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demmiblue's JournalSon calls out father's 'racist' comment after 'Why didn't you stay in Mexico?' outburst
Matthew Burtell said he feels it’s important to challenge bigotry wherever it appears -- even when it involves his own father.
His father Tom Burtell, in a tense moment during a Saline Area Schools community meeting on diversity and inclusion Monday, Feb. 3, asked the provocative question to fellow parent Adrian Iraola, who was in the middle of describing his son’s difficult experiences as a Hispanic student in the predominantly white school district south of Ann Arbor.
“It’s of vital importance to call out racism wherever you see it,” said Matthew Burtell in an interview Tuesday. “We can’t stand idly by – as children, as brothers and sisters, as friends and as people interacting with each other in daily life – when someone says or does anything racist. It’s all of our responsibilities and it shouldn’t have to get to this.
...
Matthew Burtell, a 2014 Saline High School alum with siblings still in the district, said he wanted to voice how his views differ from his father’s. His friend sent him the video Monday evening. He said it gave him “a sinking feeling."
“I was horrified,” said Matthew Burtell, a U.S. Navy veteran who’s studying computer science and math at Yale University. “"At some points in my life, I’ve felt immense dread and a sort of sinking feeling, like ‘Oh my god.’ So, I think it was that feeling."
https://www.mlive.com/news/ann-arbor/2020/02/son-calls-out-fathers-racist-comment-after-why-didnt-you-stay-in-mexico-outburst.html?utm_source=twitter&utm_campaign=mlivenews_sf&utm_medium=social
Here is the video (
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White House excludes CNN from annual pre-SOTU lunch with news anchors
Source: CNN
New York (CNN Business)President Donald Trump's targeting of CNN is moving to yet another arena: The annual presidential lunch with television network anchors.
CNN anchors are being excluded from Tuesday's lunch, three sources said on Monday night.
Trump, like presidents before him, typically invites anchors from all the major networks to dine with him at the White House in advance of his State of the Union address. The lunch conversation is considered off the record, but it gives the anchors a sense of the president's state of mind before they anchor SOTU coverage. "Despite Trump's persistent attacks on the news media, he's kept up such traditions," Politico pointed out last year.
CNN's Anderson Cooper and Wolf Blitzer attended last year's lunch. Blitzer has been attending these lunches longer than almost any other anchor — 20 years in a row.
Journalists from other networks are still planning on attending Tuesday's session, according to sources at those networks.
Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/03/media/donald-trump-state-of-the-union-lunch-cnn/index.html
https://twitter.com/sandibachom/status/1224566526419841025
https://twitter.com/ParkerMolloy/status/1224702188271886337
Sen. Manchin calls for censuring Trump over pressuring Ukraine to investigate his domestic political
Source: WaPo
Sen. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.), a moderate who is friendly with the White House, on Monday asked his colleagues to consider censuring President Trump as it concludes the Senate impeachment trial.
Manchin has prepared a censure resolution for fellow senators to consider in the coming days, which would be a less severe rebuke than removal from office for Trump’s efforts in pressuring Ukraine to investigate his domestic political rival.
“What the president did was wrong,” Manchin said in a speech on the Senate floor.
The crux of the case against Trump is the allegation that he withheld military aid and a White House meeting to pressure Ukraine to investigate former vice president and 2020 candidate Joe Biden and his son. Hunter Biden served on the board of Burisma, a Ukrainian energy company, while his father was vice president.
Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/sen-manchin-calls-for-censuring-trump-over-pressuring-ukraine-to-investigate-his-domestic-political-rival/2020/02/03/c29a42aa-46c9-11ea-ab15-b5df3261b710_story.html
Guy Sings 'Living On A Prayer' To Himself, The Entire Park Joins Him
Odds are, if you start singing it in public, someone else will join you. That’s what one man experienced when he starting singing Living On A Prayer while sitting on a bench. The man’s voice enchanted the people around him and pretty soon the entire park was singing along with him.
Passer-by Matej Priteržnik posted the video on YouTube and got over 895k views. People absolutely loved it because of the sense of community you get when you watch the clip.
https://www.boredpanda.com/guy-in-park-starts-singing-bon-jovi-song-everyone-joins/
"It's Payback Time": With Acquittal Certain, Trump Plots Revenge on Bolton, Impeachment Enemies
Several sources said Bolton is at the top of the list. Trump’s relationship with Bolton was badly damaged by the time Bolton left the White House in September. Trump has since blamed his former national security adviser for leaking details of his forthcoming memoir that nearly derailed the impeachment trial by pressuring Republicans to call witnesses. In the book Bolton reportedly alleges Trump told him directly that Ukraine aid was tied to Ukraine announcing investigations into the Bidens (Bolton has denied being a source of the leak).
