HELLOOOOOOOO GNUVILLE! 🤗 It is I, Nifty, sitting in for KariJ today. 😊 CG and I are delighted to be with you for the pre-Thanksgiving GNR and we’ve got some fun things for you today!
I am quite out of practice, so this GNR won’t be in my old format. It will be kind of a cornucopia of news and fun items all mixed together like the best kind of pumpkin pie custard. 😁
Let’s begin with a seasonal tune!
Labor and the Economy
2023 has been a year for the rejuvenation of organized labor! The UAW strike was gutsy and effective. Here’s to more of this!
UAW clinches record Detroit deals, turns to organizing Tesla, foreign automakers, David Shepardson and Joseph White, Reuters, November 20, 2023.
Nov 20 (Reuters) - The United Auto Workers (UAW) said Monday that 64% of workers at the Detroit Three automakers voted to ratify new record contracts after a six-week targeted strike, as the union turns its attention to organizing foreign-owned and Tesla auto plants.
The votes lock in the UAW's tentative agreements with the automakers through April 2028, which include a 25% increase in base wages and will cumulatively raise the top wage by 33%, compounded with estimated cost-of-living adjustments to over $42 an hour.
It also cut the number of years needed to get to top pay from eight years to three years, will boost the pay of temporary workers by 150% and make them permanent employees and includes significant retirement improvements.
The union on Monday released a new video on social media touting the "UAW Bump," referring to raises workers at non-union automakers have received since the agreements were reached with the Detroit Three. U.S. President Joe Biden appears in the video, which urges non-union workers to join the UAW.
Unions make life better even for non-unionized workers
Corporations see the writing on the wall — under pressure as unions win important gains for workers in their industries, non-unionized companies hope to forestall union organizing among their own workforces by matching the gains that the UAW just won for its members. Hopefully, these workers will recognize that the only reason they are getting these offers from Honda, Toyota et al is because those corps don’t want them to organize AND the moment they think they can get away with it, they’ll revert back. It is imperative that unions remain strong and that more workers unionize, to keep labor rights strong.
Honda joins Toyota in hiking pay after UAW agreements with Detroit Three, Breana Noble, Detroit News, November 10, 2023.
Honda Motor Co. Ltd. is matching the immediate wage hike the United Auto Workers has won for its members upon ratification of tentative agreements with Detroit's three automakers, and the union is using it as a call to organize.
Meanwhile, Subaru Corp. is teasing a "response to current industry circumstances" to its employees. That makes for a chorus of automakers including Toyota Motor Corp. taking actions concerning their workers following the union's tentative agreements with General Motors Co., Ford Motor Co. and Stellantis NV. Experts say the moves are in response to labor market conditions, but especially to ward off organizing efforts at their plants.
That's been a stated goal of UAW President Shawn Fain to change the tide of the union's past organizing failures and turn the "Big Three" into the "Big Five or Big Six" by the time the new contracts expire at the end of April 2028. President Joe Biden has given his approval.
"Union autoworkers own this victory," Biden posted … about Honda after visting on Thursday Belvidere, Illinois, where Stellantis in February had idled its Jeep Cherokee plant, which would find new life under the new deal. "I meant it when I said deals like UAW's historic agreement will change the game for every worker in America, and that I want this type of contract for all autoworkers."
Beau: Good sign for the US economic picture — and yes, people are finally starting to feel a bit better about the economy:
Student Loan debt relief continues — thanks, President Biden!
Millions could benefit from a new way out of student loan default, Cory Turner, NPR, November 21, 2023.
Right now, borrowers with federal student loans in default are already feeling relief without having to do a thing. As part of Fresh Start, the Biden administration has extended the pandemic-driven pause on collections on defaulted loans until at least September 2024. Wages and tax refunds aren't being garnished. Social Security payments aren't being withheld. The harassing collections calls... they've stopped too.
Many borrowers' credit reports have also improved, with defaulted federal loans now reported as "current" instead of "in collections."
The problem is this is a temporary reprieve. If borrowers in default want to keep these benefits, they have through September 2024 to opt into Fresh Start – the simplest path yet out of default.
