Candidate Donald Trump railed against America’s chronic trade deficits, vowing to eliminate them if he became president.

So, how’s Trump doing? Awful. Trade deficits are growing on his watch. The overall trade deficit in September was 21% larger than during his first full month in office.

In 2016, under President Barack Obama, America imported $502.9 billion more in goods and services than it sold in exports.

In 2018, under Trump, that ballooned to $627.7 billion, an increase of $124.7 billion, and the deficit is on pace to run even deeper in 2019. For the nine months ending in September, the overall trade deficit was $481.3 billion, up $24.8 billion for the same period of 2018.

New Zealand’s birds are wonderful. It’s difficult to pick just one favourite, so this year you can vote for up to five birds. Just rank your favourite birds from one to five.

Voting opens at 9am on Monday 28 October and closes at 5pm on Sunday 10 November.

Sadly, many of New Zealand's native birds are in crisis. Two thirds of our birds are threatened with extinction. Forest & Bird’s Bird of the Year celebrates our unique birds and with each vote you help give them a voice.

......Of course, by then – the 13th year of the competition – organisers knew to expect dodgy dealings in New Zealand’s bird of the year poll.

If a nationwide vote to name a favourite native bird sounds like innocuous good fun – a creative means of celebrating unique, threatened fauna – you may be underestimating bird of the year. Coordinated by the Royal Forest & Bird Society, an environmental nongovernmental organisation, it is often described as the country’s most important election – second only to, you know, the actual elections. Since 2017, too, it has had the same validation as two other Kiwi creations, pavlova and Russell Crowe: Australia has tried to pass it off as its own.

Sculptor Andrea Gandini, 22, is transforming tree stumps around the city by carving faces into them. In the last four years he has made 65 such sculptures in the capital as part of his Troncomorto (“dead trunk”) project, documenting his creations on his Instagram account.

Gandini chose to carve faces because he believes they help elicit empathy and respect from passersby towards the tree stumps. “They respect the tree is also an individual,” he says. He tries to imagine what kind of face the tree would have if it was a person: “I try to find a face that’s right for that particular tree.”

Walter Shaub
@waltshaub

Twenty-one. That's how many Republican Senators need to decide whether they love America. I don't like thinking about parties, but 21 stand in the way of saving America from the catastrophic consequences of President Trump's republic-destroying corruption. Consider this snapshot:

1. A sitting POTUS solicited a foreign attack on our election by an authoritarian superpower that recently stole 21 million security clearance files, which contain the most intimate personal information imaginable, and is now engaged in a trade war with us.

2. A sitting POTUS solicited a foreign attack on our election by a desperate country that has been invaded by our nemesis and is fighting for its survival in a battle that has already killed 13,000 people and cost it territory, making it completely depending on our government.

3. A sitting POTUS agreed to back off on criticizing the superpower's repression of protesters in Hong Kong, raising the issue of an apparent quid pro quo (which is not necessary for impeachment but is a horrific aggravating factor).

4. A sitting POTUS blocked aid to the dependent country and sent his political appointees to demand that the dependent country demonstrate it will investigate his political rival before he would even meet with them. AGAIN, although quid pro quo is not necessary, it's now CLEAR.

5. A sitting POTUS fired his AG for not stopping an investigation of his campaign, which later produced a shockingly damning report, and the beneficiary of this slow motion Saturday Night Massacre is now working with him to abuse federal resources to investigate the investigator.

6. A sitting POTUS has posted ON THE WHITE HOUSE WEBSITE evidence that he may have directed his slow motion Saturday Night Massacre beneficiary of an Attorney General to abuse the criminal investigative apparatus of the State to investigate his political rival.

7. A sitting POTUS has attacked the whistleblower who exposed his solicitation of a foreign attack on our election, in an effort to not only intimidate this whistleblower but to intimidate other whistleblowers in order to ensure that his corruption continues unchecked.

8. A sitting POTUS has attacked the constitutional separation of powers by implementing an unprecedented across-the-board refusal to cooperate with any Congressional oversight, risking the total destruction of our system of checks and balances on executive abuses of power.

9. A sitting POTUS is using federal resources to promote his properties by taking staff and foreign leaders to his resorts and by creating the appearance that access to government and favoritism can be purchased—a message influence-seekers have heard and acted upon.

10. Members of Congress who, for eight years of the Obama administration, lauded whistleblowers have done the President's bidding by attacking whistleblowers as a means to insulate the President from consequences that may flow from his rampant corruption.

11. A sitting POTUS obstructed an investigation into possible coordination with Russian during the 2016 election and has failed to explain the extensive links between his campaign and Russia, after having asked Russia on camera to hack his political rival's computer system.

12. Trump White House officials tried to conceal wrongdoing by hiding records of official conversations, both inappropriately in a highly secure national security system and by collecting translator notes and other records.

13. A sitting POTUS has violated the constitution by accepting emoluments from foreign governments, the federal government and at least one state.

14. A new whistleblower raises the possibility that a Trump appointee tried to interfere in the IRS audit of POTUS or VPOTUS's tax returns. And, even if investigation doesn't wind up substantiating the claim, the admin is violating a law requiring release of Trump's returns.

15. A sitting POTUS has advanced his scheme of corruption by targeting or publicly condemning career officials who attempt to hold him accountable or merely uphold the rule of law, including our former Ambassador to Ukraine, the Special Counsel, investigators, and others.

16. A sitting POTUS has called on DOJ to investigate his former political rival for his political advantage. He similarly pressured the USPS to raise rates on an American business because he didn't like the coverage of his misdeeds by a paper the owner of that business also owns.

17. He has called for a "treason" prosecution of a Congressional Chair for conducting congressional oversight, repeatedly attacked the free press and debased the office of the President by his disgraceful public remarks and behavior. (See impeachment of Pres. Andrew Johnson)

(The math is a little off. Technically, it's 19 Republicans. I forgot there are 2 independents. And there are some typos. But the government is burning down, so these are not the details that matter.)

Oh, one other thing people who don't own dogs don't have to do: assume the role of God. Sooner or later, like Jack the Beagle did, the dog will grow quiet, and start spending hours far back in a closet.

So you take the little fellow to the vet, hoping maybe it was something he'd eaten, or slurped up in a mud puddle, but really you know what's probably happening. And the vet will poke a bit, and look at his gums, and say well, he's getting older, maybe after a few tests we'll know better.
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I know, First World problems. And I know we anthropomorphize our pets. But anyone who speaks dog will understand.

I swear Lola gazes at us with utter trust. She has no idea what's coming. For now, I take her to the beach every day, and she takes long swims in the warm September river water and glories in fighting Charley for sticks, but she yips in pain sometimes.

I saw a bumper sticker once that stayed with me: "God help me become the person my dog thinks I am."

I don't have the heart for this. Meaning, of course, that I'm the failure.