...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.[Fritz Berggren, a mid-ranking Foreign Service officer,] for several years has been publicly calling for the establishment of Christian nation-states, warning that white people face “elimination” and railing against Jews as well as Black Lives Matter and other social movements.
[...]
“Jesus Christ came to save the whole world from the Jews — the founders of the original Anti-Christ religion, they who are the seed of the Serpent, that brood of vipers,” states an Oct. 4 blog post signed “Fritz Berggren, PhD” and titled “Jews are Not God’s Chosen People. Judeo-Christian is Anti-Christ.”
[...]
“The goal of the Left is to destroy blood and faith so that (Marxist) religion alone becomes master and enslaver of all,” Berggren writes. “Europeans must reclaim their blood and faith, just as Blacks are proud and hispanics have very strong blood identity organizations.”
[...]
“Anti-Fa/BLM is not the resistance — they are the establishment,” he writes in bullet points on a Sept. 12, 2020, post that includes a video segment. “The resistance could be White men and Christians if we man up to it.”
[...]
A major theme across Berggren’s online output is the necessity of creating explicitly Christian countries. He refers to Jesus Christ as a revolutionary icon, dubbing him “Rebel Leader One” in some posts. “The revival of Christian nation-states is required for the advancement of Truth,” he writes in one section of his Blood and Faith site. “There is no substitute for the public acclamation of Jesus Christ as the King and Lord of a nation.”
[...]
In a Oct. 24 post titled “The Demon-God of Diversity,” he states: “The world gasps in horror with each new ‘endangered’ sub-species, but cheers the elimination of White culture from whole regions of the earth. This will not stop until White people stop it — we have been handmaidens to our own demise.”
[...]
Two days after the insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, another post signed by Berggren declared: “Notes on the events of January 6. The illusion of a participatory democracy has been burst. You already live in a cult/theocracy — I offer you Christian liberty in a Christian nation.”
[...]
Berggren’s voluminous output dates back to at least September 2017.
[...]
According to a directory viewed by POLITICO, Berggren is currently assigned to a State Department unit that handles special immigrant visas for Afghans. His previous positions have included serving as a financial management officer at the U.S. Embassy in Bahrain.
[...]
Exactly when Berggren entered U.S. diplomatic ranks wasn’t clear, but he is listed as a Foreign Service employee on congressional documents at least as far back as 2009.
[...]
There are rules that govern diplomats’ on- and off-duty behavior that could be grounds for punishment or dismissal in similar instances — rules that can differ based on whether a person is serving overseas or in the United States. But the federal government, for First Amendment reasons, is not supposed to dictate its employees’ religious views.
According to a former State Department attorney, if Berggren can show that he never used work time or U.S. government equipment to craft his writings and recordings, he might fall in a gray area in terms of whether or how the department could discipline him.
Politico
Sunday, February 28, 2021
It's Sunday
It's Sunday
More than 200 faith leaders in the evangelical Christian movement signed on to a letter this week decrying "Christian Nationalism" and its role in the Jan. 6 riot that overwhelmed the U.S. Capitol.
A letter released Wednesday on saynotochristiannationalism.org describes Christian nationalism as "a version of American nationalism that is trying to camouflage itself as Christianity," which the church leaders said was "a heretical version of our faith."
[...]
"Just as many Muslim leaders have felt the need to denounce distorted, violent versions of their faith, we feel the urgent need to denounce this violent mutation of our faith," they continued.
Signees of the letter include some prominent megachurch leaders including David Swaim of the Highrock Covenant Church and Rev. Kevin Riggs of the Franklin Community Church, as well as Jerushah Duford, granddaughter of the late Rev. Billy Graham.
The Hill
Friday, February 26, 2021
Intel report on Khashoggi assassination
So, actually, conjecture based on circumstantial evidence. I'm not saying I don't believe the conclusion; I'm saying it doesn't have any more weight than original conjecture at the time of the assassination, so the Saudis can continue to deny it and nobody can do anything about it. Just like Trump can keep claiming he won the election.An unclassified intel report detailing the heinous assassination of Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi has just been released by the Biden administration—and it points the finger directly at Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.
“We assess that Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Muhammad bin Salman approved an operation in Istanbul, Turkey to capture or kill Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi,” the four-page report, released on Friday, said. “We base this assessment on the Crown Prince’s control of decision making in the Kingdom since 2017, the direct involvement of a key adviser and members of Muhammad bin Salman's protective detail in the operation, and the Crown Prince’s support for using violent measures to silence dissidents abroad, including Khashoggi.”
Yahoo
Joe Biden reportedly called the Saudi king before the report went public. I'd like to have a true transcript of that call.
The report, released by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence after previously being held back by the Trump administration, is based on a CIA report that concluded in November 2018 that the Saudi crown prince ordered the killing. Biden called Saudi Arabia’s King Salman late Thursday but the White House readout did not mention the report, instead saying the two discussed continued work on “mutual issues of concern.”
[...]
On Friday, Secretary of State Tony Blinken announced the Biden administration’s “Khashoggi Ban” that has already imposed visa restrictions on 76 Saudi individuals.
“The Khashoggi Ban allows the State Department to impose visa restrictions on individuals who, acting on behalf of a foreign government, are believed to have been directly engaged in serious, extraterritorial counter-dissident activities, including those that suppress, harass, surveil, threaten, or harm journalists, activists, or other persons perceived to be dissidents for their work, or who engage in such activities with respect to the families or other close associates of such persons,” he said in a statement.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Symptom of the disease of Republican elitist brain
Right up there with George W Bush's WH Correspondents' dinner video joking about trying to find WMDs under the Resolute desk.
Good god.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Bernie may be old, but he's not lost any mental acuity
The Senate Parliamentarian says the minimum wage hike doesn't fit the rules for including it in the big budget bill vote coming up.
An eye for an eye
And the whole world goes blind.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Yes, drone strikes are a de-escalation measure, and killing 22 people is proportionate to killing one.Joe Biden has carried out his first military action as president, with airstrikes targeting Iranian-backed fighters in Syria, in what the Pentagon said was retaliation for a rocket attack in Iraq earlier this month that killed one civilian contractor and wounded a US service member and other coalition troops.
