The United States led the world in tackling CO2 emissions last year while combining that singular success with solid economic growth, a new report reveals.

It has also been confirmed while the U.S. was hitting its climate goals, at the same time “80 percent of the increase in CO2 emissions came from Asia and that China and India both contributed significantly” to global increases.

“The United States saw the largest decline in energy-related CO2 emissions in 2019 on a country basis – a fall of 140 Mt, or 2.9%, to 4.8 Gt,” the International Energy Agency (IEA) reported Tuesday. “US emissions are now down almost 1 Gt from their peak in the year 2000, the largest absolute decline by any country over that period.”

“A 15% reduction in the use of coal for power generation underpinned the decline in overall US emissions in 2019,” the IEA continued.

“Coal-fired power plants faced even stronger competition from natural gas-fired generation, with benchmark gas prices an average of 45% lower than 2018 levels. As a result, gas increased its share in electricity generation to a record high of 37%. Overall electricity demand declined because demand for air-conditioning and heating was lower as a result of milder summer and winter weather.”

U.S. success in leading the world in tackling CO2 emissions was not lost on those who support its current efforts.

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) responded on Twitter, “FACT you will NEVER see on the 6 o’clock news: U.S. emissions FELL 2.9%, or by 140 million tons, continuing the trend of the United States LEADING THE WORLD IN TOTAL EMISSIONS DECLINE since 2000.”

The IEA pointed out 80 percent of the increase in CO2 emissions came from Asia and that China and India both contributed significantly to the increase.

“In China, emissions rose but were tempered by slower economic growth and higher output from low-carbon sources of electricity,” the IEA reported. “Renewables continued to expand in China, and 2019 was also the first full year of operation for seven large-scale nuclear reactors in the country.”

The success of the U.S. in achieving such manifest good work flies in the face of criticism from the likes of Sweden’s Greta Thunberg who has previously chided it for doing the opposite.

Last September Thunberg took her climate alarm message to the U.S. Congress, imploring the nation’s lawmakers to “take real action” to avert environmental disaster.

On the evidence it would appear that mission has been accomplished without a single job being lost in the process.

A study released by the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health declares there is no evidence “assault weapon” bans lead to a lower “incidence of fatal mass shootings.”

The push for an “assault weapons” ban is central to the Democrats’ gun control agenda nationally and is front and center for Democrats at the state level in places like Arizona and Virginia.

According to the Johns Hopkins study, researchers”did not find an independent association between assault weapon bans and the incidence of fatal mass shootings.”

https://www.jhsph.edu/news/news-release ... tings.html

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Are there any liberal policies that are based on actual facts or science, or are they all just some strange religious experience that reasonable minds cannot see?

In case any of my liberal friends are wondering why nobody cares about their fake outrage over the latest scandal.

Total Presidential pardons/sentence commutations:

Carter: 566
Reagan: 406
H.W Bush: 77
Clinton: 459
George W: 200
Obama: 1,927
Trump: 26

Trump pardons only his buddies. Guess he doesn't have many.

Yeah, if he opened up his choices to former domestic terrorists and cop killers he could probably pardon as many as Obama and Carter.

The U.S. economy added 273,000 jobs in February and the unemployment rate ticked down to 3.5 percent, the government said Friday.

Economists had forecast 175,000 nonfarm payroll growth.

Average hourly earnings were up by 3 percent compared with a year ago.

December’s estimate of payroll growth was revised upward by 37,000 to 184,000.

January’s number was revised up by 48,000 to 273,000. That adds a total of 85,000 more jobs than had previously been reported putting the three-month moving average at 243,000 jobs

The labor market has been a bright spot for the American economy in recent months, with unemployment at or near 50-year lows and the economy continuing to add hundreds of thousands of jobs month after month. The strength of the labor market has boosted consumer sentiment and consumer spending, keeping the pace of economic growth stronger than in many of the other major economies around the world.

The coronavirus is widely expected to slow economic growth this year, although the impact may be short-lived if the outbreak is contained or fizzles out after a few months. The Labor Department said there was no sign that the outbreak had hurt employment in February. The strength of the labor market, however, may bolster the economy’s ability to withstand the pressure.

OMG!

No pandemic posts? Is the subject off limits??????

Just driving through.

A few thoughts though.

A+ ?

I see where Trump has given himself another A+ rating.
This time concerning his handling of the pandemic.
Rep. Katie Porter (D) has other ideas.

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/kati ... s-covid-19

I highly recommend reading the 17 page report.
It's easy. So easy even Trump can understand it.
Should take less than 5 minutes.

Favorite Son (In-Law)

See where favorite son-in-law, Jared Kushner, is in charge of the Coronavirus Response.
Lucky us. Whoopee!

Beware!

The Republicans are coming after our right to vote Folks.
Apparently, the US Supreme Court and its Conservative majority agree.
The debacle coming out of Wisconsin was pathetic.
Voter suppression is a terrible thing.
The right to vote was a freedom my dad fought for and died during WWII.
The voters in Wisconsin boldly put that concept on display this past Tuesday.
Proud of those Wisconsin voters.

Appalling!

A black nurse that just finished her shift stood in line for hours to vote.
She was refused that right to vote! Why? She was 3 minutes late!

Foxhole Buddy?

How would you like this guy covering your ass?
Wisconsin’s Republican State Assembly Speaker Robin Vos assured voters it was safe to vote in person
during the state’s Tuesday primary election while decked out in full personal protective gear (gloves, gown, mask, headgear)

Last Week!

