NYT’s get the headline correct 
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Whistleblower alleges top Trump appointees abused authority by telling officials to alter intelligence to match Trump claims
A whistleblower is alleging that top political appointees in the Department of Homeland Security repeatedly instructed career officials to modify intelligence assessments to ensure they matched up with misleading public comments from President Donald Trump about Antifa and “anarchist” groups, according to documents reviewed by CNN and a source familiar with the situation.
Specifically, acting DHS Secretary Chad Wolf and Acting Director of US Citizenship and Immigration Ken Cuccinelli, both Trump appointees, directed officials to change intelligence assessments based on Trump’s political rhetoric, an order the whistleblower says amounted to an abuse of authority, according to the documents.
Both Wolf and Cuccinelli also tried to alter a report to downplay the threat posed by White supremacists and instead emphasize the role of leftist groups due to concerns about how the initial language would reflect on the President, according to a source familiar with the claims raised by the whistleblower.
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Senior DHS official alleges in whistleblower complaint that he was told to stop providing intelligence analysis on threat of Russian interference
A senior Department of Homeland Security official alleges that he was told to stop providing intelligence analysis on the threat of Russian interference in the 2020 elections, in part because it “made the President look bad,” an instruction he believed would jeopardize national security.
The official, Brian Murphy, who until recently was in charge of intelligence and analysis at DHS, said in a whistleblower complaint that on two occasions he was told to stand down on reporting about the Russian threat.
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Can we even call it intelligence once Trump’s people get through with it?
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Knowledge is a powerful thing…and continuously ignoring the warning of climate change EVEN from potential losses of financial markets/commodities is scary.
From the standpoint that this kind of report was commissioned, says alot. It says the administration defies the truth and will not act in the face of knowing beyond a shadow of a doubt that we need to DO SOMETHING.
WASHINGTON — A report commissioned by federal regulators overseeing the nation’s commodities markets has concluded that climate change threatens U.S. financial markets, as the costs of wildfires, storms, droughts and floods spread through insurancestrong text and mortgage markets, pension funds and other financial institutions.
“A world wracked by frequent and devastating shocks from climate change cannot sustain the fundamental conditions supporting our financial system,” concluded the report, “Managing Climate Risk in the Financial System,” which was requested last year by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and set for release on Wednesday morning.
Those observations are not entirely new, but they carry new weight coming with the imprimatur of the regulator of complex financial instruments like futures, swaps and other derivatives that help fix the price of commodities like corn, oil and wheat. It is the first wide-ranging federal government study focused on the specific impacts of climate change on Wall Street.
Perhaps most notable is that it is being published at all. The Trump administration has suppressed, altered or watered down government science around climate change as it pushes an aggressive agenda of environmental deregulation that it hopes will spur economic growth.
The new report asserts that doing nothing to avert climate change will do the opposite.
“This is the first time a government entity has looked at the impacts of climate change on financial markets in the U.S.,” said Robert Litterman, the chairman of the panel that produced the report and a founding partner of Kepos Capital, an investment firm based in New York. “Rather than saying, ‘What’s the science?’ this is saying, ‘What’s the financial risk?’”
The commodities regulator, which is made up of three Republicans and two Democrats, all of whom were appointed by President Trump, voted unanimously last summer to create an advisory panel drawn from the world of finance and charged with producing a report on the effects of the warming world on financial markets. The initial proposal for the report came from Rostin Behnam, one of the panel’s two Democrats, but the report is written by dozens of analysts from investment firms including Morgan Stanley, S&P Global and Vanguard; the oil companies BP and ConocoPhillips; and the agricultural trader Cargill, as well as academic experts and environmental groups.
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Senate report finds ‘significant’ prescription drug delivery delays under Postmaster General Louis DeJoy
Patients may have seen ‘significant’ delays in medicine deliveries by USPS, Senate report finds
Several large pharmacies say delivery times have ticked up, leading to a flood of customer complaints and the added expense of replacing missing orders.
Delivery of prescription drugs delayed significantly after postmaster ordered changes: Senate report
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Michael Cohen’s Book Details Coordination By Donald Trump, National Enquirer To Vanquish Rivals
Cohen: Trump consulted on Enquirer stories to smear his opponents
Michael Cohen claims Trump personally approved every Enquirer story attacking 2016 opponents
Note that it was shortly after this story broke that Trump put Ted Cruz forward as a potential supreme court justice.
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Deutsche Bank, under the microscope of U.S. lawmakers, enlists an old friend of U.S. Attorney General William Barr to help in Washington
Deutsche Bank Hires Longtime Friend of Bill Barr to Help Clear ‘Log-Jam’ of DOJ Investigations: Report
Deutsche Bank taps long-time ally of William Barr for legal representation in Washington: report
One of Deutsche Bank’s most famous customers has been President Donald Trump
Deutsche Bank also apparently had an investigation into it ended by the DoJ for what amounts to a minor fine.
