playing the BIG boards. options included. making the profits with this volitality !
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not a big deal. we all make faux paus. BNB and I are just fine 8^)
Trump envoy held Secret Meeting with Palestinian President's son
axios.com
Aug. 20,2018
Mahmoud Abbas (center) and his son Tarek
President Trump's special envoy for Middle East peace, Jason Greenblatt, held a secret meeting with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas's son last September on the margins of the UN General Assembly in New York, Israeli officials tell me.
Why it matters: They met to discuss the White House efforts to get a deal between Israel and the Palestinians. The Israeli officials say the undisclosed meeting was an attempt by the White House to strengthen ties with Abbas's inner circle and potentially even create channels to promote the Trump administration's peace efforts in the future.
According to the Israeli officials, Greenblatt spoke with Abass's son about the administration's efforts to reach a peace agreement and asked for his opinion.
Tarek Abbas told Greenblatt that, unlike his father, he is against the two state solution because he thinks the building of Jewish settlements in the West Bank made it impossible. Abbas's son told the U.S. envoy he supports a one state solution with equal rights for all citizens.
The backdrop:
Yesterday I reported on a June meeting between Trump and Jordanian King Abdullah, in which Trump said a one-state solution would lead to an Israeli prime minister named Mohammed. The meeting between Greenblatt and Tarek Abbass son shows the White House heard messages about a one state solution from the closest people to the Palestinian president.
The meeting between Greenblatt and Tarek Abbas took place at a time when the relations between the White House and the Palestinians were still quite good. Trump held a constructive meeting the same week in New York with Mahmoud Abbas.
But three months later Trump announced his decision on recognizing Jerusalem as Israel's capital. That enraged the Palestinians, who cut all ties with the White House. The boycott continues to this day.
Trump and Abbas will both be in New York this year for the General Assembly but are not expected to meet. Trump and his advisers are still committed to putting their peace plan on the table in the upcoming months but haven’t decided when and how to launch it.
A National Security Council spokesman told me: "We do not provide readouts of meetings not on the President’s public schedule".
https://www.axios.com/greenblatt-met-with-abbas-son-trump-peace-deal-588f6c8d-5e6c-421b-8ac3-39256e16869b.html
Female Candidates May Have an Edge in Battleground Elections
CBS poll finds women are a critical demographic—especially this year.
Stephanie Mencimer
Aug. 19, 2018 5:34 PM
UNITED STATES - JULY 4: Jennifer Wexton walks with supporters in Leesburg, Va., as she participates in the Leesburg Independence Day Parade on July 4, 2018. Wexton is challenging incumbent Republican Barbara Comstock for Virginia's 10th Congressional district seat. Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call via AP Images
For more than 40 years, women have made up a majority of American voters. Women turn out to vote at much higher rates than their male counterparts, making them a critical demographic for any political candidate hoping to win in November.
A new CBS poll also suggests that women, particularly Democratic women, might be the ticket to electing many of the female candidates who’ve thrown their hats into the ring since the election of President Donald Trump. In April, the Associated Press found 309 women who were seeking House seats this year, which broke the previous record of 298, set during the 2012 election cycle.
The new poll shows that women in competitive congressional districts from California to New York would be five times more likely to vote for a female candidate than vote for a man, provided the candidates’ policy views were similar. The percentages are even larger among Democratic women, 42 percent of whom said they’d vote for a woman over a man with the same policy positions. Only 15 percent of Republican women would do so.
The numbers won’t come as much of a surprise to the record number of Democratic women running for Congress this year. The Cook Political Report earlier this year found that women in Democratic primaries have been performing far better than expected. More than 40 percent of Democratic nominees for House races are now women.
The presence of so many women in this year’s electoral field may help explain the findings of another CBS poll released Sunday. That one showed that Democrats are making inroads in their fight to recapture control of the House. CBS is now predicting that Democrats would win 222 seats in the House if the election were held today, up from 219 in June when the network pollsters declared the fight for the House a dead heat. If those numbers hold, the Democrats may have women to thank.
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2018/08/female-candidates-may-have-an-edge-in-battleground-elections/
Trump Keeps Trying to Kill the Agency That Investigates Chemical Plant Disasters
William G. Schulz
Aug 20, 2018 6:00 AM
So far, Congress has rejected the attempts, but the turmoil is taking its toll.
On a warm morning in April, workers at a Wisconsin oil refinery were conducting a routine shutdown for maintenance. Suddenly, a gasoline cracking unit exploded, and the workers watched in horror as a huge fireball ripped through the plant. They ran for their lives, barely escaping the blast.
Debris from the explosion ruptured a tank, which spilled more than half a million gallons of hot asphalt that burst into flames and burned for nine hours. Black smoke spread over the port town of Superior. Eleven workers were injured, and about 40,000 people were evacuated from nearby homes and schools.
Within 24 hours of the explosion at the Husky Energy Inc. refinery, a small team of federal investigators arrived. Their mission, Superior Mayor Jim Paine reassured residents, was to “find out what happened and how we prevent it in the future.”
Earlier this month, after a three-month probe, the investigators from the US Chemical Safety and Hazard Investigation Board concluded that a faulty valve at the plant caused the explosion. The board plans to issue recommendations that aim to prevent such an accident from happening again at a refinery.
But despite the warm welcome in Superior—and wide recognition of its expertise in chemical plant disasters—this small, independent federal agency is teetering on the brink of elimination.
The Trump administration has twice in its budgets attempted to shut down the Chemical Safety Board; so far, Congress has rejected the attempts. For the 2019 fiscal year, both the House and Senate have proposed restoring full funding.
But the assaults appear to be taking a toll
Hostility from the Trump administration and disarray from its efforts to eliminate the agency follow years of leadership turmoil and high turnover that started during the Obama administration. In 2015, its chairman, who was embroiled in a congressional investigation into poor management, resigned under pressure—yet leadership problems remain.
Combined, these problems threaten to cripple the agency’s investigations of chemical plant disasters, according to interviews and reports obtained by Reveal from the Center for Investigative Reporting. A report from the US Environmental Protection Agency’s inspector general says the turmoil “if not addressed, may seriously impede the agency’s ability to achieve its mission efficiently and effectively.”
A report from the US Environmental Protection Agency’s inspector general says the turmoil “if not addressed, may seriously impede the agency’s ability to achieve its mission efficiently and effectively.”
The Trump administration argues that the Chemical Safety Board duplicates the work of other federal agencies. Administration budget documents also cite unspecified complaints from industry and other federal agencies about the board’s recommendations for new regulations of the chemical industry.
Health and safety advocates and labor unions say the board is essential because aging oil and chemical facilities have had some of the deadliest and costliest industrial accidents in the past two decades.
More than 12,000 plants store or handle toxic or flammable chemicals in the United States. Under worst-case scenarios for more than 2,500 of these facilities, between 10,000 and 1 million people could be harmed, according to a 2012 Congressional Research Service report. An estimated 4.6 million children at nearly 10,000 schools are within 1 mile of a plant that handles hazardous chemicals, according to the Center for Effective Government.
Local officials, including emergency responders, often have little information about the chemicals and safety conditions at the plants in their communities. The chemical industry keeps much of this information under wraps, invoking national security and a need to protect confidential business information.
“Millions of people live and work in the shadow of high-risk chemical plants that store and use highly hazardous chemicals,” said Jordan Barab, a former board investigator who now blogs about worker safety.
Little-known federal agency
Over its 20-year history, the Chemical Safety Board has investigated more than 150 explosions, fires and spills at chemical plants and oil refineries.
Included are the 2012 Chevron refinery fire in Richmond, California, which drove about 15,000 people to seek medical care, and the 2013 West Fertilizer Co. explosion in Texas, where 15 people, including 12 emergency responders, died and 350 homes were damaged or destroyed.
Similar to the National Transportation Safety Board, which probes airplane, ship and railroad accidents, the Chemical Safety Board has no regulatory authority and does not issue fines or prosecute companies. But its findings often point to problems that other agencies may act upon: It has issued 815 recommendations designed to prevent tragedies at oil and chemical plants.
Established by Congress in the wake of two chemical plant explosions in Texas that killed or injured more than 350 workers, the board has a staff of 35 and a budget of $11 million a year—minuscule compared with other federal agencies. For the next fiscal year, the House has proposed $12 million in funding, while the Senate has proposed $11 million.
Mike Wright, director of health, safety and environment for the United Steelworkers, has called the board “one of the best bargains in Washington. If it has prevented even one accident, it has saved far more money than its budget over its entire history.”
The board [is] “one of the best bargains in Washington. If it has prevented even one accident, it has saved far more money than its budget over its entire history.”
The Trump administration has justified its proposal to eliminate the agency by saying other agencies, such as the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the EPA, already do similar investigative work.
“Congress intended CSB to be an investigative arm that is wholly independent of the rulemaking, inspection, and enforcement authorities of its partner agencies,” according to Trump administration budget documents. “While CSB has done some useful work on its investigations, its overlap with other agency investigative authorities has often generated friction. The previous management sought to focus CSB’s recommendations on the need for greater regulation of industry, which frustrated both regulators and industry.”
There apparently was friction between two federal agencies during the investigation of the West Fertilizer disaster in Texas. The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives concluded that the cause was arson, while the Chemical Safety Board reported that unsafe storage practices for combustible materials contributed to the explosion and a lack of sprinklers spread the flames. The bureau kept Chemical Safety Board investigators away from the site for four weeks, which hampered their ability to investigate the explosion, according to a board report.
The White House did not disclose any evidence that industry groups or companies have complained about the board’s investigations or recommendations.
The American Chemistry Council, which represents chemical companies, told Reveal in a statement that its members “find considerable value in the CSB’s work—especially the reports and materials generated by the Board as part of its investigations.” The investigations “raise industry awareness to potential problems” and “have benefitted ACC, its members and the public.” The industry group, however, declined to answer questions.
But former board Chairman Rafael Moure-Eraso, who resigned under pressure in 2015, blames his ouster on retaliation by some Republican members of Congress for his agency’s aggressive investigations of oil company accidents, including the 2010 Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico; the 2010 Tesoro refinery accident in Anacortes, Washington; and the 2012 Chevron refinery fire in California.
