In this episode of "The Conversation", Jesse Dollemore discusses Joel Osteen and
his bizarre Americanized version of Jesus' Gospel message.
His inaction
in the face of the suffering caused by Hurricane Harvey was bad, but are
there more reasons his actions should be questioned and scrutinized?
As the slow disaster of Harvey continues to roll over southeast Texas
and into Louisiana, bringing record-shattering rainfall over the region,
the Republican Congress is pondering $1 billion in cuts to federal disaster response programs to fulfill Donald Trump's demands for a border wall.
The pending reduction to the Federal Emergency Management
Agency’s disaster relief account is part of a spending bill that the
House is scheduled to consider next week when Congress returns from its
August recess. The $876 million cut, part of the 1,305 page measure’s
homeland security section, pays for roughly half the cost of Trump’s
down payment on a U.S.-Mexico border wall.
It seems sure that GOP leaders will move to reverse the disaster aid
cut next week. The optics are politically bad and there’s only $2.3
billion remaining in disaster coffers.
The proposal, drawn up by the Office of Management and
Budget (OMB), also would slash the budget of the Federal Emergency
Management Agency, which provides disaster relief after hurricanes,
tornadoes and other natural disasters. The Coast Guard’s $9.1 billion
budget in 2017 would be cut 14 percent to about $7.8 billion, while the
TSA and FEMA budgets would be reduced about 11 percent each to $4.5
billion and $3.6 billion, respectively.
In this ‘Dollemore Daily’ Jesse Dollemore addresses the reporting from journalists
with Donald Trump which refutes his claims of witnessing the 'horror'
and 'devastation' caused by Hurricane Harvey in Houston, Texas.
Donald Trump finally made his way to Texas on Tuesday, but instead of
touring the areas that are being ravaged by floods, he stayed completely
dry, didn’t meet with a single victim, and bragged about the size of
the crowd that showed up to hear him speak.
This man is not a leader,
and his callous response to Hurricane Harvey is just another reason why
he shouldn’t be resident. Ring of Fire’s Farron Cousins discusses this.
Mike Pence is on a media blitz to insist the Trump administration will
fund Hurricane Harvey relief. But fully funded disaster relief wasn't
something he supported when he was in Congress.
Mike Pence is on a self-serving blitz of
radio appearances this week, touting the Trump administration’s response
to Hurricane Harvey. That includes promises to have federal funds ready
to go for relief — something he cruelly opposed when he was in
Congress.
Pence had the nerve, during his several radio interviews Monday, to
repeatedly refer to his time in Congress as proof he understands the
importance of passing legislation to provide for disaster relief.
“We’re very confident that the Congress of the United States is going
to be there to provide the resources necessary,” Pence told the host at
Houston’s KHOU. He added that he will work with legislators to “make
sure that the disaster assistance that already some 22,000 Texans have
signed up for is available and is there.”
But when thousands of citizens affected by Hurricane Katrina in 2005
needed Pence’s help, he had other priorities. He was instead focused on
bludgeoning those citizens by attaching his extremist political ideology
to disaster relief bills, holding up vital support that was urgently
needed.
Pence said that funding for Katrina relief should be paid for with
cuts to Social Security and Medicare, ideas that the right has
championed for decades, even though they have proved to be unpopular and destructive again and again.
Justifying his cruelty, Pence told
reporters at the time that Katrina relief and the rebuilding of
devastated areas like New Orleans just had to wait, because “it is not
acceptable to take a catastrophe of nature and turn it into a
catastrophe of debt.”
He also said
on the floor of the House, “When a tree falls on your house you tend to
the wounded, you rebuild and then you figure out how you are going to
pay for it.”
Ignoring the dire situation in the region, Pence lectured victims and offered up right-wing talking points.
“Let’s pay for the cost of Katrina by reducing the size and scope of government,” he said.
Pence even said that legislators should have considered delaying a
$40 billion prescription drug benefit for seniors, and use that money
for Katrina relief — instead of approving new funding in Congress.
