Well, we can kiss that $600 a week in enhanced unemployment benefits goodbye thanks to President Trump, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin and Mitch McConnell.
House Democrats passed a bill to extend the extra $600 a week in enhanced unemployment benefits to January 31, 2021 back in May.
Senate Republicans had two and a half months to make this a reality. Or at the very least propose a viable compromise. I thought it was plausible that they cared enough about their re-election enough to at least extend the $600 a week benefit by 90 days. As it turned out I gave Republicans far too much credit. Instead they belatedly proposed to cut the enhanced benefits to $200 a week until states figured it out on their own. Democrats told them what they could do with their belated proposal.
But now we are at an impasse the result of which is millions of Americans are going to be less able to make ends meet than we already were. That extra $600 a week in unemployment benefits was a lifeline and now it has been cut off. Oh, there's a chance the $600 could be restored or partially restored but it would take weeks to implement. How much further damage to the economy could result over those weeks? The American economy collapsed by 32% in the last fiscal quarter. And now people have less money to spend. If people weren't desperate already a full blown panic will soon set in and it could make Portland look like a Sunday picnic.
As with everything else that has gone wrong with the response to COVID-19 in this country, it didn't have to be this way. Except that President Trump, McConnell and the rest of the Republican Party insist on making our lives miserable. They do so because they care only for power, the spoils that come with it and they don't want to share it with us peasants even though we've paid for these spoils.
This isn't a new criticism of Republicans by any means, but with Trump at the helm these "qualities" are out in the open. The facade of noblese oblige has been erased. If you don't have money to offer Republicans then you are nothing but a parasite sitting at home. And that goes double for those working class voters who cast their lot for Trump in 2016 and who will do so again in November. These people will have their lifeline cut off and say, "Thank you. May I have another?"
Trump, Mnuchin and McConnell could have chosen to extend the $600 enhanced unemployment benefits for another six months. It would have promoted stability in an unstable time. But the Republican Party no longer stands for stability. It now stands for chaos and with chaos come misery. It's hardly a formula for re-election. But by suggesting the election be delayed, Trump and company are now telling us they don't need our blessing to remain in power. In which case the misery has only just begun. If Republicans have their way misery will be the American way of life.
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