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welcome to reality trivia
reality is the state of things as they actually exist
June 18, 2019
Real News Today
June 18, 2019
*Renewables now cheaper than new coal or gas ‘across two-thirds of the world’
(Oil)
*The 7 Biggest Failures of Trumponomics
(Talkers)
*Random Shit from Trump's Dumb, Weird Interview on ABC by The Rude Pundit
(Commentary)
*Cops defend tackling and handcuffing 12-year-old boy for roughhousing with his cousin
(Gestapo USA)
*Who's leading the "Wall Street primary"? Looks like Biden, Harris and Buttigieg
(Candidates)
*Here are 4 ways unrestrained crony capitalism is making Americans’ lives miserable
(Capitalism)
(for previous day's articles see "what's inside" below)
comment/tweet of the day
If you want to know what HELL is like live in a RED STATE!
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an ignorant person can learn and will accept facts they don't know; most of us are ignorant of something. whereas a stupid person won't accept facts or believe them. a stupid person is a waste of your time, beware of the stupid they are everywhere!
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Mrs. Betty Bowers
@BettyBowers
“When America sends its people to Orlando, they’re not sending their best. They’re sending people that have lots of problems. They’re bringing racism. They're bringing xenophobia. They’re ignorant. And some, I assume, are good people.” #TrumpRallyOrlando
8:53 AM - Jun 18, 2019
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PAYBACK!!!
Millions to lose benefits under Trump’s proposal to change how poverty is defined, new study shows
An insidious change to America's safety net system.
AMANDA MICHELLE GOMEZ - Thinkprogress
JUN 18, 2019, 11:51 AM
A new study released Tuesday shows just how insidious the Trump administration’s proposal to change the way the federal government measures poverty actually is. In short: millions could lose health and food benefits.
By way of background, in May, Trump’s budget agency sought public comment on updating the inflation rate used by the Census Bureau to determine the poverty line and estimate who’s poor. This technical change matters a lot because the federal poverty line is used to determine who’s eligible for government benefits like Medicaid, food stamps, and other assistance programs.
The administration floated a lot of options to replace what’s known as the Consumer Price Index (CPI), which is what the government currently uses to estimate the federal poverty line. But given the administration’s desire to slash benefits, as made clear over the years in proposed budgets and bills, it is likely to use a measurement that would redefine poverty in a way that cuts federal assistance to millions of low-income Americans.
The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) analyzed the effects of one optionthe administration is likely leaning towards: “chained CPI” (or C-CPI), which was also used in the GOP tax bill passed in 2017. Chained CPI usually grows slower than traditional CPI, which means a lot of low-income people would be at risk of losing aid if the administration moves forward with this option.
The CBPP estimated that by the 10th year of calculating the poverty line using chained CPI, millions of people — including pregnant women and children — would become ineligible for or receive less help from various government programs.
Here’s the progressive think tank’s breakdown:
Due to some limitations, CBPP says it likely “modestly” overstated the impact of eligibility changes, but that “should not change the qualitative conclusions.” The bottom line is people will lose government assistance. It will be acute for those who do, with some losing multiple benefits.
In a press call on Tuesday, CBPP Vice President for Health Policy Aviva Aron-Dine noted this is one of the “most sweeping” federal actions affecting poor and modest Americans. The administration would also be undermining some of its own policy priorities, including addressing the rising cost of prescription drugs.
The ultimate irony, said Aron-Dine, is that by making the hardship worse, it makes it seem like fewer people are poor. But in reality, there’s strong evidence to suggest that the current poverty line underestimates what poor families need and that these families experience higher inflation than the general population as a whole, she said.
The public comment period for this rule will end on Friday, at which point the administration can move forward with its guidance. There are legal questions as the guidance is not moving forward through formal rule making.
By way of background, in May, Trump’s budget agency sought public comment on updating the inflation rate used by the Census Bureau to determine the poverty line and estimate who’s poor. This technical change matters a lot because the federal poverty line is used to determine who’s eligible for government benefits like Medicaid, food stamps, and other assistance programs.
The administration floated a lot of options to replace what’s known as the Consumer Price Index (CPI), which is what the government currently uses to estimate the federal poverty line. But given the administration’s desire to slash benefits, as made clear over the years in proposed budgets and bills, it is likely to use a measurement that would redefine poverty in a way that cuts federal assistance to millions of low-income Americans.
The Center for Budget and Policy Priorities (CBPP) analyzed the effects of one optionthe administration is likely leaning towards: “chained CPI” (or C-CPI), which was also used in the GOP tax bill passed in 2017. Chained CPI usually grows slower than traditional CPI, which means a lot of low-income people would be at risk of losing aid if the administration moves forward with this option.
The CBPP estimated that by the 10th year of calculating the poverty line using chained CPI, millions of people — including pregnant women and children — would become ineligible for or receive less help from various government programs.
Here’s the progressive think tank’s breakdown:
- More than 250,000 adults would lose health insurance through Medicaid.
- More than 300,000 kids and some pregnant women would lose health insurance through the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP).
- Millions of people would receive fewer subsidies for purchasing health insurance on the Obamacare marketplace, making it more expensive to do so.
- More than 250,000 seniors and people with disabilities would lose or receive less access to the Medicare Part D subsidy program, forcing them to pay more for prescription drugs.
- More than 150,000 seniors and people with disabilities would lose premium assistance for Medicare Part B, meaning they’d have to pay over $1,500 to see a doctor.
- Nearly 200,000 people would lose food benefits through the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP).
- More than 100,000 students would become ineligible for free or reduced-price lunch, and more than 100,000 would lose free meals but remain eligible for reduced-price lunch.
- About 40,000 infants and young children would lose access to care such as breastfeeding support and healthy food through the Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC).
Due to some limitations, CBPP says it likely “modestly” overstated the impact of eligibility changes, but that “should not change the qualitative conclusions.” The bottom line is people will lose government assistance. It will be acute for those who do, with some losing multiple benefits.
In a press call on Tuesday, CBPP Vice President for Health Policy Aviva Aron-Dine noted this is one of the “most sweeping” federal actions affecting poor and modest Americans. The administration would also be undermining some of its own policy priorities, including addressing the rising cost of prescription drugs.
The ultimate irony, said Aron-Dine, is that by making the hardship worse, it makes it seem like fewer people are poor. But in reality, there’s strong evidence to suggest that the current poverty line underestimates what poor families need and that these families experience higher inflation than the general population as a whole, she said.
The public comment period for this rule will end on Friday, at which point the administration can move forward with its guidance. There are legal questions as the guidance is not moving forward through formal rule making.
another scam to screw veterans!!!
The controversial ketamine-like drug that Trump is pushing on veterans
The president has touted the drug’s benefits and offered to help a senior Veterans Affairs official negotiate the purchase of the drug
Peter Cary of the Center for Public Integrity
The Guardian
Tue 18 Jun 2019 02.00 EDT
Personal interest from Donald Trump appears to have put a controversial anti-depressant on a fast track at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) that shoved aside usual protocols, even though experts inside and outside the government have serious concerns the drug is effective and say it may be dangerous.
Sources inside the Department of Veterans Affairs say staffers were essentially told by a senior official to drop everything in March and accelerate the drug’s availability because the president had expressed enthusiasm for the drug, Spravato, as a possible treatment for depressed veterans.
Questions have also been raised about a trio of Trump friends who have been working on veterans issues and interacting with Johnson & Johnson regarding programs for troubled vets.
In the midst of a rapidly convened series of VA meetings early that month, another official said the president wanted the VA to buy “truckloads” of the drug, according to sources. Trump also touted the drug’s benefits to the veterans affairs secretary, Robert Wilkie, in a White House meeting just last week, offering to help negotiate the VA’s purchase of the drug, according to Bloomberg.
A key VA panel, the so-called formulary committee, is meeting this week to decide if Spravato, whose formal name is esketamine, will be added to the list of drugs that must be available to VA pharmacies. A vote is expected on Wednesday, though a final decision may take longer. Esketamine is a derivative of ketamine, which has been used to treat depression, and has been abused as a party drug.
The stakes are high for the drug’s owner, the pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson, because the drug could be a blockbuster. One analysis estimates Spravato could earn $600m for the company by 2022. The drug was developed by the J&J subsidiary Janssen Pharmaceuticals. While it was under development, J&J’s and Janssen’s relationships at the VA deepened. As trials for the drug went forward in late 2017, Johnson & Johnson joined the VA’s suicide prevention campaign, #BeThere. A public service announcement on the campaign said J&J and the VA will “undertake new clinical trial processes in hopes of providing access to the latest and most innovative treatments to help veterans in need”.
Janssen said in a statement that throughout its partnership it had a memorandum of understanding in place “that we’ve followed”, adding that the company had “strictly complied with the laws in place that govern partnerships across industry and government related to ethics and conflicts of interest”.
In the course of the drug’s trials, J&J was also involved with a trio of men Trump knew through his Florida social club Mar-a-Lago who became advisers on VA issues.
The three, the Marvel Entertainment CEO, Ike Perlmutter, Palm Beach physician Bruce Moskowitz and attorney Marc Sherman, were labeled the “Mar-a-Lago Crowd” in a 2018 lawsuit by a veterans group against the VA, alleging that the trio constituted an illegal advisory committee that had outsized influence over Trump’s decisions involving the agency. Much of the lawsuit is based on an article by ProPublica.
