Top Party Official Accuses DNC Chairwoman of Lying & Questions Her Leadership

Top Party Official Accuses Democratic National Chairwoman of Lying and Questions Her Leadership




R.T. Rybak, the former mayor of Minneapolis and a vice chairman of the Democratic National Committee, on Thursday accused the party’s leader, Representative Debbie Wasserman Schultz, of making “flat-out not true” statements about another top party officer, questioned her political skills and said he had “serious questions” about her suitability for the job.

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On Oct. 5, Ms. Gabbard, who as a party officer has not endorsed a presidential candidate, repeated her call for additional debates on MSNBC. The next day, she later confirmed to a reporter, her chief of staff received a message from Ms. Wasserman Schultz’s office disinviting Ms. Gabbard from the Las Vegas debate because of her public remarks. (The party denied that Ms. Gabbard was refused a ticket.)

In a series of televised interviews on Monday and Tuesday, Ms. Wasserman Schultz suggested that Ms. Gabbard was causing an unwelcome distraction by drawing attention from the presidential candidates, and insisted that she had indeed consulted with the party’s officers before scheduling the debates.

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In a telephone interview Thursday, Mr. Rybak weighed in angrily in response, expressing shock that Ms. Wasserman Schultz “would knowingly say something that is flat-out not true.”

“This is not a back-and-forth between a chair and a vice chair,” he said. “This is a chair of the Democratic Party wrongly stating that she consulted with all of the party officers. I was not consulted. I know that Tulsi Gabbard was not consulted. And this is becoming about much more than debates.”

“The Democratic National Committee staff has never been stronger,” Mr. Rybak said in an interview. ”The one thing that could stop us from having a great election coming up is if the chair continues to create these self-made dramas that are below what a chair should be doing.”

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Informed of Mr. Rybak’s remarks, Amy Dacey, the Democratic National Committee’s chief of staff, essentially conceded that Ms. Gabbard and Mr. Rybak had not been consulted about the debate schedule before it was determined.

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http://www.nytimes.com/politics/first-draft/2015/10/15/top-party-official-accuses-democratic-national-chairwoman-of-lying-questions-her-leadership/?_r=0

Baseball cards for Obama to decide who lives or dies

And for what?

The next big thing in military drones could be a boon for US manufacturers

Jonathan Camhi

Oct. 15, 2015, 6:35 PM 245 1



The next major innovation that will impact the market for military drones will be drones capable of air-to-air combat, according to a new Motley Fool article. So far, military drones have been limited to surveillance roles and attacking ground targets, but drones that could combat other aircraft would be in high demand, as they would allow militaries to conduct aerial combat without putting pilots’ lives at risk.

American drone manufacturers are well positioned to take advantage of this next development in military drone technology, the article said. Northrop Gunman is already selling drones that can take off and land from aircraft carriers, and be refueled in mid-flight. Northrop is already setting itself apart from the market by focusing on very advanced, high-altitude drones that can cover longer distances. Drones that can combat other aircraft will likely need all of those characteristics.

Although Israeli drone manufacturers like Elbit Systems currently lead the market for military drones, American manufacturers are quickly catching up, and could pull ahead if they can be the first to make air-to-air combat drones. Northrop is developing a long-distance drone, called the MQ-4 Triton, that Australia and other countries are already lining up to buy. General Atomics, another US-based drone maker, is also getting more business from European countries interested in its popular, medium-altitude Predator and Reaper drones.

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http://www.businessinsider.com/next-big-thing-military-drones-boon-us-2015-10?utm_source=feedly&utm_medium=referral

Thankfully we have whistleblowers of conscience who take the *Change* part seriously

Especially if Pepsi manipulates the numbers so people can cheer the killing

In 5-month period of a US op in Afghanistan, nearly 90% of people killed were not the targets

"a video game, drained of all humanity" How *cool* (barf)

A Massive National Security Leak Just Blew the Lid Off Obama's Drone War

A Massive National Security Leak Just Blew the Lid Off Obama's Drone War

The Intercept just published a huge expose of the Pentagon's drone program.

—By AJ Vicens and Max J. Rosenthal
| Thu Oct. 15, 2015 4:25 PM EDT





On Thursday, the Intercept published a major package of stories that reveals the inner workings of the US military's drone program, including how and why people are targeted for assassination on the amorphous battlefields of Yemen, Somalia, and other countries. "The Drone Papers," according to the Intercept, is based on a trove of a classified documents leaked by a whistleblower who grew concerned by the government's methods of targeting individuals for lethal action.

