Stephan: The Republican Party so far as I can see Is not interested in democracy or in social wellbeing. There is only one thing that interests Republican politicians -- power. They like the pay. They like the healthcare. They like the deference their titles afford them. They like the insider information they can use to enrich themselves.
Fox propagandist Laura Ingraham speaking at the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC)
Herd immunity just ain’t happening, folks. Once anti-vaccine rhetoric became normal on the right, the goal of herd immunity to stop the spread of COVID-19 was doomed.
Many folkshave beensaying itfor a few months now, but it appears that the slower-moving medical experts in the federal government are finally admitting it. Despite half of Americans getting the shot, Apoorva Mandavilli of the New York Times writes, “vaccination rates are slipping, and there is widespread consensus among scientists and public health experts that the herd immunity threshold is not attainable — at least not in the foreseeable future, and perhaps not ever.”
Herd immunity just ain’t happening, folks. Once anti-vaccine rhetoric became normal on the right, the goal of herd immunity to stop the spread of COVID-19 was doomed.
Stephan: Over the last several days I have read or heard Republicans touting the benefits of Biden's Covid-19 relief legislation, even though they all voted against it. I found it amazing. Do their listeners, readers, and viewers, I wondered, not realize that these men and women voted against the very legislation for which they are now taking credit? Apparently, in the fantasy world of the Right where facts are irrelevant, they do not.
Republican Representative Madison Cawthorn of North Carolina) takes credit on the House floor for something he voted against. Credit: House Television/AP
Republicans are touting benefits of the COVID-19 relief legislation they opposed in Congress.
Mitch McConnell said Republicans would have a “talk” with Americans about the bill’s issues.
Meanwhile, funding for healthcare and restaurants is being praised by some GOP members.
For months, Congressional Republicans have been unanimously opposed to the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, the $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief package that was backed by President Joe Biden and signed into law in March.
The stimulus package, which included $1,400 direct stimulus payments for individuals, funding for state and local governments, $300 in federal unemployment aid through September, and an expansion of the child tax credit, among other measures, did not receive a single GOP vote of support in the House or Senate.
After the bill’s passage, GOP Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky slammed the legislation as “a classic example of big-government Democratic overreach in the name of Covid relief” and “one of […]
Stephan: It is my view that Trump and his minions should be tried for crimes against humanity, not only for the disastrous handling of the Covid-19 pandemic but also for what they did to gut the EPA and its environmental regulations. It began before Trump to be sure, and Obama shares some of the blame, although he was blocked by Republicans in Congress, which should serve as a textbook study on the corruption of Congress as a result of Citizens United, which legitimized corporate and uber-rich bribery of public officials.
Happily, the good news is that now, after 14 years of legal battles, the courts have finally ruled on this, and the news is good.
Chlorpyrifos
After 14 years of legal battles, a federal court ordered the Environmental Protection Agency to take actions that will likely force the neurotoxic pesticide chlorpyrifos off the market. The federal agency has for years been considering mounting evidence that links the pesticide to brain damage in children — including loss of IQ, learning difficulties, ADHD, and autism — but, as the court acknowledged, has repeatedly delayed taking action.
“Rather than ban the pesticide or reduce the tolerances to levels that the EPA could find were reasonably certain to cause no harm, the EPA sought to evade through delay tactics its plain statutory duty,” Judge Jed S. Rakoff wrote in his decision, which was released today by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. “During that time, the EPA’s egregious delay exposed a generation of American children to unsafe levels of chlorpyrifos,” he wrote, and ordered the EPA to issue a final regulation within 60 days.
While Rakoff stopped short of requiring the EPA to immediately ban the pesticide, he gave the agency little choice in how to respond. “The EPA’s obligation is […]
Stephan: Have you ever walked down a sidewalk and inadvertently stepped on a dog turd, tried to scrape it off your shoe, yet an hour later found yourself in an embarrassing situation because you and those around you can still smell it? That's more or less the way I look at the Trumps and the Kushners. They have been gone for months but the smell of their endless scandals still lingers in the nation's political air.
What makes this important to me, is that the Republican Party pays no attention to these criminal smells, and the majority of Republicans still believe the election was stolen from Trump, and that Biden is not a legitimate president.
Jared Kushner and Donald Trump Credit: Trump White House
Kushner — the son-in-law of former president Donald Trump — is co-owner of Westminster Management and the company JK2 along with his brother Joshua, which had been accused of violating state laws protecting tenant rights.
According to the report, Administrative Law Judge Emily Daneker ruled Thursday that the company owned by the two brothers “repeatedly violated state consumer protection laws by collecting debts without required licenses, charging tenants improper fees and misrepresenting the condition of rental units.”
The judge issued a 252-page decision that called the violations “widespread and numerous.”
The lawsuit was filed in 2019 by Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh, as part of a series of suits going after 25 companies accused of violations.
As for the judge, the brother’s company was cited for […]
Stephan: The fact that Stephen Miller, an avowed White racist fascist, and former Trump speechwriter still commands media attention and is treated seriously tells us something very important about the United States: White racism is a major political and cultural trend in the country.
White supremacy has been a problem in the United States since the earliest colonial days, and is now as bad as it was in the late 1950s and early 1960s in what history knows as the Civil Rights Era. It has become so bad in the present day that it now defines the U.S. and the question being asked around the world is can it be overcome, or is America doomed to be a nation with a kind of apartheid?
Stephen Miller and Joe Biden Credit: Salon/Getty
A conservative legal group founded by former Trump officials Stephen Miller and Mark Meadows has filed a lawsuit against the Biden administration for its support of the American Rescue Plan, which the suit alleges discriminates against farmers of “white ethnic groups” by reserving funds for “socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers.”
The legal group, America First Legal, which vows to take on “the radical activist left,” is representing Texas Agriculture Commissioner Sid Miller. The suit, which the plaintiffs brought to the U.S. District Court in the Northern District of Texas, argues that “white farmers and ranchers are not included within the definition of ‘socially disadvantaged farmers and ranchers,’ making them ineligible for aid under these federal programs.”
“These racial exclusions are patently unconstitutional,” it continues. The group argues that, if the court does not recognize this, “then it should at the very least declare that the phrase ‘socially disadvantaged group’ must be construed, as a matter of statutory interpretation, to include ethnic groups of all types that have been subjected to racial and ethnic […]
