Fentanyl...In the Air at Daycare...Kills 1-Year-Old, Auto Workers Demand 4-Day Workweek with 5 Days of Pay, City of Chicago to Own Grocery Stores?! (The Five for 09/19/23)
Plus, war in Eastern Europe spreading?
Hey, welcome to The Five.
One note before we dive in.
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Now, let’s dive into the news.
[one]
An unspeakable tragedy hit The Bronx this weekend, due to a daycare being used to cut and distribute Fentanyl.
Two people have been arrested and charged in the death of a 1-year-old who was exposed to fentanyl at a Bronx daycare center along with three other children.
Grei Mendez, 36, who ran the Divino Niño daycare center, and Carlisto Acevedo Brito, 41, her cousin-in-law who rented a room from her, were both arrested on Saturday.
Police found two boys, 1 and 2, and an 8-month-old girl unconscious after they were called to the daycare center on Friday afternoon, NYPD Chief Detective Joseph Kenny said at a press briefing. First responders administered Narcan to all three children after they were determined to be exhibiting signs of a drug overdose.
1-year-old Nicholas Dominici died at Montefiore Hospital later that afternoon, while the two other children recovered.
Another 2-year-old boy from the daycare was checked into BronxCare Hospital after his mother noticed he was "lethargic and unresponsive" and recovered after being administered Narcan.
Police found a taped package containing several thousand dollars worth of fentanyl inside the daycare center, AP reported. A kilo press, a device used to package large amounts of drugs, was also recovered.
Mendez faces multiple charges, including manslaughter, criminal possession of drugs, and depraved indifference to murder. She is being held without bail and will appear in court again on Thursday.
The story is even more terrifying, according to the Morning Wire podcast…Fentanyl overdoses can happen with the drug just in the air…it’s likely none of the children had direct contact.
Mendez, the alleged perpetrator in this death, faces up to 25 years in prison, New York’s max sentence for manslaughter.
For killing a kid…with drugs…at a daycare. It’s not enough.
Overall, I’m a bit mixed on the death penalty, because the state has screwed up so many cases (we’re learning this more and more as forensic evidence becomes more advanced).
But, you kill a kid, you need to be put in the ground.
[two]
After Wal-Mart announced the closing of half it’s stores in Chicago and Whole Foods is shutting down locations as well due to rampant theft, new Windy City Mayor Brandon Johnson had decided to ignore enforcing the law…in favor of the city of Chicago going into the grocery business.
Chicago's Democrat mayor wants to create city-run grocery stores to promote 'equitable' access to food after half of the city's Walmart and Whole Foods stores closed.
Mayor Brandon Johnson announced a partnership with the Economic Security Project to open municipally-owned grocery stores in Chicago in a bid to tackle many of the city's so-called 'food deserts.'
Johnson's new moves are set to help 'repair past harms that have contributed to purposeful disinvestment and exclusion and lack of food access' in historically underserved communities.
The liberal mayor said: 'All Chicagoans deserve to live near convenient, affordable, healthy grocery options.
'We know access to grocery stores is already a challenge for many residents, especially on the South and West sides.
'My administration is committed to advancing innovative, whole-of-government approaches to address these inequities.
'I am proud to work alongside partners to take this step in envisioning what a municipally owned grocery store in Chicago could look like.'
The city did not give a timeline for when the initiative would come forward - and the grant money which will help invest could come from state and federal tax dollars, not just local taxes, reports CBS.
According to CNN, Walgreens, CVS and Starbucks are joining the grocery stores chains in shutting down in high crime cities including Chicago, New York and San Francisco.
Food deserts are a very real problem facing people living in low income areas…but I’m not sure how bringing the customer service and aptitude of the IRS and DMV to the local grocery store is going to fix that.
Also, the government owning food distribution IS socialism. And socialism has a much better track record of starving people than any other factor in the 20th century.
The residents of the South and West sides of Chicago deserve better.
[three]
The autoworkers strike, just ramping up this week, will likely last for an extended period of time.
About 13,000 workers for Ford, General Motors and Stellantis walked out of their jobs, the first time in history that they are striking against all three companies simultaneously. Their demands include wage increases, cost-of-living adjustments for salaries to match with inflation and profit-sharing plans. They are also asking for "increased work, life, and family balance through increased paid time off and additional holidays."
