Russia warns of 'consequences' for US-led strike on Syria

Russia's ambassador to the U.S. warned there would be "consequences" for the strike on Syria, and that a "pre-designed scenario" was underway.

In ordering strikes on Syria, President Donald Trump called out both Iran and Russia for their support of Bashar Assad's government.

Russia responded angrily to a U.S.-led strike against Syria on Friday, warning of unspecified "consequences" that stoked fears the conflict could escalate.

President Donald Trump ordered targeted military action in the country, following an alleged chemical weapons attack that reportedly left dozens of citizens dead.

Russia, which has backed the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad, has joined Damascus in denying an attack even took place — even though U.S. authorities have declared it did with near certainty.

In a statement released on Twitter, Russia's ambassador to the U.S. said the country was being "threatened," and issued an ominous warning that reprisals could follow.

Trump has singled out Russian President Vladimir Putin for his support of Assad, as well as Iran. In his speech announcing military action in Syria, Trump pointedly asked: "What kind of a nation wants to be associated with the mass murder of innocent men, women, and children?"

Since 2011, the Assad government has been locked in a deadly and protracted conflict with resistance fighters, and elements of ISIS, and has been backed by Russian forces.

The strikes were "quite measured, the administration wants to mete out punishment" without getting embroiled in a long-term conflict, said Behnam Ben Taleblu, a research fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies.

Noting that Trump extended "an olive branch" to both Russia and Iran in his speech, Taleblu added that "the question for the US and the coalition is how long are they prepared to sustain this," he asked.

"Fundamentally the U.S. is going to have to prove does it have a goal in Syria," and that it has an endgame in mind, Taleblu added.

Syria air strikes: All the latest updates

US, UK and France launch attack on 'chemical weapon sites' in Syria. Here are all the latest updates.

The US, UK and France have launched air strikes "on targets associated with the chemical weapons capabilities" in Syria, US President Donald Trump announced early on Saturday.

The strikes come after a suspected chemical weapons attack in the former rebel stronghold of Douma last weekend.

Here are all the latest updates on the strikes:

NATO chief: I support actions of US and allies

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said he supported the actions taken by the US, UK and France against Syria.

"I support the actions taken by the United States, the United Kingdom and France against the Syrian regime’s chemical weapons facilities and capabilities. This will reduce the regime’s ability to further attack the people of Syria with chemical weapons," Stoltenberg said in a statement on Saturday.

Syrian opposition leader: All attacks on civilians must stop

Syrian opposition leader Nasra al-Hariri called for the end to all attacks against civilians in Syria.

"Maybe the regime will not use chemical weapons again, but it will not hesitate to use weapons the international community has allowed it, such as barrel bombs and cluster bombs," Hariri said in a tweet early on Saturday.

Russia: Syria hit as country had 'chance for peaceful future'

Russia's foreign ministry says Syria was attacked at the very moment the country had a "chance for a peaceful future", Russian news agency RIA reported.

Maria Zakharova, the ministry spokeswoman, wrote on Facebook: "Those behind all this claim moral leadership in the world and declare they are exceptional. You need to be really exceptional to shell Syria's capital at the moment when it had gained a chance of a peaceful future."

The foreign ministry also said that Western media has some responsibility for the attack on Syria, which was based on its reports, according to RIA.

'Three targets hit'

Joseph Dunford, Washington's top general, said the precision strikes hit three targets - a scientific research centre near Damascus, a storage facility and command post also near the capital and a chemical weapons storage facility near Homs.

US top general: US did not notify Russia of targets

Washington's top general, Joesph Dunford, said Russia's forces in Syria had been warned through existing "deconfliction" channels that western planes would be in Syrian air space, but that Washington had not revealed the target sites or timing in advance.

US chairman of joint chiefs of staff: First wave of attacks ends

US Chairman of Joint Chiefs of Staff Joseph Dunford announced the first wave of attacks has ended.

Syrian state media says US-led strikes hit army depots

Syrian state media called the attacks by the US, France and the UK "a flagrant violation of international law", adding that the attacks had targeted army depots in the Homs area.

Russia warned 'such actions won't be left without consequences'

The Russian ambassador to the US said in a statement on the strikes that Russia warned that "such actions will not be left without consequences".

Mattis: 'Right now, this is a one-time shot'

"Right now, this is a one-time shot, and I believe it has sent a very strong message," US Secretary of Defense James Mattis said.

Syrian state TV: Syrian air defences responded to attack

Syrian state TV reports that Syrian air defences responded to the strikes by the US, UK and France

Explosions heard in Damascus

As Trump announced the strikes, explosions were heard from Damascus, Reuters news agency reported.

Emmanuel Macron confirms France's involvement

French President Emmanuel Macron has confirmed France's involvement in the strikes.

UK's Theresa May: Strikes meant to 'deter the use of chemical weapons'

UK Prime Minister Theresa May confirmed Britain's involvement in the strikes, saying: "We would have preferred an alternative path. But on this occasion there is none."

She said the strikes were not about "regime change" or "intervening in a civil war", but were to "deter the use of chemical weapons" by the Syrian government.

Trump: 'I ordered precision strikes'

"I ordered the United States armed forces to launch precision strikes on targets associated with the chemical weapon capabilities of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad," Trump said from the White House late on Friday.

The purpose of the campaign is to "establish a strong deterrent against the production, spread and use of chemical weapons," the US President said.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/04/ ... 23479.html





Update-Syrian Air defense confronts the US, French and British aggression on Syria

Damascus, SANA-Syrian Air defense confronted on Saturday the US, French and British aggression on Syria.

SANA reporter said that the tripartite aggression targeted the Research Center in Barzeh, adding that the Air defense confronted a number of missiles that targeted warehouses for the Syrian Arab Army in Homs.

Air defenses faces the aggression and down missiles

According to the Syrian TV, the air defenses downed 13 missiles over Kisweh area before reaching their targets.

The TV reporter denied news that Damascus International Airport was attacked.

Hamda Mustafa

https://sana.sy/en/?p=134193





WAR THROUGH SYRIAN EYES

In their own words, Syrian photographers reflect on the images that moved them most

A free press is the first casualty of war. Independent national outlets are overrun, threatened or shuttered. Foreign journalists are barred from entry, kidnapped or executed. Local journalists who remain to bear witness in turn bear the brunt. We have seen this and more in Syria.

According to the Committee to Protect Journalists, of the at least 101 journalists who have been killed there since 2011, 88% were local and 27% were classified as photographers. Many others have been intimidated, abducted, maimed or forced into exile.

Foreigners who venture in stick to the Kurdish-controlled territory in the north or are allowed access to government-controlled areas. But the majority of pictures that emerge, especially in opposition-held areas, are from Syrians themselves. Activist media networks tweet pictures of the latest carnage, hoping to reach change-makers. Doctors and nurses send reporters unpublishable images of the latest tragedies to unravel in their emergency rooms using tools like WhatsApp. And much of the imagery that appears in online news, in print and on television is shot by local stringers with international agencies, some working under pseudonyms due to safety concerns. They are the last-ditch effort for independent eyes and ears on the ground.

Can anybody hear us?

http://time.com/war-through-syrian-eyes/





Syria's surface-to-air missiles counter US-led strikes (VIDEO)

https://youtu.be/Vx5ez_KuV5c

Published time: 14 Apr, 2018 03:59
Edited time: 14 Apr, 2018 04:48

Syria air defences strike back after airstrikes by US, British and French forces in Damascus, Syria in this still image obtained from video dated early April 14, 2018. SYRIA TV via / Reuters

Damascus activated its anti-missile defense to counter missiles that were launched by the US and its allies against Syrian government targets.

Syrian air defenses were scrambled to confront the combined American-French-British aggression that targeted at least three military sites in Syria on Friday. Footage of the Syrian response to the Western missiles has been obtained by RT's Ruptly video agency.

The footage shows Syrian surface-to-air missiles responding to the attack. Smoke can be seen rising from a scientific research facility in Barzeh, which the coalition claims was targeted for its alleged involvement in the production of chemical and biological weapons.

According to reports, citing Syrian government sources, some 30 missiles ???? were launched by the US and its European partners. The Syrian air defenses managed to intercept roughly a third of them.

Friday's strikes saw over 100 missiles???? launched at Syria, US Defense Secretary James Mattis told reporters. It remains unclear which weapons were used, but the US deployed 59 Tomahawk missiles against Shayrat air base in Syria last year.

"We used a little over double the number of weapons this year than we used last year," Mattis said on Friday. "We were very precise and proportionate, but at the same time it was a heavy strike."

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Trump declares 'mission accomplished' after strikes against Syria

President Trump on Saturday declared "mission accomplished" after approving airstrikes with the United Kingdom and France against chemical weapons production facilities in Syria the previous night.

"A perfectly executed strike last night. Thank you to France and the United Kingdom for their wisdom and the power of their fine Military. Could not have had a better result. Mission Accomplished!" Trump tweeted.

"So proud of our great Military which will soon be, after the spending of billions of fully approved dollars, the finest that our Country has ever had. There won’t be anything, or anyone, even close!" he added in another tweet.

Pentagon spokeswoman Dana White stood by Trump's characterization during a briefing Saturday morning.

"Operations were very successful. We met our objectives. We hit the sites, the heart of the chemical weapons program," she said. "So it was mission accomplished."

"It was a successful mission. What happens next depends on what the Assad regime decides to do," she added when pressed.

Trump quickly caught flak Saturday after using the phrase "mission accomplished," which gained notoriety after former President George W. Bush gave a 2003 speech to declare the end of major U.S. combat operations in Iraq with a banner featuring the phrase displayed behind him. Despite the declaration, the U.S. military has stayed involved in Iraq to this day.

"I didn’t think I could be shocked by a tweet anymore but 'mission accomplished' was so surprising I had to double check that it was not a spoof," Sen. Brian Schatz (D-Hawaii) tweeted Saturday.

Trump announced late Friday during a televised address at the White House that he had ordered "precision strikes" on targets in Syria associated with the government of Syrian leader Bashar Assad. The strikes targeted three sites near the capital of Damascus and in Homs, roughly 100 miles north.

"I’d use three words to describe this operation: precise, overwhelming and effective," said Marine Lt. Gen. Kenneth F. McKenzie Jr., director of the Joint Staff.

McKenzie asserted that the U.S.-led strikes had set the Syrian government’s chemical weapons program back “years.”

Syria launched 40 surface-to-air missiles against the strikes, McKenzie said, adding Syria's missiles were “largely ineffective” and most were launched after the strikes from the U.S., U.K. and France took place...........


http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... inst-syria





Pentagon Sucks the Air Out of Trump’s ‘Mission Accomplished’

While the president crowed about attacking Assad, the military defined what it achieved minimally – leaving unsettled what the U.S. has actually accomplished.

Almost as soon as Donald Trump declared “mission accomplished” in Syria, the Pentagon dialed the claim back substantially.

In reviewing the Pentagon’s assessment of what U.S. warplanes and cruise missiles did last night to three suspected chemical storage and production facilities, U.S. defense representatives defined success in the most tactical of terms. That formulation resolved none of the relevant questions over the ultimate impact of a strike that Trump ordered after a substantially similar one last year failed to deter Bashar Assad from launching a chemical attack.

But the Pentagon claimed tactical success. Unlike last year’s 59-Tomahawk-missile fusillade, no Tomahawks malfunctioned. Syria’s vaunted air defenses along the Mediterranean coast failed to shoot down any U.S. hardware, despite Russian claims of interception. (Though, for good measure, the U.S. launched most of Friday’s Tomahawks from ships in the Red Sea and Persian Gulf, and its B-1 bombers fired missiles with a 620-mile range.) Most of the 40 Syrian interceptor missiles launched after the U.S. cruise missiles had already struck their targets. And a threat from a Russian diplomat to target American ships proved empty.

“We met our objectives,” said Pentagon spokeswoman Dana White, pressed on the president’s proclamation. “It was mission accomplished.”

But the objective of the mission wasn’t to hit three Syrian chemical sites in and of themselves. It was, like last year’s strike on the Shayrat airfield, to deter Assad from future chemical attacks. And that depends on calculations that last night’s strike won’t resolve. Last year, for instance, Assad held off chemical attacks for a whole three months – resuming them, conspicuously, after Trump and his then-secretary of state signaled that they would work with Russia on a political resolution to the Syrian civil war and back away from a demand Assad relinquish power.

“We did the same strike last year,” said Rep. Eric Swalwell, a California Democrat on the intelligence committee. “He still used chemical weapons on his own people. Why would this be different?”

Assad retains the capability to do so, the Pentagon conceded. While White said Assad’s ability to produce a chemical arsenal was “crippled,” her Joint Staff colleague, Lt. Gen. Frank McKenzie acknowledged, “I would not say they’d be unable to conduct a chemical attack in the future.” The strikes, McKenzie added, ought to make Assad “think twice” before doing so...........

https://www.thedailybeast.com/pentagon- ... d?ref=home





Russia: Syria air defence intercepted 71 missiles

Reports say US Tomahawk missiles used to target Syria, as UK and France deploy Tornado, Mirage and Rafale jets.

A senior Russian military official has said that Syrian air defence had intercepted at least 71 cruise missiles fired by US, UK and French forces.

At a news conference in Moscow on Saturday, Lieutenant General Sergey Rudskoy said at least 103 cruise missiles, including Tomahawks, were fired into a number of targets in Syria.

"Russia has fully restored the air defence system of Syria, and it continues to improve it over the last six months," Rudskoy said.

The Russian defence ministry was quoted as saying that Syria deployed Russian-made surface-to-air missiles, including S-125, S-200, 2K12 Kub and Buk to repel the attacks.

Among those targeted by the US-led operation was the Al-Dumayr military airport outside of Damascus. Russia said all 12 missiles directed at the airport were intercepted...........

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/04/ ... 23075.html






71 Out of 103 Destroyed: Here's How Syria's Air Defense Repelled West's Missiles


Perhaps the most surprising news surrounding the US, British and French strike on Syria Saturday morning was the report that the country's Air Defense Force managed to shoot down just shy of 70% of the Western cruise missiles launched. Sputnik looks at how the Syrians managed to do it.

The Western attack, executed this morning at 4:00 am Syrian time on April 14, saw US Navy warships in the Red Sea and Air Force B-1B bombers and F-15 and F-16 aircraft rain dozens of ship and air-launched cruise missiles down on the Syrian capital of Damascus, an airbase outside the city, a so-called chemical weapons storage facility near Homs, and an equipment storage facility and command post, also near Homs. B1-Bs are typically armed with JASSM cruise missiles, which have a 450 kg warhead and a range of 370 km. US Navy warships launched Tomahawks, which have 450 kg warheads and an operational range of between 1,300 and 2,500 km.

Attack Blunted

However, notwithstanding the powerful collection of weaponry arrayed against them, the Syrian Army seems to have managed, for the most part, to blunt the attack.

Several hours after the strikes, the Russian Defense Ministry reported that the majority of the missiles launched were intercepted by Syria's Air Defense Force, who shot down some 71 of the 103 cruise missiles detected. This included the interception of all 12 missiles launched at the Al-Dumyar airbase northeast of Damascus. Syrian media, for its part, reported that the military had destroyed 20 missiles over Damascus alone.

Furthermore, although the Syrian military does have some modern air defenses, including the Pantsir-S1 combined short-to-medium range surface to air missile (SAM) and anti-aircraft artillery system, the cruise missile attack was repelled mostly by upgrades of 30+ year old equipment, including variants of the Buk self-propelled missile system, the S-125 air defense system, and the S-200, an aging but tried and tested SAM introduced into the Soviet military in the late 1960s.
https://sputniknews.com/military/201804 ... -analysis/





The Unconstitutional Strike on Syria
The Constitution still requires congressional authorization for an attack on another country. The requirement is not a formality.

For a constitutional lawyer, the Trump administration requires a crash course in obscure parts of the document—the Emoluments Clause? The “Inferior Officers” Clause? Really?

But equally challenging is the need to keep turning the conversation back to constitutional questions that people are sick of hearing about—and, even worse, have tacitly agreed to consider irrelevant. “To see what is under one’s nose,” George Orwell wrote in 1946, “requires a constant struggle.” Orwell didn’t add that trying to point out what is under our noses can turn one into a kind of Ancient Mariner at whose approach both friend and foe are tempted to flee.

But here goes: Trump did not have the authority to order any kind of strike on Syria. Congressional authorization was needed before any use of force against Syria; Friday’s attack was unconstitutional. And his pledge that the United States “is prepared to sustain this response until the Syrian regime stops its use of prohibited chemical agents”—that is, a unilateral declaration of long-range war aims and a pledge of long-term military involvement—is about as gross a violation of the Constitution as I can think of.

The fact that Trump ordered a one-off missile strike a year ago doesn’t change that calculation. The fact that almost no one in Congress spoke up when he did doesn’t change that calculation. The fact that foreign policy commentators fawned on that decision doesn’t change that calculation. The Constitution still requires congressional authorization for an attack on another country. The requirement is not a formality. It is in the Constitution for a reason. Congress’s failure to assert its prerogatives is—even though it may have become a craven habit—a matter of life or death for a self-governing republic.

The reason, as I have written before, is that no president—not Barack Obama and not Donald Trump—has the authority under the Constitution to “declare war.” Of all the toxic constitutional developments of the Obama years, by far the most disheartening is this: Obama’s unlawful intervention in Libya garnered strong criticism; but the harshest criticism came when Obama chose to obey the Constitution by asking for congressional authorization to strike Syria. For breaking the mold of presidential unilateralism, he garnered—and continues to garner—the undisguised scorn not only of his political enemies but even of many of his friends. That hostile verdict on his presidential leadership is the clearest sign that we have entered what future historians may describe as a post-constitutional era.

Why, of all the many military misadventures into which Uncle Sam has blundered since 2001, is Syria different? The reason is that, under the Constitution and the War Powers Act, the president has no authority to send military forces into hostilities except after congressional authorization or in response to a direct attack on the U.S. or its forces. The president has no inherent power over war; it is given to Congress. In 2001, George W. Bush grumbled about his supposed executive authority, but went to Congress for approval of a “war” against “those nations, organizations, or persons he determines planned, authorized, committed, or aided the terrorist attacks that occurred on September 11, 2001”; in 2002, he did the same again, and got approval to “defend the national security of the United States against the continuing threat posed by Iraq; and … enforce all relevant United Nations Security Council resolutions regarding Iraq.” Those resolutions remain, at least technically, in force, and have been used by the Obama and Trump administrations as justification for U.S. efforts on behalf of forces—including some of the Syrian rebels—fighting against the Islamic State, supposedly a “successor” to Al Qaeda...........

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/ar ... ia/558044/





US-led Syria strikes: West trashes international law in favor of ‘might is right’

Once again, Western nations have ganged up on a sovereign state, first accusing it of crimes without evidence before following up with a brazen attack. The reason for such behavior is diabolically simple: because they can.

On Saturday morning, the world awoke to the news that the US, the UK and France had followed through on their threat to punish President Bashar Assad for his alleged use of chemical weapons against innocent people. These NATO states unleashed a massive missile strike near Homs and the capital Damascus with the stated purpose of destroying sites said to be connected to the production of chemical weapons. If the attack was intended for domestic consumption only, in typical ‘wag the dog’ fashion, it failed miserably on that score.

Russian President Vladimir Putin slammed the military assault, saying it had not been sanctioned by the UN Security Council, and was carried out “in violation of the UN Charter and principles of international law.”

That was just the beginning of the serious legal issues regarding this brazen, cowardly attack on a sovereign nation. Not only did the Americans, British and French flaunt international law, exactly as they had done seven years ago in Libya, they arrogantly ignored the democratic will of their respective constituents, bypassing congressional and parliamentary procedure in a mad rush to war. In fact, the only thing ‘transparent’ and ‘accountable’ about Saturday’s attack was the flimsy foundation upon which it was advertised.

UK Prime Minister Theresa May, invoking the very same invalid argument that she used to accuse Russia in the Skripal poisoning mystery, said it was “highly likely” Syrian President Bashar Assad was behind the 'chemical attack'.

Echoing that subjective, fact-free assertion, the White House said it had a “high level of confidence” the Assad ‘regime’ was responsible for the alleged attack.

Not to be left behind by his peers, Emmanuel Macron, displaying early warning signs of Napoleon complex, told reporters that he had “proof” Assad was responsible for the attack. Yet the French makeup artist has yet to produce a shred of evidence to support his claim, and, we can safely assume, never will.

This brings us to the really disturbing part about Saturday’s attack: had Team Trump shown some restraint for just a few more days, they would have been able to make a much more accurate and measured assessment as to what really happened in the Damascus suburb one week ago. That’s because a team of experts from the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), was scheduled to arrive in Syria on April 14 - the very same day the NATO members launched their assault - to carry out an investigation of the alleged chemical attack............

https://www.rt.com/op-ed/424168-interna ... strike-us/





War Fever Heats Up As Russians Burn Effigies of Trump

Trump’s tweet about U.S. missiles blasting past Russian defenses in Syria left many Russians thinking the Motherland might be next. Plus: oligarch sanctions and military exercises.

SAINT PETERSBURG, Russia—Cossacks are famous fighters, and right now they are among many in Russia who are preparing for an imminent war with the United States, or at least they say they are.

On Thursday, the leader, or “ataman,” of the Russian Orthodox Cossack organization Irbis, Andrei Poliakov, was looking for the best place to burn an effigy of Donald Trump, an event scheduled for Monday of next week. And Poliakov may not be the only one.

President Trump’s tweet last week telling Russians to “get ready” for U.S. missiles in Syria prompted fear and fury all over this country. Nationalists in Russia and the Chechen region called on the world to "stop this animal Trump, this clown" from threatening Russia with war. All too soon, Trump’s statement was torn out of the context in which it was made, about punitive action against the Assad regime in Syria for the use of chemical weapons, and quickly interpreted as a threat to every household in Russia.

So, speaking at his St. Petersburg office decorated with icons and swords, the ataman told The Daily Beast that Cossacks, who once lionized Donald Trump as a great friend of Russia, now have no words left to describe him. “By burning Trump’s effigy and the U.S. flag we’ll express what we really think about the war that the United States has declared to Russia.”

On Saturday morning, official Moscow was just as angry as Chechens and Cossacks, blaming Washington for striking Damascus just at the time when Syria had a chance for a peaceful future. Russian Ministry of Defense reported that at least 100 missiles hit Syrian capital on Friday. "First, the Syrian people was subjected to Arab Spring, then Islamic State, now to 'smart' American missiles. A strike was carried out on the capital of a sovereign state, which for many years has been trying to survive under the threat of terror,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova told reporters............

https://www.thedailybeast.com/war-fever ... p?ref=home






McCain to Trump: Airstrikes alone won't achieve objectives in Syria

Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) on Friday praised President Trump for ordering airstrikes in Syria, but cautioned they do not make up for a lack of strategy.

“I applaud the president for taking military action against the Assad regime for its latest use of chemical weapons, and for signaling his resolve to do so again if these heinous attacks continue,” McCain said in a statement.

“To succeed in the long run, we need a comprehensive strategy for Syria and the entire region,” he added later. “The president needs to lay out our goals, not just with regard to [the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria], but also the ongoing conflict in Syria and malign Russian and Iranian influence in the region. Airstrikes disconnected from a broader strategy may be necessary, but they alone will not achieve U.S. objectives in the Middle East.”

Earlier Friday night, Trump announced that he ordered “precision strikes” against “targets associated with the chemical weapons capabilities” of Syrian President Bashar Assad's forces in retaliation for last weekend's suspected chemical attack in the Syrian town of Douma.

“We are prepared to sustain this response until the Syrian regime stops its use of prohibited chemical agents,” Trump said.

The operation, which came after a week of deliberation, was carried out in coordination with Britain and France, leaders from the countries said.

McCain, chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, has long advocated for a more robust U.S. military response to the Syrian civil war.

He’s also repeatedly knocked Trump for not having comprehensive strategies for a slew of global hot spots, including Syria.

In his statement Friday, McCain thanked Britain and France for helping in the operation and said he hopes Assad gets the message.

“I hope these strikes impose meaningful costs on Assad,” he said. “The message to Assad must be that the cost of using chemical weapons is worse than any perceived benefit, that the United States and our allies have the will and capability to continue imposing those costs, and that Iran and Russia will ultimately be unsuccessful in protecting Assad from our punitive response.”

http://thehill.com/policy/defense/38314 ... ill-needed






Alex Jones: ‘Fuck Trump’ for Blasting Syria
From Fox News host Laura Ingraham to the Infowars auteur, many of President Donald Trump’s most vocal boosters turned on him over his decision to strike Syria.

Many of President Donald Trump’s top media allies blasted him over the decision to launch strikes against Syria on Friday.

In one major conservative media ecosystem after another, the president met opposition, and concern about the financial cost of another foreign intervention, from many of the people who are normally his most vocal cheerleaders.

On Fox News, the strike was met with heavy skepticism by several of the show’s primetime hosts. While close presidential ally Sean Hannity praised Trump’s assertiveness, hosts Tucker Carlson and Laura Ingraham both questioned the decision to strike.

Ingraham sparred with former Trump adviser Sebastian Gorka, saying she’d learned from her support of the Iraq War that intervention can be incredibly costly.

“I guess it feels good because there are horrible things happening there,” Ingraham said. “But what do we really accomplish here tonight in Syria? This is not why Donald Trump got elected."

Among conservative radio personalities, the reception was equally frosty.

Ann Coulter spent the evening retweeting criticism of the strike, remarking on Twitter that former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe might beat Trump in 2020 “if you promised no more ‘stupid wars.’”

Michael Savage, a popular conservative radio talk show personality, livestreamed himself at dinner blasting the president, saying that America had become “a nation of idiots” in the wake of the attack.

“My opinion is that this is the greatest disaster of the Trump presidency,” Savage said while pointing the camera at a plate of beans.

Many critics of the strikes noted Trump’s skepticism about foreign wars in general, and the Iraq war in particular, during his presidential run (even as he also pledged to “bomb the shit out of” ISIS).

“This is clearly not something he ran on, and and it’s inconsistent with a lot of things that he’s said over the years,” Carlson said on Fox News before Trump’s announcement.

Trump found even greater hostility in the far-right alternative media ecosystem online, where many of his most bombastic supporters are also stauch anti-interventionists, and have previously condemned his foreign military actions.

Infowars founder Alex Jones, a former libertarian Ron Paul supporter, launched into several conspiratorial rants about the nature of the strike, breaking down in tears and railing against Trump and Secretary of Defense James Mattis.

“Fuck Trump, and fuck these fucking people,” Jones said.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/alex-jone ... a?ref=home





Report: Trump Sought Syria Advice From Lawyers in Russia Probe

President Trump reportedly asked lawyers representing him in the Russia investigation for advice on how to proceed in Syria ahead of Friday’s airstrikes. White House sources cited by The Wall Street Journal say the president spent much of the past week surveying aides and staffers on how to respond to a suspected chemical attack that killed dozens in Douma last week. It was not immediately clear which members of his legal team he consulted or whether their advice played any role in his decision to launch airstrikes late Friday. But Trump is said to have spent “20-hours-a-day” obsessing over his Syria response, at times growing impatient with military officials as he pushed for a large-scale military response. While Defense Secretary Jim Mattis called for a more cautious approach that would not risk escalating the situation with Russia, Trump was encouraged by John Bolton, his new national security adviser, to launch a “ruinous” attack, according to a source cited in the report.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/report-tr ... ssia-probe





Syria Strikes: This Isn’t How You Punish a ‘Monster’

For the tyrant Assad, who has slaughtered hundreds of thousands, the penalty described by American officials on Friday night was akin to a ticket for jaywalking.

The missiles flew and the skies over Damascus and Homs lit up briefly on Friday night as the Americans, British, and French attacked from the air what they identified as important targets on the ground in Syria related to the chemical weapons program of dictator Bashar al-Assad.

We don’t know if Assad is laughing, but he might well be.

President Donald Trump announced gravely on television that the attack was aimed to punish “the crimes of a monster.” But monsters don’t respond to limited strikes like this. Indeed, what doesn’t kill them makes them stronger. And for this tyrant who has slaughtered hundreds of thousands over the last seven years, the penalty described by American officials on Friday night was akin to a ticket for jaywalking.

The targets chosen—a research and development center in the capital, and command and control and storage facilities elsewhere—might be crucial if Assad were waging a sophisticated offensive using chemical weapons, and if his regime were teetering on the brink of collapse without them. But neither of those things is true.

The fact is, thanks to massive intervention by Russia and Iran, Assad has been winning his war in the populated west of Syria without the use of chemical weapons. Conventional bombs and relentless artillery barrages, along with Shiite militias and Russian mercenaries, have done the job. Taking away what little chemical capacity Assad has left will not change that.

Such was the everpresent confusion in the U.S. administration that barely an hour after the president announced “we are prepared to sustain this response until the Syrian regime stops its use of prohibited chemical agents”—a very limited goal—Secretary of Defense James Mattis said “this wave of airstrikes is over,” strongly implying the operation is as well...........

https://www.thedailybeast.com/syria-str ... r?ref=home




DEMOCRATS SLAM TRUMP FOR REFUSING TO CONSULT CONGRESS BEFORE SYRIA STRIKES

Senior Democrats criticized President Donald Trump Friday for launching air strikes against the Syrian government without first consulting Congress.

Trump announced Friday that the U.S. and its allies the U.K. and France were launching "precision" air strikes in response to Syria’s alleged use of chemical weapons in an attack on civilians in Douma, eastern Ghouta, a week ago.

Minority House Leader Nancy Pelosi said that though the Syrian government’s use of poison gas was a “brutally inhuman war crime,” she warned, “Yet one night of airstrikes is no substitute for a coherent strategy.”

“The President must come to Congress and secure an Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF) by proposing a comprehensive strategy with clear objectives that keep our military safe and avoid collateral damage to innocent civilians,” Pelosi added.

