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Clintons personally paid State Department staffer to maintain server
Hillary Rodham Clinton and her family personally paid a State Department staffer to maintain the private e-mail server she used while heading the agency, according to an official from Clinton’s presidential campaign.
The unusual arrangement helped Clinton retain personal control over the system that she used for her public and private duties and that has now emerged as an issue for her campaign. But, according to the campaign official, it also ensured that taxpayer funds were not spent on a private server that was shared by Clinton, her husband and their daughter as well as aides to the former president.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/clintons-personally-paid-state-department-staffer-to-maintain-server/2015/09/04/b13ab23e-530c-11e5-9812-92d5948a40f8_story.html?wpisrc=al_alert-COMBO-politics%252Bnation
AND THERE YOU HAVE IT1
Lovelyplains
September 4, 2015 at 8:08 pm
Just went through the evening newscasts to see what if any coverage of the jobs/unemployment #’s….Here is the verdict:
CNN Sit Room 5: Chicago manhunt, Trump/Hewitt *Gotcha* interview, Clinton E-mail, Migrants, More Trump, U.S. Open Drone// NO JOBS
CNN Sit Room 6: Chicago manhunt, Trump/Hewitt *Gotcha* interview, Clinton E-mail, VP Biden(will he run) Trump, HRC Pres Conf// NO JOBS
BBC: Migrant crisis (U.K, Austria responses), Jewel Heist verdict, Guatemala Elex, Test scores based on teenager computer use// NO JOBS
AJAmerica: Migrants, S.Arabia visit, Yemem war, Iraqi PM protest, Guatemala corruption charges, Sri Lanka Gov reconciliation// NO JOBS
NBC: Clinton E-mails, Trump/Hewitt interview, Chuck Toad *analysis*, 22 seconds JOBS/stocks, Migrants, KY Clerk, U.S. Open Drone
CBS: LEAD STORY “At long last the…..Back to Work..Employment graph, lowest rate 5.1 % since ’08, segment on hiring” next story Oil $$$
hiring effect…4 minutes in all” Chicago manhunt, KY marriage license, Migrants, Trump/Hewitt (best part is they compared
it to 2000 GWB only being able to name 1/4 World leaders…”but he still won the Presidency”), VP Biden’s Miami speech
West Coast Drought/Fires
ABC: Clinton E-mails, Trump/Hewitt, Chicago manhunt, weather, gas$, KY clerk, Migrants, Pests, Tennis Drone, Beaches, Tiger cub// NO JOBS
PBS: Lead story JOBS/ Stock Market, Migrants, Saudi visit, KY court Clerk, Tennis Drone, Human interest stories, Shields & Gerson analysis
To recap 5 Broadcasts made absolutely no mentions of the economy/jobs….NBC did 22 SECONDS! CBS/PBS devoted their entire 1rst block
F*****G Pathetic state of the media in Fall 2015
http://theobamadiary.com/2015/09/04/a-tweet-or-two-312/
The Rehabilitationists
How a small band of determined legal academics set out to persuade the Supreme Court to undo the New Deal—and have almost won.
By Brian Beutler
August 30, 201
The main object of this group’s obsession is the Supreme Court’s 1905 decision in Lochner v. New York. Joseph Lochner was the owner of a bakery in Utica, New York, at the turn of the last century, who sought relief from the Bakeshop Act, under which he was fined for allowing an employee to work more than 60 hours a week. He believed that the act’s workplace-safety rationale was in fact a government-sanctioned tool for the bakers union to attack nonunion bakeries like his own and that it deprived him and his employees of their right to enter into their own contracts. The Supreme Court narrowly agreed. Its 5–4 ruling struck down the law and, more importantly, provided the rationale justices would use to invalidate other legislation over the course of a generation.
For decades now, legal academics and elites have considered the early twentieth century one of the Supreme Court’s darkest eras. Lochner, it’s been viewed, belongs with Dred Scott v. Sandford, the 1857 decision holding that neither slaves nor freedmen were U.S. citizens, and Plessy v. Ferguson, the 1896 decision upholding racial segregation under the separate-but-equal doctrine, in a Malebolge of rejected rulings.
In 1936, after the Supreme Court struck down a New York minimum-wage law, one of a series of New Deal measures it ruled unconstitutional, a dejected Franklin D. Roosevelt complained to the press that the Court had created “a ‘no-man’s land’ where no government—state or federal—can function.”
A year later, after Roosevelt had been reelected overwhelmingly on a New Deal platform, the Supreme Court effectively repudiated Lochner when a 5–4 majority upheld Washington’s state minimum-wage law for women. “More than 25 years ago we set forth the applicable principle in these words, after referring to the cases where the liberty guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment had been broadly described,” the Court ruled. “But it was recognized in the cases cited, as in many others, that freedom of contract is a qualified, and not an absolute, right. There is no absolute freedom to do as one wills or to contract as one chooses.” In addition to forming the basis of the modern American social contract, this decision was a hard-fought victory over fierce opposition to government regulation by employers and property owners. The enduring postwar political consensus about the proper role of government may have masked that opposition, but it was never completely vanquished.
The main object of this group’s obsession is the Supreme Court’s 1905 decision in Lochner v. New York. Joseph Lochner was the owner of a bakery in Utica, New York, at the turn of the last century, who sought relief from the Bakeshop Act, under which he was fined for allowing an employee to work more than 60 hours a week. He believed that the act’s workplace-safety rationale was in fact a government-sanctioned tool for the bakers union to attack nonunion bakeries like his own and that it deprived him and his employees of their right to enter into their own contracts. The Supreme Court narrowly agreed. Its 5–4 ruling struck down the law and, more importantly, provided the rationale justices would use to invalidate other legislation over the course of a generation.
