The World as a Going Concern

Joe Manchin (left) is hemming and hawing, at least outwardly, about the national debt when we’re at a pivotal point regarding the nation’s infrastructure and humanity’s future on this planet. He can go fly a kite. (Photo Credit: Senate Democrats/Flickr/CC BY 2.0)

I’ve spent a lot of time on Twitch since the pandemic started, most notably in the Pokémon GO Battle League sphere, and the phrase “Who was worried?” is a common refrain. It’s a sarcastic comment, uttered by the streamer or someone in Chat, indicating they were very much worried about the final outcome, but are jokingly playing it off as if it were never in doubt.

As far as the future of the planet and life on it is concerned, like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., I believe the long arc of the moral universe bends towards justice and that we will act in our best interest to avert a climate disaster. That said, am I worried? To say “no” would be a lie.

Not merely to pile on outside references, but in accounting, the term “going concern” refers to a business that will be able to meet its financial obligations and, well, survive for the foreseeable future. The presumption of going concern is fundamental to the concept of financial reporting. If a company isn’t expecting to be able to go on after a year’s time, that is, needless to say, important information for current or potential investors to know.

Planet Earth is, of course, not a business, but in terms of our ability to inhabit it for the foreseeable future, there is ample room for concern. Quite simply, we are not meeting our obligations as stewards of this big blue marble we call a home, and unfortunately, we are taking other species along with us.

As I’ve discussed in a post from last year, if our collective response to COVID is any indication, there is ample room for worry. That is, if our handling of the pandemic is to be considered a dry run for heading off a climate catastrophe, one can be forgiven for lacking confidence. Broadly speaking, in a time of great need for people, particularly those members of one or more marginalized groups, the response has been to double down on/accelerate the failed policies and systems which helped fuel our initially dilatory reaction to COVID’s spread. From a pure healthcare perspective, patient outcomes have been markedly worse for lower-class Americans and/or Americans of color.

Since the writing of that piece, the proliferation of various versions of the COVID vaccine is undoubtedly encouraging. Just the same, only about half of the U.S. population is fully vaccinated. What’s more, with the rise of the Delta variant in this country, nearly every state is reporting increases in the number of cases. For all the talk of “getting back to normal” and the idea of the end of the pandemic, it feels like we are celebrating before we’ve crossed the finish line.

After all, outside of America, the COVID picture can be very different. Look at India. Look at the United Kingdom. Look at Brazil. With news of the spread of a Lambda variant in South America and elsewhere—in other words, another mutation—we’re showing that a lot of work still has to be done in terms of vaccination and of promoting behavior/policies designed to limit the spread of infectious diseases.

The degree to which COVID and climate change are interrelated, like many things surrounding this disease, is still being explored. Regarding how climate change impacts the spread of diseases like COVID, while there may not be direct evidence that climate change affects the spread, as animal habitats get destroyed, there is an increased likelihood that pathogens may be spread by different species coming into close contact. How humans raise livestock and consume meat also can contribute to the spread of infections, not to mention limiting our consumption of meat can help reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

As for the reverse, according to Climate Central, an independent organization of scientists and journalists devoted to researching and reporting climate change information to the general public, forced quarantines and a shift toward remote learning/work initially helped curb CO2 emissions, but an end to restrictions and a push to open things back up have all but negated those gains. While, as it must be emphasized, we would or should not encourage a deadly pandemic just to prove a point about climate change, there is a lesson to be learned about how changing how we live our lives can make a quantifiable impact. By focusing on implementing renewable energy sources and electric transportation systems, we can realize the environmental impact so many of us wish to see.

At this stage in the game, however, how we approach both COVID and climate change is not an issue of what we wish to see, but what we need to do. We’re at a tipping point for being able to ensure future generations will have a habitable planet on which to dwell, and right now, we’re not meeting our end of the bargain. Who’s worried? Me, for one, and I know I’m not alone.

If you’ve watched a nightly news program in recent weeks, you’ve probably seen the effects of accelerating and deleterious climate change. Drought. Extreme heat. Floods. Wildfires. Does climate change cause these disasters? No. We’ve had these phenomena on Earth since before the Industrial Revolution. It does make them more probable and severe, though. And it’s liable to only get worse.

As climate journalist Emily Atkin expresses in a recent post on her newsletter HEATED, it’s time for all of us to become climate activists in some shape or form. Telling the tale of Pakistani teenage climate activist Jaweria Baig, a woman who has seen the devastation of climate change in her home country and has consequently chosen the path of activism over her studies, she identifies this moment in time as an all-hands-on-deck scenario. She writes:

In more than a dozen interviews over the last two weeks, activists from across the climate movement have issued a common call to arms: If you have ever thought of becoming more involved in the fight for climate justice, it’s time to stop thinking, and start doing.

The proverbial writing is on the wall. A leaked report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change revealed that we’re reaching environmental tipping reports sooner than expected, on top of those shifts which are beyond the point of no return. We can still meet the climate targets outlined in the Paris Agreement, but only if we significantly reduce our use of fossil fuels. This means fighting the fossil fuel industry, a collective which has lobbied and misdirected against environmental action, head on.

As Atkin stresses, even small actions on the part of individuals is needed in the interest of bigger systemic changes. Whether it’s asking Microsoft to reduce its carbon footprint by eliminating corporate flights through the use of its Teams software for meetings instead; pressuring members of Congress to support infrastructure legislation that insists on dramatic and transformational changes to benefit the environment; petitioning advertising agencies and social media platforms to stop working with fossil fuel companies/ban their ads; supporting indigenous groups opposing pipeline projects; or simply donating to causes that promote climate education rather than fossil fuel propaganda, there are contributions to be made without having to become a full-time climate activist. It’s about mobilizing people power and raising our voices to challenge those with the most power to do their part to act before it’s too late.

Atkin closes her post with these serious considerations:

Some people may read this and believe it is pointless. That we are too late. That none of it matters. The fossil fuel industry knows this is not true. Their fear of a determined, pissed off public is why they promoted campaigns of climate denial and “individual responsibility” in the first place. They knew if people were unsure about the problem, they’d waste time fighting about it instead of mobilizing to fix it. They knew if people were confused about the solution, they’d waste time trying to change themselves and each other instead of the system.

However worse the climate crisis gets now depends on how quickly society transforms. How quickly society transforms depends on how many people demand it. The most harmful lie being spread about climate change today is not that it is fake. It’s that nothing you can do can help save the world.

We all have in a stake in this, especially those of us who will still be around to see the impacts of a worsening global climate. The pandemic is an opportunity to start working together on an international basis and prepare for the bigger threat facing humanity, not to engage in tribalism and “America First” rhetoric, especially when our own human rights record and role in pollution is certainly not above reproach. If we don’t take that opportunity, the planet will survive, but our future very much is in doubt.

What Does “Going Back to Normal” Mean?

For all the talk of “going back to normal” in the United States, not only are certain countries and communities still coping with COVID, but pre-pandemic normal wasn’t all it’s cracked up to be. (Photo Credit: Travis Wise/Flickr/CC BY 2.0)

In the United States, there is a growing sentiment that the global pandemic is “winding down” and that we are moving past a life dictated by COVID-19 restrictions. Someone evidently forgot to inform the coronavirus of this, though, and some health experts are similarly wary about putting a rubber stamp on this whole health crisis.

The World Health Organization, for one, has cautioned against calling the pandemic “over” when significant portions of the world are facing vaccine shortages and variants that are potentially more transmissible and/or more deadly, according to a report by Berkeley Lovelace Jr. for CNBC. As WHO director Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus stressed, “The pandemic is a long way from over. It will not be over anywhere until it’s over everywhere.”

Lovelace’s report, in part, details a tale of two countries. In the United States, for example, COVID cases have been on the decline and some medical experts have suggested fully vaccinated people can eschew the mask-wearing and social distancing guidelines previously established by the Centers for Disease Control, at least among themselves.

In India, meanwhile, daily cases are in the hundreds of thousands and the country recently set a new daily record for deaths. Researchers are still trying to get a handle on what the B.1.617 variant means for transmissibility and to what extent vaccines will safeguard against it. Experts are, for the most part, optimistic on the vaccine aspect, but this assumes that vaccine distribution is orderly and that people are complying with the recommendation to vaccinate. Depending on the country and even geographic/demographic factors, that’s not a given.

Even in nations like the U.S., reaching so-called “herd immunity” may be difficult if not impossible. In addition to new variants popping up, vaccine hesitancy (I mean this in terms of people who are indeed “hesistant” and not out-and-out anti-vaxxers), ineligibility for young children to get immunized, and low access to vaccines for poor/racialized members of the population makes it all the more probable we won’t completely eradicate COVID-19. Much like the flu, it will become endemic. This is to say that it will likely become less deadly over time, but nonetheless, a seasonal occurrence.

There’s also the possibility that relaxing mask and social distancing guidelines, while not to completely undo the progress we’ve made on COVID recovery, could cause spikes and prolong our collective suffering. Of course, context matters. Going maskless makes more sense if you’re walking alone outside with no one else around than if you’re riding the subway, assuming local or state guidelines even permit you to do the latter.