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Trump bragged to a reporter that he built a secret new nuclear weapon, according to bombshell book
Trump disclosed secret weapons system to Woodward: book
Trump reportedly claimed that the US built a secret nuke. Here’s what he’s probably talking about
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James Mattis reportedly slept in his clothes to be ready for North Korea’s missile launches
Jim Mattis reportedly slept in his clothes to be ready for North Korea’s missile launches
North Korea bombshell: US defence secretary ‘slept in his clothes’ fearing nuclear attack
THEN US defence secretary General Jim Mattis was so fearful of a North Korean nuclear attack that he slept in his clothes according to an extraordinary new book on the Trump administration.
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Yes…what is the President thinking about today…Does he feel boxed in? What else should he be doing? Asking for Kim Jong Un…? Looking at more Ambassador spots maybe in Afghanistan?
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And what’s VP Mike Pence thinking about today???
Oh, he deleted his “Stand by Your Man” tweet…
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The Federal court blocked an attempt by T 'n Co to exclude undocumented immigrants (from Census) for a congressional seat count.
A special three-judge court in New York has ruled to block the Trump administration’s efforts to make an unprecedented change to the constitutionally mandated count of every person living in the country — leaving out unauthorized immigrants from the census numbers that determine each state’s share of seats in Congress.
The ruling comes after the July release of a memorandum by President Trump that directs Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, who oversees the Census Bureau, to provide Trump with information needed to exclude immigrants living in the U.S. without authorization from the apportionment count.
Since the first U.S. census in 1790, the country’s official once-a-decade population numbers used to reapportion seats in the House of Representatives have included both U.S. citizens and noncitizens, regardless of immigration status. Enacted after the Civil War, the 14th Amendment ended the counting of an enslaved person as “three fifths” of a free person by requiring the counting of the "whole number of persons in each state."
The president ultimately plays a limited role in reapportioning Congress. After the president hands off the latest numbers to Congress, it is the clerk of the House of Representatives who is supposed to send to the governors a “certificate of the number of Representatives” each state receives, according to Title 2 of the U.S. Code.
Trump’s memorandum has sparked a total of eight legal challenges around the country. In addition to the two based in Manhattan, federal judges are hearing cases over the memo in northern California, Washington, D.C., Massachusetts and Maryland, where an ongoing lawsuit about the administration’s efforts to produce citizenship data was expanded last month with additional allegations about the memo.
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Mr. Derkach. meet bus.
Giuliani Distances Himself From Ukrainian Sanctioned By U.S. As Russian Agent
President Trump’s lawyer sought to downplay his meeting and contacts with a Ukrainian member of parliament who has been described by the U.S. as attempting to interfere in the 2020 election.
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‘Pure Evil’: Report On Trump Administration Draining Fund For FDNY’s 9/11 Responders Draws Outrage
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Oh please…! Will he supply T with multiple sharpies to change the face of all climate reports.
David Legates, a University of Delaware professor of climatology who has spent much of his career questioning basic tenets of climate science, has been hired for a top position at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Legates confirmed to NPR that he was recently hired as NOAA’s deputy assistant secretary of commerce for observation and prediction. The position suggests that he reports directly to Neil Jacobs, the acting head of the agency that is in charge of the federal government’s sprawling weather and climate prediction work.
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Legates has a long history of using his position as an academic scientist to publicly cast doubt on climate science. His appointment to NOAA comes as Americans face profound threats stoked by climate change, from the vast, deadly wildfires in the West to an unusually active hurricane season in the South and East.
Global temperatures have already risen nearly 2 degrees Fahrenheit as a result of greenhouse gas emissions from burning fossil fuels. Warming is happening the fastest at the Earth’s poles, where sea ice is melting, permafrost is thawing and ocean temperatures are heating up, with devastating effects on animals and humans alike.
In 2007, Legates was one of the authors of a paper that questioned previous findings about the role of climate change in destroying the habitat of polar bears. That research was partially funded by grants from Koch Industries, the lobbying group the American Petroleum Institute and ExxonMobil, according to InsideClimate News.
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Discussion between CNN’s Jake Tapper, and Peter Navarro, representing the President’s view on what the WH says about T’s remarks to Bob Woodward about the airborne nature to Covid-19 and how much stronger it is than the Flu. Navarro is not answering this example of what the President knew and what he told the public, from a question of press Dr. Sanjay Gupta about what is worse flu or covid.
An abomination of course.
Video between CNN’s Jake Tapper and Peter Navarro, WH representative for Trade/T spokesman
More video on interview w/ Tapper and Navarro, with Navarro re-writing the question “fog of war” references.
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Trump Health Aide Alleges Broad Conspiracies and Warns of Armed Revolt
Michael Caputo, 58, the assistant secretary of public affairs at the Department of Health and Human Services, said without evidence that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention was harboring a “resistance unit” determined to undermine President Trump.
Mr. Caputo, who has faced criticism for leading efforts to warp C.D.C. weekly bulletinsto fit Mr. Trump’s pandemic narrative, suggested that he personally could be in danger.
“You understand that they’re going to have to kill me, and unfortunately, I think that’s where this is going,” Mr. Caputo, a Trump loyalist installed by the White House in April, told followers in a video he hosted live on his personal Facebook page. Mr. Caputo has 5,000 Facebook friends, and the video has been viewed more than 850 times. It has been shared by 44 followers.
