The GOP is a big tent kinda party. Big enough now for all the assholes.
Chaotic Evil - Marjorie Taylor Greene
Neutral Evil - Mitch McConnellLawful Evil - Liz Cheney
Mail a check payable to:
PO Box 9133
Springfield, IL 62791-9133
Feb 6, 2021
Podcast
A hat tip to all you honest hard-workin' D&D practitioners out there.
The GOP is a big tent kinda party. Big enough now for all the assholes.
The GOP is a big tent kinda party. Big enough now for all the assholes.
COVID-19 Update
World
USA
Vaccination Scorecard
Companies are charging hidden ‘covid fees’ to make up for lost profits
It’s unclear exactly how widespread coronavirus surcharges are, as anecdotal social media
posts of customer receipts and reports filed with attorneys general and state consumer protection departments are the only way to track them. But health-care providers and residential facilities are some of the worst-affected sectors.
For instance, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel (D) sent a cease-and-desist letter to 11 senior living facilities in August after 45 residents reported being charged $900 each in “supplemental COVID-19 fees.”
Nessel’s office said that a senior official for one of the companies said the fee covered charges for meal service, PPE and cleaning services, but that residents who pushed back were told they didn’t have to pay it.
“This pandemic has caused financial strain for many people and businesses in Michigan, but that does not provide companies with the right to impose unauthorized costs on their customers and clients — especially those in our senior communities and others who are already living on a fixed income,” Nessel said in a news release.
Extra fees, especially when they’re a surprise, aren’t typically praised by the patron. But small businesses and franchises have had to get creative out of desperation when gift card drives, individual tipping and fundraising by local chambers of commerce aren’t enough to pay the bills. Sean Kennedy, the National Restaurant Association’s vice president for public affairs, said this is especially true for the restaurant industry.
“The biggest challenge is, for most restaurants, it’s not going to be enough,” Kennedy said. “Gift cards and tipping are vital because it really is allowing us to survive week to week, but from a long-term perspective, we really need to see a restaurant-specific solution from the federal government.”
Adding surcharges as a temporary Band-Aid to help cover store closures, employee salaries and health benefits, personal protective equipment for staff, and increased sanitation, utilities and reopening costs is one approach some small businesses and franchises have taken to offset financial losses and stay open during the pandemic.
John G. Cleminshaw, 83, lives at Independence Village in Aurora, Ohio. He said the senior living facility sent a letter to its 80 residents in March 2020 announcing a $1,200 mandatory fee for extra cleaning and food because of the pandemic.
“I didn’t feel it was right,” Cleminshaw said. “There was nothing in our contract that called for it. For most businesses, this would be a cost of doing business. It certainly wasn’t their fault that they had these costs, but neither was it the residents’ fault.”
He begrudgingly paid the fee, but he brought up the issue during a residents meeting and reported it to the Ohio attorney general’s office. Eventually, the company announced it would refund the fee. Independence Village did not return a request for comment.
Most reports of coronavirus surcharges have come from patients at dentist offices. Chad Gehani, immediate past president of the American Dental Association, said the cost of PPE for dentists has jumped, so some offices have charged a fee to cover it.
“The choice to charge an additional fee for PPE is an individual dental practice business decision,” Gehani said in an email. “The American Dental Association (ADA) strongly encourages dental offices to disclose any additional fees upfront to patients and to document these charges in the patient record. The ADA has recommended that dental benefit carriers should either adjust the maximum allowable fees for all procedures to cover the increased costs of PPE or allow an additional standard fee per date of service per patient.”
Some insurance providers subsidize PPE costs, and other contracts don’t allow for customers to be held liable for additional fees tacked on later. But the rules vary from state to state and provider to provider, depending on whether the fee is disclosed upfront and what a client’s insurance policy covers.
Starting in August, a handful of state officials — in New York, Connecticut, Arizona, Michigan and Massachusetts — issued guidance warning residents of hidden fees and businesses and insurers of the consequences of violating consumer protection and insurance laws.
The New York State Department of Financial Services instructed health insurers to coordinate refunds to patients after receiving complaints about providers improperly adding on fees to cover protective equipment, especially in dental care.
New York Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo (D) said in a news release that “excessive fees” shouldn’t be required for doctor’s visits and medical procedures.
