February 27, 2023

Emboldened by its majority, House GOP turns up heat on federal workers

At a House hearing this month on fraud and waste in pandemic aid, some Republicans zeroed in on one group in particular for criticism: the federal employees overseeing the money.

“Fire people if they don’t do things they’re supposed to do,” Rep. Virginia Foxx (R-N.C.) said. “That is our biggest problem in the federal government. Nobody can be held accountable.”

That sentiment is animating a newly empowered GOP House majority eager to ramp up scrutiny of the army of civil servants who run the government’s day-to-day operations. The effort includes seeking testimony from middle- and lower-level workers who are part of what Republicans have long derided as the “deep state,” while some lawmakers are drafting bills that have little chance of passing the Democrat-led Senate but give Republicans a chance to argue for reining in the federal bureaucracy of 2.1 million employees.

In recent weeks, House Republicans have passed legislation requiring federal employees to return to the office, arguing that pandemic rules have bled into a permanent state that diminishes productivity. Lawmakers have voted to rescind $80 billion for the cash-starved IRS to hire 87,000 employees in customer service, technology and audit roles to increase tax compliance of those earning more than $400,000 — claiming the extra staff will unfairly target taxpayers. They’ve allowed House members to reduce or eliminate federal agency programs or slash the salaries of individual employees on a quick vote.

A newly formed Judiciary Committee panel led by its chairman, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), meanwhile, has already issued subpoenas to agency heads and alerted the Biden administration to impending requests for testimony from multiple mid-level career employees on contentious issues. And House Republican leaders have told almost all of their committees to come up with plans by March to slash spending and beef up oversight of federal agencies in their jurisdiction.

https://wapo.st/3Z3SXZC

February 26, 2023

REM Sleep Is Magical. Here's What the Experts Know.

Dreaming, memory-making, problem-solving: A lot happens during the most active sleep phase

Any sleep tracker will show you that slumber is far from a passive affair. And no stage of sleep demonstrates that better than rapid eye movement, or REM, commonly called dream sleep.

“It’s also called paradoxical sleep or active sleep, because REM sleep is actually very close to being awake,” said Dr. Rajkumar Dasgupta, a sleep medicine and pulmonary specialist at the Keck School of Medicine of the University of Southern California.

Before scientists discovered REM sleep in the 1950s, it wasn’t clear that much of anything was happening in the brain at night. Researchers today, however, understand sleep as a highly active process composed of very different types of rest — including REM, which in some ways doesn’t seem like rest at all.

While the body typically remains “off” during REM sleep, the brain is very much “on.” It’s generating vivid dreams, as well as synthesizing memories and knowledge. Scientists are still working to unravel exactly how this strange state of consciousness works.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/02/25/well/mind/rem-sleep-benefits.html?unlocked_article_code=QGV89_5PeaoWfEwiIie5mmbpUxH4rfFpuFjwGJA07T1Grbf6HzBxMLjaYFhnXGDz-VyBpjX7nMhVq-Xuz_xpKV1ME9RLm7fvTSzvn-N34s3zZi30_KWPM4OCciVq-N9zZkdL-9JcH7EjMYz8WiNVqEAjf7UPZ4BXMaal2dMk-43tR94Mo6EzbywZDBaKY2LZm_qtbNWXwf7ZcAZTVa7IlG7VQRFXTDGLIkp873_EMLx_dZ7SBWcMGzZ-W4ZIb3FN2NmUYXqKjNVCTeAEVhQ-DUDfDpXbXjvgPcq7cDZXaA1TOJppWzXE7eUo8bovtZHjr9u7n_faH_dt-g1lVzg&smid=url-share

Personally I feel I'm conscious of my REM sleep patterns, and if my sleep is interrupted during an early morning dream cycle and I can't go back to sleep I feel tired/grumpy for the rest of the day.

February 26, 2023

'Very, very huge question:' New College scrambles for funds to pay Richard Corcoran's $699,000 salar

New College Foundation officials tasked with scraping together funds to cover much of Interim President Richard Corcoran's $699,000 salary said Friday they still are trying to determine where the money will come from and raised concerns about donations drying up, even as those supporting Corcoran's hiring have made public assurances that the money is available to pay him.

Under state law, only $200,000 in taxpayer money can be used to pay a university official's salary. Private donations must cover the rest.

New College's new board Chair Debra Jenks has said repeatedly that the foundation has the money to pay Corcoran, but has not identified the specific pot of money that his salary will come from.

Larry Geimer, the finance chair for the foundation board and a certified public accountant with Kerkering, Barberio & Co., said during a foundation board meeting Friday that 99% of foundation funds - which total about $43 million - are restricted and indicated that foundation officials weren't consulted before the organization's resources were committed to fund Corcoran's salary.