The overnight strikes killed 22 people after hitting three trucks loaded with munitions near the border town of Abu Kamal, a war monitor said on Friday. Border posts used by Iranian militia groups were also destroyed, the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
[...]
“This proportionate military response was conducted together with diplomatic measures, including consultation with coalition partners,” [the Pentagon’s chief spokesperson, John] Kirby said. “The operation sends an unambiguous message: President Biden will act to protect American and coalition personnel. At the same time, we have acted in a deliberate manner that aims to de-escalate the overall situation in eastern Syria and Iraq.”
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
UPDATE:
Theoretically.
Thursday, February 25, 2021
Earmarks
Mitch McConnell deferred to someone? Is Satan skating?The conservative House Freedom Caucus has come out swinging against the idea, voting to formally oppose any form of congressionally directed spending, “whether in the 117th Congress or any future Congress.” Caucus members argued that the practice is ripe for abuse and would only lead to “pork-barrel” spending.
“They’re a bad idea. I’m opposed to them,” said Rep. Warren Davidson (R-Ohio), a member of the Freedom Caucus. “They’ve been described as a gateway drug toward corruption.”
“I am totally against it,” added Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), a co-founder of the group. "I don’t think Republicans should be supportive of earmarks.”
The Republican Study Committee, the largest conservative caucus on Capitol Hill, will meet next week to discuss the issue. But the group started circulating a memo, obtained by POLITICO, warning that “capitulating to calls for reinstating earmarks will amplify the power” of Democratic leaders and could “create a more hierarchical Congress.”
[...]
Republicans — who first banned earmarks when they took over the House majority following the 2010 Tea Party wave — haven’t been totally aligned on the issue, with some warming to the idea in recent years. While the practice is still formally prohibited under current House GOP conference rules, some Republicans have argued that allowing lawmakers to ensure money for specific projects restores power to the legislative branch and could help make the institution more functional.
[...]
Rep. Chuck Fleischmann (R-Tenn.), an appropriator, said the future of earmarks would ultimately be a conferencewide decision. But one of the biggest potential selling points, he said, is that bringing back earmarks would take authority away from the Biden administration. And he also noted that Democrats want to make the process more transparent. “If I had to
bet, Democrats will move forward with or without us,” Fleischmann said. “The question is, will we be able to avail ourselves of them?”
[...]
Democrats have not yet released their plan, but [House Majority Leader Steny] Hoyer has indicated the process would be reformed and earmarks would be used to help public and nonprofit projects.
[...]
Across the Capitol, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said he would defer to Alabama Sen. Richard Shelby, the top Republican on the Senate Appropriations Committee, on the issue.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.[T]he internal dynamics are tricky, especially for McCarthy. If the California Republican throws his weight behind earmarks, it could infuriate the right — a crucial constituency for McCarthy to have in his corner.
But if McCarthy discourages Republicans from requesting money for proposals that benefit their districts, it could put his own members at a huge disadvantage while letting Democrats reap the rewards from the spending practice.
Earmarks can help members direct critical resources to their districts, giving them an easy way to earn points with constituents back home. The practice can also be a useful tool for congressional leaders who are trying to corral votes for certain spending bills. And with President Joe Biden pushing for a massive infrastructure package this Congress, there may be even more temptation for the GOP to get on board.
But some Republicans are still haunted by the infamous “bridge to nowhere” — a massive proposal to build a bridge between Ketchikan, Alaska, and a nearby island with an airport — that inspired the initial earmark ban. That's not to mention the earmark scandals that helped end the careers of lawmakers in both parties during the early 2000s.
Capitol building damages
"[Architect of the Capitol] employees sheltered congressional staff in their shops to protect them from the roving mob," [Architect of the Capitol J. Brett] Blanton said, adding, "Other members of our team raced to the roof to reverse the airflows within the building to help clear the air of chemical irritants, like bear repellents and pepper spray, while more team members rushed bottles of water and eyewash stations to Capitol Police officers in need of assistance."
When the mob thronged the Capitol, the Architect of the Capitol's painters and artisans were laboring to complete the massive task of readying the campus to host a presidential inauguration.
"Over the course of a couple of hours, the hard work of our team was destroyed," Blanton said.
"The [inauguration] platform was wrecked. There was broken glass and other debris. Sound systems and photography equipment was damaged beyond repair or stolen. Two historic Olmsted lanterns were ripped from the ground, and the wet blue paint was tracked all over the historic stone balustrades and Capitol building hallways."
In the Capitol building complex, historical statues, murals and furniture were damaged, mainly from pepper spray accretions and residue from chemical irritants and fire extinguishers, requiring expert cleaning and conservation. Work crews covered gaping holes with plywood and cleared "a small mountain of debris left behind on the west and east fronts," Blanton said.
[...]
The cost of repairing damages from the attack on the U.S. Capitol and related security expenses have already topped $30 million and will keep rising, [...] Blanton told lawmakers on Wednesday.
[...]
Blanton said that congressional appropriations committees have already approved a transfer request of $30 million to pay for expenses and extend a temporary perimeter fencing contract through March 31.
But more money will be needed, he added: "History teaches us that project costs for replacements and repairs beyond in-kind improvements across campus will be considerable and beyond the scope of the current budgetary environment."
The price tag will go even higher, Blanton told lawmakers on the House Appropriations Committee, if the fence and other security measures are needed beyond March.
NPR
Total fuckup by SDNY
And we needed the SDNY to cover Trump's crimes in New York since Congress didn't hold him accountable. But now, more than ever, the office will be hit with claims that it's corrupt, and therefore, that Trump is innocent.Prosecutors in the Southern District of New York wrote each other in March 2020 that "yeah, we lied" in a letter to Judge Alison Nathan about a key document it had failed to share with defense lawyers. The office later retreated from that characterization, arguing instead the trouble resulted from a rush to file papers under a tight deadline.
[...]
In another newly revealed exchange, one supervisor in the terrorism and international narcotics section emailed his co-chief after the problems began to surface that the trial team had done some "pretty aggressive stuff here over the last few days."
[...]