The suit claims the trio convened a series of conference calls with J&J executives to discuss and promote the public awareness campaign; as part of that effort, the then VA secretary, David Shulkin, was joined by J&J officials in ringing the closing bell at the New York stock exchange on Veterans Day in late 2017.
The VA has moved to dismiss the suit, saying the Mar-a-Lago trio were just individuals giving advice. The three men did not respond to messages from the Center. But in responding to ProPublica, the trio cited Perlmutter’s “personal relationship with the president” and said they “offered our counsel, and the advice of these healthcare experts, to assist the president, secretary and VA leadership in their making essential decisions”. They said this was done voluntarily, “seeking nothing at all in return”.
Records from the Center for Responsive Politics show that J&J was among the firms lobbying most heavily at the VA in 2018. CRP records show that J&J spent a total of $6.6m that year lobbying the federal government about pharmaceuticals and health products; in 2018 and 2019 it lobbied the VA on matters including “partnership with the VA on suicide prevention”. The company gave $14,165 to Trump’s 2016 campaign.
The stakes at this week’s VA committee meeting are high for veterans too, whose ranks have been plagued by depression and suicide. A drug that offers a fast and lasting answer for treatment-resistant depression would be a godsend. But is Spravato that drug? Some say yes. FDA officials writing in the New England Journal of Medicine called it “a novel treatment for a severe and life-threatening condition,” touting its “rapid onset of effect [as] a key benefit.” Janssen called it “the first new mechanism of action” for major depression and said it “can offer significant and sustained improvement of depression symptoms for adults with TRD [treatment-resistant depression]”.
A joint FDA advisory committee previously voted 14-2 to approve the drug for release.
But Spravato’s heightened profile has unleashed a storm of questions from academics, psychiatrists and health researchers with concerns about the drug: how it was approved, how well it works, whether it is safe, how much it costs and whether it’s right for veterans. The discussion has revealed some unsettling issues:
The White House did not respond to questions about Trump’s involvement. Officials at the VA declined to answer a long series of questions, but noted in a statement that the FDA had approved the drug for adults with treatment-resistant depression.
“VA has not yet administered esketamine to any patients, and is in the process of designing a clinical implementation plan optimized for safety and efficacy,” it said.
Janssen defended its trials as proper and said they demonstrated the drug’s efficacy. It said Spravato “represents hope for many patients who have been suffering for some time and have cycled through multiple medicines without relief.” The FDA referred a reporter to a journal article authored by its officials that explained the trials and touted the drug as a “novel treatment” with “rapid onset of effect”.
But a variety of experts have found the sequence of events involving Spravato unsettling. Some VA staffers were uncomfortable with pressure from higher-ups that seemed directly attributable to their perception of Trump’s interest.[...]
Sources inside the Department of Veterans Affairs say staffers were essentially told by a senior official to drop everything in March and accelerate the drug’s availability because the president had expressed enthusiasm for the drug, Spravato, as a possible treatment for depressed veterans.
Questions have also been raised about a trio of Trump friends who have been working on veterans issues and interacting with Johnson & Johnson regarding programs for troubled vets.
In the midst of a rapidly convened series of VA meetings early that month, another official said the president wanted the VA to buy “truckloads” of the drug, according to sources. Trump also touted the drug’s benefits to the veterans affairs secretary, Robert Wilkie, in a White House meeting just last week, offering to help negotiate the VA’s purchase of the drug, according to Bloomberg.
A key VA panel, the so-called formulary committee, is meeting this week to decide if Spravato, whose formal name is esketamine, will be added to the list of drugs that must be available to VA pharmacies. A vote is expected on Wednesday, though a final decision may take longer. Esketamine is a derivative of ketamine, which has been used to treat depression, and has been abused as a party drug.
The stakes are high for the drug’s owner, the pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson, because the drug could be a blockbuster. One analysis estimates Spravato could earn $600m for the company by 2022. The drug was developed by the J&J subsidiary Janssen Pharmaceuticals. While it was under development, J&J’s and Janssen’s relationships at the VA deepened. As trials for the drug went forward in late 2017, Johnson & Johnson joined the VA’s suicide prevention campaign, #BeThere. A public service announcement on the campaign said J&J and the VA will “undertake new clinical trial processes in hopes of providing access to the latest and most innovative treatments to help veterans in need”.
Janssen said in a statement that throughout its partnership it had a memorandum of understanding in place “that we’ve followed”, adding that the company had “strictly complied with the laws in place that govern partnerships across industry and government related to ethics and conflicts of interest”.
In the course of the drug’s trials, J&J was also involved with a trio of men Trump knew through his Florida social club Mar-a-Lago who became advisers on VA issues.
The three, the Marvel Entertainment CEO, Ike Perlmutter, Palm Beach physician Bruce Moskowitz and attorney Marc Sherman, were labeled the “Mar-a-Lago Crowd” in a 2018 lawsuit by a veterans group against the VA, alleging that the trio constituted an illegal advisory committee that had outsized influence over Trump’s decisions involving the agency. Much of the lawsuit is based on an article by ProPublica.
The suit claims the trio convened a series of conference calls with J&J executives to discuss and promote the public awareness campaign; as part of that effort, the then VA secretary, David Shulkin, was joined by J&J officials in ringing the closing bell at the New York stock exchange on Veterans Day in late 2017.
The VA has moved to dismiss the suit, saying the Mar-a-Lago trio were just individuals giving advice. The three men did not respond to messages from the Center. But in responding to ProPublica, the trio cited Perlmutter’s “personal relationship with the president” and said they “offered our counsel, and the advice of these healthcare experts, to assist the president, secretary and VA leadership in their making essential decisions”. They said this was done voluntarily, “seeking nothing at all in return”.
Records from the Center for Responsive Politics show that J&J was among the firms lobbying most heavily at the VA in 2018. CRP records show that J&J spent a total of $6.6m that year lobbying the federal government about pharmaceuticals and health products; in 2018 and 2019 it lobbied the VA on matters including “partnership with the VA on suicide prevention”. The company gave $14,165 to Trump’s 2016 campaign.
The stakes at this week’s VA committee meeting are high for veterans too, whose ranks have been plagued by depression and suicide. A drug that offers a fast and lasting answer for treatment-resistant depression would be a godsend. But is Spravato that drug? Some say yes. FDA officials writing in the New England Journal of Medicine called it “a novel treatment for a severe and life-threatening condition,” touting its “rapid onset of effect [as] a key benefit.” Janssen called it “the first new mechanism of action” for major depression and said it “can offer significant and sustained improvement of depression symptoms for adults with TRD [treatment-resistant depression]”.
A joint FDA advisory committee previously voted 14-2 to approve the drug for release.
But Spravato’s heightened profile has unleashed a storm of questions from academics, psychiatrists and health researchers with concerns about the drug: how it was approved, how well it works, whether it is safe, how much it costs and whether it’s right for veterans. The discussion has revealed some unsettling issues:
- The FDA abandoned a longstanding procedure of requiring two successful short-term trials before approving anti-depression drugs. Instead, when this drug showed itself to be no better than placebo in two of three short-term trials, the FDA accepted the third trial alone, adding on another and different type of trial that some say was deeply flawed. The FDA admitted it had not previously done this, but said it was not “unreasonable”. The FDA committee member Erick Turner of the Oregon Health and Science University, who did not make the advisory committee meeting, called the FDA’s position “bull”. “It’s not a reason,” he said. “That’s like a parent saying, “Because I said so.’”
- Even though the drug is being hurried into use by the VA, some psychiatrists and researchers say the evidence from trials does not demonstrate that the drug works on people over 65 – or, some say, even on males. The VA’s patient population is 90% male and 52% over 65.
- During several years of trials, six people who had been treated with the drug died, as opposed to none on placebos. Three of the deaths were suicides. Janssen said none were considered by investigators to be related to Spravato. The FDA concurred. Still, noted one professor and psychiatrist, “It’s not heading in the direction supporting protection from suicides.”
- Data from the drug’s trials shows it to be only marginally better than placebos in its performance, several researchers and psychiatrists said after looking at the data.
- The dangers of treatment – mainly dissociation, sleepiness and blood-pressure hikes – are so significant that patients must stay in the doctor’s office for two hours after receiving their Spravato infusion. The office must be equipped with equipment to deal with hallucinatory, cardiac and respiratory problems. The patient cannot drive for 24 hours after taking the drug. “A wonder drug? I think it’s a wonder that’s anybody thinks it’s a wonder drug,” said Diana Zuckerman, president of the National Center for Health Research in Washington DC.
The White House did not respond to questions about Trump’s involvement. Officials at the VA declined to answer a long series of questions, but noted in a statement that the FDA had approved the drug for adults with treatment-resistant depression.
“VA has not yet administered esketamine to any patients, and is in the process of designing a clinical implementation plan optimized for safety and efficacy,” it said.
Janssen defended its trials as proper and said they demonstrated the drug’s efficacy. It said Spravato “represents hope for many patients who have been suffering for some time and have cycled through multiple medicines without relief.” The FDA referred a reporter to a journal article authored by its officials that explained the trials and touted the drug as a “novel treatment” with “rapid onset of effect”.
But a variety of experts have found the sequence of events involving Spravato unsettling. Some VA staffers were uncomfortable with pressure from higher-ups that seemed directly attributable to their perception of Trump’s interest.[...]
Indiana’s attorney general is being sued for sexual predation by four women
A special prosecutor did not charge Curtis Hill for his alleged groping, but did find the claims "credible."
