Fed’s Powell warns U.S. economy ‘long way from a full recovery’
“There’s nothing more important to the economy now than people getting vaccinated,” Jerome Powell said.
Today's Liberal News
The Dogs Trained to Sniff Out COVID-19
Promising early results from several studies have encouraged researchers around the world to develop and expand canine programs that may screen people for COVID-19 infection at places like airports, hospitals, or sports venues. While these early experiments appear to demonstrate high levels of accuracy by the sniffer dogs, researchers also caution that peer-review processes and larger-scale studies are still needed.
How Anthony Fauci Survived Donald Trump
You couldn’t have blamed Anthony Fauci if at any point over the past year he’d told Donald Trump he’d had enough, thank you, and quit. Everyone has a breaking point. There was the time the former president called him “a disaster” on a call with Trump-campaign staff. Or the day a White House official gave reporters an oppo-research-style memo claiming that Fauci had been “wrong on things” related to COVID-19.
The Myth That Gets Men Out of Doing Chores
“Birds at Home,” 2006 (Julie Blackmon)When you think of messiness, you might think of the unsavory ways it manifests: sweaty socks left on the floor, food-encrusted dishes piled in the sink, crumbs on the counter. Messes themselves are easy to identify, but the patterns of behavior that produce them are a bit more nuanced. Really, messiness has two ingredients: making messes, and then not cleaning them up.
MIA: Where Have All the Vaccines Gone? CDC Says Only Half of Shots Feds Sent to States Were Used
January has become the deadliest month of the pandemic in the United States, with at least 80,000 deaths from COVID-19 so far, and public health experts worry new, more contagious variants of the coronavirus could make things worse. President Joe Biden has announced plans to acquire another 200 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines, aiming to vaccinate most people in the U.S. by summer, but vaccine distribution continues to be a problem.
Sunrise Movement’s Varshini Prakash: Biden’s Climate Agenda Must Go Beyond Undoing Trump’s Damage
President Joe Biden is expected to issue executive orders to suspend new oil and gas leasing on federal property, reestablish a White House council of science advisers, and set a goal to protect 30% of federal land and water by 2030.
“A Step Forward”: Black Lives Matter Protests Forced Biden to Push Racial Equity, But More Is Needed
President Joe Biden was elected with massive support from people of color, and in his second week in office he issued four executive orders to advance what the White House calls his “racial equity” agenda. The orders aim to strengthen anti-discrimination policies in housing, end Justice Department contracts with private prison companies, reaffirm sovereignty of Native American tribes and combat xenophobia against Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders.
Dear Care and Feeding: My Husband Would Rather Play Video Games Than Help Me Parent
Parenting advice on neglectful fathers, neighborhood singers, and Harry Potter.
The GOP Is Complaining That Joe Biden Is Being “Divisive” by Governing Like a Democrat
You can, in fact, call for “unity” and pursue policies that Republicans don’t like.
What Miami Can Give Techies That San Francisco Can’t
Warm weather, low taxes, and a mayor ready to nurse their grievances about Bay Area liberalism.
States taking back Covid shots unused by nursing homes
Under pressure to speed up vaccinations, states are holding back or redirecting doses earmarked for long-term care facilities.
New virus variants threaten Biden’s pandemic plans
The government is already collaborating with Moderna to develop vaccine booster shots aimed at strains first identified in South Africa and the United Kingdom.
Biden sets sights on 1.5 million vaccinations a day
The president said he was hopeful about ramping up capacity, as parts of the country start to bump up against limitations on how many shots they can administer.
Fauci: U.K. coronavirus variant leads to worse infections
The CDC has predicted the U.K. variant could become the dominant strain of the disease in the U.S. as early as March.
U.S. jobless claims decline to a still-high 900,000
The government said that 5.1 million Americans are continuing to receive state jobless benefits, down from 5.2 million in the previous week.
30 Things Donald Trump Did as President You Might Have Missed
Trump’s presidency may be best remembered for its cataclysmic end. But his four years as president also changed real American policy in lasting ways, just more quietly. We asked POLITICO’s best-in-class policy reporters to recap some of the ways Trump changed the country while in office, for better or worse.
U.S. loses 140,000 jobs in first monthly loss since spring
At the same time, the unemployment rate stayed at 6.7%, the first time it hasn’t fallen since April.
How Biden’s dream of fighting income inequality runs through Georgia
The share of wealth controlled by the top 1 percent sits at levels not seen since the 1920s. Biden’s hopes for changing it rests on Senate control.
“They Came Away with Their Dignity”: Striking NYC Workers Win Wage Hike After Surge of Solidarity
Workers at the Hunts Point Produce Market in New York City have overwhelmingly approved a new three-year contract, ending a week-long strike that captured national attention and galvanized the community behind the essential workers at the Bronx-based business.
Tuesday Night Owls: Billionaires’ gain$ since March could fund Biden’s relief for working families
Night Owls is a themed open thread appearing at Daily Kos seven days a week.
Chuck Collins at the Institute for Policy Studies reports—U.S. Billionaire Wealth Surpasses $1.1 Trillion Gain Since Mid-March:
The $1.1 trillion wealth gain by 660 U.S. billionaires since March 2020 could pay for:
All of the relief for working families contained in President Biden’s proposed $1.
If there were any Jews still wondering which party is on their side, Jan. 6 answered the question
Late on the afternoon of Jan. 6, the Associated Press called the Georgia Senate race for documentary filmmaker Jon Ossoff. Just a few hours earlier, Donald Trump had incited an insurrection that saw his followers—a number of whom openly and proudly displayed vile anti-Semitic signs and language—violently take over the Capitol in an attempted coup that would have spelled the end of our democracy.
‘I can’t have you guys walking around’: Innocent Black teens handcuffed, accused of theft in Target
A Black teen who did little more than observe an alleged crime at a California Target store was pushed against a counter and thrown into a police car, with a sheriff’s deputy closing the door on his feet, the child’s mother told The Los Angeles Times.
Surprise! Georgia Republican refuses COVID-19 test and faces major consequences
As of the publishing of this story, Georgia has 722,062 confirmed cases of COVID-19. Georgia is passing 12,000 confirmed deaths due to COVID-19, with more than 48,498 Georgians being admitted to the hospital because of the virus. Over 8,000 people have ended up in intensive care units across the Peach State. Like most places throughout the United States, the pandemic is very much not under control.
After Democrats retake Senate, expected Republican sabotage of Biden’s Cabinet loses momentum
After Senate Republicans suggested they would delay consideration of even Joe Biden’s most essential Cabinet-level nominations, a move that only fell apart after a deadly assault on the U.S.
Everything You Need to Know About Reconciliation, the Tool Democrats Need to Govern
There’s something called the “Byrd Bath.
Hospitalizations Are Down
Today marks two weeks of declining COVID-19 hospitalizations in the U.S., 14 straight days without a blip upward, according to data from the COVID Tracking Project at The Atlantic. Case numbers, too, are declining, and today the seven-day case average is down a third since its peak, on January 12.That day, the count of current hospitalizations was 131,326; it’s now down to 108,957.