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welcome to reality trivia
reality is the state of things as they actually exist
aug 4, 2020
Real News Today
*People live longer in blue states than red; new study points to impact of state policies(America)
(for previous day's articles see "what's inside" below)
comment/tweet of the day
TRUMP’S PANDEMIC DEATH TRACKER:
dc report.com
Americans Killed by Inaction, Neglect, Incompetence and Corruption
155,402
(out of 4,713,540 current cases)
“If we did very little testing, we wouldn’t have the most cases. So, in a way, by doing all of this testing, we make ourselves look bad.” —Donald J. Trump, May 6, 2020
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Justin Frank on Trump's psychosis
CHAUNCEY DEVEGA
This hasn't been a good few weeks for Donald Trump, has it?
He has always had a split mind. It is split between two sides. This is called "binary thinking." In this way of thinking a person is either right or wrong. You like me or you hate me. You're loyal or you're disloyal. Trump's world is very clearly demarcated. Now he is likely upset by Fox News because of his interview with Chris Wallace. In his mind, Fox News is now a very difficult organization. How is he going to place them? Good or bad? Friend of foe? A person develops binary thinking as a way of protecting themselves from anxiety. Trump has made his world very simple. If anyone questions or challenges him they are "nasty" and must be retaliated against. That's how his world is.
Every child feels that way until they're five or six. Sometimes children do not engage in such simple thinking for long, it may stop at age two or three.
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norm chomsky on democracy now: trump is the most dangerous man in human history
and the most dangerous organization in history is the republican party.
---
proof of stupidity!!!
if you re stupid enough to believe trump, then you will BELIEVE these headlines!
*russia: Moscow claims to be ahead of rivals in race to produce vaccine
in the land of stupid!!!
destroying the land for greed
The Latest American Natural Wonder On The Trump Hit List
Mining Companies Want to Do Their Dirty Work Near the Boundary Waters Wilderness
By Sarah Okeson - dc report
8/4/2020
President Jimmy Carter signed a law more than four decades ago to prohibit mining in the Boundary Waters, a pristine wilderness with more than 1,000 lakes that stretches almost 200 miles along the Canadian border in Minnesota.
Now the Trump Administration is preparing to sully this land forever—to the benefit of the billionaire Chilean landlord of the Kushners.
Trump’s Bureau of Land Management plans to study the environmental impact of mining for copper, nickel, cobalt and precious metals near Ely, Minn., just three miles away from the Boundary Waters, which are within the 3 million-acre Superior National Forest . State regulators say the plans of Twin Metals, the mining company, are incomplete and have published almost 800 comments asking for more information.
Under Obama, the Forest Service said a copper-nickel sulfide mine on land leased by Twin Metals carried an “unacceptable” risk that the mine might “cause serious and irreplaceable harm” to the Boundary Waters. The Bureau of Land Management decided against renewing two leases held by Twin Metals.
After Trump was elected, a company controlled by Andrónico Luksic, the Chilean mogul behind Twin Metals, bought a six-bedroom house for $5.5 million in the Kalorama neighborhood in D.C. where Jeff Bezos and Barack Obama own homes. Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner moved in, paying $15,000 a month in rent.
Luksic’s spokesman has said that the Kushners’ choice of the property was coincidental, but soon after Trump’s inauguration the BLM started to look at reversing the Obama decision on the leases.
“The WH has expressed interest in the Twin Metals matter and Doug Domenich [sic.] (then an advisor to Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke) wants to talk to the WH today,” attorney Karen Hawbecker wrote in June 2017. The leases were renewed for 10 years in May 2019 with a right to perpetual renewal.
Twin Metals claims the design of the mine would prevent acid mine drainage in which sulfuric acid formed by mining dissolves heavy metals in rocks. The pollution can make streams as acidic as battery acid, and the damage can last hundreds, sometimes even thousands of years. Acid mine drainage destroyed Tar Creek in Oklahoma, contributing to one of the worst Superfund sites in our nation’s history.
The Wilderness Society, Minnesota businesses and other environmental organizations sued Interior Secretary David Bernhardt in federal court to try to stop the mine, saying that damage caused by acid mine drainage might not ever be remediated.
The lawsuit claims that renewing the leases without doing an environmental impact statement was a violation of the National Environmental Policy Act.
Now the Trump Administration is preparing to sully this land forever—to the benefit of the billionaire Chilean landlord of the Kushners.
Trump’s Bureau of Land Management plans to study the environmental impact of mining for copper, nickel, cobalt and precious metals near Ely, Minn., just three miles away from the Boundary Waters, which are within the 3 million-acre Superior National Forest . State regulators say the plans of Twin Metals, the mining company, are incomplete and have published almost 800 comments asking for more information.
Under Obama, the Forest Service said a copper-nickel sulfide mine on land leased by Twin Metals carried an “unacceptable” risk that the mine might “cause serious and irreplaceable harm” to the Boundary Waters. The Bureau of Land Management decided against renewing two leases held by Twin Metals.
After Trump was elected, a company controlled by Andrónico Luksic, the Chilean mogul behind Twin Metals, bought a six-bedroom house for $5.5 million in the Kalorama neighborhood in D.C. where Jeff Bezos and Barack Obama own homes. Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner moved in, paying $15,000 a month in rent.
Luksic’s spokesman has said that the Kushners’ choice of the property was coincidental, but soon after Trump’s inauguration the BLM started to look at reversing the Obama decision on the leases.
“The WH has expressed interest in the Twin Metals matter and Doug Domenich [sic.] (then an advisor to Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke) wants to talk to the WH today,” attorney Karen Hawbecker wrote in June 2017. The leases were renewed for 10 years in May 2019 with a right to perpetual renewal.
Twin Metals claims the design of the mine would prevent acid mine drainage in which sulfuric acid formed by mining dissolves heavy metals in rocks. The pollution can make streams as acidic as battery acid, and the damage can last hundreds, sometimes even thousands of years. Acid mine drainage destroyed Tar Creek in Oklahoma, contributing to one of the worst Superfund sites in our nation’s history.
The Wilderness Society, Minnesota businesses and other environmental organizations sued Interior Secretary David Bernhardt in federal court to try to stop the mine, saying that damage caused by acid mine drainage might not ever be remediated.
The lawsuit claims that renewing the leases without doing an environmental impact statement was a violation of the National Environmental Policy Act.
Deutsche Bank launches internal probe into personal banker of Donald Trump and Jared Kushner: report
The bank opened a review of a $1.5 million 2013 deal between the banker and a company co-owned by Kushner
IGOR DERYSH - salon
AUGUST 3, 2020 3:11PM (UTC)
Deutsche Bank launched an internal investigation into the longtime personal banker of President Donald Trump and son-in-law Jared Kushner, according to The New York Times.
Trump relied heavily on the bank for loans when other top banks refused to do business with him after a series of bankruptcies and defaults; he still owes hundreds of millions to the financial giant. Kushner's family also borrowed millions from the bank.
Both Trump and Kushner were clients of Rosemary Vrablic, a managing director and senior private banker at Deutsche Bank. The bank opened an investigation into an apartment which Vrablic and two other colleagues at the bank bought for $1.5 million in June 2013 from a company called Bergel 715 Associates, The Times reported.
The review was opened after Kushner revealed in his annual personal financial disclosure filed last week that he and wife Ivanka Trump had earned between $1 million and $5 million last year from Bergel 715 Associates. A source familiar with Kushner's finances told The Times that Kushner owned a stake in the company when Vrablic bought the apartment.
"Typically, banks restrict employees from doing personal business with clients because of the potential for conflicts between the employees' interests and those of the bank," The Times wrote. "Deutsche Bank said it had not been aware that Ms. Vrablic and her colleagues had done business with a company part-owned by Mr. Kushner."
