#also Haley is great and would 100 percent go for it

[invaderzia1]

I’m curious 🤔🤔

Who was your first husband/wife?

Who is your favorite husband?

Who is your favorite wife?

What spouse did you marry and regret later?

Who was an unexpected favorite spouse?

Who is your favorite non-marriage character?

Who is your least favorite non-marriage character?

Favorite monster to encounter?

Favorite animal to have on the farm (chickens, cow, pigs, etc.)?

Favorite crop to grow?

Least favorite crop to grow?

Reblog and put in the tags or comments what your answers are

[silicabeast34-blog]

Four Loko, Joose, and Sparks: An Abridged History of Caffeinated Alcohol

Remembrances of Four Loko — the super-caffeinated, alcoholic energy drink available in every convenience store for a narrow window of time before intervention by the Food and Drug Administration at the end of the aughts — are their own genre of internet content.

It is, if there is such a thing, the internet’s beverage, even years after the demise of its original formula. “If you can remember your Four Loko experiences, it wasn’t a Four Loko experience,” comedian Kady Ruth recently tweeted, in response to a question from comedian Akilah Hughes asking for stories about the drink’s golden age. “Why tell, when you can show a photo series?” dancer and YouTuber Ava Gordy replied, attaching an image of herself surrounded by Four Loko cans and wearing a gas mask. Photos from Four Loko’s golden days are scattered around on Tumblr and Imgur, captured with the high-flash, red-eyed weirdness of disposable cameras and early iPhones.

In an oral history of Four Loko, published on Grub Street last summer, the team of Ohio State buddies who created it explained how the product went from a small production run in 2005 to a splashy New York City debut in 2009 to more than $100 million in revenue in 2010. In short: They made the cans tall and they gave them a neon camouflage print to make them stand out. Plus, they raised the alcohol level as high as they legally could for a malt beverage.

2010 sounds like such a long time ago that I was honestly surprised when one of the Gawker pieces about the moment mentioned the fact that Obama was president. I wasn’t old enough to drink or permitted to have more than one other person in my car at the time, but even I feel a bubbly sort of weakness in my chest reading a blog post about the founder of Ron Jon Surf Shops getting arrested for driving under the influence of Four Loko or a blog post about Chuck Schumer comparing Four Loko to “a plague” devastating the country.

Four Loko was beloved, and it is beloved in death. But why? What’s so great about caffeinated sugar-water full of booze, in a can, retailing for $2.50, other than the obvious? The drink is infamous, and maybe an important cultural moment, but it’s not unique. There were also micro-eras for the nearly identical drinks Sparks and Joose, and the vodka Red Bull got almost two decades. In fact, there’s a long history of people trying to showily ruin their nights or their lives with disgusting combinations of chemicals dreamed up for some business purpose that doesn’t especially concern them. Caffeine and alcohol shouldn’t mix, but they have always mixed.

“People are always looking for a way to get high,” William Rorabaug, a historian at the University of Washington, tells me. “Throughout history. It seems to be part of the human condition.”

The last super-boozy generation was the baby boomers, he explains, but their children got into a health kick — yoga, meditation, bicycles, running — mostly because they saw a lot of bad stuff happen to their parents and older siblings as a result of alcohol, and because they preferred marijuana. Mothers Against Drunk Driving got big in the 1980s, and heavy alcohol consumption dipped throughout the 1990s. It didn’t rise again until about 2003, he says, when “very sweet mixed drinks” that went down easy and would mess you up with sugar and alcohol at the time became more popular.

Philip Dobard, vice president of the National Food and Beverage Foundation, explains to me that the drinking age was lower when he was a teenager, which was in the 1970s, and that he really liked drinking Long Island iced teas. Though they’ve been rebranded as premium cocktails in recent years, Long Island iced teas used to be Diet Coke and the leftover dregs of various well spirits. “It was the vodka Red Bull of its day,” he reminisces. “It was high alcohol, not particularly high caffeine, but caffeine. It was a test of one’s humanity. A test of one’s mortality. You’re young and healthy and you’re not familiar with loss. Injuries, when they occur, quickly heal.”

“It was a test of one’s humanity. A test of one’s mortality. You’re young and healthy and you’re not familiar with loss. Injuries, when they occur, quickly heal.”

A current fact sheet from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention about mixing caffeine and alcohol states that it makes drinkers feel too alert (when they should feel sleepy and want to stop drinking or at least sit down and not risk “alcohol-attributable harms”). It also points out that “caffeine has no effect on the metabolism of alcohol by the liver ... (it does not ‘sober you up’) or reduce impairment due to alcohol consumption,” and some studies have found people who mix caffeine and alcohol are three times more likely to leave a bar while still heavily intoxicated and four time more likely to attempt to drive home.

But caffeinated alcohol and the type of high it provides is communal, Dobard notes. It’s almost charming, to want to strip yourself of inhibitions in the presence of people you like. “I don’t think that impulse is new,” Dobard adds. “I think the commercial forces are new.”

He’s right. The vodka Red Bull was invented in the late ’90s by none other than … Red Bull, which chased athletes in ski towns and the rave scene on the West Coast by giving cases of free energy drinks to bartenders, even paying them thousands of dollars to put it on the menu. The first mainstream alcohol and fortified caffeine beverage was an industry plant.

As Haley Hamilton noted in MEL’s recent oral history of the vodka Red Bull, combining alcohol with caffeine has a two-part effect: “The alcohol can dull the effects of the caffeine (boring), or more problematically, the caffeine can dull the effects of the alcohol, meaning you can drink way more than you normally would without feeling super-hammered.” Dobard is not personally familiar with Four Loko, but sympathizes with the plight of a generation that just wants to get as drunk as everyone else got to.

“There’s nothing inherently illicit about combining caffeine and alcohol,” he points out, adding that coffee liqueurs and coffee-based cocktails have been around for hundreds of years, commonly used as post-dinner digestifs. “The problem occurs when there’s so much of one or the other and it’s so available that it becomes easily and widely abused as a substance. That’s typically when government agencies step in and recognize it as a public health risk.”

(In 2010, the New York Times offered the following very funny, very ahistoric thought on the demand for Four Loko: “It has long vexed club-hoppers and partygoers: how do you stay awake while drinking alcohol late into the night? For years, alcohol and soda sufficed.” Imagine if we’d just cool-mom-blind-eyed everyone for choosing to drink gas station cocktails instead of doing cocaine!)

Gawker’s Hamilton Nolan commented on the persecution of Four Loko in 2010, writing that it was part of a “full-blown scapegoating operation,” and pointing out the obvious: “Isn’t the real issue here that kids are stupid?”

Caffeinated alcohol is a distinctly American flavor of stupid. We do it over and over.

That’s a fair question. Budweiser’s alcohol-and-caffeine drink BE was a hit in the United States in the early to mid-aughts but flopped immediately when tested overseas in 2006. Caffeinated alcohol is a distinctly American flavor of stupid. We do it over and over.

A can of Joose, which is 23.5 ounces, contains approximately 380 calories. (Compared to modern Four Loko, which is 660.) While both had 12 percent alcohol by volume and were fortified with caffeine, Joose had a few differentiating features, beyond the fact it was 40 cents cheaper and covered in skulls.

Sparks actually preceded both, and MillerCoors voluntarily removed the caffeine in 2008, before Four Loko even hit its stride. In the two years between its $215 million acquisition from the McKenzie River Corporation and this quiet surrender, Sparks had a 90 percent share of the “alcopop” market, which meant that with its death, Four Loko was primed to become an easy hit.

Today, even in the midst of the “wellness” boom, young people still post exuberantly about knocking back cans of Four Loko and making bad decisions, even though the caffeine has been removed and the current drink is no more dangerous than a wine cooler. In June 2016, long after Four Loko had been rereleased sans caffeine, the strange college journalism platform Odyssey Online published a guide to matching Four Loko flavors with your personality. “Gold Loko is a VERY IMPORTANT new flavor,” the possibly underage author wrote. “The people who drink these LOVE to live on the edge. They aren’t afraid of the challenge (of the added 2 percent alcohol volume).”

But it’s not special. None of it is special. I was a straitlaced high school soccer player during the Four Loko years, but I do remember, with a warm sort of disgust, the acrid taste of college ingenuity — tequila and blue Gatorade, whiskey and strawberry-kiwi Snapple, etc. There was no reason we couldn’t have chosen slightly less revolting combinations, except for the fact that it was kind of romantic not to. In 20 years, are you going to post throwback pics of a rum and Coke? It’s not shorthand for anything, and you would probably drink one now.

In November 2010, one of Four Loko’s creators, Chris Hunter, defended the drink vehemently to Fast Company, arguing that it had the same amount of caffeine as a Starbucks coffee, less alcohol than most craft beers, and less seductive packaging than a Bud Light Lime, and that dozens of other alcoholic beverages were available in the same 24-ounce cans. Asked about a widely publicized incident at Washington State University in which nine college students ended up hospitalized, with Four Loko cited throughout the police report, Hunter got even more defensive, telling reporter Austin Carr:

The police report showed there was supposedly illegal drugs at the party. That was mentioned about 14 times in the police report. There were multiple mentions of hard liquor, but there were only a few, maybe 2 to 3, mentions of Four Loko. It’s really unfair to say our drink was the cause of this.

The same month, his company reached a voluntary agreement with the New York State Liquor Authority to stop shipping Four Loko into the state, and the FDA issued a public warning about caffeine as an “unsafe additive” to alcoholic beverages, as well as private letters to four manufacturers — including Four Loko’s Phusion Projects — that stated, “[The] FDA is not aware of any publicly available data to establish affirmatively safe conditions of use for caffeine added directly to alcoholic beverages and packaged in a combined form.”

The FDA’s letter was sent to Charge Beverages Corporation (which made drinks called Core High Gravity HG Green and Core High Gravity HG Orange), New Century Brewing Company (which made the fortified beer Moonshot), and United Brands, which made Joose.

Jonathan Howland, a community health researcher at Boston University, told Science Daily just after the ban on Four Loko, “Although several manufacturers of caffeinated beer have withdrawn their products from the market, there is no sign that young people have decreased the practice of combining alcohol and energy drinks.”

There have been other gross party beverages meant to recapture the thrill of alcoholic energy drinks without drawing the same unwanted attention. Whipped Lightning, a combination of sugar, heavy cream, grain alcohol, and artificial flavoring had a brief heyday. Forty-proof chocolate milk did not quite. The super-cheap bottled sangria brand Capriccio had a moment, which the company leaned into, saying, “Believe the hype!” MEL’s Miles Klee recently sampled every flavor of a Mark Cuban-endorsed juice-box wine cooler called BeatBox, which has hideous, brightly colored marketing materials and a low price point, but concluded that its 11.1 percent alcohol content wasn’t really enough for anything other than an “unremarkable, if quietly pleasant weekend.”

In fact, even the FDA seems to be over the whole incident. When asked whether it would involve itself in the rise of alcohol-infused cold brew — such as those offered by the California-based Cafe Agave or the forthcoming offering from Skyy Vodka, announced March 15 — a spokesperson said the agency only considers products on a case-by-case basis, when action seems called for, and would have to get back to me.

Want more stories from The Goods by Vox? Sign up for our newsletter here.

Source: https://www.vox.com/the-goods/2019/3/15/18265724/four-loko-history-joose-sparks-red-bull-vodka-caffeine

[yassinetop]

20 Best Weight Loss Stories

Kim Kardashian Claims to Drop 70 Pounds

Whether or not you believe it, Kim Kardashian has repeatedly claimed that she dropped a whopping 70 pounds after having her baby last December. "I think dieting is so important to weight loss, whereas, I didn't really ever think that before," she told PEOPLE. "I thought, 'Oh, I can work out, I can just eat whatever I want.' But you have to work out all the time." Kardashian claimed that the low-carb Atkins 40 plan is what helped her shed the pounds, adding that she aimed for 1,800 calories a day, along with intense workouts. Intrigued? Then don't miss these 15 Amazing Weight Loss Tips from Kim Kardashian's Nutritionist!

Mariah Carey Only Eats Two Things

One thing is for sure: Mariah Carey loves attention. So, it's only fitting that her latest weight loss strategy would raise a few eyebrows. The strategy? Consuming only two foods. "It's really hard. My diet, you would hate it," Carey tells E! News. "All you eat is Norwegian salmon and capers every day. That's it."

Britney's Bod Slays

This one's more about an awesome weight loss maintenance and fitness story than a dramatic before-and-after transition. With her resident show in Vegas, it's no secret that Britney Spears has gotten back in killer shape and has been turning heads for well over a year. But she garnered more-than-usual attention earlier in 2016 after a smokin' hot performance at the 2016 Billboard Music Awards in May. (We know you wanna watch it!) And then she recently celebrated her 35th birthday with another sexy performance at the Jingle Ball in LA. How does she do it? It's not exactly a secret, people. As she says: "You wanna hot body? You better work…"

Kayla Itsines Helps Millions

There's no doubt that 2016 was the biggest year yet for Instagram sensation Kayla Itsines, who now has nearly 6 million followers. Known for her online fitness guides, Itsines hosted a massively successful '2016 Sweat Tour,' but it also made her second guess naming her guides "Bikini Body." She noted on Instagram: "I originally called it 'Bikini Body Guides' because when I asked my clients what their goals were, 99 percent said at some stage that they just wanted 'to feel comfortable in a bikini,' so I didn't think twice when I called it that." She told Bloomberg, however, that she now regrets the name since it's not only about looking and feeling good in a bikini, but it's about being strong. Regardless of the name, it's clear that this is only the beginning; just see how many hashtags #bbgprogress #sweatwithkayla there were this year for endless weight loss inspiration.

Khloé Kardashian Sheds Major Pounds

Kim Kardashian called Khloé her "weight loss idol" after the reality star shed a significant amount of weight. Unfortunately, she went from being body shamed for being "the fat Kardashian" to being body shamed for being "too skinny." Whatever your judgment may be, there's no denying her weight loss story has inspired many. She credits her drop in size to small tweaks in lifestyle and her diet, saying that her "biggest tip for starting off strong is to swap out some common foods you eat for healthier versions." Now that's a suggestion we can definitely get behind. Many of these 40 Ways to Lose Weight in 4 Seconds are along the same lines.

Revenge Body With Khloé Kardashian

She wouldn't be a Kardashian if she didn't capitalize on her media attention, so Khloé announced that she would have a new show on E!—Revenge Body with Khloé Kardashian. The show has enlisted a number of A-list trainers including Simone de la Rue, Lacey Stone and Gunnar Peterson to work with the reality star to help contestants overcome traumatic life experiences through fitness.

Bride-To-Be Loses Over 100 Pounds

After seeing her engagement photos, Texas bride Haley J. Smith set off on a weight loss journey that resulted in a 100-plus pound weight loss in 15 months. How did she do it? She enlisted a workout buddy (her husband), tracked her progress, ordered smart at restaurants (and tracked her calories), cooked more, and ate a diet rich in protein (think salmon and chicken). Sounds do-able, right? For more on Haley's incredible transformation, check out The 5 Tricks One Woman Used to Lose 100 Pounds!

Megyn Kelly Swears by the F-Factor Diet

Megyn Kelly was in the spotlight for many things this year, not least of which was her reliance on a fiber-rich diet prescribed by celebrity dietitian Tanya Zuckerbrot to stay trim. In fact, the 40-something Fox News anchor not only praised Zuckerbrot's F-Factor diet and book on her show, she mentions it in her new book, Settle for More. Don't miss these 9 Ways Megyn Kelly Stays Slim at 45 for more insights into this star's slim figure.

Guordan Banks Drops 70 Pounds

Singer-songwriter Guordan Banks started his weight loss journey in 2015 and he's now down 70 pounds. Banks, who is behind the #1 single "Keep You In Mind," says he credits his weight loss with moving more (he's a fan of basketball), cutting out certain foods (like soda, bread, and fried foods), and opting for a diet full of water and lean protein (like fish and vegetables). Check out these 23 Ways to Accidentally Start Your Diet Today to see how you may be on a weight loss track you didn't even realize you were on!

Drew Barrymore Sheds 20 Pounds

As we age, losing those extra few pounds gets all the more challenging since our metabolism slows down. But Barrymore worked with celebrity nutritionist Kimberly Snyder to go from 144 to 124 pounds, and she did it all while filming her Netflix show, Santa Clarita Diet. Snyder, who is the author of several books and a proponent of a daily green smoothie, prescribes vegan or vegetarian with her weight loss plans; Barrymore, a carnivore, followed Snyder's methods but added some protein like fish and chicken. Barrymore kept it real, though, when she admitted that she "dreams of pizza."

Adrienne Bailon Reveals Pre-Wedding Weight Loss

After headlines declared she might be pregnant (she was not), Adrienne Bailon embarked on a 15-pound weight loss, which she revealed on Instagram. "Well folks, I've lost 15lbs & counting! Can't stop. Won't stop. Focused! Ha. It's always tea time in my dressing room! Loving my detox with @fittea! Have you joined me?! Um, it's November 1st! The perfect time to start! Stay classy lol. XO." This post was also captioned "#ad" so we might want to take it with a grain of salt when she credits her Fit Tea with this pre-wedding weight loss.

Gabourey Sidibe Sets Out To Get Healthy

Gabourey Sidibe showed off her weight loss—estimated by some to be as much as 100 pounds—on Instagram in a snap from Watch What Happens Live's red carpet. While the star has been vocal about how much she suffered because of her weight growing up, she has yet to reveal exactly how much she lost and how. For someone who was accustomed to being overweight, we wonder if her motivation was anything that might be on our list of 33 Reasons to Lose Weight Other Than Fitting Into Skinny Jeans.

Oprah Backs Weight Watchers

After buying a stake in Weight Watchers, the superstar influencer and media mogul once again set off on a weight loss journey. By mid-June, she showed off a 30-pound weight loss and wrote on Instagram, "Best Health report card ever! Total cholesterol 180. LDL 82. thanks to #wwsmartpoints #ClevelandClinic #AnnualCheckup."

John Goodman Is Almost Unrecognizable

A 2014 knee surgery caused by his unhealthy lifestyle served as a wake-up call for 10 Cloverfield Lane's John Goodman, who in March 2016 shocked fans when he showed up at LAX looking thinner than ever. It has been an ongoing journey for the actor; Goodman credits the tried and true method of diet and exercise for his newly svelte physique.

Lunch Lady Loses 100 Pounds

In the fall of 2015, 260-pound Tammy McRae, who works at Carver Elementary School, decided she was going to lose weight. Instead of eating donuts for breakfast and frequenting Wendy's and McDonald's, she started eating off her cafeteria menu—and the results were staggering. For breakfast, her diet typically includes fresh fruit and cereal; lunch has a menu of things like broccoli and cheese, a baked potato, and boneless chicken wings. At night, she says she has a little bit of fruit or a little yogurt. By September 2016, McRae weighed in at 160 pounds and garnered some much-deserved attention for her resourceful strategy. Speaking of lunch, get some smart tips with these 18 Lunch Rituals to Help You Lose Weight.

Widow Heals Emotional Wounds Through Weight Loss

After her husband took his life in 2015, Justine McCabe ballooned to 313 pounds. With the support of her friends and family, McCabe began documenting her 124-pound weight loss journey on her Tumblr page, taking daily selfies (she now updates via Instagram @HairStarGetsFit). How did she do it? Motivated by the daily selfies, she got a gym membership, worked out six days a week and ate clean. She also challenged herself and faced her fears by doing things like skydiving, traveling abroad alone, and climbing the Eiffel Tower. What made this story so great is that it's not only about weight loss but about emotional healing, which is why McCabe uses the hashtag "#Ichoosetolive." Now that's a weight loss mantra we love!

Penn Jillette Lost 100 Pounds Eating Potatoes

Comedian and magician Penn Jillette released his book Presto!: How I Made Over 100 Pounds Disappear this year, in which he chronicles his weight loss journey. His efforts kicked off in a very unconventional way, though; he ate nothing except potatoes for two weeks. About five naked potatoes a day to be exact, which resulted in an 18-pound weight loss. After that, he ate nothing besides vegetables for three months. He now follows a diet with no animal products, processed grains, or added sugar or salt—and has kept the weight off. The lesson of story? Do what works for you, as long as you get to a healthy, sustainable place eventually!

Rob Kardashian Begins His Journey

In a recent episode of Rob & Chyna, Kardashian says, "I'm not comfortable in my skin. I'm not comfortable with this weight. So, I feel like I'm not happy with anything I do right now." The reality star was reportedly around 300 pounds at his heaviest, and my how things have changed! He recently posted the above snap on Instagram saying: "Oh yeah we snapping back lol,,, baby will be here in 4 weeks and I'm done with carrying this pregnancy weight me and my baby gonna be righttttttt ,,, MOTIVATION TIME‼️ we almost there Chy FAAAAACK Chy looks so bomb here aghhhh ." Moreover, his type 2 diabetes is in remission, thanks to a low-carb diet and doing cardio at least five times a week.

New Zealand Woman Gets Honest About Weight Loss

New Zealand woman Simone Anderson has been chronicling her weight loss journey on social media—and after some backlash that claimed her images were Photoshopped, she posted a very honest image showing the excess skin gathered around her torso. Then, months later, she shared an unforgettable "before and after" comparison of her dramatic skin removal surgery.

Jonah Hill Gets In Shape

The comedian has seen his weight fluctuate over the years (he lost weight for his roles in Moneyball and The Wolf of Wall Street, but soon gained it back); but this summer, Hill seemed to be thinner than ever. Dr. Philip Goglia, who worked with the star, revealed that Hill would send him pictures of his food to prove that he was on track and eating healthy things like protein-rich salmon and eggs. Speaking of, find out the 26 Things You Need To Know Before Buying A Carton of Eggs now!

[thisdaynews]

San Francisco’s Quest to Make Landfills Obsolete

New Post has been published on https://thebiafrastar.com/san-franciscos-quest-to-make-landfills-obsolete/

San Francisco’s Quest to Make Landfills Obsolete

Mark Peterson/Redux Pictures for Politico Magazine

Erick Trickey is a writer in Boston.

SAN FRANCISCO—In a giant building south of downtown, a river of paper, cans, cardboard, and plastic rushes along 150 yards of conveyor belts. It flows past human sorters who snatch unsuitable items from the stream, zips past air jets that blow sheets of cardboard onto a separate track, and crosses over shaking grates that sift out paper and more cardboard. Bottles, clamshell containers and more pass under a robotic arm that jabs tirelessly at the blur of plastic like a mechanical heron stabbing at minnows. The robot’s camera connects to an artificial-intelligence system that’s learning to identify shapes and pluck them out at a speed no human can match. The belt, now carrying a pure stream of plastic bottles, moves on.

