January 17th, 2017 - January 18th, 2017. 429-430 days since the Nov 8, 2016, election of some rich asshole, no.45, and 359-360 days since the Jan 20th inauguration.
What are the odds of the rich asshole surviving 2018 in office? An expert crunches the numbers
some rich asshole Jr., some rich asshole and Ivanka the rich asshole stand together during the Republican National Convention. (Shutterstock)
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some rich asshole has been under constant fire from critics since he began his campaign in the summer of 2015, and his presidency has so far been perhaps the most chaotic and bizarre in recent decades. But as he approaches the first anniversary of his inauguration, the pressure is only getting more intense.
First came the revelations in the bestseller Fire and Fury, which reports on various White House aides’ concerns about the president’s mental capacity. Then came Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s request to question the rich asshole about the rich asshole campaign’s dealings with Russia, and his decision to subpoena the president’s ostracised former ally, Steve Bannon.
So as the rich asshole prepares to celebrate a year since his inauguration, what are the chances he’ll still be president when 2018 is over?
There are plenty of guesses and estimates out there, informed and otherwise. Bannon for one is quoted in Fire and Fury as saying the rich asshole only has a 33.3% chance of making it to the end of his term in January 2021. But while many experts and insiders have opinions on the matter, when it comes to forecasting future events, betting and prediction markets have been shown to be rather more reliable.
A prediction market is a simple financial market that allows everyone to bet on an uncertain future outcome. The market most interesting for us asks: “Will some rich asshole be president at year-end 2018?” The yes-asset will pay 100 cents if the rich asshole is still in office at midnight December 31, 2018, and 0 cents if he is not. Because an asset is worth at most 100 cents and at least 0 cents, the asset price is between 0 and 100 – just like a probability.
Since anyone can trade in these markets and adjust the prices, prediction markets have been characterised as a market-based form of the wisdom of the crowd. If the crowd thinks the asset is underpriced – that is, that the implied probability is too low – then people can buy the asset at an expected profit and thereby adjust the price upwards. If the asset is seen as overpriced, then traders can sell to bring the price down.
And indeed, research shows that the prices in these markets are a good predictor of the probabilities. Whenever the asset price is 60 cents, then in 60% of the cases the underlying outcome does in fact happen. If the price is 70 cents, then the underlying outcome happens in 70% of the cases, and so on. That means prices are “well calibrated”; on average, they correspond to probabilities.
Another study finds that assets set to expire more than half a year in the future can exhibit slight biases. Prices above 50 cents tend to be slightly larger than the true probabilities – so looking at the odds on the rich asshole’s future, it’s important to regard the prices as optimistic estimates.
What the crowd says
Currently, the yes-asset trades at 77 cents, implying a 77% or less probability that the rich asshole survives 2018 in office. So the market thinks that while the threats to his presidency are many – the Mueller investigation, rumours of early stage dementia, former staffers with axes to grind – the rich asshole is considerably more likely to survive than be ousted.
Still, of the 57 US presidential terms served prior to the rich asshole, only nine ended prematurely, meaning 84% of terms were fulfilled. The market expectation of the rich asshole making it through the next year (not even the entire term) is therefore significantly below this historical average.
Another market asks: Will the rich asshole be president at year-end 2019? Certainly the probability must be lower here, since the rich asshole cannot resume office in 2019 if ousted in 2018. And indeed, the yes-asset in this market is currently trading at 62 cents, indicating only a 62% probability or less that the rich asshole survives the next two years in office.
But despite the shockwaves generated by Fire and Fury, the prices in both markets have not changed much in the ensuing weeks. Indeed, if anything, they went slightly up around the book’s release, only to revert again a few days later. It seems the markets may have considered the book’s “revelations” just another episode of the rich asshole melodrama.
However, while the odds didn’t change much, the trading volume (i.e. the number of assets bought and sold) started to explode on January 1, around the time newspapers first started discussing the book. These numbers indicate that, while the book did create a lot of interest, it did not considerably affect people’s estimation of the rich asshole’s chances of staying in office.
The last time we saw such large trading numbers on these markets was on December 1, 2017 – the day Michael Flynn (the rich asshole’s former National Security Advisor) pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI in its Russia investigation. With new twists in the administration’s various scandals coming thick and fast, it seems safe to say there are other spikes to come – but whether they will shift the odds is another matter.
By Christoph Siemroth, Lecturer in Economics, University of Essex
This article was originally published on The Conversation. Read the original article
the rich asshole ordered Steve Bannon to withhold testimony from Congress — but it won’t save him from Mueller: report
FILE PHOTO: U.S. President some rich asshole talks to chief strategist Steve Bannon during a swearing in ceremony for senior staff at the White House in Washington, U.S. January 22, 2017. REUTERS/Carlos Barria/File Photo
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President some rich asshole personally made the decision to order former White House strategist Steve Bannon to limit his answers to Congressional investigators in testimony this week, according to a report on Thursday.
Sources with firsthand knowledge of Bannon’s testimony to the House Intelligence Committee told Foreign Policy that deputy White House counsel Uttam Dhillon made the recommendation that the rich asshole order Bannon to refuse to answer questions about his time in the White House or on the transition team.
While Dhillon apparently concluded that Bannon may have “legitimate” claims to executive privilege, those protections are not expected to extend to Bannon’s testimony before Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election.
Foreign Policy notes:
Dhillon’s private and previously unreported legal advice to the rich asshole could ultimately go against the president’s interest, however, by making it increasingly difficult for any administration official — or even a member of the president’s family who advises the rich asshole — to refuse to provide information to Mueller.Dhillon’s advice might prove to be a “Pyrrhic victory,” one senior administration official told Foreign Policy.While the president might be able to “poke the Congress in the eye,” the same legal rationale undercuts any effort to restrict the special counsel’s right to interview current or former the rich asshole aides, the official said.
Bannon and other members of the rich asshole’s inner-circle are expected to be interviewed by Mueller’s team in coming days.
Read the entire report here
Host says Fox & Friends ‘only option’ for the rich asshole because every other show calls him fat
Fox News host Brian Kilmeade
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Brian Kilmeade said President some rich asshole has no other choice but to watch “Fox & Friends” because no other news shows treated him with respect.
The “Fox & Friends” co-host appeared on Wednesday’s “Breitbart News Tonight” to promote his new book and discuss why the president loyally watched and reacted on Twitter to the daily TV program, reported Right Wing Watch.
“If you flip around, you understand why he watches us,” Kilmeade said. “I mean, we’re the only one that gives him a legitimate, fair shot. I mean, we’ll call him out when we think things are out of control, you know if those things that were said behind closed doors I think that’s ridiculous.”
Kilmeade was apparently referring to the president’s “sh*thole” insult against immigrants from African nations, which has been a top story on nearly every media outlet this week but Fox News.
“I’m not going to pretend that’s the No. 1 story in America every day,” Kilmeade said. “You know, we don’t get up every day and wonder if he’s really 239 pounds. We’re not going to spend two blocks talking about, ‘He has to lose 15 pounds,’ and, ‘Is his doctor competent?’ so that makes you the only option for him.”
Based on his Twitter reactions, the rich asshole sometimes seemed to learn more from “Fox & Friends” than his presidential daily briefings — and Kilmeade said he and his co-hosts understood their influence with the nation’s chief executive.
“Absolutely, we take it seriously, but it’s kind of odd because we were the ones that had him on for eight years prior,” Kilmeade said. “He would call into our show every Monday or Tuesday.”
That led to a personal relationship with the show’s team, who “started taking him out, thanking him for his contribution on Christmas, and next thing you know he’s president of the United States.”
Here is why the rich asshole’s ‘Fake News Awards’ event was more than just a stupid mess
President some rich asshole (Screenshot)
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some rich asshole’s “Fake News Awards” for what he calls “the most corrupt & biased of the Mainstream Media” have drawn mockery. However, behavioral science research suggests they are deadly serious. These awards create an institution for the rich asshole’s relentless attacks on mainstream media and position the rich asshole as the only voice who gets to determine truthful media. Unfortunately, the typical style of news coverage will perpetuate the rich asshole’s agenda. However, a different style informed by behavioral science strategies would convey more accurate information and address the damage from the Fake News Awards.
The purpose of any award is to create an institutionalized way of promoting a certain cause through drawing public attention. As an example, consider perhaps the most well-known prize in the world, the Nobel Prize, awarded for the most important scientific and cultural advances. Every year, the media is filled with headlines describing the awards and their recipients, resulting in significant public attention that uplifts the importance of science and culture.
This attention taps into the “availability heuristic,” our tendency to assign excessive importance to whatever happens to be at the forefront of our minds, and the “priming effect,” where we perceive exaggerated connections between past and future stimuli. Thus, the Nobel Prize causes the public to focus on scientific and cultural achievements, and interpret future advances in light of the winners of last year’s Nobel Prize.
