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Filed under: Donald Trump,Uncategorized — trp2011 @ 7:32 PM
Tags: Bill Barr, House managers, impeachment, Lev Parnas, Marie Yovanovitch, Mike Pence, prosecution, Rachel Maddow, Robert Hyde, Rudy Giuliani, Ukraine
Another busy, frustrating week for Dictator Donald Trump (DDT), that Kerry Eleveld called a "five-alarm fire" for the White House.
The Government Accountability Office reported that DDT's administration broke the law freezing congressionally-allocated funding for Ukraine.
Rachel Maddow's interview with Lev Parnas, associate of DDT's personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani, revealed the unethical and possibly illegal machinations of DDT, his administrations, and his shadow associates in Ukraine.
Ukraine started a criminal investigation into DDT's allies.
Seven House "managers" took two articles of impeachment to the Senate for a trial.
GOP senators who vociferously claimed to exonerate DDT swore under oath to "do impartial justice." Many of the 22 GOP senators up for re-election this year, including appointed Martha McSally from Arizona, search for exists from their dilemma such as lying, avoid facts, and smearing the media.
1. On the same morning that Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts swore in all the senators for DDT's impeachment trial—senators who may have lied under oath when they swore they would "do impartial justice,"—the non-partisan federal GAO ruled that DDT violated the law in withholding aid designated for Ukraine. The Impoundment Control Act mandates that the Executive Branch cannot make funding changes without asking Congress to reconsider its allocations. Congressional members weren't even notified of DDT's decision.
The OMB claimed the freeze was "to determine the best use of such funds" and "necessary to ensure that the funds were not spent 'in a manner that could conflict with the president's foreign policy.'" The GAO called that reasoning "impermissible" because the president cannot "substitute his own policy priorities for those that Congress has enacted into law." The OMB's claim of the hold being a "programmatic delay" has "no basis in law," according to the GAO decision.
2. MSNBC's The Rachel Maddow show devoted almost two hours to Maddow's interview with Parnas as he explained how DDT, Giuliani, and AG Bill Barr directed the extortion of Ukraine's new president Volodymyr Zelensky to force him into an announcement of an investigation into Joe Biden and his son Hunter for DDT's political benefit. Parnas has enough texts, documents, and notes to make many of his statements ring true, especially when members of the State Department, such as Gordon Sonderland, made the same testimony. Parnas said:
"President Trump knew exactly what was going on. He was aware of all of my movements. I wouldn't do anything without the consent of Rudy Giuliani [DDT's personal secretary] or the president."
Like DDT's comments about other people who give damaging information about him, he kept declaring that he doesn't know Parnas—nine times in two minutes. Multiple photographs of Parnas and DDT together have long been on the internet, and a video of them has also surfaced. Parnas' phone records also have contacts with Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA), who played a key part in defending DDT on the House Intelligence Committee during the impeachment inquiry. A month ago, Nunes couldn't "recall" Parnas' name but regained his memory this week although he claimed they were "talking about random things." [Newly-released documents show extensive contact between Parnas and a Nunes aide to obtain damaging material from Ukrainian prosecutors about Joe Biden.] Despite photographs to the contrary, DDT's White House aide Kellyanne Conway suffers from the same amnesia as does House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA). Parnas also gave information about VP Mike Pence's involvement in the Ukrainian scheme, for example, when Pence went to Poland on DDT's behalf to meet with Zelensky.
Knowing about Parnas' actions, Barr refused to release Parnas' documents for three months to the House for its impeachment inquiry. Parnas told Maddow that the DOJ would make corruption charges against Ukrainian oligarch Dmytro Firtash disappear if he would provide damaging information against Joe Biden and that Barr knew about the potential deal. Firtash gave Parnas $1 million, and Parnas retained Giuliani's firm while working for Giuliani to give attorney-client confidentiality to DDT because Giuliani represented both him and Parnas. Barr ultimately did not intervene in Firtash's case but met with his lawyers Victoria Toensing and Joseph diGenova. The DOJ refused to answer questions from Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS) about why Firtash has not been extradited.
Parnas told Maddow that he is being open about the events to protect himself from Barr. He said:
"[Officials in the Justice Department are] trying to scare me into not talking. My wife is scared. My kids are nervous."
After claiming that she was putting together a "small" group of senators to vote for witnesses in the impeachment trial, Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME) accused the House of doing "an incomplete job" by not addressing evidence from Parnas until after the impeachment articles were released. Information that Barr was suppressing. Since her vote for the tax cuts for the wealthy and Brett Kavanaugh for the Supreme Court, Collins, up for re-election this year, has gone from the most popular GOP senator at 82 percent to the least popular at 42 percent, even below that of the generally-hated Mitch McConnell. Collins walks a very fine line between pleasing DDT to get money from him for her campaign and getting votes from dissatisfied constituents.
3. According to texts from Robert Hyde on Parnas' phone, the DDT donor was tracking former U.S. ambassador Marie Yovanovitch last March. A few of his statements:
"They know she's a political puppet. They will let me know when she's on the move… They are willing to help if you/we would like a price."
"Guess you can do anything in Ukraine with money… what I was told."
These statements fit with DDT's comments to Zelensky in the July 25 telephone call about Yovanovitch:
"Well, she's going to go through some things."
Robert Hyde is a member of conspiracy-theory ridden QAnon, designated by the FBI as a possible domestic terrorism threat.
Yovanovitch's anti-corruption work threatened pro-Russians working with Parnas, Giuliani, and others. The U.S. ambassador escaped Ukraine last spring after she was notified by a superior during an important ceremony to "get on the next plane to the U.S." She immediately left the country. After this information became public, Pompeo cancelled a classified congressional briefing about embassy security, a mandatory monthly event.
Ukraine's national police has asked the FBI for assistance in its new investigation regarding these illegal activities. According to Ukrainian authorities, an ambassador possibly being "under illegal surveillance and her electronic gadgets … interfered [with] by the private persons at the request of the US citizen" can be a violation of both Ukrainian laws and the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, which protects diplomats on foreign soil.
4. The seven managers from the House to prosecute DDT in the impeachment trial in the Senate delivered two articles of impeachment. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi selected these prosecutors with an emphasis on litigators, comfortable in the courtroom. Six are lawyers; the seventh, Val Deming, served as the first female chief of the Orlando (FL) Police Department. Leaders are Committee Intelligence Chair Adam B. Schiff (D-CA) and Judiciary Committee Chair Jerrold Nadler (D-NY). Pelosi also achieved diversity in her selection: three of the seven (Deming, Garcia, and California's Zoe Lofgren) are women; Demings and Hakeem Jeffries (NY) are black; and Sylvia Garcia (TX) is Latina. Jason Crow (CO) and Garcia not only provide geographic diversity but also represent the freshmen House class.
5. The GOP senators have presented two defenses for DDT: what he did wasn't illegal and so what–known as the "what about it" response.
DDT first wanted a big show for the trial but now wants the trial dismissed. GOP senators rejected the idea. McConnell first claimed he had enough votes to keep any witnesses or documents from the trial, but a few GOP senators consider joining Democrats to vote for a real trial with witnesses instead of a sham. McConnell plans keep the trial from media reporting and block the trial from being filmed although the House hearings were available for public viewing. He also wants to block media access to senators as they come and go from the chamber and deny access to reporters to and in the elevators.
The "imminent" trial is unhinging DDT. He kept a student audience waiting for an hour to hear about prayer so that he could watch senators sign their oath. After reporters' questions, he whined and exaggerated his trade deals and furiously talked about the impeaching being a "hoax," over and over again. Then he shouted in a tweet, "I JUST GOT IMPEACHED FOR MAKING A PERFECT PHONE CALL!" Following that, he begged retiring Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-TN) to vote against witnesses in the trial. His meeting with aides also focused on impeachment. During his ceremony for national champion LSU football team, DDT devolved into swearing about an attempt to impeach him. (He's already impeached.) Why is he so afraid if he's done nothing wrong?
The Senate convenes for opening arguments in DDT's impeachment trial at 1:00 pm on Tuesday, January 21, 2020.
GOP Impeachment Strategy: Lies, Smears
Filed under: impeachment,Uncategorized — trp2011 @ 11:12 PM
Tags: Bill Taylor, Donald Trump, extortion, George Kent, Gordon Sondland, House hearings, Jennifer Williams, Mike Pence, Mike Pompeo, Roger Stone, Rudy Giuliani, Volodymyr Zelensky, whistleblower
News about Dictator Donald Trump (DDT)'s impeachment inquiry keeps dribbling out:
The Government Accountability Office is investigating DDT for possible law violation by withholding Ukraine aid with no supporting policy. In a legal review, the Pentagon concluded that congressionally approved funds must be released and expressed concern that the aid would expire last September 30 if not released.
DDT wanted Ukraine president Volodymyr Zelensky to support DDT's conspiracy theory by linking that false belief in Ukrainian interference for the 2016 U.S. elections with the word "Clinton," according to Deputy Assistant Secretary of State George Kent. Gordon Sondland had told Tim Morrison about DDT's wishes. More testimony from Kent from this transcript:
Rudy Giuliani, DDT's personal lawyer, orchestrated a "campaign of lies" against Marie Yovanovitch, the former ambassador to Ukraine, with "assertions and allegations … without basis."
Gordon Sondland, the ambassador to the European Union, may have lied about Ukraine-related discussions he had with DDT. Fiona Hill, the top Russia expert on the National Security Council, told Kent about her concerns that Sondland "made assertions about conversations that did not match with what had actually been said."
Mick Mulvaney, the acting White House chief of staff, wielded power over Ukraine policy and controlled the military aid designated for Ukraine. "[Mulvaney] put a hold on all security assistance to the Ukraine," Kent testified.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Kent's boss, failed to back up Yovanovitch and lied about investigators trying to "bully" diplomats into testifying.
After Zelensky's aides decided that they had to take sides in U.S. politics to get the vital military aid against Russian aggression, Ukraine was saved by leaks about the freeze on military aid and DDT's extortionist July 25 phone call. Zelensky's speech to agree with DDT's demands was scheduled for September 13 on CNN after the news broke.