The fuck? We’re at almost 200,000 American deaths and this asshole instead of taking some semblance of responsibility, blames some made up “deep state” conspiracy? Which is well known Russian propaganda talking point, btw.
The party of personal responsibility takes no responsibility for their own failures in governance. The Republican Party is a zombie party only kept to serve the Trump loyalists.
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It’s never ending
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Here comes a possible slow down on Roger Stone’s position with the Justice Dept IG coming in to investigate this case again. Was there undue pressure as per prosecutor Zelinsky.
Justice Department internal watchdog is investigating Roger Stone’s sentencing, say sources
Prosecutor Aaron Zelinsky told Congress the U.S. Attorney’s office in D.C. told him to recommend a lighter sentence because of Stone’s ties to Trump.
The Justice Department’s Office of the Inspector General has begun investigating the circumstances surrounding the sentencing recommendation for Roger Stone, a longtime friend of President Donald Trump, according to two sources familiar with the matter.
The investigation is focused on events in February, according to the two sources who spoke on the condition of anonymity, when prosecutors for Stone have said they were told to seek a lighter sentence for Stone than they had previously considered.
Attorney General William Barr ultimately intervened to override the prosecutors’ recommendation of seven to nine years and ask for a lighter sentence. All four prosecutors quit the case as a result.
One of those prosecutors, Aaron Zelinsky, testified before Congress in June that he was told by the office of the U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia to recommend a lighter sentence for Stone than he otherwise would have because of Stone’s close personal relationship with Trump.
Zelinsky said the U.S. Attorney, Timothy Shea, was "receiving heavy pressure from the highest levels of the Department of Justice to cut Stone a break, and that the U.S. Attorney’s sentencing instructions to us were based on political considerations."
The career prosecutors had recommended the longer sentence in accordance with a 2017 policy put forth by Trump‘s first attorney general, Jeff Sessions, which requires prosecutors to seek the maximum sentence called for under the guidelines unless there are significant mitigating circumstances.
One source familiar with the matter said comments made by Zelinsky during his testimony triggered the Inspector General’s Office to open an investigation. It is not known how far the Office of the Inspector General has proceeded in its investigation, who they have interviewed or whether they have found any evidence of wrongdoing.
A federal jury convicted Stone of seven felonies after a trial in which prosecutors accused him of lying to Congress and intimidating a witness. They said he was trying to protect President Trump by misleading a Congressional investigation into ties between Russia and Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign.
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GOP source has been a Russian agent for a decade
GOP source is a Russian agent
The Treasury Department announced new sanctions against Andriy Derkach, a Ukrainian lawmaker, accusing him of being an “active Russian agent” who is part of Moscow’s interference in the 2020 campaign. Derkach has been actively promoting discredited anti-Biden materials for many months, including meeting with Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani to hand over disinformation
The Treasury Department announced new sanctions against Andriy Derkach, a Ukrainian lawmaker, accusing him of being an “active Russian agent” who is part of Moscow’s interference in the 2020 campaign. Derkach has been actively promoting discredited anti-Biden materials for many months, including meeting with Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani to hand over disinformation.
Between May and July 2020, Derkach released edited audio tapes and other unsupported information with the intent to discredit U.S. officials, and he levied unsubstantiated allegations against U.S. and international political figures.
These tapes were laundered through Giuliani to OANN, the Senate Homeland Security Committee (via Chairman Sen. Ron Johnson), Don Jr., and the president himself.
Senate Finance Committee Ranking Member Ron Wyden (D-OR) called out Sen. Johnson and Sen. Chuck Grassley (Chair of Senate Finance Cmte.) for collaborating with Derkach:
Derkach has been central in advancing the Russian disinformation that underpins Senate Republicans’ effort to smear Vice President Biden. For example, in April, the Republican chairmen of the Homeland Security & Governmental Affairs and Finance Committees requested information about purported calls between Vice President Biden and Ukrainian officials. Then in May edited excerpts of those same calls involving Biden were leaked by Derkach and Andrii Telizhenko, the Senate Republicans’ star witness.
…Senate investigations should not parrot conspiracy theories pushed by Russian agents under U.S. sanctions, and Senate Republicans should immediately abandon this blatantly political effort.
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Judge rules Chad Wolf likely unlawfully serving as Homeland Security secretary and temporarily blocks some asylum restrictions
A federal judge in Maryland has ruled that Chad Wolf is likely unlawfully serving as acting secretary of the Department of Homeland Security and temporarily barred the Trump administration from enforcing new asylum restrictions on members of two immigration advocacy groups.
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Justice Dept. Opens Criminal Inquiry Into John Bolton’s Book
The department has convened a grand jury and subpoenaed for communications records from Simon & Schuster, which published Mr. Bolton’s memoir, “The Room Where It Happened,” a highly unflattering account of his 17 months working in the Trump administration.
The investigation marks a significant escalation in the fraught publication of the book. The Trump administration had sought earlier to stop publication, accusing Mr. Bolton in a lawsuit of moving forward with publication without receiving final notice that a prepublication review to scrub out classified information was complete. The director of national intelligence referred the matter to the Justice Department last month, two of the people said.
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