In those three investigations, the board made recommendations “that were opposed by industry groups … and their friendly congressmen in the US House of Representatives,” Moure-Eraso said. The overarching recommendation was that federal regulations should require refineries and offshore oil platforms to continually meet higher safety standards and reduce risk.
Moure-Eraso said industry groups welcome investigations because they improve safety for their workers and neighbors. But, he added, the groups oppose some of the board’s recommendations.
“When changes on improving protections require regulation, the support abruptly ends,” he said.
For example, after the Texas fertilizer plant explosion, the Obama administration enacted safety measures requiring more detailed public reporting of chemical hazards and improved safety training. But under President Donald Trump, former EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt moved to rescind most of the new rules, saying they would cost the industry too much—an estimated $88 million a year — and could make public information about chemical plants that would be useful to terrorists.
Moure-Eraso said the board’s highly technical investigations are not duplicated by federal regulatory agencies, which “obviously have failed to prevent some major chemical accidents.”
The EPA inspector general’s office under the Trump administration appears to agree. In a June report, the office said the board’s work complements other agencies’ work because “the root causes of an incident go beyond whether there was a violation of a regulation.”
Adam Carlesco, staff counsel for the nonprofit Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility, which represents government employees, said the chemical industry has stalled efforts to improve reporting of chemical plant accidents.
His group has sued to enforce a part of the board’s statutory authority that says it must compel companies to report plant accidents directly to the board. When the board tried to do this in 2009, industry groups called it burdensome. The pushback eventually led the board to drop the effort.
Agency in Disarray
A 2012 fire at the Chevron refinery in Richmond, Calif. led to about 15,000 people seeking medical care.
During the Obama administration, two House committees investigated charges that the board under Moure-Eraso had an abusive and hostile work environment and conspired to punish agency whistleblowers. No details about the whistleblowers were released publicly.
Also, the EPA’s inspector general criticized the number and pace of investigations. A 2014 report by the two House committees called it an “agency in disarray.”
The turmoil continues. Since January, the board has lost seven of its 18 investigators. In June, its chairwoman since 2015, Vanessa Sutherland, resigned and took a vice presidency job with a railroad company. And the EPA inspector general’s June report identified more mismanagement problems, including evidence that an unidentified board member improperly shared information with a labor union representative.
The inspector general’s office reported “negative impact from the President’s continued proposal to eliminate the agency.”
“This budget uncertainty impedes the CSB’s ability to attract, hire and retain staff,” according to the report, which added that the board “should continue to work with Congress toward achieving funding needs wherever possible.”
Earlier this month, US Reps. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.), chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, and Greg Gianforte, (R-Mont.), chairman of the Interior, Energy and Environment Subcommittee, wrote the White House asking that Trump nominate a new chairman because the vacancy “could plunge the agency into further chaos.”
The board members and chairman are appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate.
“Recent reports indicate mismanagement and improper conduct continue to undermine the CSB’s mission,” the congressmen wrote.
Living in fear in Superior
Debates about budgets and board leadership are not much of a balm for people who live with oil and chemical plants in their communities.
Residents of the Twin Ports area—the cities of Superior, population 27,000, and Duluth, Minnesota—still live in fear of the Husky Energy plant after the April accident.
Those who live near the refinery said the explosion was so powerful that they could feel the detonation. They now understand a harsh reality shared by millions of Americans: An accident at a chemical plant or refinery in their community could level their homes or injure them with toxic gases or smoke.
“I watched this … scary thing happen off my back porch,” Superior resident Renee Goodrich said at a City Council meeting a few days after the accident.
“Looking back, the normal pace of that day was terrifying,” said resident Gabriela Vo. “Were the citizens of Pompeii just going about their daily lives when the fateful volcano erupted? The smoke alone was enough to raise health concerns, let alone the possibility of the town blowing up.”
“Were the citizens of Pompeii just going about their daily lives when the fateful volcano erupted? The smoke alone was enough to raise health concerns, let alone the possibility of the town blowing up.”
The black smoke posed some health risks due to high concentrations of fine particles, but after it cleared, monitoring by company and county officials showed no air pollutants violated health standards.
Husky pledged cooperation and transparency with officials, and the Chemical Safety Board investigators said the company granted them full access to its plant and records. The company declined to answer questions from Reveal, citing the ongoing investigation.
The investigators concluded that a worn-out valve in a fluid catalytic cracking unit—equipment used to refine gasoline—allowed air to contact flammable chemicals, triggering the explosion. The board now is developing its recommendations on how to avoid such accidents.
It could have been a catastrophe: The board’s investigators reported that debris flew 200 feet into an asphalt tank. A storage tank filled with highly toxic hydrogen fluoride sits in the same area, just 150 feet away from the cracking unit that exploded. It was undamaged. If it had ruptured, the fumes could have caused severe injuries or deaths.
The company said the plant has a system of safeguards that would have prevented release of the gas, which is used to make high-octane gasoline, even if the tank had been punctured.
“The (hydrogen fluoride) storage tank is designed with multiple protection levels including a dedicated deluge system that douses the tank with a water curtain to keep it cooled and mitigate potential releases,” the company said in a statement.
But many locals—including Pat Farrell, a University of Minnesota Duluth soil scientist who is pushing for safety changes—think the town got lucky.
“One piece of shrapnel would have been all that was necessary for a major disaster, the scale of which the Twin Ports here have never seen,” Farrell said.
This story was edited by Marla Cone and copy edited by Stephanie Rice and Nikki Frick.
https://www.motherjones.com/environment/2018/08/trump-keeps-trying-to-kill-the-agency-that-investigates-chemical-plant-disasters/
i have no idea how my name got placed in this thread. i was not in the conversation you are making up.
where do you come off with this ?????
FWIW,...13 Rules for Dealing with Sociopaths
This list was taken from "The Sociopath Next Door", by Martha Stout, Ph.D
1. The first rule involves the bitter pill of accepting that some people literally have no conscience.
2. In a contest between your instincts and what is implied by the role a person has taken on---educator, doctor, leader, animal lover humanist, parent, child--go with your instincts. Your unfiltered impressions, though alarming and seemingly outlandish, may well help you out if you will let them. Your best self understands, without being told, that impressive and moral-sounding labels do not bestow conscience on anyone who did not have it to begin with.
3. When considering a new relationship of any kind, practice the Rule of Threes, regarding the claims and promises a person makes, and the responsibilities he or she has. Make the Rule of Threes your personal policy. Cut your losses and get out as soon as you can. Leaving though it may be hard, will be easier now than later, and less costly. Do not give your money, your work, your secrets, or your affection to a three timer. Your valuable gifts will be wasted.
4. Question authority.
5. Suspect flattery.
6. If necessary, redefine your concept of respect. Too often, we mistake fear for respect, and the more fearful we are of someone, the more we view him or her as deserving of our respect.
7. Do not join the game. Intrigue is a sociopath’s tool. Resist the temptation to compete with a seductive sociopath, to outsmart him, psychoanalyze, or even banter with him. In addition to reducing yourself to his level, you would be distracting yourself from what is really important, WHICH IS TO PROTECT YOURSELF.
8. The best way to protect yourself from a sociopath is to avoid him, to refuse any kind of contact or communication. Sociopaths live completely outside of the social contract, and therefore to include them in relationships or other social arrangements is perilous.
9. Question your tendency to pity too easily. Respect should be reserved for the kind and morally courageous. It should be reserved for innocent people who are in genuine pain or who have fallen on misfortune.
10. Do not try to redeem the unredeamable. Second chances are for people who possess conscience. If you are dealing with a person who has no conscience, know how to swallow hard and cut your losses. The sociopath’s behavior is not your fault, not in any way whatsoever. It is also not your mission. Your mission is your own life.
11. Never agree, out of pit or for any other reason, to help a sociopath conceal his or her true character. Other people deserve to warned more than sociopaths deserve to have you keep their secrets.
12. Defend your psyche. Do not allow someone without conscience, or even a string of such people, that humanity is a failure. Most human beings do possess conscience and are able to love.
13. Living well is the best revenge.
https://www.dailystrength.org/group/the-den/discussion/13-rules-for-dealing-with-sociopaths
thats a fantastic article and read about Jimmy Carter.
i always liked his character. a very honest-to-the-core, salt-of-the-earth type of man. a man that i would trust to steer this country back to being great.
too bad we have an oligarchy. it never works. except for a illusionary amount of time,...
then the honesty and truthfulness and government responsibility and sanity returns,...i hope in the very near future as soon as we can get dumbo orange hair removed and jalied.
fuagf,...powerful words from John Dean.
My second reaction is that Don McGahn is doing exactly the right thing, not merely to protect himself, but to protect his client. And his client is not Donald Trump; his client is the office of the president. That is one of the things that was cleared up as a result of Watergate. The American Bar Association reissued a code of ethics and dealt directly with representation of an organization and who the client is. And the client, in this instance, would not be the man who holds the office, but the office. And that is a huge difference.
