Showing posts with label Irony. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Irony. Show all posts

Wednesday, December 20, 2017

Support For Donald Trump's Impeachment Is Higher Than His Reelection Chances

Source: Newsweek Magazine
Source: https://www.democraticunderground.com/10141943791

BY SAM SCHWARZ ON 12/20/17 AT 9:18 AM

Donald Trump is hemorrhaging support among the American people, and now more than 40 percent of Americans think it's time to start the process to impeach him, a new poll finds. The number is higher than the percentage of Americans who said they planned to vote for the current resident in the 2020 election.

The NBC News/Wall Street Journal survey, out Wednesday, carried very little good news for the resident and put him on notice that close to half of Americans believe there is enough for Congress to hold impeachment hearings even before the conclusion of special counsel Robert Mueller's investigation. The poll found that 70 percent of Democrats, 40 percent of Independents and even seven percent of Republicans are in favor of Congress holding hearings to remove the resident from office.

The number calling for impeachment proceedings to get underway closely parallels the 38 percent of Americans who believe Trump colluded with Russia to win the 2016 president election.

The White House has both publicly and privately suggested that Mueller's investigation will come to an end early in the new year, but that would appear to be wishful thinking. Recent reports have instead indicated that Mueller and his team could be working at least through the midterm elections in 2018 and possibly even beyond.

Read more: http://www.newsweek.com/donald-trump-impeachment-reelection-2020-753546

Saturday, December 16, 2017

Republican Congressman Who Mocked Sick People As Immoral Announces He Has Cancer

Republican Congressman Mo Brooks from Alabama recently announced on the House floor that he has been diagnosed with prostate cancer, and was greeted with the utmost sympathy from his fellow members of Congress.

But just a few months ago, this same man said during an interview with CNN that people who lead good lives don’t get sick because they do everything right.

He also wants to deny millions of Americans the same healthcare benefits that he receives.

His diagnosis is sad for him and his family, but his actions as a Congressman are absolutely disgusting. Ring of Fire’s Farron Cousins discusses this.



Thursday, December 14, 2017

Wednesday, December 13, 2017

‘I Think Bannon Made An Ass Of Himself’: Republicans Rejoice In Breitbart Chief’s Alabama Humiliation

Roy Moore lost the election on Tuesday night. But some Republicans were thrilled that the defeat left a stain on his main backer.

Roy Moore wasn’t the only loser Tuesday night. He might not have even been the biggest one.

The Alabama Republican’s stunning defeat at the hands of Democrat Doug Jones dealt a crushing blow to the nascent political operation helmed by former White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, who threw every ounce of his political muscle behind Moore’s candidacy, even as many national Republicans, save President Donald Trump, rushed to distance themselves following the emergence of sexual assault and child molestation allegations against Moore.

Bannon headlined rallies for Moore, enlisted allies in a political effort to boost his candidacy, and marshalled his website, Breitbart News, to Moore’s defense against those misconduct allegations—and in an effort to discredit the former state supreme court justice’s accusers—with at least one top Breitbart staffer spending the last month of the race in-state. And when it was all said and done, with Jones claiming triumph, the Bannon critics (and there are many) took the chance to dance on his grave.

“Bannon is like so many people that get involved in politics. They work on their first race, their person wins, and they think people voted for them,” said Stu Stevens, the former top strategist to Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign. As part of his closing argument supporting Moore’s campaign, Bannon had made bashing Romney a rhetorical centerpiece.

“I think Bannon made an ass of himself [tonight],” Stevens added. “Be wary of the angry millionaire.”

Whether the Breitbart chief is actually buried will be determined in the days and weeks ahead.

Bannon is not known to be easily humbled and a source close to him simply said that he and his associates were “stunned” by the results of the evening.

They were also busy figuring out the moves ahead, including laying the blame on establishment Republicans for ditching Moore in the midst of his scandals. Though Jones’ margin exceeded 1.5% of all votes cast with all precincts reporting, Moore refused to concede the race. The margin is far above the 0.5% threshold that triggers an automatic recount in Alabama, but secretary of state John Merrill said on Tuesday evening that any candidate can request a recount as long as the candidate himself pays for it.

The overwhelming likelihood that Jones would be seated could well spark a tectonic shift within the GOP, strategists said on Tuesday. They equated it to Scott Brown’s surprise Senate victory in Massachusetts in 2010, which proved to be a political turning point in a young Barack Obama administration.

