Below The Fold: The news that do not make the headlines but is important. By PL Hade.
- “The Democrats didn’t fail to get Republican support. Republicans failed to support the American Every Senate race in every state is now local.
- The 50 GOP Senators who voted against the Covid19 Relief Bill represent 43,279,000 fewer US people than the 50 Democratic Senators who voted for it.
- Republican Senators Haven’t Represented a Majority of Voters Since 1996“
- Today, the 50 members of the Democratic caucus represent 56.5% of the 50-state population compared to only 43.5% for the chamber’s 50 Republicans.” https://www.dailykos.com/…/-How-minority-rule-plagues…
- 5 GOP Senators are retiring: Senator Roy Blunt (R-Missouri) announced yesterday that he will not run for reelection in 2022. https://www.politico.com/…/gop-sen-roy-blunt-will-not…
- Richard Burr (R-NC), Pat Toomey (R-Pa), Richard Shelby (R-AL) and Rob Portman (R-Ohio) are also not running for reelection.
- In court filing, ICE says it is effectively ending use of family detention. ICE disclosed that it is transitioning family detention centers to short-term facilities that will release families after no more than 72 hours. https://www.nbcnews.com/…/court-filing-ice-says-it…
- Highlights of the $1.9T COVID bill https://apnews.com/…/joe-biden-personal-taxes…
- From Tom Malinowski: Actually, the states facing the biggest COVID-related revenue loss, and that need this help the most, are Texas (-10.4%) and Florida (-11.3%). GOP leaders will pocket this funding for their states (you’re welcome), while continuing the big lie that it’s a “blue state bailout.”
- Cellphone records tie far-right Proud Boys member to someone in Trump White House in the days before they attacked and stormed the Capitol on January 6. https://news.yahoo.com/cellphone-records-tie-proud-boys…
- Far-Right Misinformation Is Thriving On Facebook. A New Study Shows Just How Much “It’s almost twice as much engagement per follower among the sources that have a reputation for spreading misinformation.” To be clear the study did not attempt to separate the engagement with misinformation posts into positive comments/shares and those comments that sought to correct the misinformation nor whether the same people tended to comment/share misinformation. But it does seem that the people who propagate lies very actively use Facebook. https://www.npr.org/…/far-right-misinformation-is…
- There are a lot of claims from the GOP about what HR1 does. Most of those claims are wrong.
- “The bill does not prohibit states from having voter identification requirements. Rather, it requires states to allow voters who do not show ID to instead submit a signed statement under penalty of perjury attesting to their identity and eligibility to vote.”
- The bill does not change current law that bans people who aren’t citizens of the United States, including undocumented immigrants, from voting in federal elections.
- The bill requires states to accept mail-in ballots that arrive up to 10 days after Election Day only if these ballots are mailed on or before Election Day.
- The Democrats’ bill does not require states to send out ballots that voters have not explicitly solicited. Rather, the bill requires states to give all voters the option of requesting a mail-in ballot without an excuse. https://www.cnn.com/…/fact-check-pence…/index.html
- The first major move is expected over the next three weeks, officials said, with a series of clandestine actions across Russian networks that are intended to be evident to Putin and his intelligence services and military but not to the wider world. https://www.nytimes.com/…/microsoft-solarwinds-hack…
- “Private executioners paid in cash. Middle-of-the-night killings. False or incomplete justifications. ProPublica obtained court records showing how the outgoing administration used its final days to execute the most federal prisoners since World War II.” https://www.propublica.org/…/inside-trump-and-barrs…
- Covid19
- 529,560 Americans have died from Covid19
- NJ: 3434 new positives
- Rate of Transmission 1.05 THIS IS THE FOURTH DAY IN A ROW THAT OUR TRANSMISSION RATE IS OVER 1
- Counties with the highest positives: Bergen 453, Monmouth 423, Middlesex 326
- This is typical of what we’re seeing from Medical Professionals.
- Spring Break in Florida is a very, very bad idea.
- VERY WORRIED FOR FLORIDA/US—More contagious #B117 is rising quickly, & exponentially replacing the old dying #SARSCoV2 common strain. B117 affects kids, & 64% more severe. B117 now over 40%—dominant in days. A new surge is coming.
- COVID-19’s Big Fat Non-Surprise: tip-toeing around the linkage of coronavirus mortality and obesity doesn’t do anyone any favors.“… the World Obesity Federation issued a report showing that there is a clear link between excess body weight, especially obesity, and COVID-19 mortality.” https://thebulwark.com/covid-19s-big-fat-non-surprise/
- The US will finally have a national Covid testing strategy. https://www.politico.com/…/07/covid-testing-biden-473937https://youtu.be/XQTuFudB028