March 31, 2016


News Clips For The Day


https://www.yahoo.com/politics/ny-gov-cuomo-bans-travel-to-north-carolina-in-184327168.html

North Carolina attorney general won’t defend transgender law: It’s a ‘national embarrassment’
Michael Walsh
Tue, Mar 29 11:43 AM PDT

Photograph -- People protest outside the North Carolina Executive Mansion in Raleigh, N.C., on March 24. (Photo: Emery P. Dalesio/AP)
Photograph -- North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper speaks at a news conference in his state offices in Raleigh, N.C., on Tuesday. (Photo: Harry Lynch/The News & Observer via AP)
Photograph -- New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo leaves a minimum wage rally in Albany, N.Y., on March 15. (Photo: Mike Groll/AP)
Photograph -- North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory speaks at the Wake County Republican Party 2016 County Convention in Raleigh, N.C., on March 8. (Photo: Al Drago/CQ Roll Call)
Related video: Hidden Camera


One day after civil liberties groups filed suit to fight a controversial “bathroom bill” in North Carolina that they say discriminates against the LGBT community, state Attorney General Roy Cooper announced that he would not defend its constitutionality.

“We should not even be here today, but we are. We’re here because the governor has signed statewide legislation that puts discrimination into the law,” Cooper told reporters in Raleigh Tuesday.

According to Cooper, House Bill 2 (HB2) is in direct conflict with nondiscrimination policies at North Carolina’s justice department and treasurer’s office, as well as many of the state’s businesses. Though the LGBT community is targeted, he said, it could ultimately result in the discrimination of other groups as well.

“House Bill 2 is unconstitutional,” he said. “Therefore, our office will not represent the defendants in this lawsuit, nor future lawsuits involving the constitutionality of House Bill 2.”

Cooper called the new law a “national embarrassment” that will hurt North Carolina’s economy if not repealed. And there are already signs that he might be right.

San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee banned nonessential publicly funded travel there in a show of opposition to the law on Friday. New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Seattle Mayor Ed Murray followed suit on Monday.

“In New York, we believe that all people — regardless of their gender identity or sexual orientation — deserve the same rights and protections under the law,” Cuomo said in a statement. “From Stonewall to marriage equality, our state has been a beacon of hope and equality for the LGBT community, and we will not stand idly by as misguided legislation replicates the discrimination of the past.”

Cuomo, a Democrat, said his ban on travel to the Tar Heel State would last “as long as there is a law in North Carolina that creates the grounds for discrimination against LGBT people.”

In its most literal application, House Bill 2 requires people to use only bathrooms reserved for their biological sex, which the bill defines as “the physical condition of being male or female, which is stated on a person’s birth certificate.”

But the reach of this bill, which goes into effect on Friday, will go far beyond bathrooms: It also prohibits local governments from passing new ordinances that would ban discrimination against specific groups.

North Carolina lawmakers approved the bill last week in reaction to a February ordinance by the Charlotte City Council. That ordinance would have outlawed discriminating against gay and transgender people and affirmed that transgender people can use restrooms that match their gender identities.

Supporters of HB2 argued that the ordinance would have allowed men to enter women’s restrooms, showers and locker rooms in public buildings — placing women in danger. Opponents of HB2 argued that the lawmakers were playing on fears to legalize discrimination.

“Charlotte had chosen to be a fair and welcoming city, to express its values in a local ordinance,” Tara Borelli, the senior attorney at Lambda Legal, said in an interview with Yahoo News. “And HB2 really runs roughshod over those values by passing this outrageous law. It really tarnishes the reputation of the state.”

The North Carolina Family Policy Council, a socially conservative nonprofit supporting HB2, argues that the council’s “radical and hazardous” ordinance undercuts the privacy, safety and dignity of women, children and the elderly.

“This is an appalling and inexcusable effort to supersede common sense laws in North Carolina and replace them with radical policies that are clearly out of touch with the values of the majority of North Carolinians,” organization president John L. Rustin said in a statement. “It is particularly disturbing that those who oppose HB 2 continue to misrepresent the law in outlandish ways and seek to put the safety of women, children, elderly, and others at risk to accommodate the desires of a few!”

Ross Murray, GLAAD’s programs director for the South, said the pro-HB2 arguments are based on “outdated and frankly horrific stereotypes” about transgender women as sexual predators and distract from the necessity of nondiscrimination ordinances to protect an already vulnerable population.

“Bills like this always get boiled down to talking about bathrooms, but it’s really important to understand that we are also talking about nondiscrimination in terms of employment and in terms of housing and being able to let people live their everyday lives,” Murray said to Yahoo News.

House Bill 2 is just one of many so-called bathroom bills in state legislatures throughout the United States. These include high-profile cases in Texas, Minnesota, Kansas and South Dakota.

LGBT rights groups have been fighting these bills, and North Carolina’s is no exception. On Monday, the American Civil Liberties Union, ACLU of North Carolina, Lambda Legal and Equality North Carolina filed a lawsuit hoping to overturn HB2.

The plaintiffs argue that the bill violates the Equal Protection and Due Process clauses of the 14th Amendment by discriminating on the basis of sex and sexual orientation and is therefore unconstitutional. They also say the bill violates Title IX because it discriminates based on sex.

“We were extraordinarily disappointed. There were clear statements on record by the governor and lawmakers, but we really hoped that reason and fairness would prevail. This law, it’s just a travesty,” Lambda Legal attorney Borelli said.

North Carolina Senate Leader Phil Berger and House Speaker Tim Moore, both Republicans, released a joint statement Monday in response to the lawsuit that accused the “far-left groups” behind the lawsuit of using the state as a pawn in their “extreme agenda.”

“This lawsuit takes this debate out of the hands of voters and instead attempts to argue with a straight face that there is a previously undiscovered ‘right’ in the U.S. Constitution for men to use women’s bathrooms and locker rooms — but we are confident the court will find the General Assembly acted properly in accordance with existing state and federal law,” the statement reads.

The lawsuit was filed against Republican North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory, Attorney General Cooper and the University of North Carolina on behalf of transgender UNC employee Joaquín Carcano, transgender UNC student Payton McGarry and Angela Gilmore, a lesbian North Carolina Central University law professor.

A firestorm of outrage erupted on March 23 after McCrory signed the bill into law, accusing Charlotte’s mayor and city council of breaching basic privacy and etiquette by going far beyond their core responsibilities.

“The basic expectation of privacy in the most personal of settings, a restroom or locker room, for each gender was violated by government overreach and intrusion by the mayor and city council of Charlotte,” McCrory said in a statement. “This radical breach of trust and security under the false argument of equal access not only impacts the citizens of Charlotte but people who come to Charlotte to work, visit or play.”

Mike Meno, the communications director for the ACLU of North Carolina, said the “ugly and distorted rhetoric” of lawmakers to pass House Bill 2 is among the most harmful consequences of this controversy.

“Transgender people face high rates of harassment and sometimes even assault in public accommodations. That is exactly what Charlotte’s ordinance was trying to protect people from,” Meno said to Yahoo News.

Sections 3.1 and 3.3 of House Bill 2 specifically protect people from discrimination based on race, religion, color, national origin, age, biological sex or handicap. In fact, “biological sex” is underlined in what was likely intended to distinguish it from gender identity.

Opponents of House Bill 2 say that the new law essentially legalizes discrimination against gay and transgender people.

“That’s something that flies in the face not only of American values but North Carolina’s values. And I think the outpouring of opposition from people across our state and across our country points to how out of step this extreme legislation is with our values,” Meno said.

In fact, on Monday, the LGBT community got other signs that the tide may be slowly turning in its favor. White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest condemned HB2 as “mean-spirited.” And Republican Georgia Gov. Nathan Deal announced that he intends to veto a “religious liberty” bill that protects opponents of same-sex marriage, saying, “I do not think that we have to discriminate against anyone to protect the faith-based community in Georgia.”



“One day after civil liberties groups filed suit to fight a controversial “bathroom bill” in North Carolina that they say discriminates against the LGBT community, state Attorney General Roy Cooper announced that he would not defend its constitutionality. “We should not even be here today, but we are. We’re here because the governor has signed statewide legislation that puts discrimination into the law,” Cooper told reporters in Raleigh Tuesday.”


This is the problem, other than simple unfairness, with writing laws that codify injustice. They are unconstitutional, but that doesn’t keep this Tea Party bunch of Republicans from trying. I think they will get themselves voted out of office soon, though, because Trump et al are beginning to come into disfavor in a big way.

Congratulations to NC’s Democratic AG for publically and clearly standing up for a fair legal system, even in a state where he could become very unpopular for it. He speaks a profound truth when he says “Though the LGBT community is targeted, he said, it could ultimately result in the discrimination of other groups as well.” This is exactly how laws of all kinds get their respective feet into the door of constitutionality. Precedent is a dangerous thing.



