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It shouldnt take a global pandemic to bring to light the impact of the Republican partys war on the working class, but now that its here, the real-life consequences of their coddling of big business is plain to see. Along with the health threat of the coronavirus, workers now must also worry about the economic consequences of staying home sick without pay. Thats why the coronavirus economic relief bill put forward by the House Democrats required paid sick leave.

But ever watchful for corporate interests over those of working men and women, Congressional Republicans and the Trump administration balked and demanded that companies with more than 500 employees be exempted. Together with hardship exemptions for small businesses with fewer than 50 employees, the benefit could exclude up to 80 percent of workers. While many large employers do offer sick leave, not all do, and few offer the 10 days or more needed to address coronavirus recovery times. Other large employers have announced temporary changes to grant sick leave during the current crisis, but still refuse to offer the benefit as a matter of course.

When the economic security of millions of hourly workers is threatened in unprecedented ways, its an outrage that Republican leadership is more concerned about corporate profits already fattened by their 2017 trillion-dollar tax cut than the welfare of ordinary Americans.

At a time when we need to desperately flatten the curve to reduce demands on the U.S. healthcare system that will be stretched beyond its breaking point, low-wage workers will be confronted with the untenable decision of showing up to work sick or staying home without pay.

Meanwhile, hypocrites like Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL), who as a state legislator backed a bill prohibiting Florida cities and counties from requiring paid sick leave, left work to self-quarantine with full pay and no risk of being fired.

Quite simply, Republicans continue to protect billion-dollar companies rather than the workers who generate their profits. As Rep. Rosa DeLaura (D-3rd District), remarked, It should not and must not take a pandemic to get working people the economic relief and stability they need.

Alone among the developed world, the United States does not have a national paid sick leave law because corporate lobbyists like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce consistently oppose it, abetted by Republican leaders like Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) who call it part of a Democratic ideological wish list.

While 12 states and the District of Colombia require paid sick leave (with Connecticut being the first do so, in 2011), the trend has been the opposite in Republican-controlled state legislatures. Not satisfied to block state-level laws requiring paid sick leave, 22 Republican governors have made it illegal for municipalities in their states to require paid sick leave, pushed by the Koch brothers and the conservative American Legislative Exchange Council.

Conservative legislators and business lobbyists are blocking paid sick leave at the expense of public health. A recent study found that requiring paid sick leave reduced cases of flu by 11 percent in the first year following implementation of the law. Considering the flu kills from 12,000 to more than 50,000 Americans each year, corporate greed and GOP opposition to paid sick leave is very likely killing Americans. The impact may be magnified, as lower-paid workers who are most likely to lack paid sick leave are more likely to be jobs with above-average contact with the public, such as food service workers, four out of five of whom dont have paid sick leave.

Opponents of paid sick leave claim it is too costly for employers. The argument lacks merit. There are many companies that do look out for their employees, and their customers, and manage to turn a profit. A just-released working paper by the National Bureau of Economic Research estimates that paid sick leave, on average, costs just three cents per hour worked.

In 2017 President Trump and the GOP pushed through a tax cut that led to a record $800 billion of stock buybacks by companies newly flush with cash. But mandating a paid sick leave benefit costing less than one-half percent of the $7.25 federal minimum wage? Dead on arrival.

Jonathan Perloe lives in Greenwich.

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Republicans again value corporate profits over the working women and men - The CT Mirror

Every week, Rewire.News highlights trends in abortion-related legislation moving through the states, and how those bills might affect abortion access. This week, we look at Wyomings dubious born-alive bill, a trigger law in Idaho, and anti-abortion efforts in Kentucky.

Wyoming

A bill based on the anti-abortion myth that doctors commit infanticide after so-called failed abortions passed the Wyoming House last Wednesday, two weeks after it passed the state senate. SF 97 now heads to the desk of Gov. Mark Gordon (R), an opponent of abortion rights.

