Pelosi is a ghastly creature. She and her ilk – Feinstein, Boxer, Jerry Brown, Gavin Newsom – have effectively destroyed California and they did it on purpose. They strive to import as many illegal migrants as possible; they've created and fostered the homelessness and let it fester. California is now a socialist disaster and the further destruction of the economy is just what they've wanted. PATRICIA McCARTHY
California Gov. Newsom numb to workers' pain
Before the coronavirus hit California, a virulent piece of legislation was already robbing workers of their jobs. With the economy now in freefall and nearly three million unemployed, Gov. Gavin Newsom turns a deaf ear to a commonsense solution.
Last year, Gov. Newsom signed California Assembly Bill 5, by San Diego Democrat Lorena Gonzalez. The measure is a declaration of war against independent contractors of all kinds and the first measure to limit Californians' ability to make a living.
The measure limits freelance writers, photographers, and videographers to 35 submissions per publication, per year. AB-5 has also taken work from independent contractors in many fields, including health care. The repressive measure is being challenged in the courts, but legislators have declined to suspend it. With a pandemic on the rise, the time had come to make a case with the governor.
"By prohibiting the use of independent contractor drivers, health care professionals, and workers in other critical areas, AB-5 is doing substantial, and avoidable, harm to the very people who now have the fewest resources and the worst alternatives available to them," said an open letter to Gov. Newsom by 151 economists and political scientists.
The signatories include Nobel laureate Vernon Smith of Chapman University, John Taylor of Stanford, Lee Ohanian of UCLA, and David Teece of U.C. Berkeley. AB-5, they contend, has pushed all the risks and all the costs of a vibrant gig economy onto lower- and middle-income individuals, those who would benefit most from flexibility to work around the restrictive policies.
While employers are not hiring, gig workers could shoulder the many tasks needed to flatten out the effects of the temporary emergency. To make this possible, the 151 economists and political scientists contend, AB-5 needs to be suspended.
At this writing, Newsom has yet to respond, but he has not hesitated to take drastic measures. Since March 4, the governor has signed 29 executive orders, including one to make local elections vote-by-mail only.
Also in March, legislators allowed Newson to spend more than $1 billion in the coronavirus emergency, with $500 million available immediately, and suspended public hearings and floor votes for a month. The governor, a San Francisco Democrat, took full advantage.
In an April 7 MSNBC appearance with Rachel Maddow, Newsom announced a deal for "upwards of 200 million masks on a monthly basis" from a manufacturer "here in the state of California." That turned out to be the Chinese firm BYD, with no history of making personal protective equipment (PPE), a record of faulty products, and ties to the Chinese military and Communist Party.
Los Angeles Democrat Holly Mitchell, chairwoman of the Senate Budget Committee, fired off an official letter demanding details. At this writing, Newsom has yet to respond. The governor refuses his own party the details of a $1-billion deal that will provide jobs for Chinese workers and profits for a Chinese company.
In similar style, the governor declines the advice of leading economists to suspend AB-5, which robs independent Americans of their jobs and makes the pandemic worse. If embattled Californians thought the governor was ignoring the best interests of the workers, the state, and the nation, it would be hard to blame them.
Lloyd Billingsley is a policy fellow at the Oakland, Calif.–based Independent Institute.
Meanwhile, Jerry Brown’s successor Gavin Newsom rejects American
products and labor to strike a $1 billion deal with BYD, a Chinese company with
a record of faulty products, and as Oregon Democrat Peter DeFazio testified last year, “a
company that is very heavily subsidized by the government of communist China.”
If anybody believed Newsom should register as a lobbyist for BYD or an agent of
China it would be hard to blame them.
Newsom Masks $1 Billion Deal with Chinese Company
Democrat governor hides the
details, even from fellow Democrats.
Fri Apr 24, 2020
“We’ve been competing against
other states, against other nations, against our own federal government for PPE
— coveralls, masks, shields, N95 masks — and we’re not waiting around any
longer. And we’re no longer interested in the progress that we were seeing in
the past.”
That was California governor
Gavin Newsom in an April 7 MSNBC
appearance with Rachel Maddow. As Newsom added, “In the last 48
hours we have secured –through a consortia of nonprofits and a manufacturer
here in the state of California – upwards of 200 million masks on a monthly
basis that we’re confident we can supply the needs of the state of California,
potentially the needs of other western states.”
