Weak Eight ofthe Trumpanzy!

[JackLuis]

Seven Weaks have go by and the world has not exploded, yet!

As the Trumpster begins his Eighth Weak he keep getting hits.

Colbert ridicules Trump-branded massage parlors: ‘Because his presidency may not have a happy ending’

Late Show host Stephen Colbert took his nightly shot at Donald Trump, noting the president was recently allowed to license his name in China in such a away that it would include massage parlors and escort services.

“Ever since he became the most powerful man in the world, we’ve heard a lot about this guy and his potential conflicts of interests overseas,” the CBS host remarked. “This week we learned that Donald Trump may have violated the Constitution to trademark massage parlors and escort services in China.”

“This is true,” he quipped. “And unlike these massages, the Trump presidency may not have a ‘happy ending.'”

 

[JackLuis]

If the EPA doesn’t believe in science, what is it good for?

The 2007 case dates back to an earlier lawsuit, where Massachusetts sued the EPA for failing to regulate greenhouse gas emissions, which are known to contribute to climate change. Whether the EPA has such an obligation depends on how you interpret a specific clause of the Clean Air Act. The clause states that the EPA Administrator must set an emissions standard for any air pollutant “from any class or classes of new motor vehicles or new motor vehicle engines, which in his judgment cause, or contribute to, air pollution which may reasonably be anticipated to endanger public health or welfare.”

The case wound its way through the lower courts. By the time it made it to the Supreme Court, the states of California, Connecticut, Illinois, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington (and the territory of American Samoa)—along with some environmental and civil society organizations—had joined the suit. Baltimore officially joined the lawsuit (although Maryland did not), as did Washington, D.C., and New York City. That's right: New York is a city so nice it sued the EPA twice.

In a 5-4 decision, the Court ruled that the EPA had to regulate greenhouse gas emissions unless it could prove that they did not endanger public welfare.

Earlier this week, current EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt said the following on CNBC: “I think that measuring with precision human activity on the climate is something very challenging to do and there’s tremendous disagreement about the degree of impact, so no, I would not agree that it’s a primary contributor to the global warming that we see.”

It was an odd (and incorrect) statement from the Administrator of the EPA, an agency that—based on the best available scientific evidence—disagrees with Pruitt’s position, as does NASA, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, the Center for Disease Control, the U.K.’s Met Office, and the Japan Meteorological Organization.

To doubt human impact on climate change is to doubt the verdict that greenhouse gases endanger the public. And the evidence against such a conclusion is staggering.

“One of funniest ways that scientists know that climate change is happening is called the Suess effect,” says Katherine Moore Powell, a climate ecologist at The Field Museum.

Yes, the effect is named after a Dr. Suess, but no, it’s not that one. This Dr. Suess was an Austrian chemist who figured out that by measuring changes in atmospheric carbon isotopes—that is, how many neutrons a given carbon atom has—you can glean all sorts of information. The technique was originally used for radioactive carbon dating (figuring out how old rocks and fossils are), but these days it’s also used to measure human contributions to greenhouse gases present in the atmosphere. Because carbon dioxide from burning fossil fuels does not contain the isotope 14C, if the amount of carbon dioxide in your air samples over time is increasing but the amount of 14C isn’t, it’s a good bet that the carbon dioxide is coming from human sources.

Pruitt is not a "Scientist" so it hard for him to say with accuracy that poisoning our planet is a "bad thing."

 

[JackLuis]

Trump administration teams up with Big Pharma to block drug pricing transparency

A week before his inauguration, Donald Trump said that when it came to drug prices, pharmaceutical companies were “getting away with murder”—and he pledged to take decisive action to reduce the rising cost of medicine. Six weeks into his presidency, though, his government has moved to help drug companies block shareholder initiatives designed to help bring more scrutiny to drug price increases.

With drug prices skyrocketing in the United States, investor groups last year filed shareholder resolutions with 13 drug companies that—if passed—would force their boards to more meticulously detail their price increases for major medicines, and to provide “the rationale and criteria used for these price increases.” Days after Trump met with pharmaceutical industry CEOs at the White House, the Securities and Exchange Commission endorsed drug companies’ moves to block the resolutions from being voted on by shareholders at their annual meetings. The SEC move followed Trump promoting Republican SEC commissioner Michael Piwowar to serve as acting chairman of the agency.