Republicans in state legislatures across the country, as well as U.S. Senate Republicans, have pushed similar born-alive legislation, which relies on misinformation about later abortion care disseminated by anti-choice activists and legislators.

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The Wyoming bill, which would impose a penalty up to 14 years in prison for a physician who violated its provisions, is even more punitive than the U.S. Senate legislation. Democratic lawmakers opposed to the bill expressed concern, according to the Casper Star-Tribune, about the chilling penalties that could cause physicians to pause or even decline to facilitate procedures necessary to save a life or prevent further suffering by the childeven if requested by the parent.

Wyoming already prohibits abortion after viability, except to protect the pregnant persons life or health, and physicians in the state only provide first-trimester abortion care, according to the American Civil Liberties Union of Wyoming.

Two other anti-choice Wyoming billsa near-total abortion ban and a 48-hour forced waiting periodfailed to advance in the legislature this session.

Idaho

In a party-line vote last Thursday, Republicans in the Idaho Senate passed a so-called trigger ban that would prohibit legal abortion if U.S. Supreme Court conservatives strike down Roe v. Wade.

Idaho had passed a trigger law after the landmark Roe decision in 1973, but it was repealed in 1990, the Post Register reported. Under the bill now being considered in the Republican-dominated legislature, a doctor would face up to five years in prison for providing abortion care. SB 1385 was referred to a house committee for a possible hearing, the Post Register reported.

Eight states already have trigger laws on the books; Utah will soon become the ninth if the states governor signs a bill passed by the Republican-controlled legislature Thursday.

Kentucky

Kentuckys Republican-controlled house passed legislation last Tuesday that seeks to amend the state constitution to state that it doesnt guarantee a right to abortion. If HB 67 receives three-fifths of the vote in the state senatewhere Republicans hold 29 of 38 seatsthe amendment will then go before voters this fall, the Louisville Courier-Journal reported.

Amending the state constitution is a tactic used by Republicans in several state legislatures this year.

House Republicans also approved HB 451, a measure that wouldincrease the power of the Republican state attorney general to seek penalties against abortion clinics for violating medically unnecessary regulations. Lawmakers said the bill, which would allow the attorney general to act without the authorization of Democratic Gov. Andy Beshears administration, would turn the attorney general into a special prosecutor against abortion clinics, theCourier-Journal reported. The legislation now heads to the state senate.

Originally posted here:
Wyoming Republicans Attack Later Abortion Care: Spotlight on the States - Rewire.News

A new NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll has revealed sharp partisan divides between Americans over the coronavirus pandemic.

The poll found 68 percent of Democrats are worried that someone in their family could catch the virus, while just 40 percent of Republicans and 45 percent of independents share that concern.

The gulf in perception over an outwardly nonpolitical issue underscores how signals from politicians and media outlets have played a critical role in shaping how seriously Americans are taking a viral outbreak that has overwhelmed health care systems and triggered mass quarantines in several countries around the world.

Nearly 80 percent of Democrats believe the worst is yet to come, but just 40 percent of Republicans and 57 percent of independents believe that. Overall, 53 percent of all voters are concerned that someone in their immediate family might contract the coronavirus, and 60 percent believe the worst is yet to come.

The poll also found 56 percent of Democrats believe their day-to-day lives will change in a major way in the future while just 26 percent of Republicans hold that view.

In response to every question about whether a respondent would change plans that would expose them to others, like travel, eating out at restaurants, and attending large gatherings, Democratic voters consistently responded affirmatively at much higher rates than Republicans. For example, 61 percent of Democrats said theyve stopped or plan to stop attending large public gatherings, but only 30 percent of Republicans said the same.

The partisan disconnect is not due to a lack of information among conservatives or a function of not hearing much about the outbreak in certain regions of the country. NBC reports that 99 percent of respondents said theyve seen, heard, or read about the spread of the coronavirus and 89 percent say theyve heard a lot about it the highest percentage that one of their polls has found for a major event since 2009.