Earlier, a junior lawyer on the case suggested they "bury it" in a stack of other papers they provided the defendant, apparently in hopes the critical document would be overlooked during the rush of the trial.
Judge Nathan did not conclude the U.S. attorney's office engaged in intentional wrongdoing, but she has referred lawyers there to the Office of Professional Responsibility at Justice Department headquarters, a unit that investigates attorney misconduct. The judge also asked FBI inspectors to probe separate allegations against FBI agents on the case.
[...]
The U.S. Attorney's office had sought to shield their internal communications from public view. But the judge found there's a significant public interest in understanding what went wrong and ensuring it never happens again.
NPR
Trump's constitutional legacy
Trump defied the Constitution and therefore left challenges in place that we'll see again in the future if Congress doesn't harden laws to prevent it.
The Atlantic has a somewhat lengthy article with five ways in which Trump informally "amended" the Constitution.
A short summary:
Although he is no constitutional scholar, Trump has a theory of the Constitution: “I have an Article II, where I have the right to do whatever I want as president.” Before he was elected, that theory was plainly wrong. But after his one term in office, the Trump amendments have brought his theory to the brink of realization.
[...]
Amendment 1. No president shall be removed from office for treason, bribery, or any other crime or misdemeanor, no matter how high, should a partisan minority of the Senate choose to protect him.
[...]
Amendment 2. Congressional oversight shall be optional. No congressional subpoena or demand for testimony or documents shall bind a president who chooses to ignore it.
[...]
Amendment 3. Congressional appropriations shall be suggestions. The president may choose whether or not to comply with congressional spending laws, and Congress shall have no recourse should a president declare that his own priorities supersede Congress’s instructions.
[...]
Amendment 4. The president shall have authority to make appointments as he sees fit, without the advice and consent of the Senate, provided he deems his appointees to be acting, temporary, or otherwise exempt from the ordinary confirmation process.
[...]
Amendment 5. The president shall have unconstrained authority to dangle and issue pardons for the purpose of obstructing justice, tampering with witnesses, and forestalling investigations.
[...]
The Trump amendments are significant individually, but together they are mutually reinforcing, blocking recourse against a rogue president in every direction. The nullification of impeachment allows the president to dangle pardons, which blocks accountability to law enforcement. Stonewalling blocks accountability to Congress. Temporary appointees and unappropriated spending prevent Congress from pushing back.
The Atlantic
Explication of each "amendment" is in the article, which you can read here.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Wednesday, February 24, 2021
Orange for them all!
Gullible sort.For months, some of Donald Trump’s top advisers have assured him that he has virtually nothing to fear from the Manhattan district attorney’s tax investigation, which they view as merely “fishing” for information. But investigators with the D.A.'s office have been expanding their criminal probe into Trump’s business empire, asking questions and grilling witnesses—as recently as in the past few days—not only about Trump but particularly about his eldest son, Don Jr., and Allen Weisselberg, one of the former president’s most trusted officers, The Daily Beast has learned.
[...]
For years, Weisselberg has loyally served as the chief financial officer at the Trump Organization, and has been a fixture in separate investigations far beyond Manhattan District Attorney Cy Vance’s team.
[...]
[Former] President Trump continued to rake in millions from foreign business entanglements, with income flowing in from licensing agreements and buildings in various nations across the globe. And according to Forbes, Trump’s two sons also “unloaded $118 million worth of the president’s real estate since his January 2017 inauguration, striking deals everywhere from New York City and Los Angeles to Charleston, South Carolina and the Dominican Republic.”
Trump Jr.’s prominent role in the Trump Organization has attracted interest from another jurisdiction, as well. Early last year, the Washington, D.C., attorney general sued the Trump inaugural committee, as well as the Trump Organization, charging that they had misused over $1 million in fundraising when the committee “grossly overpay[ed]” in booking part of the Trump International Hotel in D.C. during inauguration festivities in 2017. Last month, the D.C attorney general’s spokesperson said that the office had alerted Trump Jr. that it sought to interview him as part of the ongoing investigation.
[...]
And in their separate inquiry into Trump and his company, Manhattan prosecutors have also broadened the range of investigation into the Trump family’s assets, and have recruited some extra manpower. On Thursday, The New York Times reported that the Manhattan district attorney’s office had brought on Mark Pomerantz, a well-known former federal prosecutor, to aid in its investigation of Trump and his real-estate company.
[...]
Meanwhile, some of former President Trump’s closest advisers have also been reassuring him for weeks that he has nothing to worry about and that New York investigators aren’t going to find anything to bring him down, according to two people who’ve spoken to the ex-president recently. “He’s asked about it a few times [in recent weeks], and I have told him, as I think he already believes, that it’s a lot of political grandstanding,” one of these people said.
Daily Beast
His enemies. The State of New York.No longer a beneficiary of the significant legal privileges that come with being a sitting president, Trump has privately fretted that his enemies will be probing or “suing me for the rest of my life,” according to an individual who’s talked about this with Trump in the past few weeks.
On Monday, Trump released a statement complaining, “The Supreme Court never should have let this ‘fishing expedition’ happen, but they did,” and baselessly accusing his foes of engaging in “fascism” against him. In the written statement, he again regurgitated the lie that he “won” the 2020 presidential election in which he was decisively defeated by Democratic contender Joe Biden.
Stop the presses
Wait a minute. Wait a minute. Number 1) If the guy's face came through Ravnsborg's windshield, why wasn't Ravnsborg's windshield broken? Also, number 2) Reading glasses? The guy was walking along the road at night wearing reading glasses?Days after South Dakota Attorney General Jason Ravnsborg fatally struck a man while driving in September, detectives told the Republican official they had found a pair of broken reading glasses inside his Ford Taurus. They belonged to the man he killed.
That was a problem, detectives said, because Ravnsborg, 44, said he didn’t know he had hit a man until the following day, when he returned to the scene and found the body of Joseph Boever, 55, in a ditch.
“They’re Joe’s glasses, so that means his face came through your windshield,” one of the detectives said in an interview released by the South Dakota Department of Public Safety on Tuesday.
[...]
Boever’s cousin, Nick Nemec, told The Washington Post the new videos confirmed what he has always believed: Ravnsborg knew he had struck a man that evening and drove away anyway.
