For a week and a half, Kayla Somarriba and her husband Jeison Ruiz
Rodriguez noticed suspicious vehicles circling their Spokane Valley
block. Some were marked as federal law enforcement vehicles, others were
clandestine. The couple was getting nervous.
“With everything going on, we’re gonna be paranoid,” Somarriba said.
“You see this serious car, and I’m like, ‘Oh my God, what’s going on?’
But it was way too much. It’s one thing to see it once or twice, but it
was just something that we would see almost daily.”
But she did not expect that federal agents would soon pull them over,
break through the windows of their white Chevy Silverado, drag Ruiz
Rodriguez and his brother Cesar from the vehicle and sweep them to a
federal immigration jail in Tacoma after injuring the brothers with a
Taser and a rifle.
The Ruiz Rodriguezes are migrants from Nicaragua; Somarriba was born in Miami.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Border Patrol agents have been working in the Inland Northwest
— as they have across the country — with agencies as far-flung as the
Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) to detain and deport
migrants. It’s part of President Donald Trump’s chaotic effort to rid
the country of immigrants the administration says are here illegally.
Hey,
if we spread a rumor that they're Palestinian, you think they'd get
media coverage and protests. Or does the White student getting all the
attention just prove to be the 1% himself? I guess he'd have to be,
right? He went to Columbia, after all. Not an easy school to get into
or to afford. But let's drop everything and pretend like we're not
being fed by his attorney -- which we are even when they say things like
"we came across e-mails . . ." No, you were fed them by his attorney.
And
I can't figure out if that woman's inept or not? She certainly created
a media storm -- RAH RAH RAH -- but she can't get wifey on camera.
Wifey, when she speaks to the press, won't even give her name.
Does no one understand perception management?
You're trying to get attention for your client and his pregnant wife won't reveal her name?
They're may not be anything wrong there but it doesn't look right and it doesn't play right.
What it does do is foster doubt among people following the story as they wonder, "What's this American hiding?"
I
have no idea. Maybe it's not really a marriage or it's a common-law
marriage? Maybe another man got her pregnant and she's afraid he'll
step forward and say this was a green card scam? Maybe the attorney's
incompetent? Or maybe the wife or 'wife' is just really dumb and can't
get it through her head that if she's trying to help her husband, she
needs to be an open book including her name.
What we know at present and she'll speak to sympathetic, pre-selected journalists who agree not to name her.
As
a general rule when your clients is attempting to sway in the court of
public opinion, you don't let the spouse dictate ground rules for the
press.
But, again, the average immigrant that
is being harassed and terrorized was not someone wealthy enough to go an
ivy league school -- let alone one with a tuition cost where four years
undergrad could buy two nice houses in most states.
But keep marching and rallying for your 1%-er while you ignore the actual immigrants in need.
It's
no different, this glorification and rally of support around one
person, than the same instinct which apparently led US military veteran Ty Vaughn to Google whether or not you can get away with killing an immigrant before shooting Luis Banos Norberto in the head.
Ty got the message of hate from Donald Chump and he gets the message
tat Latino immigrants don't matter from Gaza Freaks who can't be
bothered to protest or speak out unless it's someone that they deem one
of their own. That's the message being sent and it's the message that's
responsible for Luis Banos Norberto's murder at the age of 27.
But ignore that, ignore New Jersey's Emine Emanet and Celal Emanet.as
well as so many others. And then wonder, Gaza Freaks, why you're seen
as single-issue voters and no one outside of your bubble has any respect
for you at all. With you, as with Chump, it's all transactional.
And,
ZETEO and others, stop e-mailing your garbage coverage of the 1% to
me. Looking at your own stats for streaming doesn't appear you have an
audience for the story either. Twelve hours later and you've only got
13,000 streams? But your stuff from yesterday and the day before is all
over 150,000 streams -- one over 250,000 streams?
If
you don't get it, we believe in equality in this country. That's what
fed Occupy Wall Street. So you ignore all the other deportation efforts
at your own peril while you rush to pimp the 1% who went to Columbia.
It's hypocrisy and people don't generally embrace it. Contact his
attorney and let her know she needs to work harder and come up with a
different strategy (and a spouse that doesn't have demands from the
media before she grants access).
Let's move on.
All
are invited. Because that's how it's supposed to be. Elected
officials have constituents. Those are their bosses and their party
i.d. does not matter. This isn't a campaign stop, this is about members
of Congress doing their job. While Jasmine Crockett and others are
more than prepared to do their job, the MAGA members of Congress are
hiding and scared. See Ava and my "Media: Some returns work better than others"
from Monday for more on that. Hiding away from your constituents
doesn't spell re-election. And the all powerful Alien Musk who had MAGA
members of Congress so worried because he was going to spend millions
and millions in district after district, in state after state, funding
challengers? He's still sitting pretty but the big money that he had
keeps shrinking and who knows how much he's prepared to lose? Musk
isn't very smart but I believe he's smarter than Mike Lindell.
Facing weeks of negative headlines and growing pressure from within the Trump administration,
the U.S. DOGE Service is racing to finish the first phase of its
assignment — slashing the federal bureaucracy — and move on to what the
team hopes will be seen as more constructive work: creating sleek tools
for navigating government services.
Throughout
DOGE, the need to find and champion positive achievements is seen as
urgent, according to two people familiar with the group’s internal
workings. One key ally, General Services Administration official and
former Tesla employee Thomas Shedd, told his staff during a meeting last
week that “I need wins to defend,” according to audio obtained by The
Washington Post.
