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TODAY'S HEADLINES:

Michael Bloomberg quits the presidential race, and Elizabeth Warren is thinking about it. Will she support fellow progressive Bernie Sanders, or establishment fave Joe Biden?

Meanwhile, a new study says threatened forests may be losing their ability to generate oxygen. As if on cue, Greta Thunberg reminds us nature does not respect moderation.

And lastly, hundreds of millions of kids around the world are missing school because of coronavirus. But food service workers in the US can’t get paid sick leave.

THESE ARE THE STORIES YOU NEED TO KNOW:

Former Republican billionaire Michael Bloomberg held back tears as he announced the end of his presidential campaign yesterday. Boomberg spent as much as two-hundred and twenty dollars per vote in order to lose spectacularly in the Democratic primaries. Yesterday, he said, QUOTE It’s still the best day of my life ENDQUOTE. Which is sad, really.

Elizabeth Warren’s presidential campaign may be coming to a close, as well. Her poor showing in fourteen state primaries on Super Tuesday leaves her few options. But her role in the process is not yet over. And she could still wind up in the White House, although maybe not as president.

The Washington Post reported that surrogates from the Warren and Bernie Sanders campaigns have begun discussions over how the two Senators might join forces to ensure a progressive victory. Though he far outperformed Warren, Sanders lost more states than he hoped to former Vice President Joe Biden. Warren and Sanders surrogates will hold a conference call today to discuss the possibilities. After the Post’s initial report, the paper cited two anonymous sources who said Warren associates had also discussed maybe joining or supporting the Biden campaign.

The latest reporting had Sanders with only fifty fewer delegates than Biden after Super Tuesday. Nearly two thousand delegates are required to win outright, neither candidate is yet close, and most states haven’t voted. Yesterday, Sanders called the race neck and neck. He said Biden was a decent person. But QUOTE Joe is going to have to explain to people, and union workers in the midwest, why he has supported disastrous trade agreements

ENDQUOTE. Not to mention Social Security cuts and the Iraq war. Sanders noted that his campaign swept with people of color in California, the largest state.

After his red state victories, Biden received a flood of donations from Wall Street. Health insurance stocks also rose on the news of Biden’s strong showing. And it emerged that a former Biden aide who formed a Super PAC on his behalf also registered as a foreign agent of Azerbaijan. The State Department has cited Azerbaijan for arbitrary killing, torture, imprisonment, and attacks on journalists. That’s a fact, jack!

Joe Biden’s voters may be as confused as he is. His website says he supports the Green New Deal. He does not. For instance, he refuses to support a ban on fracking. Biden’s climate plan calls for net-zero fossil fuel pollution by 2050. That’s two decades after scientists now say we will be dealing with the full scale of climate catastrophe.

Nevertheless, Biden set the same far-off target 2050 target as centrist European leaders in a new climate law under debate in Brussells. Yesterday the seventeen-year-old, two-time Nobel Peace Prize nominee and climate change activist Greta Thunberg lambasted world leaders over delaying action yet again.

The 2050 targets, she said, are an announcement by world leaders that they will sell out their children’s futures. She said, QUOTE This climate law is surrender. Because nature doesn’t bargain. And you can’t make deals with physics ENDQUOTE.

Global temperatures continue to rise. Last month was the second-hottest February on record. And a major new study in the journal Nature found that tropical forests are removing one-third less carbon from the atmosphere than they did a few decades ago. The reasons? Deforestation, and higher temperatures resulting from humanity’s use of fossil fuels. By the mid-2030s, the study estimated, the Amazon rainforest could actually become a source of carbon pollution as the ecosystem collapses. So maybe by 2050 we’ll do something.

House lawmakers yesterday approved $8.3 billion in emergency spending on the fast- spreading coronavirus. The Senate is expected to take up the measure today. Most of the money will go to agencies dealing with the virus, with some $500 million for Medicare

providers to administer remote online consultations to the elderly. It’s not nothing – it’s QUOTE tele-health ENDQUOTE. Such virtual visits may not result in a treatment prescription.

The Centers for Disease Control expanded its testing criteria for the virus after criticism over under-diagnoses. Now doctors can approve tests directly. A tenth person died in Washington State after contracting the coronavirus. And the first person with the virus to die outside Washington did so in California, which declared a public health emergency yesterday. The virus is spreading rapidly in Europe, and more than one hundred people have now died in Italy. Nearly three hundred million students around the world are missing days and weeks of school because of the virus, the United Nations said. And the Washington Post reported that nearly seven million food service workers in the US recieve no paid sick leave. Fox News says none of this is a problem.

AND NOW FOR SOME QUICKER QUICKIES:

The conservative Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts broke with tradition and chastized a leader from a coequal branch of government by name. Roberts attacked US Senate Democratic leader Chuck Schumer yesterday over comments Schumer made at an abortion rights rallying criticizing Roberts and his fellow Justices Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh. Schumer said they would pay the price for denying women’s rights. Roberts cast Schumer’s comment as threatening, inappropriate and dangerous. But he’s fine with Trump.

The worker who killed five coworkers before shooting himself at the Molson Coors headquarters in Milwaukee, Wisconsin last week was a target of racist abuse. Which was reportedly endemic in that workplace. The shooter, who was black, had found a noose in his locker. Racist graffiti and bulling was frequent. The local police chief said QUOTE I don’t believe that was a factor ENDQUOTE. Case closed, I guess.

ViacomCBS, the giant merged corporate media conglomerate that does not include Comcast or Disney, said it was getting out of the books business and selling Simon and Schuster. The reason? According to CEO Bob Bakish, the venerable publisher is not a QUOTE core asset. It is not video based. It doesn't have significant connectivity ENDQUOTE. I guess this guy has never heard of e-books!

That’s all for the AM Quickie. Join us this afternoon on the video-based Majority Report, which will never be sold, not for that price!

#AMQuickie - March 5, 2020

HOSTS - Sam Seder & Lucie Steiner

WRITER - Corey Pein

PRODUCER - Dorsey Shaw

EXECUTIVE PRODUCER - Brendan Finn