JOSH ISRAEL - Thinkprogress
JUN 18, 2019, 10:05 AM
Four women who say they were groped at a March 2018 party by Indiana Attorney General Curtis Hill (R) have filed a civil suit after a special prosecutor declined to bring charges.
After the prosecutor found the claims “credible” but said he lacked evidence of intent needed to prove battery, the group opted to file their federal suit, which claims Hill engaged in sexual harassment, retaliation, gender discrimination, battery, defamation, and invasion of privacy.
Hill is a far-right social conservative who has worked to undermine reproductive health access, marriage equality for same-sex couples, medical marijuana, needle exchange programs, and voting rights. He has frequently advised President Donald Trump on law enforcement issues and has been praised by Vice President Mike Pence for “working very closely with our administration” on that subject.
According to the four women behind the suit — a Democratic state legislator, two Democratic legislative staffers, and a Republican legislative staffer — Hill allegedly groped each of them while intoxicated at a party to celebrate the legislature’s adjournment.
State Rep. Mara Candelaria Reardon (D), Democratic legislative assistant Samantha Lozano, Republican legislative assistant Niki DaSilva, and Gabrielle McLemore, the state senate Democrats’ communications director, came forward last year and alleged separate sexual assaults by Hill at the same event.
Reardon told The Daily Beast that Hill allegedly “slid his hand onto my exposed back and down into my dress and grabbed my ass.” He allegedly did the same to the others.
Multiple witnesses observed his alleged behavior, which allegedly included him telling women at the bar “you’ve got to show a little skin” to get faster service.
After their allegations became public, Hill said he had been “publicly and falsely accused of abhorrent behavior” and “dragged through the gutter.” Gov. Eric Holcomb (R), state House Speaker Brian Bosma (R), and state Senate Majority Leader David Long (R) were unswayed and called on Hill to resign last July.
An investigation by Indiana’s Inspector General found that “multiple eyewitnesses” from both parties said Hill’s conduct had been “inappropriate,” “creepy,” and “unwelcome.” In October, the special prosecutor assigned to investigate the complaints said he could not prove that a crime occurred and declined to bring charges.
At that time, Holcomb reaffirmed his call for Hill to step down. “I said I believed the women who stepped forward to report sexual harassment by the Indiana Attorney General,” he said in a statement. “The special prosecutor agreed and said, ‘I have accepted the victim statements as true.’”
Hill’s campaign website priorities section states, “As the former Prosecuting Attorney for Elkhart County, I have fought my entire career to keep Hoosier families safe, especially from substance abuse and crimes of violence.”
ThinkProgress has reached out to Hill’s office for comment on the new lawsuit and is awaiting a response.
After the prosecutor found the claims “credible” but said he lacked evidence of intent needed to prove battery, the group opted to file their federal suit, which claims Hill engaged in sexual harassment, retaliation, gender discrimination, battery, defamation, and invasion of privacy.
Hill is a far-right social conservative who has worked to undermine reproductive health access, marriage equality for same-sex couples, medical marijuana, needle exchange programs, and voting rights. He has frequently advised President Donald Trump on law enforcement issues and has been praised by Vice President Mike Pence for “working very closely with our administration” on that subject.
According to the four women behind the suit — a Democratic state legislator, two Democratic legislative staffers, and a Republican legislative staffer — Hill allegedly groped each of them while intoxicated at a party to celebrate the legislature’s adjournment.
State Rep. Mara Candelaria Reardon (D), Democratic legislative assistant Samantha Lozano, Republican legislative assistant Niki DaSilva, and Gabrielle McLemore, the state senate Democrats’ communications director, came forward last year and alleged separate sexual assaults by Hill at the same event.
Reardon told The Daily Beast that Hill allegedly “slid his hand onto my exposed back and down into my dress and grabbed my ass.” He allegedly did the same to the others.
Multiple witnesses observed his alleged behavior, which allegedly included him telling women at the bar “you’ve got to show a little skin” to get faster service.
After their allegations became public, Hill said he had been “publicly and falsely accused of abhorrent behavior” and “dragged through the gutter.” Gov. Eric Holcomb (R), state House Speaker Brian Bosma (R), and state Senate Majority Leader David Long (R) were unswayed and called on Hill to resign last July.
An investigation by Indiana’s Inspector General found that “multiple eyewitnesses” from both parties said Hill’s conduct had been “inappropriate,” “creepy,” and “unwelcome.” In October, the special prosecutor assigned to investigate the complaints said he could not prove that a crime occurred and declined to bring charges.
At that time, Holcomb reaffirmed his call for Hill to step down. “I said I believed the women who stepped forward to report sexual harassment by the Indiana Attorney General,” he said in a statement. “The special prosecutor agreed and said, ‘I have accepted the victim statements as true.’”
Hill’s campaign website priorities section states, “As the former Prosecuting Attorney for Elkhart County, I have fought my entire career to keep Hoosier families safe, especially from substance abuse and crimes of violence.”
ThinkProgress has reached out to Hill’s office for comment on the new lawsuit and is awaiting a response.
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400 years of slavery!!!
No rest for the workers: how the US is out of step on paid leave
A survey of the 21 wealthiest countries has found that the US is the only one not to guarantee paid vacation time
Mona Chalabi in New York
The Guardian
Tue 18 Jun 2019 01.00 EDT
When it comes to paid leave, the US stands alone among ‘advanced economies’. Illustration: Mona Chalabi/The Guardian
Of the 21 wealthiest countries, the US is the only one not to guarantee workers paid leave, according to a recent report by the Center for Economic and Policy Research which dubbed it “no vacation nation”.
The lack of a federal policy on the issue particularly affects part-time workers, only 40% of whom receive paid vacation. Overall, close to one in four Americans have no paid vacation whatsoever.
The report looked at 21 countries that it described as “advanced economies” and found that the US was the only one to have zero days of mandatory paid leave.
The lack of a federal policy on the issue particularly affects part-time workers, only 40% of whom receive paid vacation. Overall, close to one in four Americans have no paid vacation whatsoever.
The report looked at 21 countries that it described as “advanced economies” and found that the US was the only one to have zero days of mandatory paid leave.
TEFLON TOXIN SAFETY LEVEL SHOULD BE 700 TIMES LOWER THAN CURRENT EPA GUIDELINE
Sharon Lerner - The Intercept
June 18 2019, 8:54 a.m.
NEW DATA SUGGESTS that the safety threshold for PFOA in drinking water should be as low as .1 parts per trillion, according to the nation’s top toxicologist. Linda Birnbaum, director of the National Institute for Environmental Health Sciences, cited the figure, which is 700 times lower than the safety level set by the Environmental Protection Agency, at a conference on PFAS at Northeastern University last week.
While PFOA has already been tied to kidney and testicular cancer, among other diseases, recent research linking PFOA exposure to pancreatic cancer is the basis for the lower number cited by Birnbaum. The research was done by the National Toxicology Program, which is a division of the NIEHS.
“If you look at the data, pancreatic tumors are present at very, very low concentrations from PFOA,” Birnbaum told the audience at the conference. “If you use the pancreatic tumors in the rats in the NTP study to calculate what would really be a virtually safe dose, you’re getting down at about .1 ppt. Well, that’s really low. And that’s only for one PFAS.” Birnbaum suggested that regulators might ultimately issue one drinking water standard for the entire class, which contains thousands of compounds.
About the EPA’s current water standard, Birnbaum said, “Many of us would think that is not health protective.”
According to a summary of the experiment, male rats exposed to PFOA developed both cancerous and noncancerous tumors of the pancreas. At the lowest of three doses given in the experiment, 20 out of 50 rats developed the tumors. At the higher doses, more than half of the exposed rats developed the tumors.
The summary also shows that PFOA increased the numbers of cancerous and noncancerous liver tumors in the two-year rat study. At the conference, Birnbaum mentioned that the recent experiments also showed that PFAS exposure affected breast development. “There were clearly impacts on the growth of the mammary gland and problems with lactation,” she said.
Both the NIEHS, which conducts scientific research on the effects of the environment on health, and the EPA, which is responsible for environmental regulation, have said they are prioritizing PFAS, industrial compounds used in firefighting foam, nonstick coatings, and other products that persist indefinitely in the environment and accumulate in people. But the new information about their health effects has been emerging very slowly.
The Japan National Institute of Health Sciences first asked the NTP to study the perfluorinated compounds in 1990, noting that in rats the chemicals induced the presence of a biomarker of DNA damage thought to be related to cancer. In 2003, the EPA also nominated the compounds for further study, citing their “presumed widespread human exposure” and the known toxicity of certain compounds in the class.
The rats in this two-year study were given their first dose of PFOA almost 10 years ago, in July 2009. And the NTP released a statistical analysis of the tumor study in June 2018. Yet more than a year later, the NIEHS has not published reports of the studies, which regulators typically need to fully understand the science when setting safety levels.
Asked in March about the delay in releasing the reports, Robin Arnette, of the NIEHS’s office of communications and public liaison, wrote in an email to The Intercept that “NTP routinely releases data tables for completed studies while formal reports are in preparation” and that reports that go along with the toxicology research on PFAS “are currently undergoing external peer review. We anticipate their publication on the NTP website later in 2019.”
A technical report based on the research “is in preparation and external peer review will take place later in 2019; the date is not yet set,” according to Arnette’s email, which also said, “Timelines and prioritization are dynamic. We are actively managing our usual processes to enable efficient delivery of information for those agents of growing public concern.”
