Burned in 2016, unions hold back endorsements – POLITICO
hmmm
Category: Domestic Affairs,
President Trump is dismissive about injuries to US military troops under his command
[Trump] was asked about the clear discrepancy between his initial claim that no Americans had been harmed in Iran’s retaliatory strikes against a US base in Iraq and reports of 11 military personnel diagnosed with concussions and an unnamed number of others also being treated in the wake of the attack.
…11 soldiers initially injured were evacuated from the base in Iraq — eight to Germany and three more to Kuwait. In addition, the Pentagon announced Tuesday that an unspecified number of other troops had been injured in the attack and evacuated to Germany.
“As medical treatment and evaluations in theater continue, additional service members have been identified as having potential injuries,” said CENTCOM spokesman Bill Urban. “These service members — out of an abundance of caution — have been transported to Landstuhl, Germany, for further evaluations and necessary treatment on an outpatient basis. Given the nature of injuries already noted, it is possible additional injuries may be identified in the future.”
sigh…
Tulsi Gabbard sues Hillary Clinton for defamation over Russia remarks
“I’m not making any predictions, but I think they’ve got their eye on somebody who is currently in the Democratic primary and are grooming her to be the third-party candidate,” Clinton said, speaking on a podcast with former Obama adviser David Plouffe. “She’s the favorite of the Russians.”
Clinton, in the same interview, suggested that person she was talking about was a “Russian asset,” while not naming Gabbard.
…The lawsuit stands little chance of success, but it offers Gabbard much-needed publicity for her campaign ahead of the Iowa caucuses next month.
…Gabbard has previously used her confrontation with Clinton as a way to draw attention to her presidential campaign, like when her lawyer wrote a letter demanding a retraction from Clinton in November 2019.
…The lawsuit, filed Wednesday in federal court in the Southern District of New York, says Gabbard has suffered damages that are “estimated to exceed $50 million.” She is seeking unspecified compensation and the prevention of a further spread of the comments. Clinton spokesman Merrill responded to the lawsuit by calling it “ridiculous.”
Tulsi Gabbard sues Hillary Clinton for defamation over Russia remarks – CNNPolitics
Trump inaugural committee improperly paid president’s hotel $1 million
Trump’s inaugural committee …violated its nonprofit status by spending more than $1 million to book a ballroom at Trump’s D.C. hotel that its staff knew was overpriced and that it barely used.
During the lead-up to Trump’s January 2017 inauguration, the committee booked the hotel ballroom for $175,000 a day, plus more than $300,000 in food and beverage costs, over the objections of its own event planner.
…Hotel management emailed the committee in November 2016 saying an eight-day package of meeting rooms, food and drinks would cost $3.6 million — an enormous number even by the standards of luxury hotels during the inauguration.
Rick Gates, a lobbyist and the committee’s deputy chairman, then emailed Ivanka Trump to say that cost “seems quite high compared to other properties.”
…Racine’s lawsuit specifically targets a $1 million deal made between the committee and the Trump Organization for the ballroom during four days around the inaugural, which he alleges was a knowing waste of the nonprofit’s resources to benefit the Trumps.
…After hotel management agreed to charge $175,000 per day for meeting space and to charge separately for food and beverage, Stephanie Winston Wolkoff, a friend of first lady Melania Trump who had previously produced the Met gala and New York’s Fashion Week, expressed alarm, writing that other properties had been offered to the committee at little or no cost.
…Wolkoff said the meeting space should cost a maximum of $85,000 per day. Even that was pricey compared to offers from other hotels.
…D.C. law requires that nonprofit organizations not operate for the purpose of generating profits for private individuals.