The process takes about 10 minutes to initiate. Borrowers need only let the U.S. Education Department know they would like to use Fresh Start. That will then trigger the shifting of their loans back to a traditional loan servicer.✂️
Perhaps most importantly, in the past, borrowers emerging from default could not immediately qualify for the most flexible, income-driven repayment plan, but the Biden administration has changed that too. When opting into Fresh Start, many borrowers can now enroll in the newest, most generous plan, known as SAVE, which offers lower payments and loan forgiveness after a set number of years.
For many low-income borrowers, SAVE could be a game-changer. According to newly released federal data, 2.9 million borrowers who are enrolled in SAVE earned incomes low enough that they qualified for a $0 monthly payment. For these borrowers, being in good standing, and even earning their way toward loan forgiveness, costs less than being in default.
Perspective for when you’re overwhelmed by RW extremism:
"We have been here before": Heather Cox Richardson on how to save our republic, Dean Obeidallah, Salon, November 2, 2023.
I'm optimistic, first of all, because we have been here before, and we have the American people. What's that saying: The American people finally do the right thing after they've tried everything else? If you had looked at America in 1853 when only white men could vote, you would have seen a country that was rapidly increasing human enslavement, not only through the South, but also in the West and soon to be national, on the principle that the United States would become a leader in a global movement to push an extractive economy, based on human enslavement.
By 1854, they managed to push that across the United States with the Kansas Nebraska Act. By 1856, there's a political party that decimates the other two political parties in the North to stand against that idea. By 1859, you have Abraham Lincoln rising and talking about the ideology of that party to recenter the Declaration of Independence. By 1861, he's in the White House, and in 1863 he gives the Gettysburg Address, which rededicates the nation to a new birth of freedom based on the Declaration of Independence and the idea that everybody must be treated equally before the law and have a right to a say in their government. In less than a decade, we go from the idea that a few rich guys should control everybody else to the idea that government should work for ordinary Americans and everybody should be treated equally. I mean, that's truly amazing.
In this moment, we have plenty of things on the negative side in this moment, but we still have Black Americans, people of color, and women who do actually still get to have a say. So I do not see this as insurmountable. I really don't see it as insurmountable.
Orban’s Dream of an Illiberal Pan-European Alliance Is Fading, Andrew Higgins, New York Times, November 8, 2023.
But Mr. Orban’s hopes of leading a pan-European movement — one that is deeply illiberal and infused with nationalism — are fading, deflated by the poor performance at the polls by some of his most fervent admirers in Europe and deep divisions over the war in Ukraine.
Most crucially, Poland’s governing Law and Justice party — a longtime partner of Mr. Orban’s Fidesz party in its battles with the European Union over minority rights, migrants, the rule of law and other issues— lost a general election last month.
That followed a string of election setbacks for Mr. Orban’s political allies across Europe over the past two years, in Spain this past summer, and upsets in Slovenia and the Czech Republic.
Women will not go back.
The Supreme Court dismantled Roe. States are restoring it one by one. Alice Miranda Ollstein, Megan Messerly and Jessica Piper, Politico, November 9, 2023.
Justice Samuel Alito challenged voters to decide the future of abortion when he wrote the U.S. Supreme Court opinion overturning Roe v. Wade last year.
“We do not pretend to know how our political system or society will respond,” he noted as he threw out half a century of precedent.
Now, 17 months later, the court has an answer: Americans want to preserve or restore Roe-like protections. In contest after contest, including a major victory in Ohio this week, voters decisively chose abortion rights over limitations — even in deep-red pockets of the country.
When the right to abortion is on the ballot, it wins. It wins in red states that voted for President Donald Trump. It wins in counties President Joe Biden lost by more than 20 points. It wins when popular Republican officials campaign for it and when they ignore it. And it wins even when the outcome has no immediate effect on abortion access.
Support for abortion cuts across party lines, performing significantly better at the ballot box than Biden and other Democrats. In fact, abortion outruns Biden most in the most Republican areas, according to a POLITICO analysis of election results from the five states that have had direct votes on abortion rights. In those five states — California, Kansas, Kentucky, Michigan and Ohio — every county that voted for Biden also voted for abortion rights.
