Sunday, June 07, 2020

Coronavirus News (134)

Powell stays above the fray — sort of - politics | NBC News

GOP leaders of the past decline to say whether they'll vote for Trump  Some legacy figures in the Republican Party are reportedly weighing how public to be about their opposition to Trump ....... Former President George W. Bush will not support Trump's re-election, while his brother Jeb Bush has not yet made a decision on how to vote ......... Former House Speakers Paul Ryan and John Boehner declined to say how they will vote, as did former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. Former Secretary of State Colin Powell said on CNN's "State of the Union" Sunday that he will be voting for Biden. ......... Rep. Francis Rooney (R-Fla.), who is not seeking re-election, says he is considering voting for Biden because Trump is "driving us all crazy” and has mishandled the U.S. response to the coronavirus. ........  Retired Adm. William McRaven, who directed the raid that killed Osama bin Laden, told the Times that Trump has shown "he doesn’t have the qualities necessary to be a good commander in chief," and called for "new leadership" this fall.



Analysis: White House, Pentagon tensions near breaking point The nub of the problem is that Trump sees no constraint on his authority to use what he calls the “unlimited power” of the military even against U.S. citizens if he believes it necessary. Military leaders generally take a far different view. They believe that active-duty troops, trained to hunt and kill an enemy, should be used to enforce the law only in the most extreme emergency, such as an attempted actual rebellion. That limit exists, they argue, to keep the public’s trust. .......... Defense Secretary Mark Esper, a West Point graduate who served 10 years on active duty, argued against bringing federal troops into Washington. In a contentious Oval Office meeting with Trump and others on Monday, the president demanded 10,000 federal troops be sent to the capital city  

Trump demanded 10,000 active-duty troops deploy to streets in heated Oval Office meeting  Attorney General William Barr, Defense Secretary Mark Esper and Joint Chiefs Chairman Mark Milley objected to the demand .......  If these governors didn't "call up the Guard, we'd have (active duty) troops all over the country" ......... On Wednesday morning, after two nights of peaceful protests, Esper ordered 700 troops from the 82nd Airborne Division to return to Fort Bragg, and then delivered a statement in the Pentagon briefing room that he was opposed to using the Insurrection Act to send active-duty troops into the streets.  

Police and protesters kneel together on June 1, 2020, in Minneapolis. Curtis Compton/Atlanta Journal-Constitution via AP

After Floyd killing, we need a truth and reconciliation commission on race and policing These commissions often accomplish what courts can't, such as public accountability and admissions of wrongdoing, and impetus for reforms and progress. .............. The instinct for many Americans with deeply felt grievances is to rage. Decades of protests — many peaceful, some violent — have yielded insufficient progress in the quest for better relations between the police and those who are policed. Criminal trials, civil lawsuits and out-of-court settlements haven’t helped enough. For paradigmatic change, a truth and reconciliation commission may be the only answer. .........  Most commissions lack subpoena authority or the power to punish, except with words.  Some even offer amnesty in exchange for the truth. They produce painstakingly detailed accounts of past eras and events, along with a slew of recommendations. In Canada, nearly three out of every four “calls to action” from its commission have been carried out or are in process. ......... Reconciliation between parties to lengthy and wide-ranging conflicts cannot occur in the absence of an agreed upon truth. A TRC’s effectiveness often hinges on whether it gives opposing sides equal chances to be heard and demonstrates impartiality as competing versions of a story are told. ........  the commissions use their bully pulpit, their independence from government, and their detachment from the traditional judicial process, to call for major societal reforms...........  While often dismissed as an overly lenient approach, truth and reconciliation commissions and other forms of restorative justice have in many cases led responsible parties to take more accountability than they might have in a courtroom. ........... We have no choice but to work together on a new path for policing in America. We must start with a clearer understanding of what truly ails us if we can ever reconcile our differences.

How Kamala Harris seized the moment on race and police reform Criminal justice reformers say she's neutralized a major liability — her past as a prosecutor — and it comes as Biden prepares to name his VP..........  Since the uprising over the killing of George Floyd, she’s taken to cable news programs and the Senate floor to argue for police reform and reconciliation. ........ She's widely considered to be a top contender for the vice-presidential appointment, if not the frontrunner. ........  Harris, along with her aides and family, kept in regular contact with leading activists and policymakers during her campaign and after she exited the race. .........  She was among the first senators to attend the protests, showing up with her husband and without mentioning it ahead of time to the news media, or her own aides. And in the crush of cable news appearances, she’s laid out an agenda that includes pushing for independent investigations into police misconduct, a national standard for when officers can use force, and Justice Department “pattern or practice“ probes into police departments. ...........  Harris, whose parents were active in the civil rights movement, was constantly asked to justify how she could choose to be part of a system she knew was discriminatory. Harris likened it to "going up the rough side of the mountain." And, in the waning days of her campaign, she confided to a group of black women leaders that the pointed memes — "Kamala is a Cop" — "breaks my heart." .........  Portraying herself as a longtime reformer, Harris cited her early re-entry program that provided job training and counseling to former offenders — before “re-entry” became common in the field. Later, as attorney general, she collected and published data on police shootings and in-custody deaths, and was early to mandate officer-worn body cameras. ......... she credited activism around the Black Lives Matter movement with expanding what reforms came to be viewed as possible ........ “All of us have evolved, right? We didn’t wake up woke” ....... “It’s clear she cares about black people and cares about their lives.” ..........   Harris’ criminal justice blueprint called for terminating federal mandatory minimum sentences and encouraging states to do the same; ending the death penalty and solitary confinement; and phasing out cash bail and for-profit prisons. It sought to end sentencing disparities between crack and powder cocaine offenses and legalize marijuana at the federal level.  