…Trump’s company is now trying to sell its lease to the hotel. Initial bids are due Thursday for the property.
hmmm
John Roberts Has the Power to Allow Impeachment Witnesses
The most prominent question today, is shall the Senate hear witnesses? Precedent suggests the answer is “yes”– there have been 15 prior impeachment trials in the Senate (two involving Presidents) and all have had witness testimony in the Senate. And there is no Constitutional bar against witnesses in what the Constitution refers to as an impeachment “trial.” …[McConnell maintains] his constitutional oath to do “impartial justice” permits him to coordinate every aspect of trial management with counsel for the President, who objects to witnesses.
…Indeed, it is the Chief Justice of the United States who shall “preside” over the trial, not the Majority Leader. So why isn’t it up to Roberts to decide whether witnesses shall appear?
John Roberts Has the Power to Allow Impeachment Witnesses | Time
hmmm
Are alternative voting systems a savior of democracy or a confusing gimmick?
“Plurality rule rewards party unity and punishes party division. RCV does the opposite. In short, plurality rule encourages compromise and the consolidation of political views. The ranked-choice voting system encourages the expression of contentious views and discourages compromise,” the pair wrote.
Campbell’s paper disagrees.
“The plurality system tilts to aggregation (helpful to governing) and the ranked choice system tilts to articulation (helpful to participation). Although its advocates embrace RCV as a reform reducing the hyper-conflict of polarization, it is likely to have exactly the opposite effect. Based on this rational choice analysis, RCV is a system that generally enables divisiveness.”
Science Cafe wonders: Are alternative voting systems a savior of democracy or a confusing gimmick?
hmmm
Lev Parnas says Trump ‘knew exactly what was going on’ with Ukraine pressure campaign
Trump “knew exactly what was going on” despite his repeated denials of wrongdoing.
…”Why would President Zelensky’s inner circle, or Minister Avakov, or all these people, or President Poroshenko, meet with me? Who am I? They were told to meet with me,” he said.
…Trump has posed for photos with either Fruman or Parnas, and CNN previously reported that Fruman and Parnas had a private meeting with the President and Giuliani during a White House party in December 2018.
Lev Parnas says Trump ‘knew exactly what was going on’ with Ukraine pressure campaign – CNNPolitics
hmmm
Scientists certain that drilling is causing earthquakes
On Thursday, the U.S. Geological Survey released the first comprehensive maps pinpointing more than a dozen areas in the central and eastern U.S. that have been jolted by quakes that the researchers said were triggered by drilling. The report said man-made quakes tied to industry operations have been on the rise.
Scientists have mainly attributed the spike to the injection of wastewater deep underground, a practice they say can activate dormant faults. Only a few cases of shaking have been blamed on fracking, in which large volumes of water, sand and chemicals are pumped into rock formations to crack them open and free oil or gas.
…Yet another study, this one published Tuesday in the journal Nature Communications, connected a swarm of small quakes west of Fort Worth, Texas, to nearby natural gas wells and wastewater disposal.
…The ground has been trembling in regions that were once seismically stable, including parts of Alabama, Arkansas, Colorado, Kansas, New Mexico, Ohio, Oklahoma and Texas.
The largest jolt linked to wastewater injection — a magnitude-5.6 that hit Prague, Oklahoma, in 2011 — damaged 200 buildings and shook a college football stadium.
The uptick in Oklahoma quakes has prompted state regulators to require a seismic review of all proposed disposal wells.
…[Trump’s toothless sham, the] Environmental Protection Agency said there no plans for new regulations as a result of the USGS study.
Scientists certain that drilling is causing earthquakes
hmmm
Family Sues DEA and TSA After Elderly Man’s Life Savings Were Seized at Airport
When Rolin’s daughter, Rebecca Brown, tried to take her fathers’ savings—$82,373 in cash—on an airplane, a DEA agent seized it simply because large amounts of cash are considered suspicious by the agency.
…Brown and Rolin are now the lead plaintiffs in a federal class-action lawsuit …challenging the DEA and TSA’s practice of seizing large amounts of cash from airline passengers without any evidence of any underlying crime.