In the counties where Biden received less than 20 percent of the vote in 2020, the abortion-rights side has averaged 31 percent in referendums — an 11-point gap.
In numbers too big to ignore, women will vote and will fight Republican attempts to subjugate them.
Good news for journalism — and you can contribute, too!
A Billion-Dollar Bet on Local News, John Palfrey, the Atlantic, November 2, 2023.
In town after town, city after city, the same story is playing out. Andover, with its active civic culture, was lucky: It still had a local-news provider, even if one that was much less robust. Roughly 20 percent of communities in America have no local coverage at all.✂️
At the MacArthur Foundation, we decided to double our bet on journalism and media—to continue our longstanding program focused on national news and to add a time-limited, big bet on local news. But we realized that even with our significant resources, we could not make enough of a difference alone. So we helped create a 22-funder consortium called Press Forward. Together, we have committed more than $500 million to address the local-news crisis over the next five years.✂️
Our goal is to raise the next $500 million at the local level. For local news to be sustainable over the long term, communities will need to stand up and support their local news providers—whoever that may be in any given area. Americans will need to support local news the same way that they invest in arts and culture, hospitals, or alma maters. They will need to add it to their list of philanthropic commitments—or at least to their list of subscriptions, alongside Amazon Prime, Hulu, and Netflix.
There are good candidates in red states — let’s support them!
Doctor Strange mentioned Arkansas yesterday and here is just the kind of candidate who might win over Arkansans who want something better for themselves and their families:
AR Dem Marcus Jones Shows How To Run For Congress In A Red State. (Don't Pretend To Be A Republican), Doktor Zoom, Wonkette, November 3, 2023.
From Adam Parkhomenko on the Threads, a really nifty political ad from Democrat Marcus Jones, a retired Army colonel who’s running for Congress against Republican incumbent French Hill, who sounds like he’s more a geographical feature than a member of the House. Jones is so far the only announced candidate in the Democratic primary for next year’s ballot, and if he keeps his messaging focused on the arguments he makes in this ad — for Democrats as the real party of everyday American values — he may have a good shot. Yes, even in Arkansas, where Sarah Huckabee Sanders and Tom Goddamn Cotton are the biggest political names.
Look at this ad, will ya? And for my fellow anti-militarist folks, try to look beyond the military bang-bang, taking out bad guys stuff, because so does Jones, as you’ll see:
We like how the ad takes the military stuff, the “challenge coins” that military people get for completing a mission or other achievement, and uses the idea to both call attention to Jones’s military record — patriotic credibility established — and then to suggest that the biggest challenges America faces are here on the home front.
The 2023 Elections Are Over. 2024 Will Be Different. David Dayen, The American Prospect, November 10, 2023.
That has changed a prior truism about elections that was the conventional wisdom for a few decades. With their disproportionate share of older voters, Republicans were seen to have an advantage in midterm and off-year elections, relative to drop-off voting groups like those aged 18–29 and people of color. This has completely turned around. Thanks to education polarization, Democrats are more likely to be politically engaged and aware, and this gives them the advantage in low-turnout and oddly timed races.
I think that’s clear in the resounding election results this week. It’s not the only reason for Democratic success; Samuel Alito has been the greatest activist for the Democrats’ cause in this century, as his ruling in Dobbs completely changed the primary issue set of U.S. elections. But even before that, in 2018, Democrats figured out how to turn out voters in an off year. Democrats have been winning special elections at a high rate this year as well. It turns out that educated neurotics addicted to doomscrolling vote at high rates. Who knew?
Simon Rosenberg has written plenty more since November 10 (see below), but first I am repeating this particular blog post because it summarizes some important wins we need to keep in mind:
Savoring Our Big Wins, The Democratic Party Is Strong, Ongoing Republican Betrayal, Simon Rosenberg, Hopium, November 10, 2023.
-
In the last 4 Presidential elections we’ve averaged 51% of the vote, Republicans 46%. 51-46 (+5). In the last 8 Presidential elections Democrats have won more votes in 7, and Republicans have only topped 48% once, in 2004, which was the last time they won the popular vote - 20 years ago. The last time we averaged 51% over 4 elections was in FDR’s 4 elections from 1932 to 1944. America today is a center-left country.
