President Donald Trump on Friday was noncommittal when asked about a legislative package making its way through Congress to address the COVID-19 pandemic.
Pelosi should agree with him. “You’re right, Mr. President. We haven’t given enough to fully protect the people.” Then go crazy with the proposal: guaranteeing immediate wages for all the working stiffs who can’t afford to miss work to care for their children; grant immediate emergency funds directly to hospitals for the purchase ventilators and other critical care equipment directly from China, etc.
We mustn’t forget that first the bill needs to get out of the infamous legislative graveyard known as the Senate.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) panned the House coronavirus package on Thursday, calling it an “ideological wish list” and raising fresh questions about whether anything can pass Congress quickly.
“Unfortunately, it appears at this hour that the Speaker and House Democrats instead chose to produce an ideological wish list that was not tailored closely to the circumstances,” McConnell said.
“One is reminded of the famous comment from President Obama’s first chief of staff: ‘You never want a serious crisis to go to waste,’ " he added.
Democrats should just tell Trump all of the stuff he wants is in the bill. Since he doesn’t read, he’ll just agree. The adults can then get back to saving our country and Trump can go back to hate tweeting, grifting, and golfing.
2 weeks paid leave is barely enough for one family member. Make it six. Repeal all Medicaid and food stamp work requirements and drug testing requirements permanently. They were always dumb ideas and doubly so right now.
Every virus test should be free without question or hesitation. Covered by all insurance with zero copay and billed to CMS for uninsured.
Also badly needed is a major day care provision for families of school children with closed schools. Nobody is prepared to have their kids home for much longer than the annual spring break, which is already a bear to plan for.
The House Democrats’ bill, most all of which was negotiated with Mnuchin, contains effective measures to specifically deal with the coronavirus public health emergency and national emergency (and they will also help Trump and the Republicans get out of the mess they’ve helped make worse).
Republicans want tax cuts to help with their re-election chances and to further harm the social safety net by not putting money into social security and medicare.
Pop Quiz: Who is more fit to govern? Who is taking the health and welfare of the American people seriously? Discuss and support your answers (with facts and real examples, boys and girls - none of that Trumpian bullshit will be considered in grading, except to subtract points).
The short term capital gains rate should be increased to 90%, to finance some of the public emergency needs on the backs of traders who short sold the indices every time Rump spoke.
Everything is a personal transaction for him. Absolutely everything. He does not understand anything except in that framework. And he’s very stupid, which narrows that already very restricted frame of reference.
Once again, Republicans are proving how badly they manage government. It was 12 years ago that they largely screwed up the initial response to the recession, and they are screwing up even worse this time around. It’s really going to be a question of how many more Americans died than necessary due to all of this incompetence.