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Demovictory9
Demovictory9's Journal
Demovictory9's Journal
February 13, 2020
White House quietly trims dozens of national security experts
White House quietly trims dozens of national security experts
Washington — Six days before President Trump chose Robert O’Brien as his national security advisor in September, the president said the job would be simple.
“You know why it’s easy?” Trump told reporters. “Because I make all the decisions. They don’t have to work.”
As a key White House advisor, O’Brien clearly works — but he meets Trump’s other job requirements: He avoids publicity, he gets out of the way on policy decisions, and he dismisses employees Trump views as meddlesome.
Unlike his predecessors, John Bolton or H.R. McMaster, who pursued their own agendas or tried to block some of Trump’s impulses, O’Brien has taken a wrecking ball to parts of the National Security Council, the intelligence and foreign policy hub of the White House, to satisfy a president who doesn’t trust experts, is suspicious of career government employees, and acts on his own whims.
https://www.latimes.com/politics/story/2020-02-12/white-house-quietly-trims-dozens-of-national-security-experts
February 10, 2020
Article says this is true for 49% of borrowers. They are making no progress on the student loans
A new report from Moody’s Investor Services highlights an alarming statistic: 49% of student loan borrowers whose repayment obligations started in 2010-12 have made no progress towards reducing the balances that they started repayment with. None.
Even worse, many recent grads are seeing their balances grow.
Kaitlyn Blount Crow is one of them. As a young adult with dreams of telling other people’s stories, Crow graduated from the University of Alabama in 2015 with a degree in communications—one that left her with $31,000 in student loans.
But her prospects for a full time journalism job were grim. The industry had gone through a continuing plague of layoffs. Jobs paying the average salary of $41,000 for news reporters were difficult to obtain and Crow struggled to find any full-time employment in her field at all.
She started taking low paid freelance jobs—and waiting tables just to squeak by. No way she could swing the monthly payment that would be due on her student loans in a standard 10-year repayment program.
Rather than default on loan payments, Crow enrolled in a federal income-driven repayment plan—one that tied her monthly payment to her earnings. At first, her income was so low her monthly repayment was $0. Nevertheless, she would pay some money towards the loans whenever she could, hoping this effort would eventually help her pay off her student debt.
Later, she got a full time job and her monthly payment rose to its current $150, which still isn’t enough to cover the interest on her loans. She has continued to make extra payments when she can, yet Crow’s original student loan balance of $31,000 has bubbled up to $34,448.
“Watching your balance go up despite making regular, on-time payments is pretty disheartening,” she says, adding, “I honestly wondered why I had bothered with the extra payments.”
Paying student debt monthly but debt keeps growing.join the club
https://www.forbes.com/sites/advisor/2020/02/09/you-pay-monthly-but-your-student-debt-keeps-growing-join-the-crowd/Article says this is true for 49% of borrowers. They are making no progress on the student loans
A new report from Moody’s Investor Services highlights an alarming statistic: 49% of student loan borrowers whose repayment obligations started in 2010-12 have made no progress towards reducing the balances that they started repayment with. None.
Even worse, many recent grads are seeing their balances grow.
Kaitlyn Blount Crow is one of them. As a young adult with dreams of telling other people’s stories, Crow graduated from the University of Alabama in 2015 with a degree in communications—one that left her with $31,000 in student loans.
But her prospects for a full time journalism job were grim. The industry had gone through a continuing plague of layoffs. Jobs paying the average salary of $41,000 for news reporters were difficult to obtain and Crow struggled to find any full-time employment in her field at all.
She started taking low paid freelance jobs—and waiting tables just to squeak by. No way she could swing the monthly payment that would be due on her student loans in a standard 10-year repayment program.
Rather than default on loan payments, Crow enrolled in a federal income-driven repayment plan—one that tied her monthly payment to her earnings. At first, her income was so low her monthly repayment was $0. Nevertheless, she would pay some money towards the loans whenever she could, hoping this effort would eventually help her pay off her student debt.
Later, she got a full time job and her monthly payment rose to its current $150, which still isn’t enough to cover the interest on her loans. She has continued to make extra payments when she can, yet Crow’s original student loan balance of $31,000 has bubbled up to $34,448.
“Watching your balance go up despite making regular, on-time payments is pretty disheartening,” she says, adding, “I honestly wondered why I had bothered with the extra payments.”
