All-purpose news and politics thread: Two Steps Beyond!(Part II)

[Tami]

Fox confirms WH directs Army Corps of Engineers to see if it can divert money to border wall from disaster funding bill to cover wildfires in California, hurricanes in Texas, Florida and Puerto Rico

Twitter Link

[Tami]

Murdered journalists were tracked by police with shadowy Russian links, evidence shows

(CNN)New evidence shows that three Russian journalists killed in the Central African Republic last year were victims of a well-planned ambush involving a senior police officer with shadowy Russian connections -- and they were tracked from the moment they arrived in the country.

The three journalists -- Kirill Radchenko, Alexander Rastorguyev and Orkhan Dzhemal -- went to CAR in July 2018 to investigate the activities of Russian private military contractors. Their intention was to find out how the contractors were involved in exploiting the CAR's mineral wealth.

The trio were shot dead after the vehicle in which they were traveling was attacked on a remote road in the volatile country. Their fate has cast a spotlight on a growing Russian presence in Africa, involving the Kremlin, private companies with ties to to President Vladimir Putin and large shipments of weapons.

The official explanation of their death is that they were in the wrong place at the wrong time, victims of bandits or rebels. But that story never quite added up. Nothing of value was taken from their vehicle, their driver survived unscathed, and investigations remain incomplete.

[Tazirai]

It should never have been raised as an issue in the first place.

All the this.
In America, by the Constitution, there are no religious tests for office holder.

[numberthirty]

While I'm not always all for the goofy stuff, this one was a keeper...

https://twitter.com/aoc/status/1083579511889973250?s=21

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Twitter Link

With California and Puerto Rico, it's about grudges Trump has with both (lost the former to Hillary in 2016, feuded with San Juan's mayor in the latter), but Texas is a Republican stalwart while Mar-a-Lago is in Florida, so that would be a foolish move on his part. But then, Trump IS a fool, so that strategy is a given.

====================

Trump Tells Sean Hannity He May Decide On National Emergency In ‘Next Few Days’

On a visit to Texas, Trump told the Fox News host that he would “most likely” declare one if he can’t reach a deal with Democrats to fund his border wall. It's sad that the only emergency is in Trump's fevered imagination.

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Thousands Of Federal Workers Just Missed Their First Paycheck

The partial government shutdown is the second-longest in history, with no end in sight. Does Trump the Hostage Taker care? NOPE!

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Opinion: A Border Wall Won’t Make Anyone Safer

The United States is safer today than at nearly any other point in the last 25 years.

Although crime has increased slightly in select U.S. cities in recent years, on average, crime in the U.S. has fallen precipitously since 1991, when homicide rates were 9.8 per 100,000 residents. Today, that rate has been cut in half to around five deaths for every 100,000 residents. Overall, crime in the U.S. has decreased by 64 percent since 1990.

Despite this, Donald Trump and the Republican Party have held the American public hostage for nearly three weeks as a means of forcing taxpayers to include more than $5 billion in the budget to build a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border.

In a live address to the nation Tuesday night, Trump said, “All Americans are hurt by uncontrolled illegal immigration.”

The problem is, they aren’t. The truth is, immigrants make us safer.

While multiple factors have contributed to falling crime rates, an overwhelming body of evidence demonstrates that crime in the U.S. is significantly lower in communities with relatively more immigrants. According to Christopher Lyons and his colleagues at the University of New Mexico, immigrants revitalize communities within the developed world by revamping urban communities, improving family and neighborhood ties, and jump-starting local economies.

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The Government Shutdown Is About To Get ‘Really Bad’ For Unpaid TSA Workers

These essential federal employees are about to miss their first paycheck of 2019. Does Trump the Hostage Taker care? NOPE!

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MSNBC Host: Trump Won’t Budge So That Ann Coulter Won’t Call Him ‘A Weenie’

After being cowed by various right-wingers, Trump “wants the fight,” not the wall, conservative Charlie Sykes said. And that makes Trump look even more pathetic than he already is.