Even so, the rush to return to relative normalcy could prompt people to become too relaxed when it comes to meeting up in public places. In addition, and not merely to be cynical, but people may claim to be fully vaccinated and not actually have followed through with the required dose(s). The honor system is only as good as the buy-in of those involved, and judging by the refusal of many to wear masks correctly (hint: it goes over your nose) or at all, not everyone may have your best interests in mind.

In all, “going back to normal” makes sense to a lot of Americans, but that reflects a worldview which potentially overlooks struggles in other countries, overestimates the availability of vaccines, and reflects an exasperation with being in quarantine for over a year. We’re not at the finish line yet, despite ample room for optimism.

While a significant part of the push to get back to normal, whether people are getting vaccinated or observing mask-wearing and social distancing guidelines is only a portion of the larger discussion we should be having. For one, as difficult as it was for people to forge new routines in response to COVID’s disruption of daily life as we knew it, it’ll be as difficult if not more so to transition back to the old way of doing things. In addition, some people, places, and jobs haven’t quite recovered from the pandemic or never will. It’s not as if we can simply erase the damage done by a global health crisis that has lasted more than a year. The ripple effects will be felt for years to come.

By no means do I wish for a deadly pandemic to continue just to prove or drive home a point. Worrying whether the wrong interaction with someone will possibly lead to their death, my death, or both gets exhausting. In the headlong rush to get past what has truly been a dark time for much of the world, though, what does seem to be lost to a large degree in the conversation is how “normal” wasn’t all that good for many Americans.

Before the pandemic, for example, greedy corporations like Amazon were effectively paying zero taxes and taking advantage of monopolistic business practices to rake in profits. The pandemic only made Jeff Bezos richer and gave the company that much more latitude to, say, run a multi-million dollar campaign to thwart a unionization attempt in one of its warehouses in the U.S. Millions of young people are being crushed under the weight of our collective student debt. Our infrastructure is crumbling. Black Americans are still getting killed disproportionately by police. Our planet is still hurtling toward a climate catastrophe.

The pandemic hasn’t obviated our responsibility in addressing these problems. Now we are looking at putting COVID in the rear view mirror and going back to brunch, content to ditch the masks absent any meaningful reflection on how broken our society already was. Our battle to overcome COVID-19 is an opportunity to rethink how we redo things at a structural level. Unfortunately, we seem dead set on learning little to nothing from our communal suffering, with the worst actors apparently intent on driving us further into the abyss and more quickly.

There’s still time to take a deep (and hopefully fully-vaccinated) breath before we turn the page on COVID, a disease we very likely will continue to see in some form in the years and decades to come. It would be a shame if we didn’t use that pause to think about how far we have come and how far we as a global community have to go.

Can Policing Be Reformed?

Can policing simply be reformed? Some like Bernie Sanders believe so, but so far, meaningful reforms have been few and far between. (Photo Credit: Renoir Gaither/Flickr/Public Domain)

Bernie Sanders is my guy. I will always feel indebted to him for inspiring me to become more educated and involved as a student of politics, and he continues to show leadership as one of the most progressive members of the Senate. That said, Bernie is not always right, and one of the areas in which he falters is racialized issues, in particular, policing in the United States.

Daunte Wright’s recent killing (I’ll leave it up to you to call it a “murder” or “manslaughter,” or opine as to whether the distinction even matters) at the hands of now-former Brooklyn Center police officer Kim Potter has re-intensified calls not only for justice for the victim in this case, but a reimagining of policing in communities across the country. Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib (D-MI), a noted ally of Bernie’s during the 2020 presidential election primaries, took to Twitter in the wake of Wright’s death to post about the role of policing in the U.S. from both a current and historical perspective. She wrote:

It wasn’t an accident. Policing in our country is inherently and intentionally racist.

Daunte Wright was met with aggression and violence. I am done with those who condone government-funded murder.

No more policing, incarceration, and militarization. It can’t be reformed.

Tlaib’s sentiments are strong ones, and are understandable regardless of the circumstances, though especially so given the pervasiveness of black Americans and other Americans of color being killed disproportionately by police, not to mention the geographical proximity of this incident to George Floyd’s murder which sparked the fervent protests and activist energy that dominated headlines in 2020. Not done on the topic, Tlaib tweeted again with a longer thread supporting her position. She tweeted:

We continue to see death after death at the hands of police officers with no meaningful accountability for the officers or departments involved.

We’ve seen [money] pumped into training and half-measures, only to see the killing of Daunte Wright mere miles from the Derek Chauvin trial justified as a “mistaken” use of a gun instead of a taser. If you can’t distinguish between a gun and a taser. If you can’t distinguish between a gun and a taser, you shouldn’t be carrying either.

I understand that many are concerned about public safety, but it is clear that more investment in police, incarceration, and criminalization will not deliver that safety.

Instead, we should be investing more resources into our community to tackle poverty, education inequities, and to increase job opportunities. We should be expanding the use of mental health and social work professionals to respond to disputes before they escalate.

Data and research supports this. We need to reimagine how we approach public safety and the opportunity for every person to thrive.

The only way we will all have safe communities is to invest in our people, not double down on failed overpolicing and criminalization.

As you might imagine, not everyone agreed with Tlaib’s stances (you yourself might balk at discussion of “defunding” and “abolishing” the police). One such dissenter was the aforementioned Bernie Sanders, who when asked whether he is in accord with his progressive comrade, responded flatly, “No, I don’t.” He elaborated, “I think that what we need to do is understand that there needs to be major, major police reform all across this country. We are tired of seeing the same thing, week after week and year after year. We do not want to see innocent African-Americans shot in cold blood.”

Putting aside the notion of whether Rashida Tlaib would say she is “done” with Bernie, his views, absent additional context, beckon explanation. How are we expected to reform policing without some degree of defunding or dismantling existing structures? Do we simply need to throw more money at the problem? That hasn’t worked with, for instance, the military/industrial complex or any number of alternative examples.

Obviously, race and demographics are relevant here. Tlaib is a 44-year-old woman of Palestinian descent who represents Michigan’s 13th congressional district, a majority of which the constituency is black. Bernie is a 79-year-old white dude who represents Vermont, a state that is predominantly non-Hispanic white. To say their experiences have been and continue to be very different is a bit of an understatement, even noting their broad agreement on a number of issues.

Discussion of defunding and abolishing policing is also fraught with political complications. For many, especially on the right and center-right, the mere suggestion of giving less to our embattled men and women in blue is near-sacrilegious. The police, for them, means safety and order. In a world that seems increasingly confusing and uncertain, to take anything away from those who pledge to protect and serve is a bridge too far and, even within the left, serves as a potential wedge issue.

In a highly-polarized political sphere replete with disingenuous talking points, misleading soundbites, and clickbait headlines that diminish the opportunity for deliberation with nuance, any matter is liable to become politicized and provoke negative knee-jerk reactions. Such is not a reason, however, to necessarily shy away from forcing a conversation about the role of policing in our communities, as contentious as it may be.

Approaching a year since George Floyd’s death at the hands of police, if progress has been made on making our societal order more just, clearly, more has to be done. Expectedly, this starts with the work of progressives in and out of government office, but this requires solidarity. For all the talk of wanting to reform policing, Bernie Sanders’s distancing of himself from Rashida Tlaib’s remarks is evidence of how far the left has to go if it is to build real power as a force for change. As Daunte Wright’s untimely passing indicates, we can’t afford to wait on this issue.

Meditating on deadly and discriminatory practices in policing, in many respects a relic of the slave patrols of the antebellum South, is only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to confronting the inequities of systemic racism that pervade present-day America. Daunte Wright’s tragic death has garnered significant media attention—as it should. Every black person killed at the hands of police deserves to have their story told.

How many tales of abuse by cops go unrecounted, however? Extending the conversation to the milieu of criminal justice, how many African-Americans have faced injustice in the form of overzealous prosecution, half-hearted defenses of those accused, and/or harsh sentences based on statutory prescriptions for “law and order?” Within this sphere, we are liable to ingest but a fraction of the often-hostile environments created for people of color for the cases that go to trial, already a slim portion of criminal proceedings. If slavery was abolished, its legacy lives on in the terrorization and potential devastation of black communities by policing that violates constitutional principles (e.g. the Fourth Amendment) as well as courtroom and carceral procedures which prize expediency over human lives.

When we speak of police reform, these are the deeply-ingrained realities we must comprehend and tackle. Such is a big ask for a system in which rampant prejudice isn’t a flaw, but a built-in feature. Especially in situations where profit is to be made off the detention of individuals regardless of the level of offense or mitigating personal circumstances, the battle for recognition of those accused’s humanity is surely an uphill one.

So, can policing in the United States be reformed? It depends on who you ask, but failing to even be able to come to a consensus among progressives on this front dampens the ability to change public opinion in favor of solutions backed by science and to everyone’s benefit (i.e. economic upturn). That leftists like Bernie would so easily dismiss wholesale transformation of the current system suggests a lack of communication among progressives. Once again, the responsibility will fall upon activists to pick up the pieces.