The more likely explanation is that, as with so many other issues, people with different political ideologies consume different kinds of information and take cues on how to think about events from different political figures and institutions. Given that President Donald Trump and media institutions that cater to conservative audiences, like Fox News, have been downplaying the issue from day one, its not surprising that Republican voters are not nearly as alarmed as Democrats.

Still, as the virus spreads and more people know someone affected, the typical partisan divides might not hold.

Ever since it has been clear that the US was at risk of a serious outbreak of the novel coronavirus, Trump has continually downplayed the risks it poses and dragged his feet on policy responses that would help contain and mitigate the spread of the virus. Reporting indicates that he has done this in part because hes worried about the political damage that would accompany treating the situation as a full-blown crisis.

As Voxs German Lopez has explained, Trump has underplayed whats at stake on many occasions:

Trump himself has tweeted comparisons of Covid-19 to the common flu which [director of the Harvard Global Health Institute Ashish] Jha describes as really unhelpful, because the novel coronavirus appears to be much worse. Trump also called concerns about the virus a hoax. He said on national television that, based on nothing more than a self-admitted hunch, the death rate of the disease is much lower than public health officials projected.

And Trump has rejected any accountability for the botched testing process: I dont take responsibility at all, he said on Friday.

Jha described the Trump administrations messaging so far as deeply disturbing, adding that its left the country far less prepared than it needs to be for what is a very substantial challenge ahead.

Trump also downplayed the issue by initially declining to get tested for it despite close contact with people who tested positive for the virus last week. He also never self-isolated despite being at risk of carrying the virus and spreading it to others (public health experts say it is possible to spread the virus even if youre not showing symptoms).

Trump did eventually get tested days after his exposure and on Saturday, the White House physician said the test was negative. But his behavior stood in stark contrast to Republican politicians like Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, who has self-quarantined after learning he came in contact with people who have tested positive for the coronavirus. Cruz reports he is currently showing no symptoms.

Conservative news outlets like Fox News have also promoted skepticism of the seriousness of the coronavirus as a serious health hazard as part of an effort to shield the Trump administration from criticism. Here are just a few examples, via progressive watchdog Media Matters:

- Fox prime-time host Sean Hannity claimed people are faking concern about coronavirus just to bludgeon Trump with this new hoax.

- On her Saturday night show, Fox host Jeanine Pirro downplayed the possibility that the coronavirus is more deadly than the flu, arguing that thats only because theres a flu vaccine and if not for the vaccine, the flu would be a pandemic. Pirro somehow drew the conclusion that this means that the talk about coronavirus being so much more deadly [than the flu] doesnt reflect reality.

- Fox host Pete Hegseth downplayed the impact of coronavirus: I feel like the more I learn about this, the less there is to worry about.

- On Hannity, Fox News medical correspondent Marc Siegel said that the worst case scenario with coronavirus is that it could be the flu.

Other prominent right-wing commentators like radio personality Rush Limbaugh have painted coronavirus fears as a ploy to stop Trump rallies.

Messaging from Trump and hard-right news outlets like Fox News has diverged from the consensus among scientists and public health experts around the world who have indicated coronavirus is a serious health hazard that could easily overwhelm the US health care system and kill millions of Americans if not taken seriously by the federal government.

While mainstream and liberal media outlets have focused on pleas from the public health and scientific communities about the serious risks posed by the coronavirus, some conservative outlets and the Trump administration have gone the opposite way. And that in turn has led to a gap between liberals and conservatives on how seriously to take it.

Experts say that by the time everyone takes it seriously, it may be too late to mitigate risks.

Read the original post:
Poll: Democrats are more worried about the coronavirus than Republicans - Vox.com

For Brad Mole, venturing into Republican politics didnt start with a sudden awakening to conservatism. It was his religious upbringing and way of life that brought him to the Republican party.

