THE LIGHT at the end of the long dark tunnel in the war against the coronavirus pandemic is now bursting through and leading us to the path toward defeating COVID-19 and helping our families and our nation rebuild our lives and livelihood back better.
Help is on the way as President Joe Biden signed the $1.9 Trillion America Rescue Plan into law on Thursday, March 11, a day earlier than initially announced.
“The president and his advisers, aware that low- and middle-income Americans are desperate for the round of direct payments that the bill includes, moved up the timeline to Thursday afternoon,” the New York Times reported.
Indeed, many hardworking American people have not been able to get as much help in previous COVID relief measures that prioritized sending taxpayers’ money to big corporations and businesses who do not even pay taxes because of all the tax credits and loopholes that favor the millionaires and billionaires.
This time, it will be different. For those of you who are struggling to pay rent, put food on the table, pay your loans and hospital bills, keep small businesses afloat and avoid bankruptcy — help is coming!
As early as this weekend, we may already be seeing direct deposits in our bank accounts, “including direct payments of $1,400 per individual, just as the economy’s halting recovery from the pandemic recession is poised to accelerate,” the Times reported.
“This historic legislation is about rebuilding the backbone of this country,” Biden said in a televised speech Thursday evening, “and giving people in this nation, working people, middle-class folks, people who built the country, a fighting chance.”
Biden also announced that by May 1, ALL American adults will already be eligible to be vaccinated as the supply of vaccines gets expedited.
By the Fourth of July, the president said we will celebrate not only our Independence Day, but our freedom from the disruption, death and desperation brought by the coronavirus pandemic. With most Americans already vaccinated by then, we will be moving safely toward “normalcy,” and on July 4, we may have our barbecue get-togethers with close families to celebrate this milestone and our path to victory.
Biden, however, told the American people that this optimistic outlook is contingent upon many conditions, and the most important of these is that we, the people, should all collectively do our part toward our healing and recovery. This includes wearing masks, practicing physical distancing, avoiding big crowds, washing our hands, and GETTING VACCINATED. And even as we are already vaccinated, we should still practice these safety measures to protect ourselves and others from any possible unknown threat from the variants of the virus.
We, the people, asked for help in our moments of desperation brought by the failure in leadership by the Trump Administration that underplayed the threat of the pandemic for political reasons.
Our plea was heard and the campaign promise of the Biden Administration is being faithfully and diligently fulfilled.
“A sizable majority of U.S. adults (70%) say they favor the legislation. Only about three-in-ten (28%) oppose the bill, which provides economic aid to businesses, individuals and state and local governments,” results of the Pew Research study conducted on March 1-7, 2021 revealed.
“While congressional votes on the legislation have been deeply divided along partisan lines, 41% of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents support the measure. The bill draws overwhelming support from Democrats and Democratic leaners (94% favor),” Pew found.
Contrary to the Republicans’ argument that this stimulus bill is too much and too broad, most Americans are in favor of it, with many saying it should be more.
“In assessing the proposed spending in the aid package, 41% of Americans view it as about right, while another 25% say it spends too little; only a third of Americans say the legislation spends too much money. Republicans are far more likely than Democrats to view the spending in the bill as excessive (61% of Republicans vs. 11% of Democrats),” according to Pew.
After four years of uncertainty and chaos under the Trump presidency — even brought to light by his handling of the pandemic that has killed almost 500,000 Americans when he left office — the optimism of the American people has been fueled by the faith in the Biden administration.
Consider the fact that there was ZERO support and vote from Republicans who were in favor of these same measures when Trump was President, but are now locked in arms in fighting against Biden’s first major legislative agenda.
“A majority of the public (57%) says the Biden administration made a good faith effort working with Republican congressional leaders on the coronavirus aid package,” the Times reported on the Pew Research findings.
“By comparison, 42% say GOP leaders made a good faith effort to work with the White House on the pandemic relief bill, with a 55% majority saying they did not work in good faith,” it added.
Americans, who are most affected by the pandemic and are desperately in need of financial help just to survive, as well as people of color like us, and women like many of us, show the most support for the bill.
More revelations from the Pew Research study as reported by the Times:
While most Americans favor the coronavirus aid package, there are demographic differences in the levels of support.
Three-quarters of women say they favor the aid package, while a smaller majority of men (66%) say the same.
While overwhelming majorities of Black (91%), Hispanic (80%) and Asian American adults (76%) say they favor the economic package, that compares with a smaller majority of White adults (63%).
There are also substantial differences in views of the economic stimulus package by household income. About eight-in-ten Americans in lower-income households (82%) favor the bill, compared with two-thirds of middle-income and 60% of upper-income Americans.
Although a 57% majority of Republicans say they oppose the proposed stimulus bill, there is a substantial ideological divide within the GOP: Roughly seven-in-ten conservative Republicans (69%) say they oppose the economic package, while the balance of opinion is reversed among moderate and liberal Republicans, 61% of whom say they favor the aid bill.
By contrast, there is near-universal support for the economic bill among Democrats: More than nine-in-ten (94%) say they favor the COVID-19 economic aid package.
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The opinions, beliefs and viewpoints expressed by the author do not necessarily reflect the opinions, beliefs and viewpoints of the Asian Journal, its management, editorial board and staff.
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Gel Santos Relos has been in news, talk, public service and educational broadcasting since 1989 with ABS-CBN and is now serving the Filipino audience using different platforms, including digital broadcasting, and print, and is working on a new public service program for the community. You may contact her through email at [email protected], or send her a message via Facebook at Facebook.com/Gel.Santos.Relos.
