What's going on with the Executive Departments

[GreyhoundFan]

45 minutes ago, onekidanddone said:

I saw that.  I will need to stock up the bunker with canned food because there is no way I'm going outside with those things crawling around.

Back in 2004, during the last emergence of Brood X, my office had a "diversity luncheon", where everyone was supposed to bring something that represented his or her heritage. A Vietnamese co-worker brought chocolate covered cicadas. <shudder> There were many leftover at the end of the meal. She said that in her region, insects are frequently eaten. I know they are a good protein source, but I just can't...

 

 

[CTRLZero]

On 5/16/2017 at 5:52 AM, fraurosena said:

But in March, the EPA abruptly changed its stance on chlorpyrifos, greenlighting it instead of banning it. The decision, among the first major ones made by Scott Pruitt in his tenure as EPA chief, caused outrage in public health circles.

I hate reading about the environmental steps backward we are taking as a nation.  I don't mean to be evil, but if it's safe enough for farmworkers, it's safe enough to be applied on the fairways at Mar-a-Lago golf course.   Erin Brockovich will have her hands full with this administration.

[CTRLZero]

4 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

I don't know if you have seen that at least some of the Brood X cicadas, which weren't supposed to re-emerge until 2021, have started to emerge, and the belief is that the early emergence is because of climate change.

"The cicadas are coming!"  This was a notice posted in Nashville a few years ago.  Being from the Seattle area, I had no idea what a cicada was, but I was in Nashville when they emerged.  I was at a baseball game, and people would scream and run through the stands when the cicadas would buzz by.  I don't know if those are the Brood X you are talking about, but they were big ol' things.  They weren't around for long.

Between climate change and EPA pesticide deregulation, I hope the critters aren't harmed (although I'll stay indoors when they are at their peak). 

(The year might have been 2011, so probably a different brood.)

[GreyhoundFan]

5 minutes ago, CTRLZero said:

"The cicadas are coming!"  This was a notice posted in Nashville a few years ago.  Being from the Seattle area, I had no idea what a cicada was, but I was in Nashville when they emerged.  I was at a baseball game, and people would scream and run through the stands when the cicadas would buzz by.  I don't know if those are the Brood X you are talking about, but they were big ol' things.  They weren't around for long.

Between climate change and EPA pesticide deregulation, I hope the critters aren't harmed (although I'll stay indoors when they are at their peak). 

I believe Brood X doesn't go west of Illinois. They are black with orange wings and red eyes. I don't find them frightening, just a little creepy. Back in 2004, they kept flying into me. It didn't bother me until one flew in my mouth. YUCK. They don't bite or sting mammals. They only emerge for about a month. They are part of the whole cycle of things -- birds, squirrels, raccoons, and even foxes will take advantage of the glut.

[fraurosena]

I am utterly and immensely apalled.

From HuffPo: 4 People, Including A Baby, Have Died In A Jail Run By Potential Trump Nominee Sheriff David Clarke 

Quote

About a week after Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke visited the Fox News set in New York to appear on the shows “Outnumbered” and “Fox and Friends,” but before he set sail on a National Review cruise, a court-appointed medical monitor visited the jail Clarke is charged with running.

From Oct. 31 to Nov. 4 ― as Clarke was calling former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton “Mrs. Bill Clinton” on the Kelly File, writing a blog post defending his use of that term, and tweeting that the “renowned” U.S. justice system doesn’t need reform ― Dr. Ronald Shanksy was interviewing staffers at Clarke’s Milwaukee County Jail.

Four people, including a newborn baby, have died at the Milwaukee County Jail since April. One man, a 38-year-old with mental health issues, died of “profound dehydration.” For a facility with a population cap of 960 that previously averaged a couple of deaths per year, the string of deaths is concerning.

During his visit, Shanksy said he was alarmed by the “extremely large number of vacancies” at the facility, particularly for medical positions.

“Questions certainly can be raised about the occurrence of these four recent deaths and the relationship to officer shortages ... as well as the health care staffing vacancies and the adequacy of oversight of staff,” Shanksy wrote.

Now Clarke may be overseeing a much larger operation. Clarke was in New York City once again this week to meet with President-elect Donald Trump. He’s reportedly in the running to take over the Department of Homeland Security, and said he would accept a Trump cabinet position if asked. [...]

From MoJo: Potential Trump Pick for Homeland Security Wants to Send up to 1 Million People to Gitmo

Quote

Donald Trump was scheduled to meet Monday with Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke Jr., a Trump supporter and surrogate during the campaign who is now reportedly being considered to head the Department of Homeland Security. Clarke is known for his extreme views on policing—including his conviction that there is a war on cops but no police brutality—and for his attacks on Black Lives Matter. One of his most out-there positions: suspend the constitutional rights of up to a million people, and hold them indefinitely at the US prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba.

Clarke's extremist approach to homeland security is no secret. In his upcoming memoir, Cop Under Fire: Moving Beyond Hashtags of Race, Crime and Politics for a Better America, he advocates treating American citizens suspected of terrorism as "enemy combatants," questioning them without an attorney, and holding them indefinitely, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported. Their cases would be handled by a military tribunal rather than a traditional court.

Where does he get these... these... abysmal excuses for human beings from? And what the hell makes him belief this is a good choice for the head of the Department for Homeland Security?

Seriously, it's becoming so ridiculous that I'm just waiting for Ashton Kutcher to finally jump out from those WH bushes (where Spicey was out looking for him the other day) and shout out "America, you've been punk'd"? 

[Audrey2]

@fraurosena, Trump must have been who Garth Brooks was thinking about when he recorded "I've Got Friends in Low Places".

 

Or, to quote my favorite line from the early 90's show, Homefront, "Some of my best friends are lowlifes and scum."