My faith pushed me more toward policies that better reflected my upbringing, he said. I began understanding that the teachings I was raised with more reflected in a party that not many around me identified with.

The son of a preacher in the Lowcountry region of South Carolina, Mole is now taking his politics a giant leap forward, challenging the Democrat Joe Cunningham for his US congressional seat.

As analysts debunk the myth of the black voter monolith, some black Republicans are stepping forward to counter stereotypes and assert a political identity very different from the usual assumption that all black Americans are Democrats, especially in the era of President Donald Trump.

As one of seven Republicans running for the seat, Mole credits his religious background for his motivations to join the crowded race. Those same traditions are often associated with centrist African American political leanings. But for black Americans like Mole, their conservatism leads some to question whether their political party and preferences actually match their worldview.

I am the typical black person who voted for Barack Obama, but I then voted for Trump, he said. At some point you think for yourself and say: You know what? Im not voting this person or this ticket just because my grandma or parents did.

Ahead of a June Republican primary and the 2020 presidential election, Mole says he is connecting with fellow voters in ways he said speak more to the nuance of conservative cultural traditions.

He is not alone. Kaaryn Walker, president of Black Conservatives for Truth, founded the advocacy group as an outlet for black Americans to connect with one another and draw attention to conservative policy initiatives.

Sometimes you find that people share the same politics you do, but because of fear or backlash, black people dont talk about it, said Walker.

If you want to see the Republican party be more diverse, you have to see us being active in the party, she said.

Walker has identified as a conservative for more than 25 years, pointing to her pro-life leanings and support for free market economics. Like Mole, an upbringing steeped in tradition led her to a closer affiliation with Republicans than the Democratic party her family typically supported.

In her outreach, she often challenges others to rethink how Democratic platforms represent black values.

We engage on policy and thats when people start seeing distinctions, she said. People start seeing other like-minded conservatives and say: My policy and mindset doesnt fit the Democratic party and thats OK.

In the decades since the notorious Southern Strategy saw white southerners flock to the Republican party in the wake of the successes of the civil rights movement, black voters have maintained close ties with Democrats that has remained steady throughout much of the late 20th and early 21st centuries.

Modern black Republicans arent a particularly new phenomenon, though. Several conservatives, including the former Republican party chair Michael Steele and former secretary of state Condoleezza Rice, have led prominent Republican initiatives that, in the past, sparked speculation of potential presidential runs.

The South Carolina senator Tim Scott has more recently stepped forward as one of the presidents most loyal supporters and has been at the forefront of the Trump administrations efforts to appeal to black voters.

Still, as the Republican party began leaning further right in the 2010s, black Americans moved left. The numbers bear out the dominance of the Democrats. More than 88% of black Americans voted for the Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016. But Walker insisted pundits shouldnt rule out black support for the president this time around.

Narrowing the wage gap, the First Step Act for prison reform, investing in black colleges, she said. Those of us proud of that progress are doing the work of educating the people who are ignorant to it.

Pew data collected in 2017 found that although African American voters remain overwhelmingly Democratic, that identification has declined modestly in recent years.

About two-thirds of African Americans identified as Democrats, down from the first half of Barack Obamas presidency. Back then, about 75% of black Americans were affiliated with the Democratic party.

In addition, Pew noted that just 8% of black voters identify as Republican, the same percent as voted for Trump in 2016. African Americans are 11% of the American electorate overall.

As Democratic campaigns face increasing demand to center black voter diversity, the Trump administration took notice, investing additional campaign dollars on aggressive outreach to African American communities.

Those initiatives include campaign ads in traditional black media outlets and a slew of Black Voices for Trump rallies at makeshift community storefronts in key battleground states.

In a press release announcing the initiative, the Trump campaign pinpointed record-low minority unemployment rates and investments in historically black colleges and universities, as evidence of the presidents continued commitment to black communities.

