February 21, 2020

...Grenell lacks intelligence experience but he is a gold Trump Card member

Begs the question: What's the hurry?

https://theweek.com/speedreads/896893/trumps-new-acting-intelligence-chief-richard-grenell-lacks-intelligence-experience-but-gold-trump-card-member

Loyal to the Chief
Trump's new acting intelligence chief Richard Grenell lacks intelligence experience but he is a gold Trump Card member
12:39 a.m.


President Trump confirmed Wednesday night that he is appointing Richard Grenell, the U.S. ambassador to Germany, as acting director of national intelligence. Current acting DNI Joseph Maguire, who would have had to step down by March 12 because he lacked Senate confirmation, "was blindsided by the news," The Washington Post reports, as were many people in the intelligence community and on Capitol Hill. Grenell will take responsibility for America's 17 intelligence agencies on Thursday, The New York Times reports.

Trump isn't expected to nominate Grenell for the job, so he can hold the office for only 210 days under the Federal Vacancies Reform Act.

Grenell has no real intelligence experience and has never run a large bureaucracy. His most relevant experience to head the U.S. intelligence community are his two-year ambassadorship and long stint as spokesman for the U.S. mission to the United Nations under President George W. Bush. Before Trump sent him to Berlin, "Grenell was known mainly as an online media critic and conservative Fox News foreign policy analyst," The Associated Press reports. One administration official told AP that "Grenell was named in an acting capacity because Trump wanted him in quickly and there were doubts about whether he could be confirmed in the job."

Director of national intelligence is "a job considered to be among the most nonpartisan in Washington," the Times notes. By picking Grenell, Trump is signaling "he wants a trusted, aggressive leader atop an intelligence community that he has long viewed with suspicion and at times gone to war against," and "the list of people with the requisite experience who have not been critical of the president is slim." Also, Grenell will be the first openly gay member of Trump's Cabinet, its third Fox News contributor, and, along with U.N. Ambassador Kelly Craft, the second Cabinet member who is a "Gold" level member of the Trump Organization's Trump Card loyalty program. Peter Weber

February 20, 2020

The Rude Pundit: Warren Finally Puts Back on Her Ass-Kicking Boots

https://rudepundit.blogspot.com/2020/02/warren-finally-puts-back-on-her-ass.html


The Rude Pundit
Proudly lowering the level of political discourse
2/20/2020
Warren Finally Puts Back on Her Ass-Kicking Boots


Last night, at the Democratic debate in Las Vegas, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren finally put on the combat boots that are still speckled with the blood of banking lobbyists and got back to the business of stomping ultra-rich asses. Warren had been trying to be above the fray at the debates, largely, until she was put on a stage with Mike fuckin' Bloomberg, fer fuck's' sake, and, well, his smug fuckin' billionaire face was just begging for a rhetorical curb-stomping.

It's not just that Warren went at him with a combination of sharp stiletto and dull ax blade, making him watch as his organs were dumped onto the stage. It's that she fucking enjoyed it, like it was absolutely cathartic. For many of us who have had Warren in our top tier (if not first) since she entered the race, it was positively orgasmic. When Warren opened with "I'd like to talk about who we're running against, a billionaire who calls women 'fat broads' and 'horse-faced lesbians.' And, no, I'm not talking about Donald Trump. I'm talking about Mayor Bloomberg" as her opening comment, the audience gasped, I fuckin' gasped, and then I thought, "Oh, shit, it's on."

And it was. The entire debate was more energetic, more passionate, and more engaging than pretty much any other primary debate that I can remember, from the Klobuchar/Buttigieg bloody cage match to the attempts to ding Bernie Sanders for his health records to Biden finally being coherently cranky. But it was Warren going warrior that raised the temperature of the whole event. The evening was something of a Hail Mary pass for Warren. Fading in the polls, watching Buttigieg, Klobuchar, and now Mike fuckin' Bloomberg pass her in the polls, she gave up her last fucks and threw long and hard. And the thing about Hail Marys is that, when they work, they are things of beauty.

snip//

Yes, the candidates on stage did seem to be ignoring the orange gorilla in the room by not attacking Trump enough, but Bloomberg was the Trump stand-in. Bitch-slapping Bloomberg around the stage is great practice for going after Trump. Jesus, Bloomberg can actually make a sentence. If Warren attacked Trump for the NDAs or his border savagery (which, by the way, was sadly not discussed last night), he'd sputter for a few seconds and yell, "Pocahontas!"

