What seems to be the priority that preoccupies this President and world leader today
US President Donald Trump has attacked former FBI Director James Comey as a “weak and untruthful slime ball”, reacting to news accounts that cite Mr Comey as hugely critical of the President in a memoir due to be published next week.
Tag: USA
It was a promise of trickle down Bullshit and Trump delivered
“President Trump and Republicans gave huge tax cuts to big drug companies, big oil, and other corporations, but corporations are giving back little—if anything—to working families.”
by
via New Analysis of GOP Tax Scam Shows “Corporate Cheapskates” Not Sharing Windfall With Workers
ask yourself a simple question: What sort of war requires no sacrifice? What sort of war requires that almost no one in the country waging it take the slightest notice of it?
via Can Democracy Survive Trump’s untransparent Forever Wars Abroad?
Austin, Texas: Deadly poisonings and attacks on Kremlin-linked figures are likely to meet little resistance from the White House, an American defence expert says.
As Cold War-era understandings on permissible spy behaviour unravel, there has been little US pressure to counter Russia’s suspected activities, Georgetown University national security professor Mark Jacobson told Fairfax Media.
“During the Cold War the Soviets were constrained by the threat of a US reaction,” Jacobson said. “Today there is no threat of action by this White House.”
via Where is the White House pressure on Russia over London poisoning?
Why is the US (and Australia) ideologically clinging to last century’s energy sources and technology? How dumb are we?
USA & Australia = Dumb and Dumber a History of Energy transformation live (OD)
Most of the steel the US imports comes from Canada, South Korea, Mexico, Brazil, Germany and Japan. China accounts for less than four per cent of total imports, Australia even less. And as an attempt to make the US great, it’ll backfire.
via As an attempt to make the US great again, this Donald Trump decision will backfire.
The Koch Brothers alone will spend $20 million on ads selling the tax bill. This is a drop in the bucket compared to the $1.4 billion they stand to gain every year in tax breaks. It’s also a tiny fraction of their overall campaign spending on the 2018 midterms elections, which is projected to reach $400 million.
The Kochs have their work cut out for them. A new poll from Politico shows most workers report seeing no increase in their take home pay after the new tax laws took effect.
This is important.
The whole premise behind adding $1.5 trillion to the debt, giving massive handouts to the ultra-wealthy, and giving a tax break to the nation’s most profitable corporations was that working folks would also get a bit of cash.
Turns out, they’re not seeing that money. But the PR push is having an impact.
via As workers notice no Raise, the Tax Scam Is Starting to Sink In | Informed Comment
Gun ownership in the United States, largely criminalized for poor people of color, is a potent tool of oppression. It does not protect us from tyranny. It is an instrument of tyranny.
via Guns and Liberty
Some of the biggest names in corporate America are coming under mounting pressure to cut ties with the National Rifle Association as gun safety activists on Friday intensified calls for a boycott in the wake of last week’s Florida high school massacre.
via ‘Bad business’: Apple, Google, Amazon pressured to cut ties with NRA
You’ll note you don’t hear about mass shootings in Australia, Japan or for the most part the United Kingdom, or other civilized countries whose politicians have not been bought by 10 major gun manufacturers.
via 11,004 Gun Murders in US vs. 26 (equiv. 130) in England Annually | Informed Comment
Despite living her whole adult life in Texas, she was deported to Mexico after a traffic stop. She warned a U.S. Border Patrol agent, “When I am found dead, it will be on your conscience.” Within a week of her deportation, she was murdered by her ex-husband.