Although the reports have yet to be released, some state regulators are already considering the NTP data as they set safety thresholds for PFAS. The Minnesota Department of Health cited the NTP tables in its April health-based guideline for PFHxS. And in March, California regulators set interim safety levels of 14 and 13 ppt for PFOA and PFOS, while citing “new cancer data recently released by the National Toxicology Program” and noting that safety levels “and the health effects on which they are based may change.”
The amount of these chemicals deemed safe to ingest in drinking water has been dropping quickly over the past several years, as is often the case as scientists learn more about how chemicals affect health. Between 2009 and 2016, the EPA’s official safety threshold for PFOA was 400 ppt. In 2016, the agency lowered the number to 70 ppt. Several states have since calculated lower limits. Vermont set drinking water health advisory limits of 20 ppt for PFOA. And, in April, New Jersey proposed drinking water standards of 14 ppt for PFOA and 13 ppt for the closely related chemical PFOS.
While PFOA has already been tied to kidney and testicular cancer, among other diseases, recent research linking PFOA exposure to pancreatic cancer is the basis for the lower number cited by Birnbaum. The research was done by the National Toxicology Program, which is a division of the NIEHS.
“If you look at the data, pancreatic tumors are present at very, very low concentrations from PFOA,” Birnbaum told the audience at the conference. “If you use the pancreatic tumors in the rats in the NTP study to calculate what would really be a virtually safe dose, you’re getting down at about .1 ppt. Well, that’s really low. And that’s only for one PFAS.” Birnbaum suggested that regulators might ultimately issue one drinking water standard for the entire class, which contains thousands of compounds.
About the EPA’s current water standard, Birnbaum said, “Many of us would think that is not health protective.”
According to a summary of the experiment, male rats exposed to PFOA developed both cancerous and noncancerous tumors of the pancreas. At the lowest of three doses given in the experiment, 20 out of 50 rats developed the tumors. At the higher doses, more than half of the exposed rats developed the tumors.
The summary also shows that PFOA increased the numbers of cancerous and noncancerous liver tumors in the two-year rat study. At the conference, Birnbaum mentioned that the recent experiments also showed that PFAS exposure affected breast development. “There were clearly impacts on the growth of the mammary gland and problems with lactation,” she said.
Both the NIEHS, which conducts scientific research on the effects of the environment on health, and the EPA, which is responsible for environmental regulation, have said they are prioritizing PFAS, industrial compounds used in firefighting foam, nonstick coatings, and other products that persist indefinitely in the environment and accumulate in people. But the new information about their health effects has been emerging very slowly.
The Japan National Institute of Health Sciences first asked the NTP to study the perfluorinated compounds in 1990, noting that in rats the chemicals induced the presence of a biomarker of DNA damage thought to be related to cancer. In 2003, the EPA also nominated the compounds for further study, citing their “presumed widespread human exposure” and the known toxicity of certain compounds in the class.
The rats in this two-year study were given their first dose of PFOA almost 10 years ago, in July 2009. And the NTP released a statistical analysis of the tumor study in June 2018. Yet more than a year later, the NIEHS has not published reports of the studies, which regulators typically need to fully understand the science when setting safety levels.
Asked in March about the delay in releasing the reports, Robin Arnette, of the NIEHS’s office of communications and public liaison, wrote in an email to The Intercept that “NTP routinely releases data tables for completed studies while formal reports are in preparation” and that reports that go along with the toxicology research on PFAS “are currently undergoing external peer review. We anticipate their publication on the NTP website later in 2019.”
A technical report based on the research “is in preparation and external peer review will take place later in 2019; the date is not yet set,” according to Arnette’s email, which also said, “Timelines and prioritization are dynamic. We are actively managing our usual processes to enable efficient delivery of information for those agents of growing public concern.”
Although the reports have yet to be released, some state regulators are already considering the NTP data as they set safety thresholds for PFAS. The Minnesota Department of Health cited the NTP tables in its April health-based guideline for PFHxS. And in March, California regulators set interim safety levels of 14 and 13 ppt for PFOA and PFOS, while citing “new cancer data recently released by the National Toxicology Program” and noting that safety levels “and the health effects on which they are based may change.”
The amount of these chemicals deemed safe to ingest in drinking water has been dropping quickly over the past several years, as is often the case as scientists learn more about how chemicals affect health. Between 2009 and 2016, the EPA’s official safety threshold for PFOA was 400 ppt. In 2016, the agency lowered the number to 70 ppt. Several states have since calculated lower limits. Vermont set drinking water health advisory limits of 20 ppt for PFOA. And, in April, New Jersey proposed drinking water standards of 14 ppt for PFOA and 13 ppt for the closely related chemical PFOS.
Mitch McConnell busted on CNN as the ‘ringmaster’ leaving the door open for more Russian election interference
June 18, 2019
By Matthew Chapman - Raw Story
On Tuesday, CNN’s John Avlon broke down how Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is every bit the obstacle to secure and safe elections as President Donald Trump is.
“There should be things that transcend petty politics, and towards the top of that list is stopping foreign powers from interfering in our elections,” said Avlon, playing a clip of former special counsel Robert Mueller warning about the dangers. “Robert Mueller’s warning is again, falling on willfully deaf ears. We know that foreign powers continue to try to meddle in our elections. Trump’s FBI director and Director of National Intelligence have made this crystal clear.”
“Surely Congress will step up and act responsibly to secure our elections, right? Just kidding, a key group of Senate Republicans is doing everything they can to block, the ringmaster of this circus of denial? Sen. Mitch McConnell. Now, he’s been careful to say that these threats and challenges are real, our responsibility to strengthen America is serious. He’s just not going to actually allow the Senate to do anything about it.”
“Remember, it was McConnell who stopped any bipartisan statement condemning Russian interference in 2016, according to former DNI James Clapper,” said Avlon. “And now the man who calls himself the ‘grim reaper’ has killed common-sense legislation from every side of the aisle on election security, including mandatory sanctions on anyone who attacks an American election, a billion dollars to state and local authorities to strengthen election security, the Honest Ads Act, which would require big tech platforms like Facebook to disclose who’s buying political ads, bills that would require backup paper ballots, and duty-to-report legislation that would require campaigns to report foreign interference.”
“The last effort was blocked singlehandedly by Tennessee Sen. Marsha Blackburn, who said no one wants foreign interference of any kind, but that bill was overbroad and should be done in a bipartisan way,” said Avlon. “The unanimous consent effort she killed was bipartisan, and her Heisman was immediately hailed by president Trump. Now she’s being joined by Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski.”
“Make no mistake, this Senate inaction is a derelict of duty, empowering our enemies at a time when FBI Director Chris Wray says more countries like China are getting into the game, and what we have experienced in the past is a dress rehearsal for what’s coming next,” warned Avlon. “Any senator blocking election security efforts is short-term politics. They’re betting you won’t notice or remember until after the next election. At that point, it may be too late. Bottom line, there can be no political excuse for failing to defend our democracy period, and that’s your reality check.”
“There should be things that transcend petty politics, and towards the top of that list is stopping foreign powers from interfering in our elections,” said Avlon, playing a clip of former special counsel Robert Mueller warning about the dangers. “Robert Mueller’s warning is again, falling on willfully deaf ears. We know that foreign powers continue to try to meddle in our elections. Trump’s FBI director and Director of National Intelligence have made this crystal clear.”
“Surely Congress will step up and act responsibly to secure our elections, right? Just kidding, a key group of Senate Republicans is doing everything they can to block, the ringmaster of this circus of denial? Sen. Mitch McConnell. Now, he’s been careful to say that these threats and challenges are real, our responsibility to strengthen America is serious. He’s just not going to actually allow the Senate to do anything about it.”
“Remember, it was McConnell who stopped any bipartisan statement condemning Russian interference in 2016, according to former DNI James Clapper,” said Avlon. “And now the man who calls himself the ‘grim reaper’ has killed common-sense legislation from every side of the aisle on election security, including mandatory sanctions on anyone who attacks an American election, a billion dollars to state and local authorities to strengthen election security, the Honest Ads Act, which would require big tech platforms like Facebook to disclose who’s buying political ads, bills that would require backup paper ballots, and duty-to-report legislation that would require campaigns to report foreign interference.”
“The last effort was blocked singlehandedly by Tennessee Sen. Marsha Blackburn, who said no one wants foreign interference of any kind, but that bill was overbroad and should be done in a bipartisan way,” said Avlon. “The unanimous consent effort she killed was bipartisan, and her Heisman was immediately hailed by president Trump. Now she’s being joined by Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski.”
“Make no mistake, this Senate inaction is a derelict of duty, empowering our enemies at a time when FBI Director Chris Wray says more countries like China are getting into the game, and what we have experienced in the past is a dress rehearsal for what’s coming next,” warned Avlon. “Any senator blocking election security efforts is short-term politics. They’re betting you won’t notice or remember until after the next election. At that point, it may be too late. Bottom line, there can be no political excuse for failing to defend our democracy period, and that’s your reality check.”
Bites from Real News
6/18/2019*
*The Energy 202: A federal watchdog is investigating Trump administration's decisions on Utah monumen
PowerPost Analysis The Energy 202: A federal watchdog is investigating Trump administration's decisions on Utah monument. A federal watchdog agency will investigate whether the Trump administration broke the law by preparing lands within the old boundaries of Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument for potential fossil-fuel leasing. (Washington Post)
*SPECIAL REPORT
Air Force landlord falsified records to boost income, documents show
As families awaited repairs, a major military landlord filed false maintenance reports to help it secure Department of Defense incentive fees.
