#because for some reason the game punishes you for having a rep group member as your roommate?? it's interesting for sure

[cassandrasimplex]

So drawing on multiple conversations I've had with multiple people about multiple characters at this point: BG3 confuses people because it's not really trying to be a typical CRPG. It's trying to be a computer simulation of a multiperson TTRPG.

A typical CRPG, in the sense I mean, builds its whole plot around the player. NPCs are, as OP identified even here, "questgivers". They give you, the player, a quest. You go complete it. You come back, say "I did for you the thing you asked me to do for you," and you are usually rewarded for that. The questgivers do not go off and do their own quests. They ask the player to do them. That's the only reason they talk to the player in the first place: to give the player a quest.

This extends to a couple of decades of inclusion of romanceable NPCs whose "romances" are quest lines that are, other than being romance-flavored, indistinguishable from faction rep grinding. The NPC I want to pair my character with has a backstory. I will start dialogues with that NPC until they tell me something actionable. I will go act on it, then return and open another dialogue to get the next quest in the chain, as dictated by the backstory providing both a quest framework and a vague sense of interpersonal dynamic. Eventually, they will love me for it. The "faction" is an NPC and the "rep" is romance, but it's still just quest grinding with skippable flavor text.

BG3 gives you NPCs who want to finish their own story lines, and that throws off CRPG gamers. All the Origin characters' stories are designed to be playable as the player character, not just tasks assigned the player by a questgiver and held together by a few lines of exposition. The non-Origin companions may have shorter arcs -- Halsin's is basically over at the end of Act 2, while you don't even get into Jaheira's until Act 3 -- but the fact that you come into these arcs late or finish them early doesn't change the way they're still primarily driven by the character they belong to -- a character who is, if you're playing Tav or Durge, not you.

Tav/Durge is the POV character for the player, and the de facto (sometimes official) leader of the party, but not in a narrative sense the "main character" in any exclusive way. This fucks with the heads of CRPG gamers brought up on "tell me what you want done so I can go do it for you" gaming.

In some cases, this attitude has been actively punished by the narrative; when it was possible for Tav/Durge to try to enter Halsin's portal, for example, the results of not letting him take the sole lead in his own arc were disastrous! In other cases, it's passively "punished" by further divorcing that NPC from Tav's story; Gale has barely spoken to my first Tav since she decided the second phase of the Thorm fight required two plant-and-taunt tanks, two extremely mobile rogues, and zero potentially self-nuking wizards. He's not unhappy with them; he just... acts like he was sidelined in his own life choices. Which he was, and death choices too. Fair, Gale, fair. (He's still got his own arc in Act 3, but he no longer turns to Tav for advice and comfort. "I do enjoy our conversations," he says, and then lets them choose between telling him to stay behind or leaving the dialogue without another word.)

Larian has gone to quite a bit of effort to present these companions' stories as if they were the individual character components of a multiperson tabletop D&D game, in which members of a party that are working together toward a common group goal also have their own, personal goals to work toward -- goals that other players might choose to contribute to, but which ultimately belong to the players whose characters they were written for. There's no dearth of traditional NPC questgivers in the game, either, randos the party encounters who ask them, "Go there, do this, get back to me." But the companion NPCs, and most particularly the Origin NPCs, are not that and are not intended to be.

In each of the Origin arcs, in Halsin's Shadow Curse arc, in Jaheira's Stone Lord arc, and maybe in others I haven't played through yet, the choice I've found most consistently rewarded by the game has been to step back and let the NPC it belongs to handle it -- often, best accomplished by choosing the "shut up and trust your friend to make their own choices" option. There may be exceptions I haven't had the nerve to test out; I've never risked letting Gale nuke the Sword Coast or watching Lae'zel suffer to death in the $spoiler without trying to persuade her to escape it. I've never not begged Wyll to free himself and let the man who abandoned him and evicted him from his life fend for himself until we have time to go find him. I don't regret intervening with a Persuasion roll here and there. "Say nothing" isn't the only choice the game rewards -- just the one that has overall produced the most reliable pattern of good results. "Stand up for your friend to the asshole shit-talking them" has been a close runner-up.

"Tell your friend to go away and let you handle this in their absence" has not.

I realize that I've strayed pretty far from the original topic of killing or abandoning the characters I'm talking about, but I think it's pretty clear by extension that if you grant that these subplots are intended to be treated as if they belong to a different player's character, rather than a non-player character, it stands to reason that eliminating the character altogether pretty thoroughly eliminates the subplot.

It's only if you take the attitude that every part of the game is there to serve you, the mind controlling the One and Only Main Character, that it seems even vaguely reasonable to expect these arcs to continue without any other connection to Tav/Durge or their immediate concerns.

If you want to play tabletop D&D, but with zero other actual people, so you just sit down and read through the PDF of a readymade module, are you missing out? I mean. Yes‽ You might enjoy what you're doing, but you're still forgoing the entire intended experience.

very funny when bg3 players on reddit go "hey so i made every bad decision the second that it presented itself to me. why am i missing out on content?" like. there needs to be more evil content for sure, massive lack of parity there, but you cannot be serious that youre down 6 companions and complaining that act 3 is empty. without clarifying that youre down 6 companions. thats actually not the default state of the game and you did make quite a few decisions that pretty directly lead to a lack of content. cause you killed the questgivers.

"hey so i staked astarion 2 hours in. am i missing out on anything?" what in the shit made you think you wouldnt be? do you think his quest ends with him telling you hes a vampire spawn? the game is 122 GBs

[thecuriousblitz]

Hopes for RWBY Vol. 8: A commitment from RT to do better by their queer mlm fans

I waited until the end of Vol. 7 to put this out there, in case there was a Hail Mary fix-it that, while not able to erase how Fairgame was handled, would at least shed some light on certain narrative decisions.

And so when RT started peddling paired Qrow/Clover pins and a ‘Born Unlucky’ Qrow drinking cup after weeks of radio silence, I said to myself - calmly - well fuck.

Having worked as both a writer and marketer for a games company and several creative agencies, I know it takes gallons of blood, sweat and tears to make a show like RWBY shine. For that, CRWBY has my utmost respect. I also know that the directors, writing, animation and marketing departments of a commercially significant project are typically very connected and cross-communicative - for many reasons, but mainly to avoid preventable shitshows.

That’s why the idea that no one important knew about and therefore can’t be held responsible for the prolonged queerteasing engaged in by several animators and marketing staff is friggin’ bizarre.

In criminal law, the severity of the punishment often hinges on the presence of mens rea, or a ‘guilty mind’. For example, if it’s proven you both intended to and did kill someone, you go down for murder. If you’re drunk and run over someone, it’s manslaughter - a lesser crime, but a crime nonetheless because harm was caused through recklessness or negligence. ie. You should have fucking known.

I don’t think there’s enough to prove intent to harm, but holy shit if it was your run-of-the-mill agency, there would have been someone tripping over their balls to shut down the weeks of ‘we gave you bumbleby, now how bouts some Fairgame wink wink’ marketing and your ‘I ship Qrover hardcore/CLOVER IS A TOP’ animators, knowing where the narrative was going. Either RT operates on some alien plane of existence where common sense/corporate liability isn’t a thing, or some serious soul-searching and a company-wide policy change needs to happen. At the very least, please have the fucking talk with your marketing and animation teams, for their sake and that of your company’s.

Additionally, anytime we were working on something that could even remotely touch on minority or sensitive issues (eg. those concerning people with disabilities, indigenous peoples, LGBTQI, potential trauma triggers), we would hire external subject matter experts to extensively comb through anything that might cause problems. The writing, character design, animation, VOs, marketing, every fucking end-to-end detail.

Once, our design team had to completely re-do the hairstyles of several minor NPCs in a game for kids because they were too ‘phallic-like’. I lead with that example because it’s my favorite ‘wtf’ workplace moment (you really had to squint to see it), but in all seriousness, there have been many times where the input of qualified experts saved our collective blind asses. When it comes to representation, details matter - even if you personally don’t see a problem.

Note the use of ‘external’ experts. We never relied on having minority members on our team to pass muster. One, that puts way too much fucking pressure on the crew member who happens to be part of that minority group to speak up. Two, and this might be shocking for some, not all members of a minority group think and feel the same way about everything.

If you can manage to sweat the details, hire experts, and have (what I thought were normal) cross-department communications, you avoid situations where individuals who are part of an underrepresented group are forced to defend the validity of their pain.

By virtue of queer/mlm being a minority, the majority of the fandom won’t see a problem. Hell, not all queer/mlm will see a problem, and that’s totally fine.

The problem is this: Once your product is out there, and your rogue animators/marketing team have at it with the baiting, you’ve just provided the perfect storm for a barrage of censorious attacks against a vulnerable group, all of varying degrees of fallaciousness, and all of which were completely preventable: ‘You’re just overreacting’, ‘You just hate that your headcanon didn’t work out’, ‘It’s sad, but no one’s to blame’, ‘I’m gay and I thought it was fine’, ‘The show has queer wlw rep, how can you criticize’, ‘I know what queerbaiting is and that wasn’t it’, ‘It’s just a fictional character/SOME BLOODY PINS, get over it’, ‘CRWBY didn’t encourage this ship’ (most people will not make the effort to dig into super shady tweets, comments and fandom interactions from months ago), etc. etc.

And by the immutable laws of internet fuckery, what should have been a beautiful opportunity for representation - whether it would have ended happily or not - gets turned into a convoluted shitstorm where argument from ignorance wins the day.

In short, RT, please, please do better. You have every right to freely create, but with freedom comes responsibility. You have a really good thing going - as a fan, it would be the ultimate tragedy if nothing is acknowledged or changes after all this.

[schraubd]

Collected Thoughts on Excluding Omar and Tlaib

I've got another kidney stone. It struck on Monday, and then I felt pain Tuesday, Wednesday, and today. Thursday was my only pain-free day this week, and I have to assume that was the universe balancing the scales and recognizing that the Israeli government's truly terrible decision to exclude Reps. Ilhan Omar (D-MN) and Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) from the country was plenty enough aggravation on its own. I went on a pretty vigorous tweet storm all through yesterday. Below I bullet point most of what I expressed on that site (which, as you may know, I've taken "private"), but my main takeaway is this: There's no serious case that either Congresswoman present a security threat to Israel (I've seen some people insinuate that they might incite a riot at the Temple Mount which -- I'm not sure I can physically roll my eyes hard enough). In practice, the "risk" Omar and Tlaib present is simply that they will hear  mean things about Israel and then say their own mean things about Israel. That's the locus of the complaint about the "balance" of the trip; that's the locus of the accusation that they merely want to rabble-rouse. What people are concerned about is they will go to the West Bank, hear people saying mean things about Israel, and repeat those mean things back to American audiences. But -- and I mean this in all earnestness -- so what? So what if that's what happens? To be clear: I don't think Omar and Tlaib were coming just to say mean things about Israel. But even if they were -- there's no security threat. The state will survive (how pathetic would it be if it crumbled?). It'd be speech. It'd be discourse. That's the price of living in a liberal, free society. Sometimes people say mean things about you. Sometimes those mean things are unfair. Sometimes those mean things are entirely fair. Whatever. It comes with the territory (pun initially not intended, but I'll own it now). It's not a valid basis for a travel ban. It used to be that Israel was emphatic that "come see us and you'll think better of us". Now Israel is terrified that if people come see them--at least, see them unchaperoned, without a constant guiding hand ensuring they see only the choice parts--they'll think of worse of them. That's the sign of a society in decay. To be sure, I think Omar and Tlaib probably would come away from their visit with a rather grim appraisal of Israel's treatment of Palestinians. But then, there's ample basis to appraise that treatment grimly--there's no inherent foul there. People can come to the West Bank and be honestly appalled by what they see. Only police states confuse "people saying mean things" with security threats. A free society can survive--and perhaps even learn from--critics giving it grim appraisals. People talk a huge game about how Omar and Tlaib could "learn" from their trip to Israel and Palestine -- and no doubt they could. But the flip side is that Israel, too, can learn from the testimony of Palestinians laboring under occupation, and from efforts to bring that testimony to the fore. It is wrong -- not to mention insulting -- to treat discourse about Israel/Palestine as if it were a one-way street, where wise, omniscient Israeli/Jewish teachers dribble knowledge onto benighted, ignorant Muslims and Arabs. Below is a recap of my other collected thoughts on the matter (many but not all of which were on Twitter):

This was a terrible and unjustified decision. Let's lead off with that and give it its own bullet point all to itself.

There is no reason to think that this decision was "what Omar and Tlaib wanted" since it made Israel look authoritarian and repressive. That is projection, to avoid speaking the more uncomfortable conclusion that "Omar and Tlaib might have had a point" in suggesting Israel acts in an authoritarian and repressive fashion.

I neither think this decision was solely Trump's doing -- Israel "caving" to his pressure -- nor do I think he played no role in the decision. I think he successfully convinced Netanyahu to do something that he already kind of wanted to do in the first place, even knowing it probably was a bad idea. Trump was like the frat boy friend egging his buddy into doing another shot flight. That Bibi was probably dimly aware it wasn't the wisest decision in the world doesn't mean that he wasn't ultimately fulfilling his own desires. Ultimately, this was a decision of Israel's right-wing government and they deserve to take the full brunt of punishment for it.

I understand why everyone is calling this "counterproductive" from Israel, since it will undoubtedly give a huge boost to the BDS movement. But, as I wrote in the Lara Alqasem case, that really depends on what Israel is trying to "produce". In many ways, Bibi benefits from an ascendant BDS movement, just as they benefit from him; and he likewise benefits from a world divided between conservatives who love everything he does and liberals who loathe him. So the fact that this decision puts wind in the sails of BDS, while further lashing Israel to a purely right-wing mast and alienating it from erstwhile progressive allies, is not necessarily a miscalculation -- it's the intended and desired effect.

On that note, remember the other day when 21 Israeli MKs wrote to Congress and said that a two-state solution was "more dangerous" than BDS? Well, if you ever wanted an example of what it looks like to trade "increased BDS support" for "kneecapping two-state solution support", this was it (even though Tlaib isn't a two-stater -- Omar is -- this act was aimed like a laser at the most prominent base of support for two-stateism in America: that is, Democrats).

On the other hand, shouldn't these right-wing Israelis be more excited to welcome Tlaib than most other Congresspeople? After all, she opposes the "dangerous" two-state solution! Oh wait, I forgot: in her one-state world, everyone gets to vote. That won't do at all, will it?

I love Emma Goldberg description of how Israel will slide away from liberal democracy via Hemingway's description of how he went bankrupt: "Two ways. Gradually, then suddenly." And by love, I mean it gives me a sick feeling of recognition in my stomach.

Justifying the ban on the grounds that Omar and Tlaib's visit wasn't "balanced" because they weren't meeting with Israeli or Palestinian government figures, only NGOs, and these are bad NGOs -- spare me. To tell visiting U.S. politicians "you can come, but only if you speak with the 'right' people/visit the 'right' sites/speak the 'correct' words" sounds like something you'd hear from the North Korean embassy. Omar and Tlaib should be entitled to visit with whomever they want to visit, and come to whatever conclusions they end up coming to. If those conclusions are unfair, we should trust the ability to defeat them with more speech, not enforced silence. But again: we can't conflate "unfair" with "critical". It's entirely feasible that a fair-minded individual hearing testimony from West Bank Palestinians will come to a sharply critical conclusion.

