Politics Plus

I was going to have a bowl of beef barley soup last night for dinner.  I had left it on the counter ready to go in the microwave.  When I went down to the kitchen to feed my cats, I saw that the container was open and the soup gone!  The guilty party was my Winnie and needless to say, he was not so hungry at dinner time.  I am sure that the other two helped, but Winnie is the one who opens lots of things including the treats jar at the vet’s.  Well I had to settle for beans instead.  I am off to physio tomorrow morning so I am posting this very early.

Jig Zone Puzzle:  

Today’s took me 4:06 (average 4:23).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

AlterNet — On Tuesday morning, in a huge victory for civil rights activists, federal judge Jesse Furman issued an order blocking President Donald Trump’s Department of Commerce from adding a citizenship question to the 2020 Census.

The case, brought by the New York State Attorney General’s office, is almost certain to be appealed by the Justice Department in a battle that could end up in the Supreme Court: …

Hallelujah!  Another set back for the Trumpians, well at least for now.  I am certain that this decision will be appealed all the way to the Supreme Court, but for now, let’s enjoy.

Vox — UK Prime Minister Theresa May spent months negotiating a deal with the European Union on the terms of Brexit, Britain’s exit from the EU.

On Tuesday, the UK Parliament voted to reject the deal by a resounding 432-202 margin — the largest legislative defeat any prime minister has suffered in modern British history.

May’s defeat should dispel any illusion that there is a happy ending to the Brexit story. The truth of the matter is that the project that defined May’s premiership — negotiating a Brexit deal acceptable to both the EU and pro-Brexit legislators in her Conservative Party — was structurally impossible. The terms on which Conservative Brexiteers wanted to leave the EU were not acceptable to EU negotiators, and the compromises necessary to bring EU negotiators on board were not acceptable to Conservative Brexiteers. No amount of negotiating could address this dilemma.  …

Now, in the clarifying light of this vote’s failure, it’s time to be honest. Barring a dramatic and unexpected change, there are two plausible outcomes to the Brexit drama. Either the UK exits the EU without a deal by the March 29 deadline, which virtually every expert agrees would result in economic catastrophe, or else the country pulls back from the brink and decides to remain in the EU.

I hope you’ll read the entire article as it explores the effect of the Brexit decision and the collapse of this agreement.  The ramifications can have a global affect.  Back in 2016, David Cameron was Conservative Party leader and Prime Minister when he called for a referendum for leaving the European Union.  Cameron himself favoured staying in the EU, but the referendum results said otherwise with 52% of the voters supporting leaving the EU.  As a result, Cameron resigned as PM and Theresa May was elected by the Conservative Party as its leader and thus became PM.  As I recall, after the referendum, there were many people who voted for leaving the EU but later found out that their knowledge of the effects of the consequences was faulty.    Some politicians lied!  May committed to honouring the will of the people and set out to negotiate the Brexit agreement with the EU.  It was that agreement that was voted down today — 432 to 202.  Jeremy Corbyn, the opposition leader in Parliament has tabled a non confidence vote which could see the Conservatives lose their current position and an election called.  All this with little more than 60 days until Britain leaves the EU.  As aside, don’t you wish that the US had a non confidence vote system — might be able to get rid of Trump more quickly.

Daily Kos — No matter what Individual 1 says, people coming across our border with Mexico without authorization is not an emergency, or a crisis (although the Trump Administration has turned it into a humanitarian crisis). The graph on the right shows the number of people apprehended crossing the border illegally—a very reasonable proxy in terms of a trend over time for the number of people crossing in general.

Look at the numbers in fiscal year 2018 compared to 2000. Apprehensions are less than one-quarter of what they were. Trump calls that an emergency? It seems more like a success, but hey, I’ve never been a reality show host, so what do I know.

Trump has spent the last three years screaming about criminals and terrorists coming across the border. The terrorism claim is absolute bunk. Nicholas Rasmussen served from December 2014 to December 2017 as director of the National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC). His job was “to lead the government’s efforts to collect and analyze all available information about terrorist threats to the Homeland.” Here’s his take:

“There is no wave of terrorist operatives waiting to cross overland into the United States. It simply isn’t true. Anyone in authority using this argument to bolster support for building the wall or any other physical barrier along the southern border is most likely guilty of fear mongering and willfully misleading the American people.”

To say the least, Trump’s bullshit factory is working overtime producing lies about the southern border and he’s holding 800,000 US employees hostage with his temper tantrum.

My Universe

Cheeky bugger, or what!

Posted to Care2 HERE

As TC once said, he has a pants load of chores to get done with Wendy’s help today . . . not to mention a shower because he is “rancid”, his word not mine.  As a result, he may only have a personal update or an Open Thread at most.  So I have  tried to take up the slack a bit with an Open Thread and a second article.  Have a great weekend.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:41 (average 5:09).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

AlterNet — Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL) on Friday appeared to short circuit after CNN’s John Berman asked him if a Democrat president could in the future use the precedent being set by President Donald Trump to unilaterally declare climate change a “national emergency.”

During a discussion about Trump potentially bypassing Congress to order the construction of his border wall by declaring a “national emergency,” Berman asked Brooks what he would think of a future Democratic president using the same tactics to address climate change.

Click through for the Republican’s palm plant hypocrisy of a response.  Absolutely unbelievable but the video does not lie!

Common Dreams — US Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) on Saturday called for congressional salaries to be put on hold during the next government shutdown.

The US government went into a partial shutdown at midnight on Friday after President Trump refused to sign a spending bill that did not include $5 billion for his wall on the U.S.-Mexico border. He had long claimed that Mexico would pay for the wall.

