July 15, 2023

Saturday,July 15, 2023. Annette’s News Roundup.

I think the Roundup makes people feel not so alone.

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Joe is always busy.

Biden White House goes after Republicans over Tuberville's military blockade.

A new White House memo paints the GOP as complicit in the Alabama senator's tactic to put a hold on promotions for military officers in protest of a Pentagon abortion policy.

WASHINGTON — The White House is amping up pressure on Republicans over Sen. Tommy Tuberville's blockade on hundreds of promotions for military officers, apparently seeking to make the GOP pay a price with voters if he persists, according to a new memo first obtained by NBC News.

In the memo addressed to "Interested parties," the White House dials up the rhetoric against Tuberville, R-Ala., and paints the Republican Party more broadly as enablers of his effort, accusing it of mounting "barely a word of protest."

"Right now, a Republican Senator is choosing to erode military readiness and abuse military families in the pursuit of an unrelated and extreme anti-freedom agenda — with barely a sound from his GOP colleagues," White House communications adviser Andrew Bates wrote in the memo, dated Thursday.

He added that the blockade is "exploiting service members as pawns," hurting military readiness and risking a "brain-drain" from the Defense Department. "He’s even subjecting the families who serve with members to excruciating uncertainty, like not knowing where children will go to school or where spouses can work."

Some Republicans on Capitol Hill have objected to Tuberville's tactics, although they agree with his policy goal on abortion. But Tuberville isn't feeling the heat: He said he has faced "zero" pressure from his party to back off his blockade. (NBC News).

Here is Senator Tammy Duckworth, an amputee veteran, speaking about Tuberville.

Biden campaign reports 'blockbuster' $72 million in fundraising for quarter 2.

President Biden is starting his reelection campaign with tens of millions of dollars in the bank, dwarfing second-quarter fundraising totals already announced by the campaigns of former President Donald Trump [who reported having raised $35 million] and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis who reported having raised $20 million].

According to an announcement from the campaign ahead of a Federal Elections Commission reporting deadline this weekend, the Biden-Harris campaign, Democratic National Committee and their joint fundraising committees combined to raise $72 million from April to the end of June. They have $77 million cash on hand.

Because Biden is the incumbent president and his campaign is fully integrated with the DNC, the combined fundraising total represents all the funds the reelect could draw upon. (From NPR).

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Kamala is always busy.

White Media may not cover her, but the Vice President is at every place black leadership gathers.

The Divine 9 - the umbrella organization for black sororities and fraternities - and their family and friends votes.

NAACP Convention.

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America is a courier nation.

UPS, FedEx, USPS make it so. Amazon pushed the nation forward on this. The Pandemic sealed the deal.

What Happens If UPS Goes on Strike.

Americans rely on delivery workers—and come August, hundreds of thousands of UPS workers could walk off the job.

Stamp price increase 2023: USPS postage, Forever stamps go up July 9.

We may prefer email to mail, but this 👇 is still true.

On average, the Postal Service processes and delivers 162.1 million pieces of First-Class Mail each day. On average, the Postal Service processes 421.4 million mail pieces each day, 17.6 million each hour, 292,628 each minute and 4,877 each second. Ten years ago, the USPS delivered 65 million pieces of First-Class Mail each day.

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Who will the Republicans go to now that DeSantis is proving not to be the Trump alternative?

Tim Scott (left), Glenn Youngkin (right).

From Wake Up to Politics - As Ron DeSantis’ poll numbers continue to spiral downward, he received two new signs this week of crumbling support from the media and financial titans that once bolstered his campaign:

• Per the New York Times, the influential conservative media properties owned by Rupert Murdoch — Fox News, the Wall Street Journal editorial board, the New York Post — have started to sour on DeSantis. Murdoch himself has reportedly begun considering whether Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R-VA) wouldn’t be a better Trump alternative.