For decades now, legal academics and elites have considered the early twentieth century one of the Supreme Court’s darkest eras. Lochner, it’s been viewed, belongs with Dred Scott v. Sandford, the 1857 decision holding that neither slaves nor freedmen were U.S. citizens, and Plessy v. Ferguson, the 1896 decision upholding racial segregation under the separate-but-equal doctrine, in a Malebolge of rejected rulings.
In 1936, after the Supreme Court struck down a New York minimum-wage law, one of a series of New Deal measures it ruled unconstitutional, a dejected Franklin D. Roosevelt complained to the press that the Court had created “a ‘no-man’s land’ where no government—state or federal—can function.”
A year later, after Roosevelt had been reelected overwhelmingly on a New Deal platform, the Supreme Court effectively repudiated Lochner when a 5–4 majority upheld Washington’s state minimum-wage law for women. “More than 25 years ago we set forth the applicable principle in these words, after referring to the cases where the liberty guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment had been broadly described,” the Court ruled. “But it was recognized in the cases cited, as in many others, that freedom of contract is a qualified, and not an absolute, right. There is no absolute freedom to do as one wills or to contract as one chooses.” In addition to forming the basis of the modern American social contract, this decision was a hard-fought victory over fierce opposition to government regulation by employers and property owners. The enduring postwar political consensus about the proper role of government may have masked that opposition, but it was never completely vanquished.
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/122645/rehabilitationists-libertarian-movement-undo-new-deal
CHANHASSEN, Minn. — Prince has some advice for up-and-coming artists that music industry bigwigs probably don’t want disseminated: “Stop signing contracts. You don’t belong to people; that’s over with,” he says during USA TODAY’s three-hour visit to the 57-year-old’s iconic Paisley Park compound in suburban Minneapolis.
Of course, his disdain for the traditional artist-label relationship is well-documented and decades-long, but his passion for the more David-and-Goliath aspects of the topic is as fiery as ever.
How fiery?
Well, here’s what says about voiding his membership with the American Society of Composers, Authors and Publishers otherwise known as ASCAP — and otherwise known as the body that pays royalties to musicians whenever their music is played: “To actually tell ASCAP, ‘Why am I a member of this? I don’t have to stay there, do I?’ When you examine what they are, why should any of us be a part of it? … We’re not against anything — it’s what we’re for.”
SNIP
There’s something else Prince wants listeners, fans, fellow artists and black America to hear: his message about pride in ownership.
“(Fans) care about black-owned, don’t they? Go over (to other services) if you want. Any sort of ownership we have is really important,” he says about Tidal and its competition. “When you own your own community, you pay for your police department. Police were created to protect property of white folks. They were originally slave catchers. … When you get your own studio, now what are (labels) going to provide for you?”
UH HUH
UH HUH
Political Animal Blog
September 04, 2015 2:29 PM
A Counterrevolutionary Supreme Court Litmus Test in the Making
By Ed Kilgore
I really do appreciate the efforts of Constitutional Conservative legal beagles Randy Barnett of Georgetown and Josh Blackman of South Texas College of Law in laying out in some detail—and not in a legal journal but in the Weekly Standard—rules for examining future Republican Supreme Court appointments. It’s not just a litmus test in the making—which presidential candidates in both parties typically say they do not want to administer—but a rationale for a litmus test. And their piece has the advantage of being very clear on the key points.
To Barnett and Blackman, who first discuss the notorious history of Republican SCOTUS appointments they view as betrayals, the big thing is that prospective Justices have a clearly documented willingness to ignore both other branches of government—the principle behind the receding Republican doctrine of “judicial restraint”—and stare decisis—the principle against overturning well-settled Court precedent—in pursuit of the “original” meaning of the Constitution. That means treating SCOTUS as an all-powerful institution communing with eighteenth century Founders—or worse yet, Con Con mythologies about those Founders—and empowered to kill many decades of decisions by all three branches of government, precedent and democracy be damned. No wonder they talk repeatedly about needing Justices—and presidents—with courage! And the dividing line between good and bad “conservative” Justices could not be made much clearer: Alito goooood! Roberts baaaaaad! Barnett and Blackman even suggest their rules should be made clear to and then demanded by presidential primary voters!
If that actually starts happening, it will be as or even more important to watch as any other discussions of any other issues. As Brian Beutler recently noted in an important piece at TNR, Barnett and Blackman are among other things leading advocates for a return to the Lochner era of jurisprudence, whereby most regulations of private economic activity by the executive or legislative branches would be declared unconstitutional as an abridgement of “natural law” concepts in the original Constitution and an exotic understanding of the due process clauses in the 5th and 14th amendments. These are dangerous people to let anywhere near a Supreme Court nomination. But they and many others like them, who now play a dominant role in the very powerful conservative legal fraternity the Federalist Society, are likely to be right there with their litmus test in hand.
Anyone who thinks it doesn’t matter who wins the 2016 presidential election because the two parties are both loaded with corporate stooges needs to pay attention to this issue. Barnett and Blackman are very clearly pointing the way to abolition of the entire New Deal/Great Society legacy via rulings by judges serving lifetime terms. If that doesn’t matter to you, I’m not sure what does.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/political-animal-a/2015_09/a_counterrevolutionary_supreme057449.php
Talk in G.O.P. Turns to a Stop Donald Trump Campaign
By NICHOLAS CONFESSORE
SEPT. 4, 2015
Quiet conversations have begun in recent weeks among some of the Republican Party’s biggest donors and normally competing factions, all aimed at a single question: How can we stop Donald Trump?