February 10, 2020
Chinese in UK report 'shocking' levels of racism after coronavirus outbreak
Asian community faces verbal and physical abuse in aftermath of first recorded cases of virus in Britain
“We’ll be in trouble if these guys sneeze on us,” Jason Ngan overheard as he and his brother got into a lift in Manchester’s Piccadilly station. Born and bred in Manchester, home to more than 7,000 Chinese people, the legal adviser said the level of anti-Asian racism the coronavirus had unearthed was “shocking”.
“People seem to have put a whole race behind it and it’s exposing all these underlying prejudices towards Chinese people, or at least anyone who looks Chinese. It’s shocking in this day and age. It was so blatant,” Ngan said.
Ngan’s mother runs a Chinese restaurant in Heywood, in Rochdale, Greater Manchester. There had been “a real downturn” over the lunar new year period, particularly since cases were confirmed in York last week, he said. “It’s been very noticeable, far fewer customers since all this started.”
Despite only four confirmed cases of the coronavirus in the UK, Britain’s 390,000-strong Chinese community have noticed a markedly racist response to the global health crisis.
In Sheffield, a postgraduate student was reportedly verbally and physically harassed in the street for wearing a face mask, while in Leicestershire two students – mistakenly thought to be Chinese – were pelted with eggs on the street in Market Harborough. The Manchester Chinese Centre has received scores of complaints of racist incidents targeting children in schools across the region.
North Yorkshire police confirmed they had received two reports of verbal abuse where individuals of an “Asian appearance” had comments about coronavirus shouted at them in York, and there was a further incident where staff at an Asian tea house had been verbally abused.
Chinese in UK report 'shocking' levels of racism after coronavirus outbreak
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/feb/09/chinese-in-uk-report-shocking-levels-of-racism-after-coronavirus-outbreakChinese in UK report 'shocking' levels of racism after coronavirus outbreak
Asian community faces verbal and physical abuse in aftermath of first recorded cases of virus in Britain
“We’ll be in trouble if these guys sneeze on us,” Jason Ngan overheard as he and his brother got into a lift in Manchester’s Piccadilly station. Born and bred in Manchester, home to more than 7,000 Chinese people, the legal adviser said the level of anti-Asian racism the coronavirus had unearthed was “shocking”.
“People seem to have put a whole race behind it and it’s exposing all these underlying prejudices towards Chinese people, or at least anyone who looks Chinese. It’s shocking in this day and age. It was so blatant,” Ngan said.
Ngan’s mother runs a Chinese restaurant in Heywood, in Rochdale, Greater Manchester. There had been “a real downturn” over the lunar new year period, particularly since cases were confirmed in York last week, he said. “It’s been very noticeable, far fewer customers since all this started.”
Despite only four confirmed cases of the coronavirus in the UK, Britain’s 390,000-strong Chinese community have noticed a markedly racist response to the global health crisis.
In Sheffield, a postgraduate student was reportedly verbally and physically harassed in the street for wearing a face mask, while in Leicestershire two students – mistakenly thought to be Chinese – were pelted with eggs on the street in Market Harborough. The Manchester Chinese Centre has received scores of complaints of racist incidents targeting children in schools across the region.
North Yorkshire police confirmed they had received two reports of verbal abuse where individuals of an “Asian appearance” had comments about coronavirus shouted at them in York, and there was a further incident where staff at an Asian tea house had been verbally abused.
February 10, 2020
Trump is underwater by 40 points (28% / 68%) among voters 18-34.
If and when that age group turns out in November, Trump is gone.
tweet of the hour
https://twitter.com/Politidope/status/1226525237317185536Trump is underwater by 40 points (28% / 68%) among voters 18-34.
If and when that age group turns out in November, Trump is gone.
February 10, 2020
quiz, which President won the popular vote, two Grammys, a Nobel Prize and an Oscar?
February 9, 2020
Bank that fired employees for helping stranded customer offers to reinstate both workers
Bank that fired employees for helping stranded customer offers to reinstate both workers
A bank that found itself steeped in an optics disaster for firing two employees who helped a stranded customer on Christmas Eve has offered to reinstate the workers.
One of them was customer service representative Emily James, who drove to a gas station with her supervisor’s blessing to give stranded client Marc Eugenio $20.
