Sunday, June 25, 2017

TRUMP LIES: The Definitive List

The New York Times has done the legwork for us and created the definitive list of Trump's lies since his presidency.

Monday, June 5, 2017

Trump is Staging a Coup

The nightmare continues, and I figure that it's easier for me to just let those who can say it so much better and who are so much better informed than me do the talking.

Today it's an article in the Salon by Chauncey Devega about a conversation with historian Timothy Snyder, who has suggested that "it's pretty much inevitable" that Trump will try to overthrow democracy, given the opportunity.

Sunday, April 30, 2017

Trump's First 100 Days

There has traditionally been a standard of "100 days" set whereby a President is given a bit of a "honeymoon" period where much of the public withholds judgment to see what the President can do. Trump doesn't seem to have had much of a honeymoon period. Perhaps this has a lot to do with the fact that the majority of Americans did not vote for him, or perhaps is due to his hateful rhetoric and threats on our democracy, but Trump already has historically low approval ratings in his first 100 days, and history would also show that a President's approval numbers usually drop after the first 100 days. So things are likely to only get worse as Democrats and Independents who voted for him become disillusioned.

Donald Trump has said “I don’t think anyone has ever done this much in 100 days.” So below we cover just what he's done in his first 100 days. Note that this list is partially compiled from a list offered up by Amin Mosharaf on a Rachel Maddow post on Facebook. I’ve included what he compiled to save myself time recompiling the info, but edited the info with some of my own additions and wording.

The first 100 days:
  • He appointed a foreign agent as National Security Advisor, and then his administration appears to have hidden the fact and lied about it, before being forced to confront the issue and fire Mike Flynn.
  • He has the lowest approval ratings of any president in recent history in his first 100 days.
  • He has launched an all-out attack on the EPA and the concept of climate change, leading to marches across the country against his stance.
  • He has continued to appoint unqualified and incompetent individuals such as Pruitt, Devos, Carson, and Perry.
  • He rolled back protections for transgender students.
  • He has refused to release his taxes just like all other presidents have for the past 40 years.
  • He would seem to be losing the respect of the leaders of the Free World and denigrating the title of President of the United States.
  • He entered office under investigation by the FBI, and under a cloud of suspicion after it was found that Russia interfered with our election process to get Trump elected, and Trump's campaign members and administration had contact with Russia throughout the campaign and after election.
  • He's authorized a failed mission in Yemen.
  • He's attempted to institute two failed Muslim bans and had both shot down by the courts.
  • He's signed disastrous anti-middle class and anti-environment executive orders.
  • He tried and failed to repeal Obamacare.
  • He authorized the bombing of an already empty airbase in Syria to distract from low ratings and the cloud of Russiagate. He then creepily bragged to Chinese president Xi Jinping about the bombing while they ate chocolate cake at his Mar-a-lago resort.
  • He's had awkwardly embarrassing meetings with foreign dignitaries.
  • He's welcomed clowns like Ted Nugent and Palin to the White House, and supported them posing for disrespectful photos inside the White House.
  • He's hired racist clowns like Bannon and Sessions.
  • He's played a ton of golf.
  • He's obsessed with taking credit for President Obama's accomplishments, and blaming him for all of his own failures. The mission in Yemen failed? Obama's fault! Mike Flynn was discovered to be a foreign agent? Obama's fault!
  • He accused Obama of wiretapping him with no evidence whatsoever.
  • He just can't stop tweeting, and the majority of the time they are juvenile barely-literate tweets and tantrums.
  • He can't stop lying-- all. the. time.
  • He has the least transparent administration in recent memory.
  • He has created the most secretive administration in US history.
  • He has the most ethically challenged administration in US history.
  • He has broken nepotism laws by giving family members important jobs and deals.
  • He has displayed cronyism by appointing billionaires to his cabinet.
  • He has proposed massive tax cuts for the rich like himself.
  • He allowed a banned pesticide proven to be dangerous to be used again.
  • He falsely claimed Navy ships were heading toward North Korea when they were actually heading to Australia. They were later turned around and headed toward Korea.
  • He said he had a plan for wiping out ISIS. ISIS remains strong despite his naive promises, and he has shown he is as clueless on how to handle ISIS as everything else.
  • He has introduced connotative terminology such as snowflakes, alternative facts, fake news and bigly...
  • He is targeting national monuments created by Obama and Clinton, and given to the people for their use and enjoyment.
  • He signed a bill that allows your private data sold to the highest bidder.
  • He has proposed cutting after-school programs and Meals on Wheels, among many other things.
  • He is wasting millions of taxpayer money every week by not moving his wife and son into the White House.
  • His administration was caught promoting his personal recreational property Mar-A-Lago on the State Department website.
  • He settled multi-million dollar lawsuit against his fraudulent university.
  • He dropped a $16 million bomb on 94 ISIS terrorists.
  • He is allowing offshore drilling. (Remember the BP leak? What has changed?)
  • He is the man in charge when we are suffering the slowest GDP growth in 3 years. (Fair to blame him since he took credit for good jobs numbers in January and February)
  • He produced the worst jobs report in a year in March.
  • He made it easier for the mentally insane to buy guns.
  • He has been taking $1-3 million weekly trips to Florida. Additionally each trip is bankrupting some small businesses, who get no business when the roads are shut down around Mar-a-lago and the airport, and is costing the city a fortune in police protection.
  • He is allowing the wholesale slaughter of entire bear and wolf families while they sleep in their dens.
  • He has been verbally attacking and threatening allies like Canada, South Korea and Australia.
  • He continues to vilify our national media outlets.
  • The coal miners are saying that he’s let them down. “He took care of the coal companies, but he’s done nothing for the miners.”
  • He has refused to divest himself of his business interests, so he is profiting off of the presidency and participating in the same “pay for play” behavior for which he’s criticized others.
  • He is eradicating regulations that protect our waterways, and that secure workplace equality.
  • He has reversed his stance on many of the things that got him elected. Among other things, one of his biggest campaign promises was building a border wall paid by Mexico. Now if the wall is built, it seems it will be paid for by the American people, with promises of recouping the money from Mexico at a later date (ain't happening).
  • He has discussed sensitive security matters in public, in view of patrons at Mar-a-lago, and had the guy carrying his nuclear codes hanging out at Mar-a-lago having his picture taken.