In an exploration of what VP Mike Pence knew about the scandal, his aid Jennifer Williams, testified about the July 25 call, which she heard. She said it was political in nature and didn't understand why the military aid was not being released. She did believe that it might be tied to an investigation into the Bidens. Her notes from the call went into Pence's folder.
Pompeo has worked hard to stay out of the limelight, but witnesses are moving the Klieg lights toward him about his mistreatment of his staff in favor of pleasing DDT. His three taxpayer-supported trips to Kansas recently indicate he might bail out from DDT's administration; a Senate seat is open.
AG Bill Barr finally refused to do something that DDT wants: Barr won't hold a press conference to declare that DDT broke no laws during his phone call with Zelensky. The DOJ is even distancing itself from DDT, saying that it won't endorse the withholding of military aid from Ukraine in exchange for an its investigation into the Bidens. Barr has also separated himself from Giuliani.
During today's Roger Stone trial, jurors heard tapes of his lying under oath to the House about his involvement with hacking by Wikileaks and communication with a former radio host and comedian, supported by texts and emails from Stone. Charged with making false statements to the committee and committing obstruction of justice and witness tampering, Stone also lied about talking with DDT. One text to the comedian, who denied Stone's claim that he was the intermediary with Wikileaks, from Stone read, "Prepare to die … You are a rat."
Giuliani admitted DDT's extortion in a tweet that was followed by his conspiracy theories about the Bidens:
"The investigation I conducted concerning 2016 Ukrainian collusion and corruption, was done solely as a defense attorney to defend my client against false charges, that kept changing as one after another were disproven."
The same Republicans who expressed fury about closed House hearings now say that they won't be watching the open hearings in the coming weeks—too busy, at their day jobs, hearings are "political," etc. This video shows Sen. Lindsey Graham's (R-SC) excuse for his demanding impeachment in Bill Clinton's refusal to submit subpoenas and exonerating DDT for the same action. Hint: it doesn't hold water. Also, the highly incensed Republicans crying "unfair" about closed hearings aren't bothering to attend them even if they can. Those who do, spend their time asking unrelated questions, complaining about the process, and planting information about the whistleblower. For Sondland's testimony, Democrats outnumbered Republicans 2-1.
Republicans may have difficulty spinning these acts:
DDT suspended the military aid himself by ordering Mulvaney to tell budget officials that the funds were frozen, perhaps permanently—one week before his phone call extorting Zelensky. Officials were told not to tell members of Congress about the frozen aid.
Giuliani publicly confirmed the whole plot at DDT's direction and to personally benefit DDT. Giuliani said, "I don't do anything that involves my client without speaking with my client."
Those texts explain of Sondland's confession that he directly informed a top aide to Zelensky that "resumption of U.S. aid would likely not occur until Ukraine provided the public anti-corruption statement that we had been discussing for many weeks." That was DDT's demand of a public statement from Zelensky exonerating Russia of electoral sabotage and falsely implicating in corruption.
Pence directly delivered the message about suspended aid to Ukraine and told him he needed to do more to fight "corruption" on top of demands by Sondland and Giuliani.
Former Florida AG Pam Bondi has been added to DDT's impeachment team after it dumped former Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC). She will have "special government employee" status, meaning that, as a part-time employee, she won't have to meet the regular ethics rules and continue her outside work. The ethics deal helps Bondi because she has a checkered career. Six years ago, DDT's now defunct charitable foundation, legally prohibited from donating to political campaigns, paid her $25,000 immediately before Bondi dropped investigation of solid allegations against the "Trump University." This morning, Bondi called Jared Kushner "one of the smartest human beings" she's ever met.
DDT claims that he's done nothing wrong, but he refuses to turn over Bill Taylor's notes to the House, blocks as many people as possible from complying with legal subpoenas, and conducts a "witch hunt" to find the whistleblower reporting his phone call with Zelensky.
One of DDT's recent strategies to distract people from his crimes and impeachable offenses is a concerted effort to out the whistleblower who alerted everyone to the July 25 phone call. After making demands on the media to follow this order, his sycophants comply with possibly legal violations of a law to keep whistleblowers' identities confidential, preventing retaliation. Conservative press, however, named a person, and Donald Jr. retweeted the name from Breitbart News. Jack Prosobiec, responsible for publicizing the conspiracy theory of Pizzagate about Democrats involved in a child sex abuse ring leading to a shooting in a restaurant, originally came out with this name for the whistleblower that he said "sounds like" the person.
By Monday's campaigning for gubernatorial candidate Matt Bevin with DDT, fellow Kentuckian and GOP Sen. Rand Paul violated the Hatch Act and then demanded the release of the whistleblower's name, a violation of another law. Yesterday, Paul blocked a resolution to protect whistleblowers although Libertarian Paul supposedly fights for privacy. The identity of the person—even the person's testimony—has lost all relevance after the number of witnesses appearing in House hearings, but it's a diversion.
Next week, open House hearings for the impeach inquiry, called a "partisan clown show" by DDT, open with Bill Taylor, who testified about two different quid pro quos from DDT and his abuse of Marie Yovanovitch. Testimony will include highlights of how Giuliani is in charge of foreign policy regarding Ukraine. In his earlier testimony, Taylor also said that getting the military aid released was difficult because of "the Greenland question, about purchasing Greenland, which took up a lot of energy in the NSC." Taylor said that a meeting with DDT was "hard to schedule."
DDT claims that he's done nothing wrong, but he refuses to turn over Bill Taylor's notes to the House, blocks as many people as possible from complying with legal subpoenas, and conducts a "witch hunt" to find the whistleblower reporting his phone call with Zelensky. DDT tries to hide everything he does.
The one success DDT can claim is pleasing Russia. Showing the fiasco of the lying to defend Republicans, a Russian commentator said that DDT is "making Russia great." She continued:
"The chaos brought by Trump into the American system of government is weakening the United States. America is getting weaker and now Russia is taking its place in the Middle East. Suddenly, Russia is starting to seriously penetrate Africa… So when they say that Trump is weakening the United States—yes, he is. And that's why we love him… The more problems they have, the better it is for us."
Russia predicts another win for DDT in 2020. DDT is giving Vladimir Putin everything he wants and more.
Ukraine: DDT's Road to Impeachment
Filed under: Foreign policy,Uncategorized — trp2011 @ 8:41 PM
Tags: 2020 election, Chris Murphy, collusion, Donald Trump, extortion, impeachment, Mike Pence, Nancy Pelosi, Rudy Giuliani, Steve Mnuchin, Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelensky, whistleblower
A new Nixon era has been introduced: House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced that six committees will begin a formal impeachment inquiry of Dictator Donald Trump (DDT) in response to allegations that he tried to enlist a foreign power for his own political gain. The impeachment committee process against Nixon, lasting almost eight months, was completed over 25 years ago at the end of July with recommendations for articles of impeachment for obstruction of justice, abuse of power, and contempt of Congress. Nixon resigned less than two weeks later.
Pelosi directed the chairs of the committees investigating DDT to send their best cases for DDT's impeachable offenses to the Judiciary Committee to lay the groundwork for articles of impeachment. That committee's investigation already focused on Robert Mueller's findings and DDT's personal profits from state and foreign governments' spending. An inquiry is the first step to a vote to charge DDT with high crimes and misdemeanors. Before Pelosi's announcement, 149 House Democrats and one Independent, formerly a Republican, called for DDT's impeachment; the number has increased since then.
Pelosi said:
"The actions of the Trump presidency revealed dishonorable facts of the president's betrayal of his oath of office, betrayal of our national security, and betrayal of the integrity of our elections…
"The actions taken to date by the president have seriously violated the Constitution. The president must be held accountable. No one is above the law."
The impeachment impetus came from allegations that DDT violated the law in his refusal to release a whistleblower's complaint about DDT's "promises" to a foreign country and his pressure on Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelensky to investigate Joe Biden for corruption while withholding almost $400 million in military aid for Ukraine to fight Russian aggression.
The Republican-led Senate Intelligence Committee entered the fray by inviting the whistleblower to a closed session by Friday and interviewing the intelligence inspector general who wanted to release the complaint to Congress as required by law. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) unexpectedly permitted a vote on Sen. Chuck Schumer's (D-NY) consent resolution to release the complaint to the Intelligence Committee that unanimously passed.
VP Mike Pence's complicity in DDT's apparent extortion and bribery plot comes from the transcript of his press conference in Poland when Pence said that he had talked to Zelensky about DDT's "financial support in great detail." Pence added that DDT "had me make clear, we have great concerns about issues of corruption." Over three weeks ago, Pence spread the same story that DDT and Rudy Giuliani are trying to promote.
DDT's shifts about Ukraine keep dribbling out:
DDT said he didn't talk to Zelensky about Joe Biden.
DDT said he talked to Zelensky about corruption but not Biden.
DDT said he "might" have talked about Biden in the "beautiful conversation with Zelensky"
DDT said that he talked about the $250 million military aid in the conversation but didn't connect it to Biden.
DDT forgot to mention that he gave Ukraine an extra $140 million after talking with Zelensky about investigating Biden; that information came from Zelensky's announcement.
DDT said, "Who wouldn't speak to your son? Of course, you spoke to your son." [Evidently DDT talked to his son about the June 2016 meeting with Russia to get dirt on political opponent Hillary Clinton.]
DDT said he connected the money designated for Ukraine to the talk about corruption: "Why would you give money to a country that you think is corrupt?"
DDT said he didn't pressure Zelensky to investigate in exchange for the money, but that if "a Republican ever did what Joe Biden did, if a Republican ever said what Joe Biden said, they'd be getting the electric chair right now." [Actually, an investigation exonerated Biden of any wrongdoing, but DDT isn't as lucky. DDT typically projects his behavior and crimes onto others. DDT's only concern with "corruption" in Ukraine has been about Joe Biden.]
DDT told budget officials to block military aid for Ukraine three days before his telephone conversation with Zelensky and ordered officials to tell lawmakers that the delays were an "interagency process" with no additional information.
DDT said he didn't tell anyone to withhold the funding to help Ukraine fight Russian aggression. (He did.)
