Beware the Ides of March -- U.S. Politics March 2021

i suspect that's news to mitch

Tim Scott, another so-called moderate and another asshole:

Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.), who led his chamber’s GOP police reform effort during the last Congress, predicted that the House bill would go nowhere in the Senate, noting “it’s the same one that they passed before.” However, Scott said he’d spoken to his Democratic counterpart, New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker, in policing talks as recently as last weekend.

“It just depends on their definition of bipartisan,” Scott said, when asked if a compromise was possible. “It depends on whether or not their bill includes demonizing police officers or not.”

https://www.politico.com/states/new-york/city-hall/story/2021/03/04/policing-guns-voting-rights-historic-democratic-goals-hit-senate-skids-1366758

I don’t know why Tim Scott doesn’t just make a thumbs down gesture and call it a day

What is happening now: GOP Sen. Ron Johnson objected to dispense the reading of the bill, forcing the 628-page bill to be read out loud before 20 hours of debate can begin in earnest. A Senate clerk started reading the bill out loud around 3:20 p.m. ET and it is expected to take about 10 hours.

thoughts and prayers to the Senate clerk.

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/03/04/climate-change-john-kerry-talking-to-banks-asset-managers-about-clean-energy.html

Who needs a Green New Deal when you can create exciting new bubbles for Wall Street?

Creating new government financed and publicly owned energy generation and distribution institutions like the New Deal TVA and BPA would be most excellent. Until Congress changes radically, it's so not gonna happen.

I am not an expert on finance wrt the environment, but I doubt SPACS are going to move the needle.

All the while, Hydro-Québec works incredibly well.

Pareene’s podcast is extremely relevant this week:

https://www.stitcher.com/show/the-politics-of-everything-2/episode/the-unnatural-endurance-of-bipartisanship-82125082

The Unnatural Endurance of Bipartisanship

Joe Biden ran for president promising to “revive” the spirit of bipartisanship, put an end to factional battles, and bring Americans together after an era of painful division. Yet faced with an intransigent, extremist Republican Party that has little to gain from compromise, such a vision of politics seems quaint at best. On Episode 26 of The Politics of Everything, hosts Laura Marsh and Alex Pareene look into the history of bipartisanship as an ideal. The show features Paul Blest, a co-founder of Discourse Blog; Ed Burmila, the author of a forthcoming book on the mistakes of the Democratic Party; Osita Nwanevu, a staff writer at The New Republic; and Julian Zelizer, a professor of history at Princeton University. Does bipartisanship have a future in American politics? And, more to the point, should it?

fwiw there’s some pretty solid research on $12/hr being a good federal minimum wage target by 2020 which was, uh, last year obv but there’s nothing magical about the number 15 other than it alliterates with “fight for”. by 2025, according to this analysis, $15/hr starts looking about right.

https://www.epi.org/publication/we-can-afford-a-12-00-federal-minimum-wage-in-2020/

A federal minimum wage of $12.00 in 2020 would return the wage floor to about the same position in the overall wage distribution that it had in 1968.

Tim Scott, another so-called moderate and another asshole

Who thinks Tim Scott is a moderate besides white people?

If you are a Black Republican in the year 2021, you also have QAnon tattoos on your duodenum

Politico and cable news hacks, hence my adjective, alas

I don't trust any non-profit economic think tank, even if it is supposedly a progressive one. Such orgs mostly exist to line the pockets of their boards and high level staff while paying lip service to ideas they don't care about.

$12 isn't a livable wage, period, and anyone saying anything else is an asshole.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fRIegpdFQqk

$12 an hour didn't happen last year and $15 an hour isn't on the table for 2025 anymore so I don't think I understand the point of the thought exercise anyway?

It's also very strange to base it on the wage distribution of 1968, the year that MLK started the Poor People's Campaign because shit was so bleak for so many.

It's a think tank doing what they do best-- absolutely nothing of any fucking value.

I watched that BBC4 documentary on Stax a couple nights ago and the section when it goes through Otis dying and then a few months later MLK being shot in Memphis was so unbelievably sad. There is a clip of that f'n mayor of Memphis talking about the striking garbage workers who really echoed that now might be a different day, but it's the same a$$holes often in charge and same BS. Uncle Sam can be just one mean son of a bitch.

It occurred someone should play straight and pull that old footage and make it look like a Fox right wing broadcast defending it. I think that image would resonate.

a heuristic i have used to sort out voices to listen to on the minimum wage goes something like "there has been a powerful, growing, nationwide movement that has genuine grassroots working class support and person-to-person organizing power, and whose advocates have presumably done their fucking homework and know what they need economically, and it is called Fight For $15, so how about we just trust them that that's a good floor?"

i trust them.