On Politics as Theater

Apparently, it’s super quirky and cool for Kyrsten Sinema to give a thumbs-down to a livable wage. Neat! (Photo Credit: Gage Skidmore/Flickr/BY-SA 2.0)

If you, like other Americans, recently received your $1,400 stimulus check, you likely appreciate the passage of the $1.9 trillion relief bill and its signing into law by President Joe Biden.

The coronavirus aid package, alongside offering direct payments of $1,400 to most Americans, also extended $300 unemployment insurance boosts until September 6, expanded the child tax credit for another year, and allocated funds to COVID-19 vaccinations, rent and utilities assistance, and relief at the local, state, and tribal level.

The path to this legislation clearing both Congress and the White House, however, was a rocky one and not without controversy. For one, no House Republican voted in favor of this bill. Not one. Heck, more Democrats voted against the stimulus/relief package (two—Oregon’s Kurt Schrader and Maine’s Jared Golden) than Republicans voted for it. Owing to a majority in the House, this never really endangered the bill’s passage, but the final tally reinforces the notion that the bill didn’t have broad bipartisan support—at least as far as Congress is concerned.

In addition, other potential relief measures which might’ve been attached to this legislation were defeated, evidencing, in the eyes of many, the genuine disdain certain members of Congress have for their constituents. Kyrsten Sinema, in particular, drew the ire of Internet onlookers everywhere when footage of her exaggerated thumbs-down floor vote on including a $15 minimum wage in the aid package went viral.

I can’t presume to know what exactly was going through Sen. Sinema’s mind when she was making her cutesy gesture. A few critics suggested the moderate Democrat was trying to get the approval of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, which is especially egregious in that 1) McConnell didn’t even turn around to watch Sinema’s vote after she initially got his attention, and 2) McConnell is, ahem, a FREAKING REPUBLICAN. Party solidarity isn’t everything, but in this instance, it means a lot.

Generally speaking, then, Sinema’s theatrics were bad optics, a notion unaided by her arriving for the vote well-dressed with a Lululemon bag slung around her shoulder and with a cake for Senate floor staff forced to work through the night on the public reading of the COVID-19 stimulus/relief bill (more on this later). Even if her dessert offering was intended as a show of kindness for beleaguered Senate workers, it was a literal “let them eat cake” moment for her on a national stage.

To make matters worse, Sinema, through spokespeople, tried to deflect criticism of her no-vote on a $15 minimum wage by insisting that it was sexist to point to her thumbs-down in decrying her vote. To be fair, criticism of female politicians is often steeped in sexism. Political figures from Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez to Hillary Clinton have suffered unfairly disproportionate barbs and scrutiny in the media, especially right-wing outlets.

In this instance, though, no one forced Sinema to make a big production out of her vote and it wasn’t as if the other Senate Democrats who helped defeat the resolution on a $15 minimum wage weren’t rightly condemned for voting with Republicans. As far as some might be concerned, she could’ve stood on her head. The direction of the vote was what mattered—and she chose incorrectly. On the heels of stated opposition to doing away with the filibuster—which is seen widely as an impediment to Democrats passing needed legislation by virtue of a simple majority—alongside the likes of fellow Democrat-when-it-suits-them Joe Manchin (who also voted against a $15 minimum wage, by the by), it casts Sinema’s outward profession of caring for working-class Americans in an awfully bad light.

Stunts like Sinema’s only serve to add to the glut of performativity which characterizes the current political landscape. Amid the negotiation of this latest stimulus/relief package through Congress and to President Biden’s desk, GOP senator Ron Johnson took it upon himself to slow down the bill’s passage by forcing Senate clerks to read all 628 pages of the bill, prompting Sen. Sinema to bring her ultimately ill-fated cake to the Senate floor. Rather than permit Americans in need, including his own constituents, to get the relief they deserve, he used his position in the Senate to delay the rolling out of real, tangible benefits.

Is the throwing of red meat to an increasingly calcified right-wing base purely for the sake of political capital not to be condemned in a more full-throated fashion? When does “owning the libs” cross the line? Is there even a line left to cross at this point?

In a similar vein, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy recently used his stature amid a deadly pandemic to very productively post a five-minute video of himself reading Dr. Seuss’s Green Eggs and Ham. The clip is an apparent attempt to defend Theodor Seuss Geisel’s works against the “cancel culture” of the left amid Dr. Seuss Enterprises’ move to take six books of his books out of publication for “racist” or otherwise outmoded imagery.

Not only was this decision the company’s and not the result of efforts of some conspiratorial leftist pressure campaign (and, by the by, Green Eggs and Ham isn’t even one of the Seuss works being taken out of publication), this doesn’t materially help Americans across the political spectrum. Besides, I could think of a lot of things more fruitful to do with five minutes of my life than watch a professional windbag like McCarthy read a book written for children. It’s boring on top of being insulting.

Don’t get me wrong—trolling has its appeal. In a media landscape already saturated by performativity and at a time when so any Americans are hurting, however, the above-listed nonsense falls flat, particularly when done as artlessly as the above examples. Only a select few people get to call themselves members of Congress. We need to demand more of them.

What is particularly unnerving in these examples of public spectacle is that they reinforce the idea of politics as theater, as something to be watched and not to be engaged with. Kyrsten Sinema, in the face of mounting financial hardship for scores of Americans, was more concerned about giving an attaboy to Mitch McConnell and bringing cake to Senate staff than improving the lives of millions of Americans, including residents of her own state. Ron Johnson, a serial Trump apologist, forced the reading of a bill basically just to be a dick and under the same conditions of health and economic crisis. Kevin McCarthy, who has been trying to claim he never supported Donald Trump’s attempts to overturn the 2020 election even though he TOTALLY F**KING DID, read a children’s book, ginning up some culture war bullshit in a disingenuous way to deflect from the disaster the Republican Party is, an organization threatening to tear asunder by its association with a pathological narcissist.

The proverbial bar seems like it has forever been lowered by four years of President Trump, but the conduct of these members of Congress is not to be encouraged or tolerated, especially for Sinema. Primary wins for progressives have regrettably been fewer and further between than leftists hungry for real change would like, but the incumbent should nonetheless be challenged here. Is her offense the most egregious in recent memory? Not by a long shot. But that one moment revealed enough such that Sinema’s constituents should have no doubt about where her loyalties lie—and they’re not with giving Americans a livable wage.

In the 24-hour news cycle, moments like these don’t get much time in the limelight—and perhaps that is a blessing as much as a curse. Regardless of whether we are to oust hack politicians like the aforementioned bad actors, it is advantageous to look past an obsession with electoral politics and build power at the community level, getting the buy-in of those who normally eschew politics as well as stunts like making videos about Dr. Seuss books and wagging their tongue at the poor. Simply waiting every two, four, or six years for better results just doesn’t cut it.

If you’re like me, you used to believe or still do believe that “politics should be left to the politicians.” This is the absolute worst thing you can do, frankly speaking. When we become spectators, it only encourages the shenanigans referenced earlier. Americans deserve better than the likes of Kevin McCarthy, Kyrsten Sinema, and Ron Johnson. The path forward starts with us, the people who elected them in the first place.

$2,000 Means $2,000

Evidently, battling for the soul of the nation involves lying about the $2,000 checks you promised Americans. (Photo Credit: Lisa Ferdinando/Flickr/CC BY 2.0)

President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, and the Democratic Party would have you believe the intention was always that a third stimulus check—which Americans have yet to receive—would amount to $1,400. The second stimulus check, totaling $600, was essentially a down payment. 600 plus 1,400 equals 2,000. You can do math, right?

The problem with this narrative is that Democrats like Jon Ossoff and Raphael Warnock ran on a promise that voters would get $2,000 checks—not $1,400 checks, but new $2,000 checks on top of the $600 they already received. They also said nothing about changing the eligibility rules for who would and who wouldn’t receive the checks in this new round of stimulus payments.

First of all, let’s get to those campaign promises. Ossoff and Warnock explicitly referenced $2,000 checks in their stump speeches. The idea even made it into official Warnock campaign literature. Biden, lending support for the Democratic Party candidates in their runoff races, said this:

By electing Jon and the reverend [Warnock] you can make an immediate difference to your own lives—the lives of the people all across this country—because their election will put an end to the block in Washington on that $2,000 stimulus check.

There was no consideration of a $1,400 check on top of the earlier $600 check, no delineation on this front. If the bipartite nature of this payment were implied, the message, ahem, has certainly been lost on the progressives using the #BidenLied hashtag which has been circulating since the Biden administration started pushing the line on $1,400.

One such critic, noted Bernie Sanders supporter Susan Sarandon, retweeted a compendium of Biden, Harris, Ossoff, and Warnock vowing that electing the Georgia Democrats to the U.S. Senate would yield voters $2,000 checks. Chuck Schumer is also included in the two-minute compilation expressly referencing $2,000 checks. In doing so, Sarandon highlighted how only 39% of Americans can afford a $1,000 emergency and that over 15 million Americans have lost their employer-sponsored healthcare since the start of the pandemic. As far as she and others of a like mindset are concerned, the difference between $1,400 and $2,000 is not just substantial—it may be a “matter of survival.”