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/politics/2023/02/24/richard-corcoran-new-college-of-florida-salary-foundation-shortfall/69936943007/

Hmmmm. New RWNJ trustees fire the last New College president, hire a DeSantis crony for almost three times the former president's salary, and now looking for private donations to supplement the president's salary. Doesn't sound like a well thought-out plan, but then their goal was to eviscerate New College, consequences be damned.

February 23, 2023

Fox News Announces Acquisition of Kevin McCarthy

NEW YORK (The Borowitz Report)—Fox News Channel announced that it has completed its acquisition of the Speaker of the House, Kevin McCarthy.

Rupert Murdoch, the network’s majority owner, said that he was “delighted” by the purchase of McCarthy and noted that Fox had snapped him up at an attractively low price.

“It helped that there were no other bidders,” he said.

But, even as Fox moved McCarthy onto its corporate ledger, some Wall Street analysts predicted that the network would rue the day that it acquired the congressman.

“Kevin McCarthy will be Rupert Murdoch’s worst investment since MySpace,” one analyst said.

https://www.newyorker.com/humor/borowitz-report/fox-news-announces-acquisition-of-kevin-mccarthy

February 23, 2023

Russia Drops Ominous Warning About Attack on Second Country

Russia claims Ukraine is planning a false flag attack on Moldova, which is exactly the sort of thing they would say before staging their own operation.

Moldova dismissed claims made by Russia’s Defense Ministry on Thursday that Ukraine “saboteurs” were prepping a false flag attack on a pro-Russian breakaway region in the country.

The warning, announced on the Russian Defense Ministry’s Telegram account, suggested the troops involved would dress up as Russians. “As a pretext for the invasion, it is planned to stage an alleged offensive of Russian troops from the territory of Transnistria,” the message warned, referring to the pro-Russian breakaway region of Moldova. “To do this, the Ukrainian saboteurs participating in the staged invasion will be dressed in the uniform of the military personnel of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation.”

In the build up to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine a year ago, the Kremlin attempted to stage or mock up a number of incidents in the Luhansk and Donbas regions which they claimed were Ukrainian military actions targeting pro-Russians. Alarmingly for Moldova, it was all just a pretext for their own all-out assault on their neighbor.

Moldova responded to the alert with its own Telegram message, denying the allegations and calling for restraint. “We call for calm and for information to be received (by the public) from official and credible sources of the Republic of Moldova,” they wrote. “Our institutions cooperate with foreign partners and in the case of threats to the country, the public will be promptly informed.”

https://www.thedailybeast.com/russia-claims-ukraine-plans-false-flag-fake-attack-on-moldova

February 23, 2023

Feds Have New Questions About Herschel Walker's Fundraising

Herschel Walker's campaign is under new scrutiny for a number of potential violations, like creating a “recount” fund that one expert called a “dumping ground.”

It wasn’t enough that Herschel Walker’s ill-fated Senate campaign in Georgia had a rough run. Now the feds want to know more about financial moves the campaign made after Walker lost—including tens of thousands of dollars stashed in a “recount” fund long after Walker had conceded defeat.

Last week, the Federal Election Commission sent the Walker campaign committee (“Team Herschel”) a notice flagging a number of apparent violations. Some were fairly common clerical issues. Other items were more eye-catching, like the recount fund, which one campaign finance expert said looked like a “dumping ground for excess contributions.”

The Daily Beast’s independent review of Team Herschel’s end-game fundraising and spending turned up other oddities. They included hefty sums hauled in after the election, an in-kind private flight donation for the “recount” from Sen. Rick Scott (R-FL), as well as a mysterious six-figure payout two weeks after the election to a family friend whom the campaign had previously described as a “dedicated volunteer.”

Not least of the puzzles is the campaign’s $5 million cash on hand—a sizable chunk of change for a candidate that, by all appearances, would have needed to burn every available dollar to keep pace with his deep-pocketed opponent, Sen. Raphael Warnock (D-GA). (Warnock, who outraised Walker by more than $100 million, also ended 2022 with less than $6 million on hand.) Walker also got air support from outside GOP groups like the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which ended the cycle millions of dollars in debt.

Brendan Fischer, deputy executive director of the watchdog group Documented, who reviewed The Daily Beast’s data, said the “recount” account appeared to be a “dumping ground” for excess cash that the campaign did not want to give back to donors.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/feds-have-new-questions-about-herschel-walkers-fundraising

February 23, 2023

'Paranoid' Murdaugh Drops a Bombshell on the Witness Stand

Murdaugh is accused of murdering his wife and son in June 2021. He took the stand to tell his side of the story on Thursday.

