turbinetree
turbinetree's JournalUS general says troops could be in Middle East for a while
By Associated Press -January 23, 2020 5:40 PM
'I'm not sure how long you're going to stay ... We'll work that out as we go ahead.'
Over the past eight months, the United States has poured more than 20,000 additional troops into the Middle East to counter the escalating threat from Iran that peaked with the recent missile attack on American forces in Iraq.
Despite Donald Trump's pledge to bring troops home, the top U.S. commander in the Middle East on Thursday said the most recent forces to enter the region could be there for "quite a while."
"You're here because I requested that you come," Marine Gen. Frank McKenzie told sailors and Marines aboard the USS Bataan amphibious assault ship, his voice booming over the ship's loudspeaker. "I'm not sure how long you're going to stay in the theater. We'll work that out as we go ahead. Could be quite a while, could be less than that, just don't know right now."
The Bataan and two other U.S. warships moved into the Middle East on Jan. 11. By Thursday, they were in the north Red Sea, roughly 50 miles south of the Sinai Peninsula. They are the latest additions to America's troop presence in the region. Since May, their numbers have grown from about 60,000 to more than 80,000.
https://americanindependent.com/us-military-general-frank-mckenzie-troops-middle-east-iran-trump/
Numbers of U.S. military service members vary by state, driven mostly by workforce levels at large bases. There were a total of 1.3 million active duty military and more than 800,000 reserve forces as of September 2017, according to Defense Department personnel data.
Ted Cruz repeatedly refused to answer if he agrees with Trump -- and then ran off
Published 3 hours ago on January 23, 2020
By Sarah K. Burris
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) really didn’t like being asked if he agrees with what President Donald Trump did trying to bribe Ukraine.
During the dinner break for the impeachment trial Thursday, Cruz approached reporters who shouted questions. CNN’s Manu Raju asked if he approved of Trump’s conduct and agrees the call was “perfect,” as the president has said.
“You asked a question last night let me let someone else ask a question,” Cruz replied.
The Texas senator then moved onto a New York Times reporter, but that one asked the exact same question: if Cruz agreed with what Trump did in Ukraine.
Not only did Cruz refuse to answer, he took a quick question and then “split,” tweeted Raju.
https://www.rawstory.com/2020/01/ted-cruz-repeatedly-refused-to-answer-if-he-agrees-with-trump-and-then-ran-off/
He swore to be impartial.............................
GOP senator attacked Lt Col Vindman for not being patriotic -- while she was ignoring the impeachment
Published 5 hours ago on January 23, 2020
By Sarah K. Burris
Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) attacked veteran and former Soviet escapee Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman while she was supposed to be attending the Senate impeachment trial of President Donald Trump.
Blackburn, who’s been criticized for not paying attention, was either tweeting from the chamber or left the Senate floor to tweet out her displeasure of the former Iraq vet.
“Alexander Vindman broke the chain of command and leaked the contents of the President’s July 25th phone call to his pal, the “whistleblower.” Over a policy dispute with the President!” Blackburn said. “How is that not vindictive?”
On the first day of the trial, Blackburn was caught spending most of her time talking to Fox News. Thursday she was observed reading a book that had nothing to do with the impeachment trial and tweeted multiple times attacking others.
https://www.rawstory.com/2020/01/gop-senator-attacked-lt-col-vindman-for-not-being-patriotic-while-she-was-ignoring-the-impeachment-trial/
Okay Marsha, can I call you Marsha, did your kids serve in the military...................I think that is a fair question......................and do you think he swore to protect and defend the Constitution.............................
Florida's swing voters shrug off Trump impeachment: 'I'm not driven by it'
In Florida’s renowned I-4 corridor, as everywhere else across the country, the all-consuming spectacle of Donald Trump’s impeachment trial is playing out on every television station, on radio and online.
But in this place where millions of swing voters provide one of the nation’s most authentic barometers of any White House hopeful’s political standing, there is evidence that the impeachment proceedings are not resonating with the electorate in a way both sides might have hoped.
A Guardian study of a cross-section of central Florida voters – Democratic and Republican; retired and working; white, black and Hispanic; US-born and immigrant – revealed attitudes ranging mostly from indifference to moderate engagement. That matters here: the I-4 corridor is the “swing state within a swing state” and where the battle for Florida will be fought in 2020’s election.