As part of the work-life balance request, the union is trying to negotiate a 32-workweek for 40 hours of pay that union President Shawn Fain said goes back to the 1940s.
"Our leaders back then were talking about a 35-, a 32-hour workweek," he said.
In addition to cutting a full work day, the UAW is also asking for a 40% raise (scaled back to 36% a few days in), citing the rapid increase of CEO salaries, which are up approximately 40% in the big three.
Observations:
A). I can’t talk about American auto manufacturing without reminding you that GM still owes the U.S. taxpayer $10 billion, and I hate that company more than anything in the United States. “Government Motors” exists because of the taxes you paid on your labor.
B). Ford is nearly as bad, having taken $9.2 billion for battery manufacturing plants, despite abysmal EV sales resulting in a $3B loss, and the “E-Mustang” piling up on dealer lots.
C). Neither of those things are the fault of the workers, but as a consumer, I would encourage you to choose wisely. There’s some evidence that if GM had been allowed to fail, Toyota would have bought the company. Which would have saved the American taxpayer $10 billion, and produced better vehicles. Sorry, the Japanese and Koreans just make better cars, and they would have made better cars under the GM banner as well.
D). So, my hope is that Ford and GM fail, and get acquired by a better automaker.
E). I can certainly understand the plight of the autoworkers, who, like nearly all working and middle class people, are being pinched by rampant inflation…but the full ask here seems nearly impossible for the Big 3 to grant, especially considering the profit on each vehicle sold is only 7.5% for the manufacturer.
[four]
Donald Trump is skipping the 2nd primary debate to hang out in Michigan, via according to The AP:
Former President Donald Trump will travel to the battleground state of Michigan next week to meet with striking autoworkers instead of participating in the second Republican presidential debate, a person familiar with his plans said Monday.
Trump, who also skipped the first debate last month, has signaled that he is already focused on the 2024 election against President Joe Biden as he maintains a wide lead against his GOP rivals in primary polls. In recent days, he has been leaning hard into the strike, painting himself as sympathetic to the workers and accusing Biden of trying to destroy the car industry by expanding electric cars and other green energy policies.
The Sept. 27 trip, first reported by The New York Times, will also include a primetime speech, according to the person familiar with the plans who spoke to The Associated Press on condition of anonymity before they were made public.
The President of the UAW responded, via CNN:
“Every fiber of our union is being poured into fighting the billionaire class and an economy that enriches people like Donald Trump at the expense of workers. We can’t keep electing billionaires and millionaires that don’t have any understanding what it is like to live paycheck to paycheck and struggle to get by and expecting them to solve the problems of the working class.”
President Biden’s response, so far, is mostly unclear, with a light signaling to support for the UAW.. You can check out this story from Reuters for more. However, the UAW has failed to endorse Biden for 2024, as of the time of publishing.
[five]
Finally, the odds of the Russia/Ukraine war growing into a larger European conflict just increased.
Azerbaijan’s defense ministry said Tuesday it had begun an “anti-terrorist” campaign in the disputed Nagorno-Karabakh region, as Armenian media and local authorities reported heavy bombardment of the regional capital of Stepanakert.
At least five people were killed, including a child, and 80 people were injured, amid artillery, missile and drone strikes by the Azerbaijan military, according to Armenian state news.
Nagorno-Karabakh, an ethnic Armenian enclave that is internationally recognized as part of Azerbaijan, has been the cause of two wars between the neighbors in the past three decades, most recently in 2020.
Tensions have been simmering around the region for months, after Azerbaijani troops blockaded the Lachin corridor in December, cutting off the only road connecting Nagorno-Karabakh to Armenia and preventing the import of food to its roughly 120,000 inhabitants.
Russian peacekeepers, who deployed to Nagorno-Karabakh under the terms of the 2020 ceasefire, have been tasked with preventing a fresh conflict breaking out. But Moscow has been accused of being unable or unwilling to intervene to protect Armenia, its long-term ally, in the face of continuing aggression from Azerbaijan.
Azerbaijan shares a close relationship with Turkey, with Armenia, a former Soviet state, aligning with Russia.
The decades long on-and-off conflicts between these two small countries often functions as a proxy war between larger powers in the region.
Until the next one,
-sth