More subtly, an award positions the grantor of the award as the sole legitimate voice in determining who deserves the award. Several Swedish and Norwegian institutions decide who gets the various Nobel Prize awards. Perhaps the most prestigious one, the Nobel Peace Prize, is determined by a committee elected by politicians in the Norwegian Parliament. Thus, the internal domestic politics of Norway powerfully influence this prize.
In parallel, the Fake News Awards promote the rich asshole’s attacks on mainstream media. In a January 2, 2018 tweet, he described the award as highlighting “Dishonesty & Bad Reporting in various categories.” We can get a more clear nature of what he means by “various categories” from when the rich asshole first tweeted on November 27, 2017 about handing out a fake news trophy for “the most dishonest, corrupt and/or distorted in its political coverage of your favorite President (me).”
the rich asshole, in other words, aims to use the award to perpetuate the narrative of himself as the victim of unfair and dishonest mainstream media coverage: after all, he is well-known for using the label “fake news” to attack accurate news stories that he doesn’t like. The President will use these awards to draw massive public attention to supposed “fake news” coverage by mainstream news sources. In fact, he even delayed the granting of the awards due to the extensive public attention to the awards.
The availability heuristic will cause the public to focus on “fake news” in mainstream media’s coverage of the President, regardless of whether this coverage is accurate or not. The priming effect will move news consumers to be more likely to perceive negative coverage as fake.
Since such awards will likely be given annually, they will institutionalize the rich asshole’s agenda of attacking the mainstream media, while also legitimating the rich asshole as the grantor of these awards. He will get to determine which media venues get labeled as providing “the most dishonest, corrupt and/or distorted” coverage. You can bet that it will not be the media venues that actually are the most dishonest, but the ones that depict the rich asshole in a negative light, regardless of how factual (or not) such depictions may be.
Some believe that the rich asshole will lose credibility from granting these awards because he will draw attention to unflattering stories about himself. Unfortunately, behavioral science research suggests that the style of coverage by news media will facilitate the rich asshole’s agenda.
The typical style of headlines about any awards generally focus on who got the awards. Unfortunately, research shows that only 41% of readers go beyond the headlines, with most getting their news from the headline alone. Many of the rest do not read beyond the first paragraph, which in most stories would summarize who received the awards and in what category. Even the ones who do go further will experience “anchoring,” a thinking error where the first information we get about a topic drastically colors our overall perspective. Yes, first impressions really do matter.
Studies reveal that the standard journalistic methods of correcting people’s misconceptions with accurate facts backfires in the long term. If you first state the false information and then provide evidence of why it is wrong, people will tend to forget over time the evidence for why it is wrong, and start to misremember the original falsehood as true. Thus, even though many articles covering the Fake News Awards will eventually explain that these awards are meant to perpetuate the rich asshole’s attacks on mainstream media and were awarded at the rich asshole’s sole discretion, the damage will already be done.
To prevent this outcome of media consumers getting the wrong impression about the Fake News Awards, mainstream media need to go against its typical style of reporting, and instead align its coverage with behavioral science research. Instead of headlines about who received the awards, headlines should say something like “In Yet Another Attack on the Media, the rich asshole Issues Fake News Awards” so that the majority of their readers who only glance at the headlines get the right impression. The first paragraph of the article should focus on how this award attempts to perpetuate and institutionalize the rich asshole’s attack on the media and position the rich asshole as the sole voice of truth, before talking about who received the awards.
Articles on the awards should devote some space to the “Press Oppressors awards” issued by the Committee to Protect Journalists. These awards – issued in response to the rich asshole’s announcement of the Fake News Awards – focus on world leaders “who have gone out of their way to attack the press and undermine the norms that support freedom of the media.” Can you guess who received the “Overall Achievement in Undermining Global Press Freedom” award?
You as a media consumer can encourage media venues to cover the Fake News Awards appropriately by writing letters-to-the-editor suggesting more appropriate coverage, or more simply by tweeting and emailing them with a link to this article. You can also encourage them to take the Pro-Truth Pledge at ProTruthPledge.org to commit to truthfulness. Consider taking the pledge yourself, which aims to unite all private citizens and public figures who care about truth and facts in our society.
You can also make sure to share only articles that cover the awards appropriately. When others post articles on social media with problematic coverage, you can make comments that give a more accurate impression and draw attention to the Committee to Protect Journalists.
You have the power to address the damage from these awards.
Dr. Gleb Tsipursky is the author of the #1 Amazon bestseller The Truth-Seeker’s Handbook: A Science-Based Guide. He is an Assistant Professor at The Ohio State University, President of the nonprofit Intentional Insights, and co-founder of the Pro-Truth Pledge, which aims to unite all who care about facts and truth.
This article was originally published at History News Network
Here are the rich asshole team’s ancestors who would be deported under White House immigration crackdown
Stephen Miller and Tucker Carlson (Raw Story composite image)
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On Thursday, Politico‘s Jennifer Mendelsohn wrote that many of President some rich asshole’s staunchest anti-immigrant allies are descended from immigrants who would not have been eligible to remain in the U.S. under the administration’s current policies.
As Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials conduct a massive roundup of undocumented workers, Mendelsohn said that it’s worth pointing out that Tucker Carlson, Dan Scavino, Jr. and other anti-immigration figures have ancestors who would have been forced to leave the country under the rich asshole administration’s policies.
“From White House adviser Stephen Miller to Fox News commentator Tomi Lahren, many prominent anti-immigration voices advocate for immigration policies like merit-based systems and language-based preferences that would have barred their own families from coming to the United States,” Politico said.
“But while our favorite immigration opponents may have forgotten their immigrant roots, lucky for them, I have an Ancestry.com account, and I know how to use it,” said Mendelsohn.
Scavino is the great-grandson of Davide “Gildo” Ernemegildo, who arrived in the U.S. in the early 1900s along with his day laborer and factory worker brothers. They were followed by sisters and the family patriarch, who were detained at Ellis Island out of fear they wouldn’t be able to support themselves.
Stephen Miller — a nativist and accused white supremacist — is descended from Eastern European Jews who arrived in the U.S. penniless. His grandmother would be eligible for deportation under today’s rules because in the 1910 census, she is listed as speaking only Yiddish in spite of four years in the country.
As Mendelsohn has reported before, Tomi Lahren’s great-grandfather Constantine Dietrich was indicted by a grand jury on charges he forged his citizenship papers.
Tucker Carlson’s great-great-grandfather was Cesar Lombardi, a Swiss immigrant who came to the U.S. to escape the narrowness of economic opportunity in Europe. He landed in New York City on Nov. 1, 1860.
Rep. Steve King (R-IA) is the grandson of Freda Harm, who arrived in the U.S. from Germany at the age of four, brought by her family. King has notoriously said that you can’t “restore civilization with someone else’s babies,” meaning white people should have more children because Hispanics are reproducing faster.
Mendelsohn said, “The good news is that while we’ve been hearing about the evils of immigration for centuries, the country appears to have continually weathered the storm. I suspect we’re going to be just fine moving forward.”
Here’s how Pentagon chief Jim Mattis tricks the rich asshole into doing what he wants — according to White House insiders
some rich asshole speaks to Jim Mattis (Pentagon)
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Defense Secretary Jim Mattis isn’t the most well-known “the rich asshole whisperer” in the White House, but new reporting claims he has one weird trick to get his way with President some rich asshole.
In a Wall Street Journal report on the methods various administration aides have used to communicate with the president, Mattis’ savvy technique is explained.
When discussing methods to exert non-military pressure on North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, the rich asshole reportedly had a novel idea: “If the U.S. stopped joint military exercises with the South Koreans, it could help moderate Kim Jong Un’s behavior.”
Staffers close to the conversation told the Journal that Mattis “says, ‘Your instincts are absolutely correct,’ and then gets him [the president] to do the exact opposite of what his instincts say.”
“some rich asshole dropped the idea,” the report continued, “although he has ordered aides to give the exercises a low profile, eliminating press releases and briefings about them.”
The report also explained that the ex-real estate mogul appreciated “frankness,” even from detractors like Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD).
“Most black people are doing pretty good. We have people struggling to make ends meet, but that’s insulting,” Cummings once told the president after the latter disparaged black communities as crime-ridden. “Probably nobody has ever told you that.”
“You’re right,” the rich asshole reportedly told him. “Nobody has ever told me that.”
the rich asshole: ‘The Democrats want a shutdown to get off the subject of the tax cuts’
some rich asshole (CNN/screen grab)
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President some rich asshole on Thursday accused Democratic lawmakers of secretly wanting the federal government to shut down because his tax cut law, which hasn’t been implemented, has “worked so well.”
While visiting Pennsylvania on Thursday, reporters asked the rich asshole if Republicans would get a continuing resolution on his desk in time to stop the government from shutting down on Friday.