JOHN KASICH --- TWO ARTICLES


http://www.cnn.com/2016/03/30/politics/donald-trump-abortion-town-hall/index.html

Trump: Ban abortions, punish women who get them
By Jeremy Diamond, CNN
Updated 4:41 PM ET, Wed March 30, 2016


(CNN)Donald Trump said Wednesday that women who undergo abortions should face "some form of punishment" if the procedure were outlawed.

Trump, who once supported abortion rights, now favors outlawing the procedure, which he called "a very serious problem," according to excerpts of an MSNBC town hall that is scheduled to air Wednesday evening.

"There has to be some form of punishment," Trump said in the town hall.

Trump declined to specify how women should be punished if they underwent an illegal abortion.

The Republican front-runner conceded that outlawing the practice would lead some women to seek out abortions illegally.

"Well, you go back to a position like they had where they would perhaps go to illegal places, but we have to ban it," Trump said during the town hall.

Later Wednesday afternoon, Trump said in a statement released by campaign spokeswoman Hope Hicks that "this issue is unclear and should be put back into the states for determination. Like Ronald Reagan, I am pro-life with exceptions, which I have outlined numerous times."

In a 1999 interview, Trump called himself "pro-choice in every respect," though he said that he did not like the concept of abortion.

Widespread condemnation

The town hall comments were met with immediate criticism from progressives.

Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton retweeted an NBC News reporter, adding, "Just when you thought it couldn't get worse. Horrific and telling. -H."

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders tweeted, "Your Republican frontrunner, ladies and gentlemen. Shameful."

Trump's Republican opponents quickly responded as well.

Ohio Gov. John Kasich told MSNBC, "Of course, women shouldn't be punished for having an abortion."

And Brian Phillips, a spokesman for Cruz, tweeted, "Don't overthink it: Trump doesn't understand the pro-life position because he's not pro-life."

Trump's comment also drew a swift rebuke from Planned Parenthood's advocacy arm, which called Trump's comments "flat-out dangerous.

"Women's lives are not disposable. There's nothing else to say, as Donald Trump's remarks today have said it all," Executive Vice President of Planned Parenthood Action Fund Dawn Laguens said in a statement.

CNN's Noah Gray contributed to this report.



“Trump, who once supported abortion rights, now favors outlawing the procedure, which he called "a very serious problem," according to excerpts of an MSNBC town hall that is scheduled to air Wednesday evening. "There has to be some form of punishment," Trump said in the town hall. Trump declined to specify how women should be punished if they underwent an illegal abortion. The Republican front-runner conceded that outlawing the practice would lead some women to seek out abortions illegally. …. Later Wednesday afternoon, Trump said in a statement released by campaign spokeswoman Hope Hicks that "this issue is unclear and should be put back into the states for determination. Like Ronald Reagan, I am pro-life with exceptions, which I have outlined numerous times." …. And Brian Phillips, a spokesman for Cruz, tweeted, "Don't overthink it: Trump doesn't understand the pro-life position because he's not pro-life." Trump's comment also drew a swift rebuke from Planned Parenthood's advocacy arm, which called Trump's comments "flat-out dangerous. "Women's lives are not disposable. There's nothing else to say, as Donald Trump's remarks today have said it all," Executive Vice President of Planned Parenthood Action Fund Dawn Laguens said in a statement.”


Donald Trump may still be a forerunner among Republican voters (a report yesterday said he is at 50% of Republicans now), but the overall voting public is strongly vocal against him. The more he says, the more trouble he’s in. He’s clever in certain ways, but not in human relations. That is a very poor characteristic for a President.



http://www.cbsnews.com/news/john-kasich-obamacare-repeal-was-a-stupid-promise-by-gop-election-2016/

John Kasich: Obamacare repeal was "a stupid promise" by GOP
By REENA FLORES CBS NEWS
March 31, 2016, 8:22 AM

Photograph -- Republican presidential candidate, Ohio Gov. John Kasich speaks at the Lansing Brewing Company, Tuesday, March 8, 2016, in Lansing, Mich. AP PHOTO/CARLOS OSORIO
Play VIDEO -- Ohio Gov. Kasich on his ideas to replace Obamacare


Republican presidential candidate and Ohio Gov. John Kasich is deriding his party's 2014 pledge to repeal the Affordable Care Act, President Obama's landmark healthcare overhaul, as a "big joke" and a "stupid promise."

"You've been supporting conservative candidates," Kasich said Tuesday in comments on a Wisconsin radio talk show, first reported by BuzzFeed News. "They told you in 2014 that they were going to repeal Obamacare. Do you realize, that's just--that's a big joke?"

On "The Jay Weber Show," the talk show host agreed, saying that he believed at the time that it was a Republican "fallacy."

"It got all these conservatives all stirred up and angry because they didn't keep their word," Kasich said. "I mean, what a stupid promise."

"And then you've got the base of the party is furious because they didn't repeal Obamacare. How are you gonna repeal Obamacare when Obama's president?" he questioned.

Serving as Ohio's governor, Kasich expanded Medicaid coverage in the state under the Affordable Care Act -- to the anger of many Ohio Republicans.

In 2013, as the Ohio legislature was considering Medicaid expansion, Kasich relied on an appeal to compassion and faith in making his case.

"Put yourself in somebody else's shoes. Put yourself in the shoes of a mother and a father of an adult child that is struggling...Understand that poverty is real," he told reporters. "When you die and get to the meeting with St. Peter, he's probably not going to ask you much about what you did about keeping government small. But he is going to ask you what you did for the poor. You better have a good answer."

The GOP's failure to repeal Obamacare, however, isn't due to lack of trying: Congressional Republicans have held over 50 votes in an attempt to roll back the president's healthcare law.



“Serving as Ohio's governor, Kasich expanded Medicaid coverage in the state under the Affordable Care Act -- to the anger of many Ohio Republicans. In 2013, as the Ohio legislature was considering Medicaid expansion, Kasich relied on an appeal to compassion and faith in making his case. …. "Put yourself in somebody else's shoes. Put yourself in the shoes of a mother and a father of an adult child that is struggling...Understand that poverty is real," he told reporters. "When you die and get to the meeting with St. Peter, he's probably not going to ask you much about what you did about keeping government small.”


Thank goodness there are Republicans who do understand that “poverty is real.” Kasich is a bright and decent man. Why couldn’t he be the Republican front runner? Because Republicans don’t’ want those characteristics?? That is what is really sad.



http://www.cbsnews.com/news/chicago-police-union-hires-jason-van-dyke-officer-accused-in-laquan-mcdonald-death/

Chicago police union hires officer accused in teen's death
CBS/AP
March 31, 2016, 8:51 AM

22 Photos -- A composite image shows Laquan McDonald and Chicago police officer Jason Van Dyke. CBS NEWS
Play VIDEO -- Chicago cop Jason Van Dyke pleads not guilty in death of Laquan McDonald


CHICAGO-- The Chicago police union says it has hired as a janitor the officer charged with first-degree murder in the fatal shooting of a black teenager.

Dean Angelo, president of the Fraternal Order of Police Chicago, says the union hired Jason Van Dykeabout three weeks ago.

Van Dyke is accused of shooting 17-year-old Laquan McDonald 16 times in 2014. The shooting was captured on squad-car video and has prompted investigations, including a federal civil rights probe of the Chicago Police Department.

Angelo says Van Dyke, who has been suspended from the department, is in a "very difficult situation, financially." Angelo says the union would do the same for any Chicago officer.

The union says Van Dyke has lost other jobs due to publicity and that threats closed his wife's business.

CBS Chicago reports that community leaders are already outraged at the reported hiring of Van Dyke.

"The FOP hiring him sends a hell of a message to the city of Chicago and the citizens of Chicago saying 'we don't care what you think, we don't care what he did, we defend him know matter what,'" said Fr. Michael Pfleger of St. Sabina.



“The Chicago police union says it has hired as a janitor the officer charged with first-degree murder in the fatal shooting of a black teenager. Dean Angelo, president of the Fraternal Order of Police Chicago, says the union hired Jason Van Dykeabout three weeks ago. Van Dyke is accused of shooting 17-year-old Laquan McDonald 16 times in 2014. The shooting was captured on squad-car video and has prompted investigations, including a federal civil rights probe of the Chicago Police Department. Angelo says Van Dyke, who has been suspended from the department, is in a "very difficult situation, financially." Angelo says the union would do the same for any Chicago officer. The union says Van Dyke has lost other jobs due to publicity and that threats closed his wife's business.”


I can’t help feeling sorry for the man on the personal level. He shouldn’t starve. It also must be embarrassing for him to have to work as a janitor. It is, however, poetic justice. Thousands of black men and women clean buildings and houses and are glad to get the jobs, so he is now walking in their moccasins. I don’t condone his abysmal police career, however, and I think he should have been charged with murder and convicted. It’s not as if there was no evidence against him. I want to think that more and more city police departments will be examining their basic philosophy of policing and their training/qualifications/ethics/supervision when they hire an officer. There is a tendency in this country for officers to work without much supervision at all, and with much too little discipline when they are caught doing bad things. There are simply too many police officers of this type in departments across the country. It’s a crying shame!