Even among those residents who say they are following developments closely, many believe the outcome is a foregone conclusion, or that the partisan and rancorous nature of events in the US Senate will switch people off to the significance of the occasion.
“I’m following it to a certain extent, I’d say it’s important but I’m certainly not overwhelmed by it, I’m not driven by it,” said Mike Banks, 52, a property manager from Orlando, which sits in the middle of the corridor which tracks the 132-mile east-west interstate 4 from Daytona Beach to St Petersburg.
Banks, who says he is an independent voter, backed Trump in the 2016 election, but is undecided who to vote for in November. His choice, he insists, won’t be influenced by the impeachment trial.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jan/23/florida-swing-voters-trump-impeachment-trial
Republicans push to weaken court that caught them rigging elections
Two years ago, Pennsylvania’s supreme court dealt a blow to state Republicans when it said they had unconstitutionally rigged congressional elections in the state. Republicans fumed and threatened to impeach four of the justices, but the map was redrawn, and voters elected an even split of Democrats and Republicans to Congress in 2018. Now, Republicans are weaponizing a new tactic – a move that seems designed to increase their power on the state’s highest court.
The Republican proposal overhauls the way that court justices are elected in a state that can swing both red and blue. The justices on the court, where Democrats hold a 5-2 majority, are currently appointed through statewide elections, but the new plan would make it so the justices are elected from districts throughout the state. The change would probably hurt Democratic candidates – four of the current justices are from the Pittsburgh area and one is from Philadelphia, both urban areas that tend to skew blue.
If the proposal is successful, it could offer a roadmap for Republicans elsewhere to undermine state courts. That’s significant after last year’s supreme court decision that determined federal courts couldn’t stop gerrymandering – the partisan redistricting of state maps – but that nothing stopped state courts from acting. State courts responded swiftly: a state court in North Carolina followed Pennsylvania and struck down electoral districts as unconstitutional gerrymanders there. And a slew of gerrymandering lawsuits are expected when districts are next redrawn in 2021.
“With the Pennsylvania supreme court having struck down the general assembly’s gerrymandering, the general assembly is now clearly trying to gerrymander the Pennsylvania supreme court itself,” said Daniel Jacobson, an attorney who helped represent the plaintiffs in the gerrymandering case. “It only goes to show the lengths that the general assembly leaders will go when they feel that their grip on power is threatened.”
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jan/23/republican-election-rigging-court-push-to-weaken
They really are fascists..................there are no other words to describe them....................
Revealed: top official did special favors on guns for NRA at interior department
Powerful gun lobby group has used connections in Trump administration to influence decisions, messages show
In the fall of 2017, a National Rifle Association lobbyist named Benjamin Cassidy left his job at the influential gun group. His next stop: a top position at the US interior department, which oversees hundreds of millions of acres of federal land across the country.
Once in office, it didn’t take Cassidy long to use his new government gig to provide his longtime NRA colleagues with special access to the powerful federal agency, as revealed by previously unreleased communications obtained by the Guardian.
The messages underscore the potent influence that industry lobbyists and conservative organizations enjoy at a government agency where many key leaders are former lobbyists and conservative activists themselves. The NRA has made the most of this dynamic during the Trump presidency, leveraging its connections to shape policy outcomes and personnel decisions at the interior department.
In 2017, for instance, Susan LaPierre, a prominent NRA member and the wife of NRA leader Wayne LaPierre, was appointed by the head of the interior department to the board of the National Parks Foundation, a congressionally chartered organization that supports park programs.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jan/23/revealed-e-mails-show-that-nra-shaped-gun-policy-at-interior-department
-snip-
Target shooting in the Sonoran Desert national monument in Arizona is controversial – it has damaged archeological artifacts, destroyed saguaro cacti, and harmed other natural and cultural resources.
Recce replied with an NRA plan to leave more of the monument open to target shooting.
In the weeks that followed, Cassidy kept Recce updated on the progress of that target-shooting plan and others, including a proposal to restrict target shooting on public lands in Utah, which the NRA opposed.
