Just Like Their Corrupt Gangland Boss Himself All the President's Men Are Scumbags As Well

All,

All of the Scumbag-in-Chief's major (and minor) associates, appointees, colleagues, acolytes, enablers, accomplices and maniacal partners-in-crime are absolutely the worst species of human beings alive: Shameless, greedy, ruthless, mendacious, mean, pathological, hypocritical, and relentlessly, thoroughly, and unabashedly fullashit no matter what...HORRIBLE doesn't even begin to adequately describe exactly who and what they are...

MICHAEL FLYNN is not only no exception to this rule but remains (as always) at the very highest tier of this massive vile HOUSE OF CARDS that is the neofascist regime we currently still pretend is "our government." Stay tuned because not only is it all going to become worse than ever very soon but we will finally have to decide if these 21st century gangsters are going to continue to rule and define not just our politics but our very liives...

Kofi 

BREAKING NEWS

Michael Flynn, the ex-national security adviser, asked to withdraw his guilty plea in the Russia inquiry. He accused prosecutors of “bad faith.”

Tuesday, January 14, 2020
9:35 PM EST

The stunning request means that more than two years after first pleading guilty and after spending dozens of hours answering the questions of investigators for the special counsel, Mr. Flynn would take his chances at trial if a judge agrees to grant his motion.

That would set up a collision course with prosecutors who could decide to bring additional charges against him.

Read the latest:

https://www.nytimes.com/…/michael-flynn-withdraws-guilty-pl…

Michael Flynn Moves to Withdraw Guilty Plea in About-Face After Extensive Cooperation

Once cited by the special counsel team as an exemplary cooperating witness, Mr. Flynn had grown increasingly combative in recent months. 

by Adam Goldman
January 15, 2020
New York Times

PHOTO: Michael T. Flynn, President 
Trump’s former national security adviser, 
in 2018 in Washington. Credit: Tom Brenner 
for The New York Times

WASHINGTON — President Trump’s former national security adviser Michael T. Flynn moved late on Tuesday to withdraw his guilty plea on charges of lying to investigators in the Russia inquiry, accusing prosecutors of “bad faith” and vindictiveness after they asked a judge to sentence him to prison for backing out of a deal to cooperate with them.

The last-ditch request means that more than two years after first pleading guilty and after spending dozens of hours answering the questions of investigators for the special counsel, Mr. Flynn would take his chances at trial if a judge agrees to grant his motion. That would set up a collision course with prosecutors who could decide to bring additional charges against him.

Mr. Flynn, a retired Army lieutenant general and former head of the Defense Intelligence Agency whose case marked a striking downfall, has already pleaded guilty twice to lying to the F.B.I. about conversations with the Russian ambassador to the United States during the presidential transition in late 2016. As part of his agreement with the government, Mr. Flynn also admitted that he violated foreign lobbying laws when he failed to disclose work he had done for Turkey.

After he cooperated extensively with prosecutors in the Russia investigation, they recommended leniency in late 2018. Mr. Flynn even agreed to delay his sentencing at the time to offer further cooperation by testifying against a former business associate in a case in Northern Virginia. But Mr. Flynn grew increasingly antagonistic in recent months and hired combative new lawyers in mid-2019.

See Which Witnesses the Mueller Report Relied on Most

A partially redacted report of the special counsel’s findings released on April 18 cited interviews with 43 individuals at least 10 times.

Those lawyers had tried to convince a federal judge that the F.B.I. had ambushed him as part of a plot by biased investigators, hoping that the case would be thrown out. But the judge rejected those accusations this month as baseless, and prosecutors reversed their stance, saying Mr. Flynn should be imprisoned.

Because Mr. Flynn has already pleaded guilty twice, he cannot unilaterally withdraw from the plea deal. The federal judge in the case, Emmet G. Sullivan of Federal District Court in the District of Columbia, has to sign off on Mr. Flynn’s request and will most likely give prosecutors a chance to respond and schedule a hearing on the matter.

Mr. Flynn’s gamble raises questions about whether he and his lawyers were making a play for a presidential pardon. Days into his presidency, Mr. Trump dismissed Mr. Flynn after learning he had lied to Vice President Mike Pence and other senior administration officials about his conversations with the Russian ambassador, but he has also said Mr. Flynn was treated badly by investigators.

In a relatively disjointed motion filed on Tuesday, Mr. Flynn’s lawyers try to make the case that their client lived up to his plea agreement, including helping the case against his former business associate Bijan Kian.

At his original sentencing hearing late in 2018, Mr. Flynn reasserted his guilt and acknowledged to prosecutors that he lied about working to influence American officials on behalf of Turkey, though prosecutors charged him only with lying to the F.B.I. as part of the deal to secure his cooperation. But they have made it clear they have evidence to charge him with secretly lobbying for Turkey, crimes that carry a stiffer sentence.

Mr. Kian was himself charged with violating foreign lobbying disclosure laws when he worked with Mr. Flynn. On the eve of Mr. Kian’s trial last year in Virginia, Mr. Flynn changed his story, which was critical of the government’s case. Mr. Kian was convicted, but the judge later threw out the charges, saying prosecutors had failed to make a strong enough case.

Mr. Flynn’s lawyers now say their client made no false statements about his work on behalf of Turkey. They say without evidence that prosecutors “concocted” the false statements and accused them of deceit.

“It is beyond ironic and completely outrageous that the prosecutors have persecuted Mr. Flynn, virtually bankrupted him, and put his entire family through unimaginable stress for years,” his lawyers wrote.

