Tag: neo-nazis

Week 136 in Trump

Posted on September 3, 2019 in Politics, Trump

Wages have decreased as union membership has decreased.

I hope you all had a happy Labor Day weekend! And I hope you were out celebrating all the benefits unions have given workers, like 40-hour workweeks and an 8-hour day; overtime pay; paid holidays and paid vacations; paid and unpaid leave (including military leave); a minimum wage; healthcare insurance; whistle-blower protections; an end to sweatshops; and safety regulations for the workplace. Before unions were gutted by things like right to work laws, they gave workers strong collective bargaining power so they weren’t at the whim of corporate executives. They also gave us higher wages, and one reason wages haven’t been rising lately is that unions don’t have the same power or membership they used to have. You can also see below that the drop in union membership corresponds with an increase in inequality.

Union membership compared with wealth inequality.

So if you see any of these benefits in your own job, thank the unions and don’t take advantage of them by not paying your union dues in right-to-work states.

Here’s what happened in politics for the week ending September 1…

Missing From Last Week:

  1. Last week I wrote, “The Amazon rainforest provides about 1/5 of the oxygen on the planet. So one out of every five breaths you take is thanks to the Amazon.” I have to retract that. Scientists don’t know where that 1/5 number came from and say it’s closer to 6%.
  2. Italy’s prime minister resigned, avoiding a no confidence vote from the far right.
  3. ICE made it easier to deport crime victims waiting for their U visa, which is a special category for victims who cooperate with law enforcement. Previously, ICE had to request a preliminary judgement from U.S. Customs and Immigrations Services. Now, ICE officers can make the preliminary determination themselves.

Shootings This Week:

  1. Here are the week‘s mass shootings (defined as killing or injuring four or more people). There were so many this week (FOURTEEN), I combined some:
    • Baltimore, MD: A drive-by shooter kills one person and injures three more. Another shooter kills one person and injures three more in a dispute at a residence. Yet another shooter injures four people in a domestic dispute in nearby Frederick. And yet another shooter injures four men, with very few details known about this one.
    • Alabama: A teenage shooter injures 10 teenagers at a football game in Mobile. A shooter injures seven people at Fairfax Kindergarten in Valley during a party and over a fight about something that happened at a football game. Also, I can’t tell if this is a real kindergarten or just the name of an event space.
    • Odessa and Midland, TX: A man shoots a police officer during a traffic stop and goes on a random shooting spree that kills eight people and injures 22 others. Police shoot and kill him in a theater parking lot.
    • South Carolina: Four people are injured in a shooting at a bar.
    • North Carolina: A shooter kills one person and injures three more near student housing at UNCC. Another shooter wounds four people outside a fraternal organization (the Moose Lodge).
    • Philadelphia, PA: A shooter kills two people and injures two others.
    • Chicago, IL: A shooter kills two people and injures three more. They were on the patio of a private home.
    • Hartford, CT: A shooter injures four men. The details aren’t known.
    • Toledo, OH: A shooter injures four people. The details aren’t known. 

  1. Police arrest a 19-year-old at a North Carolina university for threatening mass violence and for possessing guns in his dorm room.
  2. Since the shootings in El Paso and Dayton, over two dozen people have been arrested over threats to commit mass violence.
  3. Even as Texas Governor Greg Abbott addresses the Odessa shooting saying that words are inadequate and there must be action, a series of laws go into effect in Texas that make it easier to store, bring, and carry weapons to both private and public places, including school campuses and churches. Abbott also says that the status quo is unacceptable.
  4. The FBI says active shooter events are increasing, and that we’re seeing them about every other week right now. They also say people need to report changes in behavior to the authorities, especially when someone becomes darker, more violent, or appears to be distressed.

Russia:

  1. Following Russia’s blown (no pun intended) nuclear-propelled missile test, they set their first floating nuclear-power reactor afloat. This ship set off from a northwestern port city and is headed east, where it will power a region around Pevek (near Alaska).
  2. A bipartisan congressional delegation is planning a trip to Russia, but Russia denies visas to members of congress who’ve been critical of Russia. This includes Democrats and Republicans alike.
  3. Current and former intelligence experts criticize Trump’s defense of Putin and Russia at the G7 Summit. They’re so shocked by the fervency of his defense, they’re once again questioning whether Trump is a Russian asset.

