"Immunity passports" in the context of COVID-19
Coronavirus at meatpacking plants worse than first thought, USA TODAY investigation finds Coronavirus closed Smithfield and JBS meatpacking plants. Many more are at risk. Operators may have to choose between worker health or meat in stores.
Blue Angels and Thunderbirds will fly over New York and other cities to salute first responders
How New Zealand 'eliminated' Covid-19 after weeks of lockdown Monday was the final day of almost five weeks of strict level four lockdown measures, which New Zealand's Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern described as "the strictest constraints placed on New Zealanders in modern history." ........ On Tuesday, the country eased into a less restrictive lockdown, with 400,000 more New Zealanders heading back to work and 75% of the country's economy operating, according to Ardern. The new level three restrictions also mean that New Zealanders will be able to hold small funerals and buy takeaways....... "We are not out of the woods," she said at a press conference Tuesday. "(Level three) is a recovery room of sorts to assess if the incredible work that New Zealanders have done ... has worked." ........ an approach that could be applied anywhere -- moving swiftly, testing widely, and relying heavily on good science.
Brazil emerges as next potential coronavirus hotspot
Small business loans above $2 million will get full audit to make sure they’re valid, Mnuchin says
YouTube to stream Tribeca, Cannes, Sundance films for free starting May 29 The 10-day We Are One festival will feature movies from 20 of the world's most famous film festivals.
Making sense of the viral multiverse
Cautious return to normality needed With civil servants due to get back to work and some restrictions eased, there are hopes school classes will resume when time is right after virus shutdown
Full transcript: ‘Leonardo da Vinci’ biographer Walter Isaacson on Recode Decode “If you can stand at that intersection between the arts and sciences or between beauty and engineering, that’s where you’ll be the most creative.”
Amid Coronavirus Crisis, Israel Upgrades Empty Roads and Rails Roadwork is booming in Israel as construction crews take advantage of empty roads and railways in the time of coronavirus to upgrade the developed world’s most congested highways.
Pulitzer winner Chris Hedges: These "are the good times — compared to what's coming next" Author of "America: The Farewell Tour": We're heading for a steep decline; Biden and the Democrats have no answers ........ Empires fall a little bit at a time and then all at once. Over the last two decades, America has proven itself to be well along on that journey. The coronavirus pandemic has simply pushed our nation further along that downward spiral. .....Ultimately, the pandemic has further exposed and exacerbated — for those still somehow in denial about the decades-long reality of America as a decaying empire — deep political, social, economic, cultural and other societal problems. .......... The country's infrastructure is rotting. Trump presides over a plutocratic, corrupt, cruel, authoritarian, pathological kakistocracy. The commons is being reduced to rubble while the ultra-rich extract ever more wealth and other resources from the American people. Excessive military spending has left the United States incapable of attending to the basic needs of its people. A culture of distraction and spectacle has rendered many Americans incapable of being responsible engaged citizens. Our public educational system does not teach critical thinking skills. Radical right-wing Christians, white terrorist organizations and other neofascist paramilitaries and extremists are engaging in a campaign of thuggery, intimidation and violence against multiracial American democracy.......... A society can change so quickly because the underlying structures are rotten. There is the patina or the veneer of a functioning system, but the foundations of it are so decayed that they can't take the stress. That was true in the Weimar Republic in Germany, before the Nazis took full control. That was true in Yugoslavia before the civil war and ethnic violence. It is true here in the United States too. This country cannot withstand the stress of the coronavirus pandemic. Beyond the obviousness of what the Republicans are doing, the Democratic Party's response to this crisis exemplifies the problems America is facing as a whole. .......... Twelve hundred dollars to individuals suffering during this crisis is not sufficient. The Democrats were only really trying to block the equivalent of a $500 billion slush fund that is going into Mnuchin's hands, a man who acts like a criminal. That $1,200 is going to get vacuumed right up by the credit card companies and the banks who hold the mortgages........... This is like a repeat of 2008, where Congress is dumping staggering sums of money into the hands of Wall Street thieves.
......... I remember speaking to Fritz Stern, the great scholar of fascism, who himself fled Nazi Germany as a teenager. He said that in Germany there was a yearning for fascism before the word "fascism" was invented. We already see that yearning in America. The coronavirus crisis will make that yearning even more pronounced......... The pandemic was predictable. And yet, of course, especially under the Trump administration, we dismantled the mechanisms through which the United States could prepare. The needed infrastructure, such as hospital beds and ventilators and other needed equipment, was not there because, like with all decaying empires, the resources go to the defense industry and the military.