A lot of us indulged in the fantasy of Elizabeth Warren, armed for bear, stepping into an arena with Trump. And you know she's licking her lips at the possibility. Should Trump actually debate his Democratic opponent, that candidate has to know that they aren't dealing with a rational being. They are dealing with an uncontrollable rage machine powered by narcissism, lies, and spite. They are dealing with someone who had a rally during the debate where he complained that a military dog got more attention than him, vented about Hillary Clinton, bragged about his 2016 victory, and said about eliminating the estate tax, no, really, "So if you love your children, it's good. If you don't love your children, it doesn't matter. Don't leave it to them if you don't love them. If your children are no good to you, don't give them anything. Let them go out to work like hell." Debating Donald Trump will be like wrestling orange Jello.

It was a good night for a good candidate in Las Vegas. Let's hope she keeps kicking ass. And if you thought that Warren was too angry, too mean, or too shrill while Sanders, who yelled almost every answer (as is his way, love him or hate him), was presidential, you have a fuckload of self-reflection to do.

February 20, 2020

I *WANT* an Angry Woman as My President, Actually

I *WANT* an Angry Woman as My President, Actually
So don’t tell me Warren’s “anger” is a problem.
By Liz Plank
Feb 20, 2020


Senator Elizabeth Warren has spent most of her presidential campaign playing nice as everyone’s favorite teacher who has SO. MANY. PLANS. But at last night’s Democratic debate in Nevada, she cracked her knuckles, threw some bows, and basically destroyed every single electability argument the media has tossed her way since she announced her run. Then she ate Michael Bloomberg’s ego for dessert.

snip//

While many pundits celebrated the senator’s feisty performance, others played into the sexist trope of the mean, angry woman. (Original, thanks.) As it’s been argued by authors Brittney Cooper, Rebecca Traister, Soraya Chemaly, and several other feminist thinkers, people are still uncomfortable with female anger, despite it being one of the greatest catalysts for historical and lasting social change.

And even though our culture haaaaates angry women, they love to erase them when they’re not angry enough: After a third place performance in the Iowa Caucus, cable news cut away from Warren’s speech and she was basically left out of the coverage the next day. Despite being one of the clear front-runners in this race, she wasn’t even included in a poll about presidential matchups. How does that make sense?

Even after last night’s explosive performance, one headline from the New York Times appearing to recap the debate made no mention of Warren. It’s a classic double standard that’s almost impossible to escape. We ignore women by nature and then get confused and uncomfortable when they’re forced to elbow their way in.
https://twitter.com/i/status/1230313046129532928
But here’s the mind-blowing truth: Warren’s anger is a great thing. She’s not using it to fight for herself. She’s fighting for the less privileged, a trait I actually really, really want in a leader. For instance, during the debate, she was furious as she stood up for the thousands of men of color who have been stopped and frisked, the millions of black and brown families who were preyed upon with redlining, and children with disabilities who faced budget cuts while billionaires got a tax break this year.


more...

https://www.cosmopolitan.com/politics/a31022050/elizabeth-warren-debate-anger/?fbclid=IwAR16E-8JBIR9Jom-TPhbFaRPBnMzu1Kn-ME7NlDaQtDAeD47V-HeUDbRWkg

February 20, 2020

Endorsement: Vote Pete Buttigieg president to make America good again

https://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/opinion/story/2020-02-20/endorsement-pete-buttigieg-for-president-of-the-united-states-would-make-am?fbclid=IwAR24DEgOpbP9aCZ2F501U_ShID7Ey93bhFeOmgv57eAI2UFVOhEOnL9S9Wg


Endorsement: Vote Pete Buttigieg president to make America good again
By The San Diego Union-Tribune Editorial Board
Feb. 20, 2020
10:58 AM

snip//

It’s close, but in the view of The San Diego Union-Tribune Editorial Board, Buttigieg is best suited to beat Trump because of his centrist policies, his military experience, his (admittedly small-scale) executive experience and the enthusiasm he’s inspired, with better fundraising and national polling, bigger campaign crowds and more news coverage than Klobuchar. He has shown he can manage a national campaign successfully. And in a nation that only legalized same-sex marriage in 2015, his message of generational change could actually inspire change.

Of the six strong Democratic candidates left, half are 77- or 78-year-old men, two are women, one of whom is 70, and then there is Buttigieg. He may have only been mayor of the fourth-largest city in Indiana, but his fresh approach is transformational. He came out in an op-ed in a local newspaper while seeking reelection in 2015, choosing his ability to love openly over his presumed ability to advance more easily in politics.