“He knew there was a dead man in that ditch,” said Nemec, 62. “He knew what he hit and he lied.”
WaPo
The more likely conclusion is that the guy was in Ravnsborg's car, making this a hell of a lot more suspicious than just a panicked hit and run.
I suppose if Ravnsborg's window was down, the guy's glasses could have flown out of his pocket and against odds landed inside Ravnsborg's car, but it cries out for a deeper investigation.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Is the sheriff a buddy of the attorney general?On Tuesday, a bipartisan group of lawmakers filed two articles of impeachment against Ravnsborg, who has since been charged with three misdemeanors, and South Dakota Gov. Kristi L. Noem (R) called for his resignation.
But Ravnsborg said that he will not step down. “At no time has this issue impeded his ability to do the work of the office,” Mike Deaver, his private spokesman, said in a statement to the Argus Leader.
[...]
Ravnsborg has said he was driving home from a GOP fundraiser in Redfield, S.D., around 10:30 p.m. on Sept. 12 when his car hit a large figure in the dark. Ravnsborg said he believed he had hit a deer, and said he searched a ditch along Highway 14 with his cellphone’s flashlight.
“All I could see were pieces of my vehicle laying on and around the roadway,” he said in a statement. When the sheriff arrived, he added, they both searched more and found no evidence of anything or anyone in the ditch.
Maybe he didn't. Maybe Ravnsborg returned him to it.The next morning, Ravnsborg, who has said he was not drinking the night of the accident, and his chief of staff drove back to the scene. “As I walked along the shoulder of the road, I discovered the body of Mr. Boever in the grass just off the roadway,” Ravnsborg said. “It was apparent that Mr. Boever was deceased.” Shortly after his discovery, he added, he drove to the sheriff’s home and reported the body.
[...]
The family quickly cast doubt on Ravnsborg’s story and said it took authorities nearly 24 hours to notify them of Boever’s death.
[...]
Boever’s family told the Rapid City Journal that he had left his Ford pickup truck on the side of the highway earlier that day after driving into a ditch. It is unclear why he returned to his vehicle the night he was struck.
I think this story needs a little more investigation.At one point during the Sept. 30 interview, a detective presses Ravnsborg on why Boever’s glasses were found inside his car.
“His face was in your windshield, Jason. Think about that,” said a detective with the North Dakota Bureau of Criminal Investigation. The attorney general denied seeing the pair of glasses inside his vehicle or on the man’s body.
Ravnsborg told the detectives he didn’t see “anything” before he struck Boever that night. But detectives noted that Boever would have been hard to miss because he carried a flashlight that would have been like “a beacon of light” in the dark night.
[...]
Last week, prosecutors announced three misdemeanor charges against Ravnsborg. If found guilty of all charges, Ravnsborg could face up to 90 days in jail and $1,500 in damages.
[...]
The South Dakota House is expected to formally introduce [...] impeachment articles on Wednesday. A simple majority vote would be needed to advance to the state Senate, where two-thirds of the senators would need to convict him to remove him from his position.
Nemec, Boever’s cousin, said he is disappointed the lawmaker is not facing more serious charges.
“Deep inside, I was hoping he would be charged with involuntary manslaughter, but that didn’t happen,” Nemec said. “He’s grossly undercharged.”
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
UPDATE:
Nothing fishy here.
UPDATE:
Senate investigation into the coup attempt is not impressive
Let's hope future sessions produce better results.Sen. Jacky Rosen (D-Nev.) concluded her questioning with a request for information about potential violence on March 4 — the Constitution’s original inauguration day — which authorities have warned could feature another attempted attack by those who refuse to accept the election results. What, she asked, was being done by authorities in Washington to prepare?
But as law enforcement officials started to respond, Rosen’s time expired. Klobuchar ushered the hearing to the next scheduled senator, Mark Warner, leaving Rosen’s question unanswered.
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) used part of his time during Tuesday's hearing to read a discredited conspiracy theory into the record. Quoting generously from a conservative commentary piece that attributed the Jan. 6 insurrection to overaggressive police and a band of provocateurs posing as Trump supporters, Johnson showed that he’s on an island among his Senate colleagues pushing that notion.
[...]
And all four witnesses were clear that they considered the Jan. 6 event to be an insurrection aided by white supremacists.
[...]
Almost immediately after the joint oversight hearing began, senators were calling for testimony from senior officials at the Pentagon, FBI and Department of Homeland Security, some of whom were directly implicated by the four witnesses: former Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund, former House Sergeant-at-Arms Paul Irving, former Senate Sergeant-at-Arms Michael Stenger and acting D.C. police chief Robert Contee.
[...]
Sund and Contee described a conference call during which top Pentagon leaders said they worried about the “optics” of sending armed troops to the Capitol, even as the police chiefs said their respective forces were desperate for backup.
Sund said it took at least two hours for their request to be run up the chain of command at the Pentagon. Contee told senators he was “literally stunned” at the response from the Defense Department.
[...]
Sund claimed he spoke to Irving at 1:09 p.m on Jan. 6 and requested National Guard help, while Irving insisted he was on the House floor at the time and received no call — from Sund or anyone else.
Irving appears to be at least partially correct: C-SPAN video shows he was on the floor at the precise moment the clock struck 1:09 p.m. But senators never raised that fact, and they were often so rushed to squeeze in multiple strains of questions that they left essential information unaddressed.
[...]
Trump came up when Sund emphasized that only the ex-president, who controlled D.C.’s National Guard forces, had the ultimate authority to deploy those troops when the Capitol was in danger. But there was little effort to probe the former president’s actions, and no witness indicated they had any knowledge of whether the president himself was weighing in on security issues as they pleaded for assistance.
[...]
In addition, not a single member asked some of the most burning questions of the entire inquiry:
— What was the cause of Capitol Police officer Brian Sicknick’s death?
— What is the status of any review of lawmakers’ relationships to some of the rioters, including allegations that some may have been given tours of the building on Jan. 5?
— What is the basis for the Capitol Police’s ongoing investigations of 35 officers for their conduct on Jan. 6?