Legal Fallout:

  1. The House Judiciary Committee subpoenas Rob Porter, a former administration aide, about his involvement in Trump’s attempts to obstruct justice.
  2. The DOJ inspector general releases the results of his investigation into James Comey. The IG finds that Comey broke FBI protocol in handling sensitive information, but the IG doesn’t find that Comey or his friends leaked any classified information. The main criticism is that he took his contemporaneous memos home with him.
    • Note that this report doesn’t address the actual FBI investigations into Hillary Clinton or Trump.
    • The DOJ decides not to prosecute, because there’s no finding he broke the law. What he did might have been unethical, but it wasn’t illegal.
    • You can read the report here.
  1. A federal judge dismisses the lawsuit again Jeffrey Epstein following his death by apparent suicide. Sixteen women testified during the hearing, saying that now they’ll never get justice. Several victims file civil suits against Epstein’s large estate.
  2. Deutsche Bank says it has some of the tax return information being sought by the House Financial and House Intelligence Committees. We’re not sure if they are Trump’s returns specifically or if they belong to another entity under subpoena.
  3. MSNBC’s Lawerence O’Donnell does a piece on how Russian oligarchs had co-signed Trump’s loans from Deutsche Bank, which he retracts the next day after Trump’s attorney threatens a lawsuit. He doesn’t retract because the story is found to be incorrect, but it was insufficiently sourced. So we’ll see what comes of that.

Courts/Justice:

  1. The Trump administration asks the Supreme Court to lift an injunction against their rule requiring asylum seekers who pass through a third country on their way here to seek asylum in that country.
  2. Trump has requested special consideration from the Supreme Court 21 times in his first 2-1/2 years, compared to Bush and Obama requesting it a total of eight times over 16 years.

Healthcare:

  1. A court rules that Johnson & Johnson has to pay $572 million for its part in Oklahoma’s opioid epidemic.
    • Last spring, Purdue Pharma settled a suit with Oklahoma and agreed to pay $270 million.
    • Purdue Pharma is in negotiations to settle the many lawsuits against them. Reports say the payout could be between $10 billion and $12 billion.
  1. A judge in Missouri blocks their new law that would ban abortions after eight weeks of pregnancy.
  2. 58 immigration detention facilities in 19 states have reported mumps outbreaks over the past year. 898 adult migrants and 22 staff have been sickened, and more migrants are being infected as they are transferred between facilities.

International:

  1. While French President Emmanuel Macron was trying to arrange a meeting between Trump and Iran’s foreign minister, Benjamin Netanyahu and his team were scrambling to reach Trump and prevent that meeting. The Israeli government expresses concern about new negotiations between Iran and the U.S.
  2. At the same time Rudy Giuliani is pressuring Ukraine to investigate Trump’s political foes (Biden and Clinton), the Trump administration delays paying the promised $250 million in military aid to Ukraine.
  3. Trump tweets a satellite image of the aftermath of a space launch explosion in Iran, which analysts immediately speculate came from a classified satellite or drone.
  4. Hong Kong’s ongoing protests erupt in violence once more. Protestors start fires and throw petrol bombs at police. The police, in turn, use tear gas and water canons containing dyed water (so they can identify protestors).

Legislation/Congress:

In case you’re wondering why this section has been empty, Congress has been on summer recess.

Border Wall/Shutdown/National Emergency:

  1. Even though Trump says the wall is already being built and that some of it is done, none is done and the administration won’t say when they’ll start. Over 60 miles of existing fence have been fixed or replaced.
  2. Officials involved with the wall project say that Trump wants the wall done, he wants officials to take the land (from the people, organizations, and tribes that own it), ignore environmental regulations, and fast-track any approvals to start construction. And he’ll pardon any officials who break the law to get it done.
  3. With hurricane season upon us and the first hurricane expected to make landfall currently at a Category 5 level, DHS transfers $271 million from FEMA to the border. FEMA says as long as we don’t have any new catastrophic events, they’ll have enough money to operate.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

