Here's Another Way Politicians Are Screwing You Over
This could get very expensive for some states.
By Nick Stockton
Let's talk about climate change, for once without politics. Instead, money.
That's right. Forget the red and blue, the heated tempers and rising rhetoric. Instead think about the coal factories that still power much of the country, and who pays for every pound of carbon they add to the atmosphere. Right now, your state is making bets on its future economy, by choosing whether or not to change those factories by acting preemptively on a contested emissions rule.
That rule is the Clean Power Plan, which is currently locked up in a Washington, DC, circuit court pending legal review. The rules were set to go into effect in June, which would have required every state to submit their plans to cut emissions to the EPA by September 2016, or by September 2018 with an extension. Last month, though, the Supreme Court decreed that states would not be obligated to comply with the rule until it wins in court. And if it loses, never.
Nineteen states have suspended their plans. Nineteen others are proceeding as though the EPA rule is a go. The rest are either assessing or exempt.
The logic here is pretty simple. "If your state produces carbon to make energy, it won't be beneficial for your state to have a policy that does not use those inputs," says Mark Jacobsen, an energy economist at the University of California-San Diego. Conversely, your state is probably inclined to comply if it has abundant solar, wind, or hydroelectric potential.
And let's say your state happens to have all that stuff, and decides to shrug away the Supreme Court's stay and move forward with a plan to curb emissions. If the Clean Power Plan passes, your state's coal-chugging neighbors will be legally obliged to figure out another way to keep the lights on, and your state will be years ahead in terms of infrastructure, expertise, and technology. "All the know-how and infrastructure are going to flow from states that got in early to those that stayed behind," says Jacobsen. Energy, too. States that did not comply will have to jack up energy costs to drive down demand, or else buy greener energy from across state lines.
That last bit is important. States buy and sell energy to each other all the time. Under the Clean Power Plan, states are left to their own devices to meet emissions targets set up by the EPA. "The policy that one state adopts has implications for its neighbors, and there can be a first mover advantage," says Jonathan Hughes, an economist at the University of Colorado-Boulder who has co-authored research on the Clean Power Plan's state line economics.
Here's the view from 30,000 feet. States have two options for complying with the EPA's plan. The first—favored by the agency—is called a rate-based system. The state puts a price on pounds of carbon emitted per megawatt hour. Rate-based systems tend to manifest as carbon taxes and subsidies (to cleaner energy sources) paid by power plants themselves. Electricity costs are less likely to trickle down to consumers. Alternately, a state could convert those EPA-determined rate-based goals into a mass-based system, in which regulators set a statewide emissions goal and require power companies to buy portions of what they hope to emit. Power companies are buying and selling energy, and consumers are more likely to feel the pinch.
States can be strategic about which system they want to use, based on what their neighbors do. Like California and Nevada, for instance. California's cap and trade is a mass-based system—which generally means higher wholesale costs for energy consumers. Let's say they adapt the same system to comply with the Clean Power Plan. If Nevada wants to be strategic, it could set up a rate-based system. Normally, this would piss off the energy industry, because it would increase the cost of doing business. But California purchases a lot of power from other states. "When the states have different regulations, Nevada can export its surplus 'clean power' to California and get those wholesale California prices," says Hughes. Thus, Nevada gets the dual advantage of relatively low costs to consumers, and being able to export energy to California at a higher profit. Then again, hydropowered Oregon or sunny Arizona could always undercut the Silver State.
Needless to say, all this regulatory strategery gets tricky fast. But Hughes says the first movers could have an advantage, leaving their slower neighbors with fewer options if the EPA's rule passes the court. If the situation gets messy enough, the differences in state-by-state regulation could lead to loopholes where states with high carbon ceilings are routinely sating their dirtier neighbors' thirsts for power. In this case, the Clean Power Plan might have no net affect, or even lead to higher emissions than what the EPA is predicting in the Clean Power Plan, says Hughes.
Of course, cost-benefit analyses are not the only things prompting various parties to choose sides over the Clean Power Plan. Politics as usual, of course. But money is what landed the EPA in court, after 157 states, businesses, and industry groups complained that meeting the EPA's goals would be too much of a burden. Wherever your state stands, rest assured its policy makers are hoping their decision is the best bet for long term economic growth.
March 31, 2016
Tartan Taliban
U.S., Saudis set aside spat over Iran to sanction 'Tartan Taliban'
By Nahal Toosi
The U.S. and Saudi Arabia, whose relationship has hit a new low during the Obama administration because of differences over Iran, are nonetheless putting up a united front when it comes to sanctioning terrorist networks.
The two countries on Thursday announced a new series of sanctions on four people and two organizations tied to Al Qaeda, the Taliban and the Lashkar-e-Taiba extremist groups. Although not unprecedented, such a bilateral move is relatively rare for Washington and Riyadh, former Obama administration officials and analysts said.
The individuals sanctioned are James Alexander McLintock, Abdul Aziz Nuristani, Naveed Qamar and Muhammad Ijaz Safaras. The Al-Rahmah Welfare Organization and the Jamia Asariya Madrassa are the organizations targeted. The penalties they face include property freezes and prohibitions on transactions with Americans.
“Today’s action marks yet another step in [the Department of] Treasury’s efforts to financially cripple terrorist financiers and demonstrates the United States’ and Saudi Arabia’s shared resolve to target those who support terrorism,” said Adam J. Szubin, Treasury's acting undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence.
Of the people and groups targeted by the sanctions, all of which operate in or have links to Afghanistan, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, perhaps the most noteworthy is McLintock. Media reports have described him as a middle-aged, Scottish-born convert to Islam (his nickname is the "Tartan Taliban") with a long history of suspected ties to militant networks.
That Saudi Arabia continues to work with the U.S. on such sanctions underscores the Saudi royal family's worries about the threat that groups like Al Qaeda pose to its rule. The cooperation comes despite Saudi unhappiness with President Barack Obama's decision to agree to a major deal that has given Iran sanctions relief after it curbed its nuclear program.
The sanctions also follow a wave of publicity about how frustrated Obama has been with the Saudis' own religious rigidity, their fears of Iran's rising role in the Middle East and their extraordinary reliance on the United States. The president's criticisms, detailed in a story in The Atlantic, prompted spirited rebuttals by leading Saudi figures.
U.S. officials have long praised what they say is steady and increasing cooperation from the Saudi monarchy on ways to disrupt Islamist terrorists' financial networks. But critics note that private Saudi financiers are still a major source of money for terrorist groups, while the Saudis' extreme interpretation of Islam continues to inspire terrorists worldwide.
Saudi representatives could not immediately be reached for comment Thursday.
Almost a year ago, the U.S. and Saudi Arabia announced bilateral sanctions against the Al-Furqan Foundation Welfare Trust, which they accused of financing terrorism.
David Mortlock, a former National Security Council official, called the latest round of bilateral sanctions "quite remarkable" and said it could inspire other Gulf Arab states to step up.
"The United States frequently acts together with the European Union or the United Kingdom, but most other countries prefer to act through the U.N. Security Council process for terrorism designations," he said. "Given that most Gulf countries don’t have their own sanctions programs, it sends a strong message to other governments in the region when Saudi is willing to act outside of the U.N. system."
Peter Harrell, a former State Department official now with the Center for a New American Security, noted that in 2014, the Saudis adopted a new terror finance law that made Thursday's actions possible.
"You could say that we are beginning to see payoff from years of slow but relentless U.S. government work with the Saudis on these issues," he said.
By Nahal Toosi
The U.S. and Saudi Arabia, whose relationship has hit a new low during the Obama administration because of differences over Iran, are nonetheless putting up a united front when it comes to sanctioning terrorist networks.
The two countries on Thursday announced a new series of sanctions on four people and two organizations tied to Al Qaeda, the Taliban and the Lashkar-e-Taiba extremist groups. Although not unprecedented, such a bilateral move is relatively rare for Washington and Riyadh, former Obama administration officials and analysts said.
The individuals sanctioned are James Alexander McLintock, Abdul Aziz Nuristani, Naveed Qamar and Muhammad Ijaz Safaras. The Al-Rahmah Welfare Organization and the Jamia Asariya Madrassa are the organizations targeted. The penalties they face include property freezes and prohibitions on transactions with Americans.
“Today’s action marks yet another step in [the Department of] Treasury’s efforts to financially cripple terrorist financiers and demonstrates the United States’ and Saudi Arabia’s shared resolve to target those who support terrorism,” said Adam J. Szubin, Treasury's acting undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence.
Of the people and groups targeted by the sanctions, all of which operate in or have links to Afghanistan, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia, perhaps the most noteworthy is McLintock. Media reports have described him as a middle-aged, Scottish-born convert to Islam (his nickname is the "Tartan Taliban") with a long history of suspected ties to militant networks.
That Saudi Arabia continues to work with the U.S. on such sanctions underscores the Saudi royal family's worries about the threat that groups like Al Qaeda pose to its rule. The cooperation comes despite Saudi unhappiness with President Barack Obama's decision to agree to a major deal that has given Iran sanctions relief after it curbed its nuclear program.
The sanctions also follow a wave of publicity about how frustrated Obama has been with the Saudis' own religious rigidity, their fears of Iran's rising role in the Middle East and their extraordinary reliance on the United States. The president's criticisms, detailed in a story in The Atlantic, prompted spirited rebuttals by leading Saudi figures.
U.S. officials have long praised what they say is steady and increasing cooperation from the Saudi monarchy on ways to disrupt Islamist terrorists' financial networks. But critics note that private Saudi financiers are still a major source of money for terrorist groups, while the Saudis' extreme interpretation of Islam continues to inspire terrorists worldwide.
Saudi representatives could not immediately be reached for comment Thursday.
Almost a year ago, the U.S. and Saudi Arabia announced bilateral sanctions against the Al-Furqan Foundation Welfare Trust, which they accused of financing terrorism.
David Mortlock, a former National Security Council official, called the latest round of bilateral sanctions "quite remarkable" and said it could inspire other Gulf Arab states to step up.
"The United States frequently acts together with the European Union or the United Kingdom, but most other countries prefer to act through the U.N. Security Council process for terrorism designations," he said. "Given that most Gulf countries don’t have their own sanctions programs, it sends a strong message to other governments in the region when Saudi is willing to act outside of the U.N. system."
Peter Harrell, a former State Department official now with the Center for a New American Security, noted that in 2014, the Saudis adopted a new terror finance law that made Thursday's actions possible.
"You could say that we are beginning to see payoff from years of slow but relentless U.S. government work with the Saudis on these issues," he said.
Lyin' Ted
Pro-Kasich super PAC hits 'lyin' Ted'
By Nick Gass
The super PAC backing Ohio Gov. John Kasich is taking a page from Donald Trump in its latest ad, referring to Ted Cruz as "Lyin' Ted."
“Many just call him Lyin’ Ted," a narrator intones at the start of the ad from New Day for America, which features only an image of Cruz's face with a growing nose of lies.
Cruz's nose stretches throughout the 30-second video, eventually wrapping around the Texas senator's neck three times.
"Lied about Ben Carson to steal a win in Iowa," the narrator says, a reference to Cruz campaign staffers incorrectly citing a CNN report about Carson leaving the campaign trail as the Iowa caucuses kicked off the night of Feb. 1.
"Lies about being the best for the GOP when polls show he can’t even beat Hillary Clinton," the spot says, referring to Cruz's insistence that he would be the best candidate for the Republican Party to nominate.
The narrator continues, "His TV ad about John Kasich lied. Stations had to pull it off the air. If Ted Cruz’s mouth is moving, he’s lying.”
Kasich's campaign has maintained that a vote for Cruz in the primary represents a vote for Hillary Clinton, while Cruz's team has said that a vote for Kasich stands to only help Trump get closer to the nomination.
Trusted Leadership PAC, a super PAC supporting Ted Cruz, this week unveiled a $500,000 ad buy in Wisconsin hitting Kasich, which claimed that "[m]illionaires working side-by-side with George Soros are bankrolling his super PAC."
Kasich campaign manager John Weaver ripped the spot Tuesday on Twitter, writing, "Lyin' Ted, on every level. 0 Friends: tells story. 0 Record: tells history. 0 Vision: tells future. 0 chance: tells desperation. #cruzloser"
In sharing an Associated Press story on Twitter debunking the claim about Soros, communications director Mike Schrimpf tweeted, "Lyin' Ted."
By Nick Gass
The super PAC backing Ohio Gov. John Kasich is taking a page from Donald Trump in its latest ad, referring to Ted Cruz as "Lyin' Ted."
“Many just call him Lyin’ Ted," a narrator intones at the start of the ad from New Day for America, which features only an image of Cruz's face with a growing nose of lies.
Cruz's nose stretches throughout the 30-second video, eventually wrapping around the Texas senator's neck three times.
"Lied about Ben Carson to steal a win in Iowa," the narrator says, a reference to Cruz campaign staffers incorrectly citing a CNN report about Carson leaving the campaign trail as the Iowa caucuses kicked off the night of Feb. 1.
"Lies about being the best for the GOP when polls show he can’t even beat Hillary Clinton," the spot says, referring to Cruz's insistence that he would be the best candidate for the Republican Party to nominate.
The narrator continues, "His TV ad about John Kasich lied. Stations had to pull it off the air. If Ted Cruz’s mouth is moving, he’s lying.”
Kasich's campaign has maintained that a vote for Cruz in the primary represents a vote for Hillary Clinton, while Cruz's team has said that a vote for Kasich stands to only help Trump get closer to the nomination.
Trusted Leadership PAC, a super PAC supporting Ted Cruz, this week unveiled a $500,000 ad buy in Wisconsin hitting Kasich, which claimed that "[m]illionaires working side-by-side with George Soros are bankrolling his super PAC."
Kasich campaign manager John Weaver ripped the spot Tuesday on Twitter, writing, "Lyin' Ted, on every level. 0 Friends: tells story. 0 Record: tells history. 0 Vision: tells future. 0 chance: tells desperation. #cruzloser"
In sharing an Associated Press story on Twitter debunking the claim about Soros, communications director Mike Schrimpf tweeted, "Lyin' Ted."
Detrimental
Moniz on Trump's nuclear stance: 'bluntly irresponsible' and 'detrimental'
By Eliza Collins
Donald Trump’s stance on nuclear weapons, including possibly using them on Europe is “bluntly irresponsible and is detrimental to our internal allies security posture,” Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz said Thursday.
The energy secretary was speaking to MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell Thursday from the 2016 Nuclear Security Summit in Washington, D.C., when he was asked about comments Trump had made during MSNBC’s town hall Wednesday night. In that interview with Chris Matthews, Trump said he "would never take any of my cards off the table," including using a nuclear weapon in the Middle East or in Europe.
The comments are “extremely troubling, obviously,” Moniz said.
“We are trying to work to reduce nuclear weapons. Their footprint. We in the United States with Russia have made significant cuts in the arsenal. The president has talked about trying to go further. Ultimately, going to the goal of ideally, a nuclear-free world. Nuclear weapon-free world,” Moniz said.
“I'm afraid this kind of talk in an election is just bluntly irresponsible and is detrimental to our internal allies security posture,” he added.
Moniz did not say whether U.S. allies had responded on this topic specifically, but said they have reached out about “many statements made in this campaign.”
By Eliza Collins
Donald Trump’s stance on nuclear weapons, including possibly using them on Europe is “bluntly irresponsible and is detrimental to our internal allies security posture,” Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz said Thursday.
The energy secretary was speaking to MSNBC’s Andrea Mitchell Thursday from the 2016 Nuclear Security Summit in Washington, D.C., when he was asked about comments Trump had made during MSNBC’s town hall Wednesday night. In that interview with Chris Matthews, Trump said he "would never take any of my cards off the table," including using a nuclear weapon in the Middle East or in Europe.
The comments are “extremely troubling, obviously,” Moniz said.
“We are trying to work to reduce nuclear weapons. Their footprint. We in the United States with Russia have made significant cuts in the arsenal. The president has talked about trying to go further. Ultimately, going to the goal of ideally, a nuclear-free world. Nuclear weapon-free world,” Moniz said.
“I'm afraid this kind of talk in an election is just bluntly irresponsible and is detrimental to our internal allies security posture,” he added.
Moniz did not say whether U.S. allies had responded on this topic specifically, but said they have reached out about “many statements made in this campaign.”
Overruled
Flint official: State overruled plan for corrosion control
By JOHN FLESHER
An official with Flint's water plant said Tuesday he had planned to treat the drinking water with anti-corrosive chemicals after the city began drawing from the Flint River but was overruled by a state environmental regulator.
Mike Glasgow, then a supervisor at the plant and now the municipal utilities administrator, said he received the instruction from district engineer Mike Prysby of the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality during a meeting to discuss the final steps before Flint switched from the Detroit water system as a cost-saving measure in April 2014.
Glasgow said Prysby told him a year of water testing was required before a decision could be made on whether corrosion controls were needed, which the state DEQ has since acknowledged was a misreading of federal regulations on preventing lead and copper pollution. The omission enabled lead to leach from aging pipes and fixtures and contaminate tap water that reached some homes, businesses and schools.
"I did have some concerns and misgivings at first," Glasgow said before a joint legislative committee investigating the Flint water crisis. "But unfortunately, now that I look back, I relied on engineers and the state regulators to kind of direct the decision. I looked at them as having more knowledge than myself."
He added, "Now when I look back and as I move forward, wherever my career takes me, you can believe I will question some of the decisions of regulators above me in the future."
Lee-Anne Walters, who helped draw official attention to the problem after high lead levels were discovered in her house, told The Associated Press that hearing of the DEQ official's instruction to the city made her "nauseous."
"That one meeting was the difference between this city being poisoned and not being poisoned," she said.
A task force appointed by Republican Gov. Rick Snyder last week described the state as "fundamentally accountable" for Flint's lead-contaminated water crisis, partly because of the decision on corrosion controls. The group's report said the DEQ was primarily to blame, while the state Department of Health and Human Service and local and federal officials also made mistakes.
Flint, an impoverished city of nearly 100,000, was under control of emergency managers appointed by Snyder when decisions were made to switch the water sources and later to forgo corrosion treatments.
Glasgow said he wasn't consulted about the change in water sources and considered it a bad move. It followed a lengthy debate over whether the city should continue buying water from Detroit as it struggled to pay its bills.
He also wrote an email to a DEQ official a few weeks before the switchover, complaining that the process was moving too quickly and saying his staff needed more training. The plant had about 40 employees when he began working there in 2005, he said, but only 26 when it began treating and distributing Flint River water.
Even so, "I felt we had marching orders to go ahead," he said.