*Here’s why the right abandons Democracy in favor of authoritarianism
The basic thrust is a political vision that prioritizes hierarchical social cohesion and has the government takes a leading role enforcing traditionalist cultural and social values and keeping conservative Christianity as the taproot of the state.
NANCY LETOURNEAU / WASHINGTON MONTHLY(Alternet)
*Michael Wolff on why Mueller didn't indict: Trump was ready to "blow up everything" Author of "Fire and Fury" and the new "Siege": "Trump's whole career has been about what he can get away with"
by Chauncey DeVega(Salon)
*How Teach for America Evolved Into an Arm of the Charter School Movement
Documents obtained by ProPublica show that the Walton foundation, a staunch supporter of school choice and Teach for America’s largest private funder, was paying $4,000 for every teacher placed in a traditional public school — and $6,000 for every one placed in a charter school.
*GEORGIA PREPARES TO CARRY OUT THE 1,500TH EXECUTION IN THE U.S. SINCE 1976
If there’s nothing inherently significant about the number 1,500, it is at least a moment for reflection. The 1,000th execution in the U.S. took place amid candlelight vigils in North Carolina in 2005. Cameron Todd Willingham had been executed in Texas the previous year, for a crime many now recognize he did not commit.
*Eskilstuna: how a Swedish town became the world capital of recycling The city was dying. Then somebody had a great idea to save it – make it the greenest place on Earth.
Yet since 2012, Eskilstuna has implemented a spate of green initiatives, vying to make it the most environmentally friendly city in Sweden
(The Guardian)
*Top EU adviser blames US for Iran tensions
Oil tanker attacks are ‘not a particularly extreme or radical response’ to what Tehran views as American escalation in the Gulf, Nathalie Tocci says. A special adviser to EU ... (Politico-Europe)
*Iran says it won't wage war, Russia tells U.S. to stop stoking tensions
(Reuters) - President Hassan Rouhani said on Tuesday Iran would not wage war against any nation, while Russia told the United States it should drop wha ... (Reuters)
*Meet the mysterious conservative lawyer who keeps turning up in the Russia probes
A prominent conservative lawyer keeps showing up in dramas central to the Trump administration and its battles with Congress—and it turns out he has intimate knowledge of Felix Sater’s intelligence work for the U.S. government while he was working with Trump.
*No African American has won statewide office in Mississippi in 129 years – here’s why
Mississippi requires winners to receive more than 50% of the votes. When no one receives a majority, the Mississippi legislature, not the voters, chooses the winner.
*Most US drug arrests involve a gram or less
ll states treat as felonies the sale of any amount of illegal drugs. The thinking behind these laws is that you cannot catch the big fish without catching some minnows as well.
*United States of Plastic: Investigation reveals America's dirty secret
A report from 11 countries tracks how US waste makes its way across the world – and overwhelms the poorest nations
*Open Secrets has published a guide to Trump's foreign business interests
Trump’s failed defense secretary pick defended his son after he brutally beat his own mother with a baseball bat
June 18, 2019
By Brad Reed - Raw Story
Acting Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan abruptly resigned on Monday — and a new report from the Washington Post sheds some light on why.
Shanahan, who had been tapped by President Donald Trump as a permanent replacement for former Defense Secretary James Mattis, admitted to the Post this week that he had written a defense of his then-17-year-old son Will Shanahan after he brutally beat his own mother with a baseball bat in 2011 and left her “unconscious in a pool of blood, her skull fractured and with internal injuries that required surgery,” the paper reports.
Despite the gruesome nature of the attack, Shanahan sent a letter to his former brother-in-law claiming that his son had acted in self-defense.
“Use of a baseball bat in self-defense will likely be viewed as an imbalance of force,” Shanahan wrote. “However, Will’s mother harassed him for nearly three hours before the incident.”
Shanahan tells the Post that he deeply regrets writing those words and claims that he did not know the extent of his ex-wife’s injuries at the time.
Read the whole report here.
Shanahan, who had been tapped by President Donald Trump as a permanent replacement for former Defense Secretary James Mattis, admitted to the Post this week that he had written a defense of his then-17-year-old son Will Shanahan after he brutally beat his own mother with a baseball bat in 2011 and left her “unconscious in a pool of blood, her skull fractured and with internal injuries that required surgery,” the paper reports.
Despite the gruesome nature of the attack, Shanahan sent a letter to his former brother-in-law claiming that his son had acted in self-defense.
“Use of a baseball bat in self-defense will likely be viewed as an imbalance of force,” Shanahan wrote. “However, Will’s mother harassed him for nearly three hours before the incident.”
Shanahan tells the Post that he deeply regrets writing those words and claims that he did not know the extent of his ex-wife’s injuries at the time.
Read the whole report here.
Border agent attacks AOC and proves her point about ‘concentration camps’: Kids can play ‘outside their cell’
June 18, 2019
By David Edwards - Raw Story
Border Patrol agent Art del Cueto attacked Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY) on Tuesday for calling immigrant detention facilities “concentration camps.”
“This administration has established concentration camps on the southern border of the United States for immigrants, where they are being brutalized with dehumanizing conditions and dying,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote in a tweet on Tuesday after President Donald Trump vowed to deport “millions” of illegal immigrants.
Ocasio-Cortez later noted that concentration camps are “not the same as death camps” used in the Holocaust.
“I haven’t seen her down here in Arizona, I can tell you that,” del Cueto complained to Fox News host Bill Hemmer on Tuesday. “It’s disgusting to compare concentration camps to what the men and women are doing here protecting our country. In my eyes, honestly, you lose credibility. I’ve had it up to here with all these individuals constantly trying to compare concentration camps to what we’re doing.”
The Border Patrol agent explained that he had recently visited one of the detention facilities where children were playing outside of their “cell.”
“I was just at one of the detention facilities,” he explained. “The kids were outside their cell. They were out on the floor, playing puzzles, watching movies, eating cookies. What have you. She needs to come down here.”
“This administration has established concentration camps on the southern border of the United States for immigrants, where they are being brutalized with dehumanizing conditions and dying,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote in a tweet on Tuesday after President Donald Trump vowed to deport “millions” of illegal immigrants.
Ocasio-Cortez later noted that concentration camps are “not the same as death camps” used in the Holocaust.
“I haven’t seen her down here in Arizona, I can tell you that,” del Cueto complained to Fox News host Bill Hemmer on Tuesday. “It’s disgusting to compare concentration camps to what the men and women are doing here protecting our country. In my eyes, honestly, you lose credibility. I’ve had it up to here with all these individuals constantly trying to compare concentration camps to what we’re doing.”
The Border Patrol agent explained that he had recently visited one of the detention facilities where children were playing outside of their “cell.”
“I was just at one of the detention facilities,” he explained. “The kids were outside their cell. They were out on the floor, playing puzzles, watching movies, eating cookies. What have you. She needs to come down here.”
Trump’s threat to deport ‘millions of illegal aliens’ explained
The move would be unprecedented and impractical.
REBEKAH ENTRALGO - Thinkprogress
JUN 18, 2019, 11:33 AM
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agents are allegedly planning mass raids across the country beginning “next week,” according to Monday night tweets from President Donald Trump.
“Next week ICE will begin the process of removing the millions of illegal aliens who have illicitly found their way into the United States,” Trump wrote. “They will be removed as fast as they come in.”
Large scale ICE operations are kept under wraps so as to avoid tipping off those who could be a target. When Trump’s threat became public, no one was more surprised than Trump’s own immigration law enforcement agents, who told The Washington Post they were stunned Trump would make such an announcement. One former senior ICE official told Buzzfeed News it puts officer safety at risk.
A mass raid has been in the works within the administration for a long time, and is partly why many former top officials at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) left the administration earlier this year. According to The Washington Post, the plan consisted of arresting immigrant families in 10 major cities across the country, specifically targeting immigrants who failed to show up for their day in court.
Former DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and Trump’s then-rumored pick for ICE chief Ron Vitiello opposed the plan, saying ICE agents lacked the preparation for a coordinated raid of that scale, that it would take away resources from the border, and that it would cause public outrage.
Arresting “millions” of undocumented immigrants in a week, as Trump suggested in his Monday tweet, would be unprecedented for the agency. The highest yearly number of deportations from ICE was around 400,000. Furthermore, a mass operation of that scale would require much more resources than the agency currently has access to.
Enforcement Removal Operations (ERO), the arm of ICE that does the majority of arresting and deporting, only has around 6,000 agents. It would possibly need to pull from its investigations unit, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), to conduct the operation — pulling them off assignments related to cyber crimes and human trafficking. It could also potentially require DHS to pull agents from the so-called “national emergency” at the U.S.-Mexico border.
The administration claims its operation would focus squarely on the roughly one million people who have missed their court hearings and haven’t left the country despite being issued a final order of removal. The vast number of immigrants, however, do make their court appearances, and pending final orders of removal are usually the result of the government’s failure to adequately notify the person charged. For example, as ThinkProgress has previously reported, an undocumented mother from Colombia who lived in the United States for over a decade was deported because she missed a check-in with ICE, despite having a valid work visa. Her immigration lawyer had committed suicide and notifications from the government never made their way to her mailbox.
A raid of the magnitude the administration is proposing would also have a profound impact on the economy for which Trump loves to take credit. Undocumented immigrants pay an estimated $11.6 billion a year in taxes. Deporting millions would mean bills going unpaid and groceries not being bought. The total spending power of immigrants is estimated to be over $900 billion.