Using a Silicon Valley phrase
for putting new products in the hands of users, Shedd urged staff to
“remain focused on the reason you came to the government and this team
to begin with, which is to deliver value and ship.”
The effort comes as backstage turmoil
over DOGE has begun to spill into public view: Only two days after
praising billionaire Elon Musk, who oversees the DOGE team, in an
address to Congress, President Donald Trump sided last week with frustrated agency heads,
saying they -- not Musk -- are in charge of making cuts in their
departments. On Truth Social, Trump called for more precision, writing:
“We say the ‘scalpel’ rather than the ‘hatchet.’” And in pro-Trump
districts, voters have stormed town halls to protest DOGE cuts to
government services and firings of thousands of civil servants.
Chump's
people think they can crisis manage this. They're that stupid. An
unpopular program of questionable legality was always going to be a hard
sale. Though Chump's been unable to fill any post with someone
qualified, let's pretend for a moment that the person heading DOGE was
qualified. That still wouldn't have helped Alien Musk. The alien is
not an American. As Lawrence O'Donnell observed Monday night when Alien
was attacking a US citizen -- Senator Mark Kelly -- Alien doesn't know
this country.
He
was born and raised in South Africa. Scared of life there after
apartheid was due to fall, Alien ran to Canada. He doesn't know the
US. He is not part of the US. Alien is an alien to Americans and
that's before you get into his creepy parentage (14 children), before
you get into that weird voice (he speaks as though he has a hot potato
on his tongue), that weird face, etc, etc.
Chump
could have put Peyton Manning in charge and Americans would still have
problems with their sons and daughters, nieces and nephews, fathers and
mothers being fired. The Social Security office in Shreveport? When
those people are threatened with job losses (and they are across the
US), Chump and Alien's pretense that this is about DC and cleaning the
sewer just don't fly. But when you put Alien in charge, you've got an
even bigger problem and, no, this really is beyond crisis management.
DOGE would be a hard sell with anyone but with Alien? It's even worse. He can't even seem to help Tesla these days. Kelsey Vlamis (BUSINESS INSIDER) notes:
Elon
Musk said Monday running his businesses, like Tesla and SpaceX, while
also taking on a major government overhaul effort has not been easy.
[. . .]
His
comment came as Tesla stock declined 15% on Monday, its largest
single-day drop since 2020. The stock is down 55% from a high in
December, causing concern among investors.
Tesla's
stock fell by 15 percent on Monday, losing $16 billion in one day and
becoming the worst-performing stock in the S&P 500 this year.
Musk shrugged off the loss, as well as a slew of other negative news reports, in a Fox Business Network interview.
Musk
is a failure. But let's go back to our Shreveport example for a
moment. You're killing jobs in cities around the country. Shreveport
isn't even the capital of the state of Louisiana -- Baton Rouge
is. But in those areas, people are feeling the panic and the worry and
some have already lost jobs. Now that's widespread in cities in every
state -- cities plural. And now things are about to get worse -- we're
going to see people in cities and in towns suffering because of Chump
and that Musky alien. Kelly Rissman (INDEPENDENT) reports:
The
Department of Agriculture has slashed over $1 billion in funding aimed
at helping schools and food banks purchase from local farmers, according
to a nonprofit.
“Multiple states” were recently notified of these cuts, the nonprofit School Nutrition Association said in a statement Tuesday.
“With
research showing school meals are the healthiest meals Americans eat,
Congress needs to invest in underfunded school meal programs rather than
cut services critical to student achievement and health,” said the
group’s president Shannon Gleave. “These proposals would cause millions
of children to lose access to free school meals at a time when working
families are struggling with rising food costs. Meanwhile, short-staffed
school nutrition teams, striving to improve menus and expand
scratch-cooking, would be saddled with time-consuming and costly
paperwork created by new government inefficiencies.”
An
estimated $660 million in funds through the Local Food for Schools
program for 2025 will no longer be available to support childcare
institutions and schools, the group added.
The
impact of these cuts will vary by state, depending on their reliance on
the LFS program. States that had integrated these funds into their
operational plans for school meal programs and food banks will face
significant challenges.
According to USDA, the following states have signed with USDA on the Local Food for Schools Cooperative Agreement Program:
Alabama
Alaska
Arizona
Arkansas
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Florida
Georgia
Hawaii
Illinois
Indiana
Iowa
Kansas
Kentucky
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Massachusetts
Michigan
Minnesota
Missouri
Montana
Nebraska
Nevada
New Hampshire
New Jersey
New York
North Carolina
Oklahoma
Oregon
Pennsylvania
Rhode Island
South Carolina
Tennessee
Texas
Utah
Vermont
Washington
West Virginia
Wisconsin
Wyoming
Check
my math, but I'm counting forty-two states. Co-presidents Chump and
Musk are cutting off food to children. How do you think that plays with
parents and grandparents. Musk doesn't know anything, he's an idiot
from another country. But Chump doesn't even grasp how this hurts him?
Louisiana is one of the most poverty stricken states in the country. Three years ago, official state records showed
the poverty rate to be 18.6% with 829,565 people living in or below
poverty and 255,159 of those were children. USAID cuts are awful. But
Chump could hope there that most people wouldn't realize what was going
on since it impacted populations outside of America -- largely outside
of America, when you're attacking USAID, you're also attacking Americans
working with USAID. But this is Chump preparing to starve children in
this country -- children of voters.