The campaign against Bolton has already begun. On January 23, the White House sent a cease and desist letter to Bolton’s lawyer demanding that Bolton’s publisher, Simon & Schuster, not release the book in March without removal of certain information. Trump intends to ratchet up the pressure, and some Republicans close to the White House fear how far Trump will take things after he’s gotten off for a second time (Trump famously made his July 25 call to Volodymyr Zelensky the day after Robert Mueller testified before Congress.) “Trump has been calling people and telling them to go after Bolton,” a source briefed on the private conversations said. The source added that Trump wants Bolton to be criminally investigated. A person familiar with Trump’s thinking said Trump believes Bolton might have mishandled classified information. According to a former official, the White House is planning to leak White House emails from Bolton that purportedly allege Bolton abused his position at the National Security Council. The official said that West Wing officials have discussed releasing emails “showing [Bolton] was doing pay-to-play,” the official said. A person close to Bolton dismissed the story. “John plays things straight,” the person said.
The White House declined to comment.
https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/02/trump-plots-revenge-on-bolton-impeachment-enemies
https://twitter.com/RobertMaguire_/status/1224418041775214592
2 dead in shooting incident at Texas A&M-Commerce residence hall
Source: NBC News
Two people were killed and another injured in a shooting at a residence hall at Texas A&M University-Commerce on Monday.
Students and staff members on campus were asked to shelter in place as a "precautionary measure" as university police investigate the shooting at Pride Rock Residence Hall, according to campus police.
Campus police said they found three victims who suffered gunshot wounds, two of whom were confirmed dead.
Another person was transported to a hospital, according to campus police. The third victim's condition is unclear.
Read more: https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/2-dead-shooting-incident-texas-m-commerce-residence-hall-n1129021?cid=sm_npd_nn_tw_ma
'You basically are nothing': the Americans shut out of the Iowa caucuses
As Democratic candidates began a last-minute blitz across Iowa on Friday evening, nearly a dozen men gathered in a cavernous YMCA meeting room in downtown Des Moines to have a conversation that felt a universe removed from the 2020 race.
They were part of one of the largest groups shut out of Monday’s caucus: people with felony convictions. Iowans are barred from voting for life once they commit a felony, and people can’t vote even if they committed a crime decades ago. The state’s policy, one of the strictest in the country, means more than 42,000 Iowans out of prison won’t have a say in choosing a presidential candidate. Almost 10% of the black voting-age population can’t vote because of a felony conviction.
For decades, the Iowa caucuses have marked the beginning of the presidential primary, and often set the tone for the election year. But the event has come under increasing scrutiny for giving some voters – namely white and wealthy Iowans – outsized power in choosing the president in a state that’s already more than 90% white. Meanwhile, the physical and legal barriers built into the structure of the caucuses leave out large swaths of the population, whether they are disabled, work long hours, or were once convicted of a crime.
“When you know you can’t vote, you remove a certain segment of people from the political process,” said Mendoor Smith, one of the participants at the two hour meeting, organized by Image 4 Lives, a mentorship and support group founded by Robert Pate, a former felon. “If they’re removed from the process, then they’re not learning anything. If they have children, then they’re not telling their children anything.”
Smith, 46, who got his bachelor’s degree after getting released from prison said he had been closely following the caucuses and has been going to rallies and encouraging others to caucus, even though he can’t.
A few miles north, Gretchen Brown-Waech was getting ready for a historic caucus designed to serve another community often sidelined in the political dialogue: the 300,000 voting-age Iowans with disabilities.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/feb/03/americans-shut-out-iowa-caucuses?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
https://twitter.com/ashleyalman/status/1224372786027728902
Susan Collins' Campaign Is Being Helped by a Mysterious Hawaii Company
Source: The Daily Beast
A mysterious Hawaii company may have illegally funneled a six-figure contribution to a political group boosting an embattled Republican Senator 5,000 miles away, an ethics watchdog alleged on Monday.
The company, Society of Young Women Scientist and Engineers LLC, was formed in late November, according to corporate records in Hawaii. Just over a month later, on December 31, the company donated $150,000 to 1820 PAC, a deep-pocketed super PAC with ties to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce that was created to help reelect Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME).
There is scant public information about the company. It does not appear to have a website or any social media presence. Its listed address is a P.O. box in Honolulu (listed as a “unit” number in 1820’s FEC filings). Google searches turn up no information on the company. And there’s no record of prior political involvement by its sole officer, Jennifer Lam.
All of that suggests that the Society of Young Women Scientist and Engineers was set up for the sole purpose of making political contributions, according to the Campaign Legal Center, which filed a complaint on Monday asking the Federal Election Commission to investigate its December contribution to 1820 PAC, which was named after the year Maine was founded.
Read more: https://www.thedailybeast.com/susan-collins-campaign-is-being-helped-by-a-mysterious-hawaii-company
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