…In cases like Brown’s, the DEA seizes cash using civil asset forfeiture, a practice that allows police to seize cash and property suspected of being connected to criminal activity, even if the owner is not charged with a crime.
Federal, state, and local law enforcement seize millions of dollars in cash every year in drug interdiction operations, much of being transported along highways and through airports. In 2016, a USA Today investigation found the DEA seized more than $209 million from at least 5,200 travelers in 15 major airports over the previous decade.
…A 2017 report by the Justice Department Inspector General found that the DEA seized more than $4 billion in cash from people suspected of drug activity over the previous decade, but $3.2 billion of those seizures were never connected to any criminal charges.
Family Sues DEA and TSA After Elderly Man’s Life Savings Were Seized at Airport – Reason.com
hmmm
DNA Tests Make Native Americans Strangers in Their Own Land
The DNA industry has, in fact, found a way to profit from reviving and modernizing antiquated ideas about the biological origins of race and repackaging them in a cheerful, Disneyfied wrapping …offering a 21st-century version of pseudoscience that once again reduces race to a matter of genetics and origins.
…If Native Americans are reduced to little more than another genetic variation, there is no need for laws that acknowledge their land rights, treaty rights, and sovereignty. Nor must any thought be given to how to compensate for past harms, not to speak of the present ones that still structure their realities.
…They conflate ethnicity with geography, and geography with genetic markers.
…In this way, race and ethnicity are separated from and elevated above experience, culture, and history.
…In North America,” the company blandly explains, “Native American ancestry tends to be five or more generations back, so that little DNA evidence of this heritage remains.” In other words, 23andMe claims DNA as conclusive proof of Native American identity, then uses it to write Native North Americans off the map altogether.
…“DNA is not a liquid that can be broken down into microscopic drops.… We inherit about a quarter of our DNA from each grandparent—but only on average.… If you pick one of your ancestors from 10 generations back, the odds are around 50 percent that you carry any DNA from him or her. The odds get even worse beyond that.”
In reality, such testing does not tell us much about our ancestors. That’s partly because of the way DNA is passed down through the generations and partly because there exists no database of ancestral DNA. Instead, the companies compare your DNA to that of other contemporary humans who have paid them to take the test. Then they compare your particular variations to patterns of geographical and ethnic distribution of such variations in today’s world—and use secret algorithms to assign purportedly precise ancestral percentages to them.
…Native American nations are political and cultural entities, the products of history, not genes, and white people’s assertions about Native American ancestry and the DNA industry’s claim to be able to reveal such ancestry tend to run roughshod over this history.
…The recognition of tribal sovereignty at least acknowledges that the existence of the United States is predicated on its imposition of an unwanted, foreign political entity on Native lands. The concept of tribal sovereignty has given Native Americans a legal and collective basis for fighting for a different way of thinking about history, rights, and nationhood. Attempts to reduce Native American identity to a race that can be identified by a gene (or a genetic variation) do violence to our history and justify ongoing violations of Native rights.
DNA Tests Make Native Americans Strangers in Their Own Land | The Nation
hmmm
House to investigate Trump ‘Remain in Mexico’ policy
“As we have previously written to you, MPP is inconsistent with the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) statutory authority, while exposing thousands of people to threats of murder, sexual violence, and kidnapping as they are forced to wait in extremely dangerous conditions before their asylum claims may be heard,” the letter reads.
“As of today, there are 31 active travel advisories for Mexico, including 5 warnings in which the State Department explicitly advises Americans against travel. It is difficult to understand why this administration is sending children and families to areas where they will face certain harm,” the members wrote.
…”It is imperative that the United States end this reckless course of action and reaffirm its commitment to the principles of due process on which this country was founded.”
House to investigate Trump ‘Remain in Mexico’ policy | TheHill
hmm
Rail or trail? Topsham-Augusta trail proposal could derail the potential future return of passenger train service to Augusta, rail advocates warn.