Had Flint decided to add phosphorus to the water to prevent corrosion as Detroit had done, there would have been a delay of up to six months to install the necessary equipment at the Flint plant, Glasgow said.
After a Virginia Tech professor and a local doctor went public with their findings that Flint's water had high lead readings, the city was returned to the Detroit system last October. Snyder has apologized for the state's failings but has rejected critics' demands to resign, which numerous Flint residents echoed during Tuesday's hearing. They also demanded more funding to replace the city's water pipes and care for people who have suffered.
"I'm begging you — help us," a weeping Barbie Biggs said.
By JOHN FLESHER
An official with Flint's water plant said Tuesday he had planned to treat the drinking water with anti-corrosive chemicals after the city began drawing from the Flint River but was overruled by a state environmental regulator.
Mike Glasgow, then a supervisor at the plant and now the municipal utilities administrator, said he received the instruction from district engineer Mike Prysby of the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality during a meeting to discuss the final steps before Flint switched from the Detroit water system as a cost-saving measure in April 2014.
Glasgow said Prysby told him a year of water testing was required before a decision could be made on whether corrosion controls were needed, which the state DEQ has since acknowledged was a misreading of federal regulations on preventing lead and copper pollution. The omission enabled lead to leach from aging pipes and fixtures and contaminate tap water that reached some homes, businesses and schools.
"I did have some concerns and misgivings at first," Glasgow said before a joint legislative committee investigating the Flint water crisis. "But unfortunately, now that I look back, I relied on engineers and the state regulators to kind of direct the decision. I looked at them as having more knowledge than myself."
He added, "Now when I look back and as I move forward, wherever my career takes me, you can believe I will question some of the decisions of regulators above me in the future."
Lee-Anne Walters, who helped draw official attention to the problem after high lead levels were discovered in her house, told The Associated Press that hearing of the DEQ official's instruction to the city made her "nauseous."
"That one meeting was the difference between this city being poisoned and not being poisoned," she said.
A task force appointed by Republican Gov. Rick Snyder last week described the state as "fundamentally accountable" for Flint's lead-contaminated water crisis, partly because of the decision on corrosion controls. The group's report said the DEQ was primarily to blame, while the state Department of Health and Human Service and local and federal officials also made mistakes.
Flint, an impoverished city of nearly 100,000, was under control of emergency managers appointed by Snyder when decisions were made to switch the water sources and later to forgo corrosion treatments.
Glasgow said he wasn't consulted about the change in water sources and considered it a bad move. It followed a lengthy debate over whether the city should continue buying water from Detroit as it struggled to pay its bills.
He also wrote an email to a DEQ official a few weeks before the switchover, complaining that the process was moving too quickly and saying his staff needed more training. The plant had about 40 employees when he began working there in 2005, he said, but only 26 when it began treating and distributing Flint River water.
Even so, "I felt we had marching orders to go ahead," he said.
Had Flint decided to add phosphorus to the water to prevent corrosion as Detroit had done, there would have been a delay of up to six months to install the necessary equipment at the Flint plant, Glasgow said.
After a Virginia Tech professor and a local doctor went public with their findings that Flint's water had high lead readings, the city was returned to the Detroit system last October. Snyder has apologized for the state's failings but has rejected critics' demands to resign, which numerous Flint residents echoed during Tuesday's hearing. They also demanded more funding to replace the city's water pipes and care for people who have suffered.
"I'm begging you — help us," a weeping Barbie Biggs said.
Being prosecuted
Women are already being prosecuted for having abortions
By Irin Carmon
Minutes after Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump told MSNBC’s Chris Matthews that “there has to be some form of punishment” for women seeking abortions, many anti-abortion rights advocates immediately distanced themselves.
A Cruz campaign staffer tweeted, “Trump doesn’t understand the pro-life position because he’s not pro-life.” In swiftly-issued statement, Jeanne Mancini, president of the March for Life Education and Defense Fund, said: “No pro-lifer would ever want to punish a woman who has chosen abortion. This is against the very nature of what we are about. We invite a woman who has gone down this route to consider paths to healing, not punishment.”
The anti-abortion movement has spent decades working to counter the accusation that it is anti-woman. Witness anti-abortion laws, like the one currently being considered by the Supreme Court, that put new restrictions on abortion providers in the name of protecting women’s health, as opposed to protecting fetal life. Advocates for banning abortion entirely have argued, extensively, that in the world they hope for, only abortion providers will be subject to criminal penalties.
But even under the status quo, where Roe v. Wade technically hasn’t been overturned, women are already being prosecuted and even convicted on suspicion of having abortions. Just ask Purvi Patel, who is appealing a 30-year prison sentence for her conviction for feticide in Indiana. Prosecutors said she had ordered abortion pills online and charged her with feticide, which had been initially touted as a way to prosecute people who attack pregnant women. The prosecutor in South Bend, Indiana who brought the case told MSNBC of prosecuting Patel under the feticide charge, “A more accurate title would be ‘unlawful termination of pregnancy.’”
Or ask Tennessee’s Anna Yocca, who at 24 weeks pregnant used a coat hanger to try to induce an abortion and later gave birth to a living child. Earlier this month, she pled not guilty to aggravated assault after having been initially charged with attempted murder. Or Rennie Gibbs, a Mississippi teenager who after a stillbirth was indicted for “depraved heart” murder for allegedly smoking crack during her pregnancy. Or Jennie Lynn McCormack, the Idaho woman who was initially prosecuted for violating the state’s 20 week abortion ban, until a federal court said it was unconstitutional.
Jennifer Whalen of Pennsylvania wasn’t jailed for having an abortion herself. In 2014, she began serving a 9-18 month sentence for ordering pills online so her sixteen year old daughter could end her pregnancy. The New York Times reported that the closest clinic to the Whalen family was about 75 miles away, and that she and her daughter worried about the travel and affording an abortion. The hospital where they went after Whalen’s daughter took the pills reported her to child protective authorities, and she was charged with a felony and three misdemeanors for violating the state’s abortion and medical regulations. In theory, the regulations that require that abortion be performed only by licensed medical personnel are put in place to protect women. In practice, women get prosecuted under them.
Under current abortion law, women cannot be prosecuted for going to a legal abortion provider and ending their pregnancies lawfully, which depending on the state can involve multiple visits to a clinic, a required ultrasound, a ban on using insurance coverage, and state-mandated information that many doctors consider medically inaccurate.
But as the cases of these women across the country show, women have been prosecuted under current restrictions on abortion, at times with major felonies. The underlying logic of the laws is that the embryo or fetus is worthy of legal protection to the point of prosecuting the pregnant woman.
A few hours after the town hall, Trump abruptly backed away from his own comments, saying that in the world anti-abortion advocates would prefer, in which abortion is illegal, the doctor who would perform an illegal abortion would be prosecuted, not the woman. “The woman is a victim in this case as is the life in her womb,” the Trump campaign said in a statement.
But a world in which abortion is banned entirely and women are themselves prosecuted for breaking that law is not so hard to imagine, after all.
By Irin Carmon
Minutes after Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump told MSNBC’s Chris Matthews that “there has to be some form of punishment” for women seeking abortions, many anti-abortion rights advocates immediately distanced themselves.
A Cruz campaign staffer tweeted, “Trump doesn’t understand the pro-life position because he’s not pro-life.” In swiftly-issued statement, Jeanne Mancini, president of the March for Life Education and Defense Fund, said: “No pro-lifer would ever want to punish a woman who has chosen abortion. This is against the very nature of what we are about. We invite a woman who has gone down this route to consider paths to healing, not punishment.”
The anti-abortion movement has spent decades working to counter the accusation that it is anti-woman. Witness anti-abortion laws, like the one currently being considered by the Supreme Court, that put new restrictions on abortion providers in the name of protecting women’s health, as opposed to protecting fetal life. Advocates for banning abortion entirely have argued, extensively, that in the world they hope for, only abortion providers will be subject to criminal penalties.
But even under the status quo, where Roe v. Wade technically hasn’t been overturned, women are already being prosecuted and even convicted on suspicion of having abortions. Just ask Purvi Patel, who is appealing a 30-year prison sentence for her conviction for feticide in Indiana. Prosecutors said she had ordered abortion pills online and charged her with feticide, which had been initially touted as a way to prosecute people who attack pregnant women. The prosecutor in South Bend, Indiana who brought the case told MSNBC of prosecuting Patel under the feticide charge, “A more accurate title would be ‘unlawful termination of pregnancy.’”
Or ask Tennessee’s Anna Yocca, who at 24 weeks pregnant used a coat hanger to try to induce an abortion and later gave birth to a living child. Earlier this month, she pled not guilty to aggravated assault after having been initially charged with attempted murder. Or Rennie Gibbs, a Mississippi teenager who after a stillbirth was indicted for “depraved heart” murder for allegedly smoking crack during her pregnancy. Or Jennie Lynn McCormack, the Idaho woman who was initially prosecuted for violating the state’s 20 week abortion ban, until a federal court said it was unconstitutional.
Jennifer Whalen of Pennsylvania wasn’t jailed for having an abortion herself. In 2014, she began serving a 9-18 month sentence for ordering pills online so her sixteen year old daughter could end her pregnancy. The New York Times reported that the closest clinic to the Whalen family was about 75 miles away, and that she and her daughter worried about the travel and affording an abortion. The hospital where they went after Whalen’s daughter took the pills reported her to child protective authorities, and she was charged with a felony and three misdemeanors for violating the state’s abortion and medical regulations. In theory, the regulations that require that abortion be performed only by licensed medical personnel are put in place to protect women. In practice, women get prosecuted under them.
Under current abortion law, women cannot be prosecuted for going to a legal abortion provider and ending their pregnancies lawfully, which depending on the state can involve multiple visits to a clinic, a required ultrasound, a ban on using insurance coverage, and state-mandated information that many doctors consider medically inaccurate.
But as the cases of these women across the country show, women have been prosecuted under current restrictions on abortion, at times with major felonies. The underlying logic of the laws is that the embryo or fetus is worthy of legal protection to the point of prosecuting the pregnant woman.
A few hours after the town hall, Trump abruptly backed away from his own comments, saying that in the world anti-abortion advocates would prefer, in which abortion is illegal, the doctor who would perform an illegal abortion would be prosecuted, not the woman. “The woman is a victim in this case as is the life in her womb,” the Trump campaign said in a statement.
But a world in which abortion is banned entirely and women are themselves prosecuted for breaking that law is not so hard to imagine, after all.
Doomed to Melt.....
Antarctica at Risk of Runaway Melting, Scientists Discover
By John Upton
The world’s greatest reservoir of ice is verging on a breakdown that could push seas to heights not experienced since prehistoric times, drowning dense coastal neighborhoods during the decades ahead, new computer models have shown.
A pair of researchers developed the models to help them understand high sea levels during previous eras of warmer temperatures. Then they ran simulations using those models and found that rising levels of greenhouse gases could trigger runaway Antarctic melting that alone could push sea levels up by more than three feet by century’s end.
The same models showed that Antarctica’s ice sheet would remain largely intact if the most ambitious goals of last year’s Paris agreement on climate change are achieved.
The new findings were published Wednesday in the journal Nature, helping to fill yawning gaps in earlier projections of sea level rise.
The models were produced by a collaboration between two scientists that began in the 1990s. In those models, rising air temperatures in Antarctica caused meltwater to seep into cracks in floating shelves of ice, disintegrating them and exposing sheer cliffs that collapsed under their own weight into the Southern Ocean.
Similar effects of warming are already being observed in Greenland and in some parts of Antarctica, as greenhouse gas pollution from fossil fuels, farming and deforestation warms the air. Last year was the hottest on record, easily surpassing a record set one year earlier. The ice sheets are also being melted from beneath by warming ocean temperatures.
“Sea level has risen a lot — 10 to 20 meters — in warm periods in the past, and our ice sheet models couldn’t make the Antarctic ice sheet retreat enough to explain that,” said David Pollard, a Penn State climate scientist who produced Wednesday’s study with UMass professor Robert DeConto.
“We were looking for new mechanisms that could make the ice more vulnerable to climate warming to explain past sea level rise,” Pollard said.
The breakdown that they discovered was not triggered when warming in the models was limited to levels similar to those called for under the Paris Agreement — something that Pollard described as potentially “good news.” That agreement aims to keep warming to well below 2°C (3.6°F) compared with preindustrial times. Since then, temperatures have already warmed 1°C.
“You need to have a lot of melt to do this,” Pollard said.
Although the Paris Agreement contained highly ambitious goals, individual countries have not come close to committing to action plans that would ensure that the goals are actually realized.
If pollution continues to be released without being reined in, the modeling showed that high Antarctic air temperatures could lead to melting that would push up sea levels by dozens of feet during the centuries ahead. Warmer ocean waters would prevent a recovery for thousands of years after that, the scientists found.
Ongoing work is planned to refine the projections, which remain imprecise, but are nonetheless being hailed by climate scientists as an important step forward in understanding the planet’s future.
“It’s an important paper,” said Luke Trusel, a Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution scientist who was not involved in producing it, and who has recently published high-profile research on Antarctica and climate change.
“It really starts to look at some of the more underappreciated aspects of climate change across Antarctica,” Trusel said. “They’re starting to look at how sensitive ice shelves are to climate change.”
Assessments by the United Nations and others have previously assumed the effects on Antarctica’s ice sheet would be negligible as temperatures rise. The new study is the latest in a growing list of peer-reviewed papers that rejects that optimistic scenario as unrealistic.
In major East Coast cities, where land is sinking at the same time that seas are rising, an independent analysis by Climate Central shows that the rapid Antarctic melting described by the new modeling effort would push tide levels up by between five and six feet this century alone.
Climate Central’s analysis combined mid-range values from the new projections for Antarctic melting with previous mid-range projections regarding global sea level rise, along with local factors such as sinking that naturally occurs in some areas. It illuminated the dangerous collective impacts of the different ways that climate change is expected to affect sea levels.
If climate pollution is quickly and dramatically reined in, the analysis shows sea level rise in major East Coast cities, including New York, Boston and Baltimore, could be kept to less than two feet — which could nonetheless see developed stretches of shorelines regularly or permanently flooded.
Problems associated with sea level rise are expected to be worse in Louisiana, where stretches of land are being lost to erosion caused by flood control projects and gas and oil exploration. New Orleans could see more than seven feet of sea level rise by 2100, Climate Central’s analysis of the new findings showed.
West Coast cities would experience four to five feet of sea level rise by 2100, Climate Central found.
The new paper by Pollard and DeConto was received positively by sea level rise scientists. That contrasts with overwhelmingly skeptical responses to a recent apocalyptic scenario that was finalized and published last week by a team of researchers led by well-known scientist-turned-activist James Hansen.
Hansen’s 52-page academic treatise, published in the journal Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics following an unconventional peer review process, described a dystopian near-future in which climate change triggers superstorms and more than 10 feet of sea-level.
John Church, an Australian government scientist who specializes in sea level rise projections, cautioned that the experiments used to produce Wednesday’s paper were based on too few models to give him total confidence in the findings. But he said his “overall reaction” to the paper was “positive.”
“Yes, the projections are larger than previous estimates,” Church said. “But not in the unrealistic range like Hansen et al.”
The recent Hansen paper was a “worse-case scenario,” said NASA scientist Eric Rignot, one of its coauthors.
Rignot said the Antarctic study published Wednesday was “absolutely realistic.”
“I think it is setting up a new paradigm for sea level projections, because their numbers are much higher than those from traditional ice sheet models with incomplete or simplified physics,” Rignot said. “Once the ice shelves are gone, melted away, calving of big walls will be the dominant process of mass wastage. It is a great paper.”
By John Upton
The world’s greatest reservoir of ice is verging on a breakdown that could push seas to heights not experienced since prehistoric times, drowning dense coastal neighborhoods during the decades ahead, new computer models have shown.
A pair of researchers developed the models to help them understand high sea levels during previous eras of warmer temperatures. Then they ran simulations using those models and found that rising levels of greenhouse gases could trigger runaway Antarctic melting that alone could push sea levels up by more than three feet by century’s end.
The same models showed that Antarctica’s ice sheet would remain largely intact if the most ambitious goals of last year’s Paris agreement on climate change are achieved.
The new findings were published Wednesday in the journal Nature, helping to fill yawning gaps in earlier projections of sea level rise.
The models were produced by a collaboration between two scientists that began in the 1990s. In those models, rising air temperatures in Antarctica caused meltwater to seep into cracks in floating shelves of ice, disintegrating them and exposing sheer cliffs that collapsed under their own weight into the Southern Ocean.
Similar effects of warming are already being observed in Greenland and in some parts of Antarctica, as greenhouse gas pollution from fossil fuels, farming and deforestation warms the air. Last year was the hottest on record, easily surpassing a record set one year earlier. The ice sheets are also being melted from beneath by warming ocean temperatures.
“Sea level has risen a lot — 10 to 20 meters — in warm periods in the past, and our ice sheet models couldn’t make the Antarctic ice sheet retreat enough to explain that,” said David Pollard, a Penn State climate scientist who produced Wednesday’s study with UMass professor Robert DeConto.
“We were looking for new mechanisms that could make the ice more vulnerable to climate warming to explain past sea level rise,” Pollard said.
The breakdown that they discovered was not triggered when warming in the models was limited to levels similar to those called for under the Paris Agreement — something that Pollard described as potentially “good news.” That agreement aims to keep warming to well below 2°C (3.6°F) compared with preindustrial times. Since then, temperatures have already warmed 1°C.
“You need to have a lot of melt to do this,” Pollard said.
Although the Paris Agreement contained highly ambitious goals, individual countries have not come close to committing to action plans that would ensure that the goals are actually realized.
If pollution continues to be released without being reined in, the modeling showed that high Antarctic air temperatures could lead to melting that would push up sea levels by dozens of feet during the centuries ahead. Warmer ocean waters would prevent a recovery for thousands of years after that, the scientists found.
Ongoing work is planned to refine the projections, which remain imprecise, but are nonetheless being hailed by climate scientists as an important step forward in understanding the planet’s future.
“It’s an important paper,” said Luke Trusel, a Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution scientist who was not involved in producing it, and who has recently published high-profile research on Antarctica and climate change.
“It really starts to look at some of the more underappreciated aspects of climate change across Antarctica,” Trusel said. “They’re starting to look at how sensitive ice shelves are to climate change.”
Assessments by the United Nations and others have previously assumed the effects on Antarctica’s ice sheet would be negligible as temperatures rise. The new study is the latest in a growing list of peer-reviewed papers that rejects that optimistic scenario as unrealistic.