Speaking shortly after the president announced the airstrikes, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer described the military strikes as “appropriate,” but warned against further embroilment in the Syrian civil war.

“A pinpointed, limited action to punish and hopefully deter Assad from doing this again is appropriate, but the administration has to be careful about not getting us into a greater and more involved war in Syria," Schumer said in a statement.

Senator Tim Kaine, Hillary Clinton’s 2016 running mate, had stronger criticism for the president.

“Trump’s decision to launch airstrikes against Syria without Congress’s approval is illegal. We need to stop giving presidents a blank check to wage war,” he tweeted Friday night. “Today it’s Syria, but what’s going to stop him from bombing Iran or North Korea next?”

Vice President Mike Pence, who is currently on an official trip to Peru, reportedly called congressional leaders to notify them military action was going to be taken on Friday night. He spoke to Pelosi, but was unable to reach Schumer who was on a flight at the time.

Trump’s Syria policy has contrasted with that of former President Barack Obama, who took no military action against the Syrian government during his time in the White House despite declaring the use of chemical weapons by the regime constituted a “red line” in 2013.

Obama mulled military action against Syria in 2013 following a Sarin attack on civilians in a Damascus suburb and even prepared Congress for an emergency vote on the issue. But he backed away at the last minute when the Assad regime declared that it would give up its chemical weapons and allow international inspectors to search its munitions sites for banned chemical agents.

Only months into his presidency, Trump authorized missile strikes against a Syrian airbase in response to the sarin gas attack on the town Khan Sheikhoun last April.

On Saturday morning Trump tweeted "mission accomplished," and praised the U.K. and France for their support in the military strikes.

http://www.newsweek.com/democrats-slam- ... kes-886185





What media in Russia, Iran and Syria are saying on Syria strikes

State outlets in countries allied to Syrian president carry unanimous condemnation of US-led strikes on Syria.

State media outlets in Russia, Iran and Syria have been carrying heavy condemnation of US-led air strikes on Syrian government positions.

US, French and British forces launched the attacks in response to an alleged chemical weapons attack carried out by forces loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad last week.

Below is a round-up of how they are reacting:

RT (Russia)

Russian state media's English language service Russia Today (RT) is carrying comments by President Vladimir Putin condemning the strikes and warning they would lead to a "new wave of asylum seekers from Syria and the whole region".

Sputnik (Russia)

Sputnik, another Russian state-owned media outlet is reporting a claim made by Russian military officials that Syria's air defence system managed to shoot down a majority of cruise missiles fired by the US.

Russian defence officials say 71 of 103 missiles were shot down by Syrian S-125 and S-200 anti-missile systems.

Press TV (Iran)
Iran's English language media outlet Press TV is leading with the country's Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khameini's denunciation of the US-led strikes as a "crime".

It also repeats the claims made by Russian officials that a majority of the missiles launched by the US had been intercepted.

Al Manar (Hezbollah)

Hezbollah's media outlet Al-Manar has published a statement by the group condemning the "aggression" against Syria.

The group said the "vicious attack on Syria is a blatant violation of the Syrian sovereignty and its people's dignity.

"We assure that the war launched against the region's people and resistance movements won't reach its goals, and the Ummah (nation) will emerge more powerful and more determined to confront and to triumph."

SANA (Syria)

Syria's state news agency leads with a condemnation of the air strikes and also carries the claim that a majority of missiles fired by the Western states had been intercepted.

SANA also published a story claiming the Syrian army had discovered a laboratory used by rebels for "making toxic materials".

It also reports condemnation of the strikes by allied groups and protests by supporters in Western states.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/04/ ... 55218.html





The US bombing of Syria, explained in 400 words

A short guide to America’s limited military response in Syria.

The United States, along with Britain and France, bombed Syria on Friday night.

The decision to strike came one week after Syrian President Bashar al-Assad used chemical weapons against civilians outside Damascus, killing at least 42 adults and children. After that attack, President Donald Trump promised to exact a “big price” on the Assad regime.

The US and its allies deliberated a response over the following week. And then on Friday night, the countries hit three targets

— including one on the outskirts of Damascus — all related to Syria’s chemical weapons program: a research center, a storage facility, and an equipment facility and command post.

The map of Syria below shows the targets hit on Friday:
The strikes hit at the “very heart” of Syria’s chemical weapon program and dealt it a “serious blow,” Pentagon spokesperson Lt. Gen. Kenneth McKenzie told reporters Saturday. McKenzie also noted Syria could reconstitute its program and the strikes didn’t take out all of Syria’s chemical weapons facilities, which means Assad could use chemical weapons on civilians again in the future.

Speaking from the White House Friday night, President Donald Trump said the US was “prepared to sustain this response until the Syrian regime stops its use of prohibited chemical agents.”

But soon after, Secretary of Defense James Mattis gave a different assessment. “Right now, this is a one-time shot, designed to set back the Syrian war machine’s ability to produce chemical weapons.”

Russia has warned of “consequences” after the attacks, with Russian President Vladimir Putin calling the strikes an “act of aggression” that could “have a destructive effect on the entire system of international relations.” Both Russia and Syria claimed on Saturday that “a significant number” of the missiles launched at Syria were shot down, although the Pentagon disputes that. Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called the strikes a “crime.”

No American troops were killed, according to the Pentagon, and as of now the US does not know if there were any civilian casualties in Syria.

There are still broader concerns. First, the US strikes may not stop Assad from using chemical weapons, or turn the the tide of seven-year-long civil war. Second, it’s possible Assad’s allies — mainly Russia and Iran — may retaliate against the approximately 2,000 US troops in Syria. And finally, it’s unclear if the US will bomb Syria again if Assad’s forces use chemical weapons once more.

https://www.vox.com/2018/4/14/17237854/ ... al-weapons





Lawmakers rip Trump for not seeking congressional approval for Syria strikes

Several lawmakers reacted quickly on Friday to President Trump's decision to launch a military strike on Syria by criticizing him for failing to obtain congressional authorization for the move.

At least one GOP representative, Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) immediately joined a chorus of Democrats, including House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.), in blasting Trump for not consulting the constitution.

"While Bashar al-Assad must be held accountable for his unlawful use of chemical weapons against civilians, the strikes that are being carried out are being done without an authorization from Congress, which is unacceptable," Sen. Bob Casey Jr. (D-Pa.) tweeted, in one of the first reactions to Trump's announcement.

"I haven’t read France’s or Britain’s 'Constitution,' but I’ve read ours and no where in it is Presidential authority to strike Syria," said Massie.

The reactions started minutes after Trump announced in a nationally televised address that the U.S., in concert with the United Kingdom and France, had launched "precision strikes" on targets in Syria.

The strikes come in response to an alleged chemical weapons strike in the Damascus suburb of Douma over the weekend that left dozens dead. American officials have blamed the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad for carrying out the attack.

Pelosi said Friday that "one night of airstrikes" would not address longer-term issues in Syria, and demanded that Trump propose a comprehensive strategy for U.S. involvement in the war-torn country.

"The President must come to Congress and secure an Authorization for Use of Military Force by proposing a comprehensive strategy with clear objectives that keep our military safe and avoid collateral damage to innocent civilians," Pelosi said in a statement.

Kaine, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee who has ardently pushed for Trump to seek Congress's approval for military action, called the strike on Syria "illegal" and "reckless." He also accused Trump of "opening up a new military front."

“President Trump’s decision to launch airstrikes against the Syrian government without Congress’s approval is illegal and – absent a broader strategy – it’s reckless," Kaine said in a statement. "Last week, President Trump was adamant that the U.S. was leaving Syria imminently. This week, he is opening a new military front."

Trump last year also authorized an airstrike against a Syrian target in response to the use of chemical weapons, in a move that earned similar criticism from those who pointed to the constitutional requirement of congressional authorization for the U.S. to go to war.

Trump announced on Monday that he was weighing a response to the alleged chemical attack. That also prompted calls from several lawmakers for the president to first seek congressional authorization for any military action taken against Syria.

Syria and its allies, Russia and Iran, have denied that Assad's government used chemical weapons. Moscow accused the U.K. on Friday of fabricating the chemical strike in Douma, an allegation that Britain dismissed as a "blatant lie."

Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Mass.) also hit the president on Friday for not seeking congressional approval for the attack, saying that carrying out a sustained campaign without doing so violates the Constitution.

“ 'Sustained response' = war. And that requires the authorization of Congress - unless you don’t believe in the Constitution," Moulton tweeted

http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3831 ... -for-syria





The key points from James Comey's explosive book

The ex-FBI director sets out his contacts with Donald Trump in detail: from tanning goggles, to the Moscow hotel room, to his mafia vibe

Former FBI director James Comey’s book details his early career as a prosecutor, and his work at the justice department and FBI under George W Bush and Barack Obama. But the chapters on Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton and the 2016 election have attracted most attention since the Guardian and others obtained copies of the book on Thursday. Here are the key points:

First encounter with Trump:
Russia:
One-on-one:
‘Pee tape’:
‘Mob boss’:
Dinner for two:
Firing:
‘Leaks’:
Clinton’s emails:
11 days before the election:
Obama:
Judgment:

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/201 ... er-loyalty





GOP Kentucky Governor: Kids ‘Sexually Assaulted’ Because of Striking Teachers

Kentucky’s Republican governor has claimed teachers taking part in statewide strikes have caused children to be sexually assaulted. Speaking to reporters on Friday as teachers rallied for more school funding and pension protection, Gov. Matt Bevin suggested “hundreds of thousands of children” were left unattended because striking teachers weren’t in the classroom to watch over them. “I guarantee you somewhere in Kentucky today a child was sexually assaulted that was left at home because there was nobody there to watch them,” Bevin was quoted as saying by news station WCPO. “I guarantee you somewhere today, a child was physically harmed or ingested poison because they were home alone because a single parent didn't have enough money to take care of them,” he said. Soon after he made those remarks, state lawmakers voted to overturn Bevin’s veto of a $480 million tax increase that would boost school funding.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/gop-kentu ... g-teachers





Cohen ordered to disclose client list by Monday

Trump's longtime personal attorney went to federal court to stop prosecutors from looking at materials seized in a recent FBI raid.

NEW YORK — Lawyers for President Donald Trump and his longtime personal attorney Michael Cohen went to court Friday trying to stop federal prosecutors from getting at private material — but wound up with a judge ordering them to disclose Cohen’s client list in public.

U.S. District Judge Kimba Wood on Friday ordered attorneys for Cohen to hand over a list of Cohen’s law clients and proof of their relationship by 10 a.m. Monday, so she can decide whether materials seized from Cohen’s office by federal law enforcement agents last week should be protected by attorney-client privilege.

That list will be a public record, Wood said, because the identities of an attorney’s clients are not subject to attorney-client privilege unless the mere name itself would reveal the kind of advice sought or given.

Wood’s order raises the possibility of further embarrassing disclosures involving Cohen, who is already at the center of a legal dispute involving adult-film actress Stormy Daniels, who is suing the president to void a nondisclosure agreement negotiated by Cohen concerning a sexual encounter Daniels says she had with Trump in 2006.

The Wall Street Journal has reported that Cohen was also involved last year in negotiating a $1.6 million payment to a Playboy Playmate who said she was impregnated by prominent Los Angeles investor and Republican fundraiser Elliott Broidy.

Cohen is among Trump’s most loyal aides and advisers, a lawyer who lives in one of Trump’s buildings and worked for the Trump Organization, where he rose to a level of seniority held by few outside Trump’s family.

FBI agents overseen by the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan raided Cohen’s Rockefeller Center office, Park Avenue apartment, and a hotel room Cohen was using earlier this week, seizing documents, devices and other materials. Prosecutors said in court filings that Cohen is under criminal investigation, but no charges have been filed.

The raid triggered an immediate escalation in Trump’s war on special prosecutor Robert Mueller, whose probe into the Trump campaign’s collusion with Russia in the 2016 campaign has expanded to include questions of whether Trump or people close to him tried to obstruct justice.

The president subsequently complained about the raid during a White House meeting, at which he told reporters that agents “broke into the office of one of my personal attorneys.”

The president later tweeted “A TOTAL WITCH HUNT!!!” He added: “Attorney-client privilege is dead!”..........

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/ ... aid-522053





Solid earnings season won't be enough to avert another correction, economist Robert Shiller says

Nobel Prize-winning economist Robert Shiller believes a strong earnings season may not be adequate to keep stocks out of the red.

Despite two corrections since February, the Yale University Professor — who predicted both the dotcom bubble of the late 1990s and the housing meltdown that triggered the 2008 financial crisis —

"As of the fourth quarter, real S&P 500 earnings were still below their 2015, if you correct for inflation. So, it's not like we are in this spectacular market," Shiller said this week on CNBC's "Trading Nation."

However, he warned: "Obviously, a solid earnings season is good news for the market. But it's not something that we should bank on."

So far, first quarter earnings season is getting off to a solid start. On Friday, big banks JP Morgan Chase, Citigroup and Wells Fargo reported solid beats against the top and bottom lines.

Yet, the broader markets didn't take it as signal to run higher. The Dow closed lower by a half percentage point. The S&P 500 Index and Nasdaq also lost ground. But the three indexes still were up on the week.

Whether disappointing earnings enter the picture, or investors become nervous due to Mideast or trade war risks, Shiller contends it's often unclear what sparks an extended stock market downturn.

"What will take us lower? That is always the question people have. What triggers corrections," he asked. "Typically, there really isn't any really big news except news of the correction."

For now, he cites President Donald Trump's business-friendly stance, and his flair for connecting with some people, as a positive for stocks.

"We never had a President this capable of inspiring people," noted Shiller.

Despite Shiller's take on Trump, he sees volatility continuing to tick higher under his leadership.

"There is still risk in the market," Shiller said. "The United States is the most expensive market in the world."

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/04/14/solid-e ... iller.html





Trump’s Next Crisis Could Be With His Asian Bankers
America is about to go another $1 trillion in the hole. The people who hold U.S. debt are starting to get nervous.

With money you can buy a house, but not necessarily a home. President Xi Jinping can surely relate to this Chinese adage as he considers the dubious mortgage Beijing holds at the moment.

The U.S. may have built a giant, vibrant economic house on the proverbial hill, but bankers in China, Japan and elsewhere in Asia possess the deed.

Together, 10 Asian economies hold more than $3 trillion of U.S. Treasuries—nearly 15 percent of the total national debt—as Washington borrows with abandon.

That’s leverage over Donald Trump’s White House, and don’t doubt for a minute that Communist Party bigwigs in Beijing know it.

With the U.S. deficit set to soar past $1 trillion, threatening to send the U.S. debt-to-GDP ratio to a level not seen since the 1940s, Xi’s government is dropping not-so-subtle hints about calling its $1.2 trillion of loans to Washington.

The first shot across Trump’s bow came from Cui Tiankai, China’s ambassador to the U.S. In a March 23 Bloomberg interview, he hinted Beijing might scale back U.S. debt purchases, a step that would send shock waves through global markets. “We are looking at all options,” Cui said.

More recently, a top adviser to China’s central bank, Fan Gang, said it’s time to diversify. “We are a low-income country, but we are a high-wealth country,” Fan said April 9 in a speech at the annual Boao Forum. “We should make better use of capital. Rather than investing in U.S. government debt, it’s better to invest in some real assets.”

These aren’t idle threats. Xi has zero reason to think China—and its vast state wealth—has found a home with the “America First” president. It would be complacent, too, to conclude Xi’s soothing words on April 10 (“dialogue rather than confrontation”) will ease tensions. Trump won the White House claiming China is “raping” American workers. A few vague pledges by Xi to open markets, cut auto tariffs and protect intellectual property rights won’t persuade Trump to drop a core belief—and Xi knows that.

Also, Xi thinks in decades. Concrete steps to give Trump what he demands could come well after the 2020 U.S. election. White House inhabitants come and go, but Xi’s massive “Made in China 2025” plan yields to no one. Last month, Xi’s party made him the helmsman indefinitely, perhaps for life. Trump will be gone by January 2025 at the latest.

To maintain power, Xi must generate 6.5 percent growth annually and morph China into a leader in aerospace, biotechnology, electric vehicles, high-speed rail, renewable energy, robotics, software and telecommunications. Given the scale of the enterprise, Trump is more a risk-management challenge to Xi than a long-run disrupter.

The short run, though, is sure to be busy. As scandals and investigations mount, a caged and paranoid White House is desperate to change the narrative. What better way than an escalating trade war that cheers Trump’s base without requiring congressional approval?

Yet Team Trump mustn’t take its top banker, China, for granted. On top of roughly $150 billion worth of tariffs on mainland goods, Trump is demanding that Beijing curb support for high-tech sectors. That’s an economic red line for Xi and his signature 2025 project. Liu He, vice premier overseeing economics and finance, balked, according to local press reports. This standoff alone should give pause to anyone hoping cooler heads will prevail. So should Beijing’s assertive and creative pushback against tariffs, targeting the farm goods, bourbon, machine tools and motorcycles beloved in Trump country. In the end, Xi’s China won’t back down.

Trump may think he has all the leverage, but Xi can always play the Treasuries card right back. Bond traders would be remiss to think he won’t if Trump escalates the tariff arms race. One reason markets have taken warnings from Cui and Fan in stride is the mistaken belief we’ve been here before.

In June 1997, then-Japanese Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto rocked markets during a speech at New York’s Columbia University. Hashimoto warned that Tokyo could always dump its dollars to make a political point. One such episode: tense U.S.-Japan auto talks during the mid-1990s. “Several times in the past,” he revealed, “we’ve been tempted to sell large lots of U.S. Treasuries.” Thankfully, Tokyo didn’t trash the linchpin asset of world trade.

The threat Hashimoto telegraphed that day would be echoed in Beijing 14 years later. In August 2011, China looked on angrily as President Barack Obama cozied up to Taiwan, which Beijing views as a renegade province. The state-run People’s Daily newspaper spoke for many in the halls of power at the time, declaring: “Now is the time for China to use its ‘financial weapon’ to teach the U.S. a lesson if it moves forward” with arms sales to the island democracy.

Even the secretary of defense at the time, Leon Panetta, chimed in: “Attempting to use U.S. Treasury securities as a coercive tool would have limited effect and likely would do more harm to China than to the United States.” Seven years on, Panetta is right in one respect: There is indeed a mutually assured destruction dynamic at play here. By dumping Treasuries, Xi’s government would sustain massive paper losses and slam a key export market. A resulting surge in debt yields could savage U.S. jobs and consumption—a dreadful outcome for export-reliant China.

There’s also how the turmoil affects Xi’s reform drive. Tackling dueling bubbles in debt, credit, property and pollution without crashing the world’s No. 2 economy is hard enough in the best of times. A global trade brawl raises the stakes and the risks.

Even so, Beijing has valid reasons for buyer’s remorse as U.S. debt skyrockets. In February, Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats said Washington’s $21 trillion-plus debt “truly undermines our ability to ensure our national security.” On April 9, the Congressional Budget Office said the annual budget deficit will top an eye-popping $1 trillion by 2020.

Beijing, not surprisingly, looked askance at Trump’s Republican Party in December passing a $1.5 trillion tax cut the economy didn’t need. It’s not the first time. Long before Trump, a real estate tycoon who touts bankruptcy filings as good business, arrived in the White House, China fretted about the dollar. In 2009, then-Premier Wen Jiabao made an impassioned plea about Washington’s post-Lehman-Brothers-crisis borrowing binge.

“We have made a huge amount of loans to the United States,” Wen said. “Of course, we are concerned about the safety of our assets. To be honest, I am a little bit worried.” Wen urged the U.S. “to honor its words, stay a credible nation and ensure the safety of Chinese assets.” Wen was articulating Beijing’s Catch-22: Even though it has too many U.S. bonds already, there are few viable alternatives.

The Obama White House trod carefully with its Asian benefactors. In 2009, Hillary Clinton put debt diplomacy over human rights on her maiden trip to Beijing as secretary of state. Political prisoners took a back seat to how “our economies are so intertwined,” as she put it. That same year, according to cables released by WikiLeaks, Clinton asked Australia’s then-Prime Minister Kevin Rudd for advice: “How do you deal toughly with your banker?”

Trump’s trade war, though, is the wrong answer to a different question—the right question, actually. Yes, Beijing is an unfair trader. It subsidizes local players, hinders foreign firms from competing, contradicts World Trade Organization rules and cribs intellectual property. But given the uniquely symbiotic relationship between the two countries, China and the United States must sit down and negotiate in good faith, not duke it out via dueling statements and tweets.

Yet Trump is playing the most dangerous game of all: trolling his bankers. An unspoken assumption behind the December tax cut is that China, Japan, Taiwan, India, Singapore and South Korea will dutifully buy more U.S. debt. That’s now in doubt. Washington’s fiscal irresponsibility—and new weak-dollar policy—are reason enough to question its creditworthiness. But Trump shouldn’t be giving China justifications to make history’s biggest margin call, shaking America’s economic foundations. For Emperor Xi, it’s the ultimate trump card.

https://www.politico.com/magazine/story ... ebt-217991

Sean Hannity’s Ethical Mess

The revelation that the Fox News host sought legal advice from the embattled Trump attorney raised questions about the network’s journalism—and about the president’s tangled relationships.

Genuinely stunning moments are hard to come by these days, but one arrived on Monday in a courtroom in New York City.

Michael Cohen, President Trump’s fixer, was in court, trying to shield documents seized in a raid Monday on his office, home, and hotel room from prosecutors. Cohen had invoked attorney-client privilege to ask the court to hold documents back, but there have been questions about the extent to which Cohen was actually working as a lawyer. Cohen’s attorneys said he had three clients for whom his work was legal in nature. Two were previously known: Trump, and Elliott Broidy, a major GOP fundraiser for whom Cohen arranged a $1.6 million payout to a Playboy Playmate whom he had impregnated.

Cohen’s lawyer wrote to Judge Kimba Wood, “The third legal client directed Mr. Cohen to not to reveal the identity publicly.” But Wood ordered Cohen to reveal the name Monday afternoon.

It was Sean Hannity.








The Fox News host himself offered contradictory responses, denying that Cohen had ever represented him as an attorney, yet saying elsewhere that he might have taken legal advice from him. In a statement provided by Fox, Hannity said:

Michael Cohen has never represented me in any matter. I never retained him, received an invoice, or paid legal fees. I have occasionally had brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective. I assumed those conversations were confidential, but to be absolutely clear they never involved any matter between me and a third party.

On his radio show on Monday, Hannity offered a slightly different, and somewhat contradictory, answer. “Michael never represented me in any matter, I never retained him, I never paid legal fees to Michael,” Hannity said, appearing to contradict Cohen’s attorney’s statement in court. “But I have occasionally had brief legal discussions with him where I wanted his input and perspective.” Yet Hannity then said he “might have handed” Cohen $10 and said, “I want attorney-client privilege on this.” It’s not clear whether that would meet the legal standard to establish an attorney-client privilege.

From one perspective, Hannity’s entanglement with Cohen is not a great surprise. Hannity is not only politically allied with Trump, but is personally close to him and his family, and Cohen has been deeply enmeshed in Trump family and business matters for years.

Yet the ethical implications boggle the mind. Hannity has covered the raid on Cohen with vigor. Hannity said the raid was proof that Special Counsel Robert Mueller had “declared war” on Trump.

“It is clear, as I have been warning, Mueller is out to get the president and it appears at any cost,” he said. “Clearly, his objective is to remove him from office. Now, I told you and I’ve told anyone who will listen: Mueller’s team is corrupt, starting with him, and it has been from the beginning.” Hannity called the raid (which was conducted after a referral by Mueller, but executed by the federal prosecutors in Manhattan) an “unprecedented abuse of power” and evidence of a “two-tiered justice system.”

“There’s no limit at all into the fishing expedition that Mueller is now engaged in and if he has access to everything that his personal attorney has, I can only imagine where that’s going to lead,” Hannity said on his radio show.

These views align with Trump’s, so it’s likely that Hannity would have espoused them anyway. We now know, however, that his coverage represents a huge conflict of interest. By concealing—not just by omission, but by commission, in requesting that his involvement be kept anonymous—his relationship with Cohen when he made these comments, Hannity misled his viewers and listeners, whether that relationship was with an attorney or simply with a friend.

Such behavior would not pass muster at any other major news organization. Fox representatives did not respond to questions about whether the company was aware of Hannity’s relationship with Cohen, whether he should have been allowed to cover the raid without disclosing it, or whether he would be allowed to cover it going forward.

Conflicts of interest exist elsewhere in the media—witness last night’s high-profile moment, in which former Bill Clinton spokesman George Stephanopoulos interviewed James Comey about, among other things, Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. But the Fox News conflicts are on a different scale.

Fox has previously yanked Hannity back for crossing ethical lines. In 2010, he was barred from headlining a Tea Party fundraiser. But Fox has changed a great deal in recent years. Roger Ailes, its longtime leader, was forced out in a sexual-harassment scandal, and Bill Shine, his deputy, also left the company. Perhaps most importantly in this case, the channel began the 2016 race as Trump-antagonist or -agnostic, but its opinion shows have since become an important pro-Trump organ. (This separates Hannity and colleagues like Laura Ingraham from the more traditional, if right-leaning, news side, represented by hosts like Bret Baier.)

Fox News has always been a de facto ally of the Republican Party, but Hannity’s closeness with Trump is a symptom of an even closer relationship between this administration and the channel. Hannity and the president speak frequently, and Trump seems to take his advice seriously on a wide range of topics, even as he tends to disregard advice from specialist aides. That relationship is already far closer than most news organizations would find acceptable. Trump, meanwhile, has treated Fox News as a farm team for his administration, hiring widely from the network’s ranks of hosts, journalists, and contributors, most recently new National-Security Adviser John Bolton.

The substance of Hannity’s discussions with Cohen remains unknown. Although Cohen arranged settlements with ex-paramours on behalf of both of his other clients, Hannity said Cohen had not arranged any third-party agreements on his behalf.

During his interview Sunday, Comey described similarities between the mafia and Trump’s approach to leadership. “I think what it was was the nature of La Cosa Nostra, is an effort to make everyone part of the family. There’s an expression in the Mafia—there’s a distinction between a friend of yours and a friend of ours. A friend of yours is someone on the outside of the family, a friend of ours, an ‘amica nostra’ is the way they talked about it in Sicilian, is part of the Family, capital F.”

The ever-closer relationship between Fox, and especially Hannity, and Trump is another example of this. Far beyond his pose of being a simple opinion journalist, Hannity is a close adviser to the president—and they even share a relationship with the same somewhat dubious attorney. As a result, when a pinch like the current one comes, Hannity has a special interest in leaping to defend Trump and Cohen, because he, too, is implicated. Hannity’s concealment of this fact from his fans is unlikely to cost him audience in the immediate run, but these compromises erode Fox’s ability to function independently of the Trump White House. It’s a Faustian bargain, and the price is much greater than 10 bucks for legal advice.

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/ar ... -3/558167/





How Courts Are Neutralizing Trump's Deceptions

The president deploys obfuscation as a political weapon, but both the Russia and Michael Cohen investigations show that facts really do matter in the courtroom.

On April 6, FBI agents raided the home, hotel room, and office of President Trump’s personal lawyer Michael Cohen. We now have a sense of the scope of their search: Investigators appear to have been seeking material relating to, among other things, the Access Hollywood tape, Cohen’s payments to two women who signed nondisclosure agreements regarding their alleged affairs with Trump, and communications between Cohen and two leaders of the National Enquirer, who may have played a role in silencing stories unfavorable to Trump. And with that, two of the major stories of the last year—the Russia investigation and the president’s history of sexual impropriety and harassment—began to converge.

The convergence is not entire. The agents raiding Cohen’s office and residences were acting not on behalf of Special Counsel Robert Mueller, but for federal prosecutors for the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York, on the basis of a referral from Mueller’s office. Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who oversees the Mueller investigation, may have signed off on that referral precisely to keep the special counsel from overstepping the bounds of his probe into Russian election interference and obstruction of justice. What’s more, a government court filing suggests that federal prosecutors have been conducting an investigation into Cohen for some time.

Trump’s strategy for responding to these developments was the same as always: deny any wrongdoing and insist that the fault lies instead with the investigators. (“Attorney-client privilege is dead!” he tweeted. “NO COLLUSION!!!”) It’s the same instinct that has reportedly led him to argue that the voice making vulgar comments on the Access Hollywood tape isn’t really his own. In fact, the tape is real enough that federal law enforcement is reportedly looking into it as part of the investigation into Cohen.

The president is a fabulist unmoored from the truth. And the confluence of the Russia investigation and Trump’s disturbing behavior toward women shows what happens when a serial liar collides at full speed with a legal system premised on the idea that words have meaning, and actions result in consequences. Trump’s obfuscation has been alarmingly effective in the realm of politics. It will likely prove less so in the courtroom, a space reserved for evaluating facts and weighing the consistency of arguments—though as president, Trump is unlikely to find himself on the wrong end of a criminal prosecution.

A liar acts to obscure the truth, the philosopher Harry Frankfurt argues, but a bullshitter acts without reference to truth at all. Over a year into the Trump administration, an enormous amount of ink has been spilled exploring how Trump’s “indifference to how things really are,” to quote Frankfurt, poses a danger to democracy.

Trump has used this flexibility with the truth as his main weapon in his defense against the Russia investigation. The efforts of the president and his supporters to counter Mueller are less about clarifying Trump’s side of things and more about eroding faith in the possibility of ever figuring out what took place during the 2016 election. Mueller, the only person potentially in a position to really say what happened, is relentlessly criticized as “conflicted” and out of control. The rest of the time, Trump selects from a roulette wheel of conspiracy theories involving the “deep state” and Hillary Clinton—distractions that however flimsy viewed one at a time, combine to create an atmosphere of confusion around the special counsel. The point of this fabulism is to ensure no conclusion in the Russia investigation, no matter how damning, can be trusted.