They said Mr. Flynn learned only later about problems with foreign lobbying disclosures submitted to the Justice Department. He has blamed his former lawyers for filing inaccurate forms without his knowledge and accused the government of retaliating against him for hiring new lawyers who refused to let their client lie in Mr. Kian’s trial.
Mr. Flynn’s lawyers were silent on the issue of his acknowledgment in court that he lied to the F.B.I. in the Russia investigation. It is unclear how that squares with his decisions to plead guilty both in 2017 and 2018.

In their recent sentencing memo asking the judge to sentence Mr. Flynn to up to six months in prison, prosecutors said he was no victim.

“Far from accepting the consequences of his unlawful actions, he has sought to blame almost every other person and entity involved in his case, including his former counsel,” they wrote.

Read More About Michael Flynn’s Case:

Prosecutors Ask That Michael Flynn Get Prison Time
Jan. 7, 2020

Judge Rejects Michael Flynn’s Claims in His Attacks on Prosecutors
Dec. 16, 2019

Prosecutors Could Ask for Prison Time for Michael Flynn
Sept. 10, 2019

Michael Flynn’s Lawyers Escalate Attacks on Prosecutors
Aug. 30, 2019

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Adam Goldman reports on the F.B.I. from Washington and is a two-time Pulitzer Prize winner. @adamgoldmanNYT 

PHOTO: Michael T. Flynn, President 
Trump’s former national security adviser, 
in 2018 in Washington. Credit: Tom Brenner 
for The New York Times

The Criminally Coercive Separation of migrant children from their parents as deadly white supremacist and neofascist government policy toward immigrant families under Donald Trump

https://www.nytimes.com/…/family-separation-trump-administr…

Family Separation May Have Hit Thousands More Migrant Children Than Reported

by Miriam Jordan
January 17, 2019
New York Times

 

PHOTO: Brenda Garcia reunited with her 7-year-old son, K.G.G., at Dulles Airport outside Washington in June, 34 days after they were separated by officials after crossing the border into the United States illegally. Credit: Ryan Christopher Jones for The New York Times

 

HOUSTON — The Trump administration most likely separated thousands more children from their parents at the Southern border than was previously believed, according to a report by government inspectors released on Thursday.

The federal government has reported that nearly 3,000 children were forcibly separated from their parents under last year’s “zero tolerance” immigration policy, under which nearly all adults entering the country illegally were prosecuted, and any children accompanying them were put into shelters or foster care.

But even before the administration officially unveiled the zero-tolerance policy in the spring of 2018, staff of the United States Department of Health and Human Services, the agency that oversees the care of children in federal custody, had noted a “sharp increase” in the number of children separated from a parent or guardian, according to the report from the agency’s Office of Inspector General.

As of December, the department had identified 2,737 children who were separated from their parents under the policy and required to be reunified by a federal court order issued in June 2018.

But that number does not represent the full scope of family separations. Thousands of children may have been separated during an influx that began in 2017, before the accounting required by the court, the report said.

Thus, the total number of children separated from a parent or guardian by immigration authorities is “unknown,” because of the lack of a coordinated formal tracking system between the Office of Refugee Resettlement, the arm of Health and Human Services that takes in the children, and the Department of Homeland Security, which separated them from their parents.

“This report confirms what we suspected: This cruel family separation practice was way bigger than the administration let on,” said Lee Gelernt, who challenged the policy in court on behalf of the American Civil Liberties Union. “We will be back in court and ask the judge to order the government to explain these numbers,” he said.

The family separations were a key part of the Trump administration’s effort to deter migrant families from trying to enter the country at the Southwest border, where they have been arriving in large numbers, most of them fleeing violence and deep poverty in Central America.

While the policy was framed as a decision to prosecute those who entered the United States illegally, it resulted in thousands of migrant parents spending months in agonized uncertainty, unable to communicate with their children and in many cases not knowing even where the children were.

Infants and toddlers were among the children who were put into foster homes or migrant children shelters, often hundreds or thousands of miles away from where their parents were detained. Under separate policies, the administration also made it difficult for relatives other than the children’s parents to take the children into their own homes.

After a review of internal government tallies, The New York Times found last year that more than 700 migrant children had been separated from their families in the months before the government officially announced the zero-tolerance policy.

On June 26, 2018, a federal judge in San Diego, in response to the A.C.L.U. lawsuit, directed the federal government to halt the separations at the border and to reunite children with their parents. President Trump rescinded the policy that same month.

However, the federal inspectors found that separations have continued to occur: As of November, the report found, Health and Human Services had received at least 118 children who had been separated from their families since the court order.

Officials at the Department of Homeland Security, which oversaw the family separations at the border, have said they have separated families only when necessary, such as when a parent is facing a serious criminal prosecution, or when authorities have reason to believe that the adult accompanying the child is not an appropriate guardian.

“The report vindicates what D.H.S. has long been saying,” said Katie Waldman, a spokeswoman for the department. “For more than a decade it was, and continues to be, standard for apprehended minors to be separated when the adult is not the parent or legal guardian, the child’s safety is at risk, or serious criminal activity by the adult. We are required under the law that Congress passed to send all unaccompanied alien children to H.H.S.”

Ann Maxwell, the Health and Human Services Department’s assistant inspector general for evaluation and inspections, said the separations appeared to have been occurring for a full year before the court issued its order.