[worstblogever]

In 2015, 2016, and in 2017, on this date, "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" profiled former Oklahoma State Senator Don Barrington, whose biggest claims to fame are introducing a law in 2015 to ban hoodies, presumably as a response to people protesting the death of Trayvon Marin, as well as opposing a bill to potentially legalize marijuana because his church told him to. His voting record also features him trying to stop Common Core standards in education, trying to restrict abortion including supporting state Personhood bills, voting for a law to prevent minors from buying emergency contraceptives, preventing the passing of a minimum wage, allowing for open carry everywhere in the state, voting for “Stand Your Ground” in Oklahoma, trying to restrict collective bargaining rights, voting for harsher Voter ID restrictions, and trying to pass a unnecessary ban on Sharia Law. Barrington was forced out of office by term limits in 2016, and seeing as how he’s now into his seventies, he seems unlikely to re-emerge as a candidate for higher office.

It was on this date in 2018, "Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day" profiled Gerald Gay, a former engineer who worked for oil companies who became a three-term member of the Wyoming House of Representatives first arriving during the 2010 Tea Party Wave. Gay was adamant that he hated same sex marriage to an extent where he repeated it like a mantra in his 2014 re-election campaign, including a campaign video where he was dressed up like Yosemite Sam’s homophobic brother or something. We’re honestly surprised he never changed his surname. We also can’t say he’s too level-headed about people on government assistance, as Gay also sponsored legislation to drug-test welfare recipients during his time in office. Well, it seems Gay was also obsessed with people who aren’t white men abusing the system wherever possible, because when he was asked by Better Wyoming what his thoughts were on the pay equality gap between men and women, he went on a bizarre, ill-informed rant about how it was necessary because women call in sick too much, complaining about maternity leave in particular. When asked to clarify his views by the press, Gay made it worse by claiming not only do women call in sick more than men, but that they were faking it just to take their kids to activities. Rather than accept any responsibility for his comments, Gay blamed the media for taking him out of context. The ironic part was that Gay himself had repeatedly taken days off in the legislature for medical reasons of his own, and missed plenty of votes. All that sexism may have been the deciding factor for voters in Wyoming’s District 36, who voted for his opponent, Democrat Debbie Bovee by 212 votes, and doesn’t call in sick too much. We’ll retire his CSGOPOTD profile at this time and go ahead and take a look at a different wacky Republican today instead. (Current crazy/stupid scoreboard, is now 721-30, since this was established in July 2014.)


Patrick Little
Welcome to the 721st original “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” profile, where today we’ll be discussing Patrick Little, a Republican candidate for U.S. Senate in California in 2018, who was out to unseat Sen. Diane Feinstein. Perhaps he was motivated to challenge her because he’s an openly anti-Semitic white supremacist. He is in no way subtle about that, claiming that even the GOP have been overthrown by “Zionist stooges” and dragging around and spitting an Israeli flag around him on the ground after he was kicked out of the California Republican Party’s state convention. Then again, he feels the Neo-Nazi website, the Daily Stormer, is “too Jewish”. Little also refers to Adolf Hitler as “the second coming of Christ”, and would like for the United States to be “free of Jews”. He had plenty of modest and not at all hateful ideas like having the government to grant federal benefits based on merit and to nationalize internet giants like Google, Facebook and Twitter, and making it illegal for people of Jewish faith to take office in government, outlawing foreign aid to Israel and changing the U.S. Constitution to make the U.S. an explicitly an “ethnically European nation.” He also wants to make it illegal for any foundation to raise money for Holocaust education. He, of course, refers to the Holocaust as “a lie”, and bizarrely violated copyright law by sending out a robocall where he discusses his grievances with Jews set to the theme music from the classic sitcom “Friends”.

At the point the GOP took measures to not run a Neo-Nazi for U.S. Senate, Patrick Little was polling second behind Feinstein with 18% of the vote. Without his party’s support, and in spite of being a hate-fueled moron, he still managed to get nearly 90,000 votes. He seems determined to not go away, protesting outside the White House for all Jews to be expelled from the United States, and continued touring the nation to outlandishly accuse Jews of raping children or orchestrating murders while occasionally hanging out with the organizers of the “Unite the Right” rally from Charlottesville.

This will hopefully be the first and last time we mention this rotten bag of ***holes in our blog, and we’re hoping he never comes close to even sniffing political office again.

But hey, Republican posters on this forum assure me that both sides are just as bad, so...

[Ragged Maw]

The Muslim immigrant won the vote to maintain his position as Vice-Chair of the Republican party of the third most populated county of Texas by a 139-49 margin.

https://www.texastribune.org/2019/01...i-vote-muslim/

Not surprising. Their whole "case" against keeping him onboard was on flimsy ground anyways.