“I believe the Democrats want a shutdown to get off the subject of the tax cuts because they worked so well,” the rich asshole insisted. “Nobody thought, including the Democrats, it could work this well. They’ve been so good, I think that the Democrats would like to see a shutdown.”
For their part, Democrats have said that they oppose a government shutdown.
Watch the video below.
Trump tells reporters that Democrats want a government shutdown because "they want to get off the subject" of tax cuts. #right pic.twitter.com/NWfYXhDCEQ
TRUMP: "I believe the Democrats want a shutdown to get off the subject of the tax cuts because they worked so well. Nobody thought, including the
Democrats, it could work this well. They've been so good, I think that the Democrats would like to see a shutdown." pic.twitter.com/lDNgG8RHpM
Nancy Pelosi shoots down Paul Ryan’s funding bill: ‘This is like a bowl of doggie doo with a cherry on top’
Nancy Pelosi (C-SPAN/screen grab)
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House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi on Thursday blasted a Republican proposal to temporarily fund the Children’s Health Insurance Program (CHIP) as part of a continuing resolution that would prevent a government shutdown.
At her weekly press briefing, Pelosi was asked to respond to Ryan’s recent Republican proposal that would include limited CHIP funding to the continuing resolution.
“This is like giving you a bowl of doggy doo and put a cherry on top and then call it a chocolate sundae,” Pelosi complained. “This CHIP [funding] should have been done in September, first of all. Second of all, we wanted 10 years. We wanted permanent CHIP, which by the way, saves $6 billion.”
“Republicans rejected that, even just on the terms of CHIP, they rejected the 10-year savings — $6 billion,” she continued. “Doing it for 6 years, saves $1 billion. That’s good. Doing it 10 years saves $6 billion is better. In fact, it’s best.”
According to Pelosi, funding for community health centers is also important because they are responsible for implementing CHIP services.
“They could have easily put all this in this bill,” Pelosi noted. “Why didn’t they? Because they want to spend their money on tax cuts instead investments in health and well being of children and their families.”
Watch the video below from C-SPAN.
the rich asshole evangelicals tell MSNBC: His racism is ‘contrary to Christ’ but he can still help ‘criminalize abortion’
Evangelical activist talks to MSNBC (screen grab)
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MSNBC on Thursday talked to yet another panel of the rich asshole voters who said that they still support the president even though he has a tendency to do things that are “contrary to Christ.”
In a segment that aired on Thursday morning, the group of evangelical activists who MSNBC spoke to were largely supportive of the president, although they cited some troubling “character” issues.
“I think he’s doing really well in policy,” Pastor Ryan Jorgenson of Harvest Bible Chapel said. “But the character is an issue at times.”
“For instance, what was said in the office [using the term ‘shithole’ to refer to African nations], that is contrary to what Christ would stand for in the Bible and what Christians would be about,” the pastor added.
Conservative activist Steve Deace observed that ongoing White House controversies had pushed some evangelicals to the point “where they are beginning to not care.”
Deace said that if he could give the president advice, he would “appeal to his vanity.”
“I would tell him, ‘You’re not serving your ego well,'” Deace remarked. “Go outside of the beltway, do more rallies, connect more with actual everyday people, the people who put you in the White House.”
Bob Vander Plaats of The Family Leader called on the rich asshole to pass a religious liberty law allowing Christian to discriminate against LGBT people.
“If I own a venue and I believe marriage is between one man and one woman and a gay couple says, ‘I want to get married,'” Vander Plaats opined. “And that owner says, ‘Not at this venue.’ Because we don’t celebrate that.”
Jorgenson said that he hopes the rich asshole will help states “criminalize abortion” and “stop this murdering of unborn people.”
Retired school teacher Joan Acela concluded the panel by calling on the president “to follow the word of God.”
“There is an answer in the Bible for every issue,” she stated. “And if he just follows that, we will be blessed.”
Watch the video below from MSNBC.
US government to shield health workers under ‘religious freedom’
Docs and nurses at patient bedside via Shutterstock
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The U.S. government is seeking to further protect the “conscience and religious freedom” of health workers whose beliefs prevent them from carrying out abortions and other procedures, in an effort likely to please conservative Christian activists and other supporters of President some rich asshole.
The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said on Thursday it will create a division within its Office of Civil Rights to give it “the focus it needs to more vigorously and effectively enforce existing laws protecting the rights of conscience and religious freedom.”
Healthcare workers, hospitals with religious affiliations, and medical students among others have been “bullied” by the federal government to provide these services despite existing laws on religious and conscience rights, the top HHS official said.
“The federal government has hounded religious hospitals…forcing them to provide services that violate their consciences,” Acting HHS Secretary Eric Hargan said. “Medical students too have learned to do procedures that violate their consciences.”
Some of the services at issue include abortion and euthanasia, according to HHS documents. Politico reported on Wednesday that the protections would extend to care for transgender patients seeking to transition.
Democrats criticized the move as a denial of healthcare for women and others, while legal and medical ethics experts said that such exemptions have legal limits and would be challenged in court.
Democratic Senator Patty Murray said in a statement she was “deeply troubled” by reports of the new division and that “any approach that would deny or delay health care to someone and jeopardize their well being for ideological reasons is unacceptable.”
LEGAL AND ETHICAL QUESTIONS
The division would enforce the legal protection and conduct compliance reviews, audits and other enforcement actions to ensure that health care providers are allowing workers with religious or moral objections to opt out.
As the division seeks to back exemptions, it is likely to face legal and ethical challenges.
“There will be challenges to any step along the way for any expansion of religious exceptions,” said Marci Hamilton, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania. She said such challenges would be “pretty strong.”
Hamilton said that while courts had frequently upheld religious exemptions in recent years, they have recognized limits. For example, she said, courts have rejected a church’s bid to be exempt from federal marijuana laws, and a Pennsylvania order of nun’s effort to avoid eminent domain.
Professionals take an oath to serve people who are sick, Alta Charo, a professor of law and bioethics at the University of Wisconsin in Madison explained. They are also the only ones licensed to provide those services and must do so without discrimination, she said.
“When the director of the office of civil rights is quoted as saying that ‘No physician should have to choose between helping a sick person or following their personal conscience,’ the director is simply wrong. That choice was made the moment they became physicians,” she said.
It is unclear how broad such exemptions could be.
Asma Uddin, a fellow at the UCLA Burkle Center for International Relations and a Muslim, spoke at an HHS press conference about the need for protection against what she said was a variety of ways women are forced to violate their conscience.
For Muslim women, she said, this is an issue in respect to modesty, particularly as patients.
RICH ASSHOLE ORDER
The creation of the division is in accordance with an executive order signed by the rich asshole last May called “Promoting Free Speech and Religious Liberty.” The order was followed by new rules aimed at removing a legal mandate that health insurance provide contraception.
Several proponents of the changes cited the Little Sisters of the Poor, an order of Roman Catholic nuns which runs care homes for the elderly, which had challenged a legal mandate under Obamacare, the common name for former President Barack Obama’s 2010 healthcare law.
In October, HHS introduced rules that would let businesses or non-profit organizations lodge religious or moral objections to obtain an exemption from that mandate that employers provide contraceptives coverage in health insurance with no co-payment.
Planned Parenthood said the move was the latest example of the rich asshole administration’s efforts to block women, transgender people and other communities from access to care.
Americans United for Life, a group that opposes abortion rights, said the HHS had taken a strong step forward to allow individuals and organization to exclude abortions or other services that violate their conscience.
(Additional reporting by Caroline Humer, Jilian Mincer and Brendan Pierson in New York, and Julie Steenhuysen in Chicago; Editing by Alistair Bell)
Pittsburgh Newspaper Editorial Board Published A F*cked Up Defense Of the rich asshole’s Racism
The city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania is described as “overwhelmingly Democratic,” but the hometown newspaper’s editorial board is filled with relics from the “great America” some rich asshole wants to give back.
Apparently, if you call a racist a racist you’re just as bad as GOP superstar Joseph McCarthy in his crusade against alleged Communists (people he didn’t like).
Earlier this week, the newspaper published an editorial calling the act of correctly labeling someone a racist “the new McCarthyism.”
In defense of some rich asshole labeling black-majority countries “shitholes,” a group of people who clearly need to be fired from their jobs informed us that people who accuse others of racism it is simply a “term of malice and libel — almost beyond refutation, as the words ‘communist’ or ‘communist sympathizer’ were in the 1950s.”
“Moreover, the accuser somehow covers himself in an immunity of superiority. If I call you a racist, I probably will not be called one,” these awesome folks add. “And, finally, having chosen the ultimate epithet, I have dodged the obligation to converse or build.”
