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Freeloading Rusty

Freeloading Rusty

Here comes Rover, sniffin’ at your ass
Jan 11, 2016
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Trump admin cancels local hiring plan for public works projects
The Trump administration is abandoning an Obama-era plan to ensure local hiring for public works projects, according to a new report.

The New York Times reported on Friday that the Department of Transportation will withdraw the plan, which was proposed in 2015 and was supposed to take effect Friday. The initiative would have allowed cities to ensure local residents get to work on federally funded public works projects.

The move appears to be part of the White House’s ongoing push to slash federal regulations.



The Transportation Department emphasized, however, that a final decision has not been officially made.

“The prior Administration's proposed rule and proposed long term extensions of pilot programs is under review, and DOT will make an announcement after a final decision is reached," a spokeswoman said.

A pilot program has already been underway to allow local hiring for projects on a case-by-case basis, with the goal of studying its impact. The Times noted that the fate of that program is now in doubt as well.

The idea of preferential hiring has long been contentious. Some critics of the idea argue that it adds extra costs to a project and can make bidding for contracts unfair.

But supporters of hiring from within the neighborhood say it provides a new way for residents to access well-paying jobs.

“By terminating the Local Labor Hiring Pilot Program, Trump will disproportionately hurt low-income and minority communities, denying them access to the good jobs they need to make our country and communities strong, and significantly reducing the local benefits that any infrastructure investment would provide,” said Tate Hausman, co-director of the Millions of Jobs coalition.
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OSHA removes list of worker fatalities from homepage
The Labor Department’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has removed data on worker fatalities from the homepage of its website.

The agency previously included a link on the front page of its website to a list of workers who had been killed on the job. The list included the worker’s name, date they died and cause of death.

As of Friday, the box was replaced with links to information on how OSHA is working with employers to create safer workplaces. The list of worker fatalities is now under a separate section deeper into the site. The most recent death listed was on June 2.



The change was first reported by Politico.

Debbie Berkowitz, a senior fellow at the National Employment Law Project who served as a senior official at OSHA under former President Obama, told The Hill the missing data is just the latest action by the Trump administration that fails to protect workers.

“I just think this is one more action by the administration to make it clear that they are not really interested in protecting workers. They are more interested in hiding the data and hiding fatalities,” she said.

“It allows the secretary of Labor to say things are going well. There’s nothing to contradict this.”

Berkowitz argued it was important to have the information on the front page of OSHA’s website.

“We thought it was important information to pay tribute to workers who were killed on the job, to say ‘We as an agency are here to say you did not die in vain, and we’re here to prevent the next one,’ ” she said.

Labor Department spokeswoman Mandy Kraft reportedly told Politico the change was made to make the information more accurate because the “previous listings included fatal incidents that were outside federal OSHA jurisdiction, not work-related, or the employer was not cited for a violation related to the incident.”

Kraft reportedly said OSHA is keeping the previous list of workers on its site and will continue to review the data.
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How Congress is Cementing Trump's Anti-Climate Orders into Law
President Donald Trump marvels at his own velocity when he boasts about dismantling the Obama climate legacy. "I have been moving at record pace to cancel these regulations and to eliminate the barriers to domestic energy production, like never before," he said at a recent White House event.

But while Trump focuses on speed, his allies in Congress appear increasingly concerned about the durability of the president's fossil fuel directives.

In recent weeks, they have advanced a handful of legislative measures that echo and extend various presidential orders meant to boost coal, oil and gas production and set aside consideration of climate change.

These moves may seem redundant, but they could provide bulletproof armor during future challenges to Trump's agenda.

"They are ... covering their bases by trying to legislate the rolling back of these safeguards because the process to repeal, undo or rewrite a regulation is as lengthy as the public process that helped establish the standard in the first place," explained Melinda Pierce, chief lobbyist for the Sierra Club. "And, of course, any attempt to roll back environmental or public health standards can and will be challenged in court."

"The Trump administration is attacking every environmental and health protection we have," said Sara Jordan, legislative representative for the League of Conservation Voters. "If these legislative proposals get passed, it will make it that much harder for the next administration to restore environmental protections."

That's why Congressional Republicans are racing to write his instructions into law.

"We need to put the legislative stamp of approval on what the Trump administration is doing," said Rep. Evan Jenkins (R-W.Va.) during a recent debate on the House floor.

The House already has voted to fast-track Trump's withdrawal of a clean water rule and to streamline future environmental reviews over cross-border pipelines like Keystone XL. Now, GOP members are pushing forward legislation to bolster Trump's revival of federal coal leasing, and to bar government regulatory agencies from considering the future damages caused by greenhouse gas pollution.