As in that moment, Tuesday night’s ramifications for the current president could prove profound.

Dispensing with the concerns of some of his advisers and family members, Trump decided to forcefully boost Moore’s candidacy in the final weeks. He specifically touted it as a means of helping move forward his governing agenda, which now finds itself more in peril.

White House officials told The Daily Beast earlier on Tuesday that the president kept tabs on the race in his residence in the White House. When he finally weighed in just after 11 PM, Trump’s response was uncharacteristically muted.

“Congratulations to Doug Jones on a hard fought victory,” the president wrote on Twitter. “The write-in votes played a very big factor, but a win is a win. The people of Alabama are great, and the Republicans will have another shot at this seat in a very short period of time. It never ends!”

One senior Trump aide stressed early Tuesday that Trump would take a Jones upset “very, very” hard—not least, the aide said, because it would rob the president of the ability to goad his predecessor, Barack Obama, over getting involved on Jones’s behalf. (Obama didn’t touch the race until its final days, when he put out a robocall on behalf of the Democratic contender).

As much as he would have been a governing ally for the president, Moore was also an avatar for a distinctively Trump-era style of politics. Bannon in particular, considered Moore a leader of his crusade against the Republican establishment in Washington, and against Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) specifically. When Moore prevailed in a primary challenge to Sen. Luther Strange in September, Bannon allies were sure to point the finger directly at McConnell, who, they said, was so disliked in the state as to make his endorsement a poison pill.
McConnell allies were sure to reciprocate the sentiment in the wake of a massive upset that brought the Republican margin in the Senate down to just a single vote.

“Steve Bannon has done more for Democrats than they could’ve ever thought possible,” said Josh Holmes, McConnell’s former chief of staff. ”Bannon displayed an absolutely breathtaking display of political incompetence that will go down in the annals of history for every Republican to mourn for generations.”

Though McConnell allies squarely blamed Bannon for the loss, it was the Senate Leadership Fund, a McConnell-allied super PAC, that helped pave the way for Moore’s primary victory. The group spent significant sums hammering Rep. Mo Brooks, a conservative House member perceived as a likely threat to Strange’s incumbency. Moore, on the other hand, was seen as an easy target for Strange in a head-to-head primary runoff. But Moore prevailed, and his faults proved deadly in a general election.

SLF stayed out of the general election contest, and other prominent arms of the Republican political machine did the same. The National Republican Senatorial Committee, which withdrew from a joint fundraising pact with Moore in the wake of his sexual misconduct allegations, quickly—if perhaps fancifully—attempted to capitalize on that stance by immediately courting Jones’s vote once it became clear he’d prevail.

“Tonight’s results are clear—the people of Alabama deemed Roy Moore unfit to serve in the U.S. Senate,” said NRSC chairman Cory Gardner in a statement. “I hope Senator-elect Doug Jones will do the right thing and truly represent Alabama by choosing to vote with the Senate Republican Majority.”

Bannon and his anti-establishment allies, several of whom traveled to Alabama for what they expected would be a Tuesday night victory party, had been feeling incredibly optimistic about Moore’s chances right up until the race’s sudden shift, around 10 p.m. ET, in Jones’s direction.

"I'm feeling pretty good about it,” Corey Stewart, former chairman of the Trump campaign in Virginia and failed gubernatorial candidate, told The Daily Beast on Tuesday afternoon. Stewart said he would leave the Yellowhammer State on Wednesday.

“People can see through this attempt by Washington elites to try to pick the next senator from Alabama, and they don't like it,” he continued. “I’m talking about Mitch McConnell, and Condi Rice, and Cory Gardner. Naturally, people resent that.”

Still, Stewart felt there was something to worry about, even as he predicted Moore’s imminent triumph that never came.

“The reason I'm here is when the establishment is done with Roy Moore, they're going to try to crush me and any other anti-establishment, pro-Trump candidates for U.S. Senate and for Congress,” he said. “So I'm here for solidarity. They're gonna try to pick us off one by one, so we gotta stick together, man.”

If the messaging emerging out of the so-called Republican establishment on Tuesday night is any indication, Stewart has a point. Insurgent and Bannon-aligned forces in Trump’s GOP now find themselves playing defense in an ongoing civil conflict.

