Things Biden and the Democrats did, this week #14

April 12-19 2024

The Department of Commerce announced a deal with Samsung to help bring advanced semiconductor manufacturing and research and development to Texas. The deal will bring 45 billion dollars of investment to Texas to help build a research center in Taylor Texas and expand Samsung's Austin, Texas, semiconductor facility. The Biden Administration estimates this will create 21,000 new jobs. Since 1990 America has fallen from making nearly 40% of the world's semiconductor to just over 10% in 2020.

The Department of Energy announced it granted New York State $158 million to help support people making their homes more energy efficient. This is the first payment out of a $8.8 billion dollar program with 11 other states having already applied. The program will rebate Americans for improvements on their homes to lower energy usage. Americans could get as much as $8,000 off for installing a heat pump, as well as for improvements in insulation, wiring, and electrical panel. The program is expected to help save Americans $1 billion in electoral costs, and help create 50,000 new jobs.

The Department of Education began the formal process to make President Biden's new Student Loan Debt relief plan a reality. The Department published the first set of draft rules for the program. The rules will face 30 days of public comment before a second draft can be released. The Administration hopes the process can be finished by the Fall to bring debt relief to 30 million Americans, and totally eliminate the debt of 4 million former students. The Administration has already wiped out the debt of 4.3 million borrowers so far.

The Department of Agriculture announced a $1 billion dollar collaboration with USAID to buy American grown foods combat global hunger. Most of the money will go to traditional shelf stable goods distributed by USAID, like wheat, rice, sorghum, lentils, chickpeas, dry peas, vegetable oil, cornmeal, navy beans, pinto beans and kidney beans, while $50 million will go to a pilot program to see if USAID can expand what it normally gives to new products. The food aid will help feed people in Bangladesh, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Chad, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Djibouti, Ethiopia, Haiti, Kenya, Madagascar, Mali, Nigeria, Rwanda, South Sudan, Sudan, Tanzania, Uganda, and Yemen.

The Department of the Interior announced it's expanding four national wildlife refuges to protect 1.13 million wildlife habitat. The refuges are in New Mexico, North Carolina, and two in Texas. The Department also signed an order protecting parts of the Placitas area. The land is considered sacred by the Pueblos peoples of the area who have long lobbied for his protection. Security Deb Haaland the first Native American to serve as Interior Secretary and a Pueblo herself signed the order in her native New Mexico.

The Department of Labor announced new work place safety regulations about the safe amount of silica dust mine workers can be exposed to. The dust is known to cause scaring in the lungs often called black lung. It's estimated that the new regulations will save over 1,000 lives a year. The United Mine Workers have long fought for these changes and applauded the Biden Administration's actions.

The Biden Administration announced its progress in closing the racial wealth gap in America. Under President Biden the level of Black Unemployment is the lowest its ever been since it started being tracked in the 1970s, and the gap between white and black unemployment is the smallest its ever been as well. Black wealth is up 60% over where it was in 2019. The share of black owned businesses doubled between 2019 and 2022. New black businesses are being created at the fastest rate in 30 years. The Administration in 2021 Interagency Task Force to combat unfair house appraisals. Black homeowners regularly have their homes undervalued compared to whites who own comparable property. Since the Taskforce started the likelihood of such a gap has dropped by 40% and even disappeared in some states. 2023 represented a record breaking $76.2 billion in federal contracts going to small business owned by members of minority communities. This was 12% of federal contracts and the President aims to make it 15% for 2025.

The EPA announced (just now as I write this) that it plans to add PFAS, known as forever chemicals, to the Superfund law. This would require manufacturers to pay to clean up two PFAS, perfluorooctanoic acid and perfluorooctanesulfonic acid. This move to force manufacturers to cover the costs of PFAS clean up comes after last week's new rule on drinking water which will remove PFAS from the nation's drinking water.

Bonus:

President Biden met a Senior named Bob in Pennsylvania who is personally benefiting from The President's capping the price of insulin for Seniors at $35, and Biden let Bob know about a cap on prosecution drug payments for seniors that will cut Bob's drug bills by more than half.

