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You've been Trumped!

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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Wed 16 May , 2018 7:01 pm
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Pruitt stacked his advisory board with industry-friendly representatives. In this case, it didn't work out as he hoped. i.e., they didn't rubber-stamp his blatant attempt to gut clean air regulations and other environmental laws.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... y-proposal
Quote:
A team of external scientific advisers to Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) head Scott Pruitt is criticizing his proposal to restrict the scientific findings that the agency can use in writing and enforcing regulations. The critique, posted Tuesday to the EPA’s website, comes from a working group of the Science Advisory Board, a panel of experts — some of whom Pruitt hand-picked — charged with evaluating the EPA’s science and regulatory actions.

Pruitt rolled out the controversial proposal last month in what he said was an effort to improve transparency at the agency and increase scrutiny. In general, studies used by the EPA would have to fully disclose their data and methodology.

In their memo dated last week, the 10 advisers to Pruitt said that the proposal ...doesn’t adequately explain why it's necessary. They also warned that it would remove valuable scientific studies from the EPA’s consideration, among other issues.

...The group also took issue with the EPA’s decision not to evaluate the impact of the proposal on regulatory programs.
So, the same thing scientists and others have said.

The response:
Quote:
An EPA spokeswoman said the agency will consider the input. “We value the Board’s expertise, and we welcome feedback from the chartered panel on areas in which they are interested in getting additional scientific information that is relevant to the rulemaking process,” the spokeswoman said.
I suspect this is pretty much "thanks for your input, now we're going to ignore it" from Pruitt.




btw, Tillerson just delivered a commencement speech at VMI that's getting a lot of attention. It's pretty clearly criticizing Trump's constant lying, without actually naming him:
http://www.abc-7.com/story/38205320/til ... sk-freedom
Quote:
"If our leaders seek to conceal the truth, or we as people become accepting of alternative realities that are no longer grounded in facts, then we as American citizens are on a pathway to relinquishing our freedom," Tillerson said in the commencement address
Quote:
"A responsibility of every American citizen to each other is to preserve and protect our freedom by recognizing what truth is and is not, what a fact is and is not," he went on to say, "and begin by holding ourselves accountable to truthfulness and demand our pursuit of America's future be fact-based
He also stressed the importance of not abandoning the U.S.'s allies.



And on the topic of lies:
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... -immigrant
Quote:
During Wednesday's meeting, Trump reassured Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen that she is doing a good job, and that Democrats are to blame for separating families.

"You’re doing a good job. And it’s not an easy job. I know what you’re going through right now with families is very tough. But those are the bad laws the Democrats gave us," Trump said.

"They gave us that law and they don’t want to do anything about it," he added. "They’ll leave it like that because they don’t want to make any changes. And now you’re breaking up families because of the Democrats. It’s terrible."
He's nuts. A few days ago, he was railing about Nielsen NOT separating families often enough. And now the new policy is all the Democrats' fault!



Edit: This is the sort of thing the U.S. just prevented the U.N. from investigating during the Palestinian protests.
http://www.cbc.ca/radio/asithappens/as- ... -1.4663689
Quote:
Canadian shot in Gaza says he was 'clearly marked' as a doctor
His description:
Quote:
I was away from the protest scene in a relative lull. There was no smoke or tear gas. There had been lots of that earlier in the day. I was with my medical team of first responders. They were mostly paramedics. .... All of a sudden I heard an incredibly loud bang.... I was shot in both legs. The bullet came from the left part of my left leg, went through the left leg and then through the right leg.

That doctor you just mentioned, a member of your team, Musa, what happened to him?
...About an hour after he rescued me, he was trying to get another patient, and ended up getting shot in the chest. Unfortunately, he died.... There were 17 paramedics who were injured plus myself, and then Musa was killed.

It's unfortunate because we, as a medical team, always hope for and expect some protection. We're not there politically.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Thu 17 May , 2018 8:16 pm
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http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... afety-rule
Quote:
The Trump administration wants to roll back some parts of a major Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) rule meant to reduce the risks of chemical plant disasters.

The proposal to tweak the Risk Management Program rule aligns with the wishes of the chemical industry, which argued that the original January 2017 regulation from the Obama administration was too expensive and unnecessarily burdensome.


The public comment period for shrinking the national monuments was a sham:
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... m-national
Quote:
An Interior Department official predicted last year that the Trump administration wouldn’t learn anything from public comments submitted on potential changes to a major Utah national monument.

Randal Bowman, who took a leading role in the administration’s process of reviewing the Bears Ears National Monument, made the comments in a webcast meeting a week after President Trump signed an executive order to review the monument for potential changes.

...National public comments on Bears Ears were overwhelmingly opposed to shrinking or eliminating it.
Lawsuits against Zinke and Trump about shrinking the monument are still pending.




http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... us-imports
Quote:
China has purchased record amounts of soybeans from Russia in recent months amid trade tensions with the U.S., Bloomberg reported.

The world's biggest soybean importer, China has nearly tripled its imports from Russia, according to Bloomberg. Russian trade data show the country sold 850,000 metric tons of soybeans to China between July 2017 and mid-May this year.

...The move comes amid China's halt on purchases from the U.S., the world's largest producer of soybeans.


http://thehill.com/policy/finance/38819 ... st-from-xi
Quote:
President Trump on Thursday said that his surprise support for Chinese telecoms firm ZTE followed a request from Chinese President Xi Jinping to look into the matter.


http://thehill.com/policy/defense/38818 ... rea-summit
Quote:
The Pentagon’s top spokeswoman on Thursday said there was no discussion of scaling back planned military exercises between the United States and South Korea ahead of the June meeting between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un.
One reason some of us are not expecting much from the latest efforts to get North Korea to give up its nuclear weapons:
Quote:
Chronology of U.S.-North Korean Nuclear and Missile Diplomacy
https://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/dprkchron
Quote:
For years, the United States and the international community have tried to negotiate an end to North Korea’s nuclear and missile development and its export of ballistic missile technology. Those efforts have been replete with periods of crisis, stalemate, and tentative progress towards denuclearization, and North Korea has long been a key challenge for the global nuclear nonproliferation regime.

The United States has pursued a variety of policy responses to the proliferation challenges posed by North Korea, including military cooperation with U.S. allies in the region, wide-ranging sanctions, and non-proliferation mechanisms such as export controls. The United States also engaged in two major diplomatic initiatives to have North Korea abandon its nuclear weapons efforts in return for aid.


http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3881 ... p-cia-pick
Quote:
The Senate on Thursday confirmed Gina Haspel to lead the CIA despite engrained opposition over her involvement in the George W. Bush-era interrogation program.

...GOP Sens. Rand Paul (Ky.) and Jeff Flake (Ariz.) sided with most Democrats in voting against Haspel. GOP Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), who was captured and tortured during the Vietnam War, also opposes her nomination but is in Arizona battling brain cancer.
Maybe it's appropriate that they've chosen someone who supported torture and covered it up, considering the many ugly things the CIA has been involved in, around the world, throughout its history. Why pretend to have any morals. (and yes, I know, some people were worried that if they didn't confirm her, Trump would pick someone even worse)

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Fri 18 May , 2018 1:16 pm
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http://thehill.com/policy/finance/38826 ... ing-a-deal
Quote:
The nation’s top trade official issued a frank and dour statement on Thursday about the state of negotiations on the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA).

U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer said that after nine months the United States, Mexico and Canada are still far from completing an update of the 24-year-old NAFTA deal with a slew of sticking points looming over the talks.

“The NAFTA countries are nowhere near close to a deal,” Lighthizer said in a statement.


http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... en-hiv-and
Quote:
Bill Gates discloses in newly revealed footage that President Trump twice asked him to clarify the difference between HIV and Human Papilloma Virus (HPV).

...Gates also said that at both meetings Trump had asked him about the negative effects of vaccines. “In both of those two meetings, he asked me if vaccines weren’t a bad thing, because he was considering a commission to look into the ill effects of vaccines,” Gates said.

“And I said, ‘no, that’s a dead end. That would be a bad thing, don’t do that.’”
I'm not at all hopeful that Trump would make the right decisions on any disease issue, with his very poor understanding of science, arrogance and unwillingness to learn. (What adult in a western country doesn't know what HIV is?) And with the latest West African ebola outbreak reaching an urban area (and therefore, in danger of getting out of control*), this is especially worrisome. Obama handled the last ebola outbreak well; I have my doubts Trump would do the same.

*Though, at least, this time there's been a quick response. And the experimental vaccine to give to people who might have been exposed.



I think aliens must have taken over Trump's body on this one. He actually signed a sensible executive order.
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... l-agencies
Quote:
President Trump signed an executive order on Thursday designed to boost the environmental performance of federal agencies. The order mandates that federal agencies reduce the overall energy consumption of their buildings, implement waste prevention and recycling measures and reduce water consumption, among other measures.
EDIT: New reports - actually, he replaced one of former President Obama's executive orders with a weaker one. Now this makes sense.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... -to-reduce
Quote:
President Trump late Thursday replaced an executive order signed by former President Obama that sought to reduce federal agencies’ energy use and greenhouse gas emissions.

The revocation came as part of a late-night executive order that instructs agencies to set their own goals for efficiency and “prioritize actions that reduce waste, cut costs, enhance the resilience of Federal infrastructure and operations, and enable more effective accomplishment of its mission.”

Obama signed the original order in 2015, with a goal of reducing the federal government’s greenhouse gas emissions 40 percent in a decade. It asked agencies to reduce buildings’ energy use by 2.5 percent per year, use clean energy for 25 percent of their energy needs and shrink water use by 36 percent.

...Trump’s new order, signed Thursday, only asks agencies to set their own goals, and to track their progress toward them, replacing the prescriptive targets in the Obama order.




Edit to add - Trump and Pence putting abortion gag rule in place in the U.S.:
http://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/38 ... g-women-on
Quote:
The Trump administration is expected to announce on Friday a ban on federal funds for family planning clinics that discuss the possibility of abortion with clients. The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) will announce the proposed rule on Friday, which will go into effect after a listening period.

The rule would ban such clinics, including Planned Parenthood clinics which are a major recipient of federal dollars, from sharing spaces with abortion providers or discussing abortion with clients.

The move was blasted by the National Family Planning & Reproductive Health Association, which represents family planning clinics across the country. “The notion that you would withhold information from a patient does not uphold or preserve their dignity,” Jessica Marcella, the group's vice president for advocacy, told The Associated Press.


http://thehill.com/latino/388280-ice-ar ... ear-report
Quote:
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers are increasingly picking up undocumented immigrants without a record of criminal conviction, despite the Trump administration's promise to focus on those with criminal backgrounds.

ICE data released by the agency and obtained by HuffPost finds that nearly two-thirds of all undocumented immigrants arrested by ICE agents between October 2017 and April 2018 had no criminal convictions.


https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... -sanctions
Quote:
The European Union started to activate measures to preserve the Iran nuclear agreement and to protect EU companies operating in the country, as the bloc reiterated support for the landmark deal after President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw from it.

The European Commission, the EU’s executive arm in Brussels, on Friday began putting a so-called blocking statute in place to shield European companies doing business with Iran from U.S. sanctions. It’s the first time in more than two decades that the measure is being invoked.

...The commission also moved to allow the European Investment Bank to decide under the EU budget guarantee to finance activities in Iran, with a special aim at small and medium-sized businesses. The commission also is encouraging EU governments to explore the possibility of one-off bank transfers to the Central Bank of Iran, which could help the country to receive oil-related revenues, it said.
More from Der Spiegel - Macron/ France and Brussels are prepared to fight Trump economically. Merkel wants to appease (not all German politicians agree with her).
http://www.spiegel.de/international/eur ... 08528.html
Quote:
The blocking statute that the European Commission is currently pushing would fine European companies that obey the U.S. sanctions. At the same time, the EU would pay damages to companies that defy the U.S. sanctions. The European Council, the powerful body representing the EU member states, now has two months to act before the law goes into effect. Germany would only be able to stop it if there is a qualified majority on the council opposing the rule.
Some interesting quotes about how the U.S. is seen in this article:
Quote:
It's an age-old question of foreign policy, and also one of the most important: finding the correct response to pressure and coercion. Is appeasement the right way to go? Or will that just encourage the bullies of international politics? It has traditionally been a question most often raised when dealing with Vladimir Putin and the other strongment of the world.
Quote:
There is no doubt about the Americans' determination. Trump prefers applying maximum pressure -- and makes no exception for America's allies in Europe. Richard Grenell, the new American ambassador in Berlin, has very openly linked the issue of Iran to the trade dispute between the U.S. and Europe. Last week, Grenell told the New York Times that if the Europeans back Trump in his position on Iran that the president might not levy punitive tariffs against Europe on steel and aluminum.

Conversely, that also means that if the Europeans don't fall into line with Trump that they will be facing a trade war. "With friends like that, who needs enemies," EU Council President Donald Tusk said earlier this week.




http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... -on-amazon
Quote:
Trump has personally met with Postmaster General Megan Brennan multiple times since 2017 to petition her for a hike on rates for Amazon and other firms that ship packages, The Washington Post reported Friday, citing officials familiar with the conversations.

The president's demands came despite counsel from close advisers and top Postal Service employees that Amazon, the largest shipper of packages through USPS, actually helps keep it afloat financially.

According to the Post, Brennan explained to Trump in their conversations that the Postal Service is bound by its contracts with retail companies, noting that to change them would require a review by the independent regulatory agency that oversees the USPS.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Mon 21 May , 2018 6:16 pm
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http://thehill.com/policy/defense/38859 ... ry-on-iran
Quote:
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo vowed Monday to levy an “unprecedented” level of sanctions on Iran after the U.S. announced it was withdrawing from the 2015 nuclear accord.

In his fist major foreign policy address since becoming chief diplomat, Pompeo laid out 12 pillars the U.S. would demand from Iran for a new deal, even as he said a new agreement is “not the objective” of the Trump administration.

“We will apply unprecedented financial pressure on the Iranian regime,” Pompeo told an audience at the conservative Heritage Foundation.

...[The demands] include giving the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) the full history and military dimensions of its nuclear program, stopping all enrichment including closing its heavy water reactor, giving the IAEA unqualified access to the country, ending proliferation of ballistic missiles, releasing all U.S. detainees and ending support for proxies around the Middle East.