Georgia Republican Gov. Kemp said he just learned corona virus could spread without symptoms.
"Those individuals could have been infecting people before they ever felt bad," Kemp said. "We didn't know that until the last 24 hours."
Officials have warned that people who do not appear sick could be spreading the disease since late January.

Arkansas!

Arkansas' mayors were denied lockdown powers.
Gov. Asa Hutchinson, the Republican governor, barred cities and counties from issuing quarantine regulations.

Testing, Testing, Testing

"Only" a half million people across the country have tested positive. You kidding me?
Trump being Trump. Trying his best to keep the numbers as low as possible.
We've got the worst testing system in the world.
Donny! Get your finger out of your ass and get me a test kit!

Warning

According to the SCIENTISTS, the next wave is due to hit again this winter.

Lies

Trump's lies are costing lives.

<

OMG Part Deux!

Senate Republicans

Can you believe the cowardly act the Senate Republicans laid on us by not impeaching Trump?
The guy Disrespected/Defied Congress. He Disrespected the Constitution. He abused the power of the presidency.
The president and the Republican majority in the Senate both made a mockery out of their Oath of Office.
They both trampled all over the constitution and yet the failure to impeach. SAD! SOOOO SAD!
These morons just took democracy back a hundred years.

Fire Him !!

The inspector general of the intelligence community, Michael Atkinson, was fired by reality host of the white house, President Donald Trump.
The firing was disclosed in a letter to Congress for his handling of a whistle blower complaint that led to President Donald Trump's impeachment.
Trump fired him because he "faithfully discharged his legal obligations as an independent and impartial" inspector general.
The truth hurts Donny!

Cleaning House

Michael Atkinson mostly likely will not be the last enemy Trump has in his sights.
Trump - Loyalty first; Country last.

Consolation - Bitter Sweet

One consolation for me.....Trump will have the Impeachment asterisk next to his name in the history books.

Vote & Vote Often

Gotta get rid of this guy folks. We have to flip the Senate. We have to hold the house.
The only way to win this battle is through your votes.
Let's end the corruption, the lies, the finger pointing, the alienation, the cruelty, the insults, the belittling....
We deserve better as a country.
We deserve a leader that can get us through the hard times like this epidemic and his name ain't Trump.



PLEASE VOTE

Long time, no hear from you, Joe.

Good to have you back.

Stay safe.

As long as there are gullible people like Joe around the main stream media can stay in business shoveling their BS.

When the predictions were dire, millions of deaths! It was all Trump's fault. But now that the situation was handled in a great manner and the predictions have lowered hyugely it is in spite of Trump.

You dolts can't have it both ways.

-

And there is a good reason the courts and republicans do not want absentee voting. It is because it is ripe with fraud, and always for democrats. That idiot Acosta challenged Trump on that matter the other day, and asked for examples. Trump's people sent him many examples, but some how that did not find it on the CNN airwaves. This is why liberals are as uninformed as they are misinformed.

https://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/whiteh ... dcases.pdf

That is just a small sampling of fraud that has occurred. And there are 43 examples of voter fraud in Wisconsin in that article. Most of which were with ineligible and absentee voting. Gee, I wonder why the courts didn't want that?!

Wise up, Joe. My God.

-

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Here is something that used to get Joe fired up. Russia!!

Released today in a Friday news dump hoping most wouldn't notice, as usual.

-

The “central and essential” evidence used to justify invasive surveillance of an American citizen in the FBI’s probe into Russian interference was, itself, an example of Russian interference, according to once-secret footnotes declassified at the urging of two U.S. Senators. The footnotes, part of the Justice Department Inspector General’s postmortem of the FBI’s flawed operation to spy on Trump campaign aide Carter Page, were released just hours after Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) and Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) renewed their push for transparency. The senators expect a fuller declassification in the coming days.

The footnotes reveal that, beginning early on and continuing throughout the FBI’s Russia investigation, FBI officials learned critical information streams that flowed to the dossier were likely tainted with Russian Intelligence disinformation. But the FBI aggressively advanced the probe anyway, ignoring internal oversight mechanisms and neglecting to flag the material credibility concerns for a secret court.

https://www.grassley.senate.gov/news/ne ... nformation

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-

Key FBI officials failed to review an intelligence file identifying Christopher Steele's ties to Russian oligarchs and were later advised some of the information he provided agents in his dossier appeared to be misinformation planted by Russian intelligence, according to declassified information made public Friday.

The explosive revelations were contained in footnotes that had been originally redacted from Justice Department inspector general Michael Horowitz's December report on FBI failures in the Russia case. The information was provided to two Senate committees in recent days.

https://justthenews.com/accountability/ ... 28.twitter

Hey, I still have these bridges and lakes for sale here in Montana, for all you dum-dums that bought the Russia hoax hook line and sinker!

Happy Easter All



Blame Game:

As the virus continues to sweep the country,
Trump and his republican minions keep
Playing the name game. Who’s to blame?
(Media, WHO, GM, Hospitals, Democratic
Governors, Democrats in General, Obama,
Past Presidents, China, and the list goes on.)



Speaking Of China:

Who dismantled the CDC?????
Trump says China “should have told us”
about coronavirus. He removed the official
meant to do that July 2019. US epidemiologist,
Dr. Linda Quick, was embedded within the
Chinese CDC. Trump and the Trump administration
Discontinued the position.



Pandemic Response Team:

Trump and the administration fired the U.S. pandemic
response team in 2018 to cut costs.



