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babylonsister
babylonsister's Journal
babylonsister's Journal
February 16, 2019
CNN, MSNBC to air ad turned down by Fox over Nazi imagery
By Tal Axelrod - 02/15/19 10:49 PM EST
CNN and MSNBC have both decided to air a commercial for a film about American Nazis that Fox News had previously declined to carry, The Washington Post reported Friday.
The ad, which is for the short film “A Night at the Garden,” will air during CNN's “The Situation Room” and MSNBC's “The Rachel Maddow Show” on Monday, according to The Post. The film is nominated for an Academy Award and shows footage from a 1939 Nazi rally in New York.
“We decided to dig deep and pay for television ads we weren’t planning to buy because we wanted to make the point that Fox News is out of the mainstream,” the movie’s director, Marshall Curry, told the newspaper.
“It says something that some news channels trust their audience to interpret American history while Fox distrusts its audience and doesn’t think it can do that.”
more...
https://thehill.com/homenews/media/430323-cnn-msnbc-to-air-ad-turned-down-by-fox-over-nazi-imagery
CNN, MSNBC to air ad turned down by Fox over Nazi imagery
CNN, MSNBC to air ad turned down by Fox over Nazi imagery
By Tal Axelrod - 02/15/19 10:49 PM EST
CNN and MSNBC have both decided to air a commercial for a film about American Nazis that Fox News had previously declined to carry, The Washington Post reported Friday.
The ad, which is for the short film “A Night at the Garden,” will air during CNN's “The Situation Room” and MSNBC's “The Rachel Maddow Show” on Monday, according to The Post. The film is nominated for an Academy Award and shows footage from a 1939 Nazi rally in New York.
“We decided to dig deep and pay for television ads we weren’t planning to buy because we wanted to make the point that Fox News is out of the mainstream,” the movie’s director, Marshall Curry, told the newspaper.
“It says something that some news channels trust their audience to interpret American history while Fox distrusts its audience and doesn’t think it can do that.”
more...
https://thehill.com/homenews/media/430323-cnn-msnbc-to-air-ad-turned-down-by-fox-over-nazi-imagery
February 16, 2019
Lacoste Replaced Iconic Crocodile Logo With 10 Endangered Species To Raise Awareness
Posted on 2019/02/14
Tags: Animal Welfare
By John Vibes / Truth Theory
The sports apparel brand Lacoste, known for their upscale polo shirts that come with the iconic crocodile logo, raised over $328,000 for conservation efforts with a promotional line of shirts that brought attention to endangered species. The now sold-out line of polo shirts replaced that crocodile with various endangered species and were a limited edition item.
Instead of featuring one crocodile, a limited edition collection from the company shipped with ten different logos, each of them depicting a different endangered species. Each design was produced in a limited number, correlating with the estimated population size of each species.
For example, it is estimated that there are only 350 Sumatran Tigers on the planet, so 350 polos were made with the Sumatran Tiger logo.
Other species include the California porpoise, the Burmese turtle, the northern weasel maki, the Java rhino, the eastern black crested gibbon, the kakapo, the California condor, the saola, and the Anegada iguana.
The entire collection immediately sold out, with 1,775 shirts selling for $185 each. All of the profits from the sales were donated to the IUCN conservation, and donations are still rolling in from people who just want to support the cause. According to the numbers that were released, it can be easily calculated that the clothing line was able to raise over $328,275 for conservation efforts.
Lacoste Replaced Iconic Crocodile Logo With 10 Endangered Species To Raise Awareness
https://truththeory.com/2019/02/14/lacoste-replaces-logo-with-endangered-species-to-raise-328000-for-conservation/?fbclid=IwAR0cae_v7teUbpgjwg7vVG-GyxQoWgNyqzZ6awzVkjN2rF9Sjzyenbjs6mQLacoste Replaced Iconic Crocodile Logo With 10 Endangered Species To Raise Awareness
Posted on 2019/02/14
Tags: Animal Welfare
By John Vibes / Truth Theory
The sports apparel brand Lacoste, known for their upscale polo shirts that come with the iconic crocodile logo, raised over $328,000 for conservation efforts with a promotional line of shirts that brought attention to endangered species. The now sold-out line of polo shirts replaced that crocodile with various endangered species and were a limited edition item.