Advocates for restoring passenger train service to Augusta — and potentially beyond to Waterville and Bangor — fear the Merrymeeting Trail proposal could squash any hopes they have of rail service returning to that corridor.
…Richard Rudolph and Jack Sutton, directors of the Maine Rail Group, said once the rail corridor is converted to a trail, rail service will never return, due to the difficulty of both restoring the rails and reclaiming the space from those who would be using it as a trail.
…“There are plenty of places to walk or bike, there aren’t that many places to run a train,” he said. “Common sense will tell you if we lose that rail to a bike or walking trail, it’s not going to be returned.”
Dale McCormick, a former city councilor, said she loves the Rail Trail and loves the Merrymeeting Trail proposal, but not if it prevents the future development of rail service in Augusta.
McCormick said if gas prices increase again, rail travel would be more feasible because of its energy efficiency and more popular with passengers. There should be a way to do both the trail project and protect the future of rail, she said.
hmmm
How Slavery Shaped American Capitalism And the Myth of Its Economic Impact
[The legacy of anti-black racism undoubtedly has to contributed to a] divided American labor movement, weakened progressive political alliances, and undermined the provision of public goods.
…A major effect of slavery on US economic development came through its foundational influence on America’s legal and political institutions.
One of the central problems faced by delegates to the Constitutional Convention in 1787 was how to create a common legal and political framework that would unite the slave states of the South with Northern states that were then in the process of abolishing slavery.
…[The Southern voters] were disproportionately represented at the federal level through the three-fifths clause. …The constitution effectively restricted federal taxing and regulatory power to international and interstate commerce.
…This division of federal and state power over slave property is not just manifest in now-dormant articles of the constitution dealing with slavery. It imbues all parts of the constitution and arguably lent to the American state system its distinctive form, which combines strong property protections with weak regulatory and fiscal powers (the introduction of a federal income tax in 1913 required a constitutional amendment).
…[The federal government’s] powers to tax, spend, and interfere with the interests of the wealthy (e.g., through regulating banks or providing debt relief) were explicitly curtailed.
…In principle the states were left to regulate and tax as they liked, but their practical ability to do so was constrained by federally mandated capital mobility. This created a fiscal and regulatory race to the bottom, as the wealthy could force relatively weak state legislatures to compete for their investments — just as city and state governments prostrate themselves before Amazon and Boeing today.
…Einhorn’s point is not that the framers were all proslavery (they were not) nor that they intended to produce a capitalist paradise of unfettered accumulation. Her point is that in making certain concessions to the slave-owners the framers unintentionally generated those conditions. Slave-owners were particularly afraid of allowing democratic control over property because they were literally afraid of their property. They were haunted by the threat of slave insurrections, as well as foreign armies turning their slaves into enemy soldiers through offers of freedom (as the British had recently done). Einhorn concludes that “if property rights have enjoyed unusual sanctity in the United States, it may be because this nation was founded in a political situation in which the owners of one very significant form of property thought their holdings were insecure.”
…[The argument] that slavery was “the nursing mother of the prosperity of the North,” …was an encouragement to secessionists, who imagined that the North would do everything to avoid a war that would cripple the Northern economy by cutting it off from a major source of its wealth.
…It’s true that cotton was among the world’s most widely traded commodities, and that it was America’s principal antebellum export. But it’s also true that exports constituted a small share of American GDP (typically less than 10 percent) and that the total value of cotton was therefore small by comparison with the overall American economy (less than 5 percent, lower than the value of corn).
…The size of the Southern economy as a share of the national economy fell from 1800 to 1860.
…It’s true that slavery made many fortunes, in both cotton and sugar, such that there were more millionaires per capita in the Mississippi Valley than anywhere else in the country. But it’s also true that most of that wealth stayed in the South, where it was tied up in land and slaves, such that the net effect on real accumulation was probably negative.