Obama Pandemic Playbook:

Trump and the administration declined to use a nearly
70-page pandemic preparedness playbook created by
the National Security Council's health unit during the
Obama administration.

The playbook anticipated and gave instructions for
federal officials to prepare for many of the same
roadblocks the Trump administration now faces,
including lack of medical equipment and coordination.

Multiple officials from the NSC and the US Department
of Health Human Services said that they decided not to
heavily rely on it because it was finalized three years ago.

The document also never underwent the proper
inter-agency vetting and approval processes to become
an official part of the White House's strategy.



Late Response:

Trump and the administration botched the response
to the coronavirus response from insufficient testing
to a lack of coordination, Trump’s Covid-19 response
has been a disaster years in the making.

Trump’s failure to respond to the pandemic didn’t
Begin with the inability to send out millions of test kits
Or the protective medical gear for health workers, It
Didn’t start with Trump’s bungled messaging
Downplaying the crisis even as it worsened.

It began in April 2018, when the disease sickened
Enough people in China to raise a red flag.

Trump and the administration with John Bolton in
Charge of the white house national security council
Began dismantling the team in charge of pandemic
Response firing its leadership and disbanding the team.



Fess Up:

Does Trump ever accept blame for ANYTHING? It’s
Always someone else’s fault.



Trump Accepts "Dirty Tricks" Credit:

How Trump turned ventilators into a form of patronage

It isn’t supposed to work like this.

A seemingly innocuous tweet President Donald Trump*
posted about Colorado receiving ventilators from the
government actually raises troubling questions about
the extent to which the president is using lifesaving
medical equipment as a form of political patronage.

On Wednesday Trump announced that he was sending
100 ventilators to Colorado — a development he credited
to a request from a Republican senator facing an uphill
reelection campaign this year, Cory Gardner.

That tweet might look unproblematic, and perhaps
even praiseworthy on its face. Colorado is one of many
states asking for more lifesaving supplies in the middle
of a global pandemic.

But recent reports have suggested Trump has been
playing politics with the allocation of medical supplies.
CNN broke news last Friday that the federal
government swooped in and blew up a deal that
Colorado’s state government, led by Democratic
Gov. Jared Polis, made with a private company
to acquire 500 ventilators. FEMA, instead, seized
the ventilators for itself, leaving Colorado high and dry.

“A congressional source told CNN that many of the
orders Colorado places for supplies, including an order
for 500 ventilators, has been canceled, because the
items are being bought by FEMA,” CNN reported.

Trump has repeatedly deflected criticism that the
federal government is doing more to help states by
insisting the feds are just a “backup” and states should
be doing more on their own. But in Colorado’s case,
when the state tried to help itself, it was stymied by the feds.



What Kushner Said:

At a Thursday briefing on how the government is responding,
Trump's senior adviser and son-in-law Jared Kushner scolded
states for not building up their own stockpiles, saying that the
"the notion of the federal stockpile was - it’s supposed to be our
stockpile, it’s not supposed to be states’ stockpiles that they
then use."



HHS Website

(Typical Trump Admin Response):

After Kushner said 'it's our stockpile,' HHS website changed
to echo his comments on federal crisis role

It's the latest salvo in rising tensions between
Trump and the states.



Billy Barr - What He Said:

Are you Shelter In Place citizens “Hiding” under your beds.

At the end of the month, Barr said, the federal government
will be “very careful to make sure that the draconian measures
that are being adopted are fully justified.”

“When this period of time, at the end of April, expires, I think
we have to allow people to adapt more than we have, and not
just tell people to go home and hide under their bed, but allow
them to use other ways — social distancing and other means —
to protect themselves,” he said.



Testing, Testing, Testing

Will you be heading back to the workplace
Without being tested and knowing millions
Have also not been tested?

Have you sought out any testing?
I have. Due to the rules and regulations
Concerning testing……I can’t be tested.

Yet, Here’s what the president says about testing:

Trump says, ‘Anybody who wants a test gets a test’
after Pence says US can’t meet coronavirus testing
demand.

Topping a week of conflicting statements from the
administration about how many tests the U.S. is now
able to administer for the coronavirus,
President Donald Trump on Friday told reporters at
the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
in Atlanta that “anybody who wants a test gets a test.”

But by Thursday, U.S. Health and Human Services
Secretary Alex Azar told reporters he expects public
laboratories this week to test 400,000 people.
Later that day, Vice President Mike Pence said
“we don’t have enough tests today to meet what
we anticipate will be the demand going forward.”

As the lies keep spewing from the president’s mouth
Even in this time of crises.



Note - Testing:

A quarter-million people have now been tested for
coronavirus in the US.

That’s less than 1% of the population in this country.



Danger! Danger!

What is Trump and the majority of the republican
Office holders thinking? They are killing us!

Republican Governor Tate Reeves Rejects State
Lockdown For COVID-19:
‘Mississippi's Never Going to Be China



Study--

Republican governors “slower” to adopt coronavirus restrictions,
causing “significant” harm

Republican "delays are likely to produce significant, on-going harm
to public health," the study warned

Mayors across the US are on the front lines of fighting the spread
of the corona virus in vulnerable urban areas.

But the Republican governors of some of the largest states,
including Arizona, Texas, and Florida, are largely leaving
local officials to fight their own battles or usurping local authority.

Mayor Kate Gallego of Phoenix told Insider that Republican Gov. Doug Ducey
had largely stripped her power to respond to the crisis. The governor
issued a "stay at home" order only after Gallego and eight other
Arizona mayors signed a letter demanding he do so.

