TMI -- Weekly Quick Clicks & Must Reads (Exclusive For Subscribers)
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Hey everyone -- this is the regular weekly dispatch of quick clicks, news items and must-reads. I’m doing it exclusively for paying subscribers, as a personal thank you for your support. Email me and/or use the comments section in this post to give me any feedback about the newsletter in general, what you want to see etc. I want to hear from you directly. Again — thanks so much for supporting this project. Your support makes the project possible. - David
Quick clicks:
• I’ve summarized American politics in one single image right here.
• If you’re looking to stay involved in politics now that the Democratic presidential primary is winding down, check out all the Berniecrats running for office.
• Thank you, celebrities.
• Here’s something relatively rare: an interesting proposal from a Senate Republican.
• Compared to other industrialized countries, the United States’ fiscal response to the COVID crisis has been small.
• This dude is not wrong.
• When it comes to the small business lending program, you just can’t make this stuff up.
• My 9-year-old son has become obsessed with Rubik’s Cube, as you can see from this photo. He insisted to me the best in the world can solve them in seconds. I didn’t believe him. Then he showed me this and now my mind is blown.
Stuff I’m reading:
• Thanks to Covid-19, Neoliberal Globalization Is Unraveling (The Nation) — There’s a difference between globalism and internationalism. Bernie Sanders understands that, Joe Biden doesn’t — and that’s a big problem for Democrats in the 2020 general election.
• My Dad’s Friendship With Charles Barkley (WBUR) — Just read this article. I’m not even going to summarize it here. You’ll love it.
• 32 millionaire CEOs who scooped up taxpayer money meant for struggling small businesses (Popular Info) — my Substack colleague Judd Legum breaks open a big story about the Trump administration’s loans for small business.
• Bailout money bypasses hard-hit New York, California for North Dakota, Nebraska (Reveal) — were small business loans targeted towards states that are politically important for Trump?
• The Democrats Who Want to Bail Out the Oil Industry (Sludge) — this is happening during a climate crisis, and it’s not good.
• The Infection That’s Silently Killing Coronavirus Patients (New York Times) — an emergency room physician identifies COVID pneumonia as a major problem, and argues that there is a way we could more quickly identify early signs with a common medical device.
Stuff to Watch & Listen To:
• Did Amazon get caught lying to Congress about monopoly practices? (The Hill) — I was on The Hill’s morning show Rising to talk about some big news. Make sure to subscribe to Krystal and Saagar’s newsletter here.
• The Last Dance (ESPN) — I highly recommend the ESPN documentary series about Michael Jordan and the Chicago Bulls. It’s a great escape during these dark times — but it is also crushing my soul, because it is bringing back painful memories of Jordan totally steamrolling my beloved Philadelphia 76ers.
• Why Bernie Lost (Left Anchor) — I was on the Left Anchor podcast with The Week’s Ryan Cooper discussing what happened at the end of the Bernie 2020 campaign.
As always, thanks for pitching in to support this newsletter project. Please email me directly or use the comments to give me any feedback.
Rock the boat,
Sirota
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Thanks so much for the "local Berniecrats" website.... I hadn't ever seen that site before, and it is really an interesting, easy way for people to find up and coming candidates that share Bernie's progressive values! And hopefully, support them financially or with gifts of time & effort.
I believe Bernie's values are quite widely shared, and not nearly as "radical" as they are painted by those in mainstream media and Republicans, and sadly-- establisment Dem's.
Right now, establishment Dem's seem to be the opposition as much as those other two groups are-- to achieving some real change for ordinary Americans who have been taking it in the shorts for the last 40 years.... Just having a (D) after your name doesn't necessarily mean you're for the working class American anymore. I love how Krystal Ball referred to herself as being on "Team Working Class". Yup, we need more of that....
Thanks for the dispatches... all excellent. Especially poignant story about two very unlikely but very fast friends (The story about Barkley and Wang).
Listened to your interview with Ryan Cooper - heartfelt and insightful. I want to highlight a point you made that you are 'pessimistic in the short term, but optimistic in the long term', that there is reason to have hope for continuation of and progress in the political system under a Biden administration (assuming a win - the likelihood of about which which you make some good comments regarding base enthusiasm).
I would pose a problem this way (assume it's a hypothetical problem - for now) what if there is no 'long term?' As a political tactician, how do you address an approaching cataclysm? I would be interested in the way the discussions went in the Sanders campaign to discuss this - the term 'existential threat' was used liberally by Senator Sanders, but it seemed to lack the obvious impact that it should; Bernie would mention the 'existential threat of Climate Change', and then go on to discuss gun policy, or economic justice - important issues, but, hey! didn't you just say 'that we might soon cease to exist', why should I give a flying fig about economic justice?' I'm sure the irony of these issue juxtapositions was not lost on you all as you crafted messaging.
It's human nature to 'tune out' alarmist messages, which is precisely why the science community (with which I work as an engineer) has been soft-pedaling the science story of Climate Change - an example being the ICC report which understates the impacts, rather dramatically. And now it seems that this dramatic under-pedaling has been of science that has itself rather dramatically under-scoped the problem, things are much more dire than is commonly acknowledged in the lay press. This would be danger-squared (in our hypothetically posed problem, but based on real life circumstances). Chris Hedges has addressed this a number of times in (what are deemed to be) apocalyptic essays of impending doom - by the way, have you asked Hedges if he wants to join you at TMI? He’s working on a book now, but might wish to do the occasional essay.
So, I present the (hypothetical) problem: what if there is no ‘long term’ how does that change the political calculus of ‘now?’ As Martin Luther King said:
**We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history there is such a thing as being too late. Procrastination is still the thief of time. Life often leaves us standing bare, naked and dejected with a lost opportunity. The "tide in the affairs of men" does not remain at the flood; it ebbs. We may cry out desperately for time to pause in her passage, but time is deaf to every plea and rushes on. Over the bleached bones and jumbled residue of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words: "Too late." There is an invisible book of life that faithfully records our vigilance or our neglect. "The moving finger writes, and having writ moves on..." We still have a choice … today. **
In this (not so) hypothetical, what does a political-tactician do when those in a position to know say ‘time’s up.’? Would such a proposition to Sen. Sanders make him change his calculation of wanting to stay 25% ‘in the system’ (as you said), the system which is the ‘procrastinator stealing time’ and finally go ‘all out’ (as you said)?