• Per Politico, a number of top Republican donors are also looking in another direction. Billionaire businessman Ronald Lauder, a top backer of DeSantis’ gubernatorial campaign, recently met with Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), one of several wealthy Republicans giving Scott a second luck as DeSantis falters.

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Taking back the House.

The decision [in New York], if upheld, could allow Democrats to shift as many as six G.O.P.-held seats in their direction. Republicans vowed to appeal.

New district maps in 2022 helped Republicans flip four Democratic House seats in New York.

Taking back the House is an imperative. The current nonfunctional House under the control of the Republicans is an embarrassment.

New York Is Ordered by Appeals Court to Redraw House Map.

A New York appeals court on Thursday ordered the state’s congressional map to be redrawn, siding with Democrats in a case that could give the party a fresh chance to tilt one of the nation’s most contested House battlegrounds leftward.

Wading into a long-simmering legal dispute, the Appellate Division of the State Supreme Court in Albany said that the competitive, court-drawn districts put in place for last year’s midterms had only been a temporary fix.

They ordered the state’s bipartisan redistricting commission to promptly restart a process that would effectively give the Democrat-dominated State Legislature final say over the contours of New York’s 26 House seats for the remainder of the decade.

“In granting this petition, we return the matter to its constitutional design. Accordingly, we direct the I.R.C. to commence its duties forthwith,” Elizabeth A. Garry, the presiding justice, wrote in the majority opinion, referring to the Independent Redistricting Commission. (Two members of the five-judge panel dissented.)

Republicans vowed to appeal, leaving a final decision to the state’s highest court, the Court of Appeals, just a year after it stopped an earlier attempt by Democrats to gerrymander the maps.

Why It Matters

The decision has potentially far-reaching political implications.

The current district lines were drawn by a neutral court-appointed expert last spring to maximize competition. The new map served that purpose, helping Republicans flip four seats en route to taking control of the House.

If Thursday’s ruling stands, both parties believe Democrats could conceivably draw maps that pass legal muster while making re-election almost impossible for incumbent Republicans like Representatives Mike Lawler and Marc Molinaro in the Hudson Valley, or Anthony D’Esposito and George Santos on Long Island and in Queens, among others.

The case in New York is just one part of a national battlefield that is still being remade by court battles spawned by last year’s once-a-decade redistricting process.

New Democratic seats in New York could help offset gains Republicans are expected to make in North Carolina, where a newly conservative top court is allowing the party to replace a more neutral map, and potentially in Ohio. Democrats also won an unexpected victory at the U.S. Supreme Court in June that could net the party a handful of seats in the South.(New York Times).

This happened yesterday in the House.

The GOP piled on abortion and other MAGA restrictions to the Defense Bill, forcing Dems to vote against it. The bill passed with only Republican votes, but it will not pass in the Senate. The President has already promised to veto it - if it somehow gets through.

Democrats thrash defense bill [the National Defense Authorization Act] loaded with GOP culture war amendments.

As the rightward tilt became clear on the House floor, Democrats who had previously supported the NDAA in the Armed Services Committee derided the revamped bill.

“The bill we passed out of committee sent a clear, united message to our allies and partners, global competitors, and the American people that democracy still works, and Congress is still functional,” the Democrats said in their statement. “That bill no longer exists.”

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Reverend Jackson steps down, his legacy secure.

Jesse Jackson to step down as head of Rainbow PUSH civil rights organization.

CHICAGO — The Rev. Jesse Jackson plans to step down from leading the Chicago civil rights organization Rainbow PUSH Coalition he founded in 1971, his son's congressional office said Friday.

A spokesperson for U.S. Rep. Jonathan Jackson confirmed the long-time civil rights leader would be retiring from the organization.

The elder Jackson, a civil rights leader and two-time presidential candidate, plans to announce his decision on Sunday during the organization's annual convention, Rep. Jackson told the Chicago Sun-Times.

Jonathan Jackson, an Illinois Democrat, said his father "has forever been on the scene of justice and has never stopped fighting for civil rights" and that will be "his mark upon history."