  1. 19 states plus DC sue the Trump administration to block their new rule overturning the Flores Agreement. The new rule would allow Trump to detain immigrant children indefinitely.
  2. The Trump administration starts denying special protections to immigrant families who receive life saving medical care here in the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services sends out letters saying they’re not considering requests for medical relief and that people here under those protections have 33 days to leave the U.S.
    • Turns out they transferred that responsibility to ICE, though this was never announced and was not included in the letters. ICE says they don’t know anything about it, nor do they have the resources to handle the change.
    • Many of those affected are kids with diseases like cancer, cystic fibrosis, HIV, cerebral palsy, muscular dystrophy, and epilepsy.
  1. New video surfaces of Quillette editor Andrew Ngo with the group Patriot Prayer planning attacks against a group of antifa who were gathered at a bar after a protest. Ngo does a lot of reporting on antifa, but he failed to report on the planned attack by Patriot Prayer.
    • If you remember, Ngo published video of his wounds after he was attacked by antifa members earlier this year, but failed to provide information about what led up to the attack.
    • Ngo leaves Quillette after the latest video is released, which Quillette says is just coincidence.
  1. The Trump administration announces that some children born to our troops and diplomats abroad will no longer be automatically considered U.S. citizens.
    • For some, this just requires that they apply for citizenship by a certain age. But there are already people who forget this requirement when they adopt children from abroad, which has resulted in deportation of adopted kids when they become adults. I don’t see this working out much better.
    • This rule seems to be designed for others, though; service members who aren’t themselves yet citizens. Their children will have a harder time getting citizenship.
    • Ken Cuccinelli says this doesn’t change who is born a U.S. citizen, but then he’s also the guy who said the poem at the bottom of the Statue of Liberty only welcomed immigrants who can stand on their own two feet.
  1. Right-wing hate groups are using video games to recruit youngsters into their ranks. 97% of teen boys play video games, and 83% of teen girls do. The associated chatrooms are a perfect recruitment tool, and it’s where white supremacists befriend the kids and subtly manipulate them into scapegoating their minority peers.
    • Chat logs from the online game Discord show that much of the far-right’s Unite The Right rally in Charlottesville was planned there.
  1. The Trump administration wants to run DNA tests on detained undocumented immigrants.
  2. The Cherokee Nation says they’ll appoint a delegate to the House of Representatives. They’ve never done this before, even though a 200-year-old treaty says they can. It’s not clear if that Representative would actually have a vote in the House.
  3. Migrant girls held in detention are given only limited access to basic needs like sanitary pads and tampons, in some cases given only one tampon per day. Toxic Shock Syndrome anyone?

Climate:

  1. Trump says that U.S. wealth is more important than saving the planet from climate change. Not in so many words, but he did say he prioritizes our wealth over climate “dreams” and “windmills.” But we knew this already. It’s the only reason to prioritize dirty energy over clean energy.
  2. Because Jakarta is sinking into the sea, Indonesia announces they’ll build a new capital city in another location at a cost of $34 billion.
  3. Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro demands an apology from French President Emmanuel Macron before he’ll accept the $20 million in international assistance to help fight Amazon rainforest fires. Someone needs to put on their big-boy pants.
  4. While climate change is seen to be exacerbating wildfires in Arctic areas like Siberia and Alaska, those fires, along with those intentionally set in the Amazon and Indonesia, are also exacerbating climate change. A vicious cycle.
    • This is especially true with the increase in Arctic fires, which burn peat; peat releases more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than trees.
  1. The latest models coming out of the climate science community are alarming. They show much greater rates of temperature increase than had been previously thought, with the high range increasing from 4.5°C to 5.8°C. The latest reports say we still have the capability to limit the rise to 1.5°C, which is driving climate change scientists crazy. They’re having a hard time dealing with the general public’s inability to grasp how serious this is, and are experiencing stress and and even grief over it.
  2. Hurricane Dorian increases to a Category 5 and stalls out over the Bahamas. Five people are dead that we know of so far. Models predict Dorian will skim the east coast of Florida before hitting Georgia and North Carolina.
    • Trump says he doesn’t think he’s even heard of a Category 5 hurricane, even though three have hit U.S. land since he took office. No surprise, though. In the weeks between Hurricane Irma and Maria (both Cat 5s), he said he never knew Cat 5s existed.
  1. The EPA proposes a plan to completely eliminate requirements that oil and gas companies install tools to find and fix methane leaks in their wells, pipelines, and storage facilities. Even fossil fuel giants have come out against this plan, partly because this isn’t an expensive fix for an existential problem (costing just 0.01% of their annual revenue) and partly because they’re afraid it will cause some sort of disaster if methane is left unchecked by smaller companies.
  2. Trump tells Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue to exempt Alaska’s Tongass National Forest from logging restrictions. The Tongass is the world’s largest intact temperate rainforest. This exemption would open it up to logging, drilling, and mining, and would violate Clinton’s roadless rule barring the construction of roads in certain parts of our national forests.

