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More on the Blackwater Pardons
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Trump doesn't care about you, or the military, or anything except making the story about himself.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/trump-vetoes-defense-bill-ndaa/2020/12/23/ceedffaa-407f-11eb-8db8-395dedaaa036_story.html?utm_campaign=wp_main&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&fbclid=IwAR3YPzi6ricP7OdzWEs6O8CLKQC1kGLmFtLLow2sV7AhcF_n6H15BGkoK9k
Quote:[color=var(--color-ui-gray-dark)]Dec. 23, 2020 at 7:03 p.m. EST[/color]
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]President Trump made good Wednesday on his repeated threats to veto a $741 billion defense spending bill, setting up what is expected to be the first successful veto override of his presidency during his last weeks in office.
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]The impending rebuke, coming on the heels of his decisive election loss, threatens to end the White House tenure he promised would be full of “winning” instead in stinging defeat. The near-certainty that both the House and Senate will override Trump’s veto is also a harbinger of a similar fate awaiting the president if he tries to veto a pending bill to fund the government and address the coronavirus crisis, which he hinted this week he might do.[/color]
Trump’s last-minute tantrum throws pandemic relief effort into chaos[/color]
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)][color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]The House and Senate each passed the defense bill earlier this month with strong veto-proof majorities, rejecting Trump’s insistence that it be changed to meet his oftentimes shifting demands. Both chambers are expected to sustain the two-thirds majorities needed to override the president’s veto, despite pledges from House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) and other stalwart Trump allies not to cross the president’s wishes.[/color][/color]
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)][color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]In his veto message, Trump complained that the legislation includes “provisions that fail to respect our veterans’ and military’s history” — a seeming reference to instructions that the Defense Department change the names of installations commemorating Confederate leaders. He also scorned the bill as a “ ‘gift’ to China and Russia,” slammed the bill for restricting his ability to draw down the presence of U.S. troops in certain foreign outposts, and excoriated lawmakers for failing to include an unrelated repeal of a law granting liability protections to technology companies that Trump has accused, without significant evidence, of anti-conservative bias.[/color][/color]
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)][color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]Congress has until Sunday, Jan. 3, at 11:59 a.m. to override the veto and force the defense bill to become law. If they do nothing, it will expire along with the end of the two-year congressional session at noon that day. The House is planning to reconvene on Monday to hold a veto override vote, while the Senate is expected back in Washington on Tuesday and will hold its veto override vote thereafter.[/color][/color]
Congress votes to send defense bill to Trump with veto-proof majorities
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)][color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]Sen. James M. Inhofe (R-Okla.), chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee, urged members not to be swayed by the president’s resistance and vote to ensure the bill becomes law.[/color][/color]
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)][color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]“The NDAA has become law every year for 59 years straight because it’s absolutely vital to our national security and our troops,” Inhofe said in a statement Wednesday. “This year must not be an exception.”[/color][/color]
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)][color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]Meanwhile the president’s GOP critics dismissed his latest protest as the antics of a leader flailing upon his exit.[/color][/color]
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)][color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]“He just wants to break stuff on the way out,” George Conway, a lawyer and adviser to the anti-Trump Lincoln Project, wrote in a tweet shortly after the president issued his veto.[/color][/color]
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)][color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]Trump and his advisers have repeatedly objected to various provisions in the behemoth defense legislation, including its mandate to the Pentagon to rename the 10 military installations bearing titles that honor the Confederacy and the bill’s limitations on reducing troop levels in Germany, South Korea and Afghanistan.[/color][/color]
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)][color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]Trump’s insistence that the defense bill become a vehicle for a repeal of Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which protects companies from bearing legal responsibility for content third parties post on their websites, became a breaking point between the president and congressional Republicans during the final days of negotiations over the legislation. Trump views its repeal as a way to punish social media companies like Facebook, Google and Twitter.[/color][/color]