........ The fact that Fox News is even considered a news organization is staggering — although I don't think CNN is much better............. I am unsure if we have any mechanisms left in the United States by which we can effectively push back against the elites, the oligarchs and other anti-democratic forces. We don't have any ability to pit power against power. ......... the country is a naked plutocracy. The elites do not even try to hide it anymore. ........ The oligarchs do not care about job losses because, as Marx said, unemployment creates greater pools of desperate surplus labor. The oligarchs do not care about the climate. It's all about the primacy of profit and corporate power — and those values and systems are extinguishing our democracy. ........ Mass mobilization and civil disobedience is what is needed to defeat the oligarchs and take those first steps necessary to win back an American democracy. ........ A vote for Joe Biden is a vote for more of the same. The ruling elites would prefer Joe Biden, just like they preferred Hillary Clinton. Donald Trump is vulgar and an embarrassment. But the ruling elites also made it abundantly clear about their interests: Many of these people were quoted by name saying that if Bernie Sanders was the nominee — or even Elizabeth Warren — they would vote for Donald Trump. ........... James Baldwin explained why black people don't have midlife crises. Why? Because they do not buy into the myths of America. Black people know that the system in America is rigged. Black people know this when they are children. By comparison, white people buy into these illusions of meritocracy and individualism and American exceptionalism and similar beliefs. That is why the highest rates of suicide right now are among middle-aged white men, because they are finally starting to realize that the system does not care about them.
There’s Nothing Wrong With Stacey Abrams’s Campaign to Be Vice-President Biden’s own decision to narrow the field to women
Democratic lawmaker knocks Stacey Abrams: 'Inappropriate' to lobby for Biden's VP Abrams has taken the rare step of touting her strengths as a potential VP in an interview with The Atlantic last week, and has made other public comments in support of such a political partnership. ........ I ran the most successful campaign to engage the communities we need to build the broadest coalition necessary in 2020 ........ "She values honesty and encourages all women and girls - particularly women and girls of color - to speak up when asked if they are qualified to lead. ...... the progressive strategy network Way to Win released survey data indicating Stacey Abrams was Biden’s strongest potential lieutenant. .........
Stacey Abrams On Voting Rights, COVID-19, And Being Vice President "I would be an excellent running mate."
...... “Yes. I would be honored,” Abrams says. “I would be an excellent running mate. I have the capacity to attract voters by motivating typically ignored communities. I have a strong history of executive and management experience in the private, public, and nonprofit sectors. I’ve spent 25 years in independent study of foreign policy. I am ready to help advance an agenda of restoring America’s place in the world. If I am selected, I am prepared and excited to serve.” ............ Abrams’s direct response betrays ambition, makes verifiable claims, and establishes outcomes to which she could later be held accountable. By normal political rules, it is the wrong answer.
.......... Amid this chaotic unpredictability, Abrams’s candor is disarming and comforting. ....... A graduate of Spelman College, the LBJ School of Public Affairs at UT Austin, and Yale Law School ......... On the heels of her defeat, she founded Fair Fight, a national organizing effort to ensure fair elections. This was followed by Fair Count, which works to achieve a fully accurate and representative census. Then, late last year, Abrams launched the Southern Economic Advancement Project to promote equitable economic and social policy for all races, classes, and genders across the region. .......... the first black woman to deliver the official Democratic response to President Trump’s State of the Union in 2019. ............... Not becoming governor of one state gave me the opportunity to launch a national network in 20 states [to fight for fair elections]. We are helping reform democracy in places where it was broken and battered. We are fixing access to a census that the president of the United States tried to destroy.” .............. Abrams is kind and empathetic toward her colleague, saying, “Andrew and his family deserve the privacy to address the challenges they face.” ........... “I cannot know every challenge I will meet. My job is to nurture the intellectual curiosity and the stamina necessary to respond to the unknown.” ........ Introversion may be her most comfortable default, but the public-facing Abrams exudes striking eloquence, sincere warmth, and uncompromising rootedness in identity politics—a contrast to Biden’s verbal stumbles and misconduct allegations. Although she has been called a pragmatic progressive, it is her courage and straight-no-chaser public discourse that has earned Abrams the respect of voters, organizers, and elected officials alike. The vice presidency seems an odd fit for a politician who proudly writes of her own leadership, “I refused to play my scripted part.” ....... That campaign was not a whim. It was the outcome of decades of deliberate work building my capacity to serve as many people as I could, in the most effective way possible. My responsibility is to be ready to do the job—to have the core capacities that are embedded in the role. I am able to stand effectively as a partner, to execute a vision, and to serve the vision of the president.” ......... The bottom, not the top, is where Abrams has focused her work. She and I had planned to talk in Atlanta, sitting together, sharing a meal, and discussing her vision for the country. Instead we strain to hear each other over a spotty phone line, hunkered down in our homes, doing our part to flatten the curve. ........ We are all observing social distancing, but my dad is a bit surprised: ‘You’re not gonna give me a hug?’ he said. And I said, ‘Of course not. We’re gonna operate from six feet away.’ ....... “Many Americans are now experiencing what poor communities live with daily. We have communities perennially facing lower wages, higher poverty, lack of access to health care, and lack of access to child care. Shift workers, low-wage workers, agrarian workers, and service workers are now being pushed over the edge,” she says. “We must be intentional about identifying these challenges and concrete about naming and pursuing the solutions. These issues aren’t ancillary. They are central to who we are. The poor deserve expanded and deepened support. The poorest among us are often the people working the hardest. And they deserve to be protected. It is not socialism to have a social safety net.” ....... Even from quarantine, Abrams is leading Fair Fight to help ensure the congressional stimulus package includes hundreds of millions of dollars to support vote-by-mail systems for the 2020 election. ......... We are used to seeing black women this way—trained to rely on their seemingly unlimited reservoirs of strength and believing them magically invulnerable to hurt or harm. ......... I’m a sturdy black woman with natural hair. It took me a while to recognize that I am an attractive woman. I don’t look like everyone else. But I do me really well.” ........... “I feel beautiful when young black girls come up to me. They are not just excited to see me, but to see themselves in me. When little girls point to the gaps between their teeth because they haven’t had braces. They may come from families that will never be able to afford them, like mine couldn’t. I keep my gap. I could do Invisalign, but my gap is my mother’s gap. It’s my grandmother’s gap. This doesn’t make me less, because my parents didn’t have the money to have my teeth fixed with braces.
And it doesn’t make me less when I stand before a nation and deliver the State of the Union response.” ............ Abrams has a Sankofa sensibility. Sankofa is a West African assertion that our collective future must be rooted in a critical examination of our past. Abrams’s impulse to reach for the lessons of history while staying fixed on the necessity of service to the future suggests she may be the singularly remarkable leader America needs in this time of unprecedented economic and social change. In a world of social distancing, Abrams is a woman worth watching closely.
Why Stacey Abrams is making her case for VP -- everywhere Stacey Abrams is everywhere, and she's not coy about her ambitions: She wants to be Joe Biden's running mate. ....... The former top Democrat in the Georgia House has been everywhere this month, giving interviews and speeches, appearing at digital forums and writing op-eds. She has described herself in interviews as an "excellent" pick for Biden, publicly gamed out how she would debate Vice President Mike Pence and argued why it would be a mistake not to pick a black woman like herself. These comments come as Biden, whose primary campaign benefited immensely from widespread support from black voters, faces public pressure to pick a woman of color as his running mate. ...... The directness belies years of precedent by prospective running mates, who often publicly play coy about the vice-presidential ambitions while simultaneously privately running campaigns to get themselves picked. ............ straightforwardness reflects who Abrams has been for her entire adult life: A black woman raised in Mississippi and Georgia who feels if she is not upfront about her ambitions, she will get passed over. ........... as a student, she created a spreadsheet with career goals that she still uses today. .......... "As a woman of color, as a black woman, as a person of color, I cannot be shy about my response, because any hint that I don't think I'm qualified, that I don't think we can is used as a justification for saying that we can't." ........ The Democratic politician, appearing from her suburban Atlanta home, has been omnipresent over the last two weeks, just as Biden and his top advisers begin looking for a running mate.
.............. "I try to be straightforward because while we hope the work speaks for itself, sometimes the work needs a hype man," Abrams said on The View this month. "And I learned early on that if I didn't speak for myself, I couldn't tell the story." ......... "She has such a strong sense of self and confidence to be who she is despite the fact that she was raised in an America where black women have not been given all the benefits and have had a lot of barriers," said Leighton. "She was so clearly herself and so true to herself and not willing to waiver." .......... "I also know the way that black women leaders can be used by white politicians and white men," Byrd said. "And I think that Stacey has found herself in a position where it was very important to name drop her in the 2020 primary, and nearly every single candidate did. And then when she's pointedly asked the question about her ambition, she started to be criticized for that." ........... it is an "important signal to have someone of color on the ticket" because for "communities of color, particularly for the black community, there has got to be a recognition that their needs are met." .......... "It would excite people beyond anything that could be done. It would carry Georgia
" ....... "If you want to create the magic of the Obama-Biden team, you would do that best with a Biden-Abrams ticket."
