Shakesville: Manafort

Showing posts with label Manafort. Show all posts

We Resist: Day 854

a black bar with the word RESIST in white text

Former Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams on Wednesday urged Democrats to embrace identity politics, at a time when the issue has become a source of debate within the party.

Speaking at the Center for American Progress's Ideas Conference, Abrams warned that the term "identity politics" had been twisted by those aiming to silence emergent minority voters seeking political power for the first time.

"The notion of identity politics has been peddled for the past 10 years and it's been used as a dog whistle to say we shouldn't pay too much attention to the voices coming into progress," Abrams said. "I would argue that identity politics is exactly who we are and exactly how we won."

The Georgia Democrat argued that identity politics had "brought new folks to the process," and that a failure to focus on racial differences would give minority voters the impression "they have no reason to engage and no reason to show up."

"When I hear Democratic candidates, progressive candidates, American candidates decrying the identity of their voters, I'm deeply worried for our democracy," Abrams said.

Me too, Stacey Abrams. Me too.

* * *

Lots of pieces like this today...

Jennifer Rubin at the Washington Post: Pelosi Goads Trump into Another Temper Tantrum.

John Bresnahan and Burgess Everett at Politico: Why Pelosi Is So Good at Infuriating Trump.

[Content Note: Video may autoplay at link] Glenn Thrush at the New York Times: Pelosi Pushes Go-Slow Strategy on Impeachment as She Goads Trump.

Great. Yes. Sure. Nancy Pelosi is absolutely the best at getting under Donald Trump's skin. I agree wholeheartedly with that! Except, as I tweeted yesterday:

Honestly, I do not understand the argument it's a "win" if Pelosi, Schumer, or anyone else can successfully bait Trump into behaving like a villainous wreck.

WE ALREADY KNOW HE IS A VILLAINOUS WRECK. No more evidence is required.

Now it's (beyond) time to do something about it.
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) May 22, 2019

That tweet quickly went viral, and, as of this writing, has more than 1,600 retweets and 8,600 likes.

I find it very interesting that Pelosi specifically used the word "villainous" in her press conference today after that tweet went wide yesterday and this morning. And did so while pointedly not addressing the criticism I was making.

At the presser, she also continued to defend her decision to not pursue impeachment at this time:

Speaker Pelosi: “I do think that impeachment is a very divisive place to go in our country. And what we can get the facts to the American people through our investigation, it may take us to a place that is unavoidable in terms of impeachment — or not. But we’re not at that place” pic.twitter.com/oupFdoG9LN
— CNN Politics (@CNNPolitics) May 23, 2019

CNN's Manu Raju: Yesterday you said that the president may have engaged in impeachable offenses—

Pelosi: Yeah.

Raju: —yet today you're saying you're not on a path to impeachment. Can you explain why you're imposed to launching an impeachment inquiry, as many of your members want to do?

Pelosi: Let me be really very clear: The president's behavior, in terms of his obstruction of justice, the things that he is doing, it's very clear; it's in plain sight; it cannot be denied. Ignoring subpoenas, obstruction of justice — yes, these could be impeachable offenses.

But I intend not— [stammers] If— Where the facts— We— There are three things— You might understand it better if you remember these three things: We want to follow the facts, to get the truth to the American people, with a recognition — two — that no one is above the law, and — three — that the president is engaged in a cover-up. And that is what my statement is.

Now how we deal with it is a decision that our caucus makes, and our caucus is very much saying, whatever we do, we need to be ready when we do it.

And I do think that impeachment is a very divisive place to go in our country. And what we can get the facts to the American people through our investigation, it may take us to a place that is unavoidable in terms of impeachment — or not. But we're not at that place.

I just really disagree with this strategy. I firmly believe that every tool in the toolbox, including and especially the enhanced investigative powers of an impeachment process, because every day that Donald Trump is unconstrained with the immense power of the office he holds, empowered and protected by his party, is a dangerous day. Not just for the United States, but the world.

I mean:

Dan De Luce, Courtney Kube, and Abigail Williams at NBC News: Senate Dem. Warns Trump Could Push Through Saudi Bomb Deal without Congressional Approval.

Adrienne Mahsa Varkiani at ThinkProgress: Senate Committee Rejects Proposal to Require Congressional Approval before U.S. Strike on Iran.

Reshma Kapadia at Barron's: The Trade War Jeopardizes a Potential Global Economic Recovery, IMF Says.

Et cetera ad infinitum. How much longer are we supposed to wait? Donald Trump's presidency is pretty fucking "divisive," too.

* * *

Zachary Cohen and Caroline Kelly at CNN: Tillerson Told Lawmakers Putin Was More Prepared Than Trump in Germany Meeting. "Former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson told lawmakers that Russian President Vladimir Putin was more prepared than [Donald] Trump for their meeting in Hamburg, Germany, putting U.S. officials at a disadvantage, a Democratic House Foreign Affairs committee aide told CNN Wednesday." Yeahhhhh I don't think Putin's and Trump's respective "preparedness" was the primary thing putting U.S. officials at a disadvantage there.

Casey Michel at ThinkProgress: New Indictment Says Manafort's Banker Tried to Bribe His Way into Trump Administration. "A bombshell indictment released Thursday from the Justice Department detailed how banker Stephen Calk tried to use his financial ties to former Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort to bribe his way into the Trump administration. According to the indictment, Calk has been charged with 'financial institution bribery' for trying to use his position as the head of the Federal Savings Bank of Chicago, which issued 'millions of dollars in high-risk loans' to Manafort, to obtain 'a senior position' for himself within the Trump administration." Sounds about right.

Leigh Ann Caldwell and Alex Moe at NBC News: Wells Fargo, TD Bank Have Already Given Trump-Related Financial Documents to Congress. "Wells Fargo and TD Bank are the two of nine institutions that have so far complied with subpoenas issued by the House Financial Services Committee demanding information about their dealings with the Trump Organization, according to the sources. ...Wells Fargo provided the committee with a few thousand documents and TD Bank handed the committee a handful of documents, according to a source who has seen them. The committee, led by Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., is especially interested in the president's business relationship with Russia and other foreign entities." Get him!

Speaking of Rep. Maxine Waters...

Rep. Maxine Waters: "My position on impeachment is what it has always been and that is the president of the United States of America needs to be impeached." pic.twitter.com/oRG4LnbRzB
— The Hill (@thehill) May 22, 2019

From your lips to Nancy Pelosi's ears, Rep. Waters!

* * *

[CN: War on agency. Covers entire section.]

Ari Bee at Rewire.News: Georgia Democrats: Police 'Stifled Dissent' During Near-Total Abortion Ban Debate.

Heavy police presence defined the legislative battle at the state capitol around Georgia's near-total abortion ban, with pro-choice legislators calling the police presence and tactics "intimidating," charging that Republican legislative leadership used law enforcement to squelch pushback against the extreme measure.

...Rep. Renitta Shannon (D-Decatur) said she witnessed an increase in police presence at the capitol over the past two legislative sessions. But the level of police activity surrounding any debates on HB 481 was strikingly different. She told Rewire.News that police were used to "stifle dissent," and that this sent a clear message.

"Anytime the general public comes to the capitol to say how they feel about a bill, if it's not something that Republicans agree with, they [Republican leadership] immediately sic the police on them," she said.

Rage. Seethe. Boil.

Cameron Joseph at TPM: North Carolina GOP Looks to Ram Through Anti-Abortion Law.

North Carolina state Rep. Sydney Batch (D) had planned to take off work this week as she recovered from a recent mastectomy procedure to treat her breast cancer. Instead, she spent it at the statehouse, making sure Republicans couldn't come up with enough votes to pass new abortion-related restrictions into law.

North Carolina Republicans have been pushing to pass a "born alive" bill that would make it illegal for doctors not to help babies that somehow survived abortions. They're just a handful of votes away from being able to override a recent veto from North Carolina Gov. Roy Cooper (D). Republicans put the bill on the legislative calendar for Monday. When it became clear they didn't have the votes, they decided to shelve it and force Batch and the rest of the legislature to return day after day until they have the numbers.