Mayor Sylvester Turner of Houston said Texas had to work together
to keep people home and slow the virus' spread.
He called Republican Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick's comments that
older Americans would gladly sacrifice their lives to reopen
the economy more quickly "a false choice."

At the same time, several other red-state governors,
including Mike DeWine of Ohio and Larry Hogan of Maryland,
have pushed back on President Donald Trump's downplaying
of the crisis and acted quickly to crack down on the virus' spread.



Republican Cudos Where Cudos Are Due:

Republican Mike DeWine of Ohio and
Republican Larry Hogan of Maryland, and a few ohers
Like them have pushed back on President Donald Trump's
Downplaying of the crisis and acted quickly to crack down
on the virus' spread.



REMEMBER TO VOTE! YOUR VOTES ARE IMPORTANT
BEAT GERRYMANDERING AND VOTER SUPPRESSION
BY VOTING ONE AND ALL. YOUR VOTES ARE NEVER
MORE IMPORTANT THAN THEY ARE NOW.

DOWN BALLOT VOTING IS IMPORTANT IF NOT MORE
IMPORTANT THAN THE PRESIDENTIAL, SENATORIAL, &
GUBERNATORIAL RACES.

Report: Stockpile of 39 million masks exposed as fake

A major California labor union that claimed to have discovered a stockpile of 39 million masks for health care workers fighting the coronavirus was duped in an elaborate scam uncovered by FBI investigators

The Associated Press

April 12, 2020, 1:37 PM

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- A major California labor union that claimed to have discovered a stockpile of 39 million masks for health care workers fighting the coronavirus was duped in an elaborate scam uncovered by FBI investigators, according to a newspaper report Sunday.

Investigators stumbled onto the scheme while looking into whether they could intercept the masks for the Federal Emergency Management Agency under the Defense Production Act, the U.S. attorney’s office said Friday.

The federal government has been quietly seizing supplies across the country as the outbreak spreads. But in this case, there was no warehouse, and there were no masks to seize, the Los Angeles Times reported.

U.S. Attorney Scott Brady told the Times that investigators tracked the tip back to a Pittsburgh businessman, who said he had been working with the Service Employees International Union-United Healthcare Workers West to secure millions of masks.

The businessman had been using WhatsApp to connect with a broker in Australia and a supplier in Kuwait, who are both now the target of a federal investigation, Brady said.

The union, known as SEIU, and the Pittsburgh businessman are not under investigation and both appear to be among a string of middlemen who were fooled, Brady said.

“There are opportunists who are looking for any victim,” he said.

The promise of 39 million masks was first made public March 26, when the union announced it had found the stockpile after 48 hours of frantic phone calls pursuing leads on potential suppliers. The announcement by the union was widely covered by major media outlets and listed several hospital systems and government agencies as buyers.

Behind the scenes, the deal quickly unraveled. Buyers said they failed to receive reliable information about where they could inspect the shipments.

At one point, the Australian broker told the middleman in Pittsburgh that 2 million masks were located in a warehouse in Georgia and that the product had been inspected by a particular certification company.

That, Brady said, “was also part of the ruse.”

No money was exchanged in the attempts to finalize a deal, according to Brady.

Experts in the global supply chain say dubious brokers and suppliers have flooded the market with suspect offers, creating an atmosphere of confusion and distrust just as hospitals are trying to stock up on the gear doctors and nurses need to protect themselves from the virus.

Steve Trossman, spokesman for SEIU-UHW, told the Times that union officials had been trying to find equipment for members, and the group had no financial interest in any transactions.

“As far as we knew, he had legitimate masks,” Trossman said of the supplier, “and the people who were going to purchase those masks were going to fully vet it and check it out and do their due diligence.”

Brady said federal investigators had reason to suspect the arrangement. The 39 million masks were advertised as N95 masks from 3M, the largest U.S.-based manufacturer. But 3M told federal investigators it manufactured only 20 million such masks last year, making that large of a stockpile unlikely unless the product was counterfeit.

<


As feds play ‘backup,’ states take unorthodox steps to compete in cutthroat global market for coronavirus supplies

By

Annie Linskey, Josh Dawsey, Isaac Stanley-Becker and Chelsea Janes

April 11, 2020 at 3:49 p.m. CDT

Rushing to stave off a shortage of medical-grade protective gear to combat the spread of the coronavirus, Minnesota officials leaned on a local company’s global connections to airlift a cache of N95 masks from a Chinese factory back to the state for delivery this week.

Washington state purchased 750,000 cotton swabs for coronavirus tests, taking a risk because the product located by officials has not yet been approved by the Food and Drug Administration. The state is also betting that a Seattle-based outdoor gear company, known for its backpacks and parkas, can reconfigure its operations to produce N95 respirators.

And California, acting as a “nation state” in the words of the governor, began buying 200 million masks per month to shore up supplies in that state and, potentially, across the country.

Elsewhere, some governors and lawmakers have watched in disbelief as they have sought to close deals on precious supplies, only to have the federal government swoop in to preempt the arrangements.

Officials in one state are so worried about this possibility that they are considering dispatching local police or even the National Guard to greet two chartered FedEx planes scheduled to arrive in the next week with millions of masks from China, according to people familiar with the planning. These people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity, asked that their state not be identified to avoid flagging federal officials to their shipment.

As the Trump administration assumes what the president has called a “backup” role in distributing supplies to fight the pandemic, state governments are taking extraordinary — and often unorthodox — steps to compete in an increasingly cutthroat global marketplace.

