May 27, 2017

Man accused of stabbing 2 on Oregon train posted white supremacist views on Facebook

Source: Washington Post

Two men were stabbed to death Friday on a light-rail train in Portland, Ore., after they tried to intervene when another passenger began “ranting and raving” and shouting anti-Muslim hate speech at two young women, police said.

According to witnesses, a white male passenger riding an eastbound MAX train early Friday afternoon began yelling what “would best be characterized as hate speech toward a variety of ethnicities and religions,” police said. Some of the slurs were directed at two female passengers, one of whom was wearing a hijab, according to police.

“This suspect was on the train and he was yelling and ranting and raving a lot of different things, including what we characterized at hate speech or biased language,” Portland police spokesman Pete Simpson said at a news conference Friday evening.

At least two men tried to calm the ranting passenger down, but “they were attacked viciously by the suspect” when they did, Simpson said.

Read more: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2017/05/27/man-fatally-stabs-2-on-portland-ore-train-after-they-interrupted-his-anti-muslim-rants-police-say/?utm_term=.dd617a82120d

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Waiting for deplorables to condemn this radical Christian terrorism.

ETA: Dude's name is literally Jeremy Joseph Christian!

May 22, 2017

White House Moves to Block Ethics Inquiry Into Ex-Lobbyists on Payroll

Source: New York Times

The Trump administration, in a significant escalation of its clash with the government's top ethics watchdog, has moved to block an effort to disclose the names of former lobbyists who have been granted waivers to work in the White House or federal agencies.

The latest conflict came in recent days when the White House, in a highly unusual move, sent a letter to Walter M. Shaub Jr., the head of the Office of Government Ethics, asking him to withdraw a request he had sent to every federal agency for copies of the waivers. In the letter, the administration challenged his legal authority to demand the information.

Dozens of former lobbyists and industry lawyers are working in the Trump administration, which has hired them at a much higher rate than the previous administration. Keeping the waivers confidential would make it impossible to know whether any such officials are violating federal ethics rules or have been given a pass to ignore them.

Mr. Schaub, who is in the final year of a five-year term after being appointed by President Barack Obama, said he had no intention of backing down. "It is an extraordinary thing," Mr. Shaub said of the White House request. "I have never seen anything like it."

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/05/22/us/politics/trump-white-house-government-ethics-lobbyists.html

May 10, 2017

Trump 'screamed' at national security adviser H.R. McMaster over comments to South Korea: Report

Source: Washington Examiner

National security adviser H.R. McMaster and President Trump clash in front of White House staff and the relationship between the two appears to be strained, according to a Bloomberg report. (snip)

However, multiple sources to the outlet said Trump was livid after reading McMaster called South Korean officials to say Trump's statement that the American ally would have to pay for a missile defense system wasn't official policy. The report said Trump "screamed" at McMaster on the phone for undermining him.

Trump has also complained about McMaster "undermining my policy" in front of his advisers and has decreased the amount of face time he's giving to McMaster.

It appears Trump is suffering from "buyer's remorse" over picking McMaster and even spoke to former United Nations Ambassador John Bolton about become McMaster's deputy. The idea was eventually scuttled.

Read more: http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/trump-screamed-at-national-security-adviser-hr-mcmaster-over-comments-to-south-korea-report/article/2622437

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So McMaster decided extortion was not good policy, and suffered accordingly.

May 10, 2017

FBI agents in tears as news of Comey's firing spread

Source: Politico

The news of FBI director James Comey’s firing struck like a thunderclap at field offices around the country, where agents heard first from TV or the internet that their boss had been dismissed by President Donald J. Trump.

“I’m literally in tears right now. That’s all I have to say,” said a longtime special agent who’s known and worked with Comey for years, who first heard the news on the car radio.

By Tuesday evening, the shock that initially spread throughout the ranks of current and former FBI officials was mixed with a growing sense of anger among the many Comey loyalists in the bureau, and demands for answers as to why the director had been fired – and why now.

“We just have no idea why this happened. No idea,” said one recently retired top FBI official who worked closely with Comey on multiple high-profile investigations. “No one knew this was coming. Everyone is just shocked that this happened.”

Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2017/05/09/omey-firing-fbi-tears-238190?lo=ap_b2

April 1, 2017

Russia blocks access to Internet pages promoting new Moscow protest

Source: Associated Press

Russia has blocked access to several Internet pages promoting what the authorities say is a planned illegal anti-government protest in or near Moscow's Red Square on Sunday.

The planned demonstration would take place a year before a presidential election and a week after the biggest anti-government protests in years ended in hundreds of arrests, including that of opposition leader Alexei Navalny.

Sunday's organizers describe themselves online as "young people and ordinary students from Moscow" and say they have nothing to do with Navalny, who is serving out a 15-day jail sentence for his role organizing the March 26 protests.

As of Friday afternoon, around 2,000 people had signed up online to attend the student protest, which in the authorities' eyes is illegal because its organizers did not seek permission beforehand or agree the venue and timing with them.