"I was hoping to take three weeks off to recover, but unfortunately I did not have that ability," Batch told TPM about the GOP's latest effort. "When I realized that Monday, [Republicans were] planning to hold the vote it was worth physical sacrifice and pain to come in to vote. It was extremely important for me to vote."

Her presence was needed. Republicans already overrode Cooper's recent veto in the state Senate, and believe they are just three or four votes away from being able to do the same in the state House. If enough Democrats hadn't shown up, they would have been able to ram through the legislation, since all their members attended session on Monday — a rarity in a chamber where members on both sides regularly miss votes.

...Democrats are furious about the bill itself — and accuse North Carolina House Speaker Tim Moore (R) of trying to take advantage of their ailing members to grind down the Democrats until they pick off enough members to pass the legislation.

What horrible fucking people Republican legislators are. JFC.

In some positive news...

Beth Mole at Ars Technica: Anti-Abortion Clinics That Try to Trick Women Face New Google Ad Policy. "Google will roll out a policy next month to crack down on deceptive advertisements dealing with abortion — a topic rife with misleading and false health information. ...Google will now require all advertisers in the United States, Ireland, and the United Kingdom who run abortion-related ads to submit to a pre-certification. The process is intended to identify the types of services that the advertisers provide. All of their subsequent advertising will then be automatically and clearly labeled with either 'Provides abortions' or 'Does not provide abortions.'"

* * *

[CN: Extreme weather; death] Staff at the BBC: Tornadoes Kill at Least Seven People. "Tornadoes have killed at least three people in Missouri, bringing the death toll from twisters across the U.S. Midwest in recent days to seven. ...Those who work in Jefferson City were urged on Thursday to stay at home due to dangerous road conditions in the aftermath of the storm, including toppled trees and power lines. Earlier the U.S. National Weather Service (NWS) issued a rare 'high warning' for severe storms in the region. It said at least 29 tornadoes had been reported in the last 24 hours and more than 170 since Friday. The NWS described the tornado over Jefferson City as 'large and destructive.'"

Many people are without power, are injured, and/or are displaced from their homes. As always, please feel welcome and encouraged to suggest ways to help in comments.

What have you been reading that we need to resist today?

Open Wide...

We Resist: Day 783

With court orders barring [Donald] Trump from enforcing his transgender military ban out of the way, the Defense Department late Tuesday unveiled its plan to make the policy a reality, announcing it would begin April 12.

A 15-page memo signed by David Norquirst [pdf], who's performing the duties of deputy secretary of defense, spells out the timeline, procedures, and potential exemptions for implementing the plan ordered by Trump and created by former Defense Secretary James Mattis.

As stated on the first page of the memo, the new policy "is effective April 12, 2019." On the date, the policy of open transgender service as implemented June 30, 2016 during the Obama administration will come to an end after nearly three years.

The memo takes great pains to demonstrate the policy isn't a ban because it allows transgender people to enlist, provided they have no diagnosis of gender dysphoria and are willing to serve in their biological sex.

...Transgender advocates shredded the plan as a discriminatory effort to prohibit qualified individuals from joining the armed forces.

Harper Jean Tobin, director of policy for the National Center for Transgender Equality, said in a statement the policy represents a "looming purge" and "an unprecedented step backward in the social and civil progress of our country and our military."

"Throughout our nation's history, we have seen arbitrary barriers in our military replaced with inclusion and equal standards," Tobin said, "This is the first time in American history such a step forward has been reversed, and it is a severe blow to the military and to the nation's values."

There is much, much more at the link. This is a goddamn outrage. It is indecent and cruel. And it is a threat to national security.

[Content Note: Rape apologia]

Ughhhhhhh. "The Senate voted Tuesday to advance [Donald] Trump’s judicial nominee Neomi Rao, who has a record of weakening protections for sexual assault survivors and once argued that women could avoid date rape by staying sober." https://t.co/FKU1P3eNX9
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) March 13, 2019

Susan Davis at NPR: Speaker Pelosi Revokes Vice President Pence's House Office Space. "House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has reclaimed office space her predecessor, Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., awarded to Vice President Pence. Republicans gave Pence, a former House member, a first-floor bonus office in the U.S. Capitol shortly after [Donald] Trump was inaugurated in 2017. The vice president rarely used the space, but it was a symbolic gesture of the warm relationship Pence enjoyed with Ryan and the House GOP. ...A placard above the door identifying it as Pence's House office was quietly removed in recent weeks. A House Democratic aide confirmed to NPR that the space will be reassigned." Snicker. So petty. Good.

* * *

[CN: Nativism; abuse. Covers entire section.]

Bob Ortega at CNN: ICE Supervisors Sometimes Skip Required Review of Detention Warrants, Emails Show. "Internal emails and other ICE documents he obtained through a Freedom of Information Act request, since reviewed by CNN, show that other officers across the five-state region where Oxley worked had improperly signed warrants on behalf of their supervisors — especially on evenings or weekends. Some supervisors even gave their officers pre-signed blank warrants — in effect, illegally handing them the authority to begin the deportation process. ...Two other ICE employees told CNN that they're aware of similar incidents of supervisors elsewhere in the country providing pre-signed blank warrants or telling officers to sign for them without full review, and that the practice is ongoing."

Sam Levin at the Guardian: Vast License Plate Database Used to Track Undocumented Immigrants, Records Show. "The documents acquired by the ACLU show that ICE obtained access to a database with license plate information collected in dozens of counties across the United States — data that helped the agency to track people's locations in real time. Emails revealed that police have also informally given driver information to immigration officers requesting those details in communications that the ACLU said appeared to violate local laws and ICE's own privacy rules. The files, which the ACLU obtained through a records request, have raised fresh concerns about ICE's monitoring of immigrants and the way local police aid the Trump administration's deportation agenda."

[CN: Sexual assault] Tina Vasquez at Rewire.News: In Search of Justice: How DHS PREA Standards Don't Necessarily Protect Immigrants from Assault. "According to an ICE spokesperson, when an allegation of sexual assault or abuse is reported involving an ICE employee or contractor, the Department of Homeland Security's (DHS) Office of Inspector General (OIG) has 'the first right of refusal' to investigate an allegation. Investigations declined by OIG are investigated by ICE's Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR). ...But it is clear that when a PREA investigation launches, there are two sets of interviews: 'one administrative, one criminal,' Gammill said in an email. 'One investigation can conclude in a finding sooner than the other, and the conclusions can differ.'"

* * *

Take a minute and read these quotes.

It’s easy to forget after 2 years of blustering and lies, but the only real evidence of bias was never about Trump. It’s how Rudy Giuliani knew before Americans did that Jim Comey was going to do what he did. https://t.co/umomwWbXMT
— Philippe Reines (@PhilippeReines) March 12, 2019

Um, this is how it is supposed to work. Prosecutors look at the law and decide whether a person should be charged. That's exactly what the Obama DOJ did.

Put another way, would @realDonaldTrump want an FBI agent deciding if, say, Jared Kushner should be charged, or AG Barr? https://t.co/l8KfmldtEd
— Ted Lieu (@tedlieu) March 13, 2019

Cary Aspinwall, Ariana Giorgi, and Dom DiFurio at the Dallas News: Several Boeing 737 Max 8 Pilots in U.S. Complained About Suspected Safety Flaw. "Pilots repeatedly voiced safety concerns about the Boeing 737 Max 8 to federal authorities, with one captain calling the flight manual 'inadequate and almost criminally insufficient' several months before Sunday's Ethiopian Air crash that killed 157 people, an investigation by The Dallas Morning News found. The News found five complaints about the Boeing model in a federal database where pilots can voluntarily report about aviation incidents without fear of repercussions. The complaints are about the safety mechanism cited in preliminary reports about an October Boeing 737 Max 8 crash in Indonesia that killed 189." Goddamn.

[CN: Extreme weather; moving GIF at link] Brian Kahn at Earther: The Central U.S. Is About to Get Hit with a Bomb Cyclone.