I see a lot of similarity in the bungling. Watergate was not a carefully planned crime and cover-up. It was one bungled event after another. I see the same thing happening with Trump.
i love it when there is clarity from someone who had direct experience with an event. they are not speaking from theory or this is how it's suppose to be,...experience and learned lesson are speaking which i have respect for.
thanks for posting the entire article.
this man,...and i use the phrase only because his biology,...this man
is a piece of human garbage...whom surrounds himself with other garbage.
like George Carlin has stated,..."garbage in, garbage out."
i'm hoping Elon Musk or someone soon perfects space travel to the Moon or Mars,...
i'm out of here.
this is one f'd up planet.
fuagf,....great read from a conscious person. she cognized and discerned what was working and not and moved on it. granted, as she expressed, she had some slips (giving again to the collection plate after deciding she will no longer,...etc) but she snapped herself out of her guilt and moved in a positive way what works for her. f a n t a s t i c !
now,...if the rest of the world will cognize as this woman did what the CC really is,...the world will be a whole lot better !
hope you're having an awesome day,...best to you fuagf.
arizona,...how does one even talk to, speak with, debate with a certifiable asshole like Bill Donahue ???
this man is absolutely sick ! for him to use this example is exactly what the CC sites also. he is speaking for the CC. so the suggestion is if it's not penetration it's not rape.
how does one even wrap their head around such a piece of bullshit ?
this IS the EXACT (one of the) reason why the CC is in and will stay in the powerful position they are. individuals that are willing to lie and fight for the church rationalizing and dexifying the abuse actions laced by an uncaring attitude towards the victims. the CC's take,...it's just more money to pay out should it come to that.
money !,..oh, so the CC has now become pimps for their bishops and priests who conduct sexual abuse on young boys. how else can it be looked at.
whom i also blame are the parishioners.
why are they standing by allowing these monsters to control your church ?
why are people worldwide not demanding the popes head for doing nothing. he's been pope since 2013,...he's had more than enough time to heal this. yet he sits on his hands acting like he and the CC are the victim. this man is not a representative of anything spiritual.
this is why i have no use whatsoever for religion., NONE ! it's all garbage,...all of it.
fuagf,...this is pure sickness ! for this pope to allow these actions to continue on his watch, literally, he needs to be taken to task.
what is wrong with this man? his actions along with his lack of actions make him a pimp for the catholic priests perpetrating these sexual abuses on these young individuals. how else can it be looked at ? decades and decades of this sexual abuse,..and no justice except for some financial payout.
i'm not religious but i can use religious percepts to make my point.
hey Jorge or Francis or whatever you call your self,...is this the teachings in your holy book that you stand by and witness your young parishioners to be sexually abused ?
is this what Christ would have you do ?
at this point all i see is a shadow of a representative of the divine. this pope is as sick if not sicker than these priests.
as you can tell,..i'm upset about this situation. upset because the same ole same ole religious bullshit will be peddled and once again years later another study will surface and more and more abuses will be be displayed.
the current pope is just as guilty as these low life priests !
by doing nothing the pope is an accomplice in these damaging actions that are destroying young boys.
his lack of action is the tell.
so what that it is embarrassing for the church,...WAKE UP pope,..you're destroying lives.
this is a real sickness that has been protected by every pope.
the issue is NEVER really addressed.
religion like politics,...the can is just kicked down the road.
how about a pope with some real spiritual principles ????
how about a pope that states; 'this is my responsibility. we, i, the church have not really addressed this issue. this is a crime and i will now begin to give these priests over to the law for proper sentencing.'
it will never happen,...
the sickness is in charge not the conscious being in this case.
JMHO
Fox News host Trish Regan criticised Denmark's progressive social welfare system as “socialist dystopia”. But Danish politician, Dan Jørgensen, was having none of it.
Watch him dismantle Trish Regan’s argument point by point.
https://twitter.com/JamesMelville/status/1030338522992074752
“What it shows is that the president is fixated on the Russia investigation, he’s angry about it, and he wants to do everything he can to discourage or slow down the investigation,”
Former US security leaders blast Trump for yanking clearance
By Jill Colvin and Catherine Lucey
Former U.S. security officials issued scathing rebukes to President Donald Trump on Thursday, admonishing him for yanking a top former spy chief’s security clearance in what they cast as an act of political vengeance. Trump said he’d had to do “something” about the “rigged” federal probe of Russian election interference.
Trump’s admission that he acted out of frustration about the Russia probe underscored his willingness to use his executive power to fight back against an investigation he sees as a threat to his presidency. Legal experts said the dispute may add to the evidence being reviewed by special counsel Robert Mueller.
In an opinion piece in The New York Times, former CIA Director John Brennan said Trump’s decision, announced Wednesday, to deny him access to classified information was a desperate attempt to end Mueller’s investigation. Brennan, who served under President Barack Obama and has become a vocal Trump critic, called Trump’s claims that he did not collude with Russia “hogwash.”
The only question remaining is whether the collusion amounts to a “constituted criminally liable conspiracy,” Brennan wrote.
Later Thursday, the retired Navy admiral who oversaw the raid that killed Osama bin Laden called Trump’s moves “McCarthy-era tactics.” Writing in The Washington Post, William H. McRaven said he would “consider it an honor” if Trump would revoke his clearance, as well.
“Through your actions, you have embarrassed us in the eyes of our children, humiliated us on the world stage and, worst of all, divided us as a nation,” McRaven wrote.
That was followed late Thursday by a joint letter from 12 former senior intelligence officials calling Trump’s action “ill-considered and unprecedented.” They said it “has nothing to do with who should and should not hold security clearances — and everything to do with an attempt to stifle free speech.”
The signees included six former CIA directors, five former deputy directors and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper. Two of the signees — Clapper and former CIA Director Michael Hayden — have appeared on a White House list of people who may also have their security clearances revoked.
Trump on Wednesday openly tied his decision to strip Brennan of his clearance — and threaten nearly a dozen other former and current officials — to the ongoing investigation into Russian election meddling and possible collusion with his campaign. In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Trump again called the probe a “rigged witch hunt” and said “these people led it!”
“So I think it’s something that had to be done,” he said.
The president’s comments were a swift departure from the official explanation given by the White House earlier Wednesday that cited the “the risks” posed by Brennan’s alleged “erratic conduct and behavior.” It marked the latest example of the president contradicting a story his aides had put forward to explain his motivations.
Attorneys said the revocation appeared to be within the president’s authority. But they noted the power play also could be used to reinforce a case alleging obstruction of justice, following the president’s firing of former FBI Director James Comey and his repeated tweets calling for the investigation to end.
Patrick Cotter, a former assistant U.S. Attorney in the Eastern District of New York and a longtime white-collar defense attorney, said that while a prosecutor could argue that Trump’s targeting of clearances was intended as a warning that “if you contribute to, participate in, support the Russia probe and I find out about it, I’m going to punish you,” it is likely not obstruction in itself.
But, he said the move would be a “powerful piece of evidence” for prosecutors as part of a pattern to demonstrate an intent to use presidential power in connection with the probe.
Renato Mariotti, a former federal prosecutor agreed.
“What it shows is that the president is fixated on the Russia investigation, he’s angry about it, and he wants to do everything he can to discourage or slow down the investigation,” he said.
Special Counsel Mueller and his team have been looking at Trump’s public statements and tweets as they investigate whether the president could be guilty of obstruction.
“I don’t think it advances the criminal obstruction case, but I think it’s factually relevant,” said Mark Zaid, a national security attorney. “I think it shows the state of mind and intent to interfere or impede any unfavorable discussion of his potential connection to Russia.”
Former CIA directors and other top national security officials are typically allowed to keep their clearances, at least for some period. But Trump said Wednesday he is reviewing the clearances of several other former top intelligence and law enforcement officials, including former FBI Director Comey and current senior Justice Department official Bruce Ohr. All are critics of the president or are people who Trump appears to believe are against him.
The initial White House statement about Brennan’s clearance made no reference to the Russia investigation. Instead, the president said he was fulfilling his “constitutional responsibility to protect the nation’s classified information,” even though he made no suggestion that Brennan was improperly exposing the nation’s secrets.
“Mr. Brennan’s lying and recent conduct characterized by increasingly frenzied commentary is wholly inconsistent with access to the nations’ most closely held secrets,” Trump said.
Just hours later, his explanation had changed.
“You look at any of them and you see the things they’ve done,” Trump told the Journal. “In some cases, they’ve lied before Congress. The Hillary Clinton whole investigation was a total sham.”
“I don’t trust many of those people on that list,” he said. “I think that they’re very duplicitous. I think they’re not good people.”
The episode was reminiscent of Trump’s shifting explanations for firing Comey and the evolving descriptions of the Trump Tower meeting between top campaign aides and a Kremlin-connected lawyer — both topics of interest to Mueller.
And it underscores why the president’s lawyers are fearful of allowing Trump to sit down for an interview with Mueller’s team, as Trump has repeatedly said he is interested in doing.
In announcing Comey’s firing, the White House initially cited the former FBI director’s handling of the probe into Democratic rival Clinton’s emails, seizing on the FBI director’s decision to divulge details of the probe to the public during her campaign against Trump.
But a few days after Comey was dismissed, Trump told NBC’s Lester Holt in an interview that he was really thinking of “this Russia thing” when he fired Comey.
Trump later changed again, tweeting that he “never fired James Comey because of Russia!”
Early this month, he admitted in a tweet that the Trump Tower meeting, which was arranged by his son, Donald Trump Jr., “was a meeting to get information on an opponent.”
That directly contradicted a July 2017 statement from Trump Jr. — written with the consultation of the White House — that claimed the meeting had been primarily about adoption.
https://apnews.com/e64193c1a5f14736a00e13a5bf0bea14/Former-US-security-leaders-blast-Trump-for-yanking-clearance
“Rigged Witch Hunt,” Meet Trump’s “Red Wave”
By Susan B. Glasser
Aug. 17, 2018
Donald Trump’s Presidency is often described as a reality-show version of the White House, with Trump himself as the producer, director, and main character. There’s something to the metaphor, of course; Trump is a showman, a veteran of the reality-TV genre who relishes the notion of himself as a master manipulator, able to dominate the news cycle at will by changing plotlines and introducing new controversies to distract us from the old. But the President’s volatile behavior and untethered public comments in recent days suggest that the analogy misses the mark: Trump’s act today is an unreality show. The President is not so much trying to shape our perception of events with his theatrics as he is trying to sell the American public, or at least his narrow slice of it, on an entirely opposite version of what is actually happening.
“Honesty wins!” the most dishonest President since Richard Nixon, and, arguably, ever, tweeted on Thursday morning. On Wednesday, he announced that he had revoked the security clearance of John Brennan, the former C.I.A. director, who has emerged as one of Trump’s fiercest public critics, citing as grounds Brennan’s supposed “erratic conduct and behavior” and “frenzied commentary,” an example if ever there was one of a President projecting onto his enemies his own attributes. To bolster his case, Trump paraphrased his friend Sean Hannity, the Fox TV host, accusing Brennan and an array of other former national-security officials of a grave crime, the very one that Trump and his advisers are being investigated for: “They tried to steal and influence an election in the United States.”