Instead of featuring one crocodile, a limited edition collection from the company shipped with ten different logos, each of them depicting a different endangered species. Each design was produced in a limited number, correlating with the estimated population size of each species.
For example, it is estimated that there are only 350 Sumatran Tigers on the planet, so 350 polos were made with the Sumatran Tiger logo.
Other species include the California porpoise, the Burmese turtle, the northern weasel maki, the Java rhino, the eastern black crested gibbon, the kakapo, the California condor, the saola, and the Anegada iguana.
The entire collection immediately sold out, with 1,775 shirts selling for $185 each. All of the profits from the sales were donated to the IUCN conservation, and donations are still rolling in from people who just want to support the cause. According to the numbers that were released, it can be easily calculated that the clothing line was able to raise over $328,275 for conservation efforts.
February 15, 2019
Trump ripped his 'national emergency' move straight from the playbook of a dictator
By William C. Rempel
Feb 14, 2019 | 3:20 PM
President Trump’s insistence that border security justifies a state of emergency is a tactic ripped from the playbook of another unpopular and frustrated president — the democrat-turned-dictator Ferdinand Marcos of the Philippines.
The messianic Marcos, who claimed in his diary to be doing God’s bidding, took things a lot further than Trump has threatened to do. He imposed martial law nearly a half-century ago, thereby crippling the oldest democracy in Southeast Asia.
But his devastating emergency action — installing himself as dictator to fend off an invented insurgency threat — came from the same well of self-serving motivations and ego-driven politics that feeds Trump’s less menacing wall tantrums today.
As fellow narcissists risking constitutional showdowns for personal political advantage, their similarities are alarming enough to justify a closer look.
more...
https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-rempel-trump-marcos-parallels-20190214-story.html?fbclid=IwAR1iQwcSpds0YtTP6MJ-wC5jQsWs9z5FGMg9wIafiMik9lyArqlAftmwvOc
Trump ripped his 'national emergency' move straight from the playbook of a dictator
Trump ripped his 'national emergency' move straight from the playbook of a dictator
By William C. Rempel
Feb 14, 2019 | 3:20 PM
President Trump’s insistence that border security justifies a state of emergency is a tactic ripped from the playbook of another unpopular and frustrated president — the democrat-turned-dictator Ferdinand Marcos of the Philippines.
The messianic Marcos, who claimed in his diary to be doing God’s bidding, took things a lot further than Trump has threatened to do. He imposed martial law nearly a half-century ago, thereby crippling the oldest democracy in Southeast Asia.
But his devastating emergency action — installing himself as dictator to fend off an invented insurgency threat — came from the same well of self-serving motivations and ego-driven politics that feeds Trump’s less menacing wall tantrums today.
As fellow narcissists risking constitutional showdowns for personal political advantage, their similarities are alarming enough to justify a closer look.
more...
https://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-rempel-trump-marcos-parallels-20190214-story.html?fbclid=IwAR1iQwcSpds0YtTP6MJ-wC5jQsWs9z5FGMg9wIafiMik9lyArqlAftmwvOc
February 15, 2019
February 15, 2019 4:28PM ET
How the GOP Is Stripping Students of Their Voting Rights
“If you stand to be at a disadvantage when more people vote, then the problem isn’t with the voters — the problem is with you,” says 2020 candidate Pete Buttigieg
By Tessa Stuart
Young people are more engaged in politics than they have been in decades. But laws introduced by the GOP will make it harder for students to vote.
In November 2016, Republicans in New Hampshire gained complete control of the state government. GOP Representative Michael Moffett was nonetheless displeased with the results. Moffett logged onto Facebook, where he griped that “[m]any out-of-state college students in Durham, Plymouth, Keene, Manchester, Henniker and Hanover registered late and most voted Democrat… [Former GOP Sen. Kelly] Ayotte had her reelection stolen from her by out-of-staters…and Clinton’s razor-thin victory was stolen as well.”