Wednesday, December 6, 2017

FEMA Staffers Told They Might Be Billed For Working Too Much

By

(Bloomberg) - The Federal Emergency Management Agency has informed employees who’ve worked extra hours battling a record wave of natural disasters in 2017 that they may have to pay back some of their overtime.

Federal law caps some federal employees’ premium pay and permits agencies to recover money paid in excess of the maximum from future paychecks. FEMA says the extraordinary year of hurricanes, wildfires and other disasters means it may have to take that step.

“This year’s unprecedented hurricane season led to a record-setting length of national activation,” the agency said in an emailed statement. “Due to the extended work hours involved in supporting disaster recovery and response efforts for multiple storms, some employees have been affected by the annual maximum earnings limitation.”

The agency last month sent employees a Frequently Asked Questions document saying that those who hit the annual cap due to the number of extra hours they’ve worked “may still be ordered to perform work without receiving further compensation,” and would “continue to receive their regular base pay regardless of whether they exceed the annual premium pay cap or not.”

Then, it said, “A bill will be determined and established for any premium pay amounts over the annual premium pay cap and the employee will be notified and billed in 2018 for that amount."

The issue arises amid broader reckoning at FEMA. On Nov. 30, the agency’s administrator Brock Long told a House Appropriations subcommittee that staff were "tapped out" following record activation. "FEMA was never designed to be the first or only respondent in a disaster, but we often find ourselves in that situation," he said.

According to FEMA, there is a pool of about 500 employees whose compensation the agency is monitoring because they are at risk of exceeding the cap. Those employees are all exempt from the federal Fair Labor Standards Act and generally are towards the upper end of the agency’s pay scale.

Waivers Issued

One FEMA employee, who asked not to be identified because she wasn’t authorized to speak to media, said workers have voiced concerns to agency management about the issue. Billing staff or docking pay could reduce the willingness of FEMA employees or other Homeland Security staff to sign up for deployments in the future, she said.

The federal Office of Personnel Management, which handles federal workforce human resources, said the ceiling on annual compensation was out of its hands.

“The premium pay caps are statutory, and OPM does not have authority to waive or modify the premium pay caps,” the agency said in an emailed statement.

Under the law, an executive branch employee’s premium pay - which includes overtime - combined with basic pay can’t exceed the maximum rate of basic pay for certain categories of employees. An email to staff from FEMA November 2 offered the example of a category of employees based in Washington, D.C. who this year get a regular salary of $153,730; for those workers, Congress has capped the premium pay they can receive, including for working extra hours, at $7,636.40.

Along with the annual cap, there is also a ceiling on how much overtime compensation employees can receive each two-week period, but agencies have the discretion to waive that one, as the Department of Homeland Security did this year for hurricane relief - contributing to the annual cap issue.

“Employees who have exceeded the annual premium pay cap will be contacted and provided options on the overpayment process," the agency told its employees. They will be able to give back the money via payroll deduction or simply pay the full sum, according to the Nov. 3 Q&A.

The House is slated Tuesday to consider a bill that would raise the cap on overtime for Secret Service agents, a third of whom had already hit the limit as of August. The agency, in a statement, said the bill would be a "tremendous lift to employee morale."

The bill has not yet been voted on in the Senate.

Homeland Security is not powerless to address the situation for FEMA, said attorney Jacob Statman, who represents federal workers in employment disputes.

While the agency can’t waive the pay cap, a different law grants it the discretion to waive the requirement that a particular employee pay back the excessive compensation, if the employee requests the waiver and the government determines that collection "would be against equity and good conscience and not in the best interests of the United States."

Asked about that prospect, the Office of Personnel Management said in an email that "The head of each agency has authority to administer the overpayment waiver authority" under the statute.

FEMA didn’t comment on whether it might grant such waivers if employees requested them.

Agencies are generally hesitant to grant such waivers, said Richard Loeb, an attorney for the American Federation of Government Employees, in part because waiving repayments could draw scrutiny from their inspector generals.

Former OPM director Donald Devine, who led the agency under President Ronald Reagan, said Congress never should have deprived the executive branch of the authority to waive pay caps in the first place. “You need a certain amount of flexibility in terms of running the government,” Devine said. “Unfortunately, Congress gets frustrated about something, they usually try to find some blunt instrument way to do something.”