As it happened, the
manufacturer wasn’t exactly “here in the state of California.” The
manufacturer was BYD, “Build Your Dreams,” a Chinese company not known for
making personal protective equipment. Newsom wasn’t revealing details of the $1
billion deal, which as John Myers of
the Los Angeles Times noted, “will cost
taxpayers 30 percent more than the governor’s January budget allotted for
infectious diseases for the whole fiscal year.”
The day after Newsom’s MSNBC
appearance, San Francisco Democrat
Phil Ting, chairman of the Assembly Budget Committee, told reporters, “We
don’t have any information as to how many masks we’re buying, who we’re buying
them from, at what price. What are we obligated? For how long are we
obligated?” Los Angeles Democrat Holly Mitchell, chairwoman of the Senate
Budget Committee, fired off an official letter demanding
details. Newsom wasn’t talking, which prompted an escalation.
“Perhaps it’s time for
legislative leaders to dust off their rarely-used subpoena power,” the Sacramento Bee editorialized on
April 22. The administration feared that “Trump might steal California’s
equipment,” but that did not justify Newsom’s decision “to hide a taxpayer-funded
contract from legislative leaders.” Neither did the obfuscation account
for “other reasons why the administration may wish to shield the contract from
oversight.” Journalists and legislators alike should have seen this coming.
In March, as CalMatters noted,
legislators “made $500 million available immediately and allowed Newsom to
spend up to $1 billion total,” and unanimously passed two bills “waiving a
requirement that legislation must be in print for three days before lawmakers
can act.” Legislators also suspended public hearings for at least a month and
floor votes for at least a month. As Republican assemblyman Jay Obernolte
explained, “We are placing an extraordinary degree of trust in Gov. Gavin
Newsom.” The governor took full advantage, opting for BYD despite serious
issues with the Chinese company.
BYD has “glaring red flags on
its record, including a history of supplying allegedly faulty products to the
U.S., ties to the Chinese military and Communist Party, and possible links to
forced labor,” reported Daniel Newhauser and
Keegan Hamilton of Vice News. The federal Food and Drug
Administration gave the company emergency approval, even though BYD had been
prohibited by law from bidding for some federal contracts and is involved in
lawsuits with several states.
Newsom was not forthcoming
about the deal’s details but it did emerge that California already sent
the first installment of
$495 million to BYD. When reporters approached BYD, the Chinese company
referred all questions to Newsom’s office. The governor’s deal with BYD was not
the first time California politicians rejected American products and American
labor in favor of China.
“California Turns To China For
New Bay Bridge,” noted Richard Gonzalez of
NPR back in 2011. On this key infrastructure project,
“California avoided legal requirements to use domestic steel by not using
federal funds for the job.” Since politicians seldom if ever turn down federal
funds, they must have been determined to outsource the job to “a state-owned Chinese
company, Shanghai Zhenhua Heavy Industries.” This was supposedly to save money,
but it didn’t.
The bridge came in $5 billion
over budget, a full 10 years late, and riddled with broken rods and faulty
welds, all performed in China. Every one of the bridge’s 750 panels had to be
repaired. The Grade BD Chinese steel was prone to embrittlement, and in 2013
dozens of the long metal rods on the project snapped. When apprised of the
lingering safety issues, Gov. Jerry Brown famously said “I mean, look, shit
happens,” with no second thoughts about California’s use of Chinese
steel, faulty work by Chinese workers, fathomless waste and corruption, and the
ensuing coverup by politicians.
Meanwhile, Jerry Brown’s
successor Gavin Newsom rejects American products and labor to strike a $1
billion deal with BYD, a Chinese company with a record of faulty products, and
as Oregon Democrat Peter
DeFazio testified last year, “a company that is very heavily
subsidized by the government of communist China.” If anybody believed Newsom
should register as a lobbyist for BYD or an agent of China it would be hard to
blame them.
Gov. Newsom told reporters his
deal with BYD was “not political. This is not in any way, shape or form
usurping or undermining.” If anybody believes that, Newsom has a bridge to sell
them, not that anybody is buying these days.
The California economy is
in freefall, and as Newsom said Wednesday,
“there is no date for easing restrictions.”
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