CLINTON CAMP AGAINST SANDERS – TWO ARTICLES


Virginia Allain’s Facebook items on the Larry Womack assault on Sanders:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/writersforbernie/

Kathryn Grace
12 hrs

This article showed up in my feed today and I feel deeply unqualified to evaluate its veracity. Does anyone know of a knowledgeable rebuttal? Or whether someone with the stature and expertise of, say, Senator Elizabeth Warren has responded to it?

Comments
Virginia Allain

Virginia Allain I'd say ask Robert Reich, former secretary of labor, to dismantle it and set the record straight. He has great experience and is a huge Bernie supporter. It's a good thing you didn't post this to a Bernie Believers group as they think any negative article like this is planted to undermine their morale. I know that is not your intent.

Kathryn Grace replied · 1 Reply
Virginia Allain

Virginia Allain I feel sure the premise of this is wrong. Couldn't find an email or FB message way to contact Reich, so put it as a question/link on one of the threads on his FB page.

Kathryn Grace replied · 1 Reply
Wil Wynn
Wil Wynn Total cost if the bank bailout: 29.6 TRILLION. All the "arguments" the author makes are repudiated. Who forced the Federal Reserve to disclose this gigantic amount? You got it, Bernie Sanders! Check it out here: http://www.levyinstitute.org/pubs/wp_698.pdf

Kathryn Grace replied · 1 Reply
Virginia Allain
Virginia Allain I'm going to remove this now, to streamline our news feed. If you write a rebuttal, you could let us know.


The article referenced by Allain is below this commentary by dailykos. In my opinion, the face I picture when reading the following blog by Larry Womack strikes me as being decidedly “wild-eyed,” so I looked him up on the Net. See the following from DailyKos, whose writers are always able to tackle anybody, though the author has hidden his identity behind one of those clever Internet handles. The dailykos article isn’t on the subject of the anti-Sanders article, but it does thoroughly trash Womack. --

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2010/12/7/925593/-

Thank God Larry Womack is a Former Editor: Pro-Censorship
By SoLeftImRight
Tuesday Dec 07, 2010 · 8:09 AM EST


I love bloggers. I love amateur journalists. I really do. On more than one occasion (and still too few,) each has played a vital role in keeping larger media outlets honest. And on more than one occasion each has answered the call when major or minor print publications have been too afraid to break a vitally important story.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...

Whenever an article starts out with effusive praise for something, especially something that is hard to define and covers a broad spectrum of people and interests, it is so that they can demarcate clearly between people and behaviors that are 'acceptable' and those same people and behaviors which are unacceptable within the given range. It is a strawman of a higher sort: instead of craft and refuting arguments that your opponent does not actually hold or put forth, you craft a debate in which one side can only ever be understood as illogical, because the boundaries of the debate have been defined in a way that skews to the side that the creator prefers. More below the fold:

Quoting Womack:

So it is difficult for me to look across the blogosphere today and see one show of support after another for a man who has consistently shown himself to have no ethical standards as a journalist, blogger or human being.

Assange and his supporters are a part of an unethical, radical cohort; lacking empathy, reason, and balanced judgment, Wikileaks represents the latest Anarchist fifth-column that advocates justice while resorting to unjust tactics.

From the start, Womack crafts this debate where one side is ethical, and the other side is not. One side is evil, the other side is good. One side is human...

. . . .

And that really, is why Womack is so dangerous; why he is so effective at forwarding Government talking points; why it is so easy for liberals to be shamed into accepting the word of the Government as the final authority.

It is about radicalizing the 'truth', so that even 'truth' is liberal, even 'truth' is political. Even 'truth' is not real. See? So effective is this technique that already I am talking about truth in a political context, the debate has already been framed in a way that the TRUTH can be doubted by its political origin.

Perhaps this has been going on for years - I would not doubt it.

But whether Womack is regurgitating talking points from the landed, nativist elite that are straight from 1910, or whether or not this is just a scary new method of truth suppression, it is a fact that this is a method of truth suppression that is being largely played out in the media.

It must be fought.

Limited interruption: I want to say this about the media, I get all of my news from various internet sources, never the TV.

. . . . Maddow and Olbermann, and Maher, and Stewart, are all useful within their own media contexts: Maddow as the progressive educator, Olbermann as a firebrand for liberals on TV, Maher as the intellectual tough-guy, and Stewart as the cut-the-crap social satirist. Or whatever.

. . . . Anyway: back to Womack.

. . . .
But again back to the first point: Assange is a whistle-blower, he is a source journalists are supposed to use. If you pay attention to the foreign press, you see that is exactly what is happening: the press uses the materials provided by a whistle-blower to inform the public of the dissonance between policy stated by the Government, and policy actually pursued by the Government.

But what about Womack's main point, that Wikileaks:

...has also repeatedly shown a wildly irresponsible disregard for the rights and safety of human beings around the world. And for all the hype surrounding it, what I find most disturbing about the latest WikiLeaks document dump is the resulting exposure of a broad divide between the ethics of responsible journalists and crusading poseurs like Assange.
And given what Glenn Greenwald has discovered about these imperiled human beings?

To recap: warnings about the dangers from WikiLeaks are "significantly overwrought" and the impact on foreign policy: "fairly modest." So it appears that the political class and its eager enablers in the media world and foreign policy community have -- as usual -- severely exaggerated national security threats in order to manipulate the public and its emotional reactions. Shocking, I know.
(Emphasis, Greenwald's)

Womack must therefore be talking about some pretty specific instances:

When given a membership list of the far right British National Party, a responsible news organization would have exposed the police officers, solicitors, clergy and teachers involved in the organization. WikiLeaks posted the entire list of 13,500 members -- complete with home addresses.
. . . .

When given the contents of pager intercepts between Pentagon officials and the NYPD from September 11, 2001, a responsible news organization might have reported compelling exchanges or failures in the response system, leaving out details that might aid those planning future attacks. WikiLeaks saw no need to do all that reading, and just posted them all.
. . . .

The politicization is complete: not only is the truth the enemy of the public, it is hurting them too!

So complete is Womack's love for the Government, and so intimate is his embrace of Government goals, that he can do nothing in the following paragraph but wax lyrical about Their Righteous Cause:

. . . .
What this makes clear, for the American People, and the People of Yemen, is that Barack Obama and his Administration are expanding the war on terror to the innocent civilians of an impoverished country ruled by a dictator. If the people of Yemen are informed, if they are broken of this 'good lie', boys and girls, then this is bad. Why is it bad? Womack does not tell us. We can only assume it's bad because it ruins the Government game plan, it makes the Government unhappy, and therefore since Womack is scandalously in love with the Government and his sources in it, he can do nothing but react naturally and hide the blemishes of his damaged lover.

There is literally nothing more revolting that what Womack has written in this piece that what he has revealed here: that sometimes it's good to 'lie', even though no card-carrying liberal or defender of America would ever say such a terrible, immoral thing.

Again, all I can say: thank God you don't have a job as an editor anymore.



FROM LARRY WOMACK


http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-womack/dear-bernie-red-flags-frequent_b_9289954.html

THE BLOG
Dear Bernie: I Like You, But These Red Flags Are Too Frequent to Ignore
Larry Womack
02/23/2016 09:43 am ET | Updated Feb 23, 2016

Photograph -- Bernie Sanders head bowed, ASSOCIATED PRESS


You have been a lifelong champion of human equality. You have kept economic inequality, an issue I care very deeply about, at the forefront of an election cycle that might otherwise have been dominated by the antics of a reality TV clown.

On foreign policy, the issue that is generally considered your greatest weakness, I believe that you have consistently shown yourself to be responsible, inquisitive and level-headed. And you and Secretary Clinton have run campaigns which, a few stumbles aside, stand in such stark contrast to the GOP field that it is difficult to fathom how anyone could possibly consider any of them over either of you.

Senator Sanders, I like you. I admire you. Most of the time, I wish that we had 99 more senators just like you.

And I would, wouldn’t I? I’m on the younger end of the likely voter spectrum. I’m male. I’m white. I’m liberal as hell. I’m the kind of voter that you should have a lock on.

But Senator, we have a problem, and it’s a big one. When it comes to the specifics surrounding the core issue of your campaign, you have too often come across as either disingenuous or strangely removed from current reality.

The red flags have become too frequent to ignore.

You recently claimed that under your leadership, “the Treasury Department will create a too-big-to fail list of banks and insurance companies.”

Of course it will. The Treasury Department has been legally required to do that since the Dodd-Frank Act of 2010. The institutions are, on top of that, already subjected to stress tests, and when they fail, there are fairly serious consequences. The Department’s annual report is available right here. You can find a list of these institutions on Wikipedia, for crying out loud. The Financial Stability Board also maintains a global list, which you can find right here, should you find that helpful.