“In these uncertain times, as many New Yorkers are struggling to make ends meet, healthcare providers should not be creating additional financial burdens on their patients,” Cuomo said.
The department threatened to punish insurers that don’t inform providers that they cannot charge PPE fees or make sure that patients who were charged are refunded.
Businesses that require physical contact and close interaction, such as hair salons, have also been reported for charging coronavirus fees.
Ironworks, a barbershop in Glen Allen, Va., announced a 5 percent service charge in an email to customers to cover HEPA air purifiers, UV-C lights and lost revenue through the end of the year. Ironworks did not respond to requests for comment. An unnamed hair salon in South Carolina was reported to the attorney general’s office for charging a $5 disinfecting fee.
Sport Clips president and chief executive Edward Logan said the company discourages its franchisees from passing on sanitation costs to clients — but in some cases, it’s necessary.
“Sport Clips locations do not charge for disposable masks as a policy, and very few locations have added a service charge,” Logan said in an email. “Many locations have been forced to increase prices slightly to pay for increased labor and materials costs, but our franchisees also prioritize the needs of the client when they have to make difficult business decisions.”
For the restaurant industry, coronavirus fees are a way to offset the increased expenses of operating under occupancy restrictions. Kennedy said many restaurants have lost more money from reopening expenses than while completely closed — which is one reason some may feel moved to get creative to bring in more revenue, through cocktails-to-go, increased menu prices, selling groceries and, yes, adding extra fees.
“We are not an industry that is designed for an on/off switch,” he said. “For a restaurant to be able to be financially viable, they need to be operating at full capacity, seven days a week.”
Restaurants rely on paying for last week’s expenses with next week’s revenue, Kennedy said. And many communities, like New Orleans, have more restaurant seats than local residents to fill them, relying on visitors coming on cruise ships, vacations, honeymoons and business conferences. But travel restrictions eliminated much of that business, and stay-at-home orders shut down restaurants for several months starting in March.
“A lot of fixed expenses didn’t change,” Kennedy said. “Rent didn’t change. Utilities, insurance. Those were all things that still had to be paid even as no customers were coming in the door.”
When Stephanie Baiocchi’s dad called to ask her to lunch, she told him she was craving Thai or Chinese food. They settled on Big Bowl, a small chain by her Chicago office that serves both, and when she searched the menu online before lunchtime, an advisory banner with “COVID-19” caught her eye on her screen.
The chain had posted a message on its website about a 4 percent automatic surcharge for all food orders.
“To help offset restrictions on our business resulting from the COVID-19 crisis, a 4% surcharge has been added to all guest checks. If you would like this removed, please let us know,” the banner read. Big Bowl declined to comment.
Baiocchi felt duped. She’d ordered from Uber Eats, which offers options to customers to donate directly to the restaurant or delivery workers. She’s seen other restaurants temporarily increase menu prices and collect funds for furloughed staff. But an automatic fee — even if it could be removed upon request — without knowing who benefited from it felt, as she said, “super slimy.”
“You’re just banking on people not realizing and it just felt so scummy and I just did not like it at all. Right now is not the time to be taking advantage of people,” she said. “For all I know, the CEO is just keeping it all.”
Baiocchi and her dad still ate at Big Bowl, and she didn’t have the heart to ask the server to remove the surcharge, in the hopes that it might benefit staff. She said that during the pandemic she has found herself more empathetic to service industry workers. When she got a haircut, she tipped her stylist more than usual because she knew her salon had struggled while it was closed.
“It’s a tough economic climate for everyone,” Baiocchi said. “I think if businesses just lead with transparency and kindness, they’re going to get a lot further.”
New Cases: 489,754 (⬆︎ .46%)
New Deaths: 14,478 (⬆︎ .63%)
USA
New Cases: 126,125 (⬆︎ 46%)
New Deaths: 3,572 (⬆︎ .76%)
Vaccination Scorecard
Total Vaccinations: 29.6 million
Total Priority Population: 24.0%
Total Population: 8.9%
It's understandable why a business person would look to recoup expenses - it's just something you have to address one way or another.
The problems jump up to bite us in the ass when capitalistic principles are applied in a "jungle rules" kinda way - economic brutality is no better than the physical kind of brutality, and that's why some level of regulation has to be applied.
