Harris started hot and then let Pence escape and evade

 

M.Klonsky pic

The much anticipated V.P. debate turned out to be a dud with Pence ducking and dodging every question and Sen. Kamala Harris overly restrained and moderator Susan Page failing to go after him. 

I liked Harris a lot better in that primary debate back in June, when she went aggressively after Joe Biden for his backward role in the school integration battles of the '70s. Remember her devastating line, "that little girl was me."

Last night she started hot. 

Well, the American people have witnessed what is the greatest failure of any presidential administration in the history of our country. And here are the facts. 210,000 dead people in our country in just the last several months. Over 7 million people who have contracted this disease. One in five businesses closed.  We're looking at frontline workers who have been treated like sacrificial workers. We are looking at over 30 million people who in the last several months had to file for unemployment. And here's the thing, on January 28, the vice president and the president were informed about the nature of this pandemic. They were informed that it's lethal in consequence, that it is airborne, that it will affect young people and that it would be contracted because it is airborne. And they knew what was happening, and they didn't tell you. 

But then cooled off. 

Should have been BOOM! DEBATE OVER! But it wasn't. Instead, Trump's loyal V.P. was allowed to repeatedly escape and evade, steal time with long non-sequiturs, violate time limits, mansplain issues of race, criminal justice, China, and the economy, and put Kamala on the defensive on so-called, "court-packing."

Pence's outright lies were received with skeptical smiles but mainly went unchecked with little or no follow-up questioning from Page or anticipated counter-attack from Harris.  

Eg...Pence, defending Trump and himself on their failure to control pandemic-spread, praised D.T. for his supposed suspension of all travel from China. He lied. Thousands were exempted from the partial ban. Plus it was travelers from Europe, not China, who brought the pandemic to NY.

On the environment: Pence's claim that "our water is among the cleanest in the world" went unchallenged, except of course, from what I imagine were thousands of fist-shaking viewers in Flint, MI. 

He went on to deny the existence of systemic racism in the U.S., in effect supporting Trump's ban on teaching about the history of racism in schools or anti-racism training in the workplace.

Pence stonewalled Page's question about whether or not he and D.T. would accept the election results if they lost. Page quickly moved on and Harris didn't pursue. 

Trump's current squashing of a bi-partisan COVID-relief bill in order to fast-track his supreme court nomination never even came up. 

And so it went. 

Interesting side note: The term "the American people" was used 57 times in just two hours, mainly by Pence. I cringed every time he said it, knowing that he was using the term to represent his base of mainly white, male MAGAs.  

PENCE: I think the American people know that this is a president who has put the health of America first...But when you say what the American people have done over these last eight months hasn't worked, that's a great disservice to the sacrifices the American people have made... and I'm going to speak up on behalf of what the American people have done...President Trump and I have great confidence in the American people and their ability to take that information and put it into practice...We told the American people what needed to be done and the American people made the sacrifices. 

We sure as hell did sacrifice...212K dead. 

Another: 

Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley castigated Pence after he invoked the nickname AOC for Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez during the debate. 

“Pence you are obsessed,” the Massachusetts congresswoman wrote. “She’s a prolific legislator, a historymaker, a movement leader, I get it. But stop being so familiar. Titles matter & she’s earned hers. It’s CONGRESSWOMAN Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, AUTHOR of the Green New Deal.”

But the most likely takeaway, the thing people will long remember about this debate, was the fly that landed on Pence's head and offered us viewers a few moments of hilarity, diversion from the two-hour nothing-burger on the stage.

I doubt if anything else that occurred on that stage will move the needle by even a point.

With COVID-stricken, steroid-addled Trump's announcement yesterday that he won't participate in the next presidential debate, last night's event will likely be the last of this campaign's televised debates. 

Fine with me. 

WEEKEND QUOTABLES

San Juan Mayor Says 'No One' in Puerto Rico Has Received a COVID-19 Stimulus Check

Shia Kapos

It was an insurgence but "it's not quite" a Council War.

