Last Call For Bringing Rubber Bands To An Artillery Duel

North Carolina Republicans remain the worst people in America, as the GOP-controlled state House overrode Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper's budget veto while most House Democrats were at the state's 9/11 memorial ceremony this morning.

In a stunning display of contempt for democracy, House Speaker Tim Moore, a Cleveland County Republican, called a surprise vote to overturn Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper’s veto of the state budget just after a session opened at 8:30 a.m. Wednesday. Democratic lawmakers and the media had been told by Republican leaders that there would be no vote in the morning.

Most Democrats were absent. Enough Republicans, aware of the secret plan, were there. When Rep. Jason Saine, a Lincolnton Republican, made the motion to reconsider the state budget, the handful of Democrats on hand objected strenuously.

"This is a travesty of the process and you know it,” said Rep. Deb Butler, D-New Hanover.

That it was, but with these Republicans a travesty of the process is just business as usual. With only 64 of the House’s 120 members present, the vote to override passed 55-9.

Now it’s up to Democrats in the Senate to follow their conscience — and perhaps for a few Senate Republicans to find theirs — and refuse to follow the theft in the House with the necessary three-fifths vote in the Senate.

The decision will be up to individual members. Senate leader Phil Berger was no doubt aware of Moore’s plan to end run Democratic opposition. It’s a grim reality that there are likely no Senate Republicans who — however they may feel about the budget — would turn away from participating in this act of subterfuge. In a sense, the budget that comes before them to be made into law is the legislative equivalent of stolen goods. So what, they’ll figure, our side stole it; Democrats shouldn’t have been so trusting. Tough.

But this isn’t a case simply of hardball politics and sly legislative maneuvering. This is a case of breaking faith with the people of North Carolina and with all who strove and sacrificed over generations to protect and advance North Carolina’s political system as one based on a true representation of the people’s will, a true democracy.

And the legislation at issue isn’t a bill of limited scope. It is the state budget. It is how North Carolina defines itself by the priorities it sets in spending. And it’s being held up by a dispute over a major issue that involves billions of federal dollars and ultimately affects everyone in the state, Medicaid expansion.

North Carolina's Medicaid expansion is on the line, plus billions in other cuts that the NC GOP wants to make to the budget that Cooper vetoed.  They would need a three-fifths vote in the state Senate to complete the override, but Republicans only have a 29-21 majority and would need 30 votes.  Unfortunately, odds are pretty good they can get that single vote, because North Carolina. And if they can't, Senate President Phil Berger pulls the same move that the House GOP did.

This is horrific, but the NC GOP won't pay a price at all for this.

JUST IN: @JasonSaine97th (R-Lincoln) responds to @ABC11_WTVD question about his motion to call for a veto override vote this morning on 9/11. At least one @nchousedems, @RepGPierce1 (Hoke), attended #September11 memorial. @ABC11_WTVD @JTHVerhovek @ABCPolitics #ncga #ncpol pic.twitter.com/ZAssb0e1Wh

— Jonah Kaplan (@KaplanABC11) September 11, 2019

Rep. Saine's excuse for going ahead with the vote?  If we stop the business of America for memorials, the terrorists win.

You thought 9/11 was a somber day of reflection?  Screw you, hippie.  We've got people to kick off Medicaid.


Democrats are still bringing rubber bands to artillery duels and they will keep losing to Republicans who don't give a damn every time.

Boris Bad Enough Versus Scotland

I'm going to say that the government of UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson is rapidly approaching the "no longer a going concern" stage of the game.

A panel of three Scottish judges ruled Wednesday morning that Boris Johnson’s decision to suspend Parliament was illegal, escalating an already passionate debate over whether the British prime minister respects the rule of law and throwing into even greater doubt his plans for Brexit.

The ruling does not mean Parliament will immediately come back into session. But it does give the prime minister’s opponents hope ahead of an expected Supreme Court hearing next week. Some even raised the prospect that Johnson will have to resign if he loses that case.

The Scottish judges ruled that the government had been misleading — including, perhaps, to the queen — about its real reasons for the five-week suspension and that the move was “unlawful because it had the purpose of stymying Parliament.”

The Supreme Court case will be heard on Tuesday after the prime minister’s office said it would appeal the Scottish ruling. “We are disappointed by today’s decision,” Downing Street said. A government spokesperson later ruled out recalling Parliament at least until the Supreme Court has a chance to weigh in.

Wednesday’s ruling contradicts two other judgments. Courts in England and Wales had ruled that Johnson’s move was legal. Another Scottish judge, meanwhile, had decided the courts did not have the authority to interfere in the suspension.