The country's midsection is about to be hit by a rare, potentially record setting bomb cyclone that will bring everything from rain to snow to hurricane-force winds and could leave severe flooding in its wake from Texas to Minnesota. So if you live in that area, listen up!

The mayhem is already beginning as moisture streams from the Pacific into the Southwest, where winter storm warnings are in effect as of Tuesday afternoon. Up to two feet of snow could fall in New Mexico's Sangre de Cristo Mountains, accompanied by winds whipping across ridge tops at speeds of up to 75 mph, according to the National Weather Service. That alone would be pretty wild, but it's only a precursor to Wednesday's weather mayhem.

As the storm pushes inland, its pressure — which drops as storms get stronger — is expected to dip into the range of 970 millibars. That's roughly on par with an average Category 2 Atlantic hurricane and could challenge the all-time low pressure record for Kansas. The drop will be driven by the storm's winds as they wrap around its core in a counter clockwise direction, bringing moist, warm air from the Gulf of Mexico in contact with cold air from the Upper Midwest and Canada.

The movement of the winds is called cyclonic, and pressure is expected to drop more than 24 millibars in 24 hours, which means this storm is shaping up to fulfill the criteria for a rare inland bomb cyclone. It could even take on a hurricane-like appearance.

Fucking hell!

What have you been reading that we need to resist today?

Open Wide...

Manafort Sentencing Underway

Last Friday, Paul Manafort was sentenced in the first of two sentencing hearings for various crimes of fraud and fuckery. Today is the second hearing, currently underway.

If you'd like to follow along, BuzzFeed's Zoe Tillman is doing a bang-up job live-tweeting it. Her thread begins here.

So far — and I hope you're sitting on your fainting couches — the hearing has been a fucking joke.

As I noted on Twitter, this hearing marks a new low in low bars for old white dudes. Manafort is supposed to be given credit for "accepting responsibility" by taking a plea deal to serve less time. Sure. He's supposed to be pitied for being in a wheelchair, despite the fact this is a nation who had a president that fought the Nazis from a wheelchair. Okay. His generosity would have been "admirable" if only he hadn't been a fucking traitor to earn his dough. COME ON. He should get credit that his work for Ukraine wasn't totally secret, because he was in contact with the State Department. Oh gee that's okay then!

You get the gist. Poor Paul Manafort. Boo-hoo.

Anyway. At some point, the sentence will be handed down. In the meantime, here's a place to talk about the hearing and how much Paul Manafort sucks. I'll update with the sentence once it's known.

UPDATE: Zoe Tillman tweets: "Paul Manafort has been sentenced to: Count 1: 60 months, with 30 months concurrent with EDVA sentence. Count 2: 13 months, to run consecutive to count 1 and the EDVA sentence."

To be clear, only half of the 60 month sentence on Count 1 will be served concurrent with his previous sentence. The other half, plus the 13 month sentence on Count 2 will be served consecutively. That means Manafort was just sentenced to an additional 43 months, on top of the 47 months to which he was sentenced last Friday. So, about 7.5 years in total.

Open Wide...

Manafort Sentenced

Just under 4 years, including time already served, and a $50,000 fine. What a fucking joke.

[Content Note: Video may autoplay at link] Under the blunt headline "A Shockingly Lenient Sentence for Paul Manafort," former federal and state prosecutor Elie Honig writes at CNN:

Judge T.S. Ellis sentenced former Trump campaign chair Paul Manafort to 47 months in prison on Thursday. Simply put, Judge Ellis's sentence is an injustice. It fails to adequately punish Manafort for committing a series of deliberate crimes over many years, and it sends terrible messages to the public about our criminal justice system.

...Today's sentence sends a corrosive two-pronged message to the American public. First, Manafort openly flouted the criminal justice system at every step and still got an enormous break. Following his arrest, Manafort got caught trying to tamper with witnesses, which caused Judge Amy Berman Jackson in Washington, D.C., to revoke his bail and send him to jail to await trial. He went to trial in the Eastern District of Virginia, where he denied culpability but was found guilty by a jury on eight counts. He then pleaded guilty to even more crimes and purported to try to cooperate with Mueller, but instead told more lies to Mueller and the FBI. Even today at sentencing, the judge found that Manafort did not accept responsibility.

Second, as Mueller noted in his sentencing memo, Manafort committed crimes repeatedly, deliberately, and over many years, stealing millions of dollars from the U.S. government to support his absurdly lavish lifestyle (everybody remembers the ostrich coat). Yet Manafort received about the same sentence that I've countless times seen given to a typical low-level, nonviolent, first time drug offender in the federal system.

Judge Ellis, in handing out this paltry sentence, made sure to announce that the sentence was not for crimes of collusion. (He also noted that Manafort has 'lived an otherwise blameless life' and 'has earned the admiration of a number of people.' Gross. Also: Incorrect.) And it's accurate that Manafort was being sentenced only on fraud charges in this case, but it's telling and troubling that the judge felt it was important to say.

Manafort will face another sentencing next week. Honig explains: "He could end up with a maximum sentence of ten years in that proceeding, which Judge Berman Jackson might choose to run concurrent to (at the same time as) or consecutive to (on top of) the 47 months sentence in Virginia."

To be honest, I'm less interested in the time to which Manafort was sentenced (as I am, to put it mildly, not a fan of incarcerating people) than I am interested in the fine. Ellis also ordered Manafort to pay $24.8 million in restitution, which he will almost certainly never pay, which is why the fine should have been heftier.

Also because that, too, sends a message. And a fine that would have been pocket change for Manafort while he was at the top of his corruption game is frankly not a message that communicates what he did wasn't worth it.

Open Wide...

We Resist: Day 768

The House Judiciary Committee believes it has evidence that [Donald] Trump asked then-Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker to put an ally in charge of an investigation into his former lawyer, Michael Cohen, The Wall Street Journal reports.

This follows a report from The New York Times that Trump made this request of Whitaker, asking him whether he could get attorney Geoffrey Berman to head the Southern District of New York's ongoing investigation, even though Berman is a Trump supporter who donated to his campaign and used to work with Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani. Berman had also previously recused himself from the probe, which has looked into Trump's inaugural committee and has led to charges against Cohen, who implicated Trump in a crime.

The Judiciary Committee is also reportedly examining whether Whitaker may have committed perjury when he told Congress, "At no time has the White House asked for nor have I provided any promises or commitments concerning the special counsel's investigation or any other investigation." The Washington Post's Aaron Blake points out that Whitaker also said no one from the White House contacted him to express "dissatisfaction" with the SDNY probe.

Dirty rotten lying liars. Fucking hell.

Zoe Tillman at BuzzFeed: Paul Manafort's Lawyers Argue for a Lighter Sentence, Saying He's the Victim of "Public Vilification". "Paul Manafort's lawyers made the case for leniency Monday night, arguing in a new sentencing memo that Manafort had been unfairly 'vilified' by special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation, and should get far less than the 10 years in prison he faces in one of his criminal cases. Manafort's lawyers did not advocate for a specific prison term in his DC case, asking that he receive a sentence 'substantially below' the maximum penalty. However, in highlighting the toll that pretrial incarceration had taken on Manafort's physical, emotional, and mental health, they noted that courts 'routinely' allow defendants 'who suffer from serious medical conditions' to serve no prison time at all."

What a novel argument! Manafort is hated because of his traitorous crimes and suffers ill health from having to face consequences for them, so he shouldn't have to go to prison. Okay, lol. "Your Honor, my client doesn't enjoy life as much as he did before he was caught!" Case closed.

My August 2018 oped on Manafort and Cohen: "Why did officials not react with appropriate alarm when two known criminal operatives took on major roles in a presidential campaign?"

This was not a rhetorical question; the public deserves an answer.https://t.co/ioyVsslq9F pic.twitter.com/13DOGdlf1Y
— Sarah Kendzior (@sarahkendzior) February 26, 2019

* * *

[Content Note: Nativism; carcerality; loss of wanted pregnancy] Scott Bixby at the Daily Beast: Migrant Woman's Pregnancy Ends in Stillbirth, in ICE Detention.