Those statements, in contrast to his platitudes during Hurricane
Harvey, show how Pence and his fellow Republicans have often instigated
mealy-mouthed concerns about “debt” when they are out of power, only to
disregard them when they are in charge.
Pence is not alone in his hypocrisy. Other Republicans have argued
that disaster relief must be “offset” by cuts to necessary programs.
It’s a despicable way to exploit a national disaster to target programs
Republicans have long sought to dismantle.
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) is pushing for hurricane relief now, but when Superstorm Sandy hit New York and New Jersey, he voted against
the emergency aid package to help the victims. He complained at the
time that the bill had been loaded up “with billions in new spending”
unrelated to the storm. Like Pence, he also invoked worries about “debt”
to justify his stance.
The claim was also untrue. Cruz recently made the same claim while
defending his Sandy spin, and it was fact checked by the Washington
Post, which awarded him “three Pinocchios” for his ugly lie.
“The bill was largely aimed at dealing with Sandy, along with
relatively minor items to address other or future disasters,” the Post
noted.
Mick Mulvaney, currently serving as Trump’s budget director, was in Congress during Sandy as well, and he was among those who also called for budget cuts to offset storm relief.
It is unlikely he will do so now from inside the White House.
Pence, Cruz, and Mulvaney have been exposed as hypocrites. When they
were out of power, they didn’t think twice about holding up disaster
relief so they could engage in political experimentation for the right.
But now, when the storm is on their watch, all the hand-wringing
about “debt” has evaporated into thin air. As if it was always a cynical
and callous ruse all along.
A
quarter of the members of the National Infrastructure Advisory Council,
whose purview includes national cybersecurity, have resigned. In a
group resignation letter, they cited both specific shortfalls in the
administration’s approach to cybersecurity, and broader concerns that
Trump and his administration have undermined the “moral infrastructure”
of the U.S.
The resignations came Monday and were acknowledged by the White House on Tuesday. Nextgov has recently published the resignation letter that the departing councilors submitted. According to Roll Call, seven members resigned from the 27 member Council.
Several of those resigning were Obama-era appointees, including former U.S. Chief Data Scientist DJ Patil and former Office of Science and Technology Policy Chief of Staff Cristin Dorgelo.
Not surprisingly, then, the issues outlined in the resignation letter
were broad, faulting both Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris
climate accords and his inflammatory statements after the
Charlottesville attacks, some of which came during what was intended to
be an infrastructure-focused event.
“The
moral infrastructure of our Nation is the foundation on which our
physical infrastructure is built,” reads the letter in part. “The
Administration’s actions undermine that foundation.”
But
the resigning advisors also said the Administration was not “adequately
attentive to the pressing national security matters within the NIAC’s
purview, or responsive to sound advice received from experts and
advisors.” The letter also zeroed in on “insufficient attention to the
growing threats to the cybersecurity of the critical systems upon which
all Americans depend,” including election systems.
While he has ordered better security for government networks, Trump has shown little understanding
or seriousness when it comes to the broader issues surrounding, in his
words, “the cyber.” Most notably, he has refused to accept the U.S.
intelligence community’s conclusion that Russia engineered a hacking and
propaganda campaign meant to subvert the 2016 presidential election,
and even floated the idea of forming a cyber-security task force with Russia. The administration also missed a self-imposed deadline for presenting a comprehensive cyber-security plan.
In a report issued just after the mass resignations, the NIAC issued a report saying that dramatic steps were required to prevent a possible "9/11-level cyberattack."
$43 pack of bottled water being sold at a Houston Best Buy (Photo via Ken Klippenstein).
Electronics retailer Best Buy is
apologizing to outraged consumers after a social media storm of
complaints against a Houston area store charging $42 for a case of case
of bottled water.
The image, which raced across the internet, shows $42.96 cases of
Dasani bottled water, next to a “limited supply” of “Smart Water” for
$29.98 a case.
“As a company we are focused on helping, not hurting affected people,” Best Buy told Business Insider. “We’re sorry, and it won’t happen again.”