The president’s denial of the Access Hollywood tape’s authenticity is a prototypical example of his “indifference to how things really are.” He previously admitted it was real when he apologized for his “locker-room talk.” Trump surely knows the voice on the tape is his own; he just doesn’t care. In a similar vein, he has repeatedly claimed, both on the campaign trail and during his presidency, that more than 16 credible allegations of sexual harassment against him are “fake news.” According to Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, the White House’s official position is that each and every one of Trump’s accusers is lying.

As with his falsehoods regarding the Russia investigation, Trump’s insistence that he never did or said any of the things of which he’s been accused is an effort to reshape the world to his specifications. It’s an assertion of power, a declaration that he and he alone—and not any of the women who have come forward, nor for that matter Robert Mueller—gets to decide what is and is not the truth.

The same dynamic is at work behind the agreements signed by Stormy Daniels and Karen McDougal—both, reportedly, of interest to the investigators looking into Cohen—which prevented the women from speaking publicly about their relationships with Trump. Daniels alleges that Cohen threatened and pressured her into signing a nondisclosure agreement; meanwhile, the publisher of the National Enquirer reportedly purchased McDougal’s story and then failed to publish it, raising the possibility that it was what’s commonly known as a “catch-and-kill” arrangement. Trump claims he had no knowledge of the agreement with Daniels, and has disclaimed any relationship with McDougal. But whatever the real extent of his involvement, Daniels’s and McDougal’s stories show how those in Trump’s orbit used the law as a tool to exert control over what’s known as fact, and what remains in the gray space of confusion and deniability.

For this reason, there’s a certain visceral satisfaction in watching Daniels turn that same tool against Trump—the confusion and deniability Trump relies on to protect himself could give Daniels an advantage in court. She may not succeed in convincing the courts to strike down her nondisclosure agreement, but her litigation has already shown the legal system’s ability to deflate Trump’s contradictions and half-truths. Particularly at issue is Cohen’s apparent decision to draw up the agreement between himself, Daniels, and Trump while withholding Trump’s signature—which might have provided the presidential candidate with plausible deniability at the time, but could now backfire if the judge holds the contract invalid as a result. (Cohen and Trump seem to have gotten themselves into similar trouble in the Southern District of New York: Prosecutors have argued that Cohen can’t withhold documents relating to Daniels on the grounds of an attorney-client privilege between himself and Trump, given Trump’s public insistence that he had no knowledge of the Daniels agreement.)

Daniels’s legal efforts to puncture Trump’s falsehoods are a scaled-down version of what’s transpired in the flood of court rulings against the administration’s more controversial policies. Again and again, judges have refused to let Trump get away with his usual trick of evading consequences by simply denying any involvement in what he did or said. Instead, they’ve written his tweets into legal opinions as evidence of animus against Muslims or transgender servicemembers. Law, after all, is a structure of meaning used to weigh facts and arguments and then impose consequences—the opposite of Trump’s glib insistence on the irrelevance of truth. What matters is not how loudly a person can boast but what evidence can be presented.

It’s for this reason that the Russia investigation looms so large. In his sternness and silence, Mueller has become not just a prosecutor or a special counsel but the embodiment of the justice system—the opposite of the dissembler in chief. The as-yet-hypothetical interview of Trump by the special counsel would either force the fabulist to tell the truth or put him at risk of being charged with lying to investigators. (Worry over the latter possibility is reportedly why Trump’s former personal lawyer John Dowd chose to leave the job.) Such a charge would be a long shot at best: There’s a strong constitutional case that a sitting president cannot be indicted. But through indictments of those close to the president or perhaps even an impeachment referral to Congress, Mueller’s prosecutors could extract consequences for some of the actions for which the president has so far skated by without political repercussions: asking Russian hackers to deliver Hillary Clinton’s emails “if you’re listening”; firing the FBI director; demanding the firing of the special counsel. That is, they have the ability to do what no one else has: hold the president to account.

How the Russia investigation will conclude is anyone’s guess. What seems more and more likely in the wake of the Cohen raid is that Trump’s inner circle may be held legally accountable for the president’s systematic mistreatment of women—not only through private litigation against the president but by government prosecution—and that Trump himself may finally pay a political cost. The Washington Post reports that investigators are looking into a broader effort by Cohen to quash “sources of negative publicity” against Trump in the run-up to the election—an effort that may also have involved National Enquirer chief David Pecker, who paid for McDougal’s story, and the Access Hollywood tape. A legal reckoning on Access Hollywood would be a dramatic rebuttal of the lesson of Trump’s election: that the candidate had somehow unmoored himself from consequence to the point where almost half of American voters could choose him as their president, only weeks after they heard him boast about assaulting women. Or as Trump himself said, “When you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything.”

For now, the president rages on. And while he remains in the White House, the clash of his falsehoods with the ongoing investigations brings home one of the many ironies of his presidency: that a man so opposed to the truth has shouldered the constitutional responsibility to “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.”

But prosecutors can only do so much. Mueller, known for playing by the rules, is unlikely to buck the internal Justice Department legal opinions that rule out indictment of a sitting president. And the special counsel may never share the whole of his findings with the public. More concerning, however, is the possibility that law comes up against the edifice of falsehoods and fails. That is, what if the special counsel unveils a catalogue of wrongdoing by the president and those around him, only to find that Trump has succeeded in undermining the idea of truth to the extent that a substantial proportion of Americans simply won’t believe whatever investigators have found?

Where will Americans be then?

https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/ar ... mp/558086/





Michael Cohen’s third client: Sean Hannity

Sean Hannity was revealed as Michael Cohen's mystery third client in a Manhattan federal court proceeding today — after the judge ruled that the client's identity must be disclosed. Hannity later denied that Cohen had ever represented him "in any matter."

Why it matters: If Hannity was one of Cohen clients, he failed to disclose that information when covering the Cohen raid on his Fox News program.

"Michael Cohen has never represented me in any matter. I never retained him, received an invoice, or paid legal fees. I have occasionally had brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective. ... I assumed those conversations were confidential, but to be absolutely clear they never involved any matter between me and a third-party."

— Sean Hannity on Twitter Monday

The backdrop: Cohen was in court today in an attempt to prevent federal prosecutors from accessing documents and electronic devices obtained in a raid of his home and offices last week. In a previous court filing, Cohen said that he had given legal counsel to three clients in the past year, including President Trump and former RNC official Elliott Broidy. The judge revealed Hannity to be the third client on Monday.





Trump halts Russian sanctions announced by Haley

President Trump is holding off on rolling out sanctions announced yesterday by UN ambassador Nikki Haley that would punish Russian companies that manufactured equipment used by Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's government in its alleged chemical weapons attack, per The Washington Post.

Why it matters: The decision is sure to add to the perception that Trump is often unwilling to harshly punish Russia, especially after WashPost's report yesterday that detailed his anger over the scope of the expulsions of Russian diplomats from the United States in response to the Skripal nerve agent attack in England.





China is winning the 5G race

There's a race to 5G and the U.S. is not winning — China and South Korea are, according to a report conducted by research firm Analysys Mason and released today by CTIA, the wireless industry association.

Why it matters: The first country to deploy and commercialize the ultra-fast 5G mobile networks will have an enormous economic advantage— $500 billion in GDP and 3 million U.S. jobs, per a 2017 Accenture study.

How it works: 5G networks require a combination of low-, mid- and high-frequency airwaves to provide faster data speeds with lower lag time. A big infrastructure upgrade is needed: Networks will need a lot of new radio frequencies (allocated by governments) that will be transmitted by hundreds of thousands of new small antennas.

How the countries stack up: China is in the lead, followed by South Korea, the U.S. and Japan. Germany, the U.K. and France are in the second tier of countries in terms of readiness.

= China: Its 5-year plan aims for broad commercial 5G launch by 2020, and all the major wireless providers (like Huawei and ZTE) have conducted extensive 5G trials. The government has aggressively opened up significant amounts of mid- and high-band spectrum. Data from CCS Insight suggests the large Chinese market is expected to be the biggest for 5G by 2022, CNBC reported.

= South Korea: This year's Winter Olympics provided a focal point for early investment and trials by the wireless companies. The government has freed up large swaths of airwaves.

= U.S.: All major wireless companies have started trials of 5G technologies and equipment, with many commercial launches planned by the end of this year. The FCC is holding a high-band spectrum auction in November, but there's not a clear pipeline for mid-band spectrum. 16 states have enacted small cell legislation.

= Japan: Wireless companies are focused on widespread deployment ahead of the 2020 Olympics. The government adopted a 5G roadmap in 2016 and committed to releasing more spectrum by early next year.

Moving fast: The global competition is propelling 5G development much faster than was originally expected, with carriers and some cities moving quickly to install infrastructure, said CTIA president and CEO Meredith Attwell Baker, a former FCC commissioner.

Winners: Europe won the 2G race and Japan led the 3G race. The U.S. led in 4G, resulting in $100 billion in GDP by 2016, CTIA said.

= "We won the race to 4G and that meant that the semiconductor, operating systems and app industries were all here," she said. "All those benefits to the economy are going to be even greater in 5G but we have to make sure we don’t export it.”

China threat: The Trump administration is well aware of the threat of China.

= Last month, it blocked Broadcom's proposed buyout of Qualcomm on national security grounds. There were also fears that Broadcom's business practices would weaken Qualcomm's and the U.S.'s 5G position — allowing China's Huawei a bigger advantage.

= The administration also briefly toyed with the idea of nationalizing part of the U.S. wireless airwaves in an attempt to thwart Chinese advances.





China closes its borders to the world's trash

A woman sits with her baby in a sea of plastic in Laizhou, China, where she works on ripping the labels off the bottles.

The world is reeling as China — which once imported 9 million metric tons of foreign plastic waste per year — implements new regulations that ban 24 different types of garbage from its shores, reports CNBC.

Why it matters: The measure, implemented in January, is forcing the United States, the U.K., Japan and the EU to find a new destination for their trash. Chinese customs data for the first quarter of 2018 showed that the country's solid waste imports dropped 54%.

https://www.axios.com/trump-putin-russi ... bff5b.html





Puerto Rico's power outage is now the second-largest blackout on record

(CNN)You may have thought the world had run out of superlatives to describe the misery that Hurricane Maria brought to Puerto Rico. Well now, here's another one: second-largest blackout in history.

Since the monster storm slammed into the American Caribbean territory in September 2017 and heavily damaged the power grid, more than 3.4 billion hours of electricity have been lost there. That makes it the second-longest blackout in world history, according to a report from the Rhodium Group, an economic research firm.

The only blackout in world history bigger than Puerto Rico's is the one that came after Typhoon Haiyan devastated the Philippines in 2013. About 6.1 billion hours of power were lost after that massive storm.

The Rhodium Group analysis largely relies on data on electricity loss provided to the Department of Energy, as well as news reports for storms prior to 2000, according to Trevor Houser, a partner at Rhodium who co-wrote the analysis with Peter Marsters. The analysis leaves out war-related destruction of electrical infrastructure.

The worst in US history

Houser said the group analyzes the economic impacts of weather and climate events, and they decided to dig in more deeply on the impacts of Maria on the Puerto Rican economy.

"As we started looking at the scale of the blackout and try to put that in historical context, it became clear this was a record-breaking event and worthy of some attention and focus just from an electric standpoint," Houser said.

The blackout is already the worst in US history, beating out Hurricane Georges in 1998 and Hurricane Sandy in 2012.

Right now, Rhodium estimates power has been restored to 96% of the island, meaning that 53,000 households -- between 100,000 and 200,000 people -- still don't have electricity, some seven months after the storm.

Houser and Marsters said their research shows that "making existing electricity supply more resilient to storm-related disruptions in both developed and developing countries is also important, particularly given recent and projected changes in the global climate."

https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/16/us/puert ... index.html





CNN’s Anderson Cooper Calls Out Sean Hannity’s Massive Conflict of Interest With Michael Cohen

The CNN anchor went after the Fox News host for making ‘no disclosure, no disclaimer, not even a casual mention’ that he received legal counsel from Donald Trump’s personal lawyer.

Fox News anchors have been hesitant to criticize their colleague Sean Hannity in light of today’s news that he was represented in some fashion by President Donald Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael Cohen.

But CNN’s Anderson Cooper did not hold back in condemning Hannity’s blatant conflict of interest at the top of his prime-time show Monday night. Cooper noted to viewers that the “most stunning moment” of Cohen’s court hearing came when his lawyer was forced to reveal the identity of his “mystery client” and reluctantly named Hannity. “So it would seem the president and Sean Hannity share more than dinners and frequent phone calls and a mutual love of Fox News programming,” the anchor said. “They also share an attorney.”

He went on to air the clip of Hannity insisting on his radio show this afternoon that Cohen “has never represented me in any matter” even if he did occasionally have “brief discussions with him about legal questions about which I wanted his input and perspective.” Hannity also said he assumed their conversations were “confidential.”

“So he seems to be saying, ‘I wasn’t really a client of attorney Michael Cohen’s but our conversations were confidential because he is an attorney and I am his client,” Cooper remarked. In either event, Cooper pointed out that Hannity had reported on the FBI raid on Cohen’s office last week “as if he had absolutely no connection to the story.”

Instead, Hannity told viewers the raid was proof that special counsel Robert Mueller’s “witch hunt investigation is now a runaway train that is clearly careening off the tracks.”

“No disclosure, no disclaimer, not even a casual mention that, ‘Oh yeah, this guy also represents me in some form or fashion, mostly real estate,’” Cooper said, echoing Hannity’s defensive statement on Monday.

After playing a clip from Hannity’s radio show in which he said he “can only imagine” where Mueller’s “fishing expedition” will lead, Cooper replied, “He can definitely imagine at least one place where it might lead—to his own name.”

“Not disclosing a business or legal relationship with someone you report on and have had on as your guest at least 16 times since Donald Trump declared his presidency, that doesn’t sound either fair nor balanced,” he concluded.

Meanwhile, during the same hour on Fox News, Tucker Carlson defended his colleague’s “privacy,” telling viewers, “Sean Hannity is a talk show host. He’s not under investigation by anyone for anything. Who he hires as a lawyer and why is nobody’s business.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/cnns-ande ... n?ref=home





White House Throws Nikki Haley Under the Bus as New Russia Sanctions Are Put on Hold

UN Ambassador Nikki Haley announced a new round of sanctions against Russia on Sunday. She was wrong.

On Sunday, Nikki Haley, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, announced that the Treasury Department would be rolling out tough new sanctions against Russia on Monday as punishment for its continued support of Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad.

But not 24 hours later, the White House threw Haley under the bus with a clear, contradictory message: Not so fast.

“We are considering additional sanctions on Russia and a decision will be made in the near future,” White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders said.

Sources familiar with the sanctions rollout process described a chaotic back-and-forth as lawmakers and staffers were struggling to figure out what Haley was exactly referring to. It was unlikely that Haley, who has been lauded by lawmakers from both parties for her tough anti-Kremlin positions, would have misspoken so egregiously if a sanctions regime was not already in the works.

By Monday morning, the congressional committees that were responsible for drafting a sweeping sanctions bill last summer had not heard from the Treasury Department, indicating that Haley had apparently spoken too soon. But later Monday, The Washington Post reported that President Donald Trump personally intervened after Haley’s statement and halted the sanctions plan in its tracks, undercutting his UN ambassador in remarkable fashion.

Capitol Hill sources directly involved in the rollout of congressional mandated sanctions indicated that they had not received a heads up from the administration about impending financial punishments against Russia beyond the coordinated airstrikes that the U.S., along with its French and British partners, conducted on Friday and Saturday. The absence of such a notification from the administration led Capitol Hill staffers to speculate that the White House was scrambling to clean up Haley’s statements.

“The reversal is astounding,” Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.), the ranking member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, wrote in a tweet. “Either Pres. Trump doesn’t think we need more action or they cant handle a simple rollout announcement. Mr. President, get your act together. What’s the strategy?”

Haley, who has built up a reputation as a Russia hawk during her time as UN ambassador, said on CBS’ Face the Nation on Sunday that Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin “will be announcing those [sanctions] on Monday, if he hasn't already.” The Treasury Department did not respond to The Daily Beast’s request for comment on the matter, but on Monday it became clear that Mnuchin had neither announced those actions nor were they even finalized...........

https://www.thedailybeast.com/white-hou ... d?ref=home





THAT'S A NO

California Rejects Plan to Send National Guard Troops to Mexican Border

Two officials told the Associated Press that California has “rejected” President Donald Trump’s initial plans to send National Guard troops to the southern border because “the work is considered too closely tied to immigration enforcement.” In the ongoing negotiations between the federal government and the state, California has asserted that it will not permit federal troops to “fix and repair vehicles, operate remotely-controlled surveillance cameras to report suspicious activity to the Border Patrol, operate radios and provide ‘mission support.’” Negotiations soured over the weekend between the two parties, as federal officials saw the state's restrictions as “onerous,” sources told the AP.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/californi ... r?ref=home





SEAN HAYWIRE: NOT A ‘CLIENT’ — BUT WANTS ‘PRIVILEGE’

On his radio show on Monday, Hannity offered a slightly different, and somewhat contradictory, answer. “Michael never represented me in any matter, I never retained him, I never paid legal fees to Michael,” Hannity said, appearing to contradict Cohen’s attorney’s statement in court. “But I have occasionally had brief legal discussions with him where I wanted his input and perspective.” Yet Hannity then said he “might have handed” Cohen $10 and said, “I want attorney-client privilege on this.” It’s not clear whether that would meet the legal standard to establish an attorney-client privilege.

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/mi ... a07e9f6410





Basically Every Time Hannity Has Defended Michael Cohen on His Show Since the FBI Raid

The Fox News star was revealed today as Cohen’s secret client. Super awks.

Sean Hannity, the Fox News star and staunch defender of the president against the “destroy-Trump media,” was revealed on Monday to be a secret client of Michael Cohen, the president’s personal attorney whose home, hotel room, and office was raided last week by the FBI. Awkward. Especially since Hannity has become one of the most vocal defenders of Cohen on his show, Hannity—claiming, among other things, that the liberal media has whipped up hysteria about the raid, and that it represents stupendously serious violations of Cohen’s civil rights. For his part, Hannity says his dealings with Cohen were limited to chats about real estate and that he may have paid him 10 bucks for attorney-client privilege in some cases. As we wait to find out more, let’s look back at the tape. Ohh, boy.

https://www.motherjones.com/media/2018/ ... -fbi-raid/





Top Republican Official Says Trump Won Wisconsin Because of Voter ID Law

The law blocked thousands of Wisconsinites from voting in 2016, predominantly in Democratic-leaning areas.

Election officials and Democrats in Wisconsin have repeatedly argued that the state’s strict voter ID law allowed Donald Trump to win the state in 2016 by keeping thousands of voters—predominantly in Democratic-leaning areas—from the polls. Now a top Republican official in the state is saying the same thing.

“We battled to get voter ID on the ballot for the November ’16 election,” Wisconsin Attorney General Brad Schimel, who defended the law in court, told conservative radio host Vicki McKenna on April 12. “How many of your listeners really honestly are sure that Sen. [Ron] Johnson was going to win reelection or President Trump was going to win Wisconsin if we didn’t have voter ID to keep Wisconsin’s elections clean and honest and have integrity?”

The law, which went into effect in 2016, required specific forms of government-issued photo identification to vote. In a cover story last year, Mother Jones reported that the law kept tens of thousands of eligible voters from the polls and likely tipped the state to Trump. A federal court found in 2014 that 9 percent of registered voters in Wisconsin did not possess the identification necessary to vote. In a University of Wisconsin study published in September 2017, 1 in 10 registered voters in Milwaukee County and Madison’s Dane County who did not cast a ballot in 2016 cited the voter ID law as a reason why. That meant that up to 23,000 voters in the two heavily Democratic counties—and as many as 45,000 voters statewide—didn’t vote because of the voter ID law. Trump won the state by 22,000 votes.

African Americans, who favored Hillary Clinton over Trump by an 88-to-8 margin, were three times as likely as whites to say they were deterred from voting by the law...........

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/20 ... er-id-law/





Trump lawyer did secret legal work for Sean Hannity, attorney says

The revelation came as a judge is deciding whether to let federal prosecutors sift through materials the FBI seized from the Trump attorney’s home.

The legal battle over federal investigators' raids on President Donald Trump's personal lawyer Michael Cohen took an unexpected turn Monday as an attorney identified Fox News host Sean Hannity as one of Cohen's legal clients.

Cohen's attorneys had acknowledged publicly that he represented Trump and former Republican National Committee deputy finance chair Elliott Broidy in legal matters, but they had sought to avoid naming a third client. Under direct orders from a judge, Cohen's attorney Stephen Ryan named Hannity as the client in court on Monday.

The revelation came amid an extraordinary showdown between a sitting president and his own Justice Department over access to files seized in the raids on Cohen's home and office last week and over whether the materials are protected by attorney-client privilege. Hannity's connection to Cohen was revealed after the conservative commentator — one of Trump's staunchest defenders — fiercely criticized federal officials for the raids, without disclosing his own connection.

Even before the surprise disclosure about Hannity, the afternoon hearing before U.S. District Court Judge Kimba Wood was a spectacle. Cohen came under scrutiny after he acknowledged paying $130,000 to porn actress Stormy Daniels shortly before the 2016 election so she would keep quiet about an alleged sexual encounter with Trump. The Wall Street Journal reported last week that Cohen also negotiated a deal in 2017 to pay $1.6 million to a woman who said Broidy impregnated her.

The FBI raids targeting Cohen last week represented the clearest sign yet of legal trouble for Trump's inner circle and prompted outbursts from the president on social media. Cohen's and Trump's attorneys have argued that the raids were inappropriate, with the president's team saying in a filing this week that move was "disquieting to lawyers, clients, citizens and commentators alike."

Cohen's attorneys were asked to name his clients as part of the fight over whether the records were subject to attorney-client privilege, but they initially sought to avoid naming his third legal client. Ryan called him "a public and prominent individual" and said he had asked not to be identified.

Wood wouldn't accept that. "I understand that he doesn’t want his name out there. That’s not enough. I order you to disclose the client now,” the judge said.

Many in the the courtroom gasped audibly when Ryan revealed that Hannity was the client, and a half-dozen journalists rushed out to report the development.

It was not immediately clear what sort of legal work Cohen did for Hannity. The conservative media figure, who seemed taken aback by the disclosure as he addressed it on his syndicated radio program Monday afternoon, eventually said most of the advice related to real estate.

He denied being a formal client of Cohen's but said the Trump lawyer provided some advice he considered confidential............

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/ ... ist-526288





Graham calls Syria strikes a 'major step backwards' for Trump

‘We don’t have a strategy about why Syria matters,’ the South Carolina senator says.

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R.S.C.) on Monday criticized President Donald Trump's strikes on three Syrian chemical weapons sites as a "missed opportunity," calling it a "major step backwards" for his military approach in the region.

Graham scrutinized the round of air strikes, carried out Friday night in response to a suspected poison gas attack against civilians near Damascus, which he framed as dealing an insufficient blow to Syrian leader Bashar Assad, whom U.S. officials have accused of deploying chemical weapons.

Asked about the president's response to the attacks in Syria during a radio interview on "The Hugh Hewitt Show," Graham griped that his actions "didn’t lay a glove on Assad’s capabilities to wage war."

"We’re becoming the chemical weapons police," Graham said. "We don’t have a strategy about why Syria matters."

He added: "The military strike itself was a tactical response well short of what I thought was justified. So he’s been a good commander-in-chief in general, but this is a major step backwards."..........

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/ ... ham-526286





Trump just blocked his own administration’s Russia sanctions

Once again the president is taking steps to make sure he doesn’t anger Putin.

It appears that President Trump just blocked his own administration’s plan to sanction Russia.

Nikki Haley, the US ambassador to the UN, announced Sunday that the Trump administration was going to hit Russia with new sanctions on Monday over its support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s chemical weapons program in the wake of the April 7 chemical attack in Douma, Syria, that killed dozens of people. The sanctions were explicitly focused on Russian companies that deal in equipment linked to Assad’s chemical weapons program.

But just a day later, the White House backtracked, with press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders saying that the administration was merely “considering additional sanctions on Russia” and that “a decision will be made in the near future.”

So why the awkward reversal? Apparently President Trump wasn’t on board with sanctioning Russia.

According to the Washington Post, after Haley announced the sanctions on CBS’s Face the Nation Sunday morning, Trump told national security advisers he was “upset the sanctions were being officially rolled out because he was not yet comfortable executing them.”

It unclear whether Haley just mistakenly announced the sanctions prematurely before the president had officially signed off on them, or if something else entirely went wrong.

But two things are obvious: The administration is once again botching the rollout of a fairly straightforward policy, and Trump is personally taking steps to ensure that he doesn’t anger Russian President Vladimir Putin.

A Russian foreign ministry official said on Monday that the Trump administration contacted the Russian embassy on Sunday and told them that the sanctions that Haley had mentioned were not actually coming.

Trump is constantly fighting his own administration on Russia

Democrats swiftly panned the White House for backtracking. “The reversal is astounding. Either Pres. Trump doesn’t think we need more action or they can’t handle a simple rollout announcement,” Sen. Bob Menendez (D-NJ) tweeted Monday afternoon. “Mr. President, get your act together. What’s the strategy?”

But there are signs that Trump’s decision to hold off on sanctioning Russia might be paying off. On Monday, Russia announced that it was delaying a parliamentary vote on a plan to restrict American imports.

This isn’t the first time Trump has seemed to be at odds with or out of touch with the way the rest of his administration is handling Russia policy. Trump was reportedly furious about the way his administration ended up expelling 60 Russian diplomats in response to the poisoning of Russian ex-spy Sergei Skripal on British soil on March 4.

Trump had apparently thought that the US was matching the number of diplomats that other US allies were expelling, but it turned out that the US’s expulsion dwarfed the numbers of any other country.

When administration officials explained to him that the US was matching the total number of expulsions from all the other countries combined, Trump apparently exploded and said he thought he had been misled.

“There were curse words,” an administration official told the Washington Post. “A lot of curse words.”

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics ... ions-syria





Trump admits mistakes with Cabinet picks

President Trump on Monday conceded he made mistakes in assembling his Cabinet, which has already seen three departures.

Trump made the rare admission while praising Labor Secretary Alex Acosta and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin during a tax event in Miami.

"Not all of my choices were good, but they were great ones,” the president said.

The president did not single out any Cabinet officials for criticism.

Many of Trump’s Cabinet picks have faced accusations of ethical misconduct or clashed with the president for personal and political reasons.

The president this year fired Secretary of State Rex Tillerson after months of disagreements and also gave the axe to Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin, who faced criticism over taxpayer-funded travel and fought with other officials over health-care issues.

Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson are also facing scrutiny for spending taxpayer dollars on office improvements, amid other actions.

Last year, Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price was forced to resign after it was revealed he frequently used a private jet to travel on government business.

Trump’s first pick to lead the Department of Labor, Andrew Puzder, withdrew his nomination after it was revealed he employed a housekeeper who was living illegally in the U.S.

The president has faced persistent criticism from people who say he failed to properly vet his choices to fill key administration posts.

http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... inet-picks

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Former first lady Barbara Bush dies at age 92

HOUSTON (AP) — Barbara Bush, the snowy-haired first lady whose plainspoken manner and utter lack of pretense made her more popular at times than her husband, President George H.W. Bush, died Tuesday. She was 92.

Family spokesman Jim McGrath confirmed the death in a statement. The cause wasn’t immediately known.

Mrs. Bush brought a grandmotherly style to buttoned-down Washington, often appearing in her trademark fake pearl chokers and displaying no vanity about her white hair and wrinkles.

“What you see with me is what you get. I’m not running for president — George Bush is,” she said at the 1988 Republican National Convention, where her husband, then vice president, was nominated to succeed Ronald Reagan.

The Bushes, who were married Jan. 6, 1945, had the longest marriage of any presidential couple in American history. And Mrs. Bush was one of only two first ladies who had a child who was elected president. The other was Abigail Adams, wife of John Adams and mother of John Quincy Adams.

“I had the best job in America,” she wrote in a 1994 memoir describing her time in the White House. “Every single day was interesting, rewarding, and sometimes just plain fun.”

The publisher’s daughter and oilman’s wife could be caustic in private, but her public image was that of a self-sacrificing, supportive spouse who referred to her husband as her “hero.”

In the White House, “you need a friend, someone who loves you, who’s going to say, ‘You are great,’” Mrs. Bush said in a 1992 television interview.

Her uncoiffed, matronly appearance often provoked jokes that she looked more like the boyish president’s mother than his wife. Late-night comedians quipped that her bright white hair and pale features also imparted a resemblance to George Washington.

Eight years after leaving the nation’s capital, Mrs. Bush stood with her husband as their son George W. was sworn in as president. They returned four years later when he won a second term. Unlike Mrs. Bush, Abigail Adams did not live to see her son’s inauguration. She died in 1818, six years before John Quincy Adams was elected.

Mrs. Bush insisted she did not try to influence her husband’s politics.

“I don’t fool around with his office,” she said, “and he doesn’t fool around with my household.”

In 1984, her quick wit got her into trouble when she was quoted as referring to Geraldine Ferraro, the Democratic vice presidential nominee, as “that $4 million — I can’t say it, but it rhymes with rich.”

“It was dumb of me. I shouldn’t have said it,” Mrs. Bush acknowledged in 1988. “It was not attractive, and I’ve been very shamed. I apologized to Mrs. Ferraro, and I would apologize again.”

Daughter-in-law Laura Bush, wife of the 43rd president, said Mrs. Bush was “ferociously tart-tongued.”

“She’s never shied away from saying what she thinks. ... She’s managed to insult nearly all of my friends with one or another perfectly timed acerbic comment,” Laura Bush wrote in her 2010 book, “Spoken from the Heart.”

In her 1994 autobiography, “Barbara Bush: A Memoir,” Mrs. Bush said she did her best to keep her opinions from the public while her husband was in office. But she revealed that she disagreed with him on two issues: She supported legal abortion and opposed the sale of assault weapons.