Too often, the "clear-eyed pragmatic entrepreneurs" are behaving as if their customers are nothing more than a prey species. And that appeals to a lot of us because we're raised to be very competitive in what they tell us is a dog-eat-dog world.
But when we put that into practice in ways that ignore the fact that we're a prey species for others in turn, we put ourselves and everything we care about in danger unnecessarily.
Mostly, we need to be individuals and we need to do what we can to make our own way in the world, but taking that out to the logical extreme makes it harder to recognize the absolute requirement that for some things, we have to cooperate and work together.
For some things, we are - and should be - 50 discreet separate states. For other things, we have to be the United States.
It's the same for counties and cities and neighborhoods and businesses and families.
Companies are charging hidden ‘covid fees’ to make up for lost profits
They may be illegal
Attorneys general and consumers say surcharges from $5 to $1,200 are being charged to cover PPE and cleaning at dentist offices, senior living facilities and restaurants
Nearly a year into the pandemic’s gutting of the economy, businesses across the country are increasingly charging coronavirus-related fees, ranging from a $5 disinfection charge in a hair salon to $1,200 for extra food and cleaning in a senior living center, which are often undisclosed until the customer gets a bill.
According to a survey by The Washington Post of attorney general offices and financial departments in 52 states and territories, U.S. consumers in 29 states have filed 510 complaints of coronavirus-related surcharges at dentist offices, senior living facilities, hair salons and restaurants.
Hidden fees are a legitimate concern for consumers, especially for economically vulnerable Americans or senior citizens without much income, but not every state protects consumers from them. While medical insurance law in some states requires health-care providers to offer refunds to patients who have been unfairly charged for personal protective equipment, other states allow for businesses to tack on extra fees, as long as they’re disclosed upfront.
Nearly a year into the pandemic’s gutting of the economy, businesses across the country are increasingly charging coronavirus-related fees, ranging from a $5 disinfection charge in a hair salon to $1,200 for extra food and cleaning in a senior living center, which are often undisclosed until the customer gets a bill.
According to a survey by The Washington Post of attorney general offices and financial departments in 52 states and territories, U.S. consumers in 29 states have filed 510 complaints of coronavirus-related surcharges at dentist offices, senior living facilities, hair salons and restaurants.
Hidden fees are a legitimate concern for consumers, especially for economically vulnerable Americans or senior citizens without much income, but not every state protects consumers from them. While medical insurance law in some states requires health-care providers to offer refunds to patients who have been unfairly charged for personal protective equipment, other states allow for businesses to tack on extra fees, as long as they’re disclosed upfront.
posts of customer receipts and reports filed with attorneys general and state consumer protection departments are the only way to track them. But health-care providers and residential facilities are some of the worst-affected sectors.
For instance, Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel (D) sent a cease-and-desist letter to 11 senior living facilities in August after 45 residents reported being charged $900 each in “supplemental COVID-19 fees.”
Nessel’s office said that a senior official for one of the companies said the fee covered charges for meal service, PPE and cleaning services, but that residents who pushed back were told they didn’t have to pay it.
“This pandemic has caused financial strain for many people and businesses in Michigan, but that does not provide companies with the right to impose unauthorized costs on their customers and clients — especially those in our senior communities and others who are already living on a fixed income,” Nessel said in a news release.
Extra fees, especially when they’re a surprise, aren’t typically praised by the patron. But small businesses and franchises have had to get creative out of desperation when gift card drives, individual tipping and fundraising by local chambers of commerce aren’t enough to pay the bills. Sean Kennedy, the National Restaurant Association’s vice president for public affairs, said this is especially true for the restaurant industry.
“The biggest challenge is, for most restaurants, it’s not going to be enough,” Kennedy said. “Gift cards and tipping are vital because it really is allowing us to survive week to week, but from a long-term perspective, we really need to see a restaurant-specific solution from the federal government.”
Adding surcharges as a temporary Band-Aid to help cover store closures, employee salaries and health benefits, personal protective equipment for staff, and increased sanitation, utilities and reopening costs is one approach some small businesses and franchises have taken to offset financial losses and stay open during the pandemic.
