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fraurosena

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Good gravy: "Labor nominee Acosta cut deal with billionaire guilty in sex abuse case"

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There was once a time — before the investigations, before the sexual abuse conviction — when rich and famous men loved to hang around with Jeffrey Epstein, a billionaire money manager who loved to party.

They visited his mansion in Palm Beach, Fla. They flew on his jet to join him at his private estate on the Caribbean island of Little Saint James. They even joked about his taste in younger women.

President Trump called Epstein a “terrific guy” back in 2002, saying that “he’s a lot of fun to be with. It is even said that he likes beautiful women as much as I do, and many of them are on the younger side.”

Now, Trump is on the witness list in a Florida court battle over how federal prosecutors handled allegations that Epstein, 64, sexually abused more than 40 minor girls, most of them between the ages of 13 and 17. The lawsuit questions why Trump’s nominee for labor secretary, former Miami U.S. attorney Alexander Acosta, whose confirmation hearing is scheduled to begin Wednesday, cut a non-prosecution deal with Epstein a decade ago rather than pursuing a federal indictment that Acosta’s staff had advocated.

Although Epstein’s friends and visitors once included past and future presidents, rock stars, and some of the country’s richest men, he is no longer a social magnet. Epstein pleaded guilty to a Florida state charge of felony solicitation of underage girls in 2008 and served a 13-month jail sentence. Politicians who had accepted his donations, including former New Mexico governor Bill Richardson and former New York governor Eliot Spitzer, have scurried to give them back. (Harvard University kept a $6.5 million gift, saying it was “funding important research” in mathematics.)

But Epstein’s unusually light punishment — he was facing up to a life sentence had he been convicted on federal charges — has raised questions about how Acosta handled the case

...

 

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Here's an interesting (and somewhat disturbing) article about Rex Tillerson: "I was wrong about Rex Tillerson"

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The hard-working staff here at Spoiler Alerts has given Secretary of State Rex Tillerson a hard time in recent weeks. In particular, I have noted Tillerson’s abject failure to communicate his message through the media. So it seems only fair that when Tillerson actually does speak to the media, I should pay attention.

I bring this up because Tuesday night Erin McPike, the one reporter permitted on Tillerson’s plane for his latest trip, filed her 3,300-word story. Reading it, I have come to one unmistakable conclusion: I was wrong about encouraging Tillerson to speak with the press. Tillerson should shut the heck up until he demonstrates that he knows what he’s taking about.

...

None of this is rocket science to anyone who has spent some time in public policy. Tillerson, of course, is completely new to this, being the first secretary of state without any government or military experience.

One presumably does not become the chief executive of ExxonMobil without having some brains and the ability to learn from mistakes. After all it only took a few days for Tillerson to realize that skipping the NATO foreign ministers meeting was probably not the brightest idea. The learning curve is still there.

Until he moves along it further, however, Tillerson’s instinct to not speak to the press seems like a sound one. Because he’s really, really bad at it.

 

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Considering how badly Tillerson is fucking things up with North Korea, I hope this prediction turns out to be true: 

 

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4 minutes ago, RoseWilder said:

Considering how badly Tillerson is fucking things up with North Korea, I hope this prediction turns out to be true: 

 

Amen. I'm no fan of Bolton, but at least he has a concept of how to do the job.

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7 hours ago, RoseWilder said:

Considering how badly Tillerson is fucking things up with North Korea, I hope this prediction turns out to be true: 

 

If he doesn't know how to do the job and doesn't want to do the job, then why the hell did he accept the job offer?  He's a wealthy businessman who obviously hates media attention.  It's not like he needed the job or wanted the notoriety, so why the hell even entertain the notion of your name being in the hat?  He should have told Lord Dampnut the first time he mentioned his name that he wasn't interested.  I just don't get it.

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@ChildlessJust maybe, he thought as SofS he could influence oil deals, particularly with Russia, that would help Exxon?