Moffett was not alone in his irritation at these impertinent young people exercising their right to vote. State Sen. William Gannon publicly bemoaned the fact that students who attend school in New Hampshire don’t “really have skin in the game.” His colleague Sen. Dan Innis agreed: “If you’re from Boston and you’re up here eight months out of the year and you’re registered to vote there, you shouldn’t be able to vote here.” All three men would go on to support HB 1264, a measure that passed both chambers of the state legislature last year and was signed into law by Republican Gov. Chris Sununu.
The law, set to go into effect this July, would force residents with out-of-state driver’s licenses to obtain a New Hampshire ID and register their car in the state before voting — or else face criminal charges punishable by up to a year in jail. The fees to make the switch can run into the hundreds of dollars, according to the ACLU, which filed suit Wednesday on behalf of two Dartmouth students challenging the law. The civil liberties group is arguing the fees constitute a poll tax on college students, young voters and those new to the state.
more...
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/how-republicans-are-stripping-students-of-their-voting-rights-791980/
How the GOP Is Stripping Students of Their Voting Rights
February 15, 2019 4:28PM ET
How the GOP Is Stripping Students of Their Voting Rights
“If you stand to be at a disadvantage when more people vote, then the problem isn’t with the voters — the problem is with you,” says 2020 candidate Pete Buttigieg
By Tessa Stuart
Young people are more engaged in politics than they have been in decades. But laws introduced by the GOP will make it harder for students to vote.
In November 2016, Republicans in New Hampshire gained complete control of the state government. GOP Representative Michael Moffett was nonetheless displeased with the results. Moffett logged onto Facebook, where he griped that “[m]any out-of-state college students in Durham, Plymouth, Keene, Manchester, Henniker and Hanover registered late and most voted Democrat… [Former GOP Sen. Kelly] Ayotte had her reelection stolen from her by out-of-staters…and Clinton’s razor-thin victory was stolen as well.”
Moffett was not alone in his irritation at these impertinent young people exercising their right to vote. State Sen. William Gannon publicly bemoaned the fact that students who attend school in New Hampshire don’t “really have skin in the game.” His colleague Sen. Dan Innis agreed: “If you’re from Boston and you’re up here eight months out of the year and you’re registered to vote there, you shouldn’t be able to vote here.” All three men would go on to support HB 1264, a measure that passed both chambers of the state legislature last year and was signed into law by Republican Gov. Chris Sununu.
The law, set to go into effect this July, would force residents with out-of-state driver’s licenses to obtain a New Hampshire ID and register their car in the state before voting — or else face criminal charges punishable by up to a year in jail. The fees to make the switch can run into the hundreds of dollars, according to the ACLU, which filed suit Wednesday on behalf of two Dartmouth students challenging the law. The civil liberties group is arguing the fees constitute a poll tax on college students, young voters and those new to the state.
“Younger voters historically have a lower turnout, and I think that politicians start to get nervous when they see, in 2018 for example, that the young people’s turnout was a lot higher,” says Julie Ebenstein, senior staff attorney for the ACLU. “I think a lot of politicians see that and they get concerned that the dynamics of elections are going to change if young people start voting. I think there is an attempt to suppress the votes of young voters.”
more...
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/how-republicans-are-stripping-students-of-their-voting-rights-791980/
February 15, 2019
https://politicalwire.com/2019/02/15/cummings-says-trump-attorneys-lied-about-cohen-payments/
Trump Attorneys May Have Lied About Cohen Payments
February 15, 2019 at 5:22 pm EST By Taegan Goddard
Trump Attorneys May Have Lied About Cohen Payments
https://politicalwire.com/2019/02/15/cummings-says-trump-attorneys-lied-about-cohen-payments/
Trump Attorneys May Have Lied About Cohen Payments
February 15, 2019 at 5:22 pm EST By Taegan Goddard
House Oversight Committee Chairman Elijah Cummings (D-MD) said that his panel received new documents showing that two attorneys for President Trump may have lied to government ethics officials about Michael Cohen’s payments to women alleging affairs with the president ahead of the 2016 election, Politico reports.