John G. Cleminshaw, 83, lives at Independence Village in Aurora, Ohio. He said the senior living facility sent a letter to its 80 residents in March 2020 announcing a $1,200 mandatory fee for extra cleaning and food because of the pandemic.
“I didn’t feel it was right,” Cleminshaw said. “There was nothing in our contract that called for it. For most businesses, this would be a cost of doing business. It certainly wasn’t their fault that they had these costs, but neither was it the residents’ fault.”
He begrudgingly paid the fee, but he brought up the issue during a residents meeting and reported it to the Ohio attorney general’s office. Eventually, the company announced it would refund the fee. Independence Village did not return a request for comment.
Most reports of coronavirus surcharges have come from patients at dentist offices. Chad Gehani, immediate past president of the American Dental Association, said the cost of PPE for dentists has jumped, so some offices have charged a fee to cover it.
“The choice to charge an additional fee for PPE is an individual dental practice business decision,” Gehani said in an email. “The American Dental Association (ADA) strongly encourages dental offices to disclose any additional fees upfront to patients and to document these charges in the patient record. The ADA has recommended that dental benefit carriers should either adjust the maximum allowable fees for all procedures to cover the increased costs of PPE or allow an additional standard fee per date of service per patient.”
Some insurance providers subsidize PPE costs, and other contracts don’t allow for customers to be held liable for additional fees tacked on later. But the rules vary from state to state and provider to provider, depending on whether the fee is disclosed upfront and what a client’s insurance policy covers.
Starting in August, a handful of state officials — in New York, Connecticut, Arizona, Michigan and Massachusetts — issued guidance warning residents of hidden fees and businesses and insurers of the consequences of violating consumer protection and insurance laws.
The New York State Department of Financial Services instructed health insurers to coordinate refunds to patients after receiving complaints about providers improperly adding on fees to cover protective equipment, especially in dental care.
New York Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo (D) said in a news release that “excessive fees” shouldn’t be required for doctor’s visits and medical procedures.
“In these uncertain times, as many New Yorkers are struggling to make ends meet, healthcare providers should not be creating additional financial burdens on their patients,” Cuomo said.
The department threatened to punish insurers that don’t inform providers that they cannot charge PPE fees or make sure that patients who were charged are refunded.
Businesses that require physical contact and close interaction, such as hair salons, have also been reported for charging coronavirus fees.
Ironworks, a barbershop in Glen Allen, Va., announced a 5 percent service charge in an email to customers to cover HEPA air purifiers, UV-C lights and lost revenue through the end of the year. Ironworks did not respond to requests for comment. An unnamed hair salon in South Carolina was reported to the attorney general’s office for charging a $5 disinfecting fee.
Sport Clips president and chief executive Edward Logan said the company discourages its franchisees from passing on sanitation costs to clients — but in some cases, it’s necessary.
“Sport Clips locations do not charge for disposable masks as a policy, and very few locations have added a service charge,” Logan said in an email. “Many locations have been forced to increase prices slightly to pay for increased labor and materials costs, but our franchisees also prioritize the needs of the client when they have to make difficult business decisions.”
For the restaurant industry, coronavirus fees are a way to offset the increased expenses of operating under occupancy restrictions. Kennedy said many restaurants have lost more money from reopening expenses than while completely closed — which is one reason some may feel moved to get creative to bring in more revenue, through cocktails-to-go, increased menu prices, selling groceries and, yes, adding extra fees.
“We are not an industry that is designed for an on/off switch,” he said. “For a restaurant to be able to be financially viable, they need to be operating at full capacity, seven days a week.”
Restaurants rely on paying for last week’s expenses with next week’s revenue, Kennedy said. And many communities, like New Orleans, have more restaurant seats than local residents to fill them, relying on visitors coming on cruise ships, vacations, honeymoons and business conferences. But travel restrictions eliminated much of that business, and stay-at-home orders shut down restaurants for several months starting in March.
“A lot of fixed expenses didn’t change,” Kennedy said. “Rent didn’t change. Utilities, insurance. Those were all things that still had to be paid even as no customers were coming in the door.”
When Stephanie Baiocchi’s dad called to ask her to lunch, she told him she was craving Thai or Chinese food. They settled on Big Bowl, a small chain by her Chicago office that serves both, and when she searched the menu online before lunchtime, an advisory banner with “COVID-19” caught her eye on her screen.
