The swamp

[wmw999 2,122]

I think you're leaving out the part where "picking up the gun and initiating action" becomes an acceptable reaction to believing all the bullshit. And that's where I don't know a lot of people personally who would be likely to be wacko shooters. And I know a LOT of people who own guns -- I was a skydiver in Texas for 40-some years.

There's a mental health component (whether it's just crazy, or self-righteous enough and not scared of the consequences), an there's an easy access to guns component. We know a lot more about guns than we do about mental health. However, the constitution prevents a lot of ways to control them, so we're stuck, instead, with nailing the jello of mental health to a tree and trying to make it stick.

Wendy P.

There is nothing more dangerous than breaking a basic safety rule and getting away with it. It removes fear of the consequences and builds false confidence. (tbrown)

[ryoder 1,384]

SkyDekker

***If you believe anything CNN publishes anymore you really do have a problem with fake news!

Sure CNN is the problem...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWLjYJ4BzvI

Let's talk about Sinclair.

John Oliver on Sinclair last night: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kCkuuzDOKwE

"There are only three things of value: younger women, faster airplanes, and bigger crocodiles" - Arthur Jones.

[billvon 2,400]

Today's swamp denizen - Scott Pruitt.

In 2010 Pruitt became the Attorney General of Oklahoma. He was wooed by fossil fuel lobbyists who gave him more than $200,000 during his tenure as AG. In return he became a climate change denier and repeatedly sued the EPA over things like the clean air act and the clean water act. He described himself as the "leading advocate against the EPA's activist agenda." He is, of course, a climate change denier.

So of course Trump made him head of the EPA, where he immediately started following the agenda of the fossil fuel industry. Several times he's has meetings with fossil fuel executives, then the next day repealed a law that reduced their profits. He's been sued several times over this.

Once he was comfortably in his new role he started availing himself of those sweet, sweet taxpayer benefits. He had a soundproof room built in his office for $43,000 because he didn't want to walk down the hallway to the existing soundproof room, which was installed for EPA leaders who needed to have private conversations.

But his biggest abuses - until recently - have come from his habit for luxurious travel. He managed to spent $1600 on a flight from DC to NY, a flight that Jetblue offers for $110. He spent $36,000 to get himself and three staffers from Cincinatti to NY on a military jet so he wouldn't miss his $7000 first class flight to Rome. All in all, during just the first part of June he spent $90,000 on travel for himself and the aides who traveled with him (between 0 and 3.) That number does not include the costs for his security detail, which he is refusing to release.

The EPA secretly paid $120,000 to Definers Public Affairs to do opposition research for Pruitt, a contract that was cancelled when a whistleblower discovered it. Pruitt hired a friend of his - Albert Kelly - to head the Superfund program Kelly has no experience with environmental issues whatsoever. and he has been banned from working in banking due to "unfitness to serve" after the FDIC fined him $125,000 for malfeasance. (Turns out Kelly had made a lot of sketchy loans to Pruitt.)

And his latest abuse was just recently uncovered. He is leasing a room in DC from lobbyists in industries regulated by the EPA. Such condo rooms typically run $160 to $200 a night. He got it for $50 a night - and his daughter stayed for months in another room in the same condo for free.

Fill the swamp!

[kallend 1,623]

from The Right Turn by conservative Jennifer Rubin:

Right Turn Opinion
The worst Cabinet ever gets worse
By Jennifer Rubin April 2 at 10:15 AM

www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/right-turn/wp/2018/04/02/the-worst-cabinet-ever-gets-worse/?nid&utm_term=.5ab51a3cec7d

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[billvon 2,400]

Uh oh! Republicans are starting to turn against Trump's latest swamp pick!

=======
Reps. Carlos Curbelo (R-Fla.) and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.) called for Scott Pruitt’s resignation Tuesday, becoming the first Republicans to demand the embattled Environmental Protection Agency administrator step down amid growing controversy over his spending and ties to lobbyists.
=======

This doesn't look good. Will Trump be forced to hire a new lobbyist? I mean, he's running out of family members who aren't under investigation. Will democrats force him to hire someone competent and ethical? Probably not; his ratings might go down.