Said Cummings: “It now appears that President Trump’s other attorneys — at the White House and in private practice — may have provided false information about these payments to federal officials.”
Said Cummings: “It now appears that President Trump’s other attorneys — at the White House and in private practice — may have provided false information about these payments to federal officials.”
February 15, 2019
Trump's 'National Emergency' Is a Purely Dictatorial Action
It is an abuse of power. It is an assault on Congress's Article I powers. Mitch McConnell is complicit.
By Charles P. Pierce
Feb 15, 2019
snip//
Between Thursday afternoon and Friday morning, most of the Republicans seem to have made a kind of peace with the inevitability of the president*'s behaving like a tinhorn. We should be accustomed to this by now. The president* is going to raid the military. He is going to raid drug interdiction money. He is going to take money appropriated for one purpose and finance his own dark visions. He is lost in his own nightmares, abandoned in his own bigotry. His mind is a writhing ball of snakes. And there is nobody there to stop him. As Starbuck said of Ahab, he is a madman begetting other madmen. His speech was incoherent in thought, contemptuous of intellect, insane with bloodlust, and completely detached from anything that would be recognizable as reality even in Bedlam. Centuries after we ran a mad king off these shores, we now have one of our own.
This is a bill in response to nothing. This is a bill passed in order to address a delusion that the president* has shared with his most fervent supporters. There is no national emergency on the southern border. There isn't going to be a national emergency on the southern border, unless this president* has some other big, beautiful stupid ideas on how to boot brown people out of the country. Everybody voting on this bill knows all of this very well. The entire United States government has been placed in a freight car on the trolley that runs to the Neighborhood of Make Believe.
It can be argued that this precipitous move by the White House is another bit of legerdemain through which the president* can make the Andrew McCabe revelations vanish from the news cycle. That seems less important than usual now that the Senate has decided to share the president*'s delusions and bring us along for the ride.
This is a direct assault by this president* on the Congress's Article I powers. Usually, presidents use these powers to do things like levy sanctions on countries that are slaughtering their own people. What this president* is trying to do is to redirect money already appropriated for a project that Congress already has declined to fund—the last time only a couple of days ago. That is purely a dictatorial action. It is an abuse of power. It cannot be allowed to stand.
The argument being made by some on both the left and the right that, OK, if he can do this, then the next Democratic president can declare a national emergency on gun violence, say, or the climate crisis is sadly beside the point, and Democrats, in particular, should shut up about it. (This means you, Speaker Pelosi.) This is a clear and present danger to the constitutional order. Without the power of the purse, Congress has no power at all.
Mitch McConnell knows this. He even has been warning against this very power grab for a couple of weeks now. But he seems determined to neuter his own institution in order to curry favor with a failed president* and a bunch of idiot pundits from Fox News. He is abandoning his own responsibilities in the hopes that the courts will bail him out. And, again, there is no national emergency to be declared. Not outside of the Oval Office, anyway.
Charles P. Pierce: Trump's 'National Emergency' Is a Purely Dictatorial Action
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a26345673/trumps-national-emergency-is-a-purely-dictatorial-action/?fbclid=IwAR1uXPJeXSoClaLXWeUZM2RHURIJgjxy8K-kRXEm8veA68ec8n1y0meM9cQTrump's 'National Emergency' Is a Purely Dictatorial Action
It is an abuse of power. It is an assault on Congress's Article I powers. Mitch McConnell is complicit.
By Charles P. Pierce
Feb 15, 2019
snip//
Between Thursday afternoon and Friday morning, most of the Republicans seem to have made a kind of peace with the inevitability of the president*'s behaving like a tinhorn. We should be accustomed to this by now. The president* is going to raid the military. He is going to raid drug interdiction money. He is going to take money appropriated for one purpose and finance his own dark visions. He is lost in his own nightmares, abandoned in his own bigotry. His mind is a writhing ball of snakes. And there is nobody there to stop him. As Starbuck said of Ahab, he is a madman begetting other madmen. His speech was incoherent in thought, contemptuous of intellect, insane with bloodlust, and completely detached from anything that would be recognizable as reality even in Bedlam. Centuries after we ran a mad king off these shores, we now have one of our own.