“I honestly felt, and still feel, the elected person’s opinion is the one the public has the right to know,” Mrs. Bush wrote.

She also disclosed a bout with depression in the mid-1970s, saying she sometimes feared she would deliberately crash her car. She blamed hormonal changes and stress.

“Night after night, George held me weeping in his arms while I tried to explain my feelings,” she wrote. “I almost wonder why he didn’t leave me.”

She said she snapped out of it in a few months.

Mrs. Bush raised five children: George W., Jeb, Neil, Marvin and Dorothy. A sixth child, 3-year-old daughter Robin, died of leukemia in 1953.

In a speech in 1985, she recalled the stress of raising a family while married to a man whose ambitions carried him from the Texas oil fields to Congress and into influential political positions that included ambassador to the United Nations, GOP chairman and CIA director.

“This was a period, for me, of long days and short years,” she said, “of diapers, runny noses, earaches, more Little League games than you could believe possible, tonsils and those unscheduled races to the hospital emergency room, Sunday school and church, of hours of urging homework or short chubby arms around your neck and sticky kisses.”

Along the way, she said, there were also “bumpy moments — not many, but a few — of feeling that I’d never, ever be able to have fun again and coping with the feeling that George Bush, in his excitement of starting a small company and traveling around the world, was having a lot of fun.”

In 2003, she wrote a follow-up memoir, “Reflections: Life After the White House.”

“I made no apologies for the fact that I still live a life of ease,” she wrote. “There is a difference between ease and leisure. I live the former and not the latter.”

Along with her memoirs, she wrote “C. Fred’s Story” and “Millie’s Book,” based on the lives of her dogs. Proceeds from the books benefited adult and family literacy programs. Laura Bush, a former teacher with a master’s degree in library science, continued her mother-in-law’s literacy campaign in the White House.

The 43rd president was not the only Bush son to seek office in the 1990s. In 1994, when George W. was elected governor of Texas, son Jeb narrowly lost to incumbent Lawton Chiles in Florida. Four years later, Jeb was victorious in his second try in Florida.

“This is a testament to what wonderful parents they are,” George W. Bush said as Jeb Bush was sworn into office. He won a second term in 2002, and then made an unsuccessful bid for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016.

Sons Marvin and Neil both became businessmen. Neil achieved some notoriety in the 1980s as a director of a savings and loan that crashed. Daughter Dorothy, or Doro, has preferred to stay out of the spotlight. She married lobbyist Robert Koch, a Democrat, in 1992.

In a collection of letters published in 1999, George H.W. Bush included a note he gave to his wife in early 1994.

“You have given me joy that few men know,” he wrote. “You have made our boys into men by bawling them out and then, right away, by loving them. You have helped Doro to be the sweetest, greatest daughter in the whole wide world. I have climbed perhaps the highest mountain in the world, but even that cannot hold a candle to being Barbara’s husband.”

Mrs. Bush was born Barbara Pierce in Rye, New York. Her father was the publisher of McCall’s and Redbook magazines. After attending Smith College for two years, she married young naval aviator George Herbert Walker Bush. She was 19.

After World War II, the Bushes moved to the Texas oil patch to seek their fortune and raise a family. It was there that Bush began his political career, representing Houston for two terms in Congress in the late 1960s and early 1970s.

In all, the Bushes made more than two dozen moves that circled half the globe before landing at the White House in 1989. Opinion polls taken over the next four years often showed her approval ratings higher than her husband’s.

The couple’s final move, after Bush lost the 1992 election to Bill Clinton, was to Houston, where they built what she termed their “dream house” in an affluent neighborhood. The Bush family also had an oceanfront summer home in Kennebunkport, Maine.

After retiring to Houston, the Bushes helped raise funds for charities and appeared frequently at events such as Houston Astros baseball games. Public schools in the Houston area are named for both of them.

In 1990, Barbara Bush gave the commencement address at all-women Wellesley College. Some had protested her selection because she was prominent only through the achievements of her husband. Her speech that day was rated by a survey of scholars in 1999 as one of the top 100 speeches of the century.

“Cherish your human connections,” Mrs. Bush told graduates. “At the end of your life, you will never regret not having passed one more test, winning one more verdict or not closing one more deal. You will regret time not spent with a husband, a child, a friend or a parent.”

https://www.apnews.com/26296df048a042ac ... -at-age-92





BURN

Nikki Haley Fires Back at Larry Kudlow on Russia Sanctions: ‘I Don’t Get Confused’

Nikki Haley, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, fired back at top White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow on Tuesday after he suggested Haley was confused when she announced new sanctions against Russia that never came to fruition. “With all due respect, I don’t get confused,” Haley said in a statement. On Sunday, she said the administration would be rolling out new sanctions against Russia for its support of the Assad regime in Syria. But by Monday, it became clear that the administration had reversed course, and the White House effectively threw her under the bus. Speaking with reporters earlier Tuesday, Kudlow said there was “momentary confusion.” Kudlow later told ABC News that he apologized to Haley. “There was a process mistake and I shouldn’t have said what I said,” Kudlow said. “She wasn’t confused.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/nikki-hal ... t-confused





Parents Didn’t Want Fracking Near Their School. So the Oil Company Chose a Poorer School, Instead.

The first school was 77-percent white.

The second is 87-percent students of color.

In one of the most fracked counties in the country, a fight is underway between environmental justice advocates and the Colorado commission that oversees oil and gas development. Four environmental and civil rights groups are suing the commission for allowing a company to build 24 oil and gas wells by a public school in a low-income area—after the same company tossed its original plans to build near a charter school serving mostly white, middle-class families.

Back in 2013, the company Mineral Resources was granted a permit to drill a few hundred feet from Frontier Academy, a majority white charter school in Greeley, Colorado. But after parents and neighborhood residents strongly resisted, the project was delayed. The following year, the Denver-based energy company Extraction Oil and Gas acquired Mineral Resources and abandoned the plans to frack near Frontier Academy. The site, Extraction explained in an internal analysis, was “not preferable” for oil and gas development because of its proximity to the school and its playground.

Instead, Extraction began scouting other locations in Greeley, a small city about 50 miles northeast of Denver. In May 2016, Extraction Oil and Gas filed a new application. This time, Extraction selected a site even closer to another school: Bella Romero Academy. The student population at Bella Romero is more than 87 percent Latino or Hispanic, African American, or other people of color. More than 90 percent of students at Bella Romero qualify for free or reduced-price lunch. (At Frontier, 77 percent of students are white, and about 20 percent qualify for free or reduced-price lunch.)

“When they were looking for another site away from Frontier, where does it wind up? In the Hispanic community, by the Hispanic school,” says Eric Huber, an attorney with the Sierra Club’s Environmental Law Program, one of the groups behind the lawsuit. “We think that decision was made, unfortunately, because that particular community doesn’t have the resources to fight it.”..........

https://www.motherjones.com/environment ... ic-school/





The GOP is about to scrap safeguards that stop auto lenders from discriminating based on race

Republicans are using the Congressional Review Act to roll back a five-year-old CFPB guidance on car loan discrimination — and that’s just the beginning.

The Senate is on the verge of getting rid of a consumer protection measure meant to stop car dealers from charging more for car loans based on race. And the vote is just the start of lawmakers’ attempts to target years of federal agencies’ decisions through the Congressional Review Act, the GOP’s new favorite deregulatory toy.

Research shows high dealer markups often disproportionately affect nonwhite people — in other words, car dealers charge black and Latino buyers higher interest markups than they do white buyers. The CFPB tried to curtail this by introducing the guidance, a sort of notice of how to apply and interpret a law, in 2013.

The CFPB’s guidance was meant to curb racial discrimination by auto dealerships, which remains a prevalent problem in the US

“This is an attempt by auto lenders and auto dealers to prevent the CFPB from monitoring fair lending issues and enforcing them, and to tie the hands of future CFPBs on discrimination issues,” Debbie Goldstein, who heads the federal policy team at the Center for Responsible Lending, told me.

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics ... ation-cfpb





Jerry Brown: California Won’t Roll Back Auto Emissions Standards

“The idea we’re going to roll back the auto standards is absurd,” the governor said in Washington.

WASHINGTON ― California Gov. Jerry Brown (D) on Tuesday expressed confidence his state would prevail in a looming legal battle over the Trump administration’s plan to weaken auto fuel economy and emissions standards.

“The idea we’re going to roll back the auto standards is absurd. We’re not going to do that,” Brown told reporters at an event hosted by the National Press Club. “We have the legal horsepower to block the immediate legal moves by the Trump administration.”

Two weeks ago, the Environmental Protection Agency rolled out plans to gut vehicle fuel and emissions standards after complaints from automakers. Those 2012 standards, a compromise between California and federal regulators, require vehicles to average 54.5 miles per gallon by 2025, nearly doubling today’s benchmark.

Brown argued that the world auto market, especially China and Europe, demands that U.S. carmakers reduce emissions, not allow more pollution.

“They’re not going to sell cars in China if they don’t have zero-emission vehicles,” he said. “This is just another temporary kerfuffle where the newsies play around with these things. But the hard facts on the ground are we have to intensify, increase, our vehicle emission standards and not weaken them and go in the other direction.”

U.S. automakers, reeling from the financial crisis and subsequent bailout by taxpayers, agreed to the 2012 rules in part because they set national standards, avoiding the need to manufacture one set of vehicles to meet California’s strict standards, and another set for looser requirements in the remaining 70 percent of the U.S. auto market.

But carmakers pushed for relaxing the rules under President Donald Trump, complaining that lower fuel prices were boosting sales of gas-guzzling SUVs and trucks, and that electric and hybrid vehicles encouraged by the regulations weren’t selling.

Automakers, their critics say, prefer to sell gas guzzlers because that’s where the money is. Each $73,000 Cadillac Escalade, for example, nets $35,000 in profit, according to The Detroit News. Electric vehicles, meanwhile, are only half as profitable as cars with combustion engines, a Daimler executive said last year. It’s no wonder that American automakers devoted much of their coveted Super Bowl advertising slots this year to pickup trucks and SUVs.

“They create demand,” said Daniel Becker, the director of the D.C.-based Safe Climate Campaign’s Center for Auto Safety. “They know how to market vehicles ― that’s what they do for their existence. They want to make the vehicles that they make the biggest profit on.”

Brown said he was disappointed that people in Washington and elsewhere seemed to be “consumed by nonsense” rather than by the threat of climate change.

“People are asleep,” he said. “When you pick up the paper or turn on cable news, you’d think its another planet. It’s all about the nonsense of Washington, and carbon emissions are growing, and we’ve gotta radically turn that around or the migrations you see now are going to be child’s play. We’re going to have more conflicts, more terrorism, more insecurity because of climate disruption.”

Brown, 80, is California’s longest-serving governor. He’s barred by term limits from running again, but promised it’s too early to “ride into the sunset.” But he seemed to dismiss the prospect of a presidential run in 2020.

“I can’t think of anything less attractive than a Democratic presidential primary,” he said.

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/je ... c89ced017d





China hits U.S. sorghum with 179 percent tariff

April 17 (UPI) -- China is imposing a 179 percent tariff on U.S. sorghum, worth about $1 billion of imports to China a year.

The measure against U.S. imports comes a day after the U.S. Department of Commerce banned one of China's biggest tech companies from selling to U.S. firms.

The sorghum tariff, described as a "deposit" in a statement from China's Commerce Ministry on Tuesday, comes after a preliminary ruling from the ministry that concluded U.S. firms had "dumped" grain sorghum on the Chinese market, causing significant "damage" to domestic producers, Xinhua reported.

The two-month investigation found U.S. sorghum enjoyed government subsidies and the imports hurt Chinese farmers.

The tariff takes effect on Wednesday and importers will be required to pay deposits with Chinese customs at a rate of 178.6 percent.

U.S. exports of sorghum increased from 317,000 tons in 2013 to 4.76 million tons in 2017, according to Beijing's data.

Sorghum farmers, meanwhile, struggled with a 31 percent decrease in prices, China's commerce ministry stated.

The decision to hit U.S. sorghum with tariffs does not violate international law, said Wang Hejun, head of the commerce ministry's trade remedy and investigation bureau.

A day earlier, the U.S. Commerce Department said ZTE, one of China's biggest tech companies, lied to U.S. officials about taking measures against employees who violated U.S. sanctions against North Korea and Iran before imposing a new U.S. ban on ZTE sales.

"ZTE paid full bonuses to employees that had engaged in illegal conduct, and failed to issue letters of reprimand," the Commerce Department said in statement.

Beijing is challenging U.S. claims that firms like ZTE violated U.S. law and stole U.S. intellectual property.

"ZTE has a wide range of trade and investment cooperation with several hundred American companies, providing the United States with thousands of jobs," China's commerce ministry said Tuesday, according to CNN Money.

The U.S. ban prohibits sales of ZTE parts to U.S. companies for seven years.

https://www.upi.com/Top_News/World-News ... m_medium=4





Trump’s Trade War Hits Another Red State

What’s the matter with Kansas? It’ll be hardest hit by new Chinese tariffs.

President Donald Trump’s trade war with China has already sparked promises of retaliatory tariffs on U.S. exports, including soybeans, that will hit such Trump-friendly Midwestern states as Iowa, Indiana, North Dakota, and Nebraska—if they take effect. In March, U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer said “there is hope” they can be forestalled.

Sorghum growers aren’t so lucky. On Tuesday, China’s Ministry of Commerce announced it would impose a 178.6 percent duty on sorghum imports from the U.S. that will take effect almost immediately. The news puts an additional Trump-friendly state (and Republican leader) squarely in the crosshairs: Kansas is the largest sorghum producer in the U.S., and its senior senator, Pat Roberts, chairs the Senate Agriculture Committee.

“It’s extremely frustrating and very disappointing,” says Jesse McCurry, executive director of the Kansas Grain Sorghum Commission. “Half of Kansas sorghum or more was going to China, and that probably stops, at least for now.”

The new Chinese measure is a response to the tariffs Trump slapped on solar panels and washing machines earlier this year. China began a probe of sorghum imports in early February, shortly after Trump’s announcement. “We knew this was hanging over our heads,” says Kurt Winter, a sorghum farmer in Sedgwick County, Kansas, just outside Wichita. “But when we heard the news this morning, it was still just devastating to us. It’s really going to put the hammer to our price prospects.”

Trump’s campaign-trail protectionism and attacks on China were a big part of his appeal to Republican voters in 2016. But as he’s begun implementing those policies as president, the economic fallout has landed heavily on his own voters. Hardest hit by the new tariffs will be Roberts’s old congressional district (KS-01), known as “The Big First” for its sprawling, agriculture-intensive acreage. In the last election, Kansas’s first district voted for Trump over Hillary Clinton by 45 points.

Kansans such as Winter wish Trump would keep that in mind—but don’t hold out much hope. “I know that the administration is very much aware that rural America had a lot to do with putting President Trump in office,” Winter says. “But I’m not sure anybody can change his mind.”

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... dly-kansas





US-China trade: 24 hours that escalated the fight

After a brief lull in the skirmishing, the trade battle between the United States and China is escalating once again.

In the last 24 hours alone, the United States dealt a potentially crippling blow to a big Chinese tech company, Beijing hit out at a major American export crop, and President Donald Trump fired off another angry tweet.

"I hesitate to call it a [trade] war ... It's more of a trade battle at the moment, but it's escalating," said Ian Mitchell, a trade expert and senior policy fellow at the Center for Global Development.

China made clear again Tuesday that it was willing to stand its ground in the increasingly tense standoff between the world's two biggest economies.

"If the US continues to act recklessly ... we stand ready to show our sword, and fight to win this battle to defend multilateralism and free trade," Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying said in response to a punitive US move against Chinese smartphone maker ZTE.

A potential trade war has been brewing since April 2017 when Trump directed the Commerce Department to investigate whether imports of foreign steel from China and other countries could be a threat to national security.

Fast forward to March 2018: The US imposed a 25% tariff on steel imports from China and many other nations. Beijing responded by imposing tariffs on US imports worth around $3 billion. This escalated to the point that Trump ultimately threatened to impose new tariffs on $150 billion of Chinese goods.

Here's a catchup on the latest moves that are turning up the heat.

Sorghum slammed

China said Tuesday that it would introduce a huge import charge on US shipments of sorghum, a grain that is used to feed livestock and make a liquor that's very popular with Chinese drinkers.

Starting Wednesday, Chinese customs officers will charge importers a fee of about 179% on US sorghum after an investigation found the shipments were unfairly subsidized and damaging Chinese producers.

China is the largest buyer of American sorghum, and its imports were worth nearly $1 billion last year.

ZTE banned

The US cracked down on ZTE, one of China's biggest tech companies, on Monday.

The Department of Commerce has banned American companies from selling parts and services to ZTE for seven years. The US threatened the ban in 2017 after ZTE illegally shipped equipment to Iran and North Korea. Further misconduct led the Commerce Department to impose the ban, according to a statement from the agency.

ZTE buys microchips from Qualcomm (QCOM) and glass from Corning (CNIG), and the company is the fourth biggest smartphone supplier in the United States.

The company's shares were suspended from trading in Hong Kong on Tuesday following the US announcement.

Currency clash

During his presidential campaign, Trump repeatedly accused Beijing of undervaluing its currency to boost exports. By May 2017, he said the manipulation had stopped, and he personally took the credit.

Now, he seems to be having second thoughts. In a tweet on Monday, he said the world's second largest economy was once again "playing the Currency Devaluation game" and this was "Not acceptable!" (He also lumped Russia in with China.)..........

http://money.cnn.com/2018/04/17/news/ec ... index.html





Trump letting Haley take heat despite signing off on sanctions

Three administration officials say the president signed off on a package of punitive measures but changed course in the wake of Friday's Syria strikes.

President Donald Trump gave approval last week for rolling out airstrikes in Syria as well as new sanctions on Russia, according to three senior administration officials — but U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley wasn’t briefed on changes to the sanctions plan before announcing it Sunday on national television.

The episode marks the latest instance of members of Trump’s team appearing out of sync with one another or with the president on foreign affairs.

“Russia sanctions were a part of the agreed-upon plan going into the strike and going into the weekend,” said a senior administration official. “As recently as Saturday, that was reconfirmed as part of the plan.”

The Republican National Committee distributed talking points on Saturday morning in the wake of Friday’s airstrikes that specifically mentioned new sanctions, though not a specific timeline, according to a copy obtained by POLITICO: “We also intend to impose specific additional sanctions against Russia to respond to Moscow’s ongoing support for the Assad regime, which has enabled the regime’s atrocities against the Syrian people.”

The president halted the sanctions plan on Sunday night, according to a Washington Post report.

The incident is part of a pattern, administration officials say, in which the president has signed off on policy proposals only to change course days, weeks or months later, undermining some of his closest advisers and Cabinet members and leaving them flat-footed.

White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow told reporters Tuesday that Haley simply “got out ahead of the curve” on the sanctions.

“There might have been some momentary confusion,” Kudlow added.

Haley later pushed back against that characterization, saying in a statement: “With all due respect, I don’t get confused.”

(A White House official, speaking on background, said on Tuesday night that Kudlow had called Haley and apologized.)

Another administration official suggested that the Treasury Department didn’t have the sanctions package ready to go.

Others, however, say the president simply changed his mind, though it’s unclear whether he did so before or after Haley’s television appearance...........

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/ ... ike-529690

Haley sets a red line for Trump

The U.N. ambassador made crystal clear after initially being blamed for 'confusion' on Russia sanctions that she will not tolerate public humiliation quietly.

When asked about the state of her relationship with President Donald Trump, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley gave reporters a thumbs up on Wednesday and said, “It’s perfect.”

Haley has been caught up in the latest Trump administration internal battle after she said on CBS’ “Face the Nation” that the administration would soon announce new sanctions on Russia in response to the Syria chemical weapons attack. Haley’s statement was walked back on Monday by the White House, which said Trump was still weighing further sanctions.

Larry Kudlow, the director of the National Economic Council, escalated the flap on Tuesday when he told reporters during a Florida news conference that Haley's announcement was the result of “momentary confusion."

Haley fired back on Tuesday evening, saying, “With all due respect, I don’t get confused." Kudlow called and apologized to Haley, a White House official speaking on background told POLITICO.

Haley continued to take a hard line on Russia at a United Nations Security Council meeting on Wednesday, saying that “as we stated previously the U.S. agrees with the U.K.’s assessment that Russia is responsible for the chemical weapons in Salisbury.”

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/ ... hip-533738





McConnell looks at longer workweeks for Senate to keep Dems from campaigning: report

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) is reportedly looking to hold longer workweeks as a way to keep vulnerable Democratic senators off the campaign trail.

White House legislative director Marc Short told a group of GOP donors this week that McConnell planned to prolong the Senate's workweek in order to reduce the amount of time vulnerable Democrats can spend campaigning, according to The Washington Examiner.

One GOP donor told the Examiner that the tactic is intended to keep Democrats, like Sens. Heidi Heitkamp (N.D.), Joe Manchin (W.Va.) and Claire McCaskill (Mo.), "tied up from campaigning."

Heitkamp, Manchin and McCaskill are among a handful of Senate Democrats facing potentially tough reelection bids in states won by President Trump in 2016.

A spokesman for McConnell noted the leader has said publicly that the Senate will work longer weeks if Democrats continue to slow-walk nominees.

Last week McConnell filed cloture on six nominees and pledged to get them done that same week.

"He wasn't bluffing," the spokesman told The Hill.

McConnell's office declined to comment on whether the tactic was also meant to keep vulnerable Democratic incumbents from returning home early each week to campaign.

http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3838 ... ampaigning





U.S. panics over China tech threat

The U.S. is experiencing a revival of Japan syndrome, harking back to the late 1970s when "Made in Japan" abruptly stopped being a source of mirth, Americans began to snap up Toyotas and Nissans in big numbers, and Detroit sank into a profit-and-jobs bloodbath.

The big picture: Five years ago, American technologists sneered at China's Baidu and its new search engine. But "they aren't laughing anymore," says Gregory Allen, an AI expert at the Center for a New American Security. "Now they are marveling at Baidu's advances in artificial intelligence."

Chinese Big Tech is one dimension of a juggernaut that's collectively terrifying the Trump administration, Silicon Valley and the western foreign policy community.

It's "Made in China 2025," Beijing's three-year old game plan for dominating the 10 biggest technologies of the future, such as AI, robotics and electric cars.

= Driving the news: In a 215-page investigation released in March, the U.S. Trade Representative cites China 2025 111 times, notes CFR's Lorand Laskai.

= Where it stands: The Trump administration is pushing China to stop encouraging the theft of U.S. intellectual property. And just this week, the government took action to stop the sale of Huawei telecommunications gear by U.S. carriers, and barred ZTE from buying U.S.-made components.

= Between the lines: A conviction that, like Japan conquered cars, China may actually manage to pull off its tech ambitions. And not only would it have the most advanced versions of these technologies, but it would effectively block off its market for competition in these leading sectors.

Elizabeth Economy, director for Asia studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, tells Axios that the West is not being alarmist.

https://www.axios.com/why-history-sugge ... ce=sidebar





China's Tech Revolution: Baidu Has A Larger Market Share Than Google

Summary

Baidu is the Google of China.

The Chinese government almost ensures that Baidu will have a near monopoly on the internet search space for years to come.

Baidu is growing rapidly and should continue to do so as more people and more people begin using the internet in China.

Baidu Overview:
Baidu has seen explosive growth over the past 5 years. Similar to Alibaba, the company's revenue is up tenfold in the last five years, from $1 billion to $10 billion.

Baidu fills a similar roll in China as Google (GOOG) does in the US. The most important thing to understand about Baidu is that it actually has a larger market share of the Internet-search market in China than Google has of the Internet-search market in the US. Think about that for a second. If you're in the US and need to look something up online, you're less likely to use Google than someone who needs to look something up online in China is to use Baidu.

Google dominates web searches in the United States and only owns 65% of the market. Baidu on the other hand is used for over 70% of web searches in China, and thanks to the Chinese government this is very unlikely to change.

China, as a communist government, regulates media. Much like what we've seen with Facebook (FB), Google has refused to play by China's rules and is banned in the country. Your Gmail, Google Maps, and YouTube accounts are all blocked immediately once you enter the country. This is great for Baidu, as their number 1 potential competitor can't access their market.

https://seekingalpha.com/article/414123 ... are-google





Nicolle Wallace: Hannity Runs Trump ‘Like an Asset’

‘Fox isn’t state-run media,’ the MSNBC host said, ‘the state is run by Fox.’

“With Trump installed as communications director, it only makes sense Fox News personality Sean Hannity is the de facto chief of staff,” Nicolle Wallace said Wednesday afternoon on MSNBC.

That was the former White House communications director for President George W. Bush’s big takeaway from a new Washington Post story that reports Hannity is “one of the few people who gets patched immediately to Trump” when he calls and “basically has a desk in the place.”

“It's all making sense,” she said of the revelation this week that Trump and Hannity share a lot more than just an attorney. Adding her own reporting, Wallace said that Hannity “plays a big role in personnel decisions,” advocating for figures like Anthony Scaramucci and John Bolton.

More than once during the segment Wallace questioned the narrative that Fox News is “state-run TV,” saying, “We should be staring more closely at the White House and saying ‘Fox-run state.’”

When one of her guests, Donny Deutsch, suggested that the symbiotic relationship between Trump and Hannity is “somewhat harmless” because it’s so “transparent,” Wallace pushed back.

“Here's what I think is dangerous,” she said. “The Nunes memo was a huge ratings boon for Fox.” She explained that Trump’s “hand-picked” FBI director Christopher Wray went to House Speaker Paul Ryan and said, “Please for the love of god don't release the Nunes memo. It's incomplete, it’s inaccurate, it brings into question once of the most sacred processes we have, the secret FISA court.”

“This is why I think we get this wrong,” Wallace continued. “Fox isn't state-run media. The state is run by Fox. Sean Hannity needed that story and I think he ran the president like an asset the way people are wondering if the Russians are running the president.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/nicolle-w ... t?ref=home





Senate repeals auto-loan guidance in precedent-shattering vote

The Senate on Wednesday repealed a controversial Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) decree on auto-loan financing in a vote that could set a precedent for Republicans to repeal a broad range of regulations.

Senators generally fell along party lines in the 51-47 vote to repeal 2013 guidance from the CFPB on "dealer markups" — the interest a dealer adds to a customer's third-party loan as extra compensation.

Assuming the House passes the measure, the CFPB auto-lending guidance will likely be the first informal regulation to be repealed by Congress through the Congressional Review Act.

While Congress has used the Congressional Review Act more than a dozen times since 2017 to repeal formal rules issued under former President Obama, it has never before used the law to repeal guidance. Republicans are now looking to do so, and could go after a range of regulatory actions that had been considered off-limits.

Efforts to repeal rules under the Congressional Review Act cannot be filibustered, giving Republicans a powerful tool to slash regulations with only a majority vote in each chamber. The act also bans agencies from issuing rules similar to those overturned under the law.

Sen. Joe Manchin (W.Va.) was the only Democrat to vote in favor of repealing the CFPB guidance, while Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Tammy Duckworth (D-Ill.) missed the vote.

The resolution is expected to easily pass the House, and the White House announced Tuesday that aides to President Trump would recommend that he sign it.

“The goal here is simple: We want to protect consumers and job creators from needless interference by the federal bureaucracy,” said Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.).

“We can nullify a particularly egregious overstep by [the CFPB] and notch another victory in this Congress’s record of rolling back overregulation.”

It did not initially appear that the Congressional Review Act could be used to cover informal policies like the CFPB auto-lending guidance.

That changed in December, when the Government Accountability Office ruled that unofficial regulations were covered under the law. Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.), who requested the analysis, and Sen. Jerry Moran (R-Kan.) introduced the resolution repealing the guidance. ..........

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is an agency of the United States government responsible for consumer protection in the financial sector. CFPB jurisdiction includes banks, credit unions, securities firms, payday lenders, mortgage-servicing operations, foreclosure relief services, debt collectors and other financial companies operating in the United States. The CFPB's creation was authorized by the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, whose passage in 2010 was a legislative response to the financial crisis of 2007–08 and the subsequent Great Recession.

http://thehill.com/policy/national-secu ... over-comey





Trump’s Latest Foreign Policy Chaos Further Diminishes U.S. Standing, Critics Worry

If the world hadn’t figured out that the president’s words mean almost nothing, this past week made it clear.

WASHINGTON ― As Donald Trump has flipped and flopped on major foreign policy issues in recent days, America’s allies and enemies have likely been reminded yet again of a simple rule of his presidency: Pay little attention to the orange-hued man in the big white house.

The president’s unscripted statements, particularly his tweets, probably do not reflect reality, have not necessarily been thought through, and are subject to change almost immediately, say Trump critics as well as those close to the White House.

“The most important instrument the president of the United States has is his credibility. In the grand scheme of things, it’s more important than the awesome power of our military, intelligence community, and diplomatic corps,” said Ned Price, a former CIA analyst and a National Security Council spokesman under President Barack Obama. “And President Trump has squandered any credibility he once had, both at home and abroad.”

Nicholas Burns, a top State Department official under President George W. Bush, said Trump’s careless talk is actively damaging the nation. “We’re living through a chaos presidency,” he said. “It’s destabilizing the country, and it’s hurting our foreign and military policy.”

White House officials did not respond to HuffPost’s queries on this topic. In the past, they have denied that Trump changes positions or, alternatively, have argued that his unpredictability makes him effective.

For an administration notorious for its inconstant policy choices, the reversals of the past week and a half have been noteworthy nevertheless:

On April 9, Trump vowed that Russia, Iran and anyone else involved with the Syrian government’s suspected use of chemical weapons days earlier would “pay a price.” In an April 11 tweet, Trump even taunted Russia: “Russia vows to shoot down any and all missiles fired at Syria. Get ready Russia, because they will be coming, nice and new and ‘smart!’” Yet when U.S. missiles flew last Friday, the strike was similar to those launched a year ago in response to an earlier chemical weapons attack. Russian and Iranian troops and equipment were not targeted.