BLUESKY users are covering the topic.
Let's wind down with this from Senator Elizabeth Warren's office:
“As Secretary of the Navy,
you could make programmatic decisions that would increase DoD’s reliance
on companies in which you are invested. To mitigate that conflict, you
should divest your holdings in defense contractors.”
Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren
(D-Mass.), a member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, wrote to Mr.
John Phelan, nominee to be Secretary of the Navy, with concerns
regarding his “serious conflicts of interest,” given his financial
investments in defense contractors. To address her concerns, Senator
Warren asked Mr. Phelan to make a number of commitments related to his
conflicts of interest ahead of the committee vote on his nomination.
As Secretary of the Navy, Mr. Phelan could make programmatic
decisions that would increase the Department of Defense’s (DoD) reliance
on companies in which he is invested or with which he has close
relationships. These ties to various defense contractors, including Dell
Technologies, Palantir, and Red Call Partners, raise serious concerns
about his potential biases in making programmatic decisions for the
military.
Mr. Phelan has investments worth over $50 million in Dell Technologies, which has a $2.5 billion contract to
provide software services to the U.S. Navy, alongside other lucrative
DoD contracts. Since January 2024 alone, he has earned over $5 million
in capital gains and dividends from that investment. Mr. Phelan also has
investments in other defense contractors, like National Resilience, a biomanufacturing company that has a $410 million DoD contract, and Woolpert, which provides school construction services for DoD.
The nominee also founded MSD
Acquisition Corp., which has promoted Phelan’s “extensive and deep
relationships” with Palantir and other companies in which he has
invested. From his Palantir stock alone, Mr. Phelan recently earned over $5 million in capital gains.
“Even if you have sold your Palantir investments, your relationship
with the company could still bias your decision-making toward assisting
Palantir in its current push for more DoD contracts,” said Senator Warren.
Mr. Phelan also holds a multi-million-dollar stake in Red Cell
Partners, a venture capital firm that is heavily invested in defense
technology, has contracts with DoD, and has a history of hiring former senior defense officials, including former Defense Secretary Mark Esper. Red Cell aims to increase DoD’s
reliance on artificial intelligence (AI), and Phelan’s Red Cell assets
include investments in multiple defense-tech AI companies.
Senator Warren urged the nominee to divest any remaining defense
contractor investments before taking office and not repurchase stock in
these contractors while serving as the Secretary of the Navy. She also
asked him to recuse himself from particular matters involving his former
clients and employers for four years after serving in the Navy role,
as many Biden appointees did.
Lastly, Senator Warren asked Mr. Phelan to commit not to lobby DoD or
work for companies that do business with DoD for four years after
leaving office.
“The rampant revolving door of former government leaders lobbying the
agencies they once led, while their government relationships remain
fresh, erodes Americans’ faith in the federal government…By making these
commitments, you would increase Americans’ trust in your ability to
serve the public interest during your time at DoD — rather than the
special interests of political allies and private sector companies,” concluded Senator Warren.
Senator Warren has sought to protect servicemembers and national
security by pushing defense nominees to resolve their conflicts of
interest:
In March 2025, Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote to Deputy Defense
Secretary Nominee Stephen Feinberg, urging him to recuse himself from
all matters related to Ligado Networks, which has a pending $39 billion
lawsuit against the Department of Defense (DoD) over highly sought-after
telecommunications spectrum space that the military has said is
“essential for its various satellite communications, radars and
navigation systems” usage.
In March 2025, Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote to Mr. Emil Michael,
nominee for Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering,
with concern over his history of inappropriate behavior at work, his
attacks on journalists and public accountability, and his ties to
technology companies that may seek contracts with the Department of
Defense.
In February 2025, Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote to Mr. Stephen Feinberg,
nominee for Deputy Secretary of the Department of Defense, ahead of his
confirmation hearing before the Senate Armed Services Committee,
pressing him to explain his “serious conflicts of interest” and his
track record of mismanagement.
In January 2025, Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote to Mr. Michael Duffey,
nominee for Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment
of the Department of Defense, ahead of his confirmation hearing, with
serious concerns about his record, which include violating the law,
disregarding congressional authority, and his involvement in Project
2025.
In January 2025, Senator Elizabeth Warren wrote to Mr. Pete Hegseth,
nominee for Secretary of the Department of Defense, regarding his
ethics conflicts ahead of the Senate’s consideration of his nomination.
Mr. Hegseth’s household’s ownership of stock in several defense
contractors and his unwillingness to commit to post-employment
restrictions he previously advocated for at his confirmation hearing
were particularly troubling for the role of Secretary of Defense.
In March 2024, Senator Elizabeth Warren secured ethics commitments from
Douglas Schmidt, ahead of his confirmation to be the Director of
Operational Test and Evaluation (DOT&E) for the Department of
Defense.
In June 2023, Senator Elizabeth Warren and representative Andy Kim reintroduced the Department of Defense Ethics and Anti-Corruption Act,
to limit the influence of contractors on the military, constrain
foreign influence on retired senior military officers, and assert
greater transparency over contractors and their interaction with DoD.
In July 2021, Senator Elizabeth Warren secured agreements to four-year recusals from
former clients’ and employers’ party matters from then-Secretary of the
Air Force Frank Kendall and then-USD(R&E) Heidi Shyu.