Some of the attacks on the NGOs Omar and Tlaib were scheduled to meet with are the usual chad gadya (has a leader who's linked to a group which kicked the dog ....) nonsense, but there are some groups with some genuinely bad history. I've consequently seen people suggest that we need to also hold Omar and Tlaib accountable for their part in this fiasco for meeting with members of those groups. Fair enough: I'm happy to hold them accountable, weighted and prioritized in proportion to their relative culpability. In keeping with that metric, I might get around to returning to criticizing their draft itinerary sometime in 2035.

Fine, one more thing on the itinerary: Am I correct in reading it as taking Omar and  Tlaib either solely or primarily to the West Bank and East Jerusalem? If so, it's entirely understandable why they'd refer to those locales as "Palestine".

Rep. Tlaib initially applied for a humanitarian waiver to visit her family, which was approved, but then she backed out given the conditions the Israeli government was going to impose on the visit (basically, not engaging in "boycott activities"). The usual suspects are crowing: she cares less about her family than she does about boycotting! I say (a) Rep. Tlaib is well within her rights to not prostrate herself to the dictates of a foreign government seeking to humiliate her, and (b) what about the past few days gives anyone the confidence in the Israeli government's ability to fairly adjudge what qualifies as a "boycott activity"?

The argument that Israel, as a sovereign state, has a "right" to exclude whomever it wants substitutes a juridical argument for an ethical (and practical) one. Sovereign states are formally empowered to do all sorts of terrible and/or stupid things. This was one of them. Hearing nominal anti-BDS folks make this claim -- which could as easily be applied to "universities and academics have the right to collaborate (or not) with whomever they want to" is probably causing another kidney stone to develop as we speak.

The other thing is that Israel is proving itself completely incapable of exercising this "right" in a reasonable manner that distinguishes between genuine threats to national security and unhappiness that people sometimes come to Israel and then say mean things. One of the reasons we liberals seek to limit unchecked government power is precisely because of the suspicion that it won't be exercised responsibly or non-arbitrarily.

Of course, the fact that Israel also exercises the practical authority to exclude people not just from Israel-proper, but the West Bank as well, gives lie to the notion that Palestinians even conceptually could have their right to self-determination vindicated solely by voting in PA elections.

Silver lining: pretty much the entirety of the American Jewish establishment -- AIPAC, AJC, ADL, J Street, Simon Wiesenthal Center -- came out against this decision. Huzzah for that.

Tarnish on even that silver lining: the Conference of President's weak-sauce statement on the matter. "Many of the organizations expressed disagreement with the government’s decision", but "Ultimately, the government of Israel made its assessment of the countervailing arguments and acted upon their conclusion." Really, that's what you're giving us? It's amazing how the Conference doesn't care about the "consensus" of the Jewish community when that consensus is a progressive one.

When a prominent member of or institution associated with an outgroup does something awful, it is natural for members of that outgroup to feel acutely vulnerable. In part, that's because they know that this awfulness will be wielded against them; in part, that's because frequently they have feelings for or connections to the target person and institution, and it is painful to see them act in such a terrible fashion. Of course, that feeling of vulnerability needn't and shouldn't be the primary story as compared to those directly victimized by the awful behavior. But it is not per se wrong, or "centering", to acknowledge and validate the existence of the sentiment; nor is such an acknowledgment necessarily one that stands in competition with recognizing the direct damage of the instigating act.

The next time a Democrat occupies the Oval Office, I have to wonder what sort of penance is going to be demanded from the Israeli government for years upon years of insult and humiliation. It's not going to be back to as it was before. It's not even going to back as it was in the Obama administration. Democrats will -- rightfully -- insist that Israel pay a price for what it's been doing these past four (if not twelve) years. The flipside of recognizing the importance of preserving Israel as a bipartisan issue is that Israel aligning itself fully and completely with the Republican Party is going to come at a cost. It will be interesting to consider what that cost will be.

via The Debate Link https://ift.tt/2ZcVv85

[outlandershq-blog]

how historically accurate does this rp plan to be? for being lgbt+ and poc inclusive how much does it take into account the social stigmas and prejudices those groups dealt with in the 15th century?

          i would love to direct you to our WORLD page since i think we put up a good idea of how this roleplay will be handled when it comes to matters such as those! this is an ALTERNATE UNIVERSE of 1457 england. reason being? we didn’t want to limit people by requiring them to learn english history, especially since we have members from all over the world. they may not know as much about this particular setting as say someone who grew up in england. we also want them to experience it firsthand, through their characters. and frankly, as much as i love history and the middle ages, i myself loathe the idea of researching every player and battle/event ( far too numerous in the middle ages ).

          because this is an alternate universe, loosely based off of this time period, and given the fact we’ve added a fantasy element to it ( pagan magic / gods ), we feel that limiting poc and lgbt+ persons is a no no. and frankly? at this point in time, england was not all old balding white men. it was MORE DIVERSE than what hollywood typically sells onscreen. people of color had a wide range of opportunities, though there were some social / race issues still present. but they were less concerned with your skin color than your religious beliefs / country alliance.

          when it comes to LGBT+ REP, i’ve decided to make this more akin to game of thrones than the reality of this time period. men were sleeping with men, but they were not able to MARRY them. this was experienced more openly with the lower / middle class than the upper class, but there were certainly lords / ladies / even royals who did as they pleased ( but they were still expected to marry and produce heirs ). lgbt+ persons weren’t necessarily shouting about their love and sex lives / gender identity to everyone because it was still considered taboo thanks to christianity’s influences, but i imagine rumors and gossip went around and no one was really punished for their ‘behavior.’ some were a bit more bold than others, as well. that being said, it was extremely accepted within paganism! 

[patriotsnet]

How Many Jobs Bills Have The Republicans Introduced

New Post has been published on https://www.patriotsnet.com/how-many-jobs-bills-have-the-republicans-introduced/

How Many Jobs Bills Have The Republicans Introduced

President’s Address To Congress

Republicans introduce âFire Fauci Actâ to oust the âpolitical scientistâ from his top job

Wikisource has original text related to this article:Barack Obama speech to joint session of Congress, September 2011

Obama’s speech aired in the United States on 11 television networks during primetime, including ABC, CBS, NBC, CNN, Fox News Channel, Fox Business Network, MSNBC, and CNBC. Nielsen Media Research estimate that 31.4 million viewers watched the speech, 10 million less than the 2011 State of the Union Address, but six million more than his March speech on Libya. The President’s address was rescheduled to September 8 after his original request to deliver the speech on September 7 was rebuffed by Speaker of the House John Boehner, who cited a clash with a Republican Presidential debate already scheduled for the same time and stated that more time was required to secure the House for the President’s visit. The President made his speech at 7:00pm Eastern, instead of the usual 9:00pm start for presidential addresses to joint sessions of Congress, so he would be finished before the first game of the National Football League season between the New Orleans Saints and the Green Bay Packers at 8:30pm.

Bad Strategy How The Republican Attack On Voting Rights Could Backfire

Republicans are pushing hundreds of bills to limit voting access. Some measures may get in the way of their own voters

As the coronavirus wreaked havoc around the world, lawmakers in the US were faced with a monumental task: carrying out a presidential election in the middle of a once-in-century pandemic.

Concerned about the possibility of virus spread at polling places, Democrats pushed the federal government to approve more funding for states to expand absentee and early-voting options.

But Donald Trump was against the idea for a single reason: he thought it would make it harder for Republicans to win. Trump said in a Fox News interview in March of last year that, if early and absentee voting options were expanded as Democrats wanted, youd never have a Republican elected in this country again. Other Republicans haveechoed Trumps argument in recent months, as the party has pushed hundreds of bills to restrict voting access in dozens of states.

But voting experts now say the restrictions being approved in Republican-led states may not help the partys chances in future elections, and in some cases, the laws may even prevent their own supporters from going to the polls. Put simply, in seeking to suppress the vote, Republicans may be shooting themselves in the foot.

Gop Real Estate Owners Make Out Big

Besides the laws benefits to real estate pass-throughs, real estate in general was hugely favored by the tax law, allowing property exchanges to avoid taxation, the deduction of new capital expenses in just one year versus longer depreciation schedules, and an exemption from limits on interest deductions.;

If you are a real estate developer, you never pay tax, said Ed Kleinbard, a former head of Congresss Joint Committee on Taxation.;

Members of Congress own a lot of real estate. Public Integritys review of financial disclosures found that 29 of the 47 GOP members of the committees responsible for the tax bill hold interests in real estate, including small rental businesses, LLCs, and massive real estate investment trusts , which pay dividends to investors. The tax bill allows REIT investors to deduct 20 percent from their dividends for tax purposes.;

Who We Are

The Center for Public Integrity is an independent, investigative newsroom that exposes betrayals of the public trust by powerful interests.

Don’t Miss: Are Any Other Republicans Running For President

Republicans Are Defunding The Police: Fox News Anchor Stumps Congressman

Chris Wallace quizzes Jim Banks of Indiana on Fox News Sunday

Biden: $350bn in bill opposed by GOP is for law enforcement

US politics live coverage

The Fox News anchor Chris Wallace made headlines of his own on Sunday, by pointing out to a senior Republican that he and the rest of his party recently voted against $350bn in funding for law enforcement.

Cant you make the argument that its you and the Republicans who are defunding the police? Wallace asked Jim Banks, the head of the House Republican study committee.

The congressman was the author of a Fox News column in which he said Democrats were responsible for spikes in violent crime.

There is overwhelming evidence, Banks wrote, connecting the rise in murders to the violent riots last summer a reference to protests over the murder of George Floyd which sometimes produced looting and violence and the defund the police movement. Both of which were supported, financially and rhetorically, by the Democratic party and the Biden administration.

Joe Biden does not support any attempt to defund the police, a slogan adopted by some on the left but which remains controversial and which the president has said Republicans have used to beat the living hell out of Democrats.

On Fox News Sunday, Banks repeatedly attacked the so-called Squad of young progressive women in the House and said Democrats stigmatised law enforcement and helped criminals.

An Affinity For Small Business

Passing a law that helped fuel increases in stock prices wasnt the only way Republicans enriched themselves. The new law also contained a 20 percent deduction for income from so-called pass-through businesses, a provision called the crown jewel of the act by the National Federation of Independent Businesses, a lobbying group.

Pass-throughs are single-owner businesses, partnerships, limited liability companies and special corporations called S-corps. Most real estate companies are organized as LLCs. Trump owns hundreds of them, and Public Integritys analysis found that 22 of the 47 members of the House and Senate tax-writing committees in 2017 were invested in them.

Pass-throughs can be found in any industry. They pay no corporate taxes and steer their profits as income to business owners or investors, who are taxed only once at their individual rates. Despite their favored treatment as a business vehicle, the 2017 tax act did them another favor: It allowed 20 percent to be deducted off the top of the pass-through income for tax purposes.

Our investigations. Your inbox.

Sign up for the Center for Public Integritys weekly Watchdog newsletter.

No doubt. Johnson, with his wife, held interests that year in four real estate or manufacturing LLCs worth between $6.2 million and $30.5 million, from which they received income that year between $250,000 and $2.1 million, according to his financial disclosure form.

Recommended Reading: What Republicans Are Running For President

Replies To Republicans Have Passed 0 Jobs Bills During Their First 138 Days Running Congress

Democratinnysays:

What a dismal outlook for our country.

What do people expect when they continue to vote GOP, or donât vote at all?

The GOP was not working for America years before 2012, yet ignorant people are still voting against their best interests.

bebesays:Sat, May 23rd, 2015 at 5:35 pm

Boehner has no intention of calling a vote on a jobs bill. Hes already pledged allegiance to the Koch agenda. That means no new jobs to be formed because Obama would get credit for it. Same reason gop governors tried halting hiring in 2011 to screw Obama in 2012. They soon found out that they had to hire more people, the holdout was too long.

Obama accomplished unemployment down to 5.4% despite the gopâs best efforts to screw him over. Good wins over evil.

JCBluessays:

they havenât reached 100 days yet⦠they use âdynamic calendarâ daysâ¦

its a concept similar to âdynamic accountingâ they want the CBO to adoptâ¦

Robertsays:Sat, May 23rd, 2015 at 6:11 pm

The government has no jobs! Only private business can create new jobs through growth. A jobs bill is just making more government workers. The money comes from the taxpayers. Since the upper 50% of wage earners pay almost all the taxes, itâs the perfect redistribution of wealth plan. Want to get more workers hired in real jobs? Reduce/eliminate the corporate income tax.

Moongrimsays:

The only jobs Congressional Republicans are interesting in creating- their own, after they get removed from office.

Sugapeasays:

CCsays:

Hr 785: National Right

Many states have enacted so-called;right-to-work;laws, which;prohibit labor unions and employers from requiring workers to join unions to get or keep jobs. The National Conference of State Legislatures explains:

Currently, 28;states and Guam have given workers a choice when it comes to union membership. Labor unions still operate in those states, but workers cannot be compelled to become members as a requirement of their job. Kentucky became the 27th right-to-work state when it enacted HB 1 on Jan. 9, 2017. Missouri became the 28th by enacting SB 19 on Feb. 2, 2017.

Unlike many other items on their agenda, the Republican sponsors of H.R. 785;are keen on handing over;the power to decide this matter to the federal government instead of the states. Opponents say passage of the bill would lead to lower wages and greater unemployment nationwide, not to mention create an unfair situation in which non-dues-paying employees reap the benefits of union activities.

Read Also: Who Is Correct Democrats Or Republicans

Hr 147: To Criminalize Abortion In Certain Cases By Making It A Felony Punishable By Up To Five Years In Prison

The Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act of 2017, H.R. 147, was introduced on 3 January 2017 by Rep. Trent Franks , with 59 cosponsors, all Republicans. The bill, similar to ones introduced in previous sessions of Congress, would not criminalize abortion per se , but it would make it a crime;under certain conditions:

This bill imposes criminal penalties on anyone who knowingly or knowingly attempts to: perform an abortion knowing that the abortion is sought based on the sex, gender, color or race of the child, or the race of a parent; use force or the threat of force to intentionally injure or intimidate any person for the purpose of coercing a sex-selection or race-selection abortion; solicit or accept funds for the performance of such an abortion; or transport a woman into the United States or across a state line for the purpose of obtaining such an abortion.

Violations or attempted violations shall result in fines and/or imprisonment for up to five years.

How Many Jobs Bills Have The Republican

DNC Chair Harrison: âWeâre Going To Fight Against These Oppressive Lawsâ | The Last Word | MSNBC

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Circling Closer To A Federal Privacy Law Congress Has Introduced 7 Privacy Bills This Year

Congress has stated its intention to pass a federal privacy law. For more than a year following , various committees within the House of Representatives and the Senate have held hearings to figure out the composition of a comprehensive federal privacy law.

Members of Congress have introduced several privacy bills this year that aim to regulate companies collection and/or use of peoples personal information . None of these bills introduced this year have yet to be put to a vote, and if previous efforts are any indication, none are likely to pass into law. However, taken together they paint a picture of what a federal privacy law would likely cover, especially if Congress were to cherry-pick their various provisions and combine them into an omnibus bill. They also indicate Congress members differing stances on what a federal privacy law should require of companies. Those latter complications could require Congress to compromise on a federal privacy laws scope in order to ensure its passage into law, especially if Congress intends to try to pass a federal privacy law before Californias privacy law takes effect in January 2020.

Social Media Privacy Protection and Consumer Rights Act of 2019, introduced by Democratic Sen. Amy Klobuchar on January 17, 2019While introduced early into the current legislative session, this bill appears to be a model for what a bipartisan privacy law might look like.