The bank opened the review after Kushner's financial disclosure was filed.
"The bank will closely examine the information that came to light on Friday and the fact pattern from 2013," Deutsche Bank spokesman Daniel Hunter told The Times.
Kushner Companies denied Jared Kushner's involvement.
"Kushner is not the managing partner of that entity and has no involvement with the sales of the apartments," spokesman Christopher Smith told The Times.
The size of Kushner's stake in Bergel 715 is unclear. The company has sold dozens of condos in the Park Avenue building over the last four decades, according to the report. At least one of the apartments was sold to Kushner Companies.
Though Kushner and Ivanka Trump previously listed the entity used to make the investment in the company, this was the first year they listed income from Bergel 715. The income they reported was not related to the sale to Vrablic, The Times reported. There is also no indication that the apartment was sold below market value.
Vrablic is reportedly a "leading private banker" in New York who worked with the Kushner family before even coming to Deutsche Bank in 2006. In 2011, Kushner introduced Vrablic to future-President Trump when most top banks balked at doing business with him.
"I introduced him to this woman Rosemary," Kushner testified to the House Intelligence Committee in 2017. "She is one of the biggest private wealth bankers, probably in the world. Amazing banker, amazing woman. Very smart banker. And she banked my family for a long time."
The following year, the bank lent President Trump about $175 million for his Doral golf resort in Florida and the Trump International Hotel & Tower in Chicago. Trump later pursued a $1 billion loan when he unsuccessfully sought to buy the NFL's Buffalo Bills. Financial documents submitted by longtime former Trump "fixer" Michael Cohen showed that Trump inflated his net worth by about $4 billion in his pursuit.
Though his NFL bid was rejected, Trump later got another $170 million in loans from the bank for his Washington hotel. Trump later inflated Vrablic's role at the bank, as well during his 2016 presidential campaign.
"I am friends with all the major banks. They are dying to do business with me," Trump insisted to the Times in 2016 when pressed on financial firms' refusal to do business with him. "Why don't you call the head of Deutsche Bank? Her name is Rosemary Vrablic. She is the boss."
That year, anti-money-laundering specialists at the bank recommended that multiple transactions by companies controlled by Trump and Kushner be reported to the Treasury Department's financial crimes watchdog. At least some of the transactions "involved money flowing back and forth with overseas entities or individuals, which bank employees considered suspicious." However, executives at the bank rejected the suggestion and never reported them, the Times reported last year.
The Department of Justice last year launched an investigation into the bank's compliance with money laundering regulations.
The watchdog group Citizens for Ethics and Responsibility in Washington (CREW) also called on the Federal Reserve Board of Governors to investigate whether the bank failed to report suspicious financial activity by Trump and Kushner.
"Deutsche Bank's careless attitude towards banking compliance laws and failure to police its accounts may now be impacting American government at the highest levels," CREW Executive Director Noah Bookbinder said in a letter to Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. "Questions about transactions between President Trump and foreign actors whose conduct seemingly warranted suspicious activity reports, potentially facilitated by Deutsche Bank, harms the public legitimacy of the institution of the presidency itself."
Trump relied heavily on the bank for loans when other top banks refused to do business with him after a series of bankruptcies and defaults; he still owes hundreds of millions to the financial giant. Kushner's family also borrowed millions from the bank.
Both Trump and Kushner were clients of Rosemary Vrablic, a managing director and senior private banker at Deutsche Bank. The bank opened an investigation into an apartment which Vrablic and two other colleagues at the bank bought for $1.5 million in June 2013 from a company called Bergel 715 Associates, The Times reported.
The review was opened after Kushner revealed in his annual personal financial disclosure filed last week that he and wife Ivanka Trump had earned between $1 million and $5 million last year from Bergel 715 Associates. A source familiar with Kushner's finances told The Times that Kushner owned a stake in the company when Vrablic bought the apartment.
"Typically, banks restrict employees from doing personal business with clients because of the potential for conflicts between the employees' interests and those of the bank," The Times wrote. "Deutsche Bank said it had not been aware that Ms. Vrablic and her colleagues had done business with a company part-owned by Mr. Kushner."
The bank opened the review after Kushner's financial disclosure was filed.
"The bank will closely examine the information that came to light on Friday and the fact pattern from 2013," Deutsche Bank spokesman Daniel Hunter told The Times.
Kushner Companies denied Jared Kushner's involvement.
"Kushner is not the managing partner of that entity and has no involvement with the sales of the apartments," spokesman Christopher Smith told The Times.
The size of Kushner's stake in Bergel 715 is unclear. The company has sold dozens of condos in the Park Avenue building over the last four decades, according to the report. At least one of the apartments was sold to Kushner Companies.
Though Kushner and Ivanka Trump previously listed the entity used to make the investment in the company, this was the first year they listed income from Bergel 715. The income they reported was not related to the sale to Vrablic, The Times reported. There is also no indication that the apartment was sold below market value.
Vrablic is reportedly a "leading private banker" in New York who worked with the Kushner family before even coming to Deutsche Bank in 2006. In 2011, Kushner introduced Vrablic to future-President Trump when most top banks balked at doing business with him.
"I introduced him to this woman Rosemary," Kushner testified to the House Intelligence Committee in 2017. "She is one of the biggest private wealth bankers, probably in the world. Amazing banker, amazing woman. Very smart banker. And she banked my family for a long time."
The following year, the bank lent President Trump about $175 million for his Doral golf resort in Florida and the Trump International Hotel & Tower in Chicago. Trump later pursued a $1 billion loan when he unsuccessfully sought to buy the NFL's Buffalo Bills. Financial documents submitted by longtime former Trump "fixer" Michael Cohen showed that Trump inflated his net worth by about $4 billion in his pursuit.
Though his NFL bid was rejected, Trump later got another $170 million in loans from the bank for his Washington hotel. Trump later inflated Vrablic's role at the bank, as well during his 2016 presidential campaign.
"I am friends with all the major banks. They are dying to do business with me," Trump insisted to the Times in 2016 when pressed on financial firms' refusal to do business with him. "Why don't you call the head of Deutsche Bank? Her name is Rosemary Vrablic. She is the boss."
That year, anti-money-laundering specialists at the bank recommended that multiple transactions by companies controlled by Trump and Kushner be reported to the Treasury Department's financial crimes watchdog. At least some of the transactions "involved money flowing back and forth with overseas entities or individuals, which bank employees considered suspicious." However, executives at the bank rejected the suggestion and never reported them, the Times reported last year.
The Department of Justice last year launched an investigation into the bank's compliance with money laundering regulations.
The watchdog group Citizens for Ethics and Responsibility in Washington (CREW) also called on the Federal Reserve Board of Governors to investigate whether the bank failed to report suspicious financial activity by Trump and Kushner.
"Deutsche Bank's careless attitude towards banking compliance laws and failure to police its accounts may now be impacting American government at the highest levels," CREW Executive Director Noah Bookbinder said in a letter to Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell. "Questions about transactions between President Trump and foreign actors whose conduct seemingly warranted suspicious activity reports, potentially facilitated by Deutsche Bank, harms the public legitimacy of the institution of the presidency itself."
The Streets Are Quiet Again, Thanks To Trump-Barr Backing Down
The Feds Lost the Battle of Portland; the Secret Police Left Town and Nothing Bad Happened
By Terry H. Schwadron, DCReport Opinion Editor
8/3/2020
Magically, as soon as federal agents withdrew from Portland, the rioting disappeared.
As restrained Oregon state police took the place of federal agents around the Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse downtown, the protests were peaceful and, people went home rather than engage.
Hmmm.
Let’s just roll back the clock here: Donald Trump, Atty. Gen. William P. Barr and Homeland Security had insisted they needed to send in more than 100 federal marshals and immigration police to protect the courthouse from rioting protesters. The protesters widened a focus on social justice to object to the presence of unmarked federal agents in an abuse of presidential power, and a small number were throwing bottles and starting fires in response.