Politico
Vilsack is the wrong choice, but he's in
That string of Republicans is probably just voting against every nominee. They're not against corporate advantage or lobbyists, anyway.Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on Tuesday voted against Tom Vilsack to lead the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), making him the first senator who caucuses with the Democrats to vote against a Biden Cabinet nominee.
Sanders joined six Republicans in opposing Vilsack, who ran the agency for all eight years of the Obama administration.
[...]
“I opposed his confirmation today because at a time when corporate consolidation of agriculture is rampant and family farms are being decimated, we need a secretary who is prepared to vigorously take on corporate power in the industry,” Sanders said in a statement.
[...]
The Senate confirmed Vilsack in a 92-7 vote. Sanders joined GOP Sens. Ted Cruz (Texas), Josh Hawley (Mo.), Rand Paul (Ky.), Marco Rubio (Fla.), Rick Scott (Fla.) and Dan Sullivan (Alaska) in voting against the nominee.
Progressives have pushed back on Vilsack's nomination because they felt he was too aligned with major agricultural corporations during his previous stint as USDA chief. More recently, Vilsack has been president of the dairy lobby group the U.S. Dairy Export Council.
[...]
Biden passed up Rep. Marcia Fudge (D-Ohio) for the USDA post. Fudge was backed by a number of progressive groups and has been a key advocate for food banks and food insecurity programs.
Fudge is Biden’s nominee to run the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
The Hill
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Tuesday, February 23, 2021
Censure Ron Johnson
Then boot his ass out of the Senate.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Immigrant children in the post-Trump world
That part's good.Dozens of migrant teens boarded vans Monday for the trip down a dusty road to a former man camp for oil field workers here, the first migrant child facility opened under the Biden administration.
The emergency facility [at Carrizo Springs, Texas] — a vestige of the Trump administration that was open for only a month in summer 2019 — is being reactivated to hold up to 700 children ages 13 to 17.
Government officials say the camp is needed because facilities for migrant children have had to cut capacity by nearly half because of the coronavirus pandemic. At the same time, the number of unaccompanied children crossing the border has been inching up, with January reporting the highest total — more than 5,700 apprehensions — for that month in recent years.
[...]
“It’s unnecessary, it’s costly, and it goes absolutely against everything [President] Biden promised he was going to do,” said Linda Brandmiller, a San Antonio-based immigration lawyer who represents unaccompanied minors. “It’s a step backward, is what it is. It’s a huge step backward.”
During the campaign, Biden pledged to undo former president Donald Trump’s hard-line immigration policies. In his first month in office, Biden signed several executive orders reversing many of those policies. Last week, he and House Democrats introduced a plan that would provide a path to citizenship for 11 million undocumented immigrants. The administration also reversed some of Trump’s expulsion practices by accepting unaccompanied children into the country, a change that also is contributing to an increase of minors in government facilities, officials said.
WaPo
That's good, too. At least certainly better than cages. Provided these aren't children separated from their families when the cross into the US.At the 66-acre site, groups of beige trailers encircle a giant white dining tent, a soccer field and a basketball court. There is a bright blue hospital tent with white bunk beds inside. A legal services trailer has the Spanish word “Bienvenidos,” or welcome, on a banner on its roof. There are trailers for classrooms, a barber shop, a hair salon. The facility has its own ambulances and firetrucks, as well as its own water supply.
Well that doesn't set a good tone.The trailers are labeled with names such as Alpha, Charlie and Echo.
Well, that and the fact that Americans don't WANT to see immigrant kids.As of Sunday, there were about 7,000 children in HHS custody, over 90 percent capacity under pandemic-era requirements.
[...]
Weber said the influx shelters keep children from ending up in Border Patrol stations, which have holding cells that were not designed for children. During the 2019 immigration surge, many migrants were stuck in overcrowded cells for prolonged periods that exceeded legal limits.
The detention centers overseen by ICE are reserved for adults or families and often are run by private prison companies. Carrizo Springs is run by the nonprofit BCFS Health and Human Services, a government contractor for the Office of Refugee Resettlement, the agency within HHS that focuses on unaccompanied children.
Most of these children arrive to the United States planning to reunite with sponsors — usually relatives or friends of the family. Office of Refugee Resettlement case managers work with the children to identify and conduct background checks on the sponsors. If cleared, children are released to live with them while they go through the immigration court process.
[...]
“When I read they were opening again, I cried,” said Rosey Abuabara, a San Antonio community activist who was arrested for protesting outside the Carrizo camp in 2019. “I consoled myself with the fact that it was considered the Cadillac of [migrant child] centers, but I don’t have any hope that Biden is going to make it better.”
She said despite what she’s heard about the camp’s amenities, the immense cost and scale of the Office of Refugee Resettlement operations points to a government program that profits from holding migrant children, who are shepherded in unmarked vans to remote areas with what she describes as little oversight.
Brandmiller, the lawyer, said people should take note of how these emergency shelters are often located in far-flung locations away from public view.
“This is done deliberately to shelve these children in places that are not only not readily accessible, but not accessible at all to anyone who cares about the quality of life of these kids, and whether or not they comply with the federal law,” she said, referring to the Flores Settlement Agreement, which recommends children not stay in unlicensed facilities for longer than 20 days.
HHS said its goal is that children will remain at Carrizo for about 30 days, though they are coming from at least two weeks of quarantine at other Office of Refugee Resettlement facilities in the region. The average stay for children in custody across its facilities is 42 days. In the 2020 fiscal year, migrant children spent an average of 102 days in federal government custody, according to HHS.
Amen.
When the criminals investigate the crime
[V]eterans of the commission's investigation into the 2001 terror attacks worry that it will be challenging to keep politics out of an inquiry into the Jan. 6 attack that led to President Donald Trump's unprecedented second impeachment, on charges he incited the riot.
[...]
[Former New Jersey Gov. Tom Kean, Lee Hamilton, the former Indiana congressman who served as co-chair, and Tim Roemer, another former Democratic congressman] said they told Pelosi a successful commission would require appointing members who can avoid the partisan fray, supplying them with adequate resources and providing enough time to investigate on their own timetable, rather than one laid out by Congress or the White House.
