James48
James48's JournalTop Democrats Accuse the DHS Watchdog of Obstructing Their Investigations
Top Democrats Accuse the DHS Watchdog of Obstructing Their Investigations
http://GovExec.Com
Inspector General Joseph Cuffari defended his office’s work, but lawmakers pushed back.
COURTNEY BUBLÉ | AUGUST 17, 2022
Top Democratic lawmakers are accusing the Homeland Security watchdog of obstructing their investigations into how the office has handled reports on domestic violence and sexual assault as well as investigations into the Capitol attack.
The latest in a series of dramas involving DHS Inspector General Joseph Cuffari is a dispute between him and Reps. Carolyn Maloney, D-N.Y., and Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., chairs of the House Oversight and Reform and Homeland Security committees, respectively.
“In response to the committees’ requests [in May, July and August], you have refused to produce responsive documents and blocked employees in your office from appearing for transcribed interviews,” Maloney and Thompson wrote in a new letter to Cuffari on Tuesday, responding to two letters he sent them on Aug. 8. “Your obstruction of the committees’ investigations is unacceptable, and your justifications for this noncompliance appear to reflect a fundamental misunderstanding of Congress’s authority and your duties as an inspector general. If you continue to refuse to comply with our requests, we will have no choice but to consider alternate measures to ensure your compliance.”
In one letter that focused on missing text messages from Secret Service agents and President Trump’s top DHS officials in the lead-up to the Capitol attack, Cuffari defended how his office has conducted the probes and navigated access to records issues. He also repeated what he told lawmakers during a briefing on July 15, that consistent with federal guidelines, his office was “unable to confirm or discuss ongoing criminal investigations. Sharing information about ongoing criminal investigations could impact potential witnesses or others who may be involved in the investigative process.”
More:
https://www.govexec.com/oversight/2022/08/top-democrats-accuse-dhs-watchdog-obstructing-investigations/375931/
She wrote this today. I had to share.
From a friend. Her name is Darcy.
Darcy lost both her son (in Iraq), and then her husband. (A few years after he came back from Iraq. He didn’t die on the battlefield. He died back here, one of the many victims of the war who lost the battle he fought inside.)
I was her husband’s Platoon Leader, and then Company Commander at one time. I knew her son only briefly. Her husband served with me for about ten years.
How Darcy has held together I will never know. She has. And she’s started in touch with others who were with her son when he was killed. And the soldiers around both her son and husband.
She wrote and passed along today , this - from One of the guys her son was with in Iraq. She still keeps in touch with him. She talks with us all.
“ It's almost been 18 years. It has been 18 years since I last talked to you. Last heard your voice that wasn't a video. Those that were with you still bare the scars, mentally and physically. Tonight I share the writings of John. He was your driver. Remember freedom is never free. Shared with permission.”- Darcy.
“It sneaks up on me. An then I look at the date an I sort of know why. Is 19 years a long time? because somedays it seems like yesterday or even right now.
I woke up an thought I was actually in my rack for a second. The pain didn't hit till later. My first clue something horrible had happened was the taste in my mouth, expended munitions the smoke of it filled the cabin. I tried to move myself an found it Way too difficult. I didn't understand in point of fact I was lodged upside down, you get all confused when shit like that happens.
I tasted blood an that really spooked me. An then I could just barely hear above that damn high pitch whine in my ears, "John! " Rob calling from outside the rig, but it was just the barest of sounds.
I could smell fuel and wondered if I was about to be cooked alive. I tried for all I was worth to climb my way to the "top", but what I didn't know is that in reality I was just struggling a bit further into the foot well. There was a gaping hole that I could just barely make out Rob or someone.
How long was I stuck in that god damned humvee? Trying to move my legs which didn't want to move. I had no idea at the time that my pelvis had been snapped in 3 places, my left an right legs fractured multiple times in different places, my arm broke. Things didn't feel right, that's for certain, I can't really describe it beyond that.
