Today’s News Rundown

This is brief rundown of the news so you don’t have to watch cable news. It’s just the facts with maybe a little snark.

With news that the GSA had OK’d the Biden transition, the Dow Jones broke the 30,000 point ceiling. In the morning, the Squatter-in-Chief made a 55 second appearance in the briefing room to call the record “sacred” and try to take claim it. He took no questions and ran out.

He later appeared in the “Roseless” Garden for his last annual pardon of the turkeys. It was announced that this year the two birds, named Corn and Cob, would be reprieved but only Corn showed up. Bet ya Cob is on his way to the Squatter’s dinner table on Thursday. Squatter again took credit for the stock market rise and suggested President-Elect Biden adopt his “America First” slogan. Mmmm, I don’t think so. He and Melanoma left ignoring shouted questions. Press shy, are we.

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin is doing everything in his power to hinder the Biden administration from giving the unspent funds from the CARES Act.

Bloomberg News reported Tuesday that there is about $455 billion in unspent funds from the CARES Act, which Congress passed to help Americans get through the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Mnuchin plans to place the money into the agency’s General Fund, a Treasury Department spokesperson said Tuesday. That fund can only be tapped with ‘authority based on congressionally issued legislation,” the report said, citing, the Treasury’s website.

The $455 billion include about $429 billion Mnuchin is trying to get back from the Federal Reserve, “which backed some of the central bank’s emergency lending facilities.” The remaining $26 billion comes from unspent loans Treasury could give directly to companies that need help. Given the bankruptcies, evictions, and companies announcing that they’re going out of business. It’s unclear why Mnuchin didn’t spend such a huge sum of funds when so many needed it.

Nah, it’s really clear why he didn’t spend the money, he doesn’t care about the little people. After all, he has his.

Pennsylvania and Nevada have certified the election results for Biden.

In Wisconsin, the recount is underway and has voters there frustrated and baffled by the Squatter’s campaign and GOP efforts to throw out ballots. Meanwhile, Wisconsin Republicans are blaming Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg for the Squatter’s loss to Joe Biden. I guess you gotta blame somebody. Don’t you just love victimhood.

In California, a judge has tossed another of the Squatter’s lawsuits. This one would have forced our nation’s low-income elderly, disabled and blind out of their own homes and into deathtrap nursing homes during the pandemic. In another ruling, a California federal judge called the Trump rule that bars states from withholding part of the paychecks of some home healthcare workers for things like health insurance and voluntary union dues a “legal error.”

Judge Vince Chhabria wrote that the Trump rule appears “contrary to the overall purpose” of the Medicaid law. He noted that improving working conditions for home health workers, who have median hourly pay of $10.49, improves the quality of care the workers provide for Medicaid patients.

“It is unclear how barring the payroll practices would serve the purposes of the Medicaid program,” wrote Chhabria, an Obama appointee. He threw out that provision of the law and sent it back to the Centers for Medicaid and Medicare Services to rewrite it.

California and five other states challenged the law. The states in the lawsuit could have lost $6 billion in federal Medicaid funding if they didn’t comply.

This administration is really evil.

In a Guardian article, it reveled that the Squatter administration seeks to transfer ownership of Arizona area to mining company with ties to the destruction of an Aboriginal site.

Last month tribes discovered that the date for the completion of a crucial environmental review process has suddenly been moved forward by a full year, to December 2020, even as the tribes are struggling with a Covid outbreak that has stifled their ability to respond. If the environmental review is completed before Trump leaves office, the tribes may be unable to stop the mine.

Purdue Pharma pleads guilty to criminal charges related to US opioid crisis

Purdue’s plea deal carries more than $5.5bn in penalties, most of which will go unpaid. A $3.54bn criminal fine will be considered alongside trillions of dollars in unsecured claims as part of Purdue’s bankruptcy proceedings.

Purdue agreed to pay $225m toward a $2bn criminal forfeiture, with the justice department foregoing the rest if the company completes a bankruptcy reorganization dissolving itself and shifting assets to a “public benefit company” or similar entity that steers the $1.78bn unpaid portion to thousands of US communities suing it over the opioid crisis.

A sentencing imposing those penalties is set to come around the time Purdue receives court approval for a bankruptcy reorganization.

Naturally, nobody goes to jail.

The US has more than 12 million cases of CoVid-19 aand over 257,000 deaths as per John Hopkins University.

The Guardian reports

On Monday, more than 85,700 people were hospitalized with the illness as healthcare workers warned of overwhelmed clinics and emergency rooms.

The daily average of cases is the highest it has ever been across the country. There were twice as many new cases a day as there were two weeks ago in nine states: Arizona, California, Delaware, Louisiana, Maryland, New Hampshire, New Mexico, Pennsylvania and Vermont.

In the country’s most populous state, California, there were more than 30,000 cases over the weekend, prompting a flurry of new restrictions. Los Angeles is set to shut down restaurant dining on Wednesday and officials were expected to announce another lockdown.

Here’s a good chuckle. In New Hampshire, seven Republican lawmakers are threatening to impeach the Republican governor over his mask mandate. The NH Republican Party has denounced to move.

I’ve spent time in New Hampshire, most of the people are very nice but there’s a hot bed of loud Trumpsters that can be annoying.

Too many people are ignoring the warning to stay home this holiday to their own detriment and the detriment of family, friends and strangers. STAY HOME, WEAR A MASK AND WASH YOUR HANDS.

Sadly, former New York City Mayor David Dickens died in is home at the age of 93. His wife, Joyce, passed away just last month. She was 89. Mayor Dickens was NYC first, and so far only, Black mayor who served just one tumultuous term that was plagued with a soaring murder rate, stubborn unemployment, rampant homelessness, and his mishandling of a riot in Brooklyn. He was soft spoken and always a gentleman with a penchant for formal wear. He did clean up Time Square, enlisting the Disney Corporation’s help. He raised taxes to hire more police, and spent billions of dollars revitalizing neglected housing. After beating Giuliani by only 47,000 votes out of 1.75m cast in 1989, Dinkins lost a rematch by roughly the same margin in 1993.

I was at Mayor Dickens’s Inauguration and met him and his wife on many occasions during his time in office and after his term. He always kind with a smile and glint in his eye. His face and voice will be missed. May he rest in peace with Joyce. Blessed Be.