In spite of this, current administration officials support a mass raid. White House Senior Adviser Stephen Miller, ICE Deputy Director Matthew Albence, and ICE Acting Director Mark Morgan believe one dramatic operation within the interior of the United States is needed to show immigrants that the administration is serious about immigration enforcement.
Publicly announcing ICE raids in the way Trump did, however, is particularly hypocritical, considering in 2018, he and other top administration officials threatened Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf (D) with criminal charges for warning city residents of potential raids.
“The Oakland mayor’s decision to publicize her suspicions about ICE operations further increased that risk for my officers and alerted criminal aliens — making clear that this reckless decision was based on her political agenda with the very federal laws that ICE is sworn to uphold,” then-ICE Deputy Director Thomas D. Homan said at the time.
Homan has since retired from his position at ICE, but as recently as last week Trump said he would be his “border czar.” Homan meanwhile called the announcement premature and said he would need to think it over first.
Schaaf, for her part, responded to Trump’s public announcement Monday night, signaling a potential action from the city of Oakland to protect those who may be targeted.
“If you continue to threaten, target and terrorize families in my community… and if we receive credible information… you already know what our values are in Oakland — and we will unapologetically stand up for those values,” she wrote.
“Next week ICE will begin the process of removing the millions of illegal aliens who have illicitly found their way into the United States,” Trump wrote. “They will be removed as fast as they come in.”
Large scale ICE operations are kept under wraps so as to avoid tipping off those who could be a target. When Trump’s threat became public, no one was more surprised than Trump’s own immigration law enforcement agents, who told The Washington Post they were stunned Trump would make such an announcement. One former senior ICE official told Buzzfeed News it puts officer safety at risk.
A mass raid has been in the works within the administration for a long time, and is partly why many former top officials at the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) left the administration earlier this year. According to The Washington Post, the plan consisted of arresting immigrant families in 10 major cities across the country, specifically targeting immigrants who failed to show up for their day in court.
Former DHS Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and Trump’s then-rumored pick for ICE chief Ron Vitiello opposed the plan, saying ICE agents lacked the preparation for a coordinated raid of that scale, that it would take away resources from the border, and that it would cause public outrage.
Arresting “millions” of undocumented immigrants in a week, as Trump suggested in his Monday tweet, would be unprecedented for the agency. The highest yearly number of deportations from ICE was around 400,000. Furthermore, a mass operation of that scale would require much more resources than the agency currently has access to.
Enforcement Removal Operations (ERO), the arm of ICE that does the majority of arresting and deporting, only has around 6,000 agents. It would possibly need to pull from its investigations unit, Homeland Security Investigations (HSI), to conduct the operation — pulling them off assignments related to cyber crimes and human trafficking. It could also potentially require DHS to pull agents from the so-called “national emergency” at the U.S.-Mexico border.
The administration claims its operation would focus squarely on the roughly one million people who have missed their court hearings and haven’t left the country despite being issued a final order of removal. The vast number of immigrants, however, do make their court appearances, and pending final orders of removal are usually the result of the government’s failure to adequately notify the person charged. For example, as ThinkProgress has previously reported, an undocumented mother from Colombia who lived in the United States for over a decade was deported because she missed a check-in with ICE, despite having a valid work visa. Her immigration lawyer had committed suicide and notifications from the government never made their way to her mailbox.
A raid of the magnitude the administration is proposing would also have a profound impact on the economy for which Trump loves to take credit. Undocumented immigrants pay an estimated $11.6 billion a year in taxes. Deporting millions would mean bills going unpaid and groceries not being bought. The total spending power of immigrants is estimated to be over $900 billion.
In spite of this, current administration officials support a mass raid. White House Senior Adviser Stephen Miller, ICE Deputy Director Matthew Albence, and ICE Acting Director Mark Morgan believe one dramatic operation within the interior of the United States is needed to show immigrants that the administration is serious about immigration enforcement.
Publicly announcing ICE raids in the way Trump did, however, is particularly hypocritical, considering in 2018, he and other top administration officials threatened Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf (D) with criminal charges for warning city residents of potential raids.
“The Oakland mayor’s decision to publicize her suspicions about ICE operations further increased that risk for my officers and alerted criminal aliens — making clear that this reckless decision was based on her political agenda with the very federal laws that ICE is sworn to uphold,” then-ICE Deputy Director Thomas D. Homan said at the time.
Homan has since retired from his position at ICE, but as recently as last week Trump said he would be his “border czar.” Homan meanwhile called the announcement premature and said he would need to think it over first.
Schaaf, for her part, responded to Trump’s public announcement Monday night, signaling a potential action from the city of Oakland to protect those who may be targeted.
“If you continue to threaten, target and terrorize families in my community… and if we receive credible information… you already know what our values are in Oakland — and we will unapologetically stand up for those values,” she wrote.
Trump being a ‘compulsive liar and erratic ignoramus’ is why he failed on Iran: Conservative columnist
June 17, 2019
By Bob Brigham - Raw Story
President Donald Trump’s highly-criticized decision to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal has resulted as was warned, with the country reviving its nuclear program, a conservative columnist explained in The Washington Post on Monday.
Conservative Max Boot took a victory lap in the hard-hitting column, reminding that he had signed a March 2016 letter by 121 Republican foreign policy analysts warning about Trump’s approach.
“I wish we had been wrong, but we were all too right,” Boot wrote.
“Trump has shown no ability to grow in office; but then it’s hard to learn if you all you read is Fox News chyrons. He is today the same compulsive liar and erratic ignoramus he was at the start of the 2016 campaign,” Boot said. “Only now, the stakes are much higher.”
“Trump is commander in chief as the United States is locked on a collision course with the Islamic Republic of Iran. The crisis in the Persian Gulf shows the danger of having a president who is so unfit for office,” he explained. “Indeed, this crisis is largely of Trump’s own making.”
“The administration has implemented punishing sanctions that have cut Iran’s oil exports by more than half. The Iranian government considers this an act of ‘economic war,’ and it has responded like most nations under attack — not by surrendering but by hitting back,” he noted.
“What did Trump think would happen when he pulled out of the nuclear deal? Or did he think at all?” he wondered. “Most analysts warned that the move would increase the risk of Iran’s restarting its nuclear program and of war breaking out — and it has.”
“The United States cannot successfully deal with a menace such as Iran when it is led by a president with no credibility or moral standing either at home or abroad. U.S. allies distrust Trump’s claims of Iranian responsibility for the tanker attacks and bristle at Trump’s unilateralism,” he said.
“According to the New York Times, even Trump’s own intelligence and military chiefs don’t trust him enough to share details of U.S. cyberoperations against Russia. If Trump’s own subordinates don’t trust him, how can the rest of the country or the world?” Boot asked.
Read the full column.
Conservative Max Boot took a victory lap in the hard-hitting column, reminding that he had signed a March 2016 letter by 121 Republican foreign policy analysts warning about Trump’s approach.
“I wish we had been wrong, but we were all too right,” Boot wrote.
“Trump has shown no ability to grow in office; but then it’s hard to learn if you all you read is Fox News chyrons. He is today the same compulsive liar and erratic ignoramus he was at the start of the 2016 campaign,” Boot said. “Only now, the stakes are much higher.”
“Trump is commander in chief as the United States is locked on a collision course with the Islamic Republic of Iran. The crisis in the Persian Gulf shows the danger of having a president who is so unfit for office,” he explained. “Indeed, this crisis is largely of Trump’s own making.”
“The administration has implemented punishing sanctions that have cut Iran’s oil exports by more than half. The Iranian government considers this an act of ‘economic war,’ and it has responded like most nations under attack — not by surrendering but by hitting back,” he noted.
“What did Trump think would happen when he pulled out of the nuclear deal? Or did he think at all?” he wondered. “Most analysts warned that the move would increase the risk of Iran’s restarting its nuclear program and of war breaking out — and it has.”
“The United States cannot successfully deal with a menace such as Iran when it is led by a president with no credibility or moral standing either at home or abroad. U.S. allies distrust Trump’s claims of Iranian responsibility for the tanker attacks and bristle at Trump’s unilateralism,” he said.
“According to the New York Times, even Trump’s own intelligence and military chiefs don’t trust him enough to share details of U.S. cyberoperations against Russia. If Trump’s own subordinates don’t trust him, how can the rest of the country or the world?” Boot asked.
Read the full column.
New foreclosure crisis hitting after shady lenders targeted black seniors for reverse mortgages
Laura Clawson
Daily Kos Staff
Saturday June 15, 2019 · 7:00 AM PDT
The financial industry isn’t done victimizing homeowners, leading to a new mortgage crisis hitting struggling senior citizens. USA Today reports on how lenders have targeted majority black neighborhoods for shady reverse mortgages, leaving elderly homeowners fighting to keep their homes, property values diminished, and adult children without the modest homes they expected to inherit.
Reverse mortgages allow senior citizens to tap into the value of their homes to make repairs or just make ends meet, but nearly 100,000 of them have failed, and those failures are hitting predominantly black neighborhoods hard: “USA TODAY found that reverse mortgages end in foreclosure six times more often in predominantly black neighborhoods than in neighborhoods that are 80% white.” The disparity holds steady in neighborhoods where residents earn less than $40,000. Since foreclosures lower property values in surrounding houses, the damage isn’t just to the people facing foreclosure themselves.