Friday, January 27, 2017

Russian Breadcrumbs

Follow the breadcrumb trail...
  • In September 2016 there was a warning by the FBI that the election had been hacked, and IP addresses related to the hack had been traced back to Russia.
  • In October 2016, the Dept of Homeland Security and Office of the Director of National Intelligence on Election Security warned before the election that there was evidence of an effort by Russia to affect our election, including emails that were hacked and stolen from the DNC.
  • In December 2016 the CIA released a report claiming that they have evidence that Russia interfered with our election process.
  • In January 2017, a Joint Intelligence Report was released with allegations that Russia, and Putin himself, conspired to influence our election and prevent Hillary Clinton from being elected.
  • A well-respected British Op, Christopher Steele, gathers info on Trump and releases the dossier to BuzzFeed, claiming that Russia has dirt on Trump. Then Steele promptly goes to ground, apparently fearing for his life. He is said to have obtained his information from Russian entities.
  • Now Rex Tillerson, who is a close ally to Putin, is pegged to be our next Secretary of State.
  • It came out today that Sergey Yuryevich Mikhailov, deputy director of the FSB (Federal Security Service of the Russian Federation), was in a meeting when he suddenly had a bag thrown over his head and was dragged from the building, never to be seen again. It's been reported that he has been arrested for "treason". (http://www.prevendra.com/russias-fsb-cybersecurity-team-im…/) So the question is "whether the government that he's charged with aiding and abetting is our foreign government." (Rachel Maddow) The non-state controlled Russian press is reporting he was arrested for tipping off the US to what Russia was doing to influence our election.
  • And today the Trump administration purged the State Department of many high-level career diplomats, who have been with the department for 30 or 40 years (no replacements have been selected to fill their positions).
Laura Kennedy (@AmbKennedy_ret) tweeted today:
"As a career diplomat, I experienced many transitions & never saw anything like this dangerous purge of public servants now underway at State"
  • In their urgency to vacate the offices, well-respected long-timer Tom Countryman was on a plane to Rome for a meeting when he was ordered to turn back and unceremoniously let go. He was told today to leave his position by tomorrow. He's been serving since 1982.
  • Susan Glasser of Politico has now reported in a tweet:
"update: several sources reporting the proposed order would unilaterally lift sanctions."

This has become real life.