In major East Coast cities, where land is sinking at the same time that seas are rising, an independent analysis by Climate Central shows that the rapid Antarctic melting described by the new modeling effort would push tide levels up by between five and six feet this century alone.
Climate Central’s analysis combined mid-range values from the new projections for Antarctic melting with previous mid-range projections regarding global sea level rise, along with local factors such as sinking that naturally occurs in some areas. It illuminated the dangerous collective impacts of the different ways that climate change is expected to affect sea levels.
If climate pollution is quickly and dramatically reined in, the analysis shows sea level rise in major East Coast cities, including New York, Boston and Baltimore, could be kept to less than two feet — which could nonetheless see developed stretches of shorelines regularly or permanently flooded.
Problems associated with sea level rise are expected to be worse in Louisiana, where stretches of land are being lost to erosion caused by flood control projects and gas and oil exploration. New Orleans could see more than seven feet of sea level rise by 2100, Climate Central’s analysis of the new findings showed.
West Coast cities would experience four to five feet of sea level rise by 2100, Climate Central found.
The new paper by Pollard and DeConto was received positively by sea level rise scientists. That contrasts with overwhelmingly skeptical responses to a recent apocalyptic scenario that was finalized and published last week by a team of researchers led by well-known scientist-turned-activist James Hansen.
Hansen’s 52-page academic treatise, published in the journal Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics following an unconventional peer review process, described a dystopian near-future in which climate change triggers superstorms and more than 10 feet of sea-level.
John Church, an Australian government scientist who specializes in sea level rise projections, cautioned that the experiments used to produce Wednesday’s paper were based on too few models to give him total confidence in the findings. But he said his “overall reaction” to the paper was “positive.”
“Yes, the projections are larger than previous estimates,” Church said. “But not in the unrealistic range like Hansen et al.”
The recent Hansen paper was a “worse-case scenario,” said NASA scientist Eric Rignot, one of its coauthors.
Rignot said the Antarctic study published Wednesday was “absolutely realistic.”
“I think it is setting up a new paradigm for sea level projections, because their numbers are much higher than those from traditional ice sheet models with incomplete or simplified physics,” Rignot said. “Once the ice shelves are gone, melted away, calving of big walls will be the dominant process of mass wastage. It is a great paper.”
Leahy clashes
Leahy clashes with Netanyahu over Israeli rights record
By Nahal Toosi
Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are in a war of words over the Democrat's request that the State Department investigate alleged human rights violations by Israeli and Egyptian security forces.
Leahy and 10 House members sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry on Feb. 17 that lists several examples of alleged Egyptian and Israeli "gross violations of human rights," including extrajudicial killings, that should be examined. The letter's contents were first reported by POLITICO on Tuesday evening.
Leahy’s signature drew special attention because his name is on a law that conditions U.S. military aid to foreign countries on those countries' human rights records.
“In light of these reports (of suspected abuses) we request that you act promptly to determine their credibility and whether they trigger the Leahy Law and, if so, take appropriate action called for under the law,” the letter states.
The lawmakers' request was big news in Israel on Wednesday. Leaders there bristled at the notion that the Middle Eastern democracy and longtime U.S. ally could be cast as a human rights abuser.
Netanyahu issued a sharp response, defending his security forces, whom he said protect the innocent from "bloodthirsty terrorists who come to murder them."
"This letter should have been addressed instead to those who incite youngsters to commit cruel acts of terrorism," said Netanyahu in a statement released by his aides.
Leahy chided Netanyahu in a statement of his own, writing: "The prime minister of Israel knows — and it should go without saying" — that the U.S. has long supported Israel in its struggle against Palestinian militant groups such as Hamas, and that there are many U.S. laws prohibiting aid to such groups.
"The congressional letter cites allegations of possible serious abuses, identified by respected international human rights organizations, by the military and police forces of Egypt and Israel. Under the Leahy Law it is the responsibility of the State Department to evaluate the credibility of such allegations," the senator wrote.
It's difficult to measure the impact of the Leahy Law in part because the U.S. often keeps secret if and when it applies the statute. And while U.S. funding to a particular foreign military unit may be cut off as a result of the law, overall U.S. military aid to the country need not be stopped.
Egypt’s inclusion in the lawmakers' missive also is a tricky issue. The U.S. is so wary of losing the Arab country's alliance that it declined to call the military’s 2013 takeover over of the elected Muslim Brotherhood government a "coup" — knowing that it would trigger a legal obligation to stop military aid.
State Department spokesman John Kirby said Wednesday that Kerry had received the letter and that a response is in the works.
The U.S. already applies the Leahy Law in Egypt and Israel, "in the same way we do globally," Kirby said. "We do not provide assistance to any security force unit in Egypt or Israel when we have credible information that they have committed a gross violation of human rights."
State Department officials, however, declined to offer any examples of when they've used the Leahy Law to cut off funding for Egyptian or Israeli military units.
By Nahal Toosi
Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are in a war of words over the Democrat's request that the State Department investigate alleged human rights violations by Israeli and Egyptian security forces.
Leahy and 10 House members sent a letter to Secretary of State John Kerry on Feb. 17 that lists several examples of alleged Egyptian and Israeli "gross violations of human rights," including extrajudicial killings, that should be examined. The letter's contents were first reported by POLITICO on Tuesday evening.
Leahy’s signature drew special attention because his name is on a law that conditions U.S. military aid to foreign countries on those countries' human rights records.
“In light of these reports (of suspected abuses) we request that you act promptly to determine their credibility and whether they trigger the Leahy Law and, if so, take appropriate action called for under the law,” the letter states.
The lawmakers' request was big news in Israel on Wednesday. Leaders there bristled at the notion that the Middle Eastern democracy and longtime U.S. ally could be cast as a human rights abuser.
Netanyahu issued a sharp response, defending his security forces, whom he said protect the innocent from "bloodthirsty terrorists who come to murder them."
"This letter should have been addressed instead to those who incite youngsters to commit cruel acts of terrorism," said Netanyahu in a statement released by his aides.
Leahy chided Netanyahu in a statement of his own, writing: "The prime minister of Israel knows — and it should go without saying" — that the U.S. has long supported Israel in its struggle against Palestinian militant groups such as Hamas, and that there are many U.S. laws prohibiting aid to such groups.
"The congressional letter cites allegations of possible serious abuses, identified by respected international human rights organizations, by the military and police forces of Egypt and Israel. Under the Leahy Law it is the responsibility of the State Department to evaluate the credibility of such allegations," the senator wrote.
It's difficult to measure the impact of the Leahy Law in part because the U.S. often keeps secret if and when it applies the statute. And while U.S. funding to a particular foreign military unit may be cut off as a result of the law, overall U.S. military aid to the country need not be stopped.
Egypt’s inclusion in the lawmakers' missive also is a tricky issue. The U.S. is so wary of losing the Arab country's alliance that it declined to call the military’s 2013 takeover over of the elected Muslim Brotherhood government a "coup" — knowing that it would trigger a legal obligation to stop military aid.
State Department spokesman John Kirby said Wednesday that Kerry had received the letter and that a response is in the works.
The U.S. already applies the Leahy Law in Egypt and Israel, "in the same way we do globally," Kirby said. "We do not provide assistance to any security force unit in Egypt or Israel when we have credible information that they have committed a gross violation of human rights."
State Department officials, however, declined to offer any examples of when they've used the Leahy Law to cut off funding for Egyptian or Israeli military units.
Destruction
Present at the Destruction
By Rich Lowry
Donald Trump never ceases to amaze, but his answer at a CNN town hall about the pledge he had taken to support the Republican Party's nominee was still jaw-dropping.
Not only did Trump say that the pledge is null and void as far as he's concerned, he also went further and told CNN's Anderson Cooper that he doesn't want the support of Ted Cruz.
Here is a front-runner for a major party's nomination doing all he can to repel his nearest competitor, who has won 5,732,220 votes so far, or 29 percent of the total (Trump has won 39 percent), and speaks for a significant, and highly engaged, faction of the party. Is there any precedent for such a willfully and pointlessly destructive act in modern American politics?
Every rational calculation says that Trump should seek to preserve the pledge. At this point, he is more likely than anyone else to be the nominee and benefit from the support of his competitors. He should want to use every possible lever of unity at his disposal given the threats of an independent conservative candidacy should he win the nomination. And yet, he's done the opposite.
Who can guess why? Stupid pride? A manliness contest, where he wants the likes of Ted Cruz eventually to have to offer his support even after he says he doesn't want it? A disdain for every political convention, even one that might help him?
Whatever the reason, it is yet another sign that Trump is all about himself. In this sense, he is already what the RNC feared when it got him to sign the pledge—a third-party candidate. He's running against the Republican Party from within the Republican Party. He cares nothing about its values or its interests. He favors it exactly to the extent it can be subordinated to him and no further.
Political parties have been riven by clashes of personalities and ideologies before, but it is hard to think of another example of a party so damaged by such a heedless interloper.
It's been a month since the smart commentary after Super Tuesday said that Donald Trump was pivoting to being more presidential and unifying. Since then, he has: declared that he'd consider paying the legal bills of a goon who sucker-punched a black protester; talked of riots at the Republican convention if it doesn't go his way; threatened and mocked Heidi Cruz; and justified his campaign manager's manhandling of a female journalist in the most asinine and dishonest ways.
It has become a truism in the coverage of Trump that nothing can hurt him, and with his base that is certainly true. But everyone else has been paying attention, and Trump has made himself toxic with the general public. His unfavorable ratings are in the 60s and his poor standing with women and the college-educated will make it hard for him to consolidate the white vote on which his chances depend. He's losing to Hillary Clinton in head-to-head matchups by double digits in the RealClearPolitics average.
Events can always intervene, and Hillary certainly has her own weaknesses, but every objective indicator is that nominating Trump will mean a badly divided Republican Party loses in the fall, perhaps badly, maybe even epically.
Since it seems unlikely that Cruz can overtake Trump in the delegate count, the most favorable non-Trump scenario is that Cruz beats him on a second ballot at a convention and has enough anti-establishment credibility to take the edge off the inevitable revolt of the Trump forces. But surely Trump would do all he could to destroy Cruz and the GOP in retribution for denying him the nomination—lawsuits, innuendo and lies would all be ready and familiar tools at Trump's disposal, even if he didn't try to mount a late independent bid.
Trump's implicit threat is almost certainly lose with me in a simulacrum of a normal process (and lose your integrity and principles along the way), or almost certainly lose without me in an intraparty cataclysm I will make as spectacular as possible. Either way, the GOP is now managing bad outcomes.
It can take some comfort in the fact that presidential candidates in past contentious conventions at least came back to make it close, Jerry Ford in 1976 and Hubert Humphrey in 1968. Moreover, political parties are durable things, and even when they immolate themselves, they tend to rise from the ashes. Republicans won the White House four years after nominating Barry Goldwater, and Democrats four years after nominating George McGovern.
The Trump phenomenon holds important lessons for the GOP, especially about its dated policy creed and out-of-touch elites. But there is no escaping the insuperable weakness and failings of Trump himself, namely his egotism, immaturity, irresponsibility and habitual dishonesty. That one of his most stalwart supporters, Ann Coulter, felt moved to muse that he's "mental" tells you all you need to know about the Republican front-runner.
The RNC thought it had scored a victory so many months ago when Donald Trump signed its pledge. Instead, it was enacting the political equivalent of the fable of the scorpion and the frog.
By Rich Lowry
Donald Trump never ceases to amaze, but his answer at a CNN town hall about the pledge he had taken to support the Republican Party's nominee was still jaw-dropping.
Not only did Trump say that the pledge is null and void as far as he's concerned, he also went further and told CNN's Anderson Cooper that he doesn't want the support of Ted Cruz.
Here is a front-runner for a major party's nomination doing all he can to repel his nearest competitor, who has won 5,732,220 votes so far, or 29 percent of the total (Trump has won 39 percent), and speaks for a significant, and highly engaged, faction of the party. Is there any precedent for such a willfully and pointlessly destructive act in modern American politics?
Every rational calculation says that Trump should seek to preserve the pledge. At this point, he is more likely than anyone else to be the nominee and benefit from the support of his competitors. He should want to use every possible lever of unity at his disposal given the threats of an independent conservative candidacy should he win the nomination. And yet, he's done the opposite.
Who can guess why? Stupid pride? A manliness contest, where he wants the likes of Ted Cruz eventually to have to offer his support even after he says he doesn't want it? A disdain for every political convention, even one that might help him?
Whatever the reason, it is yet another sign that Trump is all about himself. In this sense, he is already what the RNC feared when it got him to sign the pledge—a third-party candidate. He's running against the Republican Party from within the Republican Party. He cares nothing about its values or its interests. He favors it exactly to the extent it can be subordinated to him and no further.
Political parties have been riven by clashes of personalities and ideologies before, but it is hard to think of another example of a party so damaged by such a heedless interloper.
It's been a month since the smart commentary after Super Tuesday said that Donald Trump was pivoting to being more presidential and unifying. Since then, he has: declared that he'd consider paying the legal bills of a goon who sucker-punched a black protester; talked of riots at the Republican convention if it doesn't go his way; threatened and mocked Heidi Cruz; and justified his campaign manager's manhandling of a female journalist in the most asinine and dishonest ways.
It has become a truism in the coverage of Trump that nothing can hurt him, and with his base that is certainly true. But everyone else has been paying attention, and Trump has made himself toxic with the general public. His unfavorable ratings are in the 60s and his poor standing with women and the college-educated will make it hard for him to consolidate the white vote on which his chances depend. He's losing to Hillary Clinton in head-to-head matchups by double digits in the RealClearPolitics average.
Events can always intervene, and Hillary certainly has her own weaknesses, but every objective indicator is that nominating Trump will mean a badly divided Republican Party loses in the fall, perhaps badly, maybe even epically.
Since it seems unlikely that Cruz can overtake Trump in the delegate count, the most favorable non-Trump scenario is that Cruz beats him on a second ballot at a convention and has enough anti-establishment credibility to take the edge off the inevitable revolt of the Trump forces. But surely Trump would do all he could to destroy Cruz and the GOP in retribution for denying him the nomination—lawsuits, innuendo and lies would all be ready and familiar tools at Trump's disposal, even if he didn't try to mount a late independent bid.
Trump's implicit threat is almost certainly lose with me in a simulacrum of a normal process (and lose your integrity and principles along the way), or almost certainly lose without me in an intraparty cataclysm I will make as spectacular as possible. Either way, the GOP is now managing bad outcomes.
It can take some comfort in the fact that presidential candidates in past contentious conventions at least came back to make it close, Jerry Ford in 1976 and Hubert Humphrey in 1968. Moreover, political parties are durable things, and even when they immolate themselves, they tend to rise from the ashes. Republicans won the White House four years after nominating Barry Goldwater, and Democrats four years after nominating George McGovern.
The Trump phenomenon holds important lessons for the GOP, especially about its dated policy creed and out-of-touch elites. But there is no escaping the insuperable weakness and failings of Trump himself, namely his egotism, immaturity, irresponsibility and habitual dishonesty. That one of his most stalwart supporters, Ann Coulter, felt moved to muse that he's "mental" tells you all you need to know about the Republican front-runner.
The RNC thought it had scored a victory so many months ago when Donald Trump signed its pledge. Instead, it was enacting the political equivalent of the fable of the scorpion and the frog.
New protocol
New abortion protocol could thwart anti-abortion laws
The agency updated the label requirements for mifepristone, the pill used in a medication abortion, so that some doses can be taken at home.
By Jennifer Haberkorn
The FDA on Wednesday waded into abortion politics by expanding its approval of a drug used for medication abortions, a decision that could make the procedure more easily available in at least three states where it was tightly controlled.
The agency updated the label requirements for mifepristone, the pill used in a medication abortion, so that some doses can be taken at home. Fewer doctor visits and a lower dosage will make the procedure cheaper; the new protocol also extends from 49 days to 70 days the period of pregnancy during which a woman can use the drug.
Health care providers have used the protocol approved Wednesday for years because scientific evidence showed it to be safe and effective. But in at least three states — Texas, Ohio and North Dakota — anti-abortion laws required health care providers to use only FDA-approved processes.
In those states, medication abortions could be nearly impossible to obtain because of the added expense and doctor visits required. Typically, providers in the three states recommended more invasive surgical abortions, even when a woman was not far along into a pregnancy.
Three other states — Arizona, Arkansas and Oklahoma — had passed similarly strict laws that were enjoined by the courts prior to the FDA announcement.
Health care providers in each of the states were now expected to begin offering medication abortions within days.
"Today, medication abortion care is once again a real option for Ohio women," said NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio Executive Director Kellie Copeland. "Ohio physicians no longer have to follow an outdated, draconian protocol enacted by anti-choice politicians, which forces women to take more medication and make more trips to the clinic than is medically necessary."
The changes were backed by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, National Abortion Federation, Planned Parenthood, the Center for Reproductive Rights and other groups that support abortion rights.
The protocol approved Wednesday has been in place at Planned Parenthood for some time, said Raegan McDonald-Mosley, chief medical officer at Planned Parenthood Federation of America. “But given the restrictions on medication abortion enacted at the state level in recent years, updating the label to reflect best medical practice represents a significant step forward for science, for women, and for health care providers who want to give our patients the highest quality care.”
The increasing availability of telemedicine abortions — in which doctors at a remote location instruct a woman in a clinic by video on how to use mifepristone — could also expand use of the drug in the many areas of the country where clinics have been closing.
Physicians routinely use off-label protocols for other drugs, and it was only political opposition to abortion that led to the restrictions of mifepristone’s use in the three states.
National Right to Life, which opposes abortion, said that the FDA underplayed the health risks of a medication abortion.
“It is obvious that the FDA's new protocol serves only the interests of the abortion industry by expanding their base of potential customers, increasing their profit margin, and reducing the level of staff and amount of resources they have to devote to the patient,” said National Right to Life Director of Education and Research Randall K. O’Bannon. “It is clear whose interests it is the FDA is serving. It isn't the women, and it isn't the babies.”
The only benefit for the company that makes the drug, Danco Laboratories, is that it can now advertise the updated protocols, which won't change much since health providers in most places were already using them.
Abortion rights supporters and researchers had encouraged Danco to ask the FDA for the new label for many years because of the restrictions, which limited providers from using “the evidence-based regimes, so women in those states have been virtually denied care,” said Vicki Saporta, president and CEO of the National Abortion Federation.
Danco first asked for a new label last May, said Beverly Winikoff, president of Gynuity Health Projects, which has extensively studied mifepristone. She cited the extensive fees required. “It has taken this long for them to feel like it was worth” the cost, she said.