Nah, I'm just getting too cynical in my old age :my_dodgy:

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Holy shit. If you thought all was known about Flynn's nefarious dealings, think again. It's now become known that he plotted to kidnap Fethullah Gulen (whom Erdogan accuses of organizing last year's coup attemt in Turkey) in order to bypass the extradition process. 

https://www.wsj.com/articles/ex-cia-director-mike-flynn-and-turkish-officials-discussed-removal-of-erdogan-foe-from-u-s-1490380426

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Retired Army Lt. Gen. Mike Flynn, while serving as an adviser to the Trump campaign, met with top Turkish government ministers and discussed removing a Muslim cleric from the U.S. and taking him to Turkey, according to former Central Intelligence Agency Director James Woolsey, who attended, and others who were briefed on the meeting.

The discussion late last summer involved ideas about how to get Fethullah Gulen, a cleric whom Turkey has accused of orchestrating last summer’s failed military coup, to Turkey without going through the U.S. extradition legal process, according to Mr. Woolsey and those who were briefed.[...]

Mr. Woolsey told The Wall Street Journal he arrived at the meeting in New York on Sept. 19 in the middle of the discussion and found the topic startling and the actions being discussed possibly illegal. [...]

Mr. Woolsey said the idea was “a covert step in the dead of night to whisk this guy away.” The discussion, he said, didn’t include actual tactics for removing Mr. Gulen from his U.S. home. If specific plans had been discussed, Mr. Woolsey said, he would have spoken up and questioned their legality.

It isn’t known who raised the idea or what Mr. Flynn concluded about it. [...]

Mr. Woolsey said he attended the Sept. 19 meeting at the urging of the Flynn Intel Group’s chairman and president, Bijan Kian. Mr. Woolsey said he had agreed to be on the group’s advisory board and was offered a consulting fee for his work, but turned it down because of what he heard at the meeting. He held no stake in the firm. [...]

Mr. Woolsey said he didn’t say anything during the discussion, but later cautioned some attendees that trying to remove Mr. Gulen was a bad idea that might violate U.S. law. Mr. Woolsey said he also informed the U.S. government by notifying Vice President Joe Biden through a mutual friend.

The mutual friend confirmed to the Journal he told Mr. Biden about the meeting. [...]

In a written statement, the Turkish Embassy acknowledged that Turkish officials met with Mr. Flynn but declined to discuss the conversation. Referencing the Flynn Intel Group’s client, Inovo, the embassy said: “We are not in a position to comment on any engagement between a U.S. consultancy firm and a private company owned by a Turkish businessman.”

The disclosure Mr. Flynn’s firm filed with the U.S. government this month said the meeting was “for the purpose of understanding better the political climate in Turkey at the time.”

 

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5 hours ago, sawasdee said:

@ChildlessJust maybe, he thought as SofS he could influence oil deals, particularly with Russia, that would help Exxon?

Nah, I'm just getting too cynical in my old age :my_dodgy:

Actually, that's exactly what I think. Even though he's not the CEO of Exxon anymore, no doubt he has a crapload of stock, and wants to make sure he gets lots of dividends. Also, I didn't need old age to be cynical, I was cynical from the time I was very young.

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The horrible fact is that they continuously obfuscate what they are doing. While everyone was looking the other way at the failure of Tryannotcare, Roger Severino was quietly appointed as head the Civil Rights Office at the Department of Health and Human Services.

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The civil rights advocates are condemning the appointment of Roger Severino, a former Heritage Foundation staffer, who has argued that same-sex marriage threatens religious liberty and that civil rights protections should not extend to transgender patients.

“This appointment is horrifying,” said Jennifer Pizer, law and policy director for Lambda Legal, which advocates for LGBTQ equality. “It is going to have a serious, probably devastating impact on LGBT people.” [...]

Severino has attacked the way the previous Barack Obama administration enforced civil rights protections for the LGBTQ community, particularly in regards to transgender people.

He claimed that allowing people to use the bathroom that corresponds with their gender identity will traumatize female sex abuse victims and be taken advantage of by men. (There is no evidence that gender-segregated restrooms are safer for cisgender women than unisex restrooms, according to Lambda Legal.) Severino has also opposed protections for gender identity when it comes to healthcare.