“As President Trump said two weeks ago, he is ready, willing and able to negotiate a new deal, but the deal is not the objective,” he said. “Our goal is to protect the American people.”
So Trump reneged on a deal, and now they supposedly expect Iran to come crawling back and sign a different deal with him? What gullible idiots is this speech aimed at?



http://thehill.com/policy/defense/38863 ... oward-iran
Quote:
The Pentagon on Monday hinted at a more aggressive approach toward Iran following Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s threats to “crush” the nation with economic sanctions.

“We are going to take steps necessary to address Iran's malign influence in the region,” Defense Department spokesman Rob Manning told reporters at the Pentagon. “...Manning would not say what the Pentagon will do to address Iran, but he said officials “are actively looking at their influence in the region” and assessing what actions will be taken.


...Pompeo [said] “We will ensure freedom of navigation on the waters in the region. We will work to prevent and counteract any Iranian malign cyber activity. We will track down Iranian operatives and their Hezbollah proxies operating around the world and crush them,” Pompeo said at the Heritage Foundation in Washington.

“Iran will never again have carte blanche to dominate the Middle East.”

More, from the Atlantic:https://www.theatlantic.com/internation ... an/560795/
Quote:
But what’s the likelihood Pompeo’s vision will come to pass? “He’s not asking the leopard to change its spots,” Barbara Slavin, director of the Future of Iran Initiative at the Atlantic Council, told me regarding what Pompeo was demanding of Iran. “He’s asking it to become a lamb.” Slavin, a longtime supporter of the JCPOA, said the demands outlined by Pompeo were also the demands of Iran’s biggest adversaries: Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Israel, and the U.S. She said of Pompeo’s speech: "It’s audacious, it’s bold, and it’s totally unrealistic.”
Quote:
Given the skepticism of traditional U.S. allies, then, the secretary of state finds himself looking further abroad in hopes of assembling a kind of coalition of the willing for a new Iran deal. Pompeo said the U.S. would work to include in a new arrangement, in addition to Europe “the Australians, Bahrainis, Indians, Japanese, Omanis, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, the U.A.E., and many, many others.”



It sounds to me as if the neocons are preparing to start a war - severe economic sanctions with an unrealistic set of demands, plus no particular goal or hope of a treaty. Iran isn't going to accept that meekly.



Meanwhile, Trump continues to expect the Justice Department to respond to his every whim.
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... f-law-to-a
Quote:
Former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates on Monday said President Trump has taken his “assault on the rule of law to a new level” by demanding the Justice Department (DOJ) look into alleged surveillance abuses of his 2016 presidential campaign.

"... this time he is ordering up an investigation of the investigators who are examining his own campaign. You know, that’s really shocking,” Yates said on MSNBC's "Morning Joe."

“I know it was just a tweet but he did say something to the effect of, if I recall correctly, ‘I hereby order.’ And we saw the Justice Department respond to that,"
You know, if the FBI actually did have an informant in his campaign,* I'd be more worried about why someone was so concerned about the Trump campaign that they'd feed information to the FBI. This latest bit of manufactured outrage seems like getting outraged about the snitch rather than about the guy making pipe bombs. I'm guessing that Mueller is getting uncomfortably close to Trump and they're getting more and more desperate to stop him.


*As far as I can tell, this originally came from mere speculation in an article in the National Review, which every far-right outlet picked up and amplified and is using to get ratings and promote outrage. Sort of like that game of telephone. And, of course, that infant in the White House has seized on it as his latest obsession.


http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... i-director
President Trump will meet with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and FBI Director Christopher Wray on
Quote:
Monday afternoon amid a burgeoning dispute with federal law enforcement over the Russia probe.
A White House official called the meeting "routine" but also said that Trump's demand for a federal investigation into whether the FBI improperly infiltrated his campaign will likely come up.

...The outcome could determine whether Trump decides to trigger a full-blown crisis with the Justice Department (DOJ) over his frustration with the Russia probe.

Trump ratcheted up the pressure on the law enforcement agency Sunday when he made his demand for a probe into allegations that there was an informant inside his 2016 campaign, an extraordinary request that few past presidents have made.
Has ANY past president made such a request? Nixon?

Also extraordinary:
Quote:
But it remains unclear whether that will be enough to satisfy the president, who has previously dismissed the Justice Department’s internal watchdog as an “Obama guy" and called it "DISGRACEFUL" he was allowed to look into whether a former Trump campaign associate was improperly surveilled.
Trump's attacks on anyone who is not a Trump loyalist (i.e., voted for him and supported him at all times) are unprecedented, bizarre and should never be normalized, no matter how often he does it. Quite clearly, his worldview is that no one can possibly be fair and impartial unless he/she is a Trump supporter or, at a minimum, a Republican. That's simply nuts.




For what it's worth, if you want to comment on the Sinclair merger (Trump's FCC ignored the public comments on net neutrality, but at least the news media reported that most people wanted to keep net neutrality and some states have taken action of various sorts):
http://thehill.com/policy/technology/38 ... une-merger
Quote:
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) will take new comments from the public on Sinclair Broadcast Group’s $3.9 billion bid for Tribune Media.

The agency is reopening its review of the merger for public comments after the two companies proposed to sell off some local stations in an effort to bring the deal in line with media ownership restrictions.

The public will have until July 12 to weigh in on the docket.



http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... on-alaskan
Quote:
Wildlife protections on black bears, coyote pups and other Alaskan animals are likely to be stripped away under a new National Park Service (NPS) rule formally proposed Monday. The rule, published in the Federal Register, aims to reverse Obama-era protections from 2015 that prohibited certain hunting practices that otherwise were allowed by Alaska.

The practices the Obama-era rule prohibited included the killing of all black bears by dogs; the hunting of caribou from powered motorboats; hunting of wolves or coyotes and their pups during denning season months; and using "bait" to attract and shoot brown bears.

Under the new NPS rule, states would be allowed to determine their own protections and could remove the previous federal protections for wildlife.


Here's an interesting idea - let the people who think Trump's wall is a good idea pay for it:
http://thehill.com/homenews/news/388661 ... -lawmakers
Quote:
Rep. Diane Black (R- Tenn.) has introduced legislation that would create a “border wall trust fund,” allowing people to donate money towards President Trump’s border wall.

The Border Wall Trust Fund Act would “allow the Secretary of the Treasury to accept public donations to fund the construction of a barrier on the border between the United States and Mexico, and for other purposes.”

Last edited by aninkling on Tue 22 May , 2018 12:22 am, edited 1 time in total.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Tue 22 May , 2018 12:15 am
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The outcome of the meeting between Trump, Rosenstein and Wray:
https://www.politico.com/story/2018/05/ ... ant-601572
Quote:
Under pressure from President Donald Trump, top Justice Department officials have agreed to share highly classified information with congressional leaders connected to the FBI's investigation of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

The decision to share the information came after Trump met at the White House with Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and FBI Director Christopher Wray and asked them to turn over to Congress and his own legal team all of the memos they have about an FBI informant who made contact with his 2016 campaign.
(Emphasis mine.)
Quote:
The White House also acknowledged that Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz would review allegations by Trump allies that the president's campaign was inappropriately surveilled in 2016, though Democrats and Justice Department defenders have called the allegations cynical attempts to undermine the ongoing probe of Trump campaign contacts with Russians

...The breadth of the agreement was not immediately clear. The Justice Department had previously indicated that sharing details about its informant could risk lives and endanger national security.It's also unclear who will be permitted to view the documents.

...On his way back into Justice Department headquarters, Rosenstein declined answer questions about the meeting.
It seems that Giuliani is hoping this will let Trump's legal team know whether the FBI picked up any crimes during the campaign.
Quote:
Giuliani predicted the Justice Department would place redactions on some parts of the material. “But as long as they turn over the vast majority of it it gives you a real sense” of what the FBI was doing. “The question is what are the justifications for it? Did the justifications continue? Did they pick up anything valuable? That’s the most important thing to do. We think they didn’t.”



And on the North Korean issue:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/as ... story.html
Quote:
President Trump is blaming Kim Jong Un for changing the scope of their summit talks planned for next month and will doubtless air his frustrations when he meets with South Korean President Moon Jae-in in Washington on Tuesday.

But in South Korea, many say the blame for the sudden problems in the diplomatic process lies squarely at the feet of someone else: John Bolton. “There are several land mines on the way to the summit between North Korea and the U.S.,” said Chung Dong-young, who served as unification minister during the last progressive administration and is now a lawmaker. “One of those land mines just exploded: John Bolton,” Chung told YTN Radio.

Woo Sang-ho, a lawmaker in Moon’s ruling Democratic Party, agreed. “Bolton’s preposterous ‘Libya solution’ is a red light in North Korea’s summit talks with the U.S. and South Korea,” he wrote in a Facebook post.

...The biggest problem comes, experts here say, from Trump’s fundamental misunderstanding of North Korea’s interests.

The regime in Pyongyang has never said it was prepared to unilaterally give up its nuclear program but has instead repeatedly made clear that this would have to be part of a “phased and synchronous” process that would involve rewards for North Korea along the way. “Kim Jong Un coming out to talks is not an act of one-way surrender but a movement to adjust mutual interests,” said Lee Jong-Seok, now at the pro-engagement Sejong Institute outside Seoul. “It’s not that North Korea rejects complete, verifiable and irreversible denuclearization, but rather they need a tangible promise from Washington in return.”
I rolled my eyes when I heard that the Trump administration has already issued a commemorative coin celebrating the yet-to-occur summit. https://www.vox.com/2018/5/21/17377278/ ... lenge-coin I believe it has Trump and Kim Jong Un on it. As far as I know, South Korean President Moon, who has done most of the hard negotiating, is ignored.



Oh, and another nice little scandal involving the Trump administration:
http://thehill.com/policy/national-secu ... di-emirati
Quote:
Two American businessmen sought to leverage access to President Trump while angling for lucrative contracts from two Gulf countries wanting to shift U.S. foreign policy against Qatar, The Associated Press reported Monday. GOP fundraiser Elliott Broidy and businessman George Nader reportedly worked to catch the president's ear by passing along praise from the princes of the United Arab Emirates and Saudi Arabia.

Broidy and Nader, who marketed themselves as having a back channel to the Oval Office, sought million-dollar contracts with the two Gulf countries for their efforts, according to the AP investigation, which included dozens of interviews as well as the review of hundreds of pages of leaked emails between the two men.

The New York Times reported earlier this year that Broidy and Nader had worked to push Emirati and Saudi interests in the White House to take a hard-line stance on Iran and Qatar. According to the AP, this new tranche of emails further reveals their "ambitious, secretive lobbying effort to isolate Qatar and undermine the Pentagon’s longstanding relationship with the Gulf country."
According to the article, Broidy is claiming that someone faked all the evidence collected, in an effort to smear him.

And this little tidbit is interesting:
Quote:
Nader is now reportedly cooperating with special counsel Robert Mueller's team of investigators, who are said to be examining foreign influence inside the Trump White House.
(edit - corrected Washington Post URL)

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Tue 22 May , 2018 2:45 pm
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A couple of comments from former administration officials (under Bush and Obama) after Trump's recent activities. I'm wondering why the current ethics chief (is there one?) has been silent. Or is Trump just ignoring him/her?

http://thehill.com/homenews/news/388729 ... than-there
Quote:
Former White House chief ethics counsel Richard Painter said there is more evidence to charge President Trump with a crime than there ever was against former President Richard Nixon. Painter told CBS News on Monday that there is plenty of evidence of abuse of power and obstruction of justice against Trump.
He called on Trump and Vice President Pence to be removed from office.

...Painter served in the George W. Bush administration from 2005 to 2007.
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... ation-into
Quote:
Former Attorney General Eric Holder on Monday urged Department of Justice (DOJ) and FBI officials to "simply say no" to President Trump's demand for an expanded investigation into his claims of FBI wrongdoing as it relates to his campaign.

"More DOJ norms being eroded. Trump-a SUBJECT of the investigation-wants access to material related to the inquiry," Holder tweeted.

...Holder served as attorney general under former President Barack Obama from 2009-2015.


http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... mpaign-its
Quote:
Former Trump campaign senior adviser A.J. Delgado tore into claims that the Obama administration may have surveilled the Trump campaign, calling it “embarrassing.”

“Are we really going w this?? That Obama put a spy inside the Trump campaign, to frame Trump? Srsly? Not sure if it’s IQ, ethics, or simple common sense but I cant,” Delgado tweeted Monday night.
At least, Trump has "let" the Dept of Justice Inspector General conduct the investigation for now.



http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... ity-report
Quote:
President Trump has rejected attempts by White House staffers to improve security surrounding his cellphone, choosing to use a device that lacks top security features and could leave him vulnerable to surveillance or hacking, Politico reported Monday.

...Aides have pushed Trump to change out the phone used for Twitter every month but he has rejected their efforts, calling it “too inconvenient,” according to one official.

Trump has gone up to five months without having security experts check the phone used for Twitter, Politico reported. It’s unknown how often the phones used for calls are changed.

...The phone Trump uses for calls includes a camera and a microphone, which could be used by hackers to access the device.



Edit to addL
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... ter-outcry
Quote:
In a reversal following media outcry, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) announced it would allow all representatives from the media to attend the second half of a chemical summit that previously barred some press.

...While a handful of reporters from publications including The Hill were personally invited to attend EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt's opening remarks and the first section of the panel, other outlets not invited were not allowed to attend the summit on hazardous chemicals linked to cancer.
They turned away reporters from the AP, CNN and E & E, citing space constraints. What came out later was this:
Quote:
reporters who were allowed to come to the event were also limited to only an hour of attendance. The entire summit spans two days. No journalists were initially invited to stay through the panel presentations, discussions and closing remarks regarding better regulating PFAS exposure and development of a cohesive federal standard.
The EPA seem to have reversed course after their actions were publicized:
Quote:
EPA spokespeople at first maintained that limiting reporter attendance was not in violation of the Federal Advisory Committees Act--which has a special emphasis on open meetings and public input.

...Members of Congress piped up on the news of reporters being barred from covering the discussion on the chemicals.
According to the article, Pruitt has a history of barring reporters from EPA events and announcements of policy changes.



http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... on-climate
Quote:
A former top energy and environment adviser to President Trump is leading an industry-backed effort to crack down on corporate shareholders’ resolutions on hot-button controversies like climate change.

George David Banks, who was the top White House adviser on international energy and environment policy, is serving as executive director of the project, dubbed the Main Street Investors Coalition.