Now, with Bannon out, we enter the uncharted waters of having a president whose chief strategist is the television. No staff member has replaced Bannon; the new power behind the throne is Fox & Friends.
via The Power Behind the Throne Is ‘Fox & Friends’ | The Nation
Trump in black and white? No, Mussolini
In my view Mussolini’s fascism in Italy is a fair exemplar of the phenomenon. One characteristic fascist societies have in common is social hierarchy. Men are better than women, they hold. Men are entitled. Some ethnicity is better than all the other ethnicities. White people are entitled (even if some white supremacists in Anglo-Saxon societies wouldn’t consider Mussolini’s Italians or Franco’s Spanish to be “white.” Hitler put off an alliance with Italy because he was still hoping he could get the white British to join him and they seemed to him a superior race). A corollary is that some ethnicities are sick or polluting to society and need to be eliminated, made to emigrate or diminished in some more sinister way.
via No Normalization: All the Fascist Highlights Trump still Hits | Informed Comment
It is worth considering the broader context of gun violence in the US. Large-scale mass shootings make up a small fraction of that violence. Of the approximately 33,000 gun violence deaths each year, only about 1.5% come from mass shootings. Two-thirds of gun violence deaths are from suicide. This chart does not show the people who are injured by guns each year in the US – more than 70,000 of them.
via Not your imagination: mass shootings now happen more frequently in the US | US news | The Guardian
Free speech hypocrisyAmid a national furor of the claimed right of Nazis and white supremacists like Richard Spencer to speak on college campuses, establishment media and politicians seldom criticize the growing censorship around Israel.But journalist Glenn Greenwald commented that the move by Dickinson again demonstrates that “the greatest and most frequent threat to free speech in the West is the attempt to criminalize and outlaw activism against Israel.”
Source: No hurricane aid if you boycott Israel, says Texas city | The Electronic Intifada
The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) filed a lawsuit last week on behalf of a Kansas public school teacher who, as a condition for taking her job, was required under a new state law to declare that she would not engage in boycotts of Israel. The law is just one in a growing list of measures in recent years aiming to counter the Palestinian-led Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) movement in the United States.
Source: ‘A legal shield for the Palestine movement in the U.S.’ | +972 Magazine
Las Vegas is being described as the worst mass shooting in US history but so what? It is a news headline. Nobody, not for a second, imagines it will be the last.
Source: America’s freedom fundamentalism impervious to death
— Cost per day for inpatient hospital stay: $5.49 in Cuba; $1,994 in the U.S.
— Inpatient hernia surgery: $14.59 in Cuba; $12,489 in the U.S.
— Hip-fracture repair: $72.15 in Cuba; $14,263 in the U.S.
— Kidney transplant: $4,902 in Cuba; $48,758 in the U.S.
How so? The vast bulk of corporate executive pay today comes in the form of stock awards. The higher a company’s share price, the heftier the CEO’s compensation. This stock connection encourages CEOs to single-mindedly focus on raising their company share prices by any means necessary.Among those any means: Pharmaceutical CEOs will jack up prices on prescription drugs and do whatever they can to get doctors to prescribe more pills. Health providers will push unnecessary tests and procedures. Hospital chiefs will downsize support staffs for patients. All these decisions fatten corporate bottom lines, pump up corporate share prices, and leave our health care downgraded.How could health care get better? Blue-ribbon commissions have all sorts of suggestions. They urge us to eliminate unnecessary procedures, tests, and devices. We need to better coordinate care, they add, and lower prices.
Los Angeles has voted to rename the holiday named after Christopher Columbus to commemorate Native Americans. The measure was passed as statues of the 15th-century explorer have been destroyed in recent weeks.
Source: LA changes Columbus Day to ‘Indigenous Peoples Day’ as statues continue to be destroyed — RT America
Trump promised to drain the swamp. . . now he is surrounding himself with starving alligators expecting welfare
Source: Dear Trump voter – Salon.com
Already, 22% of California’s electricity comes from renewable sources, and lawmakers are considering legislation requiring the state to be 100% green in its power by 2045.It isn’t just California that is swinging into action as the president retreats from our responsibility to avoid climate disaster. Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New York, Rhode Island, and Vermont will jointly cut power plant emissions by 30% between 2020 and 2030.
Source: Take that, Trump! 5% of California New Car Sales now Electric | Informed Comment
Most of the millions of Americans who watched the total solar eclipse did so wearing safety glasses. US President Donald Trump did the opposite.