Buttigieg wound up with a greater share of the vote than he’d won at age 29 in 2011.

snip//

The way Buttigieg speaks of his decision to come out — or of any decision he has made or might make — reveals a well-reasoned, thoughtful deliberation process that would serve the White House well. That it needs such sagacity now is the understatement of all understatements.

The New York Times Editorial Board asked Buttigieg how he would balance his devout Episcopalian faith with his duties as commander in chief, and he showed both his wisdom and his eloquence: “I think you have to accept the reality that you are living and working in a broken world just as we are all broken human beings and try to order your steps in a way that brings greater good than harm.”

That resonated with us, for its lofty rhetoric and grounding in humanity and hope: “greater good.”

It’s time for a generational change. It’s time to make America good again.

Vote Pete Buttigieg for president of the United States.

February 20, 2020

Bloomberg Just Helped Every Other Candidate Prove They Can Humiliate a Thin-Skinned, Entitled Billio

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/02/bloomberg-gives-democratic-debaters-a-chance-to-showcase-their-billionaire-bashing-skills.html


Michael Bloomberg Just Helped Every Other Candidate Prove They Can Humiliate a Thin-Skinned, Entitled Billionaire
By Ben Mathis-Lilley
Feb 20, 20201:09 AM


Coming into Wednesday’s Democratic primary debate in Las Vegas, idiot pundits were mainly concerned with how Michael Bloomberg’s first performance would reflect on Michael Bloomberg. Stupid! It turns out the big story, Bloomberg-wise, was how well everyone else would come off while they dunked repeatedly and remorselessly on him in the course of exposing his candidacy as the vanity project of a low-charisma onetime Republican with a history of red-flag positions and behavior.

It started almost immediately as Elizabeth Warren jumped into a discussion of electability with a pre-packaged zinger that, unlike almost all pre-packaged debate zingers, actually drew some blood:



snip//

After a subsequent discussion of Bloomberg’s wealth during which he said he had “worked very hard” for his multi-multi-billion-dollar fortune, Sanders noted to him, to oohs and aahs and oh snaps from the audience, that “maybe your workers played some role in that as well.”

It was a very hard night for Bloomberg, and a big part of why it was so hard is that the other Democrats were so sharp and confident in their criticisms of him. They weren’t flustered by his dismissive speaking style, or shaken by his poll standing and spending power, and they all seemed to find it easy to articulate (even during heated back and forths) why his record and personality were objectionable.

This should be good news for Democrats for two reasons. One is that, despite the intraparty sniping and snarking that is taking place during the primary, Bloomberg’s competitors demonstrated that they do, in fact, share common values which animate them more than their differences and can snap them quickly into a unified front. The other is that, in an environment in which Democratic voters have become obsessed with finding a nominee who can “stand up” to Trump, all five of the non-Bloomberg candidates on stage stood up to someone who shares a few of his most unsavory traits and came out as clear winners.

February 20, 2020

Trump's choice for Intel Director called 'a national disgrace'

https://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/trump-s-choice-intel-director-called-national-disgrace-n1139711


Trump's choice for Intel Director called 'a national disgrace'
A notorious online pest has a job: Rick Grenell will oversee the intelligence community of the world's preeminent superpower.
Feb. 20, 2020, 8:00 AM EST
By Steve Benen


To know anything about Richard Grenell is to know he spent several years annoying people as a prominent internet troll. I generally try to avoid blocking people on Twitter, but even I found Grenell's juvenile antics so grating that I took advantage of the platform's "block" feature.

snip//

Though Trump yesterday referred to Grenell as "highly respected," the truth is that Grenell was so reviled in his current diplomatic post that some German officials spoke publicly about the possibility of asking him to leave the country.

And did I mention that Grenell was also a relevant figure in the White House's Ukraine scandal? Because that's another relevant part of his c.v.

He'll now parlay that failure into leading the Office of the Director of National Intelligence. What's more, while this is a Senate-confirmed position, Grenell will reportedly begin his tenure today in an acting capacity.

Samantha Power, who was President Barack Obama's ambassador to the United Nations, said in a tweet, "Appointing [Grenell] who has politicized every issue he has touched and has contempt for facts, would be a travesty." Joe Cirincione, president of the Ploughshares Fund, added, "This is a national disgrace."