On Sunday, U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley announced that the United States would be unveiling new sanctions against Russia because of its alliance with Syrian leader Bashar Assad. On Monday, Trump’s new economic adviser said that was not the case and claimed Haley was confused, to Haley’s consternation. The adviser later backtracked, saying Haley “was certainly not confused” but that “the policy was changed and she wasn’t told about it.”

Last Thursday, Trump declared at a meeting with farm state senators that he wanted to join the Trans-Pacific Partnership, a trade agreement among North American, Latin American and East Asian nations that Trump campaigned against and withdrew from in his first days in office. On Tuesday morning ― just prior to hosting meetings with the leader of one of those nations, Japan ― Trump declared on Twitter that the U.S. wouldn’t be entering the TPP after all. “While Japan and South Korea would like us to go back into TPP, I don’t like the deal for the United States,” he wrote.

Sen. Bob Corker, a Tennessee Republican and retiring chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said he has become desensitized to Trump’s frequent reversals and zigzags. “Forget sanctions on Russia, I can name probably 10 other things where if one day we’re doing one thing, the next day we’re doing another,” he said Wednesday at a breakfast sponsored by The Christian Science Monitor..........

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/tr ... d0715ce555





The world learns to ignore Trump

Diplomats and investors are starting to dismiss Trump’s policy tweets and other quickly shifting statements.

Wall Street, corporate America and the diplomatic world are settling on a strategy to deal with President Donald Trump’s rapidly shifting statements on critical issues like trade deals and Russia sanctions: Just ignore him.

Trump last week shocked the world by suggesting he might rejoin the giant Trans-Pacific Partnership, an 11-nation pact among nations representing 13 percent of the global economy. He reversed himself days later.

Beyond TPP, Trump in recent weeks has declared war on Amazon then not done very much about it.

He settled on Russia sanctions only to ditch them.

leaving American allies and members of his own administration completely befuddled.

In ordinary times, a declaration like the one Trump made about TPP would have sent stocks soaring, thrilled exporters and sent corporate strategists scrambling to assess the impact.

But none of that really happened.

Financial markets and America’s trading partners largely ignored the comments as a throwaway line, and the market wisdom proved to be correct when Trump tweeted that he did not "like the deal for the U.S," deflating the TPP trial balloon before it left the ground.

All of this has led investors, executives and diplomats to the conclusion that trying to act on any single thing Trump says or tweets is a fool’s game. The more effective strategy, these people say, is to look for trends in the broad sweep of Trump’s approach to governance and ignore all the noise.

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/ ... ats-493818





Rodent Infestation, ‘Spread of Filth’ Found Before Egg Recall

Before a U.S. farm voluntarily recalled 207 million eggs, government inspectors found rodents scurrying in manure pits, equipment that was coated with grime and food debris, and outside a swarm of “large flying insects too numerous to count.”

Unsanitary conditions were found during multiple inspections of a Rose Acre Farms facility in Hyde County, North Carolina, that allowed for the “proliferation and spread of filth and pathogens throughout the facility that could cause the contamination of egg processing equipment and eggs,” according to a report from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration detailing inspections. A review of the farm’s pest control records flagged an ongoing rodent infestation, with rodents, dead carcasses and baby mice observed, along with workers who weren’t following proper sanitary practices.

The farm voluntarily recalled the eggs earlier last week after more than 20 consumers became ill from a suspected salmonella poisoning. The recall is the largest of eggs in the U.S. since 2010, when more than 550 million were recalled from two Iowa farms, according to the website Food Safety News.

The FDA’s inspection report “is based on raw observations and in some cases lack proper context,” Gene Grabowski, an outside spokesman for Rose Acre Farms, said in an email. The company is preparing a formal response to the report and “until then, we would urge everyone to wait until all the facts are presented before rushing to judgment.”

‘Debris and Grime’

Throughout a March 28 review, federal inspectors “observed condensation dripping from the ceiling, pipes and down walls onto production equipment” and pooling on floors, the FDA said. Employees were found in violation of proper sanitary procedures, and a steel wool scrubber used to clean debris off equipment was stored on a cart in a dustpan that had a pool of water “floating with debris and grime.”

Salmonella Outbreak Forces Recall of 207 Million Eggs

On one visit, inspectors saw “at least 25 flying insects” in the egg processing facility landing on food, food production equipment and contact surfaces, according to the report.

The company voluntarily recalled the eggs after an investigation of illnesses on the East Coast triggered an inspection of the facility. The recall is equivalent to about 90 days of output at the farm, which produces 2.3 million eggs a day.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles ... egg-recall





Since 2016, Half of All Coral in the Great Barrier Reef Has Died

A new study warns it has become a “highly altered, degraded system.”

Once upon a time, there was a city so dazzling and kaleidoscopic, so braided and water-rimmed, that it was often compared to a single living body. It clustered around a glimmering emerald spine, which astronauts could glimpse from orbit. It hid warm nooks and crannies, each a nursery for new life. It opened into radiant, iris-colored avenues, which tourists crossed oceans to see. The city was, the experts declared, the planet’s largest living structure.

Then, all at once, a kind of invisible wildfire overran the city. It consumed its avenues and neighborhoods, swallowed its canyons and branches. It expelled an uncountable number of dwellers from their homes. It was merciless: Even those who escaped the initial ravishment perished in the famine that followed.

Many people had loved the city, but none of them could protect it. No firefighters, no chemicals, no intervention of any kind could stop the destruction. As the heat plundered the city of its wealth, the experts could only respond with careful, mournful observation.

All of this recently happened, more or less, off the east coast of Australia. The Great Barrier Reef—which, at 1,400 miles long, is the longest and largest coral reef in the world—was blanketed by dangerously hot water in the summer of 2016. This heat strangled and starved the corals, causing what has been called “an unprecedented bleaching event.”

Though that bleaching event was reported at the time, scientists are just starting to understand how catastrophically transformative it was. A new paper, published Wednesday in the journal Nature, serves as a kind of autopsy report for the debacle.

After inspecting every one of its reefs, and surveying them on an almost species-by-species basis, the paper reports that vast swaths of the Great Barrier Reef were permanently transformed in the summer of 2016. The reef’s northern third, previously its most pristine section, lost more than half of its corals. Two of its most recognizable creatures—the amber-colored staghorn corals, and the flat, fanlike tabular corals—suffered the worst casualties.

But damage was widespread out across the entire ecosystem.

“On average, across the Great Barrier Reef, one in three corals died in nine months,” said Terry Hughes, an author of the paper and the director of the ARC Center of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies, the Australian government’s federal research program devoted to corals.

“You could say [the ecosystem] has collapsed. You could say it has degraded. I wouldn’t say that’s wrong,” Hughes said. “A more neutral way of putting it is that it has transformed into a completely new system that looks differently, and behaves differently, and functions differently, than how it was three years ago.”

“It’s a confirmation of our worst fears,” said John Bruno, a marine biologist at the University of North Carolina who was not involved in the study.

Yet it was not the end of troubles for the Great Barrier Reef. In the summer months of 2017, warm waters again struck the reef and triggered another bleaching event. This time, the heat hit the reef’s middle third. Hughes and his team have not published a peer-reviewed paper on that event, but he shared early survey results with me.

Combined, he said, the back-to-back bleaching events killed one in every two corals in the Great Barrier Reef. It is a fact almost beyond comprehension: In the summer of 2015, more than 2 billion corals lived in the Great Barrier Reef. Half of them are now dead.

What caused the devastation? Hughes was clear: human-caused global warming. The accumulation of heat-trapping pollution in the atmosphere has raised the world’s average temperature, making the oceans hotter and less hospitable to fragile tropical corals............
A researcher assesses one area of the Great Barrier Reef that escaped with only minor damage after the 2016 bleaching event.

These staghorn corals off the coast of Guam appeared bleached in October 2017

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/arc ... ed/558302/

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China refuses to recycle more of the world's trash

China just threw another curveball at the global recycling industry.

The Chinese government says it's extending last year's ban on imports of items such as unsorted paper and some plastics to dozens more types of recyclable materials, including steel waste, used auto parts and old ships.

For decades, other countries shipped containers full of scrap and waste to China for recycling. But Beijing stunned the recycling industry last year with its ban on imports of 24 varieties of solid waste.

Now, it's adding 32 more types to the list -- half of them at the end of this year, and the other half at the end of 2019.

China to the United States: Stop sending us your junk

China has billed the ban as a way to reduce environmental damage, but some experts say it could make it worse.

"The new restrictions, just like the old restrictions, are poorly considered measures that will worsen the global environment and China's competitiveness," said Adam Minter, author of "Junkyard Planet: Travels in the Billion Dollar Trash Trade."

The measures, announced Thursday, create a new headache for countries that depend on China to recycle their waste. They're still struggling to adjust to the ban announced in 2017 and will need years to expand their own facilities, Minter said.

Burying waste instead

The restrictions have reportedly led to recycling waste piling up in developed countries with nowhere to send it.

Earlier this week, a city in the Australian state of Queensland said it would start burying its recyclable waste in landfill because of the spiraling costs contractors were demanding to deal with it.


The restrictions have also caused environmental problems in inside China by depriving manufacturers of recycled materials they need to meet demand. That means they have to buy new paper pulp and plastic resins, increasing the environmental toll of their operations, according to Minter.

Ban could hurt consumers

The latest measures could cut Chinese manufacturers off from a cheap source of metals like nickel.

"That move will raise manufacturing costs in China and will be passed along to consumers," Minter added.

China has been importing billions of dollars of foreign trash every year, so the companies that rely on the trade are now having to adapt to the new rules.

The US Institute of Scrap Recycling Industries said the measures announced this week will impact about $400 million of scrap exports from the United States to China.

"We remain concerned about the effect these policies have on the global supply chain of environmentally-friendly, energy-saving scrap commodities," the institute's president, Robin Wiener, said in a statement.

Chinese firms that used to import plastic waste from developed countries have now started investing in recycling operations in the United States, Minter said.

http://money.cnn.com/2018/04/20/news/ec ... index.html





COULD TRUMP SELL DEADLY DRONES TO DICTATORS?

NEW POLICY MAKES IT EASIER TO SELL LETHAL WEAPONS ABROAD

The Trump administration unveiled a new set of policies Thursday that could allow the U.S. to sell armed drones to foreign countries more easily.

For months, President Donald Trump has been hinting at his intention to make it easier for foreign countries to purchase U.S. weapons, including deadly unmanned aerial vehicles. A new protocol on weapons sales had been stalled as policymakers debated whether to include lethal drones among the items more easily exported. Now, the administration has released a fact sheet stating its intention to export deadly drones. The policy details, however, are classified.

“For me what’s noteworthy is that the policy itself is classified. The U.S. is setting a risky precedent about drone use. It sets a tone of a lack of accountability,” Rachel Stohl, director of the Conventional Defense Program at the Stimson Center, a policy research center in D.C., told Newsweek.

The new policy on drone exports replaces a previous set of policies launched at the beginning of 2015 by the Obama administration, according to the State Department fact sheet. It also allegedly promotes several main administration objectives, including increasing trade opportunities for U.S. companies and preserving the U.S. military advantage.

Also on Thursday, the White House released a new policy to govern the transfer of conventional arms abroad. Mimicking the language in the brief on drones, the new policy pledged to increase trade opportunities and bolster U.S. national security.

“When a proposed [arms] transfer is in the national security interest, which includes our economic security, and in our foreign policy interest, the executive branch will advocate strongly on behalf of United States companies,” the policy read.

Still, some analysts argue that it is unclear exactly what the new policy is changing. The memo says a plan of action will be proposed by the secretary of state within 60 days.

“We all expected to see more tangible changes and it just isn’t there. It’s more of a political statement and appealing to the industry base, and putting a buy America, America-first spin on the conventional arms trade. But I think it’s missing a fundamental understanding of how the arms trade actually works,” Stohl told Newsweek. “I can’t tell you what practical impact that will have in the short term. There are a lot of nice words about streamlining procedures. But there are a lot of things that aren’t changed by the policy.”

http://www.newsweek.com/could-trump-sel ... hal-893628





FORMER TRUMP ADVISER ROGER STONE CALLS BARBARA BUSH 'NASTY DRUNK,' 'VINDICTIVE' AFTER FORMER FIRST LADY'S DEATH

Roger Stone, a former adviser to President Donald Trump, responded to the death of former First Lady Barbara Bush by calling her a "nasty drunk" in an Instagram post.

“Barbara Bush was a nasty drunk. When it came to drinking she made Betty Ford look like Carrie Nation #blottoBabs,” Stone wrote, hours after the former first lady's death. “Barbara Bush drank so much booze, if they cremated her … her body would burn for three days.”

When asked about his divisive statements by TheWrap, Stone doubled down.

"She said far worse things about me,” Stone told TheWrap. “Barbara Bush was a vindictive, entitled, mean-spirited woman. May she rest in peace.”'............

http://www.newsweek.com/trump-adviser-r ... unk-893012





THE PLOT AGAINST EUROPE: PUTIN, HUNGARY AND RUSSIA’S NEW IRON CURTAIN

There was a spring chill in the air on April 8, but tens of thousands crowded around the Danube River in Budapest, Hungary, waiting late into the night to hear their hero speak. When he finally emerged, around midnight, they were jubilant, “We have won,” Prime Minister Viktor Orbán declared. “We have given ourselves a chance to defend Hungary.”

Voters had just handed him a landslide victory, a historic third term in office and a supermajority in the parliament. Orbán had run a staunchly anti-immigrant campaign and denounced the European Union as an “empire.” And most voters had loved it. So did Russian President Vladimir Putin. For more than a decade, he has done everything in his power to help Orbán succeed, spreading his divisive brand of anti-EU sentiment across the continent—a process that RT, the Russian state news agency, hailed as “the Orbánization of Europe.”

For years, Russia tried to weaken and divide the EU, supporting groups ranging from Catalan separatists in Spain to British Brexit activists. The Kremlin had offered loans to France’s National Front and used its propaganda channels to whip up fake news about the persecution of Russian minorities in the Baltics. According to Political Capital, a Budapest-based think tank, Russian-based trolls, Twitter bots and social media sock puppets have been put to work, boosting exaggerated stories of crimes by immigrants and “selling pro-Kremlin narratives within a tabloid, conspiracy package.” In the neighboring Czech Republic, the populist, pro-Moscow president, Milos Zeman, was re-elected in February after his pro-EU opponent, Jirí Drahos, fell victim to a concerted smear campaign accusing him of being a pedophile and a Communist collaborator. Most of the stories originated with some 30 Czech websites that Kremlin Watch, a unit run by the Prague-based European Values think tank, has linked to Moscow. The goal? To help pro-Putin sympathizers and sow doubt and discord across Europe, making it harder for Brussels to collectively punish Russian aggression in places such as Ukraine.

The Kremlin has certainly tried to help many of Europe’s nationalist parties and politicians. But its support of Orbán has been unprecedented in its scale and scope. It has included not just propaganda but also sweetheart gas deals, multibillion-dollar loans, strategic investments and covert support for violent far-right hate groups. The payoff has been huge—at least for the Kremlin. Orbán has been a pro-Putin voice in Europe, even as the rest of the EU has recoiled from Moscow in the wake of its annexation of Crimea and its support for rebels in eastern Ukraine...........

http://www.newsweek.com/2018/04/27/puti ... 91843.html





DNC sues Trump, WikiLeaks and Russia over 2016 election

The Democratic National Committee filed a lawsuit today asking for millions of dollars from the Russian government, WikiLeaks, and the Trump campaign for Russia's "all-out assault on our democracy ... hurting the Democratic Party and electing Donald Trump."

The big picture: The last time the DNC used a legal tactic like this was in 1972 during the Watergate scandal when they sued Richard Nixon's re-election campaign for breaking into the DNC headquarters, per Washington Post, who broke the news.

The lawsuit also targets Paul Manafort, Donald Trump Jr., Rick Gates, Roger Stone, Jared Kushner and George Papadopoulos — all believed to be affiliated with Russia.

The gritty details: The lawsuit reveals details that were not previously known, such as the exact date (July 27, 2015) that Russian hacked the DNC computer system. It was hacked again on April 18, 2016 and the hackers started retrieving documents from the server on April 22, per the lawsuit which cites forensic evidence. Papadopoulos was made aware of the Russians' possession of "damaging" information against Hillary Clinton just four days later.

What they're saying: “This constituted an act of unprecedented treachery: the campaign of a nominee for President of the United States in league with a hostile foreign power to bolster its own chance to win the presidency,” DNC Chairman Tom Perez said in a statement to the Washington Post.

Meanwhile, Trump maintains "there was NO COLLUSION (except by the Dems)!"

https://www.axios.com/dnc-russia-lawsui ... b3b31.html





Trump Kept Saying He Didn't Stay Overnight In Moscow In 2013, According To Comey's Memos. But He Did.

Tweets and Instagram posts make it clear that Trump spent one or two nights in Russia the weekend of Miss Universe 2013.



In two of James Comey's memos about his interactions with President Donald Trump, the former FBI director says that Trump made a point to tell him that he didn't stay overnight in Moscow when he was there for the 2013 Miss Universe pageant.

Trump himself, however, said he spent the "weekend" in Moscow surrounding the Saturday evening event — and contemporaneous information about the event (in addition to subsequent reporting) makes clear that Trump spent at least one night, and likely two nights, in Moscow during the trip.

On the Monday morning after returning from Moscow, Trump tweeted to his partner in hosting the pageant in Moscow, Aras Agalarov, that he had enjoyed his weekend there.

Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
@AgalarovAras I had a great weekend with you and your family. You have done a FANTASTIC job. TRUMP TOWER-MOSCOW is next. EMIN was WOW!

11:39 AM - Nov 11, 2013
4,604
9,701 people are talking about this

So, what is this all about? In Comey's memos, he details that Trump, on two occasions, told the then-FBI director that he didn't spend the night in Moscow in 2013 — part of the president's response to and insistence that claims made in the "Steele dossier" couldn't possibly be true.

The first time Trump made the claim, in Comey's telling, was during a one-on-one dinner between the two men that took place in the Green Room of the White House on Jan. 27, 2017.
Comey wrote that Trump then raised the claim again in the Oval Office a week and a half later, on Feb. 8 — with then-White House chief of staff Reince Priebus in attendance.
What actually happened? Social media posts from that weekend alone show how unbelievable it is that Trump claims he didn't stay overnight.

On Friday, Nov. 8, 2013, Agalarov's son, Emin, posted an Instagram photo of Trump's arrival at Crocus City Hall — the Agalarovs' venue where the pageant was held.
The next day, Saturday, Nov. 9, 2013, Trump tweeted:

Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
I'm in Moscow for Miss Universe tonight - picking a winner is very hard, they are all winners. Total sellout of arena. Big night in Russia!

8:47 AM - Nov 9, 2013
669
1,068 people are talking about this

Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
I was just given a great tour of Moscow - fantastic, hard working people. CITY IS REALLY ENERGIZED! The World will be watching tonight!

9:21 AM - Nov 9, 2013
153
308 people are talking about this

Then, Trump and the Agalarovs went to the Saturday, November 9, 2013, pageant.
https://www.buzzfeed.com/chrisgeidner/t ... .ndjZnq6bp





UH-OH

Judge on Cohen Raids: Likely There is ‘Criminal Action to Follow’

U.S. District Court Judge S. James Otero said Friday that the FBI’s raid on the home and office of President Donald Trump’s personal attorney, Michael Cohen, could result in a criminal charges, according to the Los Angeles Times. “It is substantially likely there is going to be criminal action to follow,” Otero said during a hearing in Los Angeles, adding that Cohen’s lawyers were advising him correctly to avoid self-incrimination. Otero also said there were “gaping holes” in Cohen’s request for a 90-day stay for the Stormy Daniels lawsuit, and gave him until Wednesday to file a declaration “stating he plans to assert his 5th Amendment rights in the Daniels’ case.” Otero subsequently postponed the ruling for the lawsuit delay. Daniels is suing to free herself from the 2016 nondisclosure agreement regarding her alleged affair with Trump. The U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York is investigating Cohen for criminal charges.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/judge-to- ... w?ref=home





GOP in retreat on ObamaCare

Republicans are retreating from calls to repeal ObamaCare ahead of this year’s midterm elections.

Less than a year after the GOP gave up on its legislative effort to repeal the law, Democrats are going on offense on this issue, attacking Republicans for their votes as they hope to retake the House majority.

Antonio Delgado, a Democrat running for Rep. John Faso’s (R-N.Y.) seat, is running an ad saying Faso broke a promise to protect people with pre-existing conditions.

Faso voted for the House’s repeal bill in 2017. He says his message on ObamaCare is “keep what works, fix what doesn't.”

The Cook Political Report rates the race a toss-up.

Rep. Tom MacArthur, a New Jersey Republican who spearheaded a compromise that helped push an ObamaCare repeal bill through the House last spring, is also playing defense. He is in a competitive race in a district rated as lean Republican by Cook.

Asked if the GOP should push forward with ObamaCare repeal, MacArthur replied: “I am focused on improving healthcare in any way we can; I'm not looking to tilt at windmills.”

ObamaCare’s favorability in polls has improved since the repeal push last year, with more now favoring the law than not. A Kaiser Family Foundation poll in March found that 50 percent of the public favors the law, while 43 percent holds an unfavorable view.

GOP strategist Ford O’Connell said the political winds have shifted on the issue, turning ObamaCare into a subject Democrats want to tout and many Republicans want to duck.

“I don’t think it’s seen as a winning issue,” he said. “It’s also an issue that tends to fire up the Democratic base more so than the Republican base.”

Republican supporters of repeal argue the House is paying for the Senate GOP’s sins.

While Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), with the help of lawmakers such as MacArthur and Faso, was able to muscle through ObamaCare repeal legislation, it died in the Senate.

That’s a bigger factor than shifts in the law’s popularity, said Michael Steel, a former aide to former Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio).

While “there’ve been some incremental improvements in the popularity,” he said, “I think the legislative record is the bigger factor.”

Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.) likewise argued that “the Senate has sabotaged the issue.”

Democrats argue they have the wind at their backs on health care, pointing to polls like a CNN survey in February that found 83 percent of voters rate health care as important to their vote, above the economy or taxes.

“If Republicans continue their war on health care and Democrats call them on it, the opposition party will continue to widen its advantage in the midterm elections,” Brad Woodhouse, campaign director of the pro-ObamaCare group Protect Our Care, wrote in a memo this month.

Asked if Republicans should run on ObamaCare repeal this year, Rep. Chris Collins (R-N.Y.) replied simply, “No.”

“Frankly I think we should be running more on our positive issues, starting with tax reform,” Collins said.

If Republicans do talk about health care, he said, it should be in attacking Democrats for favoring a single payer system.

“When one of our opponents comes out and says ‘I want a single-payer system,’ sure I'll take it to them, but I don't think we should be leading with it,” Collins said. “I think to some extent we've moved beyond that message.”

Some conservatives are not happy with Republicans who are backing down on the issue.

“Freedom should be a winning issue,” said Jason Pye, vice president of legislative affairs at the conservative group FreedomWorks. “Republicans should be running on this.”

He said the party needs to get better at messaging. “They aren’t messaging it at all; they're not talking about it all,” he said.

Jesse Hunt, a spokesman for the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC), kept up the criticism of the health-care law when asked if Republicans are backing off the issue.

“Voters will be made aware of Democrats’ leading role in destroying the American health care system,” he said. “They own every failure after they forced Obamacare on the country.”

While many Republicans said they are not going to emphasize health care in the campaign this year, they argued they are not worried about Democratic attacks.

“Some people don't like my involvement, other people appreciate it,” said MacArthur, who brokered a crucial compromise with the conservative Freedom Caucus last year that helped the repeal bill pass the House. “I did what I believe was right.”

Cole, a former chairman of the NRCC, said many Republicans are in districts where Democratic attacks on repeal won’t work.

“If that's the attack, bring it on in my district, every district's different, but I'm in a state where we're not even a Medicaid expansion state because that's considered ObamaCare,” Cole said.

Faso said that he now wants to take potentially bipartisan actions to help bring premiums down, like providing funding known as reinsurance to lower rates.

“We shouldn't relitigate the issue from 2010,” he said. “We should actually figure [it] out, and resist the temptation of sloganeering on this and actually work to fix the system.”
http://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/38 ... -obamacare





The Head of the Deutsche Bank Division That Loaned Trump $364 Million Just Got a Big Promotion

Christian Sewing is the struggling firm’s new CEO.

Last week, Deutsche Bank, the struggling financial giant that is Donald Trump’s biggest lender, anointed a new CEO, a longtime executive named Christian Sewing. He’s worked in a number of roles at the bank, but what’s significant about his résumé is the job he held prior to his promotion: He oversaw the firm’s private bank, the division that caters to high-net-worth clients and has loaned Trump’s company hundreds of millions of dollars over the years, when few lenders (including Deutsche Bank’s own commercial lending arm) would do business with the bankruptcy-prone businessman. According to Trump’s financial disclosures, he has loans with the bank totaling as much as $364 million.

Sewing, who has worked for the German bank since 1989, was tapped in 2015 to run the firm’s retail and private banking divisions. During his tenure, the private bank made a $170 million loan to the Trump Organization to finance its new Washington, DC, hotel—one of at least four loans it has made to Trump and his businesses over the years. (The private bank also loaned money to a failed business venture that Donald Trump Jr. was involved in.) It was also during Sewing’s stint running the private bank that the company began to grapple with some of the sticky issues that arise when you hold hundreds of millions in debt belonging to the president of the United States.

Trump made a personal guarantee on some of his loans, meaning that in the event of a default by the Trump Organization, he would be personally responsible for some of the money owed to the bank. In late 2016 and early 2017, Deutsche Bank’s private banking division reportedly attempted to restructure Trump’s various debts in an effort to remove his guarantees from the agreements, since the prospect of having a sitting president on the hook for tens of millions of dollars seemed problematic. But the effort to renegotiate the loans foundered.

“Discussions about the loans have moved from the bank’s lending experts, who were trying to strip out the personal recourse, to more senior managers, who are assessing the political ramifications of any restructuring,” reported Bloomberg last March. It’s not clear if Trump’s loans were ever restructured.

Having Trump as a client became a headache for the bank in other ways, particularly after congressional committees and special counsel Robert Mueller began probing ties between the Trump campaign and Russia. Mueller’s office reportedly subpoenaed Deutsche Bank for information on former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort, and according to the New York Times, the US attorney for the Eastern District of New York has sought documents relating to the family of Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner. The news that Mueller was seeking records from Deutsche Bank reportedly enraged Trump so much that he considered firing Mueller, but aides talked him down.

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/20 ... promotion/





McConnell aims to reshape courts in case Senate flips

The Kentucky Republican is prioritizing confirmation of conservative judges in what may be his final months as majority leader.

Mitch McConnell is making a last dash to stock the judiciary with conservatives this year as a hedge against the chance that Republicans lose the Senate in November.

The GOP may have only a few more months of unified control of Washington to repeal Obamacare or enact President Donald Trump’s infrastructure plan. But the Senate majority leader is taking a longer view — and confirming as many conservative judges as possible to lifetime appointments.

The move will show conservative voters that the Senate can still get things done even if Republicans lose the House and is part of McConnell’s years-long plan to reshape the courts after the presidency of Barack Obama shifted them to the left. Since becoming majority leader in 2015, the Kentucky Republican stymied Obama’s nominees for two years, including blocking a Supreme Court hopeful. And now he’s going into overdrive with Trump as president.

Trump has already nominated 69 judges, but there are 149 total vacancies. GOP leaders say McConnell is intent on filling as many as he can this year, in part out of concern that Democrats take back the Senate and exact retribution on McConnell and Trump for changing the face of the courts.

“You have to be realistic about it and go into it with an expectation that [losing the Senate] is a possibility. And for that reason, I think it’s important that we move judiciously to get done as many as we can,” said Sen. John Thune of South Dakota, the No. 3 GOP leader...............

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/ ... ate-537366





A payday lender is accused of stealing millions from customers. Trump’s CFPB is now letting them off the hook.

The consumer bureau is playing nice with payday lenders under the leadership of Mick Mulvaney

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) is taking it easy on payday lenders accused of preying on low-income workers.

In the agency’s first report to Congress since Mick Mulvaney took the helm in November, the CFPB said it is dropping sanctions against NDG Financial Corp, a group of 21 businesses that the agency, under President Obama, had accused of running “a cross-border online payday lending scheme” in Canada and the United States.

“The scheme primarily involved making loans to U.S. consumers in violation of state usury laws and then using unfair, deceptive, and abusive practices to collect on the loans and profit from the revenues,” the CFPB lawyers argued in the complaint filed in the Southern District of New York in 2015.

The CFPB’s lawsuit had been winding its way through the courts until Mulvaney took over the bureau. One of the lead attorneys defending the payday lenders was Steven Engel, who is now assistant attorney general at the US Justice Department, and who was listed as an active attorney in the case until November 14, the day after he was sworn into office.

In February, the agency dismissed charges against six defendants in the case, according to federal court records. The reason for the dismissal was not explained in the court motion, and the CFPB declined to answer Vox’s questions about the case.

Now the CFPB is “terminating sanctions” against the remaining defendants, according to the agency’s latest report to Congress. A federal judge had sanctioned the uncooperative defendants in March by entering a default judgment against them, which held them liable for the charges of unfair and deceptive business practices. The next step was to figure out how much they would pay in damages to consumers and attorney’s fees — a step that the CFPB suggests it won’t be taking anymore.

The CFPB’s dismantling of the case against NDG is the latest example of the bureau backing off of payday loan companies accused of defrauding consumers — an industry that donated more than $60,000 to Mulvaney’s past congressional campaigns.