Another element critically worth mentioning is the purported timeline for these payments. According to Biden, this money would go “out the door immediately—and that’s not hyperbole—that’s real.” At this writing, Congress has still not signed off on a third round of stimulus checks, $2,000 or otherwise. In fact, following a second impeachment trial for Donald Trump that ended in acquittal (and which now infamously didn’t involve witness testimony), the Senate is due for a week off. Gee, thanks, senators.

We would be naïve, especially in today’s jumbled political climate, to expect politicians to necessarily keep their campaign promises. By now, the trope is all too familiar. Politicians lie. They’re politicians. It’s what they do. We would be remiss, too, if we didn’t give a nod to Republicans for being the poor-hating obstructionists that they are as a function of their being. That we’ve only had two stimulus payments totaling $1,800 since the start of a deadly pandemic is owed in significant part to their willingness to throw essential workers to the wolves while disingenuously hemming and hawing about the national debt.

Depressing political realities aside, the pivot to $1,400 is a bait-and-switch move based on how the checks were initially billed—pure and simple. Democrats, once again, are capitulating to competing interests—real or imagined—without much pushback and in spite of their stated goals. Despite their attempt at revisionist history, progressives and non-progressives alike remember what was truly said, creating a very real concern for a possible backlash to be felt at the polls in 2022 and 2024.

What makes the Dems’ shift yet more galling is how even its more celebrated representatives from the “Sanders” wing of the party are toeing the line on $1,400 checks—even the man himself. Bernie went on CNN with Jake Tapper a week ago, trying to paint the situation as if $600 + $1,400 was always in the cards. Not only does this fly in the face of what Joe Biden et al. pledged on numerous occasions, however, as noted, but it ignores the fact that the earlier $600 check doesn’t even have the current officeholder’s signature on it. These new checks, very much still theoretical, would be coming from a new president more than a month after their predecessor. That’s quite literally not the same thing.

On top of this, Democrats have further bogged down stimulus/relief negotiations with talk of means-testing the now-$1,400 proposed payments. Previously, $75,000 for individuals and $150,000 for couples was the threshold for direct payments, but to the warnings of progressives, some party members have mused about lowering the income eligibility limits to $50,000/$100,000 depending on marital status or basing eligibility based on 2019 income levels, which may underestimate the present need of millions of Americans. A far more efficient path forward would be to get the checks out the door, as Biden put it, and claw back that money this tax year for those who don’t qualify. The emphasis should be on expediency based on urgent need, not on political calculations that ultimately fail to consider the damage broken promises and personal financial ruin will do to voters’ perception of the party.

Americans have started receiving COVID vaccine doses, but in the interim and in the weeks, months, and possibly years to follow, the ripple effects of this pandemic will continue to be felt. No ifs, ands, or buts—everyday Americans need help and they need it now. Not long into a period when Democrats control the House, the Senate, and the White House, the party seems set upon undermining its goodwill by failing to stand by its promises and prioritizing economic prudency and political expediency (and not even succeeding) over coming to the aid of its constituents, including the ones who put party members in office in the first place. At a critical juncture in the country’s history, the Democratic Party can and must do better.

Trump, Twitter, and the Power of Big Tech: A Tangled Web

Should Donald Trump be allowed to use social media? No, not based on these companies’ guidelines. But that doesn’t mean we should let Big Tech’s power go unchecked either. (Photo Credit: Gage Skidmore/Flickr/CC BY-SA 2.0)

Donald Trump, at the time the lamest of lame duck presidents, got himself kicked off of Twitter, Facebook, and other platforms. For many liberals and progressives alike, this was a real “Ding dong, the witch is dead!” moment.

Of course, the events leading up to Trump’s widely-celebrated ban were not particularly inspiring, unless we are talking about emotions like fear and abject horror. On January 6, Trump supporters, buoyed by the urging of their preferred candidate to go to the Capitol building in Washington, D.C., stormed the place, prompting an evacuation and a halt of the counting of the Electoral College votes. What under normal circumstances is characteristically a rather prosaic affair became a chaotic series of events, the fallout of which is still being reckoned with as details of how it got so out of hand continue to emerge.

Trump, for his part, didn’t do much to stamp out the proverbial flames, offering a weak condemnation of the rioters and the eventual deadly violence before ultimately giving a statement telling the mob he egged on in the first place to go home. All the while, he expressed his “love” for the protesters and repeated his absurd claims that the election was stolen. Since then, he has—surprise!—refused to take responsibility for his role in fueling tensions that led to the debacle. Welp, if there’s one thing we can say about our Donald, it’s that he’s consistent!

It was therefore perhaps unavoidable that a score of social media sites would make the decision to ban Donald Trump indefinitely from their ranks, while other companies, if not banning Trump specifically, removed servers frequented by his followers or dropped Parler, a messaging app known to be frequented by right-wingers—particularly conspiracy theorists—and a forum on which planning for the so-called “insurrection” at the Capitol was evidently discussed.

Perhaps most significantly for Trump following his electoral defeat, he and his brand have taken a hit. Shopify, for one, removed all official Trump campaign merchandise by disabling his online stores. The Professional Golfers’ Association of America also voted to terminate their relationship with the Trump name, which means his Bedminster course won’t be hosting the PGA Championship next year. I, for one, am despondent I won’t be able to wear my MAGA hat and watch golf’s finest tee off from Trump’s private golf club—I don’t know about you.

So, yes, Trump was banned and all is well, right? That depends on who’s answering and how the ensuing discussion goes. The American Civil Liberties Union, for one, while not explicitly condemning the decision to outlaw Trump and his ilk, nonetheless expressed reservation about Big Tech’s part in all of this. The ACLU’s senior legislative counsel Kate Ruane put forth these views in the wake of Twitter’s announcement of Trump’s permanent suspension:

For months, President Trump has been using social media platforms to seed doubt about the results of the election and to undermine the will of voters. We understand the desire to permanently suspend him now, but it should concern everyone when companies like Facebook and Twitter wield the unchecked power to remove people from platforms that have become indispensable for the speech of billions—especially when political realities make those decisions easier. President Trump can turn to his press team of FOX News to communicate with the public, but others—like the many Black, Brown, and LGBTQ activists who have been censored by social media companies—will not have that luxury. It is our hope that these companies will apply their rules transparently to everyone.

Predictably, conservative outlets like Breitbart, Newsmax and the Washington Times jumped on Ruane’s statement as justification for why banning Trump was the wrong course of action for Twitter et al. Look—even the liberal ACLU thinks suspending Trump was wrong! That tells you something! Meanwhile, the kneejerk reaction of some on the left bordered on incredulity. Are you kidding me? Trump’s ban is a godsend and long overdue! Don’t rain on our parade, ACLU!

On both sides of the aisle, these protestations lack nuance, a seeming hallmark of much of today’s political discourse. Such does not seem terribly shocking coming from the right given that misleading information and misdirection are standard operating procedure for news outlets sympathetic to Trump and increasingly so the further right we go. As noted, the ACLU did not enthusiastically get behind a global social media Trump ban, but it’s not as if they gave the man a glowing review either. Speaking for the Union, Kate Ruane said that “we understand the desire to permanently suspend him.” That’s not a ringing endorsement, and Ruane pointedly mentions his sowing seeds of doubt about the democratic process. Highlighting this statement as a defense of Trump or a rebuke of Facebook and Twitter for banning him is decidedly disingenuous.

Re criticisms from the left, meanwhile, they run the risk of failing to see the forest for its digital trees. Donald Trump’s reach, president or not, should not be understated. That said, the power of Twitter and other large communications platforms to shape politics in the United States and abroad should not be undersold. We’ve seen what impact Facebook can have in the negative sense for its role in helping to spread hate speech fueling genocide in Myanmar and for allowing Cambridge Analytica, a consulting firm with ties to Ted Cruz’s and Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaigns, to harvest the data of tens of millions of Facebook users without their explicit consent. That’s an awful lot of authority in the hands of a privileged few entities.

In the span of a short statement, then, we can appreciate how much there is to unpack regarding this thorny issue. An arguably better tack is to consider some of the questions surrounding the debate about whether banning Trump is the right move. So let’s give it the ol’ college try, shall we?

Did Donald Trump do enough to warrant expulsion from Twitter and other media?

Um, have you been paying attention for the last half a decade? As even those who side with the ACLU’s view on these matters would tend to agree, if Trump were a regular person without his stature and his following, he would’ve been banned years ago. Google/YouTube, in particular, was rightly criticized for, in delivering its own public statement on why it was suspending the outgoing president, essentially admitting it was applying standards that already existed but weren’t being enforced until this point.

For particularly salient perspectives on this dimension, we need to look no further than those who are the primary targets of Trumpian rhetoric. Dianna E. Anderson, a non-binary, queer author/writer, took to Twitter to voice her “strong disagreement” with the ACLU on the Trump blackout. As they reason, the ACLU tends “to lean on a slippery slope argument when it comes to free speech, which ignores the power dynamic that happens when all speech is allowed without any kind of moderation.” For Anderson, fascists and Nazi-adjacent types are “fundamentally eliminationist” and argue from the cover of free speech to limit the freedoms—speech included—of everyone else. From this vantage point, removing Trump is de-platforming someone with dangerous views and making the Internet that much safer for members of minority communities.

Doesn’t this just risk making Trump a martyr of sorts and fueling accusations of anti-conservative bias by social media companies?