A 24-year-old Honduran woman held by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement at a Texas immigrant detention facility went into premature labor on Friday, delivering a stillborn baby boy four days after she was apprehended by Border Patrol agents, the agency said on Monday.

The woman, who was not named in the press release outlining the circumstances around the stillbirth, remains in ICE custody.

In a statement, ICE explained that the incident was not revealed to the public for three days because, for investigative and reporting purposes, "a stillbirth is not considered an in-custody death."

So, a fetus is considered a person when ICE wants to deny detained pregnant migrants access to abortion, but not when a fetus is stillborn. What a very fascinating calculation that tries to have it both ways, to pregnant migrants' detriment in either case.

Under ICE policy, pregnant women in their third trimester — which begins in the 27th week of pregnancy — are not supposed to be detained, "absent extraordinary circumstances."

ICE policy also dictates that Congress, non-governmental organizations, and the media be notified of detainee deaths within two business days.

But she was detained despite policy, and the death was not reported within two days, because of the very convenient refusal to classify a stillbirth as "an in-custody death."

This is horrific. The cruelty is breathtaking. Malice is, clearly and indisputably, the agenda.

* * *

David Nakamura and John Hudson at the Washington Post: In Hanoi, Kim Jong Un and a Culture Clash with the White House Press Corps. "As Kim's motorcade was barreling into Hanoi for the final leg of his nearly 70-hour journey from Pyongyang — which included a 65-hour train ride through China — authorities were scrambling behind the scenes to avert an all-out culture clash over the boundaries of free speech for a leader accustomed to an obedient state-controlled media. Kim was staying at the Melia hotel tower in the heart of the city, but the hotel also happened to have been booked by the White House as the filing center for the traveling press corps to cover the summit. Not long before Kim arrived, a notice was distributed to the press corps that the filing center would be moved to a separate site for the international press corps at the Cultural Friendship Palace." JFC. And that's the very least of the problems with this spectacle.

Joe Parkin Daniels at the Guardian: Univision's Jorge Ramos Detained in Venezuela After Maduro Interview, Network Says. "The Mexican-born journalist was interviewing Venezuela's embattled president, Nicolás Maduro, when he and his crew were detained after asking a question the combative Maduro did not approve of, according to a tweet by the network's U.S. president, Daniel Coronell. The team's equipment had also been confiscated, Coronell said. Coronell later said Ramos and his team had been released and he had spoken to the journalist. The equipment as well as the material that upset Maduro were confiscated. Reuters reported that Venezuela was going to deport the group. Ramos told Univision that the offending line of questioning came when he showed Maduro images taken on Ramos's phone of Venezuelans eating out of the trash to prove people were living a humanitarian crisis."

This is just unreal!
Putin spokesman Peskov’s daughter works in European Parliament as an intern and has access to many EU documents. Why?
She works for Chauprade, a French member of parliament, who supported Russia’s invasion of Crimea https://t.co/s0CpknTP8y
— Olga Lautman (@olgaNYC1211) February 25, 2019

Peter Walker and Heather Stewart at the Guardian: MPs Offered Vote on No-Deal Brexit and Possible Delay. "Theresa May has promised MPs the chance to reject a no-deal Brexit and possibly delay the departure date, while repeatedly declining to say whether or not she and the government would support such moves. In a significant first concession that Brexit could take place after 29 March, following months of insistence the deadline could not be shifted, May sought to appease restive Conservative backbenchers, but prompted concern from pro-Brexit MPs. In a sign of the continued uncertainty, the cross-party backers of a plan to be debated by MPs on Wednesday intended to prevent no deal said they would still table the amendment, pending further assurances from ministers." What a clusterfuck.

* * *

In good resistance news... [CN: LGBTQ hatred] Andy Towle at Towleroad: Daughter's Public Shaming Prompts Kansas GOP Lawmaker to Withdraw Support from Vile Anti-LGBTQ Bill.

Earlier this month we reported that Kansas GOP state Representatives Randy Garber, Owen Donohoe, David French, Cheryl Helmer, Ron Highland, Steve Huebert, and Bill Rhiley introduced a set of vile and hateful legislation.

The legislation seeks to ban same-sex marriage, legally deny the existence of transgender people, allow harmful and debunked gay conversion therapy, and much more. One of the bills describes sexual orientation as a "mythology," but that's just where the hate begins.

Highland this week withdrew his support from the bill after his daughter publicly shamed him in an open letter on Facebook.

Wrote Christel Highland on Facebook: "This has been a strange and difficult week indeed. My name is Christel Highland, and my Father, Representative Ron Highland of Wamego, KS was a co-sponsor of the legislation, bill HB2320, that will likely never make it to Governor Laura Kelly's desk for veto. As a proud member of Kansas City's LGBTQ+ community, a Mother, a Partner to the love of my life, an Artist active in my creative community, and a hard-working Businessperson, I am personally offended by the egregious nature of Kansas Representatives' proposed legislation, most notably, my father's."

...NBC News reported: "Following his daughter's public Facebook post about the controversial marriage bill, Ron Highland told local news outlets that he made a 'mistake.'"

Whoa. I regret that Christel Highland was obliged to write that letter, but what a remarkable act writing it was. You're damn right you made a mistake, Ron Highland. A BIG ONE.

[CN: Contagious disease] Amanda Michelle Gomez at ThinkProgress: What the Federal Government Can Actually Do About Anti-Vaxxers. "After virtually eliminating the extremely contagious virus in the United States at the turn of the century, measles are back thanks to anti-vaccination misinformation. More than 150 people, mostly children, in 10 states, have been infected by measles so far in 2019. These outbreaks are primarily linked to travelers from other countries, like the United Kingdom, who brought the measles into communities with low vaccination rates. The public health crisis is largely seen as a policy failure: lawmakers have made it too easy for parents to opt out of getting their kids vaccinated." No shit.

And finally: At Earther, Yessenia Funes has two articles about the very different ways two nations are addressing climate change as we barrel down the road to 2050.

The Marshall Islands Plans to Raise Its Land to Survive Rising Sea Levels: "The Republic of the Marshall Islands isn't going to allow the rising seas to wipe it off the map. Instead, the islands will attempt to rise above. Literally. President Hilda Heine announced a plan to elevate the country's islands in an interview with the Marshall Islands Journal Friday, reports RNZ Pacific. Sea level rise and erosion are set to make most island atolls uninhabitable by 2050, and small island nations have become increasingly vocal about this existential threat. They're also thinking about radical ways to adapt."

Costa Rica Lays Out Plan to Zero Out Carbon Emissions by 2050: "Time to pack my bags and move to Costa Rica. The tiny Central American country is setting an example with a plan to fully decarbonize by 2050. President Carlos Alvarado officially signed the decree to decarbonize by mid-century on Sunday. On Monday, he followed it up by announcing that the country would extend its moratorium on oil exploration to 2050, too. The government has been extending this since moratorium 2002, so hopefully, it'll continue the tradition after 2050 as well. In short? Costa Rica is doing what we all need to be doing."

What have you been reading that we need to resist today?

Open Wide...

We Resist: Day 764

A man allegedly caught researching acts of domestic terrorism and amassing more than a dozen firearms will spend at least two weeks in federal custody, a Maryland federal judge decided today.

U.S. Coast Guard Lt. Christopher Paul Hasson, 49, was arrested on charges of firearm and drug possession, but Judge Charles Day said that Hasson's internet search history, as well as previous letters and emails he had allegedly written, were enough to warrant him a danger to the community.

Speaking on behalf of the prosecution, Jennifer Sykes said that the gun and drug possession charges were "just the tip of the iceberg" in terms of the extent of Hasson's alleged crimes, indicating that they may attempt to charge him as a domestic terrorist allegedly planning to launch a major attack.

According to court documents filed Tuesday, Hasson was described as someone who had "espoused extremist views for years." In a draft email from June 2017 he allegedly wrote, "I am dreaming of a way to kill almost every last person on the earth. I think a plague would be most successful but how do I acquire the needed/ Spanish flu, botulism, anthrax not sure yet but will find something."