Similarly, you have made a fair amount of noise calling for an independent audit of the Federal Reserve. That’s already done, every single year. You can find last year’s report right here.

What the plan that you and Sen. Paul have put forth does is, a) pander to low-information voters, and b) make the Federal Reserve’s every decision subject to congressional pressure. What you are proposing, Senator Sanders, would set the Fed’s independence back four decades and allow Paul Ryan to pressure it at every turn.

Even when I agree with your proposed policies, I am too often alarmed by your extreme departures from reality.

You have proposed, for example, to pay for universal free public college with a tax on Wall Street speculation. Hillary Clinton had previously proposed such a tax, sans the promise that it would cover such a large expense. It’s called a Tobin tax. The idea dates back to 1972, and is meant to stabilize markets.

When it comes to raising revenue, however, it’s arguably little more than snake oil. Sweden once tried it after the promise of 1.5 billion kronor in new revenue. It fell 97 percent short of that projection. As investors moved to other markets, revenue from capital gains taxes fell. The relatively meager 50 million the tax did bring in was offset entirely by those losses. Recent experiments in Italy and France have been similarly disappointing.

Of course, it should bring in some money — a good deal, perhaps. Taiwan, Hong Kong, India, South Africa and South Korea currently raise tens of billions (combined, annually,) with the tax. And a group of ten European nations is now hoping that a similar tax might generate as much as $15 billion annually, between them. (Good luck with that, say Italy and France.)

But in 2012, students in the U.S. spent $62.6 billion on tuition at public colleges. In order for your scheme to work, a Tobin tax here would need to raise roughly that plus the cost of students who would return to school or take a public institution over a private one if it were free. It would also have to defray the price paid by seniors, who will end up eating some of the cost... All without being offset by other lost revenue.

Senator, you’re not going to pay for universal free public college with a Tobin tax.

But none of this holds a candle to the bizarre narrative you have consistently pushed around Glass-Steagall, your primary point of distinction from Secretary Clinton on finance. You have repeatedly insinuated, implied and said flat-out that the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act, which you tend to call a repeal of Glass-Steagall, caused the financial crisis.

Senator Sanders, that simply isn’t true. That is a lie invented for a slimy attack ad during the 2008 campaign. There is an overwhelming consensus—not from Wall Street, but from watchdogs and academics — that the repeal of Glass-Steagall did not cause the financial crisis. Fact checker after fact checker after fact checker after fact checker has found the claim to be, at best, an enormous stretch. They were doing so, from all parts of the political spectrum, years before you launched a presidential campaign.

The law had little if anything to do with the practices leading up to the crisis. It aimed, as you well know, to separate commercial from investment banking. You can support that policy or oppose it, with honest, pro-regulatory arguments on either side. I might even agree with you. But you cannot with a straight face blame the financial crisis on its absence.

Princeton’s Alan S Blinder wrote way back in 2010:

I often pose the following question to critics who claim that repealing Glass-Steagall was a major cause of the financial crisis: What disasters would have been averted if Glass-Steagall was still on the books?

I’ve yet to hear a good answer. While mortgage underwriting standards were disgraceful, they were promulgated by banks and mortgage finance companies and did not rely on any new GLB powers. The dodgy MBS were put together and marketed mainly by free-standing investment banks, not by newly created banking-securities conglomerates. All five of the giant investment banks (Goldman Sachs, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, Lehman Brothers, and Bear Stearns) got themselves into severe trouble without help from banking subsidiaries, and their problems certainly did not stem from conventional investment banking activities—the historic target of Glass-Steagall. Similarly, Wachovia and Washington Mutual died (and Bank of America and Citigroup nearly did) of banking diseases, not from entanglements with or losses imposed on them by related investment banks. In short, I don’t see how this crisis would have been any milder if GLB had never passed.

When asked to identify a law that actually contributed to the financial crisis, experts are more likely to point to the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000. TIME Magazine explained back in 2008:

If you had to pick a single government move that did more than any other to muck things up, it was probably this bill, passed by a Republican Congress and signed into law by lame-duck President Bill Clinton in December 2000. It effectively banned regulators from sticking their noses into over-the-counter derivatives like credit default swaps. There’s no guarantee that regulators would have sniffed out the dangers in time. But banning them from even looking sent a pretty clear anything-goes message to OTC derivatives markets.
Senator Sanders, you voted in favor of that law.

I’m not saying this to pin the blame on any one law, Senator. Certainly not to pin it on you. That would be absurd. I am merely pointing out that Glass-Steagall is an especially ridiculous boogeyman.

In fact, there is good reason to believe that Glass-Steagall would have made the crisis worse. The kind of combined institutions the law aimed to prevent weathered the financial crisis far better than the kind of independent investment firms it aimed to mandate.

The U.S. overall fared the global disaster relatively well, which itself blows a huge hole in any story seeking to blame it on a single US law. But it is Canada’s remarkable endurance that really sinks the Glass-Steagall claim. Canada’s relative success has often been attributed in part to Schedule I and II of its Bank Act, which serve as a sort of anti-Glass-Steagall. This gave Canadian institutions “a steady, secure stream of capital,” while “holdovers from Glass Steagall” in the US collapsed or were forced to combine.

As Factcheck.org concluded in 2008:

The Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act had little if anything to do with the current crisis. In fact, economists on both sides of the political spectrum have suggested that the act has probably made the crisis less severe than it might otherwise have been...

Deregulated banks were not the major culprits in the current debacle. Bank of America, Citigroup, Wells Fargo and J.P. Morgan Chase have weathered the financial crisis in reasonably good shape, while Bear Stearns collapsed and Lehman Brothers has entered bankruptcy, to name but two of the investment banks which had remained independent despite the repeal of Glass-Steagall.

Observers as diverse as former Clinton Treasury official and current Berkeley economist Brad DeLong and George Mason University’s Tyler Cowen, a libertarian, have praised Gramm-Leach-Bliley has having softened the crisis. The deregulation allowed Bank of America and J.P. Morgan Chase to acquire Merrill Lynch and Bear Stearns. And Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley have now converted themselves into unified banks to better ride out the storm.

Brookings Institution Fellow Phillip Wallach rather charitably described your efforts to tie Glass-Steagall to the financial crisis as, “Stretching very hard to try to fit a square peg in a round hole,” and, “not at all convincing as a matter of accurate historical description.”

Sometimes, Senator, you really live up to your initials.

I realize that you’re giving people easy answers to complicated problems because they respond to that better than wonky lectures about shadow banking. I am fully aware that three quarters of all readers checked out of this piece somewhere around the Tobin tax.

“Sometimes, Senator, you really live up to your initials.”

The problem is that you’re talking to people who sense that something is wrong, are angry about it and want to know where to place the blame. You are giving them a cabal of boogeyman bankers, corporations and allegedly bought politicians to bear the brunt of that resentment. You’re doing this through a fair degree of dishonesty, and the response of your supporters and campaign to any kind of reality check has thus far been to impugn the motives of impartial observers.

Bernie — do you mind if I call you Bernie? That’s bullshit, Bernie.

Senator, you are forming a mob of angry, misinformed people and then turning it on the likely Democratic nominee. That, Senator, is a dangerous and destructive game. Does your campaign honestly wonder why it has become synonymous with nasty online invective? If you mention the Bernie Bros online, fifty people fitting the profile pop up with abusive comments informing you that they don’t exist. On the eve of the Nevada caucus, one of your supporters attempted to place an obituary for Secretary Clinton in the Las Vegas Sun-Journal. Don’t you think this all might have a little something to do with your “me against the corrupt establishment” bluster?

It is a bitter irony, then, that Paul Krugman, Barney Frank, Gary Gensler, Jared Bernstein and Felicia Wong and Mike Konczal of the Roosevelt Institute all agree that Clinton’s plans to rein in Wall Street have more teeth than yours.

Meanwhile, anyone hoping to back up your claims will almost certainly be directed to your surrogate Robert Reich—whose website currently sports thirty-nine “above fold” links to purchase books targeted at leftist consumers. Your campaign is built on questioning the motives of the people who aren’t trying to sell your supporters anything, Senator, while simultaneously directing them toward someone who is.

“Senator, you are forming a mob of angry, misinformed people and then turning it on the likely Democratic nominee.”

A group of progressive economists recently wrote that outlandish claims of economic expansion under your proposed plans, “undermine the credibility of the progressive economic agenda and make it that much more difficult to challenge the unrealistic claims made by Republican candidates.”

Did you look at the signatures on that letter, Senator? Did you notice that half of them work at the same University as Robert Reich?

To be clear: I am not questioning Reich’s sincerity. I am, however, pointing out how ridiculous it is, given the circumstances, for your campaign to behave as if the only honest, informed economists in the world are the ones acting as your surrogates.

