Wednesday, March 25th, 2020
JONATHAN EASLEY, - The Hill
Stephan: This is amazing to me. I don't see how Trump's performance in this crisis could be worse. He has been a disaster at every turn. So what does one conclude since his approval rating has gone up? I am afraid it is that something has gone seriously wrong in America, and men and women in this country simply lack the capacity to assess what is going on. That is our political reality.
President Trump’s job approval rating has jumped by 5 points in the latest Gallup survey, matching the high point of his presidency, as a majority of voters say they have a positive view of how the president has handled the coronavirus pandemic.
The new poll finds Trump’s job approval rating at 49 percent, up from 44 percent in the same survey earlier this month. The 49 percent job approval rating is the high mark for Trump since he came into office. He first hit that mark in late January, shortly before he was acquitted by the Senate in his impeachment trial.
The president’s job approval rating has remained steady among Republicans (92 percent), but he’s gained 8 points among independents (43 percent) and 6 points among Democrats (13 percent).
It appears that Trump’s handling of the coronavirus response is behind the approval rating bump. Sixty percent of voters overall said they approve of the job Trump is doing to address the epidemic, including 94 percent of Republicans, 60 percent of independents and 27 percent of Democrats.
Trump […]
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Tuesday, March 24th, 2020
Stephan: Here is an important interview with Anthony Fauci. I will let the doctor speak for himself, and you can draw your own conclusions.
U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a Coronavirus Task Force news conference in the briefing room of the White House in Washington, D.C., U.S., on Friday, March 20, 2020. Americans will have to practice social distancing for at least several more weeks to mitigate U.S. cases of Covid-19, Anthony S. Fauci of the National Institutes of Health said today.
Credit: Al Drago/Bloomberg/Getty Images
Anthony Fauci, who to many watching the now-regular White House press briefings on the pandemic has become the scientific voice of reason about how to respond to the new coronavirus, runs from place to place in normal times and works long hours. Now, the director of National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases has even less time to sleep and travels at warp speed, typically racing daily from his office north of Washington, D.C., to his home in the capital, and then to the White House to gather with the Coronavirus Task Force in the Situation Room. He then usually flanks President Donald Trump addressing the media—and when he […]
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Tuesday, March 24th, 2020
Adam Gaffney, Faculty Harvard Medical School - Guardian (U.K.)
Stephan: Yet another voice saying what I have been saying for years; a point made more dramatic because of the failures of the illness profit system in this pandemic. My hope is that the one good thing to come out of this mess is the recognition that we must have universal birthright single-payer healthcare; a system whose first priority is wellbeing not profit.
Trump signed into law a bill that would make Covid-19 testing – but not treatment – free.’
Credit: Vanessa Carvalho/REX/Shutterstock
At the final debate of the Democratic presidential primary on Sunday, Senator Bernie Sanders and Joe Biden clashed on the coronavirus. Sanders contended the pandemic laid bare “the incredible weakness and dysfunctionality” of the US healthcare system, and called for single-payer reform. Biden countered that Italy’s universal system had failed to protect the Mediterranean nation, and asserted that Covid-19 “has nothing to do with Bernie’s Medicare for All”. At first glance, the ex-vice-president seems right: of course single-payer can’t close the door to a novel virus, any more than it can forestall a deadly earthquake or fend off a zombie apocalypse. Nonetheless, a national health program with unified financing and governance – basically the opposite of what we have in America today – is a powerful tool in a health crisis.
The debate over Medicare for All in the age of Covid-19 is complicated by the fact that it is […]
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Tuesday, March 24th, 2020
José Andrés, - The New York Times
Stephan: It is my view that all these kitchen and restaurant workers who have been laid off, ought to be hired for a kind of modern WPA program to cook food for the poor, the elderly, children, the disabled, in restaurant kitchens the government rented for the duration, so that all those Americans who now face a food crisis, as well as the workers themselves, would be taken care of, and remain productive. If we had a decent human being as president that might have happened. But, of course, it hasn't and won't. Instead, people like José Andrés, Chef and Owner of ThinkFoodGroup and founder of World Central Kitchen have stepped up, as they have done again and again, to meet the need. I think Andrés should be given the Nobel Peace Prize.
José Andrés, Chef/Owner of ThinkFoodGroup and founder of World Central Kitchen
Writing in the middle of two devastating cholera pandemics in the early 1800s, the great French culinary thinker Brillat-Savarin articulated a truth we urgently need to grasp today: “The destiny of nations depends on how they feed themselves.”
The coronavirus pandemic threatens to create both a public health and economic catastrophe. But we cannot afford to ignore the humanitarian crisis that is unfolding out of sight.
Our fate as a nation depends on how we feed our most vulnerable citizens through this crisis. If our leaders step up now with federal aid, food can be the solution — supporting millions of jobs while also feeding millions of people in desperate need.
There is historical precedent for spending federal dollars to preserve jobs and serve the public: the Works Progress Administration of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal. Over eight years, the W.P.A. put more than eight million Americans to work, building schools, hospitals and vital infrastructure. Today […]
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Tuesday, March 24th, 2020
Andrea Germanos and Jon Queally, Staff Writers - Common Dreams
Stephan: Scumbags, whether individual or corporate, always seek to turn crises to their personal or corporate advantage, and the dying nuclear power industry presents us with a prime example of this in the midst of the Coronavirus pandemic.
The Three Mile Island Nuclear Plant is seen in the early morning hours March 28, 2011 in Middletown, Pennsylvania.
Credit: Jeff Fusco/Getty
Friends of the Earth on Monday accused the nuclear power industry of exhibiting “disaster capitalism at its worst” after a lobbying group representing it reportedly asked the Trump administration for a 30% percent tax credit amid the coronavirus pandemic and pressed congressional lawmakers to include handouts in stimulus legislation making its way through the House and Senate.
According to E&E News, which focuses on the energy industry, the request came in a letter sent to congressional leaders and White House officials on Friday by Nuclear Energy Institute president and CEO Maria Korsnick.
In addition to other forms of aid—including sick leave for employees and “prioritized access” to testing and masks—the letter requested taxpayer-funded grants in the form of broad tax credits and waivers for existing regulatory fees.
“Our member companies are anticipating—or are already experiencing—severe financial strain as product orders are delayed or canceled, as industrial electricity demand falls, and as workforce availability becomes increasingly […]
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