Scotland has a separate legal system from England and Wales; the Supreme Court, which is based in London, rules on matters relating to both jurisdictions.

Johnson critics celebrated Wednesday’s decision saying they had been “vindicated.”

“You cannot break the law with impunity, Boris Johnson,” Joanna Cherry, one of more than 70 lawmakers who brought the case in Scotland, told reporters outside the court in Edinburgh. “The rule of law will be upheld by Scotland’s courts, and I hope also the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom.”

Next week's court ruling I should imagine will be rather important.  Meanwhile, the "no-deal Brexit" that Johnson insists he will follow through with will be, by his government's own estimations, an absolute disaster of biblical proportions, as the government has now released the text of Operation Yellowhammer, the contingency plans for the end of next month if there's no Brexit deal.

The plans confirm the leaks about Yellowhammer from a few weeks ago.

A government document from Aug. 1 leaked to the Sunday Times laid out projections of how the U.K. would fare if it exits the European Union without a deal on Oct. 31. The forecasts, compiled by the Cabinet Office under the ominous, James Bond–esque title “Operation Yellowhammer,” include shortages of fresh foods, medicines, and months of delays at British ports lasting up to six months. It also predicted the establishment of a hard border between Northern Ireland and the Republic—a key sticking point in the negotiations—and widespread protests. A government source told the Times, “These are likely, basic, reasonable scenarios — not the worst case.”

It's not the worst case.

The worst case scenario, you know, the one with martial law and anarchy, is supposedly covered underneath "Operation Black Swan".

As bad as things are here stateside, the UK is in mortal peril.

And Boris Bad Enough is in charge.

Maria, Mofongo And Malice

The most corrupt administration in American history continues as we find out now that of course rebuilding Puerto Rico's power grid after Hurricane Maria was going to be a massive grift job, and of course former FEMA officials were on the take to the tune of thousands.

A former top administrator of the Federal Emergency Management Agency was arrested on Tuesday in a major federal corruption investigation that found that the official took bribes from the president of a company that secured $1.8 billion in federal contracts to repair Puerto Rico’s shredded electrical grid after Hurricane Maria.

Federal authorities arrested Ahsha Tribble, FEMA’s former deputy administrator for the region that includes Puerto Rico, and Donald Keith Ellison, the former president of Cobra Acquisitions, prosecutors in Puerto Rico announced. They were accused of conspiring to defraud the federal government, among other charges.

A second FEMA employee, Jovanda R. Patterson, who worked as a deputy chief of staff in Puerto Rico under Ms. Tribble and was later hired by Cobra, was also arrested, said Rosa Emilia Rodríguez Vélez, the United States attorney for Puerto Rico.

Ms. Tribble and Mr. Ellison had a “close personal relationship,” Ms. Rodríguez Vélez said, in which Mr. Ellison lavished Ms. Tribble with gifts in exchange for her to use her influence inside FEMA to give Cobra an advantage.

The gifts ranged from a helicopter tour over Puerto Rico to securing an apartment in New York, the authorities said. They included airplane tickets, including one first class ticket from San Juan, the Puerto Rican capital, to New York, and hotel stays in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and Charlotte, N.C.
Mr. Ellison and Ms. Tribble traveled together and stayed in the same room, Ms. Rodríguez Vélez said.

In return for the gifts, Ms. Tribble is accused of performing official acts to advance Cobra’s interests. For example, according to the indictment, in February 2018, after the Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority reported an explosion at a transmission center, Ms. Tribble insisted that the public utility hire Cobra to make repairs or risk not getting reimbursed by FEMA — even though leaders of the utility insisted they could do the same work at a far lower cost.
“They took advantage of one of the most vulnerable moments in the history of Puerto Rico to enrich themselves,” Ms. Rodríguez Vélez said.

President Trump has repeatedly cast Puerto Rico’s leaders as incompetent and corrupt. Tuesday’s arrests, however, did not involve any Puerto Ricans, but rather a longtime federal employee now serving under the Trump administration.

Six people, including two senior Puerto Rican government officials, were arrested by the federal authorities in a separate case in July on charges of steering $15.5 million in federal contracts to politically connected consultants. The case stirred unrest against the governor at the time, Ricardo A. Rosselló. A leak of hundreds of pages of a private text chat between him and his inner circle days later unleashed two weeks of mass protests that led to Mr. Rosselló’s resignation.

Investigators in the latest case found no evidence that any staff member at the power authority, commonly known as PREPA, was involved in the scheme, prosecutors said.

Cobra is a subsidiary of Mammoth Energy Services. Peter Mirijanian, a Mammoth spokesman, said the company has been working with the authorities.