Even from afar, it all felt like a stage set for campaign ads for Trump to argue he is the Law & Order candidate protecting our cities from Them, rioting by organized leftists.
Then came a deal this week with Oregon Gov. Kate Brown to use state police instead, and suddenly, no rioting, no tear-gassing or pepper balls aimed at moms, no snatching of citizens from city streets into unmarked vans.
Indeed, there were no reported sightings of the state police, and plenty of reports of a congenial atmosphere on the two downtown blocks near the courthouse. From the reporting there, both police and protesters seemed surprised that there were no issues at all,
Maybe Trump should give up more often.
Trump, the Dominator
On the other hand, the excesses of this Trump as Crime Dominator campaign are on the move. Under somewhat different justification, federal agents are on the move, set to deploy next in Chicago, where the targets are gangs that have been having another bout of shootings lately.
How exactly this is a federal problem is unclear, except for the idea that Trump, who appears to be behind in his reelection attempt, needs the image projected as a strong enforcer of laws – so long as they do not apply to him or his associates. The recent ads aimed at “suburban housewives” are thinly disguised racially tainted demands for order. And this week, at congressional hearings, Barr repeatedly, cooly asserted that deployment of aggressive federal agents is warranted and legal.
It also has come to light that Homeland Security has been compiling “intelligence reports” about the work of journalists covering protests in Portland to determine who has been writing about leaks from that department about the staged enforcement. The department’s Office of Intelligence and Analysis has been sharing three Open Source Intelligence Reports to federal law enforcement agencies and others, summarizing tweets written by two journalists — Mike Baker, a reporter for theNew York Times and Benjamin Wittes, editor in chief of the blog Lawfare — and noting they had published leaked, unclassified documents about DHS operations in Portland, memos obtained by The Washington Post.
Doing so is alarming, and the disclosures prompted Chad Wolf, acting Homeland Security secretary, to order a halt to the practice and launch an investigation of how it came about. Wolf disowned going after journalists. Such unclassified DHS intelligence reports are usually used for sharing worries about foreign operatives. By law, U.S. citizens are supposed to be protected from such snooping by the First Amendment.
More directly, however, the fact of these memos is useful in determining that the whole point of the federal deployment was not what Trump and Barr have said was the justification.
Indeed, former and current Homeland officials told The Post these files on journalists were pointless from a policing point of view.
Journalists as Enemies
According to The Post, officials familiar with the intelligence efforts, said they are consistent with the department’s aggressive tactics in Portland, and with pushing the boundaries of acceptable enforcement to target “antifa” protesters to meet Trump’s expectations.
The memos were assembled by the department’s Intelligence and Analysis Office, which apparently is viewed both as a bit rogue whose reports are largely based on unclassified, often public sources of information that current and former officials have said are of limited use.
During operations in Portland, the office has sought to expand its reach. Earlier this month, collecting information on protesters who threaten to damage or destroy public memorials and statues, regardless of whether they are on federal property – the original justification for deployment.
Among the leaked memos written about including one indicating that camouflaged federal agents sent to stop unrest in Portland did not understand the nature of the protests they were facing.
All of this tumult fits with a Trump strategy of seeking to undermine the work of journalists, even while seeking to exploit the media for unquestioning publicity.
Anywhere else they would call this approach propaganda.
So, maybe we should celebrate a president who can make rioting disappear just by pulling his federal agents out of a U.S. city.
As restrained Oregon state police took the place of federal agents around the Mark O. Hatfield federal courthouse downtown, the protests were peaceful and, people went home rather than engage.
Hmmm.
Let’s just roll back the clock here: Donald Trump, Atty. Gen. William P. Barr and Homeland Security had insisted they needed to send in more than 100 federal marshals and immigration police to protect the courthouse from rioting protesters. The protesters widened a focus on social justice to object to the presence of unmarked federal agents in an abuse of presidential power, and a small number were throwing bottles and starting fires in response.
Even from afar, it all felt like a stage set for campaign ads for Trump to argue he is the Law & Order candidate protecting our cities from Them, rioting by organized leftists.
Then came a deal this week with Oregon Gov. Kate Brown to use state police instead, and suddenly, no rioting, no tear-gassing or pepper balls aimed at moms, no snatching of citizens from city streets into unmarked vans.
Indeed, there were no reported sightings of the state police, and plenty of reports of a congenial atmosphere on the two downtown blocks near the courthouse. From the reporting there, both police and protesters seemed surprised that there were no issues at all,
Maybe Trump should give up more often.
Trump, the Dominator
On the other hand, the excesses of this Trump as Crime Dominator campaign are on the move. Under somewhat different justification, federal agents are on the move, set to deploy next in Chicago, where the targets are gangs that have been having another bout of shootings lately.
How exactly this is a federal problem is unclear, except for the idea that Trump, who appears to be behind in his reelection attempt, needs the image projected as a strong enforcer of laws – so long as they do not apply to him or his associates. The recent ads aimed at “suburban housewives” are thinly disguised racially tainted demands for order. And this week, at congressional hearings, Barr repeatedly, cooly asserted that deployment of aggressive federal agents is warranted and legal.
It also has come to light that Homeland Security has been compiling “intelligence reports” about the work of journalists covering protests in Portland to determine who has been writing about leaks from that department about the staged enforcement. The department’s Office of Intelligence and Analysis has been sharing three Open Source Intelligence Reports to federal law enforcement agencies and others, summarizing tweets written by two journalists — Mike Baker, a reporter for theNew York Times and Benjamin Wittes, editor in chief of the blog Lawfare — and noting they had published leaked, unclassified documents about DHS operations in Portland, memos obtained by The Washington Post.
Doing so is alarming, and the disclosures prompted Chad Wolf, acting Homeland Security secretary, to order a halt to the practice and launch an investigation of how it came about. Wolf disowned going after journalists. Such unclassified DHS intelligence reports are usually used for sharing worries about foreign operatives. By law, U.S. citizens are supposed to be protected from such snooping by the First Amendment.
More directly, however, the fact of these memos is useful in determining that the whole point of the federal deployment was not what Trump and Barr have said was the justification.
Indeed, former and current Homeland officials told The Post these files on journalists were pointless from a policing point of view.
Journalists as Enemies
According to The Post, officials familiar with the intelligence efforts, said they are consistent with the department’s aggressive tactics in Portland, and with pushing the boundaries of acceptable enforcement to target “antifa” protesters to meet Trump’s expectations.
The memos were assembled by the department’s Intelligence and Analysis Office, which apparently is viewed both as a bit rogue whose reports are largely based on unclassified, often public sources of information that current and former officials have said are of limited use.
During operations in Portland, the office has sought to expand its reach. Earlier this month, collecting information on protesters who threaten to damage or destroy public memorials and statues, regardless of whether they are on federal property – the original justification for deployment.
Among the leaked memos written about including one indicating that camouflaged federal agents sent to stop unrest in Portland did not understand the nature of the protests they were facing.
All of this tumult fits with a Trump strategy of seeking to undermine the work of journalists, even while seeking to exploit the media for unquestioning publicity.
Anywhere else they would call this approach propaganda.
So, maybe we should celebrate a president who can make rioting disappear just by pulling his federal agents out of a U.S. city.
House Approves $740 Billion Pentagon Budget While Millions Can’t Afford Rent
BY Eoin Higgins, Common Dreams - truthout
August 1, 2020
Win Without War was among the anti-war voices on Friday issuing blistering condemnations of the passage in the U.S. House of a $740 billion defense bill as part of the 2021 Appropriations Minibus.