If one is worried about conservatives playing the victim card, then they will be all but paralyzed to inaction because these right-wingers do it all the time. All. The. Time. Trump is undoubtedly the biggest, whiniest baby of them all, but for all the barbs about the “snowflakes” on the liberal end of the spectrum, it’s conservatives who are consistently crying foul over perceived slights.

Their assertions, it should be stressed, have no basis in reality. Going back to Facebook, conservative posts are consistently among the most shared and viewed. In a similar vein, YouTube has been a haven for some truly repugnant right-wing content creators. Professional blockhead Steven Crowder got little more than a slap on the wrist for repeatedly hurling homophobic epithets and other demeaning comments at video producer and activist Carlos Maza for his work with Vox. If these companies exhibit a liberal bias, they have a funny way of doing it by letting literal white supremacists run rampant on their services.

This is where Ruane’s point about censorship of activists from vulnerable populations really comes into play. Whether specifically to silence these voices based on their politics or to preserve the appearance of “balance,” the failure of social media companies to consistently and transparently apply their stated codes of conduct or their overreliance on algorithms and other automated systems of content oversight have made at times for an inhospitable environment for leftist content creation. For smaller, independent creators, this is an especially onerous reality.

These are private companies. Isn’t it their prerogative to say who can and cannot be allowed on their service?

Whether bans like the one on Donald Trump are “censorship” is a sticking point in the ongoing conversation about the role of social media in our everyday lives, and in some respects, may be a bit of semantics. As the ACLU itself defines the word, censorship is “the suppression of words, images, or ideas that are ‘offensive’.” It is unconstitutional when carried out by the government. Because a certain amount of ambiguity exists with respect to censorship and First Amendment rights, often necessitating the intervention of the courts, and because freedom of expression is among our most cherished rights, cries about the censoriousness of these companies often draw the attention of people irrespective of party affiliation or lack thereof.

This is usually the point when objectors will point out that companies like Facebook, Google, and Twitter are private companies and can restrict who they want however they please. True as that may be and despite the risk these tech giants run by operating in uneven or heavy-handed ways, the theory that social media apps/sites should be regulated by the government as an essential public service or “utility” exists in opposition to the absolute discretion of the Mark Zuckerbergs of the world.

To insist on the ability of these companies to self-regulate ignores the monopolistic power they possess, the scope of their influence, and their already-exhibited inability to prevent abuses of their platforms’ capabilities. It’s why calls to “break up Big Tech” have only gotten louder in recent years and will no doubt continue to crescendo in certain circles. Heck, Elizabeth Warren made it a key component of her campaign platform. Big Tech may not be a government unto itself, but left unchecked, it stands to wield its influence to further stifle competition and undermine our democracy.

Banning the likes of Donald Trump amid cries of social media censorship and concern for the political influence of Big Tech altogether makes for a thorny discussion without easy answers. Especially after a whirlwind Trump presidency that saw real harm done to the United States and further damage to its democratic framework—a framework that has been under siege for quite some time, mind you—this can be frustrating. The Trump era is over, man! Let us kick up our feet and relax for a moment! Stop harshing our post-Inauguration mellow!

Far be it from me to throw the wettest of blankets on this celebratory mood, but beyond the urge, nay, the need to hold Joe Biden and his administration accountable for his campaign promises and pursuing policies that will benefit Americans regardless of their socioeconomic status, discussion of the effects social media has on our lives, for better and for worse, is an important talk to be having as well.

I’ve heard it said that the focus on Trump’s social media status is a distraction because it takes away from the dialog we should be reserving about stemming the monopolistic domination of companies like Amazon, Facebook, Google, and Twitter. To a certain extent, I disagree, in that I believe the insistence of Dianna Anderson and others that fascists be de-platformed is also critical. At the same time, however, I do worry that ceding power to Big Tech, without due restriction, is a case of robbing Peter to pay Paul. Or, in this case, Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk.

Should Donald Trump have been kicked off social media? Yes, I think so. Is conservative backlash to be worried about? Perhaps, but not to the extent it precludes his removal. Lastly, is this or should this be the end of the conversation? Not in the slightest. Until the Internet becomes a place that is safe for users from minority groups and does not privilege the interests of corporations and certain influential individuals, we have a lot more work to do in ensuring a free and fair medium.

The Discourse is Toxic and Everyone Sucks

I’m no political expert, but Jimmy Dore telling Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez she can, er, go fly a kite over whether or not to force a vote on Medicare for All in the House doesn’t seem like a great way to build a movement. (Image Credit: Gage Skidmore/CC BY-SA 3.0)

Online chatter is frequently inhospitable, but ever since the presidential election, it has been especially egregious.

Lately, checking trending political topics on Twitter has been a test of one’s mettle or, perhaps more aptly, a measure of one’s masochism. Democrats sniping at Republicans. Republicans sniping at Democrats. Donald Trump is deranged! The election is rigged! Depending on who you listen to, we either need to save the integrity of America’s elections from collapse—but only in the states where Trump lost—or we need to save the integrity of America’s elections from collapse—not by running better candidates, but pointing reflexively to RUSSIA! RUSSIA! DID YOU HEAR ABOUT RUSSIA?!?

For leftists, this would at least appear to be an advantageous situation. The election is over and Joe Biden won, so they can’t be blamed for the Democrat losing this time, right? And because leftists don’t particularly like Biden, that means they should be cool with the right, or at least not nearly the subject of the ire that Democratic loyalists are, right? Let the “vote blue no matter who” and MAGA crowds fight among themselves and focus on the issues that matter. Easy peasy.

Not exactly. Liberals, freshly emboldened by a Biden win, are feeling free to chide naysaying progressives for anything they may have done—real or imagined—to cost Joe a bigger victory or to hurt congressional candidates vis-à-vis the losses incurred in the House and the failure to secure a firm majority in the Senate. They’re the ones at the top of the heap—and the “far left” would be wise to get in line. Stop killing our post-election buzz, man.

Trump’s faithful, meanwhile, in their feelings about an election that they don’t feel they lost—rather, they believe it was stolen from them—blindly are lashing out at anyone who doesn’t support Trump in his ludicrous bid to overturn the will of the American people. As far as they are probably concerned, those who accept the results as legitimate are no better than the Biden and Harris stans who unapologetically are wagging their tongues at the losing side. And this is before we even get to the matter of the Proud Boys tearing down BLM banners, shouting “F**k Antifa,” and claiming ownership of city streets while toting assault rifles. They certainly are not taking the results of the election lying down.

Simply put, if partisan rancor was bad before, it has only intensified since the election has come and gone. Things haven’t settled down. Moreover, in the face of increasingly dire need from everyday Americans and at a time when progressives, a group most attuned to this need, should be well positioned to cut through the discord, they have their own demons and divisions to sort through.

The kerfuffle of the moment for leftists is whether or not progressives in the House should use whatever leverage they have to force a vote on Medicare for All legislation. With a narrow Democratic majority, members of the Progressive Caucus could refuse to vote for Nancy Pelosi for Speaker of the House. Such a stance is not without its immediate risk; if Pelosi does not secure the speakership, that puts GOP minority leader Kevin McCarthy, a climate change denier, a staunch Trump defender, someone who has threatened “action” against Reps. Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib for their criticism of Israel, an opponent of legal status for DREAMers, and an all-around shithead, atop the House pecking order.

What this debate essentially boils down to is a matter of strategy and how forceful progressives should be on compelling the vote on a bill (H.R. 1384, proposed by Rep. Pramila Jayapal) that is presumably dead on arrival in the Senate. On one side of the discussion, there are people like comedian and political commentator Jimmy Dore who insist that Democrats need to be held accountable, esp. if they insist people should not have access to health care in a pandemic. The merits here would exist with respect to putting pressure on elected officials to elaborate on why they don’t support a position popular with Americans across the political spectrum, and in doing so, flex their might.

On the other side of the discussion, you have people like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez who insist the votes are not there for M4A to even make it past the House, let alone the Senate, and to instead put energy behind other progressive priorities, such as pushing for a $15 minimum wage and putting progressives in leadership positions within the Democratic Party. According to this view, all the demands made for a vote on H.R. 1384 which goes nowhere won’t speak to progressive power—and could make progressives look even weaker than some might suggest they already are.

To say that some participants in this debate have taken a contentious tack would be an understatement. Dore made waves when, on his show, he told AOC to—how should I put this in a more family-friendly context?—take a long walk off a short pier. From what some observed, this diatribe was less about politics and more about wanting to destroy Ocasio-Cortez for her perceived treachery. On top of the apparent ill will, there was also the matter of Dore’s factual inaccuracy: Jimmy insisted Ocasio-Cortez had voted in favor of the CARES Act, when it was reported that the representative from the state of New York had not.

The crux of the matter here is not so much what one side believes—you probably have your own opinion on the #ForceTheVote question—or whether the vote would garner the positive attention advocates for forcing the vote are hoping in the first place—some like Ryan Grim of The Intercept are pessimistic on this front, while others, like Briahna Joy Gray, the national press secretary for the 2020 Bernie Sanders presidential campaign, think “the Squad’s” ability to generate interest is understated—but how they express their beliefs.