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)][color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]Democrats and Republicans have agreed that Section 230, which was written in 1996, is problematic. But GOP leaders willing to accommodate Trump elsewhere bristled at his threat to hold the entire Defense Department hostage over his war with the Internet giants.[/color][/color]
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)][color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]The president, however, has not been mollified by his allies’ promises to tackle an overhaul of the legislation elsewhere.[/color][/color]
Defense bill offers Biden’s team a new framework to counter China
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)][color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]Trump’s swipe at the bill’s response to China was a packaged insult to the bill’s authors, who included provisions to step up the U.S. cybersecurity and naval response to Beijing and inaugurated a Pacific Deterrence Initiative to bolster the security of American and allied interests in China’s backyard.[/color][/color]
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)][color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]Trump has groused that the bill would nonetheless be a gift to China because it does not “allow for 5G,” as he recently tweeted. The legislation refrains from greenlighting a 5G development project by Ligado, a company that earlier this year secured permission from the Federal Communications Commission to build its proposed network using a portion of the radio frequency spectrum that the Pentagon says comes dangerously close to bandwidth used in sensitive satellite-dependent military operations and could compromise the reliability of GPS. The White House has also been pushing the Pentagon this year to approve a spectrum-leasing plan to develop a nationwide 5G network.[/color][/color]
[color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)][color=var(--color-ui-gray-darkest)]Trump and his advisers also objected to provisions in the bill that stand as a repudiation of other decisions he made as commander in chief. For instance, the bill contains a prohibition on shifting more than an annual $100 million in military construction funds to domestic projects by presidential emergency decree, a direct answer to Trump’s efforts to redirect billions toward his border wall project.[/color][/color]
Your anger and ego will always reveal your true self.
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(12-22-2020, 12:41 PM)BmorePat87 Wrote: https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/21/politics/miguel-cardona-education-secretary/index.html
Dr. Cardona has 20 years of education experience including classroom teacher, principal, assistant superintendent, state commissioner, professor of education, and co-chair of two state education committees.
This is a refreshing change of pace from 0 years of experience and one of the most embarrassing confirmation hearings ever in which the candidate had to be taught basic education concepts by Senators.
Got some info from some teachers in CT from a Facebook group I'm in.
One said their principal worked with him and loves him. Great guy and a good force in education.
The other said he does not have a negative view of him but he had some concerns with what he thought was a not too labor friendly agenda during his tenure. He reached out to him multiple times regarding a number of issues and only got one generic form letter back. He also stressed that he did not dislike him and said some of the issues were a result of decisions their governor made that Dr. Cardona had to carry out.
I personally would have preferred someone with more of a labor affiliation, like Lily Eskelsen Garcia, but I respect the experience Dr. Cardona brings.
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https://abcnews.go.com/US/biden-energy-secretary-nominee-jennifer-granholm-millions-energy/story?id=75326948
Not a fan of having someone with this much invested in the area they will be heading. Regardless if they de-invest, having depended on the industry for millions isn't something you want to see.
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I was just thinking how Trump flying to FL during Biden's inauguration reminds me of Art Garfunkel flying to Europe after finding out that Paul Simon was having a solo concert in Central Park and wasn't going to invite him to join in. Old Friends, indeed!
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https://www.npr.org/sections/biden-transition-updates/2021/01/19/958291157/in-historic-first-biden-to-nominate-transgender-doctor-as-assistant-health-secre
"Levine has previously won state Senate confirmation in Pennsylvania, including a unanimous vote in 2015 to endorse her as Pennsylvania's physician general. She then rose to the role of secretary of health, also with the state Senate's approval."
The PA Senate, controlled by the GOP.
Was a pediatrician too.
Good choice, if not a perfect choice.
But the folks who REALLY care about what other people do with their own lives are up in arms because she is a she. 
Your anger and ego will always reveal your true self.
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(01-19-2021, 12:35 PM)BmorePat87 Wrote: https://abcnews.go.com/US/biden-energy-secretary-nominee-jennifer-granholm-millions-energy/story?id=75326948
Not a fan of having someone with this much invested in the area they will be heading. Regardless if they de-invest, having depended on the industry for millions isn't something you want to see.
Agreed but at least she's willing to step down and uninvest, which is traditionally how these things are done. Outside of the last four years, of course. It would be a bigger issue if she stuck with "hey I have lots of investments, it doesn't mean I'm invested."