DDT said he did withhold the funding but because NATO countries didn't give Ukraine money. (They already are.)
DDT said he might give the telephone call transcript to a "respected source" so "everyone will say" his conversation with Zelensky was perfectly fine, much like Nixon's offer to give his audio recording to a hard-of-hearing conservative senator for a summary.
DDT said that he will release the full transcript to the public tomorrow.
A timeline of the events in this debacle.
After Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) met with Zelensky in early September, he reported that Ukraine's president"directly" expressed concerns that "the aid that was being cut off to Ukraine by the president was a consequence" of his unwillingness to launch an investigation into the Bidens. Murphy said that any demand from a U.S. president provides "an implicit threat" with "consequences."
In mid-August, lawmakers discovered that acting chief of staff and budget director Mick Mulvaney took control of the Ukrainian aid from the Defense and State departments in a possibly illegal action that blocked money authorized by Congress. At the same time, the whistleblower filed a complaint about DDT and Ukraine to Intelligence Community Inspector General Michael Atkinson.
Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin is covering for DDT, avoiding answers about the telephone call with Chuck Todd on Meet the Press and with Jake Tapper about the difference between business dealings for Biden's son and DDT's family. Mnuchin said that following federal law in releasing the whistleblower complaint to Congress would "set a terrible precedent" with the current administration.
DDT's lawyer Rudy Giuliani, who claimed he was looking for "dirt on Biden," claimed that the State Department sent him to talk to Zelensky's right-hand man, Andriy Yermack. In doing so, he might avoid prosecution under the Logan Act which criminalizes a private citizen's attempt to intervene without authorization in disputes or controversies between the U.S. and foreign governments. His statements leave him open to prosecution for bribery and extortion conspiracy because he has no immunity. The Hobbs Act defines extortion as "obtaining property from another, with his consent, under color of official right," according to Barbara McQuade. The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act criminalizes the act of a U.S. citizen to corruptly offer "anything of value" to a foreign official to retain business or influence an official decision. Giuliani clearly acts on the part of DDT to persuade Ukraine to "investigate" a political opponent, illegal under federal law that blocks a person from soliciting, accept, or receiving a "contribution or donation of money or other thing of value" from a foreign national in connection to a U.S. election and prohibits a foreign national from the same act. Damaging information fits the definition of a "thing of value."
Giuliani's stories change as swiftly as those from DDT:
Last week, Giuliani said, "I did what I did on my own, and then I told [Trump] about it afterwards. Because I'm his lawyer."
Over the weekend, Giuliani told the Washington Post, about DDT, "I don't do anything that involves my client without speaking with my client."
Monday, Giuliani told Sean Hannity, about his meeting with Yermack, "I wasn't operating on my own. I was operating at the request of the State Department."
Giuliani is left hanging out to dry. DDT asked Zelensky eight times to talk to Giuliani, and the State Department said that that it didn't ask him for help:
"Mr. Giuliani is a private citizen and acts in a personal capacity as a lawyer for President Trump. He does not speak on behalf of the U.S. Government."
On Sunday, however, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said he approved of Giuliani "inserting himself in foreign affairs" and pressing Ukrainian officials to investigate Biden, possibly encouraging Giuliani to break the law.
Because the law does not designate what to do if the DNI violates the law by not releasing the complaint, experts think that the IG, who wants to provide Congress with the complaint, is in charge of delivering the complaint. Jesselyn Radack, a national security lawyer, said that "the DNI cannot countermand the inspector general's determination." The DNI, however, consulted the DOJ, another violation of the law, whose opinions are "considered to be binding." Employees of the executive branch can't be prosecuted for not doing what the White House demands, but they can be fired, according to a former DOJ official.
Repubicans argue that they don't know the facts but that DDT's actions with Ukraine aren't wrong because the people who want to know the facts are speculating. Sen. John Cornyn (R-TX) claimed that DDT didn't talk to Zelensky about Joe Biden—after DDT said that he talked to Zelensky about Biden. The media has the same confusion about how to defend DDT after he admits to extortion by saying "So what if I did?" Republicans and DDT have spread around the blame—Joe Biden, Hunter Biden, Ukraine, the whistleblower, the media—or just saying that DDT did nothing wrong by trying to blackmail Ukraine. It's all part of the coverup pattern for DDT's sole concerns, his reelection in 2020.
Failing to stop Pelosi's impeachment plan by offering to release the transcript of the Zelensky telephone call, DDT called the Speaker to "work something out" with "this whistleblower complaint." She said, "Tell our people to obey the law." He should have listened to aides who told him not to call Zelensky.
Pieces from DDT's 139th Week
Tags: Andrew McCabe, border wall, Cokie Roberts, Guantánamo Bay, health care, John Mitnick, Joy Reid, Mike Pence, Pentagon, pork inspections, recession, Robert O'Brien
The media has been consumed for the past week about a potential exchange from Dictator Donald Trump (DDT) of $250 military aid to Ukraine for an investigation into DDT's possible opponent Joe Biden and the Middle East tension from attacks by unknown enemies on the Saudi Arabian oil fields. That wasn't all.
DDT found a white man to sit around and watch him work, his criteria for a new national security adviser. According to the NYT, Robert O'Brien is known as "an affable, ingratiating personality that has earned him allies throughout the Trump administration, notably including Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Mr. Trump's son-in-law and adviser, Jared Kushner, both of whom supported his appointment." NYT also described him as a pleasant John Bolton, because O'Brien's similar ideology to his predecessor. Like many other people who DDT hires, he has few qualifications for the job other than his lavish praise for DDT. As "hostage negotiator," O'Brien persuaded Sweden to release rapper A$AP Rocky from jail for a street brawl to improve DDT's ratings among blacks. The former adviser for Mitt Romney, Scott Walker, and Ted Cruz—all losing their candidacies—now has the job to solve DDT-created disasters in Iran, China, North Korea, and Afghanistan. DDT clearly said that the new adviser won't be making any decisions because DDT is in charge. Congress is considering a law requiring confirmation for this position that DDT can freely vacate and fill. Meanwhile Bolton is now speaking out against DDT's policies.
This spring, DHS dumped a dozen high-level officials after he fired John Mitnick, the agency's fifth general counsel. In his job, Mitnick supervised 2,500 lawyers at the agency, pushed back against policies putting the DHS in a legally dubious position, and stopped DDT from releasing migrants in sanctuary cities in retaliation for their laws.
Two vegan Democratic presidential candidates, Cory Booker and Tulsi Gabbard, are safe from DDT's reduction of food safety inspectors in pork plants by 40 percent. USDA will use a small number of industry employees with no training for "inspection" and eliminate line speed limits, promoting less cleanliness in both prep and inspection. Peer reviews show that studies used as justification for faulty position that faster line speeds are safer, hidden from the public, are flawed, but the USDA moves ahead because of packing house requests despite 80,000 opposing comments from the public. Upton Sinclair's The Jungle, published over a century ago, describes the unsanitary conditions then and perhaps now. USDA's IG is investigating the faulty data, lack of transparencies, and other rule irregularities.
In an effort to politically influence the U.S. Supreme Court, 53 Republican Senators signed a letter declaring that Democrats pose "a direct, immediate threat to the independence of the judiciary." The proposed case has already been settled after New York City repealed a NRA-opposed statute almost a decade ago, proving that the lawsuit is only political. Republicans are still not happy after confirming 150 ultra-conservative judges and two Supreme Court justices, one of the positions blocked for almost a year so that a Republican president could nominate one.
Another Republican action is endangering the lives of U.S. military members, according to the Pentagon. DDT's moved $3.6 billion to build a border fence through the National Emergencies Act from the military budget designated to solve life-threatening situations such as asbestos in living quarters for troops and their families and storage facilities for ammunition that aren't fire-resistant or capable of handling explosions. The Pentagon reports that the loss of the funds hurts "military readiness" and damages national security. The lack of funding for a new boiler at Eielson Air Force Base in Alaska could be force an evacuation and leave the base frozen and damaged. The main gate at Incirlik Air Base in Turkey is current subject to "hostile penetration … and an increased terrorist threat." DDT unfunded plans "to deter Russian aggression," according to an Air Force report. The National Guard training base at Camp Santiago, destroyed when Hurricane Maria went through Puerto Rico two years ago, won't be rebuilt. Most congressional GOP members refused to stop DDT from taking the money from real military emergencies.
DDT found another black journalist to libel—this one is a woman. As one tweet commented, DDT's vile comments just sold 50,000 of Joy Reid's book, The Man Who Sold America: Trump and the Unraveling of the American Story, already on the NYT bestseller list, after he said she had no "talent" and no "'it' factor." Reid raised DDT's fury by saying that he sounded like a "desperate man" at his Baltimore speech and he treated "the gathered Republicans to some smoking hot beauty tips" such as selecting energy inefficient lightbulbs to avoid orange-appearing skin.
Reid responded to DDT by listing a few of his impeachable actions–and that was before the revelation of his extorting Ukraine.
Last week, highly respected Cokie Roberts died, and DDT tweeted his response:
"I never met her. She never treated me nicely."
Daughter of prominent U.S. Louisiana representatives for over a half century, Roberts, "called one of the 50 greatest women in the history of broadcasting" by ABC, helped pave the way for women in broadcast journalism. About Roberts, noted legal affairs correspondent Nina Tottenberg wrote:
"To know Cokie was to see the personification of human decency…. She was always the voice of people with less power, and the voice of what is right."
Showing less finesse at a reception at the recent G7 Summit, DDT looked for Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi by calling out, "Where's my favorite dictator?" DDT was greeted with silence. He has not condemned the human rights violations of el-Sisi after he took power through a 2013 military coup against former President Mohammed Morsi. DDT said that el-Sisi is "a good man, and he's done a fantastic job in Egypt." At least DDT is right about el-Sisi being a dictator.