MSN
So much for members who can avoid the partisan fray.
Video coverage at Crooks and Liars
So...another worthless investigation."You cannot have people on the commission whose job is to defend the president or defend the speaker," said Kean, a Republican, and chair of the 9/11 Commission. "You've got to have people who follow the facts."
Everything about the insurrection has to do with Trump.Pelosi said the new panel would have "nothing to do with President Trump" but would focus on Capitol security, along with white supremacy and anti-Semitism.
CNN live hearing updates.A U.S. Senate Committee where Ohio’s Rob Portman is the top Republican will hold a hearing [today] to examine security failures that allowed thousands of rioters to breach the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6 as Congress attempted to tally electoral votes from the 2020 presidential election.
[...]
Witnesses invited to testify include Washington, D.C. Metropolitan Police Department Chief Robert Contee, former Senate Sergeant at Arms Michael Stenger, former House Sergeant at Arms Paul D. Irving, and former U.S. Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund. The hearing will be conducted jointly by the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, where Portman is the top Republican, and the Senate Rules and Administration Committee.
MSN
Video coverage at Crooks and Liars
UPDATE:
Cleaning up the Trump mess
That might be bullshit if, like last time they launched the program, banks loaned to preferred businesses with big accounts, which was big businesses.The Biden administration will give the country's smallest employers two weeks of exclusive access to emergency loans, in a bid to target aid to minority-owned businesses and other companies that have struggled the most to obtain the funds during the pandemic.
From Wednesday morning to the evening of March 9, only businesses with fewer than 20 employees will be able to apply for aid through the massive Paycheck Protection Program, which offers loans that can be converted into grants if businesses keep paying workers. It is one of a series of steps the administration announced on Monday to get more aid to underserved businesses.
[...]
While the Small Business Administration, which runs the PPP, has seen improvements in funds reaching smaller businesses, administration officials told reporters Sunday night that they were limiting access to the program to push lenders to do even more to work with the smallest employers.
Politico
Banks have proven themselves to be sharks over and over again. Open the tap to small businesses and let the banks handle their large customers."During that two-week period we want lenders to be really focused on serving existing clients that are in the under-20-employee category and then going out proactively to find new small businesses with under 20 employees to help," one administration official said.
[...]
PPP lenders, which had not been briefed on the plan before its announcement, will be key to implementing the changes. The administration plans to brief them today. Some bankers were already voicing skepticism about how the changes would work and whether they were even necessary.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.The [PPP] program has been hugely popular but has faced a series of controversies related to loans that initially went to big companies, unclear rules for lenders, and significant fraud.
Most recently, the SBA faced complaints that anti-fraud measures it imposed in the latest iteration of the program in response to criticism last year were too stringent, forcing it to rethink its safeguards against scammers so legitimate businesses didn't face delays in receiving aid.
[...]
The changes include revising eligibility calculations so that sole proprietors, independent contractors and self-employed individuals receive more funds. The administration said it also planned to set aside $1 billion for businesses that are in that category and are located in low-and-moderate-income areas.
[...]
In addition, the SBA will eliminate restrictions on business owners with non-fraud felony convictions and those delinquent on their federal student loans. The agency will also clarify that business owners who are non-citizen, U.S. residents can use Individual Taxpayer Identification Numbers to apply for relief.
[...]
Consumer Bankers Association President and CEO Richard Hunt said the revamp will make it "somewhat easier" for the smallest businesses in the country, including those in low- and moderate-income areas, but that the administration needed to do more to cut red tape.
“However, without addressing issues lenders have raised since the program reopened, like streamlining some of the bookkeeping requirements imposed by Congress and addressing issues with the SBA’s internal processing systems, this two-week window will not fundamentally alter the roadblocks businesses are facing," he said. "It is like giving everyone a train ticket on an unfinished railroad.”
Monday, February 22, 2021
Hahahahaha
Everyone they invited has expressed reprehensible views. Their top draw has expressed them over and over and over: Donald J Trump.
Pence was invited, but he demurred.
UPDATE:
Young Pharaoh is an online commentator who has told followers that Judaism is a “complete lie” and “made up for political gain,” said that Jewish people are “thieving fake Jews,” tweeted that “all the censorship & pedophilia on social media is being done by Israeli Jews,” and claimed that “all of these big tech [companies], media, & social media platforms are controlled by CCP & Israel through Jewish CEO & corrupt Democrats.”
Mediamatters
Cleaning up Trump's mess - Part whatever
Also...The Biden administration is scrapping a citizenship test developed under the Trump administration that critics say was designed to make it tougher for immigrants to become Americans. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) will revert back to the 2008 version of the test, the agency said Monday, saying the 2020 test developed by the previous administration “may inadvertently create potential barriers” to citizenship.
[...]
Trump administration expanded the pool of potential questions test takers might be asked from 100 to 128. It also upped the total number of questions applicants would be asked and must answer correctly from 6 out of 10 to 12 out of 20.
[...]
In addition to the changes to the test, the Trump administration also raised the cost to apply to take it from $640 to $1,160.
The Hill
Former President Donald Trump had frozen "green cards" for new immigrants, and halted temporary work visas for skilled workers, managers and au pairs in the H-1B, H-4, H-2B, L-1 and J categories, to protect jobs. He argued that the dramatic clamp down on legal immigration was vital to safeguarding the U.S. labor market during pandemic.
But on Wednesday Biden said the earlier policy has prevented qualified and eligible non-U.S. residents from entering the country, "resulting, in some cases, in the delay and possible forfeiture of their opportunity ... and to realize their dreams in the United States."
The reversal by the new administration means that hundreds of thousands of foreigners who had expected to wait until the end of March for the chance to apply for the coveted visas, can do so immediately.
NPR
How Arizona keeps prisoners beyond their release date
According to Arizona Department of Corrections whistleblowers, hundreds of incarcerated people who should be eligible for release are being held in prison because the inmate management software cannot interpret current sentencing laws.
KJZZ is not naming the whistleblowers because they fear retaliation. The employees said they have been raising the issue internally for more than a year, but prison administrators have not acted to fix the software bug.
[...]