"There are multiple divisions in this Council. It's not pro or anti mayor," former Ald. Dick Simpson told Playbook. He would know. He was there for the 1980s Council Wars. "Mayor Lightfoot has the majority and is likely to keep the majority." --  -- IL Playbook

Rep. Pramila Jayapal on Biden

“I'd be fooling myself if I thought Joe Biden would embrace Medicare for All. But I do think there’s room for him to move much more than he has so far,” said Jayapal, who is the lead author of the House’s single-payer bill and co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus. -- Politico

Former Bush speechwriter David Frum 

President Trump is a "psychological coward" and is "heading toward a historic political defeat — one that will likely take the Republican Senate down with him." -- MSNBC

Tyson Foods board chairman John Tyson

"The food supply chain is breaking." -- CNN

V.P. Mike Pence (Note to myself: Revisit this quote on June 1)

 “I believe by early June we’re going to see our nation largely past this epidemic...I think honestly, if you look at the trends today, that I think by Memorial Day weekend we will have this coronavirus epidemic behind us,”  -- Bloomberg

Robert Reich 

The Covid-19 pandemic is putting the deepening class divide in America into stark relief. Four new classes are emerging: The remotes, the essentials, the unpaid, and the forgotten. -- Guardian

Ilhan Omar & Leah Hunt-Hendrix

Now is not the time for retrenchment into isolationism. It is time to reimagine what it means to lead, and how we might work together as a global community. -- Guardian

San Juan Mayor, Carmen Yulin Cruz

'No One' in Puerto Rico Has Received a COVID-19 Stimulus Check. “The problem is that the support goes to the higher levels of government, and doesn’t reach the people that it’s supposed to reach.” -- Time

In times like these...

Students at Chicago's Little Village Academy as CPS school ordered closed. 

"The system is not really geared to what we need right now. That is a failing. Let's admit it." -- Dr. Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases

With virus and science deniers Trump/Pence misleading the war against COVID-19, it's become impossible for local governments to rely on the feds for leadership out of the crisis. The bumbling and total incompetence of the Trump regime along with years of GOP assaults on the very idea of government has left us with a system totally ill-prepared and in full chaos mode.

Currently, the number-one concern is the lack of tests available to even begin to identify potential coronavirus patients and deliver adequate healthcare.

As yesterday's guest on Hitting Left, State Sen. Robert Peters pointed out, with the breakdown of federal support, resource-starved states, cities and local municipalities are forced to try and fill the gap. Peters, who along with States Atty. Kim Foxx, is championing efforts to get rid of cash bail, is also concerned about the plight of vulnerable prisoners and staff in the state's jails and prisons as the pandemic grows. A large percentage of these prisoners are simply there awaiting trial.

An open letter from dozens of concerned local community groups to Cook County calling for immediate decarceration of Cook County jail, the largest of its kind in the U.S.

Curtis Black, in the Chicago Reporter, reports:

Gov. J.B. Pritzker should act quickly to review the cases of elderly and infirm inmates in jails and prisons and provide medical furloughs or compassionate release to “as many of them as possible” in order to prevent a devastating outbreak of coronavirus in the prison system, according to a letter initiated by a prison educators group and signed by over 1,500 educators and health professionals.

They point out that prisons “are known incubators and amplifiers of infectious disease.” According to other advocates arguing for immediate steps, an outbreak of coronavirus would “cripple an already broken [prison health] system” and result in deaths of elderly inmates, who are particularly vulnerable to the virus.

Gov. Pritzker did what he felt he had to do yesterday when he ordered all state and CPS schools temporarily closed sending 2.2 million school children home for at least the next two weeks. Mayor Lori Lightfoot had pushed as long as she could to keep schools open as centers for delivering needed meals, healthcare and safe havens for children and families. Lightfoot said she was deeply worried about students whose parents can’t take off work and those who are dependent on breakfast and lunch at the school. About 76% of students in Chicago Public Schools are low income.

At her own news conference following Pritzker’s announcement, Lightfoot said the governor needed to consider the entire state’s needs and not just those of Chicago Public Schools. Though she insisted she and Pritzker were in “lockstep."

