Biden/Harris Presidency Discussion Thread

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....

AbusesToilets wrote: »

Not sure why you would expect Biden to reduce drone strikes, the Obama administration greatly expanded their usage.

Zascar wrote: »

What can we expect from the Biden Administration's policy for the Middle East? I'm seeing many people skeptical about Biden's foreign policy will praise the fact that Trump started no new wars and fostered peace in the middle east never seen before - like deals between Israel and UAE & Bahrain etc.. ?

Manach wrote: »

Can you back that up with a book reference - "Trump was anything but a dove". My understanding that the Trump admin significantly drew-down US involvment overseas and the Trump doctrine (by Colin Dueck in "Age of Iron") as essentially de-escalation and a negotiated settlement.
You are free to make any form of unsubstationate wish on the internet about happy days are here again, but given the international polices of the previous Obama admin of which Biden was intimately involved in the decision making, you'll likely be disabused.

ExMachina1000 wrote: »

Biden has rehired immigration cage detention advocate Cecilia munoz who worked in the Obama administration.

"Muñoz, who was a well-known advocate for the Latinx community, having previously worked at La Raza and Center for Community Change, became the public face of Obama administration’s deportation machine. She was the Latina who provided political cover for the largest deportation machine built in the history of this country. She justified Obama’s immigration policies, in Spanish, including Obama’s deportation of thousands of Central American children and its decision to stop an executive order that would have halted deportations. She defended the policy of deporting “criminals” — which could include a vast array of offenses, including traffic violations. And she went as far as to say that deporting people who had not been accused of a crime was “collateral damage.”

Not a fantastic start by any means