The Arizona Department of Corrections confirmed there is a problem with the software.
KJZZ
Prepare for Trump rants against the Supreme Court he packed
Sad!The supreme court has rejected Donald Trump’s request to block New York prosecutors from gaining access to his tax returns.
In a one-sentence unsigned order, the court ruled that it would not step in to prevent the Manhattan district attorney’s office from obtaining eight years of Trump’s financial documents from his accounting firm. The court’s decision clears the way for the documents to be turned over to a grand jury that has been convened as part of an investigation into Trump’s business dealings in New York.
The decision marks a serious defeat for Trump, who has fought for years to keep his tax returns from the public. The tax returns will not be publicly released as part of the grand jury investigation, but the former president has nevertheless launched extensive legal battles to block access to the documents.
Guardian
UPDATE: But they won't hear Stormy Daniels' appeal. Not sure that will placate him. His finances are more important.
UPDATE 2/22:
Millions?
Is Mark Zuckerberg a white supremacist?
Continue reading.In December, a former core data scientist wrote a memo titled, “Political Influences on Content Policy.” Seen by BuzzFeed News, the memo stated that [Facebook]’s policy team “regularly protects powerful constituencies” and listed several examples, including: removing penalties for misinformation from right-wing pages, blunting attempts to improve content quality in News Feed, and briefly blocking a proposal to stop recommending political groups ahead of the US election.
[...]
In April 2019, Facebook was preparing to ban one of the internet’s most notorious spreaders of misinformation and hate, Infowars founder Alex Jones. Then CEO Mark Zuckerberg personally intervened.
Jones had gained infamy for claiming that the 2012 Sandy Hook elementary school massacre was a “giant hoax,” and that the teenage survivors of the 2018 Parkland shooting were “crisis actors.” But Facebook had found that he was also relentlessly spreading hate against various groups, including Muslims and trans people. That behavior qualified him for expulsion from the social network under the company's policies for "dangerous individuals and organizations," which required Facebook to also remove any content that expressed “praise or support” for them.
But Zuckerberg didn’t consider the Infowars founder to be a hate figure, according to a person familiar with the decision, so he overruled his own internal experts and opened a gaping loophole: Facebook would permanently ban Jones and his company — but would not touch posts of praise and support for them from other Facebook users. This meant that Jones’ legions of followers could continue to share his lies across the world’s largest social network.
"Mark personally didn’t like the punishment, so he changed the rules,” a former policy employee told BuzzFeed News, noting that the original rule had already been in use and represented the product of untold hours of work between multiple teams and experts.
Buzzfeed
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
They needed this info for the second impeachment
It might not have changed the vote enough to convict, but it would be in the record. Hopefully, the investigation into the coup attempt will be thorough.
Did she say she was paid?Attorneys for Ohio Oath Keeper Jessica Watkins detail how the efforts among paramilitants who are now accused of conspiracy on January 6 were closer to the apparatus around then-President Donald Trump and his rally than was previously known.
[...]
"On January 5 and 6, Ms. Watkins was present not as an insurrectionist, but to provide security to the speakers at the rally, to provide escort for the legislators and others to march to the Capitol as directed by the then-President, and to safely escort protestors away from the Capitol to their vehicles and cars at the conclusion of the protest," the court filing said on Saturday. "She was given a VIP pass to the rally. She met with Secret Service agents. She was within 50 feet of the stage during the rally to provide security for the speakers. At the time the Capitol was breached, she was still at the site of the initial rally where she had provided security."
"To carry out its protective functions on January 6th, the U.S. Secret Service relied on the assistance of various government partners. Any assertion that the Secret Service employed private citizens to perform those functions is false," a US Secret Service spokesperson said in a statement to CNN on Sunday.
CNN
"May have." That's an odd defense.Watkins is central to one of the most aggressive criminal conspiracy cases yet to emerge from the insurrection. The Justice Department indicted her and eight other alleged Oath Keepers on several charges related to the riot, including allegations that the group coordinated their travel to the pro-Trump event, discussed training and weapons beforehand, suited up in body armor and broke through the crowd heading into the Capitol in a military-style formation.
Watkins' attorney argued in the new filing she isn't alleged to have been violent in the melee, and that, though she is charged with aiding the destruction of property, didn't participate in vandalism and encouraged others not to as well.
[...]
Watkins' defense attorney, Michelle Peterson, wrote on Saturday that her client and other supporters of Trump had believed the then-President would invoke the Insurrection Act to use the military to overturn what he falsely said was the fraudulent election of Joe Biden. And Watkins and others believed "they would have a role if this were to happen," the filing said. "However misguided, her intentions were not in any way related to an intention to overthrow the government, but to support what she believed to be the lawful government." [...] Watkins' attorney argued in the filing her client had worn tactical gear potentially to defend herself, and walked up the Capitol steps with other Oath Keepers in a "stack" formation because the group may have wanted to stay together in the crowd.
Well, she risked getting covid by being in the crowd of insurrectionists. The other...yes, she'd probably be at risk, but the bigger question is how is she a Trump supporter while being transgender?She has been detained since her arrest in mid-January. The Justice Department is seeking to keep her in jail pending trial.
[...]
She has been detained since her arrest in mid-January. The Justice Department is seeking to keep her in jail pending trial.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Sunday, February 21, 2021
Deathbed confession on the killing of Malcolm X
On February 21, 1965, minister and civil rights activist Malcolm X, 39, was shot dead inside Harlem’s Audubon Ballroom in New York by assassins identified as members of the Nation of Islam. Three men were convicted of murder and imprisoned, and all were eventually paroled.
[...]
A letter written by ex-undercover NYPD policeman Raymond Wood alleges his department and the FBI covered up details of the assassination, saying he was ordered to infiltrate the civil rights movement and had members of Malcolm X’s security detail arrested shortly before the killing.
[...]
“I participated in actions that in hindsight were deplorable and detrimental to the advancement of my own Black people. My actions on behalf of the New York City Police Department were done under duress and fear,” said Reggie Wood, a relative who read Raymond’s letter aloud at a press conference on Saturday.
[...]
