Last Call For We'll Never Have Paris

As expected, Kang the Conqueror continues America's path down the road of the international pariah as the US will now start the process to drop out of the Paris Climate Agreement.

President Trump announced Thursday that he will withdraw the United States from participation in the Paris climate accord, weakening global efforts to combat climate change and siding with conservatives who argued that the landmark 2015 agreement was harming the economy. 

But he will stick to the withdrawal process laid out in the Paris agreement, which President Barack Obama joined and most of the world has already ratified. That could take nearly four years to complete, meaning a final decision would be up to the American voters in the next presidential election. 

Still, Mr. Trump’s decision is a remarkable rebuke to fellow heads-of-state, climate activists, corporate executives and members of the president’s own staff, all of whom failed this week to change Mr. Trump’s mind with an intense, last-minute lobbying blitz. 

It makes good on a campaign promise to “cancel” an agreement he repeatedly mocked and derided at rallies, saying it would kill American jobs. As president, he has moved rapidly to reverse Obama-era policies designed to allow the United States to meet its pollution-reduction targets as set under the agreement.

“In order to fulfill my solemn duty to protect America and its citizens, the United States will withdraw from the Paris climate accord but begin negotiations to re-enter either the Paris accord or an entirely new transaction on terms that are fair to the United States,” the president said. “We are getting out. But we will start to negotiate, and we will see if we can make a deal that’s fair. And if we can, that’s great.”

The rest of the world has immediately vowed that the Paris Agreement will not be renegotiated,  Of course as I've said before, this is about exterminating Barack Obama and his legacy from the history books, and reversing as many of his accomplishments as possible.

Much like gun control, an overwhelming majority (in this case 71% of  Americans) want us to remain in the Paris Agreement, but the Trump regime and his cultists have said no, and so voters will ignore it and continue to vote for Republicans who believe climate change is a massive hoax and who will do everything they can to wreck the planet.

It's possible that the process for the US exit from the framework won't be 100% official until after the next presidential election, meaning that the Democratic candidate in 2020 may be able to keep us in, but I would assume at this point that no international partner will trust the US after this point, so there's really no point in us engaging.

We are a isolated rogue state.

The world will rightfully treat us as such.  I doubt the damage from Trump will be fixed in my lifetime, if ever.

Black Museums Matter

My only reaction to this story of a noose being found on the grounds of the National Museum of African American History and Culture at the Smithsonian is that "Wow it took this long for white supremacists to try to bring their particular brand of hatred in."

A noose was found Wednesday in a public gallery at the National Museum of African American History and Culture museum, the second such incident on Smithsonian grounds in less than a week, officials said. 

David J. Skorton, secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, said in an email announcement that he had to share “deeply disturbing news” that the rope was found in an public exhibition space Wednesday afternoon. It was in the Segregation Gallery on the second floor of the history galleries. 

“The Smithsonian family stands together in condemning this act of hatred and intolerance, especially repugnant in a museum that affirms and celebrates the American values of inclusion and diversity,” Skorton wrote. 

Skorton added that the incident is being investigated by U.S. Park Police. Spokeswoman Sgt. Anna Rose said that police are investigating but she provided no further details. 

Police officials said a noose was found hanging from a tree Saturday on the grounds of the Hirshhorn Museum.

Two in a week.

And of course the argument is "Why do they need a museum?  Why can't they just be happy with American history?  They're Americans, right?  Isn't this, you know,  racist?"

Unspoken message is "You go after our Confederate monuments, we go after your African-American museums."

So two nooses appear.

Making America Great Again™!

Russian To Judgment, Con't

A lot to cover in developments in the ongoing Trump/Russia collusion investigation in the last day or so, so let's get to it: First up, remember the two Russian diplomatic compounds in the US that then President Obama kicked the Russians out of in December? Those compounds are now going right back to Vlad and his buddies to continue operating. 

The Trump administration is moving toward handing back to Russia two diplomatic compounds, near New York City and on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, that its officials were ejected from in late December as punishment for Moscow’s interference in the 2016 presidential election.

President Barack Obama said Dec. 29 that the compounds were being “used by Russian personnel for intelligence-related purposes” and gave Russia 24 hours to vacate them. Separately, Obama expelled from the United States what he said were 35 Russian “intelligence operatives.”

Early last month, the Trump administration told the Russians that it would consider turning the properties back over to them if Moscow would lift its freeze, imposed in 2014 in retaliation for U.S. sanctions related to Ukraine, on construction of a new U.S. consulate on a certain parcel of land in St. Petersburg.

Two days later, the U.S. position changed. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson told Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak at a meeting in Washington that the United States had dropped any linkage between the compounds and the consulate, according to several people with knowledge of the exchanges.