“It’s completely unacceptable that members of Congress can force a government shutdown on partisan lines & then have Congressional salaries exempt from that decision,” Ocasio-Cortez wrote on Twitter.

“Have some integrity,” she added, calling for salaries to be furloughed for the next shutdown.

AMEN!!!  I seem to recall during a previous shutdown that a Republican congress critter was noted as saying that he could not afford to have his salary withheld because he had bills to pay including a mortgage.  I wonder if that representative understands that those government employees caught up in the shutdowns also have bills to pay.  IMO, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has the right idea and I would surely support her proposal.  Further, lawmakers should be required to work even if furloughed.

AlterNet — The governor of Missouri wants to repeal a constitutional amendment that the voters of his own state have clearly established they want to see become law.

Gov. Mike Parson, who took over in June after his predecessor resigned in disgrace, says he is thinking of repealing and replacing Constitutional Amendment 1, which the voters in his state overwhelmingly supported in last month’s election. Gov. Parson told the Associated Press that he is also thinking about making it more difficult for initiative petitions to appear on the ballot, presumably due to his dissatisfaction with the success of Constitutional Amendment 1.

“Fundamentally, you think when the people vote you shouldn’t be changing that vote. But the reality of it is that is somewhat what your job is sometimes, if you know something’s unconstitutional, if you know some of it’s not right,” Parson told the AP.

Constitutional Amendment 1 is, to say the least, very difficult to accurately describe as “unconstitutional.” It requires lawmakers to abide by the state open-records law, restricts how much lobbyists can give to lawmakers as gifts and creates a new position of “nonpartisan state demographer” to redraw state House and Senate maps in a more fair way. This last initiative would quite likely cut into the Republicans’ supermajorities in the state House and Senate.

Governor Parsons was the state’s Lieutenant Governor when he assumed the governorship at the resignation of Eric Greitens 01 June 2017 following discussions of impeachment.  The Constitutional Amendment was approved by 62% of the ballots cast.  From the St Louis Post-Dispatch:

Missouri Constitutional Amendment 1

3256 of 3256 precincts reporting (100.0%)• More than 50% needed to pass measure

This is the Missouri Constitutional Amendment 1 as shown in the Washington University ProSPER

It seems that Missouri voters are tired of all the corruption.  Trust a Republican to screw with the will of the people when they get caught!

Raw Story — During the 2016 presidential campaign, Donald Trump promised to eliminate the national debt within eight years. …

The United States Treasury Department numbers show the debt is $2 trillion larger than the day Trump took office …

The debt now stands at nearly $22 trillion.

And Trump wants $5.7 billion for a useless border wall that Mexico is NOT going to pay for?  I seriously wonder how he is going to eliminate the debt.  I suppose he could ask his buddy Putin but Russia has its own financial woes as usual.

AlterNet — In 2018, the U.S. Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security released an 11-page report suggesting that there was a link between terrorism and immigration.

Ben Berwick, counsel for Protect Democracy, has noted that about 100 foreign-born people suspected of terrorism are wrongly characterized as immigrants in the Justice Department/Homeland Security report. According to Berwick, they were extradited to the U.S. to stand trial for terrorist acts committed overseas—and they didn’t come in as immigrants.

The report noted that 73% of those convicted of “international terrorism-related charges” since 9/11 were “foreign-born.” But the report, according to CNN, wrongly gave the impression that they were immigrants to the United States—not people who committed acts of terrorism in other countries and were brought to the U.S. for prosecution.

Nahal Toosi, who covers foreign policy for Politico, has been critical of the Justice Department for not issuing a correction. In a January 4 tweet, Toosi wrote, “This is truly amazing. The Justice Department admits that, under Trump, it effectively made up and misstated information to link immigrants to terrorism, but that it won’t retract or correct the culprit report.”

Spinning information for the desired Republican talking points.  The fact that it is not accurate or true is no concern to Republicans.  The fact that the report is coming from the DOJ . . . what does that say about truth and justice?

Posted to Care2 HERE

It is Sunday evening and I was so tired after church and lunch that I decided a nap was in order.  I finished the updated version of the book “The Making of Donald Trump” by David Cay Johnston over lunch.  The book delves into greater detail of the spurious nature of Trump, his associates and methods.  To say Trump is nothing more than a third rate carnival barker and scam artist is an understatement.  I recommend reading this short book (217 pages).  Tomorrow is Christmas Eve and I will be celebrating Christmas with friends.  Then on Christmas Day, I will spend lots of quality time with my fur babes and doing the dreaded task . . . again!  However you celebrate the season, may it be joyful filled with love, peace and hope.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:45 (average 4:50). To do it, click here. How did you do?

Short Takes

The Guardian — The resignation of US defence secretary James Mattis was triggered by a phone conversation between Donald Trump and the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, in which Trump abruptly decided to upend previous US policy and withdraw troops from Syria, according to new accounts of the call.

Mattis went to see the president on Thursday afternoon in a last-ditch attempt to change the president’s mind, and argue for standing by the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which have take the lead role in ejecting the Islamic State from its Syrian strongholds.  …

“As soon as the US folds its tent and leaves, Turkey will immediately begin an air bombardment followed by a ground attack by the [Ankara-backed] Free Syrian army. Thousands will die, thousands will be displaced and will be given no haven within Syria. They will be turned away at the Turkish border,” said David Phillips, a former senior state department official, and the author of the new book: The Great Betrayal: How America Abandoned the Kurds and Lost the Middle East.