Budget/Economy:

  1. A number of farmers interviewed express frustration with Trump’s trade war and tariffs, and are concerned that it will take decades to rebuild those business relationships. Or they’ll just have to develop relationships with new buyers. At any rate, support for Trump is still pretty high among farmers.
  2. Farm bankruptcies have risen 13% so far this year, and more farmers are delinquent on their loans.
  3. Trump says trade negotiations with China have restarted, but doesn’t give any details.
  4. Trump’s aides later say he lied about trade talks with China in order to boost the markets.
  5. While central bank policies have been guiding the global economy, Fed Chair Jerome Powell says that there are no precedents to guide a policy response should we see a recession in our current situation. Interest rates are already low, and government spending doesn’t seem to be boosting the economy.
  6. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin proposes selling bonds that mature in 50 to 100 years.
  7. Trump reverses his earlier stance on freezing federal employees’ wages and sends a letter endorsing a 2.6% raise across the board.
    • This sounds great, but on further reading, it turns out if he didn’t send that letter, employees would’ve received the 2.6% raise plus cost-of-living increases based on where they work.
  1. More Americans see the economy in decline (37%) than see it improving (31%). In this environment, your guess is as good as mine as to which way it’ll go.
  2. Trump’s latest round of tariffs against Chinese goods go into effect. Tariffs on popular holiday items are still delayed, but this round of tariffs will increase the cost of some apparel, food products, American flags, tea, sporting goods, shoes, and so on.
  3. The tariffs haven’t seemed to dampen consumer spending, but business spending is in a slump.
  4. A group of laid-off miners in Kentucky are blocking a train loaded with coal from going to market in protest of the bankruptcy laws that allowed their company not to pay their final salary obligations.
    • After their company declared bankruptcy, paychecks bounced and some that had been deposited in workers’ accounts were pulled back out (leaving some with overdrafts in their accounts because they were already spending their own money).

Elections:

  1. After losing their vice chairman, the FEC is close to shutting down, putting the fight against election interference on the back burner. They’re down to three members, and no longer have enough commissioners to legally meet.
  2. DHS plans to start a program to protect voter registration databases and election systems from the types of ransomware attacks that have been hitting cities and towns around the country. Finally there’s some action against election interference.

Miscellaneous:

  1. Color me shocked. There’s a network of conservatives trying to discredit news organizations that Trump doesn’t like by smearing journalists from those outlets. They’ve already released info on journalists from CNN, The Washington Post, and The New York Times. The group plans to ramp up the smear campaign in 2020 in support of Trump’s re-election campaign.
    • The network is compiling social media posts going back at least a decade.
    • Their efforts include the families of journalists, political activists, and other political opponents of Trump.
  1. Trump finally goes after Fox News (it had to happen — he turns on everyone eventually). He says Fox News “isn’t working for us anymore.” What’s that mean? The news isn’t supposed to be working for any part of government. Anyway, he accuses the network of heavily promoting the Democrats, and tells followers to find another news outlet.
  2. After passing a law reducing penalties for marijuana possession, New York plans to expunge thousands of marijuana convictions.
  3. Trump’s personal assistant spills the Trump family tea during an off-the-record dinner with reporters, and ends up getting fired. Apparently, drinks were involved.
  4. Trump formally establishes the U.S. Space Command. This is different from his Space Force, which is still waiting on congressional approval.
  5. Trump cancels his trip to Poland in order to monitor Hurricane Dorian, but then he heads to his Virginia golf course where he tweets and golfs over the long weekend.
  6. As Puerto Rico readies itself for Hurricane Dorian, Trump calls the territory corrupt and San Juan’s mayor incompetent. OTH, Trump says he’s the best thing to happen to Puerto Rico. Trump says Congress approved $92 billion after Hurricane Maria, but it was actually $42 billion. And not much of that has been spent so far.
  7. Former Secretary of Defense James Mattis has been on a book tour, and says he had no choice but to leave after Trump said he’d withdraw troops from Syria. Mattis indirectly criticizes Trump, but doesn’t address specific complaints directly.

Week 30 in Trump

Posted on August 21, 2017 in Politics, Trump

A few quotes apropos of this past week’s events:

From Robert E. Lee himself: “I think it wiser not to keep open the sores of war but to follow the examples of those nations who endeavored to obliterate the marks of civil strife, to commit to oblivion the feelings engendered.”

From one of my favorite bloggers: “We all have the right to protest, but not all protests are right.”