“Thousands of children were separated from parents and guardians, referred to H.H.S. and released from H.H.S. care before the court order,” Ms. Maxwell said in a conference call with reporters.

“The total number is unknown,” she said. “It is certainly more than 2,737, but how many more, precisely, is unknown.” Moreover, that number may never be known: Department officials, she said, had told her office that there were “no efforts underway to identify that. It would take away resources from children already in care.”

In an email after the call, Ms. Maxwell’s spokesman confirmed that inspectors believed the number of separated children may be “thousands” more than the 2,737 reported to the court.

The inspectors provided no precise data to support that estimate, though Ms. Maxwell said that Health and Human Services had noted a “spike” in the frequency of children being separated from their families, from 0.3 percent of all apprehended families in 2016 to 3.8 percent in 2017.

Family separations have occurred for years, but they had previously been “fairly rare,” Ms. Maxwell said, occurring only in cases where there were concerns about child welfare. That changed in 2017, she said.

Ms. Maxwell said that most of the families on the list of separated families had been reunited, pursuant to the court order. But she said the figures continued to evolve, for several reasons. The absence of an integrated data system to track separated families through the two federal agencies that oversee them was one problem, she said.

Also complicating the issue, she said, was the complex problem of determining which children should be considered officially “separated” from their families. That meant that the list of families entitled to reunification was still being revised as late as December 2018, more than five months after the court order took effect.

The Department of Health and Human Services, in its official response, said it had accounted publicly for all children separated from relatives at the border and then delivered to the agency for care.

“H.H.S. faced challenges in identifying separated children,” the agency said. “The effort undertaken by H.H.S. was complex, fast-moving and resource-intensive.”

The inspector general’s report, the department said, “provides a window into the herculean work of the H.H.S. career staff to rapidly identify children in O.R.R. care who had been separated from their parents and reunify them.” O.R.R. refers to the resettlement office.

The department emphasized that the inspector general found “no evidence whatsoever” that it had lost track of children in its care. Though there were delays in linking children to parents, partly as a result of the Department of Homeland Security’s tracking system. When immigration agents separated families at the border, records that could have been used to connect parents and children were automatically deleted because the computer system had not been modified to account for separated families.

In its response on Thursday, the Department of Health and Human Services said that the inspector general’s report “corroborates what H.H.S. has said all along: H.H.S. can determine the location and status of any child in O.R.R. care at any time by accessing the case management records for the child, or the O.R.R. online portal.”

Glenn Thrush contributed reporting from Washington.

A version of this article appears in print on Jan. 17, 2019, on Page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: Many Families Split at Border Went Untallied. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper 

'Alternative Facts', The War Against the Media, and the Looming Specter of Neofascism in the Trump administration --and the Emerging Resistance Against It

All,

One can very clearly see, hear, touch, and smell the fundamental SOCIAL PATHOLOGY of this neofascist regime and its absolute determination to invoke, advocate, and defend the horrific bedrock fascist principle of the BIG LIE (see/google: Goebbels, Joseph for further details). And it's only going to get much worse very soon (like tomorrow). We're down the linguistic and amoral rabbithole of Orwellian doublespeak and cheap propaganda antics and tactics here and trust me it's not merely a "random choice" by the billionaire sociopath but a purely calculated STRATEGY pursued, honed, and developed by the head BS-in-Charge and such blatantly insidious and openly hostile media manipulators as his rancid "senior advisors" and "chief strategists" Steve Bannon (see/google: Breitbart News) and the always duplicitous and endlessly condescending Kellyanne CONway. Can you say LUGENPRESSE boys and girls? Because it's assured that the billionaire sociopath and his entire neofascist administration not only can but do every single chance they get, which of course is any time they appear before the media or general public. Stay tuned...

Kofi

January 23, 2017
The New York Times
NYTimes.com »
Breaking News Alert

BREAKING NEWS

Speaking to lawmakers, President Trump again falsely claimed that illegal immigrants had cost him the popular vote

January 23, 2017
9:45 PM EST

President Trump used his first official meeting with congressional leaders on Monday to gripe about his loss of the popular vote, falsely telling the lawmakers that he would have won a majority if millions of illegal immigrants had not voted against him.

The president’s comments about the election results came as he gathered the bipartisan leadership of Congress for a White House reception. He also sought to build support for an ambitious legislative agenda despite days earlier castigating the very institution he needs to approve it.

Read more »

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/23/us/politics/donald-trump-congress-democrats.html?_r=0

Politics

Trump Repeats Lie About Popular Vote in Meeting With Lawmakers

by MICHAEL D. SHEAR and EMMARIE HUETTEMAN
January 23, 2017
New York Times

President Trump met with leaders of Congress from both parties on Monday at the White House. Credit Doug Mills/The New York Times

WASHINGTON — President Trump used his first official meeting with congressional leaders on Monday to falsely claim that millions of unauthorized immigrants had robbed him of a popular vote majority, a return to his obsession with the election’s results even as he seeks support for his legislative agenda.

The claim, which he has made before on Twitter, has been judged untrue by numerous fact-checkers. The new president’s willingness to bring it up at a White House reception in the State Dining Room is an indication that he continues to dwell on the implications of his popular vote loss even after assuming power.

Mr. Trump appears to remain concerned that the public will view his victory — and his entire presidency — as illegitimate if he does not repeatedly challenge the idea that Americans were deeply divided about sending him to the White House to succeed President Barack Obama.

