Where does fentanyl come from? China is primary source in U.S., and much is ending up in Ohio
Well, Maggie, what now? Ya gonna build a wall of racism against China?
#fuckingbecky
What goes through my my mind when I read the news with my morning coffee. …Or for the Simon's Rockers in the group, this is my response journal.
Where does fentanyl come from? China is primary source in U.S., and much is ending up in Ohio
Well, Maggie, what now? Ya gonna build a wall of racism against China?
#fuckingbecky
Hannity explicitly stated that he was never represented by nor had he ever retained Cohen. He bent over backwards to deny the relationship, claiming nothing more than a few harmless chit-chats over real estate.
…Although he later clarified his comments to suggest that he expected that some of his conversations with Cohen would be confidential, his earlier denial that a relationship ever existed renders that expectation unpersuasive. It is gratuitous doublespeak.
Hannity’s denial fatally undermined any credible claim by Cohen that their communications were protected from disclosure by the attorney client privilege. The privilege extends to only those private conversations that take place within an established attorney-client relationship, and even then, those conversations must specifically pertain to legal advice. The privilege does not extend to conversations simply because one of its participants happens to be an attorney.
…Even if Cohen wanted to disclose the discussions, he would only be allowed to do so if Hannity agreed to it.
But in this case, Hannity isn’t asserting the privilege, so Cohen lacks any basis not to disclose the information or to prevent the government from looking at any communications between himself and Hannity.
Sean Hannity news is a real problem for Michael Cohen (Opinion) – CNN
hmmmm
When Donald Trump was elected president, it quickly became obvious that the traditional national-security briefing a person in his position receives daily would be well beyond his zone of proximal development. The briefings were slimmed down in length, chopped up into easy-to-digest bullet points, and decorated with lots of graphs and pictures. Alas, the Washington Post reports, even the kiddie version of the presidential brief has proven too challenging. Now, Trump gets his briefing verbally.
…Also, Trump does not receive his verbal briefing daily, but instead “about every two to three days on average in recent months, typically around 11 a.m.” That’s when “executive time” ends and Trump has to turn off Fox News to listen to officials for a while, before he gets more screen time later in the day.
Perhaps not surprisingly, while the verbal method comports with Trump’s preferred learning style, he does not show very strong listening skills.
Dumbed-Down Security Briefings Still Too Difficult for Trump
Jeezus…..
A federal judge denied on Wednesday a motion to dismiss a lawsuit accusing President Donald Trump of receiving improper payments from states and foreign governments — or emoluments — through his Washington hotel in violation of the U.S. Constitution.
According to court documents, U.S. District Judge Peter J. Messitte ruled that the plaintiffs, the state of Maryland and the District of Columbia, had legal standing to challenge Trump’s involvement with his eponymous company, but narrowed the scope of the suit to the Trump Organization’s business in the District of Columbia.
…The Constitution bars public officeholders from accepting payments or titles from foreign governments without approval from Congress, a clause designed to prevent officials from being corrupted.
If it withstands likely appeals, the suit could allow prosecutors — two Democratic attorneys general, Maryland’s Brian Frosh and D.C.’s Karl Racine — to seek documents from the Trump Organization on how much money is sent there by states and foreign governments, something that is not publicly known.
…If this suit progresses, it is sure to bring some history into the courtroom, since the plaintiffs are pointing to 230-year-old decision as part of their legal argument. According to the opinion released Wednesday, Maryland argued that the anti-corruption Emoluments Clauses in the Constitution were key “to its decision to enter the Union and that it retains the power to enforce those provisions today.”
Judge rejects Trump request to toss lawsuit accusing him of violating Constitution
hmmm
The left-wing leader of the British Labour Party, Jeremy Corbyn, has been condemned as “a figurehead for anti-Semitism” by Jewish leaders after a steady drip of reports over the past weeks revealed that he was a member of three secret Facebook groups where people shared anti-Jewish conspiracies and propaganda, including one post where Corbyn directly criticized the removal of anti-Semitic graffiti.
…At the beginning of March he was revealed to have been in a group where terms such as “ZioNazi” were used and conspiracy theories about Jewish involvement in 9/11 were shared among members. U.K. politics blog Guido Fawkes has since revealed Corbyn’s membership of two further groups where people shared offensive anti-Semitic content.
Jeremy Corbyn, the U.K. Labour Leader, Was In Three Secret Anti-Semitic Facebook Groups
hmmmm
Reporters and readers have been surprised to learn about the ability to gather personal data on the friends of people who install a Facebook app, the conversion of a personality quiz into a source of political data, the idea that you can target marketing messages based on individual psychographic profiles, and the surreptitious collection of data under the guise of academic research, later used for political purposes. But there is one group of people who are mostly unsurprised by these revelations: the market researchers and digital marketers who have known about (and in many cases, used) these tactics for years.
… The tactic of collecting friend data, which has been featured prominently in the Cambridge Analytica coverage, was a well-known way of turning a handful of app users into a goldmine.
…Pages and apps like this might have seemed innocent to the average Facebook user, but people in the marketing community were hardly deceived.