For months, Trump and amplifiers like Hannity have promoted an increasingly elaborate and Orwellian version of the 2016 election meddling, in which the actual outrage was not the Russian interference on Trump’s behalf, or the serious possibility of the Trump campaign’s collusion with it. Instead, there was a vast conspiracy to benefit Hillary Clinton by Brennan and other former officials of the Obama Administration; the special counsel, Robert Mueller; James Comey and the rest of the F.B.I.; Trump’s own Attorney General, Jeff Sessions; “17 Angry Democrats”; and a rotating cast of others. In a revelatory interview with the Wall Street Journal on Wednesday, Trump even tied the plotlines together, announcing that he had decided to withdraw Brennan’s security clearance because of “the rigged witch hunt” and “sham” Brennan helped lead. “It’s something that had to be done,” he declared.
The “Rigged Witch Hunt” may have become the signature story of Trump’s unreality show, but there are many other examples. Over the next ten weeks, expect the President to emphasize, with increasing urgency and intensity, the personal campaign he has started to reshape public perceptions of the upcoming midterm elections. The numbers, the polls, the battleground map, and the entire previous history of midterm elections in the modern era suggest a Republican defeat in November of large and possibly massive proportions. And yet President Trump now insists that there will be no “blue wave,” and that a “red wave” is coming instead.
Trump first started tweeting his “red wave” slogan in June, responding to California primary-election results showing Trump’s Republican Party in serious trouble in the historically G.O.P.-leaning suburban districts that the Party needs to keep to retain control of the House. Trump insisted the opposite. “Great night for Republicans!” he wrote. “So much for the big Blue Wave. It may be a big Red Wave.”
Ever since, the President has adopted this as his election mantra. Earlier this month, he tweeted this reality-defying version of his latest plotline: “Presidential Approval numbers are very good - strong economy, military and just about everything else. Better numbers than Obama at this point, by far. We are winning on just about every front and for that reason there will not be a Blue Wave, but there might be a Red Wave!” Three days later, buoyed by a series of rallies for the Trump faithful at which he repeated his new slogan, Trump tweeted it again. “As long as I campaign and/or support Senate and House candidates (within reason), they will win! I love the people, & they certainly seem to like the job I’m doing. If I find the time, in between China, Iran, the Economy and much more, which I must, we will have a giant Red Wave!” The President repeated it again after this week’s contests: “Great Republican election results last night. So far we have the team we want. 8 for 9 in Special Elections. Red Wave!”
The problem with all these tweets is not so much that they are riddled with factual inaccuracies, although they are. (Obama’s approval numbers were better at this point; pending the results in Ohio’s Twelfth District, Republicans have only won seven of nine special elections for this Congress.) The problem is that there is no red wave in sight, nor do the Republicans who have to deal with that reality expect one to somehow magically materialize. “No, there is no red wave. There is no one who thinks that,” a Republican strategist who has been advising the Party’s keep-the-House efforts told me on Thursday. “It’s like the phrase from his book, ‘The Art of the Deal’: Lying isn’t lying if it’s in the service of Trump.”
The Republican strategist told me that he and his colleagues at the national Party know what they are up against. “He’s not convincing political operators in Washington, D.C., but that’s not his goal,” the strategist told me. “He’s convincing people wearing maga hats in Waffle Houses across the country.” Even the Wall Street Journal’s conservative opinion pages, owned by the Trump promoter Rupert Murdoch, have taken issue with this particular Trumpian alternate reality. “Our sense is that Republican voters haven’t recognized how much jeopardy the party is in. Many are content to listen only to their safe media spaces that repeat illusions about a ‘red wave’ and invoke 2016 when the media said Mr. Trump couldn’t win,” the Journal editorialized last week. “But that’s not an excuse for ignoring the evidence of GOP trouble.”
That evidence is overwhelming. “I haven’t spent thirty seconds thinking about a red wave, because I think it is totally delusional. Any Republican pollster or strategist worth their salt just rolls their eyes at the thought of it,” Charlie Cook, the dean of American election forecasters, told me. Cook, the editor of the nonpartisan Cook Political Report, has followed closely every midterm election since 1974, when the Republicans suffered historic losses amid Richard Nixon’s Watergate scandal, reshaping Capitol Hill for a generation. His team at the Cook Political Report currently assesses thirty-seven Republican House seats as highly vulnerable, up from twenty in January, including three more moved to “toss-ups” after the primary-election results Trump touted in his red-wave tweet this week.
Another fifty Republican-held seats are currently assessed as potentially vulnerable. Given that Democrats only need to defend their two vacant seats and pick up twenty-three more to win back control of the House, they have many possible routes to a majority. As for other metrics used to assess the midterm-election outlook, Trump’s approval ratings remain historically low, hovering around forty per cent, and Democrats register leads of between eight and twelve points in most recent national surveys of generic congressional-ballot preference. Over the last twenty-one midterm elections, the President’s party has lost an average of thirty seats in the House and four in the Senate. No wonder Trump is trying to sell the one metric that is trending in his favor, the strong economy. But, even here, he is selling an alternate reality by declaring that the economy is “better than ever,” a conclusion that would surprise, among others, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama, each of whom saw growth numbers as good or better, depending on which ones are cited.
Cook told me that he currently believes that “we are looking at a twenty- to forty-seat loss” for Republicans in the House, along with significant losses in state legislative and gubernatorial contests. (The U.S. Senate, he said, is a much murkier picture, with anything from a small G.O.P. gain to a small Democratic gain possible.) What’s more, he added, “Republican losses would be looking in the sixty- to seventy-seat range right now,” if not for the uneven battleground dictated by partisan gerrymandering by Republican-controlled legislatures. In short, he said, the midterm election is shaping up to be a “train wreck” and “a complete shit show” for Trump and his party. So, yes, there is a blue wave—the only question is how big. Cook was categorical that Trump would not be able to somehow turn things around between now and November. “We have never seen a midterm election change directions between midsummer and Election Day,” he said. “I have never seen it happen. They either stay the same or they get worse; we’ve never seen it diminish or reverse.”
For Cook and others, Trump’s red wave comes from the same place that his “Rigged Witch Hunt” originates: Trump’s insistence on the legitimacy of his election victory in 2016 and his unwavering belief that it was the product of his own, precedent-defying brilliance. “The President is emotionally incapable of dealing with the fact that he got elected on a statistical fluke,” losing the popular vote by a wide margin and yet still winning the Electoral College, Cook said. Trump’s alternate reality for 2018 is built on the conviction that he can break the political laws of history once again, never mind that the only evidence to support that conviction, so far, is his own certainty of it. “All the experts said he was wrong and he won, and therefore there’s no reason to listen to an expert ever again.”
On Thursday, I spoke with one of the Democrats who is hoping to ride an actual blue wave this November. Tom Malinowski, a former State Department official under the Obama Administration, is running against a Republican incumbent in the Seventh Congressional District of New Jersey, a largely suburban district that includes Trump’s Bedminster golf club, where the President just spent his August vacation. (“We jokingly talk about turning his putting green blue in November,” Malinowski told me.) A Republican has represented the district since 1981, but Hillary Clinton narrowly defeated Trump there in 2016, Democratic turnout far exceeded Republican turnout in the June primary for the first time, and Malinowski has so far outraised the incumbent, Leonard Lance. Cook ranks the race a toss-up, and Malinowski said a poll conducted for his campaign in July had him leading the race by a bit more than two points. In a sign of Republican concern about the seat, a Republican super pac made a massive seven-hundred-thousand-dollar ad buy attacking the Democrat as a Washington insider, just before I spoke with Malinowski between campaign stops on Thursday.
Needless to say, none of this is evidence of a red wave building in the suburbs of New Jersey. “There’s still at least two places in America where facts matter, the courtroom and the ballot-counting room, and all the tweets in the world can’t change the outcome of what happens in those two rooms,” Malinowski told me. “You can’t tweet away the reality of what happens in those two rooms.”
https://www.newyorker.com/news/letter-from-trumps-washington/rigged-witch-hunt-meet-trumps-red-wave?mbid=social_twitter
Fox News Host Debunks the Myth That the Steele Dossier has been ‘Debunked’
By Ed Krassenstein
hillreporter.com
August 16, 2018
While many argue that Fox News is all “pro-Trump”, this simply is not true. There are a handful of hosts, commentators and newscasters who believe in reporting on facts, no matter how bad these facts may make President Trump appear in viewers’ eyes.
One such host is Shep Smith, who has made a habit out of fact-checking statements put out by President Trump even when the majority of the network refuses to hold Trump accountable for many of his falsehoods. This was again the case last night when Shep Smith decided to not only debunk claims made by Donald Trump and Rudy Giuliani, but also those which have often been preached by Smith’s Fox News colleague Sean Hannity.
With John Brennan having his security clearance removed by the White House yesterday, Rudy Giuliani claimed that Brennan was guilty of bringing the Steele Dossier to the Special Counsel’s attention, and that the Dossier has been “debunked”. This simply is not true and Shep Smith clarified these very points for his viewers.
“Much of Giuliani’s attack on Brennan involved the dossier compiled by the former British spy Christopher Steele, that the administration has repeatedly asserted was what began the Russia investigation,” Smith told his viewers. “It was not. The Russia investigation began after the former Trump policy adviser George Papadopoulos told an Australian diplomat that the Russians had dirt on his then-political opponent Hillary Clinton. That information was passed on to intelligence officials.”
Smith then went on to directly attack the allegations that the Steele Dossier has been debunked. We’ve heard over and over again from Fox News, and those who support President Trump, that the Steele Dossier has been proven false. This idea is simply false itself.
“For context, the research in the dossier includes 17 memos produced by the former spy Christopher Steele,” Smith told his viewers. “They allege misconduct and a conspiracy between members of the Trump campaign and the Russian government during the 2016 election. Some assertions in the dossier have been confirmed. Other parts are unconfirmed. None of the dossier, to Fox News’s knowledge, has been disproven.“
The entire segment can be seen below:
Sean Hannity lies about the Russia investigation at night on Fox News, Shep Smith debunks his false claims during the day pic.twitter.com/lOoOxuD2IH
— Media Matters (@mmfa) August 15, 2018
Exclusive: Omarosa's publisher tells Trump campaign: We 'will not be intimidated'
By Kaitlan Collins,
CNN Updated 2057 GMT (0457 HKT)
August 16, 2018
Washington (CNN)
Omarosa Manigault Newman's publisher has responded to President Donald Trump's campaign's "legal threats" over her tell-all book, saying Trump is fully able to use his "bully pulpit" to refute anything they take issue with -- but that the book will be published.