The agency updated the label requirements for mifepristone, the pill used in a medication abortion, so that some doses can be taken at home.
By Jennifer Haberkorn
The FDA on Wednesday waded into abortion politics by expanding its approval of a drug used for medication abortions, a decision that could make the procedure more easily available in at least three states where it was tightly controlled.
The agency updated the label requirements for mifepristone, the pill used in a medication abortion, so that some doses can be taken at home. Fewer doctor visits and a lower dosage will make the procedure cheaper; the new protocol also extends from 49 days to 70 days the period of pregnancy during which a woman can use the drug.
Health care providers have used the protocol approved Wednesday for years because scientific evidence showed it to be safe and effective. But in at least three states — Texas, Ohio and North Dakota — anti-abortion laws required health care providers to use only FDA-approved processes.
In those states, medication abortions could be nearly impossible to obtain because of the added expense and doctor visits required. Typically, providers in the three states recommended more invasive surgical abortions, even when a woman was not far along into a pregnancy.
Three other states — Arizona, Arkansas and Oklahoma — had passed similarly strict laws that were enjoined by the courts prior to the FDA announcement.
Health care providers in each of the states were now expected to begin offering medication abortions within days.
"Today, medication abortion care is once again a real option for Ohio women," said NARAL Pro-Choice Ohio Executive Director Kellie Copeland. "Ohio physicians no longer have to follow an outdated, draconian protocol enacted by anti-choice politicians, which forces women to take more medication and make more trips to the clinic than is medically necessary."
The changes were backed by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, National Abortion Federation, Planned Parenthood, the Center for Reproductive Rights and other groups that support abortion rights.
The protocol approved Wednesday has been in place at Planned Parenthood for some time, said Raegan McDonald-Mosley, chief medical officer at Planned Parenthood Federation of America. “But given the restrictions on medication abortion enacted at the state level in recent years, updating the label to reflect best medical practice represents a significant step forward for science, for women, and for health care providers who want to give our patients the highest quality care.”
The increasing availability of telemedicine abortions — in which doctors at a remote location instruct a woman in a clinic by video on how to use mifepristone — could also expand use of the drug in the many areas of the country where clinics have been closing.
Physicians routinely use off-label protocols for other drugs, and it was only political opposition to abortion that led to the restrictions of mifepristone’s use in the three states.
National Right to Life, which opposes abortion, said that the FDA underplayed the health risks of a medication abortion.
“It is obvious that the FDA's new protocol serves only the interests of the abortion industry by expanding their base of potential customers, increasing their profit margin, and reducing the level of staff and amount of resources they have to devote to the patient,” said National Right to Life Director of Education and Research Randall K. O’Bannon. “It is clear whose interests it is the FDA is serving. It isn't the women, and it isn't the babies.”
The only benefit for the company that makes the drug, Danco Laboratories, is that it can now advertise the updated protocols, which won't change much since health providers in most places were already using them.
Abortion rights supporters and researchers had encouraged Danco to ask the FDA for the new label for many years because of the restrictions, which limited providers from using “the evidence-based regimes, so women in those states have been virtually denied care,” said Vicki Saporta, president and CEO of the National Abortion Federation.
Danco first asked for a new label last May, said Beverly Winikoff, president of Gynuity Health Projects, which has extensively studied mifepristone. She cited the extensive fees required. “It has taken this long for them to feel like it was worth” the cost, she said.
Foreign policy team...
Trump to meet with foreign policy team in Washington
By Alex Isenstadt
Donald Trump will be in Washington, D.C. on Thursday to meet privately with members of his newly established foreign policy team, according to people familiar with his schedule.
Corey Lewandowski, Trump’s campaign manager, confirmed in an email that the real estate mogul would be in the nation’s capital, but he did not provide further details on Trump’s schedule.
Trump does not have any campaign events listed on his public schedule, even though Wisconsin’s primary is just five days away. A Marquette Law School poll released on Wednesday showed Trump trailing Cruz by 10 points in the state.
Trump for months had declined to name his foreign policy advisers, and has said that he largely relies on himself when it comes to matters of national security and international relations.
"I know what I’m doing and I listen to a lot of people, I talk to a lot of people and at the appropriate time I’ll tell you who the people are," Trump said earlier this month. “But my primary consultant is myself and I have a good instinct for this stuff."
A week later, he rattled off the names of five men who are sources of regular advice on national security: Walid Phares, Carter Page, George Papadopoulos, Joe Schmitz, and Gen. Keith Kellogg.
The list, however, provided little reassurance to those concerned about Trump’s readiness to become commander in chief, as many of his named advisers are either unknowns or have mixed reputations among GOP national security pros.
He set off fresh alarm bells on Wednesday when he lamented the existence of the Geneva Conventions. “The problem is we have the Geneva Conventions, all sorts of rules and regulations, so the soldiers are afraid to fight,” Trump said at an afternoon town hall as he talked about his approach to torture.
The remark on international rules of war was just one of many eyebrow-raising statements that have created a streak of negative headlines for the New York businessman and have freshly called into question his ability to unify the GOP behind him.
On Thursday he draw considerable fire from both the left and the right when he stated in a TV interview that women who get abortions should be punished if the procedure becomes outlawed.
In a rare move, Trump reversed himself, with his campaign sending out two clarifying statements about his views on abortion.
“If Congress were to pass legislation making abortion illegal and the federal courts upheld this legislation, or any state were permitted to ban abortion under state and federal law, the doctor or any other person performing this illegal act upon a woman would be held legally responsible, not the woman. The woman is a victim in this case as is the life in her womb. My position has not changed - like Ronald Reagan, I am pro-life with exceptions,” the latter statement read.
By Alex Isenstadt
Donald Trump will be in Washington, D.C. on Thursday to meet privately with members of his newly established foreign policy team, according to people familiar with his schedule.
Corey Lewandowski, Trump’s campaign manager, confirmed in an email that the real estate mogul would be in the nation’s capital, but he did not provide further details on Trump’s schedule.
Trump does not have any campaign events listed on his public schedule, even though Wisconsin’s primary is just five days away. A Marquette Law School poll released on Wednesday showed Trump trailing Cruz by 10 points in the state.
Trump for months had declined to name his foreign policy advisers, and has said that he largely relies on himself when it comes to matters of national security and international relations.
"I know what I’m doing and I listen to a lot of people, I talk to a lot of people and at the appropriate time I’ll tell you who the people are," Trump said earlier this month. “But my primary consultant is myself and I have a good instinct for this stuff."
A week later, he rattled off the names of five men who are sources of regular advice on national security: Walid Phares, Carter Page, George Papadopoulos, Joe Schmitz, and Gen. Keith Kellogg.
The list, however, provided little reassurance to those concerned about Trump’s readiness to become commander in chief, as many of his named advisers are either unknowns or have mixed reputations among GOP national security pros.
He set off fresh alarm bells on Wednesday when he lamented the existence of the Geneva Conventions. “The problem is we have the Geneva Conventions, all sorts of rules and regulations, so the soldiers are afraid to fight,” Trump said at an afternoon town hall as he talked about his approach to torture.
The remark on international rules of war was just one of many eyebrow-raising statements that have created a streak of negative headlines for the New York businessman and have freshly called into question his ability to unify the GOP behind him.
On Thursday he draw considerable fire from both the left and the right when he stated in a TV interview that women who get abortions should be punished if the procedure becomes outlawed.
In a rare move, Trump reversed himself, with his campaign sending out two clarifying statements about his views on abortion.
“If Congress were to pass legislation making abortion illegal and the federal courts upheld this legislation, or any state were permitted to ban abortion under state and federal law, the doctor or any other person performing this illegal act upon a woman would be held legally responsible, not the woman. The woman is a victim in this case as is the life in her womb. My position has not changed - like Ronald Reagan, I am pro-life with exceptions,” the latter statement read.
Daily Show
Kasich: Trump lucky that Jon Stewart isn't running 'Daily Show' anymore
By Nick Gass
Donald Trump should feel very lucky that Jon Stewart is no longer hosting "The Daily Show," John Kasich declared Thursday morning, as the Ohio governor ratcheted up his attacks on the Republican frontrunner, calling into question statements Trump has made not only over the course of the campaign but also the past 24 hours.
“The past 24 hours revealed in the clearest way yet that Donald Trump is not prepared to be President. On top of all his previous inflammatory statements, yesterday he proposed punishing women who receive abortions, attacked the Geneva Conventions and said he’d nominate Supreme Court justices based on who will look into Hillary Clinton’s email scandal," Kasich said in a statement, referring to a series of remarks Trump made in interviews and in campaign appearances as he made his way through Wisconsin ahead of the state's April 5 primary.
Kasich followed up his statement with appearances on ABC's "Good Morning America" and on MSNBC's "Morning Joe."
"I mean, it’s like a panoply of mistakes and outrageous statements. You know what it is with Donald? It's just a stream of consciousness," he said on ABC, adding, "we're dealing in such a serious time with the problem of global security, terrorism and here at home very poor economic growth, many feeling as though they've got no future. You can't operate like this. You are going to be president of the United States. People around the world must be having a field day, and you know what Donald ought to be happy about is that Jon Stewart’s not running 'The Daily Show.'"
Trump later walked back his assertion that women who have abortions should face punishment, issuing a statement that his "position has not changed."
"If Congress were to pass legislation making abortion illegal and the federal courts upheld this legislation, or any state were permitted to ban abortion under state and federal law, the doctor or any other person performing this illegal act upon a woman would be held legally responsible, not the woman," Trump said in the statement Wednesday.
Kasich then declared Trump "not ready" to be commander in chief.
"He talks loosely about the use of nuclear weapons and of dismantling NATO," the governor of Ohio stated. "America is facing major challenges at home and abroad and cannot afford to elect a President who does not respect the seriousness of the office."
During a town hall discussion with MSNBC's Chris Matthews on Wednesday, Trump said, "Look, nuclear should be off the table, but would there a time when it could be used? Possibly." As far as whether he would use nuclear weapons in Europe, as Matthews pressed him further, Trump added, ""I am not—I am not taking cards off the table."
"Since the beginning of the campaign, I have focused on uniting our country and finding solutions to the threats we are facing. I believe you can be a defender of life while respecting women, you can defend our country without alienating our allies and basic human rights and you win against Hillary Clinton without using outlandish rhetoric," Kasich concluded. "As President, I will approach every day with the seriousness of purpose our country deserves.”
The statement is only the latest in a series of critical comments Kasich has made about Trump, as the Ohio governor looks to position himself favorably for a contested convention, which at this point is his only chance of becoming the Republican nominee, as it is mathematically impossible for him to accrue the 1,237 delegates necessary to earn the nomination.
By Nick Gass
Donald Trump should feel very lucky that Jon Stewart is no longer hosting "The Daily Show," John Kasich declared Thursday morning, as the Ohio governor ratcheted up his attacks on the Republican frontrunner, calling into question statements Trump has made not only over the course of the campaign but also the past 24 hours.
“The past 24 hours revealed in the clearest way yet that Donald Trump is not prepared to be President. On top of all his previous inflammatory statements, yesterday he proposed punishing women who receive abortions, attacked the Geneva Conventions and said he’d nominate Supreme Court justices based on who will look into Hillary Clinton’s email scandal," Kasich said in a statement, referring to a series of remarks Trump made in interviews and in campaign appearances as he made his way through Wisconsin ahead of the state's April 5 primary.
Kasich followed up his statement with appearances on ABC's "Good Morning America" and on MSNBC's "Morning Joe."
"I mean, it’s like a panoply of mistakes and outrageous statements. You know what it is with Donald? It's just a stream of consciousness," he said on ABC, adding, "we're dealing in such a serious time with the problem of global security, terrorism and here at home very poor economic growth, many feeling as though they've got no future. You can't operate like this. You are going to be president of the United States. People around the world must be having a field day, and you know what Donald ought to be happy about is that Jon Stewart’s not running 'The Daily Show.'"
Trump later walked back his assertion that women who have abortions should face punishment, issuing a statement that his "position has not changed."
"If Congress were to pass legislation making abortion illegal and the federal courts upheld this legislation, or any state were permitted to ban abortion under state and federal law, the doctor or any other person performing this illegal act upon a woman would be held legally responsible, not the woman," Trump said in the statement Wednesday.
Kasich then declared Trump "not ready" to be commander in chief.
"He talks loosely about the use of nuclear weapons and of dismantling NATO," the governor of Ohio stated. "America is facing major challenges at home and abroad and cannot afford to elect a President who does not respect the seriousness of the office."
During a town hall discussion with MSNBC's Chris Matthews on Wednesday, Trump said, "Look, nuclear should be off the table, but would there a time when it could be used? Possibly." As far as whether he would use nuclear weapons in Europe, as Matthews pressed him further, Trump added, ""I am not—I am not taking cards off the table."
"Since the beginning of the campaign, I have focused on uniting our country and finding solutions to the threats we are facing. I believe you can be a defender of life while respecting women, you can defend our country without alienating our allies and basic human rights and you win against Hillary Clinton without using outlandish rhetoric," Kasich concluded. "As President, I will approach every day with the seriousness of purpose our country deserves.”
The statement is only the latest in a series of critical comments Kasich has made about Trump, as the Ohio governor looks to position himself favorably for a contested convention, which at this point is his only chance of becoming the Republican nominee, as it is mathematically impossible for him to accrue the 1,237 delegates necessary to earn the nomination.
Center of our Galaxy
Hubble’s Journey to the Center of our Galaxy
Peering deep into the heart of our Milky Way galaxy, NASA’s Hubble Space Telescope reveals a rich tapestry of more than half a million stars. Except for a few blue foreground stars, the stars are part of the Milky Way’s nuclear star cluster, the most massive and densest star cluster in our galaxy. So packed with stars, it is equivalent to having a million suns crammed between us and our closest stellar neighbor, Alpha Centauri. At the very hub of our galaxy, this star cluster surrounds the Milky Way’s central supermassive black hole, which is about 4 million times the mass of our sun.
Astronomers used Hubble’s infrared vision to pierce through the dust in the disk of our galaxy that obscures the star cluster. In this image, scientists translated the infrared light, which is invisible to human eyes, into colors our eyes can see. The red stars are either embedded or shrouded by intervening dust. Extremely dense clouds of gas and dust are seen in silhouette, appearing dark against the bright background stars. These clouds are so thick that even Hubble’s infrared capability could not penetrate them.
Hubble’s sharp vision allowed astronomers to measure the movements of the stars over four years. Using this information, scientists were able to infer important properties such as the mass and structure of the nuclear star cluster. The motion of the stars may also offer a glimpse into how the star cluster was formed — whether it was built up over time by globular star clusters that happen to fall into the galaxy’s center, or from gas spiraling in from the Milky Way’s disk to form stars at the core.
This picture, spanning 50 light-years across, is a mosaic stitched from nine separate images from Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3. The center of the Milky Way is located 27,000 light-years away. The “snowstorm” of stars in the image is just the tip of the iceberg: Astronomers estimate that about 10 million stars in this cluster are too faint to be captured in this image.
The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and the European Space Agency. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, Maryland, conducts Hubble science operations. STScI is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy in Washington, D.C.
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| This annotated, infrared image from the Hubble Space Telescope shows the scale of the galactic core. The galaxy's nucleus (marked) is home to a central, supermassive black hole called Sagittarius A-star. |
Astronomers used Hubble’s infrared vision to pierce through the dust in the disk of our galaxy that obscures the star cluster. In this image, scientists translated the infrared light, which is invisible to human eyes, into colors our eyes can see. The red stars are either embedded or shrouded by intervening dust. Extremely dense clouds of gas and dust are seen in silhouette, appearing dark against the bright background stars. These clouds are so thick that even Hubble’s infrared capability could not penetrate them.
Hubble’s sharp vision allowed astronomers to measure the movements of the stars over four years. Using this information, scientists were able to infer important properties such as the mass and structure of the nuclear star cluster. The motion of the stars may also offer a glimpse into how the star cluster was formed — whether it was built up over time by globular star clusters that happen to fall into the galaxy’s center, or from gas spiraling in from the Milky Way’s disk to form stars at the core.
This picture, spanning 50 light-years across, is a mosaic stitched from nine separate images from Hubble’s Wide Field Camera 3. The center of the Milky Way is located 27,000 light-years away. The “snowstorm” of stars in the image is just the tip of the iceberg: Astronomers estimate that about 10 million stars in this cluster are too faint to be captured in this image.
The Hubble Space Telescope is a project of international cooperation between NASA and the European Space Agency. NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, manages the telescope. The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) in Baltimore, Maryland, conducts Hubble science operations. STScI is operated for NASA by the Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy in Washington, D.C.
Shreds Trump
Warren shreds Trump on economic boasts
By Nick Gass
The average American might be hurting in her pocketbook, but adding Donald Trump to the equation would be akin to letting an arsonist near a blaze that is already out of control, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren said.
“We have an economy that’s in real trouble, but when the economy is in this kind of trouble, calling on Donald Trump for help is like if your house is on fire calling an arsonist to come help out," the Democratic senator told CBS' "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" in an interview aired Wednesday night.
Warren, who previously called Trump a "loser" on social media earlier this month, said that the Manhattan real-estate magnate is only looking out for himself. When Colbert pointed out that she shares some similarities with the Republican frontrunner, namely their rhetoric about Wall Street and financial elites, who Trump has accused of "getting away with murder," Warren had a sharp retort at the ready.
“Well, let’s be real clear. Donald Trump is looking out for exactly one guy, and that guy’s name is Donald Trump," she said. "So, look—he smells that there’s change in the air, and what he wants to do is ensure that that change works really, really well for Donald Trump.”
Calling into question Trump's claims about winning in business, Warren noted that Trump himself had some help. “He says in business he wins, wins, wins," she commented. "Well the truth is, he inherited a fortune from his father.”
Warren declined once again to say whether she would support Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders for the Democratic nomination, praising both candidates for having a discussion on the issues at the right place. “So between Secretary Clinton and Sen. Sanders, they’re talking about should it be free college or should it be debt-free college," she said, referring to Sanders' and Clinton's college-debt proposals, respectively. "God bless—that is the right place to have the discussion.”
“Look—what’s going on right now is that there’s a lot of hurtin’ out there among the American people, people who work hard, who play by the rules are having a really hard time getting ahead. Washington is not working for them, and I think Bernie Sanders gets out there makes that case," she said moments earlier. "I think Hillary Clinton gets out there and makes that case, and I’m glad to see it.”
By Nick Gass
The average American might be hurting in her pocketbook, but adding Donald Trump to the equation would be akin to letting an arsonist near a blaze that is already out of control, Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren said.