...Banks had a leading role in the administration’s policies regarding the Paris climate agreement, energy-related sanctions and energy trade, among other matters.


And Trump seems to be denying his previous tweets on ZTE after all the scrutiny:
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/38882 ... ompany-zte
Quote:
President Trump said Tuesday that there is no deal to save Chinese company ZTE, which is facing heavy fines and sanctions in the United States. Trump told reporters that he is doing Chinese President Xi Jinping a favor by looking into how to breathe life back into the company that the Commerce Department has effectively shut down. "President Xi and I have a great relationship, but there is no deal," Trump said at the White House.

...Trump in a tweet on May 13 expressed concern that ZTE was being driven out of business. He wrote that he had ordered federal officials to get the Chinese phone-maker "back into business, fast." “Too many jobs in China lost,” Trump wrote.


Edit: No Democrats need apply, as far as seeing Trump's demanded information regarding an FBI informant:
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... ussia-docs
Quote:
The White House announced top U.S. officials will brief lawmakers on Thursday about a confidential FBI source who has been a lightning rod for controversy in the Russia probe — but no Democrats are invited.

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) and House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) will meet with FBI Director Christopher Wray, Director of National Intelligence Daniel Coats and top Justice Department official Ed O'Callaghan, White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders told reporters.
Supposedly, no White House officials will be there - but we all know what it means when Nunes was one of the 2 chosen to meet with the FBI and DOJ officials. He has a very long history or protecting Trump.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Wed 23 May , 2018 2:48 pm
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An un-serious look at the sinkhole outside the White House and what it means.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/sho ... n-thinking
Quote:
The White House sinkhole: nature finally says what we’ve all been thinking
The earth literally opening up outside Donald Trump’s residence seems too good to be true
Apparently, someone has even opened a Twitter account for the new sinkhole.


Some are speculating that Melania's escape tunnel collapsed.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Wed 23 May , 2018 3:23 pm
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On a more serious note, why Trump's attempted "clawback" of some unused Congressional funds was not a good idea:
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/arc ... ds/560012/
Quote:
Ebola Returns Just as Trump Asks to Rescind Ebola Funds
Quote:
Just as news of the Ebola outbreak broke, Donald Trump asked Congress to rescind $252 million that had been put aside to deal with Ebola, as part of a broader move to cut down on “excessive spending.” That pot of money is the leftover from a $5.4 billion sum that Congress appropriated for dealing with the West African Ebola epidemic in 2015.

That epidemic ended two years ago, but “having some money left over was intentional,” says Ron Klain, the former Ebola czar. It allows USAID to quickly deploy responders to the site of a future outbreak, to prevent it from metastasizing into an international disaster. It is not, as the Trump administration suggests, an example of “irresponsible federal spending.” Quite the opposite: It’s a savvy investment, since epidemics are always more expensive to deal with once they rage out of control.
This article was from a few weeks ago. The outbreak has now become very serious indeed, with a few cases identified in a major city, where the virus can spread easily and new cases are not so easy to find.



http://thehill.com/policy/finance/38896 ... ry-tariffs
Quote:
America's trading partners are preparing retaliatory tariff measures for a total of $3.45 billion in revenue in response to recent U.S. trade moves.

It is a move that could soon impact U.S. farmers and manufacturers.

Bloomberg News reports that several U.S. trade partners, including the European Union, China, Russia, Japan, Turkey, and India, have all announced planned retaliatory duties in response to recent U.S. policy.



http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... tion-event
Quote:
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is barring reporters from attending the second day of an event on drinking water pollution.

Journalists from The Associated Press, Politico and other outlets said EPA staff at the agency's Washington, D.C., headquarters blocked them from entering the National Leadership Summit on per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) on Wednesday. EPA communications staff had told news outlets in advance that the sessions would be closed to journalists.

EPA spokesman Jahan Wilcox defended the decision to bar reporters entirely from Wednesday’s session, saying it isn’t a meeting covered by the Federal Advisory Committee Act (FACA)...“The purpose of this event is for EPA’s state, tribal, and federal government partners and national organizations to share a range of individual perspectives on the Agency’s actions to date and path forward on PFOA/PFAS.
I believe the chemicals discussed in this meeting are the "public relations nightmare" mentioned in EPA emails a week or two ago.



Edit: The American Medical Association is not happy with Trump:
http://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/38 ... program-is
Quote:
The Trump administration's proposed changes to a federal family planning program is "government interference" in the patient-physician relationship, according to the leading association representing doctors in the U.S.

Family planning clinics that refer patients for abortions or share locations or finances with abortion providers will be ineligible for funding through the Title X family planning grant program under proposed regulations released by the administration on Tuesday.

...“The AMA objects strongly to the administration’s plan to withhold federal family planning funding from Planned Parenthood and other entities. We are particularly alarmed about government interference with the patient-physician relationship in the exam room," said AMA President David Barbe.


Trump's latest idea: withhold foreign aid to any country that "lets" its citizens try to enter the U.S. illegally:
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... w-criminal
Quote:
President Trump on Wednesday suggested the United States could withhold foreign aid from countries that allow criminal illegal immigrants to come to the United States.

“I have to say that many of these countries we give tremendous amounts of aid to — tens of millions of dollars — and we’re working on a plan to deduct a lot of the aid,” Trump said at a roundtable about addressing immigration loopholes.

“I happen to believe that it’s not so hard. You know, they’ll let you think they’re trying to stop this — they’re not trying to stop it,” Trump continued. “I think they encourage people from leaving. They don’t want the people that we’re getting in that country.

“So, we’re going to work out something where every time somebody comes in from a certain country, we’re going to deduct a rather large amount of money from what we give them in aid, if we give them aid at all,” Trump said to a round of applause from the crowd.
What's the collective IQ of this group, that they would applaud this incoherent, unworkable "plan"?

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Thu 24 May , 2018 1:42 pm
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http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... for-russia
Quote:
The White House is planning a separate meeting for bipartisan House and Senate leaders to receive classified information related to the Russia investigation, responding to pressure over a decision to exclude Democrats from a highly anticipated Thursday briefing.

The group, known as the Gang of Eight, will huddle with officials representing the Justice Department, law enforcement and intelligence on Thursday afternoon — two hours after the same group of officials will hold a solo meeting with Republican lawmakers.

Thursday’s planned meeting with only House Republicans “will proceed as previously scheduled,” White House spokesman Raj Shah said — with no Democrats present.
The separate meetings, with a private meeting for Trump supporters Nunes and Gowdy, still seems suspicious to me.



More consequences of Trump's trade wars:
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/38907 ... um-tariffs
Quote:
India requested on Wednesday World Trade Organization (WTO) dispute consultations with the United States over President Trump’s decision to impose steep duties on imported steel and aluminum.

The South Asian nation said it plans to impose additional duties on U.S. goods totaling $165.56 million, which they argue is the amount of trade affected by the duties of 25 percent on steel and 10 percent on aluminum.
Pushback from Congress on ZTE:
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... ess-on-zte
Quote:
Trump’s pivot on ZTE has received terrible reviews from Republicans in Congress, who have joined with Democrats in passing measures to ensure the restrictions are kept in place. The Senate Banking Committee on Tuesday approved an amendment to a spending bill that would tie the administration’s hands on the matter.

U.S. intelligence has raised concerns that the Chinese government was using ZTE to compromise American telecommunications networks, and potentially spy on Americans. The company was also found to have violated U.S. sanctions, selling banned components to Iran and North Korea. Earlier this year, the Commerce Department nearly felled the company with tough fines and restrictions, which the Financial Times has estimated already cost ZTE upwards of $2 billion.

Trump’s apparent willingness to compromise on the fate of the company has led to an uproar in Congress.

Trump still harping on a physical wall:
http://thehill.com/latino/389135-trump- ... -real-wall
Quote:
President Trump in an interview broadcast early Thursday dismissed the possibility of an immigration bill being signed into law that does not include improvements to "real" border wall with Mexico. In an interview with "Fox and Friends," the president touted four immigration bills currently being discussed by lawmakers, before warning that none of them would obtain his signature without proper funding for border security.

..."Unless it improves a wall, and I mean a wall, a real wall, and unless it improves very strong border security, there’ll be no approvals from me, because I have to either approve it or not," he added.
Does he know so little about government that he doesn't realize Congress could overturn a veto?

Not that it seems likely, with this bunch:
http://thehill.com/homenews/house/38910 ... ion-revolt
Quote:
Centrist Republicans on Wednesday moved one signature closer to forcing immigration votes on the House floor, but encountered headwinds as some Republicans fretted about the possibility of retribution from leadership.

...Further underscoring their fears, Rep. Austin Scott (R-Ga.) stood up during a GOP conference meeting on Tuesday morning and called on leadership to punish lawmakers who sign the petition or who vote against rules setting up floor debate for other immigration bills, according to two Republican sources.

...Centrists don’t usually play hardball with leadership, but they are employing aggressive tactics after growing increasingly frustrated with the lack of action. They are seeking a permanent solution for the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program, which provides protection from deportation for young immigrants who came to the country as children


Trump admits he used the term "spy" to influence his supporters:
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... because-it
Quote:
President Trump told a confidant this week that he aimed "to brand" an FBI informant on his campaign a "spy" because he thought it sounded more nefarious, according to The Associated Press.

Trump reportedly told one ally that he thought these embellishments would produce a greater response among media and the public.

The president has seized on reports of the informant, claiming that the former Cambridge University professor had been "embedded" in his campaign by the FBI under the Obama administration, though the White House has provided no supporting evidence.


Speaking of which, I tend not to post most of Trump's nonsense unless it affects policy, but it's getting harder and harder to ignore his deeply ugly, sometimes delusional or surprisingly stupid comments. He is, after supposed to be the president of the United States now, not some 2-bit reality TV host stirring up scandal to get ratings.
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... py-scandal
Weds tweet:
Quote:
Look how things have turned around on the Criminal Deep State. They go after Phony Collusion with Russia, a made up Scam, and end up getting caught in a major SPY scandal the likes of which this country may never have seen before! What goes around, comes around!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 23, 2018

The president went on to declare that “spygate” could be one of the biggest political scandals in history.

SPYGATE could be one of the biggest political scandals in history!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) May 23, 2018
http://thehill.com/policy/national-secu ... good-thing
Quote:
In an interview with "Fox and Friends," Trump was asked by Fox's Brian Kilmeade how Republicans will "explain" their attacks on law enforcement and the Justice Department to their grandchildren.

"Well I’d actually say – how is [Comey] going to explain to his grandchildren all of the lies, the deceit, all of the problems he has caused for this country?" Trump asked. "I think of the things that I’ve done for the country, the firing of James Comey is going to go down as a very good thing," he added.
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... cant-stand
Quote:
"You have to stand proudly for the National Anthem. You shouldn't be playing, you shouldn't be there. Maybe they shouldn't be in the country...the NFL owners did the right thing" -President @realDonaldTrump pic.twitter.com/bt36t4EX5u
— FOX & friends (@foxandfriends) May 24, 2018
The shocking part of this, of course, is that the U.S. president said that people who don't stand for the national anthem should be kicked out of the country. In other words, free speech shouldn't exist.


Jeff Flake (GOP) blasts Trump in a commencement speech and blames Congress for being unwilling to act:
http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3890 ... presidency
Quote:
“Our presidency has been debased by a figure who has a seemingly bottomless appetite for destruction and division, and only a passing familiarity with how the Constitution works" Flake said in a commencement address to Harvard Law School graduates, according to prewritten remarks.

“Our Article I branch of government, the Congress (that's me), is utterly supine in the face of the moral vandalism that flows from the White House daily,” Flake continued.

The Republican senator went on to say that the country's strongest enemies could not hurt the U.S. more than "we are hurting ourselves," concluding that "we may have hit bottom."

Flake also criticized Trump for his continuing attacks on the media and what he views to be the president’s willingness to indulge and encourage “our very worst impulses.”



And Zinke's decisions have led to the first grizzy trophy hunt in more than 40 years:
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... n-44-years
Quote:
The state of Wyoming announced Wednesday that it will allow grizzly bear hunts for the first time in 44 years. In a unanimous vote, the state's Fish and Game Commission approved the hunting of 22 grizzly bears in the fall, in areas east and south of the Yellowstone and Grand Teton national parks.

The ruling comes after the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service rolled back protections on grizzlies last year — removing Yellowstone grizzly bears from the federal Endangered Species list after 42 years on it.

...When rolling back protections on the animal in June, Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke cheered the successful comeback of the bears while listed as endangered.

...Environmentalists say that although the species' numbers grew while listed as endangered, the bears continue to be threatened due to loss of food sources and human-caused mortalities.


I guess if you managed to pick up one of the commemorative coins praising the yet-to-be Trump/ Kim summit, you'd better hold on to it. It's going to be a collector's item someday:
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... not-happen
Quote:
President Trump on Thursday canceled his meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, citing Kim’s “open hostility.” “Please let this letter serve to represent that the Singapore summit, for the good of both parties, but to the detriment of the world, will not take place,” Trump wrote in a letter to Kim.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Tue 29 May , 2018 1:34 pm
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Democrats after meetings that originally included only Nunes and Gowdy:
http://thehill.com/policy/national-secu ... p-campaign
Quote:
Congressional Democrats said after a closed-door briefing with top Justice Department officials Thursday that there is "no evidence" that the FBI placed a spy in the Trump campaign, hitting back at a claim by President Trump. "Nothing we heard today has changed our view that there is no evidence to support any allegation that the FBI or any intelligence agency placed a spy in the Trump campaign or otherwise failed to follow appropriate procedures and protocols," Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) told reporters.

Schiff said he was reading the statement on behalf of House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) and Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), who also attended the meeting.


http://thehill.com/policy/finance/38966 ... by-june-30
Quote:
The Trump administration will announce further actions to crack down on unfair Chinese trade practices by June 30, the White House said Tuesday in a statement.

...Among those moves will be a 25 percent tariff on $50 billion of tech goods imported from China

...The move comes just days after Trump's trade representatives presented Chinese officials with a list of trade demands including a document asking China's government to slash its trade deficit with the U.S. by $200 billion by the end of 2020.
I assume that Navarro's fingerprints are on this trade war with China


http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... -his-prime
Quote:
President Trump has reportedly bashed Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross as being "past his prime" amid tensions within the administration over trade negotiations with China in recent weeks.