The industry also appears to be currying favor with the Trump administration another way: This week, the Community Financial Services Association of America, which represents payday lenders, is holding its annual conference at Trump National Doral near Miami — a gathering that has been greeted by protesters.

A new day for payday lenders

In January, the CFPB dropped another lawsuit against four online payday lenders that allegedly stole millions of dollars from consumers’ bank accounts to pay debts they didn’t owe. A different payday lender, World Acceptance Group (a past donor to Mulvaney’s campaigns), announced that month that the CFPB had dropped its probe of the South Carolina company...........

Payday loans are terrible for consumers

The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was created as part of the Dodd-Frank Act of 2010, which sought to regulate banks and lenders in the wake of the financial crisis. One of the main reasons for creating the quasi-independent agency was to protect consumers in the financial sector, particularly those consumers seeking mortgages, student loans, and credit cards. The CFPB regulates the financial arena in other ways — for instance, to make sure lenders aren’t discriminating against certain customers (a mission that is also being rolled back)...........

Mulvaney plans to ease rules for payday companies

Before Richard Cordray stepped down as director of the CFPB, the agency had just finalized a rule to prevent payday lenders from giving money to people who can’t repay the loans.

The regulation, known as the Payday, Vehicle Title, and Certain High-Cost Installment, requires lenders to check whether a borrower can repay the loan before making it. The agency argued that the rule would still give consumers access to short-term loans because they could still take out six payday loans per year regardless of their ability to pay back the money. Lenders would only need to verify a customer’s likelihood to repay the debt when they take out a seventh loan or more..............

In all, 2018 is turning out to be a good year for payday lenders.

Stocks for two of the biggest payday loan companies, EZ Corp and First Cash (the owners of EZ Pawn and Cash America) have skyrocketed since the beginning of the year:
https://www.vox.com/2018/4/20/17225564/ ... loan-cases

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14 states hit record-low unemployment

By Reid Wilson - 04/23/18

Fourteen states have set new records for low unemployment rates in the last year, nearly a decade after the recession put millions of Americans out of work.

The states hitting new unemployment lows run the ideological gamut, from conservative Texas to liberal California, suggesting a recovery stronger than any particular political persuasion.

In March, eight states saw new record lows, including Hawaii (2.1 percent), Idaho (2.9 percent), Kentucky (4 percent ), Maine (2.7 percent), Mississippi (4.5 percent), Oregon (4.1 percent) and Wisconsin (2.9 percent).


California also set a new record last month. The Golden State’s unemployment rate stands at 4.1 percent, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS). That’s the lowest rate recorded since BLS began keeping track of state-level unemployment figures in 1976, and it’s a third of the 12.3 percent unemployment rate California notched at the height of the recession in December 2010.

Colorado’s unemployment rate is just 2.6 percent, among the lowest in the nation, and a third of the 8.9 percent peak it hit in 2010.

In Alabama, just 3.7 percent of workers are unemployed. Arkansas reached a 3.6 percent unemployment rate last May, its lowest rate ever.

North Dakota set its own record last year. Texas hit a 3.9 percent unemployment rate in November, after peaking at 8.3 percent during the height of the recession. Tennessee fell to the lowest unemployment rate it has ever measured, 3.3 percent, in January.

Hawaii’s unemployment rate is the lowest in the nation, BLS said. Idaho, Iowa, Maine, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Dakota and Wisconsin all have unemployment rates lower than 3 percent.

Such a tight job market means businesses are competing for workers, rather than workers competing for scarce jobs. That has some economists combing through data in search of evidence of rising wages, which have been largely stagnant since the recession.

Wages have risen only slowly in recent months. The average hourly earnings of nonfarm employees stood at $26.82 in March, up from $26.11 at the same time last year.

Alaska has the highest unemployment rate in the nation, at 7.3 percent, as low commodity prices challenge a state that performed relatively well during the recession. But Alaska’s unemployment rate has historically been higher than the national average; the lowest rate the state has ever recorded, in June 2007, was 6.3 percent, markedly higher than the 4.6 percent national unemployment rate at the time.

The District of Columbia and New Mexico both had unemployment rates of 5.6 percent last month, while West Virginia’s rate stood at 5.4 percent.

Sean Hannity is a 'welfare queen'

The controversial performance artist, host of the eponymous unreality TV show, has been revealed by The Guardian as a beneficiary of a federal mortgage guarantee program.

The Guardian found that Hannity owns millions of dollars of real estate through more than 20 shell corporations, which shield his identity. The federal Department of Housing and Urban Development, The Guardian notes, insured the mortgage loans with which Hannity purchased the properties. Let's be clear: This is a subsidy. This is a benefit. This is big government aiding a very wealthy man. This is welfare.

On his state-run media platform, Hannity can be found decrying welfare. He once expressed shock as he interviewed a California surfer and musician who received $189 a month in food stamps, as well as government health insurance. "Welfare Wave" the graphic blared. In 2012, comedian Jon Stewart slammed Hannity for promoting the fiction that President Barack Obama had created "an entitlement society."

In 2013, Hannity complained that an African-American man in Tennessee had allegedly fathered 22 children who were receiving welfare. A Hannity guest called for sterilizing the man. Another Hannity guest opined that "the women should have kept their legs closed."

But when it came to accepting government support for his real estate investments, Hannity didn't keep his wallet closed. The ethic of rugged individualism gave way to the desire to have the federal government help line Hannity's pocket.

The ugly welfare stereotypes that Hannity advances -- an indolent African-American, a long-haired California hippy -- feed the grievances of his audience. Little do they know it is actually Hannity with his hand in the welfare cookie jar.

He is not alone. One of the biggest welfare queens of all is living large in public housing at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. By one account, President Donald Trump has received $885 million in tax breaks from the government of New York alone. That doesn't count the federal goodies Trump scarfs up, most recently the millions he stands to gain from the tax cut he signed into law. (We won't know for sure until he releases his taxes. My guess is that will happen just after the hockey game played in hell.)

President Ronald Reagan, who popularized the concept of a welfare queen, understood the outrage many folks feel when people who don't need government assistance take it anyway. "The truly needy," he said in his 1983 State of the Union Address, "suffer as funds intended for them are taken not by the needy, but by the greedy."

Hannity issued a statement Monday: "It is ironic that I am being attacked for investing my personal money in communities that badly need such investment and in which, I am sure, those attacking me have not invested their money," he said. "The fact is, these are investments that I do not individually select, control, or know the details about; except that obviously I believe in putting my money to work in communities that otherwise struggle to receive such support."

Yes, Sean, I'm sure it's your own money. But it's being guaranteed with taxpayers' money. That's a government subsidy. And my guess is you used shell corporations to keep your name out of the documents because you didn't want your hypocrisy exposed.

Sean Hannity is a lot of things. Needy isn't one of them. Greedy, in President Reagan's framing, seems more like it. Perhaps the program that guarantees Hannity's investments is a wise one. Perhaps, on the other hand, it is a wasteful welfare program. That's not the point. It's the hypocrisy, stupid.

Hannity is a very wealthy man. So is Donald Trump. It appears that part of the way they became rich was by decrying welfare for poor folks, then grabbing it for themselves. They view their voters, their viewers, as saps. Stooges. Suckers. As another great huckster said, there's one born every minute. And Hannity is laughing all the way to the bank.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/04/23/opinions ... index.html





Sean Hannity Defends Real Estate Empire Aided By HUD Loans

The Fox News host defended his choice not to disclose his investments, despite covering the HUD secretary on his show.

Fox News host Sean Hannity is speaking out following a report that he purchased discounted and foreclosed properties as investment tools through shell companies, all the while receiving support from the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

The “Hannity” talk show host, in a statement Monday, defended his choice to not publicly disclose what he described as his “personal” investments.

His real estate portfolio was disclosed by The Guardian on Sunday, following an investigation into President Donald Trump’s attorney, Michael Cohen, whom Hannity had undisclosed ties to before his name surfaced in court last week. Hannity had said last week that he was not a client of Cohen’s but had sought his advice on real estate. Among the documents the FBI seized from Cohen were details on the real estate investments.

In his statement, Hannity said that he did not “individually select, control or know the details about” the real estate investments that he made but that they were going to communities that he said “badly need such investment.”

Properties linked to Hannity, which were disclosed by The Guardian, include more than 870 homes that were purchased in seven states over the last decade. Their value totals at least $90 million.

Hannity, whose salary from Fox News is estimated by Forbes to be $36 million annually, acknowledged in his statement that he received loans from HUD to invest in properties during President Barack Obama’s administration.

Those mortgage loans, which, according to the Guardian, were acquired through HUD’s National Housing Act, offered investors protection against loan defaults when purchasing rental properties. There were larger loan guarantees given to buyers who offered housing to low-income tenants. Two of the most expensive properties reportedly purchased by Hannity in Georgia used $17.9 million that he acquired through HUD’s program.

After Ben Carson took over as secretary of HUD under Trump, Hannity’s loan portfolio increased by $5 million, The Guardian reported.

Hannity argued that he never discussed his original loans obtained during Obama’s administration with anyone at HUD. But he also didn’t disclose them to his viewers, including while interviewing Carson on his program last year and praising Carson’s work. Hannity also did not disclose his connection to Cohen, despite defending him on his program.

Journalists, as part of a code of ethics, are expected to recuse themselves from reporting on a subject that involves a personal connection or, at the least, disclose those connections. Hannity has argued that he is not a journalist, despite the fact that he covers national news and interviews high-profile guests on “Hannity.” Last week he identified himself as “an opinion journalist or advocacy journalist” instead.

In a twist, while he was reportedly buying up discounted homes, Hannity criticized Obama and blamed him for Americans’ struggles to own their own homes amid the nation’s housing crisis. On his program in 2016, he said Obama has failed to turn talk into action when it came to helping “every American get ahead.”

“The rate of those who own a home has now dropped several percentage points. Now we also saw record numbers of foreclosures during his presidency. 2011 was the worst year on record for home sales,” he told his viewers on that program.

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/se ... 502a4e0b52





AWKWARD

Philadelphia Eagles Owner Jeffrey Lurie Laments ‘Disastrous’ Trump Presidency

Jeffrey Lurie, the owner of the Super Bowl champion Philadelphia Eagles, called the Trump presidency “disastrous” in secretly recorded audio obtained by The New York Times. The revelation comes as the Eagles are likely set to visit the White House for the team’s Super Bowl celebration with the president. “Another fact I want to throw out there: Many of us have no interest in supporting President Trump,” Lurie said, adding that “many of us” view that Trump presidency as “disastrous.” Lurie has encouraged his players’ efforts to highlight social injustices through the “kneeling” protests that gripped much of the National Football League last season.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/philadelp ... presidency





White House won't rule out pardon for Trump's lawyer

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders on Monday refused to discuss whether President Trump is considering a pardon for his embattled personal attorney, Michael Cohen.

“It’s hard to close a door on something that hasn’t taken place. I don’t like to discuss or comment on hypothetical situations that may or may not ever happen,” Sanders said during Monday’s press briefing.

She referred further questions on Cohen’s case to his and Trump’s personal attorneys. She later added that Trump has "been clear that he hasn't done anything wrong."

Her statement echoes her comments earlier in the day that the White House would not discuss "hypotheticals that don't exist right now."
White House Legislative Affairs Director Marc Short told CNN on Monday morning that there's "no need" to pardon Cohen "at this point."

Cohen, Trump's longtime personal lawyer, is reportedly under investigation for bank fraud and campaign finance law violations. Federal agents raided his home, hotel room and office earlier this month, seizing financial records, communications between him and his clients and materials related to payments to two women who alleged they had affairs with Trump.

Trump on Saturday attacked The New York Times for a report that the president's legal team is bracing for Cohen to cooperate with investigators and turn on Trump.

The president praised Cohen as a "fine person" and denied that he would "flip."

http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... mps-lawyer





Trump lawyer tried to apologize to Melania over Stormy Daniels payment: report

President Trump’s personal lawyer, Michael Cohen tried to apologize to first lady Melania Trump about his payment to adult-film star Stormy Daniels, according to The New York Times.

The Times reported on Friday that earlier this year at a Republican fundraiser hosted at President Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort, Cohen approached Melania Trump to try to apologize “for the pain” he caused with the money.

Cohen made $130,000 payment to Daniels in October of 2016 as part of a nondisclosure agreement regarding her alleged affair with President Trump.

Melania Trump was reportedly “blindsided” by the reports of the payment and kept out of the public eye for several days.

She also suddenly backed out of a trip in January to travel with Trump to the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.

Cohen has repeatedly said that he paid Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, out of his own pocket and was not reimbursed by Trump or the campaign.

When the FBI raided Cohen’s office earlier this month, agents were reportedly seeking documents related to that payment. They also sought information about Karen McDougal, a former Playboy model who alleges she had an affair with Trump.

The Wall Street Journal first reported of the six-figure payment in January, triggering a long legal battle between Daniels, Cohen and Trump.

Daniels is pursuing legal action to break that nondisclosure agreement, arguing it is invalid because Trump reportedly never signed it.

She also offered to return the payment in order to speak publicly about the relationship she says she had with Trump in 2006, the year after Trump married Melania.

The White House and a spokesperson for Melania Trump have denied the affair.

http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... my-daniels





Dozens of retired generals, admirals oppose Haspel nomination to be CIA director

The nomination of Gina Haspel to be CIA director has hit a major snag, as dozens of military officers have written to senators, opposing her confirmation because of her actions in the CIA in the Bush administration.

"We are deeply troubled," the retired officers write, "by the prospect of someone who appears to have been intimately involved in torture being elevated to one of the most important positions of leadership in the intelligence community." They refer to Haspel's role running a "black site" prison in Thailand where suspects were tortured and at least one detainee, Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri was repeatedly tortured and waterboarded, and her role in overseeing "the CIA's entire interrogation program—a program that was rife with mismanagement and abuse."

We understand that some well-respected former senior government intelligence officials have spoken highly of Ms. Haspel's experience and long record of service to the Agency. However, we do not accept efforts to excuse her actions relating to torture and other unlawful abuse of detainees by offering that she was "just following orders," or that shock from the 9/11 terrorist attacks should excuse illegal and unethical conduct. We did not accept the "just following orders" justification after World War II, and we should not accept it now. Waterboarding and other forms of torture or cruel and inhuman treatment are—and always have been—clearly unlawful. Individuals in the service of our country, even at the lowest levels, have a duty to refuse to carry out such actions. […]

We devoted our lives to the defense of our country. We know that fidelity to our most cherished ideals as a nation is the foundation of our security. The torture and cruel treatment of prisoners undermines our national security by increasing the risks to our troops, hindering cooperation with allies, alienating populations whose support the United States needs in the struggle against terrorism, and providing a propaganda tool for extremists who wish to do us harm. It would send a terrible signal to confirm as the next Director of the CIA someone who was so intimately involved in this dark chapter of our nation's history.

The officers are advising senators to request a full declassification, with necessary redactions, of information related to Haspel's involvement in the program. "If the record shows that Ms. Haspel played any role in carrying out, supervising, or directing any form of torture or detainee abuse, or the destruction of evidence relating to these activities," they conclude, "we urge you to reject her nomination." The CIA has been engaged in a unusual PR campaign promoting Haspel, and as part of that declassified one memo praising her decision to destroy videotapes of torture being conducted in that Thai black site.

Haspel's hearing in the Intelligence Committee is scheduled for May 9.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/4 ... A-director





Mysterious allegations could threaten Trump VA pick: reports

Members of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee have reportedly been informed of unspecified allegations against Rear Adm. Ronny Jackson, President Trump's pick to the lead the VA, posing a new roadblock for his nomination.

The Washington Post reported Monday evening that the Senate panel is delaying a confirmation hearing for Jackson previously scheduled for Wednesday as members look into the new claims.

Two sources told CNN that Republicans and Democrats on the committee have been informed of allegations of improper conduct at more than one stage in the career of Jackson, who currently serves as White House physician.

(Ronny Jackson not qualified; running a hostile work environment; excessive drinking on the job; and improper dispensing of drugs - Again - Poor vetting by the president and his staff; The staff keeps rubber stamping trumps unqualified nominees )

The White House did not immediately respond to The Hill's request for comment.

“There’s a need for very exacting and close scrutiny and vetting,” Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) said, according to Politico. “And some questions that need to be answered. I’m not going to comment on any of the specifics, except to say we’re going to be doing very close and careful scrutiny.”

The committee's ranking Democrat, Sen. John Tester (Mont.) told CNN that the allegations against Jackson would be considered troubling "only if true," adding that "we'll see" if Democrats could determine if the allegations were true before Wednesday.

"All I can really tell you at this moment time is we are continuing the vetting process. We are working very hard at it. It's all hands on deck," Tester said.

Jackson was tapped to replace former Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin last month.

Shulkin, Trump's only Cabinet secretary who had served in the Obama administration, had faced backlash for his use of taxpayer dollars on travel.

Shulkin was confirmed unanimously and appeared in the White House briefing room during the first year of the Trump administration to promote accomplishments.

While Jackson is an active-duty Navy admiral who has been the physician to the president since 2013, various lawmakers have raised concerns over his fitness to run the VA, which is the second-largest government bureaucracy.

He gained national attention earlier this year when he revealed the results of Trump's physical examination, telling reporters at the White House that the president has "good genes."

http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3845 ... ck-reports





Pompeo nomination narrowly clears panel, goes to full Senate

WASHINGTON (AP) — Mike Pompeo, President Donald Trump’s choice for secretary of state, avoided a rare rebuke Monday as the Senate Foreign Relations Committee narrowly recommended him, but the vote served as a warning shot to the White House as nominees to lead the CIA and Veterans Affairs are hitting stiff resistance.

Pompeo, who’s now CIA director, received the panel’s approval only after Trump’s last-minute overtures to Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky. Pompeo’s nomination now goes to the full Senate, where votes are tallying in his favor and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said he looks forward to voting to confirm him later this week.

Trump has been quick to fire his top cabinet secretaries, but Senate Democrats are not so fast to confirm replacements. A grilling is expected Wednesday of Ronny Jackson, the White House physician nominated to head the VA, and Pompeo’s potential replacement at the CIA, Gina Haspel, is also facing scrutiny.

It’s also a reminder of how tough it could be to replace Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein. Trump has publicly mused about firing Rosenstein, who is overseeing special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 election.

“Hard to believe,” Trump tweeted Monday about what he called “obstruction.” ″The Dems will not approve hundreds of good people... They are maxing out the time on approval process for all, never happened before. Need more Republicans!”...........

( This guy just does not get it )

https://www.apnews.com/bd55f217dbd34812 ... ull-Senate

I haven't turned on CNN in a long time. What are they bitching about nowadays? That Trump put North Korean nuclear scientists out of work?

Let's see if trump negotiates a deal for Jung-Un to give up his nuclear arsenal

Republicans Want to Throw the Book at Colorado Teachers Getting Ready to Strike

A new bill would cost teachers $500 a day in fines for walking out—and even jail time.

Nearly a week before thousands of Colorado teachers are expected to descend on the state capitol to rally for better pay and protest potential retirement benefit cuts, two Republican lawmakers introduced a bill to try to stop them from striking in the future.

The bill, introduced Friday by state Sen. Bob Gardner and Rep. Paul Lundeen, would stop public school teachers and teachers’ unions from organizing strikes against employers. School districts would be barred from paying teachers who participate during the time of the strike. The districts could also seek an injunction to stop a strike from happening.

If teachers failed to comply, they could face up to $500 a day in fines and up to six months in county jail—and if found in contempt of court, they could be fired without a hearing.

The bill, which is seen as a long shot to make it through the state Legislature, came just days after hundreds of Colorado educators rallied in Denver, joining educators in West Virginia, Oklahoma, Kentucky, and Arizona in protesting for better pay and funding for public schools. Gardner told the Denver Post on Monday that the idea for the proposed legislation emerged after the strike in West Virginia, and he noted he was open to changes in the penalty for teachers who strike, adding it was “probably most important” that unions are penalized for sponsoring a strike.

“It’s a wise thing to do, in some shape or form, in the state of Colorado because we have one district that’s already voted to strike. We have others discussing a strike,” Gardner told the Post. “Strikes are not good for children.” On Twitter, Colorado Senate Democrats slammed the bill as “anti-worker trash.”

Last week, the Colorado Education Association, the state’s teachers’ union, announced that a statewide rally would take place this Thursday and Friday, prompting several school districts to cancel classes for those days, including eight of the state’s largest districts, affecting more than 400,000 kids.

Colorado teachers were among the lowest paid in the country in the 2016-2017 school year, making an average of $46,506, a 15 percent drop from the 1999-2000 school year, according to the National Center for Education Statistics. Educators there get paid worse than their peers who aren’t teachers, earning just 65 cents for every dollar other college graduates make, according to the Economic Policy Institute. In Arizona, where educators are expected to participate in a walkout on Thursday, that number is 63 cents.

At the same time, according to the Colorado Education Association, the state’s teachers spend an average of $656 out of their own pockets to pay for school supplies every year.

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/20 ... them-jail/





Trump said this tax break was for small businesses. It’s giving $17 billion to millionaires this year.

Those making $1 million or more will save more than $30 billion on the “pass-through” tax deduction by 2024.

If many average Americans aren’t noticing or loving the tax cut bill yet, it might be understandable — it benefits the wealthy by design. And a congressional report released this week shows that one specific new deduction for so-called “pass-through” companies is heavily benefiting the rich.

The Joint Committee on Taxation on Monday released a report outlining some of the initial effects of the tax law passed in December. (NBC News was first to report on it.) The committee estimates that the owners of pass-through entities — companies organized as sole proprietorships, partnerships, LLCs, or S corporations that don’t pay corporate income taxes — will save $40.2 billion in 2018 thanks to the tax bill.

Of that total, $17.4 billion will go to individuals and households making more than $1 million per year. (Revenue estimators are based on tax returns, so a married couple filing jointly is one taxpayer, and a married couple filing separately are two.)

By 2024, the committee estimates pass-throughs will save $60.3 billion on taxes via the new law. More than half of the benefit — $31.6 billion — will go to individuals and households earning more than $1 million.

How the new tax law benefits wealthy business owners

Pass-through companies have their income “passed through” to their owners to be taxed under the individual income tax rate instead of the corporate rate. The vast majority of US businesses are pass-throughs, including those owned by President Donald Trump — his Trump Organization is structured as a collection of pass-through entities.

Under the previous tax law, such companies could be taxed as much as 39.6 percent, the individual rate for the highest earners.

Under the new tax regime, pass-throughs get to deduct up to 20 percent from their income before they’re taxed. Aaron Krupkin and Howard Gleckman, analysts at the Tax Policy Center think tank, called the deduction “extremely generous” for those who qualify it, noting the law as it’s written is complicated to navigate. (So much for simplifying the tax code.)

The Joint Committee on Taxation’s Monday analysis showed just how generous the pass-through change is. Those making $1 million or more will reap $17.8 billion of the total $40.2 billion benefits of the law in 2018, or about 44.3 percent, and those making over $500,000 will get $3.6 billion. In other words, people making over $500,000 will get more than half of the entire benefit this year.

And by 2024, it will be even more skewed. Pass-through tax breaks will total $60.3 billion, with those making $1 million getting $31.6 billion and those making $500,000 getting $5.3 billion in tax benefits.
“Congress advertised the pass-through deduction as relief for ‘small-business,’ but in reality, it mainly benefits the one percent, as JCT’s table demonstrates,” said Steve Rosenthal, a senior fellow at the Tax Policy Center.

The GOP put in guardrails meant to curb some of the benefits for the pass-through deduction............

https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics ... x-cut-bill





The EPA ousted science advisers. Now it’s going after the science itself.

Administrator Scott Pruitt just proposed new restrictions on research used in rulemaking.

At a barely publicized event Tuesday with no reporters present, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt signed a new directive aimed at increasing transparency in science.

The announcement poses a fundamental challenge to the agency’s work as a regulator by instituting new restrictions on the scientific findings used by the EPA.

“It’s reducing the pool of science the agency can use,” said Christopher Zarba, who retired earlier this year from the EPA as the coordinator of the agency’s science advisory boards.

The move comes as Pruitt faces an avalanche of questions about alleged ethics violations — involving his 24-hour security detail, his $43,000 phone booth, and his luxury travel — as well as open calls from some Republicans to resign and reports that Trump will fire him “soon.” On Thursday, he will go before the House Energy & Commerce Committee as well as the House Appropriations Committee, ostensibly to talk about the EPA’s budget for the upcoming fiscal year.

But even as Pruitt fights for his job, with the new directive he is dramatically changing the role of research at the EPA and may in turn bring about outcomes that favor the very industries the agency is supposed to regulate.

Pruitt says he wants to eliminate “secret science”

Pruitt has steadily eroded environmental regulations from all sides. He is already rolling back rules on limiting air pollution. He is halting implementation of greenhouse gas restrictions. He is weakening enforcement against polluters. And he is stalling for time on many other responsibilities.

At the same time, he has also taken unprecedented steps to oust the agency’s science advisers and replace them with researchers from industry and from states that have previously sued to block environmental regulations.

In the new directive, Pruitt wants regulations modeled on the HONEST Act, a bill championed by outgoing House Science Committee Chair Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) to eliminate “secret science.” (Smith is one of the few Republicans reaffirming support for Pruitt as others have distanced themselves, praising Pruitt as “courageous” at the announcement.)

The idea is to exclude studies that aren’t reproducible or don’t make their underlying data public, standards that would bar research based on one-off events like toxic chemical leaks or experiments involving confidential patient data.

“The ability to test, authenticate, and reproduce scientific findings is vital for the integrity of [the] rulemaking process,” Pruitt said in a statement. “Americans deserve to assess the legitimacy of the science underpinning EPA decisions that may impact their lives.”

However, documents released to various news organizations under Freedom of Information Act requests also show that Smith’s office coordinated with the EPA to carve out exemptions to allow industry-backed research to still be considered by the agency.

Which means industry-friendly science could weaken the case for developing new rules and undermine the rationale for existing regulations. For instance, stricter limits on pollutants like ozone may not go into effect and the EPA may not have the foundations to tackle emerging environmental health threats like the harm from newly introduced chemicals.

Science is the foundation of the EPA’s work, and it’s being eroded...........

Pruitt’s latest move sets a restrictive standard for public health research...........

https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/ ... egulations





Man who disarmed Waffle House shooter hailed by lawmakers

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — The man who snatched an AR-15 rifle away from a gunman at a Nashville restaurant told Tennessee lawmakers Tuesday he faced “the true test of a man,” drawing a standing ovation during his brief address.

As the House hailed him as a hero, James Shaw Jr. said he acted to save his own life early Sunday at a Waffle House, and saved others in the process.

“I never thought I’d be in a room with all the eyes on me, but you know, I’m very grateful to be here,” Shaw told House members. The 29-year-old said he has since gone to see some of the shooting victims in the hospital and they all remembered him. He apologized to the people whose loved ones died in the attack.

The Senate also honored Shaw on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, the co-owner of a Colorado crane company where Travis Reinking once worked says she urged federal officials to keep Reinking in custody after he was arrested at the White House last July.

Darlene Sustrich said: “We told them, ‘Hang onto him if you can. Help him if you can.’”

Federal officials did not immediately respond to a request for comment...........

https://www.apnews.com/23f68d3f276a4307 ... -lawmakers





World War II Navajo Code Talker dies at 92

WINDOW ROCK, Ariz. — A Navajo Code Talker who used his native language to confound the Japanese in World War II has died.

The Navajo Nation says Roy Hawthorne Sr. died Saturday. He was 92.

Hawthorne enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps at 17 and became part of a famed group of Navajos who transmitted hundreds of messages in their language without error.

The code was never broken.

Hawthorne was one of the most visible survivors of the group. He appeared at public events and served as vice president of a group representing the men.

He never considered himself a hero.

Hawthorne later served with the U.S. Army.

He’s survived by five children and more than a dozen grandchildren.

https://www.marinecorpstimes.com/news/y ... ies-at-92/





Federal judge orders Trump administration to continue DACA

U.S. District Judge John D. Bates in Washington deemed President Trump's efforts to end Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals "virtually unexplained," the Washington Post reported, "ordering the administration to continue" the program and accept new applicants.

The big picture: The Department of Homeland Security still has 90 days to "provide a more solid reasoning for ending" DACA, the Post reports, but this is a significant blow to Trump's move to end the program. Axios' Dave Lawler reported previously that ending the program could have serious economic consequences for the country.

https://www.axios.com/judge-orders-cont ... ce=sidebar





Scientists 'artificially breed' coral in bid to help Australia's Great Barrier Reef

'Glimmer of hope' offered for Australian natural phenomenon which has been dying out due to ocean warming

Scientists have managed to artificially breed baby coral from larvae on damaged patches of Australian Great Barrier Reef in an environmental breakthrough.

Researchers have collected coral eggs and sperm off the reef's Heron Island before allowing them to reproduce and mature in tanks.

More than a million larvae were produced in a mass spawning last November, then developed, with more than 100 surviving and growing successfully on settlement tiles on the reef.

The project’s lead, Professor Peter Harrison of Southern Cross University in New South Wales, told Australian media it was an “exciting” development.

“The success of this new research not only applies to the Great Barrier Reef, but has potential global significance.

“The results are very promising and our work shows that adding higher densities of coral larvae leads to higher numbers of successful coral recruits.

“It may be one of the answers to some of the problems in the Great Barrier Reef. It’s a glimmer of hope.”
Artificial Coral Reef

The Australian Government is injecting funding to focus on better collection techniques and to expand the project.

Located off the Queensland Coast, the Great Barrier Reef is the world’s largest coral reef system, made up of almost 3,000 individual reefs and 900 islands.

Climate change and consequential sea temperature rises are believed to have led to widespread coral “bleaching” - with the reef also under threat from pollution.

Bleaching is not always fatal for coral but a study last year found the “largest die-off of corals ever recorded” with about 67 per cent of shallow water coral found dead in a survey of a 700km stretch.