[Phil1111 911]

billvon

Uh oh! Republicans are starting to turn against Trump's latest swamp pick!

=======
Reps. Carlos Curbelo (R-Fla.) and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-Fla.) called for Scott Pruitt’s resignation Tuesday, becoming the first Republicans to demand the embattled Environmental Protection Agency administrator step down amid growing controversy over his spending and ties to lobbyists.
=======

This doesn't look good. Will Trump be forced to hire a new lobbyist? I mean, he's running out of family members who aren't under investigation. Will democrats force him to hire someone competent and ethical? Probably not; his ratings might go down.

You're just being silly now. trump has all sorts of top quality people working for him that he can plug into government jobs.

"Six years after George Gjieli left federal prison, where he’d been sent for trying to break out a triple murderer, Donald Trump gave him a job running Trump Tower, where the billionaire businessman lived and worked.

For a decade the Albanian immigrant, whom federal prosecutors had described as having “utter disdain for the laws of our country,” was the live-in residential superintendent of Trump’s most prized Manhattan high-rise. Meanwhile, he was accused in court papers of coordinating a cash-for-jobs racket inside the building, an Associated Press review has found.

Trump’s decision to entrust responsibility of his namesake Fifth Avenue skyscraper to Gjieli adds to a growing public accounting of men with questionable backgrounds whom Trump has hired or partnered with. The AP and others have reported they include a Mafia-linked government informant whom Trump named as a senior adviser and a convicted cocaine dealer whom Trump supported in a letter to a federal judge."
https://apnews.com/84436a9fcb104bfd96c40fe9e2045cae

[jakee 1,255]

Quote

a convicted cocaine dealer whom Trump supported in a letter to a federal judge.

Sure, because the death penalty would be for those other, horrible drug dealers. The drug dealers that Trump knows are, I assume, good people.

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[DanG 1]

Good people? Excuse me, but they are the BEST people.

- Dan G

[Phil1111 911]

DanG

Good people? Excuse me, but they are the BEST people.

The BEST people get suspended, demoted and transferred. If they are so naive to imagine the trump swamp will be drained.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/381870-multiple-epa-officials-demoted-after-questioning-pruitt-spending

[billvon 2,400]

What? They got transferred and demoted? Well, I am sure that the remaining/replacement people will be just as diligent in rooting out any abuses by Pruitt. Let's read on . . .

=========
EPA on Friday evening released a memo from Kevin Minoli, a career official who serves as EPA’s top ethics expert, clearing Pruitt's lease of any ethical concerns.

Minoli wrote that the lease was a "reasonable market value," and said it authorized Pruitt's immediate family to stay there was well, which they did on unspecified occasions.
(Politico)
=========

So . . . . yeah . . . .

[Phil1111 911]

billvon

What? They got transferred and demoted? Well, I am sure that the remaining/replacement people will be just as diligent in rooting out any abuses by Pruitt. Let's read on . . .

=========
EPA on Friday evening released a memo from Kevin Minoli, a career official who serves as EPA’s top ethics expert, clearing Pruitt's lease of any ethical concerns.

Minoli wrote that the lease was a "reasonable market value," and said it authorized Pruitt's immediate family to stay there was well, which they did on unspecified occasions.
(Politico)
=========

So . . . . yeah . . . .

Not only was he renting it for $50 a day, he was late making the payments. Perhaps thinking that the owners would tell him to just forget it. trump appointees, a new definition of entitlement every day.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/381893-pruitt-late-on-some-payments-for-condo-rental-from-lobbyists-wife

[ryoder 1,384]

It looks like Trump is grooming the only member of the family with a legal education, to join the swamp:
https://www.yahoo.com/news/president-trump-working-repair-apos-191401727.html

"There are only three things of value: younger women, faster airplanes, and bigger crocodiles" - Arthur Jones.

[jakee 1,255]

Phil1111

***What? They got transferred and demoted? Well, I am sure that the remaining/replacement people will be just as diligent in rooting out any abuses by Pruitt. Let's read on . . .