...Though Trump once hailed his longtime friend Ross, a billionaire investor and trade magnate, as a champion of America-first trade policies, he now says Ross is "no longer a killer."

... Trump has reportedly largely bypassed the secretary in top-priority negotiations

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... esnt-exist
Quote:
An audio recording of a conversation between reporters and a senior White House official released Saturday disproved President Trump's claims that a source quoted by The New York Times "doesn't exist."

Trump lashed out at the Times on Twitter Saturday, saying the paper had used "phony sources" and quoted a member of his staff "who doesn’t exist." But audio released Saturday, and reports backed up by other news outlets, point out that the source does, in fact, exist.

This looks political to me, especially given that Trump is acting because he couldn't push Congress to do it. Most positions in the federal government don't turn over with each new administration, which I expect is a frustration to Trump. Stripped of Trump's rhetoric, here are the new executive orders:
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... ng-federal
Quote:
President Trump issued three executive orders on Friday aimed at cutting down on the time it takes to fire federal employees.

...Trump's directives... [limit] the amount of time required before an agency can fire a federal employee.They also encourage agencies to fire poor-performing employees instead of first suspending them, and direct agencies to limit the amount of time a poor-performing employee is given the chance to show improvement.

..direct agencies to reward "performance over seniority" and push agencies to renegotiate contracts with unions, among other provisions.

..."The president called on Congress ... they haven’t done so yet. In the meantime, the president is using all available tools in the executive branch to come as close as he can," a senior Trump administration official said, according to BuzzFeed News.


http://thehill.com/policy/transportatio ... a-costs-on
Quote:
The Department of Transportation (DOT) told Congress it is opposed to a provision in a Senate bill that would prohibit airline fees that are not “reasonable and proportional,” according to Reuters.

... the DOT told Congress in a letter obtained by Reuters on Friday that it was opposed to the Senate bill's fee provision that bars airlines from “unreasonable” fees related to cancellation, baggage, seat selection and same-day changes.
FYI, many airlines (with the notable exception of Southwest) charge about $20-80 to choose a "better" (i.e., slightly less awful) economy seat (and it looks to me as if more and more seats are being put in that category), $200 or so if you ever have to cancel or re-schedule a flight, $50 to check a bag.



Summary of changes to wildlife protections in this summary, including some not mentioned before:
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... rotections
Quote:
The Trump administration is systematically rolling back protections for endangered wildlife and expanding rights for hunters, winning cheers from sporting associations but worrying environmentalists who fear it will lead to the extinction of protected species.

The National Park Service announced last week it would end an Obama-era protection that prohibited the hunting of bear cubs, as well as wolves and pups in their dens, in Alaska’s national preserves.

...That same day, the Interior Department also announced it was expanding hunting access at 30 national wildlife refuges across the country. The rule would open or expand 248,000 acres to hunting and allow for the first time a number of new activities on the public land, including big game hunting.

...Environmentalists are also worried about budget cuts for programs meant to help endangered species. The White House budget proposal for fiscal 2019 seeks to cut the species listing budget from $20.5 million to just under $11 million.

...Interior submitted another rule in November aimed at reversing an Obama-era ban on the importation of elephant trophies from Africa, a measure initially put in place to deter big game hunting of elephants. President Trump publicly criticized the change and put it on hold, but in March the agency silently updated the policy to allow imports in on a “case by case” basis. It has yet to release details on how many have been approved.

...Last week the department announced the names of 18 people who would be sitting on its newly established Hunting and Shooting Sports Conservation Council.

...Interior’s Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) in April proposed weakening a rule that gives threatened species on private land the same protections as endangered species. The change would effectively strip threatened plants and animals of stronger safeguards they’ve been granted for more than four decades.
Quote:
[Zinke] reportedly was handpicked to lead Interior by Donald Trump Jr., an avid big game hunter.


Edit to add:
http://thehill.com/homenews/media/38977 ... oadcasting
Quote:
A former member of the Trump campaign who later joined the White House communications team is joining Sinclair Broadcasting Group as the network has weathered controversy in recent months over its pro-Trump leanings. Kaelan Dorr, who worked for the Trump campaign as a deputy communications adviser and later joined the White House as Director of Congressional Communications, will join the right-leaning network where he tweeted he will work alongside Boris Epshtyn as an executive political producer for the show.

...Epshtyn is a former surrogate for the Trump campaign himself and has been the face of Sinclair's must-run television segments that often praise Trump administration policies or attack the White House's critics, typically other members of the media.
Sinclair is the media organization currently looking for FCC approval to buy up an even larger share of local TV stations. They're also the ones who insisted that all local news anchors on their stations read a pre-written piece about how fake news is rampant in the mainstream media but the local Sinclair affiliates will give you honest information.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Wed 30 May , 2018 1:03 pm
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China reacts to yesterday's news that Trump now wants more tariffs:
http://thehill.com/policy/international ... s-reckless
Quote:
China on Wednesday hit back at the White House saying it is “reckless” to renew tariff threats.

“We urge the United States to keep its promise, and meet China halfway in the spirit of the joint statement,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying told reporters, according to Reuters. Hua added that Beijing would use “resolute and forceful” means if the U.S. continued to act in an “arbitrary and reckless manner.”

...A spokesperson for China’s Ministry of Commerce on Tuesday responded, saying that officials were “surprised by the strategic statement released by the White House, but, at the same time, it is somewhat expected.”
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/38987 ... is-on-hold
Quote:
White House National Trade Council Director Peter Navarro is contradicting Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin's assertion that the U.S. trade war with China is on hold.

...Last week, Mnuchin said..."Right now, we have agreed to put the tariffs on hold while we try to execute the framework,”

The Trump administration, however, signaled this week that it is moving ahead with 25 percent tariffs on $50 billion worth of Chinese imports, and installing a slew of new restrictions on investments and visas. ...Navarro told NPR that the Trump administration is working to prevent China from stealing American intellectual property and evading export controls on militarily sensitive technology.

He demurred, however, when asked about the administration's position on Chinese telecom firm ZTE, saying it was a law enforcement matter upon which he could not comment.


http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... fundraiser
Quote:
During a private fundraiser in Manhattan last week, President Trump boasted about a classified February clash between U.S. troops and Russian mercenaries in Syria, Politico reports.

A person briefed on Trump's remarks told the publication that despite the battle being classified, Trump told donors he was in awe of American F-18 pilots' performance and suggested the battle resulted in up to 300 Russians being taken out. He reportedly also hinted that the clash lasted as little as "10 minutes."

http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... -in-russia
Quote:
President Trump reportedly told Attorney General Jeff Sessions last year that he should reverse his decision to recuse himself from the investigation into Russian election interference. Trump made the usual ask of Sessions during a dinner at the president’s Mar-a-Lago estate in March 2017, the New York Times reported Tuesday. The meeting reportedly came shortly after Sessions announced his recusal.

...Sessions last year declined to walk back his decision to recuse himself from the federal Russia investigation, spurring Trump to publicly voice displeasure with his attorney general over several months.


Trump doubles down on some of his lies at a campaign rally in Tennessee for Republican candidate Marsha Blackburn. Fox news and the Mexican president then contradict him:
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... s-campaign
Quote:
President Trump claimed at a rally in Nashville, Tenn., on Tuesday that people were "infiltrating" his 2016 presidential campaign.

"So how do you like the fact they had people infiltrating our campaign," Trump told supporters."Can you imagine people infiltrating our campaign? Is there anybody in this big, beautiful arena right now, that's infiltrating our campaign? Will you please raise your hand," he continued.

House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes (R-Calif.) ..said on Tuesdayhe believes the FBI acted properly with its use of an informant to speak with several members of Trump's campaign team. "I am even more convinced that the FBI did exactly what my fellow citizens would want them to do when they got the information they got, and that it has nothing to do with Donald Trump," Gowdy said.
The Democrats at last week's meetings have also released a statement saying there is no evidence that the FBI did anything improper, despite Trump's claims.

http://thehill.com/homenews/media/38982 ... e-baseless
Quote:
Fox News's Andrew Napolitano said late Tuesday there is “no evidence” to support President Trump’s “Spygate” theory that the FBI planted spies during his 2016 presidential campaign. Napolitano, the news network's senior judicial analyst, said on "The Story With Martha MacCallum" that Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, is making a “baseless” claim.

...Napolitano said Tuesday that the use of an informant is “standard operating procedure” in intelligence gathering and during criminal investigations.


http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... in-the-end
Quote:
President Trump said at a campaign rally Tuesday night that Mexico will pay for his long-promised border wall “in the end.”

...“They’re going to pay for the wall, and they’re going to enjoy it,” Trump added
http://thehill.com/policy/international ... -your-wall
Quote:
Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto on Tuesday fired back at President Trump for renewing his claim that Mexico would pay for Trump's proposed border wall “in the end.” “NO. Mexico will NEVER pay for a wall. Not now, not ever,” Peña Nieto wrote on Twitter.


http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... ut-chinese
Quote:
Ivanka Trump left a White House media call she was hosting Tuesday after reporters asked about her recently approved Chinese trademarks, CBS News reports. ...According to CBS News, Ivanka left the call after she was asked about a report by The Associated Press that China has approved 13 new Ivanka Trump trademarks in recent months.

Press aide Ninio Fetalvo reportedly answered the question by directing reporters' questions about Trump's company to the press office.

...A reporter later tried to ask Trump about her father's health, CBS reports, and after a pause, Fetalvo answered again saying "Ivanka had to step out for another meeting."


https://www.politico.com/story/2018/05/ ... ion-609162
Quote:
President Donald Trump’s choice of an anti-immigration hard-liner to lead a State Department division overseeing refugees has alarmed top Democratic lawmakers as well as human rights activists.

The White House announced this week that Trump had nominated Ronald Mortensen, a retired foreign service officer with humanitarian assistance experience, to serve as the assistant secretary of state for the Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration. The bureau has been a quiet conflict zone as Trump and his aides have tried to dramatically scale back refugee admissions to the United States.



http://thehill.com/policy/defense/38980 ... orth-korea
Quote:
The Trump administration is scrambling to save a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un less than a week after President Trump canceled the meeting

....It’s unclear whether the originally scheduled date of June 12 is still achievable, but Trump appears intent on meeting with Kim sooner rather than later.

...In a traditional administration, June 12 would be too quick a turnaround for the summit after last week’s developments, experts said. Modern-day presidential summits have the results agreed to before the leaders sit down. A senior White House official, too, told reporters at a White House-arranged briefing last week that it would be difficult to hold the summit on June 12. Trump over the weekend denied that official’s existence.

Harry Kazianis, director of defense studies at the Center for the National Interest, suggested Trump’s aides will try to talk him out of meeting with Kim before the summit agenda is set. “His staff would be jumping up and down screaming not to do it, knowing these people, knowing these people all too well,” he said.


https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/ar ... er/561317/
Quote:
Trump’s Right-Hand Troll
Quote:
In the campy TV drama that is Donald Trump’s Washington, Miller has carved out an enigmatic role. He lurks in the background for weeks at a time, only to emerge with crucial cameos in the most explosive episodes. The one where Trump signed a havoc-wreaking travel ban during his first week in office, unleashing global chaos and mass protests? Miller helped draft the executive order. The one where the federal government shut down over a high-stakes immigration standoff on Capitol Hill? Miller was accused of derailing the negotiations. (“As long as Stephen Miller is in charge of negotiating immigration, we’re going nowhere,” Senator Lindsey Graham grumbled.) To watch him in his most memorable scenes—theatrically hurling accusations of “cosmopolitan bias” at a reporter; getting his mic cut in the middle of a belligerent Sunday-show appearance—is to be left mesmerized, wondering, Is this guy serious?
Quote:
Inside the White House, Miller has emerged as a staunch ideologue and an immigration hawk championing an agenda of right-wing nationalism. But people who have known him at different points in his life say his political worldview is also rooted in a deep-seated instinct for trolling. Miller represents a rising generation of conservatives for whom “melting the snowflakes” and “triggering the libs” are first principles.
Quote:
When high-profile Republicans are asked to describe their early intellectual influences, they tend to name-check a lot of the same Serious Thinkers: Edmund Burke. Milton Friedman. Friedrich Hayek. Maybe Ayn Rand. Miller’s list is different. When I asked him which books had shaped his politics, he rattled off a procession of titles by screed artists and talk-radio personalities, including David Horowitz—the author of such works as Hating Whitey and Other Progressive Causes—and Larry Elder, who wrote The Ten Things You Can’t Say in America. What these books lacked in substance, they made up for in visceral appeal. “When I read Rush Limbaugh’s The Way Things Ought to Be, it was like a page-turning thriller to me,” Miller recalled, fondly. “Every page was like some new revelation.”
He seems to have been a nasty little twit since he was a teenager: jumping into a girls' race to prove male superiority, telling a friend they couldn't be friends any more partly because of his "Latino heritage," and complaining about Spanish language announcements in high school, and later inviting extremists to speak at his college and derailing discussions in classrooms with his inflammatory comments. The article also describes how he apparently manipulated Trump into the mood where he derailed the meeting to discuss a bipartisan agreement on immigration and ranted about "shithole countries."


https://www.theatlantic.com/internation ... eo/561449/
Quote:
How Trump Could Revive the Iranian Regime

A policy seemingly aimed at bringing about the collapse of the government could backfire.
Quote:
“When your enemy is making a mistake,” Napoleon purportedly cautioned, “never interrupt him.” In recent months the Islamic Republic of Iran has been battered by accumulating crises—including a collapsing currency, an irrepressible citizen’s-rights and feminist movement, and persistent labor strikes—that have called into question its continued viability. It is increasingly evident that the Trump administration’s goal, as outlined most recently by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, is to exacerbate these crises to hasten either an Iranian capitulation or political implosion. While Iran’s positive political transformation is a worthy goal, the Trump administration’s reckless execution of this strategy could serve to resuscitate an ailing regime.



https://www.theguardian.com/science/201 ... r-employee
Quote:
Nasa’s output of climate change information aimed at the public has dwindled under the Trump administration, with a former employee claiming “fear and anxiety” within the agency has led to an online retreat from the issue.

Laura Tenenbaum, a former science communicator for Nasa, said she was warned off using the term “global warming” on social media and restricted in speaking to the media due to her focus on climate change....Tenenbaum said that around a month after Trump’s inauguration last year an “arduous review process” was put in place over every blog post, Facebook post and tweet that she put out from Nasa’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California.