I cried an called for to not be left which is silly because no one had any intention of leaving me. But that's how things are when you have a humvee on top of you.
It started getting very hard to breath, it wasn't fast, but once it started it picked up quickly. It panicked me even more.
What is bravery? What is courage? I'm not sure I can say because I felt neither brave nor courageous, just terrified out my damn skull.
You see horrible, just utterly horrible things you will Never be able to fully rip from your memory. An then you realize it's not someone else this time, it's you. Your the one fucked up, your the one unable to move.
I cannot express really all of the feelings that come with such things. The helplessness. The fear. The anger. They haunt me at times, sometimes less, sometimes More. I try to cope, as best I'm able, to ignore it, push it down, to try not to think about it so much. But it's Always there an I suspect Always will be.
The want us to come home after that nightmare an be "normal" .... When I came back what I found was that most people were bored of the war, blissfully indifferent an unknowing of the battles being fought. ALl for what? What did we achieve, what were so many young lives worth spending for? Why?! For oil? Doesn't seem like that now. To preserve American power an dominance? Don't seem much like that was ever achieved either.
The country called an we answered and I guess I don't regret that part, but I wish this country an had thought a bit more before sending us to die for nothing, no tangible benefit at all.
Now we are yet again on the cusp of multiple wars. I hope they will pass us by without conflict, but that wouldn't really work would it? Apparently we have to give a shit about other folks gov'ts, claiming that we are on the side of democracy an They are all dictators an autocrats I believe is the term currently in use.
Wars started by people who will never ever see an feel the harshness of combat, willing to spend countless young lives if there's a profit in it for Them. Sadly other countries may act an leave no choice in the matter. I hope not. WOuldn't wish such things on much of nobody here, ya know?
I wish I could be more positive, I really do. “
- John
Minimum Wage ruling by Court
Did Michigan’s minimum wage just rise to $12-an-hour because of a court ruling?$12/hour.
By Ben Orner | borner@mlive.com
A Tuesday evening Michigan Court of Claims decision ruled the state legislature unlawfully softened a 2018 ballot initiative to raise the minimum wage and require earned paid sick leave when it enacted the proposal with smaller pay bumps.
But does that really mean Michigan’s minimum wage increased from $9.87 to $12 – and the tipped wage from $3.75 to $9.60 – literally overnight? The state’s labor agency says not yet.
(Snip)
In 2018, the Republican-controlled legislature chose to enact and amend a ballot initiative increasing the minimum wage and paid sick leave instead of let it appear before voters in November.
The original would have allowed 72 hours of paid leave yearly, plus increased the minimum wage to $12 by 2022 and the minimum tipped wage to $9.60 by then. But lawmakers scaled those back to 40 hours of leave and a $12 minimum wage by 2030.
Court of Claims Judge Douglas Shapiro ruled Tuesday that it was unconstitutional when the legislature adopted the law in September 2018 then amended it after the election in the same legislative session.
“To hold otherwise would effectively thwart the power of the people to initiate laws and then vote on those same laws — a power expressly reserved to the people in the Michigan Constitution,” Shapiro wrote.
More: https://www.mlive.com/public-interest/2022/07/michigans-minimum-wage-will-go-up-if-new-court-ruling-stands.html
Michigan governor signs executive order to protect abortion providers and patients from extradition
Source: CNN
Michigan's Democratic Gov. Gretchen Whitmer signed an executive order on Wednesday that limits her office from extraditing people to or from Michigan if they're facing criminal charges for obtaining, providing or assisting an abortion.
The order signed by Whitmer, who has been supportive of abortion rights, aims to protect women who travel to Michigan seeking an abortion and Michigan abortion providers "who will not have to fear being extradited for prosecution in another state for offering abortion services," according to a news release from her office.
A provider who conducts a telehealth visit from Michigan for a patient in another state and prescribes a medical abortion will also not be extradited, Whitmer's office told CNN. The order, however, would not apply to a person who performs an abortion while in a state where it is banned.