In the path of hurricanes, the U.S. military court and prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, have cost over $6 billion to operate for almost 18 years; taxpayers are charged over $10 million each day to house 40 prisoners. Although almost 800 people have gone through the prison, only one person was convicted. So much torture has tainted evidence that no more prisoners can be convicted with an appeals processing costing a minimum of $1.5 billion during the next 10 to 15 years. If defendants are found not guilty, the government can imprison them indefinitely. The two men who proposed cost-saving measures were fired. With plans to keep the facilities open for another 25 years, the government will need to pay for geriatric care such as joint replacements. The oldest prisoner is now 71 years old.
Former acting FBI director Andrew McCabe, fired hours before his pension would go into effect in April 2018, is still in limbo because the DOJ has refused to tell him for ten days whether a grand jury indicted him for inappropriate media leaks about Hillary Clinton and her foundation. Charges against him require 12 of 23 jurors to agree for probably cause that he committed a crime. In his position, he can declassify anything he wishes so a jury will have trouble finding him guilty. He is accused of lying under oath, but that's not a problem for Brett Kavanaugh in his confirmation hearings for Supreme Court justice. It's been said that a grand jury can "indict a ham sandwich"; McCabe may be less guilty than that sandwich.
DDT wants to dump VP Mike Pence from the 2020 ballot because he doesn't provide enough defense for DDT. Ivanka and Jared Kushner regularly threaten Pence to force him to follow orders, according to a White House official.
Even FLOTUS Melania Trump has become toxic. When she asked ten students from the United Nations International School (UNIS) in Manhattan to join at the New York Stock Exchange to ring the opening bell, parents don't want their children photographed with her.
DDT consistently promises that he is bringing coal back, but in Wyoming two of the biggest U.S. mines have shut down.
Democrats passed the Affordable Care Act in 2010, and Republicans spent seven years trying to repeal it. Democrats took the House in 2018 partly because people were afraid to lose their health care. House Republicans met in 2019 and made plans to repeal people's health care as the 2020 election nears. That's all the GOP has?
Attempts by DDT's National Labor Relations Board to erase a rule making companies more responsible for temps, fast-food-franchise workers, and those who work indirectly for companies may be confounded for a second time because of conflicts of interest by the board—this time its use of temporary staffers. The board hired temporary lawyers and paralegals to review public comments on the rollback of the rule from a company that has a vested interest in the outcome, raising questions about the accuracy of their work.
Thanks to DDT's trade war with China, the economic OECD, comprised of 36 countries, predicts a world recession. According to the conservative Bloomberg.com, the recession may have already started in some areas such as manufacturing and farming since DDT started imposing tariffs. In 22 state, the number of people working in factories—members of DDT's base—fell thus far this year as has truck delivery traffic.
DDT: Week 138 – Speeches, Lesss Publicized Info
Tags: Democratic candidate debate, election rigging, farm bailout, GOP House retreat, Gregory Cheadle, gun violence, Hillary Clinton, Ireland, Mike Pence, NRA, Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument, southern border, Ukraine
Last night, audiences in Baltimore and Houston heard some odd statements. In Houston, the "meh" Democratic debate among ten candidates had a few peculiar moments for Joe Biden—even for him. He called Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) "the president," referred to himself as "the vice president as the United States," and retorted "this is America" to Sanders' statement that the United States pays twice as much in health care as Canada does. Millionaire business owner non-politician candidate (does that sound familiar?) Andrew Yang used a possibly illegal gameshow technique to give away $12,000 to each of ten people from his campaign funds. In the debate's aftermath, award-winning "pro-life hero" and Texas representative Briscoe Cain, who says he "supports the value of life," tweeted "my AR is ready for you" after candidate Beto O'Rourke said that he would ban all assault weapons.
At the same time as the third Democratic candidate debate, Dictator Donald Trump (DDT) gave a meandering speech at the House Republicans' retreat. The geriatric man in the Oval Office referred to his vice president as "Mike Pounds" and explained that the water is so clean because 25 years ago "there was nobody here" in America to explain why the water was so clean at that time. He also blamed his rejected new energy efficient light bulbs for making him "look orange." A photographer said that lighting, which doesn't make DDT's teeth turn orange, has nothing to do with his orangey-red skin, that the color comes from the heavy coat of bronzer that he puts on himself. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy's (R-CA) worshipful statements about DDT tried to cover DDT's racist slurs against Baltimore—and that was after DDT called McCarthy a "cow." [visual – McCarthy]
About Hillary Clinton, DDT said that she "didn't like stairs, didn't like airplanes, didn't like a lot"—and would rest for weeks between stops. In four years as Secretary of State, Clinton spent 401 days—over 25 percent of her tenure—to travel 956,733 miles to visit 112 countries. DDT spent the same percentage of time visiting his personal golf clubs, not counting the weekends and vacations when he didn't play golf—including the weekend that he skipped a visit to Poland to play golf. He couldn't even go a few miles in the rain to commemorate the 100th anniversary of World War I in France.
Republicans say they oppose bailouts, but DDT promises them a bailout of $30 billion after he cost them billions from his trade war with China cost them billions. Democrats threaten to not fund part of that huge sum as part of the appropriations bill necessary to keep the government from shutting down at the end of the month. DDT originally said that farmers are okay with the sacrifice, but farmers have been increasingly upset—especially when they lose their farms—as the 2020 election nears—and especially because the wealthiest farmers receive the bulk of the money.
White House officials have said that the bailout may not be legal because of its huge scope. Almost 40 years ago, President Jimmy Carter banned U.S. sales of wheat to Russia; the country produced and exported wheat in competition with the U.S. for its prior markets. Farmers believe that they are still paying for the Russian wheat embargo, and Brazil is now taking over the soybean market.
The NRA is unhappy that retail stores are dropping sales of guns and ammunitions, and NASCAR refused advertising with K-Var Corp., a large distributor of firearms, ammunition and firearm accessories. Yet Walmart, despite an announcement that it wouldn't allow open carry in its stores, isn't living up to its promise.
And NRA has its own insider telling DDT about avoiding gun legislation. Michael B. Williams, formerly the top law for the American Suppressor Association that represents the silencer industry and law clerk for NRA's Institute for Legislative Action, has become deputy assistant to DDT. Scrapping the idea for background checks, that has an 89-percent approval, DDT is considering more mental health facilities and hospitals along with capital punishment for mass shooters.
DDT's friend Bob Wright has written proposals to stop mass shootings. The former NBC chair's "advisers" proposed monitoring "phones and smart watches" to see who will become violent. It's an interesting answer for people so paranoid that they won't register guns.
At a White House ceremony this week, DDT handed out an awards for "heroes" of recent mass shootings without vetting the recipients. One of them, Chris Grant, wasn't there because he was detained by the Secret Service with an arrest warrant. El Paso police said that a video showed that Grant misrepresented his actions that were only "self-preservation."
When Republicans in four states—Arizona, Kansas, Nevada, and South Carolina—eliminated presidential primaries, one of them cut out the newest candidate from its own state, South Carolina's former governor Mark Sanford. Republicans in those four states have kept at least three presidential candidates from running. The GOP says it's just saving money; others say that they're rigging the election and protecting DDT. Republicans know that they need to stop Democrats from voting to win; now they show that they need to block voting to elect DDT as their candidate.
The RNC is accusing DDT's campaign of further rigging by concealing DDT's unpopularity in specific states and congressional districts. Information like this would allow GOP candidates to publicly distance themselves from DDT. Former RNC chairman Michael Steele said, "The RNC is not an independent actor; the RNC is now a part of the Trump campaign."
In another campaign technique, Fox and other far-right media are warning that people won't be safe if Democrats are elected in 2020. On The View, Meghan McCain predicted "a lot of violence" if laws take "people's guns away from them." She added, "I'm not going to live without guns."
According to a former agent of the Israel intelligence agency Mossad, Russia picked DDT as most advantageous to its goals and then "deployed a system [of bots] for the length of the elections." This statement follows two Senate-commission reports that Russia used every social media tool to support DDT for the election. This article was published almost nine month ago, and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has ignored it, blocking any legislature to correct these cyberattacks.
Investigated for his business affairs, DDT says that he plans to release information about his financial affairs—but not when.
Information coming out about VP Mike Pence's stay with his family at DDT's resort show that the cost for just limousines was $600,000 to go back and forth across Ireland. Taxpayers have paid DDT for Pence to visit DDT's properties at least 20 times, and political groups connected to Pence have hosted six events at DDT's properties.
Three years ago, DDT called Gregory Cheadle "my African American" at a campaign rally. Cheadle now says the GOP pursues a "pro-white" agenda and uses black people like him as "political pawns." He is running as an independent for a U.S. representative from California.
DDT is presenting a false picture of the southern border by using Mexican information instead of data provided by the U.S. government. The media adopted DDT's chart about the drastically declining number of migrants in the U.S. needing processing came from Mexico; the true story is a much higher number of migrant crossings. DDT's chart has no citation about its source.
DDT gave up on his attempt to blackmail Ukraine into investigating Joe Biden this year by releasing the $250 million that Congress had approved to oppose pro-Russian separatists backed by Moscow. The money was released only hours before a debate on a defense bill amendment stopping DDT from similar actions in the future.
The racial wealth gap will cost the U.S. economy up to $1 trillion by 2028. A faster growth of white wealth over black wealth could increase that sum to $1.5 trillion, six percent of GDP. Failure to build wealth in black families comes from not only family income but also family wealth, family savings, and community context (a community's collective public and private assets).
DDT violated federal laws in not getting congressional authorization when moving entrance fees to keep national parks open during the most recent 35-day shutdown, according to the legal opinion from the nonpartisan Government Accountability Office.
DDT's trade war has lost 300,000 jobs for people in the U.S. with another lost 500,000 jobs in the next 16 months. If the recession doesn't exist before the 2020 election, DDT's re-election will cause it.
Sixty percent of people expect a recession within the coming year, and 60 percent say that DDT doesn't deserve to be re-elected.
Mourn for the environment and the nation's public lands as DDT begins building his wall across the Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument in Arizona. Seventy-four percent of people say that climate change is a crisis or a major problem, and two-thirds say that DDT is not doing enough to solve the problem. DDT's central re-election message is "You have no choice." He's right: another DDT term would completely destroy the U.S.—and the world. People have no choice.