...Planned blogposts on coal plants being turned into solar plants, “reasons to be positive about Nasa” and an interview with Gavin Schmidt, a senior Nasa climate scientist, were all either halted or scrapped due to interference from career staff nervous about provoking the new administration, according to Tenenbaum.


Edit to add:
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... armworkers
Quote:
The AGs from Maryland, California and New York sued the Trump administration on Wednesday for indefinitely suspending an key requirement in the Agricultural Worker Protection Standard (WPS), which requires employers to give training to workers meant to protect them from pesticide poisoning.

...The EPA is also under scrutiny for its handling of another chemical: per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS), which is linked to cancer. The agency is grappling with how to handle traces of the substance found in drinking water and was criticized last week for lacking transparency over the policy-making process.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Thu 31 May , 2018 6:14 pm
Offline
 
Posts: 2048
Joined: Fri 10 Aug , 2012 4:42 pm
 
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/39003 ... and-mexico
Quote:
The Trump administration will levy hefty steel and aluminum tariffs on the European Union, Canada and Mexico starting on Friday, a move that brought threats of retaliation from the major trading partners.

Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said that President Trump had decided on Thursday morning to end the temporary exemptions for the three key trading allies despite their two months of lobbying to avoid the tariffs, raising tensions among the economic partners.

...The Section 232 law, which is rarely used, allows tariffs to be placed on imports in the name of national security. Trump is considering the same law to employ tariffs on automobiles.
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/39004 ... s-products
Quote:
The government of Mexico announced on Thursday it would implement new duties on various U.S. products in response to President Trump's decision to levy steel and aluminum tariffs on the country. "Mexico reiterates its position against protectionist measures that affect and distort international commerce in goods," the government said in a statement.

"In response to the tariffs imposed by the United States, Mexico will impose equivalent measures to various products like flat steels (hot and cold foil, including coated and various tubes), lamps, legs and shoulders of pork, sausages and food preparations, apples, grapes, blueberries, various cheeses, among others, up to an amount comparable to the level of affectation."
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/39004 ... um-tariffs
Quote:
The EU said it will file a case against the United States at the World Trade Organization (WTO) and take retaliatory action, most likely in the form of reciprocal tariffs.

...Jean-Claude Juncker, president of the European Commission, said, "The U.S. leaves us no choice but to proceed with a WTO dispute settlement case and the imposition of additional duties on a number of U.S. imports." “We will defend the EU’s interests, in full compliance with international trade law,” he added.

Besides a WTO case, Malmström said the EU will impose "rebalancing measures and take any necessary steps to protect the EU market from trade diversion caused by these U.S. restrictions."
Edit to add Canada:https://www.fin.gc.ca/activty/consult/c ... aa-eng.asp
Quote:
On May 31, 2018, the United States (U.S.) announced the imposition of tariffs on imports of certain steel and aluminum products from Canada (at the rates of 25% and 10%, respectively).

In response to these measures, Canada intends to impose surtaxes or similar trade-restrictive countermeasures against up to C$16.6 billion in imports of steel, aluminum, and other products from the U.S., representing the value of 2017 Canadian exports affected by the U.S. measures. The Government is also considering whether additional measures may be required.

http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... ars-report
Quote:
President Trump wants to impose a total ban on the imports of German luxury cars, according to a new report from CNBC and German magazine WirtschaftsWoche.

Several U.S. and European diplomats told the news outlets that Trump told French President Emmanuel Macron about his plans last month during a state visit.Trump reportedly told Macron that he would maintain the ban until no Mercedes-Benz cars are seen on Fifth Avenue in New York.
http://thehill.com/policy/international ... rt-tariffs
Quote:
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe says his country "cannot accept" potential U.S. auto import tariffs being considered by the Trump administration.
...Trump has instructed Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross to investigate whether auto imports pose a national security risk to the U.S. The investigation lays the groundwork for the administration to use a law to raise tariffs up to 25 percent on imported auto parts and vehicles.
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/39005 ... um-tariffs
Quote:
The Dow Jones industrial average sank 250 points Thursday morning after President Trump announced that he would impose steel and aluminum tariffs on Canada, Mexico and the European Union. The S&P 500 dropped 0.5 percent.

Both Mexico and the EU announced retaliatory tariffs in response to Trump's announcement, with Mexico promising to slap taxes on American steel products, pork and various agriculture and the EU imposing taxes on imported American bourbon, jeans and motorcycles, among other products.
http://thehill.com/policy/international ... is-is-dumb
Quote:
Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) on Thursday blasted President Trump after his administration announced it would impose steep tariffs on the European Union, Canada and Mexico, calling the move "dumb."

"This is dumb," Sasse said. "Europe, Canada, and Mexico are not China, and you don't treat allies the same way you treat opponents. We've been down this road before — blanket protectionism is a big part of why America had a Great Depression.


Trump also seems to be going on a pardon spree for rich-and-famous crooks with ties to him:
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... esh-dsouza
Quote:
President Trump on Thursday pardoned conservative commentator Dinesh D’Souza, who pleaded guilty in 2014 to making illegal campaign contributions.

...D’Souza is serving five years probation for illegally using straw donors to support Republican Senate candidate Wendy Long in 2012. He previously served eight months in a halfway house for the crime, which is a felony, and was ordered to pay a $30,000 fine. Long and D’Souza were friends from Dartmouth College, and he was a vocal supporter of her campaign against New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D).

...D’Souza’s clemency marks the fifth full pardon issued by Trump during his 17 months in office, with most of them going to well-known people.

Trump has shown virtually no interest in going through the Justice Department’s formal process for pardons, prompting criticism he is using the power to protect political allies.

Former Maricopa County, Ariz., Sheriff Joe Arpaio and former Bush administration official I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby are among those who have received a pardon from Trump. Like Arpaio and Trump, D’Souza promoted the unfounded conspiracy theory that Barack Obama was ineligible to serve as president because he was born outside the U.S. Obama was born in Hawaii, making him natural-born U.S. citizen.
D'Soza demonstrates his contrition by gloating:
http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... as-a-bitch
Quote:
Dinesh D'Souza lashed out at former U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara on Thursday after President Trump pardoned the conservative writer.

D'Souza in a tweet took aim at Bharara, the New York prosecutor who was behind D'Souza's 2013 conviction for illegal campaign donations. "KARMA IS A BITCH DEPT: @PreetBharara wanted to destroy a fellow Indian American to advance his career," D'Souza tweeted."Then he got fired & I got pardoned," he added.

http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... ch-stewart
Quote:
President Trump on Thursday said he is considering commuting the sentence of former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich (D) and pardoning TV personality Martha Stewart.

... Blagojevich was removed from office and convicted of a wide array of corruption charges, including trying to sell Barack Obama’s Senate seat after he was elected president in 2008. Blagojevich began serving a 14-year prison sentence in 2012.

He appeared on Trump’s “Celebrity Apprentice” reality TV show in 2010, but Trump said he doesn’t know him outside that appearance.

Stewart was convicted in 2004 for lying to federal investigators about suspected securities fraud and served time in federal prison. She also has ties to Trump through "The Apprentice,” having hosted a spinoff in 2005.



http://thehill.com/homenews/house/39006 ... -questions
Quote:
House Democrats said in a letter on Thursday that the White House is ignoring requests for information from the government's top watchdog and are asking for a hearing on the matter.

"We are writing to request that you hold an immediate hearing on the dramatic decision by the White House to obstruct investigations by our independent investigators at the Government Accountability Office. We ask that the Committee obtain testimony from the White House Counsel and General Counsel of GAO," Democratic lawmakers wrote in a letter to House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), referring to the Government Accountability Office (GAO).

...The lawmakers went on to cite a separate letter from GAO General Counsel Thomas Armstrong to White House counsel Don McGahan. ..Armstrong said the GAO had asked for meetings over the past year on a variety of different topics, including the NSC's role in "conflict prevention, mitigation, and stabilization efforts abroad" and the cost of presidential travel.

He also said the GAO had contacted Vice President Pence's office but did not receive a response.


http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... fense-fund
Quote:
An environmental organization is accusing Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) chief Scott Pruitt of violating federal ethics standards with his legal defense fund.

Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER), whose members include federal employees in environmental positions, filed a complaint Wednesday over the fund with the Office of Government Ethics.

The group alleges that Pruitt’s fund, developed to help him pay for legal representation through numerous ethics and spending scandals, violates rules against accepting gifts from parties a federal employee regulates, engaging in action that could result in “losing complete independence or impartiality of action” or the appearance thereof, and may even violate criminal law related to taking gifts.

http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... f-of-staff
Quote:
The son of a close friend of Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson will be named as HUD's deputy chief of staff, the department confirmed to CNN.

Alfonso Costa Jr. is the son of Alfonso Costa Sr., a dentist and real estate investor whom Carson once described as “one of my closest, if not my very closest friend," the network reported. Alfonso Costa Sr. was convicted of health-care fraud in 2007 and Carson wrote to the judge his behalf during the sentencing phase, CNN added.




https://www.theatlantic.com/internation ... on/561515/
Quote:
Trump’s Pick to Lead Refugee Efforts Is a Critic of Immigration

“To put somebody in charge whose track record consists of writing about how much he despises immigrants is just unfathomable.”
Quote:
When President Trump picked Ronald Mortensen to head the State Department office that coordinates the U.S. response to global refugee crises, he listed the nominee’s credentials that make him suitable for the job...What the Trump administration did not mention is Mortensen’s views on immigration, which he chronicled liberally in blog posts between June 2009 and October 2017 for the Center for Immigration Studies, a Washington think tank that supports reduced immigration to the United States...

“I think it’s alarming to have people put forward who are so strongly anti-immigrant when the job requires building bridges to other countries and working to help people in need around the world,” Anne Richards, who served from 2012 to 2017 as the Assistant Secretary of State for Population, Refugees, and Migration (PRM), the post Mortensen has been nominated to...Richards’s remarks are indicative of the widespread criticism directed at Mortensen’s nomination from individuals and groups advocating for refugees in the United States.

...But other than those blog posts, little is known about Mortensen, who spent years in government service and created few ripples.

...Mortensen’s nomination is part of a larger pattern of the Trump administration relying on critics of immigration to staff its immigration-related functions. Andrew Veprek, who is seen as skeptical of the U.S. refugee program, is now the deputy assistant secretary in the bureau that Mortensen has been nominated to lead. Veprek, a foreign service officer, was previously at the White House where he worked closely with Stephen Miller, Trump’s senior adviser, who supports lower immigration to the U.S. Jon Feere, who also worked at CIS, is now a senior adviser to Thomas Homan, who is the director of the bureau of Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The administration has also nominated Ken Isaacs, the vice president of Samaritan’s Purse, a Christian charity group, to head the United Nation’s International Organization for Migration. Isaacs has made remarks criticizing Islam.

...Trump’s administration has set a ceiling of 45,000 refugees for this fiscal year—the lowest in decades.

“Their goal is to break the system. It’s to make it so that the U.S. is no longer the leading country for refugee resettlement,” an expert on refugee-related issues, who requested anonymity out of a fear of retribution from the Trump administration, told me.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


Top
Profile Quote
aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Sat 02 Jun , 2018 4:10 pm
Offline
 
Posts: 2048
Joined: Fri 10 Aug , 2012 4:42 pm
 
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/39017 ... set-clause
Quote:
Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Thursday that NAFTA negotiations with the U.S. broke down after Vice President Pence demanded that he agree in advance to a five-year "sunset" provision.

Trudeau said at a news conference that he was prepared to travel to Washington this week to put the finishing touches on a reworked deal when he received a phone call from Pence, who insisted that any deal must expire after five years.

..."I had to highlight that there was no possibility of any Canadian prime minister signing a NAFTA deal that included a five-year sunset clause, and obviously the visit didn’t happen."
Trump's response:
http://thehill.com/policy/international ... no-deal-at
Quote:
"The United States has been taken advantage of for many decades on trade. Those days are over," Trump said in a statement issued to reporters by the White House. "Earlier today, this message was conveyed to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau of Canada: The United State will agree to a fair deal, or there will be no deal at all."

http://thehill.com/policy/international ... mp-tariffs
Quote:
Canada filed a case against the U.S. at the World Trade Organization (WTO) on Friday, marking the latest effort by a key U.S. ally to put pressure on the Trump administration to remove stiff tariffs on steel and aluminum imports.

Canada joins the E.U. in dragging a mounting trade dispute with the U.S. to the WTO, which regulates international trade.

https://www.theatlantic.com/internation ... mp/561782/
Quote:
Trudeau Reaches His Breaking Point With Trump
The Canadian leader’s response to U.S. tariffs formed his sharpest-ever rebuke of the president.
Quote:
NAFTA is being renegotiated by the three countries, but the pact looks set to go the way of the Paris climate accord, the Iran deal, and the Trans-Pacific Partnership. The advisers who advocated for Trump to remain in those multilateral pacts have long left the administration and those who remain say they support Trump’s worldview. Indeed, Ross, the treasury secretary, said Thursday the tariffs on Canada were being imposed because of insufficient progress on talks to renegotiate NAFTA. Just days earlier, investors were optimistic that the three countries were close to an agreement. No longer.

Trudeau suggested as much when he said Thursday that he canceled a trip to Washington to meet with Trump about an agreement on NAFTA because Vice President Mike Pence told him that a meeting could only go ahead if a sunset clause were added to the pact. Canada views such a clause—one in which NAFTA would be renegotiated every five years—as a red line because it creates exactly the kind of economic uncertainty that deals like NAFTA are meant to eliminate.

http://thehill.com/policy/finance/39040 ... r-business
Quote:
Some U.S. companies say they are already feeling a squeeze from President Trump's new tariffs on steel and aluminum. A number of firms that manufacture products using the metals told the Wall Street Journal that the tariffs have led to higher material prices, forcing them to charge customers more for their products.

As a result, the companies told the Journal that some customers have chosen to take their business to foreign suppliers that use cheaper materials that eschew tariffs.


http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... egulations
Quote:
Eight state attorneys general filed a lawsuit against the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) late Thursday alleging the agency is breaking the law by failing to enforce landfill methane regulations.

The regulation at issue is a 2016 guideline developed to help solid waste landfills reduce emissions. While the guideline went into effect in October 2016, the Trump administration has since delayed the rule, saying it will instead complete a reconsideration of it by the spring of 2020.