For some, this is yet additional evidence that AOC is a sellout or traitor or shill for Nancy Pelosi and that anyone who defends her now is a neoliberal bootlicker/hack. For others, Dore and likeminded #ForceTheVoters are crybabies who don’t understand political realities. Over a matter of political tactics on a theoretical vote, contingents within the broadly-stated Left are ready to go scorched earth on present and future alliances. For a mainstream media landscape eager to paint leftists as a fractured bunch, this feeds the narrative all too easily.

Beyond the optics aimed at a general audience, however, the significance of individuals perceived as leading voices of the progressive movement butting heads in an acrimonious way (Gray herself became embroiled in a bit of controversy when fellow progressive podcaster Benjamin Dixon came for her publicly for her stance on forcing an M4A vote) shouldn’t be understated. What amounts to mere performative antics for some can be taken seriously by those devotees within earshot of that soapbox—and the resulting bile spilled jeopardizes the engagement of those for whom politics is an acquired taste or whose natural inclination is to tune out at the earliest sign of contentiousness. In other words, it’s difficult to have a unified front when your forces can’t agree on a target—or lose the will to fight altogether.

In the 24-hour news cycle and amid the real and present concerns of Americans just trying to meet their basic needs—and for some, the global pandemic didn’t create their situation, but has only exacerbated it—this debate over playing hardball with House Democratic leadership and the Speaker’s seat over Medicare for All is a relative blip on the radar. Who cares about an M4A vote when they have no job and they’re facing eviction or they have loved ones sick and dying? What does it matter to me if Jimmy Dore said some bad words to Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez? The Lincoln Project crowd, for one, would be more apt to turn the lens on Donald Trump and all he hasn’t done for the country during a time of hardship for millions. Trump bad. Bad, bad man.

As minor as this episode which is still ongoing may be, that it is illustrative of a larger trend in political discourse gives scrutiny of it value. On an anecdotal note, I’ve observed numerous instances of paid pundits and armchair critics alike ready to cancel AOC for her take on bringing H.R. 1384 to a floor vote. One commenter I saw even opined that they thought Ms. Ocasio-Cortez is the most disappointing politician they’ve witnessed in the last several decades. The woman hasn’t even completed her first full term in the House of Representatives after a surprise primary win against a 10-time incumbent and she’s already a major disappointment? The notion would be infuriating if it weren’t so laughably absurd.

Of course, not every “hot take” we read on social media is going to be well considered. (Frequently, they are very poorly considered.) Still, the people uttering these lines are likely prospective voters in 2022 and beyond. Maybe it’s fatigue after a long and hard year and an even longer presidential campaign. Maybe progressives are starting to become impatient after two failed presidential campaigns for Bernie Sanders and a seemingly endless barrage of attacks from the right and center-right.

Whatever the case, that some leftists would be so apt to throw AOC, one of the most sympathetic figures to their cause in Congress, under the proverbial bus seems wrong-headed. As it stands, the pickings are slim with respect to congressional allies on core progressive issues. Besides, it’s not as if she, while remaining skeptical about forcing a vote on M4A, is devoid of ideas on how else to apply political pressure on the people who need to be pressed on universal health care. We might not agree with her stance completely, but at least there’s the possibility of negotiation. This is not Joe “I Beat the Socialist” Biden we’re talking about here.

I’ve never been super active on social media, but of late, I’ve largely distanced myself from it completely, especially as intersects with the political and social issues spheres. Do I feel less informed? Sometimes, yeah. But do I miss the drama that accompanies a lot of the day’s political discourse? No, not at all. The title of this piece is intended to be ironic, but only to an extent. The insistence of moderates on civility toward people who actively do and wish harm on others is certainly problematic in its presumption that the center is always best, but perhaps a balance should be struck when dealing with individuals who are outspoken defenders of progressive values. It could get lonely on the left otherwise.

In Hudson County, NJ, Immigrant Detention “Blood Money” is King

A view of Hudson County Correctional Facility, where tens of immigrants are held in substandard conditions and where COVID-19 has ravaged both detainees and employees. But hey, lower taxes! (Photo Credit: Jim Henderson)

Democratic officials in Hudson County, New Jersey planned back in 2018 to phase out a contract with Immigration and Customs Enforcement to jail immigrants. At a recent virtual meeting, more than 150 people made emotional pleas on behalf of the detainees, asking the county freeholders not to renew the contract. No one who called in advocated in favor of re-upping on the deal with ICE.

In spite of this, as reported on by Matt Katz for the Gothamist, whose beat is ICE detention and refugees, and others, the freeholders voted 6-3 to extend the contract. Ultimately, it seems, cash is king.

According to Hudson County Executive Tom DeGise and the other executives who voted in favor of the renewal, the county needs this money. Hudson Co. receives $120 in revenue per day per immigrant for jailing immigrants and, at present, houses about 100 people in its county jail. Without this revenue, taxes will increase—and you don’t want that, do you?

Of course, no one likes to pay more in taxes, least of all New Jerseyans, who already pay the highest property taxes of any state in America. Still, keeping undocumented immigrants locked up has its own obvious cost: a human one. At what point do financial considerations exceed moral concerns? What are the lives of these detainees truly worth to those in power?

What is especially galling to activists is the apparent bipartisan willingness to place profit over people as part of the immigration debate. DeGise, the county executive who proposed the reversal of the earlier phase-out, is a Democrat. The entire board of freeholders is populated by Democrats, which is not unexpected in Hudson County, a Democratic Party stronghold. Caridad Rodriguez, Anthony Vainieri, and Albert Cifelli, all of whom cited a belief in “Democratic values” as part of their re-election campaigns, voted in favor of renewing the contract.

How, then, does a partnership with ICE, an agency cited for a litany of abuses and which some in the progressive wing in the party have called for to abolish outright, align with Democratic values? What, pray tell, are those values?

Making matters worse is the notion that these detainees, already kept in suspect conditions (in Katz’s article, one of the attorneys representing the immigrants at the county jail cites their being kept in their cells for all but a half-hour of the day with absent or lacking medical care and sanitary supplies), only represent a fraction of the jail’s true capacity. Potentially, Hudson County can hold hundreds more immigrants, the capabilities of which are not lost on ICE, to be sure.

These substandard living conditions are not news either. Over the past half a decade, several detainees have died, over 100 medical grievances have been filed, basic quality of life provisions have been denied, and the use of physical force has been all too frequent. Throw COVID-19 into the mix and the picture is a bleak one—and not just for the detainees. Five employees have died since the start of the pandemic and dozens more have fallen ill, with accusations of insufficient PPE coming from the families of those workers. These people aren’t confined to the facility. They’re returning home, putting other members of their communities at risk of infection. In other words, it’s not as if the risk of spread is closed off herein.

These are legitimate human rights concerns. As several of the freeholders would characterize the reservations of Hudson County residents and immigrant advocates alike, however, they represent the beliefs of a small subset of the population or otherwise capture the views of individuals who are “just crazy.” This delegitimization of activist energy as some “radical” or illogical force is well familiar to leftists, some of whom see this as another turn in the battle for the soul of the Democratic Party.

Proponents of the ICE contract renewal also have used false or misleading justifications for maintaining the current arrangement. Tom DeGise’s office cited statistics of crimes once perpetrated by detainees in defense of the move, but they are now only being held for immigration violations, not crimes. Caridad Rodriguez, herself once an immigrant, likewise framed the issue in terms of keeping her community safe. For the non-violent offenders who haven’t committed major crimes, what is preventing the release you yourself have promised, Ms. Rodriguez?

All of this adds up to a grim situation that casts Hudson County and New Jersey as a whole in a harsh light when considering the other ICE detention contracts in place at other jails/detention centers in the state. With COVID rates spiking in and out of county jails, the outlook almost certainly will get worse. Meanwhile, NJ’s top politicians, notably Senators Cory Booker and Bob Menendez and Governor Phil Murphy, have been largely silent on the matter.

Once more, this begs the question: is it worth it? For all the human rights abuses recorded in the Hudson County jail and the elevated risk of infection the conditions within mean for detainees, employees, and the surrounding communities, perhaps most significantly for some members of the public, the revenue earned will not be so substantial. If current occupancy holds for 2021, Hudson County will only net $4 million from the ICE deal, a sum opponents of the extension argue can be made up elsewhere. Almost certainly, the replacement option would be a morally cleaner one.

On every front, the reversal of Hudson County’s earlier pledge to phase out its contract with ICE is a losing proposition. The Democrats vocally supporting this flip-flop or otherwise complicit in their silence would do well to consider how this “blood money,” as some advocates have labeled it, fits in with their definition of “values.”

Trump May Have Lost, but Trumpism Isn’t Dead

“I DON’T WEAR A MASK.” Oh, boy, aren’t you the alpha male, sir. (Photo Credit: Elvert Barnes/Flickr/CC BY-SA 2.0)

I’m not sure if you’ve heard, but there was a presidential election in the fabled “land of the free and home of the brave.”