The chain had posted a message on its website about a 4 percent automatic surcharge for all food orders.
“To help offset restrictions on our business resulting from the COVID-19 crisis, a 4% surcharge has been added to all guest checks. If you would like this removed, please let us know,” the banner read. Big Bowl declined to comment.
Baiocchi felt duped. She’d ordered from Uber Eats, which offers options to customers to donate directly to the restaurant or delivery workers. She’s seen other restaurants temporarily increase menu prices and collect funds for furloughed staff. But an automatic fee — even if it could be removed upon request — without knowing who benefited from it felt, as she said, “super slimy.”
“You’re just banking on people not realizing and it just felt so scummy and I just did not like it at all. Right now is not the time to be taking advantage of people,” she said. “For all I know, the CEO is just keeping it all.”
Baiocchi and her dad still ate at Big Bowl, and she didn’t have the heart to ask the server to remove the surcharge, in the hopes that it might benefit staff. She said that during the pandemic she has found herself more empathetic to service industry workers. When she got a haircut, she tipped her stylist more than usual because she knew her salon had struggled while it was closed.
“It’s a tough economic climate for everyone,” Baiocchi said. “I think if businesses just lead with transparency and kindness, they’re going to get a lot further.”
Feb 5, 2021
COVID-19 Update
World
USA
Vaccination Scorecard
Moderna is tweaking its coronavirus vaccine to make it more effective against emerging variants of the virus, the company announced Monday.
The upgrades will be designed to better protect against the different strains and could be used as a booster shot. The announcement comes as scientists around the world scramble to get ahead of a constantly mutating virus that has already killed more than 2 million people worldwide.
“As we seek to defeat the Covid-19 virus, which has created a worldwide pandemic, we believe it is imperative to be proactive as the virus evolves,” Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel said in a statement.
Moderna said its existing vaccine is effective against a more contagious variant that is thought to have emerged in the United Kingdom. But the vaccine was less protective against a strain that was first reported in South Africa. An early study found that with the South African variant, the level of antibodies produced from the vaccine diminished sixfold, according to the company.
Despite the observed drop, Moderna said neutralizing antibodies — which can bind to viruses and block them from getting into cells — remained above protective levels for both. Still, it is “unknowable what will happen in six months, in 12 months,” Bancel said Monday on CNBC.
Bancel said the vaccine upgrades are being developed “out of an abundance of caution,” but added that the reduced antibody levels seen with the South African variant may suggest that protection against this and future variants could wane.
"Immunity may go down over time," he said.
Moderna’s study, conducted together with the Vaccine Research Center at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, examined blood samples from immunized monkeys and eight people who received the company’s regular two-dose vaccine regimen. The preliminary results have yet to be published or peer reviewed.
Bancel said it will be crucial to conduct ongoing research that aims to boost immunity to emerging strains.
“We cannot be behind — we cannot fall behind this virus,” he said.
New Cases: 505,463 (⬆︎ .48%)
New Deaths: 14,348 (⬆︎ .63%)
USA
New Cases: 121,627 (⬆︎ .45%)
New Deaths: 3,523 (⬆︎ .76%)
Vaccination Scorecard
Total Vaccinations: 28.2 million
Total Priority Population: 22.8%
Total Population: 8.5%
Over the last 30 days, the 7 Day Rolling Average of New Cases has been trending down pretty significantly.
World: ⬇︎ 33%USA: ⬇︎ 49%
We're not seeing the same hopeful trend in the Daily Deaths yet, but that's a lagging indicator, so those numbers will "take a while to catch up". The good news there is that the 7 Day Rolling Average for both the world and the US is off a solid 8-10% from its peak of only about 2 weeks ago.
I guess my main concern is that the trend needs to take a real dive to push back from some grim milestones, eg: 500,000 dead Americans about a week from now, and 600,000 a month or so after that.
Meanwhile, the news on vaccines keeps getting better.
Moderna is tweaking its coronavirus vaccine to make it more effective against emerging variants of the virus, the company announced Monday.
The upgrades will be designed to better protect against the different strains and could be used as a booster shot. The announcement comes as scientists around the world scramble to get ahead of a constantly mutating virus that has already killed more than 2 million people worldwide.