How Slavery Shaped American Capitalism
hmmm
AOC should leave the Democratic Party
In the 2006 and 2012 Senate races, Sanders ran as a Democrat in the primary, then refused the nomination when he won so he could run as in Independent without facing a Democratic challenger.
AOC might also want to also have it both ways, using the Democratic designation to get elected in her liberal district while bashing the party that gave her power.
…The two-party system ensures a wide range of views within a political label, and particularly within the Democratic one — exemplified by Biden and AOC’s contrasting views.
…When asked by New York magazine what her role in Congress might look like in a Biden administration, AOC groaned, followed by “Oh, God.” That is not a response one would expect to the prospective election of a member of her own party. Without betraying her beliefs, AOC could have graciously said, “I look forward to working with a Democratic president.”
…In the interview, the congresswoman who represents parts of the Bronx and Queens complained, “We’re not allowed to talk about anything wrong the Democratic Party does.” Nonetheless, she went on to complain that “Democrats can be too big of a tent” and that “they let anybody who the cat dragged in call themselves a progressive. There’s no standard.”
Perhaps AOC would be happier leaving for another party that let her set the standards.
…It’s no coincidence that the far-left Democrats — including AOC’s three colleagues in “The Squad” — were elected in very safe liberal districts. But the Democrats now control the House not because of a handful of radicals, but because 40 mostly moderate Democrats took seats from Republicans in 2018.
…Members of the [progressive] caucus often engage in the narcissism of small differences, building hostility toward Democrats holding views that diverge in minor ways.
AOC should leave the Democratic Party (opinion) – CNN
Nothing says progressive like being willing to burn the house down if they don’t get their way. It’s this kind of thinking that got us Trump.
The U.S. has held a record 69,550 migrant children in government custody in 2019
The U.S. has held a record 69,550 migrant children in government custody in 2019
The US government are the bad guys in this movie.
Amtrak Wanted 2 Wheelchair Users To Pay $25,000 For A Train Ride
A group from his office is headed to Bloomington next Wednesday for a work retreat.
There are 10 of them, and five — including Ballard — use wheelchairs. Their train has three cars. Each car has one space for a wheelchair. That makes three spaces for five people in wheelchairs. In the past, when Access Living gave advance notice that it was sending a large group, Amtrak took out more seats to fit more wheelchairs. Once, it took out seats in the dining car and charged a few hundred dollars extra.
…”The cost is correct,” the agent wrote, citing a new policy for taking out those seats. The agent explained that it’s expensive to take out extra seats and that it means taking a car out of service.
…The ADA, which became law 30 years ago this year, is a civil rights law that prohibits discrimination against people with disabilities in jobs, schools, public places and transportation — including trains. It requires companies like Amtrak to make “reasonable accommodations” so that people with disabilities have comparable access to transportation as do people without disabilities.
…”The Americans with Disabilities Act has been the law of the land for 30 years,” she said. “Yet in 2020, @Amtrak believes it would be an unreasonable burden to remove architectural barriers that would enable a group with five wheelchair users to travel together.”
Amtrak Wanted 2 Wheelchair Users To Pay $25,000 For A Train Ride : NPR
Criminal.
Trump’s MAGA supporters and Twitter Bernie Bros have this ugly tactic in common
Time and again, we see how backlash on social media is used to bully people into submission and silence criticism. For writers and commentators like me, sometimes we have to weigh whether or not it’s even worth writing something that could incur the wrath of a political figure’s devout following. The backlash is important because it gives us insights into the nature of the political debate on social media — who has power, and how that power is wielded. And it’s also important to talk about the voices who may be keeping silent — and why.
The attacks against Warren come from the same corners of social media that disparage Democrats (like myself) as being “puppets,” “centrist,” “anti-Semitic, and “ageist” for having the audacity to question or scrutinize their chosen leader. People of color and women who dare to disagree with Sanders’ political assertions have often borne the brunt of this abuse.
…[The Bernie bros] are almost overwhelmingly white men. And they share, like Trump’s ardent supporters, a desire to “put me in my place.”