This is especially relevant to his new job, because the civil rights office at HHS is tasked with making sure people have equal access to healthcare. The office does this in part by collecting complaints of discrimination, investigating them, and enforcing the rules. And the Affordable Care Act has a nondiscrimination provision that the Obama administration, after seeking thousands of public comments, defined as including gender identity and sex stereotyping. (A federal court put the gender identity provision on hold last December.) [...]

It sends a dangerous signal “that someone would be placed in charge of enforcing some of our nation’s most important civil rights laws who doesn’t necessarily believe that discrimination against LGBTQ people is a problem,” said Robin Maril, associate legal director for the Human Rights Campaign.

Senator Patty Murray (D-Wash.), ranking member of the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions committee, called the hire “appalling” in a statement. 

HHS and Severino did not respond to comment on how he plans to ensure LGBTQ patients do not face discrimination. In a statement, Heritage Foundation spokeswoman Marguerite Bowling said that Severino “has a distinguished record of fighting for the civil rights and freedoms of all Americans.”

 

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2 hours ago, fraurosena said:

HHS and Severino did not respond to comment on how he plans to ensure LGBTQ patients do not face discrimination. In a statement, Heritage Foundation spokeswoman Marguerite Bowling said that Severino “has a distinguished record of fighting for the civil rights and freedoms of all Americans.”

Bullshit! Yet another alt right approved appointment slipped in under the radar. This administration is bowing to the religious right, and trying to roll back the civil rights won in the last eight years.

Everyone has to shout louder about appointments like this. Tweet, instagram, facebook - anything - the US needs to mobilise against this possible insidious erosion of civil rights by alt right appointees.

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Ugh. This just makes me so sad.

What leading global warming deniers want the presidunce to do.

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What does a climate change denier wish for when everything seems possible? With Congress and the White House in agreement on the unimportance of science, there's no need to settle for rolling back President Barack Obama’s environmental agenda one regulation at a time. It's time to get the Environmental Protection Agency out of climate change altogether.

To get a sense of what the wish list looks like, the annual conference of the Heartland Institute would be a good place to start. The right-wing think tank that has received funding from ExxonMobil and Koch groups—and is best known for pushing out misinformation on climate change—has sponsored this annual gathering for the last 12 years.

The usual ideas floated at the conference have ranged from abolishing the EPA to touting the universal benefits of fossil fuels, but this year one idea in particular dominated the discussions: Climate deniers think they have a chance to reverse the EPA's endangerment finding that formally says greenhouse gasses poses a threat to Americans and their health. That 2009 determination, prompted by a Supreme Court decision in 2007, is the basis for the EPA's regulatory work on climate change.

Rescinding the endangerment finding is the “number one” priority Bast sees for Trump’s EPA. “I think it’s almost a sure thing they are going to revisit it,” Bast says. “Whether they are going to succeed is maybe a 90 percent certainty.”

In his keynote address, House Science Chair Lamar Smith (R-Texas) expressed his gratitude to Heartland for its "help and support."

For anyone who acknowledges climate change is a reality and a threat, Smith's final words about President Trump to the roughly 200 attendees who were gathered might be considered ominous: “You won’t be disappointed with the direction he’s going.”

I was wrong. This makes me so MAD. :angry-fire:

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Shoot, you beat me to it, @RoseWilder :pb_lol:

But here's the politicususa article about it anyway. http://www.politicususa.com/2017/03/27/criminal-complaint-filed-attorney-general-jeff-sessions-perjury-obstruction-justice.html

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A criminal complaint has been filed against Trump Attorney General Jeff Sessions accusing him of perjury and obstruction of justice.

The criminal complaint which was filed with the Inspector General’s Office and the Office of Professional Responsibility states, “The criminal conduct described in this complaint relates to testimony and false statements about communications between Sessions and the Russian ambassador that were made by Sessions to the Senate Judiciary Committee. It also concerns Sessions’ acts of concealing his crimes, covering up his crimes, impeding the investigation his crimes, interfering with the prosecution of his crimes, conspiring to commit crimes and otherwise interfering with or impeding the proper administration of the Department of Justice.”