"This outrageous explosion of watchlisting—of monitoring people and racking and stacking them on lists, assigning them numbers, assigning them 'baseball cards,' assigning them death sentences without notice, on a worldwide battlefield—it was, from the very first instance, wrong," the source said.

The package is a deep look into how the US military has conducted its counterterrorism operations around the world, and it comes on the same day that President Barack Obama cited the counterterrorism mission against Al Qaeda as one of the two reasons to keep nearly 10,000 soldiers in Afghanistan for at least another year.

Amnesty International called for an immediate congressional inquiry into the drone program, saying the leaked documents "raise serious concerns about whether the USA has systematically violated international law, including by classifying unidentified people as 'combatants' to justify their killings."

The entire series is worth your time, so please go read it. But for now, here are some key takeaways:

- The US government kills a lot of people who aren't military targets.
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- Obama had to sign off on each target, but he didn't know when or where the military might strike.
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- And the target itself might not even be a person:
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http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2015/10/obama-intercept-drone-papers-project-kill-list

Breaking: Dem Sen Sherrod Brown Slams Obama-Backed TPP As 'Massive Sellout of American Workers'

Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown Slams Obama-Backed TPP As 'Massive Sellout of American Workers'

By David Sirota @davidsirota d.sirota@ibtimes.com on October 14 2015 3:24 PM EDT

Democratic senators have typically used deferential language when discussing Obama administration initiatives, even ones they don't support. In that, they have emulated Ronald Reagan's (possibly apocryphal) "Eleventh Commandment" about not publicly attacking members of your own party. But that may be changing with the president's push for a 12-nation trade agreement, known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

In a blast email sent out Wednesday morning, senior Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown -- who represents the all-important swing state of Ohio -- slammed the White House initiative in terms typically reserved for attack ads against Republicans. He declared that Obama’s proposal “is an enormous giveaway to huge corporations and CEOs and a massive sellout of American workers and jobs.”

Brown is now urging voters to sign a petition demanding Obama immediately release the text of the TPP, which was finalized earlier this month. The Obama administration is obligated to release the full text of the agreement before any congressional vote on the TPP, but the administration recently went to court to keep the text secret for the time being. Brown asserted that as a legislator, he needs to see the text immediately.

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Consumer, privacy and environmental watchdog groups that have reviewed leaked sections of the deal have sounded the alarm about the agreement’s provisions on everything from pharmaceutical patents to copyrights to strengthening corporations legal rights in their challenges against domestic laws.

http://www.ibtimes.com/political-capital/democratic-senator-sherrod-brown-slams-obama-backed-tpp-massive-sellout-american

Hillary Clinton: Capital’s Plan A

Hillary Clinton: Capital’s Plan A

Hillary Clinton has been talking about economic inequality lately, but there’s a reason Wall Street isn’t worried.
by Elizabeth Schulte


Hillary Clinton with Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein.

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As secretary of state, she pressured governments to change policies and sign deals that would benefit US corporations like General Electric, Exxon Mobil, Microsoft, and Boeing. She also promoted hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, and contracts with US oil companies like Chevron in Poland, Bulgaria, and elsewhere.

But perhaps her most telling corporate relationship is with the union-busting retail giant Walmart. Clinton served on the company’s board of directors from 1986 to 1992, and the law firm she worked for, Rose Law Firm, represented the corporation. During those years, Clinton sat quietly as Walmart waged a war on workers trying to unionize and fight for basic rights on the job. This fealty to Walmart never wavered. During her three trips to India as secretary of state, she tried to convince the government to reverse its law aimed at keeping out big-box retailers.

Clinton’s newfound populism would be laughable if it weren’t for her actual record — decades’ worth of cruel attacks on workers and the poor. From support for welfare reform and tough-on-crime policies in the 1990s to shilling for US corporations abroad as secretary of state, Clinton has never strayed from the Democratic Party’s aim — protecting corporate America’s bottom line.

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With her assistance, the Clinton administration managed what no Republican could achieve, shredding a key New Deal program that often served as the only thing standing between poor families and absolute destitution. The whole effort was steeped in the language of “personal responsibility,” getting people to work and off welfare, and “ending a culture of dependency” — as if poverty was the result of moral failings.

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Much more: https://www.jacobinmag.com/2015/05/hillary-clinton-president-walmart-business-feminist/