“Mammoth is aware of and has been cooperating with the government’s investigation into Ms. Tribble and Mr. Ellison and will continue to do so,” he said.

Nope, this was all FEMA, getting rich the way Trump does.  The only difference is that nobody's going to arrest him.

StupidiNews!

• Democratic US House candidate Dan McCready came up short against GOP rival Dan Bishop in a close NC-9 special election after GOP absentee ballot election fraud annulled the 2018 contest.
• Treasury Secretary Stephen Mnuchin says that Donald Trump is willing to meet with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, but that "maximum pressure" sanctions will continue.
• Apple unveiled a new iPhone, announced a $4.99 monthly streaming TV service starting November 1, and a $5 monthly mobile gaming service among several new offerings at its yearly event.
• New figures show a net two million Americans lost their health insurance in 2018 as the Trump regime continues to drag its feet on implementing the Affordable Care Act.
• The FDA is blasting e-cigarette maker Juul over product health claims and giving presentations to kids in schools, in at least one instance without teachers present or parental consent.

Last Call For Everyone's Coming For Google

Every US state and territory -- with the glaring exception of California, of course, and for some reason Alabama -- is joining Texas to sue Google over antitrust violations for controlling 75% of the internet ad market.  It's about time.  Google doesn't need to be broken up, it needs to be shattered.

Attorneys general for 50 U.S. states and territories on Monday officially announced an antitrust investigation of Google, embarking on a wide-ranging review of a tech giant that Democrats and Republicans said may threaten competition, consumers and the continued growth of the web.

Appearing on the steps of the Supreme Court, Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton charged that Google “dominates all aspects of advertising on the Internet and searching on the Internet,” though he cautioned that despite his criticism the states had launched an investigation for now and not a lawsuit.

Paxton said the probe’s initial focus is online advertising. Google is expected to rake in more than $48 billion in U.S. digital ad revenue this year, far rivaling its peers, while capturing 75 percent of all spending on U.S. search ads, according to eMarketer.

“They dominate the buyer side, the seller side, the auction side and the video side with YouTube,” he said during a news conference alongside officials from 11 states and the District of Columbia.

Some of those attorneys general appeared to raise additional complaints about Google, ranging from the way the company processes and ranks search results to the extent to which it may not fully protect users’ personal information. Their early rebukes raised the stakes for Google, threatening top-to-bottom scrutiny of its sprawling business beyond just ads. Paxton promised the probe would go wherever the facts lead.

“There’s nothing wrong with being a dominant player when it’s done fairly,” said Sean Reyes, the Republican attorney general of Utah. He said there is a “presumption” of innocence in such an investigation but still said there is a “pervasiveness” to complaints about Google’s business practices.

Jeff Landry, a Republican from Louisiana, added: “We’re here because there’s an absolutely existential threat to our virtual marketplace.”

Google declined to comment, pointing to its previous statements saying it will work with state officials.

The probe marks the latest regulatory headache for Google and the rest of Silicon Valley, which have faced growing criticism — and widening state and federal scrutiny — into whether they’ve grown too big and powerful, undermining rivals and resulting in costlier or worse service for web users. The Post first reported the states’ plans for a Google probe last week.

For Google, though, the states’ investigation comes more than six years after federal watchdogs wrapped up an antitrust investigation into its search and advertising practices and opted against bringing major penalties against the company, including breaking it up. Regulators around the world, meanwhile, have been more skeptical of Google: The European Union has issued the company $9 billion in competition-related fines over the past three years. 

The Obama administration really dropped the ball on Google and let them get away scot-free, the result was Google's internet ads being the tool of choice by Russian hackers to manipulate voters in 2016 to help Donald Trump.

As far as California not joining in, well the state's getting its taxes from Google. Alphabet, Google's parent company, paid $2.1 billion in state and federal taxes in 2018.  They're not going to cut the golden goose's throat.

California AG Xavier Becerra says the state is not joining in because of "potential and ongoing investigations" into the company but my guess is that he was told not to touch them...and oh year, Becerra like basically every other California Democrat, took Google money for his campaign when he was in the US House.

Hopefully this will lead to a crack-up.  Google made almost one out of every three global ad dollars on the internet in 2019.

It's got to go.

Spies Like Us, Con't

Yesterday's Russian spy story from CNN where the CIA pulled a key Russian spy out of the Kremlin because Trump was going to run his mouth and blow their cover has been confirmed by the NY Times late last night, and the details of the operation are far more damning of Donald Trump that originally reported.

Decades ago, the C.I.A. recruited and carefully cultivated a midlevel Russian official who began rapidly advancing through the governmental ranks. Eventually, American spies struck gold: The longtime source landed an influential position that came with access to the highest level of the Kremlin. 