01

Hr 899: To Terminate The Department Of Education

Like H.R. 861, which would get rid of the EPA, H.R. 899 calls simply for the termination of the Department of Education by the end of 2018. It was introduced by Rep. Thomas Massie , with six Republican cosponsors . President Trumps Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, has stated she would be fine with having;herself worked out of a job.

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Hr 861: To Terminate The Environmental Protection Agency

Introduced on 3 February;2017 by Rep. Matt Gaetz and three Republican cosponsors, the body of H.R. 861;is only one sentence long: The Environmental Protection Agency shall terminate on December 31, 2018. The text of the bill does not stipulate;what would become of existing EPA regulations and their enforcement, but Gaetz has indicated that he intends;jurisdiction to;fall;to individual states.

If Rep Liz Cheney Doesnt Have A Home In The Gop Who Does

To be sure, though, Fragas own research has found that white voters, regardless of how easy or hard it is for them to vote, consistently turn out at higher rates than voters of color, so we do want to be careful of not reading too much into this. Jennifer McCoy, a political scientist at Georgia State University who studies the effects of polarization on democracy, told me that she thought the current emphasis on voter restrictions boiled down to Republicans thinking they could appeal to Trumps base by codifying his baseless claims of voter fraud. know they have to attract Donald Trump supporters who now believe there is fraud, said McCoy. So a large part of the current efforts to change voter laws was a direct response to this last election. Large majorities of Republicans continue to believe Bidens win is not legitimate, and a that only 28 percent of Republicans and Republican-leaning people agreed that everything possible should be done to make voting easy, a steep drop from 48 percent in October 2018.

The GOPs restrictionist bent sends the message that Republicans dont want Black and brown Americans to vote. In September 2020, 54 percent of Black respondents and 35 percent of Hispanic respondents told FiveThirtyEight/Ipsos they believed Republicans didnt want people like me to vote.

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Republicans Submit A Flood Of Anti

Speaking to NBC News, the groups advocacy director David Topping said there has been a huge rash of anti-LGBTQ legislation since the Supreme Court ruled in favour of same-sex marriage in 2015.

He said: It feels like every state Legislature, every year, is trying to push some kind of anti-LGBTQ agenda.

Activists say that many of the bills with the greatest momentum are targeting transgender children.

Rose Saxe of the American Civil Liberties Union told NBC: The targeting of kids is really unique this year. Its really shocking, the depth of attack on trans youth.

Saxe explained that identikit bills often originate from anti-LGBT lobbying groups like Alliance Defending Freedom and the Heritage Foundation, who shop around their pre-drafted legislation to friendly lawmakers in a number of states.

The vast majority of the bills will likely not become law, but some concerning measures have already passed with Tennessee governor Bill Lee signing a bill into law last month that allows religious adoption agencies to deny service to queer couples.

The areas most vulnerable to anti-LGBT bills passing are those where Republicans have full control of the state legislature and Governors mansion.

How Many Jobs Have The Republicans Created Since Taking Over The House

2.;Repubs Have Aggressively and Successfully Launched a Negative Growth Plan

Edited on Fri Jul-01-11 09:57 AM by fredamaeWe WERE losing about 1 Million jobs per month under bushco by the end of his term in 2008.During the bushco years over 50,000 Mfg Plants have closed.More to the point, how many jobs were Saved since Obama took office?What did the Republican/Minority Controlled Senate– do but Block Over 300 Bills that would have created jobs and pumped Money into the economy?Since the Dems took control in 2006 more than 600 Bills have been blocked by repubs that Could have Reversed the Recession!Never forget that. If you don’t believe this look it all up in the Congressional Website! It’s all there: Bills, Votes, Floor Testimony etc

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[junker-town]

What we know about the CBA talks between the NFL and NFLPA

Photo by Larry French/Getty Images

The NFL and NFLPA are trying to get a jump start on negotiating a new collective bargaining agreement two years in advance.

The NFL and NFLPA have a daunting task ahead of them: Reach common ground on a new collective bargaining agreement in time to avoid a work stoppage ahead of the 2021 season.

The current CBA — set to expire after the 2020 season — was agreed upon in 2011 after a 132-day lockout. There were two even worse work stoppages a few decades ago when the 1982 and 1987 NFL seasons were both shortened by player strikes.

Seeking to avoid that kind of labor dispute, the NFL and NFLPA are getting a jumpstart on their 2021 negotiations.

The two sides had early meetings

When exactly the NFL and NFLPA descended on Minneapolis in the spring to get negotiations started isn’t clear. Giants owner John Mara said at the NFL Annual Meeting the two sides would have preliminary talks “in early to mid-April,” and the first indication that the talks started came on April 9.

That’s when ESPN’s Todd Archer reported Jerry Jones missed a press conference to announce a new contract for DeMarcus Lawrence because he’s in Minneapolis for CBA talks. A few hours later, a joint statement was released:

“Today, the members of the NFL’s Management Council and the NFLPA’s Executive Committee met to discuss negotiations for a new collective bargaining agreement. The League and the Union have committed to meet regularly in the coming months, which will involve staff, NFL leadership, members of the NFLPA Executive Committee and Player Representatives.”

They met throughout the summer and finally ended talks in late August ahead of the 2019 regular season.

Did progress on a new CBA actually get made this early?

The expiration of the CBA is still nearly two years away, so the biggest question the sides can answer in these preliminary meetings is just how much work they have to do.

According to the Washington Post’s John Clayton, it might not be much. He wrote that there is optimism a deal could get done as early as this year. That’d be extraordinarily quick, but Clayton says both sides could be happy with the current CBA due to the fast rising salary cap and minimum spending requirement (teams are required to spend at least 89 percent of their caps):

With that much money being spent, the feeling among some union leaders is that there is an incentive for players to make a deal rather than enter into an extended labor dispute. The NFL is on the verge of surpassing $15 billion in revenue, with the league’s television deals due to be extended within the next year. Each team received $255 million of shared revenue last year, with most of it coming from television.

NFLPA president Eric Winston hasn’t been quite as positive about the status quo, though:

Any conversation with NFL owners will be a renegotiation for a new deal, not an extension. At our board meetings we told everyone to prepare for a work stoppage; nothing has changed. https://t.co/DE2RLh1tBL

— Eric Winston (@ericwinston) March 27, 2019

In August, the Washington Post said the talks were “progressing,” but also said it’s still way too early to expect a resolution to come soon:

Executives with several NFL teams said it’s a good sign that talks are taking place without obvious acrimony or public sniping between the two sides. But they described the discussions as remaining in the relatively early stages and said they would be surprised if the process accelerates enough in the coming weeks to produce a near-term deal. A more realistic goal, one of those executives said, might be next spring.

Philadelphia Eagles safety Malcolm Jenkins, who also serves as the team’s NFLPA rep, also said he doesn’t expect an easy negotiation:

“I’ve got a feeling it won’t be as simple as it was last time,” Jenkins told ESPN. “Just because you have more players like myself who have been through the lockout before, saw how the NFLPA leadership handled that into where we are now, which I don’t think was a bad deal but there is a lot that I feel like we want to get back as players, or get as players.”

A month after the preliminary talks got started, NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport reported the conversation between the two sides was “cordial” and “amicable.”

Though it’s possible a deal could be reached before the 2019 season, negotiations would have to ramp up considerably. Unless the pace changes, that’s not seen as feasible. Perhaps more likely is a deal next spring, a year before the CBA expires following the 2020 season.

One source went as far as saying, as of now, there are disagreements but no contentious issues like last time. “Nothing that would make it blow up,” as of now, one person briefed on the talks said.

The New York Times warned that it’s still early to get too optimistic, though.

Officials from the league and the players’ union, who asked not to be identified so as not to be seen as negotiating in public, cautioned that labor negotiations had just begun and could quickly sour.

But the NFL’s early negotiation tactics bode well for the future. Via the Times:

The N.F.L., however, has shifted away from its combative approach of the last round of bargaining. People involved in the current discussions expect the league to agree to a modest increase in the players’ share of league revenue, and for there to be few major changes to an agreement that has led to significant gains in league revenue and player compensation for the past eight years.

Two years ago, NFLPA officials told players to begin the process of saving money for a potential lockout. That’s advice that hasn’t changed.

NFLPA Exec Dir De Smith sent an email out to all NFL agents this morning, advising them to urge player clients to save money in the event of a work stoppage. "We are advising players to plan for a work stoppage of at least a year in length," the letter states. More in SBD.

— Liz Mullen (@SBJLizMullen) May 28, 2019

These early meetings may have given an indication whether or not that’s still likely to be necessary.

What’s the No. 1 priority in the CBA talks?

A wise group of men — let’s call them a clan — once said “cash rules everything around me.” The negotiations of the next CBA will revolve around money, money, money, a couple other things, and money.

In 2011, the NFL and NFLPA agreed to a split of the league revenue with players getting 47-48.5 percent. That was down from 50 percent in the prior CBA. It was widely considered a win for the league and a loss for the players.

With league revenues soaring so much that the salary cap rose from $123 million in 2013 to $188.2 million in 2019 — more than a 50 percent increase in six years — a couple percentage points represent a LOT of money.

It’s unclear what exactly constitutes a “modest increase” for players, but if the NFL is willing to cede a chunk of their revenue it’ll help grease the wheels plenty. What the league wants in return is more games. Via NFL.com in late August:

there still has yet to be a breakthrough on the No. 1 issue, with NFL owners continuing to want more regular-season games and NFL players continuing to want a larger share of revenue without adding regular-season games, sources say. Players are guaranteed 47 percent of total revenue under the current CBA, which is set to expire after the 2020 season.

The two sides are reportedly agreeable on the idea of expanding the postseason field from 12 teams to 14, though.

What other money issues will the NFL and NFLPA haggle over?

The NFLPA will aim to raise that revenue sharing percentage, and that number will likely be the crux of the negotiation. But the money talks will go deeper than that. Both sides have other ways to try to get a bigger piece of the pie. To name a few:

The 89 percent spending floor could be raised to force teams to pay players more, or lowered to allow teams to save more.

The NFL secured large amounts of “stadium credits” in the 2011 CBA — allotments of league revenue that help pay for new stadiums. Owners are aiming to seek even more stadium credits in the next CBA too, according to ESPN. “The [stadium credits] issue has prompted the NFLPA to scoff at the notion that the current talks relate to an ‘extension’ of the 2011 agreement,” wrote Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk. The NFLPA considers the NFL’s requests “a major tweak” of the 2011 agreement.

A rookie wage scale was introduced in the 2011 CBA to end increasingly gigantic contracts for early draft picks. Sam Bradford received a six-year, $78 million deal after he was the No. 1 pick of the 2010 NFL Draft. In the most recent draft, Baker Mayfield received a four-year, $32.68 million contract for being the No. 1 pick. The wage scale is probably here to stay, but the NFLPA could aim for higher amounts for rookies or shorter contracts for first-year players that lets them cash in on second deals sooner.

The franchise tag could be in the crosshairs too with players now threatening to sit out seasons — and Le’Veon Bell even following through — to avoid it. The tag originally served to give teams more time to extend stars, but now it’s become a way to artificially avoid allowing the best players in the game to set the market higher at their respective positions.

There are a few non-money items on the agenda too

Money is the biggest reason to expect a lengthy fight, but there are also non-money issues: the league’s personal conduct policy, the substance abuse policy, and the commissioner’s unilateral authority to hand down punishment, to name a few.

The possibility of an 18-game regular season, increased or decreased practice time, and changes to the players’ healthcare plan are a few more wrenches that could be tossed into the mix.

The idea of an 18-game schedule has been floated by the NFL for several years. The league reportedly came to the NFLPA with the idea of allowing players to only play in 16 games per season — aiming to quell the union’s concern of players being overworked. There are several issues with that idea that would make it a bad compromise for both sides, though.

That was also around the time a group of Hall of Famers led by Eric Dickerson threatened to boycott future induction ceremonies if the next CBA doesn’t include significantly better healthcare benefits and revenue sharing for Hall of Famers.

The preliminary meetings were a chance for both sides to see just how far apart they are, and how much ground needs to be made up.

[florahecate]

Read More 30 Worst Diet Mistakes You’re Making

The following post 30 Worst Diet Mistakes You’re Making is republished from Eat This Not That by Olivia Tarantino

“I’m so tired of dieting!” says my friend Sarah yesterday “I’ve lost some weight, I’ve lost some inches—but I just can’t lose belly fat!”

Poor Sarah. She’d also lost her willpower. Turns out, she was sabotaging herself—without even knowing it.

You could be doing the same. By kicking these worst diet mistakes to the curb, you’ll finally see those pounds fall off—and stay off. And once you’ve stripped your routine of these pesky patterns, start burning off the flab with these 44 Ways to Lose 4 Inches of Body Fat, compliments of the researchers at Eat This, Not That!

1

You Set Unreasonable Expectations

This should come as good news for those of you who feel guilty for not following strict dietary lifestyles: Going vegan to lose weight won’t work for everyone. Especially for those who always eat eggs for breakfast and like to eat a burger for lunch. If the diet plan you’re following isn’t compatible with your lifestyle, the odds are higher that you’ll fall off the bandwagon and regain the weight. Rather, put a vegan spin on your omnivore lifestyle—add onions, peppers, and spinach to your omelet and order your burger with a side salad instead of fries. To lose weight without overhauling your lifestyle, also check out these 40 Ways to Lose Weight in 4 Seconds.

2

You Go It Alone

You’ve decided to change your life—good for you! Now spread the news! When you share your mission with your close friends and family, it will help you to build a support system and you’ll have people who can keep you accountable to your goals. It’s easy to mindlessly scoop another spoonful of ice cream into a bowl, but you might think twice if you have to justify this extra portion to your family as you eat dessert together at the dinner table. Want to take it a step further? Find yourself a diet buddy! Dieters who have a weight-loss partner lose significantly more belly fat compared to those who try to slim down alone, according to a study published in the Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology.

3

You Cut Out Groups of Foods

You shouldn’t punish an entire food group as a dietary villain. A diet that forbids entire food groups is not only unsustainable, but it can also be dangerous. (Unless, of course, there’s a medical reason—such as lactose intolerance or Celiac disease—to scratch something from your diet). For example: While eating too many refined flour foods can pack on the pounds by spiking your blood sugar and never fully satisfying your hunger pangs, that doesn’t mean that all carbs have the same effect. In fact, whole grains are rich in energizing B vitamins and digestion-slowing fiber. Plus, since carbs are an essential source of energy, completely slashing this food group from your diet can cause exhaustion, irritability, and lethargy.

4

You Fall for Health Halos

Whether it’s slapping a product with a “sugar-free” label or pointing out the food’s myriad of vitamins and minerals, marketing claims can get in the way of weight loss if you’re not actually reading the ingredients and nutritional information. You see, when dieters perceive a food to be nutritious—thanks to buzzwords like “organic” or “gluten-free”—they tend to misjudge how many calories are actually in them. As a result, dieters tend to feel entitled to indulge, which can lead to eating 131 percent more calories than you otherwise would, according to a Cornell University study.

RELATED: 14 “Health” Foods Worst Than a Donut

5

You Eat While Watching T.V.

The big game is on and it’s dinner time? Well, that’s why we have DVR! Press pause. Experts find that when your mind is distracted by other things while eating, such as watching TV or listening to loud music, it can block certain satiety cues from alerting your brain that you’ve eaten your fill. As a result, you consume more calories than your body needs, which will likely be stored as fat.