“We have an economy that’s in real trouble, but when the economy is in this kind of trouble, calling on Donald Trump for help is like if your house is on fire calling an arsonist to come help out," the Democratic senator told CBS' "The Late Show with Stephen Colbert" in an interview aired Wednesday night.
Warren, who previously called Trump a "loser" on social media earlier this month, said that the Manhattan real-estate magnate is only looking out for himself. When Colbert pointed out that she shares some similarities with the Republican frontrunner, namely their rhetoric about Wall Street and financial elites, who Trump has accused of "getting away with murder," Warren had a sharp retort at the ready.
“Well, let’s be real clear. Donald Trump is looking out for exactly one guy, and that guy’s name is Donald Trump," she said. "So, look—he smells that there’s change in the air, and what he wants to do is ensure that that change works really, really well for Donald Trump.”
Calling into question Trump's claims about winning in business, Warren noted that Trump himself had some help. “He says in business he wins, wins, wins," she commented. "Well the truth is, he inherited a fortune from his father.”
Warren declined once again to say whether she would support Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders for the Democratic nomination, praising both candidates for having a discussion on the issues at the right place. “So between Secretary Clinton and Sen. Sanders, they’re talking about should it be free college or should it be debt-free college," she said, referring to Sanders' and Clinton's college-debt proposals, respectively. "God bless—that is the right place to have the discussion.”
“Look—what’s going on right now is that there’s a lot of hurtin’ out there among the American people, people who work hard, who play by the rules are having a really hard time getting ahead. Washington is not working for them, and I think Bernie Sanders gets out there makes that case," she said moments earlier. "I think Hillary Clinton gets out there and makes that case, and I’m glad to see it.”
Maps Climate Patterns
NASA’s Spitzer Maps Climate Patterns on a Super-Earth
Observations from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope have led to the first temperature map of a super-Earth planet -- a rocky planet nearly two times as big as ours. The map reveals extreme temperature swings from one side of the planet to the other, and hints that a possible reason for this is the presence of lava flows.
"Our view of this planet keeps evolving," said Brice Olivier Demory of the University of Cambridge, England, lead author of a new report appearing in the March 30 issue of the journal Nature. "The latest findings tell us the planet has hot nights and significantly hotter days. This indicates the planet inefficiently transports heat around the planet. We propose this could be explained by an atmosphere that would exist only on the day side of the planet, or by lava flows at the planet surface."
The toasty super-Earth 55 Cancri e is relatively close to Earth at 40 light-years away. It orbits very close to its star, whipping around it every 18 hours. Because of the planet's proximity to the star, it is tidally locked by gravity just as our moon is to Earth. That means one side of 55 Cancri, referred to as the day side, is always cooking under the intense heat of its star, while the night side remains in the dark and is much cooler.
"Spitzer observed the phases of 55 Cancri e, similar to the phases of the moon as seen from the Earth. We were able to observe the first, last quarters, new and full phases of this small exoplanet," said Demory. "In return, these observations helped us build a map of the planet. This map informs us which regions are hot on the planet."
Spitzer stared at the planet with its infrared vision for a total of 80 hours, watching it orbit all the way around its star multiple times. These data allowed scientists to map temperature changes across the entire planet. To their surprise, they found a dramatic temperature difference of 2,340 degrees Fahrenheit (1,300 Kelvin) from one side of the planet to the other. The hottest side is nearly 4,400 degrees Fahrenheit (2,700 Kelvin), and the coolest is 2,060 degrees Fahrenheit (1,400 Kelvin).
The fact Spitzer found the night side to be significantly colder than the day side means heat is not being distributed around the planet very well. The data argues against the notion that a thick atmosphere and winds are moving heat around the planet as previously thought. Instead, the findings suggest a planet devoid of a massive atmosphere, and possibly hint at a lava world where the lava would become hardened on the night side and unable to transport heat.
"The day side could possibly have rivers of lava and big pools of extremely hot magma, but we think the night side would have solidified lava flows like those found in Hawaii," said Michael Gillon, University of Liège, Belgium.
The Spitzer data also revealed the hottest spot on the planet has shifted over a bit from where it was expected to be: directly under the blazing star. This shift either indicates some degree of heat recirculation confined to the day side, or points to surface features with extremely high temperatures, such as lava flows.
Additional observations, including from NASA's upcoming James Webb Space Telescope, will help to confirm the true nature of 55 Cancri e.
The new Spitzer observations of 55 Cancri are more detailed thanks to the telescope’s increased sensitivity to exoplanets. Over the past several years, scientists and engineers have figured out new ways to enhance Spitzer’s ability to measure changes in the brightness of exoplanet systems. One method involves precisely characterizing Spitzer’s detectors, specifically measuring “the sweet spot” -- a single pixel on the detector -- which was determined to be optimal for exoplanet studies.
“By understanding the characteristics of the instrument -- and using novel calibration techniques of a small region of a single pixel -- we are attempting to eke out every bit of science possible from a detector that was not designed for this type of high-precision observation,” said Jessica Krick of NASA’s Spitzer Space Science Center, at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Observations from NASA's Spitzer Space Telescope have led to the first temperature map of a super-Earth planet -- a rocky planet nearly two times as big as ours. The map reveals extreme temperature swings from one side of the planet to the other, and hints that a possible reason for this is the presence of lava flows.
"Our view of this planet keeps evolving," said Brice Olivier Demory of the University of Cambridge, England, lead author of a new report appearing in the March 30 issue of the journal Nature. "The latest findings tell us the planet has hot nights and significantly hotter days. This indicates the planet inefficiently transports heat around the planet. We propose this could be explained by an atmosphere that would exist only on the day side of the planet, or by lava flows at the planet surface."
The toasty super-Earth 55 Cancri e is relatively close to Earth at 40 light-years away. It orbits very close to its star, whipping around it every 18 hours. Because of the planet's proximity to the star, it is tidally locked by gravity just as our moon is to Earth. That means one side of 55 Cancri, referred to as the day side, is always cooking under the intense heat of its star, while the night side remains in the dark and is much cooler.
"Spitzer observed the phases of 55 Cancri e, similar to the phases of the moon as seen from the Earth. We were able to observe the first, last quarters, new and full phases of this small exoplanet," said Demory. "In return, these observations helped us build a map of the planet. This map informs us which regions are hot on the planet."
Spitzer stared at the planet with its infrared vision for a total of 80 hours, watching it orbit all the way around its star multiple times. These data allowed scientists to map temperature changes across the entire planet. To their surprise, they found a dramatic temperature difference of 2,340 degrees Fahrenheit (1,300 Kelvin) from one side of the planet to the other. The hottest side is nearly 4,400 degrees Fahrenheit (2,700 Kelvin), and the coolest is 2,060 degrees Fahrenheit (1,400 Kelvin).
The fact Spitzer found the night side to be significantly colder than the day side means heat is not being distributed around the planet very well. The data argues against the notion that a thick atmosphere and winds are moving heat around the planet as previously thought. Instead, the findings suggest a planet devoid of a massive atmosphere, and possibly hint at a lava world where the lava would become hardened on the night side and unable to transport heat.
"The day side could possibly have rivers of lava and big pools of extremely hot magma, but we think the night side would have solidified lava flows like those found in Hawaii," said Michael Gillon, University of Liège, Belgium.
The Spitzer data also revealed the hottest spot on the planet has shifted over a bit from where it was expected to be: directly under the blazing star. This shift either indicates some degree of heat recirculation confined to the day side, or points to surface features with extremely high temperatures, such as lava flows.
Additional observations, including from NASA's upcoming James Webb Space Telescope, will help to confirm the true nature of 55 Cancri e.
The new Spitzer observations of 55 Cancri are more detailed thanks to the telescope’s increased sensitivity to exoplanets. Over the past several years, scientists and engineers have figured out new ways to enhance Spitzer’s ability to measure changes in the brightness of exoplanet systems. One method involves precisely characterizing Spitzer’s detectors, specifically measuring “the sweet spot” -- a single pixel on the detector -- which was determined to be optimal for exoplanet studies.
“By understanding the characteristics of the instrument -- and using novel calibration techniques of a small region of a single pixel -- we are attempting to eke out every bit of science possible from a detector that was not designed for this type of high-precision observation,” said Jessica Krick of NASA’s Spitzer Space Science Center, at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena.
Youngest Supernova
Trigger for Milky Way’s Youngest Supernova Identified
Scientists have used data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and the NSF’s Jansky Very Large Array to determine the likely trigger for the most recent supernova in the Milky Way. They applied a new technique that could have implications for understanding other Type Ia supernovas, a class of stellar explosions that scientists use to determine the expansion rate of the Universe.
Astronomers had previously identified G1.9+0.3 as the remnant of the most recent supernova in our Galaxy. It is estimated to have occurred about 110 years ago in a dusty region of the Galaxy that blocked visible light from reaching Earth.
G1.9+0.3 belongs to the Type Ia category, an important class of supernovas exhibiting reliable patterns in their brightness that make them valuable tools for measuring the rate at which the universe is expanding.
“Astronomers use Type Ia supernovas as distance markers across the Universe, which helped us discover that its expansion was accelerating,” said Sayan Chakraborti, who led the study at Harvard University. “If there are any differences in how these supernovas explode and the amount of light they produce, that could have an impact on our understanding of this expansion.”
Most scientists agree that Type Ia supernovas occur when white dwarfs, the dense remnants of Sun-like stars that have run out of fuel, explode. However, there has been a debate over what triggers these white dwarf explosions. Two primary ideas are the accumulation of material onto a white dwarf from a companion star or the violent merger of two white dwarfs.
The new research with archival Chandra and VLA data examines how the expanding supernova remnant G1.0+0.3 interacts with the gas and dust surrounding the explosion. The resulting radio and X-ray emission provide clues as to the cause of the explosion. In particular, an increase in X-ray and radio brightness of the supernova remnant with time, according to theoretical work by Chakraborti’s team, is expected only if a white dwarf merger took place.
“We observed that the X-ray and radio brightness increased with time, so the data point strongly to a collision between two white dwarfs as being the trigger for the supernova explosion in G1.9+0.3,” said co-author Francesca Childs, also of Harvard.
The result implies that Type Ia supernovas are either all caused by white dwarf collisions, or are caused by a mixture of white dwarf collisions and the mechanism where the white dwarf pulls material from a companion star.
“It is important to identify the trigger mechanism for Type Ia supernovas because if there is more than one cause, then the contribution from each may change over time,” said Harvard’s Alicia Soderberg, another co-author on the study. This means astronomers might have to recalibrate some of the ways we use them as ‘standard candles’ in cosmology.”
The team also derived a new estimate for the age of the supernova remnant of about 110 years, younger than previous estimates of about 150 years.
More progress on understanding the trigger mechanism should come from studying Type Ia supernovas in nearby galaxies, using the increased sensitivity provided by a recent upgrade to the VLA.
A paper describing these results appeared in the March 1st, 2016 issue of The Astrophysical Journal and is available online. NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, manages the Chandra program for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, Massachusetts, controls Chandra's science and flight operations.
Scientists have used data from NASA’s Chandra X-ray Observatory and the NSF’s Jansky Very Large Array to determine the likely trigger for the most recent supernova in the Milky Way. They applied a new technique that could have implications for understanding other Type Ia supernovas, a class of stellar explosions that scientists use to determine the expansion rate of the Universe.
Astronomers had previously identified G1.9+0.3 as the remnant of the most recent supernova in our Galaxy. It is estimated to have occurred about 110 years ago in a dusty region of the Galaxy that blocked visible light from reaching Earth.
G1.9+0.3 belongs to the Type Ia category, an important class of supernovas exhibiting reliable patterns in their brightness that make them valuable tools for measuring the rate at which the universe is expanding.
“Astronomers use Type Ia supernovas as distance markers across the Universe, which helped us discover that its expansion was accelerating,” said Sayan Chakraborti, who led the study at Harvard University. “If there are any differences in how these supernovas explode and the amount of light they produce, that could have an impact on our understanding of this expansion.”
Most scientists agree that Type Ia supernovas occur when white dwarfs, the dense remnants of Sun-like stars that have run out of fuel, explode. However, there has been a debate over what triggers these white dwarf explosions. Two primary ideas are the accumulation of material onto a white dwarf from a companion star or the violent merger of two white dwarfs.
The new research with archival Chandra and VLA data examines how the expanding supernova remnant G1.0+0.3 interacts with the gas and dust surrounding the explosion. The resulting radio and X-ray emission provide clues as to the cause of the explosion. In particular, an increase in X-ray and radio brightness of the supernova remnant with time, according to theoretical work by Chakraborti’s team, is expected only if a white dwarf merger took place.
“We observed that the X-ray and radio brightness increased with time, so the data point strongly to a collision between two white dwarfs as being the trigger for the supernova explosion in G1.9+0.3,” said co-author Francesca Childs, also of Harvard.
The result implies that Type Ia supernovas are either all caused by white dwarf collisions, or are caused by a mixture of white dwarf collisions and the mechanism where the white dwarf pulls material from a companion star.
“It is important to identify the trigger mechanism for Type Ia supernovas because if there is more than one cause, then the contribution from each may change over time,” said Harvard’s Alicia Soderberg, another co-author on the study. This means astronomers might have to recalibrate some of the ways we use them as ‘standard candles’ in cosmology.”
The team also derived a new estimate for the age of the supernova remnant of about 110 years, younger than previous estimates of about 150 years.
More progress on understanding the trigger mechanism should come from studying Type Ia supernovas in nearby galaxies, using the increased sensitivity provided by a recent upgrade to the VLA.
A paper describing these results appeared in the March 1st, 2016 issue of The Astrophysical Journal and is available online. NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama, manages the Chandra program for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory in Cambridge, Massachusetts, controls Chandra's science and flight operations.
Running over Trump
Cruz jokes about running over Trump with car
By Nick Gass
Donald Trump is not the person in the United States that Ted Cruz hates most, the Texas senator remarked during his debut on "Jimmy Kimmel Live" Wednesday night. But that still, apparently, does not afford him much goodwill when it comes to his primary presidential rival.
"Who do you like better—Obama or Trump?" Kimmel asked Cruz.
The senator chuckled, paused, and then responded, "I dislike Obama's policies more. But Donald, Donald is a unique individual."
"I will say, I was watching the early part of the show, and if I were in my car and getting ready to reverse and saw Donald in the backup camera, I’m not confident which pedal I’d push," Cruz joked.
Kimmel then fired away with a few questions.
"How many of the seven Star Wars movies have you seen?" the late-night host asked. "All of them," Cruz replied.
"Favorite cereal?" Kimmel asked. Cruz responded in jest: "serial killer or cereal?" presumably an allusion to the meme slash mock conspiracy theory that the presidential candidate is the infamous Zodiac killer. "Uh actually, Mueslix, I like."
"Now that's surprising," Cruz said. "You were expecting Captain Crunch or Froot Loops..."
Kimmel deadpanned, "No, I was expecting Mueslix."
By Nick Gass
Donald Trump is not the person in the United States that Ted Cruz hates most, the Texas senator remarked during his debut on "Jimmy Kimmel Live" Wednesday night. But that still, apparently, does not afford him much goodwill when it comes to his primary presidential rival.
"Who do you like better—Obama or Trump?" Kimmel asked Cruz.
The senator chuckled, paused, and then responded, "I dislike Obama's policies more. But Donald, Donald is a unique individual."
"I will say, I was watching the early part of the show, and if I were in my car and getting ready to reverse and saw Donald in the backup camera, I’m not confident which pedal I’d push," Cruz joked.
Kimmel then fired away with a few questions.
"How many of the seven Star Wars movies have you seen?" the late-night host asked. "All of them," Cruz replied.
"Favorite cereal?" Kimmel asked. Cruz responded in jest: "serial killer or cereal?" presumably an allusion to the meme slash mock conspiracy theory that the presidential candidate is the infamous Zodiac killer. "Uh actually, Mueslix, I like."
"Now that's surprising," Cruz said. "You were expecting Captain Crunch or Froot Loops..."
Kimmel deadpanned, "No, I was expecting Mueslix."
Bumped
Sanders bumped off D.C. ballot
By Daniel Strauss
As a result of a registration error committed by the District of Columbia Democratic Party, Sen. Bernie Sanders won't appear on the Washington D.C. ballot.
The Vermont senator's name won't appear on the ballot because the party submitted the requisite paperwork one day too late, according to NBC's Washington affiliate, News4.
Both the Sanders' campaign and Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton's campaign paid the $2,500 fee to appear on the June 14 Democratic primary ballot on time but the district's Democratic Party failed to inform the Washington D.C. Board of Elections until March 17, one day after the deadline.
There are still avenues for Sanders to make the ballot -- Anita Bonds, the chairwoman of the Democratic Party in D.C., told News4 that the problem could be resolved via an emergency vote of the D.C. City Council.
In a statement, the Sanders campaign said it expected to get on the ballot.
"We did what the D.C. law requires in order to get Bernie on the ballot and we are confident he will be on the ballot," communications director Michael Briggs said.
By Daniel Strauss
As a result of a registration error committed by the District of Columbia Democratic Party, Sen. Bernie Sanders won't appear on the Washington D.C. ballot.
The Vermont senator's name won't appear on the ballot because the party submitted the requisite paperwork one day too late, according to NBC's Washington affiliate, News4.
Both the Sanders' campaign and Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton's campaign paid the $2,500 fee to appear on the June 14 Democratic primary ballot on time but the district's Democratic Party failed to inform the Washington D.C. Board of Elections until March 17, one day after the deadline.
There are still avenues for Sanders to make the ballot -- Anita Bonds, the chairwoman of the Democratic Party in D.C., told News4 that the problem could be resolved via an emergency vote of the D.C. City Council.
In a statement, the Sanders campaign said it expected to get on the ballot.
"We did what the D.C. law requires in order to get Bernie on the ballot and we are confident he will be on the ballot," communications director Michael Briggs said.
Wisconsin... That voting taste is DICK in your mouth...
Wisconsin GOP rallies for Cruz, pines for Paul Ryan
Cruz was never their first choice, but they're accepting him as the anti-Trump... for now.
By Katie Glueck
Wisconsin’s Republican establishment is publicly lining up behind Ted Cruz. Privately, it’s killing many of them to do it.
A substantial slice of Wisconsin Republican party veterans and business leaders can’t stand Cruz's combative style in the Senate, abhor his hard line on immigration, could do without his heavy religious rhetoric and have misgivings about his general election prospects. But they’re willing to swallow all of that to back their best hope of beating Trump, though some can’t help but pine for Paul Ryan — or someone like him — coming out of a contested convention.