[ed2962]

Man, Toni Preckwinkle stumbling into trouble might be worse than the Federal investigation making it look like she has problems...

https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/...110-story.html

Meet the new boss, etc...

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Not surprising. Their whole "case" against keeping him onboard was on flimsy ground anyways.

I'm surprised Shafi chooses to remain in the GOP, and held no malice against the knuckledraggers trying to oust him because he's Muslim. He's seen up close and personal the party's unceasing hate for anyone who's not lily white and still wanted to stay. Shafi is far more forgiving than I am, I would've told the party to kiss my ass and left. However, this makes me wonder what other Muslims, especially those persecuted from coast to coast think of Shafi and if they see him as their version of an Uncle Tom?

[numberthirty]

I'm surprised Shafi chooses to remain in the GOP, and held no malice against the knuckledraggers trying to oust him because he's Muslim. He's seen up close and personal the party's unceasing hate for anyone who's not lily white and still wanted to stay. Shafi is far more forgiving than I am, I would've told the party to kiss my ass and left. However, this makes me wonder what other Muslims, especially those persecuted from coast to coast think of Shafi and if they see him as their version of an Uncle Tom?

Without actually knowing the guy, there are only a couple of paths that lead to "Vice-Chair" that don't involve you being a pretty true believer in whatever party you wound up being the vice-chair of.

Edit: Now that I've said that, he'll probably step down and leave the party.

[PwrdOn]

I'm surprised Shafi chooses to remain in the GOP, and held no malice against the knuckledraggers trying to oust him because he's Muslim. He's seen up close and personal the party's unceasing hate for anyone who's not lily white and still wanted to stay. Shafi is far more forgiving than I am, I would've told the party to kiss my ass and left. However, this makes me wonder what other Muslims, especially those persecuted from coast to coast think of Shafi and if they see him as their version of an Uncle Tom?

Naked self interest is probably at work here. Shafi is a surgeon, which means that his number one fear is the onset of universal health care busting him down the socioeconomic ladder from highly paid professional to overworked public servant.

[WestPhillyPunisher]

Naked self interest is probably at work here. Shafi is a surgeon, which means that his number one fear is the onset of universal health care busting him down the socioeconomic ladder from highly paid professional to overworked public servant.

Perhaps I'm reading this wrong, so that means he's all too willing to make himself a possible, if not probable pariah in his community and in his religion for the sake of maintaining a cushy lifestyle. Yeah, that's the Republican mindset of greed and privilege all over.

[Tami]

Joshua Tree National Park To Close For Cleanup, Repairs To Vandalism, Illegal Roads

Illegal roads, cut down Joshua trees, and damaged federal property, along with the need to clean up garbage, prompted Joshua Tree National Park Superintendent David Smith to announce Tuesday that the park would close indefinitely on Thursday to address those impacts incurred during the ongoing partial government shutdown.

“The park will be closed until I can ensure that resources inside the park are protected," Smith said during a short phone call. "We’re hoping that the shutdown will be over soon."

While the closure will take effect 8 a.m. Thursday, the superintendent could not say how long it would last. Acting Interior Secretary David Bernhardt has directed the National Park Service to use fee revenues brought in under the Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act to pay for cleanup and additional law enforcement personnel. Smith said that while his park normally takes in about $9 million a year, most of that has been committed to projects. Staff was working to see how much in unobligated funds remained.

Last week park staff closed its campgrounds to overnight use because of sanitation problems, but many visitors ignored that closure. With just eight law enforcement rangers working during the partial government shutdown it was impossible to cover all areas of the park, which is about the size of Delaware.

"There are about a dozen instances of extensive vehicle traffic off roads and in some cases into wilderness," Smith replied when asked about the damage in the park. "We have two new roads that were created inside the park. We had destruction of government property with the cutting of chains and locks for people to access campgrounds. We’ve never seen this level of out-of-bounds camping. Every day use area was occupied every evening.

"Joshua trees were actually cut down in order to make new roads.”

[Tami]

Microsoft Bing not only shows child pornography, it suggests it

Illegal child exploitation imagery is easy to find on Microsoft’s Bing search engine. But even more alarming is that Bing will suggest related keywords and images that provide pedophiles with more child pornography. Following an anonymous tip, TechCrunch commissioned a report from online safety startup AntiToxin to investigate. The results were alarming.