6

You Skip Meals

Constantly find yourself downing bags of chips or sleeves of cookies? Despite what you may think, feeling like you’re always hungry is not because you have a lack of willpower. In fact, if these binges are happening on busy days when you’ve “forgotten” to eat lunch, it’s likely a sign you need to change up your diet. “While skipping meals might seem like an easy way to eat less, it will most likely actually cause you to eat more later on,” says Sarah-Jane Bedwell, RD, LDN.

7

You Dine While You Dash

In a rush? Don’t start shoveling food in your face. If there’s one resolution to make this year, it should be to extend your lunch break to at least 20 minutes. Why the time minimum? Experts have found it takes around that amount of time for your stomach to tell your brain that you’re full. It’s one of the reasons why fast food is so bad for your waistline; you quickly eat the calorie-laden fare before your body can tell you you’ve had enough!

8

You Forget to Exercise

According to recent research published in the journal Applied Physiology, Nutrition, and Metabolism, weight loss programs that formally include an exercise routine are significantly more effective for weight loss and improved health than diets without recommended sweat sessions. Dr. Conrad Earnest, lead co-author of the study, recommends an exercise routine that includes both aerobic and strength training. Before you hit the weights, don’t miss these 24 Things No One Ever Tells You About the Gym.

9

You Go Too Hard Too Fast

It’s great to switch things up into a new exercise routine, but don’t hit the ground running—both literally and figuratively. If your body isn’t used to working out on the reg, you could injure yourself if you up your reps or mileage too quickly, which can hamper your weight-loss progress. Take your time to build up your base before you start racking up 10-mile runs every day.

10

You Rely on Exercise Also

“Moving more” isn’t going to be the only thing that helps you slim down. For starters, a 2012 review published in the journal Obesity Reviews found that people tend to overestimate how many calories they burn when they workout. As a result, people will not only overcompensate for their workout by eating more calories than they burned, but they may also think they can now indulge in junk food as a “reward” for exercise. As an example, a 155-pound person biking for one hour burns on average 520 calories. That can all be undone by under two slices of Domino’s Hand Tossed Cheese pizza.

11

You Slack Off When It Comes to Beverages

Although diet usually refers to food, don’t forget beverages! Processed juices, sugary sodas, and sweetened teas are all full of calories and can do major damage to your waistline. It’s not just the calories that will encourage your body to pack on the pounds. Studies have found that our bodies don’t register liquid calories like it does solid calories—and as a result, we may end up drinking more calories until we feel full.

12

You Assume “Diet” Drinks Are Good Replacements

They may tout “zero calories,” but a 2017 review published in the journal PLOS One concluded that diet drinks are not helpful for weight loss and that they may even cause people to pile on the pounds because they can dull your sweet receptors, causing you to consume more of traditionally sweet foods, and thus, consume more calories.

13

You Treat One Food Like a Magic Diet Pill

Yes, apple cider vinegar (ACV) has been connected to delaying gastric emptying (i.e. keeping you fuller for longer) and minimizing spikes in blood sugar. But just because you’re coating your salad with it every day doesn’t mean you don’t have to change anything else about your diet. There is no magic cure-all food that will help you drop the weight. Continue drizzling on that ACV, but just make sure you’re also cutting out junk food, doing your exercise, and avoiding these 31 Things You Did Today to Slow Your Metabolism.

14

You Rely on Supplements

Americans may spend billions of dollars on dietary supplements a year, but according to a 2016 study published in the journal JAMA, many of these products show no benefit over placebo. Another surprising finding? Supplement users are apparently among the healthiest members of the population and likely don’t even need supplements. So, unless you have a nutritional deficiency and have been instructed by your doctor to take a supplement, you should look to get your nutrients from whole foods. Doing so will mean you’re getting more than just the vitamin you’re looking for; you’re also getting belly-filling fiber, muscle-building protein, and brain-powering healthy fats.

15

You Forget Fats

Let this be the last time you choose the “low-fat” option! Don’t fear fats! In fact, when you don’t eat enough fat, you may suffer from feeling constant hunger, could develop adult acne, and may constantly feel like your brain is in a fog. Fats are necessary to feed the brain and help mitigate cravings. Incorporate more healthy fats like those from avocados, nuts, seeds, coconut oil, olive oil, and grass-fed butter.

16

You Skimp On Sleep

When you snooze, you lose—weight that is. Sleep helps your body recover from those heart-thumping workouts, allowing for cell regeneration and muscle building. That’s not all. Sleep also keeps your metabolism humming, your hunger hormones in check and your stress levels low. When you don’t sleep enough (experts recommend seven to eight hours a night), your cortisol levels skyrocket, which can slow down your metabolism and lead to excess production of belly fat.

17

You Forget to Dress Your Salads

Leafy greens are some of the top sources of vitamins. In particular, four vitamins that are fat-soluble: vitamins A, D, E, and K. That means these essential micronutrients will only be absorbed into the body once they’re dissolved in fat globules (in other words, a little EVOO). These vitamins play varying roles in maintaining proper bone, eye, and skin health, but also help keep your immune system fend off the colds that could put you out of commission and may throw your diet off track.

18

You Eat Your Brown Bag Lunch at Your Desk

Being mindful is a major part of weight loss, and it’s a sure bet that it’ll take a back seat when you’re simultaneously working and chomping on your lunch. Trying to do two things at once can distract your brain from recognizing that you’ve reached your fill. Not to mention, being able to step away from work briefly can subliminally tell your body you don’t have to be so stressed about work, which can help you get a handle on your fat-inducing cortisol levels.

19

You Eat When You’re Not Hungry

You know about the seafood diet right? Every time you see food, you eat it? It’s a mildly amusing joke, but it’s also surprisingly accurate. You see, the problem is that when we see food, we’re more likely to eat it even if your body isn’t in need of calories. According to Oxford researchers, the phenomenon is called “visual hunger.” It refers to our body’s natural response to increase your “I’m hungry” hormones upon sight of food since our brains developed when food was scarce and your body wanted to ensure you consumed all available resources that could provide energy and nutrients for survival. Science says the solution to the “see-food diet” is simple: hide your vices and steer clear of the break room box of donuts. You can also try these 30 Ways to Trick Yourself Into Feeling Full.

20

You Eat Dinner Too Late

And no, it’s not because it stalls your metabolism. When you eat a large meal too close to your bedtime, you may have trouble falling asleep, thanks to your body working to digest that meal. And when you don’t get a good night’s rest, studies show you’re more likely to have higher levels of the hunger hormone ghrelin the next day, which can cause you to overeat. “Research also shows that when we’re sleep-deprived, our brains respond more strongly to junk food and have less of an ability to practice portion control,” Alissa Rumsey, RD, and Spokesperson for the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics tells us.

21

You Celebrate Success with Food Rewards

Whether it’s hitting a personal best mile time or losing another five pounds, you should certainly celebrate—just don’t rely on alcohol and sweets to reward your success. If you do, odds are you’ll see the weight creep back onto your slimmed-down frame before you know it. Instead, use things like a facial, manicure, or a favorite exercise class as a reward for your hard work.

22

You Stop Weighing In

What’s the harm in reminding yourself of your continued success? The scale keeps you mindful of your diet, and it will quickly tip you off to regained pounds. In fact, dieters who weigh themselves daily can lose twice as much weight as those who weigh themselves less frequently, according to University of Minnesota researchers.

23

You Bore Yourself with the Same Workouts

Routines are great when it comes to always heading to the gym before work, but if you get there and repeat the same elliptical workout, you’re likely not getting as much from your exercise as you could. That’s because you’re not challenging new muscles. To wake up your metabolic rate, shock your muscles by changing up your workouts every two weeks.

24

You Let Frozen Options Replace Homemade Meals

Frozen meals once in awhile: approved. But for every meal? Skip it. Not only are these cold concoctions typically loaded with bloat-inducing, blood-pressure-raising sodium, but—let’s face it—you’re not likely going to be able to subsist on frozen meals forever. After a while, you’re likely to tire of the same menus. Plus, if you rely on pre-portioned meals, once you go off them, you’re likely to regain all that lost weight since you have no replacement. If sustainable weight loss is your goal, kick the shortcuts to the curb and make your meals at home from scratch. Doing so can help you banish these nasty additives as well as cut calorie consumption by an average of 200 calories a day, according to Johns Hopkins researchers.

25

You Deprive Yourself

You don’t have to deprive yourself to lose weight. The reasoning is simple: research published in the journals Appetite and Eating Behaviors supports the notion that giving into a guilty pleasure is more effective at keeping weight off long term than trying to suppress it. Why is that? Well, both studies demonstrated that when participants gave into a craving (rather than fighting it off), it actually helped to reduce binge eating and decreased subsequent cravings.

26

You Save Your Calories for Later

You know you’re going out to dinner with your friends later tonight, so you choose to sip on a fruity drink and chomp on a couple carrots for lunch to save calories for later. It may seem responsible, but “it rarely works out as cleanly as we like,” nutritionist Lisa Hayim, MS, RD tells us. “By the time you get to dinner, and have a drink or two, the feelings of extreme hunger rush in, and you’re grabbing for whatever you can get your hands on, which is usually foods high in calories and fat. You’re so hungry, you may even end up consuming more than a day’s worth of calories in one sitting,” explains Hayim. Instead, she recommends eating on a normal schedule during the day and choosing to eat responsibility at night. And remember—one day of overindulgence isn’t going to do your body much harm. It’s only when it becomes a bad habit.

27

You Leave Your Water Bottle at Home

“Not drinking enough water can have a negative impact on the metabolism as well as your appetite,” says Alexandra Miller, RDN, LDN. Research has shown that people often respond to their thirst inappropriately by eating instead of drinking since the same part of our brain controls both responses. When you’re hydrated, it also helps to make your stomach feel full, which can fend off the feeling of hunger.

28

You Gush Over Food Porn on Instagram

If you shouldn’t eat it, don’t stop to gawk at it on your social feeds. That includes looking at oversized milkshakes and extra cheesy pizza. Studies have found that simply looking at calorie-laden fare can actually cause your hunger hormones to spike—even if your body isn’t physically in need of food.

29

You Rely on Food to Ease Your Nerves

The deadline for your project is fast approaching and you need to ease your nerves before the presentation. Here’s a newsflash: Downing a pint of ice cream is not the answer. Not only are the foods we typically lean towards when we’re stressed high in things that exacerbate your stress hormone levels—like fat and sugar—but they’re also high in calories and can cause weight gain. Plus, making a connection between eating and emotions can result in poor eating decisions and coping mechanisms. Instead, create an automatic response to stress that doesn’t involve food, such as going for a walk or taking a shower.

30

You Plan Your Life Around Your Diet

There’s a difference between being committed to a weight loss plan and being obsessed with it. If you start planning your entire life around your diet—like avoiding birthday parties so you don’t feel tempted by cake or miss out on seeing your old friend who’s in town briefly because you don’t want to get a drink—it will make your diet hard to stick to in the long run. A sustainable diet is one that leaves some wiggle room and doesn’t hinder you from living a fun and a fulfilling life. And now that you know what not to do, be sure to keep the healthy living going with these 40 Best Fat-Burning Foods.

  The post 30 Worst Diet Mistakes You’re Making appeared first on Eat This Not That.

[luxrestate60518]

HUFFPOST HILL - Better Angels Of Our Nature Totally Cuck House GOP

Joe Biden reminded everyone why he might be the closest thing humanity has to a walking, talking “tfw” joke. Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner are moving two blocks from the Obamas’ future home, though nobody is discussing their proximity to a nearby Islamic center for some reason. And a bunch of Hillary Clinton staffers have been recruited to run rapid response at the DNC, because what the opposition really needs are more black-and-white videos of Jonah Hill in a heather gray sweater solemnly telling us how much we need the individual mandate. This is HUFFPOST HILL for Tuesday, January 3rd, 2017:

GOP IN GISARRAY - The real loser in all of this is Rep. Blake Farenthold, who will now have that picture of himself dressed in duckling PJs re-broadcast to the world (see below!). Matt Fuller and Paige Lavender: “After a torrent of bad headlines, countless phone calls to member offices, and two tweets from President-elect Donald Trump, House Republicans dropped their plans to gut the Office of Congressional Ethics Tuesday, just minutes before the House was set to gavel in for the 115th Congress and adopt their rules package for the next two years. The amendment ― authored by Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) ― would have placed the independent congressional ethics office under the oversight of the House Ethics Committee, changed the OCE’s name and barred the office from releasing reports to the public. In effect, it would have neutered Congress’ most aggressive watchdog. The decision to strip the Goodlatte amendment came just before noon on Tuesday as Republicans planned to begin the 115th Congress. Earlier in the day, responding to numerous news reports about Republicans gutting the OCE, Trump asked in a tweet whether Republicans really had to make the ‘weakening’ of the ethics office their first order of business, though he also didn’t necessarily come out against the idea of eventually overhauling the OCE.” [HuffPost]

Read HuffPost’s Ryan Grim on what made this whole snafu truly important: It proved that Congress will still react to public outrage.

We just want to see Sandy Levin in Snapchat Spectacles: “Several Democrats took pictures on the House floor as the chamber held a quorum call to kick off the 115th Congress — a violation of House rules that Republicans want to start punishing with a fine of up to $2,500…. Taking photos or recording video on the House floor has been a longstanding violation of House rules, but the fine is something new Republicans are proposing this year as a delayed reaction to Democrats’ June sit-in on the House floor protesting gun violence. During the sit-in, Democrats used their cell phones to record video of their speeches and chants and took photos of themselves and their colleagues after Republicans turned off the CSPAN cameras that provide live access to the floor.” [Roll Call’s Lindsey McPherson]

Watch this video of our HuffPost DC colleagues reading mean tweets.

