If you think gay marriage & birth control are safe from reactionary Republican Supreme Court, because they are established law, popular, necessary, good in a thriving modern country: you do not understand what motivates the Supreme Court & their complete lack of accountability.
Reactionary Republican Supreme Court understands you cannot have both (1) functioning democracy (2) embittered white Christian male rule (where embittered white Christian males increasingly small minority of the eligible voting population). So they are all-in on ending democracy.
Are the Supreme Court justices publicly bemoaning their reputation as partisan hacks, because they are concerned about losing their power once everyone understands that OR are they mocking US knowing Democrats are too timid to expand the court (any time soon)? I think the latter.
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Democrats in Congress (of all ideologies) incredibly united behind Biden’s Build Back Better policy, just a few members in house (out of 222) & 2 in senate (out of 50) are fighting the policy and it is not out of ideology, but spite, power, stupidity …
Anti-Biden leader in house @JoshGottheimer is strict follower of former-Democrat, current-Trumpist @Mark_Penn, whose entire schtick for last decade has been to use status as former-Democrat to subvert Democratic Party & policy for this right-wing friends. All about power & chaos.
And Sinema left Washington to go party with rich donors has no policy goals: she is not a “centrist” or “moderate”, she is just an arsonist who wants to be famous.
Americans way *less* informed about the important aspects of the president & executive branch's policies due to the existence of the White House Press Corps. They focus US on palace intrigue, allowing all presidents to avoid scrutiny of their fitness & policy cc/ @AshleyRParker
For his entire presidency, Americans were subjected to details of the political ups & downs of ObamaCare, how it affected Obama & midterm elections: not until the Republicans were 1 vote from repealing it, did anyone bother to explain to US what the actual policy did for US.
No matter what Trump did, the White House Press Corps was there for him, to normalize the action. "Fun" to Compare @OKnox (former president of WHCA) & @atrupar twitter threads covering Trump's 3/29/20 "Press Conference"
Thoughts on my Twitter conversations today w/ a few Republican strategists about COVID-19 & vaccine mandates (1) they are desperate to avoid topic ongoing death toll (and hospitalizations) & how more vaccines will ameliorate this horrible situation: they want to talk politics ...
Important here to emphasize: the Republicans are conceding that 1,000+ people are dying per day, that vaccine mandates will get people vaccinated and save lives, but they think that they can win the politics of the fight (2) Republicans acknowledge opposition is not that big ...
Republicans counting that like abortion & guns, the can create a bunch of one-issue (anti-vax) voters, that can overwhelm the vast majority of US that are pro-vax: fortunately pro-vax group is quite motivated right now & anti-vax group is already *very anti-Democratic* ...
I have a tough time separating the love & respect NYC gets from media & politicians in 9/11 with the hatred & derision it gets from media & politicians for the other 364 day per year.
From the mocking delight that so many took in NYC's suffering & death in the spring of 2020, to Republican rally cry in the summer of 2020 to bankrupt NYC to general typecasting of NYC as a scary, dangerous place, when it is, in fact both safe & prosperous, funding the rest of US
2004 Republican convention was basically a big FU to NYC: hosted in a City that hated Bush, a reelection campaign built around using 9/11 to attack Iraq AND pushing a Constitutional Amendment to ban gay marriage, mass protests were ignored & mocked by mainstream media.
Every #RoshHashanah I reflect on this one prayer: Avinu Malekeinu. This prayer creates a strong juxtaposition: we provide to G-d deep reflection & merciful prayer for ourselves while, at the same time, demanding of G-d action for injustice others suffered at no fault of their own
It is easy for us to reflect inward on our own faults, sins, things we wish we had done, and seek mercy for those trespasses. But what can we say about our neighbors, the innocent, who suffer from pestilence, war, famine, captivity, destruction, iniquity, religious persecution?
For those neighbors, whether they live down the block, or around the world, we demand action from Avinu Malkeinu. But, these two concepts merge, as my rabbi once told me: if we treat our neighbors as we would treat ourselves, then we would not need mercy & the hungry would be fed
We have a nostalgia for factory jobs with good pay, benefits, time-off, safety, but for most of history factory jobs sucked: low pay, no benefits, brutal schedule, dangerous. It is collective bargaining of unions that made these jobs great, not the work itself …
Now that the work has moved to service sector, healthcare, etc we need to bring the fight to these sectors, make the type of jobs that exist, with high demand for workers, great: good pay, benefits, time-off, safe …
Owners of capital have massive bargaining power over workers, they have a lot more information than the workers about the work & more flexibility about who works when, only when workers unite, to bargain collectively can they get their fair shake from the owners …