Strikes

[Shirley]

If the minimum wage is important to you, there's no comparison between the parties. None.

IMO, it's scandalous that the minimum wage hasn't been raised in almost 15 years, July of '29. If it had been indexed and allowed to increase gradually over the years, it wouldn't sound so calamitous to consider bringing it into some semblance of reality and improve the lives of tens of millions of Americans. The money would be spent in no time and will help stimulate the economy.

Sanders, Scott, 29 Democratic Senators, Introduce Legislation to Raise the Minimum Wage to $17 by 2028, Benefitting Nearly 28 Million Workers Across America

July 25, 2023

If the minimum wage had increased with productivity over the last 50 years, it would be $23 an hour today. If it had increased at the same rate that Wall Street employee bonuses have increased, it would be more than $42 an hour.

WASHINGTON, July 25 – Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee, today with Rep. Robert C. “Bobby” Scott (D-Va.), Ranking Member of the House Committee on Education and the Workforce, 29 Democratic colleagues in the Senate, nearly 150 in the House of Representatives, and the support of nearly 50 organizations from across the country, introduced legislation that would raise the federal minimum wage to $17 by 2028...

kinda wonder what the world would be like right now if Bernie was the nominee in '16...

Why start wondering what if, there?

What if:

JFK hadn't been assassinated.

RFK hadn't been assassinated.

Or, if the SCOTUS hadn't inserted itself into the 2000 presidential election between Gore and W.

Or, if instead of by the electoral college, the president was elected by a majority vote, which Democrats have won in every presidential election but one since 1992, 7 out of the last 8...


Or, if Nixon, as private citizen in 1968, hadn't worked behind the scenes to keep the South Vietnamese from participating in peace talks to end the war, handing LBJ and his Vice President and Demo candidate for President Hubert Humphrey a victory heading into the election:

When Johnson got word of Nixon’s meddling, he ordered the F.B.I. to track Chennault’s movements. She “contacted Vietnam Ambassador Bui Diem,” one report from the surveillance noted, “and advised him that she had received a message from her boss … to give personally to the ambassador. She said the message was … ‘Hold on. We are gonna win. … Please tell your boss to hold on.’ ”

In a conversation with the Republican senator Everett Dirksen, the minority leader, Johnson lashed out at Nixon. “I’m reading their hand, Everett,” Johnson told his old friend. “This is treason.”

“I know,” Dirksen said mournfully. [...]


Or, if Ronald Reagan, as a private citizen in violation of the law, hadn't worked behind the scenes leading up to the 1980 presidential election to keep Iran from making a deal to release the American hostages before the '80 election, and hand President Carter a foreign policy victory:

Almost from the moment Iran freed the U.S. hostages in 1981 just minutes after President Ronald Reagan took the oath of office, there have been suspicions about a deal between the Reagan campaign and Iran. The hostage crisis had consumed the last year of the Carter presidency, contributing to a perception of weakness.

Now, Ben Barnes, a prominent Democratic politician at the time, tells the New York Times he was a witness to Republican efforts to prevent the hostages from being freed before Election Day. Gary Sick was the Iran expert on President Carter's National Security Council. He wrote a 1991 book making the case that there was a deal called October Surprise. Mr. Sick, when you heard what Burr Redwood — Ben Barnes, said, what was your reaction?

[...]