 

[onekidanddone]

Richard Thompson:  When good things happen to bad people

Good things happen to bad people
But only, but only, for a while

Quote

Sweet thing, believe me
You'll never deceive me
You stared me down without blinking
That's when I really started thinking

You must have been running around
You must have been running around
'Cause you were smiling

Your friends say you're antsy
For something fancy
Like a caged bird that's broken free
You want to fly high and mess on me

Well I know you've got a secret or two
Your hair's in a brand new 'do
And you're so happy

Good things happen to bad people
Good things happen to bad people
But only, but only, for a while
You cried the day I walked you down the aisle
And I know you've been bad
From the way you smile

Mona Lisa what a teaser
What's that strange cologne I'm smelling
You know more than you're telling

 

[fraurosena]

Isn't Tillerson's response telling...

 

... and rather disconcerting? Especially as he doesn't even seem to care one way or the other.

[GreyhoundFan]

Far too much to quote, but an easy to understand accounting of the damage Agent Orange and Betsy want to do: "Here are K-12 education programs Trump wants to eliminate in 2018 budget"

[GreyhoundFan]

"Nearly 700 vacancies at CDC because of Trump administration’s hiring freeze"

Spoiler

Nearly 700 positions are vacant at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention because of a continuing freeze on hiring that officials and researchers say affects programs supporting local and state public health emergency readiness, infectious disease control and chronic disease prevention.

The same restriction remains in place throughout the Health and Human Services Department despite the lifting of a government-wide hiring freeze last month. At the National Institutes of Health, staff say clinical work, patient care and recruitment are suffering.

Like HHS, the State Department and the Environmental Protection Agency have maintained the freeze as a way of reducing their workforces and reshaping organizational structures after a directive last month from the Office of Management and Budget that said all federal agencies must submit a plan by June 30 to shrink their civilian workforces. HHS, State and EPA also face significant cuts in the Trump administration’s budget proposal for the fiscal year starting Oct. 1. The administration, which unveiled a “skinny budget” for fiscal 2018 in March, is scheduled to release its full budget next week.

A senior CDC official said unfilled positions include dozens of budget analysts and public health policy analysts, scientists and advisers who provide key administrative support. Their duties include tracking federal contracts awarded to state and local health departments and ensuring that lab scientists have the equipment they need.

Though HHS has exempted many positions from the freeze, including physicians and personnel who respond to cybersecurity and public health emergencies, many support personnel who often play critical roles have been affected.

“It’s all the operational details,” said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because CDC staff are not permitted to comment publicly without approval from HHS. The situation has been made worse, the official said, because the agency has been operating without a permanent director since Tom Frieden stepped down in January. That job is considered one of the most crucial public health positions in the government given the CDC's role in tracking and stopping infectious disease outbreaks in the United States and worldwide.

When HHS Secretary Tom Price visited the Atlanta-based agency in April, the former Georgia lawmaker called CDC “an absolute jewel to our nation,” adding that its location in his home town “makes it extra special.” In a meeting with senior leaders, Price promised to name a director within the month.

But at least 125 job categories have been blocked from being filled, according to a recently released CDC document. Each covers multiple people. The document was released through a Freedom of Information Act request by the Sierra Club and reviewed by The Washington Post. Many of the unfilled jobs are high-level positions, at least GS-12 and above, according to the document.

Several positions are in the Office of Public Health Preparedness and Response, which regulates some of the world's most dangerous bacteria and viruses and manages the nation's stockpile of emergency medical countermeasures. Others include positions in the director's office, infectious disease offices and the office for noncommunicable diseases, injury and environmental health.

The hiring freeze, imposed by an executive order that President Trump signed Jan. 22, covers currently open positions, prevents new positions from being created and blocks lateral transfers, officials said.

The Sierra Club's public health policy director, Liz Perera, said the administration’s “thoughtless freeze on hiring public servants prevented the CDC from filling critical roles at programs essential to preventing chronic and infectious diseases, advancing immunization and safeguarding environmental health.”

An HHS spokeswoman referred questions about the freeze to a May 2 speech by Price, who asked managers to review the efficiency of operations and draft plans to reduce staff. The budget process should be viewed as a way to “reimagine how we can do the work that we do and how we can do it better,” he told employees.

“We’re not looking to achieve an arbitrary financial goal or workforce numbers,” Price said. “We’re certainly not gunning for specific programs or agencies.”

It’s unclear how many positions have been affected across HHS. At NIH, hiring is permitted for “essential patient care staff vacancies,” but reassignments are not allowed and contractors cannot be used for full-time duties, according to an internal NIH memo last month.

Some support positions, such as program assistants and laboratory assistants, remain vacant. Many of those personnel log in or handle patient specimens and issue reports, jobs that directly affect patient care, said a senior physician at the National Cancer Institute who spoke on the condition of anonymity for fear of funding retaliation.

One such assistant who worked for the physician left late last year, but the institute has been unable to replace her because the human resources department “was overwhelmed by the demand and could not process recruiting actions,” the clinician said.

Recruitment for a senior laboratory position also has been held up “since it's complicated to get exceptions granted,” the doctor said.

Yet Agent Orange can do whatever he wants and his family is making an exorbitant amount of money from his position.

[candygirl200413]

My heart hurts every time I read something disastrous about his cabinet (honestly surprised I have a heart still intact). With him leaving for barely a week on his international tour (cause it's too hard to do work), I'm hoping some type of moves are made to get them in jail.

[GreyhoundFan]

More "fun": "FCC security guards manhandle reporter, eject him from meeting for asking questions"

Spoiler

A veteran Washington reporter says he was manhandled by security guards at the Federal Communications Commission, then forced out of the agency’s headquarters as he tried to ask a commissioner questions at a public meeting on Thursday.

John M. Donnelly, a senior writer at CQ Roll Call, said he was trying to talk with FCC Commissioner Michael O’Rielly one-on-one after a news conference when two plainclothes guards pinned him against a wall with the backs of their bodies.