The Rev. Jesse Jackson, who will turn 82 in October, has remained active in civil rights in recent years despite health setbacks.

He announced in 2017 that he had begun outpatient care for Parkinson's disease two years earlier. In early 2021, he had gallbladder surgery and later that year was treated for COVID-19 including a stint at a physical therapy-focused facility. He was hospitalized again in November 2021 for a fall that caused a head injury.

Jackson, a protégé of the Rev. Martin Luther King, broke with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference in 1971 to form Operation PUSH — originally named People United to Save Humanity — a sweeping civil rights organization based on Chicago's South Side

The organization was later renamed the Rainbow PUSH Coalition with a mission ranging from encouraging corporations to hire more minorities to voter registration drives in communities of color. Its annual convention is set for this weekend in Chicago.

Jackson has long been a powerful voice in American politics.

Until Barack Obama's election in 2008, Jackson was the most successful Black candidate for the U.S. presidency, winning 13 primaries and caucuses for the Democratic nomination in 1988.

Jackson has helped guide the modern civil rights movement on a wide variety of issues, including voting rights and education.

He stood with the family of George Floyd at a memorial for the Black man murdered in 2020 by a white police officer, whose death forced a national reckoning with police brutality and racism. Jackson also participated in COVID-19 vaccination drives to battle hesitancy in Black communities.

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson called Jackson "an architect of the soul of Chicago" in a statement Friday.

"Through decades of service, he has led the Rainbow PUSH Coalition at the forefront of the struggle for civil rights and social justice. His faith, his perseverance, his love, and his relentless dedication to people inspire all of us to keep pushing for a better tomorrow," said Johnson, who was endorsed by Jackson when he ran for mayor earlier this year.

Al Sharpton, president and founder of the National Action Network, said in a statement that he had spoken to Jackson on Friday morning and "told him that we will continue to glean from him and learn from him and duplicate him in whatever our organizations and media platforms are. Because he has been an anchor for me and many others."

Sharpton called Jackson his mentor, adding: "The resignation of Rev. Jesse Jackson is the pivoting of one of the most productive, prophetic, and dominant figures in the struggle for social justice in American history."

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Tracy Chapman song is #1 on Country Music Chart.

Combs’s remake of Chapman’s 1988 hit now dominates the country charts, renewing difficult conversations about diversity in Nashville.

Tracy Chapman, Luke Combs and the complicated response to ‘Fast Car.’

Tracy Chapman’s “Fast Car” is one of those songs that you just feel in your soul: the lyrics about the yearning to escape, the gentle guitar underlying a feeling of despair but also the hope that something better is coming. It can make you cry but also inspire you to belt out the lyrics at the top of your lungs. (“I-eee-I had a feeling that I belonged. I-eee-I had a feeling I could be someone, be someone, be someone ...”)


Singers know that virtually any audience will hear the opening notes and go crazy, so it has become a go-to cover song since its 1988 release on Chapman’s self-titled debut folk album.

But in the past few months, one particular cover has struck a chord that no one saw coming.
In March, country music star Luke Combs, 33, released a new album, “Gettin’ Old,” that included “Fast Car,” a longtime favorite that he covered during live shows for years.

But when the track hit streaming services, it took on a life of its own, racking up enormous numbers and going viral on TikTok. Country radio stations started playing it, and the song was suddenly outpacing Combs’s actual single, “Love You Anyway.” Combs and his team were stunned by the response, and his label eventually started promoting “Fast Car” to country radio as well.

Last week, it reached No. 1 on the Billboard Country Airplay chart; it was at No. 3 on the all-genre Hot 100 chart, after peaking at No. 2.

To quite a few people, this is cause for yet another celebration in Combs’s whirlwind journey as the genre’s reigning megastar with 16 consecutive No. 1 hits.

But it has also prompted a wave of complicated feelings among some listeners and in the Nashville music community. Although many are thrilled to see “Fast Car” back in the spotlight and a new generation discovering Chapman’s work, it’s clouded by the fact that, as a Black queer woman, Chapman, 59, would have almost zero chance of that achievement herself in country music.