HERE’S SOME SWEET, SWEET CUD FOR FINANCIAL SERVICES DEMOCRATS TO CHEW ON - Ben Carson’s confirmation hearing before Senate Banking is quickly becoming our second-most anticipated confirmation hearing. David Dayen: “OneWest Bank, which Donald Trump’s treasury secretary nominee Steven Mnuchin ran from 2009 to 2015, repeatedly broke California’s foreclosure laws during that period, according to a previously undisclosed 2013 memo from top prosecutors in the state attorney general’s office. The memo obtained by The Intercept alleges that OneWest rushed delinquent homeowners out of their homes by violating notice and waiting period statutes, illegally backdated key documents, and effectively gamed foreclosure auctions. In the memo, the leaders of the state attorney general’s Consumer Law Section said they had ‘uncovered evidence suggestive of widespread misconduct’ in a yearlong investigation. In a detailed 22-page request, they identified over a thousand legal violations in the small subsection of OneWest loans they were able to examine, and they recommended that Attorney General Kamala Harris file a civil enforcement action against the Pasadena-based bank. They even wrote up a sample legal complaint, seeking injunctive relief and millions of dollars in penalties.” [The Intercept]

BLACK PEOPLE WORRIED ABOUT JEFF SESSIONS FOR SOME REASON - But some of his best friends are ― oh, they aren’t? Lilly Workneh: “The NAACP is staging a sit-in protest at the office of U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions in Mobile, Alabama to speak out against his nomination by President-elect Donald Trump for attorney general. Several leaders of the civil rights organization have thus far participated in the protest, which kicked off Tuesday morning, including NAACP President Cornell William Brooks, and Alabama state NAACP President Benard Simelton. Brooks posted a tweet Tuesday morning declaring that he will continue to occupy the office until the protest results in either Sessions’ withdrawal or their arrest.” [HuffPost]

Like HuffPost Hill? Then order Eliot’s new book, The Beltway Bible: A Totally Serious A-Z Guide To Our No-Good, Corrupt, Incompetent, Terrible, Depressing, and Sometimes Hilarious Government

Does somebody keep forwarding you this newsletter? Get your own copy. It’s free! Sign up here. Send tips/stories/photos/events/fundraisers/job movement/juicy miscellanea to eliot@huffingtonpost.com. Follow us on Twitter - @HuffPostHill

THE PEOPLE WHO BROUGHT YOU ‘DANGEROUS DONALD’ SOMEHOW GIVEN JOB - Listen closely to the wind and you can hear the anguished typing of a million Bernie Bros. Philip Rucker: “The Democratic National Committee is building a ‘war room’ to battle President-elect Donald Trump, pressure the new Republican administration on a variety of policy matters and train a spotlight on Russia’s alleged cyberattacks to influence the 2016 election…. The DNC’s new communications and research operation, to be staffed by former aides to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, will be one of several efforts from across the Democratic firmament to take on Trump, including the office of Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), the Center for American Progress and American Bridge.” [WaPo]

TRUMP DUBAI HOTEL OPENING TO PROVIDE FRESH CONFLICT OF INTEREST - It’s been a whole five minutes since the last ethical challenge. Jon Gambrell: “The Trump International Golf Club in Dubai — the sheikhdom in the United Arab Emirates home to a futuristic skyline crowned by the world’s tallest building — is due to open in February and be managed by Trump Organization employees. It is set inside Akoya, a massive housing development of 2,600 villas and 7,000 apartments developed by Dubai-based luxury real estate DAMAC Properties. Another Trump-managed golf course is planned for another even larger DAMAC project under development further down the road. Billionaire Hussain Sajwani, who founded DAMAC Properties in 2002, met Trump some 10 years ago and the two men hit it off over their real estate experiences, said Niall McLoughlin, a senior vice president for communications and marketing at the firm…. Sajwani and his family also attended a New Year’s Eve party at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in Florida, with the incoming president describing them from on stage as ‘the most beautiful people from Dubai.’” [AP]

‘JOEY NO SOCKS’ - Such good swamp-draining news today. Chris Sommerfeldt: “President-elect Donald Trump rang in the new year together with Joseph ‘Joey No Socks’ Cinque — a convicted felon with ties to notorious Gambino crime family boss John Gotti, a recently released video has revealed. Cinque can be seen in a video obtained by the Palm Beach Daily News, cheering loudly as a tuxedo-clad Trump runs through a number of campaign promises before the hundreds of guests attending the New Year’s Eve bash the President-elect threw at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida on Saturday. ‘The taxes are coming down, regulations are coming off, we’re going to get rid of Obamacare,’ Trump can be heard saying as an exuberant Cinque stands next to him, pumping his fists into the air.” [Daily News]

‘WHAT ABOUT CHICAGO?’ TROLLING NOW FEDERAL POLICY - “President-elect Donald Trump said Monday that if Mayor Rahm Emanuel can’t turn the tide on Chicago’s soaring murder rate, Washington may need to step in. Trump, who frequently cited Chicago’s violence during the presidential campaign, tweeted about The Windy City a day after the Chicago Police Department released year-end crime stats showing homicide numbers that dwarfed those of New York and Los Angeles combined. “Chicago murder rate is record setting - 4,331 shooting victims with 762 murders in 2016. If Mayor can’t do it he must ask for Federal help!” Trump tweeted.” [Fox News]

MEGYN KELLY HEADING TO NBC NEWS - We suppose it would be too much to ask for Shep Smith to get Kelly’s spot…. Michael Calderone: “Fox News host Megyn Kelly is leaving the cable news network for NBC News, the network announced Tuesday. Kelly will take on multiple roles at NBC. She’ll host a one-hour daytime talk show airing Monday through Friday and a Sunday evening news magazine show, and will contribute on breaking news stories and NBC’s coverage of major political and special events. ‘Megyn is an exceptional journalist and news anchor, who has had an extraordinary career,’ Andrew Lack, chairman of the NBCUniversal News Group, said in a release. ‘She’s demonstrated tremendous skill and poise, and we’re lucky to have her.’ The departure is a major blow to Fox News, where Kelly hosted a top-rated 9 p.m. show and was considered a key part of the network’s future. In a Facebook post, Kelly said she was ‘incredibly enriched for the experiences’ she had in a dozen years at Fox News.” [HuffPost]

Can you even begin to imagine this neighborhood listserv: “[M]ultiple real-estate sources say [Ivanka] Trump and husband Jared Kushner will move into 2449 Tracy Pl. NW, in Kalorama. That will put the couple less than two blocks from the Obamas, who will reportedly move here post-White House.” [Washingtonian’s Marisa Kashino]

THINGS STAY THE SAME - Once again, Heath Shuler was denied his place in history. John Bresnahan and Kyle Cheney: “House Republicans overwhelmingly reelected Paul Ryan on Tuesday to another term as speaker of the House. Only one — Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) — voted against him…. On the other side of the aisle, House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi saw four defections in her own caucus: Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.) voted for fellow Ohio Democrat Tim Ryan, and Rep. Ron Kind (D-Wisc.) voted for Cooper. Rep. Kathleen Rice (D-New York) also voted for Tim Ryan, and Rep. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) voted for Rep. John Lewis.” [Politico]

*Insert Illuminati joke here* “Former President Bill Clinton and 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton will attend President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration later this month, aides to both Clintons told CNN on Tuesday. Former President George W. Bush and former first lady Laura Bush will also attend, the 43rd president’s office said in a statement Tuesday.” [CNN’S Dan Merica and Theodore Schleifer]

THE GOP’S OBAMACARE CLOWN SHOW HAS BEGUN - Congress officially took the first procedural step Tuesday to unravel the health law, and Republicans still have no clue what the final step will be. Noam Levey: “Congressional Republicans, despite pledging to quickly repeal the Affordable Care Act, are struggling with what parts of the law to roll back and how to lock up the votes they will need, particularly in the Senate, to push their ambitious plans. Settling these questions may delay any major repeal vote for months. Just as importantly, a protracted debate could force President-elect Donald Trump and GOP lawmakers to preserve parts of the healthcare law they once swore to eliminate. And this all must be resolved before they even turn to the question of how to replace the law.” [LA Times]

TRUMP CAMP PROMISES PRESS CONFERENCE FOR THE UMPTEENTH TIME - He totally won’t back out again, you guys. Callum Borchers: “Donald Trump senior adviser Kellyanne Conway told CNN on Monday that the president-elect will probably hold a news conference Jan. 11. ‘I know that’s the current plan,’ Conway said, sounding less than certain. Let’s not forget that a September event originally billed as a news conference turned out to be an infomercial for Trump’s new D.C. hotel — capped by a brief concession that President Obama was, in fact, born in the United States. And last month’s long-planned news conference was scrapped just days beforehand. So plans can change. Assuming Trump does follow through next week, his news conference drought will end at 168 days — a staggeringly long stretch for a man who once constantly held court with reporters and seemed to view the interactions as a kind of sport.” [WaPo]

CONGRESS LOVES JESUS MORE THAN AMERICA DOES - Science says so. Eliza Collins: “Lawmakers in Congress are overwhelmingly Christian, more even than the America they represent. Nine out of 10 members the new House and Senate (91%) sworn in Tuesday describe themselves as members of the Christian faith, according to a survey released by Pew Research Center Tuesday. The number of Christians in Congress is higher than the number of Americans who identify as Christian. That number has been declining in recent decades. Between the early 1970s and 90s the number hovered around 90% but by early 2000 it had dropped to around 80%. According to a spokeswoman from Pew, that number continues to decrease.” [USA Today]

BECAUSE YOU’VE READ THIS FAR - Here is a dog being shamed about its snoring.

BREAKING RICHARD NIXON NEWS - Peter Baker: “Richard M. Nixon told an aide that they should find a way to secretly ‘monkey wrench’ peace talks in Vietnam in the waning days of the 1968 campaign for fear that progress toward ending the war would hurt his chances for the presidency, according to newly discovered notes. In a telephone conversation with H. R. Haldeman, who would go on to become White House chief of staff, Nixon gave instructions that a friendly intermediary should keep ‘working on’ South Vietnamese leaders to persuade them not to agree to a deal before the election, according to the notes, taken by Mr. Haldeman.” [NYT]

COMFORT FOOD

- Auctioneers set over rap beats.

- Tsunamis are terrifying.

-  The worst (best?) moments of the English-to-Mandarin-to-English translation of “Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith”

TWITTERAMA

@mattyglesias: Web traffic is back! Vacation and family togetherness are fine, but clicks are what matters most.

@MEPFuller: Hey but remember when House Republicans were all Let’s-make-sure-the-public-has-a-chance-to-read-and-weigh-in-on-congressional-action?

lol

@jonlovett: Maybe a moratorium

A moratorium

On videos of celebrities with serious faces

Serious faces

Not saying forever

But

But just for now

For now

Got something to add? Send tips/quotes/stories/photos/events/fundraisers/job movement/juicy miscellanea to Eliot Nelson (eliot@huffingtonpost.com)

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

from DIYS http://ift.tt/2i7BZVA

[realestate63141]

HUFFPOST HILL - Better Angels Of Our Nature Totally Cuck House GOP

Joe Biden reminded everyone why he might be the closest thing humanity has to a walking, talking “tfw” joke. Ivanka Trump and Jared Kushner are moving two blocks from the Obamas’ future home, though nobody is discussing their proximity to a nearby Islamic center for some reason. And a bunch of Hillary Clinton staffers have been recruited to run rapid response at the DNC, because what the opposition really needs are more black-and-white videos of Jonah Hill in a heather gray sweater solemnly telling us how much we need the individual mandate. This is HUFFPOST HILL for Tuesday, January 3rd, 2017:

GOP IN GISARRAY - The real loser in all of this is Rep. Blake Farenthold, who will now have that picture of himself dressed in duckling PJs re-broadcast to the world (see below!). Matt Fuller and Paige Lavender: “After a torrent of bad headlines, countless phone calls to member offices, and two tweets from President-elect Donald Trump, House Republicans dropped their plans to gut the Office of Congressional Ethics Tuesday, just minutes before the House was set to gavel in for the 115th Congress and adopt their rules package for the next two years. The amendment ― authored by Judiciary Chairman Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.) ― would have placed the independent congressional ethics office under the oversight of the House Ethics Committee, changed the OCE’s name and barred the office from releasing reports to the public. In effect, it would have neutered Congress’ most aggressive watchdog. The decision to strip the Goodlatte amendment came just before noon on Tuesday as Republicans planned to begin the 115th Congress. Earlier in the day, responding to numerous news reports about Republicans gutting the OCE, Trump asked in a tweet whether Republicans really had to make the ‘weakening’ of the ethics office their first order of business, though he also didn’t necessarily come out against the idea of eventually overhauling the OCE.” [HuffPost]

Read HuffPost’s Ryan Grim on what made this whole snafu truly important: It proved that Congress will still react to public outrage.

We just want to see Sandy Levin in Snapchat Spectacles: “Several Democrats took pictures on the House floor as the chamber held a quorum call to kick off the 115th Congress — a violation of House rules that Republicans want to start punishing with a fine of up to $2,500…. Taking photos or recording video on the House floor has been a longstanding violation of House rules, but the fine is something new Republicans are proposing this year as a delayed reaction to Democrats’ June sit-in on the House floor protesting gun violence. During the sit-in, Democrats used their cell phones to record video of their speeches and chants and took photos of themselves and their colleagues after Republicans turned off the CSPAN cameras that provide live access to the floor.” [Roll Call’s Lindsey McPherson]

Watch this video of our HuffPost DC colleagues reading mean tweets.

HERE’S SOME SWEET, SWEET CUD FOR FINANCIAL SERVICES DEMOCRATS TO CHEW ON - Ben Carson’s confirmation hearing before Senate Banking is quickly becoming our second-most anticipated confirmation hearing. David Dayen: “OneWest Bank, which Donald Trump’s treasury secretary nominee Steven Mnuchin ran from 2009 to 2015, repeatedly broke California’s foreclosure laws during that period, according to a previously undisclosed 2013 memo from top prosecutors in the state attorney general’s office. The memo obtained by The Intercept alleges that OneWest rushed delinquent homeowners out of their homes by violating notice and waiting period statutes, illegally backdated key documents, and effectively gamed foreclosure auctions. In the memo, the leaders of the state attorney general’s Consumer Law Section said they had ‘uncovered evidence suggestive of widespread misconduct’ in a yearlong investigation. In a detailed 22-page request, they identified over a thousand legal violations in the small subsection of OneWest loans they were able to examine, and they recommended that Attorney General Kamala Harris file a civil enforcement action against the Pasadena-based bank. They even wrote up a sample legal complaint, seeking injunctive relief and millions of dollars in penalties.” [The Intercept]

BLACK PEOPLE WORRIED ABOUT JEFF SESSIONS FOR SOME REASON - But some of his best friends are ― oh, they aren’t? Lilly Workneh: “The NAACP is staging a sit-in protest at the office of U.S. Sen. Jeff Sessions in Mobile, Alabama to speak out against his nomination by President-elect Donald Trump for attorney general. Several leaders of the civil rights organization have thus far participated in the protest, which kicked off Tuesday morning, including NAACP President Cornell William Brooks, and Alabama state NAACP President Benard Simelton. Brooks posted a tweet Tuesday morning declaring that he will continue to occupy the office until the protest results in either Sessions’ withdrawal or their arrest.” [HuffPost]

Like HuffPost Hill? Then order Eliot’s new book, The Beltway Bible: A Totally Serious A-Z Guide To Our No-Good, Corrupt, Incompetent, Terrible, Depressing, and Sometimes Hilarious Government

Does somebody keep forwarding you this newsletter? Get your own copy. It’s free! Sign up here. Send tips/stories/photos/events/fundraisers/job movement/juicy miscellanea to eliot@huffingtonpost.com. Follow us on Twitter - @HuffPostHill

THE PEOPLE WHO BROUGHT YOU ‘DANGEROUS DONALD’ SOMEHOW GIVEN JOB - Listen closely to the wind and you can hear the anguished typing of a million Bernie Bros. Philip Rucker: “The Democratic National Committee is building a ‘war room’ to battle President-elect Donald Trump, pressure the new Republican administration on a variety of policy matters and train a spotlight on Russia’s alleged cyberattacks to influence the 2016 election…. The DNC’s new communications and research operation, to be staffed by former aides to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, will be one of several efforts from across the Democratic firmament to take on Trump, including the office of Senate Minority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.), the Center for American Progress and American Bridge.” [WaPo]

TRUMP DUBAI HOTEL OPENING TO PROVIDE FRESH CONFLICT OF INTEREST - It’s been a whole five minutes since the last ethical challenge. Jon Gambrell: “The Trump International Golf Club in Dubai — the sheikhdom in the United Arab Emirates home to a futuristic skyline crowned by the world’s tallest building — is due to open in February and be managed by Trump Organization employees. It is set inside Akoya, a massive housing development of 2,600 villas and 7,000 apartments developed by Dubai-based luxury real estate DAMAC Properties. Another Trump-managed golf course is planned for another even larger DAMAC project under development further down the road. Billionaire Hussain Sajwani, who founded DAMAC Properties in 2002, met Trump some 10 years ago and the two men hit it off over their real estate experiences, said Niall McLoughlin, a senior vice president for communications and marketing at the firm…. Sajwani and his family also attended a New Year’s Eve party at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club in Florida, with the incoming president describing them from on stage as ‘the most beautiful people from Dubai.’” [AP]