“A $740 billion Pentagon budget is inhumane at any time,” said the group’s executive director, Stephen Miles. “In the midst of a pandemic—as people across the country struggle to make rent, to pay their bills, to survive a deadly disease—it should be unthinkable. Once again, the House has voted to put the interests of weapons manufacturers and war hawks over the wellbeing of people here and abroad.”
Win Without War
@WinWithoutWar
A $740 billion Pentagon budget is inhumane at any time.
But the House's vote to put the interests of weapons manufacturers & war hawks over the well-being of people here & abroad in the midst of a pandemic is just appalling.
The bill passed the House on Friday by a 217 to 197 margin, largely along party lines, with 16 members not voting. Only 12 Democrats voted against the measure while 217 voted in favor. All Republicans in the House either voted against the bill or did not vote. Read the full roll call here.
The bill’s passage came after a vigorous debate over recent weeks that included votes on whether to cut military spending by 10% and whether or not to allow the Pentagon to continue using video game streaming platforms to recruit impressionable children. Both measures failed.
“Though last week’s votes on whether or not to cut the Pentagon budget by ten percent were hopeful signs of the shifting tides on Pentagon spending, this Appropriations bill is a reminder that there remains much to be done,” said Miles. “We are also disappointed that House Democrats have decided to once again couple passage of a bill that fuels militarism abroad with bills that fund our priorities at home, forfeiting the ability to challenge the former without undermining the latter.”
Miles did point to what he called “bright spots” in the bill, including two provisions from Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) that repeal the 2001 and 2002 Authorizations for Use of Military Force and require congressional approval before going to war with Iran and an amendment from Rep. Jackie Spier (D-Calif.) banning the Department of Defense from using funds to implement a ban on transgender Americans in the military.
“A $740 billion Pentagon budget is inhumane at any time,” said the group’s executive director, Stephen Miles. “In the midst of a pandemic—as people across the country struggle to make rent, to pay their bills, to survive a deadly disease—it should be unthinkable. Once again, the House has voted to put the interests of weapons manufacturers and war hawks over the wellbeing of people here and abroad.”
Win Without War
@WinWithoutWar
A $740 billion Pentagon budget is inhumane at any time.
But the House's vote to put the interests of weapons manufacturers & war hawks over the well-being of people here & abroad in the midst of a pandemic is just appalling.
The bill passed the House on Friday by a 217 to 197 margin, largely along party lines, with 16 members not voting. Only 12 Democrats voted against the measure while 217 voted in favor. All Republicans in the House either voted against the bill or did not vote. Read the full roll call here.
The bill’s passage came after a vigorous debate over recent weeks that included votes on whether to cut military spending by 10% and whether or not to allow the Pentagon to continue using video game streaming platforms to recruit impressionable children. Both measures failed.
“Though last week’s votes on whether or not to cut the Pentagon budget by ten percent were hopeful signs of the shifting tides on Pentagon spending, this Appropriations bill is a reminder that there remains much to be done,” said Miles. “We are also disappointed that House Democrats have decided to once again couple passage of a bill that fuels militarism abroad with bills that fund our priorities at home, forfeiting the ability to challenge the former without undermining the latter.”
Miles did point to what he called “bright spots” in the bill, including two provisions from Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) that repeal the 2001 and 2002 Authorizations for Use of Military Force and require congressional approval before going to war with Iran and an amendment from Rep. Jackie Spier (D-Calif.) banning the Department of Defense from using funds to implement a ban on transgender Americans in the military.
COVID-19 On The Strip: Las Vegas Workers Gamble With Their Lives
Trump Kills Safety Rules; Hotel, Casino Staffs Suffer the Consequences; Infections Have Run Rampant Since the City Re-Opened
By Bill Schleicher - dc report
7/31/2020
As Nevada’s COVID-19 deaths set new records daily throughout July, rumors raged that Gov. Steve Sisolak would soon re-close Las Vegas casinos.
But that would be too late for 22 dead employees.
Donald Trump ignored medical advice and pressed states to “liberate” their economies. The mega-casinos of the famed “strip” responded by ending their 78-day shutdown as fast as a craps shooter can throw dice. There were no rules requiring safe practices.
Porter Adolfo Fernandez went back to work June 4 as eager gamblers flooded into Caesars Palace, most following Trump’s example by refusing to wear masks to halt the deadly coronavirus.
“The company is not keeping us safe. I know I’m gonna get sick,” Fernandez told his daughter, Irma. The hard-working 51-year-old knew his high blood pressure put him at great risk, but he had a family to feed and bills to pay. In two weeks, he came home with a fever and went straight to bed.
“Now he’s in heaven,” Irma said softly, almost whispering, through flowing tears. “Why was Caesars so careless, so heartless?”
Fernandez, who succumbed to the virus June 24, was a member of Culinary Workers Local 226, the branch of the UNITE HERE labor union that includes 60,000 Las Vegas hotel, food service, bar and casino workers.
Union Files Suit
Irma spoke for him June 29, as the union announced a federal lawsuit against three of the hotel-casinos, charging they had violated their duty to protect the workers, their families and the community.
They failed, it is alleged, to properly warn members or disinfect and quarantine when some tested positive for COVID-19.
The suit demands that management enforce social distancing, mandate face masks, have rooms cleaned daily and provide PPE and testing for employees. The union is also pressing Sisolak, a Democrat, and the state legislature to enact the Adolfo Fernandez Bill to require the casinos to follow safety procedures.
“Behind every worker is a family,” said union head Geoconda Arguello-Kline.
At the Cosmopolitan luxury hotel, Stella Kalaoram and her family were hit hard when the guest room attendant fell ill in July. “She was exposed at work, and now she can’t breathe on her own. We’re really worried,” said daughter Sara. “My dad, my brother and I are all positive for COVID-19.”
The hospitalization rate for union members and their families spiked 860% after the casinos reopened. By late July, COVID-19 had put 352 of them in the hospital and killed 22, said communications director Bethany Khan.
Thousands Protest
As the casinos prepared to reopen, Local 226 organized a caravan of 10,000 members down the strip asking the Gaming Commission and casinos to make safety procedures mandatory. But the drive for quick profits drowned out their message.
The lawsuit blames the federal and state agencies responsible for protecting workers’ lives and health: “OSHA and Nevada OSHA [which follows federal standards] have not issued guidelines” and “have de-prioritized inspections and enforcement,” it says.
The federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration was on the verge of issuing a standard – an enforceable set of safety rules – to protect employees from infectious diseases in the workplace. Then Trump took office and halted all work on the regulation, said George Washington University professor David Michaels, who led OSHA under President Barack Obama.
Trump ‘Refused to Protect Workers’
Michaels places the responsibility for thousands of COVID-19 deaths on Trump’s doorstep: “The disease standard would have saved lives, but his tragic order halted all work on it,” Michaels told DCReport. “In his massive deregulatory effort, he refused to protect workers’ safety and health.”
The life-saving standard was researched, drafted and ready for adoption, he told us, “so they could put it out tomorrow as a temporary emergency standard.” Without the standard, he said, “millions of American workers are literally risking their lives every day on the job.”
The U.S. Labor Department’s OSHA is the only federal agency with the power to protect workers. But under Trump, “OSHA is suffering from malign neglect and almost completely missing from the federal response to the COVID-19 pandemic, reflecting the low regard Trump has for the lives of American workers,” Michaels said.
The agency’s vital roster of inspectors is “the smallest it has been in 40 years,” key leadership positions are vacant, and officials have exempted most employers from its requirement to report cases where workers get COVID-19 on the job.
No Safety Requirements
Instead of the infectious disease standard, OSHA issued “guidance” about COVID-19. The difference between a standard and the guidance is immense, said Michaels: “Guidance is non-enforceable. This is simply shameful!”