President Trump has a real record of results for black Americans, and our party is committed to sharing that winning message far and wide, the Republican national committee chairwoman, Ronna McDaniel, said.

Opponents of Trump point to his controversial past with race, including a history of housing discrimination lawsuits. Although one in six black Americans are the children of immigrants, Trump has called Caribbean and African nations shithole countries, recently banning migrants from several African nations.

Most notable are a series of print ads in 1989 calling for the death penalty for the now-exonerated Central Park Five. Authorities involved in the case later said the ads contributed to the black and Latino mens wrongful convictions.

Walker admits an uphill battle in wooing fellow African Americans who take issue with the presidents record. She counters criticisms of being a traitor to her race by contending no one person is representative of the party values.

If the only reason that youre a Democrat is because you think the Republicans are racist then you need to go back and figure out why youre really a Democrat, she said.

Racism does not discriminate by party, and you see that playing out right now in the Democratic primaries with misstep after misstep.

But the vitriol has gotten intense. Walker recalled being unfriended, blocked or disinvited from events many times in recent years.

The rise of prominent black Republican figures whose platforms stoke controversy can also make her a target.

Sometimes Ill get a call to my phone or social media and a phantom voice is yelling, screaming and cursing at me, she said. But then theyre surprised when I respond with Are you done? Now lets try that again and actually have a dialogue because thats what politics are about.

To Mole, pushback is an opportunity to engage. He noted peer support for his platform seldom wanes even after he mentions his name will appear on the ballot with an R.

Sometimes you get a look, or an I dont know about that but, most times, from just talking, folks open up and realize for themselves just how conservative their values are.

But hes not out to change minds; he wants rebuild a sense of community.

Pointing to recent White House forums tackling black issues alongside fellow Scott, the senator, Mole said there was a momentum building most would overlook one that motivates him as he canvasses the state.

People out there are looking for someone thats going to listen to them and one of the first things my party can do is just come to the table, he said. Im willing to have those conversations where people of either party dont go, to speak to the issues.

Although he is a heavy underdog, its those kitchen-table discussions on shared traditional values Mole hopes will draw voters out in June, and again in November, regardless of his placing in the state primary.

Walker insisted whats at stake is bigger than any one election or polarizing president.

Were a community whose principles and convictions are silenced in the broader narrative of black voters, she said. But were here fighting to preserve our conservative culture as we vote Republican across the country.

See the rest here:
How black Republicans are debunking the myth of a voter monolith - Getaka.co.in

If the slow-on-the-uptake response to COVID-19 by the White House seems a little familiar to you, youre definitely not imagining it. As if were caught in some sort of Groundhog Day loop in the time-space continuum, weve absolutely been here before. Cue I Got You Babe on the alarm clock.

I realize too many Americans have gnat-like attention spans and even shorter memories, so Ill be specific. Beyond several details, the Trump presidency is looking an awful lot like the second term of the George W. Bush presidency. To his credit, Mike Pence hasntshot anyone in the face, but were seeing a traffic jam of similar events: a crisis with a growing death toll, a painfully tone-deaf, slow and inept government response,a financial meltdownand an out-of-controlbudget deficit. (Trump promised toeliminatethe deficit.) Only now, its all happening at the same time.

The Republican-led geyser of insanity that landed in our laps between 2005 and 2009 is back for an encore, and its horrifying.

Do we seea pattern here yet?

Wed have to be blind not to. For reasons that will forever confound historians, 62 million Americans, many of whom were still tangled in the nets of the previous Republican catastrophes, decided itd be a great idea toown the libs by giving the Republican Party another chance at running the federal government, not to mention Congress. This time, however, they landed on a candidate with zero experience, zero aptitude for government work, zero regard for anything other than his own popularity and, as a bonus, a history of personal financial disasters including bankrupted casinos, a fraudulent university and an even more fraudulent charitable foundation.