The complainants are 23 residents of Maine, Massachusetts, Oregon, California, and Vermont. The complainants are demanding a Special Counsel to investigate Sessions and the Russia scandal, numerous federal investigations, and an indictment of Sessions for violations of federal law.

 

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2 hours ago, RoseWilder said:

It's still shocking to me that Jess Sessions hasn't been forced to resign. 

 

He and Toddler sit in the West Wing feeding page after page of the Constitution into a shredder.

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Here's someone who has some serious iron ones at the EPA;

 

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https://www.aol.com/article/news/2017/03/29/energy-department-employees-reportedly-barred-from-saying-clima/22017907/

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Specifically, Politico says a supervisor at the Office of International Climate and Clean Energy told his staff not to use the phrases "climate change," "emissions reduction" or "Paris Agreement" in their written memos. The office previously facilitated the U.S.' role in several big international efforts to advance clean energy.

 

Department officials deny outright banning of the phrase "climate change." But Politico notes an informal practice of avoiding the words has taken root.

The outlet went on to say Energy Secretary Rick Perry and his staff have a "visceral reaction" to mentions of climate change.

Perry can step down any time he wants.  He doesn't have to be the Energy Secretary.

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Awwwww....does Ricky need one of these?

fainting-couch.jpg

Jesus reich wingers, before you call us snowflakes why don't you try looking in the fucking mirror for once in your worthless lives?

 

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"Trump administration still plans to undo parts of the ACA, Tom Price testifies"

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In his carefully calibrated testimony before House appropriators, Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price made one thing clear Wednesday: The administration is still intent on dismantling parts of the Affordable Care Act even if Republicans lack the votes to rewrite it.

Time and time again, Price invoked the pledge he has made repeatedly to lawmakers since President Trump selected him for his post. “What we’re committed to is making sure the American people have access to affordable coverage,” he told Rep. Rosa L. DeLauro (Conn.), the top Democrat on the Appropriations subcommittee on labor, health and human services, education, and related agencies.

But under intense questioning from Democrats, Price outlined how his department could make insurance plans cheaper by scaling back several federal mandates, including what the ACA currently defines as “essential benefits” in coverage. And he refused to say whether the administration will keep providing cost-sharing subsidies for insurers participating in the federal marketplace. The multibillion-dollar infusion is critical to maintaining the system’s stability, insurers say.

At one point, DeLauro asked Price whether the administration wanted to “repeal or strengthen and improve” the 2010 health-care law.

“We believe that the current law has harmed many individuals,” the secretary said.

“So you will continue to move at repeal, is what I gained from that conversation,” she replied.

Even before House Republicans withdrew legislation last week that would have jettisoned key aspects of the ACA, White House officials had pledged to pursue a “phase two” through executive action. This stage could cover everything from how aggressively the government promotes enrollment under the law to what sort of financial support it gives to prop up the ACA marketplace.

While House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.) is encouraging factions from the GOP’s moderate and conservative wings to negotiate a possible health-care compromise, several individuals briefed on the leadership’s plans said there is no immediate interest in bringing a revised bill up for a House vote.

Ryan said in a CBS News interview Wednesday that if Republicans don’t unite, Trump would “just go work with Democrats to try and change Obamacare.”

“That’s hardly a conservative thing,” he said.

Insurers are particularly anxious to know whether the cost-sharing subsidies that help lower-income people to afford their out-of-pocket costs, which House Republicans have challenged in court as illegal, will continue. According to the Congressional Budget Office, those federal payments will total $7 billion this year and $10 billion in 2018.

Price noted that as secretary he is now the named defendant in the lawsuit, and “I’m not able to comment.”

AshLee Strong, a spokeswoman for Ryan, said the House GOP is “actively working with the administration” on options for resolving the suit and possibly appropriating the subsidies. “No decisions have been made,” she said.

Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.), who chairs the panel before which Price testified Wednesday, said he was open to providing the funds but that it would have to be a House leadership decision. “It’s probably the right thing to do, I think. Otherwise you’re going to have insurance companies exiting the market,” Cole said.

