February 25, 2017

Bloomberg cancels WHCA dinner afterparty

Bloomberg L.P., host of the premier afterparty for the White House Correspondents' Association dinner, will not host an event this year, Axios has learned.

Planners for events surrounding the April 29 scholarship dinner, Washington's equivalent of Oscars night, have been beset with uncertainty because of Trump administration attacks on the press. But news organizations' strong interest in tickets for the 103rd annual dinner suggests that the night will remain sold out, as always.

https://www.axios.com/exclusive-bloomberg-cancels-afterparty-2283144254.html

February 25, 2017

What could Florida lawmakers do to keep kids from being shot?

When the annual 60-day legislative session gets under way next month, lawmakers on both sides of the aisle will be looking for ways to keep Florida’s kids safe from guns.

Statewide, the number of children killed by guns has risen nearly 20 percent since 2010, a Tampa Bay Times analysis has found. Child gun injuries went up 36 percent.

Not surprisingly, the solutions up for consideration this year differ radically along party lines. Democrats want to tighten the existing law that hold adults criminally liable when kids access their firearms, and increase the penalties. But the lawmaker with the most power over the matter has a different idea.

“We could do away with gun-free zones,” said Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Greg Steube, R-Sarasota, naming a key piece of the National Rifle Association’s agenda in Florida.

February 25, 2017

The Anti-Trump Activist Taking On Retailers

SAN FRANCISCO — Sitting in a basement office that she rents by the hour, Shannon Coulter ticks off the activities she gave up in defiance of President Donald J. Trump: renting movies with her husband on Amazon, and shopping at Nordstrom, Macy’s and other retailers that sell Ivanka Trump’s products.

A Nordstrom bag sat on a nearby table. It represents a victory lap of sorts for Ms. Coulter, who has almost single-handedly spearheaded a retail revolt against the president and his family. She was wearing a new silver Elizabeth and James lariat necklace purchased at the department store soon after it scrubbed Ms. Trump’s name from its website.

“The goal,” Ms. Coulter said, “came originally from a place of really wanting to shop the stores we loved again with a clear conscience.”

It’s been a wild ride these past few months for Ms. Coulter, who runs her shoestring movement from her home, or from cheerfully decorated work spaces like this one — surrounded by bright-blue furniture, clam chairs and decorative pillows that feel more Silicon Valley than anti-administration war room.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/25/business/the-unlikely-general-behind-an-anti-trump-boycott.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news

February 24, 2017

LaPierre's bonkers CPAC speech

National Rifle Association CEO Wayne LaPierre fired up the crowd at CPAC on Friday by angrily denouncing the protest movement against President Donald Trump, which he declared to be bordering on “terrorism.”

During his talk at CPAC, LaPierre told conservatives that, despite their victories in last November’s elections, their nightmare may “just be beginning.”

“Right now, we face a gathering of forces that are willing to use violence against us,” he said. “The leftist movement in this country right now is enraged. Among them, and behind them, are some of the most radical political elements there are. Anarchists, Marxists, communists, and the whole rest of the left-wing socialist brigade.”

LaPierre also noted that “many of these people hate everything America stands for,” including “democracy” and “free-market capitalism.”

http://www.rawstory.com/2017/02/the-nras-chief-just-unleashed-a-frightfully-bonkers-cpac-speech-heres-three-of-the-craziest-clips/

February 24, 2017

Trump deportation plan could cost taxpayers half a trillion dollars

Trump rolls out more details of a plan that could deport millions of undocumented U.S. immigrants, the true cost of such an undertaking is coming into sharper focus.

In a speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference on Friday, Trump outlined what he called his administration's "swift and strong action to secure the southern border." He said his administration would be "throwing" gang members, drug dealers and criminal aliens out of the country and "will not let them back in."

Until there are more details of the plan, much of which will require congressional approval, estimates are sketchy. But by any full accounting, the fiscal and economic costs would be huge.

Recently the Trump administration has backed off earlier pledges to deport anyone in the country illegally — Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly said Thursday "there will be no mass deportations" after he met with Mexican officials.


http://www.cnbc.com/2017/02/24/trumps-deportation-plan-could-cost-half-a-trillion-dollars.html

February 24, 2017

The White House Correspondents Association quickly rebuked the WH

“The W.H.C.A. board is protesting strongly against how today’s gaggle is being handled by the White House,” the association president, Jeff Mason, said in a statement. “We encourage the organizations that were allowed in to share the material with others in the press corps who were not. The board will be discussing this further with White House staff.”

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/24/us/politics/white-house-sean-spicer-briefing.html?emc=edit_na_20170224&nl=breaking-news&nlid=50533710&ref=cta&_r=0

February 24, 2017

White middle aged men WV, NH, Ky, Oh were hit the hardest

by drug overdoses











http://www.cnbc.com/2017/02/24/our-nations-drug-overdose-problem-in-five-bleak-charts.html

February 24, 2017

This is weird

just received this email:

Confirm For Delivery
Master mastercard <mastercard41@citromail.hu>

HAPPY NEW YEAR MasterCard® to inform you that your account has won $ 2,000,000.00 USD MasterCard® WORLD OF E-LOTTERY 2017 KINDLY LOOK attached file for more details.


LOL!

February 24, 2017

First installment on the butchers bill: Donald Trumps supporters will be made to pay

A month in, the bill keeps adding up: Trump voters backed an unqualified demagogue, and the price will be painful

snip

As P.T. Barnum is said to have famously observed, a sucker is born every minute. Donald Trump, the clown king and ruler of a plutocratic kakistocracy, will make his supporters suffer while they smile and ask for more. Sadism as political strategy is the guiding principle of the modern Republican Party. I will continue to add up the entries on Trump’s butcher’s bill. Ultimately, the American people need to be protected from his machinations. As for his supporters? I’m afraid they deserve everything they receive, and more.

http://www.salon.com/2017/02/24/first-installment-on-the-butchers-bill-donald-trumps-supporters-will-be-made-to-pay/

February 23, 2017

Conservative(Idiot) activists refuse to believe Trump is spending more on travel than Obama

NATIONAL HARBOR, MD — Sarah Chaulk says she remains “extremely bitter” about how much taxpayer money was spent on President Barack Obama’s travel and family vacations during his time in office.

“When Obama put his dog on Air Force One and then told us to give more to help poor people, it was a slap in the face to the entire country,” Chaulk, 60, a graphic designer from Columbus, Ohio, said on Wednesday at CPAC, the marquee annual conference for conservative activists.

Her friend Elaine Kent, 58, chimed in: “And when Michelle Obama and her friends went to Spain and spent millions of dollars on a vacation? They did so much nickel-and-diming of taxpayers."

They are less concerned — which is to say, not concerned at all — with recent reports that suggest President Trump cost taxpayers nearly as much in his first month in office as Obama did in a year. Their sentiments were widely shared here at the Conservative Political Action Conference, where attendees gave a wide array of explanations for why they were outraged by Obama’s travel spending, but not Trump’s.

http://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/2/23/14703472/cpac-trump-travel-budget