Unesco has resisted calls to return the reef to its “endangered” list, although it has expressed “serious concerns” and urged the Australian government to improve water quality.

The Great Barrier Reef Foundation managing director, Anna Marsden, said the research is valuable but does not lessen the urgent action needed to combat climate change.

“There is much more to be done, but this is definitely a great leap forward for the reef, and for the restoration and repair of reefs worldwide,” she said.

“It’s time to be bold and take some calculated risks because that’s the way we’ll make a change in how we can help restore our coral reefs.”

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/worl ... 77126.html





Sean Hannity's real estate venture linked to fraudulent property dealer

Shell company tied to the Fox News host bought homes through Jeff Brock, who was charged in 2016 with fraud and conspiracy for his role in a scheme to rig auctions on foreclosed properties

Sean Hannity’s real estate venture bought houses through a property dealer who was involved in a criminal conspiracy to fraudulently obtain foreclosed homes, according to records reviewed by the Guardian.

In 2012, a shell company linked to the Fox News host bought 11 homes in Georgia that had been purchased by the dealer, Jeff Brock, following foreclosures. Brock transferred the properties to corporate vehicles that sold them on to the Hannity-linked company at a profit.

Brock pleaded guilty in 2016 to federal charges of bank fraud and conspiracy for his role in an operation to rig foreclosure auctions between 2007 and 2012. He was sentenced to six months in prison and had to pay more than $166,000 in fines and restitution.

Some of the houses sold on to the Hannity-linked firm in 2012 had been acquired by Brock from banks later named by prosecutors among his victims. But the justice department declined to identify specific properties sold in the rigged auctions. Hannity has not been accused of any wrongdoing and there is no evidence he was aware that Brock was involved in fraud.

Christopher Reeves, an attorney for Hannity, said the Fox News host was not involved in choosing the houses bought via Brock and “has no knowledge whether these properties were involved in the fraud”.

Reeves said neither Hannity nor the company used to buy the properties “had any knowledge regarding Mr Brock’s wrongdoing” before being informed by the Guardian on Monday.

An attorney for Brock, Don Samuel, said in an email: “Jeff has nothing to say.”

The company linked to Hannity was one of a group identified by the Guardian on Sunday that spent $90m buying more than 870 homes in seven states over the past decade. Hannity was confirmed as the hidden owner behind some of the companies and has not disputed that he is the owner of all of them.

Hannity defended his real estate investments on Monday, stating in a post to his website that he had chosen to invest his personal wealth in “communities that badly need such investment” and that he had limited involvement in the venture’s day-to-day operation.

“The fact is, these are investments that I do not individually select, control, or know the details about; except that obviously I believe in putting my money to work in communities that otherwise struggle to receive such support,” Hannity wrote.

Hannity-linked company’s purchases..........

Brock’s auction-rigging scheme..........

https://www.theguardian.com/media/2018/ ... reclosures





Third US judge orders Daca restarted, saying new applicants must be accepted

Judge John Bates is first to order Trump administration to accept new applications as young undocumented Dreamers await their fate

A third federal judge has ordered the Trump administration to restart a program that shields young undocumented immigrants known as “Dreamers” from deportation and, in a first, to accept new applicants to the program.

Writing that the decision to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (Daca) program was “virtually unexplained”, the US district judge John Bates said on Tuesday he would stay the order for 90 days to allow the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) an opportunity to “better explain” its decision.

“DACA’s rescission was arbitrary and capricious because the Department failed adequately to explain its conclusion that the program was unlawful,” Bates wrote in his 60-page ruling, released on Tuesday evening.

Two district court judges, in San Francisco and Brooklyn, previously ordered the Trump administration to spare Daca. Bates, however, went a step further and ordered that the administration accept new applications while litigation continues.

The first injunction came several weeks before 5 March, a deadline set by the Trump administration to end the program. In the countdown to that date, nearly 100 Daca recipients per day were losing their protected status. The rulings forced DHS to begin accepting renewal applications from recipients. But it did not have to accept new applications.

Bates is also the first Republican appointee to rule on the matter. Judge Nicholas Garaufis of the federal district court in Brooklyn and Judge William Alsup of the federal district court in San Francisco were both appointed by Bill Clinton...........

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/201 ... t-dreamers





Trump gave Macron a taste of his bizarre 'dandruff diplomacy'

Standing together on a world stage, Trump took a moment to flick off ‘a little piece of dandruff’ off Macron’s shoulder. That was hardly innocent

You’ve got to hand it to Trump. The president may be a global joke but he has an uncanny knack of always making sure he has the last laugh. Today’s exercise in dandruff diplomacy vis-à-vis France’s president, Emmanuel Macron, being a shining example.

Macron is currently at the White House, a trip which marks Trump’s first state visit from a foreign leader. The pair have gotten together to discuss Iran and Syria and, also, it would appear, so that Trump can put Macron very firmly in his place.

“They’re all saying what a great relationship we have, and they’re actually correct,” Trump gushed to the camera as the pair posed for photos. “It’s not fake news. Finally, it’s not fake news. It’s a great honor, a great honor that you’re here, in fact I’ll get that little piece of dandruff, that little piece …” Trump said. He then made a very public show of brushing invisible dandruff off Macron’s shoulder. “We have to make him perfect. He is perfect.” Meanwhile, Macron grinned and appeared somewhat lost for words as he subjected himself to this humiliation.

One suspects Trump has been planning this power play for a while. While the pair may have a “great relationship”, Trump and Macron have also been jostling to prove to each other who is more dominant. This started last year, when Trump met Macron for the first and the pair shared a very awkward handshake; a White House pool reporter described it as being of “considerable intensity, their knuckles turning white and their jaws clenching and faces tightening”.

For a moment it looked like the handshake might go on and on until one of them exploded, but Trump eventually let go first. Macron was clearly very proud of himself for his stamina; he later told the the Journal du Dimanche newspaper: “My handshake with him – it wasn’t innocent … we must show that we will not make small concessions, even symbolic.”

Trump’s dandruff-flicking, it could be argued, also wasn’t innocent. It may have been a hilarious moment but it is also a product of Trump’s somewhat terrifying ideas about diplomacy. Back in the 1980s, Trump apparently lobbied the George HW Bush administration for a job leading nuclear negotiations with the Soviet Union. Richard Burt, who actually had some experience in the whole diplomacy thing, ended up getting the job instead.

According to the New Yorker, Trump later bumped into Burt at a wedding and proceeded to tell the guy, who he didn’t know, all about how he would have handled negotiations with the Soviets. He’d have welcomed the delegation very warmly and made sure they were sitting very comfortably down at the table. Then, Trump apparently said, he would have got up, yelled “Fuck you!” and left.

Burt rather charitably told the New Yorker he thought there was a sort of theory behind this. “Trump loves the chaos … to mouth off and get people off balance,” he said. “He wants to destabilize them, get them out of their comfort zone, then try to dictate the terms. By doing that, he believes he can get the upper hand. It’s the triumph of technique over substance.”

It could also be possible, of course, that Trump has zero impulse control and says and does whatever pops into his mind. Nevertheless, even if there is no method to the man’s madness, it certainly gets people out of their comfort zone. For the sake of international stability, let’s just hope that Trump is satisfied with his little dandruff jibe and tonight’s official dinner doesn’t descend into a tweetstorm about the relative size of the two men’s buttons.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfr ... -diplomacy





RUSSIA AND CHINA MILITARIES REACH ‘NEW HEIGHTS’ TOGETHER, AGREE TO CHALLENGE U.S. IN MIDDLE EAST

Russia and China have pledged to strengthen their bilateral military and political ties as part of a strategic cooperation that challenges U.S. interests, especially to Washington's stance on Middle East allies Syria and Iran.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu met Tuesday with Air Force General Xu Qiliang, deputy vice chairman of China's Central Military Commission, and other regional military officials as part of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in the eastern city of Qingdao. As increasingly powerful Russia and China build up their clout on the world stage, they sought a more united front against the U.S., which frequently challenged their rise.

"Time changes everything," Shoigu said, according to the Russian Defense Ministry. "But, fortunately, it does not change our relations both personally between us and between our states, and the very close, friendly relations of the heads of our states serve as a guarantee of this."

Shoigu praised "the privileged character of intergovernmental ties" evidenced by numerous meetings between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping, both of whom secured enough national support to extend their terms last month. He said the two nations were continuing "their strategic course toward further boosting friendly and trustworthy ties in the defense sphere," calling this relationship "an important factor for maintaining global and regional security."

http://www.newsweek.com/china-russia-mi ... dle-899689

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FRENCH KISSES

Macron Disses Trump in Front of Congress

After a while during the French president’s speech to a joint session, the standing ovations started to look like calisthenics. But what happens if the Trump love-fest sours?



MACRON ADDRESSES CONGRESS ON YOU TUBE

https://youtu.be/vqTxumF9KCQ



One may be forgiven for thinking that Donald Trump and Emmanuel Macron are in love. Their remarkable body language—the air kisses, the back pats, the hand-holding, the dandruff brushing—has been the talk of the town on Macron’s state visit to Washington. But after listening to the French president’s speech to Congress on Wednesday, a question arises that could have enormous geopolitical consequences. What happens if the love of the mercurial American president turns to hate?

Does Trump understand how often Macron dissed his isolationism and exaltation of ignorance before the largely enraptured American legislators?(There were so many standing ovations it started to look like calisthenics.) Does Trump, who is always jealous of attention, and who demands unquestioning loyalty from the people around him, not see how powerfully opposed to his policies on trade, on the Iran nuclear deal, on climate change Macron really is?

Macron’s de rigueur opening joke was about Voltaire and Benjamin Franklin embracing and kissing, which “can remind you of something.” He then went into a long panegyric about the shared history of France and the United States during the American Revolution, World War I and World War II, talking about “the continuity of our shared history in a troubled world.” (Forgotten, it seems, are the “freedom fries” and the snarky American denunciations of “cheese eating surrender monkeys” when the French dared to oppose the U.S. invasion of Iraq as an act of monumental stupidity.)

Macron’s talk about the democratic values of the West and its commitment to freedom were not boilerplate, but a direct response to the know-nothingism and ultra-nationalism resurgent in the 21st century, 70 years after World War II. “Both in the United States and Europe, we are living in a time of anger and of fear,” he said. And who has profited more from that than Trump?

“Closing the door to the world will not stop the evolution of the world,” Macron warned. “We have to keep our eyes wide open to the risks right in front of us.” Among them, “rampaging nationalism.”

On climate change, which Trump finds it politically expedient to question, Macron repeated one of his own favorite aphorisms. "We are killing our planet. Let us face it. There is no Planet B.” And then, riffing on Trump’s trademark slogan: "Let us work together to make our planet great again in order to create new jobs and new opportunities.” (That prompted one of many standing ovations.) Macron even held out hope that the United State—he didn’t say Trump—might rejoin the climate accord.

On Iran and Syria, Macron repeated the same points he has made at a press conference Tuesday: keep the Iran nuclear deal, and then cut new deals on missiles and on what happens when the original deal expires, while using military force to block the Iranian boots on the ground in Iraq and Syria—which the U.S. must not leave before “as soon as possible” is possible.

If Macron were telling Trump something significantly different in private than in public, that might explain Trump’s more than affectionate tolerance. But Macron is a fan of the French Nobel Prize laureate André Gide (a close friend of Oscar Wilde) who penned the famous aphorism: “It is better to be hated for who you are than loved for who you are not.” And of the many criticisms that might be leveled against the imperius French head of state, inconsistency should not be one of them.

No, the real danger here is that Trump is so taken with Macron’s flattery and pseudo-filial affection that he hears only what he wants to hear. Love is not blind, but it is blinding, and when the moment of revelation comes the consequences can be catastrophic. ... Let’s hope that is not the case.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/macron-di ... s?ref=home





SACRE BLEU

Emmanuel Macron: ‘Insane’ That U.S. Dumps Global Treaties

French President Emmanuel Macron on Wednesday said it was “insane” for the Trump administration to pull back from international agreements and treaties. The French leader, who is in Washington this week for an official state visit at the White House, predicted that the U.S. will pull out of the Iran nuclear deal ahead of the next deadline (May 12) for the U.S. to certify that Iran remains in compliance with the terms of the Obama-brokered accord. Macron called President Donald Trump, with whom he has formed a friendship, a “dealmaker” who “wants to find a deal under his condition.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/emmanuel- ... l-treaties





SINKING

Climate Change Could Make Thousands of Islands ‘Uninhabitable’ by Mid-21st Century: Study

Rising sea levels could make over a thousand low-lying tropical islands “uninhabitable” by the mid-21st century, according to a study published Wednesday. The study focused on Roi-Namur Island, which is on Kwajalein Atoll in the Republic of the Marshall Islands, home to more than 1,100 low-lying islands on 29 atolls. Roi-Namur has a U.S. military base. The research, which was commissioned by the Pentagon’s Strategic Environmental Research and Development Program, said that climate change could cause flooding and contaminate drinking supplies on many atoll islands. “It’s a scary scenario for us,” Marshall Islands President Hilda Heine said. A Defense Department spokesperson said military personnel on the islands will continue to prepare for “a wide range of threats.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/climate-c ... tury-study





HEATING UP

Michael Cohen to Plead the Fifth in Stormy Daniels Lawsuit


Michael Cohen, President Donald Trump’s longtime personal attorney, will invoke the 5th Amendment in the civil lawsuit brought by former porn actress Stormy Daniels in California, according to a new court filing. The documents cite the ongoing criminal probe against Cohen in New York, where his office and home were raided earlier this month by the FBI. Daniels is suing Cohen and Trump in California, alleging that the non-disclosure agreement about an alleged affair with Trump is invalid because the president never signed it. The suit also accuses Cohen of defamation, claiming that the lawyer's denial of her affair with the president “meant to convey that Ms. Clifford is a liar.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/michael-c ... ls-lawsuit





GOP moves to cut debate time for Trump nominees

Republicans are pushing forward with a proposal to change the Senate’s rules to speed up consideration of President Trump’s nominees.

The move is likely to ramp up tensions surrounding nominations, which had already become a flashpoint during the Trump era.

The proposal got a jolt of momentum Wednesday when the Rules and Administration Committee, which includes Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), approved the rules change in a 10-9 party-line vote.

If approved by the full Senate, the proposal would affect how the chamber handles hundreds of the president’s picks.

Currently, nominations need 30 hours of debate time, even after they’ve overcome an initial hurdle that shows they have the simple majority needed to pass.

The proposal from GOP Sen. James Lankford (Okla.) would cut the additional 30 hours of debate down to eight hours. Post-cloture debate for district judge nominees would be further capped at two hours.

Republicans argue the change is necessary because Democrats are slow-walking the president’s picks in an attempt to undermine the Trump administration.

( NOTE: TRUMP'S PICKS HAVE BEEN ATROCIOUS ! NOW THE GOP WANTS TO CUT THE DEBATE TIME TO 8 MINUTES ??? WOW !!! THAT'S RICH I GUESS PICKS LIKE RONNY JACKSON, GINA HASPEL, SCOTT PRUITT, MATTHEW PETERSON, ETC ARE NOT WORTH THE EXTRA DEBATE TIME NOT INCLUDED ARE ALL THE UNQUALIFIED PICKS THAT THE GOP HAVE APPROVED ON THE BASIS THAT THEY ARE "CONSERVATIVE" )

McConnell said Democrats are “wasting the Senate’s time” by dragging out debate time for uncontroversial nominees.

“At some point the question is, what is a constructive use of the Senate’s time?” he said ahead of the vote...........

http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3849 ... trump-noms





Democrats release detailed list of allegations against Ronny Jackson

Senator Jon Tester's office released a detailed summary of allegations against Ronny Jackson, Trump's pick to head the Veterans Affairs Department, on Wednesday, which range from claims of recklessly dispensing drugs to crashing a government vehicle while drunk — though Jackson denies the latter ever happened, per the AP.

Why it matters: The allegations, based on interviews with his former colleagues, add to Jackson's already tumultuous situation ahead of his now-postponed confirmation hearing. Meanwhile, the White House has vowed to vigorously defend the nominee. During today's briefing, Press Secretary Sarah Sanders characterized some of the allegations as “outrageous." Jackson told NBC News that he is "still moving ahead as planned" with the nomination.

SEE PDF FILE - CLICK ON LINK

https://www.axios.com/democrats-allegat ... 09466.html





TRY HARDER

GOP Senators Losing Their Cool Over White House Vetting Fails

Ronny Jackson’s disastrous bid to be VA secretary has brought to the surface some intense frustrations.

Republican senators are growing increasingly frustrated with the White House for foisting upon them a parade of controversial cabinet nominees whom they believe haven’t gone through a proper vetting process.

Throughout much of the Trump presidency, those frustrations have been shielded from public view out of deference to the president’s right to pick his own team. But a revolving door of high-level staff departures has forced GOP leaders to set aside valuable floor time—and expend already thin political capital—on tricky confirmation fights over controversial replacements. And not everyone is pleased.

“I understand that the president wants his people—and we want to be deferential as much as we can—but it would be nice to know some of the issues that come up after the fact, before the fact,” said Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.), the third-ranking Republican in the Senate.

The latest, most glaring pressure point—and the one to which Thune was alluding—emerged this week with the nomination of Rear Adm. Ronny Jackson to lead the Department of Veterans Affairs. Jackson, who currently serves as the top White House physician, has been accused of being drunk on the job, over-prescribing medications, and creating a hostile work environment.

He has either denied, or stressed his desire to explain away, those allegations. But an equally significant concern among Republican senators is that those allegations surfaced not from an internal White House review, but through a vetting process conducted by the Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, which is overseeing the confirmation.

“In this case, I get the sense that there wasn’t any vetting, so I think that calls [the White House’s vetting process] into question,” Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.V.) told The Daily Beast.

Jackson’s confirmation hearing, which was initially scheduled for Wednesday, has been put on hold as the White House digs in to defend him. But with little overt support coming from Republican lawmakers, that defense might prove both brief and useless. On Wednesday night, The Washington Post reported that Jackson was considering dropping his bid..............

https://www.thedailybeast.com/gop-senat ... s?ref=home





WOW

Carson to Propose Raising Rent Prices for Low-Income Americans

U.S. Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson will propose legislation on Wednesday that would raise the amount low-income Americans on housing assistance must pay for rent, The Washington Post reported on Wednesday. The legislation would require tenants on housing subsidies to spend 35 percent of their gross income on rent, up from the 30 percent that tenants currently pay. The legislation must be approved by Congress and will affect 4.5 million American families. The Trump administration signaled that HUD would increase “self-sufficiency” measures in the budget proposal released this year. Two months ago, HUD dropped anti-discrimination language from the department’s mission statement.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/carson-to ... s?ref=home





A New Trump Administration Proposal Could Triple Low-Income Families’ Rent

The Department of Housing and Urban Development aims to cut rules protecting poor tenants.

The Department of Housing and Urban Development, led by Secretary Ben Carson, has drawn up a proposal that would overhaul how rents are calculated for low-income families using federal housing subsidies.

The proposal, first reported by the Washington Post, would increase renters’ share of a unit’s cost from 30 percent to 35 percent, and eliminate key deductions, including those for childcare and medical costs, now used to calculate how much families owe. HUD current technically allows local housing agencies to charge the neediest renters a minimum rent capped at $50 a month; the proposal would triple that cap to $150.

The proposal would need to be approved by Congress before being implemented. But if enacted, the move would affect approximately 4.5 million families that currently rely on HUD’s rental assistance programs.

( NOTE: WTF ! LOOKS LIKE TRUMP AND THE GOP HAS ONE GOAL IN MIND - ELIMINATE THE LOWER CLASS AND EMPOWER THE RICH - IN PARTICULARLY THE TOP 1% )

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/20 ... lies-rent/





Trump brings in the billionaires for his first state dinner

04/24/2018 10:46 PM EDT
Gone were the musicians and actors, the chefs and journalists. In, for President Donald Trump’s first state dinner, were businesspeople — lots and lots of them.

There was Stephen Schwarzman, the billionaire chief of Blackstone and Trump confidant, and David Rubenstein, the Carlyle Group co-founder and Washington philanthropist. Luxury goods magnate Bernard Arnault was in attendance, as were Apple CEO Tim Cook, Lockheed Martin CEO Marillyn Hewson, KKR co-founder Henry Kravis, 21st Century Fox Chairman Rupert Murdoch, IBM CEO Ginni Rometty and Goldman Sachs Executive Vice President John F.W. Rogers.

The industry-minded members in Trump’s Cabinet, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, were present, along with economic adviser Larry Kudlow.

Private equity baron David Hamilton and his wife, Catharine Hamilton, who founded American Friends of Versailles, were there, too.

Trump has enjoyed his newfound power to summon prominent businesspeople to meet with him at the White House, and he made use of it Tuesday night in honoring French President Emmanuel Macron.............

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/ ... ron-550098




Full list: Expected attendees for President Trump's first state dinner

Here’s the expected attendees for President Donald Trump’s state dinner hosting French president Emmanuel Macron and his wife Brigitte Macron.


The Honorable Jerome Adams, Surgeon General, and Mrs. Lacey Adams

His Excellency Gérard Araud, Ambassador of France to the United States of America and Mr. Pascal Blondeau

Mr. Bernard Arnault and Mrs. Hélène Arnault

Her Excellency Nicole Belloubet, Keeper of the Seals and Minister of Justice

Mr. Phillippe Besson

His Excellency Jean-Michel Blanquer, Minister of National Education

The Honorable John Bolton and Mrs. Gretchen Bolton

Mr. Thierry Breton

His Excellency Christian Cambon, Senator for Val-de-Marne, President of the Foreign Affairs Committee at the Senate

Ms. Laurence des Cars

The Honorable William Cassidy, United States Senator from Louisiana, and Dr. Laura Cassidy

Mr. Timothy Cook and The Honorable Lisa Jackson

Mr. Pierre-Olivier Costa

Ms. Sarah Coulson and Dr. Douglas Bradburn

Mr. Christian Dargnat

His Excellency Jean-Yves Le Drian, Minister for Europe and Foreign Affairs

Ms. Meghan Duggan

The Honorable John Bel Edwards, Governor of Louisiana and Mrs. Donna Edwards

Ms. Laurence Engel

His Excellency Philippe Étienne, Diplomatic Advisor, G7 and G20 Sherpa of the President of the Republic

Ms. Barbara Frugier, International Communication Advisor to the Presidency of the Republic

The Honorable Joseph Hagin

Mr. David Hamilton and Mrs. Catharine Hamilton

Mrs. Marillyn Hewson and Mr. James Hewson

The Honorable Fiona Hill and Mr. Kenneth Keen

The Honorable Stuart Holliday, former Ambassador for the United States, and Mrs. Gwen Holliday

The Honorable John F. Kelly and Mrs. Karen Kelly

The Honorable John Kennedy, United States Senator from Louisiana, and Mrs. Rebecca Kennedy

The Honorable Henry Kissinger and Mrs. Nancy Kissinger

Mr. Henry Kravis and Mrs. Marie-Josée Kravis

The Honorable Lawrence Kudlow and Mrs. Judith Kudlow

The Honorable Jared Kushner and The Honorable Ivanka Trump

Ms. Christine Lagarde

The Honorable Ronald Lauder, former Ambassador for the United States, and Mrs. Jo Carole Lauder

His Excellency Aurélien Lechevallier, Deputy Diplomatic Advisor, G7 and G20 Sherpa of the President of the Republic

The Honorable Paul LePage, Governor of Maine and Ms. Lauren LePage

The Honorable Christopher Liddell and Mrs. Renee Liddell

His Excellency Bruno Le Maire, Minister of the Economy and Finance

The Honorable James Mattis, Secretary of Defense

The Honorable Kevin McCarthy and Mrs. Judy McCarthy

The Honorable Jamie McCourt, American Ambassador

Mrs. Ronna McDaniel and Mr. Patrick McDaniel

The Honorable Stephen Miller

Mr. Emmanuel Miquel

The Honorable Aaron Wess Mitchell and Mrs. Elizabeth Mitchell

The Honorable Steven T. Mnuchin, Secretary of the Treasury and Ms. Louise Linton

Dr. Mary Morton and Mr. Keith Forman

Mr. Rupert Murdoch and Mrs. Jerry Murdoch



Politicians, Olympians and leaders attend Trump's first state dinner



The Honorable Kirstjen Nielsen, Secretary of Homeland Security and Mr. Chad Wolf

Her Excellency Florence Parly, Minister for the Armed Forces

The Vice President of the United States and Mrs. Karen Pence

Mr. Emanuel Perrotin

Mr. Thomas Pesquet

The Most Revered Christophe Pierre, Titular Archbishop of Guneia, the Apostolic Nuncio to the United States

Mr. Hervé Pierre Braillard

The Honorable Michael Pompeo and Mrs. Susan Pompeo

The Honorable Dina Powell and The Honorable David McCormick

General Benoît Puga

The Chief Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States and Mrs. Jane Roberts

Admiral Bernard Rogel

The Honorable John F. W. Rogers and Ms. Deborah Lehr

Mrs. Virginia Rometty and Mr. Anthony Mark Rometty

The Honorable, Wilbur L. Ross, Junior, The Secretary of Commerce and Mrs. Hilary Ross

The Honorable Edward Royce, United States Representative from California and Mrs. Maria Royce

Mr. David Rubenstein and Ms. Gabrielle Rubenstein

The Honorable, Paul Ryan, the Speaker of the United States House of Representatives and Mrs. Janna Ryan

The Honorable Sarah Sanders and Mr. Bryan Sanders

Her Excellency Marielle de Sarnez, National Assembly Member for Paris, President of the National Assembly Foreign Affairs Committee

Mr. Guy Savoy

Mr. Stephen Schwarzman and Mrs. Christine Schwarzman

The Honorable Thomas Shannon, Jr.

Mr. John Shuster

Ms. Annette Simmons and Mr. Gerald Fronterhouse

Mr. Frederick Smith and Mrs. Diane Smith

The Honorable, John J. Sullivan, Deputy Secretary of State and Ms. Graciela Rodriguez

Mrs. Julie Sweet and Mr. Chad Sweet

Mr. Hugo Verges

Dr. Benedict Wolf and Mrs. Ursula Wolf

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/ ... ist-550106

<

Trump warns countries against opposing 2026 World Cup bid

President Trump warned other countries to not oppose the U.S.’s joint bid with Mexico and Canada to host the 2026 World Cup.

“It would be a shame if countries that we always support were to lobby against the U.S. bid. Why should we be supporting these countries when they don’t support us (including at the United Nations)?,” Trump tweeted Thursday.

Donald J. Trump
@realDonaldTrump
The U.S. has put together a STRONG bid w/ Canada & Mexico for the 2026 World Cup. It would be a shame if countries that we always support were to lobby against the U.S. bid. Why should we be supporting these countries when they don’t support us (including at the United Nations)?

The joint bid by the North American nations was initially the favorite to win the rights to host the World Cup, the first time it would be held on the continent since 1994, according to CBS Sports.

However, ESPN reported earlier this year that Morocco could land the tournament instead.

FIFA member nations will vote on the World Cup location on June 13.

Trump also used the tweet to resurrect his past criticism of countries that don’t support the U.S. at the United Nations.

He suggested last year that the U.S. could withhold foreign aid for nations that voted in favor of a U.N. resolution calling on the U.S. to withdraw its recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.

http://thehill.com/homenews/administrat ... ld-cup-bid





‘Jon poked the bear’: Tester braces for Trump’s revenge

Trump is set to campaign against the Montana Democrat for helping sink his VA secretary nominee.

Jon Tester didn't intend to play a central role in taking down President Donald Trump's pick to lead the Veterans Affairs Department. Yet that's exactly what the Montana Democrat ended up doing

And now, Trump is coming after him.

The president is enraged over Tester’s work documenting allegations of malfeasance by Rear Adm. Ronny Jackson, which quickly unraveled Jackson’s nomination to be VA secretary and marks a turning point in the relationship between the moderate Democrat and Trump.

As Tester’s reelection campaign kicks into high gear, Trump is more motivated than ever to campaign against him in the ruby-red state — accusing the senator of irresponsibly leaking the damaging information to undermine the president's nominee.

Trump said Thursday that Tester will have a “big price to pay” for his part in working to sink Jackson’s nomination. But Tester is sanguine about his decision to go public with accusations about Jackson’s workplace misconduct, poor prescription practices and drinking on the job.

“If he thinks it’s my job to sweep his stuff under the table and ignore our military folks, he’s wrong. If he thinks I should not be sticking up for veterans, he’s wrong,” Tester said Thursday of the president. “I look forward to working with President Trump. I’ve worked with him many times in the past, but we disagree.”

Tester has repeatedly tried to emphasize points of agreement with Trump in his nascent reelection campaign, including sending Trump 13 of his bills to sign. But Trump and other Republicans are taking it personally that as ranking member of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, Tester and his staff compiled interviews with more than two dozen current and former military members describing Jackson’s alleged wrongdoing and then released them this week.

Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas) said Tester “painted a big target on himself” this fall in Montana, which Trump won by 20 points. And a Republican senator, granted anonymity to speak candidly about a colleague, said a “livid” Trump is now set to prioritize the campaign to knock off Tester this fall.

“Jon poked the bear. Did you see the bear today? The bear was mad,” the senator said. “If there was any doubt he was coming to Montana it was removed today. He overreached.”

The allegations, sourced anonymously, were the death knell of Jackson’s nomination.

“That was not Jon’s best time with regards to his Senate career,” said Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan.). “Man, they aim low. They really aim low. And they brought him down.”

Democrats strongly reject that argument. They say Tester did the right thing by speaking up about a crucial post and that Trump and Republican are deflecting blame for the Jackson debacle.

“Sen. Tester released profoundly serious, credible allegations from military men and women who put their careers on the line,” said Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.). “The administration bungled this nomination from the start. And then it fumbled the defense of its nominee. So the blame really lies with the administration.”

