President Biden extends the student loan payment holiday through the end of August. Presumably he could order another one in late August as a midterm-booster -- recall that time Republicans called a vote on war with Iraq before a midterm! -- or he could decide to forgive a mere $10,000 in student loans per person and count the money unpaid during the payment holiday toward that amount. That would seem awfully anticlimactic, but it would have served as a pretty good 30-month stimulus. Personal to those who find this debt holiday "inflationary": you still think corporations aren't inflating prices on purpose?
Eric Blanc at Jacobin talks to Amazon Labor Union organizer/night shift worker Angelika Maldonado about "How We Beat Amazon." I'll admit I was a little stunned to see how many Amazon workers told organizers you don't even work here (although they did!) just because Amazon bosses told them that! I guess you don't know everyone in a large warehouse -- recall that almost 5,000 workers voted in the union election. The winning formulae, apparently, include a) talking to everyone you can on their breaks and b) coming in on your off-time and talking to everyone you can on their breaks (which our laws allow, as long as you're not actually on the clock).
Hard to believe, Harry, but Republican-run states and cities generally have higher murder rates than those run by Democrats, and if you're suspicious that the Third Way study tabulates murder from 2020, which was not exactly a typical year, note well that similar studies have found the same results in Southern (and thus almost exclusively Republican-run) states for at least a decade. I think "crime waves" are largely a right-wing invention, but I'd rather have data in hand about other crimes before declaring victory over Republican crime hysteria. I'd also, you know, like to see things like pollution and bankster predation routinely included in crime data.
I don't like to merely tabulate Republican hypocrisy, but even I was astounded at the level of chutzpah Donald Trump's sons evince by complaining that Hunter Biden is "mak(ing) millions off (his) father's presidency." The Trump family took, on average, five trips requiring Secret Service protection per day, and mostly to "promote Trump Organization businesses," per Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. At the risk of violating Godwin's Law, the Trump kids accusing Hunter Biden of profiting off his father's presidency is like Adolf Hitler complaining about other people's anti-Semitism.
When I hear that accusations of pedophilia and "grooming" are "the new Red Scare," I think that's about right -- nothing puts the chill in someone like the thought that their child could be sexually molested. But will right-wingers be smart enough this time to avoid libel or slander charges? Because that would chill this particular stratagem right quick. I'm not sure Rep. Greene could escape those charges in calling Sens. Romney, Murkowski, and Collins "pro-pedophile," and I sure as hell would like to see Mitt Romney, for example, get all Jack Palance on her and say prove it.
Finally, Democrats now say they'll meet Joe Manchin wherever he is on a massive reconciliation bill, and they'll do it by Memorial Day. At last they're calling his bluff! Are they finally learning? Or will they be caught flat-footed, again, when he says but I want this to go through committees? My money is on Joe Manchin dragging this out precisely so that it'll fail and doom Democrats' hopes of surviving the midterms, all so his absurd notion of "bipartisanship" will survive. One thing's for sure, though: one way or another, his tenure as One True Great and Real American President will be over the day after Election Day.
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