-
We’ve now have “won” the 2018, 2020, 2022 and 2023 elections. It’s a remarkable run. Our performance since the spring of 2022, in all kinds of elections across the US, even in red states like KY and OH, has been extraordinary. MAGA is a failed politics, the Republican Party is broken, and I am deeply optimistic about next year.
-
The resounding defeat of Youngkin’s 15 week abortion ban “compromise” was devastating for Republicans, for they head into 2024 with no clear way of mitigating the ongoing, deep damage the stripping of rights from women is doing to their party. It’s why we fought so hard in Virginia these past few months - we simply had to defeat the 15 week ban. For more on how cental this debate has become to our politics see Tom Bonier’s terrific new op-ed in the New York Times, American Elections Are About Abortion Now.
-
Polling, should we be worried? I’m not. Just this week two large sample, serious polls had Biden up 48-44 (+4), and 47-45 (+2), and Navigator has found Congressional Dems gaining substantial ground in the battlegrounds.
Cygnal poll news, November 7, 2023.
Joe Biden’s image noticeably improved since last month – from upside down by 8 to upside down by 3 – likely due to the war in Israel. He was 45% fav / 53% unfav [-8 net fav] and is now 47% fav / 50% unfav [-3 net fav]. At the same time, there was a 10-point jump in “right direction” among Republicans, a similar 1-point jump for right direction with Independents, and a 6-point jump in right direction among Democrats.
Trump needs 95% of Republicans to have a chance of winning. Simon Rosenberg explains "he's very far away from that"
Now, here’s something more recent from Simon: Pollster sees hope for Biden: "Republicans are in far greater trouble than is generally understood", Chauncey DeVega, Salon, November 21, 2023.
The Democrats have been winning in off-year elections. We won in the red wave midterm that we weren't supposed to win last year. We won in the general election. This idea that as the electorate gets bigger, it gets more Republican is false. The Democrats have won more votes in the last seven out of eight elections than the Republicans. No political party has done that in American history. In the last four elections, we've beaten the Republicans on average by 51 to 46 by five points.
In addition, there is a big anti-MAGA majority in this country and it continues to show up to give the Democrats big electoral victories when nobody expects it. I also have no idea how Donald Trump is going to pick up a single new vote beyond the voters who voted for him in 2020. And it's far more likely that he gets 45% of the vote than he does 49% of the vote. Trump is not a strong candidate. He's only getting 60% of the Republican field right now. That means 40% of Republicans are not supporting him right now. Trump needs 95% of Republicans to even have a remote chance of winning. He is very far away from that. Trump is actually showing a lot of structural weakness, not strength.
I know the polls have shown what they've shown. First of all, the election is a year away. Not to be overlooked, there are polls showing Biden up by between two and five points nationally over Trump. There is contradictory data out there — which is what happened with the non-existent red wave in 2022. For Trump to be in the high 40s, or even ahead of Biden, it would put Trump in a place that no Republican candidate has been in 20 years. I just don't buy that given the fact that when actual Democrats and Republicans go vote, we do well, and they don't. I'm not going to tell you we're going to win. I can't predict that. But I would much rather be us than them given everything I know about politics.
See ya, sad face, hello smiles!
Mental Health
8 things you can do this fall to help ease winter depression, ← (gift article), Richard Sima and Chelsea Conrad, Washington Post, November 12, 2023.
Susceptible people — an estimated 5 percent of Americans — already are feeling the effects of winter SAD, lower moods, lethargy and excessive sleep, despite the sweltering global heat records of summer and early fall.
“The good news is you’re dealing with a predictable phenomenon,” said Norman Rosenthal, a psychiatrist at Georgetown University School of Medicine who first described SAD. “The bad news is it is not always as predictable as you’d like.”
(Read the (free) article for some concrete things you can do to get ahead of SAD this year!)
A program helps Ukraine's veterans find sexual healing after the trauma of war, Brian Mann, NPR, November 10, 2023.
The books, the Youtube video and the effort to normalize discussions of body positivity and sexuality after war are based on the work of Kathryn Ellis, an American therapist who started her career treating U.S. veterans.