February 20, 2020

Trump Has Put Jared Kushner in Charge of Pardons, Says Report

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-has-put-jared-kusher-in-charge-of-pardons-says-report?ref=home

Trump Has Put Jared Kushner in Charge of Pardons, Says Report
FAMILY BUSINESS
Jamie Ross
Updated Feb. 20, 2020 8:16AM ET /
Published Feb. 20, 2020 7:06AM ET
REUTERS

February 19, 2020

What is the 'boogaloo?' How online calls for a violent uprising are hitting the mainstream

What is the 'boogaloo?' How online calls for a violent uprising are hitting the mainstream
The movement says it wants a second Civil War targeting liberal political opponents and law enforcement.
Feb. 19, 2020, 10:10 AM EST
By Brandy Zadrozny


An anti-government movement that advocates for a violent uprising targeting liberal political opponents and law enforcement has moved from the fringes of the internet into the mainstream in recent months and surged on social media, according to a group of researchers that tracks hate groups.

The movement, which says it wants a second Civil War organized around the term “boogaloo,” now includes groups on mainstream internet platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and Reddit as well as fringe websites including 4chan, according to a report released Tuesday night by the Network Contagion Research Institute (NCRI), an independent nonprofit of scientists and engineers that tracks and reports on misinformation and hate speech across social media.

While calls for organized and targeted violence in the form of a new Civil War have previously circulated among some hate groups, the emergence of the term “boogaloo” appeared to be a new and discrete movement. NCRI researchers analyzed more than 100 million social media posts and comments and found that through the use of memes — inside jokes commonly in the form of images — extremists have pushed anti-government and anti-law enforcement messages across social media platforms. They have also organized online communities with tens of thousands of members, some of whom have assembled at real-world events.

The report “represents a breakthrough case study in the capacity to identify cyber swarms and viral insurgencies in nearly real time as they are developing in plain sight,” John Farmer, a former New Jersey attorney general and current director of the Miller Center for Community Protection and Resilience at Rutgers University, wrote in the report’s forward.

The report comes as U.S. law enforcement officials and researchers at various levels have issued warnings about the growing threat posed by domestic extremists motivated by fringe ideologies and conspiracy theories. Joel Finkelstein, NCRI’s director and a research scholar at the James Madison Program at Princeton University, said the report had been sent to members of Congress and the Departments of Defense, Homeland Security and Justice, among others.

more...

https://www.nbcnews.com/tech/social-media/what-boogaloo-how-online-calls-violent-uprising-are-getting-organized-n1138461?fbclid=IwAR3CxNjIptP3H8P9nC835ohpC7d_E7uDOamezyo2iy97btMi7AplWgR-h1o

February 19, 2020

Why Bloomberg Can't Beat Trump

Why Bloomberg Can’t Beat Trump
It’s hard to imagine a Democrat less able to win working class votes.
by Harold Meyerson
February 19, 2020


This should be a happy time for former New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg. Right now, his ads are drowning the airwaves in the 14 states that will vote on Super Tuesday, March 3, while in most of those states, the campaigns of his non-billionaire opponents for the Democrats’ presidential nod have barely begun.

As the campaign rolls on, however, Democratic voters will learn more about Bloomberg’s actual record. The mass incarceration in black and brown communities that resulted from police practices he put in place as mayor; the pre-emptive arrests he authorized of people who sought to protest the 2004 Republican convention in New York (for which the city had to pay hefty fines for false arrests); his defense of Wall Street bankers in the wake of the 2008 financial panic (he termed the fines levied against banks for misconduct “outrageous”)—these are just some of the many Bloomberg policies and positions that should give Democrats pause.

Even so, some Democrats may be willing to overlook that Bloomberg governed and in many ways still thinks like a Republican because they believe he has the best chance to unseat President Donald Trump next November.

But he doesn’t. Indeed, he can’t.

It’s hard to imagine a Democrat less able to win working class votes—those of young black and Latino workers, and those of the white workers who swung the 2016 election to Trump. Minority voters are unlikely to look kindly on his mayoral record: intensifying stop-and-frisk, vetoing legislation that banned predatory lenders from doing business with the city, and opposing city legislation to raise the living wage. Now that he’s running for president he says he backs a minimum wage hike, but in 2014, he told Fox News, “I’ve always thought that this impetus to raise the minimum wage is one of the most misguided things we can do.”

more...

https://prospect.org/politics/why-bloomberg-cannot-beat-trump/

February 19, 2020

"...it's never involved me having to send hush money to a porn star..."

https://politicalwire.com/2020/02/18/bonus-quote-of-the-day-1276/



Bonus Quote of the Day
February 18, 2020 at 11:25 pm EST By Taegan Goddard