Predominantly black neighborhoods also appear to have been targeted by lenders. A statistician hired by homeowners in one lawsuit “found that, in one year, 70% of Urban Financial loans in Chicago went to areas that were at least 80% African American. From 2001 to 2009, the company wrote more than half of its reverse mortgages in zip codes that were 80% black, according to USA TODAY’s analysis.” USA Today found similar numbers for two other lenders, Best Mortgage Services in Detroit and Gateway Reverse Mortgage Group in St. Louis.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau tried to put some limits on the reverse mortgage lenders, and fined several. But it hasn’t been enough to protect people who signed their reverse mortgages before protections were put into place, or all those struggling now. Structural racism is real, and it’s still destroying people who’ve worked all their lives to claw out a tiny bit of security and comfort.
Reverse mortgages allow senior citizens to tap into the value of their homes to make repairs or just make ends meet, but nearly 100,000 of them have failed, and those failures are hitting predominantly black neighborhoods hard: “USA TODAY found that reverse mortgages end in foreclosure six times more often in predominantly black neighborhoods than in neighborhoods that are 80% white.” The disparity holds steady in neighborhoods where residents earn less than $40,000. Since foreclosures lower property values in surrounding houses, the damage isn’t just to the people facing foreclosure themselves.
Predominantly black neighborhoods also appear to have been targeted by lenders. A statistician hired by homeowners in one lawsuit “found that, in one year, 70% of Urban Financial loans in Chicago went to areas that were at least 80% African American. From 2001 to 2009, the company wrote more than half of its reverse mortgages in zip codes that were 80% black, according to USA TODAY’s analysis.” USA Today found similar numbers for two other lenders, Best Mortgage Services in Detroit and Gateway Reverse Mortgage Group in St. Louis.
The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau tried to put some limits on the reverse mortgage lenders, and fined several. But it hasn’t been enough to protect people who signed their reverse mortgages before protections were put into place, or all those struggling now. Structural racism is real, and it’s still destroying people who’ve worked all their lives to claw out a tiny bit of security and comfort.
U.S. Ships ‘One Million Tons’ of Plastic Waste to Poor Countries Every Year
Jamie Ross - Reporter
Published 06.17.19 5:59AM ET
DAILY BEAST - CHEAT SHEET
The U.S. ships hundreds of thousands of tons of plastic to poorly regulated developing countries around the globe every year, according to a new investigation by The Guardian. The equivalent of 68,000 shipping containers of American plastic was reportedly sent from the U.S. to developing countries last year, with new hot spots including Bangladesh, Laos, Ethiopia, and Senegal. The countries are being chosen because they have limited environmental regulation and cheap labor to sort through the trash. “We are trying so desperately to get rid of this stuff that we are looking for new frontiers,” said Jan Dell, who works with investors and environmental groups to reduce plastic pollution. “The path of least resistance is to put it on a ship and send it somewhere else—and the ships are going further and further to find some place to put it.”
Texas Pastor Who Backed Anti-Abortion Bill Arrested for Child Sexual Abuse
Audrey McNamara - Reporter
Published 06.16.19 12:17PM ET
Daily Beast - cheat sheet
A former Texas pastor who supported legislation that would have criminalized abortions in the state has been arrested on charges of child sex abuse. Stephen Bratton is accused of having “sexual intercourse multiple times a day or several times a week” with a teenage relative, over the course of two years, according to court records. Bratton was a pastor at Grace Family Baptist Church near Houston, and was an outspoken supporter this year of a bill that would have ended abortions in Texas and threatened to criminally charge women who have an abortion with homicide. Bratton reportedly came forward with the abuse to his wife on May 15, and confessed to three Southern Baptist clergy members the next day. He has since been excommunicated from the church, and is no longer living with his wife and their seven children. Bratton posted $50,000 bond and has been released from the Harris County Jail.
Alt-Right headed to court — the ‘serious injuries’ inflicted on two sisters could cost white nationalists $10 million
June 15, 2019
By Bob Brigham - Raw Story
Some of the most prominent members of the Alt-Right are being sued by two sisters for $10 million.
Sisters Tadrint and Micah Washington filed a lawsuit after being seriously injured in the fatal Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, the Daily Progress reported Saturday.
“The suit has since been narrowed to Fields, Kessler, Spencer, the National Policy Institute, William Regnery II, AltRight Corp., Mike Peinovich, Michael Hill, Matthew Heimbach, the Traditionalist Worker Party, the League of the South, Bradley Griffin, Vanguard America, Augustus Invictus, Chris Cantwell, Andrew Anglin, Moonbase Holdings, Identity Europa, Nathan Damigo and Elliott Kline,” the newspaper reported.
“The sisters — who said they did not take part in any protesting that day — were on their way home when they found themselves being detoured down Fourth Street Southeast,” the Daily Progress explained. “When Fields drove his Dodge Challenger down Fourth Street, it slammed into the sisters’ vehicle and the two were thrown into the dashboard and windshield and suffered serious injuries.”
The lawsuit has languished as many of the defendants have had difficulties finding attorneys who will represent them.
Sisters Tadrint and Micah Washington filed a lawsuit after being seriously injured in the fatal Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, the Daily Progress reported Saturday.
“The suit has since been narrowed to Fields, Kessler, Spencer, the National Policy Institute, William Regnery II, AltRight Corp., Mike Peinovich, Michael Hill, Matthew Heimbach, the Traditionalist Worker Party, the League of the South, Bradley Griffin, Vanguard America, Augustus Invictus, Chris Cantwell, Andrew Anglin, Moonbase Holdings, Identity Europa, Nathan Damigo and Elliott Kline,” the newspaper reported.
“The sisters — who said they did not take part in any protesting that day — were on their way home when they found themselves being detoured down Fourth Street Southeast,” the Daily Progress explained. “When Fields drove his Dodge Challenger down Fourth Street, it slammed into the sisters’ vehicle and the two were thrown into the dashboard and windshield and suffered serious injuries.”
The lawsuit has languished as many of the defendants have had difficulties finding attorneys who will represent them.
*What's Inside*
June 15 - June 17
✔U.S. businesses beg to be left off Trump's tariff list
(Payback)
*Puerto Rico was about to pass a ‘religious freedom’ law but Ricky Martin stepped in & shut it down.
(Colonies)
*ANCIENT GREECE: UNDERWATER ARCHAEOLOGISTS DISCOVER MONUMENTAL STRUCTURE FROM SITE OF PRE-BIBLICAL BATTLE(Ancient Times)
*How rent prices became unmoored from incomes
(America)
*Supreme Court sends gay wedding cake dispute back to state courts
(Rights)
*Federal minimum wage sets record with no increase since 2009
(Slavery 21st Century)
*Profit over safety? Boeing under fire over 737 Max crashes as families demand answers
(Capitalism)
*Hong Kong protests: pressure builds on Carrie Lam as public rejects apology
(World)
✔There’s So Much Plastic in the Environment That Bees Are Making Nests Out of It
(Environment)
*This graphic explains why Speaker Pelosi is resistant to impeachment
(Demo Politics)
*Saudi Arabia May Execute Teenager for His Protests — Including When He Was 10
(World)
*Open Letter to the MSM by Nancegreggs
(Worthless Media)
*The Best People review: how Trump flooded the swamp
(Trump)
*Israeli court convicts Sara Netanyahu for misusing state funds
(World)
*Bosses pocket Trump tax windfall as workers see job promises vanish
(Reality)
✔Mississippi fast food cashier ‘terminated immediately’ for ugly racist slur on customer’s receipt
(Amerikkkans)
*EPA Air Chief Gave Presentation At Fringe Climate Denier Event, New Emails Show
(Environment)
*GAMMA-RAY BURSTS: SOME OF THE BRIGHTEST EXPLOSIONS IN THE UNIVERSE DETECTED BY NASA'S FERMI MISSION(Space News)
*‘Eye-popping’ analysis shows top one percent gained $21 trillion in wealth since 1989 while bottom half lost $900 billion(Reality)
*Black drivers in Missouri are 91% more likely to be stopped than white drivers, a report finds
(America)
*Alabama court forces rape survivor to allow rapist to have visitation with children
(America)
*New documents reveal how a young Trump bullied the press for years as he hid his actual wealth
(Trump)
*Mike Pompeo's Pretext Rejects
(Funnies)
*late news of interest*
Incompetence costs: $400,000,000,000!!!
America Is Stuck With a $400 Billion Stealth Fighter That Can’t Fight
The planes have had several previously unreported ‘category 1’ flaws—military parlance for issues that can prevent a pilot from accomplishing their mission.
David Axe - Daily Beast
Published 06.13.19 7:27AM ET
Here’s something the public didn’t know until today: If one of the U.S. military’s new F-35 stealth fighters has to climb at a steep angle in order to dodge an enemy attack, design flaws mean the plane might suddenly tumble out of control and crash.
Also, some versions of the F-35 can’t accelerate to supersonic speed without melting their own tails or shedding the expensive coating that helps to give the planes their radar-evading qualities.
The Pentagon’s $400-billion F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program, one of the biggest and most expensive weapons programs in history, has come under fire, so to speak, over more than a decade for delays, rising costs, design problems and technical glitches.
But startling reports by trade publication Defense News on Wednesday revealed flaws that previously only builder Lockheed Martin, the military, and the plane’s foreign buyers knew about.
The newly-exposed problems underscore the potential fragility of American air power as the armed services work to replace more and more old fighters with as many as 2,300 F-35s while also reconfiguring to confront the increasingly deadly Chinese and Russian air forces.