...The defendant also allegedly compiled a list of prominent Democratic lawmakers as well as journalists from CNN and MSNBC. Names on that list include presidential candidates Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Kamala Harris, as well as MSNBC host Joe Scarborough and CNN's Van Jones.

As I noted yesterday, this didn't happen in a vacuum. Donald Trump has been waging a campaign of stochastic terrorism, rhetorically putting targets on the backs of his "enemies" and hoping that shamelessly violent wrecks among his cultists will do the rest.

And he is hardly alone in this endeavor. Just in the last day:

Staff at Media Matters: Frequent Fox News Guest Tells Laura Ingraham "We Are in a Civil War"; Suggests Everyone Buy Guns to Prepare for "Total War". "We are in a civil war in this country. There's two standards of justice — one for Democrats one for Republicans. The press is all Democrat, all liberal, all progressive, all left — they hate Republicans; they hate Trump. So the suggestion that there's ever going to be civil discourse in this country for the foreseeable future in this country is over. It's not going to be. It's going to be total war. And as I say to my friends, I do two things: I vote and I buy guns."

Also on Fox News:

“The white supremacists are American citizens. The illegal immigrants are people who shouldn’t be here.” pic.twitter.com/OcL8QihQ4m
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) February 22, 2019

Conservatives, led by Trump, are amping up the violent and eliminationist rhetoric. And they are keeping silent on the men who take their words seriously enough to act on them. They're playing with fire, and they know it. Indeed, that is the entire point.

* * *

Sabrina Siddiqui at the Guardian: 'Even Nixon Wasn't Like Him': Trump's Bid to Upend Russia Inquiry Unprecedented, Experts Say. "From high-level firings to public misstatements, Trump's repeated steps to undermine the investigations that have clouded his two years in office paint a picture of a president who is his own worst enemy, legal experts say. 'It is quite clear from all the evidence that the president has had the intent to obstruct this investigation,' said Andy Wright, a former associate counsel to Barack Obama and the founding editor of the legal blog Just Security. 'It's been in plain sight. ...It's a fundamental abuse of power for the president to be trying to shut down an investigation in which he has a personal stake — both as a potential target himself and his political allies and family members,' he added."

Every whistleblower is being charged for exposing crimes that actually led to convictions yet Trump and his whole criminal Russian mafia cabal walks around free continuing to commit crimes https://t.co/X5dMTxewrA
— Olga Lautman (@olgaNYC1211) February 21, 2019

[CN: Threats] Joshua Eaton at ThinkProgress: Judge Lights into Roger Stone over Threatening Instagram Post, Issues New Gag Order. "The federal judge overseeing former Trump campaign aide Roger Stone's criminal trial barred him on Thursday from speaking publicly about the case or anyone involved with it, just days after he posted a photo on Instagram that appeared to show her next to rifle crosshairs. His previous gag order only prevented him from speaking to press in or around the courthouse, but didn't prevent him from making media appearances." JFC.

William K. Rashbaum at the New York Times: New York Prosecutors Expected to Charge Manafort, Guarding Against Trump Pardon. "The Manhattan district attorney's office is preparing state criminal charges against Paul J. Manafort, [Donald] Trump's former campaign chairman, in an effort to ensure he will still face prison time even if the president pardons him for his federal crimes, according to several people with knowledge of the matter. ...The president has broad power to issue pardons for federal crimes, but no such authority in state cases."

* * *

[CN: Sex crimes; possible sex abuse] Staff at the Daily Beast: New England Patriots Owner Robert Kraft Charged in Prostitution Sting. "Robert Kraft, owner of the New England Patriots, has been charged in a human trafficking and prostitution investigation. ...He is a close friend of [Donald] Trump, and frequent visitor to Trump's Florida estate Mar a Lago." Which is just down the road from the place where Kraft was allegedly videotaped "in a sex act at one of the spas." News is still breaking in this story, and it's not entirely clear as of this writing whether the sex workers were all trafficked young women, but there is a possibility they were, which would make this story far worse than a straightforward consensual sex act with a professional sex worker.

[CN: Sexual assault; rape culture]

Prosecutors — among them, Trump’s U.S. Labor Secretary Alexander Acosta — broke federal law when they signed a plea agreement with Jeffrey Epstein

🚨https://t.co/qWyDuZIqk6
— Leah McElrath (@leahmcelrath) February 21, 2019

Would very much like to know what "complication" caused the current Labor Secretary while a prosecutor to favor the sex trafficker of 13-to-16-year-old girls above and beyond the interests of the abused. https://t.co/JWc7W1dhGl
— Garance Franke-Ruta (@thegarance) February 22, 2019

One of the ugly facts laid bare in the Epstein plea deal is that many powerful people feel zero shame helping a billionaire who has molested girls as young as 14. Zero consequences. Crimes against kids happen not only because of the criminals but their support networks.
— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) February 22, 2019

* * *

Eliana Johnson at Politico: Trump Aides Worry He'll Get Outfoxed in North Korea Talks. "Donald Trump is eagerly anticipating his second summit with Kim Jong Un, touting his 'really meaningful' relationship with the North Korean strongman and insisting he's ready to give up his nuclear arsenal. In Washington, he's pretty much the only one who feels that way. Many, including several of the president's top advisers, are less excited. Some have expressed trepidation not only that the summit, scheduled to take place next week in Hanoi, may not yield big results. They worry, too, that Trump, eager to declare victory on the world stage, could make big concessions in exchange for empty promises of denuclearization." That's exactly what's going to happen, because that's the entire directive for the puppet whose master wants to destabilize the region.

Someone please make Mike Pence go on record about this. Does he agree with the head of the ticket he's on that there's no need to pledge not to use hacked/stolen materials against competitors? ATTACH HIS NAME TO THIS TRAITOROUS SHIT. https://t.co/uLotJyNqXg
— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) February 22, 2019

Relatedly:

Trump is a Russian asset who routinely violates the *constitution* and Biden's big idea is to have him sign a "no more Russian propaganda" pledge?! https://t.co/wglUEoWHV1
— Sarah Kendzior (@sarahkendzior) February 22, 2019

Come on, Biden.

And finally... To be honest, I don't entirely understand this story (and the State Department is working very hard to ensure that none of us do), but it seems very troubling to me. Jacqueline Charles, David Ovalle, and Jay Weaver at the Miami Herald: Americans Arrested in Haiti with Arsenal of Guns Won't Face U.S. Charges.

The five heavily armed Americans arrested in Haiti earlier this week are back on their home soil and won't be facing any criminal charges in the United States — a decision already causing outrage among some Haitian leaders.

Federal sources told the Miami Herald that the men will not be charged criminally, but are being debriefed. They told U.S. authorities they were on the island providing private security for a "businessman" doing work with the Haitian government.

The five American citizens, who returned on a commercial flight to Miami on Wednesday night and were met by U.S. law enforcement, did not have any scheduled appearances in Miami federal court.

The U.S. Attorney's Office referred calls to the State Department, which said only: "The return of the individuals to the U.S. was coordinated with the Haitian authorities."

What promises the U.S. government made to secure the release of the men remain murky.

Oh.

What have you been reading that we need to resist today?

Open Wide...

The Bezos Story Is Profoundly Troubling

[Content Note: Extortion; harassment; invasion of privacy.]

Late yesterday, Amazon and Washington Post magnate Jeff Bezos published a piece on Medium detailing an extortion attempt by AMI, the owner of the National Enquirer, which is helmed by David Pecker, a longtime friend of Donald Trump.

The gist of it is this: AMI threatened to publish Bezos' private texts with the woman he was dating (while still legally married to someone else), including intimate images, if he didn't kill an investigation into AMI's journalistic malfeasance and "make the specific false public statement to the press that we 'have no knowledge or basis for suggesting that AMI's coverage was politically motivated or influenced by political forces.'"

Instead of capitulating, Bezos fought back, and now he's making that fight public.