Seeking to question officials after news conferences is standard practice for journalists in Washington.

O’Rielly saw the encounter but continued walking, Donnelly said in a statement through the National Press Club, where he heads the Press Freedom Team.

After O’Rielly passed, the statement read, one of the guards asked why Donnelly hadn’t brought up his questions while the commissioner was at the podium. The guard then made him leave the building “under implied threat of force,” the statement read.

Donnelly said he had approached O’Rielly in an unthreatening way, but the guards treated him as if he had committed a crime.

“I could not have been less threatening or more polite,” he said. “There is no justification for using force in such a situation.”

O’Rielly responded to Donnelly directly on Twitter Thursday evening, apologizing for the encounter and saying he didn’t notice the guards getting physical with him.

“I saw security put themselves between you, me and my staff. I didn’t see anyone put a hand on you,” he said. In another tweet, he said he was “freezing and starving” at the time.

“I appreciate the apology,” Donnelly replied. “But ‘put themselves’ there makes it sound dainty. They pinned me.”

...

CQ Roll Call, owned by the Economist Group, publishes a variety of news products focused on policy and politics in Washington. It’s known for researched, unbiased reporting.

Donnelly, a well-known specialist in defense and military affairs, serves as president of the Military Reporters and Editors Association. He has previously headed the National Press Club’s Board of Governors and served on the Standing Committee of Correspondents for the U.S. Congress.

Thursday’s meeting involved a discussion of a range of proposed FCC rules, including a proposal to roll back net neutrality regulations adopted during the Obama administration. Several pro-net neutrality groups demonstrated outside the FCC’s headquarters in the morning.

An FCC spokesman told The Washington Post in an email: “We apologized to Mr. Donnelly more than once and let him know that the FCC was on heightened alert today based on several threats.”

The incident comes at a time of growing and undisguised hostility toward the press in the upper ranks of government. Since taking office, President Trump has called news organizations the “enemy of the people,” and Stephen K. Bannon, his chief strategist, has described the media as “the opposition party.”

On Wednesday, when Trump was presented with ceremonial sword at a U.S. Coast Guard commencement ceremony, Secretary of Homeland Security John F. Kelly told him, “You can use that on the press.”

Just last week, Health and Human Services Secretary Tom Price defended the arrest of a reporter who tried to question him about the Republican health care bill in a hallway at the West Virginia state capitol. The reporter, Dan Heyman of Public News Service, was jailed on a charge of willful disruption of state government processes. Price said police “did what they felt was appropriate.”

...

Donnelly said he noticed at Thursday’s FCC meeting that security guards were following him around the building as if he were a security threat, even though he was wearing his press badge and carrying a notebook and recorder. At one point, he said, guards waited for him outside the restroom.

“I thought they were just doing it to prevent anyone from getting too close to the commissioners, which I would understand as a security measure,” Donnelly told Mic. “But then it became apparent that they were singling me out as if I were someone who was some sort of trouble.”

The National Press Club’s statement identified the guard who ejected Donnelly as Frederick Bucher, head of the FCC’s security operations center.

According to the National Press Club, Bucher took a press badge from Bloomberg reporter Todd Shields last year after Shields spoke with a protester at an FCC meeting.

...

Jeff Ballou, the National Press Club’s president, condemned the guards’ actions on Thursday.

“Donnelly was doing his job and doing it with his characteristic civility,” Ballou said in a statement. “Reporters can ask questions in any area of a public building that is not marked off as restricted to them. Officials who are fielding the questions don’t have to answer. But it is completely unacceptable to physically restrain a reporter who has done nothing wrong or force him or her to leave a public building as if a crime had been committed.”

Others came to Donnelly’s defense as well:

Attacks on the press, one more thread in the ugly cloth of authoritarianism of this administration.

[JMarie]

http://www.cnn.com/2017/05/19/politics/callista-gingrich-vatican-ambassador/index.html

Quote

President Donald Trump has announced his intent to nominate Callista Gingrich, the wife of former House Speaker Newt Gingrich, to be the US ambassador to the Vatican.

CNN reported the nomination was expected.

The announcement comes as Trump begins his first international trip as president, which will include a meeting with Pope Francis in Rome on Wednesday.

Gingrich is a devout Catholic, telling the Christian Broadcasting Network in a 2011 interview that she has "always been a very spiritual person."

Newt Gingrich was a close ally of Trump's during the presidential campaign and was considered for a Cabinet position, but decided against taking a role in the administration.

... except when she was horizontal with a married man

[fraurosena]

Ahhh, the resistance comes in many forms. I like this bipartisan pushback against Sessions!

Prosecutors are pushing back against Sessions order to pursue most severe penalties

Spoiler

A week after U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions told federal prosecutors to “charge and pursue the most serious, readily provable offense” and follow mandatory minimum sentencing guidelines, a bipartisan group of prosecutors at the state and local level is expressing concern.

Thirty current and former state and local prosecutors have signed an open letter, which was released Friday by the nonprofit Fair and Just Prosecution, a national network working with newly elected prosecutors. The prosecutors say that even though they do not have to answer Sessions’s call, the U.S. Attorney General’s directive “marks an unnecessary and unfortunate return to past ‘tough on crime’ practices” that will do more harm than good in their communities.

“What you’re seeing in this letter is a different wind of change that’s blowing through the criminal justice field,” said Miriam Krinsky, a former federal prosecutor and executive director of Fair and Just Prosecution.

“There does seem at the federal level to be a return to the tough-on-crime, seek-the-maximum-sentence, charge-and-pursue-whatever-you-can-prove approach,” Krinsky said. But, she added, at a local level, some believe “there are costs that flow from prosecuting and sentencing and incarcerating anyone and everyone who crosses the line of the law, and we need to be more selective and smarter in how we promote both the safety and the health of our communities.”