This is the front line of San Francisco’s ongoing battle to reduce to zero the amount of waste it sends to landfills. Even as other cities over the past several years have scaled back or even abandoned their recycling programs because they couldn’t find a market for the materials, San Francisco’s commitment to recycling has not wavered. Out of the city’s annual 900,000 tons of discarded material, it diverts more for reuse than it sends to landfills—a success that only a few peer cities, such as Seattle, have achieved.

But San Francisco is still far from achieving the goal it set 16 years ago when it pledged it would achieve “zero waste”—and no longer need landfills—by 2020. Today, it’s nowhere close to that goal. No city is. Though it is a leader in the U.S. at recycling and composting, San Francisco is in a predicament common among American cities, whose residents are growing increasingly vexed by their role in creating vast amounts of garbage and their struggle to control where it’s ending up.

The U.S. produces more than 250 million tons of waste per year—30 percent of the world’s waste, though it makes up only 4 percent of the Earth’s population. Sixty-five percent of that waste ends up in landfills or incinerators. Appalled by floating trash zones like the Great Pacific Garbage Patch off California, the public says it wants to stop plastics from polluting the oceans. People say they don’t want to burn garbage if it creates toxic air pollutants, and they don’t want any more landfill mountains. But if you’re a city official, crafting a waste-disposal system that is financially and environmentally sustainable is a monumental challenge. What’s different about San Francisco is that it is continuing to push the boundary of what’s possible—leaning on a combination of high tech, behavior modification and sheer political will.

For decades, recycling and composting programs have enjoyed broad political support from San Francisco mayors, legislators and voters. “They’ve always been willing to do things other cities haven’t tried yet,” says Nick Lapis, director of advocacy for the nonprofit Californians Against Waste. “They’ve pioneered a lot of programs that either are commonplace everywhere or are going to be soon.”

Curbside composting bins joined recycling bins in 2001, and composting and recycling became mandatory in 2009. Now, city residents and business actually compost more material than they recycle. The city has also regulated construction and demolition debris, diverting much of it from landfills through recycling and reuse. Wood goes to steam-driven power plants in North Carolina to be burned as fuel; metal goes to scrap yards, then to foundries; sheetrock is composted; crushed concrete and asphalt go into new roads and pathways.

The city has also banned single-use plastic bags and other hard-to-recycle items. It recycles items other cities don’t: film plastic, clamshell food containers, and lower-grade plastics such as yogurt cups. San Francisco found new markets for some items after China shut the door to them last year. Its cutting-edge sorting technology produces cleaner, purer bales of recyclables, which are easier to sell.

Yet despite its green ethos, San Francisco has found reducing waste toward zero harder than expected. The amount of trash it sends to landfills declined by about half from 2000 to 2012, from 729,000 tons a year to 367,000. But then the gains stopped, and the amount of trash sent to landfills has crept up since, to 427,000 last year. The reasons include San Francisco’s spiking population, its residents’ increasing wealth and consumption, and the hyper-convenient plastics and other packaging that are more common in American life than they were a decade ago.

So last year, the city’s new mayor, London Breed, reset the city’s ambitions. Instead of zero waste by 2020, she said the city will, by 2030, cut all waste it produces by 15 percent and reduce the waste it sends to landfills by 50 percent.

Cutting trash in half again will be harder than the first time, a decade ago. “When you’re as far down the path as we are, it gets harder and harder to figure out how to get a good bump,” says Robert Haley, the zero-waste manager for the San Francisco Department of the Environment. “We have to change the way some products are made, and we’ve got to get people not consuming so much. And those are big challenges.”

***

Looking back, San Francisco’s ambitious goal might have been too ambitious.

A California law, passed in 1989 to deal with a growing stream of waste and shrinking landfill capacity, was pressing cities to achieve a 50 percent waste diversion rate. In 2002, the city’s Board of Supervisors, urged on by an environmental commission, decided it could do better: 100 percent diversion, or zero waste, by 2020.

It was “a little forward-thinking and a little bit of hubris,” says Tom Ammiano, then president of the board, who’s now retired. “We wanted to take the lead.”

Today, Recology’s transfer station on the city’s southeast edge shows how far San Francisco falls short of that zero-waste dream—as well as how it’s made progress other U.S. cities might envy.

Inside a huge building, garbage trucks disgorge white and black trash bags into a giant pit, as they have since 1970. The pit is about 200 feet long, 80 feet wide, and 16 feet deep—big enough to hold three to four days’ worth of the city’s garbage. A pungent, rotting odor rises from it. But the pit is only about 4 feet deep in trash and that’s normal. Twenty years ago, the city sent 100 trucks of trash every weekday to a landfill; now, it sends half as many: 50.

One reason the pit is less full is visible in the next room: a composting annex built last year for $19 million. About 29 percent of the waste stream is made up of organic material. That’s what produces the compost pile that is about 12 feet high and probably 30 feet wide. Made up of about half leaves and sticks and half food scraps, it gives off very little odor, thanks to good sorting, the Bay Area’s mild temperatures, and the new facility’s odor-neutralizing system. The food decomposes over 60 days and then it’s sold to California farms and vineyards. “Composting is a very good climate action strategy,” Haley says. “You can sequester carbon back into the soil.”

The other part of the reason the garbage pit is so low is the city’s state-of-the-art recycling facility 3 miles north, at Recology’s recycling plant at Pier 96. Bales of separated paper and cardboard are bound for mills in the U.S., Canada, and Pacific Rim countries. The glass bottles and jars ship to a Bay Area glass plant and metal to an American foundry. Huge bundles of flattened milk jugs and orange laundry-soap bottles go to domestic recycling plants. Lower-grade plastics, harder to recycle and sell, go in shipping containers to the port of Oakland. There, they’ll be shipped to recycling plants in Southeast Asia.

The success of the end product begins at the curb.

This is what San Francisco does as well as any big city in the U.S., and better than most. All around the city, residents and businesses don’t have just two waste bins, they have three: black for trash, blue for recycling and green for compost. From curbs outside San Francisco’s famed Victorian houses and on sidewalks outside Chinatown restaurants, Recology picks up food scraps from green compost bins the same day it picks up recycling and trash.

Sanitation workers don’t just fling stuff into the back of their trucks. They’re auditing customers’ trash. If they see too much waste in someone’s black bin that ought to have gone into the green or blue bins, they’ll leave notes reminding the person what to recycle and compost. The notes include pictures of common items for the workers to circle — a universal means of communication in the multilingual city. It’s “very targeted communication,” Haley says, “not in a mean, police-state way, but to [say], ‘Help us clean up the recycling. Help us clean up the composting.’”

The city has also used behavior-modification strategies to get people to throw away less trash. It recently shrank the capacity of the black bins by half, to 16 gallons, but the monthly charge of $6.97 for each black bin is the same as for a 32-gallon recycling or composting bin. “If your recycling or your composting are so contaminated that they are trash, we can double your charge on those temporarily,” Haley says. About 500 large customers have received contamination charges, and about 100 have lost discounts for recycling and composting, he says.

Efforts like these cut San Francisco’s trash volumes in half. In 2012, the city’s refuse rate reports show, the city diverted 60 percent of its refuse from landfills. (At the time, then-mayor Edward Lee claimed a diversion rate of 80 percent, a subsequently debunked stat still echoing across the internet and cited by envious politicians in Washington, D.C. and other cities. San Francisco, unlike most cities, included reuse of sewage sludge and construction debris in its diversion rate.)

Then the progress stopped. San Francisco’s trend lines plateaued and even reversed a bit. By last year, its diversion rate had slipped to 51 percent.

“It’s been challenging because we’ve had such an amazing economic boom in San Francisco,” Haley says. The city’s population grew 10 percent from 2010 to 2018, from 805,000 to 883,000. Construction and demolition have surged, generating heavy debris. Meanwhile, people are discarding fewer newspapers and less glass and more plastics, take-out containers and Amazon shipping envelopes. “Eighty percent of the food in the grocery store is packaged in plastic,” laments Robert Reed, a spokesman for Recology. “That was not the case 10 years ago.”

***

It used to be easy and cheap to export recyclables.

“We could send recyclables to China for almost nothing, literally a few hundred dollars for a cargo container,” says Paul Giusti, Recology’s community and governmental affairs manager. For years, China took in 45 percent of the world’s waste and was a major market for American recycling. Then, in January 2018, China instituted its National Sword policy, a near-ban on foreign recyclable materials, so it could focus on recycling its own discards.

Many cities stockpiled recycling bales while looking for new buyers. Others cut back on the types of plastic they recycle. Still others started sending certain recyclables to landfills or incinerators. Giusti says San Francisco refused to go that route. Instead, it focused on creating a better product and finding new markets for it.

Recycling is a buyer’s market now. With China out of the picture, recyclers are getting choosier, refusing dirty or poorly sorted bales. The optical sorters and robots at Recycle Central help keep San Francisco competitive. So does the composting program, which helps keep food waste out of recycling bins. “We are consistently able to move San Francisco’s recyclables,” Recology’s Reed says, “because we are producing much higher quality bales of recycled paper and recycled plastics than other cities.” Reed says the city’s paper and plastic bales meet the market’s exacting new standard: less than 1 percent impurities.

Now, Recology exports cardboard and harder-to-recycle plastics to Malaysia, Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines. Recology’s commodities marketing manager recently spent three weeks visiting its Southeast Asian customers to confirm that they’re recycling San Francisco’s materials, not burning or sending them to landfills. The plants were “very primitive,” Giusti says— very-low-wage workers sorting material barefoot, instead of in steel-toe boots — “but they were recycling the material.”

Meanwhile, San Francisco is sizing up its new self-imposed challenge: How to cut the waste it sends to landfill in half by 2030?

Homeowners usually recycle and compost effectively, officials say. The weak links are apartment buildings and offices. So the city is cracking down on its largest waste producers: large apartment buildings, office complexes, hospitals, universities, hotels and a few really large restaurants. Under a new law, they’ll have to hire waste sorters if they fail an audit. Trash has to be 75 percent uncontaminated, recycling 90 percent, compost 95 percent.

San Francisco’s 2007 plastic-bag ban and 2012 bag fee were among of the nation’s first. The laws have reduced plastic-bag litter; 60 percent of city shoppers decline a bag. Fewer bags now get entangled in Recycle Central’s sorting machines. This year, the city also banned plastic straws, stirrers and toothpicks, and it banned napkins and single-use utensils from being automatically included in food orders without request.

Supervisor Ahsha Safai, who co-sponsored the waste audit and straw ordinances, says political support for anti-waste laws is high, though businesses will always raise financial concerns.

“That’s one of the biggest challenges we face when we’re talking about these very aspirational and wonderfully environmental policy goals,” Safai acknowledges. “How do you put it into practice without making San Francisco unaffordable for everybody?” So Safai highlights ways the laws save money: fewer supply orders for restaurants, lower garbage rates for businesses that sort.

The next frontier may be producer responsibility laws, already adopted in Europe and parts of Canada. They fund the disposal of certain packaging and printed paper by collecting fees from companies that produce them. This month, Recology CEO Michael Sangiacomo joined with two members of the California Coastal Commission to launch a petition drive for a statewide ballot initiative. Their proposed law would tax plastic manufacturers up to 1 cent per package, ban Styrofoam food containers and require that all packaging be recyclable, reusable, or compostable by 2030.

“We want to go all the way to the source and reduce waste from the source all the way to the point of consumption,” says Haley, the zero waste manager, “and then have the consumer be responsible and put it in the right place, and then have industry use it again.”

Read More

[trunewsofficial]

Washington War Hawks Lose Their Minds Over Trump’s Syria Decision

With one tweet, President Donald Trump may have hamstrung his entire 2020 re-election effort. The controversy began Sunday evening when the White House issued a statement that announced the president had spoken with Turkish President Recep Erdogan over the phone to discuss Syria. The statement read: “Turkey will soon be moving forward with its long-planned operation into Northern Syria. The United States Armed Forces will not support or be involved in the operation, and United States forces, having defeated the ISIS territorial ‘caliphate,’ will no longer be in the immediate area. “The United States government has pressed France, Germany, and other European nations, from which many captured ISIS fighters came, to take them back, but they did not want them and refused. The United States will not hold them for what could be many years and great cost to the United States taxpayer. Turkey will now be responsible for all ISIS fighters in the area captured over the past two years in the wake of the defeat of the territorial ‘caliphate’ by the United States.” This morning, as the news was finally reaching the American public, the president went on a tweet storm to defend the move: “The United States was supposed to be in Syria for 30 days; that was many years ago. We stayed and got deeper and deeper into battle with no aim in sight. When I arrived in Washington, ISIS was running rampant in the area. We quickly defeated 100 percent of the ISIS caliphate, including capturing thousands of ISIS fighters, mostly from Europe. “But Europe did not want them back; they said, ‘You keep them, USA!’ I said, ‘NO, we did you a great favor and now you want us to hold them in U.S. prisons at tremendous cost. They are yours for trials.’ They again said, ‘NO,’ thinking, as usual, that the U.S. is always the ‘sucker’—on NATO, on trade, on everything. “The Kurds fought with us, but were paid massive amounts of money and equipment to do so. They have been fighting Turkey for decades. I held off this fight for almost three years, but it is time for us to get out of these ridiculous endless wars—many of them tribal—and bring our soldiers home. WE WILL FIGHT WHERE IT IS TO OUR BENEFIT, AND ONLY FIGHT TO WIN. “Turkey, Europe, Syria, Iran, Iraq, Russia and the Kurds will now have to figure the situation out, and what they want to do with the captured ISIS fighters in their ‘neighborhood.’ They all hate ISIS, have been enemies for years. We are 7,000 miles away and will crush ISIS again if they come anywhere near us!” The initial reaction was not great for the president, but it was mostly expected. With “FOX & Friends” ripping on the decision, Washington’s top war hawk, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) called in add his two cents’ worth: “If I didn’t see Donald Trump’s name on the tweet I thought it would be Obama’s rationale for getting out of Iraq. Here is what is going to happen. This is going to lead to ISIS reemergence. Nothing's better for ISIS than to create a conflict between the Kurds and Turkey. The Kurds will align with Assad because they have nobody to count on because we abandoned them. So this is a big win for Iran and Assad, a big win for ISIS. I will do everything I can to sanction Turkey if they step one foot in northeastern Syria. That will sever my relationship with Turkey. I think most of the Congress feels that way. I will do a resolution urging the president to reconsider this decision. President’s right about ISIS fighters. Europe needs to do more but you know, he is the president of the United States and it requires leadership. When President Trump -- excuse me, Obama was told what would happen in Iraq, it did. And I’m here to say this is going to lead to the re-emergence of ISIS and the biggest winner in all of this will be the Iranians and that’s too bad.” Graham further commented on the decision in his own tweet storm: “The most probable outcome of this impulsive decision is to ensure Iran’s domination of Syria. The U.S. now has no leverage and Syria will eventually become a nightmare for Israel. “I feel very bad for the Americans and allies who have sacrificed to destroy the ISIS Caliphate because this decision virtually reassures the reemergence of ISIS. So sad. So dangerous. President Trump may be tired of fighting radical Islam. They are NOT tired of fighting us. “Finally, this decision makes it difficult for the U.S. to recruit allies against radical Islam. “By abandoning the Kurds we have sent the most dangerous signal possible – America is an unreliable ally and it’s just a matter of time before China, Russia, Iran, and North Korea act out in dangerous ways.” Other Washington war hawks who jumped on the bandwagon included former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.). Even the family of Washington’s former top war hawk, the late Sen. John McCain, spoke out—viciously—over the president’s decision. Over at the Mouse House, ABC’s “The View” co-host Meghan McCain claimed the decision was “wag the dog” to distract the media from the Democrat- and media-contrived Ukraine scandal. She railed against the decision, as well as her view that congressional Republicans didn’t do enough to stop him: “I’m going a little bit rogue, but I’ve been so mad this morning and so upset about this news that we are abandoning our Kurdish allies in the Middle East. These are allies of ours that American soldiers are still continuing to fight alongside. All we did was arm them and they fought for America. Right now we’re just saying we’re just going to leave them and abandon them. And to everyone in the White House and every Republican who was mad President Obama pulled out of Iraq, you feckless, unpatriotic cowards. (Applause) And I cannot believe this is where we’re at diplomatic-wise and I cannot — what message is this sending to our allies and to American troops who have fought and died for this? And I cannot believe I’m waking up in the morning seeing this kind of news. And I don’t care that he ran on pulling troops out. That’s a whole different thing. We leave this, this is a great day for ISIS and a great day for Assad. And shame on everyone supporting this. I’m sorry this is not the topic, but I couldn’t come out here today and not say this." After a few hours of these reactions, the president once again repeated—a bit more succinctly this time—his defense for removing U.S. troops that have been illegally situated in Syria for more than five years now: “I was elected on getting out of these ridiculous endless wars, where our great military functions as a policing operation to the benefit of people who don’t even like the USA. The two most unhappy countries at this move are Russia and China, because they love seeing us bogged down, watching over a quagmire, and spending big dollars to do so. When I took over, our military was totally depleted. Now it is stronger than ever before. The endless and ridiculour wars are ENDING! We will be focused on the big picture, knowing we can always go back and blast!” After sharing some positive reactions to his decision, the president resumed tweeting about it, adding the following: “As I have stated strongly before, and just to reiterate, if Turkey does anything that I, in my great unmatched wisdom, consider to be off-limits, I will totally destroy and obliterate the economy of Turkey (I’ve done before!). They must, with Europe and others, watch over the captured ISIS fighters and families. The U.S. has done far more than anyone could have ever expected, including the capture of 100 percent of the ISIS caliphate. It is time now for others in the region, some of great wealth, to protect their own territory. THE USA IS GREAT!” That only made the reaction to his decision even worse as more of his supporters piled on. Among them, Christian Broadcasting Network founder Pat Robertson. During his “700 Club” broadcast today, he said: “Ladies and gentlemen, I want to say right now I am absolutely appalled that the United States is going to betray those Democratic forces in northern Syria, that we possibly are going to allow the Turkish come in against the Kurds. Erdogan is a thug. He has taken control of his country as a dictator. He is a strong leader and to say he’s an ally of America in nonsense. He is in it for himself, and the president—who allowed [Saudi dissident journalist Jamal] Khashoggi to be cut in pieces without any repercussions whatsoever—is now allowing the Christians and the Kurds to be massacred by the Turks. And I believe—and I want to say this with great solemnity—the President of the United States is in danger of losing the mandate of heaven if he permits this to happen.” Robertson’s sudden 180-degree reversal on the murder of Khashoggi notwithstanding, his comments are a stunning indictment from one of the president’s most ardent supporters. But they were echoed by a number of other evangelical Christian leaders, including Tony Perkins of the Family Research Council—arguably a leader of the political wing of the Religious Right. But the president also had a surprising defender: Zionist radio host Hugh Hewitt. The conservative talking head blasted those who were critical of the decision to withdraw troops—and even draped his comments with a heaping dose of former National Security Adviser John Bolton. Calling out a New York Times headline that suggested the president had “endorsed” a military invasion of Syria by Turkey, he tweeted: “This headline and story is simply wrong. U.S. and Donald Trump do not endorse Turkey attacks, but I traveled with then-National Security Adviser John Bolton to Israel and Turkey in January. It’s been clear for months the U.S. presence in Syria was finite. “There may be terrible fighting between NATO member Turkey and our Kurdish partners in Syria. But ISIS is defeated and the U.S. cannot garrison Syria. If anyone thinks we can, they haven’t followed the defense appropriations battle or NATO countries’ refusal to take ISIS prisoners.” Hewitt reminded his Twitter followers that he was critical of the president’s decision to announce a withdrawal from Syria last year, but also noted that “much has changed” since then. He listed those four “critical differences” between then and now, based on his junket with Bolton earlier this year: NATO countries won’t take the ISIS fighters and expect U.S. to garrison Syria indefinitely; U.S.-Turkish patrols have settled the region somewhat; Notice was given to the Kurds of an eventual pullout; “most crucial of all”: the People’s Republic of China challenge is looming large. Rather than criticize the decision, however, Hewitt has turned the argument back against Congress, particularly Democrats, for failing to pass a defense budget for nearly the entire Obama presidency. Since his initial tweets in defense of the president, he has been a somewhat lone defender of the Syria withdrawal decision. He has, however, refrained from defending the commander-in-chief’s bizarre “unmatched wisdom” statement. Democrats have already begun jumping on it as the basis for once again questioning the president’s mental faculties—ostensibly in a bid to invoke the 25th Amendment. It would seem the president’s challenges from Democrats are only just beginning to emerge in the final 12-plus months before the 2020 presidential election. (Photo Credit: The White House) source https://trunews.com/stream/washington-war-hawks-lose-their-minds-over-trumps-syria-decision

[dwdelaney-blog]

dec2018

12/1

https://drive.google.com/open?id=1HXN49zYAyChYs4o0zpcLGwGzARKX3WmQ

I am calling this a no - to the question I asked a couple days ago on the fbuckley site

"Fbuckley"

Dennis Delaney <dwdelaney@gmail.com>

10:40 AM (0 minutes ago)

to me

Defecation stim this morning - note the plate on the guy that pulls up next to me - and the location - I dont ordinarily mention this sort of thing b/c its so common - I may start including this in the audio notes -- Sent from Fast notepad

Dennis Delaney <dwdelaney@gmail.com>

10:41 AM (0 minutes ago)

to me

Frank edwards - hes fd - gets schaive endorsement - hes one of the wide awakes - xa long industrial chem - grandview - furman milburn - medeival re enactment - knightx2 - bed bugs - nabors - mental illness frame - ed smith - tx is his jx - he was the regional - 10 states - jeffe - he would mingle w/ the pols in tx - big leagues - spfld dont play - Edwards - the wife runs for coroner - may have gotten the job - despite being clearly unqualified - elected position - this is yoursimpsons link btw - conan obrien sidekick is fromthe patch - thats why certain stories and inds haveil link - not just shelbyville - sang county coroner was norm richter for decades - he was coroner like all his adult life - xa spfld funeral biz - see esp don hickman - shs image - etc -- Sent from Fast notepad