‘JOEY NO SOCKS’ - Such good swamp-draining news today. Chris Sommerfeldt: “President-elect Donald Trump rang in the new year together with Joseph ‘Joey No Socks’ Cinque — a convicted felon with ties to notorious Gambino crime family boss John Gotti, a recently released video has revealed. Cinque can be seen in a video obtained by the Palm Beach Daily News, cheering loudly as a tuxedo-clad Trump runs through a number of campaign promises before the hundreds of guests attending the New Year’s Eve bash the President-elect threw at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida on Saturday. ‘The taxes are coming down, regulations are coming off, we’re going to get rid of Obamacare,’ Trump can be heard saying as an exuberant Cinque stands next to him, pumping his fists into the air.” [Daily News]

‘WHAT ABOUT CHICAGO?’ TROLLING NOW FEDERAL POLICY - “President-elect Donald Trump said Monday that if Mayor Rahm Emanuel can’t turn the tide on Chicago’s soaring murder rate, Washington may need to step in. Trump, who frequently cited Chicago’s violence during the presidential campaign, tweeted about The Windy City a day after the Chicago Police Department released year-end crime stats showing homicide numbers that dwarfed those of New York and Los Angeles combined. “Chicago murder rate is record setting - 4,331 shooting victims with 762 murders in 2016. If Mayor can’t do it he must ask for Federal help!” Trump tweeted.” [Fox News]

MEGYN KELLY HEADING TO NBC NEWS - We suppose it would be too much to ask for Shep Smith to get Kelly’s spot…. Michael Calderone: “Fox News host Megyn Kelly is leaving the cable news network for NBC News, the network announced Tuesday. Kelly will take on multiple roles at NBC. She’ll host a one-hour daytime talk show airing Monday through Friday and a Sunday evening news magazine show, and will contribute on breaking news stories and NBC’s coverage of major political and special events. ‘Megyn is an exceptional journalist and news anchor, who has had an extraordinary career,’ Andrew Lack, chairman of the NBCUniversal News Group, said in a release. ‘She’s demonstrated tremendous skill and poise, and we’re lucky to have her.’ The departure is a major blow to Fox News, where Kelly hosted a top-rated 9 p.m. show and was considered a key part of the network’s future. In a Facebook post, Kelly said she was ‘incredibly enriched for the experiences’ she had in a dozen years at Fox News.” [HuffPost]

Can you even begin to imagine this neighborhood listserv: “[M]ultiple real-estate sources say [Ivanka] Trump and husband Jared Kushner will move into 2449 Tracy Pl. NW, in Kalorama. That will put the couple less than two blocks from the Obamas, who will reportedly move here post-White House.” [Washingtonian’s Marisa Kashino]

THINGS STAY THE SAME - Once again, Heath Shuler was denied his place in history. John Bresnahan and Kyle Cheney: “House Republicans overwhelmingly reelected Paul Ryan on Tuesday to another term as speaker of the House. Only one — Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) — voted against him…. On the other side of the aisle, House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi saw four defections in her own caucus: Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Tenn.) voted for fellow Ohio Democrat Tim Ryan, and Rep. Ron Kind (D-Wisc.) voted for Cooper. Rep. Kathleen Rice (D-New York) also voted for Tim Ryan, and Rep. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.) voted for Rep. John Lewis.” [Politico]

*Insert Illuminati joke here* “Former President Bill Clinton and 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton will attend President-elect Donald Trump’s inauguration later this month, aides to both Clintons told CNN on Tuesday. Former President George W. Bush and former first lady Laura Bush will also attend, the 43rd president’s office said in a statement Tuesday.” [CNN’S Dan Merica and Theodore Schleifer]

THE GOP’S OBAMACARE CLOWN SHOW HAS BEGUN - Congress officially took the first procedural step Tuesday to unravel the health law, and Republicans still have no clue what the final step will be. Noam Levey: “Congressional Republicans, despite pledging to quickly repeal the Affordable Care Act, are struggling with what parts of the law to roll back and how to lock up the votes they will need, particularly in the Senate, to push their ambitious plans. Settling these questions may delay any major repeal vote for months. Just as importantly, a protracted debate could force President-elect Donald Trump and GOP lawmakers to preserve parts of the healthcare law they once swore to eliminate. And this all must be resolved before they even turn to the question of how to replace the law.” [LA Times]

TRUMP CAMP PROMISES PRESS CONFERENCE FOR THE UMPTEENTH TIME - He totally won’t back out again, you guys. Callum Borchers: “Donald Trump senior adviser Kellyanne Conway told CNN on Monday that the president-elect will probably hold a news conference Jan. 11. ‘I know that’s the current plan,’ Conway said, sounding less than certain. Let’s not forget that a September event originally billed as a news conference turned out to be an infomercial for Trump’s new D.C. hotel — capped by a brief concession that President Obama was, in fact, born in the United States. And last month’s long-planned news conference was scrapped just days beforehand. So plans can change. Assuming Trump does follow through next week, his news conference drought will end at 168 days — a staggeringly long stretch for a man who once constantly held court with reporters and seemed to view the interactions as a kind of sport.” [WaPo]

CONGRESS LOVES JESUS MORE THAN AMERICA DOES - Science says so. Eliza Collins: “Lawmakers in Congress are overwhelmingly Christian, more even than the America they represent. Nine out of 10 members the new House and Senate (91%) sworn in Tuesday describe themselves as members of the Christian faith, according to a survey released by Pew Research Center Tuesday. The number of Christians in Congress is higher than the number of Americans who identify as Christian. That number has been declining in recent decades. Between the early 1970s and 90s the number hovered around 90% but by early 2000 it had dropped to around 80%. According to a spokeswoman from Pew, that number continues to decrease.” [USA Today]

BECAUSE YOU’VE READ THIS FAR - Here is a dog being shamed about its snoring.

BREAKING RICHARD NIXON NEWS - Peter Baker: “Richard M. Nixon told an aide that they should find a way to secretly ‘monkey wrench’ peace talks in Vietnam in the waning days of the 1968 campaign for fear that progress toward ending the war would hurt his chances for the presidency, according to newly discovered notes. In a telephone conversation with H. R. Haldeman, who would go on to become White House chief of staff, Nixon gave instructions that a friendly intermediary should keep ‘working on’ South Vietnamese leaders to persuade them not to agree to a deal before the election, according to the notes, taken by Mr. Haldeman.” [NYT]

COMFORT FOOD

- Auctioneers set over rap beats.

- Tsunamis are terrifying.

-  The worst (best?) moments of the English-to-Mandarin-to-English translation of “Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith”

TWITTERAMA

@mattyglesias: Web traffic is back! Vacation and family togetherness are fine, but clicks are what matters most.

@MEPFuller: Hey but remember when House Republicans were all Let’s-make-sure-the-public-has-a-chance-to-read-and-weigh-in-on-congressional-action?

lol

@jonlovett: Maybe a moratorium

A moratorium

On videos of celebrities with serious faces

Serious faces

Not saying forever

But

But just for now

For now

Got something to add? Send tips/quotes/stories/photos/events/fundraisers/job movement/juicy miscellanea to Eliot Nelson (eliot@huffingtonpost.com)

-- This feed and its contents are the property of The Huffington Post, and use is subject to our terms. It may be used for personal consumption, but may not be distributed on a website.

from DIYS http://ift.tt/2i7BZVA

[thecuriousblitz]

I caught your amazing post summarizing the whole Fairgame issue and RT's corporate responsibility but can't find it in the tags anywhere. everyone should read it! particularly because there are so many people who are like 'CRWBY did nothing wrong'

Ah the Tumblr blackhole strikes again? Original post here, and reposting below, just in case. And thanks for reading. Hopefully it injects some much-needed nuance into the mess.

Hopes for RWBY Vol. 8: A commitment from RT to do better by their queer mlm fans

I waited until the end of Vol. 7 to put this out there, in case there was a Hail Mary fix-it that, while not able to erase how Fairgame was handled, would at least shed some light on certain narrative decisions.

And so when RT started peddling paired Qrow/Clover pins and a ‘Born Unlucky’ Qrow drinking cup after weeks of radio silence, I said to myself - calmly - well fuck.

Having worked as both a writer and marketer for a games company and several creative agencies, I know it takes gallons of blood, sweat and tears to make a show like RWBY shine. For that, CRWBY has my utmost respect. I also know that the directors, writing, animation and marketing departments of a commercially significant project are typically very connected and cross-communicative - for many reasons, but mainly to avoid preventable shitshows.

That’s why the idea that no one important knew about and therefore can’t be held responsible for the prolonged queerteasing engaged in by several animators and marketing staff is friggin’ bizarre.

In criminal law, the severity of the punishment often hinges on the presence of mens rea, or a ‘guilty mind’. For example, if it’s proven you both intended to and did kill someone, you go down for murder. If you’re drunk and run over someone, it’s manslaughter - a lesser crime, but a crime nonetheless because harm was caused through recklessness or negligence. ie. You should have fucking known.

I don’t think there’s enough to prove intent to harm, but holy shit if it was your run-of-the-mill agency, there would have been someone tripping over their balls to shut down the weeks of ‘we gave you bumbleby, now how bouts some Fairgame wink wink’ marketing and your ‘I ship Qrover hardcore/CLOVER IS A TOP’ animators, knowing where the narrative was going. Either RT operates on some alien plane of existence where common sense/corporate liability isn’t a thing, or some serious soul-searching and a company-wide policy change needs to happen. At the very least, please have the fucking talk with your marketing and animation teams, for their sake and that of your company’s.

Additionally, anytime we were working on something that could even remotely touch on minority or sensitive issues (eg. those concerning people with disabilities, indigenous peoples, LGBTQI, potential trauma triggers), we would hire external subject matter experts to extensively comb through anything that might cause problems. The writing, character design, animation, VOs, marketing, every fucking end-to-end detail.

Once, our design team had to completely re-do the hairstyles of several minor NPCs in a game for kids because they were too ‘phallic-like’. I lead with that example because it’s my favorite ‘wtf’ workplace moment (you really had to squint to see it), but in all seriousness, there have been many times where the input of qualified experts saved our collective blind asses. When it comes to representation, details matter - even if you personally don’t see a problem.

Note the use of ‘external’ experts. We never relied on having minority members on our team to pass muster. One, that puts way too much fucking pressure on the crew member who happens to be part of that minority group to speak up. Two, and this might be shocking for some, not all members of a minority group think and feel the same way about everything.

If you can manage to sweat the details, hire experts, and have (what I thought were normal) cross-department communications, you avoid situations where individuals who are part of an underrepresented group are forced to defend the validity of their pain.

By virtue of queer/mlm being a minority, the majority of the fandom won’t see a problem. Hell, not all queer/mlm will see a problem, and that’s totally fine.

The problem is this: Once your product is out there, and your rogue animators/marketing team have at it with the baiting, you’ve just provided the perfect storm for a barrage of censorious attacks against a vulnerable group, all of varying degrees of fallaciousness, and all of which were completely preventable: ‘You’re just overreacting’, ‘You just hate that your headcanon didn’t work out’, ‘It’s sad, but no one’s to blame’, ‘I’m gay and I thought it was fine’, ‘The show has queer wlw rep, how can you criticize’, ‘I know what queerbaiting is and that wasn’t it’, ‘It’s just a fictional character/SOME BLOODY PINS, get over it’, ‘CRWBY didn’t encourage this ship’ (most people will not make the effort to dig into super shady tweets, comments and fandom interactions from months ago), etc. etc.

And by the immutable laws of internet fuckery, what should have been a beautiful opportunity for representation - whether it would have ended happily or not - gets turned into a convoluted shitstorm where argument from ignorance wins the day.

In short, RT, please, please do better. You have every right to freely create, but with freedom comes responsibility. You have a really good thing going - as a fan, it would be the ultimate tragedy if nothing is acknowledged or changes after all this.

[junker-town]

What we know about the CBA talks between the NFL and NFLPA

Photo by Larry French/Getty Images

The NFL and NFLPA are trying to get a jump start on negotiating a new collective bargaining agreement two years in advance.

The NFL and NFLPA have a daunting task ahead of them: Reach common ground on a new collective bargaining agreement in time to avoid a work stoppage ahead of the 2021 season.

The current CBA — set to expire after the 2020 season — was agreed upon in 2011 after a 132-day lockout. There were two even worse work stoppages a few decades ago when the 1982 and 1987 NFL seasons were both shortened by player strikes.

Seeking to avoid that kind of labor dispute, the NFL and NFLPA are getting a jumpstart on their 2021 negotiations.

The two sides have had early meetings

When exactly the NFL and NFLPA descended on Minneapolis in the spring to get negotiations started isn’t clear. Giants owner John Mara said at the NFL Annual Meeting the two sides would have preliminary talks “in early to mid-April,” and the first indication that the talks started came on April 9.

That’s when ESPN’s Todd Archer reported Jerry Jones missed a press conference to announce a new contract for DeMarcus Lawrence because he’s in Minneapolis for CBA talks. A few hours later, a joint statement was released:

“Today, the members of the NFL’s Management Council and the NFLPA’s Executive Committee met to discuss negotiations for a new collective bargaining agreement. The League and the Union have committed to meet regularly in the coming months, which will involve staff, NFL leadership, members of the NFLPA Executive Committee and Player Representatives.”

Will progress on a new CBA actually be made this early?

The expiration of the CBA is still nearly two years away, so the biggest question the sides can answer in these preliminary meetings is just how much work they have to do.

According to the Washington Post’s John Clayton, it might not be much. He wrote that there is optimism a deal could get done as early as this year. That’d be extraordinarily quick, but Clayton says both sides could be happy with the current CBA due to the fast rising salary cap and minimum spending requirement (teams are required to spend at least 89 percent of their caps):

With that much money being spent, the feeling among some union leaders is that there is an incentive for players to make a deal rather than enter into an extended labor dispute. The NFL is on the verge of surpassing $15 billion in revenue, with the league’s television deals due to be extended within the next year. Each team received $255 million of shared revenue last year, with most of it coming from television.

NFLPA president Eric Winston hasn’t been quite as positive about the status quo, though:

Any conversation with NFL owners will be a renegotiation for a new deal, not an extension. At our board meetings we told everyone to prepare for a work stoppage; nothing has changed. https://t.co/DE2RLh1tBL

— Eric Winston (@ericwinston) March 27, 2019

In August, the Washington Post said the talks were “progressing,” but also said it’s still way too early to expect a resolution to come soon:

Executives with several NFL teams said it’s a good sign that talks are taking place without obvious acrimony or public sniping between the two sides. But they described the discussions as remaining in the relatively early stages and said they would be surprised if the process accelerates enough in the coming weeks to produce a near-term deal. A more realistic goal, one of those executives said, might be next spring.

Philadelphia Eagles safety Malcolm Jenkins, who also serves as the team’s NFLPA rep, also said he doesn’t expect an easy negotiation:

“I’ve got a feeling it won’t be as simple as it was last time,” Jenkins told ESPN. “Just because you have more players like myself who have been through the lockout before, saw how the NFLPA leadership handled that into where we are now, which I don’t think was a bad deal but there is a lot that I feel like we want to get back as players, or get as players.”

A month after the preliminary talks got started, NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport reported the conversation between the two sides was “cordial” and “amicable.”

Though it’s possible a deal could be reached before the 2019 season, negotiations would have to ramp up considerably. Unless the pace changes, that’s not seen as feasible. Perhaps more likely is a deal next spring, a year before the CBA expires following the 2020 season.