Senator, I’m not an economist. But I know when someone is spouting nonsense because they think it’s what I want to hear. If you want to know how that story ends, just take a look at the current Republican field.



http://www.cbsnews.com/news/clinton-tells-new-yorkers-sanders-ideas-just-wont-work/

Clinton tells New Yorkers: Sanders' ideas "just won't work"
By HANNAH FRASER-CHANPONG CBS NEWS
March 30, 2016, 3:16 PM

Play VIDEO -- Clinton leading Sanders ahead of Wisconsin primary


NEW YORK -- Speaking at the famed Apollo Theater in Harlem, Hillary Clinton cast her opponent in the upcoming New York primary election as all talk -- and no action.

"My opponent and I share many of the same goals," Clinton said of Bernie Sanders, "but some of his ideas for how to get there won't pass. Others just won't work, because the numbers don't add up, and that means people aren't going to get the help that they need and deserve."

Clinton has repeatedly alluded to Sanders' plans as "pie in the sky" proposals, including his goal to provide free tuition at public college and universities. Sanders, campaigning in Wisconsin, said Tuesday he is simply "thinking bigger and bolder" than Clinton -- a line likely to reach voters here Thursday, when he is set to hold a rally in the Bronx.

"My opponent says we're just not thinking big enough," Clinton said, pre-empting the attack. "Well, this is New York. Nobody dreams bigger than we do, but this is a city that likes to get things done."

The event on Wednesday, the unofficial kickoff of her primary campaign in the state, was a homecoming of sorts for Clinton. Sen. Chuck Schumer, who served with Clinton in the Senate when she represented New York, introduced her and Renee Elise Goldsberry, one of the stars of the hit Broadway musical "Hamilton," performed the national anthem.

And in her remarks, Clinton said she was "once again," asking for New Yorkers' votes.

"We're gonna work for every vote in every part of this state," she said. "Because New Yorkers took a chance on me and I will never forget that."

She used the venue to highlight her role in the passage and reauthorization of the Zadroga Act, which provides healthcare for first responders affected by the terrorist attacks on September 11, as well as creating jobs and working on behalf of children.

"When I joined with parents and doctors and community leaders to take on the epidemic of children's asthma right here in Harlem, it wasn't about making a point, it was about making a difference," she said.

Earlier Wednesday, Clinton's campaign released a new television ad that it plans to air in New York that looks beyond the primary, and targets Republican frontrunner Donald Trump.

"When some say we can solve America's problems by building walls," Clinton says in the ad, which features a shot of a billboard advertising Trump's new hotel in Washington, D.C. "Banning people based on their religion, and turning against each other, well, this is New York. And we know better."

At the Apollo, where many of her supporters sported pins that read "Hillary Trumps Them All," Clinton cast Trump's proposals as un-American.

"He wants to round up millions of Latino immigrants and kick them out of the United States," she said. "He wants to ban all Muslims from entering America...It's wrong and it goes against everything New York and America stand for."

In the run up to the New York primary, set for April 19, Sanders has worked tirelessly to close the gap with Clinton in the race for delegates. Clinton remains in the lead, and her campaign sees no path for Sanders to catch up. But there are 247 delegates up for grabs in New York, a number second only to California, which holds its primary in June.

Clinton, whose top strategist told reporters this week that she would campaign across the state "like a senator," will head to Purchase for another event on Thursday.



Huffington -- “You have been a lifelong champion of human equality. You have kept economic inequality, an issue I care very deeply about, at the forefront of an election cycle that might otherwise have been dominated by the antics of a reality TV clown. On foreign policy, the issue that is generally considered your greatest weakness, I believe that you have consistently shown yourself to be responsible, inquisitive and level-headed. And you and Secretary Clinton have run campaigns which, a few stumbles aside, stand in such stark contrast to the GOP field that it is difficult to fathom how anyone could possibly consider any of them over either of you. …. You recently claimed that under your leadership, “the Treasury Department will create a too-big-to fail list of banks and insurance companies.” Of course it will. The Treasury Department has been legally required to do that since the Dodd-Frank Act of 2010. …. Similarly, you have made a fair amount of noise calling for an independent audit of the Federal Reserve. That’s already done, every single year. You can find last year’s report right here. What the plan that you and Sen. Paul have put forth does is, a) pander to low-information voters, and b) make the Federal Reserve’s every decision subject to congressional pressure. What you are proposing, Senator Sanders, would set the Fed’s independence back four decades and allow Paul Ryan to pressure it at every turn. Even when I agree with your proposed policies, I am too often alarmed by your extreme departures from reality. …. It’s called a Tobin tax. The idea dates back to 1972, and is meant to stabilize markets. …. As investors moved to other markets, revenue from capital gains taxes fell. The relatively meager 50 million the tax did bring in was offset entirely by those losses. Recent experiments in Italy and France have been similarly disappointing. …. Senator, you are forming a mob of angry, misinformed people and then turning it on the likely Democratic nominee. That, Senator, is a dangerous and destructive game. Does your campaign honestly wonder why it has become synonymous with nasty online invective? …. It is a bitter irony, then, that Paul Krugman, Barney Frank, Gary Gensler, Jared Bernstein and Felicia Wong and Mike Konczal of the Roosevelt Institute all agree that Clinton’s plans to rein in Wall Street have more teeth than yours. …. To be clear: I am not questioning Reich’s sincerity. I am, however, pointing out how ridiculous it is, given the circumstances, for your campaign to behave as if the only honest, informed economists in the world are the ones acting as your surrogates. Senator, I’m not an economist. But I know when someone is spouting nonsense because they think it’s what I want to hear. If you want to know how that story ends, just take a look at the current Republican field.


CBS -- Clinton has repeatedly alluded to Sanders' plans as "pie in the sky" proposals, including his goal to provide free tuition at public college and universities. Sanders, campaigning in Wisconsin, said Tuesday he is simply "thinking bigger and bolder" than Clinton -- a line likely to reach voters here Thursday, when he is set to hold a rally in the Bronx. "My opponent says we're just not thinking big enough," Clinton said, pre-empting the attack. "Well, this is New York. Nobody dreams bigger than we do, but this is a city that likes to get things done."


This whole, extraordinarily vitriolic piece of writing from Huffington Post is by a man who finally confesses after 5 or 6 pages of rather wild ranting, “Senator, I’m not an economist.” Well, I’m not either, but I do believe that more than one tax on the 1% needs to be put into place, and that doesn’t devalue Sander’s proposal if it just doesn’t’ bring in as much money as he thinks it will. We still need controls on the 1%s use of non-wage money making methods. I wonder if there aren’t other ways to make them pay more than they do now. I’m sure this Tobin Tax isn’t the only thing he will work toward, either, and a comprehensive economic improvement plan. He plans on using public works projects as Roosevelt did to generate jobs and improve our roads and bridges. These things will help equalize the gap between the nation’s average income of $50,000 a year and the contrasting hundreds of thousands to millions at the upper end. Hillary Clinton is one of those who personally makes hundreds of thousands of dollars a year, and she has been in favor of the Iraq War, Wall Street perks, only modest social achievements, and has been in a position a number of times when her honesty has been in question. Pardon me, but I tend to trust Bernie over Hillary, though I do vote for Democrats every time and I will in 2016 as well.

I think Womack is not in favor of helping the poor as a political goal, and that is what we need. We also need to really push back hard against the Far Right Republicans who have flooded into offices from governor to city council around the country, and who have already come up with radical laws in some states. This most recent NC law against the LGBT community is one example. Several have actually spoken against the separation of church and state, preferring Christianity as the State Religion here. Two states in the Midwest have instituted laws that will punish a woman for having a natural abortion – a “miscarriage” as it’s called. That charge was brought against two high school girls. One had the miscarriage in the bathroom at school and the school called for the rent-a-cop, that the school had hired to do every bit of school discipline that comes up there. They tried at least to arrest the girl for doing something to herself to cause an abortion. Such an action, in that state, has been made punishable as a crime. After Roe v Wade, how can that be allowed??

The “conservatives” have gone way too far out on the limb and we Dems need to fight them tooth and nail. Writing vicious pieces against Bernie Sanders is not going to produce any progress on these issues. I’m shocked at Huffington Post, who have come up with some very enlightening articles against the Right Fringe in the past. I’ll read anything they put out with a wary eye from now on.



https://www.yahoo.com/politics/are-we-getting-the-leaders-1397064998158390.html

Are we getting the leaders we deserve?
Matt Bai
March 31, 2016

Photograph -- Former Sen. Gary Hart, right, announces his withdrawal from the presidential race in 1987. (Photo: AP)


If you’re tired of hearing Donald Trump go on about his ratings and polls, if you’re mystified by the Twitter War of the Candidates’ Wives, if you can’t understand why Wolf Blitzer interviews a former contestant on “The Apprentice” as if she were a political authority, then I’ve got a video you really need to watch.