The result is a patchwork and often chaotic scramble for goods, pitting states against each other and, often, against other countries or even the U.S. government.

“We’re doing what everyone else is doing,” Ohio Gov. Mike DeWine (R) said in an interview. “You’ve got 50 states and the federal government all chasing the same companies. It’s crazy.”

Soaring prices have left states at times to pay up to 10 times the normal prices for certain goods, according to officials from multiple states, eating away at cash reserves and laying the foundation for a fiscal crunch that several governors believe will require federal bailouts. Windfalls, so far, go largely to foreign companies that make the equipment along with third-party brokers that often help connect states with manufacturers and then get a cut, according to state officials and business people....

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics ... story.html

MSNBC quick hits:

* There's a lot of work to be done: "Dr. Anthony Fauci, the government's top infectious disease expert, said Tuesday the U.S. does not yet have the critical testing and tracing procedures needed to begin reopening the nation's economy, adding a dose of caution to increasingly optimistic projections from the White House. 'We have to have something in place that is efficient and that we can rely on, and we're not there yet,' Fauci said in an interview with The Associated Press."

* Governors intend to keep governing: "Despite President Donald Trump's false assertion that he has 'total' authority over American states, those with the highest number of coronavirus cases and deaths say they don't intend to wait for his decision on restarting the economy and will instead resolve for themselves what timeline is best to start a measured and calculated re-opening process."

* That said, some governors aren't governing well: "As governors across the country fell into line in recent weeks, South Dakota's top elected leader stood firm: There would be no statewide order to stay home.... But now South Dakota is home to one of the largest single coronavirus clusters anywhere in the United States, with more than 300 workers at a giant ­pork-processing plant falling ill."

* Gubernatorial praise for White House comes with a key caveat.

Governors, like Zelensky, are in a vulnerable position, are heavily dependent on White House support, and have an incentive to stay in Trump's good graces. The White House dimmed the lights during yesterday's press briefing so that Donald Trump could present a campaign-style video intended to put the president in a flattering light. It featured, among other things, some public praise from governors, including blue-state Democrats.

<

<

* Election debacle backfires on Wisconsin Republicans. Republicans effectively dared voters to put themselves at risk. The party apparently didn't realize that quite a few voters were willing to do exactly that.
It was as ugly an electoral debacle as Americans have seen in a while. Wisconsin Republicans forced the state's voters to participate in a statewide election last week, despite the pandemic circumstances, putting thousands of citizens in danger.

As regular readers know, Wisconsin's GOP-led legislature was asked to change state law to ensure that each of the state's voters received absentee ballots they could cast by mail. Republicans refused. They were then asked to reschedule the elections, so voters wouldn't have to choose between their health and their franchise. Republican lawmakers again said no. They proceeded to file lawsuits to make it as difficult as possible on Badger State residents.

There's no great mystery as to why: GOP officials believed holding a hazardous election was necessary in order to ensure a Republican victory in a state Supreme Court election. A conservative justice was on the ballot, and if he prevailed, it would likely help the party with upcoming electoral schemes, ranging from voter purges to district gerrymandering. It's why Donald Trump repeatedly tried to rally support for the conservative incumbent.

What Republicans did not anticipate is that their plan would backfire. The Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported overnight:

Dane County Circuit Judge Democrat Jill Karofsky won the race for Wisconsin Supreme Court, narrowing the conservative majority after a tumultuous election conducted in the midst of a global pandemic, according to unofficial results released Monday. Karofsky's victory marked the first time in a dozen years that a Supreme Court challenger beat an incumbent -- and just the second time in more than half a century. Her win over Justice Daniel Kelly will shift conservative control of the court from 5-2 to 4-3.

With just about all of the votes counted, the contest wasn't especially close: Karofsky, the progressive candidate, defeated Kelly, the conservative incumbent, by double digits.

Republicans effectively dared voters to put themselves at risk. The party apparently didn't realize that quite a few voters were willing to do exactly that.

Stepping back, up until recently Wisconsin appeared to be moving sharply to the right. As recently as 2016, Donald Trump narrowly won the state -- the Democratic ticket had carried Wisconsin in seven of the previous seven cycles -- at a time when Wisconsin was led by a Republican governor and a GOP-led legislature.

But in 2018, Wisconsin voters elected a Democratic governor, re-elected a Democratic U.S. senator, re-elected a Democratic secretary of state, and elected a Democratic state attorney general. Yesterday, they also elected a Democratic-backed state Supreme Court nominee. Democratic candidates even won a majority of state legislative votes in the most recent elections, and they'd be in power were it not for some of the most egregious gerrymandering in the nation.

When making a list of key 2020 battleground states, one might as well start with the Badger State.

<

<

South Dakota

How One City Mayor Forced A Pork Giant To Close Its Virus-Stricken Plant

April 14, 20204:22 PM ET

Republican Paul TenHaken, the 42-year-old mayor of Sioux Falls, South Dakota, said it wasn't easy getting the world's top pork producer to shut down one of its biggest plants.

"It was tense," TenHaken said. "You know, you shut down a plant like that, it has a pretty big impact on the food supply. So we weren't taking this lightly, making this request."

TenHaken, a former marketing entrepreneur, realized in early April that his city was turning into a hot spot of the novel coronavirus pandemic. And the infection was spreading most rapidly among the 3,700 workers at a pork processing plant owned by Smithfield Foods on the banks of the Big Sioux River, just north of the city center. Most of the workers at the plant are immigrants; they speak 26 different languages....