In January 2021, Senator Elizabeth Warren secured a commitment from
General Lloyd Austin III, then-nominee for Secretary of Defense, to
extend his recusal from Raytheon Technologies for four years and to not
seek a position on the board of a defense contractor or become a
lobbyist after his government service.
NEBRASKA. Sunny and I were
talking on the phone today and she asked me what I was listening to
lately? Since Sunday it's been Bruce Springsteen's NEBRASKA. I've
always liked the album but I just got in the mood for it Sunday, had a strong craving like when I just have to, have to, have to have a bowl of hot and sour soup. I hadn't listened to it in years.
It's an acoustic album.
At
one point, if I remember correctly, Bruce was in love with the songs
and went into the studio with the E Street Band intending to do those
songs. But he couldn't get the sound he wanted, the sound he had from
demoing it on a cassette tape -- one that he'd carried around in a pocket for weeks and months. So eventually? They just released that
version.
So let me go to WIKIPEDIA and see what it says there. Okay:
Nebraska is the sixth studio album by the American singer-songwriter Bruce Springsteen, released on September 30, 1982, by Columbia Records. Springsteen recorded the songs as solo demos using a four-track recorder in the bedroom of his home in Colts Neck, New Jersey, intending to rerecord them with the E Street Band,
but decided to release them as they were after full-band renditions
were deemed unsatisfactory. Seventeen songs appeared on the tape, ten of
which appeared on Nebraska, while others appeared in full-band renditions on the follow-up album Born in the U.S.A. (1984) and as B-sides.
Living isolated in Colts Neck, Springsteen was influenced by American literature, films, and folk music when writing the Nebraska songs. The short stories of Flannery O'Connor particularly inspired him to write about his own childhood memories. Featuring a stark, lo-fi sound,
the tracks tell the stories of ordinary, blue-collar individuals who
try to succeed in life but fail at every turn, going in search of
deliverance that never comes. Some are told through the eyes of outlaws
and criminals, such as the killer Charles Starkweather on the title track. The album's cover artwork, a 1975 photograph taken by David Michael Kennedy, depicts a black-top road under a cloudy sky through the windshield of a car.
Nebraska stylistically
stood apart from other releases in the year. Commercially, it sold
well, peaking at number three in the U.S. It was accompanied by two
European singles—"Atlantic City" and "Open All Night"; the former was supported by Springsteen's first music video.
Springsteen did not promote the record, believing listeners should
experience it for themselves. On release, critics praised the album as
brave and artistically daring and Springsteen's most personal record up
to that point. Negative reviews felt the songs stylistically merged
together and its dark themes would appeal to fans only. The album
appeared on several year-end lists.
My favorite songs? The
title track which really builds on the film BADLANDS with Martin Sheen
and Sissy Spacek. And "Used Cars" ("Mister, the day the lottery I win, I
ain't never going to ride in no used car again") and "Atlantic City"
have always been my favorites since I first heard the album. In fact,
"Atlantic City" is definitely one of the top five songs released in
1982.
Well, they blew up the Chicken Man in Philly last night
And they blew up his house, too
Down on the boardwalk they're ready for a fight
Gonna see what them racket boys can do
Now there's trouble busin' in from outta state
And the D.A. can't get no relief
Gonna be a rumble on the promenade
And the gamblin' commissioner's hangin' on by the skin of his teeth
Everything dies, baby, that's a fact
But maybe everything that dies some day comes back
Put your makeup on, fix your hair up pretty
And meet me tonight in Atlantic City
Well, I got a job and I put my money away
But I got the kind of debts that no honest man can pay
So I drew out what I had from the Central Trust
And I bought us two tickets on that Coast City bus
Everything dies, baby, that's a fact
But maybe everything that dies some day comes back
Put your makeup on, fix your hair up pretty
And meet me tonight in Atlantic City
This
is where you can really feel the influence Rickie Lee Jones had on
Bruce. It's there on THE RIVER (the album before NEBRASKA) but not as
obvious except maybe on "Drive All Night."
I'm not a Brucie but NEBRASKA is a great album. Not a good one, a great one. I think Bruce has done five great studio albums.
1) RISING
2) NEBRASKA
3) BORN IN THE USA
4) THE RIVER
5) TUNNEL OF LOVE
His sixth great album for me is the boxed set LIVE/1975-85. I'm not big on
all of his re-releases which come off to me as mere product. But
LIVE/1975-1985 came after the huge success (BORN IN THE USA) and they
probably did want to cash in. But at fifty bucks (that's what I
remember paying for the vinyl edition), they knew they had to do
something great and they picked great performances. His "Fire" rivals
the Pointer Sisters' version while "Rosalita" has never been better --
studio or live -- and "Candy's Room" demonstrates that drama he can
provide live. There are not a lot of multi-disc albums that need to be.
Sorry, but it is true. A lot of boxed sets really were unneeded. But
LIVE/1975-85 really is a great album and a classic boxed set. (Everyone
of the Joni Mitchell boxed sets -- the archive ones -- has been worthy
of release and I mention that because someone will wonder, "Was that a
slam at Joni?" No, it was not.)
Tuesday, March 11, 2025. Senators wonder where is the oversight, Chump
continues to tank the economy, Musk bleeds billions, and much more.
The Cult of Rashida continues to play the victim.
We
see that online. A Syrian born Palestinian is set to be deported and
the Gaza Freaks are back. Hissing and screaming about how 'liberals' do
this and they do that and nonsense and nonsense.
They think we don't see. We see.