As American officials began to realize that Russia was trying to sabotage the 2016 presidential election, the informant became one of the C.I.A.’s most important — and highly protected — assets. But when intelligence officials revealed the severity of Russia’s election interference with unusual detail later that year, the news media picked up on details about the C.I.A.’s Kremlin sources. 

C.I.A. officials worried about safety made the arduous decision in late 2016 to offer to extract the source from Russia. The situation grew more tense when the informant at first refused, citing family concerns — prompting consternation at C.I.A. headquarters and sowing doubts among some American counterintelligence officials about the informant’s trustworthiness. But the C.I.A. pressed again months later after more media inquiries. This time, the informant agreed. 

The move brought to an end the career of one of the C.I.A.’s most important sources. It also effectively blinded American intelligence officials to the view from inside Russia as they sought clues about Kremlin interference in the 2018 midterm elections and next year’s presidential contest.

CNN first reported the 2017 extraction on Monday. Other details — including the source’s history with the agency, the initial 2016 exfiltration offer and the cascade of doubts set off by the informant’s subsequent refusal — have not been previously reported. This article is based on interviews in recent months with current and former officials who spoke on the condition that their names not be used discussing classified information. 

Officials did not disclose the informant’s identity or new location, both closely held secrets. The person’s life remains in danger, current and former officials said, pointing to Moscow’s attempts last year to assassinate Sergei V. Skripal, a former Russian intelligence official who moved to Britain as part of a high-profile spy exchange in 2010.

The Moscow informant was instrumental to the C.I.A.’s most explosive conclusion about Russia’s interference campaign: that President Vladimir V. Putin ordered and orchestrated it himself. As the American government’s best insight into the thinking of and orders from Mr. Putin, the source was also key to the C.I.A.’s assessment that he affirmatively favored Donald J. Trump’s election and personally ordered the hacking of the Democratic National Committee. 

The informant, according to people familiar with the matter, was outside of Mr. Putin’s inner circle, but saw him regularly and had access to high-level Kremlin decision-making — easily making the source one of the agency’s most valuable assets.

When it became clear that Putin ordered the hacking of the DNC and used WikiLeaks as a cutout to get that information to Roger Stone in order to help Donald Trump and hrt Hillary Clinton, the source was imperiled.  That's why the most valuable Russian asset we had (well, that we know of) in the Kremlin was pulled.  The information against Trump was too solid to not have come from anywhere else but a close source to Putin.

So yeah.  Donald Trump cost us a major Russian inside source, not because of his big mouth, but because he was taking help from the goddamn Russians and got caught.

And of course, now Trump is attacking the entire idea of foreign human intelligence.

President Donald Trump has privately and repeatedly expressed opposition to the use of foreign intelligence from covert sources, including overseas spies who provide the US government with crucial information about hostile countries, according to multiple senior officials who served under Trump. 

Trump has privately said that foreign spies can damage relations with their host countries and undermine his personal relationships with their leaders, the sources said. The President "believes we shouldn't be doing that to each other," one former Trump administration official told CNN. 

In addition to his fear such foreign intelligence sources will damage his relationship with foreign leaders, Trump has expressed doubts about the credibility of the information they provide. Another former senior intelligence official told CNN that Trump "believes they're people who are selling out their country." 

Even in public, Trump has looked down on these foreign assets, as they are known in the intelligence community. Responding to reports that the CIA recruited Kim Jong Un's brother as a spy, Trump said he "wouldn't let that happen under my auspices." 

These new details about Trump's approach to foreign intelligence follow CNN's exclusive report that the United States in 2017 removed one of its highest-level covert sources inside the Russian government. CNN reported on Monday that the asset provided the US with insight and information on Russian President Vladimir Putin and that the extraction was driven, in part, by concerns that Trump and his administration repeatedly mishandled classified intelligence and could contribute to exposing the spy.

Because foreign CIA apies "hurt" Trump's relationship with autocratic dictators like Kim Jong Un and Vladimir Putin.

Can we please impeach this cancer traitor monkey now?

BREAKING: John Bolton's Mustache Fired

The Mustache is out.

President Donald Trump said Tuesday that he has asked national security adviser John Bolton to resign, noting that he "strongly disagreed with many of his suggestions as did others in the administration." 

"I informed John Bolton last night that his services are no longer needed at the White House. I disagreed strongly with many of his suggestions, as did others in the Administration, and therefore I asked John for his resignation, which was given to me this morning," Trump tweeted. "I thank John very much for his service. I will be naming a new National Security Advisor next week," he added. 

The tweet came just one hour after the White House press office said Bolton was scheduled to appear at a Tuesday press briefing alongside Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin. 

