Today’s edition of quick hits:
* After his other false promises, he should know not to say stuff like this: “President Donald Trump has suggested multiple times that a coronavirus vaccine could come within months, an accelerated timeline that prominent health experts and veteran vaccine developers say is unlikely absent a miracle.”
* USS Theodore Roosevelt: “Five sailors on the U.S. aircraft carrier sidelined in Guam due to a COVID-19 outbreak have tested positive for the virus for the second time and have been taken off the ship, according to the Navy.”
* Space Force: “President Donald Trump said Friday that a planned U.S. “super duper missile” could outpace those in the nuclear arsenals of foreign nations as he was presented with the official flag of the newly created military branch, Space Force, in the Oval Office.”
* Brutal data from the Fed: “The economic shock stemming from the coronavirus pandemic hit lower-income households first and immediately left them much worse off, according to a new survey from the Federal Reserve.”
* On Capitol Hill: “When the House of Representatives acts on Friday to allow remote voting and virtual hearings, the coronavirus pandemic will have officially succeeded in doing what Philadelphia’s yellow fever outbreak of 1793, the Spanish influenza of 1918, the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and generations of agitators for institutional change never could: Untethering Congress from its mandate to come together physically.” * USPS: “Weeks before a Republican donor and top White House ally becomes postmaster general, the U.S. Postal Service has begun a review of its package delivery contracts and lost its second-highest executive, which will leave its board of governors without any officials who predate President Trump. The moves, confirmed by six people with knowledge of the Postal Service’s inner workings but not authorized to speak publicly, underscore how Trump is moving closer to reshaping an independent agency he has dubbed ‘a joke.’” * A story worth watching: “A nonprofit organization run by President Trump’s nominee to lead a federal media agency with oversight of Voice of America and other news outlets is under investigation by the District of Columbia’s attorney general, a senior U.S. senator said Thursday. Michael Pack is a conservative filmmaker with ties to Stephen K. Bannon whom Trump has picked to lead the U.S. Agency for Global Media.” Have a safe weekend.
Steve Benen is a producer for "The Rachel Maddow Show," the editor of MaddowBlog and an MS NOW political contributor. He's also the bestselling author of "Ministry of Truth: Democracy, Reality, and the Republicans' War on the Recent Past."
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