Republican strategists and donors have assembled focus groups to test negative messages about Mr. Trump. They have amassed dossiers on his previous support for universal health care and higher taxes. They have even discussed the creation of a “super PAC” to convince conservatives that Mr. Trump is not one of them.
But the mammoth big-money network assembled by Republicans in recent years is torn about how best to defuse the threat Mr. Trump holds for their party, and haunted by the worry that any concerted attack will backfire.
In phone calls, private dinners and occasional consultations among otherwise rivalrous outside groups, many have concluded that Mr. Trump’s harsh manner and continued attacks on immigrants and women were endangering the party’s efforts to compete in the general election. Yet after committing hundreds of millions of dollars to shape the Republican primary contest and groom a candidate who can retake the White House, the conservative donor class is finding that money — even in an era of super PACs and billion-dollar presidential campaigns — is a devalued currency in the blustery, post-policy campaign fashioned by Mr. Trump, driven not by seven-figure paid advertising campaigns but by Twitter feuds and unending free publicity.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/05/us/politics/talk-in-gop-turns-to-a-stop-donald-trump-campaign.html?_r=1
Morning Plum: Trump has a better answer on Iran than his GOP rivals do. Seriously.
By Greg Sargent September 4 at 9:21 AM
On Morning Joe today, Donald Trump staked out another position that could — or at least should — force a real debate among Republicans that previously might have remained mostly walled off from discussion by GOP orthodoxy. This time the topic was Iran.
Trump all but ridiculed his GOP rivals for their claim that on Day One, they would promptly tear up the Iran deal into little pieces and flush them down the toilet, along with the rest of the Obama presidency. Trump said that “life doesn’t work that way,” and vowed instead to do a better job implementing it than anyone else, claiming: “I will be so tough.”
Asked by the Washington Post’s David Ignatius how he’d approach the Iran deal as president, here’s what Trump said:
“I think that it is a disastrous deal in so many ways…we have a horrible contract. But we do have a contract. I love to buy bad contracts when people go bust and I make those contracts good….
“I know it would be very popular for me to do what a couple of them said, ‘we’re gonna rip it up, we’re gonna rip it up.’…
“Iran is gonna be an absolute terror, and it’s horrible that we have to live with it. Nevertheless, we have a contract. We lost the power of sanctions because all of these other folks, these other countries that are with us are gone now, and by the way, making money…everybody is involved now with Iran selling themselves. We’re probably going to be the only ones that won’t be selling them anything….
“I will make that agreement so tough. And if they break it, they will have hell to pay….Politically, and certainly for the nomination, I would love to tell you that I’m gonna rip up this contract, I’m going to be the toughest guy in the world. But you know what? Life doesn’t work that way.”
Buried in that rambling monologue is an actual argument: unilaterally scrapping the Iran agreement is a pipe dream that would have all kinds of negative consequences, leaving the U.S. isolated, as our allies would not see it in their interests to reimpose sanctions; claiming you’d rip up the deal is politically pleasing, but it is an illusory posture of “toughness”; the more responsible and genuinely “tough” position is to vow to implement the deal with extreme vigilance against Iran cheating.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2015/09/04/morning-plum-trump-has-a-better-answer-on-iran-than-his-gop-rivals-do-seriously/
Life in a world of black accomplishment, money and position
By Robin Givhan September 4 at 11:37 AM
he Pulitzer Prize-winning writer Margo Jefferson grew up with invaluable social currency and a sense of limitless possibility. She was an African American girl from a good family that had money, connections and expectations of excellence. She attended Chicago’s private, progressive Lab School, graduated from Brandeis and Columbia universities, and eventually worked at the New York Times. She is an accomplished and connected cultural critic. “For my generation,” she writes, “the motto was still: Achievement. Invulnerability. Comportment.”
But along the way — and perhaps still — she has nursed her discomfort with being a child of privilege. She grew up in the rarified environment of black exceptionalism. Hers was a family of black folks who had wealth and social position. She was (mostly) protected from the sting of racism and its pernicious hacking away at self-esteem, opportunity and hope. Her father was a pediatrician, and she describes her mother as a socialite. They lived in a world of private black clubs, black entrepreneurs, black accomplishment, black elegance and black beauty.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/life-in-a-world-of-black-accomplishment-money-and-position/2015/09/04/75e812aa-404a-11e5-8d45-d815146f81fa_story.html?wpmm=1&wpisrc=nl_popns
She wrote one of the 18 short pieces on an article that asked about ‘the meaning and power of First Lady Michelle Obama’… NY magazine March 2009.
It’s interesting revisiting those again 6 plus years later..
http://nymag.com/news/politics/55382/
http://nymag.com/news/politics/55363/
Friday, September 4, 2015
A Bad Judgment Call In Kansas
Posted by Zandar
I’ve been talking for months about how Kansas Republicans have effectively decimated the state, cutting taxes to the point where the state can no longer fund itself, under the nightmare tenure of Gov. Sam Brownback. But now the state is rapidly going from permanent Laffer Curve punchline to third-world banana republic status with blinding speed.
On Wednesday night, a district judge in Kansas struck down a 2014 law that stripped the state Supreme Court of some of its administrative powers. The ruling has set off a bizarre constitutional power struggle between the Republican-controlled legislature and the state Supreme Court. At stake is whether the Kansas court system will lose its funding and shut down.