Next, we launch into a wholehearted defense of some rich asshole and a ridiculous argument that calling his remarks racist somehow hurts the immigrants he wants to expel from our country:
If some rich asshole is called a racist for saying some nations are “shithole countries,” does that help pass a “Dreamers” bill to keep gifted young people in this nation — people who have something to give the United States and are undocumented only because they were brought here by their parents illegally?That’s the goal, is it not? To save the Dreamers? That’s what the White House meeting last week was about. It’s what the whole week was about, until we went down the “racist” rabbit hole.
The Post-Gazette’s editorial board would have you believe that calling racist remarks racist somehow destroys the fight for decency in America, calling the rich asshole’s plans for immigrants “reasonable.” Besides, there was nothing racist at all about calling black-majority countries “shitholes” while demanding that we take in more immigrants from white countries like “Norway.”
Now, I know what you’re thinking: there’s no way this can get worse. But it does, because the Post-Gazette’s editorial board is filled with horrible people:
If the president had used the world “hellhole” instead, would that have been racist?If he had used the word “failed states,” would that have been racist?But there are nations that are hellholes in this world. And there are failed states. It is not racist to say that this country cannot take only the worst people from the worst places and that we want some of the best people from the best places, many of which are inhabited by people of color. That’s not racism, it is reason.[…]Did the president use a crudity in a private meeting? He says he did not. No one who was there has said he did on the record. But if he did, so what? So what? America today is a sadly crass place where many of us use vulgar, corrosive language we ought not use in private and work conversations. How many of us would like to see and share a transcript of everything we have said in private conversations or at work?And how many presidents have said crass things in the Oval Office in private meetings? Think of Kennedy, Clinton and Nixon, to name three.
According to the Editorial Board, a person can only be racist if they were hardcore segregationists or murder African-Americans:
We need to confine the word “racist” to people like Bull Connor and Dylann Roof. For if every person who speaks inelegantly, or from a position of privilege, or ignorance, or expresses an idea we dislike, or happens to be a white male, is a racist, the term is devoid of meaning.We have to stop calling each other names in this country and battle each other with ideas and issues, not slanders.
Maybe they’re on to something, though. For instance, when their hero some rich asshole called Mexicans rapists, drug dealers, and murderers, he probably shouldn’t have done that. When he said that countries with lots of black people are “shitholes,” that was also a bad idea as well. In fact, he probably shouldn’t toss out insults like “Crooked Hillary” and “Sloppy Steve” either. In fact, he should just stop talking.
This insanely racist editorial was condemned by the Newspaper Guild of Pittsburgh, a union representing 150 reporters, photographers, and other employees at the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, who called it a “blight on the 231 years of service the Post-Gazette has provided its readers.”
It’s interesting that the Editorial Board ended by telling us that it’s time to battle with ideas rather than “slanders” while wholeheartedly defending someone who does that on a daily basis. It’s even more interesting that they chose to run this piece of Martin Luther King Day.
F*ck the Post-Gazette Editorial Board. F*ck some rich asshole. F*ck everyone like them.
President some rich asshole, joined by First Daughter Ivanka the rich asshole.
Jessica Kwong
Posted with permission from Newsweek
Like father, like daughter?
Time in the White House has made first daughter Ivanka the rich asshole more like her father President some rich asshole, Maggie Haberman, a White House correspondent for The New York Times told Katie Couric and co-host Brian Goldsmith in a podcastreleased on Thursday.
“She has gone from being sort of a somewhat resentful daughter to really being in many ways the spitting image of him—not physically, obviously, but she’s him without a lot of the flash and style,” Haberman said of Ivanka the rich asshole.
“She has a very similar set of grievances, she has a very similar sense that people are being unfair to her,” Haberman said. “She’s a lot like him.”
Ivanka the rich asshole believes that her dad has “got a genius” and that he can intuit things that other people cannot, and “she is very riveted by it,” said the journalist who joined the Times in 2015 and worked as a political reporter at Politico for five years prior to her current position.
Haberman said she doesn’t think the first daughter is happy about how her father is being perceived and some aspects of his governance.
ICYMI, our podcast is going weekly and there's a new episode out tomorrow with @maggieNYT! Past guests include @OfficialJLD, @inagarten, @CoryBooker, @ava, @MayorLandrieu & more. Listen and subscribe here: applepodcasts.com/KatieCouric
The two have disagreed on policy issues, notably on Roy Moore, a Republican Alabama Senate candidate who lost the race to Democrat Doug Jones in the red state after being hit with sexual misconduct allegations. the rich asshole endorsed Moore, while his daughter criticized the candidate, saying, “ There’s a special place in hell for people who prey on children.”
“She has always tried to refine his style,” Haberman said of the daughter and father.
Haberman added that Ivanka the rich asshole and her husband Jared Kushner, both White House advisors, are “difficult to read” and unlike each other—Kushner is “very sort of chill and flat and speaks as little as possible.”
“But this is not the life that they wanted and none of this is what they thought was going to happen,” Haberman continued. “Like him, she believed they would walk in be treated sort of differentially and she’s been a little surprised at how D.C. really is.”
The interview, recorded on January 8, is part of a series of unscripted conversations Couric and Goldsmith are doing with newsmaking “wonder women.” Upcoming guests include Kara Swisher of Recode, actress Laverne Cox, Congresswoman Maxine Waters and actress and comedian Amy Schumer.
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President highlights journalists’ errors despite anger from some in his own party over his treatment of the media
some rich asshole, who has routinely peddled conspiracy theories and mistruths from the office of the presidency, sought to question the accuracy of the media on Wednesday by unveiling the so-called “Fake News Awards”.
The president used his preferred medium of Twitter to announce “the winners”, which ranged from minor errors by journalists on social media to news reports that later invited corrections, with the New York Times and CNN the most frequently named.
The “awards” were revealed on the Republican National Committee’s website, which swiftly crashed as a result of the attention, and prompted swift backlash, including from his own party.
10 years ago I was press secretary for @GOP. Lots of good people working there today. I’m working hard to help them elect Republicans in 2018. But these tactics by @realDonaldTrump are not helpful to anybody except Chuck & Nancy. twitter.com/realdonaldtrum…
Much of the list centered around reporting on the investigation into whether the rich asshole campaign colluded with Russia to influence the 2016 election. The president has repeatedly dismissed the inquiry as “fake news”, despite the consensus of the US government and its allies that Moscow worked to sway the presidential election in the rich asshole’s favor.
Shortly after making the awards public, the rich asshole offered mild praise for a faction of the media, tweeting: “Despite some very corrupt and dishonest media coverage, there are many great reporters I respect and lots of GOOD NEWS for the American people to be proud of!”
While the rich asshole’s attacks on press freedom date back to his candidacy, his decision to hold “Fake News Awards” marked a bizarre spectacle even by the standards of an impulsive president.
the rich asshole had initially announced the awards at the start of the new year, with plans to hold them on 8 January. The date was later pushed to 17 January, as White House aides struggled in the interim to explain the event’s purpose or whether it would even take place.
the rich asshole has often used his bully pulpit to highlight errors in the media, even when news organizations have taken steps to correct and apologize for any inaccuracies, and he has labeled the press the “enemy of the American people”. the rich asshole has yet to acknowledge any of his lies, which have been tracked in an exhaustive list by the New York Times and underscore the president’s near daily disconnect from the truth.
The move was nonetheless prime fodder for the rich asshole’s base, which has rallied behind the president’s extraordinary assault on the first amendment. Polling has found Americans relatively split on the issue of trust in the news, with registered Republican voters far more likely to believe in media bias.
Two prominent Republican lawmakers did, however, rebuke the rich asshole’s treatment of the media leading up to his “Fake News Awards”. John McCain and Jeff Flake, both senators from Arizona and among the rich asshole’s most vocal critics, implored the president to retreat from his war against the press.
In an op-ed published Tuesday, McCain said the rich asshole’s attacks on the media “provided cover for repressive regimes to follow suit”.
“The phrase ‘fake news’ – granted legitimacy by an American president – is being used by autocrats to silence reporters, undermine political opponents, stave off media scrutiny and mislead citizens,” McCain wrote.
“We cannot afford to abdicate America’s longstanding role as the defender of human rights and democratic principles throughout the world.”
Flake, who is retiring from the Senate at the end of the year, took aim at the rich asshole in a damning speech from the Senate floor.
DOJ considering arresting sanctuary city politicians
January 16, 2018
Nicole Rodriguez
Posted with permission from Newsweek
The Department of Justice is considering subjecting state and local officials to criminal charges if they implement or enforce so-called sanctuary policies that bar jurisdictions from cooperating with immigration authorities. Immigration advocates argue such a move would be illegal.
Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen made the disclosure Tuesday during a Senate committee hearing on the department’s operations.
“The Department of Justice is reviewing what avenues might be available,” Nielsen said. “The context of this is of course not only putting my [Immigration and Customs Enforcement] officers at risk, but also finding an efficient and effective way to enforce our immigration laws.”