The video I’m showing you here, courtesy of C-Span’s archive, is of a presidential candidate speaking in 1987, at a moment of tectonic upheaval in our politics and media. Chances are pretty good you’ve never seen it, or even heard about it, and there’s a reason for that.

Before I tell the remarkable story of that eight-minute speech, though, let’s put it in the context of our moment.

Recently, a bunch of commentators — among them the president of the United States — seem to have latched on to the idea that the media is culpable in enabling Trump’s antic march to the Republican nomination. In the New York Times, my former colleagues Nicholas Kristof and Jim Rutenberg have both written columns in the past week asking whether we, as an industry, need to be more accountable.

Regular readers of this column know that I wrote early and often on this theme, including a column last December about the destructive “symbiosis” between Trump and the media — a term very much in fashion now.

In fact, not long ago I wrote an entire book on the collision of entertainment and political journalism, called “All the Truth Is Out,” which seems to have accidentally anticipated the Trump phenomenon. I borrowed from the brilliant work of the social critic Neil Postman, whose 1985 book “Amusing Ourselves to Death” feels more relevant today than it probably did then.

But the guy who really predicted all of this was Gary Hart, the protagonist of “All the Truth Is Out.” And man, did he try to sound the alarm.

At this time in 1987, Hart was rather like the Hillary Clinton of his day, only more talented and more visionary; he had been the presumed nominee of the Democratic Party since narrowly losing in 1984, and the Gallup Poll had him beating George H.W. Bush — then the sitting vice president — by double digits. A man of staggering intellect, he was talking even then about the rise of stateless terrorism and the arrival of a high-tech economy.

But his campaign unraveled in the space of five surreal days, during which reporters from the Miami Herald hid outside Hart’s home in order to catch him spending time with a younger woman. Hart found himself undone by the first modern political sex scandal — the inevitable result of myriad forces that were just then reshaping the media, from the echoes of Watergate to the birth of the mobile satellite.

What happened next is interesting and almost entirely forgotten.

Driven from the campaign trail in New Hampshire, Hart repaired to his cabin in the Denver foothills, where he and his family were literally penned in by a fleet of satellite trucks and news choppers. His aides wrote him the kind of withdrawal statement we’ve come to expect from scandalized politicians — contrite, gracious, bland.

Hart couldn’t sleep after reading that speech. It made him want to vomit. He called his close friend Warren Beatty (who would later make the film “Bulworth,” not incidentally) and talked through what he wished he could say instead.

Then, the next morning, Hart drove the canyon road down to Denver, stepped before the national media and calmly delivered one of the most stinging and prescient indictments of an American institution you will ever see.

“In public life, some things may be interesting, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they’re important,” Hart said, decrying a process that he said reduced reporters to hunters and candidates to the hunted.

“And then after all that, ponderous pundits wonder in mock seriousness why some of the best people in this country choose not to run for high office,” Hart went on. “Now I want those talented people who supported me to insist that this system be changed. Too much of it is just a mockery. And if it continues to destroy people’s integrity and honor, then that system will eventually destroy itself.

“Politics in this country, take it from me, is on the verge of becoming another form of athletic competition or sporting match.”

He closed by paraphrasing his idol, Thomas Jefferson: “I tremble for my country when I think we may in fact get the kind of leaders we deserve.”

Whenever I talk about my book to audiences around the country, I close with those lines. Invariably, I look up to find shocked and silent voters nodding their heads, amazed at how eerily that captures our present reality.

So why haven’t you heard anything about this seminal speech? I’ll tell you why. Because within 24 hours of its delivery, despite the polls showing that the public mostly sided with Hart over the reporters, America’s elite media, led by its columnists and editorial boards, rose up in unison to mock and discredit it.

“Instead of saying goodbye with a measure of dignity, respect and introspection,” A.M. Rosenthal, the Times’ former editor, wrote on the paper’s op-ed page, “Gary Hart told us he had decided that Gary Hart was a wonderful man after all and that everybody was responsible for Gary Hart’s political demise except Gary Hart.” (Watch Hart’s speech and decide for yourself if that was the point.)

Hart’s monologue was instantly buried in an avalanche of defensiveness and moral posturing. “It wasn’t just that I was blaming the media,” Hart recalled when we talked this week. “It was that I was a bad guy, and it was good riddance to a bad politician.”

For 29 years after that moment, until I directed him to it this week, even Hart hadn’t watched that video clip. Nor did he bother to continue pressing his case, despite a stream of offers to give speeches or appear on talk shows.

“I was not put on earth to pick a fight with the media and carry it out,” he told me. “I couldn’t repeat the theme of that talk without the headline inevitably saying, ‘Hart attacks the press,’ and I just didn’t want to do that for the rest of my life.

“There was no capacity for thoughtful reflection,” Hart said. “It was all me versus them.”

By the time I got into the business of political journalism in the late 1990s, 24-hour cable news — mindless, sensational, personality-obsessed — was driving the conversation. Then came the Internet, with its frenzied competition for clicks. By 2007, Politico (which does some excellent work, to be fair) was calling itself the ESPN of news, which is pretty much exactly what Hart had prophesied.

And so we systematically created a process perfectly suited to a manipulative, reality-TV performer like Trump (or Sarah Palin before him) — and just as hostile to a guy like John Kasich, who talks about governing as complicated work. We spend half of any given debate talking about poll numbers and strategies, mean tweets and sordid allegations, because the game of politics is so much more alluring than the practice of statecraft.

I asked Hart if, on a week like this one, when battery charges against Trump’s campaign manager were vying for airtime against his war with Ted Cruz over their spouses, he felt vindicated at last.

“No,” he said quickly. “No. No.” After all, he explained, no one (other than me) ever saw the need to revisit what he said all those years ago.

I raise the Hart video this week because if you read this latest flood of self-criticism, some of it from commentators who have worked in our business for decades, you might come away thinking that something transformative has just taken us by surprise. You might get the impression that a tsunami of triviality has suddenly overwhelmed our media, and we barely had time to suck in air and duck our heads.

But don’t let anyone tell you that this is all just about Trump’s suckering us, or about some convergence of recent trends we couldn’t have foreseen. It is, in fact, a generational reckoning — the failure of executives and anchors and reporters-turned-cable-personalities, many of them in our most serious news outlets, who for decades refused to confront the creeping realities of their industry, as surely as a generation of political leaders refused to confront the realities of fiscal and global instability.

Leslie Moonves, the chairman of CBS, did a pretty nice job of encapsulating that failure when he talked about Trump’s campaign this way last month: “It may not be good for America, but it’s damn good for CBS.”

We can say, as Moonves surely would, that we were just responding to market forces beyond our control. We can say that voters, and not us, get to decide what matters and what doesn’t. We can point out that we’ve gone to great lengths to expose the depth of Trump’s ignorance and inconsistency.

What we can’t say is that we weren’t told it would happen.


"But the guy who really predicted all of this was Gary Hart, the protagonist of “All the Truth Is Out.” And man, did he try to sound the alarm. At this time in 1987, Hart was rather like the Hillary Clinton of his day, only more talented and more visionary; he had been the presumed nominee of the Democratic Party since narrowly losing in 1984, and the Gallup Poll had him beating George H.W. Bush — then the sitting vice president — by double digits. A man of staggering intellect, he was talking even then about the rise of stateless terrorism and the arrival of a high-tech economy. …. Hart couldn’t sleep after reading that speech. It made him want to vomit. He called his close friend Warren Beatty (who would later make the film “Bulworth,” not incidentally) and talked through what he wished he could say instead. Then, the next morning, Hart drove the canyon road down to Denver, stepped before the national media and calmly delivered one of the most stinging and prescient indictments of an American institution you will ever see. …. “Now I want those talented people who supported me to insist that this system be changed. Too much of it is just a mockery. And if it continues to destroy people’s integrity and honor, then that system will eventually destroy itself. “Politics in this country, take it from me, is on the verge of becoming another form of athletic competition or sporting match.” He closed by paraphrasing his idol, Thomas Jefferson: “I tremble for my country when I think we may in fact get the kind of leaders we deserve.” …. Hart’s monologue was instantly buried in an avalanche of defensiveness and moral posturing. “It wasn’t just that I was blaming the media,” Hart recalled when we talked this week. “It was that I was a bad guy, and it was good riddance to a bad politician.” For 29 years after that moment, until I directed him to it this week, even Hart hadn’t watched that video clip. Nor did he bother to continue pressing his case, despite a stream of offers to give speeches or appear on talk shows. “I was not put on earth to pick a fight with the media and carry it out,” he told me. “I couldn’t repeat the theme of that talk without the headline inevitably saying, ‘Hart attacks the press,’ and I just didn’t want to do that for the rest of my life. …. Leslie Moonves, the chairman of CBS, did a pretty nice job of encapsulating that failure when he talked about Trump’s campaign this way last month: “It may not be good for America, but it’s damn good for CBS.” We can say, as Moonves surely would, that we were just responding to market forces beyond our control.”


