Progressive Breakfast: If Anything Can Unite the Democrats, It's Climate

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MORNING MESSAGE

Bill Scher: If Anything Can Unite the Democrats, It’s Climate
If you are convinced that Clinton’s climate platform is insufficient, the logical course of action is not to let the Oval Office become occupied by someone who calls global warming a “hoax.” The logical course of action is to first elect the person who accepts climate science and is open to action, then follow Sanders’ admonition that “we need a movement” to push the political system farther and faster towards a comprehensive climate solution.

ORLANDo MASSACRE REVERBERATES

Orlando massacre shapes presidential debate. The Hill: “Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican presidential nominee, is citing the mass shooting to advance his argument that legal and illegal immigration are endangering U.S. security … Clinton, meanwhile, called the Orlando shooting an act of terror and hate and said the U.S. must ‘redouble our efforts to defend our country from threats at home and abroad.’ … The former secretary of State also called for gun control … ‘This is the deadliest mass shooting in the history of the United States, and it reminds us once more that weapons of war have no place on our streets,’ Clinton said.”
Orlando massacre meets gridlocked Congress. NYT: “The mass killings in Orlando will overtake events in Washington and dominate Congress this week … Senator Christopher S. Murphy … said on Sunday that Congress had ‘become complicit in these murders’ by failing to act to limit the availability of guns. Senator Ben Sasse, Republican of Nebraska, said the killings showed that ‘violent Islam, whether its card-carrying members of ISIS or Al Qaeda or its crowdsourced attackers, must be defeated.'”

Bernie HOLDS OUT

Bernie not yet conceding. NYT: “‘We are going to take our campaign to the convention with the full understanding that we are very good at arithmetic and that we know, you know, who has the received the most votes up to now,’ Mr. Sanders said … Mr. Sanders said that he and Mrs. Clinton planned to meet on Tuesday … ‘And after we have that kind of discussion and after we can determine whether or not we are going to have a strong and progressive platform,’ he said, ‘I will be able to make other decisions.'”

KEY REPUBLICANS RESIST TRUMP

Sen. Jeff Flake refuses to endorse Trump. Politico: “‘I hope that a number of us at least will withhold endorsement,’ Flake said on CBS’ ‘Face the Nation.’ ‘I’ve not endorsed, until we see. It’s not a comfortable position to not support your nominee of the party. … I’m grateful that I’m not running this year.'”
GOP donors “furious.” Politico: “During an off-the-record question-and-answer session with House Speaker Paul Ryan, Meg Whitman, the billionaire Hewlett Packard chief executive officer, confronted the speaker over his endorsement of Trump. Whitman, a major GOP giver … compared Trump to historical demagogues like Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini and wanted to know how the speaker could get behind him … Some of his top fundraisers think he’ll struggle to top $300 million, a figure that’s less than a third of what Romney raised in 2012…”
Senate Dems plan “boring” strategy to retake upper chamber. Politico: “They’re intentionally playing it safe and boring, figuring their elections will mostly be a referendum on Trump and that animosity toward the real estate magnate will put them over the top in key swing states … The play-it-safe Democrats do open themselves to criticism for running low risk, cookie-cutter campaigns.”

LAID-OFF WORKERS SPEAK OUT

Laid-off workers increasingly vocal. NYT: “…some of the workers who were displaced are starting to speak out, despite severance agreements prohibiting them from criticizing their former employers … Leading members of Congress from both major parties have questioned the nondisparagement agreements, which are commonly used by corporations but can prohibit ousted workers from raising complaints about what they see as a misuse of temporary visas.”
NYT’s Paul Krugman warns Fed against a rate hike: “I’m hearing some buzz that the Fed may still be considering a rate hike at its upcoming meeting, or if not then soon. Let’s really, really hope this is wrong. It’s true that measured unemployment is low by historical standards. But that’s a number depressed by low labor force participation; nobody really knows how far we are from full employment.”

Progressive Breakfast is a daily morning email highlighting news stories of interest to activists. Progressive Breakfast is a project of the Campaign for America's Future. more »

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