She said it's safer for immigration agents to do their jobs if they have the assistance of local and state jurisdictions.
The Justice Department’s review follows a chilling warning earlier this month from the acting director of Immigration and Customs Enforcement, Thomas Homan, who said California would feel the wrath of his agency because of its decision to become a sanctuary state. Homan also called for local and state elected officials to be charged with federal crimes for adhering to santuary policies.
“We gotta take [sanctuary cities] to court, and we gotta start charging some of these politicians with crimes," Homan said during an interview with Fox News’s Neil Cavuto. He said politicians who pushed sanctuary city legislation should be held "personally accountable” for their actions.
The Department of Justice declined to comment. The Department of Homeland Security could not be reached for comment.
Immigration advocates said charging local or state officials with crimes for not cooperating with federal immigration authorities would be unlawful and a violation of the Constitution.
"These are really troubling intimidation tactics by the Trump administration," Cecillia Wang, deputy legal director for the American Civil Liberties Union, told Newsweek. "If they’re threatening to prosecute state and local officials, it raises a number of concerns, including if they end up going after state or local officials who have been outspoken in opposing the Trump administration’s draconian and unlawful immigration enforcement policies. I think you’ve got a serious First Amendment problem.”
She added: “The Constitution doesn’t let the federal government force state and local officials to do the president’s bidding in this way."
Senator Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), who grilled Nielsen on the issue, "was deeply disturbed to hear that this Administration is actively looking for ways to prosecute California elected officials who have passed laws to protect public safety and combat the damaging effects of this Administration’s immigration enforcement policies," her press secretary, Tyrone Gayle, told Newsweek via email.
The Justice Department move is the latest escalation in the battle between the Trump administration and cities and states over sanctuary city policies. A federal judge in November blocked a Trump executive order that sought to strip sanctuary cities of federal funding.
Why the rich asshole may need Steve Bannon’s help
January 17, 2018
Alexander Nazaryan
Posted with permission from Newsweek
Stephen Bannon’s exile from Trumpworld appears to be complete. Dismissed from the White House in August, he saw his position as the president's self-described “wingman” unravel in the past two weeks, as his unflattering comments about both Donald Trump and his family made international headlines with the publication of Michael Wolff’s Fire and Fury, a look into the West Wing that would have been impossible without Bannon’s apparent candor.
Now, that candor could extent to the investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller into potential Russian interference in the 2016 election. Bannon received a subpoena from Mueller on Tuesday. While nobody knows what he will say under oath, he may have damaging information on Trump’s family and associates—not to mention Trump himself.
And yet Bannon badly needs Trump, who has the capacity to carry out his nationalist economic agenda. Trump, at the same time, needs Bannon, his strongest link to the populist right.
Is it possible, then, that Bannon could stage a comeback?
Given Trump’s anger at Bannon, a return to the president’s favor may seem unlikely. One potentially ameliorating factor: Trump is well known to have an aversion to confrontation. His famous catchphrase from The Apprentice notwithstanding, he rarely fires people he employs, and when he does, he sometimes asks them to return. Although he replaced Corey Lewandowski, his first campaign manager, Trump continued to seek out his counsel, while Lewandowski continued to speak energetically on Trump’s behalf on CNN. Recently, he was at the White House, advising the president on the 2018 midterm elections.
Coming back into the Trumpian fold is “certainly within the realm of possibility,” says one person close to Bannon, who asked for anonymity in order to speak frankly. “But ONLY if Bannon can first set aside his hubris, be patient and take a clear-eyed look in the mirror at the mistakes he made that caused this rupture in the first.”
Bannon may not be valuable in the White House, but he could be indispensable on the campaign trail. Longtime Trump adviser Sam Nunberg was fired by the New York real estate mogul on August 2, 2015, just a month-and-a-half into the campaign, and was later sued by Trump for $10 million. He believes that when Trump begins earnestly campaigning for the 2020 election, he will seek Bannon’s counsel. “I predict Steve will have regained and rehabilitated his stature as a powerful voice” by that time. “Steve,” he adds, “has a plan.”
Kurt Bardella, who once worked at Breitbart News with Bannon, explains that, “For Steve to succeed, he needs Trump to fail.” Only when Trump is down, in this case, will Bannon’s loyalty and pugnacity once again become an asset.
Others are not so sure that a reconciliation is possible, given that Bannon insulted both Ivanka Trump (“dumb as a brick”) and Donald Trump Jr. (“treasonous” for meeting with a Russian lawyer at Trump Tower). Talking to Mueller certainly can’t help, even if he doesn’t have much choice.
“Trump has let it be known to intimates that there’s no coming back,” says Roger Stone, who was fired by Trump around the same time as Nunberg. “Steve is persona non grata.”
Even so, Bannon remains one of the most feared and well-connected figures on the right. He may no longer have the White House, or even Breitbart, yet he is intent on playing a role in the future of the Republican Party. Asked about Bannon’s prospects, veteran Republican strategist Rick Wilson compared him to a resistant strain of disease: “It’s not dead yet,” he said of the political war Bannon promised to wage.
For now, at least, Bannon will have to fight it without Trump.
the rich asshole bad in bed, says porn star Stormy Daniels: report
Adult film actress Stormy Daniels (left, via Wikimedia Commons) and President some rich asshole (right, via screengrab).
The plot thickens in the curious case of President Donald Trump and his alleged dalliance with porn star Stormy Daniels.
Trump’s personal lawyer Michael Cohen denied Friday that Trump had a sexual encounter with the adult the film star in response to a Wall Street Journal report which claimed the president arranged a $130,000 payout to Daniels to keep quiet about it. The Journal also said it received a two-paragraph statement attributed to Daniels, but sent to them by Cohen, which denied a sexual affair with Trump and said reports of “hush money” were “completely false.”
On Tuesday, Slate editor-in-chief Jacob Weisberg published a piece appearing to support the WSJ settlement claims.
Weisberg said he received a tip about Trump and Daniels’s alleged tryst in the latter half of 2016, after Trump officially received the Republican nomination for the presidential election. He began speaking to Daniels—real name Stephanie Clifford—about Trump between August and October 2016. October 2016 marked a month before the election and it is also the month Cohen is reported to have finalized the deal for Daniels’s silence in exchange for a six-figure payout.
Daniels is claimed to have told Weisberg that she was negotiating a settlement with Trump’s lawyer, Cohen, at the time to keep quiet about an affair with Trump. She even texted him a photo of an unsigned document relating to the agreement. Their conversations tailed off in October—the month that WSJ says the agreement was signed.
According to Weisberg, Daniels disclosed to her that she slept with Trump in his hotel room after meeting him at a celebrity golf tournament in 2006. According to the WSJ piece, the tournament was held in July that year at Lake Tahoe in Nevada. Weisberg claims this encounter was the start of a sexual relationship “which continued for nearly a year.” Trump had married his wife Melania Trump, née Knauss, in January 2015—18 months prior to pursuing the alleged affair.
Daniels reportedly told Weisberg that Trump was bad in bed, though in not so many words. “She intimated that her view of his sexual skill was at odds with the remark attributed to Marla Maples,” he wrote, linking to a Reddit post featuring an old New York Post cover touting Trump’s ex-wife apparently saying: “Best sex I’ve ever had.”
Weisberg said that in his conversations with Daniels between August 2016 and October 2016, which was around the time Trump’s treatment of women began dominating the press—including the infamous Access Hollywood tape—”she didn’t allege any kind of abuse, insisting she was not a victim.”
“The worst Trump had done, she said, was break promises she’d never believed he would fulfill,” Weisberg continued, noting that Daniels claimed Trump wanted her to appear on The Celebrity Apprentice, which premiered in January 2008.
Daniels’s friend and fellow adult film star Alana Evans corroborated reports of a relationship between Trump and Daniels in an interview with NBC’s Megyn Kelly TodayTuesday.
Evans said Trump and Daniels also tried to convince her to “have fun” with them.
“Come hang out with us. Come have fun. Let’s party”- Alana Evans, friend of former adult-film star Stormy Daniels, says Stormy confided in her about a sexual encounter she had with President Trump in 2006. #MegynTODAY
JANUARY 17, 2018 / 7:33 PM / UPDATED 14 HOURS AGO
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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Haitians will no longer be eligible for U.S. visas given to low-skilled workers, the rich asshole administration said on Wednesday, bringing an end to a small-scale effort to employ Haitians in the United States after a catastrophic 2010 earthquake.
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced the change less than a week after President some rich asshole reportedly questioned in an Oval Office meeting why the United States would want to take in immigrants from Haiti and African nations, referring to them as “shithole” countries. the rich asshole has denied using that word.