Cruz “may not be their first choice, but he may be their only choice,” said Brandon Scholz, a longtime GOP operative who runs a governmental and public affairs shop in Madison. “Others who have not been on the Cruz ship are, at least at this point, buying into, Wisconsin is the firewall to stop Trump.”
A prominent Wisconsin Republican business leader, who required anonymity in order to speak freely, added that he expects that the business community will turn out next Tuesday, and “a narrow hold-your-nose vote for Cruz” majority will prevail among those Republicans.
“There will be a Stop Trump vote, but I do not think it reflects enthusiasm for Cruz,” this person said. “It’s going to be an unenthusiastic vote. It’s a pick-your-poison vote that does not have the business community fired up. They’re basically [asking], ‘What color suicide vest do you wear?’”
It's a far cry for the enthusiasm many in the state show for Ryan, who, as well as being a native son, matches Cruz's fiscal conservatism with a less combative approach to governing, a deep focus on "empowerment" for impoverished communities and an emphasis on expanding the party. It's a vision, and certainly a tone, more in keeping with Marco Rubio than with Cruz, and it's one that many in the party seem to be struggling to fully let go of.
“With our style here, the sort of inclusive, aspirational style of conservatism Paul Ryan would represent, the big question in my mind was, what would happen when Rubio dropped out, would Rubio backers be willing to make the switch to Cruz, who, quite frankly, is not a natural fit here?” said Charlie Sykes, a prominent conservative radio host and a leader in the stop-Trump movement in Wisconsin.
“I don’t think people know [Cruz] very well here, I think the evangelical style might have been a little harder-edged than we’re used to,” Sykes said.
Despite that awkward fit between the hardline conservative Texas senator and a Wisconsin GOP that has prioritized unity, the establishment has united for him and against Trump in a way that other states haven’t.
Leading Wisconsin Republican voices from Sykes himself to Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker are backing Cruz, with varying degrees of enthusiasm. Walker said Tuesday that he is “proud” to back the Texas senator. Both Assembly Majority Leader Jim Steineke and Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, who like many others in the state establishment were backing Rubio after Walker dropped out of the race, are now supporting Cruz.
It appears to be yielding results: Cruz surged to a 10-point lead over a stagnant Trump ahead of next week’s primary, according to the Marquette Law School poll — the state’s most reliable pollster.
For some of Cruz’s newfound supporters, however, it remains a marriage of expediency, and it hasn’t stopped establishment eyes from wandering.
Some are gaming out a scenario in which Cruz wins Wisconsin and goes on to keep Trump under the needed number of delegates to become the nominee —paving the way, potentially, for someone else to emerge from a brokered convention.
In the weeks before he made his endorsement, even Walker floated the possibility of another candidate emerging as the nominee from an open convention, saying, “if it’s an open convention, it’s very likely it would be someone who’s not currently running.”
Former Congressman Scott Klug, a Cruz critic who is supporting Ohio Gov. John Kasich, says that pining for Ryan, the home-state Congressman and House Speaker, is widespread.
“Very consciously, a lot of people are hoping it’s Paul,” Klug said, adding that he personally thought a brokered convention—respect for Ryan aside—would be “absolute chaos.”
Ryan himself has said repeatedly that he does not want the nomination, and wants someone who ran for president this year to be the nominee. He has also said that this "no" is different from the ones he initally offered about becoming House Speaker, calling it "a totally different situation."
Still, Ryan's fans are hoping they can coax him to the top of the party ticket they way they once did to the top of the House. Ryan also, as Mitt Romney's 2012 running mate, has experience on the presidential campaign trial, and many in Wisconsin and beyond see him as a future president.
But barring a stunning last-minute change from Ryan, for center-right Wisconsin Republicans, for now, the choice is Cruz.
Many lining up behind Cruz buy his campaign’s principal line about why he should get their support: Trump must be stopped, and Cruz — with his deep organization in Wisconsin and nationally, his well-funded campaign and his reliably conservative record — is the only one with a shot at doing it.
The endorsement from Right Wisconsin, the website associated with Sykes, acknowledged that Cruz was not a first or even second choice, but called him the candidate best-positioned to take on Trump.
“If you look at the political establishment in southeastern Wisconsin, it very heavily leans Cruz, from the talk show hosts all the way to a lot of state leadership,” Klug said. “The whole southeast Wisconsin infrastructure is tilting Cruz to freeze out Trump.”
Sykes noted that when Vos, the assembly speaker, came on board, “who I really did not expect to come around, it indicated this is a binary choice…if Wisconsin is going to be a firewall, you had to support Cruz, you had to at least tactically decide for Cruz. You can feel the dominoes falling in that respect in the last four days.”
That Cruz is now the choice of Wisconsin’s establishment is a remarkable development, given that the Texas senator made his name running as a fiercely anti-establishment insurgent who routinely clashes with party leadership in Washington, and whose views, particularly on immigration, have only grown more conservative throughout the primary campaign, to the dismay of Chamber of Commerce types who want a more big-tent approach.
But in Wisconsin, home to Walker and to Ryan, who are both considered quite conservative, the entire GOP has moved right over the last ten years. Walker, who during his failed presidential bid was considered too conservative by more centrist donors and party leaders aligned with other candidates elsewhere in the country, is the establishment here.
Walker’s statewide approval rating has plummeted since his presidential bid, but Scholz said he still holds significant sway over Republicans in the state — it is very much his party — and his endorsement is likely to sway some fence-sitters
“If they’re in the establishment, they are sitting there going, ‘I’m not certain what I’m going to do,’ I think the governor’s endorsement speaks a lot, means a lot,” he said.
And while Trump’s past policy positions have been all over the ideological map, Cruz’s policy views also square fairly well with party leadership, said Mark Graul, another longtime GOP operative in the state.
Cruz “has got a lot to offer center-right conservatives,” he said. “Probably on eight out of 10 issues, center-right voters agree with Ted Cruz. That’s not the case with Donald Trump.”
Nationally, those reservations — along with concerns over Cruz’s hardline views — have caused some moderate donors and party leaders to decide to stay out of the primary altogether and focus on House and Senate races instead. (Other prominent establishment voices, including Jeb Bush and Mitt Romney, have spoken out in support of Cruz).
But Wisconsin is expected to have the largest primary turnout next Tuesday since 1980. And many establishment-oriented Republicans have an interest in the state Supreme Court elections also held that day, adding motivation for voters already afraid of Trump winning the nomination.
That center-right turnout for Ted Cruz, however, will be grudging.
“We don’t need to continue to agitate and polarize, we need somebody who can try and build some consensus,” said another Wisconsin Republican business leader who does not like Cruz or Trump, and is holding out hope for Ryan.
But on Tuesday, the Republican said, “I’ll vote for Cruz.”
Cruz was never their first choice, but they're accepting him as the anti-Trump... for now.
By Katie Glueck
Wisconsin’s Republican establishment is publicly lining up behind Ted Cruz. Privately, it’s killing many of them to do it.
A substantial slice of Wisconsin Republican party veterans and business leaders can’t stand Cruz's combative style in the Senate, abhor his hard line on immigration, could do without his heavy religious rhetoric and have misgivings about his general election prospects. But they’re willing to swallow all of that to back their best hope of beating Trump, though some can’t help but pine for Paul Ryan — or someone like him — coming out of a contested convention.
Cruz “may not be their first choice, but he may be their only choice,” said Brandon Scholz, a longtime GOP operative who runs a governmental and public affairs shop in Madison. “Others who have not been on the Cruz ship are, at least at this point, buying into, Wisconsin is the firewall to stop Trump.”
A prominent Wisconsin Republican business leader, who required anonymity in order to speak freely, added that he expects that the business community will turn out next Tuesday, and “a narrow hold-your-nose vote for Cruz” majority will prevail among those Republicans.
“There will be a Stop Trump vote, but I do not think it reflects enthusiasm for Cruz,” this person said. “It’s going to be an unenthusiastic vote. It’s a pick-your-poison vote that does not have the business community fired up. They’re basically [asking], ‘What color suicide vest do you wear?’”
It's a far cry for the enthusiasm many in the state show for Ryan, who, as well as being a native son, matches Cruz's fiscal conservatism with a less combative approach to governing, a deep focus on "empowerment" for impoverished communities and an emphasis on expanding the party. It's a vision, and certainly a tone, more in keeping with Marco Rubio than with Cruz, and it's one that many in the party seem to be struggling to fully let go of.
“With our style here, the sort of inclusive, aspirational style of conservatism Paul Ryan would represent, the big question in my mind was, what would happen when Rubio dropped out, would Rubio backers be willing to make the switch to Cruz, who, quite frankly, is not a natural fit here?” said Charlie Sykes, a prominent conservative radio host and a leader in the stop-Trump movement in Wisconsin.
“I don’t think people know [Cruz] very well here, I think the evangelical style might have been a little harder-edged than we’re used to,” Sykes said.
Despite that awkward fit between the hardline conservative Texas senator and a Wisconsin GOP that has prioritized unity, the establishment has united for him and against Trump in a way that other states haven’t.
Leading Wisconsin Republican voices from Sykes himself to Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker are backing Cruz, with varying degrees of enthusiasm. Walker said Tuesday that he is “proud” to back the Texas senator. Both Assembly Majority Leader Jim Steineke and Assembly Speaker Robin Vos, who like many others in the state establishment were backing Rubio after Walker dropped out of the race, are now supporting Cruz.
It appears to be yielding results: Cruz surged to a 10-point lead over a stagnant Trump ahead of next week’s primary, according to the Marquette Law School poll — the state’s most reliable pollster.
For some of Cruz’s newfound supporters, however, it remains a marriage of expediency, and it hasn’t stopped establishment eyes from wandering.
Some are gaming out a scenario in which Cruz wins Wisconsin and goes on to keep Trump under the needed number of delegates to become the nominee —paving the way, potentially, for someone else to emerge from a brokered convention.
In the weeks before he made his endorsement, even Walker floated the possibility of another candidate emerging as the nominee from an open convention, saying, “if it’s an open convention, it’s very likely it would be someone who’s not currently running.”
Former Congressman Scott Klug, a Cruz critic who is supporting Ohio Gov. John Kasich, says that pining for Ryan, the home-state Congressman and House Speaker, is widespread.
“Very consciously, a lot of people are hoping it’s Paul,” Klug said, adding that he personally thought a brokered convention—respect for Ryan aside—would be “absolute chaos.”
Ryan himself has said repeatedly that he does not want the nomination, and wants someone who ran for president this year to be the nominee. He has also said that this "no" is different from the ones he initally offered about becoming House Speaker, calling it "a totally different situation."
Still, Ryan's fans are hoping they can coax him to the top of the party ticket they way they once did to the top of the House. Ryan also, as Mitt Romney's 2012 running mate, has experience on the presidential campaign trial, and many in Wisconsin and beyond see him as a future president.
But barring a stunning last-minute change from Ryan, for center-right Wisconsin Republicans, for now, the choice is Cruz.
Many lining up behind Cruz buy his campaign’s principal line about why he should get their support: Trump must be stopped, and Cruz — with his deep organization in Wisconsin and nationally, his well-funded campaign and his reliably conservative record — is the only one with a shot at doing it.
The endorsement from Right Wisconsin, the website associated with Sykes, acknowledged that Cruz was not a first or even second choice, but called him the candidate best-positioned to take on Trump.
“If you look at the political establishment in southeastern Wisconsin, it very heavily leans Cruz, from the talk show hosts all the way to a lot of state leadership,” Klug said. “The whole southeast Wisconsin infrastructure is tilting Cruz to freeze out Trump.”
Sykes noted that when Vos, the assembly speaker, came on board, “who I really did not expect to come around, it indicated this is a binary choice…if Wisconsin is going to be a firewall, you had to support Cruz, you had to at least tactically decide for Cruz. You can feel the dominoes falling in that respect in the last four days.”
That Cruz is now the choice of Wisconsin’s establishment is a remarkable development, given that the Texas senator made his name running as a fiercely anti-establishment insurgent who routinely clashes with party leadership in Washington, and whose views, particularly on immigration, have only grown more conservative throughout the primary campaign, to the dismay of Chamber of Commerce types who want a more big-tent approach.
But in Wisconsin, home to Walker and to Ryan, who are both considered quite conservative, the entire GOP has moved right over the last ten years. Walker, who during his failed presidential bid was considered too conservative by more centrist donors and party leaders aligned with other candidates elsewhere in the country, is the establishment here.
Walker’s statewide approval rating has plummeted since his presidential bid, but Scholz said he still holds significant sway over Republicans in the state — it is very much his party — and his endorsement is likely to sway some fence-sitters
“If they’re in the establishment, they are sitting there going, ‘I’m not certain what I’m going to do,’ I think the governor’s endorsement speaks a lot, means a lot,” he said.
And while Trump’s past policy positions have been all over the ideological map, Cruz’s policy views also square fairly well with party leadership, said Mark Graul, another longtime GOP operative in the state.
Cruz “has got a lot to offer center-right conservatives,” he said. “Probably on eight out of 10 issues, center-right voters agree with Ted Cruz. That’s not the case with Donald Trump.”
Nationally, those reservations — along with concerns over Cruz’s hardline views — have caused some moderate donors and party leaders to decide to stay out of the primary altogether and focus on House and Senate races instead. (Other prominent establishment voices, including Jeb Bush and Mitt Romney, have spoken out in support of Cruz).
But Wisconsin is expected to have the largest primary turnout next Tuesday since 1980. And many establishment-oriented Republicans have an interest in the state Supreme Court elections also held that day, adding motivation for voters already afraid of Trump winning the nomination.
That center-right turnout for Ted Cruz, however, will be grudging.
“We don’t need to continue to agitate and polarize, we need somebody who can try and build some consensus,” said another Wisconsin Republican business leader who does not like Cruz or Trump, and is holding out hope for Ryan.
But on Tuesday, the Republican said, “I’ll vote for Cruz.”
Mayhem
Trump’s 24 hours of mayhem
He left GOP leaders stupefied with a series of incendiary statements, even by his standards.
By Katie Glueck and Kyle Cheney
Donald Trump yanked the Republican Party toward a contested convention over the past 24 hours as he let rip an extraordinary series of statements on abortion, the Geneva Conventions, violence against women and his own commitment to supporting the GOP presidential nominee that seemed to obliterate the notion that the party will unite behind him anytime soon.
The fallout for Trump has been swift, as Republican rivals denounced the real estate mogul’s escalating attacks on a reporter who accused Trump’s campaign manager of battery and his suggestion that women should be punished for seeking abortions if the procedure is outlawed — a statement Trump quickly tried to walk back.
He also freshly rankled leading Republicans around the country for tearing up his previous pledge to support the eventual nominee, saying Tuesday night that “we’ll see who it is.”
The series of events gave mainstream Republicans new hope that they could prevent him from winning the nomination outright through pledged delegates. But they're also more worried than ever about a fractured party heading into the fall.
“Trump is an embarrassment for the party. He’s not a conservative, he’s not a Republican, he’s someone who’s simply for himself,” said Ryan Williams, a GOP consultant and veteran of Mitt Romney’s campaigns. “He’s set a new standard and is going to give a number of Republicans pause about supporting him if he’s the nominee. That’s Donald Trump’s fault and Donald Trump’s fault alone.”
Trump created yet another firestorm on Wednesday afternoon, when he lamented the existence of the Geneva Conventions. “The problem is we have the Geneva Conventions, all sorts of rules and regulations, so the soldiers are afraid to fight,” Trump said at an afternoon town hall.
But it was his comments regarding women — both his suggestion about criminalizing abortion and his escalating attacks on Breitbart journalist Michelle Fields — that set off the loudest alarm bells.
In a sign of how damaging his comments on abortion were, Trump swiftly reversed himself. The controversy started when MSNBC’s Chris Matthews pressed Trump on his statement that abortion “is a very serious problem, and it’s a problem we have to decide on. Are you going to send them to jail?”
After Matthews tried to draw him out on what should happen if abortions are outlawed, Trump responded, “There has to be some form of punishment.”
Bipartisan criticism was immediate, with Hillary Clinton calling the comment “horrific and telling” and Republican rival John Kasich strongly disputing Trump's assertion: “Absolutely not.”
The Trump campaign went into damage control mode, emailing out a clarifying statement. “If Congress were to pass legislation making abortion illegal and the federal courts upheld this legislation, or any state were permitted to ban abortion under state and federal law, the doctor or any other person performing this illegal act upon a woman would be held legally responsible, not the woman,” Trump said in the statement. “The woman is a victim in this case as is the life in her womb. My position has not changed — like Ronald Reagan, I am pro-life with exceptions.”
The statement on abortion compounded his inflammatory comments about Fields, the former reporter who accused Trump’s campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, of roughly yanking her arm as she tried to ask Trump a question earlier this month. Lewandowski was charged with misdemeanor battery on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, Trump stoked the controversy by accusing Fields of provoking Lewandowski in the incident and brandishing a pen as she tried to talk to him.
“Fox & Friends” co-host Brian Kilmeade challenged Trump on his account of the incident Wednesday morning, saying that campaign managers like Lewandowski "should not be putting their hands on reporters." He added, "Karl Rove didn’t do it. David Plouffe didn’t do it, David Axelrod didn’t do it. That’s why you have Secret Service, and that’s why you have your own security.”
Trump shot back, speculating that perhaps the three campaign managers had. “OK, and you don’t know that they didn’t do it, because I guarantee you they did, probably did stuff that was more physical than this," he said. "More physical, because this is not even physical. And frankly, she shouldn’t have her hands on me. Nobody says that. But she shouldn’t have her hands on me.”
While Trump has become a master at firing off controversial comments and earning kudos from his core supporters for his disregard for political correctness, the real estate mogul is making little headway in his recently stated goal of convincing the Republican Party to unify behind him as the front-runner.
Trump has a large lead over rival Ted Cruz in the delegate race, 736 to the Texas senator’s 463, but it’s not clear whether he’ll be able to secure the 1,237 delegates needed to clinch the nomination before the July convention.
Poll numbers out Wednesday for Wisconsin’s primary next week were not encouraging for the real estate mogul. The survey from Marquette Law School, the state’s most reliable pollster, showed Cruz with a 10-point lead over Trump.
And the front-runner is winning few converts among centrist Republicans. At one point earlier this year, some on Capitol Hill and among the lobbyist crowd on K Street entertained the idea that Trump would be preferable to Cruz.