After almost two years of speculation and a stunning fall from grace as a once-prominent South Carolina lawyer, Alex Murdaugh finally took the stand Thursday to provide a jaw-dropping testimony in his double murder trial, including a concession that he’d been lying to authorities for years because of drug-induced paranoia.

“I did lie to them,” Murdaugh told a packed Colleton County courtroom, four weeks into the trial. “As my addiction evolved over time, I would get into these situations or circumstances where I would get paranoid thinking.”

Breaking down several times on the stand, Murdaugh insisted he did not murder his 52-year-old wife, Maggie, and his 22-year-old son, Paul, at the dog kennels of the family’s hunting estate on June 7, 2021.

“I did not shoot my wife or my son anytime. Ever,” he declared almost immediately after taking the stand.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/alex-murdaugh-expected-to-take-the-stand-in-his-own-defense

February 23, 2023

Gov. Ron DeSantis targets 'woke' Sarasota School Board member for 2024 election

In the 2022 elections, three conservative candidates backed by Gov. Ron DeSantis' endorsements easily won seats on the Sarasota County School Board. Now, the governor is targeting the last Democrat remaining on the board.

During a strategy session Tuesday with Florida House Speaker Paul Renner, Florida GOP Chairman Christian Ziegler, and Tina Descovich and Tiffany Justice, co-founders of the conservative activist group Moms for Liberty, DeSantis announced his 2024 school board target list. The list included Edwards and 13 other school board members in Florida the governor said do not protect parental rights or protect students from "woke" ideologies. Christian Ziegler's wife, Sarasota School Board Chairwoman Bridget Ziegler, was also a co-founder of Moms for Liberty and received DeSantis' backing in her re-election campaign last year.

Edwards finds himself often as the dissenting vote on Sarasota School Board decisions, with the conservative majority comprised of Ziegler, Tim Enos, Robyn Marinelli and Karen Rose. Each of the four are registered Republicans, while Edwards is a Democrat.

Edwards said he wasn't sure why DeSantis would target him or see him as a threat since he said conservatives already control the board.

https://www.heraldtribune.com/story/news/politics/2023/02/22/sarasota-school-board-member-tom-edwards-is-desantis-election-target/69931908007/

DeSantis continues to burnish his fascist credentials.

February 23, 2023

The EV Question for Auto Executives: How Fast to Make the Shift?

Some companies are racing to convert entirely to electric vehicles, but others see caution flags

Most car executives agree that a transition to electric vehicles is inevitable. How rapidly to make the switch is a central question, one that is driving divergent strategies.

Traditional auto makers have pledged to gradually transform their vehicle lineups to EVs, but timelines vary. If car makers get ahead of consumers on EV rollouts, that could inflate their costs and hurt sales of gas-powered vehicles, profits from which are needed to fund investments in electrification.

At the same time, lagging behind rivals in EV offerings could cost car makers the chance to establish themselves in a key growth area over the next few decades, executives say.

“We don’t want to risk missing the market,” Volvo Car AB Chief Executive Jim Rowan said during an earnings call this month. The Swedish auto maker is among those seeking to rapidly evolve into an electric-only manufacturer, saying it will offer an all-EV lineup by 2030. Last year, 11% of Volvo’s vehicle sales were electric.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-ev-question-for-auto-executives-how-fast-to-make-the-shift-37254a44?st=uqwldzy7vof6d0y&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink

February 23, 2023

TV reporter, 9-year-old girl fatally shot in Florida attack, police say

Source: Washington Post

A television journalist covering gun violence and a 9-year-old girl nearby were shot and killed in Orange County, Fla., Wednesday afternoon, local authorities said. Another journalist from the same network, Spectrum News 13, was also shot, as was the girl’s mother. Both were taken to the hospital, where they were being treated as of Wednesday evening.

The journalists were at the scene of a homicide of a woman in her 20s from earlier in the day when, police said, the suspected gunman returned to the site of the morning killing and opened fired again. He also targeted a nearby house, police said. In total, he killed three.

The authorities did not immediately identify the victims.

There is no clear motive for the afternoon shootings at this time, according to Orange County Sheriff John Mina, who said it was uncertain if the suspect knew the journalists were with the media or covering the crime. The suspected shooter, identified as 19-year-old Keith Melvin Moses, has been detained. Other local journalists were also present when the shooting occurred but were not injured.

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/nation/2023/02/22/orlando-shooting-news-crew-reporter-gunman/