[WARNING: Do not search for the terms discussed in this article on Bing or elsewhere as you could be committing a crime. AntiToxin is closely supervised by legal counsel and works in conjunction with Israeli authorities to perform this research and properly hand its findings to law enforcement. No illegal imagery is contained in this article, and it has been redacted with red boxes here and inside AntiToxin’s report.]

The research found that terms like “porn kids,” “porn CP” (a known abbreviation for “child pornography”) and “nude family kids” all surfaced illegal child exploitation imagery. And even people not seeking this kind of disgusting imagery could be led to it by Bing.

[kidfresh512]

Farm Country Stood by Trump. But the Shutdown Is Pushing It to Breaking Point.

DENVER — In Georgia, a pecan farmer lost out on his chance to buy his first orchard. The local Farm Service Agency office that would have processed his loan application was shut down.

In Wisconsin’s dairy country, a 55-year-old woman sat inside her new dream home, worried she would not be able to pay her mortgage. Her loan had come from an Agriculture Department program for low-income residents in rural areas, but all of the account information she needed to make her first payment was locked away in an empty government office.

And in upstate New York, Pam Moore was feeding hay to her black-and-white cows at a small dairy that tottered on the brink of ruin. She and her husband had run up $350,000 in debt to keep the dairy running after 31 of their cows died of pneumonia, and their last lifeline was an emergency federal farm loan. But the money had been derailed by the government shutdown.

“It has just been one thing after another, after another, after another,” Ms. Moore, 57, said.

Farm country has stood by President Trump, even as farmers have strained under two years of slumping incomes and billions in losses from his trade wars. But as the government shutdown now drags into a third week, some farmers say the loss of crucial loans, payments and other services has pushed them — and their support — to a breaking point.

“I may lose the farm, but I strongly feel we need some border security,” Mr. Nunnery said.

But Davinder Singh, 41, the Georgia pecan farmer, said the border wall was not worth the price he had already paid — losing out on the chance to finally buy his own orchard instead of working other people’s land.

“Why spend money on the wall?” he said. He just wanted the government to reopen — “as soon as possible.”

The Agriculture Department had tried to blunt the effects by keeping local Farm Service Agency offices open through December. And it extended deadlines for farmers to apply for the administration’s $12 billion bailout for farmers hurt by Mr. Trump’s trade policies.

States like Wisconsin, which lost at least 638 dairy farms last year, are particularly vulnerable.

The new farm bill passed in December contained programs to help dairy farmers weather swings in the market, and to help farmers struggling with stress and depression get mental health services. But those programs cannot be put in effect during the shutdown, said Senator Tammy Baldwin, Democrat of Wisconsin.

“More uncertainty and more stress,” she said. “We can’t afford to wait months and months. We need to get this moving now.”

12 Billion dollar bailout so they don't have to feel the pain his tarrifs are causing. Then some payments start getting halted because everyone agrees on border security, but only Trump wants this useless WALL.

Due to TSA absences, Miami airport will temporarily close one terminal early for 3 days

Miami International Airport will close a terminal early for three days because of a shortage of Transportation Security Administration screeners, airport spokesman Greg Chin said Thursday.

The security checkpoints in terminal G will be closed after 1 p.m. on Saturday, Sunday and Monday, he said. Terminal G is one of six terminals in the airport.
"Due to an increased number of TSA screeners not reporting to work, we have decided to take this precautionary step and relocate about 12 flights to adjoining concourses in the afternoons," he said.

Chin said federal screeners are calling in sick at double the normal rate for Miami, and TSA managers aren't confident they will have enough workers to operate all 11 checkpoints throughout the airport at normal hours.
"We felt we had to make a decision before the weekend," Chin told the Miami Herald. "They're erring on the side of caution."
The government shutdown has left TSA employees working without pay, raising concerns that airports might not be able to provide the usual standard of security.
In a wave of what one federal official has dubbed as the "blue flu"-- a nod to the blue shirts worn by TSA officers -- hundreds of TSA screeners at at least four major airports have called out from their shifts since the shutdown began in December.
Last week, TSA spokesman Michael Bilello acknowledged that "callouts began over the holiday period and have increased," and that the agency was "closely monitoring the situation."
Union officials say officers can't afford to work unpaid.
A TSA union official told CNN some employees have found that showing up for work was actually hurting them financially, when factoring in costs such as child care and commuting. Some skipped work to seek temporary jobs to help make ends meet.

What a mess. Even if they wanted to come to work without pay out of "duty" its hurting them faster to try and show up because of paying for the commutes and child care.