This is a bill in response to nothing. This is a bill passed in order to address a delusion that the president* has shared with his most fervent supporters. There is no national emergency on the southern border. There isn't going to be a national emergency on the southern border, unless this president* has some other big, beautiful stupid ideas on how to boot brown people out of the country. Everybody voting on this bill knows all of this very well. The entire United States government has been placed in a freight car on the trolley that runs to the Neighborhood of Make Believe.
It can be argued that this precipitous move by the White House is another bit of legerdemain through which the president* can make the Andrew McCabe revelations vanish from the news cycle. That seems less important than usual now that the Senate has decided to share the president*'s delusions and bring us along for the ride.
This is a direct assault by this president* on the Congress's Article I powers. Usually, presidents use these powers to do things like levy sanctions on countries that are slaughtering their own people. What this president* is trying to do is to redirect money already appropriated for a project that Congress already has declined to fund—the last time only a couple of days ago. That is purely a dictatorial action. It is an abuse of power. It cannot be allowed to stand.
The argument being made by some on both the left and the right that, OK, if he can do this, then the next Democratic president can declare a national emergency on gun violence, say, or the climate crisis is sadly beside the point, and Democrats, in particular, should shut up about it. (This means you, Speaker Pelosi.) This is a clear and present danger to the constitutional order. Without the power of the purse, Congress has no power at all.
Mitch McConnell knows this. He even has been warning against this very power grab for a couple of weeks now. But he seems determined to neuter his own institution in order to curry favor with a failed president* and a bunch of idiot pundits from Fox News. He is abandoning his own responsibilities in the hopes that the courts will bail him out. And, again, there is no national emergency to be declared. Not outside of the Oval Office, anyway.
February 15, 2019
Boyfriend’s Email: Butina ‘Manipulated’ Russian Spy Agency for NRA Trip
According to her boyfriend, Russian agent Maria Butina had major sway with the FSB officers ‘assigned’ to her.
Betsy Woodruff,
Spencer Ackerman
02.14.19 7:51 PM ET
The boyfriend of confessed Russian agent Maria Butina wrote that she “manipulated” a Russian spy agency when arranging NRA bigwigs’ trip to Moscow, The Daily Beast has learned.
Paul Erickson, Butina’s boyfriend, made this claim on Nov. 25, 2015 in an email to a trip participant. The light-hearted, chummy tone of the email, which was subsequently read to The Daily Beast, contrasts significantly with how Erickson characterized Butina’s relationship with the FSB to The New Republic: tense, bordering on hostile.
It also shows that at least one trip attendee was led to believe that Russia’s FSB—whose predecessor was the KGB—helped lay the groundwork for the trip.
Erickson began the email, sent to then-incoming NRA President Pete Brownell, with florid language.
“Dear International Man of Mystery or should we just start calling you “Austin Powers” to your face??” he wrote, with a smiley face.
“The right thing to do would have been to inform the FBI and cancel the trip,” Sipher said. “Cavorting with those who claim to be at war with you is unpatriotic at best. Mr. Erickson’s actions are especially abhorrent.”
more...
https://www.thedailybeast.com/boyfriends-email-butina-manipulated-russian-spy-agency-for-nra-trip?ref=home
Boyfriend's Email: Butina 'Manipulated' Russian Spy Agency for NRA Trip
Boyfriend’s Email: Butina ‘Manipulated’ Russian Spy Agency for NRA Trip
According to her boyfriend, Russian agent Maria Butina had major sway with the FSB officers ‘assigned’ to her.
Betsy Woodruff,
Spencer Ackerman
02.14.19 7:51 PM ET
The boyfriend of confessed Russian agent Maria Butina wrote that she “manipulated” a Russian spy agency when arranging NRA bigwigs’ trip to Moscow, The Daily Beast has learned.