Mr. Trump received 304 electoral votes to capture the White House, but he fell almost three million votes short of Hillary Clinton in the popular vote. That reality appears to have bothered him since Election Day, prompting him to repeatedly complain that adversaries were trying to undermine him.

Moving into the White House appears not to have tempered that anxiety. Several people familiar with the closed-door meeting Monday night, who asked to remain anonymous in discussing a private conversation, said Mr. Trump used the opportunity to brag about his victory.

As part of that conversation, Mr. Trump asserted that between three million and five million unauthorized immigrants voted for Mrs. Clinton. That is similar to a Twitter message he posted in late November that said he would have won the popular vote “if you deduct the millions of people who voted illegally.”

Voting officials across the country have said there is virtually no evidence of people voting illegally, and certainly not millions of them. White House officials did not respond to requests for a comment on Mr. Trump’s discussion of the issue.

Representative Steny H. Hoyer, Democrat of Maryland, who attended the meeting, said that Mr. Trump also talked about the size of the crowd for his Inaugural Address.

“It was a huge crowd, a magnificent crowd. I haven’t seen such a crowd as big as this,” Mr. Hoyer told CNN, quoting Mr. Trump. He added that Mr. Trump did not “spend a lot of time on that, but it was clear that it was still on his mind.”

The president’s comments about the election results and his inauguration came as he gathered the bipartisan leadership of Congress for a White House reception. He also sought to build support for an ambitious legislative agenda, despite days earlier castigating the very institution he needs to approve it.

Mr. Trump has said he intends to press Congress to move quickly to repeal and replace Mr. Obama’s health care law, pass a large investment in the nation’s infrastructure, make changes to the country’s immigration laws and overhaul the tax system.

Senator John Cornyn, Republican of Texas, called the meeting a “good sort of get-to-know-you session” and noted that “relationships count for a lot in this business.”

Mr. Cornyn said he thought such sessions would be more frequent while Mr. Trump is in office than they were during Mr. Obama’s tenure. Mr. Obama famously disliked socializing with members of Congress.

Referring to Democrats, Mr. Cornyn said, “They said they’d never been over to the White House for anything like this before.”

Representative Nancy Pelosi of California, the Democratic leader, said it was an “interesting” meeting. Along with health care and infrastructure, she said they discussed China and currency manipulation, as well as issues involving intellectual property rights, which she said were a point of agreement.

“We talked about the Affordable Care Act and said what the Affordable Care Act has been successful in doing is improving quality, expanding access and lowering costs,” she told reporters. “And any proposal that they might have that does that, we’d be interested in hearing about.”

Even with Republicans in control of Congress, Mr. Trump will have to build relationships in a city that he spent more time mocking than praising during his campaign.

In his Inaugural Address, the president criticized the political establishment, saying the people assembled behind him — including the leaders he met with on Monday — had “reaped the rewards of government while the people have borne the cost.”

White House officials said the meeting was designed to press the lawmakers on the need to move quickly.

The reception included, among others, House Speaker Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin and Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, as well as Ms. Pelosi and Senator Chuck Schumer of New York.

“The American people are frustrated with the lack of progress here in Washington, and the president wants no delay in addressing our most pressing issues,” said Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary. “He’s taking every opportunity to forge strong bonds with congressional leaders on both sides of the aisle.”

As the group sat around a dining room table for photographs, Mr. Trump described his interactions with lawmakers.

A “beautiful, beautiful relationship,” Mr. Trump told reporters.

That has not always been the case. Before Mr. Trump secured the Republican nomination, Mr. Ryan pointedly declined to endorse him. At one point, Mr. Ryan said he was “not ready” to back Mr. Trump after his remarks about women and Hispanics and because of his divergence from Republican orthodoxy.

That relationship slowly improved after Mr. Trump became the party’s nominee and later won the election to become the 45th president. Monday’s reception, officials said, was another step in that process.

Matt Flegenheimer, Thomas Kaplan and Jennifer Steinhauer contributed reporting.

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http://money.cnn.com/2017/01/22/media/alternative-facts-donald-trump/index.html

'Alternative facts:' Why the Trump team is 'planting a flag' in war on media
by Brian Stelter @brianstelter
January 22, 2017
CNN

"Alternative facts" are lies

The alternative to "facts" is "fictions."

But President Trump's special adviser Kellyanne Conway proposed something new on Sunday: "alternative facts."

The strange phrase entered the lexicon when Conway told NBC's Chuck Todd that the numerous misstatements in press secretary Sean Spicer's angry statement to reporters Saturday were actually "alternative facts."

Related: White House press secretary attacks media for accurately reporting inauguration crowds

The phrase called into the question Conway's understanding of the word "facts" and caused widespread mockery on Sunday.

But Conway's remarks were reflective of something real -- a new administration which feels, on day three, that it is already under siege from unfair reporters. Trump himself spoke about his "running war with the media" on Saturday.

Spicer, Conway and other Trump aides are "planting a flag, saying they're not going to tolerate this," a longtime Trump aide told CNN on condition of anonymity.

The aide blasted alleged media "obsessions," using some of the exact same language Trump chief of staff Reince Priebus used on "Fox News Sunday."

"I'm saying there's an obsession by the media to delegitimize this president, and we are not going to sit around and let it happen," Priebus said on Fox. "We are going to fight back tooth and nail every day, and twice on Sunday."

The administration's view, according to the source, is that journalists have seized on Trump's popular vote loss; intelligence community findings regarding Russian interference in the election; and inauguration crowd size counts, all in order to "delegitimize" the new president.