Stocks Rally After Unexpected Drop in U.S. Unemployment  Tens of millions remain out of work, and the unemployment rate, which fell to 13.3 percent from 14.7 percent in April, remains higher than in any previous postwar recession. ........ offering hope that the rebound from the pandemic-induced economic crisis could be faster than forecast. ....... “employment rose sharply in leisure and hospitality, construction, education and health services, and retail trade” .........  at least part of the pain in April was due to people being laid off or furloughed who still had very strong connections to their employers ........ “As good and surprising as this report was, this may just be the low-hanging fruit. These may have been the easiest workers to bring back.” .......... “As good and surprising as this report was, this may just be the low-hanging fruit. These may have been the easiest workers to bring back.” .........  the U.S. economy may be more resilient than many investors and analysts feared ....... Financial markets have been on an upward trajectory for weeks as investors have responded to signs around the world that businesses were slowly but steadily returning to normal and policymakers pumped money into the economy and financial markets...........  The data tells the story of an employment rebound as the state and local economies began to reopen and Paycheck Protection Program checks went out, spurring rehiring and bringing workers back onto payrolls. .......... “The economy is still being very much buffered by stimulus,” said Michelle Meyer, head of U.S. economics at Bank of America. “When that starts to wane, we will learn a lot more about the underlying health of the recovery.” ........... it was far too soon, he warned, to declare the economic crisis over, noting that black unemployment had risen even as the numbers declined over all. .........  a 27 percent expanded unemployment rate, which could more closely reflect the share of the labor force whose employment has been negatively affected by the pandemic. ......  Joblessness for white adults fell to 12.4 percent from 14.2 percent the prior month, and Hispanic worker unemployment declined to 17.6 percent from 18.9 percent. For black workers, however, joblessness was up slightly to 16.8 percent, and unemployment for Asians also increased, to 15 percent from 14.5 percent.  .........  The employment-to-population ratio for black workers ticked up to 49.6 percent, up from 48.8 percent the prior month. Still, that means that less than half of black adults are working — worse than any other large racial or ethnic group. ...........  Gap, one of the biggest U.S. retailers with its namesake, Old Navy and Banana Republic chains, said on Thursday that net sales in the first quarter plummeted 43 percent to $2.1 billion and that it posted a net loss of $932 million. The company, which has nearly 2,800 stores in North America, said that it had reopened more than 1,500 locations and expected the “vast majority” of stores to be open by the end of June. ............ Slack, the business communication platform, said in a regulatory filing that its first-quarter revenue rose 50 percent to $201.7 million and a small loss compared with the same period last year. But the results disappointed investors, who expected greater growth during the pandemic, and its shares plunged.



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Saturday, June 06, 2020

Coronavirus News (133)