Bolton tweeted minutes after Trump's announcement, "I offered to resign last night and President Trump said, 'Let's talk about it tomorrow.'" 

CNN reported last week that tensions between top figures on Trump's national security team had devolved into all-out hostility, creating a deep disconnect between staffers on the National Security Council, led by Bolton, and the rest of the administration, six people familiar with the matter said. 

Bolton was initially brought into the administration last year to replace HR McMaster partly due to his hawkish position on Iran -- supporting Trump's exit from the Iran nuclear deal -- but he soon began to clash with the President's vision for diplomacy in North Korea and most recently on Afghanistan.

Amazingly enough, Trump's malignant narcissism and refusal to give Bolton credit for anything, plus Bolton's own towering ego, is what probably stopped Trump from going to war with Iran so far.

I still think Trump is going to get there, especially as the 2020 election gets closer and it becomes more apparent that Trump will lose.

We'll see who follows this act.

Also, let's remember the Mustache is why Bolton wasn't hired in the first place.

Another One Bites The Dust

The retail apocalypse continues as the latest victim of a US economy driven increasingly by Amazon Prime purchases and dollar stores multiplying like rabbits is 72-year-old discount chain store, Fred's.

Fred's, a 72-year-old discount chain, is closing all of its roughly 300 remaining stores and going out of business. The chain had as many as 557 stores earlier this year. 

The Memphis-based retailer filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy on Monday and said liquidation sales will take place at its stores over the next 60 days. 

"Despite our team's best efforts, we were not able to avoid this outcome," said CEO Joe Anto in a statement. 

In bankruptcy court, the company will seek a financing agreement that would inject up to $35 million in fresh funding into the business to ensure an "orderly wind-down of its operations." 

Fred's (FRED) sells a variety of items, such as food and household cleaning supplies. Stores are scattered across several US states including Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, Florida and Texas. 

Fred's has been reporting yearly losses since 2015. It struggled to find a turnaround plan and had to make multiple rounds of store closures.  

It's still trying to get out of the pharmacy business. Walgreens (WBA) bought some of Fred's pharmacy patient prescription files and inventory last year. The company said that it will continue to fill prescriptions at its remaining pharmacy locations while it tries to find a buyer. 

Fred's opened its first store in 1947 in Mississippi. It later expanded its footprint across the United States with the idea of becoming a value-focused retailer and drug store. It sells both private labels and national brands. 

Fred's is the latest store to enter bankruptcy or to completely shut its doors. Forever 21, Barney's, Charming Charlie, Payless Shoes and Gymboree have all had reports of or confirmed financial difficulties this year.

Fred's has been wiped out in a matter of months, leaving shoppers in the South with even fewer options for general goods.  Pretty soon everything is going to be Dollar General, Dollar Tree, and Walmart.

 

StupidiNews!

• Three people were killed and a fourth injured in a shooting in the Dutch city of Dordrecht, police officials say the shooting appears to be domestic violence and not terror-related.
• A federal judge on Monday stopped the Trump regime from blocking most migrant refugees at the border and issued a nationwide injunction against the policy.
• Donald Trump held a Fayetteville rally for GOP House candidate Dan Bishop ahead of today's special election for NC's 9th district, a new election was called after GOP election fraud in 2018.
• North Korea has tested more ballistic missiles after bringing up the idea of more bilateral talks with the US between Leader Kim Jong UN and Donald Trump.
• California Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom is expected to sign a vaccine bill that would allow for far fewer medical exception, including voiding hundreds of exemptions from one physician.

Last Call For May Lightning Strike If I'm Wrong, He Said

We're at the point where in order to keep from embarrassing Dear Leader Trump, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross openly threatened to fire NOAA forecasters who dared to contradict the fact that Hurricane Dorian wasn't headed for Alabama when Trump said it was.

The Secretary of Commerce threatened to fire top employees at NOAA on Friday after the agency’s Birmingham office contradicted President Trump’s claim that Hurricane Dorian might hit Alabama, according to three people familiar with the discussion.

That threat led to an unusual, unsigned statement later that Friday by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration disavowing the office’s own position that Alabama was not at risk. The reversal caused widespread anger within the agency and drew criticism from the scientific community that NOAA, a division of the Commerce Department, had been bent to political purposes.

Officials at the White House and the Commerce Department declined to comment.

The actions by the Secretary of Commerce, Wilbur L. Ross Jr., are the latest developments in a political imbroglio that began more than a week ago, when Dorian was bearing down on the Bahamas and Mr. Trump wrote on Twitter that Alabama would be hit “harder than anticipated.” A few minutes later, the National Weather Service in Birmingham, Ala., posted on Twitter that “Alabama will NOT see any impacts from Dorian. We repeat, no impacts from Hurricane Dorian will be felt across Alabama.”