“It was pretty common knowledge among people who understood the internet that if you were taking a quiz to find out what kind of cheese you are, somebody on the other end is very interested in getting that data,” says Susanne Yada, a Facebook ad strategist.
…“We did this project for the Hard Rock Cafe Casino in Las Vegas,” Hodder told me. “They wanted to put wands in the ceiling to collect the IMEI [identification] numbers of every phone that went by, map everywhere they went in the casino or on the property, and map them in the hallways up to their rooms. And then they could do a reverse lookup on IMEI numbers because there are companies that aggregate IMEI numbers, and as soon as they figured out who the person was, they could send them offers, text them offers, and the people had not opted in. So they were basically just intercepting your phone, and figuring out how to send messages to you in one form or another.”
…The outrage now directed at Cambridge Analytica and Facebook suggests there might be an appetite for an online ecosystem based on a different compact between consumers, platforms and advertisers. But we won’t build that ecosystem by pretending that this is a matter of a few bad actors. It’s time for us to face up to what online marketers and researchers have known for more than a decade: the contemporary Internet runs on the exploitation of user data, and that fact won’t change until consumers, regulators and businesses commit to a radically different model.
It surprises me that is not more discussion of the once ubiquitous fb game apps that were formulated to make sending “invitations” and “gifts” something that unlocked more access to the game.
…Or the facebook integration with news media, etc. sites.
Today we have two parties that are as far apart ideologically, and as internally unified, as they’ve been in any of our lifetimes. For many years the Republicans were moving to the right far faster than the Democrats were moving to the left, but recently Democrats have begun to catch up; by 2020 every Democratic presidential candidate will probably support single-payer health care, a $15 minimum wage, and even marijuana legalization.
When you have those ideological divisions, each party’s leadership will inevitably reflect where the party is; you aren’t going to get a presidential nominee or a congressional leader who comes from the Democratic Party’s right flank or the Republican Party’s left flank.
…Charging your opponent with being too close to his or her party’s leaders is a good way to rile up your own base.
…Last year when she was asked about Republican attacks on her, Pelosi responded, “I think I’m worth the trouble, quite frankly.” There was a time when few Democrats would have questioned that assertion. People who understand how Congress works will tell you that Pelosi has been one of the most effective legislative leaders in American history, keeping her caucus together and shepherding legislation with a toughness and skill Paul Ryan can only dream about.
Nancy Pelosi doesn’t care if you hate her
hmmmm
House Republicans break with intelligence community – CNNPolitics
Because corruption, pure and simple.
Specific brain structures (amygdala, hippocampus, prefrontal cortex) are adversely affected by stress. Executive functions (such as planning, memory, focusing attention, impulse control, and using new information to make decisions) can become impaired. Moreover, children who have had chronic exposure to real or perceived threats may become conditioned to react with fear and anxiety to a broad range of circumstances. Their diminished capacity to differentiate between genuine threats and objectively safe or neutral situations can impair their ability to learn and interact with others, and may lead to serious anxiety disorders.
Children’s Exposure to Violence – Child Trends
hmmm
In some communities, gun violence is a rare and alarming occurrence. In others, it’s just a fact of life.
…In one study of urban youth, 42 percent reported having seen someone shot or knifed and 22 percent reported having seen someone killed. Indirect exposure through the sound of gunfire is only now being explored.
…What kind of damage does this do to young people? Exposure to gun violence has been linked to a variety of psychological challenges like anger and dissociation, anxiety and depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). It can also affect youth in the classroom, making it difficult for them to concentrate in class and damaging their academic performance and educational or career aspirations. [emphasis: mine]
… Crime encourages urban flight, which can impose a wide range of social costs on families who leave the city, from longer commutes to distance from family and friends. For those who stay, violent crime can impose tangible costs by reducing housing values and community investment, making it difficult to build wealth.
Raising the Voices of Gun Violence
hmmmm
Government data and academic research on children and gun violence show that the young people of the United States are at disturbing risk of getting shot — by other children, by their parents, by themselves, by strangers.
…Nineteen kids a day killed or hurt by guns that were too easy to access; 135,000 students studying in schools where shots have rung out; hundreds of millions of dollars spent on medical treatment to save young lives.
…On average, 1,300 children die and nearly 5,800 are treated for gunshot wounds each year, according to a July 2017 study from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As The Trace’s Elizabeth Van Brocklin put it, that’s “at least two Little League lineups worth of children” shot every 24 hours.
…Among wealthy, industrialized countries, 91 percent of children under 15 killed by guns die in the United States. The same report found that young Americans (ages 15 to 24) are 49 times more likely to die by gun than their peers in other high-income countries.
…For African-American boys between the ages of 10 and 14, homicide is the second-leading cause of death, at 11 percent. That proportion more than quadruples as this cohort ages: 49 percent of deaths of African-American males between 15 and 19 are homicides — more than the next nine leading causes of death combined. Their white counterparts die from homicides in less than 8 percent of deaths.
Nearly 70 percent of all homicides in 2014 were “firearm homicides,” which means that roughly 34 percent of African-American males who die between the ages of 15 and 19 are killed by a gun.
14 stunning facts that show how gun violence hurts American kids – Business Insider
hmmm