Incidentally, a press release sent out to journalists shortly before the eclipse took place explained that the Commander-in-Chief would be “watching the total eclipse from the Truman Balcony [of the White House] with the First Lady.” BuzzFeed’s Zahra Hirji noted that from Washington DC, only a partial eclipse would be seen – and shortly afterward, the White House press statement was updated
The Trump administration and its figurehead already have the ignominious reputation of being the most anti-scientific federal government in living memory, but this may be a new record. Honestly: how can anyone get a solar eclipse wrong – on multiple occasions?
Well, there’s a first time for everything, we suppose.
Hint: It’s not North Korea, Russia, or Iran.
Source: There’s 1 Country Practically Begging the World for Sanctions | The Nation
Both the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security issued a report in May that warned about the likelihood of far right groups carrying out future attacks, according to a report by Foreign Policy. The same report detailing this also pointed out that white supremacist groups had carried out more attacks over the past 16 years than any other domestic extremist group and “likely will continue to pose a threat of lethal violence over the next year.”
Source: A right-wing terrorist tried to blow up a government building: report – Salon.com
Progressive American senators are having a hard time explaining their support for a law that would criminalize support for the Palestinian boycott movement, BDS. By James J. Zogby It is fascinating to watch some U.S. senators tripping over themselves as they attempt to defend their support for or opposition to proposed legislation that would make it a federal crime to support the international campaign to Boycott, Divest, or Sanction (BDS) Israel for its continued occupation of Palestinian lands. What ties these officials up in knots are their efforts to square the circle of their “love of Israel,” their opposition to…
Source: Criminalizing support for Palestinian human rights | +972 Magazine
The report is concrete, careful and scarier than any horror movie you’ve ever seen. It gives upper and lower estimates, depending on whether humankind gets its act together. Given the oil-drenched buffoons now in charge, you’d want to bet on the higher and more dangerous numbers in each case.
Source: Scientists Leak Study on Global Heating Impact b4 Trump can Suppress it | Informed Comment
Steven Jessie Harris allegedly embarked on a violent spree over a decade ago. Since then, he has been in jail, waiting for a trial date, which never came. He was finally released after doctors found him mentally incompetent to stand trial.
Source: Mississippi man freed after 11yrs in jail without a trial — RT America
Sources say US gunship bombed checkpoint just 30 minutes after police unit retook it from Taliban
Source: US friendly fire kills at least eight Afghan policemen in Helmand | World news | The Guardian
A third of voters, however, remain unapologetic fans.
Source: Trump’s Support Falling Among Swing-State Voters Who Elected Him, Recent Polls Find – Truthdig
If the policies favored by the Trump administration—including massive tax cuts for the rich and reductions in spending on Medicaid and education—go into effect, the U.S. will only fall further in the global rankings
Source: US Inequality Crisis Worst in Industrialized World. Trump Will Make It Worse. | Common Dreams
The ABC’s political editor explains his searing critique of US president Donald Trump’s performance at the G20.
n the many occasions over the last five months where President Donald Trump demonstrated his deep ignorance, his alarming impulsiveness, his bottomless need for praise, or his tendency to lash out when criticized, one common response has been to ask, “What happens when he faces a genuine crisis with the need to make difficult decisions and lives at stake?”
Source: Ready or not, Trump may be about to face his first full-blown international crisis
If you are white in America, you have an unfair advantage solely based on skin color. So deal with it
Donald Trump loves the safe space of Fox & Friends
TeleSur | – – Even though the rising inequality is a global phenomenon, it is especially pronounced in the United …
Source: 3 mn will own 70% of US Wealth generated by 320 mn by 2021 | Informed Comment
As the US influence in the Middle East wanes, it increasingly associates itself with dictatorships like Saudi Arabia, whose “dark face” and “role in supporting terrorism is known to everyone in the region,” a high ranking Iranian Revolutionary Guard official told RT.
Source: US seeks to ‘milk’ terrorism sponsor Saudi Arabia – Iran’s Revolutionary Guard to RT — RT News