Newsroom leaders strongly reject this suggestion.

"The president may feel he's at war with the media. 'The media' is just honest men and women trying to do their jobs," NPR head of news Michael Oreskes said on CNN's "Reliable Sources."

Spicer said at least five things that are not true during the five minutes that his angry statement lasted on Saturday. His false claim about Trump having the biggest inauguration audience ever, "period," came under severe scrutiny on the Sunday morning news shows and online. Meanwhile, Spicer had no further comment on the controversy.

Todd, the moderator of "Meet the Press," was startled by Conway's "alternative facts" explanation.

"Alternative facts are not facts. They're falsehoods," he said to her.

At one point in the interview, when Todd brought up "falsehoods," Conway said he was being "overly dramatic."

Before their discussion ended, Todd asked Conway if it's "a political tactic to come up with 'alternative facts' and try to set up the press as your enemy."

Conway replied, "no, I didn't say that at all."

But to a lot of journalists, that's exactly what it sounds like.

The presentation of "alternative facts" undermines the media's reporting of reality in a way that decreases public trust in the media -- and in facts.

The administration's tactics in its first days, coupled with Conway's invocation of "alternative facts," has observers worried that one of the ways it will "fight back" is to simply deny that two plus two equals four.

"Alternative facts" is "a George Orwell phrase," Washington Post reporter Karen Tumulty said, referring to the science fiction novel "1984."

"This brings us to '1984' doublethink, where war is really peace, where famine is really plenty. That's what's happening here," political historian Allan Lichtman said on CNN Sunday afternoon.

The phrase was a top trending topic on Twitter during the day. Some people made jokes while others took it very seriously.

"'Alternative facts' is a euphemism of propagandists and authoritarians. The new White House administration is full of both. Actual facts," MTV's Jamil Smith tweeted.

The Merriam-Webster dictionary even tweaked Conway by tweeting out the definition of a "fact."

"May I say that we teach no courses in our journalism program about alternative facts," Frank Sesno, the director of the school and media public affairs at the George Washington University, said on CNN's "Reliable Sources."

"We will flunk you if you use alternative facts," he added.

Oreskes said Conway's "alternative facts" comments are symbolic of a larger "struggle going on in the world right now."

"There are people who understand that if you can create a different understanding of reality, you can actually change politics or anything else you want to deal with," he said.

The administration is likely not all that upset with the discussion it's started among the press about the truth and its flaunting of it. The Trump aide, speaking on condition of anonymity, pointed out a fringe benefit of the administration's media complaints: "By going out and doing this, it took images of people protesting off the TV."

http://www.salon.com/2017/01/21/congratulations-america-you-did-it-an-actual-fascist-is-now-your-official-president/

January 21, 2017

Congratulations, America — you did it! An actual fascist is now your official president

Yes, the word fits him, and it really happened. There is still time to fight back and save the best of America

by Chauncey DeVega
SALON

                      PHOTO: (Credit: Getty/Alex Wong)

Congratulations, America — you did it! An actual fascist is now your official president

America’s increasingly abnormal politics have now surrendered to dystopia.

Donald Trump, a serial liar, narcissist, failed businessman, political con artist, adulterer, professed grabber of women’s genitals without their permission, man who does not read, ignoramus, admirer and fan of despots and dictators, encourager of vigilante violence against innocent people, actor in a porn video, person who does not pay his employees, member of the Vladimir Putin fan club, racist landlord, preferred candidate of neo-Nazis and other fringe racists, professional wrestling villain, and candidate who incites violence against his political opponents, is now the 45th president of the United States of America.

Donald Trump is also a fascist authoritarian in the American mold and leader of the world’s most powerful and influential “democracy.”

Throughout the 2016 presidential campaign, the American news media desperately avoided using such language to describe Donald Trump. They did this because of material self-interest and advertising revenues, as well as an inability to accept how Trump had gamed obsolete journalistic norms of “fairness,” “balance” and “objectivity.”

In doing so, the American news media facilitated Trump’s rise to power. They labeled Trump as a “populist” who was “unconventional.” The American news media kept suggesting that Trump would “pivot” for the general election in order to win more “mainstream” and “centrist” voters. There were some bold voices who said that Trump had “authoritarian tendencies.” But very few commentators had the courage to plainly state that Donald Trump was a fascist — even though the evidence was growing then and is now insurmountable.

Video: Here's How Much Donald Trump's Inner Circle Is Worth

Consider the following:

Donald Trump does not believe in freedom of the press.
Donald Trump threatens his political enemies with violence and/or prison.
Donald Trump uses ethnocentrism, bigotry, nativism and racism to mobilize his voters.
Donald Trump does not believe in standing norms of democratic governance or tradition.
Donald Trump is a misogynist.
Donald Trump is obsessed with “strength” and his own “virility.”
Donald Trump promises “law and order.”
Donald Trump is a militant nationalist.
Donald Trump traffics in conspiracy theories and lies.
Donald Trump admires authoritarians and political strongmen.
 
Donald Trump’s most recent press conference was modeled on the way Vladimir Putin manipulates Russia’s news media.
Donald Trump has surrounded himself with a cabal that consists of family members and self-interested Cabinet appointees, who — like him — stand to enrich themselves through the agencies they are supposed to administer in the public interest.

Ultimately, the American news media were and are like the troglodytes in Plato’s “Allegory of the Cave,” comforted by the dark because their eyes would be hurt by the light of the truth. Or, to borrow from a more contemporary example, the media did not want to face the situation Morpheus explains to Neo in “The Matrix”: “Standing there, facing the pure horrifying precision, I came to realize the obviousness of the truth.”