Dennis Delaney <dwdelaney@gmail.com>

10:42 AM (0 minutes ago)

to me

It - rushton - spfld mayors race Frank edwards - jim langfelder Thursday, Nov. 29, 2018 12:07 am Familiar faces in mayoral race Contest pits incumbent against former alderman By Bruce Rushton Former alderman Frank Edwards, left, will face Mayor Jim Langfelder in the April mayoral election. It’s been a dozen years since Springfield has seen a two-horse mayoral race. In 2007, incumbent Tim Davlin shellacked Bruce Strom, who got less than 40 percent of the vote, both in the primary and the general election. In 2011, seven mayoral candidates crowded the primary ballot; in 2015, there were five. And now, we are, again, down to two, with former alderman Frank Edwards being the only candidate to file against Mayor Jim Langfelder, who never has had a close call at the polls. Before winning the mayor’s post in 2015 with 55 percent of the vote, Langfelder had last faced an opponent in 2003, when he got nearly 60 percent in his first of three successful bids for treasurer. Edwards says he figures he’s the underdog, but that’s true of anyone running against an incumbent. He says he can’t think of anything that the mayor’s done well; Langfelder says he’s done plenty. The candidates’ views also diverge on money. Edwards, whose campaign committee filed organization papers last week, predicted a $300,000 price tag for his campaign, with the tab for both candidates exceeding $500,000. The mayor, who spent nearly $200,000 in 2017 and had $52,000 on hand at the end of September, projected his campaign budget at $100,000, noting that there will be no primary before the April 2 general election. Edwards has been in the mix since October, when he attended a meeting at headquarters for Laborer’s Local 477, whose business manager, Brad Schaive, at the time said he was trying to find candidates to challenge Langfelder. Edwards declined to tell Illinois Times who attended the meeting, Schaive could not be reached for comment. Rosemarie Long, chairwoman of the Sangamon County Republican Party, said that the GOP doesn’t plan to issue an endorsement in the nonpartisan race. “But that doesn’t mean we won’t work to support him,” Long said. Edwards, who got party support when he ran for city treasurer in 2015, said he expects labor support in the mayor’s race. The mayor chuckled when asked whether he and Schaive have exchanged Christmas gift wish lists. “We’ve never exchanged Christmas gifts,” Langfelder said before praising Schaive for being an effective union leader. “He’s a great leader for his group,” the mayor said. “I have to represent 115,000 people.” Langfelder downplayed the importance of organized labor’s support of his 2015 candidacy. “I owe the victory to the voters of Springfield,” the mayor said. “They were one of many groups that helped out.” Edwards last appeared on a municipal ballot in 2015, when he was beaten by Misty Buscher, who’d never before run for elective office and won the treasurer’s office with 55 percent of the vote over the veteran officeholder. “I can’t explain that, to be real honest with you,” says Edwards, who allows that he may have underestimated his opponent. “I didn’t work as hard as I should have. I wasn’t out there fighting the battle that I should have fought, educating the people like I should have done.” This time, Edwards says, will be different. “I think it’s going to be an all-out fight,” he says. Edwards criticizes Langfelder for pushing through tax hikes. “I see people leaving, I see job loss,” Edwards says. “Our town’s dying. And yet our taxes keep going up.” Edwards says the city should be able to balance books from efficiencies as opposed to raising taxes, and he says he’d instill an immediate hiring freeze if he’s elected. “Our finances are in terrible shape,” he says.  “If we’re raising taxes, why are we hiring people?” Edwards also says that crime is an issue, pointing to a real-estate website called neighborhoodscout.com, which scores cities on crime and says that Springfield is a four on a 1-to-100 scale, with 100 being safest, making the capital city more dangerous than East St. Louis, which got a six, and Chatham, which was rated at 82. Edwards said that he has not examined crime statistics published by the U.S. Department of Justice, which show that both violent crime and property crime rates in Springfield have remained essentially flat between 2014, the year before Langfelder took office, and last year, the most recent year for which statistics are available. Edwards wouldn’t say whether he’d replace police chief Kenny Winslow, who was on the wrong end of a no-confidence vote by officers last year. “I’m not prepared to say that right now,” Edwards said. He said he didn’t have a position on whether the city properly handled the case of Samuel Rosario, an officer fired in 2017 after getting into a fistfight with a man who had exchanged insults with the officer. Edwards said it wouldn’t be appropriate to comment on the case of Sgt. Gary Wangard, who is under investigation after a woman was shot in October, five days after the sergeant was captured on video telling an arrestee that the woman’s son had been an informant. Edwards said he can’t think of anything that Langfelder has done well. “I’ve tried to come up with something,” Edwards said. “That’s why I’m running for mayor.” “Evidently, he hasn’t followed city government very well,” Langfelder responded. The mayor pointed to the city’s successful effort to persuade the legislature to enable renewal of the downtown tax-increment financing district as one of many accomplishments. He also said he’s made hard decisions such as pushing for Bicentennial Plaza and demolition of the YWCA building on a now-vacant block with a purpose yet to be determined. “The hard decision was bringing down the Y – I took the hit on it, now people see the magnificence of the (governor’s) mansion,” said Langfelder, who added that Edwards, while an alderman, voted to purchase the property without first getting an appraisal. “We’ve been making the tough decisions and really moving plans forward.” Contact Bruce Rushton at brushton@illinoistimes.com. -- Sent from Fast notepad

Dennis Delaney <dwdelaney@gmail.com>

10:42 AM (0 minutes ago)

to me

King - hrh - hank - tom anderson beavis and butthead The hill charachter is a spin off of the anderson charachter - judge u uses the same voice and only made slight changes to the appearance - not latest appearnce of hank is ufc - shumate is big mma fan - ufc - xa fudd - comedy - comed - fu theme - shumate was do around the same time as cofer black - bunn badgers - bw - sticfusion - auger bush - bunn - ronsumate - xa sonic - heffe ron - op - ron howard - happy days - 123 oclock - and see 2m - m2 - mu - res - lil ruby - xa ufcw - ameren 10 mi sstl - roth - anderson - an dre sun - soo - note generally - hank is h/k - the boy is bobby - -- Sent from Fast notepad

Dennis Delaney <dwdelaney@gmail.com>

10:43 AM (0 minutes ago)

to me

Corsi has been promised a pardon -- Sent from Fast notepad

Dennis Delaney <dwdelaney@gmail.com>

10:43 AM (0 minutes ago)

to me

King - hank r hill - rutherford - hayes Rutherford b hayes - h yes aye - is - eyes - consent - icu - xa ilga rutherford -- Sent from Fast notepad

Dennis Delaney <dwdelaney@gmail.com>

10:44 AM (0 minutes ago)

to me

Maga - maggie - thatcher - mage wizard intel - m&ga - big - bigly - wal mega lo mart - xa facio us - gray et again - grey grey - graze - res -- Sent from Fast notepad

Dennis Delaney <dwdelaney@gmail.com>

10:45 AM (0 minutes ago)

to me

Mannafort -  magallanes - comet - little kings - steven - collusion - hic - 11/29 ny headlines - board games -- Sent from Fast notepad

Dennis Delaney <dwdelaney@gmail.com>

9:52 AM (0 minutes ago)

to me

Fletch - u might be right Chase - ache - bunn - po - scso - the mental illness stuff - the stuff about the 15 yr old - bill haley and the comets - ierc - wide awakes - military academies - the lawsuit - u were right - they lost - badly - they arent fooling anyone w/ that nonsense - and it doesnt matter - the real civics lesson starts after they lost - the po - selective enforcement - hard to believe - usattys was me - cifa was me - lam - no fooling -- Sent from Fast notepad

12/8

Nyt 12/8 - trump dod guys - Gen mills - cereal - sere guy - mil&mil - milly burns - montgomery - desert fox - dessert fox - tom fox - redd fox - ox hunt - murdoch - fox channel - comedy - Simpson - king of the hill - ailes - Miley cyrus - wal - megalomart - mega - maga - not omega - wont stop the chem - regardless of legal judgment - smiley - mi - David goldfein - joe dunford - implied dispute of damages - mills is 82 airborne - a2 - e&t - etu brute - 10th mtn - lance mountain - precinct 10 - x - ab - 33 - psych - fronkenstein - martin - 2brains - kung fu - 10th mi stl - caths - alton - paradise - slu callis - x - xi - soccer football - futbol- ecks - noonan - wharton - carnduff - gnuteck - sticfusion - bilbray vegas lahood - torricelli - riggle wavering mayor houston - hurricane fence sears - carlucci - guards - wackenhut - securitas - cra - ierc - perc - dph sacco demarco - Joseph f dunford - joseph aboud - was right about cifaD

Dennis Delaneyto me

2 minutes agoDetails

Nyt 12/8 - trump dod guys - Gen mills - cereal - sere guy - mil&mil - milly burns - montgomery - desert fox - dessert fox - tom fox - redd fox - ox hunt - murdoch - fox channel - comedy - Simpson - king of the hill - ailes - Miley cyrus - wal - megalomart - mega - maga - not omega - wont stop the chem - regardless of legal judgment - smiley - mi - David goldfein - joe dunford - implied dispute of damages - mills is 82 airborne - a2 - e&t - etu brute - 10th mtn - lance mountain - precinct 10 - x - ab - 33 - psych - fronkenstein - martin - 2brains - kung fu - 10th mi stl - caths - alton - paradise - slu callis - x - xi - soccer football - futbol- ecks - noonan - wharton - carnduff - gnuteck - sticfusion - bilbray vegas lahood - torricelli - riggle wavering mayor houston - hurricane fence sears - carlucci - guards - wackenhut - securitas - cra - ierc - perc - dph sacco demarco  - Joseph f dunford - joseph aboud - was right about cifa More like this 'Little Hint' From President About the Joint Chiefs: [National Desk] Cooper, Helene. New York Times, Late Edition (East Coast); New York, N.Y. [New York, N.Y]08 Dec 2018: A.15. Publisher logo. Links to publisher website, opened in a new window. Full text Details Translate Full text WASHINGTON -- President Trump is expected to name Gen. Mark A. Milley, the Army chief of staff, to be the next chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the top-ranking military position in the country, administration officials said on Friday. Mr. Trump teased the decision in remarks to reporters at the White House on Friday, saying that he would make an announcement at the Army-Navy football game on Saturday in Philadelphia. "I can give you a little hint: It will have to do with the Joint Chiefs of Staff and succession," the president said. Mr. Trump, who made several staff change announcements on Friday, met two weeks ago with General Milley and the Air Force chief of staff, Gen. David L. Goldfein, the two men believed to be in contention to succeed Gen. Joseph F. Dunford Jr. of the Marines, whose term as chairman expires next autumn. It is unusual for a successor to the top military job to be chosen so early, but the president has long been known to have a preference for General Milley, an ebullient officer who is well known in the halls of the Pentagon and at Army bases around the world. That preference for General Milley was at odds with Mr. Trump's defense secretary, Jim Mattis, who is believed to have wanted General Goldfein for the job. But Mr. Trump has in the last few months been overriding Mr. Mattis on a number of issues, most recently the decision to send American troops to the southern border with Mexico to counter caravans of migrants making their way north from Central America. But Pentagon officials said that Mr. Mattis, a retired Marine, was perfectly willing to work with General Milley, a graduate of Princeton University who also holds a master's degree in international relations from Columbia University. General Milley has a long military pedigree with some of the Army's legendary units, like the 82nd Airborne Division and the 10th Mountain Division. He has served multiple combat deployments in Afghanistan and Iraq. Before he was appointed Army chief in May 2015, General Milley was head of Army Forces Command at Fort Bragg, N.C., where he decided to charge Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl with desertion for walking off his post in Afghanistan in 2009. Sergeant Bergdahl was captured and held by the Taliban for five years and was released last year in exchange for five Taliban prisoners held at the military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. He was dishonorably discharged last year. A Boston Red Sox fan, General Milley carries himself with the kind of earthy manner that screams Fenway Park. He does not shy away from the occasional ribald story, although he does sometimes pepper conversations with talk of "little engines that could" and red cabooses and other well-worn references to inspirational stories. At the same time, anyone talking to him knows where they stand; he is direct, an approach that played well in Afghanistan, where he was the No. 2 American commander. He was popular among the troops he commanded and got on well with Afghan military officers and civilian officials, even when he pushed back against some of their wilder claims about the war. His political skills -- the same skills he used in the last two years to become a favorite of Mr. Trump -- were on display during a day trip in summer 2013 to northern Afghanistan, where he listened patiently as a senior Afghan security official blamed Pakistanis and other foreigners for all the violence in the country. General Milley responded politely but firmly, saying that while foreign insurgents were exacerbating the situation, the Taliban are an Afghan movement, and that it was ultimately up to Afghans to work out their differences if they wanted peace in their country. At the time, it was a message that Afghans had long ago tired of hearing from the Americans, but General Milley managed to deliver it without offending his host. Five years later, American military officials are still delivering that same message, as the Afghanistan war continues on. As the Army chief of staff, General Milley has instead turned his attention to whether almost two decades of fighting in Afghanistan -- and Iraq and Syria -- has taken away from the Army's ability to fight a land war against a more traditional military adversary. "Today, a major in the Army knows nothing but fighting terrorists and guerrillas, because he came into the Army after 9/11," General Milley said in an interview in 2016 with The New York Times. He described a loss of what he called muscle memory: how to fight a large land war, including one where an established adversary is able to bring sophisticated air defenses, tanks, infantry, naval power and even cyberweapons into battle. Photograph Gen. Mark A. Milley of the Army is expected to be President Trump's choice to lead the military. (PHOTOGRAPH BY GABRIELLA DEMCZUK FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES) Word count: 806 Copyright New York Times Company Dec 8, 2018

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12/10D

Dennis Delaneyto me

1 minute agoDetails

Steil - links to other cities - fema Esposito nyc ema dir He was nypd & oem - & carlyle badger - xa spfld - where steil is connected to irv - ffs are patronage - and do ops - note esp - saathoff pacman - acherman - terry nelson - duane gibson - wal - omnimedia - tyler perry - see also sticfusion - 10th mi stl - 10 - ab - 10th precinct - 33rd - il plates - lol - ala - xa alec baldwin - dave keil radio guy - eng st neighbor - package store owner - po leadership law enf intel - moonlighters - selective enforcement - xa gnuteck - links to pols

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12/11

uicksilverD

Dennis Delaneyto me

2 minutes agoDetails

Quicksilver Mercury group - aiw - sylvester - danbury hatters - mad as a hatter - mental illness frame - toxic substances - demyelinization - hypersensitivity - aiw as economics - pound sterling - tic tac - watches - cit scso - cat peoria - cat urine virus - carlyle - barnum - achey breaky - smiley - wal - nsa badgers - haspel video - pound tic tac x/o - airport - ab - ecks futbol - carnduff - noonan capranica - abe 33rd - ala - plates lol - laffers

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Natl rev 12/17 art re watchesD

Dennis Delaneyto me

2 minutes agoDetails

Natl rev 12/17 art re watches P41-42 - luminous dials - sabotage - rolex - fam - military ops - grand seiko - xa bunn - sangamo meters

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Mercury public affairs - quicksilverD