In Congress, Democratic representatives called on Trump Labor Secretary Eugene Scalia to order the emergency standard, and Senate Democrats pressed for it in recent coronavirus legislation. Neither could overcome Republican opposition. Instead of protecting employees and their families, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) demanded that legislation under consideration in late July immunize employers against lawsuits for failing to provide safe working conditions, like the one Local 226 has filed.
Plaintiff Jonathan Munoz, a food server for the $8.6 billion-a-year Caesars Entertainment conglomerate, explained the union’s position in simple terms: “All we want is for them to treat us like humans, not like machines that make money for them. If I get sick, are they going to take care of my family?”
But that would be too late for 22 dead employees.
Donald Trump ignored medical advice and pressed states to “liberate” their economies. The mega-casinos of the famed “strip” responded by ending their 78-day shutdown as fast as a craps shooter can throw dice. There were no rules requiring safe practices.
Porter Adolfo Fernandez went back to work June 4 as eager gamblers flooded into Caesars Palace, most following Trump’s example by refusing to wear masks to halt the deadly coronavirus.
“The company is not keeping us safe. I know I’m gonna get sick,” Fernandez told his daughter, Irma. The hard-working 51-year-old knew his high blood pressure put him at great risk, but he had a family to feed and bills to pay. In two weeks, he came home with a fever and went straight to bed.
“Now he’s in heaven,” Irma said softly, almost whispering, through flowing tears. “Why was Caesars so careless, so heartless?”
Fernandez, who succumbed to the virus June 24, was a member of Culinary Workers Local 226, the branch of the UNITE HERE labor union that includes 60,000 Las Vegas hotel, food service, bar and casino workers.
Union Files Suit
Irma spoke for him June 29, as the union announced a federal lawsuit against three of the hotel-casinos, charging they had violated their duty to protect the workers, their families and the community.
They failed, it is alleged, to properly warn members or disinfect and quarantine when some tested positive for COVID-19.
The suit demands that management enforce social distancing, mandate face masks, have rooms cleaned daily and provide PPE and testing for employees. The union is also pressing Sisolak, a Democrat, and the state legislature to enact the Adolfo Fernandez Bill to require the casinos to follow safety procedures.
“Behind every worker is a family,” said union head Geoconda Arguello-Kline.
At the Cosmopolitan luxury hotel, Stella Kalaoram and her family were hit hard when the guest room attendant fell ill in July. “She was exposed at work, and now she can’t breathe on her own. We’re really worried,” said daughter Sara. “My dad, my brother and I are all positive for COVID-19.”
The hospitalization rate for union members and their families spiked 860% after the casinos reopened. By late July, COVID-19 had put 352 of them in the hospital and killed 22, said communications director Bethany Khan.
Thousands Protest
As the casinos prepared to reopen, Local 226 organized a caravan of 10,000 members down the strip asking the Gaming Commission and casinos to make safety procedures mandatory. But the drive for quick profits drowned out their message.
The lawsuit blames the federal and state agencies responsible for protecting workers’ lives and health: “OSHA and Nevada OSHA [which follows federal standards] have not issued guidelines” and “have de-prioritized inspections and enforcement,” it says.
The federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration was on the verge of issuing a standard – an enforceable set of safety rules – to protect employees from infectious diseases in the workplace. Then Trump took office and halted all work on the regulation, said George Washington University professor David Michaels, who led OSHA under President Barack Obama.
Trump ‘Refused to Protect Workers’
Michaels places the responsibility for thousands of COVID-19 deaths on Trump’s doorstep: “The disease standard would have saved lives, but his tragic order halted all work on it,” Michaels told DCReport. “In his massive deregulatory effort, he refused to protect workers’ safety and health.”
The life-saving standard was researched, drafted and ready for adoption, he told us, “so they could put it out tomorrow as a temporary emergency standard.” Without the standard, he said, “millions of American workers are literally risking their lives every day on the job.”
The U.S. Labor Department’s OSHA is the only federal agency with the power to protect workers. But under Trump, “OSHA is suffering from malign neglect and almost completely missing from the federal response to the COVID-19 pandemic, reflecting the low regard Trump has for the lives of American workers,” Michaels said.
The agency’s vital roster of inspectors is “the smallest it has been in 40 years,” key leadership positions are vacant, and officials have exempted most employers from its requirement to report cases where workers get COVID-19 on the job.
No Safety Requirements
Instead of the infectious disease standard, OSHA issued “guidance” about COVID-19. The difference between a standard and the guidance is immense, said Michaels: “Guidance is non-enforceable. This is simply shameful!”
In Congress, Democratic representatives called on Trump Labor Secretary Eugene Scalia to order the emergency standard, and Senate Democrats pressed for it in recent coronavirus legislation. Neither could overcome Republican opposition. Instead of protecting employees and their families, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) demanded that legislation under consideration in late July immunize employers against lawsuits for failing to provide safe working conditions, like the one Local 226 has filed.
Plaintiff Jonathan Munoz, a food server for the $8.6 billion-a-year Caesars Entertainment conglomerate, explained the union’s position in simple terms: “All we want is for them to treat us like humans, not like machines that make money for them. If I get sick, are they going to take care of my family?”
|
|
greed rules!!!
opinion
In a pandemic, billionaires are richer than ever. Why aren't they giving more?
Billionaires get huge tax breaks to park money in private family foundations operated by wealthy heirs. Little goes to actual charity work
CHUCK COLLINS - the guardian
Mon 3 Aug 2020 07.46 EDT
A decade ago, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett did an important thing. They organized the Giving Pledge to inspire their fellow billionaires to donate more money to charity.decade ago, Bill Gates and Warren Buffett did an important thing. They organized the Giving Pledge to inspire their fellow billionaires to donate more money to charity.
A decade later, however, two obvious problems have emerged.
First, billionaire wealth has expanded at a phenomenal rate. Of the 62 living Pledgers who were billionaires in 2010, their personal wealth has increased by 95%, from $376bn to $734bn in 2020 dollars.
They’d pledged to give away half. Instead, their wealth has nearly doubled.
Not even the pandemic has slowed them down. From March to July 2020, the 100 US billionaires who are currently part of the Giving Pledge saw their total wealth increase $214bn – an increase of 28% in just four months.
Many have stepped up to give during the pandemic. But their giving is not keeping pace with their exploding wealth.
This leads to the second problem: in all likelihood, most of what they give away won’t go to on-the-ground charities, but to private family foundations often controlled by wealthy heirs and their advisers. Instead of supporting charities on the frontlines of problem solving, these billions end up sitting in tax-advantaged intermediaries.
You may be thinking: it’s their money, they can do with it as they choose.
But the notion that philanthropy is a private preserve, apart from the government, is a myth. The wealthier the donor, the more advantaged the charitable tax deduction becomes. For every dollar donated by a billionaire to their private foundation, we the taxpayers chip in as much as 74¢ on the dollar in lost tax revenue.
For this reason, the philanthropy of billionaires is at best understood as a public-private partnership. We taxpayers have a legitimate interest in ensuring these funds serve the public interest.
Through this lens, it is troubling that so much wealth is sequestered in private foundations and donor-advised funds – and that these are the fastest-growing areas of the giving sector. There is over $1.2tn parked in private foundations and an estimated $120bn in donor-advised funds.
Private foundations are required to give away – or “pay out” in charity lingo – at least 5% of their assets each year, ostensibly to working charities. But administrative overhead, salaries and gifts to other tax-advantaged funds are counted toward this 5%. And many larger foundations treat this 5% as a ceiling, not a floor.
Donor-advised funds, or DAFs, have no mandated payout at all. The donor takes a generous tax break when placing funds into the DAF, but the DAF does not legally have to pay out – ever. Donors can set up a DAF and pass it on to their grandchildren, who may or may not ever share the money with active charities.