Victims' bodies still at New Orleans Hard Rock Hotel months after collapse
Source: The Guardian
Wind blows tarp off one of two bodies amid ruins
Unstable building to be imploded in March
Three months after the partial collapse of the Hard Rock hotel construction site on the tip of New Orleans’s historic French Quarter, a macabre reminder of the tragedy that claimed three lives was visible to passersby this week.
Among the collapsed building’s twisted remains and rubble, the dangling legs of a wedged corpse were revealed to the public after a tarpaulin sheet covering the body was blown away by wind.
The gruesome sight came as city officials are scrambling to dismantle the 18-storey, 350-room hotel, which remains an eyesore and still holds the trapped remains of two workers, Quinnyon Wimberly and José Ponce Arreola.
After images of the exposed corpse provoked outrage on social media, city firefighters installed a new tarp on Wednesday afternoon. As of Thursday morning the covering remained intact, as police maintained a heavy presence around the collapsed building.
The mayor of New Orleans, LaToya Cantrell, urged members of the public and the media not to photograph or share images of the body.
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jan/23/new-orleans-hard-rock-hotel-body-collapse
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are you fucking serious........................
Trump's impeachment lawyers 'tending toward conspiracy theories' says Schumer - live trial updates
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/live/2020/jan/23/donald-trump-impeachment-trial-news-today-senate-democrats-liveAnd Ernst and Cotton are laughing.................the same two enabling traitors that sent a letter to Iran................did they think people would forget..............................don't think so......................
November 3, 2020 cannot get here fast enough....................
U.S. regulator to announce enforcement actions against former Wells Fargo executives: sources
Source: Reuters
BUSINESS NEWS JANUARY 23, 2020 / 12:20 PM / UPDATED 38 MINUTES AGO
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - One of Wells Fargo & Co’s (WFC.N) top regulators plans to announce enforcement actions against as many as 10 individuals in relation to the bank’s sales practices scandal as soon as Thursday, a person familiar with the matter told Reuters.
The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) actions will target a “breadth” of individuals, including former executives, for their role in the scandal that erupted three years ago, a second person with knowledge of the discussions said. The actions may result in monetary penalties against the individuals and bans from working for OCC-regulated banks, one of the sources said.
Wells Fargo declined to comment. A spokesman for the OCC did not immediately provide comment.
The OCC actions would mark the first time a federal government agency has sought to punish individuals for their roles in the San Francisco-based lender’s scandal, instead of just the institution.
Read more: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-wells-fargo-regulator-charges/u-s-regulator-to-announce-enforcement-actions-against-former-wells-fargo-executives-sources-idUSKBN1ZM2M2
-snip-
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-wellsfargo-regulator-charges-occ/ex-wells-fargo-executives-face-civil-charges-multimillion-dollar-fines-from-u-s-bank-regulator-idUSKBN1ZM2SQ
Greta rejects U.S. Treasury chief's degree dig in latest climate clash
BIG STORY 15 JANUARY 23, 2020 / 3:32 AM / UPDATED AN HOUR AGO
Balazs Koranyi, Alessandra Galloni
3 MIN READ
DAVOS, Switzerland (Reuters) - U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin told Greta Thunberg on Thursday she should study economics, a jibe which prompted the climate activist to say she did not need a degree to know the world was not meeting its climate targets.
Asked about Thunberg’s previous calls to divest from fossil fuels, Mnuchin told a news briefing in Davos: “Is she the chief economist? I’m confused ... After she goes and studies economics in college, she can come back and explain that to us.”
Mnuchin lists a bachelor’s degree in economics from Yale University on his LinkedIn social network profile.
Earlier in the week U.S. President Donald Trump and Thunberg sparred indirectly at the World Economic Forum in the Swiss ski resort. After Trump said the United States had committed to joining the one trillion tree initiative, Thunberg retorted that fixing the climate crisis was not only about trees.
Thunberg, who has taken a year off school to advocate action on climate change, hit back on Twitter, saying it did not take a degree to know the world was not meeting its climate targets.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-davos-meeting-greta/greta-rejects-u-s-treasury-chiefs-degree-dig-in-latest-climate-clash-idUSKBN1ZM0ZL
And then the "guy" fucking the whole planet says.................................in his saddest mind fuck............. .
Before leaving Davos, Trump seemed to extend an olive branch, saying he wished he had seen Thunberg speak.
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