A briefly refreshing candidacy was Tulsi Gabbard's; she spoke out against America's elective, "regime change" wars in a field where no one else was doing that.
Then she ended her run and endorsed warmonger Joe Biden.
In this painful video, comedian and Tulsi fan Jimmy Dore asks her why she did that, and she blathers platitudes.
around the web
pandemic resources
State-by-state numbers on virus cases (positive test results, and, if available from the states, negative results and deaths): The COVID Tracking Project
If you have the command line you can view a summary of the positive test data by typing
curl news.coffee
(hat tip John Romero for making this!)
Update: For global numbers try worldometer (hat tip news.coffee)
biden on social insecurity
Biden didn't have any obvious senior moments in his debate with Sanders last night -- he was a slick, practiced liar* and some viewers may consider that presidential.
Sanders attempted to point out that Biden favors cuts to Social Security, which Biden denied several times. Sanders told viewers, "go to YouTube" to see Biden's true position.
Naked Capitalism commenter John went to YouTube, and here are some links:
Joe Biden Brags About Wanting To Cut Social Security
Joe Biden: “Let’s cut Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, & Veterans’ Benefits!”
Joe Biden Talks About Cutting Social Security And Medicare. Update: This clip has since been deleted so here's another, from the Young Turks on December 2018. Cenk Uygur says he likes Biden (yuck) but not enough to vote for him -- this is before Biden became the presumptive candidate to go against Trump. Curious if Cenk changes his tune and gets behind Joe in the general. Biden is super creepy in these clips, whispering "social security" like it's some taboo thing, and saying it "can stay but needs adjustments" (that is, cuts or changes to the retirement age). Biden shares with many conservatives the belief that the US can't "afford" social benefits but can "afford" a huge military.
*Update 2: See Nina Illingworth's catalog of these falsehoods.
public service message
One of Pres Trump's solutions to the pandemic is to cut so-called payroll taxes. This sounds great but he's deliberately confusing those taxes, which fund Social Security and Medicare, with regular income tax, which funds, among other things, elective wars and presidential salaries. He's taking advantage of a crisis to accomplish right-wing goals of cutting popular social programs. A letter to Congress from Social Security Works explains the scam [PDF].