The Trump campaign also filed an arbitration action Tuesday against Manigault Newman, alleging she breached a 2016 confidentiality agreement she signed.
Responding to a letter from Charles Harder, who is litigation counsel for the Trump campaign, book publisher Simon and Schuster's outside counsel Elizabeth McNamara wrote: "While your letter generally claims that excerpts from the book contain 'disparaging statements,' it is quite telling that at no point do you claim that any specific statement in the book is false. Your client does not have a viable legal claim merely because unspecified truthful statements in the Book may embarrass the president or his associates. At base, your letter is nothing more than an obvious attempt to silence legitimate criticism of the president."
"Put simply, the book's purpose is to inform the public. Private contracts like the NDA may not be used to censor former or current government officials from speaking about non-classified information learned during the course of their public employment."
Harder did not immediately respond to a request for the letter he sent to Simon and Schuster.
"Your letter recounts at great length the details of a non-disclosure agreement between former White House Senior Staffer Omarosa Manigault-Newman's and the Trump Campaign (the "NDA"), and threatens that publication of Ms. Manigault-Newman's book, Unhinged: An Insider's Account of the Trump White House (the "Book"), will be subject S&S to 'substantial monetary damages and punitive damages' for various legal claims arising from the Book and the NDA," the Simon and Schuster letter said.
"My clients will not be intimidated by hollow legal threats and have proceeded with publication of the Book as schedule," it added. "Should you pursue litigation against S&S, we are confident that documents related to the contents of the Book in the possession of President Trump, his family members, his businesses, the Trump Campaign, and his administration will prove particularly relevant to our defense."
Simon and Schuster's director of corporate communications Adam Rothberg said in a statement to CNN that "despite various legal claims and threats made by representatives of the Trump campaign" Gallery Books and Simon & Schuster are proceeding as planned with publication of "Unhinged," noting they are "confident that we are acting well within our rights and responsibilities as a publisher."
https://edition.cnn.com/2018/08/16/politics/omarosa-simon-schuster-white-house/index.html
i have rooster, Jim Lur, and conix on IGNORE. i have no time to banter with proven uninformed, uneducated assholes as these three.
ROTFLMAO,...you're really really hung on that chasing your tail th'ang.
i guess you make it your personal business to look at backsides. hmmmm,..that is very telling.
maybe you have an unconscious desire to have your tail wagged,...
just making an observation.
oh,...i don't use vulgarity.
it's called language skills,... which you don't have along with your poor 4th grade spelling lack of ability.
are your little ears having a difficult time having adult conversations ? you like wagging tails,...maybe one item has nothing to do with the other.
great post Peg ! that is a very powerful statement from a retired Navy admiral, who was also commander of the U.S. Joint Special Operations Command.
so much for the military and Trump in alignment.
Don/Con just got a military haircut !!!! LOL !
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
",...Like most Americans, I had hoped that when you became president, you would rise to the occasion and become the leader this great nation needs.
A good leader tries to embody the best qualities of his or her organization. A good leader sets the example for others to follow. A good leader always puts the welfare of others before himself or herself.
Your leadership, however, has shown little of these qualities. Through your actions, you have embarrassed us in the eyes of our children, humiliated us on the world stage and, worst of all, divided us as a nation.
If you think for a moment that your McCarthy-era tactics will suppress the voices of criticism, you are sadly mistaken. The criticism will continue until you become the leader we prayed you would be."
LOL,...you still haven't posted the PROOF of the dossier ????
you've done fantastic at avoiding the question,..just like your master bater Orange Hair.
your excuses,...it's news,... i'm stupid,...
everything but the PROOF !!!
i guess you and Don/Con are circle jerk partners.
with nothing to deliver !!!!
LOL !!!
First biomarker evidence of DDT-autism link
National birth cohort study finds DDT metabolites in the blood of pregnant women are associated with elevated odds of autism in offspring
Date:
August 16, 2018
Source:
Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health
Summary:
A study of more than 1 million pregnancies in Finland reports that elevated levels of a metabolite of the banned insecticide DDT in the blood of pregnant women are linked to increased risk for autism in the offspring. The study is the first to connect an insecticide with risk for autism using maternal biomarkers of exposure.
A study of more than 1 million pregnancies in Finland reports that elevated levels of a metabolite of the banned insecticide DDT in the blood of pregnant women are linked to increased risk for autism in the offspring.
An international research team led by investigators at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health and the Department of Psychiatry published these results in the American Journal of Psychiatry. The study, conducted in collaboration with investigators at the University of Turku and the National Institute of Health and Welfare in Finland, is the first to connect an insecticide with risk for autism using maternal biomarkers of exposure.
Researchers identified 778 cases of childhood autism among offspring born from 1987 to 2005 to women enrolled in the Finnish Maternity Cohort, representing 98 percent of pregnant women in Finland. They matched these mother-child pairs with control offspring of mothers and offspring without autism. Maternal blood taken during early pregnancy was analyzed for DDE, a metabolite of DDT, and PCBs, another class of environmental pollutants.
The investigators found the odds of autism with intellectual disability in offspring were increased by greater than twofold for the mother's DDE levels in the top quartile. For the overall sample of autism cases, the odds were nearly one-third higher among offspring exposed to elevated maternal DDE levels. The findings persisted after adjusting for several confounding factors such as maternal age and psychiatric history. There was no association between maternal PCBs and autism.
While DDT and PCBs were widely banned in many nations over 30 years ago, including the U.S. and Finland, they persist in the food chain because their breakdown occurs very slowly, as long as several decades, resulting in continuing exposure to populations. These chemicals are transferred across the placenta in concentrations greater than those seen in the mother's blood.
"We think of these chemicals in the past tense, relegated to a long-gone era of dangerous 20th Century toxins," says lead author Alan S. Brown, MD, MPH, professor of Epidemiology at Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health and of Psychiatry at Columbia University Medical Center. "Unfortunately, they are still present in the environment and are in our blood and tissues. In pregnant women, they are passed along to the developing fetus. Along with genetic and other environmental factors, our findings suggest that prenatal exposure to the DDT toxin may be a trigger for autism."
The researchers offer two reasons for their observation that maternal exposure to DDE was related to autism while maternal PCB exposure was not. First, maternal DDE is associated with low birthweight, a well-replicated risk factor for autism. In contrast, maternal PCB exposure has not been related to low birthweight. Second, they point to androgen receptor binding, a process key to neurodevelopment. A study in rats found DDE inhibits androgen receptor binding, an outcome also seen in a rat model of autism. In contrast, PCBs increase androgen receptor transcription.
Story Source:
Materials provided by Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.
Journal Reference:
Alan S. Brown et al. Association of Maternal Insecticide Levels With Autism in Offspring From a National Birth Cohort. American Journal of Psychiatry, 2018 DOI: 10.1176/appi.ajp.2018.17101129
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/08/180816081500.htm
that's a rumor,...its not news. it's news when it can be PROVED !
you can't even find a verifiable link to your fantasy because the proof does not exist.
so the rumor isn't a secret.
but the most important element is,...
YOU HAVE NO PROOF !
but there is DEFINITELY PROOF that Don/Con, Trump Jr. , Kushner all were at a meeting with Russians to get some dirt on Hillary,...
THAT IS PROOF !
PROVE IT ASSHOLE,..PROVE IT. you wrote,...She paid the Russians for that bullshit dossier
you can't.
where's your third party verifiable links ? PROVE IT !
you can't.
you got no real information just a bunch of rumor and rhetoric churned up by your duffus potus and his band of criminals.
PROVE IT,...you know you can't..or you would have posted those links of proof immediately.
you're pathetic !
let me know who your employer is,...they need to be notified,...
you suck at your job.
FAKE NEWS !
amazing,...you keep fighting for your limitations.
the only one that is blind here is YOU!
Peg,..what's wild is Don/Con and his band of criminals are using victimhood to create a sentiment.
the exact same "entrapment" the Don/Con team was attempting on Clinton BACKFIRED on them and they were caught with their underwear over their heads.
even IF the Clinton team did perform as this Editorial article suggests (no proof mind you, just an opinion) the Clinton team outsmarted the Don/Con team to take the bait of "some dirt on Hillary",...they were outsmarted at their own game !!!!!
i love how this is playing out.
the Don/Con team is sooooo desperate that they have editorials written.
but,...it's ALL fake news right 8^)
prove it ! prove it !! post the link and third party verification.
i'll make it easy for you and give you a format to use;
1- Hillary did what ?
1a - what is "the same thing"?
post the link and third party verification.
no youtube videos. actual proof,..if you even know what that is.
so what ! Don/Con, Trump Jr., Kushner and others still either attended or had knowledge of that meeting to collect the goods on Clinton.
no one pushed them in the door against their better judgment,...
no one told them to do anything,...they followed their own criminal mindsets.
they got suckered by their own greed and potential possibility to gain an upper hand.
once again,...their lies (this entire Don/Con administration)have caught up with them.
LOL,..you ignorant asshole. you're living in a country that has a racist as potus.
you know that is the truth,..you just can't get to that line and cross it.
are you stupid from your birth or did you practice intensely to get to the top of your game ?
either way,..mission accomplished.
Donald Trump, Gunrunner for Hire
by William Hartung
Aug. 16, 2018
The NRA and the Gun Industry in the Global Stratosphere
While Donald Trump rails — falsely — against a flood of criminals washing across the U.S.-Mexico border, he conveniently ignores this country’s export of violence in the other direction thanks to both legal and illegal transfers of guns to Mexico and Central America.
In the meantime, welcome to the world of American gunrunning and start thinking of Donald Trump as our very own gunrunner-in-chief.
American weapons makers have dominated the global arms trade for decades. In any given year, they’ve accounted for somewhere between one-third and more than one-half the value of all international weapons sales. It’s hard to imagine things getting much worse — or better, if you happen to be an arms trader — but they could, and soon, if a new Trump rule on firearms exports goes through.
But let’s hold off a moment on that and assess just how bad it’s gotten before even worse hits the fan. Until recently, the Trump administration had focused its arms sales policies on the promotion of big-ticket items like fighter planes, tanks, and missile defense systems around the world. Trump himself has loudly touted U.S. weapons systems just about every time he’s had the chance, whether amid insults to allies at the recent NATO summit or at a chummy White House meeting with Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, whose brutal war in Yemen is fueled by U.S.-supplied arms.
