Last Call For Russian To Judgment

Here's a thing, maybe the Trump regime should stop admitting to obstruction of justice on national television.

Earlier Thursday, White House deputy press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said the Comey firing may hasten the agency's investigation into Russian meddling. 

"We want this to come to its conclusion, we want it to come to its conclusion with integrity," she said, referring to the FBI's probe into Moscow's interference in last year's election. "And we think that we've actually, by removing Director Comey, taken steps to make that happen." 

The statement had come as a surprising admission from the White House that Comey's sudden dismissal on Tuesday may have an effect on the Russia probe. Officials have insisted the removal came because of Comey's handling of an investigation into Hillary Clinton's email server, and was unrelated to his oversight of the look into Russia's election hacking and possible ties between Trump advisers and Russian operatives. 

Earlier in her briefing Thursday, Sanders claimed that Comey's firing had not altered the Russia investigation at all. 

"Any investigation that was taking place Monday was taking place today," Sanders said, suggesting that was an indication that Comey's firing would not impact the ongoing probe. 

Now, you can make the argument that the "make that happen" Sanders was referring when it came to removing Comey from his job was modifying the word "integrity" rather than "conclusion" and that she wanted the "integrity" part to happen as a result of Comey's firing.

Well, you could argue that if Sanders or anybody in the regime had any credibility on this, which they do not (and Sanders certainly did not help anyone with her bad choice of wording.)

Still, nobody believes that Comey's firing was the reason Trump gave on Tuesday.  That ship has sailed.  We're deep in the weeds on this one for now, and we'll just have to see what the FBI investigation finds.

Operation Trump The Vote

You guys know I've been talking about Kansas GOP Secretary of State Kris Kobach for a while now, as he's been the leading Republican on the party's national voter suppression efforts for the last several years now.  Kobach was also in the running for Trump's Attorney General but that ultimately went to Jeff Sessions.

However, it seems that Trump has found something for Kobach to do, and that is to officially lead up the regime's efforts to disenfranchise millions of Democratic voters in 2018.

President Donald Trump is expected to sign an executive order today establishing a commission to review alleged voter fraud and voter suppression in the American election system, multiple senior administration officials tell ABC News. 

The officials say Vice President Mike Pence and Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach will be announced as Chair and Vice Chair of the ‘Presidential Commission on Election Integrity’ in a press release today. It's not clear whether the White House will allow coverage of the order signing. 

The commission, which will include Republicans and Democrats, will be tasked with studying "vulnerabilities" in U.S. voting systems and potential effects on "improper voting, fraudulent voter registrations and fraudulent voting," according to one official with knowledge of the announcement. 

In the aftermath of the 2016 election, Trump claimed widespread voter fraud explained why former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton emerged with nearly 3 million more popular votes. To date, neither Trump nor his team has provided evidence to substantiate the claims, but they have promised an investigation. 

“You can never really find, you know, there are going to be -- no matter what numbers we come up with there are going to be lots of people that did things that we're not going to find out about,” Trump told ABC News' David Muir in January. "But we will find out because we need a better system where that can't happen." 

Administration officials would not provide a draft copy of the order but described its scope to ABC News. The commission's review is expected be broad in scope, and will not just address Trump's allegations about the 2016 election but also "systemic issues that have been raised over many years in terms of the integrity of the elections," one official said. 

There's no doubt in my mind that this commission is the first step on the way to de facto national Voter ID laws ahead of 2018 midterms and especially 2020 presidential elections, and the GOP effort to keep millions, maybe tens of millions of people from being able to ever vote again.

That was always the plan once the GOP got back in power again.  Looks like more than ever that this plan is on.

Drain Your Own Swamp For Once

Back in October, Hurricane Matthew tore up Haiti, the Dominican Republic, and Cuba as a Category 5 storm, killing more than 500, and then dumped feet of rain on the Carolinas and killing 50 more before stumbling into the Canadian Maritimes and setting rainfall records.

The flooding damage in North Carolina was particularly bad, especially near the border with SC and last month Gov. Roy Cooper and NC House Republicans requested nearly a billion dollars in FEMA aid for the state from the Trump regime to help families in the Fayetteville and Wilmington area. Lumberton, where interstates 74 and 95 cross, was the hardest hit.

This week the Trump regime got back to them on that request and told them to go pound sand.

The State of North Carolina requested $929 million from the federal government to help with costs associated with Hurricane Matthew, but the state will be receiving far less than that, according to an announcement by Gov. Roy Cooper. 

North Carolina will receive only $6.1 million from the Trump administration. That’s 99 percent less than the requested amount. 

In a letter Cooper sent to the president and other officials today, he expressed “shock and disappointment in the lack of federal funding for Hurricane Matthew recovery efforts.”
The governor had worked with Sen. Thom Tillis and Representatives David Price (D) and Rep. David Rouzer (R) in April to come up with a request to Congress to help cover the costs associated with the destruction left by Matthew. 

The $929 million requested would have been used to “help communities and families fix homes, repair businesses and recover from the historic flooding,” Cooper said. 

“Families across Eastern North Carolina need help to rebuild and recover, and it is an incredible failure by the Trump Administration and Congressional leaders to turn their backs,” said Cooper said in a statement released to the press. “Matthew was a historic storm and we are still working every day to help families return home and rebuild their communities. North Carolinians affected by this storm cannot be ignored by the Trump Administration and Congressional leadership, and I will continue to work with our Congressional delegation to get North Carolina residents affected by the storm the help they deserve.”

Southeastern NC?  Voted big for Trump and the GOP.

Here endeth the lesson.

StupidiNews!

• Under police watch, city parks crews in New Orleans have begun the removal of the city's Jefferson Davis memorial, the second of four Confederate monuments slated for relocation.
• China has issued warning statements to US members of Congress who visited the Dalai Lama in India last week, saying that it sends the wrong message about the status of Tibet.
• Pope Francis is expected to announce canonization of two Portuguese shepherd children who first reported visions of the Madonna a century ago in the town of Fatima.
• European airlines are already working to inform passengers to the US of the Trump regime's expected laptop ban being expanded to all incoming flights from Europe this week.
• Tech company Tesla is launching its solar roof panel nationally this week, pre-orders for the roof system require $1,000 to get on the waiting list.