Read more: http://www.reuters.com/article/us-russia-protests-idUSKBN1721Y4

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And to think, this is the one regime he won't criticize.

March 25, 2017

Donald Trump takes 12th golf trip since becoming President nine weeks ago

Source: The Independent

Donald Trump has this weekend taken his twelfth golfing holiday since his presidential inauguration just over nine weeks ago.

Departing the White House for the Trump National Golf Club in Virginia, it is unclear whether he plans to do anything other than tee off.

The White House has made no comment regarding the trip, which the US leader's eighth consecutive weekend visit to a Trump-owned property, according to NBC News.

Each of these trips costs $3 million (£2.4 million), according to an analysis by the Politico website. If correct, the President's golfing trips alone may have already cost the taxpayer $36 million dollars (£28.9 million).

Read more: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/donald-trump-twelve-golf-trips-mar-a-lago-millions-taxpayer-a7650166.html

March 11, 2017

Trump adviser admits to contact with DNC hacker

Source: The Hill

Roger Stone, President Trump's former campaign advisor, on Friday admitted to having private conversations with a hacker who helped leak information from the Democratic National Committee (DNC) during last year's campaign.

Stone insisted to The Washington Times that the conversations were "completely innocuous."

"It was so perfunctory, brief and banal I had forgotten it," Stone told The Times of a private Twitter conversation he had with a hacker known as Guccifer 2.0.

Guccifer 2.0 is believed by the U.S. intelligence community to be a cover identity for Russian intelligence. The intelligence community concluded that Moscow sought to interfere in last year's election specifically to help Trump win.

Read more: http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/323477-top-trump-adviser-admits-to-contacting-dnc-hackers-report

March 3, 2017

Jeff Sessions Used Political Funds for Republican Convention Expenses

Source: Wall Street Journal

The Trump administration says Attorney General Jeff Sessions was acting as a then-U.S. senator when he talked to Russia’s ambassador at an event during last year’s Republican National Convention in Cleveland, but Mr. Sessions paid for convention travel expenses out of his own political funds and he spoke about Donald Trump’s campaign at the event, according to a person at the event and campaign-finance records.

Mr. Sessions made comments related to Mr. Trump’s presidential campaign at a Heritage Foundation event during the Republican convention in July, when he met with Russian Ambassador Sergei Kislyak, according to a person at the event in Cleveland.

Read more: https://www.wsj.com/articles/jeff-sessions-used-political-funds-for-republican-convention-expenses-1488509301

February 28, 2017

Illinois town in Trump territory backs detained immigrant

Source: Associated Press

WEST FRANKFORT, Ill. A southern Illinois community that solidly backed President Donald Trump has rallied behind a Mexican restaurant manager who doesn't have legal permission to live in the U.S. and has been detained by immigration officials.

Letters of support for Juan Carlos Hernandez Pacheco have poured in from West Frankfort's mayor, police chief, high school athletic director and the county prosecutor. They describe Hernandez as a role model and praise his robust civic involvement, including funding school scholarships, benefit dinners for families in need and hosting a law enforcement appreciation event.

Hernandez, 38, came to the U.S. in the 1990s but didn't obtain legal status, according to friends. He has been the manager of La Fiesta Mexican Restaurant for a decade in the community with coal mining roots, about 100 miles southeast of St. Louis.

He was arrested at his home earlier this month and remains in custody at a U.S. Immigration Customs and Enforcement facility outside St. Louis. ICE officials did not explain why Pacheco was arrested, but noted his drunken-driving convictions from 2007.

Read more: http://m.startribune.com/illinois-town-in-trump-territory-backs-detained-immigrant/414876684/

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Yes, your actions can affect the lives of REAL PEOPLE!!!

February 25, 2017

H.R. McMaster Breaks With Administration on Views of Islam

Source: New York Times

President Trump’s newly appointed national security adviser has told his staff that Muslims who commit terrorist acts are perverting their religion, rejecting a key ideological view of other senior Trump advisers and signaling a potentially more moderate approach to the Islamic world.

The adviser, Lt. Gen. H. R. McMaster, told the staff of the National Security Council on Thursday, in his first “all hands” staff meeting, that the label “radical Islamic terrorism” was not helpful because terrorists are “un-Islamic,” according to people who were in the meeting.

That is a repudiation of the language regularly used by both the president and General McMaster’s predecessor, Michael T. Flynn, who resigned last week after admitting that he had misled Vice President Mike Pence and other officials about a phone call with a Russian diplomat.

It is also a sign that General McMaster, a veteran of the Iraq war known for his sense of history and independent streak, might move the council away from the ideologically charged views of Mr. Flynn, who was also a three-star Army general before retiring.

Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/24/us/politics/hr-mcmaster-trump-islam.html

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McMaster is someone who could have served very comfortably in the Obama administration. I hope he gains the clear upper hand against Bannon and Co., and sooner rather than later.