“As we seek to defeat the Covid-19 virus, which has created a worldwide pandemic, we believe it is imperative to be proactive as the virus evolves,” Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel said in a statement.
Moderna said its existing vaccine is effective against a more contagious variant that is thought to have emerged in the United Kingdom. But the vaccine was less protective against a strain that was first reported in South Africa. An early study found that with the South African variant, the level of antibodies produced from the vaccine diminished sixfold, according to the company.
Despite the observed drop, Moderna said neutralizing antibodies — which can bind to viruses and block them from getting into cells — remained above protective levels for both. Still, it is “unknowable what will happen in six months, in 12 months,” Bancel said Monday on CNBC.
"Immunity may go down over time," he said.
Moderna’s study, conducted together with the Vaccine Research Center at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, examined blood samples from immunized monkeys and eight people who received the company’s regular two-dose vaccine regimen. The preliminary results have yet to be published or peer reviewed.
Bancel said it will be crucial to conduct ongoing research that aims to boost immunity to emerging strains.
“We cannot be behind — we cannot fall behind this virus,” he said.
Meanwhile
Feb 4, 2021
The GQP
NYT is in classic Press Poodle form with this one.
In her Georgia district, voters saw Ms. Greene as a conservative voice that would be impossible to ignore. Now the revelation of past social media posts has unsettled some who backed her.
"Some"
Billy Martin does not care much for politicians. But the retired teacher and coach liked what he heard from Marjorie Taylor Greene, who promised to arrive in Washington as a defiant force, intent on rattling the establishment.
For his community in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains, which he believed had long been overlooked, Ms. Greene had a voice that was impossible to ignore.
But in recent weeks, it has also been impossible to ignore the torrent of troubling social media posts and videos in which Ms. Greene had endorsed violent behavior, including executing Democratic leaders, and spread an array of conspiracy theories, including that the Sept. 11 terrorist attack on the Pentagon and the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., were hoaxes.
“Sometimes people say things they regret, speak before they think,” Mr. Martin said as he got in his pickup in downtown Summerville, a town of 4,300 people represented by Ms. Greene, a Republican who was elected to Congress in November in an unopposed race that drew national attention because of her promotion of the pro-Trump movement QAnon.
He found her posts and statements puzzling. Still, he added, he was not sure what to believe. “I don’t think they treat you fairly anymore,” Mr. Martin said, referring to the news media and Democratic politicians.
As Democrats push to strip Ms. Greene of committee assignments and as some Republicans condemn her statements, she has argued that the resistance confronting her only “strengthens my base of support at home and across the country.”
To some degree, that was true, as her most fervent supporters saw in the treatment of Ms. Greene a reminder of all that they loathed about Washington. But in a congressional district proud of its ranking as one of the most conservative in the country, voters drawn to her unapologetic intensity were now also brushing the limits of their support.
“It’s embarrassing,” Ashley Shelton, a stay-at-home mother who voted for Ms. Greene, said of the controversy. She thought former President Donald J. Trump would serve another term and saw Ms. Greene as “a backup, a comfort.”
“I think she’s kind of a loose cannon,” Ms. Shelton said before paraphrasing a line from the Old Testament: “The wise are the quiet ones,” she said. “The more she opens her mouth, the less evidence of her wisdom.”
Georgia has been gripped by a political tug of war, as the once reliably Republican state was won by President Biden in November, the first Democrat to do so in nearly three decades. And last month, the state’s two Republican senators were replaced by Democrats, tilting control of the Senate to that party.
Ms. Greene’s district represents the other end of the rope — a largely white and rural corner of the state dominated by Republicans. Sprawled across a dozen counties, the 14th Congressional District reaches from the outer suburbs of Atlanta to the outskirts of Chattanooga.
Despite her promotion of conspiracy theories during the tightly contested primary and runoff, Republicans said Ms. Greene gained traction by hewing to core conservative themes — defending gun rights, opposing immigration and supporting Mr. Trump. She covered a lot of ground, too, sometimes attending as many as five campaign events in a day.
“A lot of people here feel like they really know her,” said Luke Martin, a local prosecutor and chairman of the Republican Party in Floyd County, which is in her district. “They’ve met her. They’ve spoken with her. She never talked about that stuff. It’s kind of confusing to a lot of people. The person they think they know is not this person.”