(Updates with Office of Personnel Management statement in fourth to last paragraph.)
--With assistance from Christopher Flavelle
To contact the reporter on this story: Josh Eidelson in Washington at jeidelson@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Jon Morgan at jmorgan97@bloomberg.net, Michael B. Marois

Monday, November 13, 2017

How Low Will They Go - The Roy Moore Edition


Oh, So Now Steve Harvey Is Sorry For Cozying Up To Trump?

Black celebrities from Ben Vereen to Wilt Chamberlain have identified themselves with Republicans and survived. But this is different.

The latest ratings for Steve Harvey’s show are bad. He’s lost his audience, and he blames his meeting with then President-elect Donald Trump at Trump Tower on Jan. 13 as the cause of his plummeting ratings. Back then, Harvey had nothing but glowing praise for Trump and high hopes for Trump’s presidency.

“I walked away feeling like I had just talked with a man who genuinely wants to make a difference in this area. I feel that something really great could come out of this,” said Harvey of his meeting with Trump.

Harvey basked in the glory of meeting with a man who rose to prominence as a “birther” and elevated white supremacists to the highest levels of power. For months, Harvey defended his decision to meet with Trump and only now that it could potentially ruin his career he has seen the error in his ways. Harvey’s no longer a person worth listening to.

Frankly, Harvey had already stopped being funny back in June, after he told a man from Flint, Michigan, who called into his radio show to “enjoy your nice brown glass of water.”

Harvey gets it now. “Meeting with Donald Trump was the worst mistake of my life,” he recently said on his radio show. But he has a lot of work to do to win back black support.

Ben Carson was loved by black America when he was the brain surgeon from Johns Hopkins who wrote inspirational books for black children. But all of his credibility quickly evaporated once he started criticizing President Barack Obama. His clueless political statements, stunningly moronic presidential campaign, and friendship with Trump only further solidified his exile from and ridicule within the black community. Carson seems uninterested in making amends and working to earn back the support he once had. He’s chosen a new team.

Harvey and Carson deserve their ostracism. But not everyone does. In recent years, the most dramatic and controversial shunning a black celebrity has received from the black community is also the most tragic and unjust.

When Buck Dancing Kills Your Ratings: Steve Harvey Is Now Having Coon Regrets

Thursday, November 9, 2017

Another Tuesday Night Loser: The Overrated Steve Bannon

After Ed Gillespie lost, the shaggy alt-righter and his followers immediately denounced him as ‘establishment.’ Yeah, right. And if Gillespie had won, running the same campaign...

Tuesday, October 31, 2017

3 Key Trump Campaign Officials Arrested - Donald Trump Defends Via Tweets!

In this ‘Dollemore Daily’ Jesse addresses the first round of indictments as a result of Robert Mueller's investigation of Donald Trump and his residential campaign.

Sunday, October 29, 2017

Ivanka Trump Says American Workers Are The “Best”, Still Has Her Products Made Overseas

During an interview on Fox News, Ivanka Trump claimed that both her and her father believe that American workers are the absolute “best” in the world.

If that’s the case, why do both Ivanka and Donald have the products for their clothing lines made overseas?

It has nothing to do with tax codes, as Ivanka claims, and has everything to do with paying slave wages to workers. Ring of Fire’s Farron Cousins discusses this.



https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/ivanka-trump-us-workers-best-hypocrite-president-daughter-donald-business-organisation-fashion-brand-a8016556.html

Tuesday, October 24, 2017

This Amazing Pic Of Trump And Mitch McConnell Having Russian Flags Thrown At Them Is Priceless

By Jason Easley

A picture captures the precise moment when Trump and Mitch McConnell had Russian flags thrown at them as they arrived for the Republican Senate lunch.


A picture captures the precise moment when Trump and Mitch McConnell had Russian flags thrown at them as they arrived for the Republican Senate lunch.

The picture was taken by Roll Call photographer Bill Clark.

Pictures are capable of capturing the mood of a nation better than words ever could. This is one of those moments as a smiling Mitch McConnell, and thumbs up Trump are reminded of what they did to win an election as Russian flags fly toward them.

McConnell has been one of the cover-up artists for Trump in the Russia campaign. Going back to the 2016 campaign, McConnell refused to work with President Obama and issue a joint statement condemning Russian interference in the presidential election.