The entire scenario is troubling on so many levels, especially since AMI has tried to extort other journalists in the same way, including Ronan Farrow and a number of AP reporters.

Primarily of concern to me is how AMI came to acquire Bezos' private text messages in the first place. (Which is something his personal investigator has been working to uncover.)

The Philadelphia Inquirer's Will Bunch has some ideas about that, detailing them in a thread that begins with this tweet: "It came out of left field, but last night's bombshell developments seem to have exposed a tangled web involving the Saudis, MBS, their allies, Team Trump, global hacking rings, Khashoggi, the Washington Post, and Bezos that could take everything down."

AMI often gets ahold of compromising materials that it has effectively used to blackmail people for decades, and its usual play to secure those materials is money and lots of it. But that seems unlikely here. It seems more likely that these private texts were intercepted by a state actor who had an interest in silencing the Washington Post's investigations of AMI — and its pursuit of the truth about who was behind the murder of its columnist, Jamal Khashoggi.

Pecker has ties to Saudi Arabia, and, not long ago, AMI published "a slick, ad-free magazine" which was nearly 100 pages of favorable propaganda about Saudi Arabian Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, that was sold in U.S. supermarkets.

Just a few months later, Pecker was given immunity by Special Counsel Bob Mueller as part of the Michael Cohen investigation. And he's apparently used that immunity to keep committing crimes on behalf of Donald Trump and his Saudi allies.

Which is another troubling piece of this, at least to me. Pecker got immunity, and this is what he's doing with it. Yesterday, we also found out, care of Tom Winter at NBC News, that Paul Manafort "continued working for a political client in Ukraine into 2018, after he had already been indicted in Robert Mueller's probe," which he was able to do, of course, because he was not remanded, despite being a known national security risk.

Jared Kushner is still in the White House. Manafort is still working with Putin-allied clients. Pecker is still harassing and threatening "enemies" of the president, possibly with the assistance of Saudi Arabia. I increasingly find it difficult to believe that the Mueller investigation will accomplish anything at all besides giving Republicans all the time they need to fully consolidate power.

As Bezos said in his piece, if this is what they feel like they can do to someone with his wealth and influence, what are these sadistic crooks going to use their continued freedom to do to dissidents who have nothing with which to fight back but their own voices?

I'm very sorry Bezos was put in this position, and I am very grateful that he was willing to make public this heinous campaign against him. I hope it will matter.

Open Wide...

Thinking Out Loud About the Mueller Investigation

Three pieces of news first:

1. Yesterday, Special Counsel Bob Mueller told a judge that he's not ready to sentence former Trump campaign aide Rick Gates because Gates is still cooperating with "several ongoing investigations," and instead requested an update in two months.

2. Also yesterday, it was reported that Mueller has subpoenaed more associates of Roger Stone and Jerome Corsi.

3. Finally yesterday, ten Republican Senators broke with their party to align with Democrats on a procedural vote regarding legislation to protect sanctions against Putin-allied Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska.

Now, a few thoughts on each, in order:

1. Two months means that the breathless reports Mueller is on the verge of completing his investigation were, once again, premature.

2. There are a few people whose obvious criminality make them a sort of litmus test for me on how serious and effective Mueller's investigation is. I've previously expressed my consternation that Jared Kushner, for example, who repeatedly broke federal disclosure laws, still retains his highly influential position in the administration. Dirtbags Roger Stone and Jerome Corsi still facing no meaningful consequences is also troubling.

3. It's perplexing why a handful of Republican Senators suddenly decided to break ranks over Russia out of nowhere. It's not like they haven't known that Deripaska is a bad dude — and obviously Putin is way worse, and yet they've been protecting Trump on Russian collusion for two years.

Of course it's possible that ten Republican Senators spontaneously became courageous patriots overnight, but I don't find that to be likely.

Especially given the timing.

All at once, we have "breaking" news about Trump's fealty to the Kremlin which isn't actually breaking news at all; Mueller petitioning to extend his Russia investigation yet again; and Republicans suddenly deciding that the president being in cahoots with Russia is a bad thing. And we're days away from the point at which Mike Pence could assume the presidency and still be eligible to run for two more full terms.

I have long feared (and repeatedly expressed) that Mueller's investigation is effectively, if not intentionally, creating loads of time and space for Republicans to so thoroughly consolidate power that they won't have to care about his conclusions, even if those conclusions eventually recommend serious, meaningful consequences for Donald Trump and/or his various co-conspirators in 2016 election meddling and ongoing collusion with Russia.

(And indeed, during his confirmation hearing yesterday, Bill Barr testified that, if confirmed, he would not make Mueller's report public, but would write up his own report on the special counsel investigation.)

I have also long suspected that Pence is cooperating with Mueller, and that he recognizes assuming the presidency via succession is his best bet to achieve his lifelong ambition to be president.

I have additionally believed for some time that the Republicans were preparing to throw Trump under the bus as soon as we reached this point in his presidency, at which time Pence could be elevated. And, to my eyes, it looks like the pieces of that plan are falling into place.

Including, of course, Mueller's old friend Barr going through the confirmation process right now, too.

As I said on Monday: My sense is that they're using Trump to demolish Democratic norms (and stack the judiciary), then Pence will be able to exploit the "new normal" without any of the blame. Trump will be the Republicans' scapegoat forever, as they pretend to be restoring democracy while killing it.

I used to believe that Mueller's investigation was inadvertently giving Republicans' time to consolidate power and get their succession plan in order. Now I am inclined to believe that it was designed that way.

I was thinking about the special counsel investigation last night, again questioning my own instinct that it's not on the up-and-up, and instead I came up with a stronger feeling that the fix has been in from the very beginning.

Think about this: It was always kind of shocking that Jeff Sessions recused himself from overseeing the Russia investigation. An ethical move from someone who is hardly known for his ethics, or his professionalism. Why did he do that? That question has always bugged me. It was so out of character.

Then it hit me: Sessions must have had assurances, maybe from Mueller himself, about how this was going to go.

Even now, we've not heard a fucking peep about Sessions being investigated (just like Pence), even though Sessions was obliged to recuse himself for reasons that warrant investigation.

And the fact that Sessions did recuse himself, and a non-Trump appointee, Rod Rosenstein, then came to oversee the investigation, helped give it the illusion of credibility.

Then there's this: If someone didn't whisper something in Sessions' ear, he had no motivation to recuse himself. He viewed his role as Attorney General as protecting Trump. He petitioned for the position specifically so he could play that role. It doesn't make sense that he would then just abruptly offer to recuse himself.

Further, Sessions then spent the next year and a half being publicly (and presumably privately) berated by Trump over the recusal, by which Trump was utterly confused. Sessions never cleared up that confusion by satisfactorily explaining to Trump why he recused himself (because "ethics" was never going to make sense to the boss who'd hired him based on his promises to essentially eschew ethics). The most likely reason Sessions wouldn't have told Trump his reason is because it would have clued Trump in to a plan, by his own party, to remove him.

It's also telling that Sessions is laying low now. Dude has disappeared. He isn't on CNN; he isn't even on Fox News. He's just gone. He doesn't want anyone asking him questions about anything.

Anyway. This is where my head is at the moment, as I try to figure out what's happening and what's likely to happen next. As always, I hope I'm wrong. Although, at this point, I can't be wrong about all of it, because some of it has already happened: The Republicans have indeed consolidated power and stacked the judiciary in the time that Mueller has been investigating.

My major lingering question at the moment is this: Why have Mike Pence, who was hand-picked by Paul Manafort and oversaw the presidential transition during which many of these Russian contacts took place, and Jeff Sessions, who was obliged to recuse himself for Russian contacts he failed to disclose, not been reported as targets of the investigation? They are central figures. We need to know what their participation is, or isn't.

Open Wide...

We Resist: Day 721

REPORTER: If this is a national emergency, why haven't you delcared it?

TRUMP: "Because I would like to do the deal through Congress and because it makes sense to do it through Congress. But the easy route is for me call a national emergency and do it." pic.twitter.com/Hg9vuYO5Bw
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 10, 2019

Reporter (off-camera): Given how the meeting went yesterday, are you now going to decide to declare a national emergency? Is that you're only option left?

