Here's another fighter they tried to take down, Sam Seder

How the alt-right duped MSNBC into firing one of its contributors
An online community weaponized the political commentator Sam Seder’s satirical 2009 tweet.

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The 2009 tweet that prompted Seder’s dismissal was recirculated by Mike Cernovich, a blogger and purveyor of the Pizzagate conspiracy, and his followers. (Seder attributed the smear to his criticism of Republicans defending Roy Moore in Alabama.) But this isn’t the first time the alt-right has carried out a similar campaign against a journalist. Earlier this year, the New York Times’s ombudsman publicly reprimanded a reporter after a Cernovich-led outrage campaign over a joke about a tweet from rapper Bow Wow.

Many news outlets care deeply about how their reporters act on social media and will suspend or even fire reporters for a single tweet. Cernovich — who has used Twitter to spread fake news, accuse prominent Democrats of running a child sex ring, and repeatedly suggest that women lie about rape — is using this sensitivity to his advantage.
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https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/12/6/16738564/sam-seder-msnbc-firing-alt-right-smear

https://img-s-msn-com.akamaized.net/tenant/amp/entityid/AAwgxic.img?h=348&w=728&m=6&q=60&o=f&l=f&x=417&y=235

(cannot get photo to show up- at link to see)

A bus parked outside Shiva Ayyadurai's campaign headquarters taunts Mass. Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren's claims of Native American heritage.

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A self-described "real Indian" who is running against Mass. Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren is suing after city officials demanded he take down his signs calling her a "fake Indian."

The upstart independent Senate challenger, Shiva Ayyadurai, on Sunday filed a federal lawsuit alleging that the demand from the city of Cambridge violates his constitutional free speech rights, according to The Washington Times.

Since March 17, Ayyadurai's campaign bus has sported two identical signs picturing himself and a rendition of Warren wearing Indian attire. Emblazoned next to the images are the words: "Only a REAL INDIAN Can Defeat the Fake Indian."

“We will not remove the slogan from our bus,” Ayyadurai told The Washington Times. “We will defend the First Amendment, and we will fight this egregious attack on the First Amendment, at any cost.”

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https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/real-indian-running-against-sen-elizabeth-warren-sues-after-city-tells-him-to-stop-calling-her-fake-indian/ar-AAwgqEP?li=BBnbcA1

Death of McMaster’s father being investigated as suspicious: report

The Hill
Josh Delk
12 hrs ago

Philadelphia authorities are investigating the death of the father of former White House national security adviser H.R. McMaster, ABC6 reports.

According to the Philadelphia department of health, the former official's father, H.R. McMaster Sr., died on April 13 of blunt force trauma to the head.

While health officials have ruled his death to be an accident, investigators have labeled the death suspicious, and are looking into whether there could have been institutional neglect in treating him by the retirement community where he lived.

The 84-year-old Korean War veteran reportedly did not receive proper care at the Cathedral Village retirement home, where he was living after suffering a stroke.

The Philadelphia police's homicide unit is looking into allegations that McMaster Sr. had fallen and was placed on a chair and neglected. Employees also reportedly told the McMaster family that records related to his death had been falsified.
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http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/383870-death-of-hr-mcmasters-father-being-investigated-report

Nikki Haley finds herself under the bus as Trump shifts course on Russia

The Washington Post
Aaron Blake
1 hr ago


The Washington Post reported late Sunday that President Trump “has battled his top aides on Russia and lost.”

Less than 20 hours later, Trump has now reversed U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley's announcement that the United States would be ramping up sanctions on Russia.

Hmm.

The sudden reversal of Haley's Sunday-morning announcement is hardly the only example of the right hand in the White House not always knowing what the left hand is up to. Trump often seems to be negotiating not just those around him but also with himself and has been unafraid of contradicting top aides and even Cabinet-level officials like Haley.

But on Russia and on an issue of such import, the quick reversal is stunning — and relatively rare. There is no clear indication whether Haley or someone else is at fault, but as The Post's team notes, she has a tendency to clear her remarks with Trump personally before she makes them. It seems entirely possible that she got Trump to sign off on saying more Russia sanctions were coming on Sunday morning, and then the White House got cold feet (possibly because Trump suddenly felt the need to exert himself over the process).

A look back at Haley's remarks Sunday leaves little doubt that she appeared on CBS's “Face the Nation” with the clear purpose of announcing the sanctions. It was the second answer she provided, and she volunteered the information rather than being lured into saying something that perhaps wasn't ready for public consumption.
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Those are very specific comments — not only that sanctions are coming, but that Mnuchin would announce them within 24 hours or so. It's really difficult to believe Haley was just freelancing here and didn't get the go-ahead to announce something of such significance.

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https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/nikki-haley-finds-herself-under-the-bus-as-trump-shifts-course-on-russia/ar-AAvXbrI

Published on Jan 25, 2008
SUBSCRIBE 81
BALDWIN: We were having a good time until "no talent" and "cabin boy" came breaking through the window...

LEVIN: I just told you - you've got a two digit IQ.

BALDWIN: And who's that - who's your little cabin boy there with you.

LEVIN: I'm not a cabin boy, butt-boy.

BALDWIN: What are you doing there, cabin boy? ... I now dub you Sean Hannity's cabin boy.