On Monday, the count of positive coronavirus tests among employees at the Sioux Falls plant reached 350. It represented almost 10% of all workers at the plant, and 40% of all COVID-19 cases in South Dakota....

https://www.npr.org/2020/04/14/83447014 ... cken-plant

<

South Dakota Refused To Shut Down, Now Faces One Of The Largest Coronavirus Outbreaks In The Country

Apr 14, 2020,01:19pm EDT

Republican Gov. Kristi Noem is one of five governors yet to issue a statewide stay-at-home order, saying that it is the job of individuals, not the government “to exercise their right to work, to worship and to play. Or to even stay at home.”

South Dakota, one of five remaining states yet to issue a statewide stay-at-home order, now has one of the largest coronavirus outbreaks in the United States—with 300-plus cases at the world’s biggest pork processor Smithfield Foods, raising concern about coronavirus spreading through processed meat and how South Dakota’s rural healthcare facilities will fare with the disease.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/alexandras ... 84becb6d72

<

Nebraskans in Virus Hot Zone ‘Terrified’ After Governor Rejects Stay-at-Home Order

Republican Governor Pete Ricketts has bucked calls for a statewide stay-at-home order from officials in Grand Island—where coronavirus is on the rise.

Updated Apr. 14, 2020 9:11PM

A hundred miles away in Lincoln, there’s an almost eerie calm—at least publicly.

Pete Ricketts has closed schools (even before New York City did), banned gatherings of 10 people or more, and closed dine-in areas in restaurants—but he is one of only eight governors in the country to resist a statewide stay-at-home order. The state’s May 12 primary is still on the books, and last week, Ricketts was already talking about easing what restrictions are in place, and a mall in Gretna was planning on reopening on April 24.

“Reopening sit-down restaurants and bars may be a part of that,” Ricketts, a conservative Republican, said on Wednesday. “As we get into this toward the end of the month, we'll be re-evaluating where we are with regard to where the virus is and making those decisions."

https://www.thedailybeast.com/coronavir ... home-order

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GOTTA ASK, WHAT IS IT ABOUT "PANDEMIC" DO TRUMP & THE REPUBLICANS NOT UNDERSTAND?

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Trump's name will be added to stimulus checks - CNN

President Donald Trump's name will appear on checks sent to millions of Americans to combat the economic effects of the coronavirus in a last-minute Treasury Department order, a senior administration official confirmed to CNN on Tuesday.

[Didn't know Trump had anything to do with the negotiations. Thought it was Pelosi/O'Connell?? Didn't Trump refuse to negotiate with Pelosi? If anyone was going to sign the checks, shouldn't it be Pelosi/O'Connell? Trump taking credit...again....where credit is not due; appalling to campaign during a pandemic crisis; When a mad dog is cornered, I guess this is one of the ways to fight back]

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PROTECT YOUR OWN - Daily Beast

White House Scrambled to Secure Masks for Staffers as U.S. Discouraged Using Them: Report

In mid-March, when President Trump was advising the American public against wearing face coverings to protect against the spreading coronavirus, a White House team worked to secure thousands of masks for their colleagues, The Washington Post reported on Wednesday. A National Security Council team made an appeal to Taiwan’s government for help on March 14 amid growing reports that the nation’s stockpile of protective gear was at risk of running dangerously low. The majority of Taiwan’s donation was added to the Strategic National Stockpile, while 3,500 masks were made available to White House staff and officials, the Post reported. “While the administration had detailed pandemic response plans, somehow those did not include maintaining a supply of masks for White House personnel,” an unnamed official told the Post. “That was a lesson learned. We did look at buying some, but couldn’t find available supply.” While the Centers for Disease Control and the White House were discouraging the use of masks, both internally and to the public, a top NSC official was convinced that they were necessary to protect against infection and transmission. Roughly two weeks later, the CDC and the White House changed course and released a new recommendation: Everyone should now wear face coverings.

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A NIGHTMARE - Daily Beast

Coronavirus Ravages Florida Poker Group, Infecting All and Killing Three

A tight-knit group of eight friends who came together every Sunday to Thursday in a Florida condominium to play poker has been ravaged by the coronavirus, leaving three members of the poker family dead and five others in critical condition, according to the Sun Sentinel. The players, all retirees, met a decade ago and quickly developed a close friendship that would lead to many travel adventures and shared memories. The last time the group convened for a poker game was on March 12, which was followed by devastating losses, hospitalizations, and severe illnesses, the Sentinel reported. Beverly Glass, 84, and Fred Sands, 86, who were described by Glass’ daughter as “movers and shakers,” were together for 20 years before they died just four days apart from complications of the coronavirus in late March. Another group member, Harriet Molko, who is in her 70s and survived the disease after testing positive for it, said that a few of the other players continued frequenting casinos in Florida after their last game. “It’s just a nightmare and I’m trying to get over it,” she said.

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Hot spots erupt in farm belt states where governors insist lock downs aren’t needed - Politico

Cases in parts of the heartland are starting to spike, raising concern about new hot spots that could quash Trump’s push to reopen the economy and extend the public health crisis into the summer. The only hospital in Grand Island, Neb., is full. The mayor has asked for a statewide stay-at-home order that the GOP governor insists isn’t needed. More than one-third of those tested for coronavirus in the surrounding county are positive — and there aren’t enough tests to go around. Grand Island is the fourth-biggest city in a state President Donald Trump and his top health officials repeatedly name check for keeping the virus at bay without the strict lockdowns 42 other states have imposed.