The company claims the “big mistake” was caused by an employee
multiplying the price of a single bottle. The company says the
price-gouging signage was only up on Friday and that the Cypress, TX
store in question is now closed due to Hurricane Harvey.
One Houston resident sent me a pic of water he
saw being sold for *$42* at a nearby Best Buy. They were kind enough to
offer $29 bottles too pic.twitter.com/8dKz3sJJM1
In this ‘Dollemore Daily’ Jesse Dollemore addresses the just revealed plans for a
Trump Tower in Moscow, Russia which were previously concealed by Donald
Trump.
Add to the mix, Felix Sater, who has deep mafia ties and
connections to heavy hitters in the Russian government.
When Hurricane Sandy caused
widespread damage in New York and New Jersey in 2012, the Senate
Republican absolutely nobody likes, Sen. Ted Cruz, was one of the
loudest voices opposing federal disaster aid for the region.
Now that he
is asking for disaster relief for his own state in very similar
circumstances, he is naturally being asked about the apparent
contradiction.
(Yeah, yeah, I'll be getting to Arpaio and Russia and whatever other
clusterfucks of doom happen, but first, let's deal with the big damn
Harvey in the room.)
We know that Donald Trump is a man whose ego must be
constantly stroked, like the head of a grumpy baby who won't go to
sleep. Any chance any of his administration has to praise him, praise
him they must or they will face the jowly gaze of disapproval and
probably some kind of stupid-ass threat at a public gathering. They
gotta blow this fuckin' guy so often that they get assigned
government-issue knee pads.
So it was that during Hurricane (now Tropical Storm) Harvey, which is
wrecking the fuck out of the lives of millions of Americans, Trump not
only stayed for the weekend at Camp David, but he teleconferenced into
situation room meetings. That gave us photos of an old man in an ill-fitting suit and stupid, over-sized
"USA" hat, alone at a table, talking over speakers to those who were
genuinely engaged beyond watching footage on TV and tweeting, "Wow,
that's a whole bunch of rain!" or whatever the fuck Trump said.
Today. Trump's most voracious chowder-guzzler, Vice President Mike
Pence, made the rounds of talk radio to show just how enthusiastically
he gargles on Trump's nutsack. Seriously, the amount that Pence praised
Trump for his actions during the hurricane makes it sound like the
president was personally out in his yacht, rescuing people. Instead,
what really is occurring is that Barack Obama's FEMA was, so far, doing a
pretty good job for Texas.
But here's Pence, on a Houston news station,
just licking his lips in anticipation of Trump dick. "Trump
made his decision on Friday night, before landfall, to issue an
emergency declaration with regard to Texas" and later, Louisiana, Pence
said. "Trump and our entire administration have been working
closely with Governor Abbott...Trump assembled the Cabinet
twice... I can tell you that from Friday night forward, Trump
has been continuously engaged in this."
Then, on another station,
Pence fellated on about "the swift response by Trump" and
"Trump’s direction" in the crisis. "I couldn’t be more proud
of Trump’s leadership," Pence asserted, obviously.
We get it. You wanna make sure the spin is that Trump's not fucking it
up like Bush during Katrina. But a real leader would tell his people to
knock that praise shit off, that it's not necessary, and that, frankly,
the effort to save southeast Texas and, likely, parts of Louisiana is
just beginning, and there's still plenty of time to fuck it up. The
nauseating amount of appreciation that his staff and cabinet heap on
Trump is tough to take in non-catastrophic times. Now, it just comes
across as needy and selfish on the part of Trump, putting himself at the
center of the story when, at best, he's a tangential element, someone
who would serve everyone best by staying the fuck out of everyone's way
while grown-ups are working here.
Put him in a corner. Give him the remote. Put a big boy hat on him. And ignore him.
Editorial: Donald Trump said he was going to pardon
former Sheriff Joe Arpaio. But knowing in advance didn't soften the blow
to Latinos - and equal justice.