=========
EPA on Friday evening released a memo from Kevin Minoli, a career official who serves as EPA’s top ethics expert, clearing Pruitt's lease of any ethical concerns.

Minoli wrote that the lease was a "reasonable market value," and said it authorized Pruitt's immediate family to stay there was well, which they did on unspecified occasions.
(Politico)
=========

So . . . . yeah . . . .

Not only was he renting it for $50 a day, he was late making the payments. Perhaps thinking that the owners would tell him to just forget it. trump appointees, a new definition of entitlement every day.
http://thehill.com/policy/energy-environment/381893-pruitt-late-on-some-payments-for-condo-rental-from-lobbyists-wife

It’s quite an easy cliche to say that such and such is “in bed with Lobbyists” but how often are they literally sleeping full time in a lobbyist’s bed?

Do you want to have an ideagasm?

[DJL 232]

ryoder

It looks like Trump is grooming the only member of the family with a legal education, to join the swamp:
https://www.yahoo.com/news/president-trump-working-repair-apos-191401727.html

"President Trump and his daughter, Tiffany, are reportedly trying to repair what is being described as a “damaged relationship.” "

Damaged, as in everyone in America knows that he told her mother to get an abortion. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5290905/Trump-asked-Marla-Maples-abort-Tiffany.html

"I encourage all awesome dangerous behavior." - Jeffro Fincher

[billvon 2,400]

Looking worse and worse for Pruitt. Latest swamp update:

==========
Scott Pruitt, Trump’s embattled EPA chief, involved in shady 2011 real estate deal

As Oklahoma attorney general, Pruitt made $70,000 flipping a Tulsa property under questionable circumstances

ARN PEARSON
SALON
04.05.2018

Scott Pruitt, President Trump’s embattled EPA administrator, finds himself under attack this week after news broke that he had rented a Washington townhouse at below-market rates from the wife of a lobbyist who represents major fossil fuel companies. That was not the first time Pruitt has exercised questionable judgment around a property transaction, according to documents obtained by the Center for Media and Democracy, a nonprofit watchdog group.

In 2011, Pruitt and his wife, Margaret, bought a property in Tulsa, Oklahoma, just days before a court ruled that it had been fraudulently transferred by a Las Vegas developer who was on the hook for a $3.6 million loan default. Pruitt, who was then Oklahoma attorney general, apparently flipped the property for a $70,000 profit four months later, selling it to a dummy corporation set up by a major campaign contributor, Kevin Hern.

Hern, a successful Tulsa businessman and the finance chair of the Oklahoma Republican Party, has been a major donor to Pruitt and other Republican candidates in the state over the years. According to records on file with the Oklahoma Ethics Commission, Hern contributed $3,500 to Pruitt between 2010 and 2014, and has given a total of $33,625 to Oklahoma candidates since 2006.
=============

To the eyes of Republicans, of course, his only crime was getting caught.

[Phil1111 911]

billvon

Looking worse and worse for Pruitt. Latest swamp update:

==========
Scott Pruitt, Trump’s embattled EPA chief, involved in shady 2011 real estate deal

As Oklahoma attorney general, Pruitt made $70,000 flipping a Tulsa property under questionable circumstances

ARN PEARSON
SALON
04.05.2018

Scott Pruitt, President Trump’s embattled EPA administrator, finds himself under attack this week after news broke that he had rented a Washington townhouse at below-market rates from the wife of a lobbyist who represents major fossil fuel companies. That was not the first time Pruitt has exercised questionable judgment around a property transaction, according to documents obtained by the Center for Media and Democracy, a nonprofit watchdog group.

In 2011, Pruitt and his wife, Margaret, bought a property in Tulsa, Oklahoma, just days before a court ruled that it had been fraudulently transferred by a Las Vegas developer who was on the hook for a $3.6 million loan default. Pruitt, who was then Oklahoma attorney general, apparently flipped the property for a $70,000 profit four months later, selling it to a dummy corporation set up by a major campaign contributor, Kevin Hern.

