'They're Playing With Us': Anger Mounts Against GOP As $600 Unemployment Benefit Lapses; Pelosi

[appalachiablue]

‘They’re playing with us’: Anger mounts against GOP as $600 unemployment benefit lapses.' Written by Eoin Higgins / Common Dreams August 2, 2020, AlterNet.

Americans angry with inaction from Senate Republicans and President Donald Trump on extending $600 a week unemployment benefits are accusing the government of not living up to its responsibility to care for the public during the Covid-19 pandemic as the boost in aid expired Friday.

“In the middle of this pandemic they’re playing with us,” said Candida Kevorkian, a 53-year-old California woman relying on the payments to survive, told the Washington Post Saturday.

The benefits are credited with keeping the economy from a complete collapse due to the ongoing nationwide Covid-19 outbreak and staving off a wave of evictions many advocates fear is coming now that the weekly infusion is gone. But the initial program, passed in the CARES Act in late March, only ran until the end of July.

House Democrats approved the HEROES Act, a $3 trillion stimulus package which included an extension of the unemployment benefit boost, in late May, but GOP lawmakers in the Senate, led by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), took no action on the bill, instead presenting a competing bill known as the HEALS Act last month that cut the payment to $200 a week. That legislation was dead on arrival, however, not even generating necessary support within the caucus due to the level of spending..

“We recognize the gravity of the situation,” Pelosi told reporters Friday. “They don’t.”...

More, https://www.alternet.org/2020/08/theyre-playing-with-us-anger-mounts-against-gop-as-600-unemployment-benefit-lapses/

Speaker Nancy Pelosi: 'GOP doesn't understand 'gravity' of the pandemic', Friday, July 31, 2020.
The U.S. has the highest number of coronavirus cases in the world, 4 and a half million, with 157,000 deaths. "No. 1"

[RKP5637]

1. Maybe, just maybe this will wake up some who think Trump is really their BFF. n/t

[appalachiablue]

2. Hopefully, but if not, we have even more drastic problems..

[cannabis_flower]

3. I called John Cornyn's office

I had to talk to his voicemail. I told him I was a substitute teacher and my school district isn't opening for in person class until at least after Labor Day. I also said that I was 61 years old and have asthma. Then I reminded him that he is up for re-election (not that I would ever vote for him anyway. )

[BigmanPigman]

5. Good for you!

We all need to call and keep calling!

[dchill]

4. They understand 'gravity' of the pandemic'...

They're just hoping it gets worse.

[appalachiablue]

12. ...

[cstanleytech]

6. They are going to have to rework it also because a straight 600 per week is going to

piss alot of voters off that are barely even bringing in 450 a week while working 40 hours a week.
A better overall strategy for economic recovery is actually via infrastructure spending on things like roads and dams.

[progree]

7. The HEELS Act - well named

GOP lawmakers in the Senate, led by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), took no action on the bill, instead presenting a competing bill known as the HEALS Act last month

Ooops, it's HEALS, not HEELS. My bad

[Hortensis]

8. Profound contempt and callous abandonment are "playing"?

Last edited Mon Aug 3, 2020, 05:53 AM - Edit history (1)

No. They're not "playing" with people. They're trying to redefine our place and role in society, while reserving taxes we pay in for the new kleptocrats they've helped create and thrown in with.

Their insulting comments about what people in trouble deserve and why and their willingness to let people live or not as they can manage on their own are just an early indication of what that would mean.

As is, even more gravely, their deliberate refusal to stop pandemic disease when it appeared on our shores, presumably thinking it could be of benefit to them. That they have done this is beyond question, only why is not known. When this is over and we investigate what they've done, I imagine we're going to be stunned by the combination of evil and jaw-dropping incompetence among top Republican leaders.

”Few of us can easily surrender our belief that society must somehow make sense. The thought that the State has lost its mind and is punishing so many innocent people is intolerable. And so the evidence has to be internally denied.” — Arthur Miller

For just one example that this is not just Trump:

2006: Authored by Republican Senator Richard Burr: Pandemic and All-Hazards Preparedness Act (PAHPA) is passed.
2013: Senate Pandemic Preparedness act is reauthorized.

Mid Feb 2020: "On the Same Day Sen. Richard Burr Dumped Stock, So Did His Brother-in-Law. Then the Market Crashed."
Mar 19 Wapo: "Sen. Burr offered dire warning about the coronavirus at private luncheon three weeks ago"
Aug 1: "FBI serves warrant on Sen. Richard Burr over coronavirus-related stock sales

[appalachiablue]

9. Well said, the brutal truth and long game for decades.

They're not 'playing' (a figure of speech when people don't want to say f__over) and know exactly what they're doing.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

10. Well said. Yes, we're all expendable

If we’re not generating money for them.

I’ve hated republicans for a long time, seeing how debased they are, since Reagan and before.

[dickthegrouch]

11. At worst they're trying for civil upheaval

When people don’t have enough money for food, far less for rent, they will start stealing from those who do. There could be significant civil unrest and gangs of looters far worse than anything we’ve so far.

When there are no slaves to $450/week wages left who will serve the rich? And for how much? We all need those essential workers, those doctors, those teachers, those meat packers, waiters and waitresses, etc. etc.

How many of us have to go bankrupt before the god of GNP is appeased?

I’m losing confidence.