Dennis Delaneyto me

3 minutes agoDetails

Mercury public affairs - quicksilver Russian links charlotte & ussr - deripaska - aluminum/spk - boeing - redmond - preston gates - started by guy w/ burson ties - bought by omnicom/pr and dc ops folded into fleishman hillard - early ldrshp has ties to nj - chris christie - mercury group is pr gov affairs - lobsters reps uber xa fixer - blago Trying Cash and Cocktail Galas To Ease Bite of U.S. Sanctions: [National Desk] Vogel, Kenneth P. New York Times, Late Edition (East Coast); New York, N.Y. [New York, N.Y]11 Dec 2018: A.1. Publisher logo. Links to publisher website, opened in a new window. Full text Details Translate Full text WASHINGTON -- On a July evening, Trump administration officials and allies, including the president's personal lawyer, Rudolph W. Giuliani, gathered with investors atop the Hay-Adams hotel overlooking the White House for a cocktail reception featuring a short presentation by the Democratic Republic of Congo's special envoy to the United States. An invitation for the reception billed it as an opportunity to learn about "the role Africa plays in gaining access to critical minerals, such as cobalt" and to discuss "the strategic relationship" between the United States and the nations of Africa. In fact, the reception was part of an aggressive $8 million lobbying and public relations campaign that used lobbyists with ties to the Trump administration to try to ease concerns about the Congolese president, Joseph Kabila, whose government was facing threats of additional sanctions from the Trump administration for human rights abuses and corruption. The lavish cocktail party was one example of a lucrative and expanding niche within Washington's influence industry. As President Trump's administration has increasingly turned to sanctions, travel restrictions and tariffs to punish foreign governments as well as people and companies from abroad, targets of those measures have turned for assistance to Washington's K Street corridor of law, lobbying and public relations firms. The work can carry reputational and legal risks, since clients often come with toxic baggage and the United States Treasury Department restricts transactions with entities under sanctions. As a result, it commands some of the biggest fees of any sector in the influence industry. And some of the biggest payments have been going to lobbyists, lawyers and consultants with connections to Mr. Trump or his administration. "People overseas often want to hear that you know so-and-so, and can make a call to solve their problem," said Erich Ferrari, a leading Washington sanctions lawyer who said he has tried to disabuse prospective clients of such notions. It is a perception that matches up with the pay-to-play mind-set that defines politics in many parts of Africa, Asia, the Middle East and the former Soviet states. As politicians and executives from those regions have increasingly been targeted by sanctions, they have sought to apply that approach -- backed by huge sums of cash -- to navigating Washington, lobbyists and former government officials say. This has been encouraged, they say, by the willingness projected by Mr. Trump and his team to make deals around sanctions and tariffs exemptions. Previous administrations had worked to wall off politics from those processes, which are supposed to be overseen primarily by career officials and governed by strict legal analyses. In June, after a personal intervention by Mr. Trump, the Commerce Department rescinded sanctions that could have crippled the Chinese technology giant ZTE, which had fought the sanctions through an intense three-month lobbying push that cost $1.4 million. A $108,500-a-month lobbying campaign has helped delay the imposition of sanctions against an industrial conglomerate owned by the Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska. Among the leaders of the lobbying efforts for both ZTE and Mr. Deripaska's companies was Bryan Lanza, a former Trump campaign aide who maintains close ties to administration officials. His firm, Mercury Public Affairs, has signed other clients facing punitive measures from the United States government, including the United States subsidiary of Hikvision, a company owned by the Chinese government. The company, according to lobbying filings, paid a Mercury team including Mr. Lanza a fee that started at $70,000 a month to lobby on the carrying out of a military-spending bill. The bill bars the United States government from purchasing video surveillance products made by a handful of Chinese companies, including Hikvision, ZTE and Huawei, whose chief financial officer was arrested in Canada at the request of the United States government, apparently on suspicion of violating sanctions against Iran. Sanctions targets who had not previously tried to win reprieve are sensing an opening. Viktor F. Yanukovych, the former president of Ukraine, who had sanctions levied against him in 2014, has discussed a push to win relief and refurbish his image with well-connected law and lobbying firms including Greenberg Traurig. Among the other Trump-linked lobbyists who have received big contracts from targets of sanctions and tariffs is Brian Ballard, a top fund-raiser for Mr. Trump's campaign and the Republican National Committee. His firm signed a $125,000-a-month contract in August 2017 to represent the Turkish-state-owned bank Halkbank, which has been working to avoid punishment for its role in a billion-dollar scheme to evade sanctions on Iran. The representation brought Mr. Ballard into discussions with Mr. Giuliani, who represented a gold trader charged in the scheme. Then there is the lawyer Alan Dershowitz. His criticism of the special counsel's investigation of Mr. Trump has endeared him to the president. But Mr. Dershowitz also has a long history of representing clients in transnational legal matters, including sanctions. Mr. Dershowitz is advising Dan Gertler, an Israeli billionaire who was the target of sanctions by Washington last year for using his connections to Mr. Kabila, the Congolese president, to facilitate what the Treasury Department called "opaque and corrupt mining and oil deals." Mr. Dershowitz called Mr. Gertler "a very good person" who is "being targeted primarily because of the actions of other people." While Mr. Trump has invited Mr. Dershowitz to the White House to discuss Middle East issues on multiple occasions, Mr. Dershowitz said he had not used his access to lobby on behalf of Mr. Gertler. "I would never raise an issue like this," he said. Mr. Kabila's government has stocked up on consultants who have cast themselves as able to broker access at the highest levels of the administration. It has paid $8 million to its security contractor, an Israeli firm called Mer Security and Communication Systems, to hire American lobbyists, according to lobbying filings. Mer paid $500,000 in April 2017 to Alston & Bird, the firm of former Senator Bob Dole. Mr. Dole's team indicated that it could secure a meeting between Mr. Kabila and Mr. Trump, according to people familiar with the relationship. The meeting never happened, and Mer ended the subcontract in frustration. Mer proceeded to invest millions more in lobbying and public relations firms with lower profiles but closer ties to the Trump team. Lobbying filings show $360,000 paid by Mer to Adnan Jalil, a former congressional liaison for Mr. Trump's campaign; $250,000 to the firm of Nancye Miller, the wife of the Trump campaign adviser and former C.I.A. chief R. James Woolsey Jr.; $680,000 to the firm of former Representative Robert L. Livingston, an early Trump endorser; and $598,000 to the firm of Brian Glicklich, who has represented Trump allies such as Breitbart News and Rush Limbaugh. Mer also agreed to pay $1.25 million to the firm of Robert Stryk, who had worked with Trump campaign officials, to organize the Hay-Adams event and meetings around it for Mr. Kabila's special envoy to the United States. (Mr. Stryk's firm, Sonoran Policy Group, also signed a $100,000-a-month contract in August to represent Somalia in its bid for increased military aid from the Trump administration and removal from its travel ban list. And Sonoran registered as a subcontractor for a law firm to lobby for a notorious Serbian arms dealer who was hit with sanctions for selling weapons to Liberia). At the time of the Congolese reception, the Trump administration and the international community were pressuring Mr. Kabila to step down, partly by intimating that his allies might face additional sanctions. Not only had he been accused of violent repression of dissent and looting millions, but he had overstayed the country's constitutionally mandated term limits by nearly two years. The Congolese officials at the reception posed for photos with Mr. Giuliani, and afterward there was some confusion about his connection to the lobbying effort. Francois Balumuene, the Congolese ambassador to the United States, suggested in an interview in September that his country was working with Mr. Giuliani to figure out the administration's position on an upcoming presidential election called by Mr. Kabila to avoid threatened sanctions. "What I know is that it is possible that Giuliani will let us know how to go ahead," Mr. Balumuene said. He referred additional questions about Mr. Giuliani's role to the country's special envoy to Washington, Raymond Tshibanda, who could not be reached for comment. Mr. Giuliani said he was not serving as an intermediary between the Democratic Republic of Congo and the administration. In an interview in September, he initially said he stopped by the reception for a half-hour to "say hello to people" and to impress a woman with whom he had been dining by taking her "to the top of the Hay-Adams to see a Washington party" with a "great view." But he later suggested that he attended at least partly because he was interested in exploring business opportunities, adding, "We've always wanted to see what's Africa all about." And someone familiar with Mr. Giuliani's business affairs said that one of his companies has recently been negotiating a consulting deal to work in the Democratic Republic of Congo, possibly through Mer. In text messages on Sunday, Mr. Giuliani said that "if I do it, it would only be security consulting" similar to what he does in other countries, not lobbying. "Beyond that, I can't say anything other than you can assume if we are working in a foreign country, we are doing security -- physical and cyber, antiterrorism, emergency management." It is not clear whether the lobbying overseen by Mer had much effect, and several of Mer's subcontracts with Trump-linked lobbyists have expired. Less than a month after the Hay-Adams event, Mr. Kabila announced that he would not seek a third term in presidential elections scheduled for this month. While some Trump administration officials are concerned that the elections are being tilted in favor of Mr. Kabila's chosen successor, the United States has not leveled additional sanctions against the country since Mr. Kabila's announcement -- an outcome some lobbyists on the account are privately claiming as a victory. In October, Mer signed a new $200,000 contract with a public relations firm called Sanitas International that was co-founded by Christopher Harvin, a senior adviser to the Trump campaign who had worked in President George W. Bush's administration. The firm is seeking to demonstrate to the news media that Mr. Kabila does, in fact, intend to step down and hold free and fair elections. Credit: KENNETH P. VOGEL; Jesse Drucker contributed to this report. Photograph Rudolph W. Giuliani at a reception hosted by a Democratic Republic of Congo envoy in July. (PHOTOGRAPH BY SCOTT MCINTYRE FOR THE NEW YORK TIMES) (A19) Word count: 1727 Copyright New York Times Company Dec 11, 2018 Mercury Public Affairs Mercury Public Affairs Mercury public affairs.png Basic facts Location: Washington, D.C. Type: Public Strategy Firm Affiliation: Bipartisan Top official: •CEO: Kieran Mahoney •President: Kirill Goncharenko Founder(s): Kirill Goncharenko and Kieran Mahoney Year founded: 1999 Website: Official website Connections •Brian Jones •Rick Wiley •Mike DuHaime •Roger Salazar Mercury Public Affairs is a bipartisan political strategy and consulting firm that focuses on campaigns and political communications ranging from advocacy advertising to litigation communications to media and public relations. The firm has multiple locations throughout the U.S and in Mexico City as well as London. The firm was co-founded, in 1999, by Kirill Goncharenko and Kieran Mahoney in Manhattan. The firm has since been purchased by Omnicom Group, a company that controls 1,500 marketing communication agencies around the world.[1] Omnicom Group's chairman is Bruce Crawford. Several past and present members of Mercury are working on presidential campaigns for the 2016 election cycle. Background Mercury Public Affairs was co-founded by Kirill Goncharenko and Kieran Mahoney in 1999. It began as a small political communications firm in Manhattan. By 2003, however, the firm had been purchased by the Omnicom Group, an international marketing and communications company.[2] In 2006, Mercury merged its Washington, D.C., government relations division with Fleishman-Hillard, another Omnicom media firm. The two firms kept their names and Mercury was responsible for daily operations.[3] Mercury offers a wide-variety of services in communications and marketing consulting:[4] Advocacy Advertising Crisis Management/Communications Digital Communications Government Relations Grassroots/Grasstops Integrated Campaign Management International Consulting Litigation Communications Market & Public Opinion Research Media & Public Relations Political Consulting 2016 Election Several current and former members of Mercury have active roles within some of the presidential campaigns for the 2016 election cycle. Mike DuHaime, a partner at Mercury, was appointed senior strategist for Chris Christie's presidential campaign on July 3, 2015.[5] That same day, former vice president of polling and advertising and managing director of public affairs at Mercury, Brian Jones, was selected as Christie's senior communications consultant.[5] Former managing director at Mercury, Rick Wiley, was appointed campaign manager, in July, to Scott Walker's presidential campaign.[6] Notable members past and present Kirill Goncharenko.jpg Kirill Goncharenko: Goncharenko is president and a founding partner at Mercury. From 1994 to 1998, he has worked as a managing director for the public relations firm, Burson-Marsteller. Goncharenko served as an aide to former Sen. Alphonse M. D'Amato (R-N.Y.). He has extensive experience in both the private and public sectors with regard to communications and strategy.[3][2] Kieran Mahoney.png Kieran Mahoney: Mahoney is a founding partner and current CEO of Mercury. He has served as a senior adviser to former Gov. George Pataki's gubernatorial campaigns in 1994, 1998 and 2002, including serving as the top strategist and manager of Pataki's 1994 campaign. In 2002, Mahoney was media consultant for the National Republican Senatorial Committee, working on independent expenditure campaigns for John Sununu (R) in New Hampshire, Norm Coleman (R) in Minnesota and Lamar Alexander (R) in Tennessee.[7] Brian Jones square.jpg Brian Jones (former): In 2003, Jones began working at Mercury as the vice president of polling and advertising, but left in 2004. However, Jones returned 2008 and stayed until 2011, when he became a partner with Black Rock Group. He has worked on George W. Bush's 2004 presidential campaign as the senior communications advisor. He has also worked as a communications director for the Republican National Committee and as the communications director for John McCain's 2008 presidential bid. Jones is the senior communications consultant for Chris Christie's 2016 presidential campaign.[8][9] Mike DuHaime.jpg Mike DuHaime: DuHaime joined Mercury in 2010 as a partner. He has worked on George W. Bush's 2004 presidential campaign as a regional political director. He also worked as a political director for the Republican National Committee (RNC) and campaign manager for Rudy Giuliani's 2008 presidential bid. In 2014, DuHaime served as the senior advisor to the Republican Governors Association (RGA) and oversaw national gubernatorial campaigns. DuHaime is the senior strategist for Chris Christie's 2016 presidential campaign.[10] Rick Wiley.jpg Rick Wiley (former): Wiley joined Mercury in March 2013 as a managing director in their Washington, D.C. office, but left in July 2015. He worked two presidential campaigns, George W. Bush's 2004 presidential re-election and Rudy Giuliani's 2008 presidential bid. He also worked as the executive director of the Wisconsin Republican Party and political director of the Republican National Committee (RNC). He was the campaign manager of Scott Walker's 2016 presidential campaign.[11][12] Erin Pelton.jpg Erin Pelton: Pelton joined Mercury's New York office in 2014 as a managing director. Prior to her coming to Mercury, she served as director of communications and spokesperson to the United States Mission to the United Nations under Ambassadors Susan Rice and Samantha Power under President Barack Obama's administration. From 2011 to 2012, she was communications director and assistant press secretary at the White House National Security Council. Between 2009 and 2011, Pelton was the spokesperson for the State Department’s Bureau of Near Eastern Affairs.[13][14] Recent news The link below is to the most recent stories in a Google news search for the terms Mercury Public Affairs. These results are automatically generated from Google. Ballotpedia does not curate or endorse these articles. Mercury Public Affairs - Google News See also Brian Jones Rick Wiley Mike DuHaime Roger Salazar Chris Christie presidential campaign, 2016 Scott Walker presidential campaign, 2016 External links Mercury Public Affairs Omnicom Group Footnotes Omnicom, "About Us," accessed July 16, 2015 Mercury, "Kirill Goncharenko," accessed July 16, 2015 Washington Post, "Republican to Lead Fight on Gun Violence," May 4, 2006 Mercury, "Strategies," accessed July 16, 2015 Washington Post, "Exclusive: Chris Christie hires presidential campaign manager and appoints senior staff," July 3, 2015 Politico, "The power players behind Scott Walker's campaign," July 14, 2015 Mercury, "Kieran Mahoney," accessed July 16, 2015 New York Times, "Emily Schell, Brian Jones," July 13, 2003 Black Rock, "Team," accessed June 30, 2015 Mercury, "Mike DuHaime," accessed July 16, 2015 Mercury, "Rick Wiley," accessed July 7, 2015 Politico, "The power players behind Scott Walker's campaign," July 14, 2015 Mercury, "Erin Pelton," accessed July 16, 2015 Politico, "Playbook," June 2, 2014

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Bay area property tax extension 2018D

Dennis Delaneyto me

3 minutes agoDetails

Bay area property tax extension 2018 Mercury public affairs

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12/12

Herr - wal - swatting

Wal y wal - megalomart - mrt - ba b - baise - louisville slugger - raynor elastic hart - walter - principles and agents - gentlemen - mus - ache - paprocki - ipi - tileman - denny has t hurt - mark denzler - I cant make this "stuff"up - wall y wall - walls - wallace - ides - walter - wal land wal - eng - this goes ay back - swimmers - fu - b&b - sauvage - glutamic acid - stim - sleep deprivation - bethesda - chevy chase - bunn - esda - judaism - res - uber - r e bu - albums - wal sparky - wally world - pink floyd - anglophilia - knights - horses - patch - mi - chess - dark side - prism - driftnet - fema horse guy - centaur - acherman - lincoln - vannelope - lol - 33rd - cle - cletus - celletti - stefunny peoria - 182 airlift - kit kit barnum - addiction frame is bogus - they tried that at trial and got laughed out of the room - thats why the judgment was so high - they couldn' just admit to what they have been doing - still wont - I guess

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GalvestonD

Dennis Delaneyto me

1 minute agoDetails

Galveston Gwb puts ila pres o rourke on labor bd Ila pres - obscene calls - threats - fist fights - galv lu is dirty - note also merger of ports - xa ftl moscatiello - suncruz - gotti gambino - and see frank the german - c l & e - shella - herschell - behind the scenes - kid rock

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John cornyn - where is he from where in tx - 2004 links?D

Dennis Delaneyto me

2 minutes agoDetails

John cornyn - where is he from where in tx - 2004 links? Xa galv deps - wal - perry - homicidal threats - arson - wacaser - hou meps - civaff - ports - longies - cleat - hanson - day labor - ed smith - shim - job at the factory - literally at a machine stamping out metal shims - tex mex - trucks - gwb homicidal threats frame - note esp port auth link from spk cleat futbol - spkattys - clute - follow usccb ldrshp - bob has a gavel collection - old friends from chamber - xa bunn - sangamo meters - dials - bunn made top secret stuff - instruments - subs - usn - water heaters - xa zito celnet - ovp - cheney halliburton galv - possible links to atl flightpath - Cornyn was gwb - ag - was tx supreme ct jdg - xa alberto gonzales - arriba - my pediatrician was a dr gonzales - xa kjell is the med soc lobster - ims - xa ama hq is chi - big pharma - team lift - rolex - benne & the jets - af - hvac - operant cond - psyops moved to "civaff"  bush admin did that - xa jpen talon - terr frame - unsubstantiated tip line - swatting - they knew I wasnt a terrorist - trump wants a new cos - like crime stoppers

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See tx22 - galveston - donna - texasNote esp stallone delay - herb henkel - kindred - mu - eric hall - boes - shriners - clown cars - dale patterson - ssc

Cornyn -

12/13

Im going to try to put together a timeline of the legal stuff - things I think might point toward when certain things happened - if there was a legal case -

Ive been trying to do this the right way - I think - everything ive tried hasnt worked - ive got nothing to lose - I may trying to do this the wrong way - just saying - new page re the legal stuff - page is at cringed

12/15

- google drive wont work - about 5 gig is missing from my google drive acct - cant tell what is missing - may have something to do w/ the post at cringed - think what I said is right - natsec - inv - doj - nsa blows up people that are wits - whistleblowers - xa press - will google drive - and flickr - other places

12/16

Pallazollo was rotary us pres - his wife is staab - pallazollo does an ad for some lube place in spfld

Palazzolo - possible op added to oil - farm chem often oil soluble - first responders - palazzolo fam and staab vehicles all get 10 percent off - regardless op added to gas would also show up in the oil filter - it would accumulate if driver used chem often

See esp - 912 - brahler- nudo - parma - ssdi - mhcci - cra - griswold - it could be the oil -

12/17

couldn't get into my google drive yesterday - at a lib in a a differrent town - tried for hours - will use wordpress or flickr if that happens - sites posted this month in addiction to the monthly -

foop - cringed - comeysubpoena - nabors - freedomu - fbuckley - bigfootyou -

the dates the sites were posted are listed with the text of the site - note esp that problems w/ computers happens after freedom site - Somebody is messing w/ my tablet as im trying to use it in the library

12/19 - tried to upload video of hot coffee from 2 libraries this morning - someone is messing w/ the computers - the audio is in the dec2018 file - computer not working at coffee shop this morning either - flickr not working either - somethings up - library a couple days ago not working either -

12/28

Tried to add to the cringe site

Wouldnt work - see at jan2019 - video wouldnt load to google - see at flickr - addiction frame bogus

[kansascityhappenings]

Heavy rains douse California’s deadliest wildfire — but pose new dangers

Watch Video

CHICO, Calif. — The deadliest blaze in California history is nearly contained after firefighters got a little help from the rain. While more rain Friday could mean an end to the two-week fire, it also brings the risks of flooding and mudslides.

Northern California’s Camp Fire, which has killed 84 people, was 95 percent contained as of Friday, according to Cal Fire, the state’s forestry and fire protection agency.

An inch and a half of rain Wednesday all but extinguished the blaze, National Weather Service meteorologist Bill Rasch said.

The rainfall hit the “sweet spot,” Rasch said. “We needed it to come in and rain, and rain not too heavy.”

Water is the solution for the scorched region, extinguishing the flames and clearing smoke from the air. But it also could bring more problems: flooding, mudslides and the flow of debris.

“Rainfall that would normally be absorbed will run off extremely quickly after a wildfire, as burned soil can be as water-repellent as pavement,” the National Weather Service said.

The weather agency has two meteorologists onsite monitoring conditions in the Camp Fire area. Rasch said they are paying close attention to the rate of rainfall, with 2 to 4 inches forecast to hit the upper end of the fire by Friday morning.

More obstacles to recovery

Floods, mudslides and debris flow can be an especially dangerous cocktail following the devastation of a wildfire.

“It makes the ground really unstable for firefighters,” Sacramento fire Capt. Dave Lauchner told KTXL on Thursday. “But we just keep our eyes open, make sure we’re in safe areas and watch out for each other.”

Butte County Sheriff and Coroner Kory Honea told the TV station that his department would continue searching for the missing as long as conditions were not too dangerous.

Rain falls on a home destroyed by the Camp Fire on November 22, 2018 in Paradise, California. Fueled by high winds and low humidity the Camp Fire ripped through the town of Paradise charring over 150,000 acres, killed at least 84 people and has destroyed over 18,000 homes and businesses. The fire is currently at 85 percent containment and hundreds of people still remain missing. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Almost 1 million people in Northern California are under a flash flood watch that remains in effect through Friday morning, CNN meteorologist Haley Brink said.

“If you can look uphill from where you are and see a burnt-out area, you are at risk,” the National Weather Service said.

And the risk of damage is both great and far-reaching. The running debris and floodwater can be powerful enough to destroy culverts, roadways and buildings, the weather service said, even reaching miles away from affected areas.

Rains bring new urgency to flee

About 10 minutes from Paradise, a town devastated by the Camp Fire, evacuees with nowhere else to go have set up a temporary encampment in a Walmart parking lot in Chico.

The camp became a community where volunteers distributed essential supplies.

“Walmart was one of the generous community partners that offered a site for respite and relief. Courageous and compassionate community volunteers came together and built an immediate safe place for many evacuees,” the city of Chico said in a statement.

But as the weather turns, Walmart is encouraging the evacuees to find safer shelter.

“The weather forecast from the National Weather Service showing steady rain continuing through Friday has heightened our existing concerns and increased the urgency to find a more sustainable solution,” company spokeswoman Delia Garcia said.

Walmart and the city offered free bus rides to other available shelters as well as gas gift cards, money and food.

Litigation over the fires

In Southern California, where rain is also expected, the Woolsey Fire reached 100 percent containment on Wednesday.

The fire killed three people and burned nearly 100,000 acres — big enough for the scar to be seen from space via NASA’s Terra satellite.

Three plaintiffs in Ventura and Los Angeles counties have filed a lawsuit against Southern California Edison Co., a supplier of electricity, over the fire.

“Had Southern California Edison Company followed the standard of care in inspecting, maintaining and repairing its overhead lines, properly maintaining its electrical equipment, and trimming away vegetation from its wires as is required by law and industry standards, the catastrophic Woolsey Fire could have been avoided,” Patrick McNicholas, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said in a statement.

The utility declined to comment on the lawsuit, saying Cal Fire and the Ventura County Fire Department are investigating the cause of the fire.

A similar lawsuit on behalf of 22 victims of the Camp Fire was filed last week, alleging the Pacific Gas & Electric Co. was responsible. The company reported an outage on the day the fire began.

In response, PG&E said the exact cause of the fire has not been determined.

from FOX 4 Kansas City WDAF-TV | News, Weather, Sports https://fox4kc.com/2018/11/23/heavy-rains-douse-californias-deadliest-wildfire-but-pose-new-dangers/

from Kansas City Happenings https://kansascityhappenings.wordpress.com/2018/11/24/heavy-rains-douse-californias-deadliest-wildfire-but-pose-new-dangers/

[yahoo-roto-arcade-blog]

Juggernaut Index, No. 27: Another year, another Cleveland QB

Tyrod Taylor opens the season at quarterback for the team Baker Mayfield will eventually lead. (AP Photo/Tony Dejak)

Hue Jackson has gone 1-31 as head coach of the Cleveland Browns, which, to be clear, is considered quite bad. His team ranked last in the NFL in scoring in 2017 and next-to-last the year before. Jackson has had five different starting quarterbacks over his two seasons in Cleveland, including two rookies. All five of those QBs are now gone. If you’re wondering where they went, maybe check the bus under which Jackson keeps throwing his players.

This year, Coach Jackson will be working with the sixth and seventh starting QBs of his Browns tenure, one of whom was the first overall pick in the 2018 draft. Cleveland’s offense has an abundance of talent at the skill spots, so there’s no reason this team shouldn’t make a significant leap. Jackson has used a variety of motivational gimmicks to this point in the offseason, which presumably can’t hurt. But eventually he’s going to have to reverse this team’s recent tradition of never, ever winning football games.

[Yahoo Fantasy Football leagues are open: Sign up now for free!]

For now, Jackson remains in charge in Cleveland. The Browns hired former head coach and longtime offensive coordinator Todd Haley back in January, and it’s expected he’ll have complete control of the offense. The team also traded a third-round pick for veteran QB Tyrod Taylor prior to the draft, so we have a short-term position controversy to deal with as we consider the Browns’ fantasy potential.

There’s no way Baker Mayfield holds a clipboard all season

Taylor zealots are everywhere, and their commitment to him is, to a certain extent, understandable. He’s fine. Over the course of his three seasons as Buffalo’s quarterback, he was good if not spectacular as a passer, completing 62.6 percent of his throws at 7.2 yards per attempt. Taylor was risk-averse to a fault, which naturally led to a low interception rate (1.3 percent). That trait also led him to finish near the bottom of the league last year in deep attempts per game (3.8) and air yards per game (108.1), per Player Profiler. He’s a talented and productive runner (career 5.5 YPC), which boosts his fantasy appeal in no small way. For however long Taylor lasts as Cleveland’s starting quarterback, he’ll have a place in the fantasy conversation.

But here’s the thing: Baker Mayfield is going to play. It would be highly unusual, in this era, for Mayfield to sit beyond mid-season. Fourteen different quarterbacks have been selected first overall in the draft over the past 20 years, and those guys have averaged 10.3 starts per season. Four of the past five have started all 16 games. Mayfield is the future of the position in Cleveland and he’s already 23 years old. He was widely considered one of the most field-ready QB prospects in his draft class. He. Will. Play.

Taylor is an excellent placeholder for the Browns and he’s entering the final year of his deal. It’s already decided that he’ll open the season behind center for Cleveland. But it would be stunning if Mayfield isn’t playing by November. The first time Taylor has an unproductive half for the Browns, the countdown to Baker will begin.

Mayfield produced monstrous stats at Oklahoma, as most of you know, completing over 70 percent of his throws in each of the past two seasons, averaging 318.2 yards per game and an astonishing 11.3 per attempt. It helps of course that he played his games in the Big 12, where tackling is largely unknown. He was often throwing into mile-wide passing windows. But his numbers were simply insane. It’s also worth mentioning that many of the early concerns about Mayfield were erased during the pre-draft process. Scouting reports once listed arm strength in the “weaknesses” column, but he threw with the second best velocity at the combine (60 mph), just a couple ticks behind Josh Allen.

Again, Mayfield is gonna start games for the Browns — and when he does, he’ll let it fly. He has a clear shot at fantasy relevance as a first-year QB, because…

Cleveland’s receiving corps is suddenly legit

Jarvis Landry was one of the big offseason adds for the Browns, and he’s an easy fit in any offense. He had one of the highest target shares among all NFL receivers last season (27.4 percent), yet averaged only 3.1 air yards per chance. He became just the fourth player in league history (and first wide receiver) to catch over 100 passes yet finish with less than 1000 yards. Cleveland may not use him in precisely the same way Miami chose to, but he seems particularly well paired with a short-range passer like Taylor. It would be a small surprise if those two fail to click in the early weeks. Landry’s targets will likely dip this season — he saw 161 last year — but he’s a near-lock to make a leap in terms of efficiency. There’s minimal risk attached at his current ADP (61.4, WR25).

Josh Gordon is looking to recapture that 2013 magic. (AP Photo/Tony Dejak)

You don’t need a fantasy expert to tell you that Josh Gordon is a fantastically talented choose-your-own-adventure of a player. He closed his 2017 season with a 115-yard effort, which is clearly a promising sign. He’s had glowing things to say about Taylor and Mayfield, and the quarterbacks have been plenty excited about him. Everyone loves everybody else in the Browns family right now. Confidence is exceedingly high…

Reporter: “Hey Jarvis, Josh Gordon just told us the Browns have the best receiving corps in the league.”

Jarvis Landry: “He ain’t lying.”