Hern, a successful Tulsa businessman and the finance chair of the Oklahoma Republican Party, has been a major donor to Pruitt and other Republican candidates in the state over the years. According to records on file with the Oklahoma Ethics Commission, Hern contributed $3,500 to Pruitt between 2010 and 2014, and has given a total of $33,625 to Oklahoma candidates since 2006.
=============

To the eyes of Republicans, of course, his only crime was getting caught.

Its no wonder that evangelicals wrap their arms around him.

Trump Claimed EPA Chief Scott Pruitt Spent More On Security Because Of Death Threats. But He May Not Have Received Any
http://www.newsweek.com/trump-claimed-epa-chief-scott-pruitt-spent-more-security-because-death-threats-877248

We have a new frontrunner for America's Next Top Swampmonster
https://www.esquire.com/news-politics/a19717300/scott-pruitt-death-threats-epa/

At Fox News
EPA says 'unprecedented' number of death threats against Pruitt
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2018/04/07/epa-says-unprecedented-number-death-threats-against-pruitt.html

[billvon 2,400]

And now it looks like he went around the White House to give $$ to his buddies.

==========================
Scott Pruitt Bypassed the White House to Give Big Raises to Favorite Aides

The embattled EPA chief used an obscure provision last month to increase the salaries of a pair of staffers by tens of thousands of dollars.

ELAINA PLOTT AND ROBINSON MEYER APR 3, 2018
The Atlantic

Updated on April 3 at 2:23 p.m. ET

In early March, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt approached the White House with a request: He wanted substantial pay raises for two of his closest aides. . . . The White House, the source said, declined to approve the raises.

So Pruitt found another way.

A provision of the Safe Drinking Water Act allows the EPA administrator to hire up to 30 people into the agency, without White House or congressional approval. The provision, meant to help expedite the hiring of experts and allow for more flexible staffing, became law in 1996. In past administrations, it has been used to hire specialists into custom-made roles in especially stressed offices, according to Bob Perciasepe, a former acting EPA administrator.

After the White House rejected their request, Pruitt’s team studied the particulars of the Safe Drinking Water provision, according to the source with direct knowledge of these events. By reappointing Greenwalt and Hupp under this authority, they learned, Pruitt could exercise total control over their contracts and grant the raises on his own.

Pruitt ordered it done. Though Hupp and Greenwalt’s duties did not change, the agency began processing them for raises of $28,130 and $56,765, respectively, compared with their 2017 salaries. Less than two weeks after Pruitt had approached the White House, according to time-stamped Human Resources documents shared with The Atlantic, the paperwork was finished.
=======================

But this is all legal, right? Nothing to see here, right? From an interview with FOX News:

========================
HENRY: Why did you go around the president and the White House to give pay raises to two staffers –

PRUITT: I did not. My staff did, and I found out about that yesterday and I changed it . . .

HENRY: Who did it?

PRUITT: There . . . there will be some accountability.

HENRY: Career person or political person?

PRUITT: I have to . . . I don’t know. I don’t know.
=====================

Looks like Pruitt is sweating. The last thing Trump wants is the appearance that he's a powerless tyrant in a rudderless, impotent White House, and firing people is what he does best.

[Phil1111 911]

billvon

And now it looks like he went around the White House to give $$ to his buddies.

==========================
Scott Pruitt Bypassed the White House to Give Big Raises to Favorite Aides

The embattled EPA chief used an obscure provision last month to increase the salaries of a pair of staffers by tens of thousands of dollars.

ELAINA PLOTT AND ROBINSON MEYER APR 3, 2018
The Atlantic

Updated on April 3 at 2:23 p.m. ET

In early March, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt approached the White House with a request: He wanted substantial pay raises for two of his closest aides. . . . The White House, the source said, declined to approve the raises.

So Pruitt found another way.

A provision of the Safe Drinking Water Act allows the EPA administrator to hire up to 30 people into the agency, without White House or congressional approval. The provision, meant to help expedite the hiring of experts and allow for more flexible staffing, became law in 1996. In past administrations, it has been used to hire specialists into custom-made roles in especially stressed offices, according to Bob Perciasepe, a former acting EPA administrator.