More Investigations by and for DDT
Filed under: Executive action,Uncategorized — trp2011 @ 7:42 PM
Tags: Congress, Donald Trump, economy, election rigging, Emoluments Clause, energy, farmers, homophobia, investigations, Ireland, Martha McSally, Mike Pence, mortgages, NRA, Pentagon, tariffs, Thom Tillis, trade war, wall
Investigations into the abuses of Dictator Donald Trump (DDT) using government funds for his own private piggy back does not end with the Pentagon supporting his Scottish Turnberry resort. VP Mike Pence added to DDT's coffers during Pence's European trip. While VP Mike Pence attended meetings in Dublin (Ireland), he stayed at DDT's golf course, Doonbeg, requiring four extra flights in Air Force 2, four extra motorcade trips, and security. Marc Short, Pence's chief of staff, said that the government "negotiated room rates" for DDT's resort. DDT "suggested" (code for ordered) the stay at the golf course including Pence's wife, sister, and mother. Pence's chief of staff Marc Short said "suggested" and then denied he said it until the next day when he reversed the reversal, the same day that DDT said he did not "suggest" anything. Although Pence claims to be "personally paying all family expenses," taxpayers covered expenses for staff, security, and transports for them.
Pence claimed that he wanted to stay close to his ancestral home, but the visit there was rather bleak. Only one couple finally showed up, a huge difference from the crowds in Ireland for President Obama.
Deputy Press Secretary Judd Deer tried—and failed—to cover up for Pence's homophobia:
"For all of you who still think our @VP is anti-gay, I point you to his and the @SecondLady's schedule tomorrow where they will join Taoiseach @LeoVaradkar and his partner Dr. Matthew Barrett for lunch in Ireland."
Pence also faced LGBTQ support for LGBTQ people at his next stop, Iceland, where he was greeted with row of rainbow flags from the technology company Advania across from his meeting with President Gudni Johannesson in the capital, Reykjavik. Johannesson and Iceland's first lady, Eliza Reid, wore rainbow bracelets during the meeting.
Two House committees are investigating Pence's stay at DDT's golf resort and DDT's suggestion that the 2020 G7 summit meet at his Doral resort in Miami. Representatives requested documents from DDT, Pence, and other officials about violations of the Emoluments Clause. The State Department enriched DDT by allowing seven foreign governments to rent luxury condos in New York's Trump Tower in 2017 with no congressional consent from lawmakers as required by the constitution.
Pro-pollution DDT is is bad for businesses that cross him. The DOJ is accusing four automobile companies of antitrust violations because they plan to conform with California's fuel efficiency standards. The EPA and Transportation Department also notified California that the deal "appears to be inconsistent with federal law."
CEOs understand that DDT is causing them serious problems. In an August survey of CEOs, 62 percent said the trade war with its flipflops on tariffs is "highly detrimental" to outlook and strategy, and 72 percent believe that cutting interest rates won't sustain the economic cycle. The 3.9 percent rate of investment DDT has fallen from President Obama's 5.7 percent after the nation's economy started to recover in 2010.
History shows that no one wins in a trade war. When President George W. Bush raised steel tariffs in 2002, the GDP declined by $30.4 million, and about 200,000 jobs disappeared, 13,000 in raw steel-making. The cost to taxpayers was $400,000 for every steel-industry job saved. The World Trade Organization also ruled that the Bush tariffs were illegal.
With DDT, the U.S. trade deficit for the first half of 2019 is bigger than in the last two years.
Farmers may suffer more than businesses. Bob Kuylen, the vice president of the 50,000-member North Dakota Farmers Union, said that farmers "lost pretty much all of our markets since Trump took over" leaving farmers "land-rich and cash-poor." He added that bonuses for his high-protein wheat crops have dropped 95 percent.
In more DDT corruption, the private company of DDT's campaign manager Brad Parscale has received almost $1 million from a PAC supporting DDT and Pence. Law prohibits PACS from coordinating with candidates' campaigns.
DDT may have defrauded the IRS by not paying taxes on a tax-avoidance $50-million dollar loan that he owes to one of his own companies. He says it's a wash; IRS law states that a firm owed money and has no outstand debt is worth at least as much as it is owed.
To give DDT $3.6 billion for his wall, the Pentagon "deferred" 127 projects in 23 states, 19 countries, and three U.S. territories, including $400 million for military installations in Puerto Rico. Another $770 million of the money disappeared from projects in allied European nations to help deter a possible attack from Russia, and another one is for cybersecurity. The Pentagon plans to get Congress to replace the $3.6 billion for a wall that Congress voted down. Either the projects weren't important in the first place, of the military thought they could blackmail Congress.
Congressional members are losing status with their constituents because of the lost revenue after Pentagon projects were deferred. North Carolina is unhappy after losing $80 million dollars, and its GOP senator Thom Tillis voted to remove FEMA funds for detention centers. The biggest loser, Tillis is up for re-election next year. He's also in trouble after DDT lied about signing an emergency declaration "at the request of Senator Thom Tillis." Federal law allows only governors to make these requests, but DDT couldn't bear to give a Democrat credit for anything.
GOP Sen. Martha McSally, also up for re-election after being appointed last year, downplayed Arizona's loss by saying the state loses only $30,000. Later she had to explain that the loss is $30 million. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) simply blamed the Democrats.
Seventy percent of residents in the 200-household living community for older adults, River Bend Resort and Golf Club in Brownsville (TX), found that DDT's wall puts them on Mexico's side of DDT's 30-foot-tall barrier.
DDT wants to raise mortgage costs and the deficit by ending government control of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae that handle half the nation's mortgages. Part of the strategy in stopping an even worse recession from the unraveling housing market in 2008 was to have government control of those companies. People are already struggling to find affordable homes, and the U.S. will lose revenue from the companies' profits while Wall Street gets richer. After paying less than $200 billion to rescue Freddie and Fannie, the government received $300 billion in dividends from them. Neither company has capital to be sustainable for several years, and taxpayers would be forced to bail them out again in "exigent circumstances," according to the 53-page proposal. Shares in the companies drastically fell last week.
DDT brought out his 85th mandate to destroy the planet by rolling back George W. Bush's energy-efficient requirements for LED bulbs. Continued use of incandescent bulbs cost people more money. Eliminating inefficient bulbs nationwide would save electricity equivalent to the output from at least 25 large power plants, equivalent to powering all homes in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Since 2010, energy consumption in U.S. homes dropped by 6 percent.
Only three incumbent presidents—Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, and George H.W. Bush—faced primary challengers, and all three lost the general elections for a second term. With GOP politicians planning to run against DDT, Republicans have a solution: cancel 2020 presidential primaries and caucuses, already almost done in four states. One of the states is South Carolina, where Mark Sanford is considering an intent to run against DDT. DDT is right about the rigging of the election—at least for the GOP.
More NRA scandals: Former NRA president Marion Hammer obtained loans of over $250,000 at an interest rate down to two percent from the NRA's Florida affiliate where she is the only employee. This affiliate reported a $28,389 shortfall when it gave Hammer a $200,000 loan. Most of Unified Sportsmen of Florida gets almost all its budget from the NRA. The IRS can impose tax penalties if the organization benefits a private shareholder or person.
Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who incited people to defend themselves from immigrants before the El Paso shooting, cannot understand how the killer at Midland-Odessa last week could obtain a gun without a background check. The shooter bought the gun in a private sale which, under state law, has no background checks.
"The economy is great," says DDT, but new jobs slowed in August to 130,000, 34,000 of them government jobs included 25,000 short-term positions for the 2020 U.S. census. Reductions of June and July jobs numbers by 20,000 brought the 2019 monthly average down to 143,000, 25 percent below the 192,000 in 2018. President Obama's monthly job growth averages were 251,000 per month in 2014, 227,000 in 2015 and 193,000 in 2016. The stock market went up but only because of DDT's promise of trade talks with China in October. U.S. business investment and growth in trade-sensitive sectors slumped after fewer foreign sales, rising costs of imported goods, and the uncertain global outlook. People's views of the economy are partisan, but they're all going down—and independents are much closer to those of Democrats than Republicans. And the election is less than 14 months away.
Hatred: Conservative Religion in U.S.
Filed under: Religion,Uncategorized — trp2011 @ 8:33 PM
Tags: cruelty, Donald Trump, immigration camps, Mike Pence, mistreatment
Today, highly religious VP Mike Pence undoubtedly prayed to his god in a fundamentalist church after ignoring the plight of immigrants. Frustrated by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's (D-NY) assertions that the detention centers are "concentration camps," Pence visited them himself. A video shows he wrinkled his nose at the stench, made no eye contact with the men, and turned his back on them to leave after a minute. He didn't take his wife with him and have dinner in the center, as he had promised. After his visit, Pence praised "the care that our Customs and Border Protection personnel are providing." He tried to whitewash the situation by saying "I was not surprised" and that something should be done about overcrowding.
Reporters stayed for 90 seconds and reported that the foul-smelling McAllen (TX) border facility had almost 400 immigrant men in sweltering cages without mats or pillows on the concrete floor. The heat index in McAllen on Friday was 110 degrees, and some of the men said they had been there for over 40 days. Agents claimed they could brush their teeth once a day and have water when they wanted, but the inhabitants refuted these claims. They said they couldn't have water without permission to go outside the cage and were not provided showers. Men said that they were hungry.
The DHS Inspector General report reported adults and children with no access to showers, adults fed only bologna sandwiches, and immigrants held in standing room-only cells, some standing on toilets for breathing space. One for-profit company is billing the U.S. $775 for each child for one day of detention in Dictator Donald Trump's (DDT) "tent cities." These are the facilities where understaffing requires children to care for toddlers and some infants don't even have diapers. That $775 doesn't provide mattresses, clean clothes, bed linens, sufficient food, soap, etc. DOJ lawyer Sarah Fabian tried to argue that migrant children don't need amenities such as soap and toothbrushes.
Pence chuckled in an interview with Jake Tapper about detained migrant children lacking toothbrushes and soap and about the "stench." "It's all part of the appropriations process," Pence said.