'A Very Slippery Slope to Government by Fiat'
The courts have already started chipping away at the Trump administration's edicts. A federal appeals court ruled July 3 that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) cannot simply suspend an Obama-era rule on methane emissions from oil and gas facilities. And a federal judge ruled last month that the Army Corps of Engineers had moved too hastily to permit the Dakota Access pipeline project, without considering environmental justice impacts on the Standing Rock Sioux tribe.

Environmental groups, states, and tribes have planned or filed lawsuits over virtually every aspect of the Trump energy agenda. "We're going to meet them in court, we're going to sue them, and we're going to prevail," Mitchell Bernard, chief counsel for the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC), said in a video the environmental group produced.

But Congress could short-circuit that litigation strategy with measures like the provision passed by the House last week allowing withdrawal of Obama's "Waters of the U.S." rule without public notice, comment or any of the other requirements that apply to federal departments and agencies. The Trump administration already has begun rescinding the rule, which was written to protect wetlands from dredge and fill material and created new permitting and reporting requirements that the oil, gas and coal industry abhor. The rider that the GOP tucked into an $800 billion budget bill would hurry the repeal and reduce possibilities for legal challenge.

"That doesn't sound like America to me," said Rep. Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio), calling it "a very slippery slope to government by fiat." But after a mere 10-minute debate, the majority by voice vote flicked away a Democratic effort to remove the provision, which now could be folded into must-pass budget legislation for the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1.

Preventing Presidents from Halting Pipelines
House members also aim to ease energy development long after the Trump presidency ends, even if voters elect a successor who wants to reinstate pro-climate policies.

For example, the "Promoting Cross-Border Energy Infrastructure Act," passed by the House on July 19, would ensure no future president acts to block an oil or gas pipeline or electric power project that crosses a U.S. border, as President Barack Obama did with Keystone XL.

The bill would take away presidential permitting authority and put decisions in the hands of a small independent agency, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which has the mission of ensuring reliable energy for consumers at reasonable rates.

If enacted, the law "tips the scales in favor of massive controversial oil and gas pipeline and electric transmission projects," said Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-N.Y.), voicing futile opposition on the House floor. All Republicans and 17 Democrats voted for the bill.

Blocking Future Coal Lease Moratoriums
Another bill would make it impossible for a future administration to declare a moratorium on federal coal leasing, as the Obama administration did in its final year. The pause provided time to conduct the first review in decades of coal royalty rates, especially in light of coal's role in climate change.

Under an order signed by Trump, his secretary of Interior, Ryan Zinke, lifted the moratorium soon after taking office.

That move is being challenged in court by four states, environmental groups and a Native American tribe in Montana. But Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) introduced legislation that would require future administrations to seek Congressional permission before imposing any such moratorium—circumscribing the authority that the Interior Department has had under federal mining law since 1920.

"It's an important bill even though we've seen a change in policy from the past administration," Cheney said last week at a hearing in the House Natural Resources Committee. "We've got to make sure we're protecting our coal industry across the board from the potential of future political shifts."

Officially Ignoring the Social of Cost of Carbon
At the same hearing, the committee looked at legislation to bolster the Trump administration's move against "social cost of carbon" calculations in regulatory decision-making. That is a method used by economists to estimate in today's dollars the damages expected to be caused in the future by current emissions of greenhouse gases.

It's a key concept in conducting cost-benefit calculations while keeping in mind that the harm from today's pollution continues long into the future.

Jenkins, sponsor of the so-called "Transparency and Honesty in Energy Regulations Act," blamed the loss of coal jobs in his state on regulations that were justified by taking account of the social cost of carbon—particularly the Obama administration's Clean Power Plan (although the Clean Power Plan had been stayed by the courts.)

Jenkins' bill mimics the wording of Trump's March 28 executive order requiring federal policymakers to look back to guidance from President George W. Bush's Office of Management and Budget (OMB) on how to calculate the social cost of carbon. That approach gets around a legal problem: federal courts have made clear the costs of greenhouse gas pollution need to be weighed in regulatory decision-making. But under the 2003 OMB guidance, carbon emissions can be calculated as having zero cost or even benefits. (The guidance steeply discounts future impacts and allows for no consideration of effects outside U.S. borders.)

NRDC Legislative Director Scott Slesinger said the result is a perverse elimination of climate change from the environmental cost and benefit analysis that the law requires. "It's like saying 'Let's look at the health impact of cigarette smoking, but don't count cancer'," he said. Jordan, of the League of Conservation Voters, called it "seeking to codify climate denial."

These Efforts Are Flying Under the Public Radar
Most of the legislative proposals shoring up the Trump energy agenda originate in the House, and their fate is unclear in the Senate, which already has rejected an effort to undo Obama-era methane regulations by legislative fiat, and where appropriators are less tolerant of budget riders.

Still, Senate negotiators may feel pressured to go along with some provisions to pass budget legislation that would keep the government up and running after the fiscal year ends on Sept. 30.