After the White House rejected their request, Pruitt’s team studied the particulars of the Safe Drinking Water provision, according to the source with direct knowledge of these events. By reappointing Greenwalt and Hupp under this authority, they learned, Pruitt could exercise total control over their contracts and grant the raises on his own.

Pruitt ordered it done. Though Hupp and Greenwalt’s duties did not change, the agency began processing them for raises of $28,130 and $56,765, respectively, compared with their 2017 salaries. Less than two weeks after Pruitt had approached the White House, according to time-stamped Human Resources documents shared with The Atlantic, the paperwork was finished.
=======================

But this is all legal, right? Nothing to see here, right? From an interview with FOX News:

========================
HENRY: Why did you go around the president and the White House to give pay raises to two staffers –

PRUITT: I did not. My staff did, and I found out about that yesterday and I changed it . . .

HENRY: Who did it?

PRUITT: There . . . there will be some accountability.

HENRY: Career person or political person?

PRUITT: I have to . . . I don’t know. I don’t know.
=====================

Looks like Pruitt is sweating. The last thing Trump wants is the appearance that he's a powerless tyrant in a rudderless, impotent White House, and firing people is what he does best.

Something dosn't ring true about this story. Fox is going to have to put Sean Hannity on the case. I find it hard to believe that a Fox broadcast employee would ask tough questions of an administration appointee.

[kallend 1,623]

"Glad our arrogant Pres. is enjoying his taxpayer funded golf outing after announcing the US should take military action against Syria" - Sean Hannity.


(So it was 9/3/2013 but WTF)

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[kallend 1,623]

By Richard Cohen April 9 at 8:04 PM
It came over the city during the night, hovering eerily over the Capitol. Some people saw a spooky cloud, while others saw a haze of sorts, appropriately tinged yellow. But as it moved over the Capitol dome, everyone heard the same thing — a terrifying crunching sound. One by one, congressional leaders were having their spines removed.

The first person to be filleted in this matter was Paul D. Ryan (R-Wis.), the speaker of the House. He was averse to Donald Trump, but he subordinated the larger agenda of opposing an anti-democratic president to a smaller agenda of tax cuts and regulatory reform. Ryan would make a splendid president of any chamber of commerce.

The other leaders have been similarly de-spined. They chortle among themselves as Trump says in the morning that he will veto this bill or that bill, and in the afternoon signs it. They say nothing about the rhetorical mugging of Mexico or his long-held and mysterious adulation of Russian President Vladimir Putin. They stay silent while being soaked in a rain of lies, dignity running off them and splashing into the Washington gutter.

...

The only sure way to survive a canopy collision is not to have one.

[ryoder 1,384]

Trump’s Chief Adviser on Homeland Security Resigns
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/10/us/politics/tom-bossert-trump-homeland-security.html

"There are only three things of value: younger women, faster airplanes, and bigger crocodiles" - Arthur Jones.

[billvon 2,400]

Swampiest swamp denizen Pruitt has a 20-man security detail to protect him against death threats. And an entire floor of the building cleared to protect him. And a bulletproof car. And a bulletproof desk. And that's why he just has to fly first class, to protect him from a sniper in coach presumably.

Except he never received any death threats. Someone filed a freedom-of-information request for the reports on the threats, only to receive a reply 'there are no such reports.'

Reporters have asked around to see if anyone can identify any actual threats. Several letters were produced with obscene language, one of which contained the phrases “You ignorant fuck,” and “You are evil incarnite" - but again no credible threats. Oh, and there were hecklers at a speech he gave.

So the EPA launched an internal investigation to find out if the threats were real. They weren't.

So of course they fired the guy who approved the report.
===================================
EPA removes staffer who OK’d report on Pruitt’s security

By EMILY HOLDEN 04/10/2018 12:45 PM EDT
Politico

EPA removed a career staffer Tuesday who approved an internal report that undermined Administrator Scott Pruitt's claims that he needed around-the-clock bodyguards and other expensive security protection, according to two former agency employees familiar with the situation.