Private philanthropy has always been a form of power for wealthy donors. But as wealth inequality has exploded in recent decades, it’s concentrating that private power in even fewer hands – all subsidized by public taxpayers.
This has troubling implications for charities, who are forced to cater to a smaller number of mega-donors, and our democracy. As governments at all levels face growing austerity from the Covid-19 pandemic and recession, billionaire philanthropy may well fill the vacuum for local services and institutions. But unlike local taxpayer dollars, billionaire foundations don’t answer to voters.
So what can be done?
The first step is for Congress to pass an “emergency charity stimulus”, a three-year mandate to increase the payouts of foundations and donor-advised funds. This would move $200bn to frontline charities doing urgent work during the pandemic – without costing taxpayers another dime, since these funds have been “paid for” by tax deductions.
But ultimately we need a movement to democratize charitable giving. We should reorient the rules governing taxes and charity to discourage the concentration of power and decision-making. Taxpayers should not subsidize private fortresses of wealth and power that will exist for generations, controlled by the same families and their professional advisers.
The implication for Gates, Buffett and the other Giving Pledgers is clear: give more money – not to private foundations, but directly to working charities and community-controlled foundations. Ten years from now, on the 20th anniversary of the Giving Pledge, the private family foundation should no longer exist.
A decade later, however, two obvious problems have emerged.
First, billionaire wealth has expanded at a phenomenal rate. Of the 62 living Pledgers who were billionaires in 2010, their personal wealth has increased by 95%, from $376bn to $734bn in 2020 dollars.
They’d pledged to give away half. Instead, their wealth has nearly doubled.
Not even the pandemic has slowed them down. From March to July 2020, the 100 US billionaires who are currently part of the Giving Pledge saw their total wealth increase $214bn – an increase of 28% in just four months.
Many have stepped up to give during the pandemic. But their giving is not keeping pace with their exploding wealth.
This leads to the second problem: in all likelihood, most of what they give away won’t go to on-the-ground charities, but to private family foundations often controlled by wealthy heirs and their advisers. Instead of supporting charities on the frontlines of problem solving, these billions end up sitting in tax-advantaged intermediaries.
You may be thinking: it’s their money, they can do with it as they choose.
But the notion that philanthropy is a private preserve, apart from the government, is a myth. The wealthier the donor, the more advantaged the charitable tax deduction becomes. For every dollar donated by a billionaire to their private foundation, we the taxpayers chip in as much as 74¢ on the dollar in lost tax revenue.
For this reason, the philanthropy of billionaires is at best understood as a public-private partnership. We taxpayers have a legitimate interest in ensuring these funds serve the public interest.
Through this lens, it is troubling that so much wealth is sequestered in private foundations and donor-advised funds – and that these are the fastest-growing areas of the giving sector. There is over $1.2tn parked in private foundations and an estimated $120bn in donor-advised funds.
Private foundations are required to give away – or “pay out” in charity lingo – at least 5% of their assets each year, ostensibly to working charities. But administrative overhead, salaries and gifts to other tax-advantaged funds are counted toward this 5%. And many larger foundations treat this 5% as a ceiling, not a floor.
Donor-advised funds, or DAFs, have no mandated payout at all. The donor takes a generous tax break when placing funds into the DAF, but the DAF does not legally have to pay out – ever. Donors can set up a DAF and pass it on to their grandchildren, who may or may not ever share the money with active charities.
Private philanthropy has always been a form of power for wealthy donors. But as wealth inequality has exploded in recent decades, it’s concentrating that private power in even fewer hands – all subsidized by public taxpayers.
This has troubling implications for charities, who are forced to cater to a smaller number of mega-donors, and our democracy. As governments at all levels face growing austerity from the Covid-19 pandemic and recession, billionaire philanthropy may well fill the vacuum for local services and institutions. But unlike local taxpayer dollars, billionaire foundations don’t answer to voters.
So what can be done?
The first step is for Congress to pass an “emergency charity stimulus”, a three-year mandate to increase the payouts of foundations and donor-advised funds. This would move $200bn to frontline charities doing urgent work during the pandemic – without costing taxpayers another dime, since these funds have been “paid for” by tax deductions.
But ultimately we need a movement to democratize charitable giving. We should reorient the rules governing taxes and charity to discourage the concentration of power and decision-making. Taxpayers should not subsidize private fortresses of wealth and power that will exist for generations, controlled by the same families and their professional advisers.
The implication for Gates, Buffett and the other Giving Pledgers is clear: give more money – not to private foundations, but directly to working charities and community-controlled foundations. Ten years from now, on the 20th anniversary of the Giving Pledge, the private family foundation should no longer exist.
Bites from Real News
*8/4/2020*
*The Republican Party Is Racist and Soulless. Just Ask This Veteran GOP Strategist.
Stuart Stevens says he now realizes the hatred and bigotry of Trumpism were always at the heart of the GOP.
DAVID CORN
*Cannabis, Lies and Foreign Cash: A Mother and Daughter’s Journey Through the Underground Mask Trade
Contracts, emails and spreadsheets that Juanita and Dawn Ramos shared with ProPublica detail how domestic and foreign investors, many with marijuana industry ties, seized upon the nation’s public health disaster.
*THE WAR ON IMMIGRANTSBORDER PATROL LAUNCHES MILITARIZED RAID OF BORDERLANDS HUMANITARIAN AID CAMP
FOR THE SECOND TIME IN TWO YEARS, BORDER PATROL LAUNCHED A RAID AGAINST NO MORE DEATHS WITHIN DAYS OF THE GROUP RELEASING EMBARRASSING INFORMATION ABOUT THE AGENCY.
*saving a sellout: CONGRESS PUT THE BRAKES ON CUBA RELIEF TO PROTECT FRONT-LINE DEMOCRAT
Two amendments aimed at alleviating the stranglehold on Cuba’s economy were withdrawn because of pressure to protect a vulnerable Florida rep.
*The Goopification of grapes Why 'clean wine' is a scam
Winemakers don’t have to list ingredients – which has opened a door for opportunists chasing a piece of the $52.5bn wellness market
*Nobody Accurately Tracks Health Care Workers Lost to COVID-19. So She Stays Up At Night Cataloging the Dead.
Anesthesiologist Claire Rezba started tracking lost health workers almost instinctively. Researchers and industry professionals say the lack of good official data on these deaths is “scandalous” and is putting lives in danger.
Alan Dershowitz mocked for defensive tweet after he’s named in damning new Epstein documents
July 31, 2020
By Brad Reed - raw story
Trump-defending attorney Alan Dershowitz on Friday posted a defensive tweet hours after he was named in newly unsealed documents pertaining to the late alleged child sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.
According to the documents, victim Virginia Giuffre alleged that Epstein required her to “have sexual relations with Dershowitz on numerous occasions while she was a minor,” while also alleging Dershowitz “was an eye-witness to the sexual abuse of many other minors by Epstein and several of Epstein’s co-conspirators.”
Additionally, Giuffre claimed that Dershowitz worked on a plea deal for Epstein to avoid getting implicated himself as a co-conspirator in the late billionaire’s crimes.
Reacting to this, Dershowitz claimed that he actually wanted these documents to come out because they helped prove his innocence.
“I demanded release of all documents because they contain emails and manuscripts proving in Guiffre’s own words that she never met me,” Dershowitz wrote. “I knew they would repeat her false accusations against me, Al and Tipper Gore and others, which her own lawyers admit are ‘wrong.'”
Many of Dershowitz’s Twitter followers were not buying his spin, however, and mocked him as “Captain Underpants” in his replies, a reference to his past claims that he kept his underwear on when he received a massage from a young woman at one of Epstein’s properties.[...]
According to the documents, victim Virginia Giuffre alleged that Epstein required her to “have sexual relations with Dershowitz on numerous occasions while she was a minor,” while also alleging Dershowitz “was an eye-witness to the sexual abuse of many other minors by Epstein and several of Epstein’s co-conspirators.”