They had considered Trump someone with whom they could cut deals, and questioned whether he really believed the fiery rhetoric he employed on the stump. But his repudiation on Tuesday night of his promise to support the eventual GOP nominee — on top of a string of other controversial statements he's made over the past few weeks — made many Republicans deeply uncomfortable, making unity an even more unlikely prospect.
“As head of the party, it is disturbing for anybody — not necessarily Trump — saying that they may or may not support our nominee,” said Diana Waterman, chairwoman of the Maryland GOP. “At the end of it, we’re supposed to all come together. That includes the people who were not successful in getting there.”
Another party chairman from a state with an upcoming primary, who requested anonymity to share reservations about Trump, said his theatrics take the party’s focus off members' shared rejection of Clinton and Bernie Sanders.
“Unfortunately it seems that whenever Mr. Trump is worried he may not become the Republican nominee, he makes these sorts of comments,” the chairman said. “My concern about his latest comments is that it will only make it harder for him to convince longtime loyal grass-roots Republicans of his sincerity and to persuade them to rally behind his candidacy. All of the Republican candidates must always first consider the best interest of this country and not hurt feelings.”
But there is also risk to Republican leaders in being openly hostile to Trump. In a contested convention scenario, there is no guarantee that Trump supporters would get in line behind another candidate should the real estate mogul fall short, particularly if they feel that he has been treated unfairly by the party — and Trump has already claimed mistreatment.
“How things are conducted going forward matters, and I’m really personally counting on our party leadership to set an example and come together,” said Steve Munisteri, former chairman of the Republican Party of Texas.
Munisteri said that if Trump ultimately wins the nomination, he would expect supporters of Cruz and Kasich to put aside their differences and back him, regardless of what the candidates themselves do. But, he acknowledged, Trump backers are less predictable and could set the stage for a deeply damaging moment for the Republican Party.
There is also always the threat of a third-party bid, either from Trump himself if he doesn’t clinch the GOP nomination, or from another candidate brought in as an alternative to Trump, though Republicans well-versed in party rules note that there is limited time, and ballot access constraints could keep that headache in check.
But as the convention nears with Trump still leading the pack, despite his fiery statements, the Republican Party’s soul-searching will become even more dire.
“I don’t envy my friends at the [Republican National Committee] right now,” said Williams, the Romney veteran. “It’s going to be a difficult task for the RNC to try to bring the party together.”
He left GOP leaders stupefied with a series of incendiary statements, even by his standards.
By Katie Glueck and Kyle Cheney
Donald Trump yanked the Republican Party toward a contested convention over the past 24 hours as he let rip an extraordinary series of statements on abortion, the Geneva Conventions, violence against women and his own commitment to supporting the GOP presidential nominee that seemed to obliterate the notion that the party will unite behind him anytime soon.
The fallout for Trump has been swift, as Republican rivals denounced the real estate mogul’s escalating attacks on a reporter who accused Trump’s campaign manager of battery and his suggestion that women should be punished for seeking abortions if the procedure is outlawed — a statement Trump quickly tried to walk back.
He also freshly rankled leading Republicans around the country for tearing up his previous pledge to support the eventual nominee, saying Tuesday night that “we’ll see who it is.”
The series of events gave mainstream Republicans new hope that they could prevent him from winning the nomination outright through pledged delegates. But they're also more worried than ever about a fractured party heading into the fall.
“Trump is an embarrassment for the party. He’s not a conservative, he’s not a Republican, he’s someone who’s simply for himself,” said Ryan Williams, a GOP consultant and veteran of Mitt Romney’s campaigns. “He’s set a new standard and is going to give a number of Republicans pause about supporting him if he’s the nominee. That’s Donald Trump’s fault and Donald Trump’s fault alone.”
Trump created yet another firestorm on Wednesday afternoon, when he lamented the existence of the Geneva Conventions. “The problem is we have the Geneva Conventions, all sorts of rules and regulations, so the soldiers are afraid to fight,” Trump said at an afternoon town hall.
But it was his comments regarding women — both his suggestion about criminalizing abortion and his escalating attacks on Breitbart journalist Michelle Fields — that set off the loudest alarm bells.
In a sign of how damaging his comments on abortion were, Trump swiftly reversed himself. The controversy started when MSNBC’s Chris Matthews pressed Trump on his statement that abortion “is a very serious problem, and it’s a problem we have to decide on. Are you going to send them to jail?”
After Matthews tried to draw him out on what should happen if abortions are outlawed, Trump responded, “There has to be some form of punishment.”
Bipartisan criticism was immediate, with Hillary Clinton calling the comment “horrific and telling” and Republican rival John Kasich strongly disputing Trump's assertion: “Absolutely not.”
The Trump campaign went into damage control mode, emailing out a clarifying statement. “If Congress were to pass legislation making abortion illegal and the federal courts upheld this legislation, or any state were permitted to ban abortion under state and federal law, the doctor or any other person performing this illegal act upon a woman would be held legally responsible, not the woman,” Trump said in the statement. “The woman is a victim in this case as is the life in her womb. My position has not changed — like Ronald Reagan, I am pro-life with exceptions.”
The statement on abortion compounded his inflammatory comments about Fields, the former reporter who accused Trump’s campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, of roughly yanking her arm as she tried to ask Trump a question earlier this month. Lewandowski was charged with misdemeanor battery on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, Trump stoked the controversy by accusing Fields of provoking Lewandowski in the incident and brandishing a pen as she tried to talk to him.
“Fox & Friends” co-host Brian Kilmeade challenged Trump on his account of the incident Wednesday morning, saying that campaign managers like Lewandowski "should not be putting their hands on reporters." He added, "Karl Rove didn’t do it. David Plouffe didn’t do it, David Axelrod didn’t do it. That’s why you have Secret Service, and that’s why you have your own security.”
Trump shot back, speculating that perhaps the three campaign managers had. “OK, and you don’t know that they didn’t do it, because I guarantee you they did, probably did stuff that was more physical than this," he said. "More physical, because this is not even physical. And frankly, she shouldn’t have her hands on me. Nobody says that. But she shouldn’t have her hands on me.”
While Trump has become a master at firing off controversial comments and earning kudos from his core supporters for his disregard for political correctness, the real estate mogul is making little headway in his recently stated goal of convincing the Republican Party to unify behind him as the front-runner.
Trump has a large lead over rival Ted Cruz in the delegate race, 736 to the Texas senator’s 463, but it’s not clear whether he’ll be able to secure the 1,237 delegates needed to clinch the nomination before the July convention.
Poll numbers out Wednesday for Wisconsin’s primary next week were not encouraging for the real estate mogul. The survey from Marquette Law School, the state’s most reliable pollster, showed Cruz with a 10-point lead over Trump.
And the front-runner is winning few converts among centrist Republicans. At one point earlier this year, some on Capitol Hill and among the lobbyist crowd on K Street entertained the idea that Trump would be preferable to Cruz.
They had considered Trump someone with whom they could cut deals, and questioned whether he really believed the fiery rhetoric he employed on the stump. But his repudiation on Tuesday night of his promise to support the eventual GOP nominee — on top of a string of other controversial statements he's made over the past few weeks — made many Republicans deeply uncomfortable, making unity an even more unlikely prospect.
“As head of the party, it is disturbing for anybody — not necessarily Trump — saying that they may or may not support our nominee,” said Diana Waterman, chairwoman of the Maryland GOP. “At the end of it, we’re supposed to all come together. That includes the people who were not successful in getting there.”
Another party chairman from a state with an upcoming primary, who requested anonymity to share reservations about Trump, said his theatrics take the party’s focus off members' shared rejection of Clinton and Bernie Sanders.
“Unfortunately it seems that whenever Mr. Trump is worried he may not become the Republican nominee, he makes these sorts of comments,” the chairman said. “My concern about his latest comments is that it will only make it harder for him to convince longtime loyal grass-roots Republicans of his sincerity and to persuade them to rally behind his candidacy. All of the Republican candidates must always first consider the best interest of this country and not hurt feelings.”
But there is also risk to Republican leaders in being openly hostile to Trump. In a contested convention scenario, there is no guarantee that Trump supporters would get in line behind another candidate should the real estate mogul fall short, particularly if they feel that he has been treated unfairly by the party — and Trump has already claimed mistreatment.
“How things are conducted going forward matters, and I’m really personally counting on our party leadership to set an example and come together,” said Steve Munisteri, former chairman of the Republican Party of Texas.
Munisteri said that if Trump ultimately wins the nomination, he would expect supporters of Cruz and Kasich to put aside their differences and back him, regardless of what the candidates themselves do. But, he acknowledged, Trump backers are less predictable and could set the stage for a deeply damaging moment for the Republican Party.
There is also always the threat of a third-party bid, either from Trump himself if he doesn’t clinch the GOP nomination, or from another candidate brought in as an alternative to Trump, though Republicans well-versed in party rules note that there is limited time, and ballot access constraints could keep that headache in check.
But as the convention nears with Trump still leading the pack, despite his fiery statements, the Republican Party’s soul-searching will become even more dire.
“I don’t envy my friends at the [Republican National Committee] right now,” said Williams, the Romney veteran. “It’s going to be a difficult task for the RNC to try to bring the party together.”
Fucking Japs....
Japan Just Completed Its Whale Hunt in Antarctica — And It Killed a Lot of Animals
By Matt Smith
We cannot understand why the fuck people are still killing whales, and the fucking Japanese ‘research” slaughter just ended with a tally of 333 whales, 200 of them pregnant females – an increase over the last whale hunt season.
We are outraged that the Japanese continue this barbaric “tradition”, and further outraged that there isn’t a significant international outcry against this brutal, inhumane slaughter. Photo from Sea Shepherd.
And every time you right wing fucks bitch about the Sea Shepherds and their brethren, take a look at the pictures and get off your bullshit high horse. If you can’t figure out who the real bad guys are, then congratulations – you have blood on your hands.
https://news.vice.com/article/japan-just-completed-its-whale-hunt-in-antarctica-and-it-killed-a-lot-of-animals
By Matt Smith
We cannot understand why the fuck people are still killing whales, and the fucking Japanese ‘research” slaughter just ended with a tally of 333 whales, 200 of them pregnant females – an increase over the last whale hunt season.
We are outraged that the Japanese continue this barbaric “tradition”, and further outraged that there isn’t a significant international outcry against this brutal, inhumane slaughter. Photo from Sea Shepherd.
And every time you right wing fucks bitch about the Sea Shepherds and their brethren, take a look at the pictures and get off your bullshit high horse. If you can’t figure out who the real bad guys are, then congratulations – you have blood on your hands.
https://news.vice.com/article/japan-just-completed-its-whale-hunt-in-antarctica-and-it-killed-a-lot-of-animals
Best and Worst...
The best bits…&…the worst bits
by katie and jessie on a boat
Once upon a time my house was 27 feet long and 9 feet wide, space was tight. Amenities minimal. When our daily lives weren’t frustrating, they were hilarious. Progressive insurance got a kick out of this and asked me to answer some of my most common questions. One of them being – What was the best, and the worst part about living and traveling aboard a 27 foot sailboat for two years?
So I present you… the glitter and the shits.
I began writing a simple list: The best things about living aboard a tiny sailboat. I shocked myself with the amount of bullet points that dotted this category. It was as if they had been pent up in my brain waiting to be released onto paper. I then began my second list: The worst things about living aboard a tiny sailboat. My brain fired again, and the bullets struck the exact same points as the first.
Every reason that was the best was also the worst. My lists were nearly a perfect match. Contradicting? Well, kind of, yes, let me explain:
BEST
Simplicity // You have with you one of everything you need and nothing more. You have left all the clutter behind. Your diet is simple. Your wardrobe is slim. You might have two pairs of shoes, if you haven’t lost one overboard. You sleep when the sun goes down, and you awake when it rises. You stop paying attention to time, calendars and all of numbers that once defined you. When you have no Internet, you read a book, and when your phone dies, you write letters. You perfect the art of sitting still. You find joy in the simplest of things.
Take your home anywhere // The longer you live aboard the boat, the more foreign a square house in a cement neighborhood begins to feel. This vessel becomes your home, your safety zone, your friend, your transportation and your ticket to explore the world. Restrictions are slim, and opportunities are endless.
Jack of all trades // You get to try on a lot of different hats. When something breaks, you take the time to figure it out on your own before making a phone call. When you are on a tight budget with plenty of time, you will be amazed at what you are capable of fixing, much the opposite of those who have a plentiful budget and are tight on time. You suddenly find yourself to be a bit of a mechanic, plumber, electrician, craftsman, sailor and a navigator. At this point you lose your mind a bit and start to think you are really funny, this is the best part.
Mother Nature // As you can imagine, this reason is self-explanatory. Sunrises. Sunsets. Harvest moons. Wildlife. Eagles. Pelicans. Herons. Otters. Dolphins. Alligators. Manatees. Sharks. Spiders. The brightest of stars. Incredible cloud formations. Thrilling thunderstorms. Blinding rain. Flowing rivers. Fresh water lakes. Vast salty oceans. Ever changing scenery. It never gets old.
Uncertainty // Every day your goal is to get from point A to point B. You don’t really ever know if you are going to make it. In my opinion, there is nothing more thrilling nor motivating than a good challenge. There is a perpetual flood of unanswered questions, and you are constantly educating yourself simply by being curious.
WORST
Simplicity // When it rains, you get wet. When it’s unbearably hot, there is no air conditioner. When the deck frosts over, you have no source of heat. When all of your clothes are dirty, you have no laundry. When you are starving, you open a can of tuna with a side of brown avocado. When you are filthy, you jump in a salty ocean or a muddy river for a bath. When the sun goes down, you turn on your headlamp. Above all else, there is sometimes never-ending physical discomfort.
Take your home anywhere // Once you are used to constantly being on the go, it is very, very difficult to flip that switch off. You are never settled. It’s hard to stay at a job. It’s hard to stay in a relationship. It’s hard to stay in one place—period—knowing you can untie the lines at any time you please. The ability to move your home trumps everything. So you go, and you keep going, and you are constantly saying goodbye.
Jack of all trades // When your engine quits, you will sit in front of it for countless hours praying that your intense stare will fix the problem. When you can’t fix the engine, you become the sailor who sails in every direction besides the right one. When your head breaks, you are the plumber. When salt corrodes your electric wires, you are the questionable electrician. When you are lost, you are still the navigator. The dirty jobs cannot be pawned off to highly-qualified tradesmen.
Mother Nature // There is no negotiating with Mother Nature. Quite frankly, she couldn’t care less about you and your needs. She will change her mind at any moment, day or night, forcing you to alter your route, take shelter or ride it out. You are always at her mercy. She is your mother-in-law who you secretly despise. You are nothing but a game piece on her game board while she deviously deals the cards.
Uncertainty // Again, you are never certain if you are going to make it to where you are trying to go. The variables and obstacles that could be chucked at you throughout your daily travels will keep coming, but you will never know when. Having to re-route, seek out plan C or backtrack is common. Nothing is certain. Even when you have firm plans, you must understand that things may not go accordingly.
You see what I am saying? It is merely a matter of perspective. If your glass is half full, you understand list one and might consider this a lifestyle for you. If your glass is half empty, list two is enough to make you cringe every time you see a sailboat hereafter. List one wins in my opinion, and if list two hits home for you you probably shouldn’t live on a boat and I apologize that you just read this whole article.
Read it all and more pictures at: http://katieandjessieonaboat.com/2016/03/22/the-best-bits-the-worst-bits/
by katie and jessie on a boat
Once upon a time my house was 27 feet long and 9 feet wide, space was tight. Amenities minimal. When our daily lives weren’t frustrating, they were hilarious. Progressive insurance got a kick out of this and asked me to answer some of my most common questions. One of them being – What was the best, and the worst part about living and traveling aboard a 27 foot sailboat for two years?
So I present you… the glitter and the shits.
I began writing a simple list: The best things about living aboard a tiny sailboat. I shocked myself with the amount of bullet points that dotted this category. It was as if they had been pent up in my brain waiting to be released onto paper. I then began my second list: The worst things about living aboard a tiny sailboat. My brain fired again, and the bullets struck the exact same points as the first.
Every reason that was the best was also the worst. My lists were nearly a perfect match. Contradicting? Well, kind of, yes, let me explain:
BEST
Simplicity // You have with you one of everything you need and nothing more. You have left all the clutter behind. Your diet is simple. Your wardrobe is slim. You might have two pairs of shoes, if you haven’t lost one overboard. You sleep when the sun goes down, and you awake when it rises. You stop paying attention to time, calendars and all of numbers that once defined you. When you have no Internet, you read a book, and when your phone dies, you write letters. You perfect the art of sitting still. You find joy in the simplest of things.
Take your home anywhere // The longer you live aboard the boat, the more foreign a square house in a cement neighborhood begins to feel. This vessel becomes your home, your safety zone, your friend, your transportation and your ticket to explore the world. Restrictions are slim, and opportunities are endless.
Jack of all trades // You get to try on a lot of different hats. When something breaks, you take the time to figure it out on your own before making a phone call. When you are on a tight budget with plenty of time, you will be amazed at what you are capable of fixing, much the opposite of those who have a plentiful budget and are tight on time. You suddenly find yourself to be a bit of a mechanic, plumber, electrician, craftsman, sailor and a navigator. At this point you lose your mind a bit and start to think you are really funny, this is the best part.
Mother Nature // As you can imagine, this reason is self-explanatory. Sunrises. Sunsets. Harvest moons. Wildlife. Eagles. Pelicans. Herons. Otters. Dolphins. Alligators. Manatees. Sharks. Spiders. The brightest of stars. Incredible cloud formations. Thrilling thunderstorms. Blinding rain. Flowing rivers. Fresh water lakes. Vast salty oceans. Ever changing scenery. It never gets old.
Uncertainty // Every day your goal is to get from point A to point B. You don’t really ever know if you are going to make it. In my opinion, there is nothing more thrilling nor motivating than a good challenge. There is a perpetual flood of unanswered questions, and you are constantly educating yourself simply by being curious.
WORST
Simplicity // When it rains, you get wet. When it’s unbearably hot, there is no air conditioner. When the deck frosts over, you have no source of heat. When all of your clothes are dirty, you have no laundry. When you are starving, you open a can of tuna with a side of brown avocado. When you are filthy, you jump in a salty ocean or a muddy river for a bath. When the sun goes down, you turn on your headlamp. Above all else, there is sometimes never-ending physical discomfort.
