Democrats in the U.S. Senate chose to support Mitch McConnell and his opposition to a vote giving Americans a $2,000 check. They instead voted (almost every Democrat except Bernie Sanders and 5 others) to make sure that the Pentagon has money to fight endless wars. If this isn’t proof that both parties don’t give a damn about Americans nothing does. Democrats and Republicans don’t agree on much anymore. But they do agree on one thing: spending incredible amounts of money on defense. They rarely disagree. Do you feel safe? It wasn’t Russia or China that killed 300+ thousand Americans this passed year:
In total, 41 Democrats—including Schumer and Vice President-elect Kamala Harris—voted for the motion, paving the way for an override of Trump’s NDAA veto and effectively killing the prospect of a vote on $2,000 direct payments before the next Congress. View the full roll call here.
A final vote on the NDAA veto override is expected by January 2. Sanders made clear following the motion’s passage Wednesday that he plans to continue pushing for a vote on the direct payments.
“The sheer scale of Wednesday’s Democratic surrender was truly a sight to behold,” wrote The Daily Poster’s David Sirota and Andrew Perez. “And it probably ended the chance for more immediate aid to millions of Americans facing eviction, starvation, and bankruptcy… Democratic senators in fact provided the majority of the votes for the measure that lets the defense bill proceed without a vote on the $2,000 checks.”
It was the kind of surrender we have become accustomed to with Democrats in Congress:
Democrats and Beltway pundits helped Mitch McConnell undermine Bernie Sanders’s push for direct aid to millions of Americans facing eviction, starvation, and bankruptcy through $2,000 checks. Even for a party that is constantly disappointing, Democrats’ complete capitulation to McConnell and austerity ideology was shockingly pathetic.
…And capitulation became even more likely when Clinton-era Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, corporate Democratic pundits, and billionaire-owned elite media outlets began parroting a series of eerily similar let-them-eat-cake talking points against the survival checks — which McConnell promptly used to bludgeon proponents of the bipartisan initiative.
But even appreciating all of this — and also knowing that many Democratic leaders still cling to an outdated austerity ideology — the sheer scale of Wednesday’s Democratic surrender was truly a sight to behold. And it probably ended the chance for more immediate aid to millions of Americans facing eviction, starvation, and bankruptcy.
The 99 Percenters 