Last year, the Kansas legislature passed a law that took away the top court’s authority to appoint chief judges to the state’s 31 judicial districts—a policy change Democrats believe was retribution for an ongoing dispute over school funding between the Supreme Court and the legislature. (Mother Jones reported on the standoff this spring.) When the legislature passed a two-year budget for the court system earlier this year, it inserted a clause stipulating that if a court ever struck down the 2014 administrative powers law, funding for the entire court system would be “null and void.” Last night, that’s what the judge did.
The Republican legislature has threatened to destroy the state’s court system unless the GOP can strip the power the judiciary has to appoint judges and give that power to lawmakers instead. The judiciary called the legislature’s bluff.
http://zandarvts.blogspot.com/2015/09/a-bad-judgment-call-in-kansas.html
why is this?
how’d they get away with this?
https://twitter.com/vctv_images/status/639467353374355456/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc^tfw
GOP’s Ben Carson eyes end to Veterans Administration
09/04/15 10:41 AM
By Steve Benen
Republican presidential candidates often like to talk about the cabinet agencies they’re eager to destroy. Just this week, for example, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) dismissed the federal Department of Education as unnecessary. In the last presidential election, then-Gov. Rick Perry (R) said he intended to scrap three cabinet agencies, though he famously forgot the third.
But when GOP candidates go after these agencies, they usually stick to departments like Commerce, Education, and occasionally Energy. Ben Carson, a leading 2016 contender, actually has a very different idea in mind. The Military Times reported:
Presidential hopeful Ben Carson’s comments suggesting the Veterans Affairs Department should be eliminated drew quick condemnation from multiple veterans groups, who called the idea short-sighted and ill-informed.
On a national radio show [on Aug. 27], Carson said that the country need to re-examine how it cares for veterans but also how to cut back on government bureaucracy.
The retired neurosurgeon said, “We don’t need a Department of Veterans Affairs. Veterans Affairs should be folded in under the Department of Defense.”
As regular readers probably know, plenty of Republican presidential candidates support incorporating a voucher system into the VA, effectively privatizing parts of veterans’ care, but Carson is the first national candidate, at least in recent memory, to suggest eliminating the cabinet agency altogether.
John Biedrzyck, head of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, isn’t impressed. “To suggest that disabled veterans could be sent out into the economy with a health savings account card overlooks the fact that civilian health care has waiting lists of their own … and presupposes that civilian doctors have the same skill sets as VA doctors, who see veterans of every age and malady every day,” Biedrzyck said in a statement.
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/gops-ben-carson-eyes-end-veterans-administration
Obama turns the ‘lame duck’ narrative on its head
09/04/15 01:22 PM—Updated 09/04/15 01:54 PM
By Steve Benen
Saudi Arabia’s King Salman will meet with President Obama today, and as Politico put it, the Saudi king will meet with a U.S. leader “with a swagger in his step.”
Nearly four months after he skipped President Barack Obama’s high-profile Camp David summit, Saudi Arabia’s King Salman will arrive at the White House to find a strengthened Obama and less leeway to influence U.S. policy toward Iran.
The elderly Arab monarch’s White House visit Friday comes just days after Obama secured the Senate votes he needs for the Iran nuclear deal to survive Congress.
Senate support for the diplomatic solution is still growing – in addition to the three new endorsements yesterday, Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.) announced his backing for the policy this morning. Sen. Ben Cardin (D-Md.) announced his opposition around the same time, but as a practical matter, his siding with the far-right on the issue won’t change the outcome.
Under the circumstances, it’s tough to blame the president for having “a swagger in his step,” not just because he’s overcome the Saudis’ skepticism about the international agreement, but also because Obama has had quite a bit of success lately.
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/obama-turns-the-lame-duck-narrative-its-head
https://twitter.com/StevenTDennis/status/639876503598198784
Ted Cruz indifferent to rule of law in Kim Davis case
09/04/15 08:01 AM
By Steve Benen
When Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) condemns President Obama – a frequent occurrence – the far-right national candidate often emphasizes the rule of law. Cruz doesn’t just think the president is wrong; he thinks Obama is a tyrannical dictator who flouts legal norms.
“The pattern we’ve seen under President Obama, disregarding the law, is really one of the most troubling aspects of this presidency,” Cruz said last year. “When he disagrees with the law … he simply refuses to comply with it.” The Republican senator added that the president is “lawless.”
But that was in 2014. In 2015, Cruz sees Kentucky clerk Kim Davis ignoring court orders, ignoring Supreme Court rulings, and ignoring her oath of office – and the GOP presidential candidate sees her as some kind of hero. In a written statement released late yesterday:
“Today, judicial lawlessness crossed into judicial tyranny. Today, for the first time ever, the government arrested a Christian woman for living according to her faith. This is wrong. This is not America.
“I stand with Kim Davis. Unequivocally. I stand with every American that the Obama Administration is trying to force to choose between honoring his or her faith or complying with a lawless court opinion.”
Cruz’s statement went on to argue, “Those who are persecuting Kim Davis believe that Christians should not serve in public office. That is the consequence of their position. Or, if Christians do serve in public office, they must disregard their religious faith–or be sent to jail.”
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/ted-cruz-indifferent-rule-law-kim-davis-case
https://twitter.com/mmfa/status/639836597437927425/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc^tfw
This is why Murdering Joke’s getting an extra hour in the morning. He and his puppets get to set the narrative, lie, distort and carry that water for their corporate masters and the RETHUGS.