Take your home anywhere // Once you are used to constantly being on the go, it is very, very difficult to flip that switch off. You are never settled. It’s hard to stay at a job. It’s hard to stay in a relationship. It’s hard to stay in one place—period—knowing you can untie the lines at any time you please. The ability to move your home trumps everything. So you go, and you keep going, and you are constantly saying goodbye.Jack of all trades // When your engine quits, you will sit in front of it for countless hours praying that your intense stare will fix the problem. When you can’t fix the engine, you become the sailor who sails in every direction besides the right one. When your head breaks, you are the plumber. When salt corrodes your electric wires, you are the questionable electrician. When you are lost, you are still the navigator. The dirty jobs cannot be pawned off to highly-qualified tradesmen.
Mother Nature // There is no negotiating with Mother Nature. Quite frankly, she couldn’t care less about you and your needs. She will change her mind at any moment, day or night, forcing you to alter your route, take shelter or ride it out. You are always at her mercy. She is your mother-in-law who you secretly despise. You are nothing but a game piece on her game board while she deviously deals the cards.
Uncertainty // Again, you are never certain if you are going to make it to where you are trying to go. The variables and obstacles that could be chucked at you throughout your daily travels will keep coming, but you will never know when. Having to re-route, seek out plan C or backtrack is common. Nothing is certain. Even when you have firm plans, you must understand that things may not go accordingly.
You see what I am saying? It is merely a matter of perspective. If your glass is half full, you understand list one and might consider this a lifestyle for you. If your glass is half empty, list two is enough to make you cringe every time you see a sailboat hereafter. List one wins in my opinion, and if list two hits home for you you probably shouldn’t live on a boat and I apologize that you just read this whole article.
Read it all and more pictures at: http://katieandjessieonaboat.com/2016/03/22/the-best-bits-the-worst-bits/
March 30, 2016
Planted story
Ted Cruz: Trump team planted National Enquirer sex scandal story
By Eric Bradner and Gregory Krieg
Ted Cruz on Tuesday night accused Donald Trump's allies of conspiring to publish a National Enquirer story alleging the Texas senator had multiple affairs with unnamed women.
Cruz suggested that Roger Stone, a former aide to Trump, and David Pecker, CEO of the National Enquirer's parent company, had been in cahoots, pushing an item he has repeatedly denied and denounced as "garbage."
"The story, on its face, quoted one person on the record: Roger Stone," Cruz said during a CNN town hall event in Wisconsin. "Roger Stone has been Donald Trump's chief political adviser. He planned and ran his presidential campaign and he's been his hatchet man -- he's spent 40 years as a hatchet man. But not only that, the head of the National Enquirer, a guy named David Pecker, is good friends with Donald Trump."
Representatives for National Enquirer's parent company, American Media Inc., did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But on Friday, the company said in a statement that "no one influences" the tabloid magazine's reporting "other than our own reporters and editors."
"We stand by the integrity of our coverage and remain committed to our aggressive reporting on such an important topic," the spokesperson said in an email.
Trump campaign spokeswoman Hope Hicks told CNN in a statement Tuesday that the campaign is "emphatically denying any truth to this claim."
She said another campaign could have been responsible and added, "Mr. Trump had no knowledge of this story."
Earlier in the day, a former communications director for Cruz denounced "sexist smears" pushed online by Trump's social media director suggesting she had an affair with Cruz.
Amanda Carpenter, who is now a CNN political commentator, told CNN's Jake Tapper on "The Lead" there is no truth to the allegations.
"I have a purely professional relationship with Sen. Cruz. And I want to go further than that: I am 100% faithful to my husband. There is nothing more important to me than being a good wife and a good mother, and it's been very hard the last few days to have my character called into question and watch this blow back on them," Carpenter said.
Cruz has vehemently denied the accusations in the National Enquirer, which did not name any women but did include five pixelated photographs of women.
Subsequent to the National Enquirer story, the Trump campaign's social media director retweeted a 30-second video that suggested a relationship between Carpenter and Cruz.
It's all false, she said on CNN.
"I don't want to run away from this. I want to address it. But at the same time, the hardest thing about doing this is defending myself but not making it worse," she said. "And so that's the weird conundrum that I've found myself in and so many of these other women who have to confront these sort of sexist smears."
She said she, her husband and her children have suffered attacks, especially online, since the allegations surfaced last week.
"I just want to encourage everyone to look at the broader culture of this campaign: There is a toxic culture being produced this season. And I think we all need to recognize what's happening, look at the facts, and go into this with our eyes wide open and be unafraid to confront it," Carpenter said.
Dan Scavino, the Trump campaign's social media director, shared a video on Twitter that pushed the unfounded rumors.
Carpenter criticized Trump's refusal to dismiss the story as "disheartening."
"This is just a really ugly smear that seems all too common this campaign season," she said.
In an interview with Tapper, Trump adviser Sarah Huckabee Sanders deflected questions about Scavino's move to push the rumors by saying she hadn't seen the video.
But she said Carpenter and Cruz should sue the tabloid.
"For the sake of both Amanda and Sen. Cruz's family, I think they should fight back and sue the National Enquirer on this false story," she said.
Carpenter was asked about whether she has plans to sue and she said right now she's just trying to get through the ordeal.
By Eric Bradner and Gregory Krieg
Ted Cruz on Tuesday night accused Donald Trump's allies of conspiring to publish a National Enquirer story alleging the Texas senator had multiple affairs with unnamed women.
Cruz suggested that Roger Stone, a former aide to Trump, and David Pecker, CEO of the National Enquirer's parent company, had been in cahoots, pushing an item he has repeatedly denied and denounced as "garbage."
"The story, on its face, quoted one person on the record: Roger Stone," Cruz said during a CNN town hall event in Wisconsin. "Roger Stone has been Donald Trump's chief political adviser. He planned and ran his presidential campaign and he's been his hatchet man -- he's spent 40 years as a hatchet man. But not only that, the head of the National Enquirer, a guy named David Pecker, is good friends with Donald Trump."
Representatives for National Enquirer's parent company, American Media Inc., did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But on Friday, the company said in a statement that "no one influences" the tabloid magazine's reporting "other than our own reporters and editors."
"We stand by the integrity of our coverage and remain committed to our aggressive reporting on such an important topic," the spokesperson said in an email.
Trump campaign spokeswoman Hope Hicks told CNN in a statement Tuesday that the campaign is "emphatically denying any truth to this claim."
She said another campaign could have been responsible and added, "Mr. Trump had no knowledge of this story."
Earlier in the day, a former communications director for Cruz denounced "sexist smears" pushed online by Trump's social media director suggesting she had an affair with Cruz.
Amanda Carpenter, who is now a CNN political commentator, told CNN's Jake Tapper on "The Lead" there is no truth to the allegations.
"I have a purely professional relationship with Sen. Cruz. And I want to go further than that: I am 100% faithful to my husband. There is nothing more important to me than being a good wife and a good mother, and it's been very hard the last few days to have my character called into question and watch this blow back on them," Carpenter said.
Cruz has vehemently denied the accusations in the National Enquirer, which did not name any women but did include five pixelated photographs of women.
Subsequent to the National Enquirer story, the Trump campaign's social media director retweeted a 30-second video that suggested a relationship between Carpenter and Cruz.
It's all false, she said on CNN.
"I don't want to run away from this. I want to address it. But at the same time, the hardest thing about doing this is defending myself but not making it worse," she said. "And so that's the weird conundrum that I've found myself in and so many of these other women who have to confront these sort of sexist smears."
She said she, her husband and her children have suffered attacks, especially online, since the allegations surfaced last week.
"I just want to encourage everyone to look at the broader culture of this campaign: There is a toxic culture being produced this season. And I think we all need to recognize what's happening, look at the facts, and go into this with our eyes wide open and be unafraid to confront it," Carpenter said.
Dan Scavino, the Trump campaign's social media director, shared a video on Twitter that pushed the unfounded rumors.
Carpenter criticized Trump's refusal to dismiss the story as "disheartening."
"This is just a really ugly smear that seems all too common this campaign season," she said.
In an interview with Tapper, Trump adviser Sarah Huckabee Sanders deflected questions about Scavino's move to push the rumors by saying she hadn't seen the video.
But she said Carpenter and Cruz should sue the tabloid.
"For the sake of both Amanda and Sen. Cruz's family, I think they should fight back and sue the National Enquirer on this false story," she said.
Carpenter was asked about whether she has plans to sue and she said right now she's just trying to get through the ordeal.
Campaign Manager
Donald Trump's Campaign Manager Led a Double Life as a Solar Power Lobbyist
Corey Lewandowski privately sought earmarks for a solar company while publicly leading the fight against taxpayer-funded green-energy projects.
By Russ Choma
Before becoming the controversial campaign manager of Donald Trump's presidential bid, Corey Lewandowski oversaw the New Hampshire chapter of Americans for Prosperity, the advocacy group founded by the Kock brothers. The conservative activist, who was charged with battery on Tuesday, led an aggressive operation dedicated to slashing government spending—including earmarks and subsidies—and eviscerating government regulations, particularly the green-energy agenda of the Obama administration. Yet Lewandowski led something of a double life, because while he was battling the government for AFP, he was also working as a lobbyist and seeking federal funds for clients that included a solar power company.
In June 2008, when Americans for Prosperity set up a new chapter in New Hampshire and tapped Lewandowski as its head, the group declared that it intended to bolster conservative politics in New Hampshire and noted that it was "a leader in the fight against pork-barrel earmarks and economy-destroying policies being advanced in the name of global warming." Known as a hard-charging political brawler, Lewandowski had been drifting through the political world before joining AFP. He had been an administrative assistant to Ohio Republican Rep. Bob Ney (who was later jailed on corruption charges), served a brief stint as legislative director for a regional branch of the Republican National Committee, and worked on Sen. Bob Smith's failed Senate reelection bid in New Hampshire.
While running AFP's New Hampshire operation, Lewandowski had at least two other jobs. From 2006 to 2010, he served as a marine patrol officer trainee, working on a seasonal basis with the state law enforcement agency that patrols New Hampshire's lakes and seacoast. He also was a registered federal lobbyist employed by Schwartz Communications, a Massachusetts-based public relations firm.
As he played a prominent role at AFP stoking tea party anger over government spending and President Barack Obama's agenda, Lewandowski represented three clients for Schwartz Communications: Passport Systems, a company that manufactures radiation detectors for ports; Logical Images, a firm that makes health care software; and Borrego Solar, a California-based corporation with offices in Massachusetts that designs and installs solar power systems.
According to federal filings, Lewandowski lobbied on various appropriations bills, suggesting that he was striving to obtain government contracts and subsidies for his clients. In one case, he helped to land a lucrative earmark for the type of solar power project he publicly has criticized as government waste.
In 2009, AFP was sponsoring anti-Obamacare protests and opposing a cap-and-trade program designed to counter climate change. Meanwhile, Lewandowski, according to disclosure forms, was lobbying members of the House and Senate on behalf of Borrego Solar in connection with the 2010 Energy and Water Appropriations Act, a $33.5 billion spending bill that financed major energy and water infrastructure projects. In early 2009, as the bill was under consideration, Lewandowski escorted a group of Borrego executives to Capitol Hill for meetings with lawmakers, including Rep. Nikki Tsongas (D-Mass.). Tsongas—whose office confirmed the meeting with Lewandowski—later inserted a $500,000 earmark into the appropriations bill for a major solar electricity project in Lancaster, Massachusetts, that involved Borrego.
Orlando Pacheco, who at the time was town administrator for Lancaster, recalled that Lewandowski was an important part of the team that brought the project to fruition. "All I can say is all those involved have made an incredibly long-lasting impact on Lancaster," Pacheco said. "All those people involved, Mr. Lewandowski, Congresswoman Tsongas…that project is really the only one of its kind in Massachusetts, and we would not have been able to pull it off without their help, and I'm deeply appreciative."
Lewandowski's firm, Schwartz, later declared on its website that it had helped Borrego secure "federal government financing for a solar project during the depths of the financial crisis." But the company ultimately ended up backing out of the project, which continued without Borrego's participation. A Borrego Solar representative declined to comment.
Though he had succeeded as a pro-solar lobbyist looking for government assistance, at AFP he waged a campaign against government programs that supported green energy. In early 2011, Lewandowski penned an op-ed for the Concord Monitor in which he railed against a regional program that sought to address climate change by spawning investment in green-energy projects. And, with AFP's president, Tim Phillips, Lewandowski co-wrote another op-ed condemning green energy and the government policies, including subsidies and grants, that support the industry:
In reality, the subsidies keep taxes high on productive companies while politicians get to pursue their favorite pet projects, all while energy prices continue to rise…Obviously it's time for lawmakers to realize that if a new technology truly has worthwhile benefits for American consumers (lower cost, higher efficiency, environmental benefits, or otherwise) then that technology will demonstrate its value by competing for consumers' dollars in the open market—not by gobbling up special handouts from their pals in Washington.
And AFP targeted government grants to the green energy industry as part of its anti-Obama crusade, launching a fusillade of television ads accusing Obama of handing out irresponsible grants to California-based solar technology company Solyndra.
In addition to Borrego Solar, Lewandowski's other clients landed lucrative government funding while he represented them. Passport Systems secured more than $23.9 million in federal dollars between 2008 and 2011, according to a federal contracting database. In the six years Lewandowski represented Passport Systems, it paid his firm more than $350,000.
Lewandowski was paid $40,000 in 2009 for his lobbying work for Logical Images. In recent years, the company has sold more than $6.5 million worth of software to the federal government. (Art Papier, the company's CEO, says Logical Images hired Lewandowski's firm to do PR work and that he wasn't aware any lobbying was done on the company's behalf.)
Lewandowski did not respond to a request for comment.
Corey Lewandowski privately sought earmarks for a solar company while publicly leading the fight against taxpayer-funded green-energy projects.
By Russ Choma
Before becoming the controversial campaign manager of Donald Trump's presidential bid, Corey Lewandowski oversaw the New Hampshire chapter of Americans for Prosperity, the advocacy group founded by the Kock brothers. The conservative activist, who was charged with battery on Tuesday, led an aggressive operation dedicated to slashing government spending—including earmarks and subsidies—and eviscerating government regulations, particularly the green-energy agenda of the Obama administration. Yet Lewandowski led something of a double life, because while he was battling the government for AFP, he was also working as a lobbyist and seeking federal funds for clients that included a solar power company.
In June 2008, when Americans for Prosperity set up a new chapter in New Hampshire and tapped Lewandowski as its head, the group declared that it intended to bolster conservative politics in New Hampshire and noted that it was "a leader in the fight against pork-barrel earmarks and economy-destroying policies being advanced in the name of global warming." Known as a hard-charging political brawler, Lewandowski had been drifting through the political world before joining AFP. He had been an administrative assistant to Ohio Republican Rep. Bob Ney (who was later jailed on corruption charges), served a brief stint as legislative director for a regional branch of the Republican National Committee, and worked on Sen. Bob Smith's failed Senate reelection bid in New Hampshire.
While running AFP's New Hampshire operation, Lewandowski had at least two other jobs. From 2006 to 2010, he served as a marine patrol officer trainee, working on a seasonal basis with the state law enforcement agency that patrols New Hampshire's lakes and seacoast. He also was a registered federal lobbyist employed by Schwartz Communications, a Massachusetts-based public relations firm.
As he played a prominent role at AFP stoking tea party anger over government spending and President Barack Obama's agenda, Lewandowski represented three clients for Schwartz Communications: Passport Systems, a company that manufactures radiation detectors for ports; Logical Images, a firm that makes health care software; and Borrego Solar, a California-based corporation with offices in Massachusetts that designs and installs solar power systems.
According to federal filings, Lewandowski lobbied on various appropriations bills, suggesting that he was striving to obtain government contracts and subsidies for his clients. In one case, he helped to land a lucrative earmark for the type of solar power project he publicly has criticized as government waste.
In 2009, AFP was sponsoring anti-Obamacare protests and opposing a cap-and-trade program designed to counter climate change. Meanwhile, Lewandowski, according to disclosure forms, was lobbying members of the House and Senate on behalf of Borrego Solar in connection with the 2010 Energy and Water Appropriations Act, a $33.5 billion spending bill that financed major energy and water infrastructure projects. In early 2009, as the bill was under consideration, Lewandowski escorted a group of Borrego executives to Capitol Hill for meetings with lawmakers, including Rep. Nikki Tsongas (D-Mass.). Tsongas—whose office confirmed the meeting with Lewandowski—later inserted a $500,000 earmark into the appropriations bill for a major solar electricity project in Lancaster, Massachusetts, that involved Borrego.
Orlando Pacheco, who at the time was town administrator for Lancaster, recalled that Lewandowski was an important part of the team that brought the project to fruition. "All I can say is all those involved have made an incredibly long-lasting impact on Lancaster," Pacheco said. "All those people involved, Mr. Lewandowski, Congresswoman Tsongas…that project is really the only one of its kind in Massachusetts, and we would not have been able to pull it off without their help, and I'm deeply appreciative."
Lewandowski's firm, Schwartz, later declared on its website that it had helped Borrego secure "federal government financing for a solar project during the depths of the financial crisis." But the company ultimately ended up backing out of the project, which continued without Borrego's participation. A Borrego Solar representative declined to comment.
Though he had succeeded as a pro-solar lobbyist looking for government assistance, at AFP he waged a campaign against government programs that supported green energy. In early 2011, Lewandowski penned an op-ed for the Concord Monitor in which he railed against a regional program that sought to address climate change by spawning investment in green-energy projects. And, with AFP's president, Tim Phillips, Lewandowski co-wrote another op-ed condemning green energy and the government policies, including subsidies and grants, that support the industry:
In reality, the subsidies keep taxes high on productive companies while politicians get to pursue their favorite pet projects, all while energy prices continue to rise…Obviously it's time for lawmakers to realize that if a new technology truly has worthwhile benefits for American consumers (lower cost, higher efficiency, environmental benefits, or otherwise) then that technology will demonstrate its value by competing for consumers' dollars in the open market—not by gobbling up special handouts from their pals in Washington.
And AFP targeted government grants to the green energy industry as part of its anti-Obama crusade, launching a fusillade of television ads accusing Obama of handing out irresponsible grants to California-based solar technology company Solyndra.
In addition to Borrego Solar, Lewandowski's other clients landed lucrative government funding while he represented them. Passport Systems secured more than $23.9 million in federal dollars between 2008 and 2011, according to a federal contracting database. In the six years Lewandowski represented Passport Systems, it paid his firm more than $350,000.
Lewandowski was paid $40,000 in 2009 for his lobbying work for Logical Images. In recent years, the company has sold more than $6.5 million worth of software to the federal government. (Art Papier, the company's CEO, says Logical Images hired Lewandowski's firm to do PR work and that he wasn't aware any lobbying was done on the company's behalf.)
Lewandowski did not respond to a request for comment.
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