A recent presidential export policy directive, in fact, specifically instructs American diplomats to put special effort into promoting arms sales, effectively turning them into agents for the country’s largest weapons makers. As an analysis by the Security Assistance Monitor at the Center for International Policy has noted, human rights and even national security concerns have taken a back seat to creating domestic jobs via such arms sales. Evidence of this can be found in, for example, the ending of Obama administration arms sales suspensions to Nigeria, Bahrain, and Saudi Arabia. The first of those had been imposed because of the way the Nigerian government repressed its own citizens; the second for Bahrain’s brutal crackdown on the democracy movement there; and the last for Saudi Arabia’s commission of acts that one member of Congress has said “look like war crimes” in its Yemeni intervention.
Fueling death and destruction, however, turns out not to be a particularly effective job creator. Such military spending actually generates significantly fewer jobs per dollar than almost any other kind of investment. In addition, many of those jobs will actually be located overseas, thanks to production-sharing deals with weapons-purchasing countries like Italy, Japan, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates, and other U.S. allies. To cite an example, one of the goals of Saudi Arabia’s economic reform plan — unveiled in 2017 — is to ensure that, by 2030, half the value of the kingdom’s arms purchases will be produced in Saudi Arabia. U.S. firms have scrambled to comply, setting up affiliates in the Saudi capital, Riyadh, and in the case of Lockheed Martin’s Sikorsky unit, agreeing to begin assembling military helicopters there. McClatchy news service summed up the situation in this headline: “Trump’s Historic Arms Deal Is a Likely Jobs Creator — In Saudi Arabia.”
For most Americans, there should be serious questions about the economic benefits of overseas arms sales, but if you’re a weapons maker looking to pump up sales and profits, the Trump approach has already been a smashing success. According to the head of the Pentagon’s arms sales division, known euphemistically as the Defense Security Cooperation Agency, the Department of Defense has brokered agreements for sales of major systems worth $46 billion in the first six months of 2018, more than the $41 billion in deals made during all of 2017.
And that, it seems, is just the beginning.
Slow Motion Weapons of Mass Destruction
Yes, those massive sales of tanks, helicopters, and fighter aircraft are indeed a grim wonder of the modern world and never receive the attention they truly deserve. However, a potentially deadlier aspect of the U.S. weapons trade receives even less attention than the sale of big-ticket items: the export of firearms, ammunition, and related equipment. Global arms control advocates have termed such small arms and light weaponry — rifles, automatic and semi-automatic weapons, and handguns — “slow motion weapons of mass destruction” because they’re the weapons of choice in the majority of the 40 armed conflicts now underway around the world. They and they alone have been responsible for nearly half of the roughly 200,000 violent deaths by weapon that have been occurring annually both in and outside of official war zones.
And the Trump administration is now moving to make it far easier for U.S. gun makers to push such wares around the world. Consider it an irony, if you will, but in doing so, the president who has staked his reputation on rejecting everything that seems to him tainted by Barack Obama is elaborating on a proposal originally developed in the Obama years.
The crucial element in the new plan: to move key decisions on whether or not to export guns and ammunition abroad from the State Department’s jurisdiction, where they would be vetted on both human rights and national security grounds, to the Commerce Department, whose primary mission is promoting national exports.
The Violence Policy Center, a research and advocacy organization that seeks to limit gun deaths, has indicated that such a move would ease the way for more exports of a long list of firearms. Those would include sniper rifles and AR-15s, the now-classic weapon in U.S. mass killings like the school shootings in Parkland, Florida, and Newtown, Connecticut. Under the new plan, the careful tracking of whose hands such gun exports could end up in will be yesterday’s news and, as a result, U.S. weapons are likely to become far more accessible to armed gangs, drug cartels, and terrorist operatives.
President Trump’s plan would even eliminate the requirement that Congress be notified in advance of major firearms deals, which would undoubtedly prove to be the arms loophole of all time. According to statistics gathered by the Security Assistance Monitor, which gathers comprehensive information on U.S. military and police aid programs, the State Department approved $662 million worth of firearms exports to 15 countries in 2017. The elimination of Congressional notifications and the other proposed changes will mean that countries like Mexico, the Philippines, Turkey, and the United Arab Emirates, as well as various Central American nations, will have far easier access to a far wider range of U.S. firearms with far less Congressional oversight. And that, in turn, means that U.S.-supplied weapons will play even more crucial roles in vicious civil wars like the one in Yemen and are far more likely to make their way into the hands of local thugs, death squads, and drug cartels.
And mind you, it isn’t as if U.S. gun export policies were enlightened before the Trump era. They were already wreaking havoc in neighboring countries. According to a report from the Center for American Progress, an astonishing 50,000 U.S. guns were recovered in criminal investigations in 15 Western Hemisphere nations between 2014 and 2016. That report goes on to note that 70% of the guns recovered from crimes in Mexico are of U.S. origin. The comparable figures for Central America are 49% for El Salvador, 46% for Honduras, and 29% for Guatemala.
While Donald Trump rails — falsely — against a flood of criminals washing across the U.S.-Mexico border, he conveniently ignores this country’s export of violence in the other direction thanks to both legal and illegal transfers of guns to Mexico and Central America. The U.S. has, in short, already effectively weaponized both criminal networks and repressive security forces in those countries. In other words, it’s played a key role in the killing of significant numbers of innocent civilians there, ratcheting up the pressure on individuals, families, and tens of thousands of unaccompanied minors who have then headed for the United States looking for a safer, better life. Trump’s new proposal would potentially make this situation far worse and his “big, fat, beautiful wall” would have to grow larger still.
In the past, congressional awareness of foreign firearm deals has made a difference. In September 2017, under pressure from Senators Patrick Leahy (D-VT) and Chris Van Hollen (D-MD), the Trump administration reversed itself and blocked a sale of 1,600 semiautomatic pistols to Turkey because of abuses by the personal security forces of that country’s president, Recep Erdogan. (Those included what the New York Times described as “brutal attacks” on U.S. citizens during Erdogan’s May 2017 trip to Washington, D.C.) Similarly, Senator Ben Cardin (D-MD) persuaded the Obama administration to halt a deal that would have sent 26,000 assault rifles to the Philippines, where security forces and private death squads, egged on by President Rodrigo Duterte, were gunning down thousands of people suspected of (but not charged with or convicted of) drug trafficking. As Washington Post columnist Josh Rogin has noted, under the new Trump rules, it will be nearly impossible for members of Congress to intervene in such a fashion to stop similar deals in the future.
On the implications of the deregulation of firearms exports, Cardin has spoken out strongly. “The United States,” he said, “should never make it easier for foreign despots to slaughter their civilians or for American-made assault weapons to be readily available to paramilitary or terrorist groups… The administration’s proposal makes those scenarios even more possible. The United States is, and should be, better than this.”
The Trump plan is, however, good news for hire-a-gun successors to Blackwater, the defunct private contractor whose personnel killed 17 civilians in Baghdad’s Nisour Square in a notorious 2007 incident. Such firms would be able to train foreign military forces in the use of firearms without seeking licenses from the State Department, allowing them to operate in places like Libya that might otherwise have been off-limits.
Embracing the Gun Lobby
Not surprisingly, Trump’s proposal to make it easier for global gunrunners to operate from U.S. soil has been greeted with jubilation by the National Rifle Association and U.S.-based firearms manufacturers. The NRA has been a staunch opponent of efforts to place any kind of controls on the global trade in guns since at least the mid-1990s. That was when the United Nations first addressed the impact of the global trade in small arms and light weapons, which ultimately led to the passage of an international Arms Trade Treaty in 2014. Though the Obama administration signed it, the Senate refused to ratify it, in large part thanks to an NRA lobbying campaign.
Now, the NRA has an enthusiastic ally in the president. And that organization, which vigorously backed him in the 2016 election campaign, spending over $30 million on ads praising him or trashing Hillary Clinton, is backing his efforts to deregulate gun exports to the hilt. In a June 2018 letterfrom its Institute for Legislative Affairs, the NRA urged its supporters to weigh in favorably during the public-comment period on the new rules, describing them as “among the most important pro-gun initiatives by the Trump administration to date.” That’s no small claim, given the president’s enthusiastic embrace of virtually every element of the NRA’s anti-gun-control agenda.
The National Sports Shooting Federation (NSSF), the misleadingly named trade association for U.S. gun manufacturers, is also backing Trump’s efforts to boost firearms exports. The federation’s president, Lawrence Keane, has asserted that the administration proposal will be “a significant positive development for the industry that will allow members to reduce costs and compete in the global marketplace more effectively, all while not in any way hindering national security.”
Among the biggest threats posed by Trump’s approach to guns is his administration’s decision to settle a case with Defense Distributed, a Texas-based firm run by gun advocate Cody Wilson, and so usher in “the age of the downloadable gun.” Though a Seattle-based judge intervened to stop him for the time being, the government had green-lighted Wilson’s posting of designs on the Internet that could be used to produce plastic guns on 3-D printers. If it does happen, it will undoubtedly prove to be a global bonanza for anyone in need of a weapon and capable of purchasing such a printer anywhere in the world.
Arms control and human rights groups have joined domestic gun control organizations like the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, Everytown for Gun Safety, and the Giffords Law Center to Prevent Gun Violence in trying to block the change, which will dramatically undermine efforts to limit the proliferation of guns at home and abroad. If they fail, it will suddenly become much easier to produce untraceable plastic firearms — from handguns to AR-15s. The administration even agreed to pay Cody Wilson’s legal fees in the dispute, a move former congressman Steve Israel (D-NY) has described as “a particularly galling example of Mr. Trump’s obsequiousness to the most extreme fringe of the gun lobby.”
Congress could seek to blunt the most egregious aspects of the Trump administration’s deregulation of firearms exports by, for instance, ensuring that oversight of the most dangerous guns — like sniper rifles and AR-15 semiautomatic weapons — not be shifted away from the State Department. It could also continue to force the administration to notify Congress of any major firearms deals before they happen and pass legislation making it illegal to post instructions for producing untraceable guns via 3-D printing technology.