The problems might also help to explain why acting defense secretary Patrick Shanahan reportedly described the F-35 program as “fucked up.”
Defense News obtained military documents detailing a wide range of serious problems with two of the three versions of the F-35. The Air Force’s F-35A appears to be exempt from the latest flaws, but the Marine Corps’ vertical-landing F-35B and the Navy’s carrier-compatible F-35C both suffer what the services call “category 1” deficiencies. (In military parlance, a category 1 flaw in a plane can prevent a pilot from accomplishing their mission.)
The F-35 program and the office of the secretary of defense did not respond to requests for comment.
One problem cropped up during test flights in 2011, Defense News reported, citing the trove of military documents. In the 2011 tests, at least one F-35B and F-35C both flew at speeds of Mach 1.3 and Mach 1.4. A post-flight inspection in November 2011 revealed the F-35B sustained “bubbling [and] blistering” of its stealth coating.
Further supersonic tests in December 2011 revealed structural damage on an F-35C resulting from the extreme heat coming from the plane’s single Pratt & Whitney engine, one of the most powerful fighter engines ever made.
To avoid similar damage, the military has limited F-35B and F-35C pilots to flying at supersonic speed for less than a minute at a time.
But that could make it impossible for aviators to keep up with, or avoid, Russian and Chinese fighters flying faster than the speed of sound without any restrictions. “It is infeasible for the Navy or Marine Corps to operate the F-35 against a near-peer threat under such restrictions,” Defense News paraphrased the documents as saying.
The test reports Defense News obtained also reveal a second, previously little-known category 1 deficiency in the F-35B and F-35C aircraft. If during a steep climb the fighters exceed a 20-degree “angle of attack”—the angle created by the wing and the oncoming air—they could become unstable and potentially uncontrollable.
To prevent a possible crash, pilots must avoid steeply climbing and other hard maneuvers. “Fleet pilots agreed it is very difficult to max perform the aircraft” in those circumstances, Defense News quoted the documents as saying.
The implications are chilling. In a dogfight with a Russian or Chinese jet that can exceed a 20-degree angle of attack, an American flying and F-35 could be at a serious disadvantage.
The revelation of the two performance flaws comes at a critical time for the 18-year-old F-35 program. Pentagon officials plan to declare an end to the testing phase of the F-35’s development sometime in late 2019 and clear the fighter for mass production.
The stealth fighter enjoys strong support from Congress, owing in part to the thousands of jobs the JSF program sustains, albeit at a cost of around $10 billion a year to U.S. taxpayers. In anticipation of a green light for mass production, the Pentagon and Lockheed in early June reached an informal agreement on a $34-billion deal for 470 F-35s.
The Air Force told The Daily Beast it is confident in its own version of the F-35. “Fielding and deployment plans for the F-35 have not changed,” the Air Force’s Air Combat Command said in a statement. “The F-35 plays an essential role in U.S. air combat superiority and we are highly confident in its capabilities and performance.”
The military and Lockheed have identified possible fixes to all the problems Defense News revealed. A new coating could minimize heat damage. Better flight-control software could mitigate the risk of a crash during hard maneuvers. “We expect this item to be resolved or downgraded,” Greg Ulmer, a Lockheed vice president, told Defense News in reference to crash risk.
But if the program doesn’t apply the fixes before F-35 production picks up, it’s possible the deficiencies will become “baked in” on scores or even hundreds of F-35s. Retroactively fixing deficient jets could cost billions of dollars.
To a great extent, the damage is done. Owing to the Pentagon’s controversial decision to manufacture F-35s while still testing them, Lockheed has delivered around 400 early-model F-35s to the U.S. Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps and to U.S. allies such as the United Kingdom and Israel.
The Air Force, Marines, and Israel have already deployed their F-35s in combat against lightly-armed militant groups.
More than 100 of those early F-35s are B-models that cannot safely fly fast or maneuver hard. They’ll need fixing. It won’t be cheap. The military was already spending billions of dollars modifying older F-35s. That bill could grow to cover the flaws Defense News revealed.
Fixes could take a while. “The services will have to wait five years or more to get a fully functional aircraft, if they ever do,” Dan Grazier, an analyst with the Project on Government Oversight in Washington, D.C., told The Daily Beast.
In the meantime, the armed services possess scores of F-35s they cannot safely send into high-tech combat, according to Grazier. “The program is definitely not ready for active service.”
Also, some versions of the F-35 can’t accelerate to supersonic speed without melting their own tails or shedding the expensive coating that helps to give the planes their radar-evading qualities.
The Pentagon’s $400-billion F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program, one of the biggest and most expensive weapons programs in history, has come under fire, so to speak, over more than a decade for delays, rising costs, design problems and technical glitches.
But startling reports by trade publication Defense News on Wednesday revealed flaws that previously only builder Lockheed Martin, the military, and the plane’s foreign buyers knew about.
The newly-exposed problems underscore the potential fragility of American air power as the armed services work to replace more and more old fighters with as many as 2,300 F-35s while also reconfiguring to confront the increasingly deadly Chinese and Russian air forces.
The problems might also help to explain why acting defense secretary Patrick Shanahan reportedly described the F-35 program as “fucked up.”
Defense News obtained military documents detailing a wide range of serious problems with two of the three versions of the F-35. The Air Force’s F-35A appears to be exempt from the latest flaws, but the Marine Corps’ vertical-landing F-35B and the Navy’s carrier-compatible F-35C both suffer what the services call “category 1” deficiencies. (In military parlance, a category 1 flaw in a plane can prevent a pilot from accomplishing their mission.)
The F-35 program and the office of the secretary of defense did not respond to requests for comment.
One problem cropped up during test flights in 2011, Defense News reported, citing the trove of military documents. In the 2011 tests, at least one F-35B and F-35C both flew at speeds of Mach 1.3 and Mach 1.4. A post-flight inspection in November 2011 revealed the F-35B sustained “bubbling [and] blistering” of its stealth coating.
Further supersonic tests in December 2011 revealed structural damage on an F-35C resulting from the extreme heat coming from the plane’s single Pratt & Whitney engine, one of the most powerful fighter engines ever made.
To avoid similar damage, the military has limited F-35B and F-35C pilots to flying at supersonic speed for less than a minute at a time.
But that could make it impossible for aviators to keep up with, or avoid, Russian and Chinese fighters flying faster than the speed of sound without any restrictions. “It is infeasible for the Navy or Marine Corps to operate the F-35 against a near-peer threat under such restrictions,” Defense News paraphrased the documents as saying.
The test reports Defense News obtained also reveal a second, previously little-known category 1 deficiency in the F-35B and F-35C aircraft. If during a steep climb the fighters exceed a 20-degree “angle of attack”—the angle created by the wing and the oncoming air—they could become unstable and potentially uncontrollable.
To prevent a possible crash, pilots must avoid steeply climbing and other hard maneuvers. “Fleet pilots agreed it is very difficult to max perform the aircraft” in those circumstances, Defense News quoted the documents as saying.
The implications are chilling. In a dogfight with a Russian or Chinese jet that can exceed a 20-degree angle of attack, an American flying and F-35 could be at a serious disadvantage.
The revelation of the two performance flaws comes at a critical time for the 18-year-old F-35 program. Pentagon officials plan to declare an end to the testing phase of the F-35’s development sometime in late 2019 and clear the fighter for mass production.
The stealth fighter enjoys strong support from Congress, owing in part to the thousands of jobs the JSF program sustains, albeit at a cost of around $10 billion a year to U.S. taxpayers. In anticipation of a green light for mass production, the Pentagon and Lockheed in early June reached an informal agreement on a $34-billion deal for 470 F-35s.
The Air Force told The Daily Beast it is confident in its own version of the F-35. “Fielding and deployment plans for the F-35 have not changed,” the Air Force’s Air Combat Command said in a statement. “The F-35 plays an essential role in U.S. air combat superiority and we are highly confident in its capabilities and performance.”
The military and Lockheed have identified possible fixes to all the problems Defense News revealed. A new coating could minimize heat damage. Better flight-control software could mitigate the risk of a crash during hard maneuvers. “We expect this item to be resolved or downgraded,” Greg Ulmer, a Lockheed vice president, told Defense News in reference to crash risk.
But if the program doesn’t apply the fixes before F-35 production picks up, it’s possible the deficiencies will become “baked in” on scores or even hundreds of F-35s. Retroactively fixing deficient jets could cost billions of dollars.
To a great extent, the damage is done. Owing to the Pentagon’s controversial decision to manufacture F-35s while still testing them, Lockheed has delivered around 400 early-model F-35s to the U.S. Air Force, Navy and Marine Corps and to U.S. allies such as the United Kingdom and Israel.
The Air Force, Marines, and Israel have already deployed their F-35s in combat against lightly-armed militant groups.
More than 100 of those early F-35s are B-models that cannot safely fly fast or maneuver hard. They’ll need fixing. It won’t be cheap. The military was already spending billions of dollars modifying older F-35s. That bill could grow to cover the flaws Defense News revealed.
Fixes could take a while. “The services will have to wait five years or more to get a fully functional aircraft, if they ever do,” Dan Grazier, an analyst with the Project on Government Oversight in Washington, D.C., told The Daily Beast.
In the meantime, the armed services possess scores of F-35s they cannot safely send into high-tech combat, according to Grazier. “The program is definitely not ready for active service.”