Last week the Russian Embassy's Twitter account retweeted a Sputnik article calling for the US to return those two compounds or face consequences.  Looks like manly man Trump caved in order to give his real boss a nice present.

And speaking of Russian bosses, Attorney General Jeff Session has once again been caught perjuring himself with evidence of yet another clandestine meeting between him and Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak that Sessions failed to disclose to Congress.

Congressional investigators are examining whether Attorney General Jeff Sessions had an additional private meeting with Russia's ambassador during the presidential campaign, according to Republican and Democratic Hill sources and intelligence officials briefed on the investigation. 

Investigators on the Hill are requesting additional information, including schedules from Sessions, a source with knowledge tells CNN. They are focusing on whether such a meeting took place April 27, 2016, at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, DC, where then-candidate Donald Trump was delivering his first major foreign policy address. Prior to the speech, then-Sen. Sessions and Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak attended a small VIP reception with organizers, diplomats and others. 

In addition to congressional investigators, the FBI is seeking to determine the extent of interactions the Trump campaign team may have had with Russia's ambassador during the event as part of its broader counterintelligence investigation of Russian interference in the election.

Once again Sessions lied to Congress under oath, but he's still allowed to be Attorney General. Fun times. 

On the congressional side of the investigation, the House is finally issuing subpoenas to those involved in the Russia investigation...but also to former Obama administration officials over "unmasking" these names as Republicans still blame the previous administration for all this.

A political feud erupted on Wednesday over the U.S. House Intelligence Committee's probe of suspected Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election, with charges that the panel's Republican chairman subpoenaed the CIA, FBI and National Security Agency without telling Democratic members.

Committee aides complained that the chairman, Representative Devin Nunes, who publicly recused himself from leading the Russia probe in April following a secret visit he paid to White House officials, failed to consult Democrats on the subpoenas.

The subpoenas asked the agencies to provide details of any requests made by two top Obama administration aides and the former CIA director to "unmask" names of Trump campaign advisers inadvertently picked up in top-secret foreign communications intercepts, congressional sources said.

The former officials named in the subpoenas were Obama national security adviser Susan Rice, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Samantha Power and former CIA Director John Brennan.

"Subpoenas related to the 'unmasking' issue would have been sent by Chairman Nunes acting separately from the committee's Russia investigation. This action would have been taken without the minority's (Democrats') agreement," said a senior committee aide, speaking on condition of anonymity.

Another congressional source, who also requested anonymity, said Democrats were "informed and consulted" before the subpoenas were issued.

Former Trump National Security Adviser Mike Flynn and Trump's personal lawyer, Michael Cohen were issued subpoenas, but so have former Obama National Security Adviser Susan Rice, Obama's CIA Director John Brennan, and Obama's UN Ambassador Samantha Power.

In other words, the House GOP wants to dump as much of this on "Obama leakers" as they can to distract from Trump's possible crimes.

But in the Senate, the hammer may drop as early as this time next week as fired FBI Director James Comey is expected to testify publicly.

Fired FBI director James Comey plans to testify publicly in the Senate as early as next week to confirm bombshell accusations that President Donald Trump pressured him to end his investigation into a top Trump aide's ties to Russia, a source close to the issue said Wednesday. 

Final details are still being worked out and no official date for his testimony has been set. Comey is expected to appear before the Senate Intelligence Committee, which is investigating possible connections between the Trump campaign and Russia during last year's presidential election. 

Comey has spoken privately with Special Counsel Robert Mueller III to work out the parameters for his testimony to ensure there are no legal entanglements as a result of his public account, a source said. Comey will likely sit down with Mueller, a longtime colleague at the Justice Department, for a formal interview only after his public testimony. 

When he testifies, Comey is unlikely to be willing to discuss in any detail the FBI's investigation into the charges of possible collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign -- the centerpiece of the probe, this source said. But he appears eager to discuss his tense interactions with Trump before his firing, which have now spurred allegations that the president may have tried to obstruct the investigation.

This of course explains the House move to put Rice, Brennan and Power under oath.  I would expect it to happen the same day or the day after Comey testifies.

Stay tuned.

StupidiNews!

• In a "friendly fire" incident, 11 Philippines solders were killed and 7 wounded when a Duterte regime airstrike against terrorists on Mindanao Island missed its target.
• Ohio GOP Attorney General Mike DeWine is suing five drugmakers over the state's opioid crisis, Ohio has led the nation in opioid overdose deaths for the past several years.
• Donald Trump is expected to announce that the US will abandon the Paris Climate Accords this afternoon, joining Syria and Nicaragua as the only countries refusing the global compact.
• China has surpassed the US in the size of the country's gaming market as global revenue from PC, console, and mobile games topped $100 billion last year.
• A German court has ruled that the parents of a deceased 15-year-old girl have no rights to her Facebook account, saying that allowing access would set a dangerous privacy precedent.