“And so we systematically created a process perfectly suited to a manipulative, reality-TV performer like Trump (or Sarah Palin before him) — and just as hostile to a guy like John Kasich, who talks about governing as complicated work. We spend half of any given debate talking about poll numbers and strategies, mean tweets and sordid allegations, because the game of politics is so much more alluring than the practice of statecraft.”
This paragraph sums up the main thing that I fear about the condition of our “statecraft” today – we the people who have become too often racist and thoroughly greedy, are faced with a candidate who does mirror our highly flawed minds.

My only hope is that the two superheroes Bernie and Hillary will win in the national election in November as our public produces enough honest citizens at the polls that Cruz and Trump will be swept aside, their tawdry bedraggled skirts dragging in the mud. I am happy to see John Kasich being mentioned very favorable in this article, because I have been watching him. He is absolutely the best Republican in the race, and if he were to become president I wouldn’t be as distraught as I will if any of the others should happen to win. I think he’s an honest man who cares about human beings.



http://www.cbsnews.com/news/tv-station-wtae-ends-relationship-with-anchorwoman-wendy-bell-over-racial-comments/

TV station "ends relationship" with anchorwoman over racial comments
CBS/AP
March 31, 2016, 7:02 AM

Photograph -- Former WTAE anchor and reporter Wendy Bell TWITTER


PITTSBURGH-- Pittsburgh television station WTAE said it has ended its relationship with anchorwoman Wendy Bell over racial comments she posted on Facebook about an ambush shooting at a cookout that left five people and an unborn baby dead.

In a statement Wednesday, parent company Hearst Television said Bell's comments were "inconsistent with the company's ethics and journalistic standards."

Bell, who is white, speculated about the identities of the two men who fatally shot five black people in the poor Pittsburgh suburb of Willkinsburg on March 9.

In her March 21 post on her anchor Facebook page, she said in part: "You needn't be a criminal profiler to draw a mental sketch of the killers who broke so many hearts two weeks ago Wednesday. ... They are young black men, likely in their teens or in their early 20s. They have multiple siblings from multiple fathers and their mothers work multiple jobs. These boys have been in the system before. They've grown up there. They know the police. They've been arrested."

In the same post, she also praised a black restaurant worker in a way some readers felt was condescending.

After a social media backlash, Bell apologized, saying her words "were insensitive and could be viewed as racist." The station also apologized, saying Bell's remarks showed "an egregious lack of judgment."

After Bell posted her comments, the Pittsburgh Black Media Federation issued a statement, which read, in part: "The irresponsible statements demonstrate a persistent problem with how African-Americans are negatively stereotyped by too many journalists and news organizations."

Authorities have not made any arrests in the killings or provided a description of the possible suspects. Siblings Jerry Michael Shelton, 35, Brittany Powell, 27, and Chanetta Powell, 25, along with two cousins, Tina Shelton, 37, and Shada Mahone, 26, were killed in the ambush shooting, police said. Chanetta Powell was nearly eight months pregnant.

On Wednesday, Bell defended herself, saying she didn't get a "fair shake" from the station, and that the story was not about her, but about "African-Americans being killed by other African-Americans."

"It makes me sick," she told The Associated Press when reached at her home on Wednesday. "What matters is what's going on in America, and it is the death of black people in this country. ... I live next to three war-torn communities in the city of Pittsburgh, that I love dearly. My stories, they struck a nerve. They touched people, but it's not enough. More needs to be done. The problem needs to be addressed."

Bell joined WTAE in 1998 and has won 21 Emmy Awards.

Her post drew mixed reactions from viewers. Some saw her comments as offensive and called for her firing, while others said the comments were not racist and applauded her honesty. Facebook pages in support and opposition of Bell were created in the wake of the incident.


“Bell, who is white, speculated about the identities of the two men who fatally shot five black people in the poor Pittsburgh suburb of Willkinsburg on March 9. In her March 21 post on her anchor Facebook page, she said in part: "You needn't be a criminal profiler to draw a mental sketch of the killers who broke so many hearts two weeks ago Wednesday. ... They are young black men, likely in their teens or in their early 20s. They have multiple siblings from multiple fathers and their mothers work multiple jobs. These boys have been in the system before. They've grown up there. They know the police. They've been arrested." In the same post, she also praised a black restaurant worker in a way some readers felt was condescending. …. After Bell posted her comments, the Pittsburgh Black Media Federation issued a statement, which read, in part: "The irresponsible statements demonstrate a persistent problem with how African-Americans are negatively stereotyped by too many journalists and news organizations." Authorities have not made any arrests in the killings or provided a description of the possible suspects. Siblings Jerry Michael Shelton, 35, Brittany Powell, 27, and Chanetta Powell, 25, along with two cousins, Tina Shelton, 37, and Shada Mahone, 26, were killed in the ambush shooting, police said. Chanetta Powell was nearly eight months pregnant. On Wednesday, Bell defended herself, saying she didn't get a "fair shake" from the station, and that the story was not about her, but about "African-Americans being killed by other African-Americans."


“My stories, they struck a nerve. They touched people, but it's not enough. More needs to be done. The problem needs to be addressed." Bell joined WTAE in 1998 and has won 21 Emmy Awards.” Black on black assault is not worse than white on white attacks. Go to any poor white neighborhood in a city and you will find white men fighting each other over women or over who cheated at a pool game. It’s no more creditable whichever side it applies to.

The startling thing here is that the police, according to this article, had not issued a description of any kind about the attackers, so her comments were based on an assumption, which in that case, is a racist assumption. As her network said showed an extreme lack of “judgement.” The fact that she, in the same article, portrayed a “good” black man who worked in a restaurant (a proper black job), merely made her comment worse. She had undoubtedly said that to prove that she isn’t a hard core racist, but it backfired. We need to get down to the human issues in the black-white divide, and try to mend our mental framework on the matter of race. Whether we like it or not, that is a daily endeavor for all of us. White or not, this is a very racist society, and I find it impossible to be unreservedly proud the US. We’ve done good, but we still need to do better.



http://www.collegehumor.com/post/7036401/a-bird-flew-onto-bernie-sanders-podium-and-its-the-most-delightful-thing-ever

A Bird Flew Onto Bernie Sanders' Podium and It's the Most Delightful Thing Ever
CH STAFF
March 25, 2016

Play Video -- Bernie Sanders “Put A Bird On It” At Portland Rally
Photograph -- Bernie Sanders smiling while speaking

Presidential candidate/delightful old man Bernie Sanders was giving a speech at a Portland rally earlier today when a bird (not yet identified) flew onto his podium, immediately turning the entire affair into a scene out of a Disney film. How did we not see earlier that Bernie was a Disney princess?!

Anyways, the internet is predictably freaking out, using the hashtag #BirdieSanders:

Ali Versi: “The bird is definitely “feeling the Bern.”
# BirdieSanders #Feel the Bern

Joseph Segal @joesegal
Mother Earth recognizes a Warrior fighting for the Sacred Hoop Of Life! We are the Rainbow People! @BirdieSanders



This article, as a kind of comment from the deity (Mother Earth), reminds me of a graduation ceremony years ago at Duke University. The students, walking up to receive their diplomas, were grouped by subject. Just as the 30 or so ministerial graduates walked across the stage there came a humongous roar of thunder, as we have in the South from time to time. It was just like the voice of God stating his approval of the group.

What’s best about this article is the video, showing the expression on Sander’s face. He was truly delighted as it flew down to his podium and perched. As he lifted his hand it very quickly flew off. The audience went nuts, as you might expect.

March 30, 2016


News Clips For The Day


http://www.wxii12.com/news/company-invents-gun-that-folds-up-to-look-like-cellphone/38750158?utm_source=Social&utm_medium=FBPAGE&utm_campaign=WXII%2012%20NEWS

Company invents gun that folds up to look like cellphone
By NBCNews.com
Published 4:48 PM EDT Mar 29, 2016


A Minnesota company has invented a handgun that folds up to look just like a smartphone.

The .380-caliber pistol, called Ideal Conceal, will be available later this year and "will be virtually undetectable because it hides in plain sight," Ideal Conceal says on its website.

In locked position, the two-shot plastic gun with a metal core can be discreetly slipped into pockets, like a real phone. But "with one click of the safety it opens and is ready to fire," Ideal Conceal claims.

The creator, Kirk Kjellberg, told NBC News the idea came to him after he attracted attention for carrying a concealed weapon in a restaurant.

A Facebook page for Ideal Conceal already has more than 13,000 likes. But the product has attracted concern too, with critics arguing its design could pose a security threat at airports and other places.

Kjellberg denies that.

"It's kind of an erroneous idea that this is any different from any other pistol, because when you run it through an x-ray, it has barrels and triggers and hammers -- all the things other guns have. It has enough metal in it that it can't escape the metal detector," he said.