…Bernie Twitter operates under the self-righteous guise of being the true progressives of the internet. This smugness distinguishes their tweets. But there’s nothing progressive about attacking members of your own party who may have reservations about the presidential candidate you’re supporting. There’s also nothing progressive about having so little tolerance for different opinions that even the hint of opposition is enough to incite a virtual mob.
…It should concern Democrats who have spent the past four years lamenting Trump’s deteriorating effect on political discourse that the supporters of a major liberal presidential candidate conduct themselves with such intolerance.
…Candidates must set a standard of conduct for their supporters, and if it’s not met, it must be denounced. Trump is unwilling to do this, but Democrats [and whatever the hell Bernie identifies as] shouldn’t sink to the same subbasement.
Trump’s MAGA supporters and Twitter Bernie Bros have this ugly tactic in common
Yup.
Obama campaign guru: Trump would love to run against Bernie
Trump would exploit Sanders’ stamp of socialism in battleground states needed to defeat Trump, keep control of the House and have a shot at winning the Senate.
…“From a general election perspective, socialism is not going to be what Democrats are going to want to defend,” Messina added.“If you’re the Democratic nominee for the Montana Senate race, you don’t want to spend the election talking about socialism.”
…Sanders would not be able to help Democrats in states like Arizona and North Carolina if they’re to defeat Trump.
“My concern about Sanders would be just how low his ceiling may be,” the adviser said. “The argument Sanders would make is he can turn out tough-to-turn-out voters. While many are very progressive like the Sanders base, most aren’t, most aren’t connected to politics, they tend to be more moderate,” the adviser said. “I think it’s a falsehood that all the people not registering to turn out are looking for the most classically liberal candidates — that’s just not true.”
Obama campaign guru: Trump would love to run against Bernie – POLITICO
hmmmm
Marie Yovanovitch calls for investigation into ‘disturbing’ surveillance as ex-diplomats outraged over her treatment
“Needless to say, the notion that American citizens and others were monitoring Ambassador Yovanovitch’s movements for unknown purposes is disturbing,” said Lawrence S. Robbins, Yovanovitch’s attorney, in a statement. “We trust that the appropriate authorities will conduct an investigation to determine what happened.”
…”The very idea that there were elements, possibly of the US government or connected to the US government, who were trying to do an end run around everything that we’ve established to keep our mission safe is just outrageous.”
…”It’s common that terrorists and former communists do this to us. It’s appalling and incomprehensible that somebody who is working for the President’s personal lawyer would have been doing this to our ambassador.”
…The texts released by the House Democrats Tuesday show Connecticut Republican congressional candidate Robert Hyde berating Yovanovitch and suggest he was monitoring her while she was in Kiev and relaying her movements to Parnas.
…McEldowney told CNN she believes Pompeo is “derelict in his duty for refusing to speak out about diplomats who are loyally and faithfully and professionally carrying out their responsibilities and who are being slandered by political attacks.”
hmmm
Who will win New Hampshire? 5 top state Democrats dish on the state of play
Levesque: The media is completely missing minority populations here, especially with all the talk of lack of diversity in New Hampshire and Iowa. The media could do a better job of seeking out opinions from more diverse populations in both states.
…Sullivan: At this point in 2016, Sanders was at 50 percent in the polls. He ended up winning with about 61 percent. Now he’s in the mid-20s. That’s a pretty significant loss of support, yet the media seems to think he is doing well. The media is also missing the potential that there may be no clear winner here. Any candidate who finishes with more than 15 percent of the vote picks up delegates under the party rules.
…Meyer: The supposition that Sanders and Warren have a stranglehold on the state is wrong. They certainly have an advantage by virtue of familiarity. But that also creates a much greater expectation for them to perform very well.
Who will win New Hampshire? 5 top state Democrats dish on the state of play – POLITICO
hmmmm
Comments From The Peanut Gallery 