Fox's Shep Smith called Clint's facility "horrendous" and said that conditions would violate the Geneva Convention of the incarcerated were prisoners of war. A doctor permitted into a McAllen (TX) facility after five infants were taken from there to neonatal intensive care from flu compared conditions to torture. One toddler was "completely unresponsive," and her eyes rolled to the back of her head. The doctor said that minors were subjected to "extreme cold temperatures, lights on 24 hours a day, no adequate access to medical care, basic sanitation, water, or adequate food." The diseases easily spreads from denial of access to washing hands and cleaning baby bottles.
Dismayed by the lack of hygiene products for children, six people paid $340 for diapers, wipes, soaps, and toys that they took to a detention facility in Clint (TX). They were ignored at the facility, and others have been told that no donations of such necessities as toothbrushes, soap, towels, etc. are accepted.
Pence gave sufficient warning that he would be visiting detention centers, but other government officials are prevented from inspection. Five Democratic candidates for president including two U.S. Senators were denied entry into the Homestead (FL) facility that holds 3,000 children. Two other candidates, also senators, were earlier refused entry.
When migrant children in an Arizona facility reported bad food and water, the CBP agents removed mats from their cells and forced them to sleep on concrete. Agents also offensively treated the children and sometimes sexual assaulted them. These are not problems from overcrowding; they were denied phone calls, showers, warm blankets while sleeping outside, and enough food. Dinner wasn't served until after 9:00 in the evening. Lack of funding is no reason for the abusive behavior of agents toward the detainees and the retribution they suffer if they tell the truth about their treatment.
A report from the House Oversight Committee shows that at least 18 migrant infants and toddlers under the age of two were separated from their parents at the border "including nine infants under the age of one" for between 20 days and six months. Some children were detained in Border Patrol facilities longer than the allowed 72 hours, sometimes moved to multiple facilities to give the appearance of staying within the law. Media reports caused 300 children to be removed from a Texas facility where children were left filthy and neglected. Yet agents returned 100 of them within a few days, saying that the Clint facility was a "consolidated" holding facility. In early June, DDT canceled English classes, recreational programs, and legal aid for unaccompanied minors in detention centers. Licensing laws may not allow him to carry out that plan, but Florida has not licensed the Homestead facility.
Tropical Storm Barry officially begins this year's hurricane season, and children in Homestead are in tents, metal trailers, and a former U.S. Job Corps building—all in the second-most vulnerable hurricane zone in Florida. HHS claims that its plans are secret, but history shows a serious lack of planning from that agency about undocumented immigrants.
DDT plans to eliminate interpreters for undocumented migrants, using only videos to videos in multiple languages to explain rights and the proceedings. After that, no one will be available to answer questions in their language. Immigrants speak diverse indigenous languages and frequently don't speak Spanish. Many of them don't have attorneys and lack representation.
CPB agents and private companies with detention centers are creating a serious and permanent public health crisis replete with pulmonary diseases, fungal infections, skin infections, and a large number of illnesses such as mumps, measles, and chicken pox. Conservatives claims that the people came with these diseases; even if that were true, DDT's policies are greatly excerbating the problem because of no attention and care. If people in prolonged detention escape these diseases, they still suffer from mental health conditions from panic attacks to psychosis. Young people can have irreversible neurological impact both physical and emotional, and the problems can be genetic for future generations. Those not arrested and deported live in constant terror and fear that parents or spouses will be taken from them, affecting the health of blood pressure, metabolism, psychological well-being, etc. The number of abusers using deportation threats against their victims has increased by 100 percent in the past two years while rape reports by Latinas has decreased by 50 percent.
As of early June, 24 people died in ICE custody during DDT's term. At least four others died soon after release, and more migrants, including five children, died in the custody of other federal agencies. Since that report, at least one migrant, a Honduran man, died after being in ICE custody for almost a month.
Officials have known for over three years about the sexist secret Facebook page by 9,500 current and former border agents with abusive content and done nothing about it. Since information about the social media went public, the members dropped to 4,000. They also tried to scrub the content, but a website has captured and archived much of the content. The head of the Border Patrol for almost a year, Carla Provost, condemned the racist, vulgar, and sexist posts as inappropriate, but she is one of several Border Patrol supervisors who participates in the Facebook. At least one more Facebook page for CBP employees posting vulgar and sexually explicit posts has been uncovered, this one also demeaning Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) and blacks and Asian-Americans.
ICE has increased detention to 54,000—far above the 40,520 limit and ignoring congressional instructions at the end of the government shutdown in February. With no permission for more detention money, ICE has also opened three new for-profit immigration centers in Louisiana and Mississippi correction facilities within the past few weeks. ICE plans to put 15,000 asylum seekers in Louisiana by the end of summer although the state lacks judges to hear the cases. Congress has given ICE no additional detention money so no one knows how the bills will be paid, especially because existing facilities cannot afford soap and toothbrushes. ICE is also not telling lawyers where their clients are and not listing them on the detainee locator software. When the facilities were prisons operated by the same companies as the detention centers, they were understaffed, and inmates received poor treatment.
Bank of America reported that it will no longer have connections to companies that provide prisoner and detention services, including Homestead. Meanwhile, DDT is using his citizenship question and today's raids in ten cities to distract people from his sexual assaults, fraudulent financial dealings, and close relationships and appointments with corrupt people.
Not satisfied with the number of people in detention centers, DDT plans to increase the overcrowding in detention facilities by breaking up families of those with Temporary Protected Status and deporting youth with DACA status. Haitian families arriving at the border are already not permitted to work in the U.S.; instead men and teenage boys are arrested and put into detention, leaving the women and children without any family support. HUD is threatening to evict 100,000 members of mixed-status families if any of them are undocumented. DDT plans to destroy millions of people in his goal to "make America white."
On Sunday, July 14, 2019, that's religion in "America."
DDT's People Need Vetting
Filed under: Donald Trump,Uncategorized — trp2011 @ 11:08 PM
Tags: Federal Reserve, Hope Hicks, Matthew Kacsmaryk, Mike Pence, nominees, Patrick Shanahan, vetting
Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders should have been left to tell the lies of Dictator Donald Trump (DDT) instead of going back to Alabama: she does a better job. Patrick Shanahan's nomination to serve as Donald Trump's new Defense secretary collapsed yesterday after revelations surrounding incidents of domestic violence within Shanahan's family. A journalist asked:
"Does that make you concerned then about the White House vetting process if you had just heard about it yesterday?"
DDT answered:
"No, we have a very good vetting process. And you take a look at our Cabinet and our Secretaries — it's very good. But we have a great vetting process."
DDT is a disaster at vetting anyone. Last month, DDT's nominees for the Federal Reserve, Stephen Moore and Herman Cain, had to withdraw their names. They are on the top of a long list of non-vetted nominees. Appointments are going to get only worse because fewer and fewer people are willing to be involved in DDT's administration.
Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan, formerly a Boeing executive, resigned after an FBI investigation further delayed his confirmation hearings. He took over after James Mattis resigned in December before DDT fired him. Shanahan's ex-wife has made accusations of abuse and was arrested as part of a domestic dispute. DDT tweeted the spending "more time with his family" for Shanahan departure. Some Republicans kept Shanahan's problems from Democrats because they didn't want the situation to become another Kavanaugh debacle. Democrats discovered the domestic abuse surrounding Shanahan after the information was published in the newspaper.
Secretary of the Army Mark Esper, DDT's replacement for Shanahan and another lobbyist, will be more to DDT's satisfaction. Unlike Shanahan, Esper doesn't worry about the deployment of thousands of military member to the southern border eroding readiness for combat, and he's close to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who currently seems to be announcing military strategy regarding Iran, and David Urban, DDT's close friend and adviser to the Pennsylvania presidential campaign in 2016. Esper was also the top lobbyist for Raytheon, now a U.S. defense contractor embedded in Saudi Arabia.
DDT has lost support from the vastly wealthy and powerful Mercer family who helped him get elected in 2016 with $15.5 million and data mining by Cambridge Analytica. DDT's inauguration fund also got $1 million from the Mercers. Some of the Mercers' disillusionment came from DDT's exile of Steve Bannon and Robert Mercer's elimination as co-CEO of Renaissance Technologies, "really spooked" by the FBI's investigation of Cambridge Analytica. The Mercers originally preferred Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) as the presidential candidate but supported DDT in preference to Hillary Clinton. Robert Mercer also feels that he lost his privacy because of his support for DDT.
Matthew Kacsmaryk slipped through as a lifetime judge with 52 votes because GOP senators will confirm almost any judicial nominee. Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), who believed Brett Kavanaugh's statement of support for Roe v. Wade, either learned her lesson or worries about re-election next year; she was the only GOP senator to vote him. Kacsmaryk:
Opposes employment, housing, and health care protections for LGBTQ people
Opposes including LGBTQ people in the Violence against Women Act.
Wrote that being transgender is "a delusion."
Defended county clerk Kim Davis for refusing to give marriage licenses to same-sex couples in opposition to the law.
Opposes employer contraceptive mandate in the Affordable Care Act.
Played a lead role in opposing a Washington state law requiring pharmacist to give birth control to women with prescriptions.
Criticized the Supreme Court decision in Roe v. Wade giving women the right to abortions.
Labeled the Equality Act a "public affirmation of the lie that the human person is an autonomous blob of Silly Putty, unconstrained by nature or biology, and that marriage, sexuality, gender identity, and even the unborn child must yield to the erotic desires of liberated adults.'"
Tony Perkins, a leader of the infamous hate group Family Research Council, has been named to chair the U.S. Commission on International Freedom. It's purpose is to review violations of religious freedom and make policy recommendations to the president, Secretary of State, and Congress.
Kelly Craft, formerly U.S. ambassador to Canada and now nominee for the UN ambassador, had the reputation for rarely being in Canada. Her absence for over 300 days between October 23, 2017, and June 19, 2019 means that, like Congress, she was missing for about half the time. A spokesperson said she had permission to be away but declined to give details. Craft reportedly left her job to a deputy while attending to personal business and domestic U.S. politics. Her husband's private jet, used by Craft, made round trips between Canada and the U.S. about once a week, such as travel to the Kentucky Derby and a media interview for an event for her coal billionaire husband. Both Craft and her husband are supporters of Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) who lobbied for her appointment. Her answers at the confirmation hearing showed an ignorance of UN workings.