Anna Fleck (STATISTA) notes,
"Between his inauguration and February 5, the Trump administration
deported a total of 4,745 Latin American undocumented immigrants, who
were returned to their countries of origin. According to official data,
4,094 of those deported were Mexican citizens, mirroring the prominence
of Mexico as one of the major countries of origin for immigration to the
United States."
Where you been, baby?
Ignoring it because Latinos and Latinas didn't matter to you.
And
now you to take BLUESKY to whine and those mean "liberals" who voted
for Kamala Harris aren't helping you whine! WHINE! WHINE!
Cult
of Rashida, we have not forgotten nor will we. You can play it all the
way you want to in your own f**ked up head but we saw and we remember.
You lived on TIK-TOK and you lived to attack us.
And now you want our help?
You
attacked us online. You said the most racist things and it was okay
because you were supporting Gaza (you weren't really supporting them).
And you thought that after the election, after you trashed us and
targeted with your racism that we could come together?
We laugh when we read your bulls**t about how now -- now! -- it's time to pull together.
No, we don't work with racists.
And all The Cult of Rashida Tlaib boils down to is racism.
We're not forgetting.
You
apparently have not noticed that at your little rallies and other
pathetic 'events,' we're not there. We're not going to be there. We're
not going to be the ones physically attacked while you run and try to
hide behind us.
We've marched for you. We've marched for everyone.
At the end of the day, we voted for everyone.
You didn't.
And you put the Convicted Felon back in the White House.
Just
like until this week you couldn't be bothered with deportations, you
also can't apologize for what you did or admit that the attacks on Black
women that you Gaza freaks carried out did real harm.
That's why so many of us went on a vacation. We're not helping you. We're not helping racists.
Again, weeks after the deportations started, they've finally discovered the topic due to a Syrian-born Palestinian man.
It's interesting, search their accounts and you'll see what I'm talking about, how they are now concerned with deportations.
They're
not just single-issue voters, they're stuck up, smug assholes who
refuse to work with anyone on any issue that is not about Gaza.
Selfish is as selfish does and that's all The Cult of Rashida have to offer.
For a while I'm speaking
You know how much you hate to be interrupted
Maybe spend some time alone
Fill up your proverbial cup
So that it doesn't always have to be about you
-- "Front Row," written by Alanis Morissette and Glen Ballard, first appears on her SUPPOSED FORMER INFATUATION JUNIKIE
I
see Rashida's just endorsed a candidate for mayor. See she identifies
the candidate as a Democratic Socialist. She doesn't live in New York
but, as a Socialist, she feels she has a say. Call it a tip toe out of
the closet.
I'm in the front row
The front row with popcorn
I get to see you, see you close up
That's
where Black women are now. And we roll our eyes as The Cult of Rashida
-- the same cult that attacked us -- tries to appropriate our culture,
tries to steal our language. We roll our eyes and just sit there
watching the spectacle that the cult created.
By
the way, this is me being nice. Mean? Mean would be critiquing
various leftist platforms that are violating basic journalism guidelines
while pretending that they're journalists as they try to help create
anger over this one deportation.
President Trump is on the defensive. The Dow fell nearly 1,000 points after Trump admitted
that he couldn’t rule out a recession. This comes after more turmoil in
the markets stemming from his erratic flip-flops on tariffs. Meanwhile,
Trump’s agency heads are raging
at Elon Musk over the cuts he’s inflicting on their agencies. The
opposition has awakened: House Democratic Leader Hakeem Jeffries is whipping
opposition to the continuing resolution temporarily funding the
government. But will Senate Democrats step up and oppose the C.R.? We
talked to former Congressman Tom Malinowski, who’s been urging Democrats to stand strong
against Trump, about why the government shutdown fight is a critical
opportunity for Democrats to draw a hard line against the Trump-Musk
reign of destruction. Listen to this episode here. A transcript is here.
Yes,
Chump continues to destroy the economy. He took Alien Musk's buzzsaw
to a strong economy and now we're in free fall and it's only going to
get worse. Aaron Parnas (MTN) reports:
Today, two Canadian Premiers have ignored the Trump Administration's
pause on most tariffs and have imposed their own retaliatory actions
directly targeting key resources used by the American people.
First,
Ontario Premier Doug Ford announced that Ontario will be putting a 25%
surcharge on all electricity exports to the United States. Right now,
Ontario provides a significant amount of electricity to New York,
Minnesota, and Michigan.
Ford's surcharge will impact American
residents and is already in place, regardless of what happens with the
United States' tariffs. Ford, when making this announcement noted that
Ontario will not back down until the threat of tariffs from the United
States is completely eliminated.
Amy
Klobucher was on MSNBC last night speaking about this topic. I don't
see the video at MSNBC. (I do see numbers and they match AP's coverage
-- no one's streaming for the Gaza Freaks -- in fact, Rachel's report on
it is still in the single digits not even 3,000 streams. Her other
segments from last night's show have 60,000 or more streams.) But here
are two segments on this topic.
But the best segment of all -- for pure joy -- is the one on Alien Musk losing and losing and losing again.
One year ago, a report appeared in the media documenting Musk’s heavy
use of a range of illegal and mind-altering drugs. This report didn’t
come from some left-wing scandal sheet; it was actually a front-page story in The Wall Street Journal. Here’s how the story begins:
Elon Musk
and his supporters offer several explanations for his contrarian views,
unfiltered speech and provocative antics. They’re an expression of his
creativity. Or the result of his mental-health challenges. Or fallout
from his stress, or sleep deprivation.