His first paycheck from a new job held by the bank, he was unable even to buy gas to get home, let alone finish his Christmas shopping, The Oregonian reported.
“I was a customer of U.S. Bank, I needed help, and she went above and beyond,” Marc Eugenio of Clackamas, Oregon, told The Oregonian at the time. “I felt so bad. She was the only one helping me.”
https://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/ny-us-bank-man-stranded-20-dollars-workers-fired-reinstated-20200209-bshezhu3znc3lcj5bu3yghsdea-story.html
Just about out of gas, Eugenio drove to a filling station, stranded without the money. The hold continued.
Desperate, he redialed the bank’s 800 customer-care number and got James again. She obtained permission from her supervisor – Abigail Gilbert, who gave her the $20 – and sped the 14 miles to the gas station.
“I handed him $20 in cash, said, ‘Merry Christmas,’ and went right back to work,” James told The Oregonian.
Five days later, she arrived at the office only to be greeted by the regional manager, who fired her, reported KGW-TV. Gilbert also lost her job.
February 9, 2020
Trump finalizes plan to allow drilling at Utah monuments
The U.S. government implemented final management plans Thursday for two national monuments in Utah that Donald Trump downsized more than two years ago that ensure lands previously off-limits to energy development will be open to mining and drilling despite pending lawsuits.
The lands have generated little interest from energy companies in the two years since Trump cut the size of Bears Ears National Monument by 85% and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument by nearly half, said Casey Hammond, acting Assistant Secretary for Land and Minerals Management with the U. S. Department of the Interior.
Hammond said the department had a duty to work on the management plans after Trump signed his proclamations in December 2017, despite the pending lawsuits by conservation, tribal, and paleontology groups aiming to restore the monuments to their original sizes.
"If we stopped and waited for every piece of litigation to be resolved we would never be able to do much of anything around here," he said.
Conservation groups that have called the decision the largest elimination of protected land in American history criticized the administration on Thursday for spending time on management plans they believe will become moot. They contend Trump misused the Antiquities Act to reverse decisions by previous presidents.
A federal judge last year rejected the administration's bid to dismiss the lawsuits. In a recent court filing, tribal groups said the Bears Ears lands are "a living and vital place where ancestors passed from one world to the next, often leaving their mark in petroglyphs or painted handprints, and where modern day tribal members can still visit them."
Trump finalizes plan for the largest elimination of protected land in American history.
https://americanindependent.com/donald-trump-administration-utah-national-monuments-protected-land-drilling-mining-bears-ears-grand-staircase-escalante/Trump finalizes plan to allow drilling at Utah monuments
The U.S. government implemented final management plans Thursday for two national monuments in Utah that Donald Trump downsized more than two years ago that ensure lands previously off-limits to energy development will be open to mining and drilling despite pending lawsuits.
The lands have generated little interest from energy companies in the two years since Trump cut the size of Bears Ears National Monument by 85% and Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument by nearly half, said Casey Hammond, acting Assistant Secretary for Land and Minerals Management with the U. S. Department of the Interior.
Hammond said the department had a duty to work on the management plans after Trump signed his proclamations in December 2017, despite the pending lawsuits by conservation, tribal, and paleontology groups aiming to restore the monuments to their original sizes.
"If we stopped and waited for every piece of litigation to be resolved we would never be able to do much of anything around here," he said.
Conservation groups that have called the decision the largest elimination of protected land in American history criticized the administration on Thursday for spending time on management plans they believe will become moot. They contend Trump misused the Antiquities Act to reverse decisions by previous presidents.
A federal judge last year rejected the administration's bid to dismiss the lawsuits. In a recent court filing, tribal groups said the Bears Ears lands are "a living and vital place where ancestors passed from one world to the next, often leaving their mark in petroglyphs or painted handprints, and where modern day tribal members can still visit them."
February 9, 2020
Melania Trump Hides Away: What Does the First Lady Even Do All Day?
https://twitter.com/realTuckFrumper/status/1226583494681186304
February 9, 2020
The first daughter made the remarks to Fox News host Sean Hannity on Wednesday night, describing Trump as being an unabashed “cheerleader for American excellence”.
She touted Trump’s accomplishments in the White House, listing off new jobs he created and cited statistics of 10 million people who are now off of welfare.