It is unclear when Wood died, but he did not want the letter made public until after his death, saying he feared repercussions from authorities if he came forward with his allegations, according to Reggie Wood.
alJazeera
Half-assed ICE restrictions
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.The Biden administration rolled out new instructions to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officers Thursday, temporarily restricting the causes agents can rely on for initiating deportation.
The enforcement priorities, which will be in effect for up to 90 days while ICE develops long-term guidelines, shrinks the types of convictions that allow for someone to be deported as a public safety threat.
The guidelines additionally allow for deportation of those who are deemed a national security threat due to terrorism or espionage concerns or who illegally crossed a U.S. border after Nov. 1 of last year.
The Hill
Saturday, February 20, 2021
Ending support for Saudi war on Yemen
In his first major foreign policy speech as President earlier this month, Biden announced an end to "all American support for offensive operations in the war in Yemen, including relevant arm sales," though he also said the US will "continue to help and support Saudi Arabia defend its sovereignty and its territorial integrity."
[...]
In 2017, [Rep. Ro] Khanna, a progressive Democrat from California, introduced a measure that came to be known as the Yemen War Powers resolution. It was intended to curtail US military support for the Saudi-led campaign in Yemen, which has created a humanitarian crisis in the country. At the time, there was very little support on Capitol Hill. Now, the policy appears to have been embraced by the White House.
[...]
The move is an early global consequence of Biden taking over from former President Donald Trump, who vetoed the Yemen War Powers resolution in 2019 after it passed Congress with bipartisan support.
Yemen has been embroiled in a years-long civil war that has pitted a coalition backed by Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates against the Iran-backed Houthi rebels, a Shia political and military organization from the north of Yemen. The conflict has cost thousands of civilian lives.
Democrats are optimistic the Biden administration will prioritize diplomatic and humanitarian efforts to bring an end to the conflict and point to the fact that career diplomat Timothy Lenderking has been appointed as special envoy for Yemen as a promising sign. But questions remain over exactly what the US will do next and how the administration will implement the policy change, and lawmakers on both sides of the aisle are promising oversight.
[...]
"The details matter," Khanna said, when it comes to the Yemen policy change, noting that one of his concerns is that the Saudis will claim future attacks are defensive and not offensive in an effort to find a loophole. The term offensive strikes should refer to "any strikes into Yemen," he said.
CNN
It was a given
Gas company profits soar on the backs of freezing Texans.
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.
Resurgence of right-wing attempts to MAGA
In addition to a spate of new abortion and voter suppression bills being introduced, we're now into fossil fuel protest bills.
Lords of the earth meet virtually
So, back to the status quo: West vs. East."America is back. I speak to you today as president of the United States at the very start of my administration, and I'm sending a clear message to the world — America is back," [US president Joe] Biden said in what could be a summary of his speech [to the Munich Security Conference].
[...]
"Competition with China is going to be stiff. That's what I expect. And that's what I welcome," Mr. Biden said, adding the U.S. and European partners can "own the race of the future."
The president also spoke of Russia as an adversary, something that threatens the freedom of its people. That's why the U.S. must stand up for Ukraine, and stand against hacking and other Russian tools, he said.
[...]
Mr. Biden also spoke of Iran as a threat to the safety and prosperity of the Middle East.
CBS
Earlier Friday, the president participated virtually in the G7 COVID-19 meeting with world leaders and announced the U.S. would contribute $4 billion to COVAX, emphasizing the administration's stance that the coronavirus must be fought around the world.
The Biden administration is also officially reentering the Paris climate accords later Friday afternoon.
Did Australia get booted out of the "Five Eyes" intelligence group, or just snubbed for this meeting?Joe Biden, Angela Merkel, Emmanuel Macron and Boris Johnson topped the bill on Friday in a virtual version of the world’s top gathering on foreign affairs and defense — the Munich Security Conference.
Politico
Interesting.The online event presented a first opportunity for the new U.S. president to set out his foreign policy agenda to Europe since he took office last month. John Kerry, Biden’s climate envoy, also addressed the conference — a scaled-down rejig of the gathering that normally fills Munich’s Hotel Bayerischer Hof every February.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, European Council President Charles Michel and U.N. chief António Guterres were among the other big names on the program.
[...]
Boris Johnson (who has a reputation as a political chameleon) pulled off the trick again. The man Joe Biden once called a Trump “clone” gave a Munich speech that positioned him as the optimistic champion of the transatlantic alliance Trump so often scorned.
[...]
Johnson highlighted the U.K.’s role in standing up to Beijing on human rights over the Munich Security Conference, as he was the only national leader to mention Xinjiang and Hong Kong during the event.
Oh, we're way past the decisive decade. We're now in the desperate one.It's “not acceptable for countries to think they can go to Glasgow and simply put out big numbers” for decades into the future, [U.S. climate envoy John Kerry] said. “We are absolutely clearly … now inside the decisive decade.”
Which Joe Biden has officially rejoined as of this meeting.Scientists have warned that governments need to drastically cut emissions and drop fossil fuel use by 2030 to keep warming in line with the goals of the Paris Agreement.
Indeed, a climate pact that leaves out China (and Russia) seems like a huge disadvantage.NATO needs to step up efforts “to fully understand the security consequences” of climate change [noted NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg].
[...]
Stoltenberg warned that climate change has a direct impact on military operations and infrastructure, with rising sea levels raising questions over where to built military bases, especially naval bases, and the future of organizing military missions as temperatures are going through the roof.
[...]
“In the future, we will need even more cooperation,” particularly when it comes to dealing with China.
“Neither NATO nor the European Union have all the tools you need to address the consequences of the rise of China,” he argued.
I wonder what "democratic limits" are.In her speech, European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen put the regulation of internet platforms front and center — together with fighting climate change — of a new transatlantic agenda.
“The storming on the U.S. Capitol was a turning point for our discussions on the impact social media have on our democracies,” the Commission president said.
“Imposing democratic limits on the uncontrolled power of the big tech companies alone will not stop political violence but it is an important step.”
...but hey, do what you want...you will anyway.“I don’t think that TTIP [Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership] will be revived because we are not there where the United States left us four years ago,” she said. “The world has changed, the United States has changed, and Europe has changed.”
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)