Additionally, Giuffre claimed that Dershowitz worked on a plea deal for Epstein to avoid getting implicated himself as a co-conspirator in the late billionaire’s crimes.
Reacting to this, Dershowitz claimed that he actually wanted these documents to come out because they helped prove his innocence.
“I demanded release of all documents because they contain emails and manuscripts proving in Guiffre’s own words that she never met me,” Dershowitz wrote. “I knew they would repeat her false accusations against me, Al and Tipper Gore and others, which her own lawyers admit are ‘wrong.'”
Many of Dershowitz’s Twitter followers were not buying his spin, however, and mocked him as “Captain Underpants” in his replies, a reference to his past claims that he kept his underwear on when he received a massage from a young woman at one of Epstein’s properties.[...]
playing the stupid
‘Mourning Nazis’: Trump ambassador blasted for visiting WWII-era cemetery on Jewish day of mourning, lamenting cost of war
July 31, 2020
By David Badash, The New Civil Rights Movement - raw story
U.S. Ambassador to the Netherlands Pete Hoekstra on Thursday visited a cemetery and called the experience a “terrible reminder of the cost of going to war and why we must always work towards peace.” Hoekstra is a former GOP Congressman who served as the Chair of the House Intelligence Committee.
The cemetery is the burial place of dead German soldiers from both WWI and WWII. Thursday was a Jewish day of mourning, Tisha B’Av, known as “the saddest day on the Jewish calendar.”
In World War II the Nazis murdered an estimated 6 million Jews.
The nonprofit news site Michigan Advance notes that “Neo-Nazis have been known to visit to honor Nazis buried” at at the Ysselsteyn German war cemetery. It is the largest World War II German cemetery.
Why a United States Ambassador is mourning the deaths of German soldiers is incomprehensible to many, who expressed outrage on social media.[...]
The cemetery is the burial place of dead German soldiers from both WWI and WWII. Thursday was a Jewish day of mourning, Tisha B’Av, known as “the saddest day on the Jewish calendar.”
In World War II the Nazis murdered an estimated 6 million Jews.
The nonprofit news site Michigan Advance notes that “Neo-Nazis have been known to visit to honor Nazis buried” at at the Ysselsteyn German war cemetery. It is the largest World War II German cemetery.
Why a United States Ambassador is mourning the deaths of German soldiers is incomprehensible to many, who expressed outrage on social media.[...]
Anti-Muslim Trumpist Anthony Tata Handed Pentagon Role Days After Snub From Congress
Jamie Ross - Reporter
Published Aug. 03, 2020 5:16AM ET
DAILY BEAST CHEAT SHEET
Anthony Tata, President Trump’s anti-Muslim pick to be undersecretary of defense for policy at the Pentagon, has been handed a policy role at the Defense Department days after the Republican-led Senate abruptly canceled his confirmation hearing. Tata’s hearing in front of the Senate Armed Services Committee was scheduled for last Thursday—but it was pulled moments before it was due to begin as the Senate declined to take up his nomination. The decision followed reports on Tata’s offensive social-media posts in which he called former President Barack Obama a “terrorist leader,” spread the false claim that Muslims are terrorists, and called a Black congresswoman, Maxine Waters, a “vicious race-baiting racist” for supporting Rodney King, a victim of police violence. Late Sunday, the Defense Department confirmed Tata had been handed a less-senior policy role instead. Rep. Adam Smith, the Democratic chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, said: “If an appointee cannot gain the support of the Senate, as is clearly the case with Tata, then the president should not put that person into an identical temporary role.”
Facebook Refuses to Take Down Another Fake Nancy Pelosi Slurring Video
Jamie Ross - Reporter
Published Aug. 03, 2020 5:53AM ET
daily beast cheat sheet
Facebook is refusing to take down a video of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that has been doctored to make her appear to be drunk. It’s the second time a Pelosi video has gone viral on the platform after being slowed down to make it seem like the California Democrat is slurring her words. Like last time, instead of removing it, Facebook has instead decided to add a disclaimer to the video calling it “partly false.” The video was shared with the caption: “This is unbelievable, she is blowed out of her mind, I bet this gets took down!” The post has thousands of interactions and the video can still be viewed as of Monday morning. All of the top commenters appear to take the video at face value.
Facebook spokesman Andy Stone told CNN that the video didn’t warrant removal, and went on to say: “Following an incident over a year ago with a previous video of Speaker Pelosi, we took a number of key steps, making it very clear to people on Facebook when a third-party fact-checker determines content to be false and updating our policy to make explicit the kind of manipulated media we will remove. And, as always, when a video is determined false, its distribution is dramatically reduced and people who see it, try to share it, or have already shared it, see warnings alerting them that it's false.”
Facebook spokesman Andy Stone told CNN that the video didn’t warrant removal, and went on to say: “Following an incident over a year ago with a previous video of Speaker Pelosi, we took a number of key steps, making it very clear to people on Facebook when a third-party fact-checker determines content to be false and updating our policy to make explicit the kind of manipulated media we will remove. And, as always, when a video is determined false, its distribution is dramatically reduced and people who see it, try to share it, or have already shared it, see warnings alerting them that it's false.”
Anti-Abortion Centers Handed at Least $4 Million in COVID-19 Bailout, Says Report
BAILED OUT
Jamie Ross - Reporter
Updated Aug. 03, 2020 6:44AM ET
DAILY BEAST CHEAT SHEET
Anti-abortion “crisis pregnancy” centers reportedly got their hands on at least $4 million in forgivable federal loans as part of the Trump administration’s coronavirus bailout package. The Guardian reports that, given a lack of transparency from the U.S. Small Business Administration on the exact amounts of loans, the true total given out to the centers could be as high as $10 million. The centers are designed to look like women’s health clinics—but reportedly push dubious medical treatments, rail against modern birth-control methods, and exaggerate the risks of abortion to persuade women not to have them. They received financial backing from the government even though evidence-based family-planning organizations have been excluded from the programs. In May, the Trump administration told Planned Parenthood affiliates around the U.S. to return millions of dollars in loans it received through the relief package.
*What's Inside*
aug 1 - aug 3
✔A HORRIFYING CHAPTER FROM U.S. HISTORY: “WILMINGTON’S LIE” DETAILS WHITE SUPREMACIST ATTACK ON AFRICAN AMERICANS IN 1898(HISTORY)
*VITAMIN D HELPS US FIGHT COVID-19, MAJOR STUDY FINDS
(WORLD)
*DID STEVE DAINES GET PHARMA KICKBACK?
(CORRUPTION)
*ARE WE WITNESSING THE FINAL COLLAPSE OF "OBJECTIVE" POLITICAL REPORTING? LET'S HOPE SO(WORTHLESS MEDIA)
✔NEW REPORT SUGGESTS TRUMP CHOSE NEGLIGENT HOMICIDE AS HIS PANDEMIC RESPONSE
SADISM OFTEN DRIVES POLITICS. SO DOES MASOCHISM.(TRUMP)
*HOUSE DEMOCRATS FIND ADMINISTRATION OVERSPENT FOR VENTILATORS BY AS MUCH AS $500 MILLION(CORPORATE CRIMINALS)
✔STELLA IMMANUEL’S THEORIES ABOUT THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN DEMONS, ILLNESS AND SEX HAVE A LONG HISTORY(CHRISTIANITY)
*POOR, MINORITY STUDENTS AT DILAPIDATED SCHOOLS FACE ADDED RISKS AMID TALK OF REOPENING CLASSROOMS(EDUCATION)
*DEMOCRATS EXIT BRIEFING SAYING THEY FEAR ELECTIONS UNDER FOREIGN THREAT
(DEMO POLITICS)
*REVEALED: SUPER-RICH DONATE TO CUOMO AS HE REJECTS TAX HIKES FOR BILLIONAIRES
(SELLOUTS)
*late news of interest*
a blast from the past!!!