Except that new cases there and in Iowa, South Dakota and other parts of the heartland are starting to spike, raising concern about new hot spots that could quash Trump’s push to reopen the economy and extend the public health crisis well into the summer. Trump and red state governors for weeks have fairly bragged about how large parts of the farm belt have escaped the ravages of the virus without the enforced shelter-in-place policies common on both coasts. It’s still unclear whether the states actually “flattened the curve,” or if the virus just reached there later. But now, cases are erupting, threatening a local population that doesn’t always have easy access to the same health care as more urban areas. And the outbreaks are striking the heart of the nation’s farming and meatpacking industry, potentially disrupting the national distribution of food as meat processing plants close down and truckers who move food across the country are sidelined by illness.

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ACROSS THE BOARD - Daily Beast

Fox News Anchor: ‘Conservatives’ Heads Would've Exploded’ if Obama Claimed ‘Total’ Authority

Fox News anchor Bret Baier on Tuesday called out conservatives for exhibiting some hypocrisy over President Donald Trump asserting he had “total” authority over states’ decisions, pointing out that their “heads would’ve exploded” if the previous president made similar remarks. During an unhinged coronavirus briefing on Monday, the president insisted that he had absolute power when it comes to states’ social-distancing guidelines, claiming that he has authority over governors to decide when states should reopen amid the pandemic. Despite legal experts rebutting his assertion, the president doubled down on Tuesday and likened Democratic governors to mutineers.

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Feds under pressure to publicly track nursing home outbreaks - AP

NEW YORK (AP) — Federal health officials are coming under increasing pressure to start publicly tracking coronavirus infections and deaths in nursing homes amid criticism they have not been transparent about the scope of outbreaks across the country that have already claimed thousands of lives. Experts say the lack of tracking and transparency has been a major blind spot, and that publicizing outbreaks as they happen could not only alert nearby communities and anguished relatives but also help officials see where to focus testing and other safety measures. “This is basic public health — you track this, you study it, and you learn from it,” said David Grabowski, who specializes in health care policy at Harvard Medical School. He said it’s difficult to have confidence in officials’ ability to contain the virus if they aren’t tracking where it has struck and why.

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MORE RELEASED PATIENTS TESTING POSITIVE AGAIN - AP

South Korea’s top infectious disease expert says the number of patients who tested positive for the coronavirus for a second time after their initial release from hospitals has increased to 116. Jeong Eun-kyeong, director of the country’s Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said Monday that so far there haven’t been any confirmed transmissions from patients who tested positive for a second time.

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Trump threatens to adjourn Congress to push through nominees - Politico

President Donald Trump is threatening to invoke a never-before-used authority to push through dozens of executive-branch nominees while Congress remains out of Washington due to the coronavirus crisis. The move would likely set off a battle between the White House and Congress over the limits of presidential power. Complaining that the Senate Democrats are using so-called "pro forma sessions" to prevent him from making recess appointments, Trump threatened to formally adjourn Congress and install his nominees without a vote. Those nominees could potentially serve until Jan. 2021. "They've been warned, and they're being warned right now," Trump said at Wednesday's press conference. "We'll probably be challenged in court, and we'll see who wins."

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Florida Gov. DeSantis declared WWE an “essential service.” His explanation doesn’t make much sense - Vox

During a news conference on Tuesday, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) was asked to explain a bizarre move: Classifying professional wrestling as an “essential service,” thereby allowing World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) to continue to broadcast live shows from a facility near Orlando, despite the state’s stay-at-home order. His answer didn’t inspire confidence that good public health reasons underpinned the decision. “Obviously, WWE, there’s no crowd of anything, so it’s a very small amount of people,” DeSantis said, overlooking that WWE announced last week that one staffer recently tested positive for Covid-19, and that putting others in a position where they feel obligated to travel to and from work at the live shows is a risky proposition. DeSantis went on to make a case that WWE shows will help people who are currently “starved for content.”

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America’s embarrassingly mediocre coronavirus testing, in 2 charts - Vox

The US has improved from “horrifically bad” to “woefully short” on Covid-19 tests.

Apr 15, 2020, 2:10pm EDT
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We Alerted The World' To Coronavirus On Jan. 5, WHO Says In Response To U.S. NPR

We regret the decision of the president of the United States to order a halt in funding to the World Health Organization," WHO Direct0r-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Wednesday in response to President Trump's plan to stop U.S. money from going to the agency.

On Tuesday, Trump accused the WHO of "severely mismanaging and covering up the spread of the coronavirus." He also said the organization is overly influenced by China and was too trusting of that country, particularly in the early phase of the outbreak. Through the middle of January, the president said, the WHO "parroted and publicly endorsed the idea that there was not human-to-human transmission happening despite reports and clear evidence to the contrary." The president also said the health agency had delayed raising the alarm on the threat posed by the new coronavirus, which is now confirmed to have infected more than 2 million people.

Responding on Wednesday to a question about the U.S. accusations, Dr. Mike Ryan, executive director of the WHO's Health Emergencies Programme, said, "In the first weeks of January, the WHO was very, very clear." "We alerted the world on January the 5th," Ryan said. "Systems around the world, including the U.S., began to activate their incident management systems on January the 6th. And through the next number of weeks, we've produced multiple updates to countries, including briefing multiple governments, multiple scientists around the world, on the developing situation — and that is what it was, a developing situation."

Trump said the WHO had "deprived the scientific community of essential data," accusing it of failing to obtain virus samples.

