DL Open Thread Monday, March 29, 2021
Dildo-headed capitalist Jeff Bezos is personally behind the company’s recent shitty behavior toward its critics. He issued a “broad mandate” to executives to fight back. Hey, it worked last time Amazon workers tried to unionize — in 2014 in Smyrna. In Delaware, not even exploited workers will rock the boat. If the Grateful Dead had been from Delaware, they would have written “Trucklin’.”
In the latest episode of “So Suez Me,” crews have gotten the back of the ship, or the “stern” as the seafaring folk say, out of the bank of the canal. The bow — that’s the front, you landlubbers — remains stuck. UPDATE: The entire ship has been freed with the help of a high tide and is now being towed through the canal.
The News Journal has a story about the sale of Wesley College to Delaware State University that notes not-public Wesley was treated quite generously by the General Assembly, but it’s behind a paywall and I don’t subscribe, so it would be helpful if someone could summarize it in the comments.
Criticism of Dr. Deborah Birx does not sit well with Dr. Anthony Fauci, who explained the duo were performing a good cop/bad cop routine.
They referred to me as I would often say the skunk at the picnic. Every time they say things were great, I said, “Ehh, I don’t think so.” It was easy for me to say that out loud and openly say that I had my base. My base was the NIH. Deb had a much more difficult situation. She had an office right there in the West Wing. So, I am very, very reluctant to condemn anything that even though people felt she should push more, she did a lot of good. She knocked herself out, getting up at 3:00 in the morning and putting that data together and presenting it every day.
Even many progressives have been surprised by the Joe Biden and the Democratic Party taking what, for them, amounts to bold action. Even swing-district Congresscritters are lining up behind progressive proposals:
It took a long time, but it appears that a combination of outright aggression of Republicans in the Trump era, the increasingly dire policy challenges that conservatives refuse to face, and the almost comical demonization of Joe Biden in right-wing media as some sort of radical leftist, has changed the conversation. Even many purple district moderates (and their consultants) are now increasingly convinced of the need to just do what is right without worrying about the potential fallout that has traditionally frightened them off since the Reagan era.
Why are Republican state legislatures conducting a war on trans athletes? Oh, c’mon. It’s a tiny, easily-demonized group of people that Republicans find “weird.” Do you really have to ask? The issue is the culmination of years of conservative searching for a way to punish trans people for existing.
In animal news, a mysterious illness among immature black bears in California is making them unafraid of people. It doesn’t take Nostradamus to figure out that isn’t going to end well.
The floor’s yours.
TNJ article is basically Bob Clark is a bad president and they told us Wesley would still be its own thing, not just an arm of DSU. It’s interesting and I feel bad for the students and faculty, but realistically, what better options are there at this point?
Wesley has received more than $6.3 million from the state over the past few years, and state legislators who represent the area talk about how important it is to the underprivileged community and brings money to a disadvantaged neighborhood.
Employees will be told in mid-April whether they will have jobs after this academic year. DelState says it will hire a “substantial number” of current faculty and staff, most likely those in STEM and health science. Students are saying they were told Wesley would continue as a branch campus, but DSU says it was clear throughout negotiations that would not be the case.
And apparently, no one should hire Bob Clark to run their college or any other business that relies on funding to survive.
Thanks, both of you.
If they’re so worried about the underprivileged community, they could just give the poor people the money and cut out the college as middleman. Which indicates that the poor aren’t the actual interest there.
Going unmentioned in the story is the ceaseless hypocrisy of one Colin Bonini, advocating for state funds to rescue his alma mater but never in his tenure in the state Senate having voted in favor of a state budget bill.
Consider it mentioned.
I think about the transphobic comments I hear from the Karens at work — and just, you know, in general everywhere — and the parallels to the gay/lesbian civil rights movement are so obvious. From as flippant and ridiculous to “they’re not real”/”it’s just a phase” to the more insidious “it’s unnatural”/”they’re deviants” etc…. it’s uncanny how it feels like the 70s and 80s again when those sentiments were the majority opinion against homosexuality.
How asinine are these statements going to sound in 50 years?