UPDATE 2/11/17:  Since this list was compiled, there have been a few other developments:
  • In an interview with Bill O'Reilly released on 2/4/17, Trump defended Putin by saying that America is a killer, too.
"There are a lot of killers. You think our country's so innocent?"
  • Putin's good friend Rex Tillerson was confirmed as our new Secretary of State.
  • It has been learned that National Security Advisor Michael Flynn called Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak on 12/29/17, the same day that President Obama expelled 35 Russian diplomats in retaliation for Russia's hacking. It is believed that Flynn may have spoken with the ambassador about the impending sanctions and reassured him that Trump would back off on the sanctions once he was in office.
  • It was announced that Russia was considering handing over Edward Snowden as a "gift" to Trump.
  • And, though it isn't related to the Trump-Russia connection, it bears noting that Putin seems to have done it once again and has poisoned another "enemy". Putin critic Vladimir Kara-Murza fell ill a couple of weeks ago after being poisoned by an unknown substance. The thing is, this is the second time he was poisoned, having narrowly survived a poisoning in 2015.
UPDATE 2/15/17: Michael Flynn resigned on 2/13/17 amid allegations that not only had he spoken to Ambassador Sergey Kislyak, but he had indeed implied that the Trump administration would back off on sanctions against Russia, and the call was recorded by intelligence offices. Putin then backed off on his threats of retaliation, and Trump tweeted how smart Putin was for not retaliating. Flynn also put Pence in a bad position by lying to him about the nature of his phone call with the ambassador, causing Pence to lie to the American public about it. Then apparently Trump knew about the phone call for weeks before telling Pence.

Wednesday, January 25, 2017

The First Five Days in a Trump Presidency...

It seems we will see utter devastation of constitutional and civil rights under Donald. We already knew we'd see a complete loss of human decency. And it seems Republicans will sit by and cheer him on as he does it or simply remain quiet, with only a few decent folk like McCain standing up in defiance.

This is from a Facebook post (author unknown):

Utter devastation. And we are only 5 days in.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the DOJ’s Violence Against Women programs.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the National Endowment for the Arts.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the National Endowment for the Humanities.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the Minority Business Development Agency.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the Economic Development Administration.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the International Trade Administration.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the Manufacturing Extension Partnership.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the Office of Community Oriented Policing Services.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the Legal Services Corporation.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the Civil Rights Division of the DOJ.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the Environmental and Natural Resources Division of the DOJ.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the Overseas Private Investment Corporation.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the Office of Electricity Deliverability and Energy Reliability.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy.
* On January 19th, 2017, DT said that he would cut funding for the Office of Fossil Energy.
* On January 20th, 2017, DT ordered all regulatory powers of all federal agencies frozen.
* On January 20th, 2017, DT ordered the National Parks Service to stop using social media after RTing factual, side by side photos of the crowds for the 2009 and 2017 inaugurations.
* On January 20th, 2017, roughly 230 protestors were arrested in DC and face unprecedented felony riot charges. Among them were legal observers, journalists, and medics.
* On January 20th, 2017, a member of the International Workers of the World was shot in the stomach at an anti-fascist protest in Seattle. He remains in critical condition.
* On January 21st, 2017, DT brought a group of 40 cheerleaders to a meeting with the CIA to cheer for him during a speech that consisted almost entirely of framing himself as the victim of dishonest press.
* On January 21st, 2017, White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer held a press conference largely to attack the press for accurately reporting the size of attendance at the inaugural festivities, saying that the inauguration had the largest audience of any in history, “period.”
* On January 22nd, 2017, White House advisor Kellyann Conway defended Spicer’s lies as “alternative facts” on national television news.
* On January 22nd, 2017, DT appeared to blow a kiss to director James Comey during a meeting with the FBI, and then opened his arms in a gesture of strange, paternal affection, before hugging him with a pat on the back.
* On January 23rd, 2017, DT reinstated the global gag order, which defunds international organizations that even mention abortion as a medical option.
* On January 23rd, 2017, Spicer said that the US will not tolerate China’s expansion onto islands in the South China Sea, essentially threatening war with China.
* On January 23rd, 2017, DT repeated the lie that 3-5 million people voted “illegally” thus costing him the popular vote.
* On January 23rd, 2017, it was announced that the man who shot the anti-fascist protester in Seattle was released without charges, despite turning himself in.
* On January 24th, 2017, Spicer reiterated the lie that 3-5 million people voted “illegally” thus costing DT the popular vote.
* On January 24th, 2017, DT tweeted a picture from his personal Twitter account of a photo he says depicts the crowd at his inauguration and will hang in the White House press room. The photo is of the 2009 inauguration of 44th President Barack Obama, and is curiously dated January 21st, 2017, the day AFTER the inauguration and the day of the Women’s March, the largest inauguration related protest in history.
* On January 24th, 2017, the EPA was ordered to stop communicating with the public through social media or the press and to freeze all grants and contracts.
* On January 24th, 2017, the USDA was ordered to stop communicating with the public through social media or the press and to stop publishing any papers or research. All communication with the press would also have to be authorized and vetted by the White House.
* On January 24th, 2017, HR7, a bill that would prohibit federal funding not only to abortion service providers, but to any insurance coverage, including Medicaid, that provides abortion coverage, went to the floor of the House for a vote.
* On January 24th, 2017, Director of the Department of Health and Human Service nominee Tom Price characterized federal guidelines on transgender equality as “absurd.”
* On January 24th, 2017, DT ordered the resumption of construction on the Dakota Access Pipeline, while the North Dakota state congress considers a bill that would legalize hitting and killing protestors with cars if they are on roadways.
* On January 24th, 2017, it was discovered that police officers had used confiscated cell phones to search the emails and messages of the 230 demonstrators now facing felony riot charges for protesting on January 20th, including lawyers and journalists whose email accounts contain privileged information of clients and sources.