— Zac Jackson (@AkronJackson) June 12, 2018

Gordon has experienced a full, uninterrupted all-football offseason for the first time in forever. That’s a big deal, yet easy to overlook. Gordon is still only 27 years old, gifted with a rare combination of size, speed and explosiveness. He’ll be a restricted free agent in 2019, so he won’t lack motivation. His fantasy ADP doesn’t leave much room for profit (29.8, WR11), but he deserves his status as the first Browns player off the board.

If we assume that a healthy Landry and Gordon will combine for something like 250-270 targets, then it’s going to be tough for supporting players like Corey Coleman and tight end David Njoku to consistently produce. Both can be drafted in fantasy as bench decorations, but neither projects as an ideal starter. Coleman is a burner who’s had trouble staying healthy in his two seasons, appearing in just 19 games. Haley has already put Coleman on notice, expecting things to click in his third year as a pro. Njoku is a hyper-athletic player who’s looking at an uptick in snaps and opportunities after seeing only 60 targets as a rookie. He has all the traits you’d expect from a dominant red-zone weapon, so it’s reasonable to eye him as a deep redraft flier.

Cleveland traded up to land Florida receiver Antonio Callaway in the fourth round of the 2018 draft, and he definitely deserves a spot on dynasty cheat sheets. Callaway’s recent off-the-field history is complicated and problematic, but his raw talent and athleticism are exceptional. He’s a terrific punt returner, too. Callaway could eventually push Coleman for opportunities.

The Browns’ backfield is stuck in committee

Cleveland’s two leading rushers last year were Isaiah Crowell and quarterback DeShone Kizer, and both relocated during in the offseason. Duke Johnson averaged just 5.2 carries per game last season (4.2 YPC), so he wasn’t a significant factor on the ground. Johnson was an extremely productive receiving threat, however, catching a career-high 74 balls for 693 yards on 93 targets. He agreed to a three-year, $15.6 million extension earlier this month, a strong indication that he remains a major piece for this offense. Johnson is a great bet to deliver another 70-plus receptions and 900 or more scrimmage yards. Draft accordingly.

Duke Johnson still belongs in your PPR plans. (Jeff Haynes/AP Images for Panini)

This team added Carlos Hyde to the mix back in March, signing him to deal that looks a lot like Johnson’s, then used an early second round pick on Georgia’s Nick Chubb. So Cleveland’s backfield does not lack weapons. Hyde has had issues with health and availability over the years, though he played all 16 games for San Francisco in 2017. Chubb is a big back who had a stellar collegiate career (6.3 YPC, 48 TDs) and he impressed at the combine (4.52 speed, 38.5-inch vert). The obvious hole in Chubb’s game is his lack of involvement as a receiver; he caught only four passes last year and five the season before.

Ultimately, we can expect a three-man backfield committee in Cleveland, with Johnson having the clearest role. Hyde and Chubb are a fun early-down tandem, but it’s tough to forecast either back for more than 170-180 carries. In reality, this is a deep and talented backfield. For fantasy purposes, it’s messy. Hyde is going well ahead of Chubb in early drafts (ADP 66.1 vs. 90.5), which makes the rookie the better value by far. The intended distribution of carries has not yet been decided, according to Haley:

“I do not really have a philosophy. I have done it both ways. We led the league in rushing in Kansas City [in 2010] in a two-back, almost a two-and-a-half back system. Then in Pittsburgh, obviously, when Le’Veon Bell was playing, he was playing. [Here it] will really be determined by those guys, what they are capable of handling on a down-in, down-out basis and really who gives us the best chance to win. Yet to be determined would be the best answer.”

Sorry, gamers. Johnson is a bankable PPR asset, while Hyde and Chubb are flex-worthy pieces. We probably have to give Taylor at least a five percent chance to lead this team in rushing, which further complicates the Cleveland backfield projection.

The Browns have several interesting names on defense — Kirksey, Collins, Ward, Garrett, et al — and veteran coordinator Gregg Williams is making decisions. We should clearly expect growth from this group, but Cleveland’s D isn’t playable in standard fantasy formats. Last year, this team ranked last in the league in takeaways (13) and next-to-last in points allowed (25.6 PPG).

In a nutshell, this is a team with fun personnel led by a head coach with a brutal track record. It’s tough to do anything but improve after an 0-16 finish, so we have to assume the Browns will be better. The franchise hasn’t won a postseason game since the days of Testaverde and Hoard; let’s hope the Mayfield era is a success.

2017 Offensive Stats & Ranks

Points per game – 14.6 (32rd in NFL) Pass YPG – 201.8 (22) Rush YPG – 107.1 (18) Yards per play – 4.9 (24) Plays per game – 63.0 (16)

Previous Juggernaut Index entries: 32) Buffalo, 31) Miami, 30) NY Jets, 29) Baltimore, 28) Oakland, 27) Cleveland

Follow the Yahoo fantasy football crew on Twitter: Andy Behrens, Dalton Del Don, Brad Evans, Liz Loza, Scott Pianowski and Tank Williams

[investmart007]

WASHINGTON | US to hit Russia with new sanctions for aiding Syria's Assad

New Post has been published on https://goo.gl/8XJdS6

WASHINGTON | US to hit Russia with new sanctions for aiding Syria's Assad

WASHINGTON | April 15, 2018 (AP)(STL.News)President Donald Trump on Sunday defended his use of the phrase “Mission Accomplished” to describe a U.S.-led missile attack on Syria’s chemical weapons program, even as his aides stressed continuing U.S. troop involvement and plans for new economic sanctions against Russia for enabling the government of Bashar Assad.

Stepping up the pressure on Syria’s president, U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley indicated the sanctions to be announced Monday would be aimed at sending a message to Russia, which she said has blocked six attempts by the U.N. Security Council to make it easier to investigate the use of chemical weapons.

“Everyone is going to feel it at this point,” Haley said, warning of consequences for Assad’s foreign allies.

“The international community will not allow chemical weapons to come back into our everyday life,” she said. “The fact he was making this more normal and that Russia was covering this up, all that has got to stop.”

Trump tweeted Sunday that the strike was “perfectly carried out” and that “the only way the Fake News Media could demean was by my use of the term “Mission Accomplished.”” He added that he knew the media would “seize” on the phrase, but said it should be used often. “It is such a great Military term, it should be brought back,” he wrote.

Trump tweeted “Mission Accomplished” on Saturday after U.S., French and British warplanes and ships launched more than 100 missiles nearly unopposed by Syrian air defenses. While he declared success, the Pentagon said the pummeling of three chemical-related facilities left enough others intact to enable the Assad government to use banned weapons against civilians if it chooses.

His choice of words recalled a similar claim associated with President George W. Bush following the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq. Bush addressed sailors aboard a Navy ship in May 2003 alongside a “Mission Accomplished” banner, just weeks before it became apparent that Iraqis had organized an insurgency that would tie down U.S. forces for years.

Later Sunday, Trump sent a letter to congressional leaders informing them in writing of his decision to order the strike. Under the War Powers Resolution, the president must keep Congress informed of such actions.

Haley made clear the United States won’t be pulling troops out of Syria right away, saying U.S. involvement there “is not done.”

Haley said the three U.S. goals for accomplishing its mission are making sure chemical weapons are not used in a way that could harm U.S. national interests, defeating the Islamic State group and having a good vantage point to watch what Iran is doing.

“We’re not going to leave until we know we’ve accomplished those things,” she said.

Haley said the joint military strike “put a heavy blow into their chemical weapons program, setting them back years” and reiterated that if Assad uses poison gas again, “the United States is locked and loaded.”

French President Emmanuel Macron said Sunday that France wants to launch a diplomatic initiative over Syria that would include Western powers, Russia and Turkey. Speaking on French television BFM and online site Mediapart, Macron stressed that the French diplomacy is able to talk with Iran, Russia and Turkey on one side and to the United States on the other side.

He said, “Ten days ago, President Trump wanted to withdraw from Syria. We convinced him to remain.”

Asked about Macron’s comments, White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders stressed that Trump’s plans for the region have not changed. In a statement, she said: “The U.S. mission has not changed — the President has been clear that he wants U.S. forces to come home as quickly as possible.”

The nighttime assault on Syria was carefully limited to minimize civilian casualties and avoid direct conflict with Russia, but confusion arose over the extent to which Washington warned Moscow in advance. The Pentagon said it gave no explicit warning. The U.S. ambassador in Moscow, John Huntsman, said in a video, “Before we took action, the United States communicated with” Russia to “reduce the danger of any Russian or civilian casualties.”

Russia has military forces, including air defenses, in several areas of Syria to support Assad in his long war against anti-government rebels.

Russia and Iran called the use of force by the United States and its French and British allies a “military crime” and “act of aggression.” The U.N. Security Council rejected a Russian resolution calling for condemnation of the “aggression” by the three Western allies.

Assad denies he has used chemical weapons, and the Trump administration has yet to present hard evidence of what it says precipitated the allied missiles attack: a chlorine gas attack on civilians in Douma on April 7. The U.S. says it suspects that sarin gas also was used.

“Good souls will not be humiliated,” Assad tweeted while hundreds of Syrians gathered in Damascus, the capital, where they flashed victory signs and waved flags in scenes of defiance after the early morning barrage.

The strikes “successfully hit every target,” said Dana W. White, the chief Pentagon spokeswoman. The military said there were three targets: the Barzah chemical weapons research and development site in the Damascus area, a chemical weapons storage facility near Homs and a chemical weapons “bunker” a few miles from the second target.

Although officials said the singular target was Assad’s chemical weapons capability, his air force, including helicopters he allegedly has used to drop chemical weapons on civilians, were spared. In a U.S. military action a year ago in response to a sarin gas attack, missiles took out nearly 20 percent of the Syrian air force, the Pentagon said.

The U.S.-led operation won broad Western support. The NATO alliance gave its full backing; NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said the attack was about ensuring that chemical weapons cannot be used with impunity.

In his televised address from the White House on Friday, Trump said the U.S. was prepared to keep up the economic, diplomatic and military pressure on Assad until he ends a pattern of killing his own people with internationally banned chemical weapons.

That did not mean military strikes would continue. In fact, Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said no additional attacks were planned.

Asked about Trump’s “Mission Accomplished” assertion, White said it pointed to the successful targeting of the three Syrian chemical weapons sites. What happens next, she said, is up to Assad and to his Russian and Iranian allies.

Haley appeared on “Fox News Sunday” and CBS’ “Face the Nation.”

___

Associated Press writer Edith M. Lederer at the United Nations contributed to this report.

By HOPE YEN and ROBERT BURNS, By Associated Press – published on STL.News by St. Louis Media, LLC (Z.S)

___

[thrashermaxey]

Ramblings: Connor McHockey Saves Fantasy Teams (March 25)

Connor McDavid is your new NHL scoring leader, thanks to two goals on Saturday. That gives him 38 goals and 96 points on the season. There may be a debate as to who the NHL’s most valuable player is, given how much certain players have had to do with the fortunes of their teams. Hockey’s best player is clearly McDavid, though. He’s 30 points clear of the Oilers’ next-highest scorer. Only Anze Kopitar and Taylor Hall have a larger gap on their respective teams. Could we still not make a Hart Trophy argument for McDavid, even with the Oils missing the playoffs? Think about where they would be without him. Wow.  

Most even-strength points this season:#Oilers Connor McDavid: 77 Nathan MacKinnon: 62 Nikita Kucherov: 61 Anze Kopitar: 60

— Sportsnet Stats (@SNstats) March 25, 2018

This is incredible if you’re an advanced stats kind of person. Maybe not so much in multicategory fantasy leagues, as it also means that McDavid isn’t elite when it comes to power-play points. As in 16 PPP, which is barely inside the top 100. The Oilers’ 14.3 percent power play (dead last in the NHL) might have something to do with that. More on that further down.  

You’ll know that it is no fun if you are facing McDavid in a head-to-head playoff battle right now. That’s the situation I’m in right now, where I am losing by a small margin to a McDavid owner. The guy also owns Nathan MacKinnon, Auston Matthews, and Nico Hischier thanks to last-place (or near-last place) finishes the last several seasons, along with trades for more top draft picks. It’s basically been a five-year rebuild for this team, and it’s just coming to fruition now. So if he can hold off my late-week charge, hats off to him for sticking through the rebuild.

So in that head-to-head match it was his first period McDavid goal, followed by my Jeff Carter assist less than a minute later. Then in the second period his McDavid goal, followed by my Jeff Carter goal just over two minutes later. Life happens quickly.

Speaking of which, Carter has been scoring at a near point-per-game pace (13 points in 15 games) since his return from injury. Carter’s return has also boosted Tanner Pearson, who has five goals and three assists in 12 games this month.

They may not be household names in most fantasy leagues, but Pontus Aberg and Ethan Bear are both receiving first-unit power-play minutes in Edmonton. It’s understandable that they are there for the Oilers, who at this point should be experimenting with anything to ensure next season’s power play is a vast improvement over this season’s. Aberg is a speedy talent who just couldn’t find room on a deep Nashville roster, while the rookie Bear’s shot from the point could prove to be an asset going forward.

By the way, Aberg has seven points (2g-5a) and a plus-5 over his last four games. So there’s some sneaky good value if you’re looking for it.

*

Evander Kane’s fantasy value was falling as the season went on in Buffalo, so his fantasy owners should be relieved with his trade to San Jose. Kane continues to be a great fit for the Sharks, scoring another two goals with 11 penalty minutes on Saturday. That gives him seven goals and 12 points in 12 games with his new team. Kane has also been shooting a ton with the Sharks, averaging over four shots a game since the trade.

Before the trade, things weren’t trending in the right direction for E-Kane with just six points in 23 games over January and February with the Sabres. Even though he had racked up over 200 shots before the trade, Kane had averaged one shot less per game with the Sabres than he is now with the Sharks. It will be interesting to see where Kane lands in the offseason, but his keeper owners have to be pulling for a return to the Bay Area.

Brenden Dillon has been in the NHL long enough that we know that he’s not in the lineup for his offense. But it’s worth mentioning that with a goal and an assist on Saturday, he now has eight points over his last seven games. That puts him at a career high of 20 points. None of those points have been on the power play, so you shouldn’t ever be targeting him in pure points leagues. But he consistently reaches 60+ penalty minutes and 150+ hits, so he might be worth a look in those leagues while he’s hot.

*

The Flames will have to play out the string on a disappointing season without Sean Monahan, their second-leading scorer. So how does Monahan’s absence affect the Flames’ line combinations?

17.63%  EV           GLASS,TANNER – HATHAWAY,GARNET – SHORE,NICK

16.99%  EV           BENNETT,SAM – GAUDREAU,JOHNNY – LAZAR,CURTIS

15.71%  EV           BACKLUND,MIKAEL – BROUWER,TROY – FROLIK,MICHAEL

14.74%  EV           FERLAND,MICHEAL – JANKOWSKI,MARK – STEWART,CHRIS

As expected Sam Bennett moved up to Johnny Gaudreau’s line, while Mikael Backlund moved up to the first-unit power play. It didn’t help either player, as both were held without a point and were minuses (Backlund was a minus-3). Backlund has been without a point in his last nine games, while Bennett is without a point in his last seven games. Not much to see in Calgary, so it’s probably best to move along.

*

In his return to the Senators’ lineup after losing his unborn son, Erik Karlsson recorded an assist in 24:45 of icetime. Karlsson missed two games after the unfortunate news. Given the Senators’ situation, I would have thought Karlsson would decide shut it down instead. There shouldn’t be any precedent when something like this happens, though, as everyone handles grief differently. Jordan Staal missed a similar amount of time after losing his infant daughter, so maybe playing through after a short grieving period can be therapeutic for some. Best wishes to both Karlsson and Staal.

*

Evgeny Kuznetsov returned to the Capitals’ lineup after missing the past week with an upper-body injury, scoring two goals. As we found out with Taylor Hall, streaks aren’t really streaks if they’re interrupted by injury. So to word it correctly, Kuznetsov has recorded multiple points in each of the last four games he has played in. That’s a total of nine points over his last four games.

Nicklas Backstrom recorded four assists on a depleted Habs team. After a stretch of six games without a point during February, Backstrom has been helping your team in March with 15 points (4g-11a) in his last 11 games.

Tom Wilson has reached must-own status in leagues that count penalty minutes. Wilson is second in the NHL with 181 penalty minutes, quite a distance from third-place Antoine Roussel and his 121 penalty minutes (the league leader is Micheal Haley with 203 penalty minutes, but just nine points). With two goals on Saturday, Wilson is up to 13 goals and 33 points, which nearly holds his own scoring-wise in medium-sized leagues.

How high will you rank Carey Price in your fantasy drafts next season? He could potentially be all over the map.  

Stat of the day. Carey Price has given up 4 goals or more in 17 of the 44 games in which he has started. #ouch #FallinForDahlin @smn013

— PJ Stock (@PJStock28) March 25, 2018

*

One more injury return: Marc-Andre Fleury returned earlier than I had expected after taking a shot to his mask earlier in the week. He stopped 29 of 30 shots in what eventually became a shootout loss to the Avalanche.

*

How’s this for a turnaround: Jake Allen has wins in five consecutive games and seven of his last eight games. Sometimes it helps to wait it out, as I had seen Allen banished to the waiver wire in at least one of my leagues. The turnaround was driven at least partially out of necessity, as Carter Hutton has been sidelined since early March, forcing the Blues to turn to Allen.

Compare his splits over the past three months:

January: 0-2-0, 4.93 GAA, .871 SV%

February: 1-5-0, 3.32 GAA, .877 SV%

March: 7-2-0, 2.00 GAA, .927 SV%

You would have struck gold if you picked him up at exactly the right time. I know firsthand that he was a significant reason that my season ended in one head-to-head league as my opponent (he will know who he is if he’s reading, and you may know who he is if you follow my timeline since he’s well-known in fantasy circles) did exactly that.

Allen and the Blues snapped Columbus’ ten-game win streak. No relief to those facing Cam Atkinson in head-to-head playoffs, though. Atkinson scored again, giving him six goals over his last six games. Because he won’t come close to reaching his 35 goals and 62 points from last season, Atkinson should fall a ways in single-season drafts next season. That could make him a great rebound candidate and value pick. Dobber would agree.

Since being acquired by the Blue Jackets, Thomas Vanek has nine points (4g-5a) and a plus-9 in 13 games. Playing for his 17th and 18th NHL teams this season (okay, I’m slightly exaggerating), Vanek has quietly put together another 20-goal and 50-point season. That’s inexpensive production, as he’s only 15 percent owned in Yahoo leagues.

*

After a stretch of 13 games without a goal, William Nylander has scored three goals in his last four games. A considerable portion of that slump was without Auston Matthews in the lineup, so any future Matthews injuries should be viewed as a resulting hit to Nylander’s value.

Here’s a nice goal that involved the two young Leafs.

{youtube}OajAQAY56To{/youtube}

*

It’s all or nothing with Jimmy Vesey in March. From mid-February to mid-March, Vesey recorded just one point in 13 games. Then on March 12 he posted a hat trick. Then four more games without a point. Then Saturday when he scored two goals and added an assist. Among players who have at least 17 goals (which Vesey has), only Michael Grabner has fewer assists than Vesey’s eight assists. But with a minus-22, 16 penalty minutes, and just one power-play point, Vesey isn’t going to help your team beyond the goal department.

*

The Coyotes had a 2-0 lead on the Panthers after two periods. Then Vincent Trocheck took over, scoring two goals and adding an assist. Trocheck continues to get better and better, as he has now reached 30 goals and is on the verge of reaching 70 points. Trocheck does so much for his real-life team with over 21 minutes of icetime per game, which is top 5 among forwards. He has also been providing for his fantasy teams, as he is a near top-10 option in shots on goal and a top-20 option in power-play points. He won’t come nearly as cheap in fantasy drafts next season, as his average draft position was 168 in Yahoo leagues – yes, that's correct!

*

For more fantasy hockey information, you can follow me on Twitter @Ian_Gooding.

from All About Sports https://dobberhockey.com/hockey-rambling/ramblings-connor-mchockey-saves-fantasy-teams-march-25/

[ts-crossroads]

Episode Five - “All In The Spirit of the Game” - Johnny

And the resume has begun. I’m glad I can start to get some moves out of the way earlier so I don’t have to to balls to the wall at merge to prove I’m a player. I’d rather make big moves before merge, make people trust me, and then play a game behind the scenes at merge. I don’t wanna be the big guy at merge trying to make moves to have a shot to win. If I get some big moves done now I can lay low at merge. So let me just be cocky for a second. I take FULL credit for that Bran blindside. Johnny and John were voting Brandon. They didn’t wanna ruin trust with Ryan but I just kept throwing more seeds out there and it fucking worked. You know. I didn’t think this day could get better... but it did my friend. It so, so did. Ryan comes to me and blows Johnny and johns game up. Suddenly I now have so much idol info. John has an idol half, Johnny has an idol. Ryan even told me he’s got a half!! I ended up telling Ryan about my half. I figured he told me all this info. I had to tell him something. I gotta keep this dude close cause he’s my key to an idol. He told me I can have his half when we wanna combine it. My next move is to split votes and blindside John or Johnny. That is the best case scenario. Man I feel at the top of the world. I hope Ned and Dane are doing good. I really wanna reunite with those guys soon. If we can get me ned Dane autumn Haley Brandon and Ryan as a strong 7 we can very easily run the merge. Man I’m playing too far ahead but how can I not? Everything is falling into place. And last night I thought I was doomed if Brandon went home. Suddenly everything has changed. I feel like a king.