Katharine Gorka, political appointee as press secretary at Customs and Border Protection, remains in the government although her husband, Sebastian, known for white supremacist connections, has gone. Both are openly anti-Muslim, and Gorka worked to stop a DHS grant for Life after Hate, a group trying to stop white supremacist groups. DHS has refused to release documents about her through the Freedom of Information Act.
Jerome Powell, chair of the independent agency Fed Reserve, would likely be on the chopping block if DDT could figure out a way to get rid of him. Although the stock markets are currently going up, their volatility partly comes from DDT's trade wars. Yet DDT blames the refusal to drop interest rates as the only reason. Last February, he checked with lawyers to see if he could demote Powell and said two weeks ago that the board is "not my people." Three of the five are DDT's nominees, and DDT appointed Powell as chair. The seven-member board is still missing two people, and all four of DDT's nominees have failed confirmation—difficult to do with the current GOP senate. Powell said he's not going anywhere.
VP Mike Pence isn't any better than DDT at vetting people. Pence's former national security advisor, Andrea L. Thompson, now undersecretary of state for arms control and international security affairs, had close relationships with confessed Russian agent Maria Butina and her boyfriend, veteran GOP activist Paul Erickson. Butina's job was to infiltrate the NRA and GOP to help Russia. In June 2017, Butina attended Thompson's wedding where Erickson officiated. A year later, Thompson's connection to Butina wasn't mentioned at her confirmation hearings despite Mueller's investigation, including Erikson's allegedly trying to establish "secret backchannels to the Kremlin." Thompson's job is negotiating with Russia on arms control treaties, but she never discussed her Butina ties. After 18 months in prison, Butina will be deported to her home in Russia.
Hope Hicks, DDT's former communications director, may have testified for almost eight hours before the House Judiciary Committee, but six White House, DOJ, and private lawyers blocked the questions 155 times in the closed hearing. Their excuse was the non-existent "absolute immunity," applying to "anything about her knowledge of anything during the period of time in which she was employed in the White House." She didn't answer even simple answers such as the location of her office in the White House and the existence of any conversation with DDT during lunch time.
Hicks could answer questions before and after she was in the White House and had a few revelations. Under repeated questioning, she said DDT was wrong in possibly accepting political dirt from a foreign power on an opponent, and she agree that the Russian government hacked the DNC and Clinton campaign during the 2016 presidential election campaign. Hicks also found it "odd" that DDT asked Corey Lewandowski, a former campaign manager but not an employee, to tell former AG Jeff Sessions to reverse his recusal in overseeing the Russian investigation. She knew about the hush money that DDT paid to two women that DDT denied. Hicks' testimony also shows that DDT and his team knew about possible tapes of DDT with "Russian hookers, participating in lewd activities" (pp. 196-197) soon after the release of Access Hollywood tapes in late October 2016, long before former FBI Director James Comey briefed him on it in January 2017. At that time, DDT appeared shocked about the tapes.
The oddest aftermath of Hicks' testimony is Rep. Devin Nunes' (R-CA) false claim that "old, pervy" Democrats asked her personal questions about her love life, a message that went viral on the fake conservative media. He wasn't present, but he claimed to have "sources" that were "inside," that people "would be ashamed if they knew what actually happened in that room." With the transcript released, people can find out "what actually happened" if they read the document—which they most likely won't. I read all 273 pages. It's filled with factual questions about Hicks' professional activities, 155 "objections," and some whining from Republicans who still want to protect DDT. Once again, conservative media consumers will believe the "fake news."
Religion, GOP's Desperate Hypocrisy for Control
Tags: fundamentalism, Michael Cohen, Mike Pence, Miracle Hill Ministries, Muslim, Portland (OR), Religious discrimination, Republicans, theocracy
Yesterday, I wrote about the values of Republicans who attacked Michael Cohen, former fixer for Dictator Donald Trump (DDT) during testimony before the House Oversight Committee hearing. Walter Einenkel, social media editor and writer on Daily Kos, has produced a compilation of their specific values. The following are all GOP committee members who attacked Cohen's character. Their behavior reflects their personal values:
Jim Jordan (R-OH): He denies the allegation of complicity in multiple sexual assaults against athletes while he was assistant coach, but the accusations are credible. The other congressional Republicans protected him.
Clay Higgins (R-LA): He resigned his job as an Opelousas (LA) police officer to avoid disciplinary action for using "unnecessary force on a subject during the execution of a warrant and later lied during an internal investigation."
Virginia Foxx (R-NC): She claimed that she didn't know that "tar baby" is a racial slur and that the murder of Matthew Shepard was not a hate crime, but instead "a hoax that continues to be used as an excuse for passing [hate crimes] bills."
Jody Hice (R-GA): He wants to remove Muslims from any First Amendment protections with the claim that Islam is not a religion.
Mark Green (R-TN): He said that people should get their health care from God, not Medicaid, and his disparaging comments about Muslims and LGBTQ people are so extreme that he had to withdraw his nomination for DDT's Secretary of the Army.
Paul Gosar (R-AZ): His seven siblings opposed his election and supported his opponent, perhaps because he subscribes to conspiracy theories such as Jewish Holocaust survivor George Soros funded and organized the neo-Nazi movement in the U.S., including the violent rallies in Charlottesville (VA) and most recently said that climate change doesn't exist because of "photosynthesis." He's the one who said, in his adult fashion, "liar, liar, pants on fire" to Cohen during the hearing.
Thomas Massie (R-KY): He met with Maria Butina, arrested for being a Russian spy.
Mark Meadows (R-NC): He lied about having a college degree and claimed that he wasn't a racist during the hearing although he campaigned as a "birther" while President Obama was running for a second term.
Ralph Norman (R-SC): He pulled out a gun at a townhall meeting and left it lying on the table in front of him in violation of state law, but high-level friendly officials exonerated his actions.
Bob Gibbs (R-OH): He compared serving in Congress to serving in the military to wipe out his veteran opponent and sent fliers to influence the Democratic primary.
Glenn Grothman (R-WI): He has a long history of saying crazy things such as marriage equality should be illegal because it does a disservice to men who fought in the Civil War and college Pell Grants "discourage marriage."
James Comer (R-KY): He was sued for threatening a senior state legislative staffer who reported allegations of sexual harassment to his superiors while they were both in state legislature.
Kelly Armstrong (R-ND): He has a history of driving infractions—a DUI conviction in 2001 that he tried to get out of and more recent citations for using a wireless communication device while driving and speeding in North Dakota.
That's over two-thirds of the GOP members of the Oversight Committee who failed to defend DDT's actions in exchange for smearing Cohen throughout his testimony. The other five members are new—first or second term—and standard far-right, Christianity only, gun-loving, climate deniers.
Christian Republicans elsewhere are standing up for their religion.
Some of them celebrated West Virginia GOP Day with a poster connecting Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) to the terrorism of 9/11 because she is a Muslim. The arguments about the image in the capitol rotunda became so heated that the state House's sergeant at arms, Anne Lieberman, resigned after her anti-Muslim remark and another person was injured. Last month, a West Virginia legislator was called on to resign after he called LGBTQ groups "the closest thing to political terrorism in America" and "a modern day version of the Ku Klux Klan." It's the state that believes in freedom of religion—if the religion is Christianity.
In December 2018, a girl was bullied after her mother sued the Mercer County School District for teaching the Bible as fact.
Fundamentalist Christians have become so rigid that they think even Catholics don't deserve religious freedom. DDT's waiver permitting a South Carolina foster care agency to discriminate kept same-gender parents from becoming caregivers for children; now the agency is discriminating against a Catholic because of her faith. The Catholic woman was not only rejected as a foster parent but also told that she could not volunteer with the agency because it wanted only the "right type of Protestant church." The biggest foster care agency in the state, Miracle Hill Ministries refused to work with a Jewish family in 2017. The governor rescued them with an executive order allowing the government-supported agency to discriminate, and Miracle got its federal waiver from the federal Department of Health and Human Services in January. This sentence in Miracle's foster care manual may need revision:
"In accordance with Federal and State laws and South Carolina Department of Social Services (SCDSS) policy, this agency and contracted providers for foster care and adoption services are prohibited from discriminating on the basis of race, color, national origin, sex, age, religion, political beliefs or disability."
During the past ten years, the number of South Carolina home placements has been flat while the number of children in foster care has spiked. In addition, South Carolina law requires that foster children receive religious education "in accordance with the expressed wishes of the child's natural parents." The exemptions for Miracle permits it to "effectively terminate biological parents' rights to direct their children's religious upbringing while those children are in the care of the child-placement agency or a foster family," according to a lawsuit. Another lawsuit is challenging Michigan's "license to discriminate" law for adoption agencies.
The evangelical legal service Alliance Defending Freedom is suing on the behalf of homeless shelter Hope Center in Anchorage (AK) for the "right" to deny assistance to transgender people. The shelter wants an exemption from the city to discriminate in violation of its law and say that charities should be able to deny access if they want. Assistant municipal attorney Ryan Stuart said that the suit has not proceeded because Hope Center refused to cooperate with the investigation. Rather than being threats, transgender people are the most likely targets of physical and sexual abuse.
In his speech at last week's conservative CPAC conference, VP Mike Pence said that "freedom of religion" is under attack, and the above examples prove that he's right. What he wants, however, is freedom of evangelical religion to oppress all others. Pence's religion is attacking LGBTQ rights, denying health care to people, limiting medical providers to communicating only his own non-medical beliefs, keeping children from finding good homes, rejecting scientific education for young people, in short, complete control of all people in the United States with his far-right Christian sexist, racist, homophobic beliefs.
Many times, I'm proud to live in Oregon, and this week is one of those times. The City Council for the state's largest city, Portland, unanimously approved a measure giving civil rights protections for atheist, agnostic, and other nonreligious residents in employment, housing, and public accommodation. Madison (WI) may be the only other city in the United states with similar protections.
