence

and more ...

Editorial: Trump Whistles Racist Base

Donald Trump spent the Fourth of July weekend seeking to drive a wedge between his Republican base and those who are working to end his con game as Trump desperately seeks re-election.

In a July 3 speech at Mount Rushmore, S.D., the Great Misleader warned of “angry mobs” pursuing “far-left fascism” and a “left-wing cultural revolution” that is seeking to remove statues and monuments celebrating Confederate leaders and other US historical figures. “Our nation is witnessing a merciless campaign to wipe out our history, defame our heroes, erase our values, and indoctrinate our children,” he declared.

The following day, he told guests during an Independence Day celebration on the South Lawn of the White House, “We are now in the process of defeating the radical left — the Marxists, the anarchists, the agitators, the looters.”

Police brutality clearly doesn’t bother Trump, who in 2017 called on NFL owners to fire Colin Kaepernick and other NFL players who “took a knee” in protest of police misconduct toward people of color. “That’s a total disrespect of our heritage. That’s a total disrespect of everything that we stand for,” Trump said, apparently endorsing police brutality as part of American heritage. After the NFL in 2018 threatened to fine players who kneel during the National Anthem, he praised the ban, saying, “You have to stand proudly for the national anthem or you shouldn’t be playing, you shouldn’t be there, maybe you shouldn’t be in the country.”

Trump sees little need to reform police departments despite repeated abuses of minorities that have proved fatal. He appears to be more interested in protecting the memory of Confederate heroes whose rebellion against the United States, with the primary purpose of preserving slavery, cost more than 618,000 American lives.

Trump, who has shown reckless disregard for the truth throughout his presidency, wants to run as the “Law and Order” candidate against a threat he has created. He seized on a quote by a man who runs a fringe group that claims to be affiliated with Black Lives Matter in a June 25 tweet: “Black Lives Matter leader states, ‘If U.S. doesn’t give us what we want, then we will burn down this system and replace it’. This is Treason, Sedition, Insurrection!”

Trump was quoting Walter “Hawk” Newsome, who was a guest on Fox News earlier in the day. Newsome also said that BLM activists should be applauded for arming themselves with guns,

A BLM spokesperson told CNBC, “As BLM has told Mr. Newsome in the past, and as is still true today, Mr. Newsome’s group is not a chapter of BLM and has not entered into any agreement with BLM agreeing to adhere to BLM’s core principles.”

A review of the BLM website does not indicate support for attacking police, looting or burning businesses, toppling statues of former slaveholders, or changing the name of Washington, D.C., among controversial positions that have been attributed to the movement. BLM expresses a commitment to “struggling together and to imagining and creating a world free of anti-Blackness, where every Black person has the social, economic, and political power to thrive.”

And BLM appears to be winning public support. A national poll by Ipsos for Public Agenda and USA Today released June 29 found 58% say racial bias against Black Americans by police and law enforcement is a serious problem in their community and 55% of Americans want either major change or to redesign police departments completely. Only 7% want police to stay the same.

The poll also found 60% would support forcing officers to reapply for their jobs to help weed out bad cops and 63% would limit the scope of policing to focus on serious and violent crimes, but people were split over whether to cut off police departments’ ability to buy military gear, with 50% supporting demilitarization.

Media critic Eric Boehlert noted CNN labeled Trump’s address at Mount Rushmore as “impassioned,” the Associated Press reported Trump was merely “offering a discordant tone,” and the Minneapolis Star Tribune’s front page portrayed the event as “patriotic.”

Boehlert, who wrotes at Pressrun.Media, added, “Across the media landscape Trump’s bizarre, unsettling address was whitewashed and described as being ‘fiery’ ...

“There comes a point — and we’re way past it — when reporters covering Trump should be honest with what they’re witnessing. It shouldn’t be left to ‘opinion’ writers to note that Trump speeches aren’t merely ‘divisive’ as the New York Times reported on [July 3]. The speech was undemocratic as Trump demonized civil protesters, and dangerous as he portrayed them as lurking enemies of the state.”

‘Baby Bonds’ Could Boost Low-Income Kids

While many African Americans are calling for the federal government to pay reparations to descendants of slaves, we don’t think it’s a practical way to address inequalities in the United States.

Americans have received compensation for injustices done to them, but we usually don’t wait more than 150 years after the injustice to pay the injured parties. Descendants of Union soldiers who fought and died to free the slaves might argue that they should not now be taxed to pay for reparations to the descendants of those freed slaves. An Ipsos poll conducted for the Associated Press in June found 73% of respondents oppose reparations for Black Americans whose ancestors were slaves as compensations for that slavery.

An alternative to reparations is a proposal that the federal government set up a “Baby Bonds” trust fund for every American child, which would provide an endowment that could be used for college or vocational training or to buy a house when the child reaches adulthood.

The concept of a government-funded nest egg is not unprecedented. Thomas Paine in 1797 called for the government to provide 15 pounds (approximately $1,800 today) to every 21-year-old.