One source went as far as saying, as of now, there are disagreements but no contentious issues like last time. “Nothing that would make it blow up,” as of now, one person briefed on the talks said.

The New York Times warned that it’s still early to get too optimistic, though.

Officials from the league and the players’ union, who asked not to be identified so as not to be seen as negotiating in public, cautioned that labor negotiations had just begun and could quickly sour.

But the NFL’s early negotiation tactics bode well for the future. Via the Times:

The N.F.L., however, has shifted away from its combative approach of the last round of bargaining. People involved in the current discussions expect the league to agree to a modest increase in the players’ share of league revenue, and for there to be few major changes to an agreement that has led to significant gains in league revenue and player compensation for the past eight years.

Two years ago, NFLPA officials told players to begin the process of saving money for a potential lockout. That’s advice that hasn’t changed.

NFLPA Exec Dir De Smith sent an email out to all NFL agents this morning, advising them to urge player clients to save money in the event of a work stoppage. "We are advising players to plan for a work stoppage of at least a year in length," the letter states. More in SBD.

— Liz Mullen (@SBJLizMullen) May 28, 2019

These early meetings may have given an indication whether or not that’s still likely to be necessary.

What’s the No. 1 priority in the CBA talks?

A wise group of men — let’s call them a clan — once said “cash rules everything around me.” The negotiations of the next CBA will revolve around money, money, money, a couple other things, and money.

In 2011, the NFL and NFLPA agreed to a split of the league revenue with players getting 47-48.5 percent. That was down from 50 percent in the prior CBA. It was widely considered a win for the league and a loss for the players.

With league revenues soaring so much that the salary cap rose from $123 million in 2013 to $188.2 million in 2019 — more than a 50 percent increase in six years — a couple percentage points represent a LOT of money.

It’s unclear what exactly constitutes a “modest increase” for players, but if the NFL is willing to cede a chunk of their revenue it’ll help grease the wheels plenty.

What other money issues will the NFL and NFLPA haggle over?

The NFLPA will aim to raise that revenue sharing percentage, and that number will likely be the crux of the negotiation. But the money talks will go deeper than that. Both sides have other ways to try to get a bigger piece of the pie. To name a few:

The 89 percent spending floor could be raised to force teams to pay players more, or lowered to allow teams to save more.

The NFL secured large amounts of “stadium credits” in the 2011 CBA — allotments of league revenue that help pay for new stadiums. Owners are aiming to seek even more stadium credits in the next CBA too, according to ESPN. “The [stadium credits] issue has prompted the NFLPA to scoff at the notion that the current talks relate to an ‘extension’ of the 2011 agreement,” wrote Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk. The NFLPA considers the NFL’s requests “a major tweak” of the 2011 agreement.

A rookie wage scale was introduced in the 2011 CBA to end increasingly gigantic contracts for early draft picks. Sam Bradford received a six-year, $78 million deal after he was the No. 1 pick of the 2010 NFL Draft. In the most recent draft, Baker Mayfield received a four-year, $32.68 million contract for being the No. 1 pick. The wage scale is probably here to stay, but the NFLPA could aim for higher amounts for rookies or shorter contracts for first-year players that lets them cash in on second deals sooner.

The franchise tag could be in the crosshairs too with players now threatening to sit out seasons — and Le’Veon Bell even following through — to avoid it. The tag originally served to give teams more time to extend stars, but now it’s become a way to artificially avoid allowing the best players in the game to set the market higher at their respective positions.

There are a few non-money items on the agenda too

Money is the biggest reason to expect a lengthy fight, but there are also non-money issues: the league’s personal conduct policy, the substance abuse policy, and the commissioner’s unilateral authority to hand down punishment, to name a few.

The possibility of an 18-game regular season, increased or decreased practice time, and changes to the players’ healthcare plan are a few more wrenches that could be tossed into the mix.

The idea of an 18-game schedule has been floated by the NFL for several years. The league reportedly came to the NFLPA with the idea of allowing players to only play in 16 games per season — aiming to quell the union’s concern of players being overworked. There are several issues with that idea that would make it a bad compromise for both sides, though.

That was also around the time a group of Hall of Famers led by Eric Dickerson threatened to boycott future induction ceremonies if the next CBA doesn’t include significantly better healthcare benefits and revenue sharing for Hall of Famers.

The preliminary meetings were a chance for both sides to see just how far apart they are, and how much ground needs to be made up.

[junker-town]

What we know about the CBA talks between the NFL and NFLPA

The NFL and NFLPA are trying to get a jump start on negotiating a new collective bargaining agreement two years in advance.

The NFL and NFLPA have a daunting task ahead of them: Reach common ground on a new collective bargaining agreement in time to avoid a work stoppage ahead of the 2021 season.

The current CBA — set to expire after the 2020 season — was agreed upon in 2011 after a 132-day lockout. There were two even worse work stoppages a few decades ago when the 1982 and 1987 NFL seasons were both shortened by player strikes.

Seeking to avoid that kind of labor dispute, the NFL and NFLPA are getting a jumpstart on their 2021 negotiations.

The two sides met in Minnesota

When exactly the NFL and NFLPA descended on Minneapolis to get negotiations started isn’t clear. Giants owner John Mara said at the NFL Annual Meeting the two sides would have preliminary talks “in early to mid-April,” and the first indication that the talks started came on April 9.

That’s when ESPN’s Todd Archer reported Jerry Jones missed a press conference to announce a new contract for DeMarcus Lawrence because he’s in Minneapolis for CBA talks. A few hours later, a joint statement was released:

“Today, the members of the NFL’s Management Council and the NFLPA’s Executive Committee met to discuss negotiations for a new collective bargaining agreement. The League and the Union have committed to meet regularly in the coming months, which will involve staff, NFL leadership, members of the NFLPA Executive Committee and Player Representatives.”

Will progress on a new CBA actually be made this early?

The expiration of the CBA is still two years away, so the biggest question the two sides can answer in these preliminary meetings is just how much work they have to do.

According to the Washington Post’s John Clayton, it might not be much. He wrote that there is optimism a deal could get done as early as this year. That’d be extraordinarily quick, but Clayton says both sides could be happy with the current CBA due to the fast rising salary cap and minimum spending requirement (teams are required to spend at least 89 percent of their caps):

With that much money being spent, the feeling among some union leaders is that there is an incentive for players to make a deal rather than enter into an extended labor dispute. The NFL is on the verge of surpassing $15 billion in revenue, with the league’s television deals due to be extended within the next year. Each team received $255 million of shared revenue last year, with most of it coming from television.

NFLPA president Eric Winston hasn’t been quite as positive about the status quo, though:

Any conversation with NFL owners will be a renegotiation for a new deal, not an extension. At our board meetings we told everyone to prepare for a work stoppage; nothing has changed. https://t.co/DE2RLh1tBL

— Eric Winston (@ericwinston) March 27, 2019

Philadelphia Eagles safety Malcolm Jenkins, who also serves as the team’s NFLPA rep, also said he doesn’t expect an easy negotiation:

“I’ve got a feeling it won’t be as simple as it was last time,” Jenkins told ESPN. “Just because you have more players like myself who have been through the lockout before, saw how the NFLPA leadership handled that into where we are now, which I don’t think was a bad deal but there is a lot that I feel like we want to get back as players, or get as players.”

A month after the preliminary talks got started, NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport reported the conversation between the two sides was “cordial” and “amicable.”

Though it’s possible a deal could be reached before the 2019 season, negotiations would have to ramp up considerably. Unless the pace changes, that’s not seen as feasible. Perhaps more likely is a deal next spring, a year before the CBA expires following the 2020 season.

One source went as far as saying, as of now, there are disagreements but no contentious issues like last time. “Nothing that would make it blow up,” as of now, one person briefed on the talks said.

The New York Times warned that it’s still early to get too optimistic, though.

Officials from the league and the players’ union, who asked not to be identified so as not to be seen as negotiating in public, cautioned that labor negotiations had just begun and could quickly sour.

But the NFL’s early negotiation tactics bode well for the future. Via the Times:

The N.F.L., however, has shifted away from its combative approach of the last round of bargaining. People involved in the current discussions expect the league to agree to a modest increase in the players’ share of league revenue, and for there to be few major changes to an agreement that has led to significant gains in league revenue and player compensation for the past eight years.

Two years ago, NFLPA officials told players to begin the process of saving money for a potential lockout. That’s advice that hasn’t changed.

NFLPA Exec Dir De Smith sent an email out to all NFL agents this morning, advising them to urge player clients to save money in the event of a work stoppage. "We are advising players to plan for a work stoppage of at least a year in length," the letter states. More in SBD.

— Liz Mullen (@SBJLizMullen) May 28, 2019

These early meetings may have given an indication whether or not that’s still likely to be necessary.

What’s the No. 1 priority in the CBA talks?

A wise group of men — let’s call them a clan — once said “cash rules everything around me.” The negotiations of the next CBA will revolve around money, money, money, a couple other things, and money.

In 2011, the NFL and NFLPA agreed to a split of the league revenue with players getting 47-48.5 percent. That was down from 50 percent in the prior CBA. It was widely considered a win for the league and a loss for the players.

With league revenues soaring so much that the salary cap rose from $123 million in 2013 to $188.2 million in 2019 — more than a 50 percent increase in six years — a couple percentage points represent a LOT of money.

It’s unclear what exactly constitutes a “modest increase” for players, but if the NFL is willing to cede a chunk of their revenue it’ll help grease the wheels plenty.

What other money issues will the NFL and NFLPA haggle over?

The NFLPA will aim to raise that revenue sharing percentage, and that number will likely be the crux of the negotiation. But the money talks will go deeper than that. Both sides have other ways to try to get a bigger piece of the pie. To name a few:

The 89 percent spending floor could be raised to force teams to pay players more, or lowered to allow teams to save more.

The NFL secured large amounts of “stadium credits” in the 2011 CBA — allotments of league revenue that help pay for new stadiums. Owners are aiming to seek even more stadium credits in the next CBA too, according to ESPN. “The [stadium credits] issue has prompted the NFLPA to scoff at the notion that the current talks relate to an ‘extension’ of the 2011 agreement,” wrote Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk. The NFLPA considers the NFL’s requests “a major tweak” of the 2011 agreement.

A rookie wage scale was introduced in the 2011 CBA to end increasingly gigantic contracts for early draft picks. Sam Bradford received a six-year, $78 million deal after he was the No. 1 pick of the 2010 NFL Draft. In the most recent draft, Baker Mayfield received a four-year, $32.68 million contract for being the No. 1 pick. The wage scale is probably here to stay, but the NFLPA could aim for higher amounts for rookies or shorter contracts for first-year players that lets them cash in on second deals sooner.

The franchise tag could be in the crosshairs too with players now threatening to sit out seasons — and Le’Veon Bell even following through — to avoid it. The tag originally served to give teams more time to extend stars, but now it’s become a way to artificially avoid allowing the best players in the game to set the market higher at their respective positions.

There are a few non-money items on the agenda too

Money is the biggest reason to expect a lengthy fight, but there are also non-money issues: the league’s personal conduct policy, the substance abuse policy, and the commissioner’s unilateral authority to hand down punishment, to name a few.

The possibility of an 18-game regular season, increased or decreased practice time, and changes to the players’ healthcare plan are a few more wrenches that could be tossed into the mix.

The idea of an 18-game schedule has been floated by the NFL for several years. The league reportedly came to the NFLPA with the idea of allowing players to only play in 16 games per season — aiming to quell the union’s concern of players being overworked. There are several issues with that idea that would make it a bad compromise for both sides, though.

That was also around the time a group of Hall of Famers led by Eric Dickerson threatened to boycott future induction ceremonies if the next CBA doesn’t include significantly better healthcare benefits and revenue sharing for Hall of Famers.

The preliminary meetings were a chance for both sides to see just how far apart they are, and how much ground needs to be made up.

[junker-town]

What we know about the CBA talks between the NFL and NFLPA

The NFL and NFLPA are trying to get a jump start on negotiating a new collective bargaining agreement two years in advance.

The NFL and NFLPA have a daunting task ahead of them: Reach common ground on a new collective bargaining agreement in time to avoid a work stoppage ahead of the 2021 season.

The current CBA — set to expire after the 2020 season — was agreed upon in 2011 after a 132-day lockout. There were two even worse work stoppages a few decades ago when the 1982 and 1987 NFL seasons were both shortened by player strikes.

Seeking to avoid that kind of labor dispute, the NFL and NFLPA are getting a jumpstart on their 2021 negotiations.

The two sides met in Minnesota

When exactly the NFL and NFLPA descended on Minneapolis to get negotiations started isn’t clear. Giants owner John Mara said at the NFL Annual Meeting the two sides would have preliminary talks “in early to mid-April,” and the first indication that the talks started came on April 9.

That’s when ESPN’s Todd Archer reported Jerry Jones missed a press conference to announce a new contract for DeMarcus Lawrence because he’s in Minneapolis for CBA talks. A few hours later, a joint statement was released:

“Today, the members of the NFL’s Management Council and the NFLPA’s Executive Committee met to discuss negotiations for a new collective bargaining agreement. The League and the Union have committed to meet regularly in the coming months, which will involve staff, NFL leadership, members of the NFLPA Executive Committee and Player Representatives.”

Will progress on a new CBA actually be made this early?

The expiration of the CBA is still two years away, so the biggest question the two sides can answer in these preliminary meetings is just how much work they have to do.

According to the Washington Post’s John Clayton, it might not be much. He wrote that there is optimism a deal could get done as early as this year. That’d be extraordinarily quick, but Clayton says both sides could be happy with the current CBA due to the fast rising salary cap and minimum spending requirement (teams are required to spend at least 89 percent of their caps):

With that much money being spent, the feeling among some union leaders is that there is an incentive for players to make a deal rather than enter into an extended labor dispute. The NFL is on the verge of surpassing $15 billion in revenue, with the league’s television deals due to be extended within the next year. Each team received $255 million of shared revenue last year, with most of it coming from television.

NFLPA president Eric Winston hasn’t been quite as positive about the status quo, though:

Any conversation with NFL owners will be a renegotiation for a new deal, not an extension. At our board meetings we told everyone to prepare for a work stoppage; nothing has changed. https://t.co/DE2RLh1tBL

— Eric Winston (@ericwinston) March 27, 2019

Philadelphia Eagles safety Malcolm Jenkins, who also serves as the team’s NFLPA rep, also said he doesn’t expect an easy negotiation:

“I’ve got a feeling it won’t be as simple as it was last time,” Jenkins told ESPN. “Just because you have more players like myself who have been through the lockout before, saw how the NFLPA leadership handled that into where we are now, which I don’t think was a bad deal but there is a lot that I feel like we want to get back as players, or get as players.”

A month after the preliminary talks got started, NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport reported the conversation between the two sides was “cordial” and “amicable.”

Though it’s possible a deal could be reached before the 2019 season, negotiations would have to ramp up considerably. Unless the pace changes, that’s not seen as feasible. Perhaps more likely is a deal next spring, a year before the CBA expires following the 2020 season.

One source went as far as saying, as of now, there are disagreements but no contentious issues like last time. “Nothing that would make it blow up,” as of now, one person briefed on the talks said.

The New York Times warned that it’s still early to get too optimistic, though.

Officials from the league and the players’ union, who asked not to be identified so as not to be seen as negotiating in public, cautioned that labor negotiations had just begun and could quickly sour.