Though the final result is still being contested by the incumbent, Joe Biden is poised to become the 46th president of these United States. Word of Donald Trump’s defeat at the hands of his Democratic Party challenger began to circulate last weekend, giving rise to spontaneous celebrations in cities across the nation. For the millions of Americans who voted to oust Trump, Biden’s victory is welcome news. In a year that has seen sickness, death, and economic devastation for many, it’s a bright spot, to be sure.

Especially for members of the most vulnerable groups in our society, Biden’s win is an immense relief. CNN commentator Van Jones notably broke down in tears when reacting to his network’s call for Biden, relating how, on that day, it was easier to be a father, it was easier to tell his children that “character matters.” For immigrants to the U.S., too, having Biden in the Oval Office means not being openly vilified as they have been under President Trump.

With Kamala Harris becoming the first female vice president—and a woman of color, at that—there’s also ample room for inspiration. While identity politics is a double-edged sword, representation matters. For other children of immigrants, be they black, brown, or otherwise, Harris’s history-making ascendancy to the role of VP means they can hold their heads up higher and dream that much more sweetly about holding the same role—or better.

So yes, far be it from me to dampen the enthusiasm of scores of Americans about how, come January, the U.S. will have officially turned the page on one of the darkest chapters in a history that has seen its share of darkness. At the same time, it should be underscored that, while Trumpty Dumpty has taken a great fall, he still has his avid supporters. Additionally, looking at the results at large, while disaster was avoided at the presidential level, at other levels, the Democrats fell below expectations.

In the House, Dems will retain a majority, but a slimmer one. Control of the Senate remains a possibility, but is dependent on the outcomes of close races. Dems also lost control of a gubernatorial seat in Montana—to a man in Greg Gianforte who once body-slammed a reporter for asking a question he didn’t like, no less. A blue wave, this was not.

Even with Biden’s win, there are some red flags. Despite what numerous national polls might have suggested leading up to Election Day, the Democratic challenger currently only has about a 3.5% lead with 97% of the vote counted. In terms of total votes, Biden’s margin of victory is 5.5 million. These are comfortable margins, yes, but not quite the repudiation of a failed president many left-leaning optimists envisioned.

In fairness to Joe, national polls do not appreciate that electors are decided on a state-by-state basis, so the final results were always liable to be skewed by virtue of this indirect comparison. Still, Biden arguably underperformed with constituencies that are at least superficially more favorable to the Democratic Party. Trump made significant gains with black and Latinx voters, not to mention he had the backing of many of the rank-and-file union members casting their ballots in 2020.

Ostensibly, these should be solid bases of support for Democrats against a party that has all but conceded its rejection of multiculturalism and which favors the wealthy and big business over the middle and working classes. Gains among women, people of color, and the intersection between by a Republican candidate should be concerning to Democratic Party strategists and liberal commentators alike.

Regrettably, self-reflection doesn’t appear to be a hallmark of the Democratic Party’s approach of late—if it ever was. Despite what the actual data suggests, center-left critics have cited the party’s shift too far leftward as a reason it has ceded territory to Republicans in key areas. All the while, party leaders and sympathetic media outlets have lauded the pair of Biden and Harris, characterizing the former as the man for this moment and the latter as a bridge to a new generation of political aspirants.

The reality of the situation, however, is that, while we should be encouraged by America not shooting itself in the proverbial foot, more than 73 million people opted for the clearly inferior option this election. That’s more than a little disturbing.

As Donald Trump and his campaign have gone indiscriminately throwing around accusations of fraud, filing lawsuits of questionable merit (and I’m being charitable here), enthusiasm for his brand of politics hasn’t died down. In fact, if anything his devotees seem more demonstrative and more vocal in their support than ever.

For one, conservatives have been flocking to apps like Gab, MeWe, and Parler following Election Day, apparently of the belief that major social media platforms are “censoring” right-wing voices and that FOX News (!) is becoming too liberal. While it may not truly have lived up to the name by the numbers, that a Million MAGA March even occurred and that Proud Boys went galumphing about the streets of Washington, D.C. shouting “Whose streets? Our streets!” and “F**k Antifa!” is vaguely frightening. If YouTube comments sections are any indication, too, a good percentage of Americans truly believe the election was stolen from the now-lame-duck incumbent. They also see fit to poke fun at my last name. Mangina. Man-jerkoff. Thank you. Very witty.

Not that it’s exclusively the byproduct of anti-maskers’, QAnon’s, and other groups highly correlative with voting for Trump’s actions, but COVID cases are going up in, like, 52 of 50 states. (Yes, I know how numbers work.) It makes the efforts of front-line workers like Jodi Doering, an emergency room nurse from South Dakota whose tweets about Trump supporters literally dying of COVID-19 and not believing they have the disease went viral, all the more commendable.

For those of us who dabble in schadenfreude, it’s tempting to respond in less-than-sympathetic terms. It’s their fault for believing the likes of Trump and Alex Jones. They didn’t heed the warnings. Fair enough, but they’re still average people like you and me. They shouldn’t be dying in record-high numbers day after day. Not to totally excuse their actions, but their leadership has failed them. This is the danger of Trumpism. Even after the dust has, for all intents and purposes, settled on the 2020 presidential election, scores of Americans will still reject science and the scientific accumulation of data.

We talk about a divided America politically speaking, but perhaps most dangerously, we’re living in what has been referred to as a “post-truth” era, in which the value of experts is derided and in which false and misleading news travels faster than the genuine article. For the most progressive among us who realize it will take a commitment of Americans from all walks of life and across geographical boundaries to save the country from a widening chasm of income and wealth inequality, it becomes that much more challenging to build a movement when it feels like you live in two separate Americas.

Joe Biden and his campaign won this election. That much shouldn’t be disputed. How they were able to win, meanwhile, should be part of the discussion moving forward. To a certain extent, Biden won in spite of himself. Without turnout from constituencies loyal to the Democratic Party (like African-American women—hello, somebody!) as well as contributions from new voters and grassroots organizing by the left, we very easily could’ve had a repeat of the debacle that was the 2016 election.

So, yes, Biden’s bipartisan approach to politics and his fidelity to certain moneyed interests ultimately didn’t cost him. As some would argue, however, he is poorly suited for a moment in which the Republican Party has seemingly gone off the deep end and in which Americans regardless of class, ethnicity, gender, or other identifier(s) are fed up with the status quo. Donald Trump may have failed in his bid for re-election, but Trumpism isn’t dead and buried. A refusal by Democrats to recognize this state of affairs and continue to offer milquetoast policy goals in the face of widespread, genuine need of voters could result in worse losses in 2022.

Voting Is Not an Endorsement, Or, Stop Trying to Get Me to Like Joe Biden

Note to liberals from progressives: We might vote for Joe Biden, but that doesn’t mean we like him or all of his policies, and he, like any politician, should be pressured to do right by the American people. (Photo Credit: Gage Skidmore/Flickr/CC BY-SA 2.0)

I advocate voting strategically for Joe Biden for president, especially for those voters for whom their vote potentially stands to make a difference in a so-called “battleground” or “swing” state. I feel as though anyone who can vote should, barring legitimate concerns about one’s health or risk of infection specifically from voting.

What I won’t do, however, is lie for Biden or try to bully or shame people into voting for him. Furthermore, I won’t try to sugarcoat the position of many who will be casting their ballots for the former vice president: they are voting for Biden specifically to prevent Donald Trump from winning a second term, to avoid disaster and not because they truly engage with Biden’s vision for America—full stop.

For some Democratic Party supporters, however, this stance seems insufficient. It is not enough merely to cast one’s ballot for the Biden-Harris ticket—you get the sense that they want you to “bend the knee,” as Jon Snow would bend the knee to Daenerys Targaryen, too. The time for raising concerns about policy goals has passed, at least until after the election (to be picked up again at an unnamed and mythical future occasion). It’s time to be ridin’ with Biden. Any negativity about the Democratic candidate evidently goes into the political aether, to be immediately absorbed by the opposition and added to his life force or vote tally or something. Don’t ask me—I’m trying to understand the same as you.

Leftist YouTubers inhabiting the space colloquially known as BreadTube have lent their voices and influence to coaxing their American viewers into voting for Joe Biden, and increasingly so now that Election Day is fast approaching (early voting has been underway for weeks, but some remain undecided or haven’t voted). The political satire channel Some More News, hosted by Cody Johnston, produced by Katy Stoll, and written by David Christopher Bell, recently published a video essay titled “Vote! (For Joe Biden (Who Sucks!)).”

As the name implies, the segment is a frank discussion of the importance of voting for Biden in this election, as unpalatable as it might be. It also reinforces the ideas that A) even if Biden wins, he should be held accountable for his campaign’s promises at a minimum and that B) we should not accept a return to “normal,” whatever that looks like this year and at this point in history.

In the aftermath of the video’s release, Johnston related that it wasn’t Trump supporters who reacted the most harshly to the video, but rather those on the left and center-left. On October 16, he tweeted the following:

Made a video that observably persuaded people to vote against Trump by voting for Joe Biden, a guy that I think sucks, and the most aggressive and obnoxious reaction has been from liberals whining that I didn’t persuade people in a way that they liked.

