Biden/Harris Presidency Discussion Thread

Foxtrol wrote: »

Biden has an amazing shield with how the senate looks to turned out.

At this point they are all pointing fingers at who is to blame for not quite getting another 'blue wave'. It is a pity all sides couldn't wait and enjoy the big victory but I think things will die down a bit once Biden rolls out some executive orders to fix what Trump put in place and the ideologues realise what is actually possible with a split government.

Manic Moran wrote: »

This. The BBC recently did a brief report on why Hispanics are starting to leave the Democrat fold. https://www.bbc.com/news/av/world-us-canada-54861000
Consider latino tradition and culture, and look at the common associations with the Democrats.

Related note: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/nov/07/how-democrats-latino-voters-texas-border-towns
Although residents in the valley lean left in terms of partisanship, “many people actually bleed red” ideologically, McNeely said. Some of that boils down to religious beliefs, with large contingents of Catholics and Protestant evangelicals in the area.
[...]
Ocañas, for example, views border patrol agents as protectors, not enemies, and she balked at the criticism they have faced on the job.

Manic Moran wrote: »

Any uber driver I spoke with hated it, but I seemed to only find uber drivers who were working as side gigs, not full-time uber drivers. It wasn't the uber drivers that the money was targeting, it was voters who just saw "worker protections" in the title of the law they were trying to overturn.

The story of AB5 actually had nothing to do with the gig economy at all to begin with. I seem to recall it started out with a trucker's union around Port of Oakland who were pissed off with independent owner-operators coming in and taking loads, and it was something of a follow-on from a California Supreme Court Case involving a delivery service named "Dynamex" in 2018 which required classifying previously independent contractors as employees if they met certain criteria. In any case, AB-5 of 2019 expanded on that, requiring job benefits (healthcare, sick days etc) for those now-employees. Which also meant, though, that as employees, the companies would have much greater control over them, such as mandating working hours. One of the big appeals for working for Uber is you can clock in and clock out whenever you feel like it, so it's a great little pocket-money earner for folks who drive into town an hour or two before their regular work, for example, or just want to pull a couple of hours in the evening when everyone's going out for dinner.

The first legal challenge came from the California Association of Truckers, on behalf of the independent owner-operators. It's been working its way through the system, in the meantime some truckers have lost work even with an injunction from the district courts protecting them as some large trucking companies (with employees) have already restructured operations to avoid hiring these independents. Argued at the Ninth Circuit two months ago, no opinion rendered yet to my knowledge.

Then it was realised that all sorts of people were being affected by the law, not just truckers and uber drivers. The legislature then passed AB2257 specifically exempted a series of contractors, to include photographers, content contributors, photo editors, musicians, barbers, translators, performing arts instructors (as long as they don't tech more than once a week), realtors, home inspectors, and a few others. A bunch of other gig economy workers were not exempted, including uber/lyft.

Enter Prop 22 on the ballot this month, an 8-page-long document of incomprehensible legalese. The way it's worded, it refers solely to app-based driving and delivery, which kindof sucks for a bunch of others, to include, most likely, the truckers. On the other hand, most everyone in California is familiar with and uses Uber and Lyft and can relate to it far better than someone who writes computer apps on the side. The list of opponents to the proposition includes Biden, Harris, Sanders, Warren, California Democrat Party, and a bunch of labour unions. They still lost as 58% voted to exempt the ride-share and doordash-type folks.

The saga continues for the truck drivers, performing arts instructors, programmers, etc....