Signers of the letter include Los Angeles City Attorney Mike Feuer, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr., and Karl Racine, attorney general of the District of Columbia.

The prosecutors say that there are no real benefits to Sessions’s May 10 directive, but they noted “significant costs.”

The letter states:

The increased use of mandatory minimum sentences will necessarily expand the federal prison population and inflate federal spending on incarceration. There is a human cost as well. Instead of providing people who commit low-level drug offenses or who are struggling with mental illness with treatment, support and rehabilitation programs, the policy will subject them to decades of incarceration. In essence, the Attorney General has reinvigorated the failed “war on drugs,” which is why groups ranging from the American Civil Liberties Union to the Cato Institute to Right on Crime have all criticized the newly announced policy.

“It’s an interesting issue because the attorney general of the United States has no power over local prosecutors, so his directive doesn’t impact my work,” Deschutes County (Ore.) District Attorney John Hummel said in an interview. “I thought it was important to tell the people in Deschutes County that this policy doesn’t bind me but I still disagree with it.”

Hummel, who is not affiliated with a political party, said the directive still will have an impact on his community, in that there are people in his jurisdiction who will be charged with federal crimes and prosecuted by the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Oregon.

“If the United States Attorney for the District of Oregon is now going to be seeking a sentence that is as tough as possible with incarceration as opposed to seeking a sentence that is most likely to result in this person not committing a new crime, well that person is going to be more likely to commit a new crime in Deschutes County when he comes home,” Hummel said. “So this policy is going to make Deschutes County less safe under the guise of ‘tough on crime.’ So when I see that happening, it is relevant to Deschutes County.”

The signers say the purpose of the letter is to make it clear that not all those in the justice system share Sessions’s view.

“It’s a national message because all of us signed it. But I wanted to say, ‘Hey, that’s not how we do things in King County,’ ” Daniel Satterberg, prosecuting attorney in King County, Wash., said about the letter. Satterberg said he is now nonpartisan but that he has been elected three times as a Republican. “We consider the facts of the case and the law, and come up with what I think is a pretty thoughtful approximation of justice … and it doesn’t always mean seeking the maximum charge and the maximum length of time.”

[Sessions vows crackdown on violent crime in first major speech as attorney general]

Racine (D), the attorney general of the District, said Sessions’s policy is “a return to the nonsensical days of tough-on-crime rhetoric as opposed to evidence-based policy.”

Racine and 14 other attorneys general signed another open letter Thursday, urging Sessions to rescind the order calling for mandatory minimums from federal prosecutors.

“A broad, bipartisan consensus exists that ‘tough-on-crime’ approaches like mandatory minimum sentences for nonviolent, low-level offenses have not made our nation or our cities safer,” they wrote. “Simultaneously, there is strong evidence that contact with the justice system exacerbates the likelihood that a low-level offender will go on to commit more serious crimes. One-size-fits-all sentencing has, at best, a questionable deterrent effect.”

Following Sessions’s announcement, the National District Attorneys Association, which represents thousands of elected and appointed state and local prosecutors, said in a statement that the charging and sentencing guidelines give federal prosecutors flexibility by reserving “the harshest punishments for those committing the most serious offenses, instructing federal prosecutors to seek the most serious charge they can prove,” while, at the same time, allowing them “to deviate from the federal sentencing structure should circumstances in a case warrant a lesser sentence.”

The reason that is important, the association said, is because circumstances vary greatly from case to case.

“It is a myth that low level, nonviolent drug offenders are languishing in federal prisons,” the association said in the statement. “Yet we must be smart about the way we use prison and prosecutors must continue to learn how best to handle certain types of cases, such as human trafficking, where the victims too often have been treated as criminals.”

Larry Leiser, president of the National Association of Assistant United States Attorneys, which also supports Sessions’s order, said the tough sentencing practice, which was put in place in the 1980s and reaffirmed by U.S. attorneys general several times since, establishes consistency among federal prosecutors. “Consistency is the hallmark of justice,” he said.

In 2013, then-Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. put an end to the longtime approach, saying such penalties should be reserved for “serious, high-level, or violent drug traffickers.”

“So what you have here is Sessions really going back to the long-standing practice of the Department of Justice,” Leiser said. “I think the vast majority of around the country are glad we’re back to the practice that served us so very well for so many years starting in 1981.”

But John Chisholm (D), district attorney in Milwaukee County, Wis., said certain approaches, such as mandatory minimums, did not accomplish what they intended.

“I’m just a firm believer in people using judgment and discretion in every case and that includes judges,” he said. “The approach has not been demonstrated to be particularly effective and I don’t think it enhances public safety — and in some ways, it takes us backward instead of moving us forward.”

A small quote from the longish article behind the spoiler:

Quote

Signers of the letter include Los Angeles City Attorney Mike Feuer, Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus R. Vance Jr., and Karl Racine, attorney general of the District of Columbia.

The prosecutors say that there are no real benefits to Sessions’s May 10 directive, but they noted “significant costs.”

The letter states:

The increased use of mandatory minimum sentences will necessarily expand the federal prison population and inflate federal spending on incarceration. There is a human cost as well. Instead of providing people who commit low-level drug offenses or who are struggling with mental illness with treatment, support and rehabilitation programs, the policy will subject them to decades of incarceration. In essence, the Attorney General has reinvigorated the failed “war on drugs,” which is why groups ranging from the American Civil Liberties Union to the Cato Institute to Right on Crime have all criticized the newly announced policy.

 

[sawasdee]

Thank Rufus there is a fight back - and including from Repug and former Repug prosecutors. It's a policy proven to not work but rather embed deeper criminalisation. But it does help the bottom line of private prisons.....

[GreyhoundFan]

Sinclair wants to be "to the right of" Faux. Lovely. "Sinclair’s TV deal would be good for Trump. And his new FCC is clearing the way."

