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Republican Opposes $15 Min Wage, Says He Earned $6...40 Years Ago
Senator John Thune, Republican of South Dakota, went on Twitter and made a self-defeating argument against raising the minimum wage. This is a topic that has been getting a great deal of attention lately since a provision in the current iteration of the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021 would bump up the federal minimum wage from $7.25 an hour to $15 an hour. Thune tweeted, “I started working by bussing tables at the Star Family Restaurant for $1/hour & slowly moved up to cook – the big leagues for a kid like me– to earn $6/hour. Businesses in small towns survive on narrow margins. Mandating a $15 minimum wage would put many of them out of business.”
John Thune is forgetting about something called “inflation.” The costs of goods and services have gone up significantly since Thune worked that kitchen job in the late 1970s. That six-dollar-an-hour wage forty years ago would be more like $21.62 per hour today. This does not even factor in a hypothetical productivity-adjusted minimum wage or a cost-of-living-adjusted minimum wage that would make that number even higher. There are really only two explanations for Thune’s Twitter post and neither one of them are good: Either Thune wasn’t aware of this inflation argument and our elected officials don’t understand the most basic of economic principles. Or, the senator knows that his example is bunk but he believes it will trick enough of his constituents so that he can continue to serve business interests at the expense of low-income workers.
The Truth and Lies of the Cuomo COVID Cover-Up
The Andrew Cuomo nursing home scandal has been blowing up and it’s important to distinguish between the truth, the lies, and what we just don’t know yet. Early on during the pandemic, Governor Cuomo was seen as an effective communicator with millions tuning in to watch his daily press briefings on how the virus was affecting New York. As time went on, Cuomo began getting more scrutiny of his handling of COVID-positive nursing home residents and his decision to keep them in care-assisted facilities rather than the makeshift hospitals set up to deal with the virus. In a second layer of the scandal, it’s alleged that once they realized this was a bad idea, at Cuomo's direction, nursing home COVID deaths were undercounted to the tune of thousands. New York now acknowledges that its nursing home death numbers were initially reported as 40% lower than the true number.
Separately, there are allegations of Andrew Cuomo engaging in a coverup of the nursing home scandal and bullying subordinates and New York lawmakers over it. Democratic Assemblyman Ron Kim of Queens claimed that Cuomo threatened to end his career because he criticized the administration’s lack of transparency with the legislature. Separately, there are new allegations of inappropriate sexual advances and conduct by Cuomo. Lindsey Boylan, who worked for the governor as an aide, said that on a private jet Cuomo suggested playing strip poker, which made her feel uncomfortable. All of these allegations need to be thoroughly investigated, and every possible consequence, including removal from office, needs to be on the table.
From yesterday’s show:
Tucker Carlson Says Q-ANON is Fake Because He Can't Find Its Website
Fox News propagandist Tucker Carlson tried to dispel the notion that QAnon is a dangerous conspiracy theory by arguing that it barely even exists. Carlson said on his primetime program, “we spent all day trying to locate the famous QAnon, which in the end we learned is not even a website.” The idea of QAnon from the beginning was that it would be a sub rosa group where supposed insiders could leak information and post it to obscure internet forums for Q supporters. Tucker also argued that he could not find any disinformation on Marjorie Taylor Greene’s Twitter feed — which there is no shortage of, even looking at her posts from the last week. Carlson is gaslighting his audience because he knows they won’t verify his claims and that many are sympathetic to QAnon and Congresswoman Greene to begin with.
--More on the show:
--Congressman Ro Khanna (D-CA) joins David to discuss the COVID relief bill, Joe Biden's accomplishments so far, radical Republican members of Congress, firearms at the Capitol, and much more
--75% of the country supports Joe Biden's COVID relief bill, but it's still not clear when it will pass
--Notable discussions from the David Pakman Show subreddit, including about flu season, Rush Limbaugh, and more
--Joe Biden sets up the removal of Donald Trump's Postmaster General Louis DeJoy by adding three members of the Postal Board
--Just days after the Supreme Court's decision, the Manhattan District Attorney's office has obtained Donald Trump's tax returns
--Voicemail caller suggests that extreme anti-vaxxers are often mentally ill, and whether it should be dealt with as a mental illness
--On the Bonus Show: Texas blackout could have lasted even longer, South Dakota AG faces impeachment over fatal crash evidence, Trump's offer to Kim Jong-Un of a flight home to North Korea, much more...
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