The Senate: “I’ve Got Five On It”

I’ve got five on it. 

Grab your forty.

Let’s get keyed.

When the Senate returns on September 13, these are the five priorities they must address, gain votes on, and pass. For the country to continue distancing itself from TFG and his racist administration and their Koch and Russian-backed chaos agents, the Senate must take big bold steps to beat back those who sought and seek to destroy America.

The Biden-Harris administration have thus far proven to be effective at getting their priorities passed despite a few well-planned-for hiccups along the way, and despite incessant and incorrect Beltway media doom and gloom predictions.

Democrats in the center, left, and right each have strong passions about where the administration  – and thus where the Senate – should focus its energies when they return for the fall session. The Senate, basically tied at 50-50 (two independents who vote with Democrats) and with V.P. Kamala Harris as tiebreaker, will not please all constituents this (or any) session. But the leaders of the “World’s Greatest Deliberative Body” (outdated, unhelpful, full of self-serving hubris)  will serve the majority of their voters and help most of the country by focusing on these priorities:

John Lewis Voting Rights Act

This is the priority because nothing else matters if Democratic voters, i.e. Black voters, cannot vote and/or are blocked or gerrymandered in large numbers, as is the case in states all across the nation where state Republicans have written or passed hundreds of laws that restrict, limit, block, and penalize Black and Indigenous voters. Though this isn’t a favorite of the left wing of lightweight single-issue Democratic voters, it remains the number one priority in the effort to save this country from its worst, most racist impulses.

The next four priorities can be prioritized in any order, so feel free to do so as you write your senator. For me, they line up quite nicely like this:

INFRASTRUCTURE

This bill, the largest of its kind in history, is transformative across a broad spectrum of industries, states, cities, and career statuses. It touches the priorities of climate, roads and bridges, rural and city broadband, ending child poverty, driving up wages, expanding health care for all stages of life, and pumps billions into shoring up a crumbling and outdated infrastructure that we all see every day from tattered roads, broken transit, rail, and airports, which are all at the mercy of increasingly destabilized weather patterns that are a product of climate changes. We just witnessed Louisiana, Texas, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey, get pummeled by the latest hurricane to hit the eastern seaboard, and California is again experiencing massive seasonal fires that are again record-breaking in their size and ferocity. 

Passing the infrastructure bill places our collective home at the forefront of long-needed improvements and helps present future generations with more than a “fixer-upper.”

JUDGE CONFIRMATIONS

President Biden has plenty of district and appeals court judges awaiting confirmation. And while the president has kept ahead of pace for getting judges confirmed, there is a long way to go to catch up and overtake TFG and the host of ideologues and unqualified judges.

[In a Twitter thread, Candidly Tiff highlights great judges up for confirmation.]

President Biden and MVP Harris, democratic elected, and of course Democratic voters need judges in place to ensure fair trials, free and fair elections, fair sentencing, and the ability to deny or strike down frivolous lawsuits Republicans will bring during the 2020 election cycle and beyond.

JANUARY 6th INSURRECTION INVESTIGATION

The insurrection touches every bill, law, act, executive order, and every American who actually supports the rule of law, constitutional governance, and respect for history, and government workers and those who protect them.

A country that almost collapsed at the hands of mostly white men and women who decided that rather than lose an election and be governed like everyone else, they would tear down the government they illogically professed to loving and supporting.

The first convictions have started and trials are ongoing and will be ongoing for years it seems. But what the nation needs and hasn’t seen, are the charges, arrests, trials, and convictions of the men at the top who tried to overthrow the US Government. The names that need to be part of the investigation and made to testify under oath include… every name in the prior cabinet, TFG family members, the shadow government run by Stephen Miller, Jared Kushner, Steve Bannon, Mike Flynn, Mike Pompeo, Mike Pence, Ivanka, Don Jr., and the other Trump son with the big head, and all of their assistants, staff, and their supporters. The supporters include, but is not limited to, Jim Jordan, Mitch McConnell, Kevin McCarthy, Lyndsey Graham, Rand Paul, and another forty or so names.

The administration can continue its rehabilitation and restructuring of itself on track as long as it remains focused on the big picture and those things that matter to most Americans. Staying away from Democratic ideologues and single-issue crybabies has been a refreshing change of pace from the last administration who catered to the worst of their base.

President Biden and MVP Harris are on the right track, despite a Beltway media unable or incapable of objectively covering their successes because doing so interferes with their clickbait sensationalist impulses that require daily feeding they no longer get with TFG gone.

Let’s hope that all Democrats, Democratic voters, and Democratic supporters each “put five on it” and help the Senate have a productive fall session.

© 2021 by Myron J. Clifton. All Rights Reserved. 

Myron J. Clifton is slightly older than fifty, lives in Sacramento, California, and is an avid Bay Area sports fan. He likes comic books, telling stories about his late mom to his beloved daughter Leah, and talking to his friends.  

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