Senate supporters of the Trump energy agenda already have introduced their own version of the "Ozone Standards Implementation Act" that the House passed on July 18. That bill would help EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt delay implementation of the Obama administration's standards regulating smog emissions for a year. The House-passed legislation would give states until 2025 to comply with the revised standards and would change long-standing law to allow the EPA to revise the standards every 10 years instead of every five.

Both the NRDC and a coalition of environmental, health and labor groups have published online running tallies of budget provisions that affect regulations, but they lament that the Congressional efforts to cement the Trump agenda have not received attention while the health care repeal effort and Russia investigations crowd out media coverage.

"It's incredibly cynical," said Slesinger, "and unfortunately it's going on pretty much under the radar."
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Freeloading Rusty

Freeloading Rusty

Here comes Rover, sniffin’ at your ass
Jan 11, 2016
26,916
26,589
Psychiatrists tell Congress Donald Trump is 'a clear and present danger' to the world
A group of psychiatrists has written to Congress to warn Donald Trump poses a "clear and present danger" to the world.

Among them is Dr Bandy Lee, of Yale University, who is also reportedly consulting with Democratic members of Congress on setting up an expert panel to give advice on the President's mental health.


The group's letter, sent to members of both parties, said: "It no longer takes a psychiatrist to recognise the alarming patterns of impulsive, reckless, and narcissistic behaviour — regardless of diagnosis — that, in the person of President Trump, put the world at risk.

"We now find ourselves in a clear and present danger, especially concerning North Korea and the President’s command of the US nuclear arsenal."


First tabled by Maryland congressman Jamie Raskin, and now backed by more than two dozen members of the House, the bill would see Mr Trump or any other US president forced from the Oval Office is he or she is deemed to be mentally or physically unfit for the role.

Discussion of Mr Trump's fitness to lead has intensified in the days since his extraordinary address to supporters in Phoenix, Arizona.
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Public relations execs tied to Manafort project get grand jury subpoenas
Special Counsel Robert Mueller issued grand jury subpoenas in recent days seeking testimony from public relations executives who worked on an international campaign organized by Paul Manafort, people directly familiar with the matter told NBC News.

This is the first public indication that Mueller's investigation is beginning to compel witness testimony before the grand jury — a significant milestone in an inquiry that is examining the conduct of President Donald Trump and his son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner, among others.

It is also further indication that Manafort, Trump's onetime campaign chairman, could be in serious legal jeopardy.

According to one executive whose firm received a subpoena, Mueller's team is closely examining the lobbying campaign, which ran between 2012 and 2014. Some of the firms involved in the campaign received subpoenas for documents weeks ago, the executive said, and now the Mueller team is seeking testimony.

"We think they are trying to figure out, was this a legitimate project?" the executive said. "From our perspective it was — we did a lot of work. We took it seriously."
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Belobog

Belobog

First 100
First 100
Jan 14, 2015
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We should have a three strikes and you're out rule on posting fake quotes\information.
 
Freeloading Rusty

Freeloading Rusty

Here comes Rover, sniffin’ at your ass
Jan 11, 2016
26,916
26,589
Donald Trump's Cybersecurity Team Accuses Him Of Ignoring Security Matters, Resigns En Masse
Seven members of Donald Trump's cybersecurity team, including an Indian-origin data scientist, have resigned, accusing the US president of ignoring the pressing national security matters.

In a group resignation letter, the members of the National Infrastructure Advisory Council or NIAC, whose purview includes national cybersecurity, cited both specific shortfalls in the administration's approach to cybersecurity, and broader concerns that have undermined the "moral infrastructure" of the US, Fortune reported.


"You have given insufficient attention to the growing threats to the cybersecurity of the critical systems upon which all Americans depend, including those impacting the systems supporting our democratic election process," the letter reads.

They also cited his failure "to denounce intolerance and violence of hate groups" when asked about the "horrific violence in Charlottesville" as one of the reasons why they left.
 
Freeloading Rusty

Freeloading Rusty

Here comes Rover, sniffin’ at your ass
Jan 11, 2016
26,916
26,589
Trump Associate Boasted That Moscow Business Deal ‘Will Get Donald Elected’

A business associate of President Trump promised in 2015 to engineer a real estate deal with the aid of the president of Russia, Vladimir V. Putin, that he said would help Mr. Trump win the presidency.

The business associate, Felix Sater, wrote a series of emails to Mr. Trump’s lawyer, Michael Cohen, in which he boasted about his ties to Mr. Putin and predicted that building a Trump Tower in Moscow would be a political boon to Mr. Trump’s candidacy.

“Our boy can become president of the USA and we can engineer it,” Mr. Sater wrote in an email. “I will get all of Putins team to buy in on this, I will manage this process.”

The emails show that, from the earliest months of Mr. Trump’s campaign, some of his associates viewed close ties with Moscow as a political advantage. Those ties are now under investigation by the Justice Department and multiple congressional committees.