Fox light
https://twitter.com/ddiamond/status/639778732006371328
https://twitter.com/NerdyWonka/status/639843238401081344/photo/1
https://twitter.com/thinkprogress/status/639878375289585664
https://twitter.com/3ChicsPolitico/status/639814386731737088
https://twitter.com/David04G/status/639849331458207745
LOL Silly Mofos. With he GOP, it’s SILLY SEASON 365. They are all about gaining power and nothing else.
Black folks and the mentally ill are being killed EXPONENTIALLY by cops, and white America wants Black folks to SHUT UP about being killed.
38 & counting
JUST IN: U.S. Sen. Michael Bennet to announce support for #IranDeal http://dpo.st/1hHpjnt by @mkmatthews #copolitics
http://www.denverpost.com/politics/ci_28757685/u-s-sen-michael-bennet-announce-support-iran
See, I gotta get in on grift like this.
………..
For $525, You Can Learn How To Fight Terrorists (Muslims Need Not Apply)
September 04, 2015
“I’m going to try to scoot you guys across the finish line before you suck a bullet,” barks Larry Vickers, addressing his men with disdain. He was once among elite U.S. Army warriors, but today his troop is a ragtag assortment of two dozen male gun enthusiasts, predominantly white and beefy, on a sandy gun range in a rural South New Jersey abyss between Philadelphia and Atlantic City.
The men sport earmuffs and digital camouflage cargo shorts bought on clearance, and their beer bellies hang over gun belts stocked with pistols and extra clips. Lunch was at a diner where every overstuffed sandwich came with a side of soup—plus somebody’s wife made brownies. Yet they soldier through the cheeseburger-and-chicken-noodle fatigue.
At the sound of a beep, they stagger into grunting sprints, turn around and unload hell on paper targets. Next, to simulate the position they might assume in hiding behind a car door during a firefight, they drop to their knees—some go one-kneed but Vickers advises the “double-kneeling Monica Lewinsky” for stability—draw their pistols again and open fire, ejecting spent clips to the dirt and a spray of golden shells everywhere, including on each other. A shooter’s jeans rip down the side.
When the firing stops at one point, the air filled with the smell of gun smoke, Vickers trudges up and studies the targets closely.
His verdict: “You fuckers suck.”
Vickers lives in North Carolina but travels the country teaching classes to a loyal contingent. The students today include, among others, an IT guy, a software engineer, a dog breeder and a cell phone tower installer. They’ve come from all over the Northeast and paid $525 to receive tactical training from one of the best-known instructors in a burgeoning cottage industry that takes itself deadly serious.
Wow! I can say ‘You fuckers suck.” Can I get paid $52, please? SMGDH
It Was New Orleans’ Musicians—Not Its Politicians—Who Saved the City Post-Katrina
The money may have come from Washington, but 10 years after Katrina, the city’s true rebirth came from within.
As the media descend for the 10th anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans is a robust city with a booming $800 million film industry, a burgeoning digital economy, rising real estate values and a solid growth curve. The population is approaching 90 percent of the 457,000 people who lived there when the place nearly drowned on international television starting August 29, 2005.
Washington saved New Orleans with a financial lifeline, at least $19.5 billion from FEMA alone, as the New Orleans Advocate reports. The money came slowly in the early years, the spigot quickening in the five years since Mitch Landrieu became mayor. The Rockefeller Foundation contributed $6.5 million for citywide planning. Congress also allocated $9 billion to assist under-insured residential owners in the Road Home program, a grant process that became a byzantine scandal.
Private investment followed the flow of federal dollars. The business district is becoming an upscale residential neighborhood. The city’s rebirth shows in building projects, streets that are cleaner than at any time in living memory, a robust scene of music clubs, restaurants, and art galleries.
New Orleans is the American city with the deepest African identity. The shadow-story of the rebirth is the resilience of musicians, artists, and tradition-bearers who came back, against the odds, when it was a shattered mud town in fall 2005. Culture is the life force here, a powerful current of memory and rituals that proved vital to the city’s resurrection.
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/08/23/it-was-new-orleans-musicians-not-its-politicians-who-saved-the-city-post-katrina.html
Love these ladies
What has four marriages, three divorces and two kids out of wedlock? I don’t know but the gays have ruined the sanctity of marriage.
Posted by: Helen Philpot | September 4, 2015
Margaret, I had a hell of a good time watching the news last night. Sending that Davis girl to jail has the GOP madder than a wet hen. Huckabee says that Christianity has now been criminalized in America. That asshat Ted Cruz called it Judicial Tryanny. And Rand Paul warned that local governments might just have to get out of the marriage business. Lord I sure wish the rapture would finally happen so the rest of us could get back to enjoying a world with fewer idiots in it.
Speaking of idiots, Trump said he really didn’t know much about it. Bless his heart. She’s not Mexican or Chinese so Donald didn’t know what to say.
Now I feel for little Kim Davis. I really do. Poor thing looks like something the dog’s been hiding under the porch. But that’s what four marriages, three divorces and a few kids out of wedlock can do to a person with strong moral convictions.
http://margaretandhelen.com/2015/09/04/the-gop-really-has-lowered-the-bar-on-what-constitutes-being-a-christian/
https://twitter.com/richdoll54/status/639841643999436800
The usual trick is to blame the students, their families, and their communities for the crisis in urban school systems. And, now, the curtain has been pulled back a bit so we can see the absolute power and injustice in having ignorance rule from the very top. Failure would be the only option under these circumstances.