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(01-19-2021, 01:42 PM)GMDino Wrote: https://www.npr.org/sections/biden-transition-updates/2021/01/19/958291157/in-historic-first-biden-to-nominate-transgender-doctor-as-assistant-health-secre
"Levine has previously won state Senate confirmation in Pennsylvania, including a unanimous vote in 2015 to endorse her as Pennsylvania's physician general. She then rose to the role of secretary of health, also with the state Senate's approval."
The PA Senate, controlled by the GOP.
Was a pediatrician too.
Good choice, if not a perfect choice.
But the folks who REALLY care about what other people do with their own lives are up in arms because she is a she.
I don't live in PA, obviously. But from what I've read on the Steelers board I frequent, and actual news sources, she is wildly unpopular in PA.
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(01-19-2021, 01:49 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: I don't live in PA, obviously. But from what I've read on the Steelers board I frequent, and actual news sources, she is wildly unpopular in PA.
You mean... Were not your only board?
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(01-19-2021, 01:51 PM)Benton Wrote: You mean... Were not your only board?
Honestly, it's the only one I post on with any regularity. So don't feel too bad.
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(01-19-2021, 01:49 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: I don't live in PA, obviously. But from what I've read on the Steelers board I frequent, and actual news sources, she is wildly unpopular in PA.
Given the way PA has been taking the COVID restrictions, that's not surprising.
"A great democracy has got to be progressive, or it will soon cease to be either great or a democracy..." - TR
"The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little." - FDR
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(01-19-2021, 01:57 PM)Belsnickel Wrote: Given the way PA has been taking the COVID restrictions, that's not surprising.
This. Too many "you can't tell me what to do" and "she's mental unfit because she thinks she's a woman".
Didn't matter what she said or did.
Meanwhile the rates keep rising and those geniuses can't figure out why...other than everyone is lying to them.
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God almighty that's one ugly whatever. Made me think of this.
"Abraham Lincoln once posed the question: 'If you call a dog's tail a leg, how many legs does it have? ' and then answered his own query: 'Four, because calling a tail a leg doesn't make it one,'"
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(01-19-2021, 01:57 PM)Belsnickel Wrote: Given the way PA has been taking the COVID restrictions, that's not surprising.
Then I suppose the next question is where the criticisms and concerns of her valid?
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(01-19-2021, 06:41 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Then I suppose the next question is where the criticisms and concerns of her valid?
I'd say it's a mixed bag, but my experience with it all is limited. I've spent a total of three weeks in Pennsylvania during the pandemic and my experiences are skewed as they come from very rural, very conservative areas that are generally antagonistic towards pretty much anything Governor Wolf and his administration is doing. I will say, though, that Pennsylvania was fairing pretty well for a while. Then, right around Thanksgiving, things took a turn for the worse.
"A great democracy has got to be progressive, or it will soon cease to be either great or a democracy..." - TR
"The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little." - FDR
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Hawley, whose rhetoric and show of support helped drive the attack on the Capitol, has blocked the fast tracking of the DHS nominee from being approved on day 1 because they would not spend $1b on Trump’s incomplete wall. The DHS nominee was fast tracked for the last two incoming presidents to ensure a seamless transition for national security. While there are enough votes to confirm, this can delay the process by days.
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(01-19-2021, 09:00 PM)BmorePat87 Wrote: Hawley, whose rhetoric and show of support helped drive the attack on the Capitol, has blocked the fast tracking of the DHS nominee from being approved on day 1 because they would not spend $1b on Trump’s incomplete wall. The DHS nominee was fast tracked for the last two incoming presidents to ensure a seamless transition for national security. While there are enough votes to confirm, this can delay the process by days.
He is such trash.
"A great democracy has got to be progressive, or it will soon cease to be either great or a democracy..." - TR
"The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little." - FDR
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(01-19-2021, 01:57 PM)Sociopathicsteelerfan Wrote: Honestly, it's the only one I post on with any regularity. So don't feel too bad.
Regularity is important.
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Trump made sure to let everyone know the china virus is from China one last time. I'll hand it to him though, he didn't say anything about the election being rigged.
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(01-20-2021, 10:44 AM)Nately120 Wrote: Trump made sure to let everyone know the china virus is from China one last time. I'll hand it to him though, he didn't say anything about the election being rigged.
That's because in 3 hours he is looking at a legit threat of legal action against him, so even discussing it at this point he has probably been told could make his legal situation worse.
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