Mr. Trump persisted in saying that Alabama was at risk and a few days later, on Sept. 4, he displayed a NOAA map that appeared to have been altered with a black sharpie to include Alabama in the area potentially affected by Dorian.

Mr. Ross, the Commerce Secretary, intervened two days later, early last Friday, according to the three people familiar with his actions. Mr. Ross phoned Neil Jacobs, the acting administrator of NOAA, from Greece where the secretary was traveling for meetings and instructed Dr. Jacobs to fix the agency’s perceived contradiction of the president.

Dr. Jacobs objected to the demand and was told that the political staff at NOAA would be fired if the situation was not fixed, according to the three individuals, who requested anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the episode. Unlike career government employees, political staff are appointed by the administration. They usually include a handful of top officials, such as Dr. Jacobs, and their aides. 

However, a senior administration official who asked not to be identified when discussing internal deliberations said that the Birmingham office had been wrong and that NOAA had simply done the responsible thing and corrected the record.

That official suggested the Twitter post by the Birmingham forecasters had been motivated by a desire to embarrass the president more than concern for the safety of people in Alabama. The official provided no evidence to support that conclusion.

On Monday, Craig N. McLean, NOAA’s acting chief scientist, sent an email to staff members notifying the agency that he was looking into “potential violations” in the agency’s decision to ultimately back Mr. Trump’s statements rather than those of its own scientists. He called the agency’s action “a danger to public health and safety.”

Dr. Jacobs is scheduled to speak Tuesday at a weather industry conference in Huntsville, Ala.

On Monday, the National Weather Service director, Louis W. Uccellini, got a standing ovation from conference attendees when he praised the work of the Birmingham office and said staff members there had acted “with one thing in mind, public safety” when they contradicted Mr. Trump’s claim that Alabama was at risk.

I mean look at this.  Wilbur Ross was going to fire NOAA officials over contradicting an idiot, an idiot who put people in danger and then refused, like a petulant baby, to admit he was wrong. 

This is Day 8 of this stupid scandal.

Science and weather now means whatever Trump says it means, and that infuriates me.

Spies Like Us, Con't

When Donald Trump went after musician John Legend and his wife, model and activist Chrissy Teigen, on Twitter last night, it was a dead giveaway that some news outlet called the White House late last night for a comment on a story being run today, putting the Narcissist-in-Chief in a lousy mood and leading to his latest lash-out to try to cover-up coming bad news.

This afternoon we know what that story was: CNN is reporting that in 2017, the CIA yanked a high-level covert spy from Russia's government because then-director Mike Pompeo was worried that Trump was going to blow the source's cover.

In a previously undisclosed secret mission in 2017, the United States successfully extracted from Russia one of its highest-level covert sources inside the Russian government, multiple Trump administration officials with direct knowledge told CNN. 

A person directly involved in the discussions said that the removal of the Russian was driven, in part, by concerns that President Donald Trump and his administration repeatedly mishandled classified intelligence and could contribute to exposing the covert source as a spy. 

The decision to carry out the extraction occurred soon after a May 2017 meeting in the Oval Office in which Trump discussed highly classified intelligence with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and then-Russian Ambassador to the US Sergey Kislyak. The intelligence, concerning ISIS in Syria, had been provided by Israel. 

The disclosure to the Russians by the President, though not about the Russian spy specifically, prompted intelligence officials to renew earlier discussions about the potential risk of exposure, according to the source directly involved in the matter. 

At the time, then-CIA Director Mike Pompeo told other senior Trump administration officials that too much information was coming out regarding the covert source, known as an asset. An extraction, or "exfiltration" as such an operation is referred to by intelligence officials, is an extraordinary remedy when US intelligence believes an asset is in immediate danger. 

A US official said before the secret operation there was media speculation about the existence of such a covert source, and such coverage or public speculation poses risks to the safety of anyone a foreign government suspects may be involved. This official did not identify any public reporting to that effect at the time of this decision and CNN could not find any related reference in media reports. 

Asked for comment, Brittany Bramell, the CIA director of public affairs, told CNN: "CNN's narrative that the Central Intelligence Agency makes life-or-death decisions based on anything other than objective analysis and sound collection is simply false. Misguided speculation that the President's handling of our nation's most sensitive intelligence—which he has access to each and every day—drove an alleged exfiltration operation is inaccurate." 

A spokesperson for Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declined to comment. White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham said, "CNN's reporting is not only incorrect, it has the potential to put lives in danger."