DHS said in a regulatory filing that it was removing Haiti from lists of more than 80 countries whose citizens can be granted H-2A and H-2B visas, given to seasonal workers in agriculture and other industries
It cited what it said were “high levels of fraud and abuse” by Haitians with the visas, and a “high rate of overstaying the terms” of their visas.
A DHS report published last year stated that Haitians on a variety of non-immigrant visas, including H-2As and H-2Bs, had a roughly 40 percent visa overstay rate in the 2016 fiscal year.
Belize and Samoa were also removed from the lists, for risks stemming from human trafficking and not taking back nationals ordered removed from the United States, respectively.
Just a few dozen Haitians entered the United States on the visas each year since they were given permission to do so in 2012 by the Obama administration, according to DHS data.
Sixty-five Haitians entered the United States on H-2A visas, given for agricultural work, in the 2016 fiscal year, according to DHS data, and 54 Haitians were granted H-2A visas by the State Department between March and November 2017. The number of Haitians entering in 2016 on H-2B visas, which are for non-agricultural seasonal work, was more than zero but too low to report, according to DHS.
Supporters of the visas say they gave Haitians a rare opportunity to work legally in the United States, contribute to the U.S. economy, and help fund the recovery of Haiti after the earthquake, which killed more than 200,000 people.
“They’re just cutting off the most economically beneficial visa for the Haitian people,” said Sarah Williamson, founder of PTP Consulting, a Virginia-based consultancy that ran a pilot program to bring Haitians to the United States on the visas. “Even though not many people have been able to avail themselves of it, it’s been hugely transformational for those who have participated.”
The Haitian embassy in the United States did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Officials in Haiti were not immediately available for comment.
In an interview with Reuters on Wednesday, the rich asshole praised Haitians.
“I love the people. There’s a tremendous warmth,” he said. “And they’re very hard-working people.”
Humanitarian groups and Republican and Democratic members of Congress lobbied the Obama administration to make Haiti eligible for the short-term worker visas, arguing that remittances to family in Haiti would help the country recover from the earthquake. Without H-2A and H-2B visas, there are few legal avenues for most Haitians to go to the United States.
“The post-earthquake reconstruction efforts ignored migration and remittances entirely,” said Michael Clemens, a senior fellow at the Center for Global Development who was heavily involved in the efforts to allow Haitian workers to come to the United States. “We saw it as an opportunity to help Haiti rebuild after the earthquake.”
The Obama administration added Haiti to the list of approved countries in 2012, and PTP Consulting stepped in to screen and match Haitian workers with farmers in the United States.
In countries with more experience sending workers to the United States, such as Jamaica, the home-country government typically does much of that work and regulates the H-2A process heavily, Williamson said.
Jon Hegeman, who operates a commercial greenhouse in Alabama, brought in eight Haitian H-2A workers in 2015 through the consultancy, and nine workers in 2016.
Before Hegeman hired Haitians, his business had trouble finding local workers. Within a three-month period, they went through 300 people for eight positions, he said. When he was approached by PTP to participate in the program, he agreed.
“These guys were awesome. They worked hard, you see a smile on their face every day,” said Hegeman, who as the child of a missionary was born and largely raised in the Dominican Republic, which neighbors Haiti. “We’ve changed or impacted communities in Haiti.”
He said he would escort his workers to the airport in order to make sure they left the United States when their visas ran out.
“That was one of my biggest concerns,” he said. “We had zero visa overstays.”
Williamson said PTP was able to ensure the return to Haiti of every worker that came through its program, but said other companies applying for H-2A visas for Haitians may not have been as scrupulous.
Reporting by Yeganeh Torbati, additional reporting by Joseph Guyler Delva in Port-au-Prince, Haiti; Editing by Sue Horton and Grant McCool
Our Standards The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
JANUARY 17, 2018 / 3:28 PM / UPDATED 2 HOURS AGO
Exclusive: the rich asshole considers big 'fine' over China intellectual property theft
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President some rich asshole said on Wednesday the United States was considering a big “fine” as part of a probe into China’s alleged theft of intellectual property, the clearest indication yet that his administration will take retaliatory trade action against China.
In an interview with Reuters, the rich asshole and his economic adviser Gary Cohn said China had forced U.S. companies to transfer their intellectual property to China as a cost of doing business there.
The United States has started a trade investigation into the issue, and Cohn said the United States Trade Representative would be making recommendations about it soon.
“We have a very big intellectual property potential fine going, which is going to come out soon,” the rich asshole said in the interview.
While the rich asshole did not specify what he meant by a “fine” against China, the 1974 trade law that authorized an investigation into China’s alleged theft of U.S. intellectual property allows him to impose retaliatory tariffs on Chinese goods or other trade sanctions until China changes its policies.
the rich asshole said the damages could be high, without elaborating on how the numbers were reached or how the costs would be imposed.
“We’re talking about big damages. We’re talking about numbers that you haven’t even thought about,” the rich asshole said.
U.S. businesses say they lose hundreds of billions of dollars in technology and millions of jobs to Chinese firms which have stolen ideas and software or forced them to turn over intellectual property as part of the price of doing business in China.
The president said he wanted the United States to have a good relationship with China, but Beijing needed to treat the United States fairly.
the rich asshole said he would be announcing some kind of action against China over trade and said he would discuss the issue during his State of the Union address to the U.S. Congress on Jan. 30.
Asked about the potential for a trade war depending on U.S. action over steel, aluminum and solar panels, the rich asshole said he hoped a trade war would not ensue.
“I don’t think so, I hope not. But if there is, there is,” he said.
In Beijing, foreign ministry spokesman Lu Kang said there were no laws in China to force foreign investors to transfer technology, but acknowledged such things may happen as part of “market behavior” between companies working with each other.
“There is absolutely no government meddling in these actions,” Lu told a daily news briefing on Thursday.
“At the same time, I want to stress that China will resolutely protect its legitimate rights,” he added, without elaborating.
Jeffrey Schott, a senior fellow at the Peterson Institute for International Economics, said the penalties under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974, which authorized the investigation into China’s intellectual property practices, would probably include a package of both tariffs and restrictions on Chinese investment in the United States.
“I suspect the U.S. measures will involve restrictions in areas where we don’t have WTO (World Trade Organization) obligations,” Schott said. “the rich asshole likes to talk about tariffs so that may be part of the package too. The Chinese would have the legal right to retaliate against tariff increases.”
Throughout his 2016 election campaign, the rich asshole routinely threatened to impose a 45 percent across-the-board tariff on Chinese goods as a way to level the playing field for American workers. At the time, he was also accusing China of manipulating its currency to gain an export advantage, a claim that his administration has since dropped.
the rich asshole said on Wednesday that China stopped meeting the criteria for currency manipulation after his election, and he said making that designation while trying to work with Beijing to rein in North Korea would be tricky.
“How do you say, ‘hey, by the way, help me with North Korea and I‘m going to call you a currency manipulator?’ It really doesn’t work,” the rich asshole said.
The president also said he and Chinese President Xi Jinping had not discussed China’s plans with regard to purchases of U.S. Treasury bonds.
Bloomberg reported earlier this month that Chinese officials reviewing the country’s foreign exchange holdings had recommended slowing or halting purchases of U.S. Treasury bonds.
the rich asshole said he was not concerned such a move would hurt the U.S. economy.
“We never talked about it. They have to do what they do,” he said.
Additional reporting by James Oliphant, Ayesha Rascoe, Lesley Wroughton, David Lawder, and Ben Blanchard in BEIJING; Editing by Alistair Bell
Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images North America
Attorney General Jeff Sessions preached the administration’s message on merit-based immigration on Fox News Tuesday night, claiming “a good nation” doesn’t admit “illiterate” immigrants.
“What good does it do to bring in somebody who is illiterate in their own country, has no skills and is going to struggle in our country and not be successful? That is not what a good nation should do, and we need to get away from it,” Sessions said, speaking on “Tucker Carlson Tonight.”
Sessions criticized Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) for reportedly reciting during a meeting Emma Lazarus’ poem that’s historically affiliated with American immigration and the Statue of Liberty.
“Not really a case you would expect a Republican to be making,” Carlson said, referencing Graham’s use of the poem. “Why aren’t there more articulate Republican members of Congress making the case that you just made?”
“Well, I wish there were, actually,” Sessions said, before claiming the U.S. should be more like Canada in its immigration policies. “We should evaluate them and make sure they are going to be lawful. They are not threats to us. They have the education and skills level to prosper in America. That’s good for them and good for America.”
Watch a clip of the interview below:
FBI agents visited Bannon's house
FBI agents visited the home of former chief the rich asshole strategist Steve Bannon last week, a source familiar with the situation has confirmed to CBS News.
CBS News White House and senior foreign affairs correspondent Margaret Brennan reports FBI agents made a trip to Bannon's home last week, in what became a heated exchange with the agents. It's unclear if Bannon had an attorney on retainer at that point. The agents delivered a subpoena for Bannon. That subpoena has become a moot point now, since Bannon has agreed to speak with investigators, CBS News Katiana Krawchenko confirmed.