The attorneys general say the multiyear delay is a violation of the Clean Air Act.

http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... -to-pruitt
Quote:
A lobbyist whose wife rented a condo to Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Scott Pruitt lobbied the agency for three clients last year, apparently contradicting his claim that he hadn’t represented clients at the EPA during the Trump administration, according to new disclosure forms filed by his former employer.

http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... coal-plant
Quote:
President Trump has ordered Energy Secretary Rick Perry to take "immediate steps" to prevent the further closures of coal and nuclear power plants around the U.S., the White House said Friday.

...The statement from the White House comes hours after Bloomberg News obtained a draft memo detailing an Energy Department plan to order grid operators to buy electricity from coal and nuclear plants that are at risk of retiring due to cheaper energy available from renewable energy sources and natural gas.


...Earlier this year, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission unanimously rejected a plan by Perry to require electric utilities and their customers to pay higher rates to coal and nuclear plants and guarantee them a profit.

Since then, the Energy Department has considered granting a petition from FirstEnergy Solutions to require such payments solely in an area in the Northeast, or using the Defense Production Act to mandate buying coal and nuclear power, as the leaked DOE memo suggests.

http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... e-cleanups
Quote:
The official tapped to chair the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) task force charged with overseeing the cleanup of some of the country's most contaminated sites is a former lawyer for a plastics and chemicals company suspected of creating some of those sites.

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... c-wildlife
Quote:
The Interior Department is pushing back on the first permit application for development work in the newly-opened Arctic National Wildlife Refuge amid criticism from environmental groups.

An oil exploration firm and two Alaska Native corporations together submitted an application to begin seismic exploration work in the wilderness area, the first application for such a project since Congress opened up the area to such work last year, The Washington Post reported


http://thehill.com/regulation/court-bat ... estricting
Quote:
The largest federal employee union is suing President Trump over his new executive order restricting the amount of time federal employees on the job can spend on union activity.

The American Federation of Government Employees (AFGE) alleges in the lawsuit, filed in U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia on Wednesday, that Trump’s order violates the First Amendment and is an overreach of Trump’s authority laid out in the Constitution.

...The order was among three signed by Trump last week aimed at cutting down the time it takes to fire federal employees.

The AFGE is challenging one of the orders, which restricts so-called “official time,” or the time that federal staffers who are also union officials can spend at work representing employees who filed claims of unfair labor practices or appealing discipline taken against them.


http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... a-real-job
Quote:
Charlie Kushner, the father of President Trump's adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner, said Friday that the ethics watchdogs scrutinizing his family's real estate business are "jerks" who "can't get a real job."

...The wealthy investor dismissed concerns of ethics violations and conflicts of interest within his family business in an interview published Friday, calling recent probes into the Kushner Cos.' loans and financial records "nonsense." ...He said the watchdogs are intent on attacking the wealthy. "All they want to do is assure that poor, not successful people go into government," Charlie Kushner said.


http://thehill.com/homenews/state-watch ... tes-double
Quote:
New York interim Attorney General Barbara Underwood said on Thursday that President Trump's pardoning of conservative commentator Dinesh D'Souza shows his willingness to thwart justice and adds urgency to the state's double jeopardy loophole.

“President Trump’s latest pardon makes crystal clear his willingness to use his pardon power to thwart the cause of justice, rather than advance it," Underwood said in a statement.

..."Lawmakers must act now to close New York’s double jeopardy loophole and ensure that anyone who evades federal justice by virtue of a politically expedient pardon can be held accountable if they violate New York law.”




EDIT to add:
http://thehill.com/business-a-lobbying/ ... ist-report
Quote:
Chinese telecommunications company ZTE hired a former member of the Trump campaign as a lobbyist amid negotiations with President Trump to loosen restrictions hampering the company's ability to do business with the U.S.

The Daily Beast reported that the company hired Bryan Lanza, a former adviser to both the Trump campaign and Trump's White House transition team, just a day after the president tweeted that he was considering helping ZTE regain access to American markets.

http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... sec-report
Quote:
Former Rep. Scott Garrett (R-N.J.), President Trump's rejected nominee to run the Export-Import Bank, has been quietly hired to a position at the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) despite the agency's hiring freeze, Politico reported Saturday.

Garrett had an "excepted service" position as an attorney created for him at the SEC’s Office of the General Counsel earlier this year, according to the report. The personnel move, which was not announced publicly by the SEC, was discovered through a Freedom of Information Act request.

Garrett's hiring to the SEC follows his failure to win enough votes last year after two Republicans joined with Democrats to oppose his nomination to lead the Export-Import Bank. Those who opposed him cited Garrett's past opposition to the bank.


https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/ar ... es/561854/
Quote:
Tariffs Can Work—but Not Stupid Ones
Trump’s new steel and aluminum tariffs mistake the means for the ends.
Quote:
Tariffs and interventionist trade policy have had their place in the building of the American economy. You can look it up! But to say that they have paid off in particular times and places is different from saying that they’re generally a good idea. Like other inherently damaging steps, from invasive surgery to blowing up decrepit buildings, they are justified only when the alternative is worse.

Tariffs are good or bad, useful or pointless, depending on the balance of disruption they cause versus benefits they bring. By that standard, Donald Trump’s new steel and aluminum tariffs against Mexico, Canada, and the European Union are both pointless and bad.

...The reason for starting, the cause for applying the tariff in the first place, is whatever the other country has done that you find objectionable. The reason for ending is that the other country has halted or changed that practice. The whole object in applying the tariff is to get back to the position where you can remove it, because the other country has stopped doing what you considered wrong....The countries being punished—Canada, Mexico, those of the European Union, and others—aren’t doing anything about steel or aluminum that the United States could plausibly call wrong or unfair.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Mon 04 Jun , 2018 6:15 pm
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Posts: 2048
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http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3905 ... ility-were
Quote:
Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) on Monday said that his team was also denied a tour of a migrant processing facility one day after Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) said he was barred entry from a detention center in Texas.

...“My team was also barred from touring a migrant processing facility where families are being separated,” the senator added. “When the elected representatives of the people can't observe how our government is operating, we're in an upside down world.”

...Merkley on Sunday was turned away from an immigrant detention center in Texas which he said was housing immigrant children. In a live stream of the event, he is seen introducing himself to guards outside the detention building and asking for permission to enter. “I was barred entry. Asked repeatedly to speak to a supervisor—he finally came out and said he can’t tell us anything. Police were called on us,” Merkley said in a tweet.


http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... don-myself
Quote:
As has been stated by numerous legal scholars, I have the absolute right to PARDON myself, but why would I do that when I have done nothing wrong? In the meantime, the never ending Witch Hunt, led by 13 very Angry and Conflicted Democrats (& others) continues into the mid-terms!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 4, 2018

In a subsequent tweet, the president argued the appointment of Robert Mueller as special counsel “is totally UNCONSTITUTIONAL” but cited no evidence to support his claim.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Tue 05 Jun , 2018 2:16 pm
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http://thehill.com/latino/390724-border ... om-parents
Quote:
U.S. Border Patrol agents are running out of space to hold migrant children who have been separated from their families, NBC News reported Tuesday.

Border agents have been placing children who crossed the U.S.-Mexico border illegally in holding stations. Roughly 550 children are in custody, and of those, nearly 300 have spent more than 72 hours there, NBC reported.

Seventy-two hours marks the time limit for immigrants of any age to be held in the border stations, which are meant to serve as temporary housing facilities.
Trump continues to pretend that the Democrats are responsible for his administration's policy, despite all evidence to the contrary. At the same time, his administration continues to defend this sick policy:

http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... -they-dont
Quote:
Attorney General Jeff Sessions on Tuesday defended the Trump administration's policy of separating migrant children from their families, arguing that the measure promotes border security and that the children are "well taken care of."

..."If people don’t want to be separated from their children, they should not bring them with them. We’ve got to get this message out," Sessions said.



Trump's pettiness is on full display in his latest public spat.
http://thehill.com/homenews/news/philad ... l-kneeling
Quote:
Only 10 to 12 members of the Philadelphia Eagles planned to attend a now-canceled White House visit celebrating their Super Bowl win, according to a report by The Washington Post.

The event was abruptly canceled by President Trump on Monday. In his announcement, Trump cited the team's participation in national anthem protests.

...This marks the second time the president has disinvited a championship team from the White House over political differences. Trump rescinded an invitation to the Golden State Warriors last year after star player Stephen Curry said he probably would not attend.

http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... -anthem-at
Quote:
President Trump taunted NFL players in a tweet early Tuesday, saying there would be no "escaping to locker rooms" when the national anthem is played at a White House event later in the day.

"We will proudly be playing the National Anthem and other wonderful music celebrating our Country today at 3 P.M., The White House, with the United States Marine Band and the United States Army Chorus. Honoring America! NFL, no escaping to Locker Rooms!" Trump tweeted.

http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... nfl-report
Quote:
President Trump told White House officials that they should use the Republican-backed tax plan to punish the NFL, according to a report from The Washington Post. Aides reportedly began looking into how to punish the league and those ideas spread to Capitol Hill. White House and Capitol Hill aides told The Post about the remarks.

A White House official told the publication that the president was venting when he made the remarks and that the ideas were never put into action.
Nice spin. Both seem to be true - 1) the president was venting and 2) the ideas didn't get implemented. But if aides started looking into ways to implement his plans, then it's pretty clear that Trump wanted them to happen.




http://thehill.com/regulation/technolog ... neutrality
Quote:
States are pushing their own net neutrality laws and rules in defiance of the Federal Communications Commission’s (FCC) repeal, heightening the possibility that supporters will be waging another legal battle over the popular Obama-era regulations.



Here's a good use of Dept of Justice resources/ taxpayer money:
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... m-blocking
Quote:
The Department of Justice (DOJ) said Monday that it will appeal a federal judge’s ruling that President Trump can't block Twitter users, Reuters reported.


https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/201 ... estigators
Quote:
Federal investigators have accused Donald Trump’s former campaign manager, Paul Manafort, of tampering with potential witnesses while on bail ahead of his federal bank fraud and tax case.

Prosecutors asked that the judge overseeing his case “revoke or revise” the order releasing him ahead of trial.

In a court filing on Monday, prosecutors working for the special counsel Robert Mueller... said Manafort and an associate “repeatedly” attempted to contact witnesses using his phone and an encrypted messaging application
.


And Trump seems to imply in a tweet that he would not have chosen Sessions if he didn't think he could make him shut down the Mueller probe:
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... -hunt-hoax
Quote:
"The Russian Witch Hunt Hoax continues, all because Jeff Sessions didn’t tell me he was going to recuse himself...I would have quickly picked someone else," Trump said.

Edit to add:
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... -executive
Quote:
More than a dozen lawyers and legal scholars have signed onto a letter to two top White House lawyers, torching an argument deployed by President Trump's personal attorneys that the president cannot obstruct justice.

The letter, sent on Monday to White House counsel Don McGahn and special counsel to the president Emmet Flood, sharply rebuts a letter sent by Trump's attorneys to special counsel Robert Mueller earlier this year, arguing that the president has unfettered authority over all federal investigations, including the right to end them.

“The Office of the President is not a get out of jail free card for lawless behavior,” the letter reads. “Indeed, our country’s Founders made it clear in the Declaration of Independence that they did not believe that even a king had such powers...
http://thehill.com/homenews/media/39071 ... of-the-law
Quote:
Judge Andrew Napolitano blasted President Trump's legal team during an appearance on Fox News Monday, arguing it was showing a “sophomoric view of the law" and that it was not serving the president well.

The senior judicial analyst for Fox News called the January memo from Trump’s legal team to special counsel Robert Mueller a "disgrace" and "very harmful" to the president's case.


http://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/39 ... t-proposal
Quote:
The White House on Tuesday walked back a proposal to claw back $252 million in unspent funding from the 2015 Ebola outbreak. The proposal was part of a broader "rescissions" package the Trump administration sent to Congress last month aimed at rescinding $15 billion in unspent funding Congress appropriated years ago.

But public health groups and Democrats raised an uproar, pointing at the ongoing Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republican of the Congo that has killed 27 people.


https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/0 ... ng-invite/
Quote:
The US ambassador to Germany was on Tuesday accused of attempting to act as a rival to Angela Merkel after it emerged he had invited the Austrian chancellor Sebastian Kurz to a meeting during his visit to Berlin next week.

The row comes a day after Richard Grenell, who was personally appointed ambassador by Donald Trump, came under attack from all sides of the German political spectrum over an interview with Breitbart magazine in which he said he wanted to “empower conservatives across Europe”.

The German foreign ministry has demanded an explanation from the US while opposition politicians accused have accused Mr Grenell of “interfering” in the country’s politics.

...It is highly unusual for ambassadors to entertain visiting heads of government, and the move has ruffled feathers in Berlin. The choice of Mr Kurz is particularly sensitive following Mr Grenell’s comments about “empowering conservatives across Europe”. The Austrian leader is in coalition with the far-Right Freedom Party (FPÖ).
http://thehill.com/policy/international ... al-remarks
Quote:
The State Department defended U.S. ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell on Tuesday after he stoked controversy in Germany by saying he wanted to "empower" conservatives overseas.

State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert told reporters in a press briefing that Grenell "was merely highlighting that there are some parties and candidates in Europe who are doing well right now."


http://thehill.com/policy/technology/39 ... e-business
Quote:
ZTE has reportedly reached an agreement in principle with the Trump administration to lift the Department of Commerce’s ban on American companies selling equipment to the Chinese telecommunications giant.

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing- ... of-america
Quote:
A man took a knee during the national anthem at President Trump’s “Celebration of America” event Tuesday amid renewed uproar over NFL protests during the song. European reporters captured a photo and video of the unidentified individual kneeling during a performance of the national anthem.

...Trump's "Celebration of America" event lasted roughly 10 minutes.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Tue 05 Jun , 2018 10:29 pm
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The New Yorker has a good background article on the Trump administration's policy of taking children away from their parents while the family's request for asylum goes through the courts:
https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-des ... ir-parents
Quote:
Two months into Donald Trump’s Presidency, John Kelly, then the Secretary of Homeland Security, publicly confirmed that his department was considering separating immigrant parents from their children at the border, as a way of discouraging families from crossing illegally. It was a radical idea, one that past Administrations had considered and then dismissed as too extreme and too complicated. After coming under intense criticism from the press, human-rights advocates, and members of Congress, Kelly backed off from it.