I'm kinda annoyed. Woohoo tribal went to plan, but the first fucking second Haley gets onto this tribe one of Stoner, Autumn or BDC were telling her that I saying all these negative things about her. Because I was telling people Haley was very OTT and caused paranoia on our tribe, essentially telling the truth, but also REALLY trying to convince people that the Fatum four wouldn’t be an issue if Ryan, John and I survived tribal council. So then I went to her about it, and I told her the biggest reasons I did it were because I didn't want anyone to suspect that we were close, and I also wanted to mask any thoughts on the fatum four to keep John, Ryan and I safe,, and she was like “I don’t believe what these people are saying because I know how close we are, and it’s just their attempt to swing my vote." And I was like SUREEEEEEEEEEEE...... She should definitely trust me because now i'm 100% sticking Fatum strong, and I am not backing down, because whoever did this really pissed me off, and I'm going to get to the bottom of it and make sure that person goes home! You won't like me when I'm ANGRY!!!!! I really trusted those three too, so it annoys me to see one of those three just jump at the opportunity to throw me under the bus.   I think it may have been Stoner, which would really piss me off to the core because I trust him more than I trust most people, even including some on my tribe. Honestly, stoner gives me a BIG manipulator vibe. Like a BIG one Because he's really good at building those relationships with people and people not realizing he's got that bind with everyone. He's come in 2nd 1st and 12th due to an idol play ffs, so he's clearly good at Tumblr Survivors, and I'm looking out for it AGAIN this time around, because I'm starting to really not trust him, and if I can manage to blindside Stoner if we lose another one, that'd be HUGE for my game. Also, John told me all of this Haley nonsense was going down so big shoutout to my man John. John also said that Bran, after tribal council, swore up down left and right that he never wanted something with Ryan, Stoner and Autumn, which is most likely Stoner making up another lie, and that being the reason we kept BDC over Bran. I get the feel that Stoner would do nearly anything to stay in the game, so I'm just going to continue to talk to him like he's got my trust more than anyone else's, but if we lose another tribal, I might wanna see his snake ass out the door

Ok. So I really don’t wanna lose this immunity challenge. The imperium majority of 4-3 is planning on sticking together but I really don’t wanna vote out Jake, rebecka, or Julia. I was thinking maybe Julia if it came down to it, but I’ve gotten closer to her now and wouldn’t want to see her go. Ugh. Hopefully I can just pull out a win in Simon.

I feel there are so many things to talk about since we've left off, and I've been thinking about so many of them since tribal ended, and I may or may not have forgotten if I made a confessional. Oh well... I'm just getting really over this, and this may be the most pessimistic attitude ever seen in a tumblr survivor ever, but this has really been ruining my night to the core. I have been to THREE tribal councils in a row, and the second the challenge got announced, I got really excited because it's about will power and getting good at challenges, improving your scores, and beating the other tribe in a head to head matchup, but of course, my tribe proceeds with the following: "I've never really played any of these games :/" "Sooooo just so you know ... I am known for getting the worst score in every challenge in my first season. Every challenge was a flash game So this won’t be good for me" "I’ll do whatever y’all want . I’m not the best at flash games" "I'm not great at flash games either. Tetris is my worst" This is from FOUR of the other SIX of my tribe members, to where Ryan is really trying, because he's a comp beast, but of course the rest of my tribe has pretty much thrown in the towel or they think that someone is going to carry them to this victory.. AND THEN OF COURSE in my state of depression of inevitably going to my fourth tribal council in a row, I tried to delegate to everyone what they should do for the challenge, but now this might put a target on my back, and they won't even try anyways, so what's the fucking point? Now here's the absolute worst thing that I am going to say tonight... I just KNOW that if this tribe continues to lose challenges, we're going to vote out BDC, and then probably Autumn, and then if we lose again it might have to be Stoner, and then guess what happens? The Fatum Four make merge woohoo, but we're the obvious targets. We're likely just going to get picked off like old school survivor, like a good ol' pagonging, and I'm about to get fucked. I don't really know what to do, and I'm sure I'll figure out something, but everything since this break has ended has really killed my mentality, and I'm not happy about it. I am fully prepared to lose this challenge, for a fourth straight loss, and then I'm going to have to vote out someone I don't wanna vote out, but whatever. It's all in the spirit of the game. *rolls eyes*

So i told autumn about my half idol. Merge is looming so I need people to know they can trust me going into merge. If it puts a target on my back so be it but I think I can trust Autumn. Ryan also knows about my half but I know about his half as well. I trust Ryan has my back, he seems genuine with me. I really wanna merge. I’ve merged every time I played and I don’t wanna stop now. I think I’m in a good spot. I seem to be good with the johnnies as well with my core 4 (autumn, Haley, brandon) with Ryan as a potential 5th. I am hoping a 3-2-2 split so we can avoid idols.

In the midst of me being all depressed and whatnot of our tribe losing, and knowing we're going to tribal, i get this: On 12/27/17, at 3:30 PM, Owen (Crossroads Host) . wrote: > You have been selected to receive this round's reward!! Here is your reward offer: you can choose to gamble an ANONYMOUS disadvantage to your flash game score, in order to receive a personal reward. If you choose to take the personal reward, your flash game score will be reduced by either 10, 15, 25, or 50 percent - this will be generated randomly. You must submit this decision by the time your score is due (10 PM EST), and you may NOT share this information with ANYONE. It will not be revealed that you have taken a disadvantage, it will just adjust the score shown. So what do I do? I obviously take it! I don't give a fucking shit anymore about this tribal stuff. If the people on the bottom don't want to try, then I'll gladly take a tribe disadvantage to make sure I can get an advantage for me and my alliance members. I would love for a vote steal or something like that.. idk, I'd just be excited with anything at this point. I've got an idol, and a resting idol, and now this, and I know Ryan has a full idol now too, so there are plenty of good things going on right now, but some secrets have to stay with me, so this is good. I should start making a chart with all the information I have saved in my brain because i'm starting to lose all of it LMAO

So I'm just shopping at Target and drinking my Smoothie King when I see a notification from Owen: "You have been selected to receive this round's reward!! Here is your reward offer: you can choose to gamble an ANONYMOUS disadvantage to your flash game score, in order to receive a personal reward. If you choose to take the personal reward, your flash game score will be reduced by either 10, 15, 25, or 50 percent - this will be generated randomly. You must submit this decision by the time your score is due (10 PM EST), and you may NOT share this information with ANYONE. It will not be revealed that you have taken a disadvantage, it will just adjust the score shown." Since I'm already a Tetris god (literally all I did in high school was play Tetris), I think I can risk having my score lowered. Most people wouldn't risk their already rocky connections on a swapped tribe for an unknown personal advantage. https://i.redd.it/ejeax09ea4vy.gif However, I've already TOLD my tribe my highest score- and I won't be home to try to raise it. In addition, nowhere in the message does it say that I am the ONLY person to receive the reward. For all I know, everyone has been given this same temptation, and if I take it, they won't trust me anymore. I think what I'll do is accept the offer, but use the challenge advantage I have stuffed in my back pocket to try and offset the disadvantage's effects. Hopefully this works out well.

I’m so happy we won whew but I’m also very nervous bc I STILL haven’t been to tribal yet (along with 5 other castaways-the original impala tribe members) therefore I’m not standing out whatsoever and I’ve had no chance to strategize or make moves. A FTC speech from me rn would not sound too impressive. I can’t believe we are at final 15 (?) though, that’s insane. Hopefully the other tribe having tribal gives me some time to relax. The break in this game literally ended after I started my Christmas vacation. I won’t be at my house (aka somewhere with access to WiFi) until January 3rd. That’s an entire week from now, so unless I can be excused or given opportunities for mobile play, I’m screwed on a personal level and I’d be putting my tribe at a disadvantage. I feel like I’m not contributing as much to my tribe as the other castaways, but I’m so busy! A few challenges ago, with the scavenger hunt, I sat out. And then this challenge, I was the lowest wager on our entire tribe, betting 1 point. The other tribe put their highest wager of 7 on flappy bird (my only mobile option) and gained 8 points for their tribe. It didn’t do anything, since we still won the overall comp 41 to 15, but still, I hate that me and Jake were the only ones not earning points for our tribe. I don’t know if the rest of the castaways look at me like that. And it’s a tricky time period in the game, because if they do, it could make them think in 2 different ways. The first would be negatively, because if we want our tribe to be strong and win, we don’t want someone bringing down the win streak, or the second being positive, because I won’t be a challenge threat when it comes to individual immunities post merge. Hopefully (if I’m still here by then) I can turn things around on them and show them I’m here to compete, but for now, I have to do the best I can with the resources I have. I also am excited about this coin advantage I received! I’m excited to see what it is. I hope it’s something big like a half idol, bc I’m pretty sure ned has the other half (?) I can’t actually remember. I hope the other tribe votes off an impala member. I know that sounds awful and I have been going back and forth for a while on it, but getting down to the end, I can’t be compared to 5 players with the same pre merge game, it’s not impressive to a jury. Between Chris and autumn, I’m torn. I have no relationship with autumn so her leaving would not hurt me at all. BUT even though I’m close with Chris and semi trust him, I know he has won and he has been playing hard this game. It’s tough, which I guess is why I’m glad Fatum is choosing it and not me. But if fatum doesn’t choose one of them, it’s their own faults if impala sweeps through merge and dominates the rest of the game. I still can’t believe all of us are here. And they have only had a few opportunities to get rid of us, but with how powerful we are, I’m really surprised they haven’t taken any chance they could. “They” being fatum members who were not original impala. I don’t know what Julia, rebecka, or Jake would do, but I really don’t think they would turn on each other. Not without a fight at least. 

Tag urself I'm me accepting a reward getting a disadvantage on my score that no one knew about and still winning it hehehehe my reward was a coin idk what that means this game is a doozy I don't have any allies I'm literally just here for the ride I guess wow 

BDC[12/27/2017 11:16:33 PM] BDC: I’m about to either make a big move [12/27/2017 11:16:38 PM] BDC: Or get myself voted out [12/27/2017 11:16:48 PM] BDC: We shall see [12/27/2017 11:20:07 PM] Owen (Crossroads Host): :O [12/27/2017 11:20:08 PM] Owen (Crossroads Host): what is it [12/27/2017 11:20:31 PM] BDC: Well first I just need  to talk to Ryan [12/27/2017 11:20:44 PM] BDC: And see if we can mend things [12/27/2017 11:21:34 PM] BDC: If we can, I know Ryan Johnny and Coffey are close [12/27/2017 11:21:43 PM] BDC: I wanna blindside stoner [12/27/2017 11:21:52 PM] BDC: For fun [12/27/2017 11:22:06 PM] BDC: And that og tribe hasn’t lost anyone [12/27/2017 11:22:19 PM] BDC: Like him or autumn has to go [12/27/2017 11:22:45 PM] BDC: John and Johnny saved me last round so maybe if I save them this round it’ll be even [12/28/2017 12:19:14 AM] BDC: I lied [12/28/2017 12:19:17 AM] BDC: Fuck Johnny 

I.... feel like I do so much acting on this tribe and play all sides. The guys are cool or whatever but at the end of the day I just want to go survive and see my original alliance aka Mystery Inc be reunited. Am I crazy about Chris' split vote plan? Meh cause the last split vote I did wreckt my game #athenahimalayas Do I care about saving Brandon? Not as much as I care about staying alive myself. Am I here for blindsiding John and Johnny? Not really but my loyalty is already spoken for I keep telling myself that I'm protecting me, Ned, and Chris rather than ruining other people's games. I'm a savage with a heart so I'm not exactly tribal material because I get caught up in mercy and pleas but also strategy and big moves. I actually have better relationships with John and Johnny than I do with Ryan and Haley BUT I don't see a future with John and Johnny. I think we've done all we can for each other and I believe me, Brandon, and Chris are preparing to go the distance. Chris is coming up with plans while Brandon actively secures relationships w/ Haley and Ryan so that the 5 of us can work together. Meanwhile John and Johnny are just asking me a bunch of leading questions. I JUST WANNA TALK TO NED AND BE BACK ON IMPERIUM!! FATUM ONLY KNOWS HOW TO FLOP AND THATS NOT APART OF MY BRAND BUT IM STUCK HERE http://media0.giphy.com/media/D3ggX9iWqOHza/giphy.gif

*Skips to another idol search* Owen: Johnny, would you like to insert a coin? Johnny: Hold on lemme ask my consultant. *Johnny runs to Andrew bae* Johnny: Hey Andrew, I have this coin that I got from a random person one hour ago, and now Owen wants me to insert a coin into a dead arcade machine to either get a prize or punishment. I have a 1/10 chance of getting a half an idol, but it's made public, or you get a a challenge advantage/disadvantage, blah blah blah, should I take it? Andrew: Meh. You can only play in a main so many times, so ya might as well. Worst thing that happens is you find a half an idol and they announce it publicly *Johnny inserts coin, gets half an idol, Owen announces it publicly* VDFJKLSNVJKLSNDFJKLNSVDJKLNFJKLNVJKLSVDNSNDFJKLVNSJKLDFNKJLVSFDSNVJKDFNSJKLVNSDFJLKNVSJKLDNVJKLNSDJKLFNVJKLSNDFJ WELP! I've got another half of an idol, and boy oh boy I wish people didn't know about this one. Here's my big dilemma here. Haley has previously given me a half an idol to form a whole one, so i feel I'm the biggest asshat in the world if I don't give her this one, but at the same time, I'm still sitting on this egg, where if I survive another two tribal councils, then something is going to pop out, which can be a good thing for me, and I'm really NOT trying to give that up, especially if the thing that pops out is a half an idol, because I would love to have two. It'd be a Survivor Dream come true, but I also don't wanna get too carried away. I think if Haley brought it up, I'd end up giving it to her out of .... y'know, not committing Survivor Suicide and pissing off an ally, plus I think this thing I'm sitting on in this egg is an advantage like a special idol, and it may not even be a half an idol, who knows? But I still wanna play every situation the best I can, so time will tell how this all pans out. I'm sure i'll write more neurotic confessionals about idols as time goes on until I find out what's in this STUPID egg! All for now! TA TA TA from Johnny xoxoxox 

DAMN! I have a lot to say.  I will start with last round because I got too busy to submit a legit confessional.  So I came into this new tribe completely frazzled and on the bottom.  I had Bran from my OG tribe who never spoke, Coffey who I voted out of a game like 3 years ago, and Ryan who I also voted out of a game and put up for nomination a couple rounds prior. So to put it nicely...I felt FUCKED!   But luckily my angel is on this new tribe.  Chris is my savior.  We had exchanged snapchats back during round one and he was the person I had talked to most that round.  So I put my entire game in his hands.  He definitely took control of the round and made sure he had Autumn, Coffey, and Johnny on our side.  This was easy because Bran came off CRAZY from the get-go. He was trying to pit everyone against me the entire round without even getting to know anyone first - which comes off as shady.  I, on the other hand, just got to know everyone on a personal level so when it came down to the vote, they WANTED to keep me over Bran.   I may have taken a back seat in this new tribe in the strategic aspect but I definitely did not stop my social game.   When the votes came out, the plan all worked out and Bran was vote out.  At the same time, Johnny and Coffey voted Bran and lied to Ryan all round which fractured that relationship.  I made sure to message both Coffey and Johnny directly after the vote to literally bow down to them and thank them for saving me.  I pretty much told them that I owed them my life. 

MERRY CHRISTMAS BITCHEZ! What an eventful holiday.  The entire family came together for a Christmas feast.  Obviously, the feast was nothing but dramatic.   Sitting at the head of the table was Chris because he thinks he's the old, wise father who can survive anything.  He is the most respected member of the family and literally everyone goes to him with advice and ideas. Next down the line was Autumn.  She is the only daughter to Chris and his prized possession.  She will do anything for her father and does not like when anyone talks bad about him.  She is definitely a daddy's little girl.  She is also a charmer; she is the sweetest girl you will find in the neighborhood. Next to her was me, Brandon.  I am the husband to Autumn and the son-in-law to Chris.  I managed to pick up Autumn when I moved into the neighborhood and it was love at first sight.  I also became fast friends with her father.  However, I am greedy and Chris is quite rich so I am pretty envious of his position at the head of the table.  There is nowhere I would rather be. Sitting right beside Chris on the other side of the table was Ryan.  He is Chris' youngest son and Autumn's brother.  He left home right after high school and never turned back.  He loves his family but he separated himself from them.  During the holidays, he tries to make mends which usually lasts for a month tops after the new year.   Right beside Ryan was his new girlfriend Haley.  This was Haley's first time meeting the family and she made quite the positive impression.  The entire family loves her almost as much as Ryan does.  However, not the entire family is quite as loving and accepting. Next to Haley was Johnny.  He is the first of the twins and he doesn't really get along with the family.  He tries to keep things on the down low by lying about his issues but they run very deep.  He had a flask in his pocket throughout the day so he could drink away his problems.  He stole money from Chris and tried to get Autumn and me divorced last year.  The family doesn't like him very much...they tolerate him. Finally, at the far end of the table was John, the other twin.  He is the nicer of the twins.  He tends to keep to himself and not really take sides.  However, everyone knows he will fall on the sword for his twin brother. ~~~~SECRET SANTA~~~~ Following Christmas dinner, the family headed outside to compete in the 66th annual neighborhood Christmas games.  We all tried to come up with our best strategies but we lost to the rich family next door.  (They win every year). So right after the loss, we all headed inside to do Secret Santa.  It was quite the tradition.  It was also quite shady because not everyone got something.  First was Chris.  He was given a disadvantage in the upcoming family game night.  Haley then received a huge advantage granting her half safety.  I received two disadvantages.  Finally, Johnny received half safety. ~~~~GAME NIGHT~~~~ In preparation for family game night, the family began to strategize (things got serious at game night).  Tired of the twins' antics, the entire family decided to put aside their issues to turn on the twins.  However, afraid of the advantage, we decided to make it look like nothing was wrong and that everyone was actually targeting the two new family members.  If everything works out the way they should then Chris, Ryan, and Haley will side together, myself and Autumn will side together and one of the twins will be the loser of Game Night. BDCFor real though, I have worked very hard this round to set myself up in a better spot.  I am the only one left from my tribe on this new tribe now that Bran is gone which puts me as an easy target. The second we lost, I messaged Chris and told him that we should create a chat with Autumn as the core three of the tribe.  I want Chris to continue to believe that I am his slave in this game.  I am the Natalie to his Russell.  He will not see me as a threat as long as I bow down to him.  At the same time, I made sure to message Haley and Autumn about their days.  I want to continue to work my personal connections with the girls so they trust me and like me.  The biggest news of the night though is that me and Ryan called and hashed everything out.   We agreed to put the past behind us and actually work together to get out the two people who are playing the game way too hard and being way too shady - Coffey and Johnny.  They saved me last round, but now they are after me for some dumb reason...don't come for me!!! So if everything works out the way I want it to, the votes will be split between the two Johns and one of them will be gone.  I am personally hoping to see Johnny leave because he is ~SHADY~.   As far as the game is concerned, I think I am setting myself up to be in a pretty okay position come merge.  I am probably perceived from the other tribe as being on the bottom because I am the only one left from my OG tribe.  I am perceived as having absolutely no power because of my strategy of bowing down to everyone's feet.  Plus everyone thinks me and Ryan hate each other so now that we are semi working together, that will help both of us make it further. I am hoping I can at least make merge at this point because I have tried really hard to solidify my relationships which will definitely come in handy at that point.  Hoping for the best, expecting the worst - like always!

I’m still shook that I haven’t gone to one tribal this season. Like. Whoa. But it also sucks a little cuz I’m not going to have as firm as a grasp on who is loyal to me and who isn’t come merge. But still. Being safe is pretty nice. 

I'm getting really nervous for tribal. No one is giving me straight answers. Stoner and Autumn said they wanted to vote for BDC way too quickly for  my liking. Haley has BARELY spoken to me since she's gotten back on this tribe, and Ryan hasn't spoken to me period since tribal council. I think I'm just going to tell Haley i'm giving her the half an idol I got last night, but waiting until after tribal, just in case, because I have no idea what's going to happen, and maybe if something is happening, she'll be more inclined to keep me because I haven't given it to her yet, and then if I make it past this tribal I think I'm going to give it to her. Tbh, she's the reason I have a full one in the first place, so it's only right of me to give her one too. I just wanna survive this round so bad because I'm feeling paranoid, and getting that sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach i don't like getting in games premerge, but it's happening. oh well. only time will tell

STOP JOHNNY STOP!! YOU'RE BEING SO STUPID! Idk why I'm being so paranoid because like ..... this tribe is so easy. No one is going to do something that RASH this early in the game, and now I'm just getting the CRAZY PERSON EDGIC VNDFJKSLNVJKLDSFNJVKLSNDFJKLVNSJDKLFNVJKLSNDFJKLNVSJKLDNFJKLNSVDJKLNFJKLSNDVJLKNSDFJLKNVSLJKDFNVJKLSNDFJKLNVSDJKLNFVJL It's cool. i'm breathing again. After talking to BDC, he said it seems clear that him and Ryan are going to be targeting each other for their final showdown, and i'm ready for it. I just have this vision of me at tribal council, and then a Johnny pops up on a parchment, and I'm going to go home and cry, and I don't like crying, so I'm preventing that from being a possibility. We'll see. I just need to sit here and just wait and let people run around to figure out if it's BDC or Ryan. I'm hoping this is all truth and honesty right now. I don't see this many people turning on me this quick for no reason, and now that I have an idol CONGRATULATIONS OWEN YOU'LL BE GETTING THESE KINDS OF CONFESSIONALS FOR THE REST OF THE GAME

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=heew_FCZGLU

So, after last tribal Bran and I were blindsided with Bran leaving 5-2. Leaving me on the outs. So I go to Stoner and tell him everything I know. That the John's are using Haley, that they have 1.5 idols, that they were so messy on the last tribe we were on. I call Haley, we talk the second she came back. She literally told me Johnny PMd her while we were on call that "it's okay Ryan's not around right now" when I was around all day and night! It took a day for Coffey to PM me and two days (on Christmas dinner) for Johnny to PM me. So fuck them. I call with BDC tell them that they're targeting him, and it works since they're not actively talking to BDC anymore. Coffey gives me his idol half which lol I'm still going to fuck you over. So Haley/Stoner/BDC/me/Autumn and I decide to form a 5 person alliance to get Johnny and his idol the fuck out of here. It's probably not the best move for merge coming back I've felt so empty this game, like I already won and recently and I can't put so much effort into this game... but now I found my motivation, which is revenge. Love you as a friend Johnny but you don't fuck with me and I don't follow anyone.

my tribe won again twirls nothing much has happened really no game talk since we haven’t lost yet so um goes back to playing my switch 

i got half an idol in my pussyyyyyy @cole 

Well this round I definitely felt like I was going to be at the bottom coming back since I didn't really have my tribes trust. Turns out that I'm actually in the numbers and Johnny is so fake he thought this would be an easy vote this round but he's at the bottom. I'm just happy to have the fab 5 which is stoner, Ryan, bdc, and Autumn.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=N2Kr9Qmhe3Q

It’s a FAN-FUCKING-TASTIC feeling to have a hidden immunity idol in possession. I have my safety net. Even better, Johnny gave Haley his idol half to earn trust... we’re one half away from a SECOND idol. Ned had his half from before swap so I could very bring these two halves together, and then I’ll know where another idol is. The plan is for Ryan, Haley, and myself to vote Johnny. If an idol is played, we have Autumn and Brandon voting John. It’s foolproof IF no one flips. And the only person who would possibly flip is Ryan and I quite frankly don’t see that happening. Unless  he’s playing me but I just don’t see it happening. He’s leaked so much info to me since last round. If by chance John and Johnny both play an idol, they should be voting Brandon... so I’m safe either way :)

Based on the abundance of people looking in the storybook this round, I think it's pretty clear that the "personal reward" was just a coin. I ended up not taking the temptation, because I quickly realized that it was offered to everyone, and I didn't want to look sketchy or avoid losing immunity. Regardless, I already had a coin, and I ultimately decided not to use it because I don't want to put a target on my back by accidentally rolling a public advantage. Seriously, the second Owen started screaming "HALEY HAS A HALF IDOL" and "BRANDON HAS A CHALLENGE ADVANTAGE" my brain just went: https://media.giphy.com/media/DdQJi7npuyvPW/giphy.gif Sam and I have also gone back and forth recently talking about how much we love each other. I really do think we have a lot in common and I think she's an amazing person. It's just... the only other time she's ever said such nice things to me, she backstabbed me that day. I'll keep her handy as a possible side ally, but unfortunately, there's literally nothing she can do to make me trust her again. I guess we'll keep up this fake front of "You're my best friend!!" until one of us blindsides the other, and I just have to make sure I'm the one who strikes first. http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-aTZsB3eg8_g/TnZgu37177I/AAAAAAAAAwQ/XfuJAgWQmOU/s1600/staceysurvivorsleep.gif Right now, my goal is just to win out until the merge and really start playing hard once that happens. Even then, not doing anything until the merge and riding to the end in a solid onion alliance probably won't net me the win, so I need to risk it for the biscuit and make sure I'm the one calling the shots.