The numbers are bleak: A recent study by data journalist Jan Diehm and musicologist Jada Watson reported that fewer than 0.5 percent of songs played on country radio in 2022 were by women of color and LGBTQ+ artists. Watson’s previous work shows that songs by women of color and LGBTQ+ artists were largely excluded from radio playlists for most of the two decades prior.


“On one hand, Luke Combs is an amazing artist, and it’s great to see that someone in country music is influenced by a Black queer woman — that’s really exciting,” said Holly G, founder of the Black Opry, an organization for Black country music singers and fans. “But at the same time, it’s hard to really lean into that excitement knowing that Tracy Chapman would not be celebrated in the industry without that kind of middleman being a White man.”

Holly, who started the Black Opry more than two years ago, withholds her last name in interviews because she has received so many threats for highlighting racism in the majority-White country music industry, which has sidelined artists of color since the early 20th century, when songs from Black singers were filtered out of the genre and labeled “race records.”

There has been a concerted effort from some in Nashville to promote inclusivity, particularly since the industry-wide reckoning after the killing of George Floyd in 2020. But despite some individual success stories, the systemic lack of diversity has persisted. Now that Chapman’s classic is on pace to become one of the biggest songs of Combs’s career, there are uneasy and complex emotional responses.


“I’ve talked to a lot of Black artists about it. …We don’t know how to feel,” Holly said, noting that “it did make things a little bit easier” when Chapman, who hasn’t given an interview in years, sent a brief statement to Billboard last week: “I never expected to find myself on the country charts, but I’m honored to be there. I’m happy for Luke and his success and grateful that new fans have found and embraced ‘Fast Car.’” (A representative for Chapman declined further comment for this story; Combs’s publicist said he was unavailable for an interview.)


“We can continue to celebrate it,” Holly said, “but it doesn’t mean we shouldn’t be having these conversations.”

These mixed feelings were echoed on social media last month when Combs’s “Fast Car” made headlines after it jumped to No. 4 on the all-genre Billboard Hot 100, surpassing Chapman’s own peak of No. 6 in August 1988. Even taking into account the differences in chart metrics over time, some people had the typical visceral reaction that occurs when anyone covers an iconic song: It will never be as great as the original. But whether they liked the cover or not, others hoped this situation would lead to more awareness about the larger issues in country music and Black art in general.

Jake Blount, an Afrofuturist folk artist who has devoted his career to studying music history and reinterpreting older songs, tweeted about the concern of Chapman’s “legacy being overwritten in real-time.” He thought about how Big Mama Thornton’s “Hound Dog” was consumed by Elvis Presley or how Memphis Minnie and Kansas Joe McCoy’s “When the Levee Breaks” was overshadowed by Led Zeppelin, along with endless other examples of the “White male genius” archetype that often receives credit for songs by Black artists.


“When I wrote those tweets, people [replied] to me and said, ‘Oh, there’s no way anybody’s going to forget Tracy Chapman, she’s too big already.’ ... And I hope that’s true, but I know how it’s played out before,” Blount said. “We know Black visionaries who have created incredible, powerful, influential works ... that have been forgotten and erased. It’s not malice from the White artists making derivative music based on theirs, but it’s how society works.”

A similar pattern has existed in country music for years, said Tanner Davenport, a Nashville native and co-director of the Black Opry: White country singers struck gold this past decade releasing songs heavily influenced by R&B and hip-hop, but few Black artists are even signed to major Nashville labels. He pointed to breakout star Jelly Roll, a White former rapper who has been happily embraced as a newcomer on country radio, earning a No. 1 hit with another near the Top 5.

Meanwhile, history has shown that up-and-coming Black singers such as Willie Jones and Rvshvd will have a much more difficult path forward, considering how few Black artists are on country radio.
The immediate success of Combs’s “Fast Car,” Davenport said, “kind of just proves that when you put a White face on Black art, it seems to be consumed a lot easier.”