Now the White House is screaming at CNN right now about "putting lives in danger", but that only tells me the story is true.  Trump opened his mouth and blew the cover of the CIA's top asset in Moscow, or came close enough to it by revealing information that the US should not have had to Sergey Lavrov, that the CIA made the decision to pull the plug on the mission and exfiltrate the source.

And this of course was a massive loss for our intelligence, a massive loss to Russia, another in a string of catastrophic, generational losses to Putin in the last few years that began with Snowden and has hollowed out the CIA's Russia desk ever since.

Hotel, Motel, Trumpaday Inn

With renewed interest over why so many GOP lawmakers and government employees are staying at Trump properties around the world (in obvious violation of that whole Constitution thing) even the US Air Force is feeling like they should maybe take a look at setting some ground rules for airmen.

The U.S. Air Force has ordered a world-wide review of how it chooses overnight accommodations on long flights following revelations that air crews had occasionally stayed at President Donald Trump's Scotland resort while refueling at a small commercial airport nearby.

The review comes as news outlets including POLITICO uncover additional instances of military personnel staying at Trump properties. And the C-17 crew’s overnight stay at Trump’s Turnberry resort in Scotland earlier this year, first reported by Politico on Friday, was was not an isolated incident.

In September 2018, on its way back to the U.S. from Al Udeid Air Base in Qatar, a unit of the Maine Air National Guard landed at Prestwick Airport, the airport closest to Trump’s luxury waterfront resort. The crew and their passengers then spent the night at his hotel, according to one person who was present, an Instagram post and a voucher detailing the crew’s itinerary reviewed by POLITICO.

The Air Force did not immediately respond to questions about that September stay, but Air Force Brig. Gen. Ed Thomas, the chief spokesman, told POLITICO in a statement that “initial reviews indicate that aircrew transiting through Scotland adhered to all guidance and procedures."

He acknowledged, however, that U.S. service members “lodging at higher-end accommodations, even if within government rates, might be allowable but not advisable. Therefore, we are reviewing all associated guidance."

He added: “Even when USAF aircrews follow all directives and guidance, we must still be considerate of perceptions of not being good stewards of taxpayer funds that might be created through the appearance of aircrew staying at such locations."

No fooling, huh?

The most corrupt government in history keeps churning out the hits, I swear.  Daily violation of the Emoluments Clause doesn't even rate more than a blip these days.

We all exist to enrich Trump.

StupidiNews!

• Tory lawmaker Amber Rudd is the latest resignation from the cabinet of UK PM Boris Johnson after the expulsion of 21 Conservatives from the party by Johnson after torching his "no-deal Brexit" vote.
• Congressional Republicans will be in Baltimore later this week as GOP officials worry that Donald Trump's presence at the biennial retreat could lead to mass protests and demonstrations.
• Beijing is warning any effort by Hong Kong to secede from mainland China "will be crushed" as state media now says the continuing protests are "trying the patience" of China's government.
• Former SC GOP Rep. Mark Sanford is entering the 2020 GOP presidential race, saying Donald Trump has "failed" America and that the Republican party needs a new standard-bearer.
• India has lost communication with its Vikram spacecraft as it was attempting a lunar landing, India's space agency says it will analyze the data to see what went wrong.

Last Call For Disaster Diplomacy

Trump's now-cancelled Camp David talks with the Taliban are the latest example of Trump being in over his head, now it's the rest of the GOP's job to bail him out.  Luckily for him, the Taliban are pretty repugnant terrorist killers and are pretty bad at general PR.

President Donald Trump’s decision to cancel Afghan peace talks will cost more American lives, the Taliban said on Sunday while the United States promised to keep up military pressure on the militants, in a stunning reversal of efforts to forge a deal ending nearly 20 years of war in Afghanistan.

The Islamist group issued a statement after Trump unexpectedly canceled secret talks planned for Sunday with the Taliban’s major leaders at the presidential compound in Camp David, Maryland. He broke off the talks on Saturday after the Taliban claimed responsibility for an attack in Kabul last week that killed an American soldier and 11 others.

Zabihullah Mujahid, a Taliban spokesman, criticized Trump for calling off the dialogue and said U.S. forces have been pounding Afghanistan with attacks at the same time.

“This will lead to more losses to the U.S.,” he said. “Its credibility will be affected, its anti-peace stance will be exposed to the world, losses to lives and assets will increase.”

In Washington, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said that Afghan peace talks were on hold and Washington would not reduce U.S. military support for Afghan troops until it was convinced the Taliban could follow through on significant commitments.