All aboard! Claypool transfers CTA pals to CPS
Rahm’s schools CEO is putting a new spin on an old Chicago budget trick.
It’s budget season at the Board of Education, which means we’ve entered that twilight zone of misdirection where the bosses say one thing and do something else.
In this case, Forrest Claypool, Mayor Emanuel’s latest schools CEO, is making a big public to-do about how he’s cut central office spending to the bone. All so that teachers, facing a 7 percent pay cut, and principals, worried about millions in budget cuts, will not feel so alone. Or as Claypool, who the mayor brought in from the CTA, recently put it during a press conference: “Everybody’s got to pitch in.”
Meanwhile, very quietly—with nary a press conference—Claypool’s padding the payroll with various rubber stamps, most of whom have no experience in public education. (If you think you’ve seen this trick before, you’re right: Ron Huberman, Mayor Daley’s last schools CEO, tried much the same thing.) As exasperating as this practice sounds to anyone who has to teach or attend a public school, it’s sort of a field day for reporters looking for examples of double standards in Chicago.
Just a few days ago, George Schmidt, the ageless writer for Substance News, broke the story that Claypool had hired a former CTA staffer named Ronald DeNard as his $225,000-a-year senior vice president of finance. (He’s at least the third former CTA official Claypool has brought on. If you hear of any more, let me know.) Basically, DeNard is now the guy in charge of the budget. CPS already had a high-ranking guy in charge of the budget, Tim Cawley, so now we have two. Lucky us.
Then Lauren FitzPatrick, ace education reporter for the Sun-Times, revealed that DeNard lives in Flossmoor. So the board needed to give him a waiver on the requirement that school employees live in Chicago.
Curiously, Cawley also needed a waiver to take the job, because he lived in Winnetka. Apparently the mayor can’t find any decent accountants who live in the city.
I now feel compelled to follow up on Schmidt’s and FitzPatrick’s pieces with a schools-CEO-budget-game-column. (It’s been five years since I wrote the last one, which was about Huberman. I guess annual columns—unlike central office budget cuts—aren’t what they used to be.)
http://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/forrest-claypool-board-of-education-chicago-public-schools/Content?oid=18943081
BWDenali @theonlyadult 1h1 hour ago
Obama brought the #unemployment lower than Reagan did. They literally got *nothing* anymore. Expect the derangement to break all records.
Jeff B@AoSHQDD@EsotericCD
“Low information voters” are a fact of political life in any modern democracy. But “low information candidates” are an alarming new trend.
Lupita!!
http://assets-s3.usmagazine.com/uploads/assets/articles/91524-lupita-nyongo-swaps-short-crop-for-long-braids-see-the-hairstyle/1441214996_lupita-nyongo-braids-467.jpg
Lovely! My daughter met her and she is as pleasant as she seems!
Cable networks enabling slander against #BLACKLIVES MATTER, while airing and drooling every word Trump says. and no regard for his truth-telling or actual knowledge of policies as a candidate.
The media is getting their rocks off on Trump’s anti-immigrant, anti-woman, anti-anything or anyone who is not MILKY WHITE.
*LOOKING@YOUMSNBC*
NO FUCKING CLUE
Remember this turd? Same deal with Trump
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WW_nDFKAmCo
https://twitter.com/3ChicsPolitico/status/639830472541929472
LOCK HIM UP
https://scontent.cdninstagram.com/hphotos-xaf1/t51.2885-15/e35/11849901_824964740936211_87874213_n.jpg
Riley was thinking hard. Eeeerrrrrrrrbody had a ‘talk’ with her before they went out to take this picture.
LOL
https://twitter.com/DaRiverZkind/status/581151732106981376/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc^tfw
sigh….
sigh….
Police in Texas Hospital Shoot Patient in the Chest
Thursday, 03 September 2015
By Aaron Miguel Cantú,
Christian Alexander Pean, a fourth-year medical student in New York City, had been anxiously texting his father in Houston throughout the morning to inquire about his younger brother, Alan Christopher Pean, a patient at St. Joseph Medical Center in Texas. The night before, on August 26, Alan had called his parents to tell them he was in the middle of a panic attack.
“We knew it was an acute mental health crisis,” Christian told
Truthout. Alan’s parents implored their son to seek help, so Alan, a
student at the University of Houston, drove himself to the hospital.
While in the parking lot, he experienced a severe mental health episode and crashed into multiple parked cars. He was treated for possible injuries in the emergency room, and officially admitted to the hospital early the next morning, when he was transferred to the medical psychiatric ward on the eighth floor.
Alan’s parents, including his father, who is a doctor, flew up to
Houston that morning from their home in McAllen, Texas. They immediately went to St. Joseph to corroborate Alan’s psychiatric health and implored the staff that he needed inpatient mental health treatment. But the hospital seemed bent on discharging him, Christian said. The staff did not even summon a physician to speak with Alan’s parents, claiming no one was available.
Frustrated that their concerns were dismissed but assured that their
son was in good hands, Alan’s parents left to their hotel a few blocks from the hospital. A few hours later, they received a call from St. Joseph Medical Center: Alan was being discharged and was ready to be picked up.
In the short time it took his parents to walk back to the hospital,
however, something terrible happened to Alan. His parents were told when they arrived that their son was in the intensive care unit. When Christian heard the news, his mind immediately leaped to horrifying possibilities; as a Black man living in the US, he had been conditioned to fear the worst for himself and his family.