Tuesday, January 24, 2017

April 15 Anti-Trump March

We just finished the Women's March on Washington and sister marches all around the world (I participated in the one here in Naples, FL), and already the next march is being planned. This one is being planned for April 15th, in order to take a stand and try to pressure Trump into releasing his taxes. Kellyanne Conway has said that the American people don't care whether he releases his taxes, when polls have shown that 60% of Americans do in fact want him to release his records. This march is intended to make a statement and show that Americans insist that Trump release his tax records. Take a stand!

SUMMARY: What's happening in the World According to Trump?

My friend is overwhelmed and depressed over everything Trump, and can't even deal with reading everything that comes out surrounding him. So she's taken to wanting me to just summarize things for her. Here is today's summary of Trump news from the last day or two:

  • Trump has named January 20th a National Day of Patriotic Devotion. If that doesn't frighten you, then you are just plain stupid.
  • CBS News has confirmed that Trump's team brought a group of about 40 people who filled out the crowd at the CIA when Trump spoke to them on Saturday.
'CBS News confirmed reports that President Donald Trump brought a studio audience to his visit with the CIA on Saturday. The news agency reports that an official said the visit left a wake of “unease,” “made relations with the intelligence community worse,” and was “uncomfortable.”
Intelligence people were “stunned” and “offended by the president’s tone,” CBS reported U.S. government sources tell CBS News that there is a sense of unease in the intelligence community after President Trump’s visit to CIA headquarters on Saturday.”

Also, Trump did bring cheering props, which fits with how he has operated previously in requiring a cheering section – a sort of laugh track of supportive extras like those his campaign hired for his announcement event. It has been confirmed by Trump insiders that the President loves props.'
  • Saturday we had the dressing-down of the media by press secretary Sean Spicer for their accused lying about the size of the inauguration audience. Trump's outfit maintained that the inauguration crowd was about 1.5 million, which is nearly twice the official government estimate of 800,000 attendees. Other estimates run as low as 250,000. However "crowd scientists", who are experts at analyzing photographs to determine crowd size, have actually placed Trump's crowd as something more akin to 160,000, with estimates of the Women's March crowd in DC around 470,000. When Chuck Todd pushed Kellyanne Conway to explain why Sean Spicer would lie about something so inconsequential when it was something we could all easily fact-check, the only explanation she could come up with is that there are "alternative facts", a term which quickly went viral.
  • The Trump administration has frozen all EPA grants and contracts. And they have banned employees from providing updates to reporters or on social media.
  • In addition to the gag on EPA employees, there is also an order forbidding the research unit of the US Dept of Agriculture from releasing "public-facing documents", and the National Park Service was ordered to cease any tweeting last week. But despite this, someone took control of the Badlands National Park Twitter account and began tweeting out climate change information. Booyah!
  • The New York Times flat-out called Trump a liar for continuing to spread his rhetoric (now as President of the United States rather than simply as a campaign candidate) claiming that he lost the popular vote due to 3-5 million fraudulent votes, even though there is not a single piece of evidence to support such a claim.
  • There is a video clip taken at the inauguration during the offering of something of a prayer, where a smiling Trump turns to his broadly smiling wife, and everything seems fine, and then he says a word or two and wipes the smile from his face and turns coldly from her and leaves her crestfallen as he smirks in pleasure. It's extremely disturbing.
  • And perhaps most astounding of all is a story in New York Magazine attesting that nearly a dozen Trump "senior White House officials and other Trump advisers and confidants" have opened up about the first few days in the White House, accusing Trump of being infantile and prone to temper tantrums, egotistical and easily embarrassed. They also have some not-so-kind words about Kellyanne Conway, describing her essentially as an attention whore. We are only four days into this presidency, and already some of Trump's closest confidants are breaking ranks and spilling the beans.

Monday, January 16, 2017

Cops: Greenwich Republican Insulted Town Worker, Then Pinched Her Groin

'He allegedly replied: "I love this new world, I no longer have to be politically correct," according to the warrant.'

And so it begins. Life under a Trump administration.