The United States has recalled U.S. special envoy for Afghanistan Zalmay Khalilzad to chart the path forward, Pompeo said in appearances on Sunday TV news shows. Asked on “Fox News Sunday” whether Afghan talks were dead, Pompeo said, “For the time being they are.”

My guess is somebody told Trump that having the Taliban over to Camp David on the week of September 11 probably wouldn't play well with, well, 99% of America, so Trump "bravely" canceled the talks.  Unlike Kim Jong Un, the Taliban don't have the diplomatic cover of statehood.

The story of how the peace deal fell apart this week though is pure Trumpian meltdown.

Mr. Trump made no decision on the spot, but at some point during the meeting the idea was floated to finalize the negotiations in Washington, a prospect that appealed to the president’s penchant for dramatic spectacle. Mr. Trump suggested that he would even invite President Ashraf Ghani of Afghanistan, whose government has not been party to the talks, and get him to sign on.

In the days that followed, Mr. Trump embraced an even more remarkable idea — he would not only bring the Taliban to Washington, but to Camp David, the crown jewel of the American presidency. The leaders of a rugged militant organization deemed terrorists by the United States would be hosted in the mountain getaway used for presidents, prime ministers and kings just three days before the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks that led to the Afghan war.

Thus began an extraordinary few days of ad hoc diplomatic wrangling that upended the talks in a weekend Twitter storm. On display were all of the characteristic traits of the Trump presidency — the yearning ambition for the grand prize, the endless quest to achieve what no other president has achieved, the willingness to defy convention, the volatile mood swings and the tribal infighting.

What would have been one of the biggest headline-grabbing moments of his tenure was put together on the spur of the moment and then canceled on the spur of the moment. The usual National Security Council process was dispensed with; only a small circle of advisers was even clued in.

Trump thought he was better than he was and the result, once again, is an America that looks foolish and stupid.  His narcissism blinded him to reality, and the result is, as every other American ally and foe has learned at various stages of peril, that Donald Trump and the United States of America cannot be trusted under any circumstances.

Even if Trump, Pence, and the entire GOP Senate left tomorrow, it would still take the rest of my lifetime before anyone considered America to be anything more than a giant, flatulent joke.

I expect diplomacy for the next several decades will be the EU, China, India, and the UN "containing the only nation-state that has used nuclear weapons in anger" and preventing us from doing anything as harmful again.

We're not a global leader, we're a global cancer.  And all this happened in a space of 32 months.

The Empire Of The Orange

Trump's 2020 campaign manager, Brad Parscale, has managed to keep his job for so long despite Trump drowning in the polls because he knows exactly what his boss wants to hear.

President Donald Trump’s campaign manager predicted Saturday that the president and his family will become “a dynasty that will last for decades,” transforming the Republican Party while hewing to conservative values.

Speaking to a convention of Republican Party delegates in Indian Wells, California, Brad Parscale also said the campaign’s goal is to build a national army of 2 million trained volunteers, far beyond the president’s 2016 organization, that in California could help the GOP retake a string of U.S. House seats captured by Democrats last year.

“The Trumps will be a dynasty that will last for decades, propelling the Republican Party into a new party,” he said. “One that will adapt to changing cultures. One must continue to adapt while keeping the conservative values that we believe in.”

Parscale later declined to elaborate on his prediction of a coming Trump “dynasty,” or whether the president’s children could become candidates for public office.

He told reporters after the speech, “I just think they are a dynasty. I think they are all amazing people with ... amazing capabilities.”

Parscale’s speech was a highlight of the weekend GOP conclave, in which party delegates sought to map out an election strategy in an increasingly Democratic state that Trump lost by over 4 million votes in 2016. Polls show the president remains widely unpopular outside California’s depleted GOP ranks.

Parscale also acknowledged the obvious — that California was not a target for Trump in the 2020 campaign. He declined to respond directly when asked by a reporter if Trump would campaign for candidates in the state known as the home of the so-called Trump resistance. He said that would be the president’s decision.

“This is not a swing state,” Parscale said to laughter from the capacity crowd.

However, he emphasized the campaign would invest heavily in the state as it builds a sprawling volunteer network that could help candidates across the ballot.

“Many of you are worried that we have written you guys off, that California doesn’t matter,” Parscale said. But “there’s a lot of work out here to be done.”

Still a good four or five million Trump voters and potential donors in California, even if Trump will lose by four million to the eventual Democratic nominee in the state. Parscale is playing the long game, even in the bluest state in the nation.

I sure wish Democrats spent more time in states like Alabama, Louisiana, Missouri, and yeah, Kentucky.

Of course, Parscale is predicting a Trump, Donald or otherwise, will be in the White House for decades to come.  That's silly.

The country won't last that long.