...Last summer, public defenders and immigration judges along the border began noticing an alarming pattern. Parents who had crossed into the U.S. with their children were arriving to detention facilities without them.

...At first, the Trump Administration denied there was a formal family-separation policy in place. Then, as the evidence mounted, it claimed that it was only trying to protect immigrant kids from smugglers and imposters posing as their guardians.

...Last month, the pretense fell away completely. On April 6th, Jeff Sessions and Kirstjen Nielsen, the head of Homeland Security, announced a zero-tolerance policy for immigrants at the border. Anyone who didn’t cross the U.S. border at an official port of entry would be criminally prosecuted, even if they were seeking asylum, and those travelling with their children would be separated from them.
Quote:
There appeared to be no coördination between the different government agencies involved, so parents were losing contact with their own children....In one judicial order, a federal magistrate judge, in El Paso, Texas, asked the government, “What are the arresting agency’s procedures for providing information (e.g. location and well-being) regarding the unaccompanied minor children of undocumented alien defendants charged with a petty misdemeanor such as illegal entry . . . ?” Government lawyers didn’t seem to have an answer.
Quote:
According to the D.H.S., six hundred and fifty-eight children were separated from their parents between May 6th and May 19th. Reports have surfaced of children, some as young as toddlers, being wrested from family members, and of parents being deported before they could locate their children, who remain stranded in the U.S.
This is evil, pure and simple.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Wed 06 Jun , 2018 8:21 pm
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Posts: 2048
Joined: Fri 10 Aug , 2012 4:42 pm
 
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/39099 ... rade-moves
Quote:
The World Trade Organization (WTO) advanced trade complaints from the European Union and Canada against the United States on Wednesday after President Trump announced he would move ahead with steep tariffs on imported steel and aluminum.

...Should the WTO rule that Trump’s tariffs are illegal, the EU is planning to impose another $4.2 billion in tariffs on American goods, though those would not take effect until 2021.

Critics of Trump’s tariffs have warned that his aggressive trade actions could spark a trade war, in which the U.S. and its trade partners volleyed tariffs back and forth, hurting exporters and consumers.
http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... broken-wto
Quote:
The president’s top economic adviser on Wednesday implied that the U.S. may not abide by any rulings from the World Trade Organization (WTO), a tough signal ahead of a G-7 summit this weekend where Trump is expected to face a backlash from allied leaders over his protectionist trade agenda.

“International, multilateral organizations are not going to determine American policy,” White House National Economic Council Director Larry Kudlow told reporters at a press briefing organized to preview President Trump’s trip to Canada for the G-7.

...Far from backing away from the tariffs, Trump may consider threatening new trade barriers at the meeting, according to the Washington Post. He is in the process of evaluating steep tariffs on automobiles under section 232 of the trade law, the same approach he took for the aluminum and steel tariffs. The section 232 law allows the president to put tariffs in place for national security concerns.

...A study by the Coalition of American Metal Manufacturers and Users released Wednesday calculated that the combination of U.S. tariffs, foreign retaliation, and self-imposed quotas from allies Trump has struck trade deals with would lop 0.2 percent off American GDP each year, and destroy over 400,000 jobs.

Kudlow, a former CNBC commentator who had frequently criticized tariffs before joining the White House, vigorously defended Trump’s trade actions on Wednesday, insisting that he was the “strongest trade reformer of the last 20 years.”
http://thehill.com/policy/international ... ada-report
Quote:
The White House is discussing additional economic penalties against Canada in response to the country's threat to impose retaliatory tariffs on U.S. products, according to The Washington Post.

The Post offered no details on what kind of penalties the administration is considering against Canada, which plans to levy tariffs on about $13 billion of U.S. products in response to U.S. tariffs on Canadian steel and aluminum.
http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/s ... -authority
Quote:
Senators are moving forward with legislation that would curb President Trump's authority on tariffs, despite opposition from the White House.

"If the president truly believes invoking Section 232 is necessary to protect the United States from a genuine threat, he should make the case to Congress and to the American people and do the hard work necessary to secure congressional approval," Corker said in a statement announcing the bill. In addition to Corker, Sens. Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.), Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), Mark Warner (D-Va.), Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii), Ron Johnson (R-Wis.), Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.), Mike Lee (R-Utah), and Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) are supporting the bill.

The bill would require Trump to submit tariffs implemented under Section 232 of the trade law for approval to Congress. Any approval legislation would then be fast-tracked through both chambers



https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/ar ... ns/561974/
Quote:
A top aide to Scott Pruitt, Millan Hupp, resigned from the Environmental Protection Agency...Hupp, who worked as the director of scheduling and advance, has been entangled in many of the scandals dogging EPA Administrator Pruitt. In March, she was one of two aides who received hefty salary bumps, even after the White House refused Pruitt’s request for raises. And as The Washington Post reported on Monday, she recently testified to the House Oversight Committee that she regularly spent her days doing personal tasks for Pruitt, from hunting for housing to calling the Trump Hotel in Washington, D.C., in order to inquire about purchasing a used mattress.

According to one top EPA official, the 26-year-old was “tired of being thrown under the bus by Pruitt,” and weary of seeing her name constantly appear in headlines about the agency.

...Hupp’s closeness with Pruitt was often a point of contention among officials; many staffers grumbled that she and others in the “Oklahoma posse,” as they were called, received special treatment, as the March raises seemed to imply.

When reached by phone, Jahan Wilcox, an EPA spokesperson, would not comment. He said: “You have a great day, you’re a piece of trash.”
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... e-of-trash
Quote:
A spokesperson for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) derided a reporter for The Atlantic as a "piece of trash" as he ended a phone call with her.

...Wilcox did not immediately respond to an email from The Hill seeking comment on the reported remark
.

http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... -to-pruitt
Quote:
President Trump reaffirmed his support for embattled Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) chief Scott Pruitt on Wednesday, saying that under him the agency is "doing really, really well."

"Thank you Scott, very much. EPA is doing really, really well,” Trump told Pruitt while praising Cabinet officials during a meeting at the Federal Emergency Management Agency.


More from that Cabinet meeting, in Trump's inimitable style:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... m-at-least
Quote:
Trump Praises His Cabinet Members at FEMA. Most of Them, at Least
Some samples:
Quote:
Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke
“Keeping very busy, I know that, Ryan, it’s good, it’s good for you, keeping busy and opening up those lands so people can use and enjoy them. Largest landlord in the world, Ryan, nobody knows that. But you’re the largest by far, the largest landlord, it’s almost half the United States if you think about it. So, great job you’re doing.”
Zinke, of course, has opened up more public lands to (and eased restrictions on) oil drilling and mining, and is systematically loosening restrictions on all forms of hunting, while trying to raise national park entrance fees astronomically.

Quote:
Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue
“Sonny Perdue and the farms are doing well, and I did the farmers a big favor last night, right? I did a big, big favor for the farmers. We love the farmers and they were happy. I know that Senator Grassley and Senator Ernst were very happy with what we did so thank you for your help, I appreciate it."
(Trump shot down a proposed new policy on biofuels Tuesday.)
btw, as far as the farmers supposedly doing so well:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... -trade-war
Quote:
The U.S.-China trade war President Donald Trump unleashed may punish the Midwest heartland that helped put him in office.

Hog producers in Iowa have seen their returns plunge in the last month and losses are expected for the full year as China’s retaliatory tariffs on U.S. pork take effect. On average, the farmers will probably see a loss of $4.34 per hog, based on futures prices as of April 2, according to Lee Schulz, an assistant professor who specializes in agricultural economics at Iowa State University.
http://fortune.com/2018/04/18/trump-tar ... upporters/
Quote:
Farmers helped carry President Donald Trump to White House. But as the former businessman threatens to unleash a global trade war, the same farmers are now forced to come to terms with how up to $150 billion in proposed tariffs on Chinese goods, and subsequent backlash from the Middle Kingdom, could hurt their livelihood.



http://thehill.com/policy/international ... kim-summit
Quote:
Former White House aide Sebastian Gorka and Fox News host Sean Hannity will be in Singapore during President Trump's summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un next week

...Gorka and Hannity are noted allies of Trump's and frequently support the president and his administration on air. In May, it was reported that Hannity and Trump speak on the phone several times a day. .
Supposedly Gorka and Hannity will be in Singapore to cover the news. As far as I know, neither is a reporter - Gorka was a White House staffer and Bannon ally (until he was forced out, possibly by Kelly https://www.politico.com/story/2017/08/ ... gns-242054 ) and Hannity is, of course, an extremist right wing commentator. Which does make you wonder what their true roles in this meeting will be.


An old article from Rolling Stone, back when Gorka still worked at the White House.
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/f ... ru-w496912
Quote:
Renowned for his disdain for the media and his blithe readiness to defend Trump to the last tweet, Gorka – who apparently tools around Washington in a Mustang with a license plate that reads ART [OF] WAR – has become a nearly ubiquitous presence on television and radio as a spokesman for the White House. "Did you see Gorka?" Trump reportedly said after Gorka took part in figurative fisticuffs on CNN. "So great. I mean, really, truly great!"

Gorka began his rise with a 2008 Ph.D. awarded by little-known Corvinus University of Budapest, an institution that several scholars who spoke to Rolling Stone described as having a questionable reputation....Perhaps even more worrisome, Gorka's thesis proposed a dramatic restructuring of the national-security apparatus to create a police state. He suggests a radical reform of "internal barriers between the police force, the army and various intelligence services." This could also be seen as the start of a Gestapo-like, all-powerful national system of repression. "That's about as Nazi Germany- or Soviet Union-like a proposal as I've ever heard," says Patrick Eddington of the conservative Cato Institute. "The net effect would be to suspend the Bill of Rights, if his proposal ever saw the light of day."
The article goes on to describe what seems to be some very unsavory connections.




Also from The Atlantic, the newspaper that has earned a special bit of nastiness from an official government (EPA) spokesperson (the saying "fish rots from the head down" seems particularly apt, these days):
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/ar ... -a/562217/
Quote:
The Astonishing Tale of the Man Mueller Calls ‘Person A’

One of the most shocking revelations from the special counsel’s investigation is the suggestion that Paul Manafort’s longtime aide is a pawn of Russian intelligence.
Quote:
What everyone close to Paul Manafort already knew, and what The New York Times and other outlets later confirmed, is that Mueller was pseudonymously describing none other than Konstantin Kilimnik. Or to put it even more bluntly than Mueller: Donald Trump’s campaign chairman had a pawn of Russian intelligence as his indispensable alter ego.


Edit to add:
http://thehill.com/policy/finance/39107 ... d-shutdown
Quote:
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) on Wednesday said it is making cuts to three key advisory boards, enraging advocates who say the agency’s acting director doesn't want to engage with dissenting opinions.

The CFPB told members of the advisory boards Wednesday that the bureau would shrink the groups and shift the agency’s external outreach to town halls and roundtables across the U.S., citing cost concerns. CFPB communications director John Czwartacki said that members of the boards had not been fired and that the bureau would “continue to meet its statutory obligation” to convene board meetings. The changes will impact the CFPB’s Community Advisory Board, Community Bank Advisory Council, and Credit Union Advisory Council.

The CFPB told board members in a Wednesday email that the groups wouldn’t meet until the bureau selects their replacements

...CAB members said Mulvaney’s move to reshape the board is meant to silence opponents of the bureau’s new direction.

...CFPB officials downplayed the furor among consumer advocacy groups and insisted that CAB members were only looking out for themselves, not the groups they claim to serve.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Thu 07 Jun , 2018 1:51 pm
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Posts: 2048
Joined: Fri 10 Aug , 2012 4:42 pm
 
http://thehill.com/regulation/court-bat ... trump-over
Quote:
A federal judge on Wednesday refused the Trump administration's request to dismiss a lawsuit by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) challenging the practice of separating migrant parents and children at the U.S. border.

U.S. District Judge Dana M. Sabraw in San Diego said in his ruling that the Trump administration's "wrenching separation" of families might violate the Constitution's guarantees of due process.

“Such conduct, if true, as it is assumed to be on the present motion, is brutal, offensive, and fails to comport with traditional notions of fair play and decency,” Sabraw wrote. "The facts alleged are sufficient to show the government conduct at issue ‘shocks the conscience’ and violates Plaintiffs’ constitutional right to family integrity.”


http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... ate-change
Quote:
A U.S. district judge has ordered the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to release any documents used by Administrator Scott Pruitt to make his public statement that human behavior is not a “primary contributor” to climate change.

The chief judge of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia, Beryl Howell, said in a ruling issued last Friday but first widely reported this week that the EPA had to comply with a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request filed last year by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER).
Another of Pruitt's top staffers, a lawyer, also resigned yesterday. I haven't seen any details.



Trump's allies in Congress are blocking bipartisan efforts by centrists, if Trump won't approve of their bills:
http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/391 ... tes-agenda
Quote:
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has all but ruled out the Senate making a second attempt at immigration reform legislation this year. "Honestly ... I can't see us going back to immigration this year unless there was some proposal that the president actually was okay with and said he was willing to sign. I don't think he's okay with anything that I've seen coming our way," McConnell told Fox News.

...McConnell's comments come as House Republicans are barreling toward a make-or-break moment on their immigration reform fight. House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) is expected to pitch a compromise to rank-and-file members during a closed-door caucus meeting on Thursday.

If Ryan can't sell his caucus on a compromise, centrist House Republicans are threatening to push forward with a discharge petition that would set up a series of immigration votes on the House floor.

http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3911 ... -authority
Quote:
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said on Wednesday that the Senate will not pass legislation reining in President Trump's tariff authority, despite frustration within the caucus about the administration's recent trade actions.
"We're not going to be, in the Senate, passing a bill preventing the president from what he can legally do under current law," McConnell told Fox News on Wednesday night.

...McConnell's comments come as a bipartisan group of senators, led by Corker, introduced legislation that would require Trump to get congressional approval if he wants to implement tariffs under the national security provisions of the trade law, referred to as Section 232.
http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3910 ... hite-house
Quote:
GOP Sen. Lindsey Graham (S.C.) is signaling that he will not support legislation reining in President Trump's authority on tariffs after a closed-door meeting at the White House on Wednesday.

“Now is not the time to undercut President Trump’s ability to negotiate better trade deals. I will not support any efforts that weaken his position," Graham said in a statement.