Trump voters justified this choice by suggesting that an obnoxious, undisciplined businessman whosold steaks in Sharper Image mall stores was fully qualified to run the worlds most powerful government (which isnt at all like a business). This was like shoving a carnie who runs the Tilt-a-Whirl into the cockpit of a Space-X rocket. Maybe hell stir things up, they thought, choosing to experiment with the presidency by handing an erratic weirdo the nuclear codes. What could possibly go wrong? For starters, the rocket is nosediving, and were all passengers, including the voters who put us here.

We tried to warn the Red Hats. We tried to remind themwhat happened the last time around. But rather than employing basic common sense or, at the very least, a Google search for what went down during the previous, slightly less moronic Republican administration, they decided to jam their faces into the GOP propeller blades once again, and here we are. Ned The Head Ryerson should be along any second now, refusing to abide social distancing.

Whether it was refusing to acknowledge the onset of the virus orclosing down the pandemic response unita couple of years ago, the Trump White House bungled this from the beginning, likely worsening the death toll and precipitating the collapse of the financial markets. Meanwhile, Trumps tax cuts ended up benefiting Trumps wealthy Mar-a-Lago guests far more than the forgotten men and women of America and there was no way to pay for them, adding still more billions to the deficit. Weve also seen this dynamic play out at the state level, for example with former Kansas Gov. Sam Brownback and his tax cut experiment, which nearly bankrupted the state rather than creating the explosive economic growth he promised.

Say what you will about the Democratic Party, but history has illustrated that Democratic presidents are infinitely better at governing than any recent Republican. I mean, its shocking that the party that wants to drown government in the bathtub doesnt know how to govern, nor is interested in learning. But notice how Trump and Bush each eagerly embraced big government when their asses and legacies were on the line.

Trump arrived in Washington believing he could tweet, blurt foul nicknames and show off his executive orders like a big boy, and everything would work out great. It turns out that being president requires more vision, discipline and actual knowledge than he thought, and thats just the very basic skill set.

Much to Trumps surprise, when the disasters stacked up, he couldnt bullshit his way through like hes done so many times before. If it werent for his life support system at Fox News Channel, not to mention his loyalists on CapitolHill, Trump wouldve been forced to resign after Charlottesville if he had even been elected in the first place, which would have beendoubtful without the late Roger Ailes, Mitch McConnell and, yes, Vladimir Putin. Theyll all try like hell now, but I wonder whether they can put President Humpty back together again.

During his inaugural address, Trump referred to the Obama years as American carnage, and promised to make America great again. It turns out, a no drama competent family man who kicked off the heretofore longest economic expansion in history wasnt anything close to being American carnage that was another Trump lie, eagerly swallowed by his own people. It turns out that while theres always room for improvement,economic growth,job creationandother indicatorswere equal to or more robust during the so-called carnage under Obama.

Indeed, carnage is what were seeing now as we wake up to our shocking new normal for the foreseeable future. But even before the COVID-19 crisis, even before the financial crisis, there was the Trump Crisis the daily institution-crushing mayhem erupting from Trumps phone, from federal investigators and from the fast-moving process of turning the executive branch into a subsidiary of the Trump Organization. It was only a matter of time before Trumps flimsy, brittle presidency, built on make-believe and held together with masking tape and spit by Fox News, fell apart. Sadly, were all getting hit by the debris from the crash.

The only way to break this cycle is to take a step back, turn off the Fox News fairy tales about big hands and perfect hair, and reprioritize the question of who ought to be leading the country. As wecovered last week, those leaders should never again be slack-jawed morons you hypothetically want to have a beer with, and they definitely shouldnt be loudmouth wannabe mobsters turned game-show hosts. Were dangerously close to fighting the next pandemic with Brawndo unless this ridiculousness is finally shocked out of our system.

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The Republican-led geyser of insanity that landed in our laps between 2005 and 2009 is back for an encore and its horrifying - AlterNet