Nearly all missing people accounted for as at least 35 killed US firesSocial media disinformation on blazes ‘spreading faster than fire’Biden aims to make election about Covid as Trump steers focus elsewhereJust 50 days until a US election both sides see as an existential struggleSign up for our First Thing newsletter 2.43pm BST This is Joan Greve in Washington, taking over for Martin Belam.Trump will receive a briefing on the wildfires in the California later today, but the president is currently busy tweeting his complaints about the November election.His handlers and the Fake News Media are doing everything possible to get him through the Election. Then he will resign, or whatever, and we are stuck with a super liberal wack job that NOBODY wanted! https://t.co/eHhy0yBx9o 2.10pm BST Speaking of that coronavirus relief plan – or lack of it – Margaret Somers as written for us this morning, asking how is such unnecessary suffering justified?The 31 million Americans struggling with unemployment today are not a whit less desperate and fearful now that Mitch McConnell’s “skinny” Covid-19 relief bill failed to pass the US Senate. Thursday’s performative theatrics did little more than provide cover to vulnerable Republicans and add one more day to the now six weeks since Senate Republicans refused to extend the extra $600 in Covid-related weekly jobless benefits. With McConnell sounding all but liberated from any more pressure to show compassion before the election, and the media’s attention pinned to shinier Trumpian objects, it is even more imperative to refocus on the crisis at hand and to dig beneath the hollow excuses for such demonstrable indifference on the part of lawmakers. It is time to find an answer to how is such unnecessary suffering justified?According to the Republicans, the aid is “too generous” and “disincentivizes” the unemployed from seeking work. So perverse are the effects of these benefits, they argue, that it is actually workers gaming the system who are slowing the economic recovery, not the Covid-driven loss of millions of jobs. That these charges persist despite significant evidence to the contrary testifies to the power of the conservative creed that few things in life are more perilous than excess government compassion Related: Even the Republican ‘skinny’ relief bill failed. How is such unnecessary suffering justified? | Margaret Somers Continue reading…
Via: Donald Trump heading to California for wildfires briefing as death toll rises – US politics live
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