Spoiler

When French voters resoundingly elected a centrist president rather than a right-leaning antiglobalist this month, one reason may have been the nation’s news media.

As a French newspaper editor commented: “We don’t have a Fox News in France.”

The United States certainly does have one. Pretty soon, it may have the equivalent of two.

Sinclair Broadcast Group has struck a deal with Tribune Media to buy dozens of local TV stations.

And what Fox News is for cable, Sinclair could become for broadcast: programming with a soupcon — or more — of conservative spin.

Already, Sinclair is the largest owner of local TV stations in the nation. If the $3.9 billion deal gets regulatory approval, Sinclair would have 7 of every 10 Americans in its potential audience.

“That’s too much power to repose in one entity,” Michael Copps, who served on the FCC from 2001 to 2012, told me. Sinclair would have 215 stations, including ones in big markets such as Los Angeles, New York City and Chicago, instead of the 173 it has now.

There’s no reason to think that the FCC’s new chairman, Ajit Pai, will stand in the way.

Already, his commission has reinstated a regulatory loophole — closed under his predecessor, Tom Wheeler — that allows a single corporation to own more stations than the current 39 percent nationwide cap.

And Pai has made no secret of his deregulatory fervor. The former Verizon lawyer, an FCC commissioner for five years, is moving quickly.

“We need to fire up the weed whacker and remove those rules that are holding back investment, innovation and job creation,” Pai said in a speech late last year.

Copps, now an adviser to Common Cause, puts an entirely different spin on the new FCC’s approach: “They believe in a corporatized media.”

The stakes are high — and not just for Sinclair’s business interests. There’s evidence that when Sinclair takes over, conservative content gets a powerful platform.

When Sinclair bought Washington’s WJLA-TV in 2014, the new owners quickly moved the station to the right, as my colleague Paul Farhi repeatedly has documented. It added conservative commentary pieces from a Sinclair executive, Mark Hyman, and public affairs programming with conservative hosts. (The deal would give Sinclair a second Washington station, WDCW.)

And Sinclair regularly sends “must-run” segments to its stations across the country. One example: an opinion piece by a Sinclair executive that echoed President Trump’s slam at the national news media and what he calls the “fake news” they produce.

Some of Sinclair’s local journalists objected — this commentary, they reasonably complain, is presented as though it were part of the news report.

During the presidential campaign, Trump’s message came through loud and clear on Sinclair’s stations, many of which are in small or medium-sized markets in battleground states such as Wisconsin, Ohio and Pennsylvania.

Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, even bragged, according to Politico, that the campaign cut a deal with the media conglomerate for uninterrupted coverage of some Trump appearances.

Is there a link between such content — and the expectation of more — and the loosening of federal rules?

Tim Karr, strategy director at Free Press, an advocacy organization that opposes media consolidation, certainly thinks so.

“It’s legitimate to suggest a quid pro quo — a trade of policy favors for favorable media coverage,” Karr told me.

Sinclair’s Rebecca Hanson, a senior vice president, objected: “With respect to Sinclair, this speculation is patently false.” In an email, she insisted that the company’s content is not partisan, but rather based on impartial local news reporting.

An FCC spokesman declined to comment on Karr’s assertion.

It may be going too far to say that conservative content has a direct tie to federal policy decisions. And it’s probably not even a necessary element.

We already know that the Pai-led commission believes in deregulation that will help a company like Sinclair grow into an even bigger behemoth.

We already know that Sinclair’s audience reach probably will be immense, and its political influence wide — just like Fox in the cable world. (Fox’s parent company, 21st Century Fox, also tried to buy the Tribune stations.)

And we already know that Sinclair makes conservative programming a part of its offerings, in some cases taking decision-making out of the hands of local news people.

The long march of media consolidation is a given. That’s a shame, because local TV news is still fairly well-trusted, while public trust in the media as a whole is scraping bottom.

But as former FCC commissioner Copps put it: “The bazaar is open as it’s never been open before.”

I used to watch WJLA, they had great news anchors and good reporting. Once Sinclair took over, they started running off the good people.  I refuse to watch the news on that station any more.

[Zola]

Just curious - Do you watch Fox DC 5 WTTG?

[GreyhoundFan]

10 minutes ago, Zola said:

Just curious - Do you watch Fox DC 5 WTTG?

No, I don't care for WTTG's news programs, anchors, or reporters. I usually watch WRC-4. Sometimes, I'll watch WUSA-9. I used to love the old days on Channel 9 with Gordon Peterson, Maureen Bunyan, and Glenn Brenner. Do you watch WTTG?

[onekidanddone]

1 hour ago, GreyhoundFan said:

No, I don't care for WTTG's news programs, anchors, or reporters. I usually watch WRC-4. Sometimes, I'll watch WUSA-9. I used to love the old days on Channel 9 with Gordon Peterson, Maureen Bunyan, and Glenn Brenner. Do you watch WTTG?

Oh I loved Gelnn Brenner. WUSA was good when Derrick McGinty was on.  I usually try to avoid the local news.  They give you about 30 seconds of real news.."Trump said something today", weather, sports and fluff. The channel 9 weather guy is just a little to enthusiastic about his jobfor me. Yes, I know weather forecasting is important especially for storms, but cheese and crackers how much can you talk about a 70 degree day with light winds.

I get most of my news from WoPo or NYT. 

[GreyhoundFan]

Two sobering articles about Agent Orange's proposed budget: "Trump budget seeks huge cuts to disease prevention and medical research departments"

Spoiler

President Trump's 2018 budget request to Congress seeks massive cuts in spending on health programs, including medical research, disease prevention programs and health insurance for children of the working poor.

The National Cancer Institute would be hit with a $1 billion cut compared to its 2017 budget. The National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute would see a $575 million cut, and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases would see a reduction of $838 million. The administration would cut the overall National Institutes of Health budget from $31.8 billion to $26 billion.