The anxiety about calling Donald Trump a fascist was also enabled by many liberals and progressives who were desperate to appear fair-minded by being politically generous to their conservative and Republican foes. Such people maintain an erroneous belief that there is some type of continuum or symmetry between today’s Republicans and the policies offered by Democrats.

Because liberals and progressives belong to a centuries-long tradition with origins in the Enlightenment, they are unprepared to deal with the primitive thinking and irrationality that drives Donald Trump’s political movement and contemporary conservatism more generally. In reality, the Republican Party abandoned any semblance of normal politics beginning with their assaults on Bill Clinton in the 1990s. This long decline culminated with the Republican reaction to Barack Obama and now the rise of Trump.

In New York magazine, Jonathan Chait offers a classic example of this dangerous liberal reasoning:

"It is impossible to know what course American democracy will take under Trump’s presidency. The fears of authoritarianism may prove overblown, and Trump may govern like a normal Republican."

This assumes there is something called a “normal Republican,” and that Trump is something else. But Trump won more votes than any Republican presidential candidate in history. Research shows that authoritarian attitudes have increased among the American public over the last 20 years, especially among Republicans. The Republican Party is the country’s largest white identity organization: It mobilizes anti-black and anti-brown animus for political gain. Since at least the 1960s, conservatism and racism have been functionally identical in this country. Trump leveraged those forces to maximum effect in order to defeat Hillary Clinton and win the White House.

In short, Donald Trump is a normal Republican. Pretending otherwise is what led the chattering classes to underestimate Trump’s appeal to the angry, authoritarian-minded white voters who elected him.

Donald Trump is a fascist. It’s not an easy thing to say. Own those words. Acknowledge the truth of the situation that America (and the world) now faces.

What to do now?

Protest marches are great. Now plan for what comes after the cathartic release.

Run for office on the local and state level. Practice political consumerism: Refuse to spend money at stores, banks, and other businesses that work with Trump, his administration or his enterprises. Target Republican officials with phone calls and emails. Let them know that if they support Trump there will be negative consequences at the ballot box.

Borrow from the obstructionist strategy that Republicans used against Barack Obama. Turn the metaphorical map upside down and practice political Aikido.

Learn from those groups and individuals who have been actively fighting fascism. Donald Trump and his movement are not normal. Do not make the mistake of treating them like they are. There is no room for negotiation or compromise.

America is your country. Donald Trump and his supporters represent the tyranny of minority opinion. Consequently, they are the worst example of the will, spirit and character of the American people.

Now is the time to reclaim the United States’ fundamental character before the world, and recapture the most noble sense of American exceptionalism. Shouting “Not in my name!” is a fine beginning, but not an ending. Resistance to Donald Trump and everything he represents must be the new normal. Anything less is not acceptable.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR:

Chauncey DeVega is a politics staff writer for Salon. His essays can also be found at Chaunceydevega.com. He also hosts a weekly podcast, The Chauncey DeVega Show. Chauncey can be followed on Twitter and Facebook.

The Relentless Assault On American Democracy Has Begun: The Billionaire Sociopath Comes to the White House

 All,

JANUARY 20, 2017:  NATIONAL DAY OF RECKONING

Here comes the straight up evil agenda of the incoming neofascist administration led of course by the trolling billionaire sociopath. And if you don't think that this incredibly wealthy, greedy, selfish, bigoted, cruel, dishonest and ignorant gang of mercenary demagogues and pathological liars (for verification do your own research check of exactly who these people are and what they have actually done throughout their careers for the ugly evidence), are not going to relentlessly try to do every single thing that their "Fearless Leader" promised (and more) then you are seriously deluding yourself. The very disturbing truth is that this bunch of swaggering far rightwing bullies are going to be far worse than they are depicted in this article (which is reprehensible enough), and the fallout from the draconian policies they will propose and enact are going to have a devastating impact on not only the millions who voted against this administration and everything it stands for but will also adversely affect many of their resentful and scapegoating supporters as well. If you don't believe me just WATCH AND SEE...Stay tuned because the worse is yet to come...for real...

Kofi

https://www.nytimes.com/…/trump-cabinet-hearings-obama-poli…

Politics

Trump Nominees Make Clear Plans to Sweep Away Obama Policies

by MICHAEL D. SHEAR

January 19, 2017

New York Times

WASHINGTON — President-elect Donald J. Trump’s cabinet nominees, while moderating some of their stances, have made it clear during two weeks of hearings that they intend to work hard to sweep away President Obama’s domestic policy by embracing a deeply conservative approach to governing.

In dozens of hours of testimony, Mr. Trump’s nominees told senators that they favored less regulation, a smaller federal government, more state control over policy decisions and taxpayer money, and greater personal responsibility by Americans across the country.

The sometimes contentious hearings continued up until the day before the inauguration, as Mr. Trump triumphantly arrived in Washington on Thursday to kick off three highly choreographed days that will usher Republicans back into full political power in Washington for the first time in more than a decade.

After arriving at Joint Base Andrews on a military plane that will become Air Force One the next time he steps onboard, Mr. Trump visited the Trump International Hotel before making an appearance at the Lincoln Memorial, where thousands watched an inaugural concert.

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“All over the world they are talking about it. All over the world,” Mr. Trump told the crowd before a fireworks display over the National Mall. “And I love you folks, and we’re going to work together. And we are going to make America great again.”