Michael Adelberg, a health-care principal at FaegreBD Consulting, considers the subsidies “the single most important action” the administration can take to stabilize the marketplace. Refusing to pay them will bring “significant premium increases,” Adelberg said in an email. “Some insurers will drop out, and the remaining insurers will have to seek large rate increases.”

...

On several occasions, Price suggested he may define how much insurers would have to cover under the category of essential benefits, which includes maternity and newborn care as well as substance abuse and mental-health treatment.

Asked by Rep. Nita M. Lowey (D-N.Y.) whether maternity care “should be a covered benefit under federal law,” Price said consumers should make that decision in the coverage they choose, “not the kind that the government forces them to buy.”

When Lowey pressed him on whether women should be able to access contraception without having to pay an insurance co-pay — another ACA mandate — Price made the same point.

“Again, this is one of those areas where we think individuals ought to have access to the kind of coverage that they want, not the kind of coverage that the government forces them to buy,” he said.

The administration is likely to face resistance from the opposition party in making those changes. After House Democrats met behind closed doors Wednesday morning on Capitol Hill to formulate a health-care strategy, key members said they were focused on blocking any steps the administration might take to weaken the law while continuing to blame its shortcomings on Democrats.

..

Price is another loathsome prick.

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This is right in line with my post in the States Senate thread, stating how the UN is worried about human rights in America. I shouldn't be surprised, really...

Tillerson Dropping Human Rights Conditions on Sale of F-16s to Bahrain

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The State Department told Congress on Wednesday that the Trump administration supports the sale of up to 19 F-16 jet fighters valued at about $3 billion without requiring that Bahrain first demonstrate improvements on human rights issues. The sale would add to the country’s existing fleet of 16 operational jets and four training versions.[...]

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s support of the deal without preconditions reverses rules attached to the deal by the Obama administration, which told Congress last year it would support the sale but require Bahrain to first show human rights improvements.

That condition was instituted as the country’s ruling Sunni monarchy has cracked down on opposition groups representing the country’s Shiite majority.

The reversal of the human rights requirements comes as the Trump administration pushes to more actively confront destabilizing Iranian behavior across the Middle East.[...]

Human rights groups criticized the Trump administration’s move and said the preconditions should remain in place.

“At a moment when Bahrain is in the middle of an intensified crackdown, removing the conditions attached to the F-16 sale will validate hard-liners in the government who want to completely silence dissent and walk away from commitments on reform. Congress should use its authority to correct course and, unless the conditions remain, block the sale,” said Sarah Margon, Washington Director at Human Rights First.

Others said the deal has global ramifications.

“This deal sends a dangerous signal to Bahrain and all other countries that engage in serious human rights violations,“ said Sunjeev Bery, an advocacy director with Amnesty International USA.[...]

Mr. Tillerson earlier this month drew criticism for not personally presenting the State Department’s annual human rights report, which faulted Bahrain for limiting citizens’ abilities to peacefully choose their government as well as for restrictive policies on free speech, assembly and association.

 

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"Secretary of State Rex Tillerson spends his first weeks isolated from an anxious bureaucracy"

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Secretary of State Rex Tillerson takes a private elevator to his palatial office on the seventh floor of the State Department building, where sightings of him are rare on the floors below.

On many days, he blocks out several hours on his schedule as “reading time,” when he is cloistered in his office poring over the memos he prefers ahead of in-person meetings.

Most of his interactions are with an insular circle of political aides who are new to the State Department. Many career diplomats say they still have not met him, and some have been instructed not to speak to him directly — or even make eye contact.

On his first three foreign trips, Tillerson skipped visits with State Department employees and their families, embassy stops that were standard morale-boosters under other secretaries of state.

Eight weeks into his tenure as President Trump’s top diplomat, the former ExxonMobil chief executive is isolated, walled off from the State Department’s corps of bureaucrats in Washington and around the world. His distant management style has created growing bewilderment among foreign officials who are struggling to understand where the United States stands on key issues. It has sown mistrust among career employees at State, who swap paranoid stories about Tillerson that often turn out to be untrue. And it threatens to undermine the power and reach of the State Department, which has been targeted for a 30 percent funding cut in Trump’s budget.