There is no evidence in the emails that Mr. Sater delivered on his promises. Mr. Sater, a Russian immigrant, was a broker for the Trump Organization at the time, which means he was paid to deliver real estate deals.

In another email, Mr. Sater envisioned a ribbon-cutting in Moscow. “I will get Putin on this program and we will get Donald elected,” Mr. Sater wrote.

Mr. Cohen suggested that Mr. Sater’s comments were puffery. “He has sometimes used colorful language and has been prone to ‘salesmanship,’ ” Mr. Cohen said in a statement. “I ultimately determined that the proposal was not feasible and never agreed to make a trip to Russia.”

Mr. Sater presented himself as so influential in Russia that he helped arrange a 2006 trip that Mr. Trump’s daughter, Ivanka, took to Moscow. “I arranged for Ivanka to sit in Putins private chair at his desk and office in the Kremlin,” he said.

Ms. Trump said she had no involvement in the discussions about the Moscow deal. In a statement, she said she that during the 2006 trip, she took “a brief tour of Red Square and the Kremlin but I have never met President Vladimir Putin.” She did not say whether she sat in his chair.

The Times reported earlier this year on the plan for a Trump Tower in Moscow, which never materialized. On Sunday, The Washington Post reported the existence of the correspondence between Mr. Sater and Mr. Cohen but not its content.

The Trump Organization on Monday turned over emails to the House Intelligence Committee, which is investigating Russian meddling in the presidential election and whether anyone in Mr. Trump’s campaign was involved. Some of the emails were obtained by The Times.

The Trump Organization issued a statement Monday saying: “To be clear, the Trump Organization has never had any real estate holdings or interests in Russia.”
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Freeloading Rusty

Freeloading Rusty

Here comes Rover, sniffin’ at your ass
Jan 11, 2016
26,916
26,589
Oxford University professor resigns in Donald Trump protest
A leading political academic has resigned from his Oxford University post after it emerged that one of the university’s key patrons is also one of Donald Trump’s biggest financial backers.

Bo Rothstein was professor of government and public policy at the Blavatnik School of Government, named after the Ukraine-born billionaire Leonard Blavatnik, who gave the university £75m to set up the school.

Rothstein told the Guardian he had resigned on Monday after learning that Blavatnik had given a substantial donation to the Trump campaign, which he called “incomprehensible and irresponsible”.
 
Freeloading Rusty

Freeloading Rusty

Here comes Rover, sniffin’ at your ass
Jan 11, 2016
26,916
26,589
Trump Punished Longtime Aide After Lackluster Phoenix Rally
Last week, President Trump reportedly told longtime aideGeorge Gigicos that he would never organize another Trump rally due to the fact that his Phoenix rally appeared to be less-than-full. The content of the rally was fiery, with Trump threatening to shutdown the government if the border wall wasn't funded. But the room itself appeared to partly empty, with part of it being bisected by a dividing wall, and all of the audience on the flat floor.

Trump Says 'All Options On The Table' After North Korea Missile Launch Over Japan
In the wake of a rare North Korean missile launch over Japan, President Trump issued a statement saying "all options are on the table." Trump continued, saying "This regime has signaled its contempt for its neighbors, for all members of the United Nations, and for minimum standards of acceptable international behavior." Japanese PM Shinzo Abe spoke to President Trump for 40 minutes after the incident, where the two apparently agreed that an emergency UN Security Council meeting should be held.

Mueller Investigating Trump Response To Trump Tower Meeting Article
NBC reports that special investigator Robert Mueller is investigating Donald Trump's hand in the response to the explosive story revealing a meeting between Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner and Russian attorney Natalia Veselnitskaya. Mueller reportedly wants to know what Trump knew about the meeting, and whether he attempted to conceal its real purpose in his response.

Cohn And Mnuchin Move Towards Lower Tax Cut In Effort To Pass Trump Plan
Gary Cohn and Steve Mnuchin, the two members of Trump's cabinet charged with drafting and passing Trump's tax plan, meet every day to discuss how they'll get tax cuts through congress. Two sources tell The New York Times that the two are now pursuing a plan that would cut the corporate tax rate by 10% rather than the originally planned 20%, and that the current cap on personal income tax would remain intact.
 
Freeloading Rusty

Freeloading Rusty

Here comes Rover, sniffin’ at your ass
Jan 11, 2016
26,916
26,589
Trump Expected To Request Harvey Repair Funding Package As Early As Next Week

The Washington Post reports that President Trump is expected to request disaster relief funding from Congress for Houston as early as next week. Trump has called a meeting next week with Congressional leaders to discuss the details. On consideration facing the administration and Congress is the debt ceiling. If the relief will cost billions, Congress will be forced to raise the debt ceiling to continue funding other aspects of the government.
 
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