The SEC win for the pharmaceutical industry represents the latest victory for an industry that has been ramping up efforts to stop governments from taking action to lower—or force more disclosure about—drug pricing. Last month, federal lawmakers from both parties helped the industry block Senate legislation to let Americans purchase lower-priced FDA-approved medicines from Canada. Meanwhile, in the last two years, drug companies have been largely successful in their fight against a barrage of price transparency bills. Such legislation has been stymied in all but one state, Vermont.

 

[JackLuis]

Trump to be Charged with Treason! NSA Director take him down!

Real Time Politics has some Breaking news on this first day of Weak Eight of the Trumpanzy.

Maxine Waters says she has the Russian Hooker film of Donald and the hookers!

Tillerson reinstates a deal to sell $1.1 Billion in munitions to the Saudis for Yemen. Such a humanitarian.

 

[LadyVer]

No comment.

 

[JackLuis]

As Day Two opens Trump get his dick slapped.

Assad: No one invited US to Manbij, all foreign troops in Syria without permission are ‘invaders’

When a journalist asked the Syrian president if Damascus had “opened doors” for American troops in Aleppo province’s city of Manbij, Assad said “No, we didn’t.”

“What are they [foreign troops] going to do? To fight ISIS [Islamic State, formerly ISIL]? The Americans lost nearly every war. They lost in Iraq, they had to withdraw at the end. Even in Somalia, let alone Vietnam in the past and Afghanistan.”

According to Assad, the US “didn’t succeed anywhere they sent troops, they only create a mess; they are very good in creating problems and destroying, but they are very bad in finding solutions.”

 

[JackLuis]

And it gets deeper.

CNN legal analyst: Trump likely fired US Attorney Bharara to sabotage ‘troublesome’ investigations

Saturday evening, CNN legal analyst Jeffrey Toobin appeared by phone to discuss the firing of U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara with anchor Ana Cabrera.

Mediaite.com said that Toobin believes Bharara was axed because he was pursuing lines of investigation that would prove “troublesome” to the Trump administration.

“The question arises,” Toobin said, “Is there something either that the Trump administration doesn’t want Preet Bharara to pursue, or are there things he knows that he might disclose later that could be troublesome for the Trump administration?”

Bharara was fired by Attorney Gen. Jeff Sessions after he refused to comply with a Justice Department order for 46 U.S. Attorneys appointed by the Obama administration to vacate their posts immediately.

The call for the resignations came less than 24 hours after Fox News host and indefatigable Trump booster Sean Hannity called for a “purge” of federal officials appointed by the Obama administration.

What would a NY US Att be investigating? Gangsters? Trumpsters?

 

[JackLuis]

WATCH: Scarlett Johansson’s talking dog turns out to be a Trump-spouting ‘monster’ on SNL

Johansson, as Helen heading up the $17 million project, explains that her device will “scan the household pet’s mind to translate his thoughts into words.

Using her own dog, Max the Pug then tells the assembled researchers and investors, “I like park, and leash, and I like Trump. He’s my man.”

Expressing concern there is a translation error, Max corrects Helen explaining, “There’s no glitch. Donald Trump is our president. He carried the Electoral College fair and square. I know Trump has issues, but one big change is better than business as usual. The Dow is up 2700 points since he was elected, what’s not to like?”

“Your dog is a monster,” a horrified researcher exclaims as one of the investors in the project interjects, “All right, stand back. I’m gonna shoot him with the gun I carry.

 

[Carnal_Flower]

Why do we have this cabal of connivers in the Oval Office????

Who's making the decisions and policy for this President?

The f with Steve Bannon? Seriously? He's got his fat face into EVERYTHING.

 

[JackLuis]

Trump, Merkel to meet for first time in Washington

@realDonaldTrump

I told you @TIME Magazine would never pick me as person of the year despite being the big favorite They picked person who is ruining Germany
5:53 AM - 9 Dec 2015

I sure Trump will straighten her out, and we will see who the "Leader of the Free World" will be!

 

[JackLuis]

Obama lawyers move fast to join fight against Trump

When Johnathan Smith resigned from the U.S. Justice Department on Inauguration Day, he looked forward to spending time with his infant son, but that plan unraveled a week later when President Donald Trump unveiled his explosive foreign travel ban.

Within two weeks, Smith had a new job as legal director of civil rights group Muslim Advocates and was drafting briefs for a successful court challenge to the ban, joining other former top Obama administration lawyers now fighting Trump.

It is not surprising that Smith and some of his colleagues, political appointees of Democratic President Barack Obama, would leave the Justice Department now led by Republicans. What is unusual is how fast they have signed up to be Trump adversaries.