Bannon has agreed to speak with Special Counsel Robert Mueller's team, as Mueller and his associates investigate Russian election meddling and any ties to the rich asshole associates. Bannon was interviewed by the House Intelligence Committee Tuesday, as it conducts a separate investigation.
According to House Intelligence Committee ranking member Rep. Adam Schiff, R-California, Bannon refused to answer a number of questions. The White House is blaming the committee for not knowing what it is doing, and pointing to written guidance on congressional testimony. The Associated Press reported Bannon's lawyer was relaying questions to the White House in real time, something a source close to Bannon told CBS News was not accurate. The White House, according to White House officials, believed the questions posed to Bannon Tuesday went beyond the scope of the agreed-upon topics.
Some of the committee staff members for the majority members are also frustrated by Tuesday's interview, according to committee sources. They said there was never an agreement on a narrowed scope of questioning.
"There was never an agreement with the committee counsel," according to one congressional source familiar with the matter.
Since the White House briefing Wednesday afternoon, the White House counsel and the committee have spoken again. The White House has indicated, CBS News has learned, that it is open to a new scope of inquiry regarding Bannon, but wants to go through a certain process.
Bannon is expected back on the Hill Thursday. Earlier this month, President the rich asshole publicly split with him, and Breitbart News subsequently severed ties with its former executive chairman.
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the rich asshole’s Doctor Now Admits the rich asshole Does In Fact Have Heart Disease, Dr. Sanjay Gupta Reports
Dr. Sanjay Gupta – CNN’s chief medical correspondent – had some tough questions for Dr. Ronny Jackson yesterday during the press conference about the rich asshole’s results from his medical exam. Gupta asked if being borderline obese and being on cholesterol medication could be classified as being healthy. Dr. Jackson basically said ‘yes’, the president is fine.
However, Dr. Gupta pointed out just hours ago that he believes, based on test results that he’s seen, that President the rich asshole has heart disease.
Gupta points out that dating back to 2009, the rich asshole started to have “these tests that are actually looking for the presence of calcium in the blood vessels that lead to the heart.”
“Steadily, up until just this past week when he had it performed again, those numbers have gone up,” he said.
“When they get to a certain range … that means he has heart disease.”
Gupta then talked about his interaction Tuesday with the rich asshole’s doctor, Navy Rear Adm. Dr. Ronny Jackson.
“It was interesting when I spoke to Dr. Jackson. At first he said he passed all the tests with flying colors,” Gupta said. “When I asked him specifically about that test, he did then concede that, in fact, the president does have heart disease.” (source)
“They’re going to be increasing the medications, including the cholesterol-lowering medications to try and combat that, but there’s no question, by all standards, by all metrics, anyway a doctor or cardiologist will look at it, the president does have heart disease.”
Gupta says the disease is controllable with medications, but also adds that the rich asshole needs to have his diet under control.
“But he does have heart disease,” Dr. Gupta said.
Prominent Democrats are getting a free ride in 2018 as the GOP fails to recruit top challengers.
At this point, it would probably be news when the Republican Party can find high-profile candidates who are willing to jump into the 2018 cycle.
It’s a campaign year that poll watchers say could form into a Democratic wave. That’s why for now, more and more would-be GOP candidates are declining any invitations to run.
From New York to Ohio, and from Minnesota, and North Dakota, each new day seems to bring confirmation that the GOP, weighted down by a historically unpopular president and facing a huge national head wind, is struggling to even compete this year as recruiting efforts fail again and again.
The latest example came on Tuesday when local Illinois businessman Mark Kleine announced he would not challenge Democratic Rep. Cheri Bustos, despite having already raised $373,000, leaving the GOP with a back-up candidate who has raised almost no money for the pending contest.
Nationally, “Republican leaders have failed to secure their top-choice candidate in eight of the 10 Senate races in states that the rich asshole won in 2016, and Florida Gov. Rick Scott has yet to commit to his expected run for Sen. Bill Nelson’s seat,” Politico reports.
The White House is reportedly so desperate to get Scott to run for the Senate that Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke last week carved out a controversial exemption for the state of Florida, protecting its shores from proposed offshore drilling that the administration is proposing nationwide.
That stubborn inability to recruit candidates means that high-profile Democrats who may be eying a White House run in 2020 are getting a pass.
For years, the strategy has always been that if prominent members of the opposing party are likely considering presidential runs, the president’s party makes sure those politicians have to win bruising re-election runs before they get to throw their hat in the ring.
It’s a way to make sure the would-be White House challengers don’t have an unobstructed path for years as they plot their national run.
That’s just not happening this year.
And that’s “allowing the potential White House hopefuls to envision a 2018 spent honing their image as leaders of the anti-the rich asshole resistance as they stockpile campaign cash — rather than having to focus on a serious GOP attempt to beat them, or just sully their image,” Politico reports.
On the Democratic side, it’s a much different story unfolding in 2018, with the party buried in a blizzard of challengers eager to knock off local Republicans.
In California alone, “There already are 43 Democrats, many of them with plenty of campaign cash, lined up to challenge Republicans in the top seven districts targeted by their party,” according to a recent San Francisco Chronicle report.
Incredibly, Rep. Steve Knight of Palmdale, already has eight opponents seeking to unseat him in a congressional district that Hillary Clinton won by seven points in 2016.
Overall, Democrats need to flip 24 seats to take control of the House. The Cook Political Report currently rates 63 GOP seats as being competitive in November. By comparison, just 21 Democrats seats are deemed to be competitive, while the rest are safe.
One Republican campaign strategist recently told ABC News, “The only question is whether Democrats win narrowly by picking up 25 seats or whether it is a blowout of more than 35 seats.”
No wonder the GOP can’t find willing challengers.
Patty Schachtner is the first Democrat to win Wisconsin’s 10th Senate District in nearly two decades.
On Tuesday night, Democrats added another entry to their column of special election upsets in heavy the rich asshole territory — this time in Wisconsin.
Democrat Patty Schachtner, a local school board member and former EMT who was featured on “Wife Swap”, pulled off a victory against GOP state Rep. Adam Jarchow in the race for Wisconsin’s 10th Senate District.
This is the first state legislative seat to flip in 2018, and the 34th since the rich asshole took office. It reduces the GOP’s majority in the state senate to 18-14.
The district, which encompasses a rural part of the Minnesota border, was vacated by Sheila Harsdorf, who took a position in Gov. Scott Walker’s administration in November. It is extremely conservative — Republicans have held it since 2001, even before the state was aggressively gerrymandered, and the rich asshole won it by 17 points. The GOP put up a furious and well-funded fight to hold on to the seat, with the Koch-backed Americans for Prosperity sinking $50,000 into the race.
But Schachtner claimed a double-digit victory, thanks in part to her pitch to improve mental health and addiction treatment in Western Wisconsin, and to a campaign that maintained a disciplined, positive tone.
“My message has always been be kind, be considerate and we need to help people when they’re down,” Schachtner told the Associated Press. “We just need to be kind to people who are less fortunate and just help.”
The loss of a deep red district was not lost on Walker, who tweeted that the election result is “a wake up call for Republicans in Wisconsin.”
The special election was one of four held on Tuesday night for open Republican seats in Wisconsin, Iowa, and South Carolina. And while Republicans managed to hold the other three, Democrats overperformed by double digits in every single race:
Heading into the midterms this year, Democrats have an overwhelming edge among voters nationally — and that is even before a potential government shutdown over restoring full protection for young immigrants, which battleground state polls show voters would decisively blame on Republicans.
It is evident Americans want a sea change in politics. Even in overwhelmingly red districts, many voters are now beginning to question the status quo — and vote for something new.
The RNC unleashed a petty and racist attack on Sen. Cory Booker, and tried to hijack feminism in the process. But all it did was make the party look pathetic — and make Booker look awesome.
New Jersey Democratic Sen. Cory Booker is well-known for being a powerful speaker and a passionate advocate for the causes in which he believes.
And the Republican National Committee just gave a surely unintended boost to that positive reputation.
During Tuesday’s Senate Judiciary Committee oversight hearing of the Department of Homeland Security, Booker vehemently called out Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen for her weak and dismissive response to some rich asshole’s racist outburst against Haiti, El Salvador, and the entire continent of Africa.
“Your silence and your amnesia is complicity,” Booker told Nielsen when she claimed that she couldn’t remember the rich asshole’s crude words.
“I’ve got a president of the United States, whose office I respect, who talks about the countries of origin of my fellow citizens in the most despicable of manner,” Booker continued. “You don’t remember, you can’t remember the words of your commander in chief? I find that unacceptable.”