"I cannot in good conscience participate in other states' efforts to make it a crime to exercise a fundamental right or to punish health-care providers," Whitmer said in her executive order.
Read more: https://www.cnn.com/2022/07/13/politics/michigan-whitmer-executive-order-abortion/index.html
TEXAS WOMAN FINDS UNSECURED RIFLE IN NATIONAL GUARD TRUCK, TAKES IT, TWEETS IT
(Somebody is going to get a counseling statement.)
TEXAS WOMAN FINDS UNSECURED RIFLE IN NATIONAL GUARD TRUCK, TAKES IT, TWEETS IT
When a Texas woman found an unsecured M4-style rifle inside an unlocked Texas National Guard truck Monday, June 27, she took matters into her own hands by, well, taking the weapon into her own hands.
“Today, I got my hands on a fully automatic weapon thanks to the stupid, irresponsible #TexasNationalGuard #OperationLonestar who left their vehicle running & unlocked with guns inside on the side of the road,” Marianna Wright tweeted Monday. Operation Lone Star is the long-term deployment of Texas National Guard troops to the US-Mexico border within the state. “Guess the truck could’ve been mine, too. #PublicSafety, #Texas Style.”
In a series of three tweets Monday, Wright chronicled finding what she described as a pickup truck used by the Texas National Guard left unattended and unlocked. She posted a picture of the front seat with what appears to be an M4-style rifle unsecured between the front seats.
(Snip)
“When they left, they didn’t even notice it was missing.
https://twitter.com/mtwrighter/status/1541562540773326850?s=21&t=hyqSKmEJGcuDrOaXjMSGLw
More:
https://coffeeordie.com/texas-unsecured-rifle/?fs=e&s=cl
On the SAME day, the world changes.
And on the same day Michigan’s 1931 total abortion ban is now back in place, Germany repeals its abortion information ban put in place in 1930’s , by the Nazi party. THE-SAME-DAY!
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/germany-abolishes-nazi-era-abortion-law-2022-06-24/
In one day- roles are reversed.
Today- in Germany, no more Nazi abortion discussion ban.
But today -in the USA, Michigan flips a switch and it becomes a Republican (just like Nazi’s rules) felony.
I'm curious- First Americans and Abortion?
I’m looking for some education- and I know all peoples have a variety of beliefs, but what can sone tell tell me about First American tribal culture surrounding abortion?
Would Tribal Lands be exempt from state laws on abortion?
I know some tribes have treaty rights, and are not subject to state laws. Would that hold equally true for abortion pills? Or for medical procedures? Could/would such clinics be supported within tribal communities? Or is that a subject that would create more friction?
I missed the whole thing
Will it be rebroadcast? Is it on YouTube?
Where can I find it?
Buttigieg, at least 14 others test positive for COVID-19 after Mackinac Policy Conference
Source: Detroit Free Press
U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg and at least 14 others have tested positive for COVID-19 after covering or attending the Mackinac Policy Conference last week.
In a statement issued Monday afternoon, conference organizer Detroit Regional Chamber indicated it is aware of at least 15 people who tested positive after attending the conference.
Buttigieg joined hundreds of politicians, business leaders, reporters and others at the conference Wednesday on Mackinac Island. He participated in multiple events unmasked, including press conferences and interviews, at times with Gov. Gretchen Whitmer.
"I have tested positive for COVID-19 and am experiencing mild symptoms. I plan to work remotely while isolating according to CDC guidelines, and look forward to when I can safely return to the office and the road," Buttigieg said.
Read more: https://www.freep.com/story/news/politics/2022/06/06/buttigieg-positive-covid-19-mackinac-policy-conference/7532212001/
Great. Lots of republicans at the Mackinac conference.
Having republicans at a gathering is just like small-pox laced Indian blankets. You shouldn’t go within a mile of them.
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