McConnell also allowed Russia to attack the election by expressing skepticism about the intelligence that Russia was interfering in the US presidential election.

Mitch McConnell is still working hard to cover-up Trump's crimes.

Sometimes a picture is worth a thousand words, or in this case, one stolen presidential election.

Sunday, October 22, 2017

Andy Borowitz: The End of Trump | The New Yorker

New Yorker contributor Andy Borowitz discusses Nazis, Donald Trump and impeachment, and starting his own movement, élitism.

Wednesday, October 18, 2017

Televangelist: God Will Punish Those Who Mock Me!

Jim Bakker wants you to know that if you make fun of him God will punish you. Cenk Uygur and Ana Kasparian, the hosts of The Young Turks, break it down.

“You remember Jim Bakker? He’s the guy who hosted the televangelist program The PTL Club in the 1980's until it was revealed he paid off Jessica Hahn over rape allegations. Bakker would end up serving five years in prison for mail and wire fraud and has since gone back to his televangelist ways, hosting a show in which he pitches survivalist goods to those prepping for the end of days.

 Last week, during his program’s broadcast, Bakker took aim at those who have ridiculed him over the years by telling them that eventually, they will have to answer to God for doing so.

 Defending his past prophecies that haven’t come true yet, Bakker and his wife claimed that he had accurately predicted 9/11 while noting that “when God says something to you, you don’t always know the exact time it’s going to happen.”

He added that his critics need to stop “beating up on prophets” because the lord proclaims “woe unto you when you beat up on the prophets.” After labeling those who aren’t speaking to God as “mean people” and “anti-Christ,” he then railed at those who have made fun of him over the years.”



https://www.mediaite.com/weird/televangelist-jim-bakker-warns-critics-god-will-punish-you-for-making-fun-of-me/

Senate Intelligence Committee comes for the stupidest man in the Trump–Russia investigation

Former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn has a son who is also named Michael Flynn.

Flynn the younger is best known for his outlandish statements in support of every possible conspiracy theory, such as a Russian bribery scandal involving President Obama, a secret group behind the Las Vegas shooting, and a fresh set of accusations against Hillary Clinton.

And all that is just today.

Which makes this a fairly typical day in the life of blowhard racist golf bro, Michael Flynn—whose biggest accomplishment in life is spreading the insane “Pizzagate” story.

But the scruffier, pudgier Flynn—whose only military experience is dodging duck hooks on the golf course—was employed for a bit packing his father’s briefcase, accompanying him on overseas trips, and possibly little things like helping poppa plan to kidnap people and hand them over to foreign dictators.

Which has earned him some time with Special Counsel Robert Mueller, and has now brought him to the attention of the Senate Intelligence Committee.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2017/10/17/1707474/-Senate-Intelligence-Committee-comes-for-the-stupidest-man-in-the-Trump-Russia-investigation

Saturday, October 14, 2017

Maxine Waters Grills Ben Carson On Trump's Puerto Rico Tweets

Rep. Maxine Waters questions Housing and Urban Development Secretary, Ben Carson, on Donald Trump's tweets regarding abandoning hurricane relief efforts in Puerto Rico.

Monday, October 9, 2017

Wealthy Republican Donors Furious That They Backed Incompetent Buffoons To Run The Country

According to reports, wealthy Republican donors are growing angry over the fact that they spent millions of dollars electing a group of incompetent simpletons to run the country. But they aren’t mad that these people are pushing for disgusting policies – quite the opposite, actually.

They are angry that the morons they paid for aren’t able to pass legislation to screw over American citizens, as Ring of Fire’s Farron Cousins points out.



http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/353993-report-top-gop-donors-revolting-over-legislative-failures

More Gun Talk




Tuesday, October 3, 2017

Trump Forgets His Wife Is Next To Him: "Melania Really Wanted To Be With Us"

Trump appears at a Hurricane Irma relief event in Fort Myers, Florida and says his wife "Melania really wanted to be with us," while she was standing right next to him.


Monday, October 2, 2017

Conservative Logic: We LOVE Free Speech, But Shut The FUCK Up!

LOL Tomi Lahren forgets she was fired and sued The Blaze over for the same thing she’s now telling the NFL to do. Hosted by Hasan Piker.