While America was talking about tearing
down monuments that offend historically oppressed people, Donald Trump
effectively erected yet another one.
His pardon of Joe Arpaio
elevated the disgraced former Maricopa County sheriff to monument
status among the immigration hardliners and nationalists in Trump’s
base.
This erases any doubt about whether Trump meant to empower them after the violence in Charlottesville.
Arpaio is their darling. Arpaio is now back on his pedestal thanks to their resident.
Expecting the pardon doesn't make it better
This insult wasn’t a surprise. Trump told us it was coming during his rally-the-base speech in Phoenix Tuesday.
But that doesn’t lessen the sting or diminish the significance of Trump’s decision to put Arpaio back on the national stage.
Maricopa County had a bellyful of this showboat sheriff and voted him out of office last year.
A
federal court found Arpaio in criminal contempt for ignoring a judge's
order in a long-running case over racial profiling of Latino motorists.
It
was a dose of hard-won justice for a too-flamboyant sheriff who showed
little respect for the Constitution as he made national news as an
immigration hardliner – and let real crimes go uninvestigated.
Donald Trump’s pardon elevates Arpaio once again to the pantheon of those who see institutional racism as something that made America great.
It's a slap for Latinos - and everyone else
Many will characterize it as a slap to the Latino community – and it is.
The
vast majority of Latinos in Arizona are not undocumented, yet they all
fell under heightened scrutiny as Arpaio honed his image.
The
pardon was a slap to those who worked through the judicial system to
make Arpaio accountable, too. It robbed the people hurt by his policies
of justice – even before a judge could mete out a sentence.
The pardon was a sign of pure contempt for every American who believes in justice, human dignity and the rule of law.
This isn't about one group of people. It’s about all Americans.
Arpaio
was a lawman who scorned his duty to treat all people equally. He made
it law enforcement policy to profile people based on their heritage.
It played well in Arizona, then it turned hollow.
Arpaio
was riding high in 2010 when then-Gov. Jan Brewer signed Senate Bill
1070, a draconian law written to intimidate people. Then Arizona came to
its senses. It recognized the dangers of scapegoating – or at least the
economic risks of alienating a growing demographic group.
Institutional racism is clearly Trump's goal
Then
came Trump. He resurrected Arpaio’s rhetoric and made a hit on the
national stage. He used Arpaio as a warm-up act during campaign rallies
and modeled his own speeches on Arpaio’s rambling populist routine.
Many hoped the country would tire of this toxic folly – just as Arizona had.
After
Trump was elected, many hoped he would abandon his habit of appealing
to the worst instincts of disaffected white Americans who have been left
behind by economic changes that had little to do with undocumented
immigration.
A former elections worker in North Carolina was indicted by a grand
jury on Monday for purposefully changing ballot results during the March
2016 primary election.
Richard Robert Rawling, 59, of Cary, was charged with felony counts
of failing his duties and obstruction of justice after allegedly skewing
the vote tallies to help elect Donald Trump and other conservative
candidates.
Rawling allegedly ordered subordinates to run provisional ballots
through tabulators more than the correct number of times, and then made
manual changes so that the results of the provisional canvass would
match the tally of total ballots.
Elections board officials found the smoking gun during an audit of primary results in April.
According to the State Board of Elections and Ethics Enforcement,
Rawling’s actions were a desperate attempt to hide his tampering with
results. Rawling resigned less than a month after the primary results
were tallied.
“The State Board’s top priority is ensuring the integrity of
elections so voters have confidence in the process,” the North Carolina
State Board of Elections and Ethics Enforcement said in its remarks to
the media.
An arm of the White House’s anti-drug office has asked Massachusetts and
several other states where medical marijuana is legal to turn over
information about registered patients, triggering a debate over privacy
rights and whether state officials should cooperate with a federal
administration that appears hostile to the drug.
Donald Trump wants to build a wall, Donald Trump is threatening to not
raise the debt ceiling. Both of these things are a disaster. Jeff
Waldorf breaks it down.