The reactions to Johnston’s reaction to, ahem, his post’s reactions were intriguing in their own right. Many defended him because, at the end of the day, he still comes to the same conclusion as full-throated Biden supporters, but some chided him for making it seem that voting was a “disgusting” act when it should be regarded as the very least an American should aspire to as a means of civic engagement. Others suggested that, well, you said their candidate sucks, so what else did you expect? Or they insisted that viewers were just as likely to not vote having watched the video—if not more so. Or kids in cages, kids in cages, kids in cages. You can probably fill in the blanks with your own examples of liberal refrains which vary to their degree of legitimacy.

This debate over the merits of Some More News’s effort to encourage its viewership to vote for Biden are a microcosm of a tension between wings of the Democratic Party that has existed for some time, but has really gotten a jump start in the post-Obama era. Do robust primaries help or hurt the eventual winner (which isn’t always but frequently is a more moderate incumbent)? After the primary, is it fair to continue to criticize the nominee in good faith, pointing out their shortcomings so as to shore up potential weaknesses in the general election as well as to highlight important issues to address after the votes are counted, or should critics hold their tongues indefinitely for fear of providing the opposition with a line of attack?

I specify good-faith criticisms of Democratic Party candidates by leftists under the assumption these critics don’t actually want the Republican Party candidate to win. Of course, I would be naïve to think there aren’t some lefties who believe that we might as well vote for the worse candidate to add fuel to an activist fire that has been burning for decades but has seen its intensity grow in the wake of the recession of the 2000’s and the progressive movement spurred on by the likes of Bernie Sanders and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Or they believe that by voting Republican, they’re somehow sticking it to the Democratic National Committee, an entity which well merits scorn.

In this particular case, though, we’re talking about Donald Trump, someone who not only would seek to stamp out that activist fire, but the activists who started it and anyone who dares to cross him, at that. The accelerationist argument, for any and all positive long-term intentions, loses luster when considering this position’s short-term consequences, of which the brunt is to be borne by the most vulnerable among us.

As for the DNC “learning its lesson,” I would point to Joe Biden in 2020 being the nominee as reason enough to think voting for #45 as a protest vote is an exercise in futility. The Democrats haven’t learned anything from 2016, or if they have, they’re actively ignoring it. If you want to protest what you perceive to be poor stewardship of the Democratic Party, I submit your best option is simply to tighten up those proverbial purse strings. Whatever you do, don’t vote for Trump. Don’t cut off your nose to spite your country.

To reiterate, for the majority of discerning American lefties, a Biden victory is the desired outcome of the 2020 presidential election, a reality seemingly lost on some Democratic Party loyalists who see valid criticism of their nominee as tantamount to helping the enemy or imagine that “Bernie or bust” types represent a larger part of the electorate than they actually do.

On the former count, if progressive criticisms of Biden have been weaponized by the right, um, Trump and his team are doing a poor job of utilizing them. Instead, despite obvious evidence to the contrary, the bad orange man has doubled down on the assertion that Amtrak Joe is a tool of the “radical Left” and has tried to tie Hunter Biden’s business dealings and personal failings to his father’s supposed unsuitability for the presidency, a move which has failed to garner traction if polling numbers are any indication. For that matter, it may be actively hurting Trump and his campaign, making Biden all the more sympathetic for treating his son with dignity and love.

On the latter count, Democratic supporters—and even the nominee himself, who has told people at various points in the campaign raising objections to his plan for America to vote for the other guy if they don’t like it point blank—have treated dissenters to the party platform as all but heretics, castigating them for wanting more than the “most progressive presidential party platform in history,” (which may or may not actually be implemented—fingers crossed!) pointing out much to their chagrin that “their guy lost,” (gee, we had forgotten Bernie lost—thanks for reminding us!), and telling them not to be such stupid, uncompromising babies and suckle at the teat of incrementalism. Amid the beating drum of vote shaming and lame pro-Biden slogans (what the hell is “build back better” anyway?), there is the refrain that not voting for Joe Biden is a vote for Donald Trump.

First of all, from a logical standpoint, this is not true. The only vote for Donald Trump is—not to be a dick about it—a vote for Donald Trump. By this logic, not voting for Trump could be considered a vote for Joe Biden. In turn, belaboring Biden’s susceptibility to losing due to poor turnout is a bit of a tell that true enthusiasm for your chosen candidate is lacking. It’s also an admission that you need the Left’s votes if you want to win—despite, you know, telling them they’re not welcome all the time.

The solution, therefore, is apparently to browbeat progressives into submission rather than genuine voter outreach, even when they’re not suggesting people shouldn’t vote, because it’s easier than coalition building. In fairness, progressives often struggle with this in their own right. There are so many problems to solve, so little time, and so many individual groups formed around specific geographical regions or pet causes. So, so many groups. And re turning out the vote, might progressives be similarly not so charitable to their closer-to-center counterparts were the roles reversed? Perhaps. Without the historical precedent, though, who’s to say?

In his closing, Cody Johnston makes this point about the motivation to vote for Joe Biden:

Every attempt I’ve seen to be, like, “Vote, and vote for the not-fascist!”—it has just seemed obnoxious or condescending or, like, not honest about Biden or about the situation. ‘Cause it sucks. We should be able to say that it sucks, and hold the nominally left party to not the lowest bar ever. Criticism is healthy. F**k Joe Biden, but f**k Donald Trump way more.

Alas, some liberals don’t agree. They want to have our vote and eat it too, as mixed a metaphor as that is. But a vote is not necessarily an endorsement and there’s a reason why people invoke imagery of holding one’s nose and pulling the lever or choosing between the lesser of two evils when describing the voting process. For those who can and do vote, many do it begrudgingly, without a strong attachment to either candidate. Pretending otherwise only makes it harder, and in a year which has seemed to have no limit to the perils it has thrown us, that’s harder than it needs to be.

Ever-present concerns about COVID-19 and hurricanes and poisonous hairy caterpillars (yes, that’s a thing now, apparently) notwithstanding, the subtext of the enthusiasm gap for prospective Joe Biden voters is glaring.

The people most enthusiastic about Biden as their nominee of choice tend to be those for whom the failings of either major-party candidate won’t matter all that materially or those who already have positive associations with the Democratic Party and voting in general. Less psyched about casting their ballots for Biden are the Americans who have struggled regardless of the party affiliation of the president and/or who hold the Obama-Biden administration in lower esteem than those fervent Democratic cheerleaders.

Herein, matters of age, class, and race are all highly relevant. For Gen Z and millennial voters especially, and those of a progressive mindset especially especially, Biden’s legacy as vice president doesn’t hold the same positive connotations as it does with liberals who swoon at Barack Obama’s smooth talk or who regard the Obamas as something closer to royalty than to the family of a former president.

These are voters who are living through a pandemic, a recession, and a period of social and political unrest, and, in some cases, came of political age during another recession. These are also voters who understand that, despite glowing visions of hope and change, Obama’s track record didn’t match his rhetoric. The Obama administration largely eschewed the energy from progressives which helped its namesake reach the White House and populated its ranks with the same kinds of neoliberal hacks that led us to a financial crisis in the first place. It’s no wonder, favorable comparisons to his successor and predecessor aside, a relic of the Obama years like Biden should be regarded with distrust.

This is all before we get to Biden’s history as a legislator prior to receiving the vice presidential nomination, a checkered history to say the least. Particularly on the topic of race, Biden’s legacy as an author and strong advocate for a crime bill that did discernible harm to communities of color as well as a centrist who has extolled his ability to work amiably among Southern segregationists does him no favors as the head of a Democratic Party trying to separate itself at all costs from a Republican Party plunging full tilt into a white supremacist agenda.

To his credit, Biden has at least acknowledged that supporting the 1994 Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act was a “mistake.” For some, however, this apology is weak sauce, as the kids say. Moreover, amid calls to defund and demilitarize police departments across the country, Biden’s team, while embracing some aspects of police reform, have been clear that Joe doesn’t support defunding the police, despite Donald Trump’s protestations that he has called for this measure. If anything, Biden wants more financial assistance for police forces. Progressive on this issue, he is not.

I get it—Joe Biden is a charmer. The warm smile, the working class appeal, the ability to convey a sense of empathy. His profile is tailor-made for a career in politics. For many voters rightfully skeptical of leadership across the political spectrum, meanwhile, appeals to “decency” aren’t enough. We’re in the midst of societal upheaval on top of global climate and health crises, and Biden’s milquetoast centrist policy stances are less than ideal to meet the challenges of this moment in time. Biden, in upending Bernie Sanders in the Democratic Party primary (with a lot of help from the other candidates and Barack Obama himself), boasted that voters don’t want a “revolution”—they want results. For the primary voters who fueled his comeback in the primary, that may well be the case.

For a growing number of Americans, however, a revolution is not just desired, but needed. It’s something that would benefit all Americans, not just the socioeconomically downtrodden, too. Unfortunately, Biden either doesn’t get it or pretends otherwise, and at the end of the day, that’s not on everyday people should he lose the election (though, to be clear, they should vote if ready, willing, and able)—that’s on him for not making the stronger case to elect him.

So you’ll have to excuse us if we don’t endorse Joe Biden or even like him all that much. It’s strategic voting, after all, and even if he wins, as Cody Johnston emphasized at the end of his aforementioned video, brunch is still cancelled. Sorry, liberals.