British Writer Pens The Best Description Of Trump I’ve Read
MICHAEL STEVENSON - The HOBBLEDEHOY.com
MARCH 8, 2019
Someone on Quora asked “Why do some British people not like Donald Trump?” Nate White, an articulate and witty writer from England wrote the following response:
A few things spring to mind.
Trump lacks certain qualities which the British traditionally esteem.
For instance, he has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace – all qualities, funnily enough, with which his predecessor Mr. Obama was generously blessed.
So for us, the stark contrast does rather throw Trump’s limitations into embarrassingly sharp relief.
Plus, we like a laugh. And while Trump may be laughable, he has never once said anything wry, witty or even faintly amusing – not once, ever.
I don’t say that rhetorically, I mean it quite literally: not once, not ever. And that fact is particularly disturbing to the British sensibility – for us, to lack humour is almost inhuman.
But with Trump, it’s a fact. He doesn’t even seem to understand what a joke is – his idea of a joke is a crass comment, an illiterate insult, a casual act of cruelty.
Trump is a troll. And like all trolls, he is never funny and he never laughs; he only crows or jeers.
And scarily, he doesn’t just talk in crude, witless insults – he actually thinks in them. His mind is a simple bot-like algorithm of petty prejudices and knee-jerk nastiness.
There is never any under-layer of irony, complexity, nuance or depth. It’s all surface.
Some Americans might see this as refreshingly upfront.
Well, we don’t. We see it as having no inner world, no soul.
And in Britain we traditionally side with David, not Goliath. All our heroes are plucky underdogs: Robin Hood, Dick Whittington, Oliver Twist.
Trump is neither plucky, nor an underdog. He is the exact opposite of that.
He’s not even a spoiled rich-boy, or a greedy fat-cat.
He’s more a fat white slug. A Jabba the Hutt of privilege.
And worse, he is that most unforgivable of all things to the British: a bully.
That is, except when he is among bullies; then he suddenly transforms into a snivelling sidekick instead.
There are unspoken rules to this stuff – the Queensberry rules of basic decency – and he breaks them all. He punches downwards – which a gentleman should, would, could never do – and every blow he aims is below the belt. He particularly likes to kick the vulnerable or voiceless – and he kicks them when they are down.
So the fact that a significant minority – perhaps a third – of Americans look at what he does, listen to what he says, and then think ‘Yeah, he seems like my kind of guy’ is a matter of some confusion and no little distress to British people, given that:
• Americans are supposed to be nicer than us, and mostly are.
• You don’t need a particularly keen eye for detail to spot a few flaws in the man.
This last point is what especially confuses and dismays British people, and many other people too; his faults seem pretty bloody hard to miss.
After all, it’s impossible to read a single tweet, or hear him speak a sentence or two, without staring deep into the abyss. He turns being artless into an art form; he is a Picasso of pettiness; a Shakespeare of shit. His faults are fractal: even his flaws have flaws, and so on ad infinitum.
God knows there have always been stupid people in the world, and plenty of nasty people too. But rarely has stupidity been so nasty, or nastiness so stupid.
He makes Nixon look trustworthy and George W look smart.
In fact, if Frankenstein decided to make a monster assembled entirely from human flaws – he would make a Trump.
And a remorseful Doctor Frankenstein would clutch out big clumpfuls of hair and scream in anguish:
‘My God… what… have… I… created?
If being a twat was a TV show, Trump would be the boxed set.
RELATED: Lucie Arnaz Shares Her Husband’s Letter to Trump; “All Tyrants End the Same Way –in Misery. That is Your Destiny…”
..."The people see all that you are doing to destroy the country that belongs to us. There are so many, many, many things you and your captive minions have done and are doing to change the people into your servants, slaves, even. The people can only tolerate the theft of their freedom for so long–but finally, as in our original Revolution, they will gather en masse to remove you and every one of your party from any position of power ever again."
A few things spring to mind.
Trump lacks certain qualities which the British traditionally esteem.
For instance, he has no class, no charm, no coolness, no credibility, no compassion, no wit, no warmth, no wisdom, no subtlety, no sensitivity, no self-awareness, no humility, no honour and no grace – all qualities, funnily enough, with which his predecessor Mr. Obama was generously blessed.
So for us, the stark contrast does rather throw Trump’s limitations into embarrassingly sharp relief.
Plus, we like a laugh. And while Trump may be laughable, he has never once said anything wry, witty or even faintly amusing – not once, ever.
I don’t say that rhetorically, I mean it quite literally: not once, not ever. And that fact is particularly disturbing to the British sensibility – for us, to lack humour is almost inhuman.
But with Trump, it’s a fact. He doesn’t even seem to understand what a joke is – his idea of a joke is a crass comment, an illiterate insult, a casual act of cruelty.
Trump is a troll. And like all trolls, he is never funny and he never laughs; he only crows or jeers.
And scarily, he doesn’t just talk in crude, witless insults – he actually thinks in them. His mind is a simple bot-like algorithm of petty prejudices and knee-jerk nastiness.
There is never any under-layer of irony, complexity, nuance or depth. It’s all surface.
Some Americans might see this as refreshingly upfront.
Well, we don’t. We see it as having no inner world, no soul.
And in Britain we traditionally side with David, not Goliath. All our heroes are plucky underdogs: Robin Hood, Dick Whittington, Oliver Twist.
Trump is neither plucky, nor an underdog. He is the exact opposite of that.
He’s not even a spoiled rich-boy, or a greedy fat-cat.
He’s more a fat white slug. A Jabba the Hutt of privilege.
And worse, he is that most unforgivable of all things to the British: a bully.
That is, except when he is among bullies; then he suddenly transforms into a snivelling sidekick instead.
There are unspoken rules to this stuff – the Queensberry rules of basic decency – and he breaks them all. He punches downwards – which a gentleman should, would, could never do – and every blow he aims is below the belt. He particularly likes to kick the vulnerable or voiceless – and he kicks them when they are down.
So the fact that a significant minority – perhaps a third – of Americans look at what he does, listen to what he says, and then think ‘Yeah, he seems like my kind of guy’ is a matter of some confusion and no little distress to British people, given that:
• Americans are supposed to be nicer than us, and mostly are.
• You don’t need a particularly keen eye for detail to spot a few flaws in the man.
This last point is what especially confuses and dismays British people, and many other people too; his faults seem pretty bloody hard to miss.
After all, it’s impossible to read a single tweet, or hear him speak a sentence or two, without staring deep into the abyss. He turns being artless into an art form; he is a Picasso of pettiness; a Shakespeare of shit. His faults are fractal: even his flaws have flaws, and so on ad infinitum.
God knows there have always been stupid people in the world, and plenty of nasty people too. But rarely has stupidity been so nasty, or nastiness so stupid.
He makes Nixon look trustworthy and George W look smart.
In fact, if Frankenstein decided to make a monster assembled entirely from human flaws – he would make a Trump.
And a remorseful Doctor Frankenstein would clutch out big clumpfuls of hair and scream in anguish:
‘My God… what… have… I… created?
If being a twat was a TV show, Trump would be the boxed set.
RELATED: Lucie Arnaz Shares Her Husband’s Letter to Trump; “All Tyrants End the Same Way –in Misery. That is Your Destiny…”
..."The people see all that you are doing to destroy the country that belongs to us. There are so many, many, many things you and your captive minions have done and are doing to change the people into your servants, slaves, even. The people can only tolerate the theft of their freedom for so long–but finally, as in our original Revolution, they will gather en masse to remove you and every one of your party from any position of power ever again."