The proposed cuts to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention drew an unusually sharp rebuke from former CDC director Tom Frieden, who went on Twitter to describe the administration's CDC request as "unsafe at any level of enactment. Would increase illness, death, risks to Americans, and health care costs."

In a separate tweet, Frieden listed what he sees as the dire ramifications of the Trump proposal, saying, for starters, that it "Devastates programs that protect Americans from cancer, diabetes, heart attacks, strokes and other deadly and expensive conditions."

The full budget document is scheduled to be released Tuesday morning, but either by mistake or design, the administration posted the section dealing with the Department of Health and Human Services late Monday afternoon. The document was soon taken offline but can be read here.

“The only official version of the HHS budget will be released by the Office of Management and Budget at 11:00 a.m. tomorrow. At that time, Budget Director [Mick] Mulvaney will hold a press briefing and address any questions," HHS national spokesperson Alleigh Marré wrote in an email to The Post.

The slashing of programs that normally have enjoyed bipartisan support is part of the Trump administration's effort to trim trillions of dollars in spending over the next decade while at the same time paying for tax cuts and increases in military spending.

Trump's Office of Management and Budget produced a “skinny budget” in March, in effect an outline with few details, and that document delivered a number of surprises, including a call to cut nearly one-fifth of National Institutes of Health budget and nearly one-third of the Environmental Protection Agency funding.

Lawmakers appeared to ignore that budget request entirely when putting together a spending plan for the rest of fiscal 2017, which runs through September. Much of that spending plan had been in the works before the November election. It is unclear how Congress, which has the power of the purse, will treat this new and more detailed budget request.

But the document posted late Monday shows that blow-back from that earlier budget request did not dissuade the administration from its strategy of cutting nonmilitary discretionary spending to pay for tax cuts and a boost in the Pentagon budget.

Among the highlights:

Funding for the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) would be slashed by at least 20 percent for the next two fiscal years. According to the budget document, the administrator favors a renewal of CHIP, a program created 20 years ago for the children of lower-working class families and which currently insures 5.6 million children.

The spending plan would, however, eliminate an element of the Affordable Care Act that increased by 23 percent the portion of the program’s costs that is paid for with federal money, leaving states to shoulder a larger share. It would also for the first time essentially limit states’ eligibility levels to qualify, saying that the government would no longer help cover children from families with incomes of more than 250 percent of the federal poverty level. Currently, 18 states plus the District of Columbia allow families with incomes higher than 300 percent of the poverty line to sign up their children for CHIP, according to data from the Kaiser Family Foundation.

The Trump budget asks for cuts to several key programs at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, which responds to disease outbreaks in the United States and around the world, makes sure food and water are safe, and helps people avoid heart disease, cancer, stroke and other leading causes of death.

The president's budget seeks an $82 million cut at the center that works on vaccine-preventable and respiratory diseases, such as influenza and measles. It proposes a cut of $186 million from programs at CDC’s center on HIV/AIDS, viral hepatitis, sexually transmitted infections and tuberculosis prevention. One of the biggest cuts, $222 million, is to the agency’s chronic disease prevention programs, which are designed to help people prevent diabetes, heart disease and stroke, and obesity.

Some of those funds are being channeled into a new $500 million block grant program to states and territories to focus on “leading chronic disease challenges specific to each state.” Critics have said block grants allow states to plug holes in their budgets, without accountability that federal programs require.

The agency’s center on birth defects and developmental disabilities also gets a 26 percent cut to its budget at a time when researchers have yet to understand the full consequences of Zika infections in pregnant women and their babies.

The budget calls for a 17 percent cut to CDC’s global health programs that monitor and respond to disease outbreaks around the world. It also cuts about 10 percent from CDC’s office of  public health preparedness and response.

The budget document highlights $35 million that the CDC spends on childhood lead poisoning prevention. But the overall spending on environmental health would under Trump's plan be cut by $60 million, down to $157 million, according the document.

Trump administration officials have also proposed the establishment of an Emergency Response Fund to respond quickly to emerging public health threats. In the wake of the Ebola and Zika epidemics, U.S. officials have repeatedly called for the need for such a fund. The budget does not provide a specific amount. It says HHS would have “department-wide transfer authority to support the Fund in the case of a natural or man-made disaster or threat.” The fund would be available to receive a transfer of up to one percent of any HHS account, without any limitation on the total, for use in emergency preparedness and response.

The Food and Drug Administration would see a cut from $2.74 billion to $1.89 billion. User fees paid by manufacturers of drugs, devices and other products would be increased by close to $1 billion to pay for product reviews.

Republican Sen. Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, the chairman of the health committee, has said he does not want to reopen negotiations with the industry over fees that it pays to support FDA activities, as the Trump administration has previously suggested. His committee recently approved legislation that ignores the administration request.

 

And: "EPA remains top target with Trump administration proposing 31 percent budget cut"

Spoiler

Candidate Donald Trump vowed to get rid of the Environmental Protection Agency “in almost every form,” leaving only “little tidbits” intact. President Trump is making good on his promise to take a sledgehammer to the agency.

When the White House releases its latest budget proposal on Tuesday, the EPA will fare worse than any other federal agency.

An advance copy of EPA’s budget for fiscal 2018, obtained by the National Association of Clean Air Agencies, indicates the administration will proceed with its effort to reduce current funding by more than 31 percent, to $5.65 billion.

The plan would eliminate several major regional programs, including ones aimed at restoring the Great Lakes, Chesapeake Bay and Puget Sound, as well as EPA’s lead risk-reduction program. The White House also proposes nearly halving categorical grants, which support state and local efforts to address everything from pesticide exposure to air and water quality, to $597 million. It would slash funding for the Superfund cleanup program, which helps restore some of the nation’s most polluted sites, despite the fact that EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt lists it as one of his priorities.