Many have expressed alarm that Tillerson has not fought harder for the agency he now leads.

Rep. Eliot L. Engel (N.Y.), the top Democrat on the House Foreign Affairs Committee, said Tillerson called him after the proposed cuts were announced. Engel said Tillerson seemed to share Engel’s concern that the cuts are “draconian” and counterproductive. But Engel said Tillerson seemed to signal his acquiescence when he called them “a glide path to what was about to happen.”

“I’m chagrined by what’s happening, or not happening,” Engel said.

“When you put it all together, it certainly seems they’re trying to downsize the State Department and make it irrelevant. I’m at a loss for words. Why would Tillerson take the job if he was not going to defend his agency?”

...

Still, the secretary of state is visibly uncomfortable with the vast infrastructure and expectations of public diplomacy that come with his new role.

Tillerson’s slow start has rattled other foreign diplomats. Some complain that with assistant secretary of state positions occupied only by “acting” deputies, they have no one of authority to contact. Tillerson remains the only Senate-confirmed official selected by Trump anywhere inside the State Department building. Weeks after the White House embarrassed Tillerson by rejecting the seasoned foreign policy hand he had selected for a deputy, Republican lawyer John J. Sullivan is the leading candidate. Sullivan held senior jobs in the George W. Bush administration but has no direct experience in the State Department.

...

Tillerson’s political advisers have little foreign policy experience and little pull at the White House, current and former officials said. Their dealings with the department staff have sometimes been testy and unpleasant.

“Part of it is a deep distrust of bureaucracy,” said a senior Senate Democratic aide. “It sets a command climate that makes people cautious and paranoid. These folks, in their political-commissar roles, take that to an extreme. Everything we have heard is about how small the aperture is for information coming in and going out of the secretary’s office. That is not a recipe for success.”

...

Tillerson charmed employees on his first day on the job with a pledge to listen and learn — “Hi, I’m the new guy,” he said then — but the ensuing weeks suggest that the former executive’s boardroom sensibilities are an awkward fit for the diplomatic salon.

Career employees might have helped Tillerson avoid embarrassing gaffes such as the initial decision not to attend a NATO foreign ministers’ meeting.

The 28-member session Friday in Brussels was rescheduled to accommodate Tillerson, who reversed course amid criticism that by his planned absence he had offered proof of the new administration’s indifference to the transatlantic military alliance.

“Rookie error, plain and simple,” one former State Department employee said, noting that department officials in charge of dealings with NATO and Europe were cut out of many planning discussions.

The debacle may serve as an example of how Tillerson’s corporate insistence on efficient time management did not serve him well, another official said.

...

Tillerson has told employees that he will travel less than previous secretaries did and will take a smaller, faster plane that is more like the corporate jets of his former life. The government plane he is using this week in Europe has room for fewer than a dozen staff members, perhaps half the contingent that customarily traveled with recent predecessors.

No official note-taker accompanied him on a recent trip, so senior aides did the job to have a record of his talks with foreign ministers, according to a congressional aide.

On Thursday, Tillerson held his first visit with State Department employees abroad, at the U.S. Embassy in Ankara, where he appeared to acknowledge some dissent in the ranks when he urged “honest” confrontation of differing opinions.

“That’s how we come to a better decision in all that we do. And only if we do that can we then be honest with all of our partners and allies around the world as well. And still, I mean, we’re going to have our differences, but we’re going to be very honest and open about those, so at least we understand them.”

Just because someone knows business doesn't mean they can handle high profile government work. Sigh.

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As it was adressed to DeVos and Sessions, I'm posting this here. 

Over 90 organizations demand Trump administration enforce Title XI in powerful letter

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Early Friday morning, more than 90 national organizations published a letter to President Trump’s administration demanding the federal government enforce Title IX. 

Title IX is “a comprehensive federal law that prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex in any federally funded education program or activity,” according to the United States Department of Justice. While Title IX is best known for demanding equal treatment of female and male student athletes, it also offers other important protections in areas including sexual harassment, sexual assault, and protections for trans and parenting students. 