WHY DOES THIS TRIBE SUCK. Why is fatum cursed. What did we ever do to DESERVE THIS?! Last round Johnny and I blindsided Ryan and I knew I would have some damage to fix. I talked to Ryan the next day and he was very upset that he was the only one to do what he said he was going to. I sent my half idol to him in order to let him know just because I voted against him then didn't mean I was against him. Haley came back, which is exciting yet scary. Idk what she's going to do or if I can fully trust her again yet. I got on call with her and she said people have been telling her johnny was going around calling her crazy. I am also a bit guilty of that because I told people about the nicole vote. I'm just hoping people aren't going to sway her because she could be easily swayed by someone like chris. We lost by a landslide and this vote is looking like it's Brandon vs ryan. Frankly I am terrified. Stoner says he is going to vote for Brandon but I'm terrified that haley might flip or Brandon could play an idol. This seems too easy. I'm hoping all goes our way tonight 

Well fuck this, I'm out. I saw this coming and just didn't play my idol, and I'm sure they were all SHAKING in their boots because of it too. The cast was boring as fuck, none of them are people I think I wanna be friends with after the game, except for John. Thanks for having me. Ryan is an overemotional cunt who needs to get outside and stop playing games. I play a game every three months and now I think it's safe to say I have very few left in me, and I'm glad this game happened to give me that closure.

So Bran got voted out and I’m so conflicted. On one hand I’m really sad because Bran was going to be loyal to me as being a fellow hunty of his, but on the other hand I’m glad he’s gone so now I can be more of a free agent. The only thing holding me back from being completely free is Ryan. He’s a huge competition threat and if people don’t get him out he will steam roll the merge. Also side note on this tribal: I have yet to converse with Brandon but I already know I don’t want to. His fucking introduction into the game was extra, his voting confessionals are extra, he is so extra and not even in the cute way. He uses “💁🏻‍♂️“ unironically and I want to throw up, our arsenic into it, and eat my throw up just thinking about it. ANYWAYS!  I’m immune again and honestly I’m getting really bored. Invite just tapping my feet doing challenges and waiting for the merge where I can finally socialize and strategize and fuck up my game like usual. I think I’m considered one of tumblr survivors worst players but this season I’m here to prove to myself and everyone else that I will play a game that will get me the win, it may not be flashy flip-floppy ways like the old days, but I will win.

[lettersforyoulettersforme]

When You Talk about Everything From Power Plays to Engagement...

Stephen and I were talking about marriage last night. Ha because I brought it up. It’s something we talk about sometimes and I had been with (old) Sophie earlier that day. She and I were discussing it in the context of our own respective relationships. She and Ben don’t talk about it very much- she doesn’t quite feel ready.

It’s interesting to accept that I do, in fact, feel ready. Not only that, but I want to get married to Stephen. I’m not jumping into anything too quickly, but I just feel ready. Does that mean I’m like a fully formed adult? I don’t know. I don’t really know anyone else my age in my position, so I feel like I don’t have anyone to really ask about this. So I’m just going with my gut.

When Stephen and I were talking about it last night, we both acknowledged how we were falling into semi stereotypical roles. Stephen, the “guy,” who was “not quite ready” with “things to accomplish first.” Me, the “girl,” who is “pushing him for answers ever so slightly” and who “feels that marriage isn’t a death sentence or the same thing as having a kid, meaning that it wouldn’t put your life on hold.”

But then it got me thinking about the technical aspects of marriage, aspects that are often glossed over and ones that I don’t really think about. Ever. Like WHERE would it be? And who would come? And who would pay for it? Or how would WE pay for it? And since our lives and our friends are so geographically distant, how could we get everyone in one place for one day? How many people would come?

I told Stephen that I would split the cost of the ring with him. Hmmmm maybe I just want a new piece of jewerly and a slew of parties. Maybe I just want to be more the center of everyone’s attention? That’s true, I will not for even more breath deny that. BUT (big but here), it’s much more than that. I do want to celebrate my relationship with my family and celebrate with my friends and be close and happy. But I would just be happy marrying him tomorrow. It wouldn’t be what I was picturing, but I do think that I would be happy. In a lot of ways, I already feel married to Stephen. I feel domesticated (though, let’s be honest, I was never THAT wild). I feel great about my relationship. I feel like my whole life, in fact, is in a good, strong place. I feel comfortable where my friendships are, where my school and then professional life will be/ currently are, and hey, I’m getting my driver’s license (hopefully) soon. So this whole life thing is coming somewhat full circle. I guess that I just feel happy and it’s not a new feeling and it’s a feeling that should be celebrated. Sure, sad and annoying things have happened to me, but I feel like I’ve been able to work past them. Which, on a slightly unrelated note, makes me think of Christiana. We are so similiar in so many ways (What’s up Saint James? Hi NYU). She’s even said “Our lives have been running parallel for so long.” And that WAS true, but it’s not true anymore. It just makes me think about nature versus nurture and other things of that ilk- like.. Why, despite all of the odds, is Christiana still depressed? She had the “right” upbringing, her parents give her so much (I’m just leaving Tess out of this equation because she’s another can of worms), she was cum laude-- which at the time, felt like everything, she graduated with Honors- which at the time, felt like everything (here’s looking at you, Snee), but she isn’t in a good place.  I don’t mean to compare, I feel like I’m coming from a place of concern. I hate that she isn’t more of where she thought she would be. She will say things like “I hate that I’m not where I thought I would be. But I’m working to accept that.” Its hard to not disagree with her. I dont want to whole heartedly agree, I want to support her and use that strengths based perspective we’re always talking about in school. But I wonder if the sugar coating is sheltering her further and kind of damaging her even more? Hoensty is important, but I don’t want to crush her by agreeing with the negative voice in her head. I think it just depends on the day/ hour with her and it’s been something that’s been tough over the later year of our friendship. It’s tough to know HOW to be there for someone who can’t pick themselves up. Shouldering her and her mania and her depression (not that I did it alone) was exhausting. Even that fraction that I shouldered felt unbearable  most of the time (Hayley knows from my complaining) but yeah… I feel like I just went on a tangent. I think that if I were to cut through the words that I just spewed, I would  note that the emotions behind that content were concern and perhaps guilt for being quote on quote “happy” when Christiana is quote on quote “not.” It feels weird to be talking about weddings and engagements with someone who I love, someone who christiana barely knows, when she’s locked herself away in Hagerstown. I feel bad that our lives were so parallel for so long and now she’s just slid back into a place and a person that I don’t recognize.

I know that I can seperate my happiness and her life, but I do need to find a way to stop feeling “bad” and “guilty” about things that I have no control over in my life. So that’s just a theme that I clarified for myself- I feel guilty about aspects of my life that are outside of my control. I knew that, but it never hurts to say it again. Once more, ladies!

Anyway, to back away from that for a minute, Isabella comes back tomorrow. I don’t quite know how I feel about her return. She’s been out of DC for a year and she’s back. Part of me wondered if I’d see the day. But here we fucking are, people. So much has changed for both of us and in a way, we’ve barely spoken over the course of her time abroad. Which is fine, no one is upset about that. But I’m supposed to see her tomorrow to return her stuff and catch up with her. But I’m just like not excited about it. Mainly because I feel like she’ll always be wanting to catch up and hang out and do things. I always complain about hanging out with her and then when I get there, it’s always great and incredible. But she is just so judgemental and I hate that about her. I feel like I can never truly and 100 percent be myself with her (unless there’s wine) and I don’t like that uneasy feeling. She was the first friend I made here and honestly, I feel like I outgrew her. How do you break up with friends? Especially in this day and age on social media and shit? Nothing is a fucking secret. Haley Jakobson acts like she’s the only one who spills all of her secrets, but the rest of us are not that far behind. Not to take anything away from her, and what she’s doing is important. But I feel like that could be me or you or anyone else at any point. We’re getting closer and closer to realness. Also, realness includes an Instgram that isn’t perfectly well lit and curated like hers is. Sorry, I’m stepping away, literally no need to tear her down. Truly no need.

San Diego is so soon, by the way! January is like almost half way done and then February and then we basically go. I have a lot of tests and stuff beforehand, but we’re almost there. Time is fucking flying and I’m just trying to loosen the purse strings and treat myself and have a little bit more fun. LIke if I see a dress in San Diego that I want, I should just BUY it. Me and money man. What a doozey there.

I’m going to wrap this up soon. I’m just rambling at this point and putting off reading my second article for my social work in communities power. OH the first article was so interesting though… Just about how as social workers, we have more power than our clients, especially if they are nonvoluntary. And how we need to learn to accept that power dynamic and how to truly advocate on the behalf of our clients. And how that isn’t as easily said or done because everyone’s reality is objective to their past experiences/ their lives and how it’s tough to TRULY advocate on behalf of a client because we’ll never know their experiences. It’s just endlessly fascinating to me because this whole social work field is so steeped in politics (like everything is and always has been) and how individual therapy can only go so far when the overarching policies that are dictating various clients’ lives keep them in chains (metaphorical or otherwise). Just makes me realize how badass social workers are and how it really is this clan of individuals fighting for the marginalized. But how as much as we can fight for them, even our occupation itself is reliant on a particular sector fo the population to remain marginalized in SOME sense. (READ the essay the positive functions of poverty.) It’s just important to remember that there is relief/ allyship/ advocacy but at the end of the day, when social workers go home, we have REST but our clients might never get that same rest or peace of mind. What a humbling position to be in, to constantly know that your client is  “on the job” 24/7 and you get to walk away and exist in your own life. It’s weird to keep those two ideas seperate, but also necessary in order to avoid emotional burnout. Something to consider now and later….

[historyxcomplex]

WASHINGTON — Of all the State Department employees who might have been vulnerable in the staff reductions that Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson has initiated as he reshapes the department, the one person who seemed least likely to be a target was the chief of security, Bill A. Miller. Republicans pilloried Hillary Clinton for what they claimed was her inadequate attention to security as secretary of state in the months before the deadly 2012 attacks in Benghazi, Libya. Congress even passed legislation mandating that the department’s top security official have unrestricted access to the secretary of state. But in his first nine months in office, Mr. Tillerson turned down repeated and sometimes urgent requests from the department’s security staff to brief him, according to several former top officials in the Bureau of Diplomatic Security. Finally, Mr. Miller, the acting assistant secretary for diplomatic security, was forced to cite the law’s requirement that he be allowed to speak to Mr. Tillerson. Mr. Miller got just five minutes with the secretary of state, the former officials said. Afterward, Mr. Miller, a career Foreign Service officer, was pushed out, joining a parade of dismissals and early retirements that has decimated the State Department’s senior ranks. Mr. Miller declined to comment. The departures mark a new stage in the broken and increasingly contentious relationship between Mr. Tillerson and much of his department’s work force. By last spring, interviews at the time suggested, the guarded optimism that greeted his arrival had given way to concern among diplomats about his aloofness and lack of communication. By the summer, the secretary’s focus on efficiency and reorganization over policy provoked off-the-record anger.Now the estrangement is in the open, as diplomats going out the door make their feelings known and members of Congress raise questions about the impact of their leaving. In a letter to Mr. Tillerson last week, Democratic members of the House Foreign Relations Committee, citing what they said was “the exodus of more than 100 senior Foreign Service officers from the State Department since January,” expressed concern about “what appears to be the intentional hollowing-out of our senior diplomatic ranks.” Senator John McCain, Republican of Arizona, and Senator Jeanne Shaheen, Democrat of New Hampshire, sent a similar letter, telling Mr. Tillerson that “America’s diplomatic power is being weakened internally as complex global crises are growing externally.” Mr. Tillerson, a former chief executive of Exxon Mobil, has made no secret of his belief that the State Department is a bloated bureaucracy and that he regards much of the day-to-day diplomacy that lower-level officials conduct as unproductive. Even before Mr. Tillerson was confirmed, his staff fired six of the State Department’s top career diplomats, including Patrick Kennedy, who had been appointed to his position by President George W. Bush. Kristie Kenney, the department’s counselor and one of just five career ambassadors, was summarily fired a few weeks later. None were given any reason for their dismissals, although Mr. Kennedy and Ms. Kenney had been reprimanded by Trump transition officials for answering basic logistical questions from Nikki R. Haley, President Trump’s pick as United Nations ambassador. Mr. Tillerson is widely believed to dislike Ms. Haley, who has been seen as a possible successor if Mr. Tillerson steps down. In the following months, Mr. Tillerson launched a reorganization that he has said will be the most important thing he will do, and he has hired two consulting companies to lead the effort. Since he decided before even arriving at the State Department to slash its budget by 31 percent, many in the department have always seen the reorganization as a smoke screen for drastic cuts. Mr. Tillerson has frozen most hiring and recently offered a $25,000 buyout in hopes of pushing nearly 2,000 career diplomats and civil servants to leave by October 2018. His small cadre of aides have fired some diplomats and gotten others to resign by refusing them the assignments they wanted or taking away their duties altogether. Among those fired or sidelined were most of the top African-American and Latino diplomats, as well as many women, difficult losses in a department that has long struggled with diversity. One of them was Linda Thomas-Greenfield, a career Foreign Service officer who served as ambassador to Liberia under Mr. Bush and as director general of the Foreign Service and assistant secretary for African affairs during the Obama administration. Ms. Thomas-Greenfield was among those asked to leave by Mr. Tillerson’s staff, but she appealed and remained until her retirement in September. “I don’t feel targeted as an African-American,” she said. “I feel targeted as a professional.”For those who have not been dismissed, retirement has become a preferred alternative when, like Mr. Miller, they find no demand for their expertise. A retirement class that concludes this month has 26 senior employees, including two acting assistant secretaries in their early 50s who would normally wait years before leaving. The number of those with the department’s top two ranks of career ambassador and career minister — equivalent to four- and three-star generals — will have been cut in half by Dec. 1, from 39 to 19. And of the 431 minister-counselors, who have two-star-equivalent ranks, 369 remain and another 14 have indicated that they will leave soon — an 18 percent drop — according to an accounting provided by the American Foreign Service Association. The political appointees who normally join the department after a change in administration have not made up for those departures. So far, just 10 of the top 44 political positions in the department have been filled, and for most of the vacancies, Mr. Tillerson has not nominated anyone.“Leadership matters,” said Nancy McEldowney, a former ambassador who retired in June after a 30-year career as a Foreign Service officer. “There’s a vacuum throughout the State Department, and the junior people now working in these top jobs lack the confidence and credibility that comes from a presidential nomination and Senate confirmation.” Even more departures are expected as a result of an intense campaign that Mr. Tillerson has ordered to reduce the department’s longtime backlog of Freedom of Information Act requests. CNN reported that the task had resulted from Mr. Trump’s desire to accelerate the release of Mrs. Clinton’s remaining emails. Every bureau in the department has been asked to contribute to the effort. That has left midlevel employees and diplomats — including some just returning from high-level or difficult overseas assignments — to spend months performing mind-numbing clerical functions beside unpaid interns. Mr. Tillerson’s spokesman, R. C. Hammond, dismissed any suggestion that the departures had had a negative effect. “There are qualified people who are delivering on America’s diplomatic mission,” Mr. Hammond said. “It’s insulting to them every time someone comes up to them and says that the State Department is being gutted.” Former State Department officials disagree. “The United States is at the center of every crisis around the world, and you simply cannot be effective if you don’t have assistant secretaries and ambassadors in place,” said R. Nicholas Burns, a retired career diplomat who was an under secretary of state for President George W. Bush. “It shows a disdain for diplomacy.” One result is that there is no one in place with responsibilities for some key trouble spots. Although the North Korean nuclear crisis is the Trump administration’s top priority, the administration has yet to nominate an assistant secretary for East Asia or an ambassador to South Korea, crucial positions to deal with the issue. In the midst of the war in Syria and growing worries over a possible conflict between Saudi Arabia and Iran, there is no confirmed assistant secretary for Near Eastern affairs or ambassadors to Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Jordan, Egypt or Qatar. And as Zimbabwe confronts the future after the departure of Robert Mugabe, the department is lacking a confirmed assistant secretary for African affairs or an ambassador to neighboring South Africa.And the department’s future effectiveness may also be threatened. As more senior officials depart, interest in joining the Foreign Service is dwindling. With fewer prospects for rewarding careers, the number of people taking its entrance exam is on track to drop by 50 percent this year, according to the Foreign Service Association. “The message from the State Department right now is, ‘We don’t want you,’ and students are hearing that,” said James Goldgeier, former dean of the School of International Service at American University. For many at the State Department, their experience under Mr. Tillerson has been a particular shock because their hopes for him were initially high. Mrs. Clinton and John Kerry, her successor, were both seen as focused on their own priorities and were not particularly popular within the department. The model secretaries in recent history have been Colin Powell, James A. Baker III and George P. Shultz, Republicans who cared about management. “Everyone who called me, I said: ‘Listen, guys, this is going to be great, and maybe he’ll finally get the department in shape,’” said Dana Shell Smith, the ambassador to Qatar, who recently resigned. Since then, Ms. Smith has changed her mind. “These people either do not believe the U.S. should be a world leader, or they’re utterly incompetent,” she said. “Either way, having so many vacancies in essential places is a disaster waiting to happen.”

[geekade]

Turn It Up: New Music Releases for September 2017

Um, excuse me, but where did summer go? Where is this (albeit gorgeous) colder weather coming from? A sure sign it’s fall: new music is abound, as everyone gets those fall releases in. I could venture to guess it’s because Grammy nominations are coming (the most wonderful time of the year, in my opinion), or maybe to promote for some great Christmas presents. Maybe it’s because we’re all heading back inside on these colder-to-come days and will be streaming so much more. Whatever the reason – I’m not complaining. You guys know me by now – there can never be enough music. Let’s check out who’s serving up new albums this month.

Thomas Rhett – Life Changes

Release date: 9/8 I remember being so confused when Sam Hunt said he was only going to do singles, not full-length albums anymore. This, coming from a country artist (in a genre where consumers are still buying physical product – despite the three concerts I went to this summer where there were no CDs for sale…), was surprising. I had hopes that this wasn’t going to start a trend, considering what a top guy Sam is in the industry.

Thankfully, Thomas Rhett has calmed my fears. As one of probably the biggest names in country music today with, easily, one of the most hectic schedules and lives (congrats on the new baby!), he still made a full-length album for our enjoyment. He could have rode on “Craving You” (featuring my girl-crush, Maren Morris) for a little longer, then hopped onto another song. Instead, we’ve gotten a taste of the new songs through steady unofficial single releases via Spotify, and are amped up for the whole thing to drop.

Thomas is “new country” – borderline Bro, incorporates a little rap, but generally is there for the good, sweet backroad times that we honestly look for in this genre. “Unforgettable” (the official second single) is closer to pop, but there’s no denying that little country bump in the backing. I still don’t understand why so many people mention Coldplay these days in their lyrics, but whatever. I want a campfire stat for this one.

The other songs? Well, “Sixteen” will have you all kinds of nostalgic and wishful at once (who knew Thomas was old enough to have this kind of nostalgia, by the way?). We get a surprising love song in the one called “Grave” to melt a bit, and you have to believe that between an adoption and new baby, that one’s for his wife (think the “Die A Happy Man” feels all over again). “Life Changes” is personal and sums up that smile this man carries around.

Oh, and he duets with his poppa, Rhett Akins. Yeah, this is going to be a good ol’ boys record and I can’t wait to hear it from start to finish.

Other 9/8 releases:

Jack Johnson – All The Light Above It Too

Tori Almos – Native Invaders

Ringo Starr – Give More Love

Release date: 9/15

Don’t worry – the backstory I’m about to share with y’all isn’t meant to make you feel bad. I promise I can look back on these memories with some kind of wistful smile.

My mom was the Beatles fan. I mean, I assumed they were the end-all-be-all of music until I discovered Hanson when I was 8 (literally – I assumed every song was written by them, and performed by either them, Frank Sinatra, Elvis, or Celine Dion). We had every album (except the elusive Fan Club Christmas one… someday). We listed to Anthology until even I knew every word and the tapes about wore out.

Ringo was my favorite. Even from an early age, I had to go against the norm and love the drummer (I believe that’s what led me to an odd attraction to good arms, but that’s another article for another time). I also thought he looked to be having the most fun, and the Ringo-written tracks obviously appealed to my only-child colorful imagination. Plus, the man later showed an affinity for Country Music – clearly, the best Beatle.

So when I was… gosh, 10 or so, and the Internet was at my fingertips and we found out he would be touring through Atlantic City with the All Starr Band, it was a no-brainer. We were there. And we were there every other year, when he’d tour again, for 10+ years. I got older and appreciated all of the other songs so much more, and my mom was…. Well, she was 16 again during each show. This made for a weird argument about who he was singing about during “You’re Sixteen” that makes me giggle a little to this day.