In a political climate dominated by an erratic president in the pocket of the NRA and a Congress with large numbers of members under the sway of the gun lobby, however, only a strong, persistent public outcry might make a difference.
In the meantime, welcome to the world of American gunrunning and start thinking of Donald Trump as our very own gunrunner-in-chief.
https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/08/16/donald-trump-gunrunner-for-hire/
Curing Fascism
by David Swanson
Posted on August 15, 2018
Fascism is a disease, a delusion, a toxic worldview. It’s encouraged and manipulated by propaganda. Its characteristics are numerous and to various degrees widespread and long-lasting. At what point their combination in sufficiently extreme degree rises to the level of fascism, as opposed to moderately fascistic tendencies I’m happy to leave to others to decide.
Fascism is not a tendency born into subhuman monsters who threaten the purity of our anti-fascist homeland, as one might suspect when reading posters like “The only good fascist is a dead fascist” at anti-fascist rallies.
Fascism is not easily eliminated and not best eliminated by simply any random opposition to it, even opposition that much resembles it. Eliminating fascism and how best to do it is a reasonable topic of discussion which necessarily involves opposing some tactics as less effective than others. This means that it is possible to oppose an anti-fascist act without being a fascist — although not without getting called a fascist.
Jason Stanley’s new book How Fascism Works: The Politics of Us and Them analyzes the elements of fascism in a very valuable way, even if I disagree with some bits of it as a result of the most anti-fascist behavior there is: independent thinking.
Fascism, Stanley tells us, using numerous recent and historical examples, creates a mythic past. Yet if I consider the view of U.S. high school history books found in Lies My Teacher Told Me by James Loewen or Founding Myths by Ray Raphael or other similar books, the fascism of U.S. schools has long extended to much more than pledging allegiance to a flag, and the struggle to teach the truth about the past can be called an anti-fascist struggle.
Fascism, Stanley writes, demands patriarchal families, in large part as a metaphor and training for an authoritarian government. Blind obedience to authority and belief in something larger than yourself are traits shared by religion and fascism, though Stanley does not characterize fascism as religion. Again, this tendency has been around for centuries.
Fascism is Orwellianism, says Stanley. That is, it markets corruption as anti-corruption, irrationality as reason, and suppression as freedom of speech. Its version of anti-corruption is total trust in the most corrupt figures around. Its idea of reason is barbaric bigotry announced as arrived at by reason and evidence and inevitable obvious natural laws. Its conception of free speech is armed rallies. These behaviors are extreme versions of common mainstream practices, but here it’s easier I think to figure out where the fascist line is crossed.
Fascism is anti-intellectualism, anti-education. It substitutes unreality for intelligent observation and deliberation.
Fascism favors hierarchy, racism, and union busting (because in unions people join together across race or other lines, as well as because they make more money).
Fascism adopts a passionate stance of victimhood. “You will not replace us!” they shout at marches in Charlottesville.
Fascism demands so-called law and order, that is: racially biased official abuse and violence. Stanley discusses the rise of U.S. mass incarceration under the regimes of various U.S. presidents from both of the two major parties. Nobody would call everyone involved a fascist, but the fascist tendency is clearly just that: part of what makes up full-blown fascism.
Fascism fears sex and rape and the mixing of the races. Trump called Mexican immigrants rapists and wanted innocent black kids in New York murdered for alleged rape not for any sensible reasons, but perfectly in line with this element of fascist propaganda as Stanley describes it.
Stanley’s examples of each of the patterns above come from, among other places, Germany, Italy, and more recently Poland, Hungary, India, Turkey, Russia, Myanmar, and the United States — never Ukraine, I notice, but one sentence on Israel surprisingly made the cut!
Stanley makes a strong case that when Trump says he wants to make America great again, the answer to when was it great is the 1930s. Trump’s model may be Charles Lindbergh, a fan of “America First” and of fascism.
Running through Stanley’s analysis is the idea that fascism divides “us” from “them.” I would add that central to fascism is belief in the power of violence. Of course, both of these tendencies are extremely widespread beyond that constellation of horrors that we take to make up fascism.
At one point in his book, Stanley addresses the question of “having to regard women as equals in the workplace or on the battlefield.” This acceptance that there must be wars, and the old-timey myth that wars take place on battlefields, is in line with the belief in violence that I see as central to fascism, even though no American would call a casual reference to battlefields fascist.
Stanley defends freedom of speech while denouncing people who have been convicted in European countries for the crime of holocaust denial. I agree with the denunciation, but some acknowledgement of the problem such laws are for free speech is in order.
Stanley’s book is in some ways a particular part of the answer to the question plaguing Democrats and pundits for the past nearly two years: “How did Trump win?” So, it makes sense that this book is less heavily marred than many by Russiagate. Yet Russiagate does rear its head. Stanley does not address the problems of unreality, of ridiculous accusations against U.S. journalists, of shouts of “Putin lover!” or of claims of new Pearl Harbors. Instead he claims, without offering any evidence, that the intention of the unnamed schemers (dare I say conspirators) who created Russia TV was to undermine trust in so-called democracy by drowning out “objective truth” with a “cacophony of voices.” Stanley also claims that this has succeeded, for which he offers no evidence and not even a citation of anyone agreeing with him.
When, on the following page, still discussing Russia TV, Stanley gets around to offering an example of this scheme in action, the reader could not be blamed for believing he’s offering an example from Russia TV. Yet, if you check out the show he uses in his example, it’s a show produced by the Family Research Council, an organization dedicated to opposing gay rights. So the example of this show’s host having claimed that climate scientists are promoting homosexuality is actually an example of that network’s central viewpoint, not an example of including numerous viewpoints in order to damage democracy, and not an example from Russia TV at all. Nor is it obvious to me why multiple viewpoints don’t benefit democracy, unless they’re largely slanted toward the sort of fascist propaganda of this example.
Stanley, like virtually every other person on earth, is eager to oppose “conspiracy theories.” He provides some excellent examples of ridiculous and damaging Trumpian and fascistic “conspiracy theories.” But, like everyone else I’ve ever read on the topic, he declines to develop any workable definition of what a “conspiracy theory” is. Dictionaries all define the concept as something similar to this:
“A theory seeking to explain a disputed case or matter as a plot by a secret group or alliance rather than an individual or isolated act.”
But that definition is demonstrably useless. If I suggest that the Democratic National Committee secretly plotted to hurt the primary campaign of Senator Bernie Sanders, I’m stating both a dictionary-definition conspiracy theory and the established undisputed facts. And if I suggest that Donald Trump and the Russian government and WikiLeaks secretly plotted to win Trump the election by exposing Democrats’ emails about cheating Sanders out of the nomination, I’m stating a dictionary-definition of a conspiracy theory and, in this case, something for which no public evidence yet exists, but by general media consensus simply not a “conspiracy theory.”
Liberal activists are clapping themselves on the back for having persuaded Facebook and Twitter to ban Alex Jones for being a “conspiracy theorist.” Why they couldn’t ban him for advocating violence is not clear to me. Perhaps it’s related to the extremely widespread acceptance of violence. But once you ban him for believing that sometimes two or more people act together in private, you’ve opened a door to banning anyone else on the same ground.
I think we’d be better off dropping the term “conspiracy theory” entirely, and instead using such distinctions as “speculative” vs. “well-founded” or “false” vs. “true.” These and similar distinctions have done great duty for centuries and are really not at all worn out.
But how do we wear out fascism? Do fascists in elected office not have to make anyone better off to maintain their support? Is it enough to just be fascist? To some extent, that must be true. But pointing out the failure to make anyone better off and what would make them better off can be part of the cure. As with Curing Exceptionalism, curing fascism can begin with understanding how one is manipulated into it, resenting that manipulation, and testing out the benefits of a richer, more encompassing worldview.
http://washingtonsblog.com/2018/08/curing-fascism.html
El Niño may Make a Comeback this Fall and Winter
axios.com
Aug. 16,2018
Note: Temperature anomalies are relative to the 1985 to 2012 average; Data: National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration; Map: Chris Canipe/Axios
Odds favor a return this year of the climate phenomenon known as El Niño — above-average sea surface temperatures in the equatorial tropical Pacific Ocean and related changes in weather patterns.
Why it matters:
Depending on their intensity and exact location, El Niño events can alter global weather patterns — favoring above average precipitation in the parched state of California, for example, while inducing drought elsewhere. Typically, such events develop sometime in late summer or early fall, and peak during the winter.
Such events also can provide a natural pulse of heat released from the ocean to the atmosphere, boosting the odds that 2018 and possibly 2019 could be among the top five warmest years on record.
The big picture:
The last El Niño event took place in 2015 and 2016, and it was one of the strongest on record. Michelle L’Heureux, a meteorologist at NOAA's Climate Prediction Center in Maryland, tells Axios that the upcoming event — which has about a 70% likelihood of occurring by the upcoming winter — is unlikely to be as potent.
"If something forms it’s likely to be on the weaker side of things," she said. "In general, weaker events tend to be a bit tougher to predict than stronger events.”
For signs of El Niño, scientists like L'Heureux look at sea surface temperatures in specific parts of the tropical Pacific, known as El Niño regions. These are the boxed areas on the sea surface temperature chart. In recent weeks, ocean temperatures have increased in parts of these areas.
But the formation of El Niño is a complicated dance between air and sea, and now, L'Heureux says, it's the atmosphere's turn to alter trade winds in a way that reinforces the changes in the water. These air and ocean feedbacks are what really get an El Niño going.
https://www.axios.com/el-nino-may-return-by-winter-73c16c52-1cb5-4639-bfb4-b5dd2a505f2d.html
Exclusive: Steve Bannon's new film, "Trump @ War"
axios.com
Aug. 16/2018
Here's a first look for Axios readers at the trailer for a forthcoming film, "Trump @ War," that Steve Bannon will release on Sept. 9.
Why it matters:
The film is part of a drive by Bannon to galvanize Republicans to embrace the midterms as Trump's "first re-elect."
The film is designed to portray Trump supporters as being under siege — complete with clips of CNN’s Don Lemon, and footage of a "Make America Great Again" hat being burned.
Bannon shared the trailer as he announced a new political group aimed at turning out Republicans this fall, Citizens of the American Republic (COAR).
Bannon, describing the film, told me: "How jacked do we think Trump will be when he sees this?"