From the University of Texas at Austin: “We do not choose our history, but we choose what we honor and celebrate on our campus.”

And just my opinion here, but we’ve seen a lot of strong intellectuals, scientists, and business leaders jumping Trump’s ship—and there are calls for Gary Cohn to step down and save his reputation. But we need brains and leadership to help guide this careening ship, so I hope he stays, along with other thoughtful, smart people.

Here’s what happened in week 30…

Russia:

  1. One of the veteran FBI investigators working on the Russia probe, Peter Strzok, moves into a human resources position. We don’t know if it was voluntary or not.
  2. Internal Trump campaign emails show that one of Trump’s campaign advisers, George Papadopoulos, tried several times to set up meetings between the campaign and Russian leaders during the run-up to last year’s election.
  3. Mueller wants to talk to Reince Preibus in the Russia probe.

Courts/Justice:

  1. We learn that Jeff Sessions requested info on 1.3 million visitors to an anti-Trump organizing site. It looks like this is part of the investigation into the antifa violence on inauguration day. The host company is pushing back against the request saying that it’s too broad and captures too much information.
  2. Judge Gorsuch raises ethics questions when he agrees to speak at an event being held at the Trump Hotel, which is under litigation around conflicts of interest.
  3. Sessions once again criticizes Chicago, the right’s poster child for the unproven narrative of failed liberal policies leading to violence. He says their sanctuary policies are what’s driving violent crime there.

Healthcare:

  1. The Trump administration continues its effort to roll back Obama’s anti-arbitration regulations. At question are patients’ rights to sue healthcare companies, including nursing homes, for harm caused. Most healthcare institutions have anti-arbitration clauses that you must sign before receiving services or moving into a nursing home. This gives consumers little to fall back on when they are mistreated, and especially affects eldercare in nursing homes.
  2. The CBO reports that cutting the ACA subsidies would not only increase insurance premiums, but would also increase the cost to the federal government. Trump agrees to continue paying the subsidies. But did he do it in time to mitigate the expected increase in next year’s premiums?
  3. Tom Price ends an experiment to see if bundling payments for certain procedures, like hip surgeries, would lower overall costs. Under the program, healthcare facilities were required to charge the same price across the board for the same procedures. I guess we won’t find out if it would have worked.

International:

  1. North Korea backs down from its threats to bomb Guam, but says the U.S. is still on notice.
  2. American intelligence agencies link North Korea’s success in their missile tests with an old Ukrainian factory with ties to Russia’s cold-war missile program.
  3. Iran threatens to drop out of the nuclear deal if any new sanctions are put in place against them. This would let them get back to work on nuclear weapons, so this is not something we want.
  4. Not political, but definitely newsworthy and not getting enough coverage: At least 200 people die in a massive mudslide in Sierra Leone, and hundreds are missing. At least 3,000 people lose their homes.
  5. There are multiple terrorist attacks in Spain, with a vehicular attack on a main tourist pedestrian street in Barcelona and a bomb that accidentally exploded in the terrorists home. There are 15 dead, including several perpetrators.
  6. Trump reacts more swiftly and harshly against the terrorist attacks in Barcelona than the one in Charlottesville.
  7. After that measured response, Trump also tweets a debunked rumor about General Pershing shooting Muslims with bullets soaked in pig’s blood. Seriously people. This never happened.
  8. Pence cuts his South American trip short to meet with Trump about the war on Afghanistan.
  9. A terrorist wielding a knife kills two and injures eight in Finland. This is a bad week for terrorism.
  10. The U.S. starts a trade investigation into China’s trade violations around intellectual property. This presents risks at time when hostility with North Korea is building up and we could use China’s help. But China has ignored our intellectual property laws for decades, cutting into the profits of U.S. companies.
  11. Trump moves the cyber command unit of the military up so it will be better able to improve its capabilities to fight cyber attacks.
  12. Again? Another U.S. Navy destroyer collides with a ship—this time an oil tanker—off the coast of Singapore. Ten people are missing. This puts us down three destroyers so far. The Navy opens a broad investigation into the accidents.