Source: Bloomberg

Ryan Poised to Earn Millions Even If He Sheds 'Weekend Dad' Role

Bloomberg
Jeff Green, John McCormick and Bill Allison
8 hrs ago

Paul Ryan will easily add to his already considerable net worth if he opts to stray from his native Wisconsin to join a corporate board or dabble in Washington power struggles when he retires next year as speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives. "The kind of board that he would go after would probably pay between $250,000 and $300,000 a year and he could probably get three or four of them," said Fred Foulkes, a professor of at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business. "There would be dozens that would like to have him, particularly companies that have part of their business in key relationships with certain parts of government."

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Ryan, 48, who said he was retiring to be more than a "weekend dad," could easily follow the path of previous congressional leaders, including Newt Gingrich and Richard Gephardt, who became corporate directors. Former Speaker John Boehner, his immediate predecessor, recently joined the advisory board for U.S. cannabis producer Acreage Holdings and is already serving on the board of Arizona Mining Inc. and the advisory board to JBS USA, the American arm of a Brazilian food giant. That’s in addition to being a senior strategic adviser at the law firm of Squire Patton Boggs LLP.

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From Capitol to Capital
A Bloomberg analysis before that election showed that among directors who had previously served in Congress there were 31 Democrats and 33 Republicans, with the average pay more than $330,000.

Ryan will no longer be making his speaker’s salary of $223,500, but he will be eligible for a pension in a few years, and has an estimated net worth of slightly more than $6 million, according to a Center for Responsive Politics analysis of his 2016 financial filings. AshLee Strong, a Ryan spokeswoman, didn’t respond to an email seeking comment on her boss’ potential future employment.
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Read more: https://www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/ryan-poised-to-earn-millions-even-if-he-sheds-weekend-dad-role/ar-AAvNx5W?li=BBnbfcL

Jimmy Kimmel Fires Back at Hannity: ‘If I’m an A– Clown… You, Sean, Are the Whole A– Circus’

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"I woke up this morning, early. I did two hours of Pilates as I do every morning. I shampooed, I condished. And then I open my computer and find out I'm at war with Sean Hannity and Fox News. Who by the way I thought were my "and Friends," Fox, but they are not, it turns out. Because there is nothing important going on in the country right now, Sean Hannity and his fellow Fox News 'people' spent a lot of time talking about me today," Kimmel said, doing finger quotes when he said "people."

After playing the clip of Hannity being outraged by his joke at Melania Trump's expense, Kimmel came back with his own set of harsh owns for Hannity.

"This is the guy who defended the multiply-alleged pedophile Roy Moore," Kimmel said. "And I'm a despicable disgrace. I'm the a-- clown. Here's the thing. If I'm an a-- clown, and I might very well be, you, Sean, are the whole a-- circus. You're the juggler, you're the trapeze artist, you are the a-- lion tamer and the a-- human cannonball all jammed into one little car. You are the Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey of A-- Clownsmanship."

Kimmel also had to note the irony of Hannity getting mad at a joke about an immigrant, and how Hannity hasn't been all that upset at certain others being allegedly disrespectful to Melania, like Donald Trump himself.

"But I do want to say, I appreciate how compassionate you've suddenly become to the plight of immigrants in this country over the last 24 hours. You know what I think is disrespectful to the First Lady? Cheating on her with a porn star after she has a baby. Why don't you rant a little about that Sean Hannity?" Kimmel said.
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https://www.thewrap.com

man. If this were any fortune 500 company, the board of directors would have thrown him out. In this case, the Republican party is the board of directors. This is very disturbing..." Said we are beyond code red.

Jefferson’s preference for “newspapers without government” over “government without newspapers” (1787)

Jefferson writes from Paris to Edward Carrington, whom Jefferson sent as a delegate to the Continental Congress from 1786 to 1788, on the importance of a free press to keep government in check. He concludes that if he had to choose between “a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter”:

"The people are the only censors of their governors: and even their errors will tend to keep these to the true principles of their institution. To punish these errors too severely would be to suppress the only safeguard of the public liberty. The way to prevent these irregular interpositions of the people is to give them full information of their affairs thro’ the channel of the public papers, & to contrive that those papers should penetrate the whole mass of the people. The basis of our governments being the opinion of the people, the very first object should be to keep that right; and were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. But I should mean that every man should receive those papers & be capable of reading them."

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http://oll.libertyfund.org/quote/302

Trump proposed Putin visit Washington in March 20 phone call, Kremlin says
Washington Post Staff
2 hrs ago

MOSCOW — President Trump proposed meeting Vladimir Putin at the White House in a March phone call, the Kremlin said Monday, a fresh revelation about a conversation that stirred controversy for its friendly tone toward the Russian leader amid mounting tensions with the West.

After the March 20 phone call — in which Trump congratulated Putin for a reelection victory in a vote widely criticized as not free and fair — Trump said that the two leaders had discussed plans for a possible meeting.

White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said Monday that “a number of potential venues, including the White House,” were discussed for the summit. A Kremlin aide, Yury Ushakov, disclosed the White House invitation in comments to Russian journalists on Monday. But he added that no preparations for such a meeting have taken place since the March 20 phone call, according to Russian news agencies.


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https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-proposed-putin-visit-washington-in-march-20-phone-call-kremlin-says/ar-AAvnqLJ?li=BBnb7Kz