...The White House is stepping up its efforts to kill the momentum behind Corker's proposal. Supporters are hoping to attach the bill to the National Defense Authorization Act as soon as this week.


http://thehill.com/business-a-lobbying/ ... gainst-ban
Quote:
Chinese telecom firm ZTE is spending big on K Street as it looks to save its business and remove restrictions on its ability to buy from U.S. suppliers.

The company is leaning heavily on three firms and representation that includes ex-lawmakers, former federal regulators and individuals with ties to President Trump.

A report late Tuesday suggested the investment might be paying off.


http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... 20-percent
Quote:
A plan being pushed by Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Secretary Ben Carson would raise rents on Americans receiving federal assistance by 20 percent on average in metropolitan areas around the country, according to a new study.

...The rent hike, however, is estimated to be on average six times the greater than the average growth in hourly wages, meaning that thousands of Americans could find themselves at risk of homelessness under the plan.

...Carson has billed the plan as an incentive to drive lower-income Americans, many of whom already have jobs, to work. “It’s our attempt to give poor people a way out of poverty,” Carson told Fox News.

http://thehill.com/policy/national-secu ... orth-korea
Quote:
National security adviser John Bolton has not yet called a Cabinet meeting to discuss the upcoming summit between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, Politico reported Thursday.

Sources told the news outlet that Trump’s preparation ahead of the summit with Kim has been “unstructured.” The president has reportedly not consulted heavily with his national security team, instead relying largely on Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.

Trump has also not yet led a meeting focused on the North Korea summit with officials from his national security council, Politico reported.


https://www.economist.com/graphic-detai ... wer-plants
Quote:
On June 1st—just as America’s fellow members of the G7, a club of the world’s biggest economies, were condemning Donald Trump’s tariffs on steel and aluminium at a meeting in Canada—the president announced a new regulatory plan for America’s energy market. The proposal, which was detailed in a 41-page memo circulated among senior White House staff, would prop up ailing coal- and nuclear-power generators by forcing electricity-grid operators to buy energy from unprofitable plants. The official justification for the policy was national security. But the chief beneficiaries would be a small number of companies, located mainly in Midwestern states whose voters backed Mr Trump in the presidential election of 2016 (see map).
Quote:
Mr Trump’s latest proposal would direct regional grid operators to buy power from coal and nuclear plants, which have been struggling to compete with natural gas and renewable-energy sources for years. The cost, however, would be borne by consumers, and could come to as much as $12bn a year. ... In December Nora Brownell, a former FERC commissioner appointed by George W. Bush, described the proposed subsidies as “cash for cronies”. The Energy Department is nevertheless expected to carry out its plan in the coming months. Whether it survives legal challenges by natural gas and renewable energy companies is unclear

Should Congress put more power in Trump's hands?
https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/ar ... ry/562280/
Quote:
A Decision Too Important for Rick Perry
Quote:
The Trump administration and its allies in Congress want the secretary of energy to determine whether to develop a new class of low-yield nuclear weapons.
A generation ago, the House of Representatives debated a matter of huge civilizational consequence: whether building a neutron bomb would help deter conflict with the U.S.S.R. or make an apocalyptic catastrophe more likely by lowering the threshold for nuclear war...Today a strikingly similar question arises: Should the United States develop a low-yield nuclear warhead to match a similar weapon developed by the Russians, as the Trump administration proposes to do? Would doing so lower the threshold for nuclear war, as many more experienced hands warn? Would it trigger a new arms race that ultimately sees more nuclear weapons held by more countries?

At present, Congress must decide what course to pursue. The Trump administration is constrained from developing a new, low-yield nuclear weapon without the approval of the representatives that citizens elected. .. But strong efforts are underway to strip away those basic mechanisms of accountable republican government, as Senator Gary Peters warned Wednesday during a noteworthy aside in a Senate subcommittee hearing on a different matter.

...If the change is made, members of Congress will unburden themselves of a controversial vote and escape accountability for the potentially grave consequences. Instead, the matter will be unilaterally decided by Secretary of Energy Rick Perry, who can draw on whatever expertise he gained as … governor of Texas.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/ar ... ey/562274/
Quote:
America's Whittling Away of Consumer Protections

By suddenly ousting a board of advisors, the head of the CFPB is continuing to shape the bureau in Trump's image.





Edit to add:
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... -replacing
Quote:
The superintendent of Yellowstone National Park revealed on Thursday that he was being forced out of his post by the Trump administration and that he will be replaced by August.

..."I feel this is a punitive action but I don't know for sure," Wenk told the AP, adding that he was not provided with an official reason for his departure. Wenk cited an ongoing disagreement between himself, the administration and with Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke over the number of bison the park can handle.

Montana ranchers have raised concerns over the number of bison in Yellowstone, citing the risk of disease and overgrazing in portions of the park. Wenk said that Zinke, who served as a Montana congressman prior to joining the administration, and his staff have argued that the bison population is too high. However, Wenk argues that the number of bison, presently more than 4,000, is sustainable. "We're not a livestock operation. We're managing a national park with natural systems," he told the outlet. "We do not believe the bison population level is too high or that any scientific studies would substantiate that."

...Interior Department spokeswoman Heather Swift referred The Hill to a previous statement, saying President Trump had directed a reorganization of the government, and that Zinke was out front on the issue. ..."Personnel moves among the Senior Executive Service are conducted to better serve the taxpayer and the Department's operations." Wenk announced last week he would be retiring in 2019 after he was offered a transfer that he did not want to agree to.
This also suggests that Zinke might be planning to cull the Yellowstone bison herd to please ranchers. The bison and elk in Yellowstone do actually have a disease called brucellosis that's a problem for cattle if the animals meet, but scientific research suggests that the bison aren't transmitting it to cattle (though elk do, once in a while).


http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... lculations
Quote:
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Scott Pruitt is floating major changes to how the agency weighs the benefits and costs of regulations on air pollution and other subjects.

The EPA put out a formal notice Thursday that it is soliciting ideas for overhauling its regulatory cost-benefit analysis, heeding requests from industry groups who complained that the Obama administration improperly boosted the benefits and downplayed the costs of the agency's rules.

http://thehill.com/homenews/house/39119 ... lt-for-now
Quote:
House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) on Thursday tamped down a Republican insurrection on immigration — at least temporarily — with vows to “put pen to paper” on a compromise bill to protect the young undocumented immigrants known as Dreamers.

During a two-hour, closed-door meeting in the basement of the Capitol, Ryan and other GOP leaders urged their troops not to endorse a procedural move to force votes on the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program — known as a discharge petition — and instead give leaders more time to forge a compromise that can win 218 Republican votes.

...By the obscure rules of the discharge petition, the supporters hoping to ensure DACA votes this month have until June 12 to gather the 218 signatures needed to force the issue to the floor. ...That leaves leadership with just five days to craft legislation they believe can garner 218 GOP votes. Supporters of the petition are two Republican signatures away from the number of members needed to bypass leadership and bring the “Queen of the Hill” rule to the floor.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Fri 08 Jun , 2018 2:17 pm
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Cross the border and apply for asylum, have your kids taken away from you, get put in an actual prison with true criminals? No details in this article about who ICE is now putting into the prison system because they have no space for all the people they're arresting.

http://thehill.com/policy/national-secu ... al-prisons
Quote:
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) is transferring some 1,600 detainees to federal prisons, an ICE spokeswoman said Thursday. The detainees will be split between five prisons, with one in Victorville, Calif., taking in 1,000 people, the spokeswoman, Danielle Bennett, said in a statement.

Bennett said that the decision was made in an effort to "meet the demand for additional immigration detention space, both long and short term."

"To meet this need, ICE is collaborating with the U.S. Marshals Service (USMS), the Bureau of Prisons (BOP), private detention facility operators and local government agencies," she said.


http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... ed-into-g7
Quote:
President Trump on Friday said that Russia should be reinstated into the Group of Seven major economies, a comment that could further anger U.S. allies who have sought to isolate Moscow.

Speaking to reporters on the South Lawn before leaving for Canada to attend the G-7 summit, Trump said he has been “Russia’s worst nightmare” but argued the country should be a part of the talks.“With that being said, Russia should be in this meeting,” he said. "Why are we having a meeting without Russia being in the meeting?"

Russia was ousted from the then-Group of Eight in 2014 for annexing Crimea.


https://maplight.org/story/worried-abou ... ber-execs/
Quote:
A timber executive organized a secret Earth Day visit to an elementary school for Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt, according to emails and text messages reviewed by MapLight.

The correspondence, obtained through a public records request, underscores Pruitt’s penchant for excessive security measures and his preference for industry over the public. The EPA has routinely concealed Pruitt’s public events and refused to provide the public information about his Georgia trip, although at least 18 timber executives were invited to the elementary school for his announcement of a new biomass policy.

...Pruitt used the secret elementary school visit to announce the EPA’s controversial decision to consider burned biomass from forest products as “carbon neutral.” The new policy treats burned biomass as a renewable source of energy like wind or solar power -- even though scientists say the move could increase CO2 emissions in the short term and exacerbate climate change.

https://maplight.org/story/southern-co- ... anization/
Quote:
Three major corporate donors to a pro-Trump nonprofit whose officials have expressed racist, anti-Muslim, and anti-Semitic sentiments announced this weekend they would stop giving money to the dark money organization.

Southern Company, CVS Health and Dow Chemical have donated at least $1.6 million to America First Policies, MapLight reported on Thursday. Amid widespread outrage, the corporate titans issued statements over the weekend disavowing the pro-Trump organization and promising to cut off future funding.

...America First Policies was created by former Trump campaign officials to support the president’s legislative agenda. The organization reportedly raised $26 million last year. The source of all of its funding is unknown, since the organization doesn’t disclose its donors. CVS Health, Dow Chemical and Southern Company all voluntarily disclosed their donations on their websites.
FYI: "MapLight is a nonpartisan, nonprofit research organization that reveals and tracks the influence of money in politics in the United States. The organization publishes a free public database linking money and politics data sources, including campaign contributions to politicians, how politicians vote on bills, and support and opposition to legislation. "

Their factual reporting was rated as very high by a media bias check organization I checked.



Edit to add:


http://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/39 ... acare-case
Quote:
The Justice Department declined to defend ObamaCare on Thursday night against a lawsuit filed by Texas and 19 other GOP-led states, arguing that central parts of the law are unconstitutional.

The Justice Department sided, in large part, with the states, arguing that the law’s protections for people with pre-existing conditions should be invalidated

The states argued that because Congress repealed the penalty for not having coverage in last year's tax bill, ObamaCare’s individual mandate can no longer be upheld as a tax and thus should be invalidated. The states also said that protections for people with pre-existing conditions should be overturned because they are not able to be separated from the mandate.

Legal experts view that argument's chance of success with deep skepticism, in part, because Congress indicated that the rest of ObamaCare could still stand without the mandate when it moved to repeal the tax penalty last year.

http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/s ... amilies-at
Quote:
Senate Democrats have introduced legislation to prevent the separation of immigrant children from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border in an attempt to push back against the Trump administration.

The legislation, spearheaded by Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein (Calif.), would only allow children to be separated from a parent if they are being abused, trafficked or if a court decides "it is in the best interests of the child."

http://thehill.com/policy/energy-enviro ... from-major
Quote:
Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Scott Pruitt sought and acted upon a recommendation from a major Trump campaign donor for an individual to head the agency's leading science body, internal documents show.

Doug Deason, a Dallas businessman and financial backer of Trump's 2016 presidential campaign, gave the EPA a list of names of candidates for Pruitt's Science Advisory Board in August, after being asked by Pruitt personally for recommendations.

...The board is meant to serve as an independent adviser to the agency's regulatory processes.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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aninkling
Post subject: Re: You've been Trumped!
Posted: Fri 08 Jun , 2018 8:29 pm
Offline
 
Posts: 2048
Joined: Fri 10 Aug , 2012 4:42 pm
 
Two more today:

http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... ckers-foia
Quote:
As Secretary of Homeland Security, John Kelly directed at least one official to avoid emailing him about agency business due to fears that his email had been been hacked and was susceptible to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests from journalists and the public, according to an email obtained through a FOIA request.

The email, acquired by BuzzFeed News in response to a FOIA lawsuit, shows correspondence from June 8, 2017, between then-Secretary Kelly and an official whose name was redacted on privacy grounds.

"As we discussed in NYC about the toxic atmosphere here in the D.C. cesspool, my folks are nervous about e-mails you send and ask that you no longer include them on any postings,” Kelly wrote to the official. "FOIA is real and everyday here in the cesspool, and even federal court action on personal accounts is real."



http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-e ... story.html
Quote:
The Trump administration's top environmental official met privately with the chief executive of Dow Chemical shortly before reversing his agency's push to ban a widely used pesticide that health studies showed can harm children's brains, newly released records reveal.

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt's schedule shows he met with Dow CEO Andrew Liveris for about half an hour March 9 during a conference held at a Houston hotel. Twenty days later, Pruitt announced his decision to deny a petition to ban Dow's chlorpyrifos pesticide from being sprayed on food even though a review by his agency's scientists concluded that ingesting even minuscule amounts of the chemical can interfere with the brain development of fetuses and infants.

And one I missed yesterday:
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/07/us/p ... icals.html
Quote:
The Trump administration, after heavy lobbying by the chemical industry, is scaling back the way the federal government determines health and safety risks associated with the most dangerous chemicals on the market, documents from the Environmental Protection Agency show.

Under a law passed by Congress during the final year of the Obama administration, the E.P.A. was required for the first time to evaluate hundreds of potentially toxic chemicals and determine if they should face new restrictions, or even be removed from the market. The chemicals include many in everyday use, such as dry-cleaning solvents, paint strippers and substances used in health and beauty products like shampoos and cosmetics.

But as it moves forward reviewing the first batch of 10 chemicals, the E.P.A. has in most cases decided to exclude from its calculations any potential exposure caused by the substances’ presence in the air, the ground or water, according to more than 1,500 pages of documents released last week by the agency.

_________________

Society can and does execute its own mandates, and if it issues wrong mandates instead of right, or any mandates at all in things with it ought not to meddle, it practices a social tyranny more formidable than many kinds of political oppression, since, though not usually upheld by such extreme penalties, it leaves fewer means of escape, penetrating much more deeply into the details of life, and enslaving the soul itself. ― John Stuart Mill


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