Travel Ban/Immigration/Discrimination:

Charlottesville Fallout:

  1. Days after the Charlottesville attack, Trump retweets a GIF of a train hitting CNN (a person with a CNN logo). He later deletes the tweet.
  2. The University of Virginia holds a candlelight vigil for Heather Heyer, who was killed in the car attack. They didn’t want to put it on social media because they were afraid neo-nazis would show up.
  3. Two days after his statement blaming ″both sides″ in the Charlottesville violence, Trump reads a written statement denouncing white supremacist groups specifically by name.
  4. And then on Tuesday, he screws up any goodwill he might have gotten by doubling down on his words from Saturday and arguing with reporters for several minutes about how both sides are equally to blame and equally as bad. This was an unplanned Q&A at the end of a press conference on infrastructure, and Trump sounded very angry, defensive, and frustrated.
  5. Trump later says he feels liberated by his off the rails press conference.
  6. News hosts covering the press conference show their stunned reactions in real-time. All of them, from CNN to Fox to local news channels, are shaken by what they just saw.
  7. Even Trump’s staffers say they’re “stunned and disheartened” by Trump’s remarks.
  8. This is a tactic Trump has used before—delay denouncing members of his base for 48 hours or so, and then say something to dampen the media frenzy caused by his lack of calling out the bad apples.
  9. Here are a few of the responses across the country to the violence and Trump’s handling of it:
    • The Illinois Senate passes a resolution to have police classify neo-nazi groups as terrorist organizations.
    • Cities accelerate the pace of removing Confederate statues. Unfortunately, some city councils have voted to have the statues destroyed instead of maintained in a museum or other facility.
    • Foreign leaders denounce Trump’s response to Charlottesville.
    • So many CEOs pull out of Trump’s business councils that he disbands them.
    • The CEO of Walmart criticizes Trump’s response in a memo to his employees.
    • GoDaddy, Google, and Squarespace kick white supremacist sites off their servers.
    • Republicans are forced to step up and take a stand against racist hate groups.
    • So far, at least 16 charities have pulled their events from Mar-a-Lago.
    • One pastor resigns from Trump’s Evangelical Advisory Board, saying they have conflicting values after Charlottesville.
    • All 16 commissioners on the Committee on the Arts and the Humanities resign in a scathing letter (where they also spell out ″RESIST″ in the first letter of each paragraph).
    • James Murdoch, son of Rupert and CEO of 21st Century Fox, writes a letter condemning white hate groups and pledging to donate $1 million to the Anti-Defamation League.
    • A group of Liberty University alumni return their diplomas in protest of university president Jerry Fallwell’s defense of Trump’s comments on Charlottesville.
    • House Democrats introduce a measure to censure Trump over his comments on Charlottesville.
  10. Trump says that the counter protests were illegal because they didn’t have permits. They did have permits.
  11. The White House issues a memo urging GOP members to back Trump’s original remarks on Charlottesville.
  12. Obama’s response to the Charlottesville tragedy becomes the most liked and (so far) 4th most retweeted tweet in history.
  13. Both former presidents Bush 1 and 2 denounce racism and bigotry. Paul Ryan calls white supremacy “repulsive.” Mitch McConnell says those ideologies are not welcome here. Mitt Romney pens an eloquent and scathing letter denouncing both racist hate groups and Trump’s response.
  14. The four branches of military, the Navy, Marines, Army, Air Force, and National Guard, felt the need to denounce racism after Trump’s remarks.

Everything Else:

  1. Two weeks later, we’re still waiting for Trump to denounce the bombing of a mosque in Minnesota.
  2. John Dowd, Trump’s lead lawyer on the Russia investigation, sends a bizarre email to conservative journalists saying that there’s basically no difference between George Washington and General Robert E. Lee. If I have to explain the difference to you, you need to go back to school.
  3. Dowd’s email also says that Black Lives Matter has been totally infiltrated by terrorist groups.
  4. Someone vandalizes the Lincoln Memorial, spraying painting “Fuck law” in red paint.
  5. Alt-right leaders start dealing with the fact that police and authorities in Virginia didn’t back them up last weekend. They’re having to come to terms with the realities of being members of an unpopular minority group.
  6. White supremacists have a bizarre affection for Russia:
    • From Richard Spencer: “Russia is the sole white power in the world.”
    • From David Duke: “Russia is key to white survival.”
  7. Trump’s Thursday tweet storm shows a lack of understanding about American culture and the meaning behind Confederate monuments. In this tweet storm, he:
    • Attacks two sitting GOP senators.
    • Goes after the fake news media (again).
    • Says he’s sad that we’re removing our beautiful statues. Side note: Most of these statues were erected during the Jim Crow and civil rights eras as a reminder of white supremacy.
    • Wonders if we’ll pull down all the Jefferson monuments.
    • Says we’re ripping apart our culture.
  8. According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, there are around 900 hate groups in the U.S. Their list is controversial because they include anti-LGBTQ Christian groups, but sorry folks, hate is hate is hate. Here’s their reasoning, if you’re interested.
  9. The ACLU says they will no longer defend the right to free speech if the group in question is armed with guns. The ACLU originally defended the alt-right’s right to march in Charlottesville. Some feel that hate speech or intent to promote violence should play into whether they defend someone, but up until now, they have defended the 1st amendment without question.
  10. The Charlottesville incident raises new concerns about pending legislation in six states to protect drivers who hit protesters with your car.
  11. People organize marches across the country in support of Charlottesville.
  12. There are also rallies across the country calling for the removal of Confederate monuments, plus a few to keep the statues up.
  13. Several ″free speech″ March on Google rallies are scheduled across the country, with counter protests also planned. Organizers cancel the March on Google rallies, citing fears of violence; but the counter protests go on. Actually it looks like the March on Google rallies didn’t spark much interest.
  14. A free speech rally in Boston draws tens of thousands of counter protesters amid suspicion that it was actually a white supremacist rally. Police arrest 27 people, mostly for disorderly conduct, but nobody is injured.
  15. While organizers claim the free speech rally isn’t a white supremacist rally, several speakers either pull out or are uninvited after the events in Charlottesville. At least two of them are known white supremacists.
  16. During the Boston marches, Trump tweets “Looks like many anti-police agitators in Boston. Police are looking tough and smart! Thank you.” It was easier for him to call out peaceful protesters who didn’t kill or injure anyone than to call out the white hate groups that did.
  17. In contrast, Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh said, “I think it’s clear today that Boston stood for peace and love, not bigotry and hate.”
  18. And then later, someone must’ve taken over Trump’s account because he tweeted “I want to applaud the many protestors in Boston who are speaking out against bigotry and hate. Our country will soon come together as one!”
  19. Fox News tweets that thousands turn out for the free speech rally in Boston. In reality, tens of thousands turn out to protest the rally due to the white supremacist speakers scheduled. The number of rally attendees was fewer than 100.
  20. Of note, the protesters aren’t protesting free speech, but rather the white supremacists who organized the free speech rallies. The rallies were organized under the guise of protecting the free speech of the Google employee who was fired after his screed on gender in tech. Since he’s not being prosecuted, this is not a free speech issue.
  21. The University of Texas at Austin begins removal of Confederate statues in the middle of the night.
  22. As of August, Trump has a mixed record on immigration and border control. We have fewer Border Patrol officers than when he started, and if the current pace keeps up, 10,000 fewer undocumented immigrants will be deported this year. Illegal border crossings are down though. Side note: We just got back from Mexico, and the border area is really beautiful and rugged. The fence is already a blight and I think building a massive wall would just be a shame.
  23. A nazi rally in Berlin brings 500 nazis and 1,000 protestors.
  24. Some NYPD officers hold a rally in support of Colin Kaepernick. Frank Serpico attends. Yes, that Frank Serpico.
  25. In a May report,“White Supremacist Extremism Poses Persistent Threat of Lethal Violence,” the FBI and DHS warned Trump about white hate groups. The report says these groups “likely will continue to pose a threat of lethal violence over the next year,” and that they carried out more attacks than any other domestic extremist group in the past 16 years.
  26. Trans-surgical care is put on hold in the military, pending further guidance.
  27. The DHS ends a program where Central American children can apply for parole status, but it continues the program for applying for refugee status. The parole component was started as a way to reduce the flow of children illegally crossing the border.

Climate/EPA:

  1. Ryan Zinke announces that, for now, the Sand to Snow National Monument east of Los Angeles is safe for now. This is one of the monuments Obama designated. No word on the other monuments under review.
  2. Trump disbands the federal advisory panel for the National Climate Assessment. This group helps government and private-sector officials plan around the government’s climate analysis.
  3. A surge of GOP Members of Congress publicly jump the climate-denial ship. The House Climate Solutions Caucus has more than tripled its membership since January. And last month, 46 GOP members voted with Democrats to stop an amendment that would have removed the requirement that the Department of Defense prepare for the effects of climate change.
  4. Meanwhile, the EPA is revising an Obama-era regulation that limits the dumping of toxic metals from coal-fired power plants, along with a regulation that sets emissions standards for heavy-duty trucks.