The recent cascade of past social media posts, which also included a conspiracy theory that a space laser controlled by Jewish financiers started a California wildfire, Luke Martin said, has weakened her support. “You can’t justify it,” he said of her statements and social media activity. “It’s indefensible.”
But local Democrats contend that Republicans should not have been surprised. Some have written letters to the editor of newspapers in the district calling for her to step down.
“I didn’t think she was fit for office back then,” John Lugthart, who wrote one of the letters published in The Daily Citizen-News in Dalton, said of his opinions of Ms. Greene during the election. “More and more has come out, and my hope is that many others in our district now realize she’s not the one to represent us.”
Others, having long been resigned to the minority position held by Democrats in the region, said they hoped an infusion of energy in the party could bolster its chances in the next election.
But emotion filled Teresa Rich’s voice as she stood outside the radiator shop she owns with her husband, bemoaning the way Ms. Greene has been treated and the failure of other Republicans to adequately defend her.
“I love her,” she said of Ms. Greene, describing her as a fighter taking on the political establishment. “She fought them. If the party was like it was supposed to be, she wouldn’t be in a corner by herself.”
Billy Martin does not care much for politicians. But the retired teacher and coach liked what he heard from Marjorie Taylor Greene, who promised to arrive in Washington as a defiant force, intent on rattling the establishment.
For his community in the foothills of the Appalachian Mountains, which he believed had long been overlooked, Ms. Greene had a voice that was impossible to ignore.
But in recent weeks, it has also been impossible to ignore the torrent of troubling social media posts and videos in which Ms. Greene had endorsed violent behavior, including executing Democratic leaders, and spread an array of conspiracy theories, including that the Sept. 11 terrorist attack on the Pentagon and the massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Fla., were hoaxes.
“Sometimes people say things they regret, speak before they think,” Mr. Martin said as he got in his pickup in downtown Summerville, a town of 4,300 people represented by Ms. Greene, a Republican who was elected to Congress in November in an unopposed race that drew national attention because of her promotion of the pro-Trump movement QAnon.
He found her posts and statements puzzling. Still, he added, he was not sure what to believe. “I don’t think they treat you fairly anymore,” Mr. Martin said, referring to the news media and Democratic politicians.
As Democrats push to strip Ms. Greene of committee assignments and as some Republicans condemn her statements, she has argued that the resistance confronting her only “strengthens my base of support at home and across the country.”
To some degree, that was true, as her most fervent supporters saw in the treatment of Ms. Greene a reminder of all that they loathed about Washington. But in a congressional district proud of its ranking as one of the most conservative in the country, voters drawn to her unapologetic intensity were now also brushing the limits of their support.
“It’s embarrassing,” Ashley Shelton, a stay-at-home mother who voted for Ms. Greene, said of the controversy. She thought former President Donald J. Trump would serve another term and saw Ms. Greene as “a backup, a comfort.”
“I think she’s kind of a loose cannon,” Ms. Shelton said before paraphrasing a line from the Old Testament: “The wise are the quiet ones,” she said. “The more she opens her mouth, the less evidence of her wisdom.”
Georgia has been gripped by a political tug of war, as the once reliably Republican state was won by President Biden in November, the first Democrat to do so in nearly three decades. And last month, the state’s two Republican senators were replaced by Democrats, tilting control of the Senate to that party.
Ms. Greene’s district represents the other end of the rope — a largely white and rural corner of the state dominated by Republicans. Sprawled across a dozen counties, the 14th Congressional District reaches from the outer suburbs of Atlanta to the outskirts of Chattanooga.
Despite her promotion of conspiracy theories during the tightly contested primary and runoff, Republicans said Ms. Greene gained traction by hewing to core conservative themes — defending gun rights, opposing immigration and supporting Mr. Trump. She covered a lot of ground, too, sometimes attending as many as five campaign events in a day.
“A lot of people here feel like they really know her,” said Luke Martin, a local prosecutor and chairman of the Republican Party in Floyd County, which is in her district. “They’ve met her. They’ve spoken with her. She never talked about that stuff. It’s kind of confusing to a lot of people. The person they think they know is not this person.”