That work will be shaped by the new president’s cabinet, which is coming under scrutiny as lawmakers from both parties press the nominees about their fealty to Mr. Trump’s campaign promises and their adherence to their own long records.

Many of the nominees sought to shave the sharp edges off Mr. Trump’s more provocative campaign promises and their own past decisions and statements. Some backed away completely from past assertions, making clean breaks with Mr. Trump on climate change or the need to build a wall at the Mexican border.

Others remained vague about their commitment to the most divisive proposals in their policy areas, leaving a veil of uncertainty over what they would do to lead their departments if confirmed.

Ben Carson, the housing secretary nominee, told lawmakers that “safety net programs are important.” But he did not disown past statements about the failure of government interventions and his belief that poverty was “really more of a choice than anything else.”

PHOTO: Ben Carson during his confirmation hearing to lead the department of housing and urban development last week. Credit Al Drago/The New York Times

Scott Pruitt, the Environmental Protection Agency nominee, told senators that he now believed that “climate change is not a hoax.” But he also forcefully advocated a far smaller and more restrained agency, while criticizing federal rules established by Mr. Obama’s administration to protect air and water and tackle climate change.

Betsy DeVos, a longtime supporter of charter schools, pledged to work for “common ground,” but did not back down on the use of federal money for private and religious schools. Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama, the attorney general nominee, vowed to be “impartial and enforce laws that I didn’t vote for,” while holding firm to a decades-long conservative approach to immigration and civil rights.

Several Democratic lawmakers appeared exasperated as they sought to pin the nominees down on the actions they intended to take in office.

“Will you insist upon that equal accountability in any K-12 school or educational program that receives federal funding whether public, public charter or private?” Senator Tim Kaine, Democrat of Virginia, asked Ms. DeVos.

“I support accountability,” she said, repeating that phrase three times in response to Mr. Kaine’s efforts to extract a more detailed answer.

But there is no doubt that Mr. Trump’s nominees collectively will lead an effort to undermine the legacy of Mr. Obama on the environment, health care, immigration, civil rights and education.

In his remarks to lawmakers, Representative Tom Price of Georgia, the nominee for secretary of health and human services, promised to lead an effort to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act. Representative Ryan Zinke of Montana, the nominee to lead the Interior Department, said he supported drilling, mining and logging on federal lands. Mr. Sessions came to the defense of police departments, saying officers had been “unfairly maligned and blamed” for the actions of a few in cases involving the deaths of young black men.“There’s a great deal of reform coming to Washington,” Sean Spicer, the president’s incoming press secretary, said during his first on-camera briefing on Thursday. “These are amazing individuals that have a commitment to enacting an agenda of change.”

Taken together, the congressional testimony reflects a domestic policy agenda that is still evolving. The president-elect recently said he wanted his nominees to “be themselves and express their own thoughts, not mine!” On Friday, he will have an opportunity to sketch out a broad vision during his inaugural address from the steps of the Capitol. 

During his campaign, Mr. Trump was often contradictory in laying out a domestic policy blueprint.

On immigration, he talked about the mass deportation of 11 million undocumented workers, then later said he was focused on getting “bad dudes” out of the country. He also proposed, then backed away from, a total ban on Muslim immigration to the United States.

PHOTO: Betsy DeVos arriving for her confirmation hearing to be secretary of education on Tuesday. Credit Al Drago/The New York Times

Mr. Trump at times called for having guns in classrooms, but other times said he opposed that policy. He said he was against a “first-strike” policy on the use of nuclear weapons, but also said he could not “take anything off the table.” He said in one interview that he would criminalize a woman’s decision to have an abortion; in another, he said the opposite.

As his nominees faced lawmakers during the past two weeks, many of them took a similar approach, responding to questions about their records with less hard-edge language even as they declined to accept Democrats’ approaches.

The hearing for Mr. Price was one example. Mr. Price, an orthopedic surgeon from an Atlanta suburb, sought to reassure senators that he and Mr. Trump did not want to let people “fall through the cracks” as they overhauled the nation’s health care system.

“Nobody’s interested in pulling the rug out from under anybody,” Mr. Price said. “We believe that it’s absolutely imperative that individuals that have health coverage be able to keep health coverage and move, hopefully, to greater choices and opportunities.”

But any Democrats who heard those comments as a kind of concession in the fight to unravel Mr. Obama’s health care law are likely to be disappointed.

Mr. Price insisted that “states know best” in caring for Medicaid beneficiaries. He said the government should not dictate care to patients. And he vowed that Mr. Trump and his administration would put in place “a different construct” for providing health care to every American.

Wilbur Ross, the billionaire investor who will serve as commerce secretary if he is confirmed, also tried to reassure senators on issues like trade, even as he echoed some of Mr. Trump’s more incendiary promises of economic warfare with other nations.

Like the president-elect, Mr. Ross lashed out at China, accusing it of being “the most protectionist country of the very large countries — they talk more about free trade than they actually practice.”

But he also declared that he was “not anti-trade” and declared as unworkable Mr. Trump’s proposal of a 35 percent tax on American companies that manufacture goods overseas and try to sell them in the United States.

Shortly after arriving in Washington on Thursday, Mr. Trump toasted his cabinet nominees, telling a luncheon audience at his Pennsylvania Avenue hotel that there had never been better ones.

“We have by far the highest I.Q.,” he said, “of any cabinet ever assembled.”