Former Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel also defended Tester from partisan attacks............


( NOTE: TRUMP IS A REAL TOOL ! A REAL DUMBASS ! TRUMP REBUKED TESTER FOR DOING HIS JOB AS RANKING MEMBER OF THE SENATE VETERANS AFFAIR COMMITTEE TRUMP HAS A PENCHANT FOR BLAMING OTHERS FOR HIS FAILURES. RONNY JACKSON WAS TRUMP'S PICK ! TRUMP'S FAILURE TO PROPERLY VET JACKSON IS NOBODY'S FAULT BUT TRUMP'S ! TRUMP ! YOU'RE FIRED !! )

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/ ... nge-556111





FOX & FRIENDS HURRIEDLY SHUTS DOWN INTERVIEW AS TRUMP RANTS ABOUT MUELLER

Anchors grew visibly uncomfortable as they listened to the president undermine his own legal defense.

In what is surely a first for a news network, the hosts of Donald Trump’s favorite variety show, Fox & Friends, hurriedly ended an interview with the president Thursday morning as Trump began ranting about Robert Mueller and threatening to seize control of the Justice Department. The phoner began pleasantly enough, with Steve Doocy, Brian Kilmeade, and Ainsley Earhardt tossing the president a softball question about his wife: April 26 is Melania Trump’s birthday, a “very, very special day,” the president explained, though the First Lady apparently didn’t get much beyond the shout-out she received on air. “Maybe I didn’t get her much,” Trump admitted nervously, when Kilmeade asked. “I got her a beautiful card. You know, I’m very busy.”

The conversation went downhill from there, slowly devolving into ever-longer bouts of furious ranting, as the president was asked about the scandal surrounding his allegedly prescription-happy personal doctor, Ronny Jackson (an “unblemished record,” he said), conservative YouTube celebrities Diamond and Silk (“beautiful women”), and James Comey (“a leaker and a liar”). He praised Kanye West, lamented that Shania Twain had backed away from defending him, congratulated the Republican Party on doing “the thing” in the Civil War, and complained about his treatment on CNN (“I don’t watch them at all,” Trump insisted).

Doocy, Kilmeade, and Earhardt endured the deluge heroically, fidgeting slightly at times, and offering small laughs as they encouraged the president and tried to keep him on track. The interview went off the rails, however, when the Fox hosts asked Trump about the Russia investigation dogging his presidency, and whether he would agree to interview with Mueller:

“Well, if I can. The problem is that it’s such a—if you take a look, they’re so conflicted, the people that are doing the investigation. You have 13 people that are Democrats, you have Hillary Clinton people, you have people that worked on Hillary Clinton’s foundation. They’re all—I don’t mean Democrats. I mean, like, the real deal. And then you look at the phony Lisa Page and [Peter] Strzok and the memos back and forth and the F.B.I.—and by the way, you take a poll at the F.B.I. I love the F.B.I.; the F.B.I. loves me. But the top people at the F.B.I., headed by Comey, were crooked.”

“You look at the corruption at the top of the F.B.I.—it’s a disgrace,” Trump continued, practically yelling, as the Fox hosts stared ahead nervously. “And our Justice Department—which I try and stay away from, but at some point I won’t—our Justice Department should be looking at that kind of stuff, not the nonsense of collusion with Russia. There is no collusion with me, and everyone knows it.”

The hosts exchanged furtive glances as they simultaneously began interrupting the president, insisting that they were out of time, even as Trump continued to shout over them. “Right, all right,” Kilmeade said. “All right,” Earhardt interjected. “O.K.” “We’d talk to you all day but it looks like you have a million things to do,” Kilmeade added. Earhardt smiled: “Thank you so much for being with us.”

As the Fox & Friends control room may have guessed, Trump’s burning anger could come at the expense of his current legal-defense strategy. With Mueller reportedly investigating the president and his associates for obstruction of justice in the Russian collusion probe, Trump’s lawyers have urged him to stay quiet about the special counsel’s work and allow his investigation to go forward. By impugning the F.B.I. and threatening to intervene at the Justice Department, Trump may have just given his adversaries more legal ammunition. He may also have undermined his case in more roundabout ways: at another point, he referred to his longtime lawyer Michael Cohen as having done a “tiny, tiny little fraction of my legal work”—an apparent attempt to distance himself from Cohen, who he admitted represented him in “this crazy Stormy Daniels deal.” Michael Avenatti, Daniels’s lawyer, immediately called the admission a “gift from the heavens” and “hugely damaging”: not only did Trump’s statement suggest he was aware that Cohen had paid hush money to Daniels, it also undercut Cohen’s argument that his communications with Trump, recently seized by the F.B.I., are protected by attorney-client privilege.

Federal prosecutors have argued that Cohen—who is being investigated by the Southern District of New York—is barely a lawyer, and therefore has little evidence to support the contention that his files should be kept out of the F.B.I.’s hands. And indeed, it took next to no time for prosecutors to use Trump’s interview as evidence. Less than two hours later, lawyers from the S.D.N.Y. told a federal judge they no longer objected to a third party determining whether certain documents from the Cohen raid were protected by attorney-client privilege—a claim that Cohen has made vociferously—arguing that if Cohen only conducted a “tiny, tiny little fraction” of legal work for the president, it would ”suggest that the seized materials are unlikely to contain voluminous privileged documents.” One wonders how Trump’s own lawyers, who joined Cohen’s argument last week, are feeling about their client pouring napalm on their defense.

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2018/04 ... -interview





Pruitt dodges blame

The EPA chief told lawmakers his staff made decisions on pricey security measures and pinned his troubles on President Donald Trump's critics.

Scott Pruitt may have handled his daylong congressional grilling well enough to salvage his job for now — but only after he blamed his torrent of scandals on staff, disavowed one of his top advisers and raised new questions about what he knew about massive raises awarded to some of his closest aides.

The Environmental Protection Agency administrator shrugged off responsibility Thursday for a $43,000 privacy booth and more than $100,000 in first-class flights, and even said he has no idea whether his chief policy adviser showed up for work at all during a three-month stretch.

But the former Oklahoma attorney general stayed calm throughout the nearly six hours of questioning. And his televised performance brought no immediate complaints from the one person whose opinion matters — the media-obsessed president who has so far stuck with Pruitt despite a multitude of investigations and the exasperation of key White House staff.

“Let me be very clear: I have nothing to hide as its relates to how I’ve run the agency for the past 16 months,” Pruitt told a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee, the first of two panels to subject him to hours of questioning Thursday.

But he also didn’t offer enough specifics to satisfy Democratic lawmakers — and a few Republicans — who criticized the lavish spending, cozy relations with lobbyists and other controversies that have taken root on his watch. He pointedly refused to apologize, instead accusing his critics of trying to “derail” President Donald Trump’s policies.

Several Republican lawmakers who defended him during the hearings said he'd held his own against a barrage of Democratic complaints.

"I think he did well," said Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.), adding, "I know him well enough to not believe that he’s deliberately done anything wrong or that he’s made decisions in an inappropriate or unethical manner."

Still, Cole admitted any decision on Pruitt’s fate is in Trump’s hands.

One aspect of Thursday’s testimony drew a notable amount of attention — Pruitt’s shifting explanations for what he knew, and when, about raises as high as 72 percent that went to some of his key aides.

Weeks ago, Pruitt told Fox News that he hadn’t known about the raises until after the fact, that he did not know who authorized them and that the aides should not have received them. But under lawmakers’ questioning Thursday, he acknowledged that he had authorized his chief of staff to award pay increases to the aides — but said he did not know how high they would be or that they would circumvent the White House’s disapproval.

"I was not aware of the amount, nor was I aware of the bypassing or the [Presidential Personnel Office] process not being respected," Pruitt said, responding to a question from Rep. Paul Tonko of New York, the top Democrat on the Energy and Commerce Environment Subcommittee.

Pruitt also blamed his staff for the controversial purchase and installation of the privacy booth in his office, and said he would have stopped it if he knew the cost. He said the installation came after he’d received a phone call “of a sensitive nature” and requested “access to secure communication.”

“I gave direction to my staff to address that, and out of that came a $43,000 expenditure that I did not approve,” he said. “If I’d known about it, I would have refused it.".

Even after surviving Thursday’s gauntlet, Pruitt is still facing numerous investigations from Congress, the White House and government watchdogs into his taxpayer-funded first-class travel; unprecedented, 24-hour security detail; and sweetheart rental deal with the wife of a lobbyist who sought to influence his agency. A senior EPA official said Thursday that high-level staffers including Jackson, Greenwalt and Perrotta are willing to sit for interviews with staff of the House Oversight Committee, which is carrying out one of the probes of Pruitt's actions.

Sitting in front of protesters wearing "Impeach Pruitt" T-shirts and a sign calling him "Mr. Corruption” on Thursday morning, Pruitt dismissed the wave of criticism as an attempt to undercut “transformational change” happening at the agency.

Under questioning from Rep. Anna Eshoo (D-Calif.), Pruitt declined multiple times to answer whether he felt any remorse for wasteful spending at the agency,

"I think there are changes I’ve made already,” he said. But he deflected several questions about his first-class flights, saying his security detail decides where he sits on airplanes, and that he now plans to fly coach.

Eshoo didn’t buy it.

"With all due respect, I may be elected, but I’m not a fool,” she said. "That’s really a lousy answer from someone that has a high position in the federal government.".............


( NOTE: SEEMS TO BE A RECURRING THEME UNDER THIS ADMINISTRATION.........LIKE TRUMP, KEEP LYING AND PASS THE BLAME ELSEWHERE !!! WHAT A MESS !!! SCOTT PRUITT !!! YOU'RE FIRED !!! )

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/04/ ... ing-555152





House Republicans on Scott Pruitt: We’re With Him

“I have, high, high, high confidence in his personal integrity.”

One of the reasons Scott Pruitt has probably survived this long at the Environmental Protection Agency is that he still has key Republican support in Congress. It was clear Thursday that House Republicans were still willing to defend him, when Pruitt appeared before the House Energy and Commerce and the House Appropriations subcommittees.

The hearings followed a pattern. Democrats grilled Pruitt on the ethical problems surrounding his administration—or spent their remaining time with monologues about his actions. Republicans were less interested in getting answers from Pruitt on what subcommittee chair Rep. John Shimkus (R-Ill.) called his “stewardship” of the agency, and spent more time focusing on the “policy” they agreed with. Despite Pruitt’s innumerable and well-documented ethical violations and questionable spending patterns, many Republicans in the hearing used their time to offer support for the embattled EPA head.



“It’s shameful today that this hearing has turned into a personal attack hearing and a shameful attempt to denigrate the work that’s being done at the EPA,” Rep. Bill Johnson (R-Ohio) said.

Rep. Gregg Harper, (R-Miss.) complained of the “political bloodsport to destroy anyone who is affiliated with this administration.”

Rep. Joe Barton (R-Texas) called Pruitt a “victim” of Washington politics. “If you can’t debate the policies in Washington, you attack the personality. And that’s what’s happening to you.”

“I apologize for the abrasiveness of some of my colleagues who would rather tarnish your reputation than address the problems facing the nation,” Rep. Jeff Duncan (R-S.C.) said after a heated line of questioning from the other side of the aisle.

And as the Huffington Post pointed out, Rep. David McKinley called the criticism a “classic display of innuendo and McCarthyism.”

“I have, high, high, high confidence in his personal integrity,” Rep. Tom Cole (R-Ok), who comes from Pruitt’s home state, added in the second hearing of the day.

In between the hearings, Shimkus told reporters Pruitt’s answers were “a little vague” but maintained that only the White House had the power to decide the EPA administrator’s fate.

https://www.motherjones.com/environment ... -with-him/





Arizona teachers marching in historic strike

PHOENIX (AP/KSAZ) - Thousands of Arizona teachers and their supporters are marching toward the state Capitol to demand more education funding in a historic statewide strike that's shut down schools.

Crowds in red shirts filled the streets from the starting point at downtown Phoenix's baseball park Thursday and broke into chants of "Red for Ed" as they marched en masse.

Phoenix Police estimate over 50,000 people took part in the march to the Arizona state Capitol, in an effort to demand a 20% raise for teachers, about $1 billion to return school funding to pre-Great Recession levels and increased pay for support staff, among other things.

The march in Phoenix had a positive vibe, along with a clear message: that the walkout is for real, until demands are met.

"We want a sustainable, reasonable plan that gives funding back to our classrooms," said one participant.

"All of us want a quick resolution," sand another participant. "Every single person would rather be in their classroom right now, so quick is best, but a quick resolution that actually solves the problems."

Arizona Education Association president Joe Thomas said that the march to the Capitol is necessary after attempts at outreach have been ignored. There's no end date for the walkout and he said educators may have to consider a ballot initiative for education funding if lawmakers do not come up with a plan on their own.

"How it ends is up to the governor and up to those legislative leaders," Thomas said. "If they're courageous, if they have the political capital to come down and speak with us, we all get a win."

Republican Gov. Doug Ducey has laid out a plan for a 20 percent teacher pay raise by 2020, but organizers of the so-called #RedforEd movement say his plan relies on rosy revenue projections and doesn't address the other issues.

Districts around the state have said they will close as a result of the walkout. More than 840,000 Arizona students are expected to be out of school on Thursday, according to an analysis from the Arizona Republic that tallied up at least 100 school districts and charter schools are closing. The state Department of Education said the state has more than 200 districts and more than 1.1 million school children.

In Colorado, more than 10,000 teachers are expected to demonstrate in Denver as part of a burgeoning teacher uprising. About half of the student population will have shuttered schools as a result, with teachers using personal leave time to take off.

The walkouts are the climax of an uprising that began weeks ago with the grass-roots #RedforEd movement that spread from West Virginia, Oklahoma and Kentucky.

Colorado lawmakers from both parties have agreed to give schools their largest budget increase since the Great Recession. But teachers say that the state has a long way to go to make up for ground lost during the recession and before that due to the state's strict tax and spending limits.

http://www.fox10phoenix.com/news/arizon ... o-protest_

<

Trump doctor Harold Bornstein says bodyguard, lawyer 'raided' his office, took medical files

Bornstein said he felt "raped" after White House aide Keith Schiller and lawyer Alan Garten showed up unannounced and took Trump's files.

In February 2017, a top White House aide who was Trump's longtime personal bodyguard, along with the top lawyer at the Trump Organization and a third man showed up at the office of Trump's New York doctor without notice and took all the president's medical records.

The incident, which Dr. Harold Bornstein described as a "raid," took place two days after Bornstein told a newspaper that he had prescribed a hair growth medicine for the president for years.

In an exclusive interview in his Park Avenue office, Bornstein told NBC News that he felt "raped, frightened and sad" when Keith Schiller and another "large man" came to his office to collect the president's records on the morning of Feb. 3, 2017. At the time, Schiller, who had long worked as Trump's bodyguard, was serving as director of Oval Office operations at the White House.

"They must have been here for 25 or 30 minutes. It created a lot of chaos," said Bornstein, who described the incident as frightening.

A framed 8-by-10 photo of Bornstein and Trump that had been hanging on the wall in the waiting room now lies flat under a stack of papers on the top shelf of Bornstein's bookshelf. Bornstein said the men asked him to take it off the wall.

Bornstein said he was not given a form authorizing the release of the records and signed by the president known as a HIPAA release — which is a violation of patient privacy law. A person familiar with the matter said there was a letter to Bornstein from then-White House doctor Ronny Jackson, but didn't know if there was a release form attached...........

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/donald ... ok-n870351





Mueller's questions for Trump: Read the full list

What is your knowledge of calls that Gen. Flynn made with [former Russian ambassador Sergei] Kislyak late December 2016?

What is your reaction to press accounts Jan. 12, 2017, Feb. 8-9 2017?

What did you think and what did you know regarding Sally Yates’ meetings on Jan 26-27 regarding Gen. Flynn?

How was the decision made to request the resignation of Gen. Flynn on Feb. 13?

What was the purpose of the meeting with James Comey on Feb. 14 after the Homeland Security briefing?

What did you say to Comey about Gen. Flynn?

What did you think and what did you do about the Comey June 8, 2017 testimony regarding Gen. Flynn?

After Gen. Flynn resigned, what calls or efforts were made by people associated with you to reach out to Gen. Flynn or to discuss Flynn seeking immunity or possible pardon?

On fired FBI Director James Comey:
What was the President’s view of James Comey during the Transition with respect to job performance?

What did the President think and do in reaction to James Comey’s briefing on January 6, including the intelligence community assessment?

What was the President’s reaction to Comey when they met alone regarding what they called other ICA matters (the Steele Dossier)? Also, what was discussed [regarding] ancillary reports?

What was the purpose of the Jan. 27 dinner meeting you had with Comey?

Was loyalty discussed? Did you communicate with Comey concerning his status at the end of the dinner? What was your knowledge of the Gen. Flynn and Russia investigation in days leading up to the March 20 testimony of Comey before House Intel Committee?

What did you think and what did you do in reaction to the Comey testimony on March 20 before House Intel Committee?

Describe outreach to Intel chiefs [Mike] Rogers, [Mike] Pompeo, and [Dan] Coates?

What did you say to them?

What was the purpose of the reach-out on March 22, 25 and 27?

What was the purpose of your calls to Comey on March 30 and April 11?

What was the purpose of your statement to Maria Bartiromo on April 11, 2017?

What did you think and what did you do regarding the May 3 Comey testimony before the Senate Intel Committee?

Regarding the decision to terminate Comey, when was it made, why was it made, who on your staff played a role in decision, and how was it determined to make it public?

What did you mean to communicate during your May 10 meeting with Kislyak and [Sergey] Lavrov (concerning ‘pressure off’ and ‘nutcase’)?

What did you mean regarding your statements to Lester Holt regarding Comey and Russia?

What was the purpose of May 12 tweet that Comey better hope there are no tapes?

What was the purpose of the September and October press statements, including tweets, regarding an investigation of Comey? Also, Sarah Sanders statements regarding same?

What was the reason for your continued criticism of Comey and McCabe, even till today?
What did you think and what did you do regarding AG Sessions recusal?

What efforts did you make to try to get him to change his mind and reverse?

Did you have a discussion about whether the AG was going protect him and reference other AG’s?

What did you think and what did you do in reaction to the news of the appointment of the Special Counsel? – Including your reaction to AG Session’s resignation?

What was the purpose of holding AG Sessions resignation until May 31 and with whom did you discuss it?

What did you think and what did you do in reaction to the June 20, 2017 determination that the SC was speaking to Rogers, Pompeo and Coates?

What consideration and discussion did you have regarding terminating the Special Counsel in June of 2017?

What did you think and do in reaction to January 25, 2018 story about the termination of the Special Counsel and Don [McGahn] backing you off of the termination?

What discussions did you have with Reince Priebus in July 2017 about obtaining the Sessions resignation?

With whom did you discuss obtaining the AG’s resignation?

What was the purpose of the public criticism of Sessions via tweets during July 2017?
What did you think and what did you know about the June 9, 2016 meeting in Trump Tower and that it might be disclosed?

What involvement did you have in the communication strategy regarding the June 9, 2016 Trump Tower meeting and the release of Don Jr.’s emails concerning same?

What interaction and communication did you have with Michael Cohen, Felix Sater, and others, including foreign nationals, regarding real estate developments in Russia during the period of the campaign?

During a 2013 trip to Russia, what communication and relationships did you have with the Agalarovs and any Russian government officials?

What discussions did you have during the campaign regarding any meeting with Putin?

What discussions did you have during the campaign regarding US Sanctions toward Russia?

Did you discuss either meeting with Putin or US sanctions with others?

What knowledge did you have regarding the June 9 Trump Tower meeting? When did you become aware of the meeting?

What knowledge or involvement did you have concerning platform changes regarding arming Ukraine?

During the campaign, what knowledge or information did you have regarding Russian hacking, use of social media or other acts aimed at the campaign?

What knowledge did you have of any outreach by members or former members of your campaign to Russia offering potential assistance to the campaign? NOTE: specifically mentioned [Paul] Manafort.

What knowledge did you have of communication with or regarding Roger Stone, persons associated with Roger Stone, Julian Assange, or Wikileaks?

What knowledge did you have during the Transition of an attempt to establish back channel communications to Russia and efforts by Jared Kushner regarding same?

What knowledge do you have of a 2017 meeting in Seychelles regarding Erik Prince of Blackwater?

What knowledge do you have of a Ukrainian peace proposal provided to Michael Cohen in 2017?

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2018/05 ... -list.html





STABLE GENIUS

If Team Trump Leaked Mueller’s Questions, It’s Bound to Backfire

Now the president is making the novel argument there can’t be obstruction of justice if there is no collusion. He’s trying to shape public opinion, not contest the facts.

The New York Times recently obtained and published a list of more than 40 questions that special counsel Robert Mueller reportedly wants to ask President Donald Trump. Is this leak a carefully orchestrated move in a chess match, or a desperate attempt to roil the investigation?

The questions themselves seem thorough but straightforward — questions relating to widely reported events, such as the firings of former FBI Director James Comey and former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn and the June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower.

The only surprise was a question about outreach by the Trump campaign, including Paul Manafort, to Russia for election assistance. Previous reports had indicated offers of assistance going only in the other direction. This could be a significant new reveal (it’s unlikely Mueller would ask a question based on a false premise) or it could just be a scrivener’s error, in light of the way these questions were obtained by the Times. Mueller’s team reportedly read the questions over the telephone to members of Trump’s legal team, who wrote them down. As anyone who has ever played the old “Telephone” game knows, details are sometimes lost in the translation, and so it may be that this development is nothing new.

And so the “what” regarding these questions is mostly unsurprising. The surprise is the “who” and the “why.”


First, who might have leaked these questions? Mueller himself or someone on his team could have done so, but Mueller is known for his tight-lipped approach to investigations. Not only is it against his nature to leak these questions, it is also against his interest. Sharing these questions with the media telegraphs areas of inquiry to all other witnesses. The president may get the extraordinary courtesy of advance notice of the questions to induce him to come to the table, but no other witness will likely receive this unusual benefit. Publishing these questions only stands to compromise Mueller’s investigation, and so it seems unlikely that the leak came from his camp.

That leaves Trump’s team with Rudy Giuliani new to the team. These questions were not leaked when they were first communicated to Trump’s team in March, but only now, after Giuliani has come on board.

Why might Trump’s legal team want to leak these questions? The answer may lie in Trump’s morning tweets. Trump criticized the leak, and then stated: “No questions on Collusion. Oh, I see...you have a made up, phony crime, Collusion, that never existed, and an investigation begun with illegally leaked classified information. Nice!” A second tweet said, “It would seem very hard to obstruct justice for a crime that never happened! Witch Hunt!”...........

https://www.thedailybeast.com/if-team-t ... e?ref=home





Mueller's real questions for Trump will be a lot tougher

(CNN)Much is being made of the leaked topic areas relating to Robert Mueller's impending testimonial showdown with President Donald Trump. Having worked for 13 years as a federal prosecutor in the Clinton, Bush and Obama administrations, I can report that the reasons why the questions, crafted by the Trump legal team after consultation with the special counsel's office, were leaked are far more interesting than the leaked information itself.

First, the leaked information: In complex criminal cases, it is simply not unusual for prosecutors to disclose information or evidence to a target or subject of an investigation; it is called a "reverse proffer." Through such disclosures, prosecutors seek to advance the government's case. For example, oftentimes, prosecutors disclose specific incriminating evidence against a target or subject in an effort to flip that person against higher level members of a conspiracy. Prosecutors essentially lay out key evidence and say, "We got you; it's time to cut a deal."

In this case, Mueller's disclosure served a different prosecutorial purpose. By providing the general topic areas to the President's lawyers, Mueller short-circuited a lengthy court battle, which he would have ultimately lost, without giving away anything important about his investigation.

Months ago, Trump's lawyers likely informed Mueller that the President needed to consider whether to take legal action to restrict Mueller's questioning based on executive privilege, the Fifth Amendment, or other grounds. To do so, the President required an understanding of Mueller's topic areas.

While Mueller could have refused such a request, a federal judge would likely have required Mueller to disclose enough information for the President's lawyers to make those important legal determinations. It was entirely in Mueller's interest to voluntarily provide the information to avoid protracted litigation, which would have only delayed the opportunity to question the President............

https://www.cnn.com/2018/05/01/opinions ... index.html






Rod Rosenstein on House GOP Impeachment Threat: I Will Not Be Extorted

The deputy attorney general hits back hard against threats from the right-wing Freedom Caucus in Congress.

Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein, who has come under fire by President Trump and Republican lawmakers, responded on Tuesday to the conservative House Freedom Caucus drafting articles of impeachment against him by warning that he will not be extorted.

The caucus move represented increasing tension between the Department of Justice and conservative lawmakers about the scope and continuity of special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into possible collusion between Trump and Russian officials during the presidential campaign.

“They can’t even resist leaking their own drafts,” Rosenstein said at an event at the Newseum on Tuesday afternoon. “I just don’t have anything to say about documents like that, that nobody has the courage to put their name on and that they leak in that way.”

He also said: “I can tell you that there have been people that have been making threats against me privately and publicly for some time, and I think they should understand by now the Department of Justice is not going to be extorted.”

The Washington Post reported that the draft articles, which had been referred to as a "last resort," were created after members have been attempting to get documents from the Department of Justice about FBI surveillance of the Trump campaign as well as information about the probe into Hillary Clinton's email server.

“My frustrations about their inability to respond to simple requests could warrant further action,” Freedom Caucus chairman Rep. Mark Meadows (R-NC) told the Post.

A spokesperson for the caucus did not respond to a request for comment from The Daily Beast about Rosenstein's remarks.

Rosenstein also specifically addressed the caucus' concern about obtaining a FISA warrant.

"There's a lot of talk about FISA application and many of the people I see talking about it seem not to recognize what it is. A FISA application is actually a warrant, just like a search warrant," Rosenstein said. "In order to get a FISA search warrant, you need an affidavit signed by a career federal law enforcement officer who swears that the information in the affidavit is true and correct to the best of knowledge and belief. And that is the way we operate, and if that is wrong, sometimes there is, if you find there is anything incorrect in there, that person is going to face consequences."

https://www.thedailybeast.com/rod-rosen ... ref=scroll





DR. TRUMP

Trump’s Doctor: He ‘Dictated’ Health Letter During Campaign

Dr. Harold Bornstein, President Donald Trump’s longtime personal doctor, told CNN on Tuesday that then-candidate Trump “dictated” the dramatic letter that spoke glowingly of his health. “He dictated that whole letter. I didn’t write that letter,” Bornstein said. “I just made it up as I went along.” Among other lines, the letter stated that Trump “will be the healthiest individual ever elected to the presidency.” Bornstein on Tuesday also claimed that Trump’s former bodyguard Keith Schiller raided his office and stole the president’s health records. The White House said it was not a “raid” but was rather routine for a newly elected president.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trumps-do ... n?ref=home






Republicans confirming Trump's court nominees at record pace

Senate Republicans are poised to confirm more of President Trump’s nominees to appeals courts next week, putting Trump on pace to have more of those nominees approved in the first two years of his tenure than any other recent president.

In addition to the 15 appeals court nominees already confirmed, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has set up votes on six additional circuit court nominees for next week, when the chamber returns from a week-long recess. That will bring the total number of appeals court nominees confirmed for Trump up to 21.

At 21 appeals court judges confirmed, Senate Republicans will only be one short of that record — the 22 circuit nominations President George H.W. Bush got through the Senate during his first two years.

The fast pace comes as Republicans have increasingly pointed to their ability to confirm Trump’s nominees as a key reason they should keep control of the Senate heading into the midterm election.

And unlike signature legislation — which GOP senators note Democrats could be quick to overturn once they are back in power — confirming Trump’s judicial picks could shape the direction of the U.S. court system for decades.

McConnell told Fox News late last month that confirming circuit court nominees is his “top priority.”

“I've processed the circuit judges as rapidly as they've come out of committee. It's been my top priority,” he said.

Republicans under pressure from their base and from prominent conservatives to go even further in speeding up confirmation votes, potentially by keeping Democrats in for a rare Friday or weekend session.

Democrats have bristled over the pace of the confirmation votes. With only a simple majority needed to confirm nominees, Trump’s picks can clear the Senate without help from Democrats if most of the GOP caucus supports them.

“The Republicans have not stopped this year. The Republicans engaged in hardball tactics at the district and circuit court levels,” Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) said from the Senate floor late last week...............

(Note: GOP STACKING THE COURTS WITH CONSERVATIVE - LIFETIME POSITION JUDGES - DANGEROUS PRECEDENT! GOP CONTROLS BOTH HOUSES SO THERE'S NO STOPPING A RUNAWAY TRAIN )

http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/3857 ... ecord-pace





The real reason Mueller hasn’t called Ivanka Trump

The special counsel seems to be leaving the president's children for last.

She was in Bedminster, N.J., with President Donald Trump the rainy May 2017 weekend when he decided to fire FBI Director James Comey.

She was a passenger on the plane flying home from the G-20 conference in Germany the next month, strategizing about how to manage the fallout of her brother Don Jr.’s 2016 meeting with a Russian lawyer peddling “dirt” about Hillary Clinton.

Ivanka Trump, the president’s daughter and West Wing adviser, also spoke briefly at Trump Tower with a Russian lawyer and a lobbyist who was present for that meeting during the campaign.

Yet the family member closest to the president – and the woman who as a key campaign figure helped lobby her father to hire Paul Manafort, a man who is now under indictment on money laundering and fraud charges, as campaign manager – has yet to be called in for questioning by special counsel Robert Mueller, according to multiple people familiar with the investigation.

As Mueller negotiates an interview with the president, former White House aides who themselves have sat down with prosecutors for daylong grillings are wondering why.

“She’s involved in everything,” said one former White House adviser who has previously clashed with the Trump children. “It’s odd. Unless they consider her that ‘T’ word.”..........

https://www.politico.com/story/2018/05/ ... obe-563169

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