Ivanka added: “For us not to come together as a nation and celebrate America’s success is not forgivable.”
Ivanka Says It's 'Unforgivable' if People are Unwilling to Support Her Corrupt and Evil Father
https://www.politicalflare.com/2020/02/ivanka-says-its-unforgivable-if-people-are-unwilling-to-support-her-corrupt-and-evil-father/The first daughter made the remarks to Fox News host Sean Hannity on Wednesday night, describing Trump as being an unabashed “cheerleader for American excellence”.
She touted Trump’s accomplishments in the White House, listing off new jobs he created and cited statistics of 10 million people who are now off of welfare.
Ivanka added: “For us not to come together as a nation and celebrate America’s success is not forgivable.”
February 9, 2020
Thank you to the Sun-Times Editorial Board for finally calling a spade a spade in its critique of Donald Trump’s latest buffoonery: The draft order, now being circulated around his administration, entitled, if you can believe it, “Making Federal Buildings Beautiful Again.”
In the mode of dictators past, including Hitler, Franco, Mussolini and Stalin, people in the Trump administration now want to dictate architectural style for future federal buildings by mandating that they return to the look of the Roman Empire — glorious in its day, but hardly appropriate any longer.
No doubt the global architecture community shall have much to say about this. But more significant is that by labeling this action “reactionary,” the editorial has at last accurately defined the true nature of our political right, which customarily is euphemistically called “conservative.” In reality, our political right wing actually seeks to conserve only its power. It cares not one whit about conserving what matters: our planet, air and water, natural wonders, one-person-one-vote, or fair sharing of the bounty of our lands or labor.
https://chicago.suntimes.com/2020/2/5/21124236/architecture-making-federal-buildings-great-again-trump-executive-order-design
Make federal buildings ‘beautiful again?’ Trump declares war on modern architecture
In a draft order obtained by the Sun-Times, Trump declares that future buildings should look like those of ancient Rome, Greece and Europe. This is such a bad idea
In a seven-page draft executive order obtained by the Chicago Sun-Times, Trump declares that the federal government since the 1950s has “largely stopped building beautiful buildings that the American people want to look at or work in.”
Future federal government buildings, he decrees, should look like those of ancient Rome, Greece and Europe.
“Classical architectural style shall be the preferred and default style,” he states.
Trump’s draft order is titled — get ready for it — “Making Federal Buildings Beautiful Again.”
Trump administration buffoonery on display with "make federal buildings beautiful again"
https://chicago.suntimes.com/2020/2/8/21128362/trump-make-federal-buildings-beautiful-again-architecture-suntimes-lettersThank you to the Sun-Times Editorial Board for finally calling a spade a spade in its critique of Donald Trump’s latest buffoonery: The draft order, now being circulated around his administration, entitled, if you can believe it, “Making Federal Buildings Beautiful Again.”
In the mode of dictators past, including Hitler, Franco, Mussolini and Stalin, people in the Trump administration now want to dictate architectural style for future federal buildings by mandating that they return to the look of the Roman Empire — glorious in its day, but hardly appropriate any longer.
No doubt the global architecture community shall have much to say about this. But more significant is that by labeling this action “reactionary,” the editorial has at last accurately defined the true nature of our political right, which customarily is euphemistically called “conservative.” In reality, our political right wing actually seeks to conserve only its power. It cares not one whit about conserving what matters: our planet, air and water, natural wonders, one-person-one-vote, or fair sharing of the bounty of our lands or labor.
https://chicago.suntimes.com/2020/2/5/21124236/architecture-making-federal-buildings-great-again-trump-executive-order-design
Make federal buildings ‘beautiful again?’ Trump declares war on modern architecture
In a draft order obtained by the Sun-Times, Trump declares that future buildings should look like those of ancient Rome, Greece and Europe. This is such a bad idea
In a seven-page draft executive order obtained by the Chicago Sun-Times, Trump declares that the federal government since the 1950s has “largely stopped building beautiful buildings that the American people want to look at or work in.”
Future federal government buildings, he decrees, should look like those of ancient Rome, Greece and Europe.
“Classical architectural style shall be the preferred and default style,” he states.
Trump’s draft order is titled — get ready for it — “Making Federal Buildings Beautiful Again.”
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Member since: Tue Feb 27, 2018, 10:32 PM
Number of posts: 32,454