The temporary school closings were done only after a belated advisory was issued from the CDC authorizing local districts to temporarily close their schools. Until now, the CDC had advised that schools stay open and issued a set of guidelines for their operation during the crisis.

Here in Chicago, the closings were demanded by the CTU.

The state will view these as “act of God” days, meaning school personnel are expected to be paid during the next two weeks. The governor also waived the requirement that schools be in session for 180 days to receive state funding, meaning no district will lose tax dollars as a result of cancellations.

A plan has apparently been put in place to deliver food and other supports to children and families who are normally served by in-school programs. But I imagine that many teachers are still torn about once again being separated from their kids during this crisis.

Now Pritzker should follow Ohio and Washington state's lead and suspend statewide standardized testing.

A salute goes out to the heroic Chicago librarians and park district workers who are trying to fill the gap while putting themselves at risk, keeping libraries and park programs up and running during the school shutdown.

Nationally, Senate Democrats are expressing concern over the negative effects that K-12 school closings could have on students and families and demanding answers from Trump's Sec. of Education Betsy DeVos.

"In K-12 schools, many families rely on the Federal School Lunch Program and may experience food insecurity if they can no longer access meals at school," they explained.

"Few school districts have experience providing wide-scale educational services online for all students, and not all families have access to home computers and high-speed internet to take advantage of such online options. Online learning cannot substitute for a number of services provided in the school setting, and it raises particular challenges to ensuring equity in access to education for all students," they added.

All this while the Fed is about to bail out Wall Street with weekly injections of $1.5 trillion (with a T), to try and revive a crashing stock market. The next time you hear a politician tell you that we can't afford healthcare for all or abolishing student loan debt, tell them to go f**k themself.

We at @uplcchicago co-signed this letter. To prevent disastrous spread of Covid-19 to people in Cook County Jail, the best solution is to release anyone who can be released w/o endangering community, & allow those on monitors access to doctors w/o delay https://t.co/iZ3zEPsOsX

— Alan Mills (@alan_uplc) March 14, 2020

Thousands of children receive two meals a day at school and many live in food deserts. How will children in closed districts receive proper food security? We deserve answers from DeVos. https://t.co/hgkLHE3Ven

— Kerry Kennedy (@KerryKennedyRFK) March 13, 2020

WEEKEND QUOTABLES on MLK Day

"The King is Dead" and "Long Live the King" are seen written on a store in the 1400 block of North Sedgwick on April 7, 1968, two days after Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s assassination. | Sun-Times file photo

Classic Mike Royko (April 5, 1968)

Hypocrites all over this country would kneel every Sunday morning and mouth messages to Jesus Christ. Then they would come out and tell each other, after reading the papers, that somebody should string up King, who was living Christianity like few Americans ever have. -- Chicago Daily News

Pence compares Trump to Dr. King

Claims, "both leaders have inspired Americans to change through the legislative process". -- Newsweek

Michelle Alexander's King Day Op-ed

 Similarly, many students are fearful of expressing support for Palestinian rights because of the McCarthyite tactics of secret organizations like Canary Mission, which blacklists those who publicly dare to support boycotts against Israel, jeopardizing their employment prospects and future careers. -- NYT, Time to Break the Silence on Palestine

Director Alan Sorkin goes after young, elected Dems

"The young Democrats newly elected to Congress should "stop acting like young people".  Sorkin said he believes Democrats should say the party is "not just about transgender bathrooms". -- CNN

Rep. Ocasio-Cortez responds

"News Flash: Medicare for All & equal rights aren’t trends," 29-year-old Ocasio-Cortez, the youngest woman elected to the House, wrote in response to a video of Sorkin's interview.

"When people complain about low turnout in some demos, it’s not because communities are apathetic, it’s bc they don’t see you fighting for them. If we don’t show up for people, why should you feel entitled to their vote?" -- The Hill

Let’s dig into “gravitas,” bc it’s an ambiguous word, selectively applied.

Ever wonder how expression that’s feminine, working-class, queer, or poc isn’t deemed as having “gravitas,” but talking like an Aaron Sorkin character does? 🤔

Men have “gravitas,” women get “likeable.” https://t.co/0g9FNpExAl

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) January 20, 2019