Addressed to U.S. Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos and Attorney General Jeff Sessions, the letter details specific requests including prevention programs for gender-based violence, implementing proper channels for survivors to get justice and protecting undocumented students from being targeted for their immigration status. [...]

“As students, faculty members, and advocates for survivors across the country, we strive each day to reduce instances of gender-based violence, yet the number of students who experience violence is still too high,” the letter begins. “Because it is our collective responsibility to work toward creating communities that will support survivors of violence, we urge you to strongly enforce Title IX.”

Uhm, yeah. With the pussy-grabber president, this demand will fall onto deaf ears. 

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Why the hell does this man still have a job?

Way to go Oklahoma Bar Association. I'm glad someone is attempting to hold this man accountable for his lies. 

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The title of this article says it all: "The beclowning of the executive branch"

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Fewer than a hundred days into the Trump administration, there are two, actually three, competing narratives about how the government is being run. The first narrative is the Trump administration’s claim that things are running so, so smoothly. A brief glance at the poll numbers suggests that not many people are buying this, so we can discard it quickly.

The second narrative, made by the Wall Street Journal’s editorial board among many others, is that America’s system of checks and balances turns out to be working pretty well. President Trump’s more egregious moves have been checked by federal courts and even by the court of public opinion at times. A historically unpopular and costly health-care bill did not pass the House of Representatives, which seems like the right outcome. Irresponsible foreign policy statements made by the president during the transition have been walked back. Efforts by the Trump White House to deny or scuttle investigations into foreign meddling into the election have resulted in congressional investigations, pushback by the intelligence community and recusals by Trump appointees. The administration successfully managed to pick a Supreme Court nominee who is not a laughingstock.

There’s a lot to this argument. But if I may, I’d like to proffer just a sampling of the news stories that have broken in the past 24 hours to suggest a third and more troubling narrative: the president and his acolytes are beclowning the American state.

Think I’m exaggerating? Consider the following:

...

The American system of government has checked Trump’s worst impulses. He has so many bad instincts, however, that not all of them will get checked. The burn rate of his staff is extraordinarily high, and there is no evidence that his remaining acolytes really know how to govern. We are 70 days into an administration that has nearly 1,400 more days in office. Think of the screw-ups that await us.

Last month Trump’s chief political strategist, Stephen K. Bannon, told CPAC that he was engaged in a daily fight for the “deconstruction of the administrative state.” He might very well succeed in that fight — not through cunning, but through epic levels of incompetence.

The article discusses the many news stories that have shown how bad and incompetent Agent Orange and his minions are.

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This is insane: "New EPA documents reveal even deeper proposed cuts to staff and programs"

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The Environmental Protection Agency has issued a new, more detailed plan for laying off 25 percent of its employees and scrapping more than 50 programs including pesticide safety, water runoff control, and environmental cooperation with Mexico and Canada under the North American Free Trade Agreement.

At a time when the agency is considering a controversial rollback in fuel efficiency standards adopted under President Obama, the plan would cut by more than half the number of people in EPA’s division for testing the accuracy of fuel efficiency claims by automakers.

It would transfer funding for the program to fees paid by the automakers themselves.

The spending plan, obtained by The Washington Post, offers the most detailed vision to date of how the 31 percent budget cut to the EPA ordered up by President Trump’s Office of Management and Budget would diminish the agency.

The March 21 plan calls for even deeper reductions in staffing than earlier drafts. It maintains funding given to states to administer waste treatment and drinking water. But as a result, the budget for the rest of EPA is slashed 43 percent.

...

The Trump administration says the EPA cuts reflect a philosophy of limiting federal government and devolving authority to the states, localities and, in some cases, corporations. But environmental groups say the Trump administration is answering the call of companies seeking lax regulation and endangering Americans’ air and water.

In a memorandum at the front of the March 21 document, the EPA’s acting chief financial officer David A. Bloom said the agency would now  “center on our core legal requirements,” eliminating voluntary activities on scientific research, climate change and education, and leaving other activities to state and local governments.

...

There is a graphic showing all the cuts. It's insane.

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