Under the American Opportunity Accounts Act proposal by Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), roughly four million children born every year in the US would receive $1,000 in interest-bearing “American Opportunity Accounts” managed by the Treasury Department, with an estimated 3% annual return. The government would contribute up to $2,000 to each account every year, with lower-income children receiving the largest payments.

By age 18, the children from low-income families would have about $46,200 in their accounts, while the wealthiest children — those in families at five times the poverty level — or $147,100 for a family of four — would end up with $1,681 — the original $1,000 payment plus earnings accrued from the government investing it in low-risk funds, according to an analysis by Booker’s office. Blacks and Latinos would collect nearly twice the amount than whites would, on average, the analysis found. Booker’s plan also would fund existing children.

The program would cost about $60 billion per year, which could be paid for by restoring estate taxes on wealthy Americans to 2009 levels and closing the tax break for inherited capital gains.

The Baby Bond program should be attractive for working-class families of all ethnic descriptions and it has a lot more favorable prospects for passage than a reparations program that would generate considerable resentment. Baby Bounds would do more good for more people, at the expense of the 1%. What’s not to like? — JMC

From The Progressive Populist, August 1, 2020

---

Populist.com

Blog | Current Issue | Back Issues | Essays | Links
About the Progressive Populist | How to Subscribe | How to Contact Us

---

Copyright © 2020 The Progressive PopulistPO Box 819, Manchaca TX 78652

Selections from the August 1, 20 issue

COVER/Brianna Bailey and Maya Miller
CRITICAL CONDITION: She needed lifesaving medication, but the only hospital in town did not have it

EDITORIAL
Trump whistles his racist base

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

DON ROLLINS
Are we ready for a Black Jesus?

RURAL ROUTES/Margot McMillen
Defund police militarization

DISPATCHES
China turns table on Trump, says ‘US epidemic’ is threat to rest of world.
Voters in COVID hotspots know who to blame.
Trump sank himself in Michigan; Biden didn’t have to lift a finger.
Contracts show Trump lets Big Pharma gouge taxpayer-funded COVID drugs.
Shock doctrine in action: Trump friends, former staff cash in on COVID crisis.
Minimum wage rises in some places, but it’s still COVID economy.
Breonna Taylor shooting scandal has so many strands of country's wretched history on race ....

ART CULLEN
Trump directs an assault on our town

BILL JOHNSTON
Trump the draft dodger

JILL RICHARDSON
Learning not to look away

JOHN YOUNG
Stupidity spread in droplets

BOB BURNETT
Five things you can do about racism

JOEL D. JOSEPH
Free trade bill of rights

ROBERTO Dr. CINTLI RODRIGUEZ
Police abuse: Reform or revolution? 

GENE NICHOL
A hard rain

HEALTH CARE/Joan Retsinas
Where are the Republicans’ spines? 

SAM URETSKY
Who do you trust? 

FRANK LINGO
Journalism school refresher

WAYNE O’LEARY
Trump’s bunker and Biden’s box

JOHN BUELL
A just minimum wage does many good things

DAVID SCHMIDT
Prohibiting the peaceful: How nonviolent protests get criminalized here and around the world

SETH SANDRONSKY
Protesting California’s billionaires

BOOK REVIEW/Heather Seggel
Everyday magic

ROB PATTERSON
‘Country music’ for people who don’t like country music

GRASSROOTS/Hank Kalet
Graven images

MOVIE REVIEW/Ed Rampell
Black moviegoers matter: Must ‘Gone with the Wind’ be gone? 

SATIRE/Rosie Sorenson
The reformation of Donald Trump

and more ...

Uncle Don Wants You

Art By Jaklyn Hutchins

Editorial: Trump Goes Full Fascist

Donald Trump must have thought the video of Minneapolis’ Third Precinct Police Station in flames was a gift to his flagging re-election campaign. Perhaps an appeal to law and order, with the video of burning buildings and looters in Minneapolis and elsewhere, would provide the much-needed distraction from his incompetent response to the coronavirus pandemic, which had already claimed more than 100,000 lives since the first cases were reported in February and plunged the nation into the greatest recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s.

But Trump overplayed his hand, berating local and state officials as weak for not doing more to put down the rallies protesting the May 25 killing of George Floyd in the custody of Minneapolis police. Trump invoked the 1807 Insurrection Act to send in federal troops to crush the protests. “We’re going to do something that people haven’t seen before,” he said, “but you got to have total domination, and then you have to put them in jail.”

Then the Trump administration, in one action, violated every tenet of the First Amendment: A half hour before a curfew was supposed to take effect in Washington on June 1, Trump’s minions ordered troops guarding the White House to clear a peaceful crowd from Lafayette Park that included protesters and credentialed journalists. The storm troopers used tear gas canisters, grenades containing rubber pellets and flash bombs to scatter the crowd. They also gassed a priest and seminarian who were providing aid to protesters in front of St. John’s Episcopal Church, to clear the way for Trump to take a photo op brandishing a Bible in front of the boarded-up church.