That’s why some goals of the Black Opry are to make sure artists of color can have equal opportunities and get the same amount of attention, he said, and to push for change among gatekeepers in Nashville. “This genre needs to expand their boardrooms and let marginalized people be in these rooms and make a bigger bet on these artists.”

One reason “Fast Car” hit a nerve is that it’s special to everyone for different reasons. In interviews, Combs has talked about how it was one of the first songs he learned to play on guitar, and how it reminds him of spending time with his dad when he was young. But the song has always had a particular significance in the Black and LGBTQ+ communities, Davenport said; the Black Opry performed a group singalong of “Fast Car” when it closed out its first show. (Chapman does not discuss her personal life, but writer Alice Walker has disclosed their relationship, which occurred in the 1990s.)

“I think the song in general is pretty reflective for a lot of people who do identify as queer, and also for a person of color — the song almost seems like an anthem for us,” Davenport said. “It’s been pretty monumental in our lives, and I think it made us feel like we weren’t alone.”


Francesca Royster, author of “Black Country Music: Listening for Revolutions” and an English professor at DePaul University, said the song’s story of the narrator feeling trapped and trying to escape is “a really American iconography” about cars holding the promise of freedom. “This is something country music is very invested in, too: the American dream of reinvention and finding happiness after a life of struggle,” Royster said.

That might be one reason the song hits with the country audience, Royster said. Though, as someone who lived in Oakland, Calif., when “Fast Car” came out and saw how it connected to the queer community, she said, it’s difficult to see the success of Combs’s cover knowing that country music, with its historic emphasis on “tradition,” has generally shied away from highlighting LGBTQ+ artists and their stories — which is all part of the complexity of the current life of the song.

Through it all, one thing is certain: Chapman has now made history. Rolling Stone reported that Chapman, who wrote “Fast Car” by herself, is now the only Black woman to ever have a solo writing credit on a No. 1 country song.


“I love the fact that Tracy Chapman is the first Black woman to have that superlative,” said singer-songwriter Rissi Palmer, who hosts Apple Music radio show “Color Me Country,” about the Black, Indigenous and Latino roots of country music, adding that it remains “crazy” that only a few Black women have had No. 1 country songs: “I definitely don’t think that speaks to talent.”


Palmer, who was drawn to Chapman’s “soulful, almost mournful” sound when she first heard the album as a child, recently did a deep dive into Chapman’s catalogue for an upcoming “Color Me Country” episode and recalled how the singer “spoke truth to power,” spotlighting issues such as domestic violence and poverty.

“I really think that Tracy should be a bigger household name than she is,” Palmer said.


In addition to being pleased by the royalties Chapman is earning from the “Fast Car” cover (Billboard estimated that, because she owns the publishing, she is due a “sizable portion” of Combs’s approximately $500,000 in earnings so far), fans are gratified by the renewed attention on the singer.

Aurélie Moulin of France, who has run the definitive Tracy Chapman fan site since 2001 and has social media accounts with more than 2 million combined followers, confirms that discussion of Chapman has “exploded” online — and that the last time a “Fast Car” cover was so hotly debated was when Justin Bieber performed his version in 2016.


As Combs’s cover stays glued near the peak of the Billboard Hot 100, there’s the hope in Nashville and beyond that this can add to the discourse of the urgency of change in country music. Holly of the Black Opry said that now would be a great time for Combs to invite a queer Black female artist to join him on tour or to offer his support: “You used her art to enrich your career, and that opens you up to a little bit of responsibility giving back to the community.”


“I think the big lesson here is Black women belonged in country music all along,” Holly said. “If that song can chart as No. 1 today in country, it should have charted in [1988]. ... The only thing different is a White man is singing the song. I hope that’s a lesson that people take away from it: Our art is good enough and deserves to be recognized on the same scale.” (Washington Post).

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