Shouting Into the Institutional Void Demonstrators are hammering on a hollowed-out structure, and it very well may collapse. ...........   In July 1967, immediately after the riots in Newark and Detroit, President Lyndon B. Johnson created a commission to study the causes and prevention of urban unrest. The Kerner Commission—named for its chairman, Governor Otto Kerner Jr. of Illinois—was an emblem of its moment. ...........  “What white Americans have never fully understood—but what the Negro can never forget—is that white society is deeply implicated in the ghetto. White institutions created it, white institutions maintain it, and white society condones it.” The report called for far-reaching policy reforms in housing, employment, education, and policing, to stop the country from becoming “two societies, one black, one white—separate and unequal.” ..............  It was too much for Johnson, who resented not being credited for his efforts to achieve civil rights and eradicate poverty, and whose presidency had just been engulfed by the Tet Offensive in South Vietnam. He shelved the report. A few weeks later, on the evening of April 4, Martin Luther King Jr. was killed in Memphis. The next night, Johnson—who had just announced that he wouldn’t run for reelection—spoke to a country whose cities were burning from coast to coast. “It is the fiber and the fabric of the republic that’s being tested,” he said. “If we are to have the America that we mean to have, all men of all races, all regions, all religions must stand their ground to deny violence its victory in this sorrowful time, and in all times to come. Last evening, after receiving the terrible news of Dr. King’s death, my heart went out to his family and to his people, especially to the young Americans who I know must sometimes wonder if they are to be denied a fullness of life because of the color of their skin.” To an aide, he was more blunt in assessing the uprising: “What did you expect? I don’t know why we’re surprised. When you put your foot on a man’s neck and hold him down for 300 years, and then you let him up, what’s he going to do? He’s going to knock your block off.” ............  King’s murder and the riots it sparked propelled Congress to pass, by an overwhelming and bipartisan margin, the decade’s last major piece of civil-rights legislation, the Civil Rights Act of 1968, which enforced fair standards in housing. Johnson signed it on April 11. It was too late. The very best reports, laws, and presidential speeches couldn’t contain the anger in the streets. That year, 1968, was when reform was overwhelmed by radicalization on the left and reaction on the right. We still live in the aftermath. The language and ideas of the Kerner Report have haunted the years since—a reminder of a missed chance. ...............   The difference between 1968 and 2020 is the difference between a society that failed to solve its biggest problem and a society that no longer has the means to try. ........  The protesters aren’t speaking to leaders who might listen, or to a power structure that might yield, except perhaps the structure of white power, which is too vast and diffuse to respond. Congress isn’t preparing a bill to address root causes; Congress no longer even tries to solve problems. No president, least of all this one, could assemble a commission of respected figures from different sectors and parties to study the problem of police brutality and produce a best-selling report with a consensus for fundamental change. A responsible establishment doesn’t exist. Our president is one of the rioters. .............  Levers of influence no longer connect to sources of power. Democratic protections—the eyes of a free press, the impartiality of the law, elected officials acting out of conscience or self-interest—have lost public trust. The protesters are railing against a society that isn’t cohesive enough to summon a response. They’re hammering on a hollowed-out structure, and it very well may collapse. ................   If 2020 were at all like 1968, the president would go on national television and speak as the leader of all Americans to try to calm a rattled country in a tumultuous time. But the Trump administration hasn’t answered the unrest like an embattled democracy trying to reestablish legitimacy. Its reflex is that of an autocracy—a display of strength that actually reveals weakness, emptiness. Trump’s short walk from the White House to St. John’s Episcopal Church had all the trappings of a strongman trying to show that he was still master of the country amid reports that he’d taken refuge in a bunker: the phalanx of armored guards surrounding him as he strutted out of the presidential palace; the tear gas and beatings that cleared his path of demonstrators and journalists; the presence of his daughter, who had come up with the idea, and his top general, wearing combat fatigues as if to signal that the army would defend the regime against the people, and his top justice official, who had given the order to raid the square. ................  William Barr has reacted to the killing of George Floyd like the head of a secret-police force rather than the attorney general of a democratic republic. .............  The protests have to be understood in the context of this institutional void. They resemble the spontaneous mass cry of a people suffering under dictatorship more than the organized projection of public opinion aimed at an accountable government. They signify that democratic politics has stopped working. They are both utopian and desperate.............   the overwhelming message of the protests is simply “end racism,” which would be a large step toward ending evil itself. .........    For white protesters—who are joining demonstrations on behalf of black freedom and equality in large numbers for the first time since Selma, Alabama, 55 years ago—this demand means ending an evil that lies within themselves. It would be another sign of a hollow democracy if the main energy in the afterglow of the protests goes into small-group sessions on white privilege rather than a hard push for police reform. ...........  The immediate context of the protests helps explain their breadth and intensity: three years of the bigoted and cruel presidency of Donald Trump; three months of the worst pandemic in a century, with more than 100,000 Americans dead and 40 million unemployed. Trump’s utter failure to protect Americans from COVID-19 and his indifference to suffering that fell most heavily on poor, black, and brown people, and to the economic ravages that followed—injustice on this scale burned like smothered coals in millions of homes and hearts during the months of quarantine. The easing of the lockdown and the video of a man’s life being crushed out of him came at the same moment, and the anger received a tremendous burst of oxygen.............   the collision between pandemic and protest ..........  The coronavirus doesn’t care if it’s stopped trending on Twitter. ...........  it’s impossible not to worry that the curve, finally bent in New York and other cities, is about to spike upward ..........  There’s an election coming in five months. It won’t end racism or the pandemic, or repair our social bonds, or restore our democracy to health. But it could give us a chance to try, if we get that far.

India Risks Junk Status As Economy Faces 10% Contraction    The problem, of course, is that Indian growth is now grinding to a halt. India’s 3.1% growth from January to March are as good as things get as Covid-19 fallout upends global demand. Former finance secretary Subhash Chandra Garg expects the economy to contract by 10% this fiscal year, India’s first time in the red in more than 40 years.   ..........   These risks, though, would be a lot less troubling if Modi had used the last 2,200 days to get under the hood of a stalling economy. 



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