In recent years, some executives and board members at his
companies and others close to the billionaire have developed a
persistent concern that there is another component driving his behavior:
his use of drugs.
The world’s wealthiest person has used LSD, cocaine, ecstasy and psychedelic mushrooms, often at private parties around the world,
where attendees sign nondisclosure agreements or give up their phones
to enter, according to people who have witnessed his drug use and others
with knowledge of it. Musk has previously smoked marijuana in public
and has said he has a prescription for the psychedelic-like ketamine.
The story documents the drugs he took at parties, naming specific
people (a brother, a board member, friends) with whom he took them. It
recounts incidents at work where he appeared to be too wasted to
function (including one attempt to address SpaceX employees that
attendees termed “nonsensical” and “cringeworthy”). It cites repeated
concerns of his companies’ board members about his ability to function
on at least a somewhat steady keel, and their concerns that his
companies might have to pay a price for his conduct. In particular,
members also feared that Musk’s drug use might threaten SpaceX’s ability
to do business with the government, as SpaceX is privy to highly
classified information about the U.S. spy satellites it sends into
orbit. As a subsequent Journal story that ran less than three months ago reported:
[T]he company’s lawyers advised senior executives not to seek a
higher security clearance for Musk that would give him access to
details about sensitive programs SpaceX is involved in, according to
people familiar with the matter.
The reason, these people said, was that Musk would have had to
answer questions from the government about his contacts with foreign
nationals and drug use previously reported by The Wall Street Journal.
In internal discussions, the lawyers and executives posited scenarios in
which Musk might inadvertently disclose secrets to foreign officials
with whom he regularly speaks, the people said. The Journal reported in October that Musk has been in regular contact with Russian President Vladimir Putin since late 2022.
That may explain why Donald Trump hasn’t officially appointed Musk to
anything, as he might be required to perjure himself to become an
actual administration official. Then again, chatting with Putin while in
possession of highly classified U.S. secrets and being
hallucinogenically high as a kite probably poses no problem in the Trump
White House.
Yet Chump turns our most private information over to him.
Pema Levy (MOTHER JONES) observes,
"Since the opening days of the administration, Musk and his minions
have barged into agencies, including such august institutions as the
Treasury Department, where they demanded access to the most sensitive
systems and were handed the keys to the kingdom. Across government,
career officials facing DOGE orders have resigned quietly, leaving the
public to guess as to what is happening as reporters rush to share
snippets." We have no idea what they're doing with the information that
they're harvesting and Chump doesn't care enough about American
citizens to put in any protections or to see that real oversight is
taking place on Musk's actions.
Musk gave him a ton of money and that's all that matters to Chump.
Where is the oversight? Senator Sheldon Whitehouse's office issued this statement:
Whitehouse and Grassley were the original sponsors of the TITLE Act, the precursor to the Corporate Transparency Act
Washington, DC – Senators Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA) sent a letter today
to Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent requesting an explanation for the
Treasury Department’s announcement that it intends to suspend
enforcement of the bipartisan Corporate Transparency Act (CTA), the 2021
law considered the most important anti-money laundering law in
decades. Congress passed the CTA to clamp down on criminals and foreign
enemies hiding assets from U.S. law enforcement, national security
officials, and tax authorities.
The CTA was designed to play an important role in protecting national
security and public safety by providing law enforcement and national
security officials with the names of the true owners (“beneficial
ownership information”) of U.S. corporations and other legal entities.
This information facilitates the government’s efforts to combat
terrorist financing, money laundering, sanctions evasion, proliferation
financing, tax evasion, and other forms of illicit finance carried out
through shell and front companies.
On March 2, the Treasury Department announced that it would refuse to
enforce penalties or fines associated with the CTA’s beneficial
ownership information reporting rule against U.S. citizens or domestic
reporting companies, and would be issuing a new proposed rulemaking that
will narrow the scope of the rule to foreign reporting companies only.
“We request that you provide us the legal basis for the
Treasury Department’s policy decision to categorically suspend
enforcement of the CTA’s reporting requirements for all U.S. citizens
and domestic reporting companies. In addition, we request that you
provide us with information about how you intend to satisfy the policy
goals of the CTA,”wrote Whitehouse and Grassley.
The senators asked the Treasury Department to respond to the following questions by Wednesday, March 12:
Has the Treasury Department followed or initiated the process
required by the CTA to exclude an entity or class of entities from its
reporting requirements?
What steps has Treasury taken to ensure that any change in the
practice or rulemaking governing [beneficial ownership information]
reporting fulfills the law enforcement and national security purposes of
the CTA?
“This is a matter of public and congressional accountability
and ensuring that relevant policy interests underlying the CTA are
satisfied. We encourage you to fully implement the CTA so that law
enforcement agencies around the country have access to information
necessary to prevent human trafficking, terrorist financing, border
smuggling, drug distribution, and many other categories of criminal
activity,”added Whitehouse and Grassley.
Whitehouse and Grassley were the original sponsors of the TITLE Act, the precursor to the Corporate Transparency Act.
The CTA was the culmination of more than a decade of painstaking
bipartisan congressional deliberation. The CTA passed as part of the
FY2021 National Defense Authorization Act and was supported by a wide
range of stakeholders, including national security experts, law
enforcement, anti-corruption groups, human rights organizations, faith
communities, financial institutions, real estate organizations, the U.S.
Chamber of Commerce, labor unions, and the first Trump Administration.
