In his latest Washington Post column, Joe Scarborough says ‘…2018 will be the most consequential political year of our lives.’ The Morning Joe panel discusses.
View the NBC post here.
Trump Again Tries To Pass Off New Sprint Jobs As His Own Deal (It’s Not)
The following article by Richard Cowan of Reuters was posted on the National Memo website December 29, 2016:
PALM BEACH, Fla. (Reuters) – U.S. President-elect Donald Trump on Wednesday said telecommunications group Sprint Corp and a U.S. satellite company OneWeb will bring 8,000 jobs to the United States, and the companies said the positions were part of a previously disclosed pledge by Japan’s SoftBank Group Corp.
SoftBank holds stakes in both companies and its chief, billionaire businessman Masayoshi Son, earlier in December said he would invest $50 billion in the United States and create 50,000 jobs. Continue reading “Trump Again Tries To Pass Off New Sprint Jobs As His Own Deal (It’s Not)”
Russian operation hacked a Vermont utility, showing risk to U.S. electrical grid security, officials say
The following article by Juliet Ellperin and Adam Entous was posted December 31, 2016 on the Washington Post website:
A code associated with the Russian hacking operation dubbed Grizzly Steppe by the Obama administration has been detected within the system of a Vermont utility, according to U.S. officials.
While the Russians did not actively use the code to disrupt operations, according to officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a security matter, the discovery underscores the vulnerabilities of the nation’s electrical grid. And it raises fears in the U.S. government that Russian government hackers are actively trying to penetrate the grid to carry out potential attacks. Continue reading “Russian operation hacked a Vermont utility, showing risk to U.S. electrical grid security, officials say”
Trump on alleged election interference by Russia: ‘Get on with our lives’
The following article by John Wagner was posted on the Washington Post website December 28, 2016:
President-elect Donald Trump distanced himself Wednesday night from the Obama administration’s plans to punish Russia for its alleged interference in the 2016 presidential election, telling reporters that “I think we ought to get on with our lives.”
Trump, appearing at his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Fla., was asked what he thought about the Obama administration’s plans to sanction Russia for what U.S. intelligence officials say was state-sanctioned hacking of Democratic organizations, the targeting of state election systems and meddling in the U.S. presidential election. Continue reading “Trump on alleged election interference by Russia: ‘Get on with our lives’”
Trump must prove that he supports ‘our LGBTQ citizens’
The following editorial from the Editorial Board at the L.A. Times posted the following December 29, 2016:
Among the many constituencies viewing the presidency of Donald Trump with apprehension are gay, lesbian and transgender Americans, who are disturbed by what they’ve heard from members of the president-elect’s inner circle and by language in the Republican platform.
Vice President-elect Mike Pence, for example, has espoused troubling views on issues of importance to the gay community. As a member of Congress, for instance, he supported a constitutional amendment to outlaw same-sex marriage, warning that “societal collapse was always brought about following an advent of the deterioration of marriage and family.” As governor of Indiana, Pence signed a “religious freedom” bill that many feared would allow businesses to discriminate on the basis of sexual orientation (though he later signed a revised version making it clear that businesses couldn’t deny services to anyone based on sexual orientation or gender identity). Continue reading “Trump must prove that he supports ‘our LGBTQ citizens’”
Americans — especially but not exclusively Trump voters — believe crazy, wrong things
The following article by Catherine Rampell was posted on the Washington Post website December 28, 2016:
Many Americans believe a lot of dumb, crazy, destructive, provably wrong stuff. Lately this is especially (though not exclusively) true of Donald Trump voters, according to a new survey.
The survey, from the Economist/YouGov, was conducted in mid-December, and it finds that willingness to believe a given conspiracy theory is (surprise!) strongly related to whether that conspiracy theory supports one’s political preferences. Continue reading “Americans — especially but not exclusively Trump voters — believe crazy, wrong things”
The Continuing Financial Muddle At A Pro-Trump Political Committee
The following article by Robert Faturechi and Derek Willis was posted on the ProPublica website December 24, 2016:
‘America Comes First’ can’t seem to decide if it’s a PAC or a super PAC, but in either case its federal filings remain problematic.
A political action committee that backed Donald Trump’s bid for the presidency is continuing to flout campaign finance laws.
Earlier this month, ProPublica reported that the America Comes First PAC had violated the rules by not disclosing the source of its funding before Election Day and by exceeding caps on contribution amounts.
America Comes First gave $115,000 to Trump Victory, a group that raised money for the Trump campaign and for national and state-level Republican groups. It now ranks as the second-biggest PAC contributor to Trump Victory, according to a list compiled by the nonprofit Center for Responsive Politics — behind GEO Group, a private prison company.
Continue reading “The Continuing Financial Muddle At A Pro-Trump Political Committee”
Some lessons from Jesus, for all of us
The following by the Editorial Board at the Washington Post was posted on their website December 24, 2016:
FOR SOME years now, around Christmastime, there has been a pseudo-controversy going on — promoted if not wholly created by various talky people on radio and TV — about a “war on Christmas,” seen as a concerted effort by the disciples of secularism to eliminate or ignore religious elements of the holiday. Now, with a new administration coming to power, the war apparently has been won — by the righteous. “You can say again, ‘merry Christmas’ because Donald Trump is now the president,” proclaimed Corey Lewandowski, a former aide to President-elect Trump, who has himself voiced similar sentiments.
Actually, we’ve been at liberty to say “merry Christmas” for quite a few centuries; this isn’t like the early Christians emerging from the Roman catacombs into the bright light of freedom. But it’s true that social pressure arising from the effort to avoid giving offense to people of other faiths, or of none, has led to some silly evasions and to a great many spare and uninspiring greeting cards. Probably, though, no amount of training was ever going to condition many of us to replace “office Christmas party” in everyday speech with “holiday party” (the amount of misbehavior being about the same at either). After centuries of use, wishing someone a merry Christmas has become a fairly innocuous statement of good cheer, with widespread appeal. Continue reading “Some lessons from Jesus, for all of us”
Trump’s history of discussing nuclear weapons
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Trump On Nuclear Weapons Tweet: ‘Let It Be An Arms Race’
The following article was released by Reuters December 23, 2016:
U.S. President-elect Donald Trump, asked to clarify his comments about expanding U.S. nuclear weapons capability, said, “Let it be an arms race,” and that the United States would win it, MSNBC reported on Friday.
Trump had alarmed non-proliferation experts on Thursday with a Twitter post that said the United States “must greatly strengthen and expand its nuclear capability until such time as the world comes to its senses regarding nukes.” Continue reading “Trump On Nuclear Weapons Tweet: ‘Let It Be An Arms Race’”