The recent cascade of past social media posts, which also included a conspiracy theory that a space laser controlled by Jewish financiers started a California wildfire, Luke Martin said, has weakened her support. “You can’t justify it,” he said of her statements and social media activity. “It’s indefensible.”
But local Democrats contend that Republicans should not have been surprised. Some have written letters to the editor of newspapers in the district calling for her to step down.
“I didn’t think she was fit for office back then,” John Lugthart, who wrote one of the letters published in The Daily Citizen-News in Dalton, said of his opinions of Ms. Greene during the election. “More and more has come out, and my hope is that many others in our district now realize she’s not the one to represent us.”
Others, having long been resigned to the minority position held by Democrats in the region, said they hoped an infusion of energy in the party could bolster its chances in the next election.
But emotion filled Teresa Rich’s voice as she stood outside the radiator shop she owns with her husband, bemoaning the way Ms. Greene has been treated and the failure of other Republicans to adequately defend her.
“I love her,” she said of Ms. Greene, describing her as a fighter taking on the political establishment. “She fought them. If the party was like it was supposed to be, she wouldn’t be in a corner by herself.”
"Leadership" in the GQP is practically nonexistent. And when you've cultivated a base of voters with lies about women and minorities and "real America" and all the other shit they've been peddling for 50 years, you can't feign surprise to find out the people who're determined to step into leadership roles are as crazed as a buncha scorpions with heat stroke.
Like Driftglass says:
"I'm shocked - shocked - to find the Republican Party is filled with Republicans".
Crafty manipulators like MTGreene get elected by idiot voters who can't figure out what a lie sounds like because that's what the Party and Dumfux News have been drumming into everybody's heads for decades.
Unfortunately, we can't really tell anymore if MTGreene is the crafty cynical manipulator I think she is, or if she's dumb-as-a-fuckin'-stump like her idiot supporters.
And after NYT spills their ink all over this thing, their style book comes shining through - they still try to shoehorn some kind of middle ground into it - a safe place for them to land. They managed to put 4 whole sentences in the piece that sound critical to the rubes, but the rest of it pulls up way short of telling those rubes that we really really really need them to get their heads outa their asses "Cuz you're not fucking it all up just for yourselves, morons. The rest of us have to live with your stoopid fuckin' decisions too".
But hey - at least some of them are starting to get a little uncomfortable with some of the Qrazy shit.
COVID-19 Update
World
USA
Vaccination Scorecard
New CDC Director Dr Rochelle Walensky on Rachel Maddow last night:
New Cases: 489,188 (⬆︎ .47%)
New Deaths: 14,293 (⬆︎ .63%)
USA
New Cases: 113,459 (⬆︎ .42%)
New Deaths: 3,999 (⬆︎ .87%)
Vaccination Scorecard
Total Vaccinations: 27.5 million
Total Priority Population: 22.3%
Total Population: 8.3%
"The answer is 'We don't know, but we can't be wrong...' "
"I want to be clear on what the science shows and on what I believe we should prioritize..."
Some more of those breaths of fresh air.
Feb 3, 2021
Today's Beau
Justin King - Beau Of The Fifth Column
The filibuster rule has to be changed. It's outdated. It works against the will of the people, and has become a destructive device in the hands of an unscrupulous dishonorable slug like Mitch McConnell.
It should be restored to its original intent - to be used as a delaying tactic in order to give senators a little extra time to make deals and whip votes and push for public support. It was not supposed to be a tool for establishing and maintaining minority rule.
It can't be allowed to go on being a way for a minority faction to kill legislation favored by a majority in both houses and among the general population.
Two relatively simple changes:
1) Reduce the cloture requirement to 55 votes.2) Re-establish it as a delay - not a permanent hold
If I choose to filibuster, I can do that, but an immediate vote is called, and my filibuster is sustained only if there aren't 55 votes to end the debate (cloture).
But even if I sustain my filibuster, there's a limit to the delay. I can't just use it to kill a bill outright. The measure comes up for a vote automatically at the end of a set period of time.
eg: 10 days - 2 weeks - pick something that's workable, and with as few loopholes as possible, and at least more or less asshole-proof.
They have to work out what happens in Lame Duck sessions and the transition from one session to the next, but the rules have to be clearer and more enforceable.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)