I think the dumbest hypothetical is those questions where it’s like “would you rather have $10,000 or eat dinner with X celebrity?” like of course I will take the money because eating dinner with a celebrity is literally a nightmare scenario. are you insane? Do you have a hole in your head?  I don’t care who I am dining with. I will literally shit myself on the spot if i have to eat dinner with someone who knows what a million in a bank account feels like. could be the coolest motherfucker in the world.  I would still find a way to fuck that up so fast.  like I could be eating dinner with serj from system of a down and I bet that guy is chill as fuck I’m sure it’ll be a very memorable experience. but I could still find a way to roll up to the restaurant wearing mice on my feet.  a banana peel, on my head.  and I’ll be like sorry man traffic is a nightmare today ha ha.  but that’s not the truth before this I tied both my shoelaces together and tripped on accident in a giant dumpster crusher machine like the one from toy story that crushes all the toys and they start getting suicidal, crawled my ass OUT, and then I fell in some gunk i check my phone : 4:30 . i go “fuck.” this is fucked. and I still gotta eat dinner with serj from system of a down at five !!so like I don’t have time to go home and wash up from my extremely embarrassing accident and all i have to wear is MICE no clothes since they got slipt in the crusher PURE. MICE. i’m sure he would be very chill and understanding of my situation and circumstances but that does not change the fact that I have mice around my feet as shoes . do you think I want to imagine serj seeing my my MOUSE shoes while we have to eat dinner and they are squeaking as I eat my steak ? and dude and then the waiter comes up and he goes you can’t be wearing mice. this is a five star establishment .and KICKS me the FUCK out dude ? would i rather imagine that nightmare scenario from hell (and the demons, and margaret thatcher she’s down there too ofc) or get money? not like buy a house and sustain yourself money but enough money to buy a nice fursuit or something . the ones with the removable tongues and eyelids and shit.? do the math four eyes don’t even waste my time





Pearl timeline

It's a healing process for those who were consumed by guilt.

what music they listen to in my au 🤨🤔

also their fits 🤤😲

huge au dump: Rose Quartz edition ✨️

au dump: fusion edition 🤤🔥🔥🔥

(THIS WAS SUPPOSED TO BE FOR 50 FOLLOWERS BUT NOW ITS FOR 70?!?! THANK YOU SO MUCH!!)

just remembered these old su pearls/some kind of music gem fusions based on ballerina music boxes i did forever ago and...i actually still like them...

pearl vandalism<3

Screenshot redraw ❗👹👹

Three cool alien ladies that always save the day or whatnot

A.I. photos are flooding social media and contributing to an Internet where we can't believe what we see. Spotting A.I. 📷s is an important media literacy skill.

None of us have time to research every image we see. We just need people to notice BEFORE THEY LIKE OR SHARE that an image might be fake. If unsure, check it or don't share.

I've started drawing some comics explaining the basic of AI spot-checking and media literacy in the age of disinformation. Follow along here or on my Twitter.

if you do not live in china and you’re worried that the chinese government will Steal Your Data and you’re not like an ambassador or a glamorous international spy then your brain has been turned into a fine powder by sinophobia. like buddy they don’t even want it

Art meme from Twitter: draw two of your comfort characters as the Steven Universe comic panel meme image.

This one is oddly fitting somehow.

(Pretend I remembered to draw Sakura’s scars and also wrote “we’re gonna” in Amethyst’s bubble whoops)

Redesign of akane I did for fun! I love her so much but her original outfit is way too plain.. so I spruced it up!!

My queers, we really need to put the "no men" thing away. Men are not inherently bad. There are queer men. There are questioning men. There's men that are just plain cool. Denying these men a space at our table is not helping - except the TERFs. I just came off the back of reading a transphobe gleeful rant about the need to have pride without men - They of course mean me. This kind of stuff is damaging to me and I really need us all to take a step back and maybe kill this "men dni, men not allowed" stuff. What you mean is "no men who are going to do mean stuff to me." And frankly those men won't give a shit about that kind of boundary.

But I promise you there's a fleet of good honest men who will see that and be sad they're not allowed in your version of queer spaces.

PATRIARCHY is what you hate. Dni Patriarchs.

"you attract what you fear" aaaaaa strong ladies raaah so spooky

(why the fuck are they so pretty)