Some Republican lawyers say they were less hasty in moving into oppositional roles post-election. George Terwilliger, a senior Justice Department official under President George H.W. Bush, described the Obama lawyers’ actions as “unprecedented to my memory – and really bad form.”

Some career government lawyers, who are not political appointees and normally do not resign in power shifts, have also resigned to oppose Trump. One is Sharon McGowan, who worked on LGBT issues at the Justice Department.

On Inauguration Day, she was offered a job as director of strategy at Lambda Legal, an LGBT advocacy group. McGowan said she decided to leave Justice when Trump named Jeff Sessions, a hardline conservative Alabama senator, to be attorney general.

That was a “game-changer,” she said. “I knew there would be no chance for me to preserve what I’ve been working on so hard.”

Lawyers with ethics, how novel!

 

[JackLuis]

Dem rep. calls on Trump to stop deporting veterans: ‘About 1,400’ have already been removed from US

A U.S. congressman from Texas has called on his fellow lawmakers to force President Donald Trump to stop deporting U.S. veterans.

Rep. Vicente Gonzalez (R-TX) told Rio Grande Guardian that “around 1,400” veterans who were not U.S. citizens — but fought for the U.S. in Iraq and Afghanistan — had been deported in recent years.

Gonzalez said that he is “looking for a Republican colleague to join me” in co-sponsoring a bill that would allow immigrant veterans to stay in the U.S.

“It is the most American thing to do,” he explained. “To take of our veterans who fought for us. Many were highly decorated veterans that were in Afghanistan and Iraq. Many of them came hope with high levels of PTSD. We didn’t offer them the mental healthcare they needed to transition them back into society.”

 

[JackLuis]

This tiny program keeps our coasts safe. Trump’s gutting it, of course.

http://www.rawstory.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/donald-trump-flickr-478x257.jpg​

The semi-annual meeting of the Sea Grant Association in Washington, D.C., is usually a straightforward affair. It’s typically a time for administrators from around the country to discuss coastal research and hash out the association’s business.

But as members gather to start their meeting on Tuesday, there’s plenty of drama. The Trump administration reportedly plans to slash the budget of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association and gut federal funding for NOAA’s Sea Grant program.

This time, Sea Grant’s very existence is at stake.

“My initial reaction [to the news] was horror and disgust,” says Jim Eckman, director at California Sea Grant. “I think we’re facing a much graver crisis that we’re going to have to deal with.”

Though hardly a household name, Sea Grant funds important work, supporting over 3,000 scientists and paying for coastal research through 33 university programs. Sea Grant projects shed light on sea-level rise, ocean acidification, the effect of melting glaciers on kelp beds, and much, much else.

The Trump administration reportedly wants to use the cuts to NOAA and its $73 million Sea Grant program to help pay for a $54 billion boost in military spending.

According to Wagner from Washington Sea Grant, every federal dollar spent returns about $8 in economic benefits. A NOAA analysis shows the program helped support $575 million in economic development and more than 20,000 jobs in 2015. “This is a small but mighty program,” Wagner says.

 

[Carnal_Flower]

Just learned the shocking fact that Obama's spying on us through our microwaves! Something must be done about this travesty!!

 

[JackLuis]

Just learned the shocking fact that Obama's spying on us through our microwaves! Something must be done about this travesty!!

The CIA/NSA is watching you thru your S-M-R-T TV too!

 

[phrodeau]

The CIA/NSA is watching you thru your S-M-R-T TV too!

Put two TV's in opposite sides of the room. Then they can watch each other.

 

[sr71plt]

The CIA/NSA is watching you thru your S-M-R-T TV too!

And your microwave oven, according to Kellyann.

 

[KingOrfeo]

Just learned the shocking fact that Obama's spying on us through our microwaves! Something must be done about this travesty!!

That's Michelle's bad, I'm afraid. She put the system in place as part of her anti-obesity program.

 

[JackLuis]

‘It’s called journalism’: Katy Tur mocks Sean Spicer for whining about reporters’ questions

‘If he’s not joking’: Sean Spicer loses it when NBC reporter asks ‘when can we trust the president?’

Alexander replied: “The bottom line is the question is still not answered. Can you say affirmatively that whenever the president says something, we can trust it to be real?”

“If he’s not joking!” Spicer exclaimed.

Trump whines Obamacare looks ‘so great’ now: ‘Like President Obama — when he left, people liked him’

Trump argued that “whether we [repeal] it or not, it will be imploded off the map.”