"There were tons of service members coming back at that time from Afghanistan and they had questions about sex and intimacy," Ellis tells NPR. "Often the providers were not prepared to address those questions."
Ellis wrote a book — Sex and Intimacy for Wounded Veterans — that provided much of the material, with her permission, in the manuals now being used in Ukraine.
Military cultures tend to be conservative, she says. Sex and self-image are areas where many soldiers can feel extra-vulnerable after an injury. Many wounded veterans also experience low libido, according to Ellis.
"It can feel really shameful to bring that up," Ellis says. "Body image plays such a role."
With help and guidance, she says, many veterans recover, learning to feel good again about their bodies. She believes sexual healing can also help with other parts of mental and physical recovery after war.
🦃🥧 Now For the Good Stuff! 🥧🦃
Have you ever wondered…? ⬇
It's not your imagination: Why Brussels sprouts taste better than when you were a kid, Ashlie D. Stevens, Salon, November 20, 2023.
I didn’t grow up in a brussels sprouts family, yet through the powerful force of cultural osmosis, I somehow grew up believing that they were always just a little gross. It’s not really a surprise why: Much like cafeteria lunches or liver and onions, brussels became a popular culinary punchline among the jungle gym set. Just the name evoked images of emotionless housewives boiling them over high-heat, rendering the little cruciferous vegetables bloated, soft and gaseous, destined to be scraped into the trashcan or offered to a family dog under the table.
But then sometime in the 2010s, alongside the explosion of New American and New Southern cuisine, brussels sprouts underwent some reputational repair. Chefs moved away from straight boiling them and started to slow-roast them in halves or quarters, coaxing out a really appealing caramelized sweetness that masked the vegetable’s inherent bitterness. They coated them in butter and bacon and maple syrup. And this happened over and over and over again until overpriced maple-glazed brussels were as much a cliché of hipster gastropub dining as Mason jar cocktails and food served on wooden planks. And the thing is — I loved them. ✂️
“In the late 1960s, our industry switched over to mechanized harvesting, which required a plant that would mature fairly evenly over the entire stem,” Steve Bontadelli, a Brussels sprouts farmer, told MEL Magazine in 2021. “The Sakata seed company developed the first plants that would mature evenly, and they were beautiful and green with lots of production, but they were horribly bitter, and we turned off an entire generation,”
The ultimate Thanksgiving Dinner ideas list (seriously, it is ALL here from pre-dinner drinks to condiments, to dishes to dessert!) 80+ Thanksgiving Dinner Ideas, Gaby Dalkin, November 1, 2023.
You know you want them all: 😍 The 27 Most Popular Thanksgiving Desserts of All Time, New York Times, November 12, 2023. 😋
Preparing to meet your MAGA: For some of us, holiday gatherings with some MAGA type relatives is unavoidable, but I’ve got you! Here is an article (gift article!) with the lowdown — that is, the FACTS — so you can disarm the top contenders for Thanksgiving dinner fights. Here are the facts to prepare you for your Thanksgiving arguments, Ben Brasch, Washington Post, November 21, 2023.
Thanksgiving can be hard. When loved ones gather, it’s natural to reflect upon what’s happened since everyone last came together. That can be fertile ground for awkward conversations — whether with an uncle who only nourishes his brain with Facebook or a 14-year-old Redditor who has it all figured out. Let’s not turn Thanksgiving into a gobble squabble.
Whether at the adults table or the kids table, The Washington Post wants to help readers with a big helping of what we’re best known for: facts.
We’ve compiled potential turkey-day topics for some of the year’s biggest stories in politics, pop culture, the economy, international news, sports and a smattering of leftovers.
40 Best Thanksgiving Games to Play Before the Big Feast, Jill Gleeson, The Pioneer Woman, November 20, 2023.
Every household has its own Thanksgiving traditions that help make the holiday special. Nothing can beat watching the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade with your cousins or even just breaking the wishbone. But any family that enjoys a bit of friendly competition (other than watching football on Thanksgiving) will want to add a few Thanksgiving games to their lineup. These activities will keep everyone entertained while the chefs concentrate on the most important thing of all—the Thanksgiving menu! Even Ree Drummond has a game idea from her crew: "Start a new around-the-table tradition of vocalizing things you're thankful for," she says. "You can even turn it into a game by following the alphabet and seeing how far you can get."