“My dad texts me and says, something happened, he’s in the ICU,”
Christian said. “And one minute after, I asked, did they shoot him? I
instantly thought that was what had happened.”
Christian’s worst fears proved true.
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/32630-police-in-texas-hospital-shoot-patient-in-the-chest
Things MUST change!
I will say this again. We need a mired educated police force with a 4 year criminal justice degree. With focus on humanities, cultural differences, and social services. We need to help veterans coming back from war deal with their ptsd instead of handing them a gun and sending them into communities being scared of everything. So far the training is kill or be killed, but it’s not a war zone, we are in our communities in the United States of America!
https://twitter.com/imfabulous13/status/639809835245137920/photo/1?ref_src=twsrc^tfw
BWA HA HA AH AH AH HA HA HA HA HA
………………………………………………………………………
How Trump Outsmarted the GOP
The real estate magnate didn’t just pledge his loyalty to the Republican Party. The GOP pledged itself to Trump.
By Jim Newell
And though Trump has signed this piece of paper saying he will and won’t do certain things next year, he has not signed any piece of paper requiring him to disavow the unorthodox nationalist, protectionist, tax increase–supporting agenda with which he’s carved his sizable lane. The Republican Party, however, has now committed itself to supporting this agenda, which goes against decades of its own dogma, if Trump is able to pull off the nomination. Most of today’s news has been framed as Trump signs pledge to support eventual nominee. Another way to look at it is Establishment Republican candidates pledge to support Donald Trump. Trump has not pledged to incorporate into his candidacy any of the cheerier tones or traditional Republican policies that the GOP establishment would like to see from him. The Republican Party, though, has agreed to incorporate Trump.
In bringing his politics into the fold, the GOP has also handed Trump a shield just when he might need it. Jeb Bush’s campaign has begun the offensive against Trump’s political past, putting together a montage of Trump over the years stating that he’s pro-choice, a friend and admirer of Hillary Clinton’s, and an advocate for a single-payer health care system—all delivered with the same phony conviction that he wields now to emphasize the opposite. Now, when Bush or whoever else uses these attacks against Trump on the trail or at the next debate, Trump can fire right back: Didn’t you see Reince Priebus come to my office? Didn’t you see me just pledge my support to the Republican nominee? If I were a liberal, why would I do that?
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2015/09/donald_trump_s_loyalty_pledge_to_the_republican_party_how_the_real_estate.html
The GOP cannot escape the glaring FACT. They have become the party of RACISTS, FEARMONGERING, HOMOPHOBIC, MYSOGYNIST.
And Trump is their OFFICAL SPOKESPERSON for 2016
//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js
And it shows!
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So upsetting.
https://twitter.com/StevenTDennis/status/639192097367695361
Yes, and it’s DRIVING THEM CRAZY
https://twitter.com/truthmessiah/status/583913219636465664/photo/1
There you go! I was there last month. The Crazy Horse Memorial is coming along, slowly. It’s going to be massive, just stunning with him on his horse.
https://twitter.com/waltjack/status/639607644458774528
Propane Jane @docrocktex26
Rand Paul Thinks ‘Lack Of Assimilation’ Is Native Americans’ Problem http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/rand-paul-assimilation-native-americans_55e8986fe4b0b7a9633c4edc … via @HuffPostPol Fuck you, Rand.
Any problems that have EVER been created in America have been created by WHITES, .
Because of their refusal to ASSIMILATE, Instead they pillaged, raped, stole, murdered, and forced NATIVE AMERICANS to assimilate, so they could claim they discovered America.
RUNTELL THAT, Rand RUG head Paul.
LOL This is gif for the AGES!
https://twitter.com/TomthunkitsMind/status/635477973911629824/photo/1
This photo just exudes hatred.
PragmaticObotsUnite @PragObots
Total Black UER rose 9.1% to 9.5. Black men UER rose 8.8% to 9.2%. Black women UER rose 8% to 8.1% #AugJobsReport #BlackTwitter #p2
LeMar McLean @MarzMediaUS
Black woman go to jail for petty shit doesn’t leave alive. White woman goes in for violating the U.S. Constitution and will come out rich.
You go got. She’ll get out of jail and make the rounds at Fox. Probably already has a book agent.
Top House Dems: Drop Planned Parenthood investigations
By Peter Sullivan – 09/03/15 01:15 PM EDT
The top Democrats on two committees investigating Planned Parenthood are calling on Republicans to drop the investigations, saying there is no evidence the organization has broken the law.
Reps. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) and John Conyers (D-Mich.) wrote a letter to the chairmen of the Judiciary and Oversight committees on Thursday calling on them to call off the investigations, or at least expand it to include an inquiry into the anti-abortion-rights group behind the recent undercover videos.
Cummings and Conyers write that while there is no evidence Planned Parenthood has broken the law, it appears that the group behind the videos, the Center for Medical Progress (CMP), may have.
“We call on you to halt these one-sided investigations immediately,” the pair wrote. “Millions of women across the country rely on Planned Parenthood for critical health services, and they should not be denied their rights under the law and the Constitution based on the Center for Medical Progress’s warped — and ultimately unsuccessful — effort to entrap Planned Parenthood.”
http://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/252676-top-dems-call-on-gop-to-drop-planned-parenthood-investigations
https://twitter.com/MashableNews/status/639796705483997184
Four Seasons rolls out the red carpet for King Salman
09/03/15, 04:14 PM EDT
In anticipation of King Salman bin Abdulaziz of Saudi Arabia’s stay, the Four Seasons hotel in Georgetown has done some redecorating — literally rolling out red carpets in order to accommodate the royal’s luxurious taste.