Booker’s words were a deserved admonishment for Nielsen, and he was well within his rights as a member of Congress, and a citizen of this nation, to call out her unwillingness to stand up to the rich asshole’s racism.
But, unsurprisingly, the RNC saw nothing more than an angry black man being mean to the nice white Republican lady.
Indeed, the party even attempted to use its vapid understanding of feminism to make the point.
It didn’t work. Instead, it simply invited even more people to see how awesome Booker is — and how horrible the GOP’s own party and ideology are.
Using the Trumpian nickname “Derogatory Cory,” the RNC sent out a press release and even set up a web page fervently trying to attack Booker, complete with screenshots of him mid-speech with his hands raised, brow furrowed, and mouth open.
“Picture it,” the site reads. “A male Republican senator spends his entire 10 minutes ‘mansplaining’ the female DHS secretary about immigration policy, throws around the term ‘conscientious stupidity,’ yells at her the only time she tries to speak, and concludes his diatribe without even asking her to respond.”
It goes on to snidely note how many “triggered Democrats” and hashtags there would be in that role reversal, slamming Booker for “performing” for the “selectively-outraged base.”
And it ends, infuriatingly, with, “Nevertheless, she persisted.”
What Booker did was not “mansplaining” — he was simply and accurately pointing out Nielsen’s apparent dearth of knowledge or concern for those at the center of the immigration debate. Nielsen herself admitted she has not even met with a single DREAMer.
And it is telling that the GOP sees Booker’s emotional response as a performance, since it is apparently exceedingly difficult for many in the Republican Party to grasp the concept of caring about immigrants’ lives.
No one is buying the nonsense the GOP is trying to sell. All the effort did was draw even more people to watch Booker’s righteous speech, and to witness Nielsen’s pathetic response.
Meanwhile, Foreign Service applications have plunged by 50 percent as the rich asshole makes clear his disdain for diplomacy.
Colin Powell was right.
The former Republican secretary of state late last year warned that some rich asshole’s callous, shortsighted foreign policy agenda, where diplomats were ignored and countries often insulted via Twitter, was gutting the U.S. State Department.
And it has.
According to a new McClatchy report, “60 percent of the State Departments’ top-ranking career diplomats have left and new applications to join the foreign service have fallen by half.”
This comes in the wake of the rich asshole’s vulgar, racist comments about not wanting black immigrants arriving in the U.S. from “shithole” countries, like ones in Africa.
With the rich asshole vowing to slash the State Department’s budget, while simultaneously undercutting Secretary of States Rex Tillerson, more and more staffers and diplomats are heading for the door.
“Others have wrestled with staying, feeling unsure whether they’re protecting U.S. influence or contributing to its erosion,” McClatchy reports. “Many diplomats had never contemplated leaving State, always intending instead to make U.S. diplomacy their life’s work and long-term career track.”
That career track often begins by joining the Foreign Service, which is seen as the backbone of the U.S. diplomatic corps. But under the rich asshole, applications have plummeted.
He’s having the exact opposite effect that President Barack Obama did. Applications spiked to a new high in June 2009, soon after Obama was inaugurated. And between 2009 and 2012, the Obama administration expanded the number of Foreign Service employees by 21 percent.
Why the stampede away from the rich asshole by diplomats and would-be diplomats?
Last August, the rich asshole thanked Russian President Vladimir Putin for expelling American diplomats from his country because it would save the U.S. “a lot of money,” a comment that stunned State Department employees. (the rich asshole later claimed he was being sarcastic.)
During a Fox News interview in November, the rich asshole said that he was not concerned about the huge number of unfilled jobs in the State Department because, in his view, “I’m the only one that matters.”
And then there was the “shithole” fiasco, after which in at least one African country, the U.S. ambassador was summoned by the host government and asked if the rich asshole considered that country to be among the “shithole” ones he denigrated during an Oval Office meeting.
“It’s one thing for us to go in and slam our hands on the table and say this is what we want,” one U.S. official told McClatchy. “It’s another to denigrate them and make it crystal clear this is what our leadership thinks about them in the vulgarest of terms.”
By all indications, the rich asshole wants the State Department gutted. As of now, he’s succeeding.
Don Jr Shares Article While Somehow Totally Unaware That It Savages His Father
A son-of-a-the rich asshole just tweeted what he thought was a glowing article about his father, but it wasn’t. Reading is HARD. some rich asshole Jr. who is arguably the dumbest member of the rich asshole family tweeted a link to an Associated Press article without being aware that it was highly critical of his porn star banging father.
The problem is that the article notes that after a year into his ‘presidency,’ some rich asshole “is no closer to making Mexico pay for a border wall than when he made supporters swoon with that promise at those rollicking campaign rallies of 2016.”
But wait, there’s more!
“His own administration’s sloppy start explains why none of the laws he pledged to sign in his first 100 days came to reality then and why most are still aspirational,” the AP reports.
Twitter users wondered if Junior had read the article.
Seriously did you read it ... it was a well written critique of your father's weak and Pathtic first year... not reading must run in your family
Kitty Lewis
My favorite lines from the article
"He’s not delivered on that"
"His approach so far is all carrot, no stick."
"It hasn’t been done"
"never acted on."
"a tangle of ethical questions"
"Mexico still isn’t ponying up money for the wall."
Like your dad, you're obviously not big on reading.
"His own administration’s sloppy start explains why none of the laws he pledged to sign in his first 100 days came to reality then and why most are still aspirational."
My favorite part, though. From the article: "A year in, Trump is no closer to making Mexico pay for a border wall than when he made supporters swoon with that promise at those rollicking campaign rallies of 2016." BOOM! Do the math.
You really didn't read this did you? LOL. On another note...Yay!!! #45 got a good medical report. It's good news!!! It means, he is fit to STAND TRIAL!!! Can't use "bad wiring" as an excuse! Whoop! Whooop!!
The article Junior is bragging about is not flattering. It speaks of a man who brags about non-existent achievements, sort of what Junior is doing right now.
It mentions the rich asshole bragging about “having signed more than 80 pieces of legislation into law, but there’s little of consequence in that pile.”
The article notes that the rich asshole has “signed laws naming federal buildings after people, appointing a Smithsonian Institution regent and other housekeeping steps that all presidents do but tend not to make a fuss about.”
“In contrast, Obama signed an enormous stimulus package into law in his first month while also achieving a law expanding health care for children and other policy steps,” the AP reports.
“Then there’s Franklin Roosevelt, credited by historians Alan Brinkley and Davis Dyer with achieving “the most concentrated period of U.S. reform in U.S. history,” starting immediately with emergency legislation to stabilize the Depression-devastated banking system and setting in place the New Deal with 14 pieces of historic legislation in 100 days,” the article concludes.
the rich asshole Told Adult Film Star He Was F*cking That She’s ‘Just Like His Daughter’
“Hey baby, you remind me a lot of my daughter” is the sort of flirtation one would expect in Roy Moore’s Alabama, but apparently that’s the same tactic used by President Stable Genius as well.
Adult film star Stormy Daniels revealed that while the rich asshole was attempting to “seal the deal” so to speak, he confided in her that she’s “someone to be reckoned with, beautiful, smart, just like his daughter.”
Most women would immediately bolt, but apparently the “daddy issues” thing works for Ms. Daniels, who went on to have what she describes as “textbook generic” sex with the rich asshole.
Naturally, the world is collectively puking its guts out, laughing, or both:
I’m leading the walk into the sea twitter.com/thedailybeast/…
News like this probably represents the rare occasion that Tiffany Trump is happy to be the forgotten daughter twitter.com/thedailybeast/…
Porn star Stormy Daniels to 'In Touch': Trump said I was “just like his daughter” trib.al/5sQnRhW pic.twitter.com/CAz9ZxiTBp
Trump makes disgusting "jokes" about dating children - including his own child — a lot
pic.twitter.com/IeeMqU2odB
Stormy Daniels said Trump told her that she reminded Trump of Ivanka.
Tie that information to this Trump quote.
His question: “Is it wrong to be more sexually attracted to your own daughter than your wife?”
The article supporting the Trump quote: cosmopolitan.com/politics/a8353… pic.twitter.com/xsQ50U31K2
Trump told Stormy Daniels she was ‘just like his daughter’ rawstory.com/2018/01/trump-…
Many levels of "ew": "Porn Star Stormy Daniels to In Touch<: Trump Said I Was 'Just Like His Daughter'" spin.com/2018/01/stormy…
the rich asshole has made numerous creepy comments about his daughter Ivanka over the years, including indicating that he “would be dating her” if he could get away with it and telling the host of a talk show that what he has most in common with her is “sex.” In addition he has remarked about her “great body” on multiple occasions and asked if it’s “wrong to be more sexually attracted to your own daughter than your wife?”
It utterly unsurprising that the rich asshole would go after people who remind him of his daughter. After all, he’s been very clear that she’s exactly what he wants.
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