Budget/Economy:

  1. Trump signs an executive order expediting the environmental review process for high-profile infrastructure projects, like highways, bridges, and, probably most importantly, his amazing wall.
  2. NAFTA talks get underway between Canadian, U.S., and Mexican trade officials.
  3. Senator James Lankford (R-Okla.) says that having a trade deficit is a good thing because it means that foreigners are investing in our economy. For example, when a foreign agent invests in a U.S. company or buys U.S. Treasury bonds, that increases our trade deficit.
  4. While groups from all sides have come forward opposing the merger between the Sinclair Broadcasting Group and Tribune Media, none have come forward to defend the merger. Conservative media oppose it because of the competition and everybody else opposes it because of Sinclair’s mandatory conservative op-eds.
  5. There’s a lot of talk about housing some of the Confederate statues in museums, but Trump’s budget eliminates funding to museums.
  6. In just 7 months, the Secret Service has gone through their entire year’s budget for protecting Trump and his family.
  7. Trump drops his plan to form an infrastructure advisory committee in light of the disbanding of his other two business advisory boards. IMO, this is not a good development—he needs all the help and support he can get here.
  8. Pence makes a few small trade deals in South America that opens up markets for U.S. agriculture, and South Korea lifts its ban on U.S. poultry and egg products.

Elections:

  1. A federal court rules that the district lines in Texas (drawn by the GOP) discriminate against ethnic minorities and must be redrawn before the midterm elections. If the Texas legislature won’t fix them, the court will.

Miscellaneous:

  1. Carl Icahn resigns from his advisory role to the White House ahead of an article discussing his potential conflicts of interest and possible illegalities.
  2. Trump closes his off-the-cuff press conference by bragging that he owns one of the largest wineries in the US, right there in Charlottesville.
  3. Steve Bannon calls a liberal journalist whom he respects to talk about trade policies, but ends up giving an accidental on-the-record interview. He undercuts Trump, mocks the alt-right as irrelevant clowns, and talks about the in-fighting in the White House.
  4. And just like that, Bannon is out. He says his purpose there is done; he’s achieved what he wanted to achieve.
  5. Bannon will go back to Breitbart, where he’ll have an even wider audience for his own brand of propaganda. Yay. Here’s what sources close the Bannon say about that:
    • Bannon will be “going to war” for Trump, vowing to intensify the fight from the outside.
    • “Steve is now unchained. Fully unchained.”
    • “He’s going nuclear. You have no idea. This is gonna be really fucking bad.”
    • According to a GOP Member of Congress: “Now the real circus begins. … This is the tea party coming full circle.”
    • From Bannon himself: “The Trump presidency that we fought for, and won, is over.”
  6. Bannon says he’s going after his enemies, so if you’re a Breitbart reader, be on the lookout for hit jobs against the following: Paul Ryan, Mitch McConnell, Ivanka Trump, Jared Kushner, and Gary Cohn.
  7. Trump thinks Bannon was behind the leaks targeting McMaster, specifically that he has a drinking problem and that he’s anti-Israel.
  8. GOP leaders worry that they don’t have anyone on their side in the White House anymore.
  9. Donald and Melania Trump announce that they will not participate in the Kennedy Center Honors this year so as not to cause political distractions.
  10. Trump hosts a dinner at his Bedminster country club with some of his most generous donors.
  11. Trump ignores Phoenix mayor’s request to cancel his rally in the city.
  12. Hope Hicks takes over as Trump’s interim Director of Communication.
  13. Prescient. During a campaign speech last year for Hillary Clinton, Obama said that no one changes the president, but instead the office “magnifies” who you are already. So if you “accept the support of Klan sympathizers before you’re President, or you’re kind of slow in disowning it, saying, ‘Well, I don’t know,’ then that’s how you’ll be as President.” Of note, Hillary also warned us.
  14. And on a positive note, with Newt Gingrich’s wife taking on the ambassadorship to the Vatican, Newt will soon be leaving the country.

Polls:

  1. Trump’s approval rating continues its slow decline, sitting at 34% in the latest Gallup poll. 61% disapprove, a new high for the Gallup poll.
  2. The percent of Americans who think Trump should be impeached has increased from 30% to 40% over the course of his presidency.
  3. Most countries worldwide trust Putin more than Trump to handle global affairs. Of the countries who trust Trump more, most trust him just barely more than Putin.
  4. Trump’s approval rating is at 34% to 36% in the three states that won him the election: Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Wisconsin. 60% in those states say Trump has embarrassed them.