Eyewitnesses at the property have seen crates of gilded furniture and accessories being wheeled into the posh hotel over the past several days, culminating in a home-away-from-home fit for the billionaire Saudi monarch, who is in Washington for his first White House meeting with President Barack Obama tomorrow.
“Everything is gold,” says one Four Seasons regular, who spied the deliveries arriving at the hotel. “Gold mirrors, gold end tables, gold lamps, even gold hat racks.” Red carpets have been laid down in hallways and even in the lower parking garage, so the king and his family never have to touch asphalt when departing their custom Mercedes caravan.
[…]
The guests staying at the 222-room hotel for the next couple of days are all part of the 79-year-old king’s entourage of Saudi diplomats, family members and assistants, one source said; a full buyout of the entire property was reserved for the visit. Guests who had booked to stay at the Four Seasons during the royal visit have apparently been moved to other luxury hotels in town. A call to the Four Seasons confirmed the hotel is sold out Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights.
King Salman, who ascended the throne in January, has a habit of displacing commoners for his own comforts; this summer, during a sojourn to the French Riviera, his eight-day stay forced the closure of a popular beach, enraging locals. Salman rolls deep, with a reported 1,000-person delegation joining him for his seaside August vacation.
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/09/four-seasons-king-salman-visit-red-carpet-213324#ixzz3kmGpFmk3
Just WOW
Peanut on Picture Day
Is that Peanut? Oh my goodness what a little precious doll. And she’s styling that dress. LOL! Show us how it’s done. Rikyrah, she has grown up. That’s your baby! :)
She looks adorable. I love her long hair.
It’s official. Peanut’s a PRINCESS! This is 3 Chics PICTURE OF THE DAY
LOL So sweet & precious, and she’s getting her TWIRL on too.
What? She’s STYLING!
Oh, I just want to hug her…she is so sweet and precious!
US Employers Added 173K Jobs in Aug.; Rate Falls to 5.1 Pct.
WASHINGTON — Sep 4, 2015, 9:36 AM ET
By CHRISTOPHER S. RUGABER AP Economics Writer
Associated Press
The U.S. unemployment rate fell to a seven-year low in August as employers added a modest 173,000 jobs, a key piece of evidence for the Federal Reserve in deciding whether to raise interest rates from record lows later this month.
The Labor Department said Friday that the jobless rate fell to 5.1 percent — a level consistent with a normal economy and the lowest since April 2008 — from 5.3 percent in July.
Though hiring in August was the slowest in five months, the government revised up job growth for June and July by a combined 44,000. From June through August, the economy added a robust 221,000 jobs a month, up from an average of 189,000 from March through May. Three years of solid hiring have put nearly 8 million more Americans to work.
Friday’s report appeared neither so strong nor so weak as to tilt the Fed decisively toward either a rate hike or against one. But as the final report on the job market before the Fed meets Sept. 16-17, it’s one of the most significant pieces of evidence it will consider.
http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory/us-employers-add-173k-jobs-august-rate-falls-33533287
THIS is one of those watershed moments. Nobody is actually talking about this, as an accomplishment of President Obama, but it really is. How absolutely HUGE this is. Of all the reasons why I’m pleased about the Iran deal, giving AIPAC the middle finger really does top my list.
………………………………..
How AIPAC Lost the Iran Deal Fight
September 3 at 6:12 PM
Not since George H.W. Bush was president has the American Israel Public Affairs Committee sustained such a public defeat on an issue it deemed an existential threat to Israel’s security.
But the Iran nuclear deal has Washington insiders wondering if the once-untouchable lobbying giant has suffered lasting damage to its near-pristine political reputation.
In fighting the deal, AIPAC and its affiliates mustered all of its considerable resources: spending tens of millions on television ads in the home states of undecided lawmakers and organizing a fly-in to blitz lawmakers on Capitol Hill – another is planned for next week when Congress returns from August recess to vote on a resolution of disapproval. But all that noise amounted to a humbling and rare defeat this week, when President Obama secured a strong enough plurality in the Senate to protect the pact from efforts to dismantle it.
Many say AIPAC’s efforts were doomed to fail in the aftermath of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s combative speech to Congress in March — an appearance brokered by Israel’s ambassador to the U.S. along with House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) without White House consultation. Many of AIPAC’s supporters also blame President Obama and what they see as a process he rigged and a debate he polarized.
But whether or not the White House won a lasting victory in securing the Iran deal’s fate, AIPAC may have lost their claim to iron-clad influence over lawmakers on issues pertaining to Israel.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/powerpost/wp/2015/09/03/how-aipac-lost-the-iran-deal-fight/
I understand, VP Biden. It’s hard when you and your family are still grieving. Bless you for taking the time to process your grief and consider your family’s grieving too.
Good morning, ladies. Also happy Friday and safe Labor Day travels.
Good Morning Everyone.
https://twitter.com/businessinsider/status/639487721736642560
I tried not to see the picture, but I did. It was heartbreaking.
Just gut-wrenching……
https://twitter.com/rolandsmartin/status/639084024699293696
Just like FAUX-FOX and their minions to try and shutdown folks who call out the HATE. The same HATE that cable network has breeding and perpetuating 24 hours/day
https://twitter.com/rolandsmartin/status/638512181408088064
Good morning, everyone!
Happy Friday! Enjoy your weekend. Stay safe, have fun and do it any way you wanna.
Good Morning, Everyone. Have a ‘last days of summer’ rockin’ good weekend.