What a strange country where people have rights–or no rights–based on where they live.
DDT: Week 109 – Disregard from Allies, Corruption
Tags: Alex Acosta, Andrew McCabe, Christopher Hasson, domestic terrorism, Iran anti-nuclear deal, Jussie Smollett, Mark Harris, Mike Pence, nondisclosure agreements, Roe v. Wade, Roger Stone
Dictator Donald Trump (DDT) has lost—again. In VP Mike Pence's attempt to turn Europeans against the 2015 Iran anti-nuclear deal at the 55th annual Munich Security Conference, he faced stony silence, starting when he said he brought greetings from DDT. Joe Biden received cheers for his speech. The French foreign minister asked why DDT can be so firm about opposing Iran while pulling troops out of Syria that helps Iran.
Like U.S. intelligence agencies, European nations have found no indication of Iran building nuclear weapons. Last month, Europe created a plan to purchase Iranian energy, stopping damage from U.S. sanctions, while not suffering U.S. financial reprimands. Even anti-Iran countries in the Middle East couldn't agree at the meeting because of the Saudi-operated boycott of Qatar. With war-hungry national security adviser John Bolton, DDT wants a war with Iran, but his only follower may be Israel, whose Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called for "war with Iran." The blasts against DDT came at the heels of a failure in a U.S.-led meeting about Iran in Warsaw where European nations sent only low-level delegations, if anyone.
No longer is Roe v. Wade being chipped away; it's being chopped away with a hatchet. DDT's newest rule takes Title X funds from family planning clinics that provide abortions, refer patients for abortions, or promote or support abortion for family planning. Funds will be directed to religious places, such as phony Crisis Pregnancy Centers, for women seeking reproductive health care—care which many CPCs promise but don't provide. Title X covers reproductive health care for 4 million women every year at a cost of $286 million.
Former FBI deputy Andrew McCabe is providing the public with news about his conversations with DDT. A major revelation is that DDT believes that North Korea's missiles can't reach the U.S., despite intelligence to the contrary, because "[Vladimir] Putin had told him that the North Koreans don't actually have those missiles." On the day before its release, McCabe's The Threat was #1 on the bestseller list.
Earlier this week, North Carolinian Baptist pastor Mark Harris, who paid a contractor to request and pick up absentee ballots that were either marked Republican or destroyed if for Democrats, said he knew nothing about what his employee was doing in an attempt to get seated in the U.S. House. Harris' son said that he had told him about what was happening, but Harris said he ignored his son, a federal prosecutor, because he was only 27 years old at the time. The father described his son as a "very judgmental" person who "has a taste of arrogance." A quantity of incriminating emails between Harris and his employee of them show that he lied about his ignorance. That issue seems to be the tipping point: Harris has asked for a new election. Harris excused himself by saying that he is recovering from an infection that led to sepsis and two strokes and therefore cannot deal with the "rigors" of the state election board hearing. The "rigors" of the election will start all over, beginning with a primary.
Most of DDT's former Advisory Commission on Election Integrity, including VP Mike Pence, stayed silent about this fraud after their attempts to suppress poor and minority voters. The only GOP response came from election lawyer J. Christian Adams who scolded fellow commission member Maine Secretary of State Matt Dunlop for a WaPo op-ed, "Why Doesn't the 'Voter Fraud' Crowd Care about What Happened in North Carolina?" In a tweet, Adams called Dunlop a "charlatan."
DDT deflected questions about the North Carolina fraud by mentioning California and Texas. Told that these accusations had been disproved, he moved on. At the same time, DDT has been highly vocal about the revelation that Jussie Smollett allegedly paid two brothers $3,500 to fake a racist attack on him. Also missing from DDT's prolific tweets is commentary on the arrest of a Coast Guard lieutenant, Christopher P. Hasson, for a domestic terrorist plot to kill prominent Democrats, CNN and MSNBC journalists, and "almost every last person on earth." The self-identified white nationalist (aka supremacist), obsessed with neo-fascist and neo-Nazi views, has stockpiled weapons and ammunition since 2017 to sow destruction and chaos. He also planned biological attacks targeting the food supply. Hasson got many of his ideas from books by Harold A. Covington, whose books, along with other white supremacist polemics, are available on Amazon. Covington, who popularized the concept of a white ethnostate in the Pacific Northwest, died in 2017.
Federal authorities concealed the arrest for five days until a private citizen discovered information in a documents search about extremism. Another Coast Guard member was reprimanded and removed from the response to Hurricane Florence after the public complained that he flashed a white-supremacy sign last September during a televised interview with another officer.
The current cultural and political climate will most likely result in punitive measures for Smollett, concerns about the mental state of Hasson, and exoneration for Harris.
One DDT game is which Cabinet secretary is the next to go. Maybe Secretary of Labor Alex Acosta? Eleven years ago, Acosta, then U.S. Attorney for southern Florida, was sued for giving Jeffrey Epstein federal immunity on child molestation and trafficking charges, blocking an FBI probe into Epstein who may have trafficking young girls in Florida but also from other states and Europe. For his leadership in abusing scores of underage girls, Acosta received only 13 months of prison time, most of it on work release and the rest in a special suite separate from other prisoners. Epstein's lawyers, including Ken Starr who led Bill Clinton's impeachment for lying, were largely allowed to set the terms of their client's plea deal. Acosta had this evidence but complained that he would have trouble convicting Epstein.
The Miami Herald has been working on the story for months and reported yesterday a judicial ruling that Acosta and federal prosecutors "broke the law when they concealed a plea agreement from more than 30 underage victims who had been sexually abused by wealthy New York hedge fund manager Jeffrey." The judge wrote that prosecutors not only violated the Crime Victims Rights Act when they didn't tell the victims but also misled the victims into believing that the case, secretly closed after the plea bargain was sealed, was ongoing. For the first time, a judge has ruled that Acosta illegally hid the agreement from Epstein's victims although the only follow-up is that the victims have 15 days to settle the issue with the government. Acosta was so convincing during his confirmation hearings—even calling the Epstein deal a "point of pride"—that he gained the votes of all the GOP senators plus 8 Democrats and one independent.
Asked about Acosta, DDT said:
"I really don't know too much about it. I know he's done a great job as labor secretary and that seems like a long time ago."
Sex trafficking in DDT's mind exists only as a device to get votes through his wall on the southern border.
DDT doesn't mind troops in Syria—he just thinks they shouldn't be from the U.S. After he announced his pullout of the U.S. military, he asked Europe to send in more soldiers to replace them, raising questions of whether he thinks that Syria is safe enough to be left on its own. EU allies refused DDT's request. Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), separated himself from DDT by shouting at the DOD acting secretary Patrick Shanahan who supports the pullout by April 20. "That's the dumbest f—ing idea I've ever heard," Graham yelled. he said that ISIS would return, Turkey would attack Kurdish forces, and Iran would have the advantage. Shanahan agreed with Graham but said he would do what DDT wants. Maybe DDT listened to Graham: today he plans to keep 400 soldiers on the ground in Syria, up from the 200 that Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders announced yesterday.
The leakiest White House in history has mandatory non-disclosure agreements for all employees—at least for now. Former DDT staffer Jessica Denson is suing to nullify the NDAs, claiming that their broadness allows retaliation against employees with legitimate workplace grievance. The lawsuit describes the NDAs as "unenforceable" and "unconscionable." The class-action suit covers thousands of DDT's employees and volunteers, including for his campaign, that prevented them from making any disparaging comments about DDT, the campaign, and his family. Staffers aren't even allowed copies of the NDAs that they sign that include a $10 million penalty for each infraction.
Roger Stone groveled after he sent out a tweet incorporating a gun target symbol with a photo of his judge and his criticism of her, but his abject apology wasn't enough. She just placed a full gag order on him.
Spin—twisting negative events to make them sound positive—has reached an artistic high in a conservative Wall Street Journal editorial. Attorney David Rivkin and "legal theorist" Elizabeth Foley purported that criminal allegations against DDT are so many that he should not be investigated. One concern was taking time away from DDT's "work"—aka "Executive Time." Investigating DDT's money laundering and other business fraud might take away from the unscheduled calls he makes to GOP legislators to talk about his television watching or golf or whatever.


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The Unblessed Woods – czwarty album hiszpańskiego blackmetalowego zespołu Elffor. Został wydany w 2006 roku.

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The Aryankuzhi Devi temple is an ancient Hindu temple located in the town Aryankuzhi in Kerala. The temple holds great significance for the devotees of the Goddess Bhadrakali, and is a place of huge mental satisfaction and spirituality for them. Every religious person in India has in some or the other way a deep connection with the symbol of power and tranquility embodied in the mother like figure of the Goddess Shakti. Aryankuzhi temple is that place for the millions of people in India where they find spiritual refuge and immense strength.
The Aryankuzhi temple is an age old temple which dates back to times immemorial. It is a temple built in South Indian style and grandeur. The beautiful temple was built by the ardent devotees of Goddess Bhadrakali or Devi Shakti. Its architecture is that of a typical South Indian temple which is grand and spectacular quite synonymous with almost every Southern temple.
One can easily reach the Aryankuzhi temple through rail route. Thiruvananthapuram is the nearest railway station and is well connected with almost all cities in Kerala and Tamil Nadu.
Thiruvananthapuram has an international airport so it is even easier to reach there through flights and it is connected to all the major cities in India and the world.
It is convenient to reach Aryankuzhi by road also as there is a good connection between Thiruvananthapuram and Kollam, Chennai, Trichur, Puducherri and many other cities.
This majestic temple is of utmost importance to the millions of worshippers of the Goddess Shakti or Devi. Not only for the people in the Southern part of India, but people from all across the country and the world come to this place to get a view of their intensely worshipped goddess who is not just a deity but a mother like figure to them. Goddess Bhadrakali or Shakti is the epitome of motherly love as well as fierce aggression and enormous power. People of all age groups and from every sphere of life come over here to seek the blessings of their beloved Goddess. People from both North and South India have a huge love and respect for the Goddess Shakti and seeing the deity in such a divine and beautiful form is like a wish being fulfilled for them.