“The press is making it look so wonderful so that if we end it, everyone’s going to say, ‘Oh, remember how great Obamacare used to be, remember how wonderful it used to be, it was so great,'” the president complained. “It’s a little bit like President Obama, when he left people liked him. When he was here people didn’t like him so much.”

You'd think Obama had been replaced by an idiot, the way people talk now!

 

[JackLuis]

Trump Recession Will Be Excellent News For Donald Trump!
https://wonkette.com/614184/trump-recession-will-be-excellent-news-for-donald-trump

Much like Steve King’s balls-out racist Tweet, it’s not like we didn’t know this was coming, because they told us it was, but there’s still a jolt of shock and revulsion at the imminent arrival of Donald Trump’s official budget proposal. It’s every bit as awful as promised, and if enacted (a very big if) would be the biggest all-at-once contraction of the federal workforce since the end of WWII, slashing government agencies and throwing huge numbers of federal employees out of work. Not to worry, though, because the private sector will expand so rapidly when it’s freed from regulatory and tax burdens that everyone will have a job building tanks. Or at least anyone who’s out of work can join the Army, the Border Patrol, or the staff of a private prison for detaining immigrants, although those last will be closed once they’re all deported. We haven’t even considered the wealth to be generated by bounties from turning in the Messican family down the street or anyone suspected of disloyalty to the Trump regime.

Initially, some of the biggest economic hits would come in Washington DC, exactly where they should:

"According to an economic analysis by Mark Zandi, chief economist for Moody’s Analytics, the reductions outlined so far by Trump’s advisers would reduce employment in the region by 1.8 percent and personal income by 3.5 percent, and lower home prices by 1.9 percent."

Joining poor folks on the streets will be a bunch of useless scientists and staff at the EPA, which will see a 20 percent cut, because the environment will be fine by itself and global warming is a myth.

In addition, when millions of people are thrown off their health insurance, we can look forward to rural hospitals closing, so there’s a lot more doctors, nurses, and support staff who won’t be a drain on the economy any more — they can probably join the army if they want.

Lets see the Congress pass this POS budget and face a 2018 Election with 9% unemployment!

 

[Carnal_Flower]

Prognosis: Oranger than usual

http://img.huffingtonpost.com/asset/255_255/58c712f42700003800749bdf.jpeg

 

[sr71plt]

Well, Florida . . . golf course . . .

 

[JackLuis]

‘They have to stop this charade’: House intel member blisters Trump for stalling on wiretap evidence

A Democratic member of the House Intelligence Committee could barely contain his disgust after the Trump Justice Department asked for more time to turn over evidence that former President Barack Obama wiretapped newly-elected Donald Trump’s offices during the election.

Moments after the Justice Department asked for an extension, Rep. Mike Quigley (D-IL) appeared on CNN with host Erin Burnett to call out the White House.

Asked by host Burnett about the decision by House intel committee head Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA) to give Trump’s people another week, a resigned Quigley replied, “I guess we don’t have any choice.”

“The information is not forthcoming but at some point in time, they have to stop this charade,” Quigley remarked.

So we can call BS on Trump's wiretap charge, just as I thought.

 

[JackLuis]

Will Trump expand CIA’s paramilitary role?

A REALLY BAD idea!

Shifting from the drone policy of the Obama administration, President Donald Trump has given the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) new authority to conduct drone attacks against suspected militants, anonymous U.S. officials said. The new policy is in contrast to that of former President Barack Obama that limited the CIA's paramilitary role, the Wall Street Journal reported Monday.

Under the Obama administration, the CIA used drones and other intelligence resources to locate suspected terrorists and then the military conducted the actual strike.

Read: Trump May Reopen CIA Black Site Prisons With Executive Order

Although Obama pushed for the use of drones, he kept the military in place to conduct the actual strike. During Obama's two terms, a total of 563 strikes, largely by drones, targeted Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen compared to 57 strikes under George W. Bush, according to the Bureau of Investigative Journalism. Obama's aim to keep up the war against al Qaeda while releasing the U.S. military from war grounds in the Middle East and Asia gave way to the use of drones.

 

[JackLuis]

White House accuses MSNBC of violating the law over Maddow Trump tax reveal

The White House on Tuesday accused MSNBC of “violating the law” in a “desperate” ratings push after host Rachel Maddow tweeted that her nightly program has acquired a portion of Donald Trump’s tax returns.

“You know you’re desperate for ratings when you are wiling to violate the law to push a story about two pages of tax returns from over a decade ago,” a White House statement read ahead of Maddow’s bombshell report.

Trump’s tax returns show he paid less than 4 percent tax rate plus AMT in 2005: report