Paul Erickson, Butina’s boyfriend, made this claim on Nov. 25, 2015 in an email to a trip participant. The light-hearted, chummy tone of the email, which was subsequently read to The Daily Beast, contrasts significantly with how Erickson characterized Butina’s relationship with the FSB to The New Republic: tense, bordering on hostile.
It also shows that at least one trip attendee was led to believe that Russia’s FSB—whose predecessor was the KGB—helped lay the groundwork for the trip.
Erickson began the email, sent to then-incoming NRA President Pete Brownell, with florid language.
“Dear International Man of Mystery or should we just start calling you “Austin Powers” to your face??” he wrote, with a smiley face.
“Miss Butina has (apparently) moved heaven and earth and manipulated the Russian FSB (the current incarnation of the old KGB) and gotten you cleared for a tour of one (1) Russian arms factory the day before the NRA delegation arrives in Moscow,” he continued. “She found a way to shrink a normally 3-week process into about 3-days (probably because most of the FSB agents ‘assigned’ to her want to marry her).”
“The right thing to do would have been to inform the FBI and cancel the trip,” Sipher said. “Cavorting with those who claim to be at war with you is unpatriotic at best. Mr. Erickson’s actions are especially abhorrent.”
more...
https://www.thedailybeast.com/boyfriends-email-butina-manipulated-russian-spy-agency-for-nra-trip?ref=home
February 15, 2019
Trump’s Emergency Declaration Will Face Many Lawsuits
February 15, 2019 at 6:12 am EST By Taegan Goddard
Trump's Emergency Declaration Will Face Many Lawsuits
https://politicalwire.com/2019/02/15/trumps-emergency-declaration-will-face-many-lawsuits/Trump’s Emergency Declaration Will Face Many Lawsuits
February 15, 2019 at 6:12 am EST By Taegan Goddard
“If President Trump declares a national emergency to construct a wall on the southern border, only one thing is certain: There will be lawsuits. Lots of them. From California to Congress, the litigants will multiply,” the Washington Post reports.
“They will file suit in numerous jurisdictions — certainly within the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit on the West Coast, in U.S. District Court in Washington and maybe even in New York. That’s been the pattern in the hundreds of lawsuits, many of them successful, brought against the Trump administration, the idea being that some judge somewhere will block the wall.”
New York Times: “As a matter of legal reality, the proposal is likely to be bogged down in a court challenge, leaving any actual construction work based on emergency powers spending an uncertain and, at best, distant prospect.”
“They will file suit in numerous jurisdictions — certainly within the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit on the West Coast, in U.S. District Court in Washington and maybe even in New York. That’s been the pattern in the hundreds of lawsuits, many of them successful, brought against the Trump administration, the idea being that some judge somewhere will block the wall.”
New York Times: “As a matter of legal reality, the proposal is likely to be bogged down in a court challenge, leaving any actual construction work based on emergency powers spending an uncertain and, at best, distant prospect.”
February 15, 2019
Democrats Set Qualifications for Presidential Debates
February 14, 2019 at 6:09 pm EST By Taegan Goddard
Democrats Set Qualifications for Presidential Debates
https://politicalwire.com/2019/02/14/democrats-set-qualifications-for-presidential-debates/Democrats Set Qualifications for Presidential Debates
February 14, 2019 at 6:09 pm EST By Taegan Goddard
“As many as 20 Democratic presidential candidates will be invited to the party’s first sanctioned debates this summer if they can meet new polling or grass-roots fundraising thresholds to qualify,” the Washington Post reports.
“Candidates can qualify either by attracting campaign donations from at least 65,000 people, including at least 200 people from at least 20 states, or by registering at least 1 percent in three state or national polls from a list of surveys approved by the party.”
“Candidates can qualify either by attracting campaign donations from at least 65,000 people, including at least 200 people from at least 20 states, or by registering at least 1 percent in three state or national polls from a list of surveys approved by the party.”
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