Hardly. As of 1789, several states had personal rights to firearms. The Framers ignored those and instead wrote a limited right for state militias. Right-wing Justices made up the personal "right" 200 years later.
Great example. Or, set up an investment account. Each day, buy a stock and sell it again. Just one share. On the fourth day you'll be locked out for a week or until you deposit $25,000, per SEC regulations.
.@LeaderMcConnell mostly puts his millions into Vanguard mutual funds—including making money off of underfunded infrastructure that forces municipalities to issue debt—but he's got a special place in his heart for Wells Fargo, which does lots of lobbying. /2
.@LeaderMcConnell and his wife just can't get enough Wells Fargo $WFC stock. Bought some more in March. Wells Fargo announces their earnings Wednesday morning, get your orders in now!
/3
The new thing on the right is calling the COVID vaccines "gene therapy." That's like saying horses are solar-powered because they eat plants. It's wordplay, the type of statement that is only "true" in a silly, useless, bad faith way.
Let's discuss.
/1
A viral vaccination works by putting something like the virus in your body so your immune system can learn to fight the virus. You can use a weakened or dead version of the virus, a specific part of the virus, or code for part of the virus.
/2
The vaccines carry code for the COVID spike protein. J&J carries it in DNA stuffed into a virus that can't replicate (Ad26), Moderna & Pfizer carry it in mRNA. Your cells read it and start making the spike protein.
.@Sen_JoeManchin talks about Robert Byrd as if he was a Republican obstructionist. The reason cloture is 3/5 now instead of 2/3 is because Dems, including Byrd, used the nuclear option in 1975.
Reminder about all the supposed "norms" of the Senate: in 2001, when the Senate Parliamentarian "made it harder for the GOP to push President Bush's budget and tax cut proposals through the evenly divided body," Republicans simply fired him: washingtonpost.com/archive/politi…
I don't blame the Senate Parliamentarian, the "rules" of reconciliation are a joke.
In terms of "what now?" both options—VP Harris ruling otherwise or a standalone minimum wage bill—boil down entirely to whether 50 Dems would do it, i.e. Manchin & Sinema.
It's not really up to Harris. Sure, she can disregard the Parliamentarian—but she'll immediately face an appeal of her ruling. If she doesn't have 50 votes to back it up, it's an embarrassing defeat for no reason. The problems here are Manchin & Sinema.
I want to pick up on the 'emergency relief' aspect, because this is yet another example of SCOTUS's "shadow docket" where they decide cases without full proceedings.
Unsurprisingly, they botched the facts of COVID restrictions in California.
Gorsuch, joined by Thomas & Alito, couldn't figure out the rules for singing in movie productions, so inexplicably decided the issue in the church's favor.
Barrett, joined by Kavanaugh, held it was "unclear," but recognized the church bore the burden.
They're all wrong.
/2
As California pointed out in its brief, and the Ninth Circuit recognized, the film industry has onerous safety protocols that the church doesn't have and never said they'd adopt. It's not comparable.
And anyway they've also been prohibited from singing indoors since November.
/3
Once again, Silver reveals that he has no idea what he's talking about. The J&J / Janssen vaccine uses a technology (adenoviral vector) that is entirely different from Moderna & Pfizer's (mRNA).
Let's talk for a second about what the FDA is doing and why.
First, Silver's (and Yglesias's) whole argument is premised on FDA review of J&J's vaccine delaying distribution. That's questionable. J&J keeps a lot of this stuff confidential, but we know they've had delays and are not ready to distribute yet.
At this very moment, the Biden admin is working to speed up J&J's production line. @aslavitt46 is on it. There is no benefit whatsoever in yelling at the FDA for doing its job to ensure the safety and efficacy of the vaccine.