Mitch McConnell has budged just a tad on a mini-stimulus bill that includes direct payments, and yesterday CNN reported why.

During the call with GOP senators, McConnell noted that direct payments for individuals and families have become a major issue in the race.

“Kelly and David are getting hammered” on the issue, he said, according to a source who heard his remarks, a reference to incumbent GOP Sens. Kelly Loeffler and David Perdue, who are both facing off against Democratic challengers.

However, they’re talking $600 instead of $1,200 this time, which might seem like an insult to people who are months behind on house and utilities payments. There is also talk of $300 additional weekly unemployment benefits, but it’s not clear to me what might happen to people whose benefits are ending entirely. Beyond that, the negotiations are moving so fast, while still going nowhere, that it’s really hard to keep track of what’s in and what’s out.

Also, even if Congress manages to pass something before Christmas, there will almost certainly be a lapse in benefits to millions of workers. Emily Stewart writes for Vox:

After months of a will-they-or-won’t-they dance that’s left workers, businesses, and much of the economy in limbo, lawmakers yet again have a potential deal: a $748 billion proposal to help boost the economy as the Covid-19 pandemic rages on. While it may have some shortcomings — Democrats dropped state and local government aid from the main bill in exchange for Republicans dropping corporate liability protections — it’s not the worst deal in the world, and it does have new payments for the unemployed.

But there is a hiccup: Even if a bill passes, millions of workers will likely face a lag in receiving those payments while the regulators and states responsible for distributing them iron out the new process.

An estimated 4 million workers have likely already had their benefits run out, some of them for months, after they maxed out the number of weekly payments to them established by the CARES Act, the first stimulus package. However long it takes to get a new system up and running is how long they’ll have to wait before they get another check. Other programs expanded by the CARES Act are set to expire in December, and given the bureaucratic intricacies of the 50-state unemployment insurance system, the transition will probably be a messy one.

At this point, whether Congress passes its mini-relief bill or not, there will be massive evictions. There already is hunger, and that’s getting worse. Lots of people are probably going to try to get through the winter with the heat turned off.

But McConnell is only giving in to a bill to help Kelly and David. That’s because their opponents, Raphael and Jon, are running ads like this:

Kelly and David are selling themselves to voters as a “firewall” against “socialism,” Greg Sargent writes. If Mitch keeps control of the Senate, you can bet there will be no more relief/stimulus bills passed next year, no matter how many businesses close for good and how many families end up living in cars and shelters. But, by damn, Kelly and David will keep us all safe from socialists and antifa! Let’s remember what’s important!

Elsewhere

The Week reports that Trump still genuinely believes he won the election.

President Trump was privately coming to terms with his loss to President-elect Joe Biden, but he “has now reversed and dug in deeper — not only spreading misinformation about the election, but ingesting it himself,” CNN reports, “egged on by advisers like Rudy Giuliani and Jenna Ellis who are misleading Trump about the extent of voting irregularities and the prospects of a reversal.” One adviser told CNN, “He’s been fed so much misinformation that I think he actually thinks this thing was stolen from him.”

Even the Electoral College formalizing Biden’s win “did not appear enough to shake Trump from his delusions of victory,” CNN says, “but it is adding urgency to a push by several of his advisers to gently steer Trump toward reality.” Discussions of Trump’s post-presidency future tend to go nowhere because Trump “all but shuts down,” CNN reports. “In his moments of deepest denial, Trump has told some advisers that he will refuse to leave the White House on Inauguration Day, only to be walked down from that ledge. The possibility has alarmed some aides, but few believe Trump will actually follow through.”

Oh, but it would be so much fun to see him evicted.

A food bank in the Cleveland area.