I haven’t seen Ringo live since I lost my mother over two years ago (despite his shows in Brooklyn and birthday celebrations in Central Park), but regardless, seeing him continue to release music surrounding all I’ve ever hoped for through music – Peace and Love – never fails to make me smile. If you’re reading this to get an idea of the sounds to come – know that it’s gentle, wonderful, and every bit as Beatles-esque as you could ever want from this living legend (plus the many, many living legends that accompany him on it – seriously, Google it – I’ll give you one name… Paul).

It took me a year to listen to Beatles music again, and even hearing this new music is tough, but worth it. Thank you – both Mom and Ringo – for this musical gift.

Other 9/15 releases:

Foo Fighters – Concrete & Gold

Wyclef Jean – Carnival III: The Rise And Fall Of A Refugee

The Killers – Wonderful Wonderful

Release date: 9/22

The Killers have always mildly fascinated me for some reason, and this fifth album just keeps that interest going. Maybe it’s Brandon Boyd’s drive to make so many projects work and the fact that, in a unique way, he does it. I mean, have you ever heard someone say they don’t like The Killers?

“The Man” takes things to a disco area that takes some time to appreciate – in that, you remember it’s not disco, just the sound of this band bringing those elements into our odd-ball new millennium culture. And on further investigation, perhaps the Kool & The Gang sample in the song may have something to do with it. I dare you not to literally strut down the street to this one.

We mellow out on that sound with “Run For Cover” (which is not really more mellow, but I feel justified by the Bob Marley sample that’s included). It’s quick paced, but more rock based, and there seems to be a general toss-up out there on which of the first two singles were better. This one’s my pick, but I never was a fan of the 70’s sound.

By the way, Ryan Tedder helped produce some of this album. My concept of Indie Pop has completely been shattered, and that’s 100% okay.

The title track is the latest song we’ve gotten to sample, and to be honest the thing that’s starting to interest me most about this album is how all the songs will fit together. These three don’t tie out aside from Boyd’s familiar voice and vocal effects on it. “Wonderful Wonderful” is set to be the opening track, and it does seem to march in and create the same anticipation as I’m starting to have for this late-September release.      

Other 9/22 releases:

Circa Survive – The Amulet

Haley Reinhart – What’s That Sound?

Miley Cyrus – Younger Now

Release date: 9/29

I know, I’m as surprised as y’all probably are that I’m choosing this one to write about, especially with Demi dropping an album on the same day (which, um, timing is weird). But Miley has been intriguing me lately. Obviously, girl lost her dang mind for a few years there, at least by “normal” standards. She did things that were in no way socially acceptable, but definitely owned it.

There’s something about her attitude in recent months though, that seems to show a maturity. Granted, I’m basing this entirely on her music, since I really haven’t kept up with the latest gossip. “Malibu” just has such a, well, nice sound to it. It’s relaxing but there’s something really honest in there about life, so I have to believe Miley is coming around to making adult decisions and, maybe more importantly, realizations.

“Inspired” wasn’t an official single, but it is available to stream in promotion of the new album. It’s sweet and light, and I’ll go ahead and say this – I feel Tennessee in here (there are even moments that you can tell her Godmother, Dolly Parton, really did play a huge role in this girl’s life). Her voice is even slightly crisper (her laziness in enunciation is one of my few vocal complaints about Miley), and the title and feel just all fit together.

The second single is the title track, “Younger Now,” and I guess of the three this is the closest to her persona over the past few years. Even in saying that, the opening line plays: feels like I just woke up, and I have to believe this is Miley finding her way back all while looking ahead. Did anyone expect her to go legitimately deep on us? Did you expect to care this much and want this album in its entirety? Me either. But I do.

Other 9/29 releases:

Demi Lovato – Tell Me You Love Me

Echosmith – Inside A Dream

[global-justice-blog]

100 Days - Taking Stock on Promoting Freedom

By Nicole Bibbins Sedaca 

Nicole Bibbins Sedaca is Global Politics and Security Chair, and Professor in the Practice of International Affairs, Master of Science in Foreign Service Program, Georgetown University.

The “first 100 days” assessment is arbitrary and does not speak to the entirety of an administration that will last 1,460 days, if not 2,920. It is not and cannot be a final grade. It is, however, a useful time to take stock of the direction in which a new administration is taking the country.

And certainly, when a president releases both a “100-day action plan to Make America Great Again” and three press releases detailing his administration’s 100-day accomplishments, it is fair game for foreign policy watchers to comment on the occasion as well. (It is worth noting that the White House also released “First Month” and “First 40 Days of Action” summaries as well, so the president's stated opposition to the 100-day assessment is highly dubious.)

No reasonable analyst expects a president to accomplish many significant policy objectives in the first 100 days in office — particularly objectives that require legislative approval or significant overhauls of longstanding systems. Most often, there are only a handful of key reforms in this short window. The Obama administration initiated a state children’s health insurance program and an economic stimulus plan. President George W. Bush launched a significant tax cut and the No Child Left Behind initiative. President Bill Clinton introduced sweeping budget reform and launched an overhaul of health care, under the leadership of Hillary Clinton. President Ronald Reagan advanced an ambitious tax and budget plan and elevated foreign relations — with Central America, Iran, and the Soviet Union — in his early days.

Just as important as these quick policy wins was the way in which each administration signaled how it would govern and what values it would promote. Therefore, this initial assessment should look not only at policy accomplishments, but also at actions that created an environment for future policymaking. Those signal-sending actions include rhetoric, engagement of partners, budget creation, team building, and leadership by example. Looking at how an administration chooses to begin its tenure is arguably more fruitful than just a look at completed tasks.

In an earlier piece, I questioned whether President Donald Trump would be the leader of the free world, continuing the bipartisan American tradition of promoting democracy and human rights around the globe. Examining signal-sending actions is the most effective means of assessing this commitment, as most presidents do not take significant, concrete policy actions to promote democracy or human rights in their first 100 days.

Since his inauguration, Trump has made clear that he is not committed to promoting democracy and human rights, or America’s leadership role in these areas. This is not breaking news to anyone in the foreign policy community, as no one expected such leadership. It is not breaking news to those outside of the Beltway bubble, as he is not negating any campaign promises or doing a radical about-face. But it is essential to highlight this deviation from a bipartisan consensus that has been shared since President Jimmy Carter held office, not because of an arbitrary 100-day marker, but rather to highlight that Trump’s unwillingness to play this role leaves a significant gap that must be filled by some entity in the international community for the remaining 1,360 days of his term.

Let’s look at the signals he has sent since inauguration.

Telling rhetoric. Trump’s Inauguration Day commitment not to impose “our way of life on anyone” has translated into silence on violations of universally recognized values. He has made no references to an American role in supporting democracy and human rights globally in his first 100 days. The White House has been remarkablely unresponsive to even the worst atrocities or democratic violations around the world, including those in Myanmar, South Sudan, and Syria (with notable exceptions covered below). In three months of White House press statements, only a release about the Armenian genocide and the first lady’s honoring of International Women of Courage indicate any reference to these issues.

Two significant exceptions to this assessment are Trump’s reaction to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s use of chemical weapons against civilians and strong remarks at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in recognition of International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Unfortunately, each must be contextualized within the administration’s repeated silence on these issues. The Syrian remarks were situated within an unclear muddle of comments by administration officials about Assad’s fate, with positions ranging from avoiding confrontation with him, to allowing the Syrian people to decide, to insisting he must go, leaving doubt that the administration was more serious about a sustained response to mass atrocities in Syria. The Holocaust Museum remarks came after months of silence about the significant increase in anti-Semitic attacks throughout the United States.

Trump would be wise to remember that the strength of rhetoric comes not only from each statement, but from the consistency of the entire narrative.

Mixed levels of engagement with other countries. A foundational component of exercising leadership of the free world, or of promoting democracy and human rights, is highlighting the importance of these values in America’s relationships with other nations. Naturally, the United States will and should engage nondemocratic nations as part of its pursuit of national security and foreign policy interests, but must do so while maintaining a clear message about the importance of shared liberal values among democratic allies.

While Trump has met with many democratic allies, including Argentina, Canada, Denmark, Germany, Israel, Japan, Peru, the United Kingdom, and others, as well as nondemocratic allies, he has missed important opportunities in these meetings to highlight that the United States values shared democratic commitments.

This was remarkably evident in the differences between Trump’s reception of German Chancellor Angela Merkel and of Egyptian President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, which illustrated Trump’s failure to value the importance of democratic allies — even when confronted with differences of views — and not just allies that deliver cooperation. Certainly, the United States can and will have disagreements with democratic countries, and will have close relations and cooperation with autocratic governments. However, the outward hostility toward the leader of a key democratic ally and the European Union signals an indifference to the importance of the relationship, particularly at a time when liberal values are strained in Europe and globally. Likewise, the praise for Sisi sent a strong signal about American willingness to ally with and publicly praise dictators, with no nuance. A person who is not afraid of offending others, Trump certainly could have highlighted Egypt’s shortcomings on human rights or even mentioned the Americans who have been imprisoned there. While Trump should be commended for negotiating the release of Aya Hijazi, Trump’s failure to make clear that the United States will oppose continued violations of human rights and illegal imprisonment of Americans is telling and highly problematic.

A dismal budget. Trump is well within his rights, and certainly well advised, to streamline and improve the large bureaucracy he oversees. Few will defend the current size or functioning of the bureaucracy.

However, the president’s proposed 30-percent cut of the State Department and the U.S. Agency for International Development is highly concerning in terms of both the magnitude and the targeting of human rights and democracy-related functions — among many other, such as the environment — for significant cuts. While it is impossible that the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor would be eliminated, it is likely that it would take a significant cut if Trump’s budget moved forward. The fact that the Office of Global Women’s Issues would potentially be fully eliminated is highly problematic. Again, this is not to argue that the State Department does not need cuts, realignment, or streamlining. Rather, it is to say that the articulation of the cuts without an articulation of the value of many human rights or democracy programs, and the explicit targeting of these programs, is yet another indication of the administration’s unwillingness to promote these values abroad.

A mixed-quality team. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley are the two appointees most responsible for the promotion of democracy and human rights, and thus worthy of review.

Tillerson’s record is mixed at best. His steadfastness on Russia sanctions gave reason to be hopeful about his commitment to holding the line on democracy. But his decision to skip the rollout of his department's annual report on the state of human rights, which would have been an effortless way to show a commitment, gave human rights activists some cause for concern. His decision to lift human rights conditions on an arms sale to Bahrain bodes very poorly for how the administration will balance the ever-tense relationship between security priorities and human rights. Tillerson’s consideration of disengaging the U.N. Human Rights Council should be received positively, given his willingness to speak truthfully about the membership of China, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia on such a body. However, the real test of his commitment to human rights will not be how quickly he walks away from a highly hypocritical human rights body, but rather if his critiques of the human rights records of members and of the council’s efficacy are paired with American bilateral pressure on the countries in question outside of the U.N., and with a commitment to reform the council. Critique and disengagement without honest efforts to reform ring hollow.

Haley has been a bright light within the first 100 days, with strong statements on Russia’s support for Syria, Chechnya, and the Human Rights Council, as well as an unprecedented U.N. Security Council meeting focused on human rights. She has boldly bucked U.N. operating procedures and customary practices to speak out against human rights violations. Whether she is acting on her own or at the direction of a coordinated White House policy operation is unclear, but her actions are very welcome. Trump’s offhand remark about replacing Haley, made at the U.N. Security Council meeting at the White House which she shrewdly and courageously organized, could be a sign of Trump’s inexplicable and poor sense of humor or a developing rift. For the sake of having a principled voice in the administration, I hope it is the former.

The lack of a USAID administrator clearly hurts many of the objectives advanced by the agency, including democracy and human rights. While USAID is sorely in need of organizational reform, the gutting or neglect of the agency without a clear signal of support for the mission is a clear indication of disregard for its importance.

Setting a sad example. Trump’s inaugural promise to “let [the American way of life] shine as an example for everyone to follow” has proven hollow.

While he is conceptually correct that America’s international efforts to stand for human rights and promote democracy have long been a powerful example for the world to follow, he has not translated this into practice. Historically, when the United States has faltered in its own daily exercise of democratic principles or boldly lived up to the best of this tradition, the world has taken notice and in diverse ways, followed suit. Weaknesses in the America’s own democratic and human rights practices are often met with cries of hypocrisy or even satisfaction that the United States is no longer the moral leader of the world.

Trump’s willingness to critique democratic institutions — judges, Congress, laws that constrain his power or behavior — when they do not agree with his views is highly dangerous to both American democracy and the example that America sets for the world. His divisive rhetoric sends a signal that all types of people do not share the same respect or rights under his administration, a dangerous sign to authoritarian leaders seeking affirmation for their more extreme versions of targeting groups in their own countries. The strength of U.S. democracy is based on an appreciation that disagreements can and must be civilly discussed and adjudicated in the public square and through democratic institutions. Trump’s seeming disagreement with this as a core component of American democracy is highly damaging to our system and our ability to display strength globally.

What’s next? Over its first 100 days, the Trump administration’s lack of foreign policy commitment to democracy and human rights was highly problematic. None of this is a surprise or a violation of campaign promises. Rather, it is a clarion call for those in both parties to ask whether the promotion of democracy and human rights should be a foreign policy objective, and if so, who should lead the process. Trump is making it very clear that the U.S. government will no longer play that role.

This post was originally published by Foreign Policy. 

[pat78701]

Welcome Back! GOP Congress Returns To Resume Kabuki Dance Of Governance

After a two-weeks of being berated by their constituents at raucous town halls—and watching Democrats come close to flipping two solidly red districts in Kansas and Georgia—members of Congress return to DC Monday. With few legislative accomplishments under their belts so far, they now face a government funding deadline, a debt ceiling increase, demands from the White House to take another swing at repealing Obamacare, and the daunting, likely impossible task of overhauling the tax code by August.

Though Republicans control both chambers of Congress and the White House, deep divisions on all these issues remain, exacerbated by weeks of finger-pointing and inter-party threats in the wake of the health care bill’s embarrassing demise. And the closer it gets to the 2018 midterm elections, the more cautious members in swing districts will become about sticking their neck out to vote for controversial or unpopular bills.

“They have a lot to accomplish, but it’s a big question mark whether they’ll be able to do it,” said Dan Scandling, who worked as a senior staffer for GOP lawmakers for nearly 25 years. “At some point the Republicans have to start delivering, or their base will start showing up at their town halls saying, ‘Hey, you for years said if we gave you a Republican House and Senate you’d get things done. What’s the holdup?'”

Because members face enormous pressure to at least appear that they are making progress on the people’s business, we can expect to see a great deal of stalling, finger-pointing, earnest press conferences, bouts of secret negotiations, and other forms of political theater in the months ahead. For Republicans, the show must go on.

Government shutdown posturing

The government’s funding will expire at midnight on April 28, giving Congress less than a week to pass either a temporary or long-term budget in order to keep the lights on.

Under President Obama, each government funding and debt ceiling deadline offered Republicans a fresh opportunity to engage in brinksmanship and win concessions on red-meat issues like private school vouchers and abortion. This practice peaked in 2013, when Republicans triggered a two-week government shutdown over the implementation of Affordable Care Act.

This time around, despite breathless news reports that some members of both parties and the Trump administration are gunning for a shutdown showdown, Republican leaders acknowledge they have zero incentive to shutter a government under their own unified control. To do so would be a self-own for the ages.

“With a Republican House, Republican Senate and Republican administration, we don’t want to stumble into a shutdown,” warned Rep. Tom Cole (R-OK), a senior member of the Appropriations Committee currently drafting the budget.

House Speaker Paul Ryan hammered this point in a conference call with Republicans on Saturday, telling them his top priority was passing a budget to keep the government open.

And with several Republicans publicly declaring they won’t vote for any short-term budget—out of concern it will hurt the military’s ability to plan ahead—GOP leaders know they will need Democratic votes in order to get anything to the president’s desk. This leverage has allowed Democrats to lay down several red lines.

“Our position has been crystal clear,” Matthew Dennis, an aide for the House Appropriations Committee’s top Democrat Nita Lowey (D-NY), told TPM. “There are several poison pill riders that the President wants, and they are articulating those priorities to Republicans in Congress. But we will not provide any money to fund the border wall. We won’t agree to defunding Planned Parenthood or Sanctuary Cities, or underfunding any critical domestic programs.”

Democrats are also demanding the budget include guaranteed funding for Obamacare’s subsidies to insurers covering high-risk patients.

Dennis said negotiations “in good faith” took place over the congressional recess between Republicans and Democrats in the House and Senate. But the White House  threw a wrench into the process over the weekend by insisting that the budget include billions in funding for a wall along the U.S.-Mexico border and for hiring more Border Patrol and ICE officers.

“We want wall funding. We want [immigration] agents. Those are our priorities,” OMB Director Mick Mulvaney told the Associated Press. President Trump’s year-long campaign promise that Mexico will pay for the wall—which even top Republicans dismissed as a fantasy—has turned into vague assurances of eventual reimbursement.

Eventually, but at a later date so we can get started early, Mexico will be paying, in some form, for the badly needed border wall.

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 23, 2017

Trump is also demanding the budget include upwards of $30 billion more for the military and the ability to strip federal funding from sanctuary cities.

Despite this White House bluster, Republicans in Congress do not seem eager to push for these demands if doing so would risk a shutdown on their watch. As Rep. Davis (R-IL) told CNN on Friday when asked about the border wall funding: “I don’t think there’s any appetite for a shutdown.”

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), who has previously vowed to block any new funding for what he calls a “pointless wall,” boasted last week that negotiations over recess were “so far, so good” for Democrats.

If Congress can’t come to an agreement in the next four days, however, Dennis predicted they may pass a “one-week patch to buy more time.”

Scandling agreed that a fair amount of stalling is the most likely outcome. “It sounds like they may kick the can down the road,” he told TPM.

Groundhog Day for health care

After the first version of GOP health care bill died a humiliating death in March—pulled from the floor minutes before a vote that would have defeated the legislation—top Republicans vowed to stop setting “arbitrary deadlines” and to be more transparent the next time around.

“One of the lessons we learned from this process is to let it be slow and deliberate and give everyone a chance to try to bring their ideas to the table,” Rep. Kevin Brady (R-TX), the chairman of the Ways and Means Committee told reporters before recess.

But under pressure from a White House desperate for a tangible victory within the largely meaningless “first 100 days” window, the GOP is gearing up for another rushed vote on a revised bill drafted behind closed doors over the recess.

Though no legislative text has been unveiled and no whip count taken to gauge support, some members made noises last week about a brand new amendment they say can bring the House GOP’s warring factions together and get the struggling health care bill across the finish line.

This latest act in the GOP’s Kabuki health care drama has played out much like the previous amendments and deals they have rolled out—which similarly have done nothing to bridge the fundamental ideological divide between lawmakers who believe the government has no business at all in the health care sector and those who believe the government has a responsibility to care for the sick and the vulnerable.

The question nagging Republicans, Scandling says, is: “For every Freedom Caucus vote they get, how many moderates do they lose?”

Almost immediately after the latest deal was announced, a proposal to allow states to easily opt of Obamacare’s cost protections for people with pre-existing conditions, lawmakers were tamping down expectations—telling TPM that it is not clear the measure could garner the 216 votes necessary to pass the House. Others say even the prospects of a vote on the bill this week are dim.

Republicans in Congress are skeptical about the White House pushing AHCA next week. From a GOP aide close to health care negotiations: http://pic.twitter.com/ig2RkhNfX1

— Haley Byrd (@byrdinator) April 21, 2017

Still, despite the high likelihood of another embarrassing collapse, the Trump administration is calling for a vote as soon as Wednesday.

“They have to show they’re trying to move the ball forward,” Scandling said. “It’s kind of like a Hail Mary pass in my opinion, but it’s important to the Speaker and President to get a win on the board.”

Tax morass

The drawn out song-and-dance around health care, the budget, the border wall, and sanctuary cities may be a mere opening act to President Trump and Capitol Hill Republicans plans to tackle an overhaul of the U.S. tax code.

For decades, the raison d’etre for the GOP has been cutting taxes, and the Trump administration came into office promising to deliver on this by Congress’ August recess. But after watching a Hill Republicans’ seven-years-long battle cry to repeal Obamacare collapse in a just a few weeks, hopes for meeting the August deadline have faded.

“Tax relief by August is never happening,” Scandling said. “Everyone in Washington knows it’s an unrealistic deadline.”

Again, as with health care, Republicans have not yet addressed some basic hurdles. For one, will Republicans who have for years decried the ballooning federal deficit support the deep tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations that would add an estimated $6.2 trillion dollars to that deficit?

“If you don’t have a savings, it can’t move forward,” Rep. Chris Collins (R-NY) told TPM before leaving DC for recess. “In a conference that doesn’t like deficits, you have to have a pay-for. If all you do is cut taxes, there’s the question of the pay-for and our $20 trillion in debt.”

Without a revenue generator, Republicans may only be able to propose a very modest tax cut, though this will do little to inspire lawmakers desperate for a tangible victory to show their constituents ahead of the 2018 midterm elections.

“If you only cut the corporate tax rate from 35 to 34 [percent], what have you really accomplished?” Collins said. “We’re looking for dramatic cuts.”

Additionally, any plan that increases the deficit over the next decade can’t pass the Senate with a simple majority vote under the rules of reconciliation, meaning Republicans would need to win over Democratic votes in an atmosphere where fired-up Democrats are in no mood to bail out their colleagues and help President Trump.

Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin provided a laughable answer to this conundrum last week, assuring lawmakers and the public that the plan to slash corporate taxes will “pay for itself with growth” and generate at least $2 trillion dollars—a promise even conservative economists characterize as fuzzy math and wishful thinking.

What options are left? The one concrete proposal on the table to raise revenue, a border adjustment tax (BAT), has come under fire from those fearing constituent anger over higher prices at grocery stores, Walmarts, and gas stations.

“It’s completely dead in the water in the Senate,” said Scandling bluntly.

And the one proposal aimed at reducing the tax of middle class working Americans, the elimination of the payroll tax, is already drawing the ire of the AARP and other advocacy groups who note that this would imperil the Social Security trust fund.

Congressional and budget experts tell TPM to expect either a modest or temporary tax cut from Congress this year—though not by August—or nothing at all.

“I never thought they’d get tax reform done this year,” said Bill Hoagland, who worked for decades for the Senate Budget Committee. “The only possible solution is something very simple.”

from DIYS http://ift.tt/2olL3NG