Trump (on-camera): I have the absolute right to declare a national emergency. The lawyers have so advised me. I'm not prepared to do that yet, but if I have to, I will. I have no doubt about it. I will. I have the absolute right to declare — this was passed by Congress, so when you say, "Was it passed by Congress?", it was. Other presidents have used it, some fairly often. I have the absolute right to declare a national emergency. I haven't done it yet. I may do it. If this doesn't work out, probably I will do it. I would almost say definitely.

[reporters shout questions]

Trump: This is a national emergency.

Reporter (off-camera): If this is a national emergency, why haven't you declared it?

Trump: Because I would like to do the deal through Congress, and because it makes sense to do it through Congress. But the easy route, for me, would have been: Call a national emergency and do it. And I will tell you: This is a tremendous crisis at the border. Look at President Obama's statements from the past; numerous statements where he calls it a crisis. This is a crisis. [Counts on his fingers] You have human trafficking; you have drugs; you have criminals coming in; you have gangs, MS-13, we're taking 'em out by the thousand and bringing 'em back! This is a crisis. And they don't come in at the checkpoint, which they do also, but they go in between the checkpoints, where you don't have any barriers.

He is such an ignorant, lying sack of shit. And of course there was lots more, the absolute nadir of which might have been this rambling mess:

BREAKING NEWS
Trump: During the campaign, I would say Mexico would pay for it, I NEVER SAID THIS and never meant they would write out a check. pic.twitter.com/wYCUhAzshp
— Scott McGrew (@ScottMcGrew) January 10, 2019

When, during the campaign, I would say, "Mexico's going to pay for it," obviously I never said this, and I never meant they're gonna write out a check.

JFC.

Speaking of the wall... Jacob Soboroff and Julia Ainsley at NBC News: Test of Steel Prototype for Border Wall Showed It Could Be Sawed Through. "Donald Trump has repeatedly advocated for a steel slat design for his border wall, which he described as 'absolutely critical to border security' in his Oval Office address to the nation Tuesday. But Department of Homeland Security testing of a steel slat prototype proved it could be cut through with a saw, according to a report by DHS. A photo exclusively obtained by NBC News shows the results of the test after experts from the Marine Corps were instructed to attempt to destroy the barriers with common tools."

image of steel bars with a giant hole sawed out

Yes, that is the actual image. For fuck's sake.
* * *

Katelyn Polantz and Evan Perez at CNN: Manafort Intended for Polling Data to Go to 2 Ukrainian Oligarchs Who Owed Him Millions. "Serhiy Lyovochkin and Rinat Akhmetov, two Ukrainian oligarchs who had paid Paul Manafort for years for his political work in their country, were the intended recipients of the American polling data that Manafort shared with Konstantin Kilimnik during the 2016 presidential campaign, a person familiar with the matter said on Wednesday." Gee, what could Ukrainian oligarchs with ties to Vladimir Putin want with U.S. polling data? I WONDER.

Christal Hayes at USA Today: Trump's Team Had over 100 Contacts with Russian-Linked Officials, According to Think Tank Analysis. "Members of [Donald] Trump's campaign and transition team had more than 100 contacts with Russian-linked officials, according to an analysis by the Center for American Progress think tank and its Moscow Project. CAP, a liberal think tank, used publicly available court documents and reporting to tally up the number of contacts with Russian-linked officials, which includes those with close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin and others tied to Russian intelligence, banks and politicians." Sounds about right.

Tarini Parti at BuzzFeed: Here's Trump Allies' Plan to Meddle in the 2020 Democratic Primary. "America First Policies and its affiliated super PAC have made significant investments in the opposition group America Rising, funding their efforts to dig into the top Democratic contenders — along with some second-tier candidates — and prep opposition research books on all of them, according to five sources involved or familiar with the plans. Those close to Trump say the work from America Rising will be used against Democrats in the primary to hammer candidates they think will be most challenging for Trump to beat, weakening the overall field and the eventual Democratic nominee."

* * *

[Content Note: Sexual harassment and assault] Alex Thompson at Politico: Top Bernie Sanders 2016 Adviser Accused of Forcibly Kissing Subordinate. "The woman did not formally report the incident at the time because the campaign was over. But over the past several months, Becker, who is not on Sanders' payroll, has been calling potential staffers and traveling to early primary states to prepare for another presidential run — activities that Sanders' top aides did not endorse, but did not disavow, either. Among those whom Becker contacted was the woman who says he assaulted her. The entreaty prompted her to step forward to tell senior Sanders advisers... 'There was lots of bros protecting bros, to the point that now there is a conversation among female alumni of not working on this campaign again,' said one former campaign staffer."

Frank Dale at ThinkProgress: Sen. Klobuchar Says William Barr Refused to Meet with Her 'Because of the Shutdown'.

William Barr, [Donald] Trump's pick for attorney general who has a history of echoing Trump's rhetoric, is scheduled for a Senate confirmation hearing on Tuesday.

Cabinet nominees typically meet with senators from both parties who will be part of their confirmation process.

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee that will oversee Barr's attempt to become attorney general for the second time, said on Wednesday that Democrats are being prevented from meeting with the nominee in advance of his confirmation hearing.

"I have always met with major cabinet members under both the Obama administration as well as the Trump administration," Klobuchar told MSNBC's All In with Chris Hayes. "I have met with the head of the Botanical Gardens — who's not on the cabinet, of course. I have met with the nominee for the Patent Office, Chris. But we can't have a meeting with the nominee for one of the most important cabinet positions while this Mueller investigation is going on before the hearing. And I just think that's wrong."

Especially since Barr somehow found the time yesterday to meet with Republican Senators Chuck Grassley, John Cornyn, Ted Cruz, Lindsey Graham, and Ben Sasse. Huh!

[CN: White supremacy] Staff at the Daily Beast: Rep. Steve King: How Did 'White Supremacist' Become an Offensive Term? "In a Thursday interview with The New York Times, Rep. Steve King (R-IA) decried the demonization of the term 'white supremacist,' and wondered why it had become deemed to be offensive in the first place. King first claimed that he supported immigrants who came to America legally and assimilated into the culture — because, he said, maintaining a white European 'culture of America' is more important than maintaining racial homogeneity. 'White nationalist, white supremacist, Western civilization — how did that language become offensive?' King added." This fucking guy.

[CN: Bullying] Clare Lombardo at NPR: Virginia Study Finds Increased School Bullying in Areas That Voted for Trump. "In the 2017 responses, Huang and Cornell found higher rates of bullying and certain types of teasing in areas where voters favored Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election. Seventh- and eighth-graders in areas that favored Trump reported bullying rates in spring 2017 that were 18 percent higher than students living in areas that went for Clinton. They were also 9 percent more likely to report that kids at their schools were teased because of their race or ethnicity. In the 2015 data, there were 'no meaningful differences' in those findings across communities, the researchers wrote."

(That's further evidence that Trump's campaign of stochastic terrorism is working, of course. These bullies are violently enacting the hatred that Trump transmits.)

[CN: Anti-choicery] Amanda Michelle Gomez at ThinkProgress: Trump's Rollback of Birth Control Mandate Could Go into Effect Next Week Unless Courts Block It. "The administration chipped away at the mandate by significantly broadening an employer's ability to seek an exemption and choose not provide employees contraceptive coverage. In November 2018, officials released finalized regulations (effective Jan. 14) that permit any employer and college or university with religious beliefs to object to the mandate. The regulations also allow any employer (except publicly traded corporations) to object because of moral convictions. Two multi-state lawsuits, led by California Attorney General Xavier Becerra and Pennsylvania Attorney General Josh Shapiro, are trying to block the regulations before residents reap the consequences." FINGERS CROSSED.

What have you been reading that we need to resist today?

Open Wide...