So Trump scored a hat-trick: He violated the people’s right peaceably to assemble and petition the government for redress of grievances; he abridged the freedom of speech and the press; and he interfered with the nearby church and attacked its clergy, which provoked a blistering response from the Episcopal bishop.

That apparently was one boneheaded move too many for Jim Mattis, the former secretary of defense who previously had refused to criticize Trump. The retired Marine general finally blew his top, calling Trump “the first president in my lifetime who does not try to unite the American people…. Instead, he tries to divide us.” He asked Americans to “reject and hold accountable those in office who would make a mockery of our Constitution.”

Mattis continued: “When I joined the military, some 50 years ago, I swore an oath to support and defend the Constitution. Never did I dream that troops taking that same oath would be ordered under any circumstance to violate the Constitutional rights of their fellow citizens—much less to provide a bizarre photo op for the elected commander-in-chief, with military leadership standing alongside. We know that we are better than the abuse of executive authority that we witnessed in Lafayette Square.”

Taking their cue from Trump, police around the country pursued more aggressive techniques against protesters — shooting rubber bullets and tear gas at protesters, whether they were peaceful or not. In some cases they sprayed pepper irritants in the faces of protesters who were in custody, as well as journalists. Police driving vehicles into a crowed, and in a notorious case in Buffalo, N.Y., where police officers pushed a 75-year-old man and then blamed him for striking his head on the pavement, which caused bleeding from his ear, as the police marched past him.

The Committee to Protect Journalists also reported that more than 300 journalists were assaulted, arrested or otherwise prevented from doing their jobs during protests in 60 cities after Floyd’s death.

The tide of opinion turned against Trump and toward support for Black Lives Matter. A CNN/SSRS poll conducted June 2-5, in the wake of the battle of Lafayette Square, showed just 38% of Americans approved of the way he’s handling his job, down seven points since the previous month, while 57% disapproved. The poll also found 84% said the peaceful protests following the death of Floyd are justified. Americans now consider race relations as important a campaign issue as the economy and health care, according to the survey.

In some small towns, armed vigilantes., primarily white, came out to defend against what they feared were Antifa “invasions” that never happened, after the White House made a baseless claim that Antifa is a terrorist organization that would seek to capitalize on the disorder.

In fact, Antifa is little more than a broad-based movement that is opposed to fascism (the name stands for “anti-fascist”). There is considerably more evidence that right-wing groups, such as the Proud Boys and the Boogaloo Boys, who hope to start a race war, were seeking to capitalize on the disorder. Twitter removed an account that claimed to be Antifa, but actually was run by Identity Evropa, a white supremacist group, which claimed Antifa would “move into residential areas” and “white” neighborhoods, Twitter said.

Trump has favored giving police broad leeway in dealing with suspected criminals, telling police officers on Long Island, N.Y., in July 2017, “Please don’t be too nice” with people they arrest. The audience laughed.

The Obama Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division aggressively investigated complaints against police, which was seen by police unions as a “war on cops.” In 2016, Trump, and his perceived embrace of official impunity for law enforcement officers, got him endorsed by the Fraternal Order of Police — the nation’s largest police union, with more than 330,000 members. Chuck Canterbury, national president of the union, said Trump “will make America safe again.” Many black members dissented.

Trump’s first attorney general, Jeff Sessions, ended the Justice Department’s oversight of local police departments. Sessions declared that such investigations “undermine the respect for police officers and create an impression that the entire department is not doing their work consistent with fidelity to law and fairness.”

Trump’s current attorney general, William Barr, in December 2019 sounded more like a mob consigliere than a guarantor of justice when he warned communities that protest police abuses “might find themselves without the police protection they need.” Barr has maintained the “hands off the cops” approach that suits Trump.

Too many police appear to think they are occupying forces, and that certainly is how a lot of black and brown people see them. The body count of people killed by police tends to confirm those suspicions. Good cops need to embrace the need for reforms that make them fit the role of guardians instead of warriors and give minorities a reason to trust them.

Reforming police does not mean doing away with police. Police should be demilitarized and become more responsive to the communities they patrol.

State and local governments should be responsible for the lawful conduct of their police agencies, but they might need prompting from Congress, and House and Senate Democrats on June 8 unveiled a bill intended to start the overhaul. The Justice in Policing Act would limit legal protections for police who engage in misconduct “knowingly or with reckless disregard,” create a national database of excessive-force incidents, ban chokeholds, including the kind used by the police officer in the death of George Floyd, as well as no-knock warrants in drug cases, a tactic that led to the March death of Breonna Taylor in Louisville, Ky., when police barged into the wrong house. The bill would also would make lynching a federal crime. But it would leave funding decisions to state and local governments, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi noted. That’s a good start. — JMC

From The Progressive Populist, July 1-15, 2020

---

Populist.com

Blog | Current Issue | Back Issues | Essays | Links
About the Progressive Populist | How to Subscribe | How to Contact Us

---

Copyright © 2020 The Progressive PopulistPO Box 819, Manchaca TX 78652