To that charge, Ryan replied, "The virus was identified on January the 7th. The [genetic] sequence was shared on the 12th with the world."

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandso ... nse-to-u-s

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Even Business Execs Think Trump Is Nuts to Reopen the Country Without Mass Testing - Vanity Fair

And they’ve said so to his face.

Earlier this week, it looked as though Donald Trump, in all his infinite wisdom, had put his daughter and son-in-law on the council advising the White House on when to “reopen” the country. Given the president’s long history of putting the dynamic duo in charge of matters they have literally no business being anywhere near, and his claim that Ivanka has single-handedly created 15 million jobs, the development appeared unsurprising if not completely absurd. Luckily, it seems that someone with some ounce of sense intervened, and told Trump he should probably speak to a few actual business executives, if not real-life economists. And what do you know? Those people have apparently told him it would be absurd to get back to regular life before the government has hugely increased testing capabilities.

The Wall Street Journal reports that in Trump’s first task force meeting of business and political leaders, executives told the president that the administration must dramatically increase the availability of coronavirus testing “before the public would be confident enough to return to work, eat at restaurants or shop in retail establishments,” according to sources familiar with the call.

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/04 ... ry-council

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A widow believed coronavirus killed her husband. It took weeks to learn the truth

For Julie Murillo, the fight to get her husband tested for COVID-19 lasted twice as long as his battle with the illness itself.

Julio Ramirez fell sick March 8 after returning from a trip to Indiana for his job as a sales representative for a jewelry company. Fearing he’d been exposed to the coronavirus, the 43-year-old sought care, but doctors refused to test him on two separate occasions, instead giving him medication and telling him to rest at his San Gabriel home.

He died there March 16.

Nearly three weeks later, after a campaign by Murillo that included calling government agencies and hiring a private autopsy firm, a team from the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health visited the funeral home where Ramirez’s body was being kept. Test results confirmed what Murillo had suspected: Her husband had contracted the coronavirus.

https://www.latimes.com/california/stor ... er-he-died

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Sean Penn wants to 'save lives' with free COVID-19 testing

MALIBU, Calif. (AP) — After nearly a decade of helping communities in distress abroad, Sean Penn is joining the fight against the coronavirus much closer to home.

The Oscar winner’s disaster relief organization CORE has teamed up with Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti’s office and the city’s fire department to safely distribute free drive-thru COVID-19 test sites for those with qualifying symptoms. He along with his staff wearing hazard suits also are administering tests in his home city of Malibu.

Penn hopes the program can “save lives and alleviate depletion of resources” through the efforts of CORE, which stands for Community Organized Relief Effort. His non-profit organization stepped in to help rebuild Haiti after the 2010 earthquake and the devastating Hurricane Matthew.

The actor said he and his staff decided to “pull the trigger” very quickly to help run the test sites.

https://www.smdailyjournal.com/arts_and ... bdbdd.html

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Trump halt to WHO funding violates same law as Ukraine aid freeze, House Democrats say - Politico

GAO concluded that Trump broke the law when he paused hundreds of millions of dollars in critical military aid to Ukraine last summer.

President Donald Trump's halt to World Health Organization funding is illegal and violates the same federal spending laws as the Ukraine aid freeze that partly prompted his impeachment, House Democrats said on Wednesday.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Trump’s decision is “dangerous, illegal and will be swiftly challenged," without elaborating on what specific action might be taken.

But a senior administration official contended that language in the most recent spending bill for the State Department and other foreign aid programs gives Trump “broad discretion” in spending money allocated to WHO, including a possible redirection of the health organization’s funding to other international causes after the administration completes a review of the funds in two to three months. Trump announced the review at the same time he said WHO funding would be halted.

House Democrats for months have homed in on the administration’s efforts to slow, halt or redirect dollars appropriated by Congress to satisfy Trump’s personal policy priorities, and they said this is another example.

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/04/1 ... ing-188124

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White House still has no road map for restarting the economy - Politico

Internal competition, a lack of communication and a shortage of coronavirus testing are complicating President Donald Trump’s May 1 goal.

With the White House moving to reopen the economy as early as May 1, top officials have yet to coalesce around a single plan to allow Americans and businesses to safely resume work as the coronavirus pandemic rages on.

Instead, senior administration officials are engaged in an earnest yet scattershot effort to support President Donald Trump’s long-expressed desire to revive the downward-spiraling economy and stabilize the volatile financial markets in the middle of an election year.

The ever-evolving discussions inside the White House about when and how to relax the administration’s guidelines on social distancing are happening against the backdrop of a rising death toll in the U.S. — the number of casualties reached nearly 21,000 as of Sunday morning — with the coronavirus spreading to new cities and rural areas.

“I will say this: I want to get it open as soon as we can. We have to get our country open,” Trump told reporters at a White House briefing on Friday. When asked which metrics he would use to make his decision, he pointed to his head: “The metrics right here. That’s my metrics. That’s all I can do.”

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/04/1 ... lan-182373

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Update:

Smithfield Pork Plant, South Dakota, 644 confirmed cases as of today, 3700 workers. Tuesday's total just over 300. Cases doubled in one day, but that doesn't seem to be a problem according to Noem. Trump doesn't see a problem. Let's get all back to work at the end of the month.

Republican Gov. Kristi Noem yet to issue a statewide stay-at-home order, saying that it is the job of individuals, not the government “to exercise their right to work, to worship and to play. Or to even stay at home.”.

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Red ink is really cool ! The rest is just a waste of time.....