Dozens of other programs also would be zeroed out entirely, including funding for radon detection, lead risk reduction, projects along the U.S.-Mexico border and environmental justice initiatives. The agency would have significantly less money for enforcement of environmental crimes and for research into climate change and other issues.

The budget proposal would maintain funding for “high priority” infrastructure investments such as grants and low-cost financing to states and municipalities for drinking water and wastewater projects. But in the broadest sense, the White House wish list would undoubtedly hobble the EPA, leaving the work of safeguarding the nation’s water and air primarily up to local officials.

EPA officials declined to talk publicly about the specifics of its budget ahead of Tuesday’s planned release of the latest White House proposal. But in a recent email, an agency spokeswoman said the proposal “prioritizes federal funding for work in infrastructure, air and water quality, and ensuring the safety of chemicals in the marketplace. The budget aims to reduce redundancies and inefficiencies and focus on our core statutory mission.”

S. William Becker, executive director of the National Association of Clean Air Agencies, said in an interview that he was amazed the administration had not shifted course from its first proposal in March — former EPA administrator Gina McCarthy called it a “scorched earth” budget — despite bipartisan push back in Congress and warnings from many groups that such cuts could hamper state and local work to curb pollution.

“You would think they would have learned something from these trial balloons,” Becker said. “Instead, they’re doubling down. They just don’t care about the reaction.”

Ken Cook, president of the Environmental Working Group, echoed the exasperation of many in the environmental community. “This isn’t a budget — it’s a road map for the President, EPA Administrator Pruitt and polluters to see that millions of Americans drink dirtier water, breathe more polluted air and don’t have enough nutritious food to lead healthy lives,” he said in a statement. “With each cut in EPA funding, each regulatory rollback, each special favor for polluters, it becomes more clear that for President Trump, public health protection is not a priority, but a target.”

Trump administration officials, including Pruitt, repeatedly have made clear that they intend to return the agency to its “core responsibilities” of protecting air and water quality. Combating climate change, which was a key focus in the Obama administration, has essentially vanished from the EPA’s mission.

In unveiling its initial proposal, the administration acknowledged that the drastic cuts “will create many challenges” at the agency. But it suggested that, “by looking ahead and focusing on clean water, clean air and other core responsibilities rather than activities that are not required by law, EPA will be able to effectively achieve its mission.”

A deal reached recently by lawmakers to fund the government through September left the EPA largely untouched, reducing its budget $81 million below the current operating level — about a 1 percent cut.

Off to call my senators and representative again. This budget can't happen this way.

[candygirl200413]

We get it Mulvaney, you're a horrible person.

 

[fraurosena]

The Presidunce's Commerce Secretary praises lack of demonstrations in Saudi Arabia

... where protests are punishable bij death...

Quote

US Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross praised the lack of protests during Donald Trump's visit to Saudi Arabia, despite the country being well known for handing out brutal punishments to dissenting voices. 

Over a dozen prominent activists convicted on charges arising from their peaceful activities were serving long prison sentences in 2016, according to Human Rights Watch. Others have been sentenced to death. 

But seemingly unaware of this, Mr Ross told US broadcaster CNBC: “There was not a single hint of a protester anywhere there during the whole time we were there. Not one guy with a bad placard."

A journalist then tried to give him a hint...

Quote

Asked whether this could be because protests were stifled in the country, Mr Ross replied: “In theory, that could be true. But, boy, there was certainly no sign of it, there wasn’t a single effort of any incursion. There wasn’t anything. The mood was a genuinely good mood.”

He added that there was “no question” that the Saudis were “liberalising their society”. 

... but well, a hint isn't bribe-money, so he didn't take it. Then came the presidunce's speech:

Quote

Delivering his first presidential speech in Riyadh, Mr Trump neglected to mention Saudi Arabia's human rights violations during his 36-minute address.

“We are not here to tell other people how to live, what to do, who to be, or how to worship,” he said. 

Nope, you only do that in your own country.

[Zola]

23 hours ago, GreyhoundFan said:

No, I don't care for WTTG's news programs, anchors, or reporters. I usually watch WRC-4. Sometimes, I'll watch WUSA-9. I used to love the old days on Channel 9 with Gordon Peterson, Maureen Bunyan, and Glenn Brenner. Do you watch WTTG?

I don't seek to watch DC Fox 5 news myself, but my husband is a fierce creature of habit and has been watching their news for decades. He doesn't consider turning on any other station for news, he's so used to watching it on channel 5. I think he sees it as more of an entertainment thing than a source of actual news.

These days he gets the majority of political news from me, and I get it at FJ and all the links you guys provide - Thanks, Everyone! I'm reading all of it. Still trying to get him abreast of this entire debaucle we are in now...I recently had to explain to him that the Fox News Channel and the news on Fox channel 5 are not the same thing. 

While I watch Fox DC 5 fairly often (like almost every Sunday night for the past 30 years,) I've slowly become ever more disenchanted with their news. HLN Morning Express with Robin Meade, as grating and annoying as I find that show and host to be, has proven in the past to be a better, more informed (and informative) source of news than Fox 5.

If I really want to know what's going on outside of the US, I watch the news out of London on BBCA.

We also listen to WTOP anytime we're in the car...unless our 18 yr old son is along, then it's twenty-one pilots or Childish Gambino.

No big deal, I was just asking out of curiosity as I know we both live in the DC viewing area. The DMV, yo. Thanks for reply!

[GreyhoundFan]

I think we all know the answer to this one: "DeVos won’t say whether she’d withhold federal funds from private schools that discriminate"'

Spoiler

Education Secretary Betsy DeVos refused to say Wednesday whether she would block private schools that discriminate against LGBT students from receiving federal dollars, explaining that she believes states should have the flexibility to design voucher programs and that parents should be able to choose schools that best fit their children’s needs.