The text of the letter is below and a PDF of the letter is availablehere.
March 10, 2025
The Honorable Scott Bessent Secretary U.S. Department of the Treasury 1500 Pennsylvania Ave NW Washington, DC 20220
RE: March 2, 2025 Corporate Transparency Act Enforcement Announcement
Dear Secretary Bessent,
We write regarding the Department of the Treasury’s March 2, 2025
announcement that Treasury intends to suspend enforcement of the
bipartisan Corporate Transparency Act (“CTA”) for U.S. citizens and
domestic reporting companies.[1] We wish to ensure that the terms of the CTA are followed and that its purpose is fulfilled.
The CTA,[2] part of the
Anti-Money Laundering Act of 2020, was enacted into law as a piece of
the National Defense Authorization Act for Fiscal Year 2021.[3]
The CTA is the product of a sensitive and painstaking legislative
process, that included robust input and support from the first Trump
Administration,[4] and its passage represents perhaps the most important anti-money laundering reform in two decades.
“For years, experts routinely ranked anonymous shell companies—where
the true, ‘beneficial’ owners are unknown—as the biggest weakness in our
anti-money laundering safeguards.”[5]
Drug cartels, terrorist groups, foreign adversaries, corrupt foreign
officials, and many others who wish harm to Americans have used
anonymous shell companies and opaque corporate structures to finance and
facilitate their crimes.
The CTA directly tackled this problem by requiring Treasury’s
Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (“FinCEN”) to create a national
directory of beneficial owners of companies within the United States,[6] bolstering
our nation’s efforts to combat “money laundering, the financing of
terrorism, proliferation finance, tax evasion, human and drug
trafficking, sanctions evasion, and other financial crimes.”[7]
In enacting the CTA, Congress found that reporting of Beneficial
Ownership Information (“BOI”) was necessary for law enforcement and
national security purposes. In particular, Congress found:
(1) more than 2,000,000 corporations and limited liability companies are being formed under the laws of the States [emphasis added] each year;
(2) most or all States [emphasis added] do not require
information about the beneficial owners of the corporations, limited
liability companies, or other similar entities formed under the laws of the State [emphasis added];
(3) malign actors seek to conceal their ownership of corporations, limited liability companies, or other similar entities inthe United States[emphasis
added] to facilitate illicit activity […] harming the national security
interests of the United States and allies of the United States;
(4) money launderers and others involved in commercial activity
intentionally conduct transactions through corporate structures in order
to evade detection, and may layer such structures, much like Russian
nesting ‘Matryoshka’ dolls, across various secretive jurisdictions such
that each time an investigator obtains ownership records fora domestic [emphasis
added] or foreign entity, the newly identified entity is yet another
corporate entity, necessitating a repeat of the same process;
(5) Federal legislation providing for the collection of beneficial
ownership information for corporations, limited liability companies, or
other similar entities formed under the laws of the States[emphasis
added] is needed to—(A) set a clear, Federal standard for incorporation
practices; (B) protect vital Unites States national security interests;
(C) protect interstate and foreign commerce; (D) better enable critical
national security, intelligence, and law enforcement efforts to counter
money laundering, the financing of terrorism, and other illicit
activity; and (E) bring the United States into compliance with
international anti-money laundering and countering the financing of
terrorism standards.[8]
In 2019, the Trump administration issued a Statement of
Administration Policy (“SAP”) supporting a draft of the CTA. That SAP
agreed with the importance of the goals of the CTA as well as a BOI
rule:
This legislation would require corporations and limited liability
companies in the United States to disclose their beneficial owners, a
measure that will help prevent malign actors from leveraging anonymity
to exploit these entities for criminal gain. It would also assist law
enforcement in detecting and preventing illicit activity such as
terrorist financing and money laundering.[9]
We acknowledge that the CTA creates a process by which the Secretary
of the Treasury may exclude “an entity or a class of entities” from BOI
reporting requirements so long as four conditions are met. First, the
exclusion must take place through the regulatory process. Second, the
exclusion must be with “the written concurrence of the Attorney General
and the Secretary of Homeland Security” to account for law enforcement
and national security interests. Third, the Secretary of the Treasury
must determine that BOI reports of these entities “would not serve the
public interest.” Fourth, the Secretary of the Treasury must determine
that such reports “would not be highly useful in national security,
intelligence, and law enforcement agency efforts to detect, prevent, or
prosecute money laundering, the financing of terrorism, proliferation
finance, serious tax fraud, or other crimes.”[10]
We request that you provide us the legal basis for the
Treasury Department’s policy decision to categorically suspend
enforcement of the CTA’s reporting requirements for all U.S. citizens
and domestic reporting companies. In addition, we request that you
provide us with information about how you intend to satisfy the policy
goals of the CTA. As part of your response, please address the following
questions:
Has the Treasury Department followed or initiated the process
required by the CTA to exclude an entity or class of entities from its
reporting requirements?
What steps has Treasury taken to ensure that any change in the
practice or rulemaking governing BOI reporting fulfills the law
enforcement and national security purposes of the CTA?
This is a matter of public and congressional accountability and
ensuring that relevant policy interests underlying the CTA are
satisfied.We encourage you to fully implement the CTA so
that law enforcement agencies around the country have access to
information necessary to prevent human trafficking, terrorist financing,
border smuggling, drug distribution, and many other categories of
criminal activity.
Please provide your response to our information request and questions no later than Wednesday, March 12, 2025.
Even Republican Grassley's worried about oversight.
