But That's None Of My Business (Neutral)

With a one-time check of $1900?

Several huge bipartisan Coronavirus Economic Relief Bills passed Congress in recent weeks — and I’m glad that they did!

But the only thing that changed the calculus is that Republicans woke up to the fact that this crisis made it necessary to do so.

Previously, in the face of Democratic proposals, the GOP would have told you that increasing welfare by even a fraction of this amount was “unaffordable.”

And now?

We actually have an example of what Democrats would have likely done. I find it instructive that over a million Americans had caught the H1N1 virus and 1,000 Americans had died in 2009 before Obama and Democrats were smart enough to call a national emergency. Eventually over18,000 Americans died and over 67 million Americans were affected by H1N1. Trump and his team have been a LOT better organized and have been impressive in their approach to the scourge.

Not with a one-time check alone. With a plethora of parallel supports such as providing 9 months of unemployment payments (often for more money than they were being paid on their jobs), getting landlords and mortgage servicers to pause mortgage payments and rents for 3 or more months, pause payments on utilities and internet and phone, pause on tax payments and tax filings, pause student loan payments, and so forth