Is that garbage strike well known to the public? Apart from the famous speech that came out of it, which I'd wonder how many people would link to it.
& the situation that triggered teh strike is so appalling. NOt having places to warm themselves and stay out of the rain etc workers would sit inside their trucks and one got turned on and crushed those inside. Always hope that there might be a bottom line for work conditions taht couldn't be sunk below. I mean gosh they were probably warned taht taht was bad practise but like cold is cold and wet is wet and what are you going to do in the middle of a shift. If you're stuck with inhumane conditions you try to do your best with the hand you're dealt etc.
Hope things likie tat are protected against at the moment though, wouldn't be surprised tehy ahdn't progressed at all.

the $12/hr analysis uses 1968 because that was the historical peak of the minimum wage. but you’re right milo, there’s nothing magic about a “peak” that still left millions of people in poverty. did you know the poor people’s campaign still exists by the way? they think $12/hr is trash. anyway i still think it’s useful to see what it would take to get us to that 1968 peak, and the strong evidence that there would be very little negative repercussions for the wider economy. aita??

as i’ve said many times here, if the minimum wage had kept pace with productivity growth since the late 60s it would be north of $20/hr right now - which seems better than either of those numbers!

xpost

$12/hour = 25k a year. that's way too low. it's better than what it is now, yes, so of course I'd rather $12 than 7.25 an hour, but you also have to remember that most of these jobs that will be paying this amount won't give their employees much opportunity for advancement, so it'll get worse as inflation keeps growing.

$15/hour isn't actually *that much money* either but it's $31,200 per year, which isn't great but gives people more of a fighting chance.

when I was making $12/hour I was still living with my parents. after taxes, that came out to about $800 a pay period (semi-monthly).

so $1600/month. let's say you have a car note of $300/month

$1300 left.

let's say you want to ....eat. and you spend $50/week on groceries/food

$1100 left

Ok, you drive places and you fill up once a week. that's .....let's say $35/week

$960 left

Student loans? $100/month?

$860 left

if you're renting a one bedroom, where I live, you're already fucked. if you're doing the roommate thing, you could possibly get by on $500/month. so let's say you do that

$360 left - or $12/day to do....anything else really.

Good morning!

good morning Alfred your rent is due please send to me via check or money order

my condo association fees are due today, actually, thanks for the reminder

Meanwhile, anyone left alive in the Senate?

Dems seem to have outplayed GOP on the Covid delay. After the all-night reading, @ChrisVanHollen simply got up, proposed shortening the debate from 20 hours to 3 and no Republican including @RonJohnsonWI was around to contest. In the end, the dramatic Bill reading delayed nothing

— Jim Sciutto (@jimsciutto) March 5, 2021

lol

hahahaha

the modern-day Poor People's Campaign is a different organization from MLK's afaik. established in 2017.

Parlolmentary procedure

thanks crut - didn’t realise that.

here's your minimum wage shit list

Joe Manchin (WV)
Jon Tester (MT)
Jeanne Shaheen (NH)
Maggie Hassan (NH)
Angus King (ME)
Kyrsten Sinema (AZ)
Tom Carper (DE)
Chris Coons (DE)

+ 50 GOP

What's up with the Northeasters?

they make too much money

half will come out with statements about how they really really really really support the minimum wage increase but can't get past the oath they swore to defend Senate traditions and the parliamentarian unto death

UI benefits now lowered to $300 too?

xp Right. Even if they claim that the vote is about process, they're basically saying that they think respecting the parliamentarian is ultimately more important than raising the minimum wage.

goddammit. that's so unnecessary and stupid.

they extended it another month which is their way of saying "see, it's still the same amount of money!", but that only works if your landlord only charges you for one month of rent across August/Sept

supposedly the proposal would also make the first $10,200 in unemployment insurance benefits nontaxable.

that really only helps you next year though

well, ok, this year if you were having federal withholding proactively taken from it i guess

Democrats won the Senate by campaigning on $2,000 checks.

Then we had to message $600+$1,400=$2,000.

Then we narrowed eligibility = 17 million fewer people getting checks under Biden v. Trump.

All to save $12B in a $1.9T package with no GOP support. All for a couple moderates.

— Sawyer Hackett (@SawyerHackett) March 5, 2021

aide to Julian Castro - it's maybe not just Brooklyn podcasters and DSA Twitter who think $1400 vs. $2000 (followed by 'no check for you') is a fuck up.

Maggie Hassan (NH)

i feel like i pay a decent amount of attention to national politics, and yet there's always at least one senators where i'm like "who the fuck are you? never heard of ya"

RONALD REAGAN WAS ELECTED IN 1980. THAT WAS 41 YEARS AGO. THERE ARE NO MORE 'REAGAN DEMOCRATS.' THEY'RE ALL DEAD. FUCK THE FUCK OFF WITH THIS BULLSHIT.

The Rise of the Biden Republicans
The pollster who identified “Reagan Democrats” in the 1980s sees the emergence of a mirror image voting bloc. And it spells trouble for a GOP dominated by Trump.

she's up for re-election next year too, after winning by less than 800 votes in 2016

xp

the bill is a good thing for many many people, and the child credit component is going to help a lot of people. but the bill could have been way better if idiot moderates hadn't been allowed to water the fucking thing down.

even the child credit was watered down to one year

"all for a couple of moderates". there were 8?

i mean those are bad votes, but i'm not sure what the other 42 were supposed to do.

(biden on the other hand can eat shit for not grabbing some lapels and leaning over people and yelling at them from the toilet johnson-style on this.)