Because?
There
are no protections in Chumpland. Everything has a price tag on it.
Every thing We The People own is up for sale. Senator Elizabeth
Warren's office issued the following:
RFK Jr. joined Trump’s
“million dollar” dinners with Pharma execs, raising questions about
promises to “clean up corruption” and industry’s influence on key
policies to lower drug costs
“You owe the American public an explanation for why you took part in PhRMA’s influence-peddling events with President Trump.”
Washington, D.C. – U.S. Senator Elizabeth Warren
(D-Mass.), along with Senate Finance Ranking Member Ron Wyden (D-Ore.),
and Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions (HELP) Ranking
Member Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), pressed Health and Human Services
Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. on his promises to “clean up corruption”
and “stop the revolving door between industry and government,”
following reports that Kennedy attended multiple “million-dollar”
dinners with Big Pharma executives at President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club.
According to the Wall Street Journal,
healthcare executives wrote checks for millions of dollars to attend at
least six private dinners with President Trump at Mar-a-Lago. Kennedy
attended several of these dinners, despite being a longtime Big Pharma
critic and leading previous proposals to beat back the industry’s
influence — raising questions about Big Pharma’s ability to throw its
weight around during the Trump Administration.
“It is unclear why you attended private dinners with Big Pharma
executives at President Trump’s Mar-a-Lago club following your promises
to ‘clean up corruption’ and 'stop the revolving door between industry
and government,’” wrote the lawmakers.
The pharmaceutical executives who attended Trump’s dinners alongside
RFK Jr. have repeatedly called on the Administration to stop the
Medicare drug negotiations that have already lowered prescription costs
and could save taxpayers as much as $100 billion by 2032. Big Pharma
stands to profit immensely from President Trump’s abandonment of this
and other policies that would bring drug prices down, such as patent
reform. PhRMA officials have continued to lobby President Trump to
weaken drug price negotiations in the months since the dinners.
“The dinners may have served as an opportunity for Big Pharma to
gain insider access to both you and President Trump,” continued the
lawmakers.
At Kennedy’s swearing-in ceremony last month, he committed to “end
the corruption, end the corporate capture” of regulatory agencies like
HHS by Big Pharma, additionally promising to remove regulatory panel
members with conflicts of interest, and provide “radical transparency.”
His presence at these lobbying dinners stands in stark contrast with
these commitments, and raises questions about the policies he may
pursue at HHS.
“You owe the American public an explanation for why you took part in
PhRMA’s influence-peddling events with President Trump, what happened at
these meetings, and whether they will affect your commitment to
ensuring that Americans receive the relief they deserve from high drug
prices,” concluded the lawmakers.
Senator Warren led efforts to oppose RFK Jr.’s nomination and
subsequent confirmation for his conflicts of interest and dangerous
views on vaccines:
On March 3, 2025, Senator Warren wrote to RFK
Jr. regarding his dangerous actions to undermine vaccines and vaccine
production, just weeks after he was confirmed as Secretary and days
after he published a new op-ed.
On February 13, 2025, following Senate Republicans voting to confirm
Robert F. Kennedy Jr. for Secretary of Health and Human Services,
Senator Elizabeth Warren released a statement calling
his confirmation “a huge mistake” and said his conflicts of interest
would allow him and his family to “continue getting richer from his
anti-vaccine crusade.”
On February 12, 2025, on the Senate floor, Senator Elizabeth Warren
joined Democrats in delaying a final vote to confirm Robert F. Kennedy
Jr. for Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. In her
speech, she warned that
American families and children would pay the price for Mr. Kennedy’s
“conspiracy-driven health care decisions,” while his serious ethics
conflicts remain unresolved.
On February 6, 2025, Senators Elizabeth Warren and Tim Kaine (D-Va.) wrote to then-nominee Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. about his continued conflicts of interest.
The senators called out Mr. Kennedy’s plan to enter office with a
serious ethics conflict by keeping a financial interest in anti-vaccine
lawsuits within his family, asked him to recuse himself from former
clients’ matters, commit to not lobbying HHS after his tenure as
Secretary, and more.
On February 4, 2025, following the Senate Finance Committee vote to
advance the nomination of RFK Jr. for Secretary of Health and Human
Services, Senator Warren gave remarks regarding Mr. Kennedy’s continued conflicts of interest.
On February 3, 2025, Senators Warren and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.), Ranking Member on the Senate Finance Committee, wrote to RFK Jr., pressing him to urgently resolve his serious conflicts of interest before the committee vote Wednesday morning.
On January 31, 2025, following pressure from Senate Democrats, RFK Jr., agreed to amend his flawed ethics agreement (see Warren QFRs at the end of Part 2 and start of Part 3).
On January 29, 2025, at a hearing of the Senate Finance Committee, Senator Warren questioned Mr.
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., nominee for Secretary of Health and Human
Services, about his dangerous conflicts of interest and record of
profiting from anti-vaccine conspiracies.
On January 18, 2025, ahead of RFK Jr.’s confirmation hearing for Secretary of Health and Human Services, Senator Warren sent a 34-page letter detailing
her concerns with his nomination and asked him to answer 175 questions
ahead of his hearing before the Finance Committee.
On November 14, 2024, in response to the news that President-elect
Donald Trump selected Robert F. Kennedy Jr. to serve as Secretary of
Health and Human Services, Senator Warren released a statement calling him a “danger to public health, scientific research, medicine, and health care coverage for millions of Americans.”