But the NFL’s early negotiation tactics bode well for the future. Via the Times:

The N.F.L., however, has shifted away from its combative approach of the last round of bargaining. People involved in the current discussions expect the league to agree to a modest increase in the players’ share of league revenue, and for there to be few major changes to an agreement that has led to significant gains in league revenue and player compensation for the past eight years.

Two years ago, NFLPA officials told players to begin the process of saving money for a potential lockout. That’s advice that hasn’t changed.

NFLPA Exec Dir De Smith sent an email out to all NFL agents this morning, advising them to urge player clients to save money in the event of a work stoppage. "We are advising players to plan for a work stoppage of at least a year in length," the letter states. More in SBD.

— Liz Mullen (@SBJLizMullen) May 28, 2019

These early meetings may have given an indication whether or not that’s still likely to be necessary.

What’s the No. 1 priority in the CBA talks?

A wise group of men — let’s call them a clan — once said “cash rules everything around me.” The negotiations of the next CBA will revolve around money, money, money, a couple other things, and money.

In 2011, the NFL and NFLPA agreed to a split of the league revenue with players getting 47-48.5 percent. That was down from 50 percent in the prior CBA. It was widely considered a win for the league and a loss for the players.

With league revenues soaring so much that the salary cap rose from $123 million in 2013 to $188.2 million in 2019 — more than a 50 percent increase in six years — a couple percentage points represent a LOT of money.

It’s unclear what exactly constitutes a “modest increase” for players, but if the NFL is willing to cede a chunk of their revenue it’ll help grease the wheels plenty.

What other money issues will the NFL and NFLPA haggle over?

The NFLPA will aim to raise that revenue sharing percentage, and that number will likely be the crux of the negotiation. But the money talks will go deeper than that. Both sides have other ways to try to get a bigger piece of the pie. To name a few:

The 89 percent spending floor could be raised to force teams to pay players more, or lowered to allow teams to save more.

The NFL secured large amounts of “stadium credits” in the 2011 CBA — allotments of league revenue that help pay for new stadiums. Owners are aiming to seek even more stadium credits in the next CBA too, according to ESPN. “The [stadium credits] issue has prompted the NFLPA to scoff at the notion that the current talks relate to an ‘extension’ of the 2011 agreement,” wrote Mike Florio of Pro Football Talk. The NFLPA considers the NFL’s requests “a major tweak” of the 2011 agreement.

A rookie wage scale was introduced in the 2011 CBA to end increasingly gigantic contracts for early draft picks. Sam Bradford received a six-year, $78 million deal after he was the No. 1 pick of the 2010 NFL Draft. In the most recent draft, Baker Mayfield received a four-year, $32.68 million contract for being the No. 1 pick. The wage scale is probably here to stay, but the NFLPA could aim for higher amounts for rookies or shorter contracts for first-year players that lets them cash in on second deals sooner.

The franchise tag could be in the crosshairs too with players now threatening to sit out seasons — and Le’Veon Bell even following through — to avoid it. The tag originally served to give teams more time to extend stars, but now it’s become a way to artificially avoid allowing the best players in the game to set the market higher at their respective positions.

There are a few non-money items on the agenda too

Money is the biggest reason to expect a lengthy fight, but there are also non-money issues: the league’s personal conduct policy, the substance abuse policy, and the commissioner’s unilateral authority to hand down punishment, to name a few.

The possibility of an 18-game regular season, increased or decreased practice time, and changes to the players’ healthcare plan are a few more wrenches that could be tossed into the mix.

As recently as August 2018, Cowboys owner Jerry Jones was still pushing for an 18-game season. That was also around the time a group of Hall of Famers led by Eric Dickerson threatened to boycott future induction ceremonies if the next CBA doesn’t include significantly better healthcare benefits and revenue sharing for Hall of Famers.

The preliminary meetings were a chance for both sides to see just how far apart they are, and how much ground needs to be made up.

[junker-town]

What we know about the CBA talks between the NFL and NFLPA

The NFL and NFLPA are trying to get a jump start on negotiating a new collective bargaining agreement two years in advance.

The NFL and NFLPA have a daunting task ahead of them: Reach common ground on a new collective bargaining agreement in time to avoid a work stoppage ahead of the 2021 season.

The current CBA — set to expire after the 2020 season — was agreed upon in 2011 after a 132-day lockout. There were two even worse work stoppages a few decades ago when the 1982 and 1987 NFL seasons were both shortened by player strikes.

Seeking to avoid that kind of labor dispute, the NFL and NFLPA are getting a jumpstart on their 2021 negotiations.

The two sides are meeting in Minnesota

When exactly the NFL and NFLPA descended on Minneapolis to get negotiations started isn’t clear. Giants owner John Mara said at the NFL Annual Meeting the two sides would have preliminary talks “in early to mid-April,” and the first indication that the talks started came on April 9.

That’s when ESPN’s Todd Archer reported Jerry Jones missed a press conference to announce a new contract for DeMarcus Lawrence because he’s in Minneapolis for CBA talks. A few hours later, a joint statement was released:

“Today, the members of the NFL’s Management Council and the NFLPA’s Executive Committee met to discuss negotiations for a new collective bargaining agreement. The League and the Union have committed to meet regularly in the coming months, which will involve staff, NFL leadership, members of the NFLPA Executive Committee and Player Representatives.”

Will progress on a new CBA actually be made this early?

The expiration of the CBA is still two years away, so the biggest question the two sides can answer in these preliminary meetings is just how much work they have to do.

According to the Washington Post’s John Clayton, it might not be much. He wrote that there is optimism a deal could get done as early as this year. That’d be extraordinarily quick, but Clayton says both sides could be happy with the current CBA due to the fast rising salary cap and minimum spending requirement (teams are required to spend at least 89 percent of their caps):

With that much money being spent, the feeling among some union leaders is that there is an incentive for players to make a deal rather than enter into an extended labor dispute. The NFL is on the verge of surpassing $15 billion in revenue, with the league’s television deals due to be extended within the next year. Each team received $255 million of shared revenue last year, with most of it coming from television.

NFLPA president Eric Winston hasn’t been quite as positive about the status quo, though:

Any conversation with NFL owners will be a renegotiation for a new deal, not an extension. At our board meetings we told everyone to prepare for a work stoppage; nothing has changed. https://t.co/DE2RLh1tBL

— Eric Winston (@ericwinston) March 27, 2019

Philadelphia Eagles safety Malcolm Jenkins, who also serves as the team’s NFLPA rep, also said he doesn’t expect an easy negotiation:

“I’ve got a feeling it won’t be as simple as it was last time,” Jenkins told ESPN. “Just because you have more players like myself who have been through the lockout before, saw how the NFLPA leadership handled that into where we are now, which I don’t think was a bad deal but there is a lot that I feel like we want to get back as players, or get as players.”

A month after the preliminary talks got started, NFL Network’s Ian Rapoport reported the conversation between the two sides was “cordial” and “amicable.”

Though it’s possible a deal could be reached before the 2019 season, negotiations would have to ramp up considerably. Unless the pace changes, that’s not seen as feasible. Perhaps more likely is a deal next spring, a year before the CBA expires following the 2020 season.

One source went as far as saying, as of now, there are disagreements but no contentious issues like last time. “Nothing that would make it blow up,” as of now, one person briefed on the talks said.

Two years ago, NFLPA officials told players to begin the process of saving money for a potential lockout. These early meetings may have given an indication whether or not that’s still likely to be necessary.

What’s the No. 1 priority in the CBA talks?

A wise group of men — let’s call them a clan — once said “cash rules everything around me.” The negotiations of the next CBA will revolve around money, money, money, a couple other things, and money.

In 2011, the NFL and NFLPA agreed to a split of the league revenue with players getting 47-48.5 percent. That was down from 50 percent in the prior CBA. It was widely considered a win for the league and a loss for the players.

With league revenues soaring so much that the salary cap rose from $123 million in 2013 to $188.2 million in 2019 — more than a 50 percent increase in six years — a couple percentage points represent a LOT of money.

What other money issues will the NFL and NFLPA haggle over?

The NFLPA will aim to raise that revenue sharing percentage, and that number will likely be the crux of the negotiation. But the money talks will go deeper than that. Both sides have other ways to try to get a bigger piece of the pie. To name a few:

The 89 percent spending floor could be raised to force teams to pay players more, or lowered to allow teams to save more.

The NFL secured large amounts of “stadium credits” in the 2011 CBA — allotments of league revenue that help pay for new stadiums. Owners are aiming to seek stadium credits in the next CBA too, according to ESPN.

A rookie wage scale was introduced in the 2011 CBA to end increasingly gigantic contracts for early draft picks. Sam Bradford received a six-year, $78 million deal after he was the No. 1 pick of the 2010 NFL Draft. In the most recent draft, Baker Mayfield received a four-year, $32.68 million contract for being the No. 1 pick. The wage scale is probably here to stay, but the NFLPA could aim for higher amounts for rookies or shorter contracts for first-year players that lets them cash in on second deals sooner.

The franchise tag could be in the crosshairs too with players now threatening to sit out seasons — and Le’Veon Bell even following through — to avoid it. The tag originally served to give teams more time to extend stars, but now it’s become a way to artificially avoid allowing the best players in the game to set the market higher at their respective positions.

There are a few non-money items on the agenda too

Money is the biggest reason to expect a lengthy fight, but there are also non-money issues: the league’s personal conduct policy, the substance abuse policy, and the commissioner’s unilateral authority to hand down punishment, to name a few.

The possibility of an 18-game regular season, increased or decreased practice time, and changes to the players’ healthcare plan are a few more wrenches that could be tossed into the mix.

As recently as August 2018, Cowboys owner Jerry Jones was still pushing for an 18-game season. That was also around the time a group of Hall of Famers led by Eric Dickerson threatened to boycott future induction ceremonies if the next CBA doesn’t include significantly better healthcare benefits and revenue sharing for Hall of Famers.

The preliminary meetings were a chance for both sides to see just how far apart they are, and how much ground needs to be made up.

[junker-town]

What we know about the CBA talks between the NFL and NFLPA

The NFL and NFLPA are trying to get a jump start on negotiating a new collective bargaining agreement two years in advance.

The NFL and NFLPA have a daunting task ahead of them: Reach common ground on a new collective bargaining agreement (CBA) in time to avoid a work stoppage ahead of the 2021 season.

The current CBA — set to expire after the 2020 season — was agreed upon in 2011 after a 132-day lockout. There were two even worse work stoppages a few decades ago when the 1982 and 1987 NFL seasons were both shortened by player strikes.

Seeking to avoid that kind of labor dispute, the NFL and NFLPA are getting a jumpstart on their 2021 negotiations.

The two sides are meeting in Minnesota

When exactly the NFL and NFLPA descended on Minneapolis to get negotiations started isn’t clear. Giants owner John Mara said at the NFL Annual Meeting that the two sides would have preliminary talks “in early to mid-April,” but the first indication that the talks started didn’t come until Tuesday.

That’s when ESPN’s Todd Archer reported Jerry Jones missed a press conference to announce a new contract for DeMarcus Lawrence because he’s in Minneapolis for CBA talks. A few hours later, a joint statement was released:

“Today, the members of the NFL’s Management Council and the NFLPA’s Executive Committee met to discuss negotiations for a new collective bargaining agreement. The League and the Union have committed to meet regularly in the coming months, which will involve staff, NFL leadership, members of the NFLPA Executive Committee and Player Representatives.”

Will progress on a new CBA actually be made this early?

The expiration of the CBA is still two years away, so the biggest question the two sides can answer in these preliminary meetings is just how much work they have to do.

According to the Washington Post’s John Clayton, it might not be much. He wrote that there is optimism a deal could get done as early as this year. That’d be extraordinarily quick, but Clayton says both sides could be happy with the current CBA due to the fast rising salary cap and minimum spending requirement (teams are required to spend at least 89 percent of their caps):

With that much money being spent, the feeling among some union leaders is that there is an incentive for players to make a deal rather than enter into an extended labor dispute. The NFL is on the verge of surpassing $15 billion in revenue, with the league’s television deals due to be extended within the next year. Each team received $255 million of shared revenue last year, with most of it coming from television.

NFLPA president Eric Winston hasn’t been quite as positive about the status quo, though:

Any conversation with NFL owners will be a renegotiation for a new deal, not an extension. At our board meetings we told everyone to prepare for a work stoppage; nothing has changed. https://t.co/DE2RLh1tBL

— Eric Winston (@ericwinston) March 27, 2019

Philadelphia Eagles safety Malcolm Jenkins, who also serves as the team’s NFLPA rep, also said he doesn’t expect an easy negotiation:

“I’ve got a feeling it won’t be as simple as it was last time,” Jenkins told ESPN. “Just because you have more players like myself who have been through the lockout before, saw how the NFLPA leadership handled that into where we are now, which I don’t think was a bad deal but there is a lot that I feel like we want to get back as players, or get as players.”

Two years ago, NFLPA officials told players to begin the process of saving money for a potential lockout. These early meetings could give an indication whether or not that’s still likely to be necessary.

What’s the No. 1 priority in the CBA talks?

A wise group of men — let’s call them a clan — once said “cash rules everything around me.” The negotiations of the next CBA will revolve around money, money, money, a couple other things, and money.

In 2011, the NFL and NFLPA agreed to a split of the league revenue with players getting 47-48.5 percent. That was down from 50 percent in the prior CBA. It was widely considered a win for the league and a loss for the players.

With league revenues soaring so much that the salary cap rose from $123 million in 2013 to $188.2 million in 2019 — more than a 50 percent increase in six years — a couple percentage points represent a LOT of money.

What other money issues will the NFL and NFLPA haggle over?

The NFLPA will aim to raise that revenue sharing percentage, and that number will likely be the crux of the negotiation. But the money talks will go deeper than that. Both sides have other ways to try to get a bigger piece of the pie. To name a few:

The 89 percent spending floor could be raised to force teams to pay players more, or lowered to allow teams to save more.

The NFL secured large amounts of “stadium credits” in the 2011 CBA — allotments of league revenue that help pay for new stadiums. Owners are aiming to seek stadium credits in the next CBA too, according to ESPN.

A rookie wage scale was introduced in the 2011 CBA to end increasingly gigantic contracts for early draft picks. Sam Bradford received a six-year, $78 million deal after he was the No. 1 pick of the 2010 NFL Draft. In the most recent draft, Baker Mayfield received a four-year, $32.68 million contract for being the No. 1 pick. The wage scale is probably here to stay, but the NFLPA could aim for higher amounts for rookies or shorter contracts for first-year players that lets them cash in on second deals sooner.

The franchise tag could be in the crosshairs too with players now threatening to sit out seasons — and Le’Veon Bell even following through — to avoid it. The tag originally served to give teams more time to extend stars, but now it’s become a way to artificially avoid allowing the best players in the game to set the market higher at their respective positions.

There are a few non-money items on the agenda too

Money is the biggest reason to expect a lengthy fight, but there are also non-money issues: the league’s personal conduct policy, the substance abuse policy, and the commissioner’s unilateral authority to hand down punishment, to name a few.

The possibility of an 18-game regular season, increased or decreased practice time, and changes to the players’ healthcare plan are a few more wrenches that could be tossed into the mix.

As recently as August 2018, Cowboys owner Jerry Jones was still pushing for an 18-game season. That was also around the time a group of Hall of Famers led by Eric Dickerson threatened to boycott future induction ceremonies if the next CBA doesn’t include significantly better healthcare benefits and revenue sharing for Hall of Famers.

The preliminary meetings are a chance for both sides to see just how far apart they are, and how much ground needs to be made up.