DeVos returned frequently to the theme of what she called a need for a return to more local control in her first public appearance before Congress since her rocky confirmation hearing in January.

Fielding questions from members of a House appropriations subcommittee, she said that states should decide how to address chronic absenteeism, mental health and suicide risks among students, and states should decide whether children taking vouchers are protected by federal special-education law.

Asked by Rep. Katherine Clark (D-Mass.) whether she could think of any circumstance in which the federal government should step in to stop federal dollars from going to private schools that discriminate against certain groups of students, DeVos did not directly answer.

“We have to do something different than continuing a top-down, one-size-fits all approach,” DeVos said.

Democrats immediately criticized DeVos’s philosophy, saying the nation’s top education official must be willing to defend children against discrimination by institutions that get federal money. “To take the federal government’s responsibility out of that is just appalling and sad,” said Rep. Barbara Lee (D- Calif.).

DeVos pushed back against the notion that the Education Department would be abdicating its authority. “I am not in any way suggesting that students should not be protected,” she said.

DeVos traveled to Capitol Hill to defend a spending plan that has drawn criticism from both ends of the political spectrum.

President Trump has proposed slashing $10.6 billion from federal education initiatives, including after-school programs, teacher training and career and technical education, and reinvesting $1.4 billion of the savings into promoting his top priority: School choice, including $250 million for vouchers to help students attend private and religious schools.

The administration is also seeking far-reaching changes to student aid programs, including elimination of subsidized loans and public service loan forgiveness and a halving of the federal work-study program that helps college students earn money to support themselves while in school.

In her opening remarks Wednesday, DeVos said that while the size of the proposed cuts to K-12 and student financial programs “may sound alarming for some,” the president’s budget proposal reflects a push to return more decision-making power to states and more educational choice to parents.

“We cannot allow any parent to feel as if their child is trapped in a school that is not meeting their needs,” DeVos said.

Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.), chairman of the House education appropriations subcommittee, opened the hearing Wednesday with praise for DeVos’s efforts to expand charter schools. But he said he would have questions about the administration’s proposals to dramatically cut college financial aid programs such as work-study and college-access programs for low-income students — “which, frankly, I will advise you,” Cole said, “I have a different point of view on.”

Another key Republican, Rep. Rodney Frelinghuysen of New Jersey, chairman of the full appropriations committee, emphasized that it is members of Congress and not the president who hold the power of the purse and will ultimately design the federal budget. His Democratic counterpart Rep. Nita Lowey (N.Y.), ranking member of the appropriations committee, was more pointed.

“This budget reflects the views of an administration filled with people who frankly never had to worry about their children going to college,” Lowey said. “And yet I’m most upset that this budget would undermine our public education system and the working families who depend on them.”

Randi Weingarten, president of the American Federation of Teachers, called the administration’s spending proposal “cruel to children,” while Sen. Patty Murray (Wash.), ranking Democrat on the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, said the budget proposed by Trump and DeVos “slashes funding for public schools to fund their extreme privatization agenda.”

Sen. Lamar Alexander (R-Tenn.), chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee and a key education voice on Capitol Hill, has said that he is not on board with the president’s proposed cuts to discretionary spending programs generally — and he has made clear that Trump’s proposals are just suggestions.

“Congress will write the budget and set the spending priorities. Where we find good ideas in the president’s budget, we will use them,” Alexander said in a statement Tuesday.

Critics said they are hopeful that Congress will reject many of Trump’s ideas, as lawmakers did this month when they reached a bipartisan deal to fund the government through September. But even in that scenario, Trump’s proposal creates damaging uncertainty for school districts and students seeking to pay for college, said John B. King Jr., who served as education secretary in the Obama administration and now helms the nonprofit group Education Trust.

“The administration has framed the conversation as a conversation about cuts rather than a conversation about investment,” King said. “We should be talking about investing more.”

Many of the cuts are likely to find support among conservatives who have argued that Education Department programs need to be trimmed or eliminated. But some conservatives are also troubled by the administration’s proposal to invest new money in school choice, saying that represents an unwelcome expansion of the federal footprint in education.

“As much as I want to see every single child in America have school choice, it is just not appropriate for the federal government to be using new dollars and new programs to push states in that direction,” said Lindsey Burke, an education policy expert at the conservative Heritage Foundation. “You need local buy-in for these school-choice options to really be supported and viable in the long run.”

Trump and DeVos are seeking to increase the federal investment in charter schools by 50 percent, bringing the total appropriation to $500 million per year. They also want to establish a new $250 million fund to expand and study private-school vouchers, and they want to dole out $1 billion in grants to school districts to adopt policies that allow tax dollars to follow students to the public school of their choice.

In a speech Monday night, DeVos called the push for school choice “right” and “just,” and an opportunity to “drag American education out of the Stone Age and into the future.” She referred to her critics as “flat-earthers,” and said that while the federal government would never force states to adopt choice-friendly policies, those who opt out are making a “terrible mistake.”

She has become one of the most recognizable and polarizing figures in Trump’s Cabinet, in part because of her performance during her Senate confirmation hearing in January.

During that hearing, DeVos stumbled over policy questions and suggested that schools might need guns to defend against grizzly bears — a moment that became an overnight meme and fodder for late-night comics.

 

[JMarie]

Be prepared to scream!

http://www.cnn.com/2017/05/24/politics/ben-carson-poverty-state-of-mind/index.html

Quote

Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson said in an interview Wednesday that having "the wrong mindset" contributes to poverty.

"I think poverty to a large extent is also a state of mind," the retired neurosurgeon said during an interview with SiriusXM Radio released on Wednesday evening. "You take somebody that has the right mindset, you can take everything from them and put them on the street, and I guarantee in a little while they'll be right back up there. And you take somebody with the wrong mindset, you could give them everything in the world, they'll work their way right back down to the bottom."