Mario Caraballo was the deputy associate administrator of EPA's Office of Homeland Security, which in February concluded that an earlier assessment failed to identify credible direct threats against the administrator that would justify his heavy security spending.
====================================

Drain the swamp!

[Phil1111 911]

billvon

Swampiest swamp denizen Pruitt has a 20-man security detail to protect him against death threats. And an entire floor of the building cleared to protect him. And a bulletproof car. And a bulletproof desk. And that's why he just has to fly first class, to protect him from a sniper in coach presumably.

Except he never received any death threats. Someone filed a freedom-of-information request for the reports on the threats, only to receive a reply 'there are no such reports.'

Reporters have asked around to see if anyone can identify any actual threats. Several letters were produced with obscene language, one of which contained the phrases “You ignorant fuck,” and “You are evil incarnite" - but again no credible threats. Oh, and there were hecklers at a speech he gave.

So the EPA launched an internal investigation to find out if the threats were real. They weren't.

So of course they fired the guy who approved the report.
===================================
EPA removes staffer who OK’d report on Pruitt’s security

By EMILY HOLDEN 04/10/2018 12:45 PM EDT
Politico

EPA removed a career staffer Tuesday who approved an internal report that undermined Administrator Scott Pruitt's claims that he needed around-the-clock bodyguards and other expensive security protection, according to two former agency employees familiar with the situation.

Mario Caraballo was the deputy associate administrator of EPA's Office of Homeland Security, which in February concluded that an earlier assessment failed to identify credible direct threats against the administrator that would justify his heavy security spending.
====================================

Drain the swamp!

This may just be a Conservative v Liberal psychology at play.

Why conservatives are more likely than liberals to believe false information about threats

"After an electoral season that blurred the line between fact and fantasy, a team of UCLA researchers is offering new evidence to support a controversial proposition: that when it comes to telling the difference between truth and fiction, not all potential voters see it the same way.

When "alternative facts" allege some kind of danger, people whose political beliefs are more conservative are more likely than those who lean liberal to embrace them, says the team's soon-to-be-published study.

Conservatives' vulnerability to accepting untruths didn't apply equally to all false claims: When lies suggested dangerous or apocalyptic outcomes, more conservative participants were more likely to believe them than when the lie suggested a possible benefit."...

Slated for publication in the journal Psychological Science, the new study offers insight into why many Americans embraced fabricated stories about Hillary Clinton that often made outlandish allegations of criminal behavior. And it may shed light on why so many believed a candidate's assertions that were both grim and demonstrably false.

Finally, the results offer an explanation for why these false claims were more readily embraced by people who endorse conservative political causes than by those whose views are traditionally liberal.

"There are a lot of citizens who are especially vigilant about potential threats but not especially motivated or prepared to process information in a critical, systematic manner," said John Jost, co-director of New York University's Center for Social and Political Behavior. For years, Jost said, those Americans "have been presented with terrifying messages that are short on reason and openly contemptuous of scholarly and scientific standards of evidence." i.e. Rushmc!!!

http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-conservative-believe-false-threats-20170202-story.html

But for Pruitt...me... thinks he has demigod dictator syndrome. Hence the motorcade with front and back entourage cars and flashing lights. I think they have to check bathroom stalls in advance in case hidden snipers, lie in wait.

[billvon 2,400]

>But for Pruitt...me... thinks he has demigod dictator syndrome. Hence the motorcade
>with front and back entourage cars and flashing lights. I think they have to check
>bathroom stalls in advance in case hidden snipers, lie in wait.

Right after he started as head of the EPA he got in his motorcade to get to an appointment somewhere else. He was late, so he told the driver to use his lights and siren to get through traffic. "Those are really only for emergencies," the driver told him.

The driver was immediately reassigned to a miserable job.

[Phil1111 911]

Meanwhile the rest of the world looks at the USA. Wondering if the end of Rome is near.
Former FBI chief James Comey compares Donald Trump to a 'mob boss'
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2018/04/11/former-fbi-chief-james-comey-compares-donald-trump-mob-boss/