Bannon added: "If you’re a deplorable, you’ll literally standing on your chair with your pitchfork saying: 'I’ve got to get people out to vote.'"
Bannon said the film — from his longtime production company, Victory Films — will last about 75 minutes, and will include interviews with former Trump campaign manager Corey Lewandowski; Dr. Seb Gorka, an alumnus of Trump’s White House; and about 18 others.
The release date, Sept. 9, is the second anniversary of Hillary Clinton’s statement, seized on by the Trump campaign, that "you could put half of Trump's supporters into what I call the basket of deplorables."
Bannon — President Trump’s former campaign chief executive, and White House chief strategist — said the premiere will be the culmination of an all-day "Deplorables Conference" in New York featuring pro-Trump speeches.
A read between the frames:
Everything is a war to Steve. Bannon’s caricatured framing of the election — as one pitting hooded Antifa members and Dems screaming about impeachment and burning MAGA hats, against the hero Donald Trump — will almost certainly appeal to Donald Trump.
But I’ll be shocked if the president can get past his animus towards
Bannon and endorse or promote his latest effort.
Whenever I mention Bannon’s name to a White House official or Republican leadership sources, they still roll their eyes.
And when it comes to midterm politics, they like to mention, derisively, his scorched earth campaign on behalf of an accused pedophile, Roy Moore.
I’ll be surprised if Bannon becomes a magnet for serious donor money for the fall. But this is a country full of quixotic billionaires, so who the heck knows.
Trump still hates "Sloppy Steve" and thinks he tries to steal his limelight. So Bannon was smart to recruit some of Trump’s favorite diehards.
Bannon said his new group is aimed at stoking the "populist-nationalist movement" that put Trump into office, and includes booking, messaging and rapid-response operations that regularly brief friendly cable-news pundits.
"The war room is up and running," Bannon bragged, saying Citizens of the American Republican will focus on the triumvirate of ideas, communication and action.
"When I got involved [with the Trump presidential campaign] in August 2016, Trump was down 12, 14, 16 points. Democrats thought I was a clown. They never took him seriously. We caught them napping. We can do it again."
The effort to hold the House for Republicans "is more winnable" than Trump's campaign was three months before Election Day, Bannon contends.
"I think we can hold this to a net loss [for Republicans] of under 15 seats." (Democrats need to flip 23 seats to take House; top Republicans fear losses of 40 or more seats.)
"All the whining I hear among establishment Republicans, all the whining I hear in the official corridors of the Republican Party, has got to stop."
https://www.axios.com/trump-at-war-steve-bannon-2018-midterm-elections-43ab32b3-3944-4f52-8bf7-ceaf18a15c4e.html
it's just an opinion,...why should a fake potus spewing fake news creating the chaos himself be trusted much less contribute to what he considers great.
don't think for one minute Cuoma didn't know what he was doing when he said that. he's looking for a piece of the news time. marketing,...america at it's best.
there are many that agree with Cuomo,...many,...
yo babe,...your Orange Hair potus lies 7 times per day at an average. it's something like 4,229 in 558 days other lies he's spewed since being in office,...
but you are ok with that.
you just select the generic ones that even a monkey could pass the test for.
what else would you say after it's official news.
it must be weird to not know you're fooling your own self.
Ilhan Omar for Peace
by DavidSwanson
Posted on August 14, 2018
Ilhan Omar is the second person this year to win a Democratic Party nomination for Congress in a Democratic Party district with a platform advocating peace in a way not seen inside the Beltway. The first was Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in New York City, whose advocacy for peace I wrote about. Ilhan Omar has just won the nomination from Minnesota’s Fifth District.
I am making zero predictions as to whether having peace on a campaign website will, in the case of Ocasio-Cortez or the case of Ilhan Omar, translate into serious advocacy and action for peace in office. I’m well aware that our choices for Congress are usually either lifelong mediocrities or promising candidates who immediately become dedicated mediocrities. Omar’s predecessor in that seat, after all, is Keith Ellison, who wanted to impeach George W. Bush until the very moment he was elected and became Captain Humanitarian Wars. I’m also aware that any good cause in Congress would require a couple of hundred Congress members, not two.
But the evidence is overwhelming that you are more likely to get decent behavior out of someone who campaigned on it than someone who did not. Almost nobody now in or running for Congress has ever campaigned on the sort of platform put forward by Ocasio-Cortez or Omar. The two of them ought to hear our support and encouragement, our preferences for where they put emphasis. And other candidates ought to see that support every time they raise their eyes from their donor call lists.
Here’s Ilhan Omar’s platform:
Promote Peace & Prosperity
We must end the state of continuous war, as these wars have made us less safe. Hundreds of thousands of civilians have been killed, entire countries have been destabilized, and we are currently in the midst of an extreme global migration crisis. Meanwhile at home, there have been increasingly cuts to spending on healthcare, infrastructure, education, and housing. We must scale back U.S. military activities, and reinvest our expansive military budget back into our communities. Once this happens, we can begin to repair the harm done, repair America’s broken image, and invest in diplomatic relationships.
She points out that the wars are counterproductive on their own terms, endangering rather than protecting. Servants of the weapons dealers do not do that, no matter how they vote on legislation. She begins with the central evil, the mass killing, and she gets the numbers right. And she cites the wars as a cause of the refugee crisis. That’s all almost unheard of, even in the peace movement completely outside of electoral campaigning, where the habit is to focus on financial cost or harm to U.S. troops. She notes the financial tradeoffs as well. I wish she didn’t say the money all needed to go to U.S. domestic spending. I don’t think she’ll see the sense in saying that once she finds out how much money it really is.
- We spend by far the most on our military budget, and more than the next seven countries on the list of top spenders combined
- In 2017, the United States spent over $700 billion dollars—well over half the country’s discretionary budget
- The Pentagon has spent $400 billion dollars on the F-35 fighter jet program, and will eventually spend over 1 trillion dollars in costs and maintenance
- American intervention in democratically-elected governments has contributed to the migration crisis
- The executive branch has escalated U.S. involvement in Saudi Arabia’s war in Yemen, with no authorization from Congress
That’s as close to accurate on the money as I’ve seen from any candidate.
She also names a particular war, that on Yemen. The focus on Congressional “authorization” rather than immorality or illegality is disappointing from someone from the hometown of Frank Kellogg of the Kellogg-Briand Pact. But it’s a start. Now read this:
Vision and Policy Priorities
End funding for perpetual war and military aggression
We are currently engaged in a number of wars that have no end in sight—Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Libya, Yemen, and Somalia. These wars have destabilized regions, created massive humanitarian crises, and continue to hurt our image across the world. We must end these wars, and we must avoid military-use as a last resort in the future.
She just named six of the United States’ current wars and advocated ending all of them. And for serious honest moral reasons. That’s unheard of. One can tolerate the delusion that there can be such a thing as “military use as a last resort” from someone willing to help end its use in six actual current cases.
- Reduce total spending on the military from its projected FY 2019 levels of $886 billion and reinvest that money into healthcare, education, housing, jobs, clean energy, and infrastructure
- Cut the Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO) that has been called the Pentagon’s ‘slush fund’. In 2017, the OCO budget increased by 41% to $82.4 billion.
- Eliminate wasteful military programs like the F-35 fighter jet program, saving taxpayers $1 trillion dollars total
- Scale back the number of US military bases across the world
She’s got the right focus: cut the military funding. Just saying that is the rarest of rarities. It’d be nice if she’d say by how much, but it’s a heck of a start. Naming one particular weapon to eliminate is much more than most candidates offer. And proposing to close foreign bases is a terrific place to begin.
- Repeal harmful sanctions and oppose all U.S. intervention into democratically-elected governments
- Sanctions and economic blockades have been used to hurt the economies of countries outside of the U.S. sphere of influence. These measures hurt working people in other countries and foster animosity towards our government.
- End sanctions and embargoes against countries, which ultimately only hurt the working families of those countries
- Support diplomatic solutions to the conflicts in both North Korea and Iran, and avoid military conflict at all costs
- Support the JCPOA, and advocate for a deal that does not disproportionately impose economic sanctions on the people of Iran.
This sounds like a Congress member willing to back some of the obvious steps to avoid new wars.
Renegotiate harmful free trade agreements
Free trade agreements like the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) were passed on the promise that they would help workers across the continent. However, the opposite happened. Jobs have left the United States, multinational corporations exploit working people and lobby against any labor and environmental protections.
- Invest in a robust Trade Adjustment Assistance program that provides support for workers who have lost their jobs due to the impact of trade
- Eliminate NAFTA’s investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) that empower corporations to attack environmental and public health protections
- Add strong, enforceable environmental and labor standards to the core text of NAFTA’s agreement
- Require governments to prioritize policies that minimize climate pollution by including a “climate impact test” for policy making
- Fully fund programs to care for our veteran population
We must ensure that veterans who have returned home from conflict-zones are taken care of. It is unacceptable that politicians have send soldiers to fight in wars, and refuse to fund the programs they need when returning home. We must ensure that all veterans are housed, have access to healthcare, and mental health care services.
- Eliminate homelessness among veterans by expanding the HUD-VASH program and Supportive Services for Veterans Families
- Oppose the privatization of the Veterans Affairs healthcare system and expand funding for physical and mental healthcare for veterans
- Support a peace that affirms the safety and rights of both Palestinians and Israelis
Stability in the Middle East depends on the establishment of a lasting peace between Palestinians and Israelis. But without justice, there will never be peace. The United States must work with the international community, and not unilaterally, to work towards a solution. I will use my voice in Congress and work with communities on the ground to center the ultimate goal of self-determination and peace.
- Fight against efforts from the Trump administration to undermine the peace process, and support the autonomy for the Israeli and Palestinian peoples to define what a solution looks like
- Uplift the voices of Palestinians demanding an end to the occupation of the West Bank, East Jerusalem, and end the siege of Gaza
- Oppose the killing of civilians in Gaza and the expansion of settlements into the West Bank
If that last position survives the first month in Washington D.C. we’ll know this is an incorruptible advocate for peace. I’m not predicting it. I’m not holding my breath. I’m suggesting that we do anything we can to try to help make it happen.
http://washingtonsblog.com/2018/08/ilhan-omar-for-peace.html