A version of this article appears in print on January 20, 2017, on Page A1 of the New York edition with the headline: Trump Arrives, Set to Assume Power. Order Reprints| Today's Paper

Related Coverage:

Steven Mnuchin, Treasury Nominee, Failed to Disclose $100 Million in Assets JAN. 19, 2017

Nominee Betsy DeVos’s Knowledge of Education Basics Is Open to Criticism

JAN. 18, 2017

Trump Budget Nominee Did Not Pay Taxes for Employee

JAN. 18, 2017

‘Learning Curve’ as Rick Perry Pursues a Job He Initially Misunderstood

JAN. 18, 2017

PHOTO: Scott Pruitt arriving for his confirmation hearing to be administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency on Wednesday. Credit Gabriella Demczuk for The New York Times

Trump Nominees Make Clear Plans to Sweep Away Obama Policies

Over two weeks of hearings, Donald J. Trump’s cabinet picks have strongly embraced a deeply conservative approach to governing.  nytimes.com

All,

If you think this speech by the billionaire sociopath and everything it both says and connotes is in any way whatsoever a sane or rational understanding of political, social, and economic reality in either this country or the rest of the world in the 21st century you are as clinically braindead and arrogantly delusional as he is...Look out folks because here comes the catastrophe...

Kofi

Donald Trump full inaugural address as 45th President of United States 

United States President Donald Trump spoke to the nation for the first time as Commander-in-Chief Friday afternoon moments after taking the oath of office to become the 45th President.

 

Donald Trump full inaugural address as 45th President of United States

United States President Donald Trump spoke to the nation for the first time as Commander-in-Chief…

youtube.com

A BLAST FROM THE (VERY RECENT) PAST...

"WHAT'S PAST IS PROLOGUE..."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/…/1c69e9cc-85b5-11e6-a3ef-f3…

The Post's View

The clear and present danger of Donald Trump

by Editorial Board

September 30, 2016

The Washington Post

IF YOU know that Donald Trump is ignorant, unprepared and bigoted, but are thinking of voting for him anyway because you doubt he could do much harm — this editorial is for you.

Your support of the Republican presidential nominee may be motivated by dislike of the Democratic alternative, disgust with the Washington establishment or a desire to send a message in favor of change. You may not approve of everything Mr. Trump has had to say about nuclear weapons, torture or mass deportations, but you doubt he could implement anything too radical. Congress, the courts, the Constitution — these would keep Mr. Trump in check, you think.

Well, think again. A President Trump could, unilaterally, change this country to its core. By remaking U.S. relations with other nations, he could fundamentally reshape the world, too.

Of course, in many areas Mr. Trump would not have to act unilaterally. If he won, chances are Republicans would maintain control of Congress. GOP majorities there would be enthusiastic participants in much of what Mr. Trump would like to do: gutting environmental and workplace regulations, slashing taxes so that the debt skyrockets, appointing Supreme Court justices who oppose a woman’s right to have an abortion. In areas where Republican officeholders such as House Speaker Paul D. Ryan (Wis.) and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) imagine themselves acting as a brake on Mr. Trump’s worst instincts, skepticism is in order. If these supposed leaders are too craven to oppose Mr. Trump as a candidate, knowing the danger he presents, why should we expect them to stand up to the bully once he was fully empowered?

But say they did — or imagine, also improbably, that Mr. Trump faced a Democratic Congress. The president would appoint officers — a budget director, an attorney general, a CIA chief — who were disposed to let him have his way. And in the U.S. system, the scope for executive action is, as we will lay out in a series of editorials next week, astonishingly broad. At times we have questioned President Obama’s sweeping use of those powers even when we agreed with his goals, such as his broad grant of amnesty to millions of undocumented immigrants. Mr. Trump could push it much further.

The Washington Post explores the origins of Donald Trump's transformation from a businessman to political candidate. (McKenna Ewen, Whitney Shefte, Dalton Bennett/The Washington Post)

Could he tear up long-standing international agreements? Round up and expel millions of longtime U.S. residents? Impose giant tariffs? Waterboard terrorist suspects? Yes, yes, yes and yes — all without so much as an if-you-please to Congress. Could he bar the media from covering him? To a large extent, yes. Could he use the government to help his businesses and, as he has threatened, injure those he perceives as enemies? Yes, he could.

Given Mr. Trump’s ever-evolving positions, and the apparent absence of fundamental beliefs other than in his own brilliance, it would be foolish to make flat predictions of how he would behave. Nor do we underestimate the resilience of the U.S. system or the devotion that U.S. government workers bring to the rule of law.

But it would be reckless not to consider the damage Mr. Trump might wreak. Some of that damage would ensue more from who he is than what he does. His racism and disparagement of women could empower extremists who are now on the margins of American politics, while his lies and conspiracy theories could legitimize discourse that until now has been relegated to the fringe. But his scope for action should not be underestimated, either. In our upcoming editorials, we will examine some arenas where Mr. Trump has been relatively clear about his intentions — and where presidential powers are mighty. We hope you will read them before you vote.

The damage Mr. Trump could do:

A President Trump could deport freely


A President Trump could end the era of American global leadership


A President Trump could wreck progress on global warming


A President Trump could destroy the world economy


How much damage could a President Trump do? We can only begin to imagine.

PHOTO: Donald Trump at a rally in Council Bluffs, Iowa, on Wednesday. (John Locher/Associated Press)

The clear and present danger of Donald Trump

The first in a series of editorials on the damage he could wreak unilaterally as president.