For more fun ideas, check out this list of the best DIY Thanksgiving games for kids and adults to play before and after the big feast. You'll find plenty of options for the whole family, as well as great ways for your little turkeys to burn off some energy after all that pumpkin pie. Family bowling contests, counting challenges, Thanksgiving trivia, and icebreakers are included. There are even some games that double as Thanksgiving decorations!
These Thanksgiving activities can be played indoors, outdoors, or in some cases, both. Some are twists on old favorites, and some are entirely new. You can even turn Thanksgiving crafts into a fun competition! But no matter how different these family Thanksgiving games are, they have a couple things in common: They're all easy to play, and even easier for everyone to enjoy. In fact, they're so much fun, they might even turn out to be the highlight of the holiday—besides the food, of course!
A sweet Thanksgiving update
A few years ago, one of us (maybe even me!) posted about this unexpected Thanksgiving celebration. A woman texted her grandson (or so she thought) to let him know what time to come for dinner and it turned out to be another teenager’s phone. What followed was a happy Thanksgiving dinner invitation and the story went viral. Well, it’s UPDATE TIME! Wanda Dench and Jamal Hinton continued to spend Thanksgivings together over the past 7 years and are planning to do so again this year — with another modern twist:
Grandmother and man she accidentally invited to Thanksgiving in 2016 adding two guests to this year's holiday dinner, Kayla Galloway, NBC, November 15, 2023.
A grandmother in Arizona and the stranger she accidentally invited to her Thanksgiving dinner in 2016 are set to celebrate their eighth holiday together — but this year, they are inviting two more people to the dinner table.
Their story went viral when Wanda Dench texted then-teenager Jamal Hinton, telling him the time of her Thanksgiving dinner.
Dench told the 17-year-old that dinner was at her house at 3 p.m. on Nov. 24, 2016.
He responded by asking who was texting him and she responded, “Your grandma.”
After the initial confusion and back-and-forth, Hinton jokingly asked, “Can I still get a plate tho?”
The rest of the story became an annual holiday tradition, and a lasting internet sensation.
(Nifty note: As part of this teaming up with Wanda and Jamal, Airbnb has pledged to make a donation to Feeding America)
The 22 Best Holiday Movies and Shows to Watch This Year, From ‘Best. Christmas. Ever!’ to ‘Family Switch’, Fletcher Peters and Coleman Spilde, Daily Beast, November 9, 2023.
We’re little more than a week into November—have you set up your festive decorations yet? If not, why not get started a little early this year? We could use the good cheer. Bring out your garland, your fake (or real?) snow, your mistletoe, your stockings, and your warmest blankets. It’s time for the holiday season.
Streaming services are going big on Christmas movies this year, with plenty of romantic comedies and entertainment for the whole family. Stars like Eddie Murphy, Leighton Meester, Brandy Norwood, and even Ludacris are making a foray into holiday specials this year. Thanks to Netflix, it’s going to be the Best. Christmas. Ever! (Yes, that is the title of one of its upcoming wintery movies.)
🐩💙 CG’s Picks 💙🐩
Hello Everybody, it’s me, Curlygirl! I am so happy to see you all again! Me and Mama have been SO BUSY this year with so much family To-Do and also we are moving! Next week! So, did I mention we have been so busy? Lucky for Mama, I am the best dog ever (that’s what Mama says! 🥰) and I am very helpful because I keep us both exercised and relaxed.
Today, I have some fun videos for you featuring different kinds of dogs (the second one is a trick, though!). I hope you like them!
Thanksgiving Hijinks
First Chicago-style Hot Dog
Olive and Mabel hard working dogs (like me!)
RoundUp WindDown
In the past, I used to leave you with a list of things you could do to help protect Democracy — and I will do that again — but for this Thanksgiving Week, I would like to give us all permission to take a little breather.
Enjoy your Thanksgiving celebration, however you like it. If you can, spend some time outdoors breathing in some outdoor air and watching the seasonal changes. It will restore your spirits.
Thanks for reading! Happy Thanksgiving, Gnuville!