We Resist: Day 719

One of the difficulties in resisting the Trump administration, the Republican Congressional majority, and Republican state legislatures (plus the occasional non-Republican who obliges us to resist their nonsense, too, like we don't have enough to worry about) is keeping on top of the sheer number of horrors, indignities, and normalization of the aggressively abnormal that they unleash every single day.

So here is a daily thread for all of us to share all the things that are going on, thus crowdsourcing a daily compendium of the onslaught of conservative erosion of our rights and our very democracy.

Stay engaged. Stay vigilant. Resist.

* * *

Late yesterday and earlier today by me: No and No, Trump. and The Trump Regime Will Horrify You; I Hope My Typo Will Delight You and Democrats Will Present Rebuttal to Trump Tonight.

Here are some more things in the news today...

Devlin Barrett and Matt Zapotosky at the Washington Post: Russian Lawyer at Trump Tower Meeting Charged in Separate Case. "A Russian lawyer whose role at a 2016 meeting at Trump Tower has come under scrutiny from special counsel Robert S. Mueller III was charged Tuesday in a separate case with obstructing justice in a money-laundering investigation. Natalia Veselnitskaya became a central figure in the Mueller probe when it was revealed that in June 2016, she met with Donald Trump Jr., after an intermediary indicated she had dirt on Hillary Clinton. But the charges unsealed Tuesday say she made a 'misleading declaration' to the court in a civil case."

Meanwhile, BuzzFeed's Zoe Tillman reports on Twitter: "Paul Manafort's lawyers filed his submission due yesterday re: the allegations of a plea deal breach under seal, per spokesman Jason Maloni — 'Mr. Manafort's counsel filed their opposition yesterday under seal.'" She adds: "Recall that parts of the special counsel's filing re: what they say Manafort lied about after signing a plea deal were redacted, so it's not totally surprising that Manafort would seek to file under seal. We could see a redacted version later."

Also: Greg Stohr at Bloomberg: Supreme Court Receives New Filing in Apparent Mueller Case. "A new U.S. Supreme Court filing suggests the public may soon get more information about a mystery case believed to be tied to the criminal investigation being conducted by Special Counsel Robert Mueller. The filing stems from an appeals court ruling that upheld fines against a mystery company, owned by an unidentified foreign country, for failing to comply with a grand jury subpoena. The filing seeks permission to file an appeal of the ruling under seal. It also asks the Supreme Court to let a redacted version of the appeal be made public, according to the court's online docket."

Obviously, I don't know which company the filing regards, but I have a few ideas. It could be Prevezon, which is the company in the aforementioned civil case related to the charges brought against Natalia Veselnitskaya — although I'm not sure that's state-owned. I also think there's a good chance it could be Rosneft. My best guess, however, is that it's Vnesheconombank, because of the meeting Jared Kushner had with the chief of Vnesheconombank, Sergey N. Gorkov, at the urging of Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak, after Vnesheconombank was on the U.S. sanctions list. I've always wondered why that meeting never seemed to get any scrutiny, but maybe it has.

In more related news: Dan Mangan at CNBC: Blackwater Founder Erik Prince Says Mueller Asked About Meeting Russian Putin Pal in Seychelles. "Blackwater founder Erik Prince said Monday that he would have preferred getting a 'proctology exam' to being interviewed by special counsel Robert Mueller's team of investigators about his meeting with a Russian investor linked to Vladimir Putin. But the controversial security consultant told CNBC's Squawk Box that his previously reported sit-down with Mueller's team regarding that curious encounter in the Seychelles islands, which took place shortly before Donald Trump became president, was 'much ado about nothing.' Prince, whose sister Betsy DeVos is Trump's Education secretary, is a supporter of the president. 'I answered their questions, and they haven't talked to me since,' said Prince, a former Navy SEAL."

There's a lot of investigative news today which Donald Trump would surely likely to overshadow. More and more reason to fear a big announcement tonight.

And speaking of Trump's immigration lies... Salvador Hernandez at BuzzFeed: Trump Claimed Former Presidents Told Him They Should Have Built a Border Wall; All Four Living Presidents Say That's Not True. "Providing no evidence, Trump has claimed wide support for the wall and, on Friday, dragged his predecessors into the ongoing debate, claiming that past presidents had privately told him they should have built the wall during their administrations. 'This should have been done by all the presidents that preceded me, and they all know it,' Trump told reporters. 'Some of them have told me that we should have done it, so we're not playing games. We have to do it.' But representatives for all four living past presidents, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, and Barack Obama, have said this is not true."

* * *

Erdogan refuses to meet Bolton while his press secretary demands no delay in US withdrawal of troops from Syria https://t.co/A5VOpk3YFx
— Olga Lautman (@olgaNYC1211) January 8, 2019

Julian Borger at the Guardian: Trump Administration Downgrades EU's Status in U.S., without Informing Brussels. "The Trump administration has downgraded the diplomatic status of the EU mission in Washington, without informing the mission or Brussels, officials confirmed on Tuesday. The downgrade from nation state to international organisation status reverses an Obama administration decision in 2016 to grant the EU an enhanced diplomatic role in Washington, and is being seen in Brussels as a snub reflecting a general antipathy to the EU in the Trump administration. The president has supported Brexit and has described the EU as a 'foe.' The change, first reported by the German news agency Deutsche Welle, potentially means that the EU mission would have less clout and access to U.S. officials."

Lauren Hirsch at CNBC: Sears Plans to Shutter After 126 Years in Business as Chairman Eddie Lampert's Bid Fails. "Sears Holdings has rejected Chairman Eddie Lampert's bid to save the 126-year-old company, setting the storied retailer with more than 50,000 employees on a path to liquidation, people familiar with the situation told CNBC on Tuesday. Sears, which also owns Kmart, planned to announce its liquidation plans Tuesday morning, the people said. Lampert had put forward a $4.4 billion bid to save Sears by buying it out of bankruptcy through his hedge fund ESL Investments. His offer, though, was deemed insufficient by Sears' advisors, the people said."

Sears and Kmart (which Sears now owns) used to be some of those common community retailers with reliable employment, both for career service employees and for people who'd been laid off. Sears and Kmart saw through an awful lot of laid-off steelworkers in my community in the 1980s. Either probably would have made a good temporary gig for a number of federal workers during a shutdown, if the entire economy that supported Sears hadn't collapsed. Sob.

Emily Holden at the Guardian: Carbon Emissions up as Trump Agenda Rolls Back Climate Change Work. "A new analysis shows US greenhouse gas levels are increasing as the Trump administration unravels efforts to slow climate change. Carbon emissions rose sharply last year, increasing 3.4%, according to new estimates from the economic firm Rhodium Group. That year's jump in emissions is the biggest since the bounce back from the recession in 2010. It is the second largest gain in more than two decades. ...The Environmental Protection Agency chief, Andrew Wheeler, often trumpets declines in greenhouse gases, citing data showing that they fell 2.7% from 2016 to 2017. But the EPA is rescinding Obama-era climate work... 'The tailwinds of Obama administration policy are dissipating,' said Trevor Houser, a partner at [Rhodium Group]."

Charlie Pierce at Esquire: A Joe Biden 2020 Campaign Would Be the Most Divisive Thing for the Democratic Field. "Joe Biden has run for president twice before and he was a genuinely terrible candidate both times. He found his groove — and his half-ironic, half-campy fame — only as Barack Obama's sidekick. In a time in which Hillary Rodham Clinton is being told to disappear because she lost twice, the idea that important parts of the Democratic Party are thinking about nominating Biden is bound to be notable for its obvious hypocrisy. ...Moreover, Biden has a track record that puts him on the wrong side of every issue that currently energizes his political party." Yup.

What have you been reading that we need to resist today?

Open Wide...

We Resist: Day 854

We Resist: Day 783

Manafort Sentencing Underway

Manafort Sentenced

We Resist: Day 768

We Resist: Day 764

The Bezos Story Is Profoundly Troubling

Thinking Out Loud About the Mueller Investigation

We Resist: Day 721

We Resist: Day 719

Welcome to Shakesville

Search This Blog

Archives

Recent Comments

Donate

Twitter Updates

Credits and Stuff