Ah, we needed this! Another almost undetectable hand gun for those who apparently “fear for their lives” at restaurants and airports and schools, etc. We live in an increasingly illogical and emotionally disturbed society. Trump and his group are the tip of the iceberg, I think. If a large percentage of our society weren’t in this category, he wouldn’t even be in the running as president. The things he does would make him so unpopular that he would go into hiding somewhere.



http://www.ewao.com/a/worlds-poorest-president-explains-why-we-should-kick-rich-people-out-of-politics/

‘World’s Poorest President’ Explains Why We Should Kick Rich People Out Of Politics
Earth We Are One
Written by Roque Planas of www.huffingtonpost.com
Posted on Feb 28th, 2016

Photographs -- Jose “Pepe” Mujica: source – indy100.independent.co.uk

After five years in power, the man described as the “world’s most humble president” has stepped down from office in Uruguay in 2015. Jose “Pepe” Mujica, who leaves with approval ratings of nearly 70 per cent, is a real person with real advice for leading a nation.

People who like money too much ought to be kicked out of politics, Uruguayan President José Mujica told CNN en Español in an interview posted online Wednesday.

“We invented this thing called representative democracy, where we say the majority is who decides,” Mujica said in the interview. “So it seems to me that we [heads of state] should live like the majority and not like the minority.”

Dubbed the “World’s Poorest President” in a widely circulated BBC piece from 2012, Mujica reportedly donates 90 percent of his salary to charity. Mujica’s example offers a strong contrast to the United States, where in politics the median member of Congress is worth more than $1 million and corporations have many of the same rights as individuals when it comes to donating to political campaigns.

“The red carpet, people who play — those things,” Mujica said, mimicking a person playing a cornet. “All those things are feudal leftovers. And the staff that surrounds the president are like the old court.”

Here Are Eight Reasons Why We Will Miss President Jose “Pepe” Mujica

Mujica explained that he didn’t have anything against rich people, per se, but he doesn’t think they do a good job representing the interests of the majority of people who aren’t rich.

“I’m not against people who have money, who like money, who go crazy for money,” Mujica said. “But in politics we have to separate them. We have to run people who love money too much out of politics, they’re a danger in politics… People who love money should dedicate themselves to industry, to commerce, to multiply wealth. But politics is the struggle for the happiness of all.”

Asked why rich people make bad representatives of poor people, Mujica said: “They tend to view the world through their perspective, which is the perspective of money. Even when operating with good intentions, the perspective they have of the world, of life, of their decisions, is informed by wealth. If we live in a world where the majority is supposed to govern, we have to try to root our perspective in that of the majority, not the minority.”

Mujica has become well known for rejecting the symbols of wealth. In an interview in May, he lashed out against neckties in comments on Spanish television that went viral.

“The tie is a useless rag that constrains your neck,” Mujica said during the interview. “I’m an enemy of consumerism. Because of this hyperconsumerism, we’re forgetting about fundamental things and wasting human strength on frivolities that have little to do with human happiness.”

He lives on a small farm on the outskirts of the capital of Montevideo with his wife, Uruguayan Sen. Lucia Topolansky and their three-legged dog Manuela. He says he rejects materialism because it would rob him of the time he uses to enjoy his passions, like tending to his flower farm and working outside.

“I don’t have the hands of a president,” Mujica told CNN. “They’re kind of mangled.”

source – waking times.com
cover photo – noticias.starmedia.com



“We invented this thing called representative democracy, where we say the majority is who decides,” Mujica said in the interview. “So it seems to me that we [heads of state] should live like the majority and not like the minority.” Dubbed the “World’s Poorest President” in a widely circulated BBC piece from 2012, Mujica reportedly donates 90 percent of his salary to charity. Mujica’s example offers a strong contrast to the United States, where in politics the median member of Congress is worth more than $1 million and corporations have many of the same rights as individuals when it comes to donating to political campaigns. “The red carpet, people who play — those things,” Mujica said, mimicking a person playing a cornet. “All those things are feudal leftovers. And the staff that surrounds the president are like the old court.” …. “I’m not against people who have money, who like money, who go crazy for money,” Mujica said. “But in politics we have to separate them. We have to run people who love money too much out of politics, they’re a danger in politics… People who love money should dedicate themselves to industry, to commerce, to multiply wealth. But politics is the struggle for the happiness of all.” …. Even when operating with good intentions, the perspective they have of the world, of life, of their decisions, is informed by wealth. If we live in a world where the majority is supposed to govern, we have to try to root our perspective in that of the majority, not the minority.” …. “The tie is a useless rag that constrains your neck,” Mujica said during the interview. “I’m an enemy of consumerism. Because of this hyperconsumerism, we’re forgetting about fundamental things and wasting human strength on frivolities that have little to do with human happiness.” …. . He says he rejects materialism because it would rob him of the time he uses to enjoy his passions, like tending to his flower farm and working outside. “I don’t have the hands of a president,” Mujica told CNN. “They’re kind of mangled.”


I don’t really expect very many politicians to follow his lifestyle, but I wish they would. Interestingly, the Pope has been criticized by some American Tea Party politicians for espousing a similar view on wealth and for his life style. They think he’s a radical Leftist. He doesn’t live in the Vatican, but in the Guest House and speaks often about helping the poor as Christian duty. (See article: http://www.thecatholictelegraph.com/pope-of-the-people-pope-francis-to-live-in-vatican-guesthouse-not-papal-apartments/13355.)



http://www.cbsnews.com/news/15-year-old-pepper-sprayed-outside-donald-trump-rally/

15-year-old pepper-sprayed outside Donald Trump rally
By REENA FLORES CBS NEWS
March 30, 2016, 9:22 AM


A teenage girl was pepper-sprayed outside of a Donald Trump campaign rally in Janesville, Wisconsin on Tuesday, and she alleged she was sexually assaulted, according to the Janesville Police Department.

In a statement, the police department said: "A 15 year [old] girl from Janesville was peppered sprayed in the crowd by a non-law enforcement person... A male in the (crowd) groped the 15 year [old] girl, when she pushed him away; another person in the (crowd) sprayed her. We are currently looking for two suspects, one for the sexual assault and one for the pepper spray."

A 19-year-old woman from Madison, Wisconsin also received second-hand spray the police said.

Video of the pepper-spraying incident was posted to a Janesville community Facebook page late Tuesday.

In the video, a blonde girl screamed at a man in the crowd that "you f***ing touched my chest." Later, the man denied the accusation, putting his hands up and saying, "I never touched her."

Approximately 30 seconds in, another member of the crowd sprays the teenage girl's face in close range.

Another video posted to YouTube.com shows a little more of the altercation between the man and the teenager. As she held up a sign, they exchanged words, and he pointed at her with a sheaf of papers.

Janesville Police Sgt. Aaron Ellis told the Associated Press Wednesday that the girl told police she punched the man whom she accused of groping her, named by the Wisconsin State Journal as Dan Crandall of Milton.

"I didn't touch her," Crandall, a Trump supporter, told the newspaper. "She started to challenge why I was at the Trump rally since I was a grown man. I told her I was at the Trump rally because I was a grown man and I cared about my country."

Ellis said the girl could also face charges for punching Crandall.

The incident took place outside the Holiday Inn Express and Janesville Convention Center, where over 1,000 supporters gathered at a Donald Trump rally held Tuesday afternoon. About a thousand more attendees, including both supporters and protesters, convened outside the venue.

On Monday night, six protesters were arrested by the Janesville Police Department after refusing to leave the venue's lobby as part of an anti-Donald Trump protest. Trump, for his part, was campaigning in Wisconsin as part of a last-minute bid for support ahead of the state's primary on April 5.

This only the latest in a string of violent incidents and assaults involving Trump supporters at his events.

Just this week, Trump's campaign manager Corey Lewandowski was charged with "simple battery" after he grabbed and allegedly bruised a former Breitbart reporter earlier this month at a press conference.

Trump stuck by Lewandowski after the charge, even threatening to sue the reporter after she tried "to grab me and shout questions."

The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment about the Janesville Police Department's investigation.



“In a statement, the police department said: "A 15 year [old] girl from Janesville was peppered sprayed in the crowd by a non-law enforcement person... A male in the (crowd) groped the 15 year [old] girl, when she pushed him away; another person in the (crowd) sprayed her. We are currently looking for two suspects, one for the sexual assault and one for the pepper spray." …. Video of the pepper-spraying incident was posted to a Janesville community Facebook page late Tuesday. In the video, a blonde girl screamed at a man in the crowd that "you f***ing touched my chest." Later, the man denied the accusation, putting his hands up and saying, "I never touched her." Approximately 30 seconds in, another member of the crowd sprays the teenage girl's face in close range. …. Janesville Police Sgt. Aaron Ellis told the Associated Press Wednesday that the girl told police she punched the man whom she accused of groping her, named by the Wisconsin State Journal as Dan Crandall of Milton. "I didn't touch her," Crandall, a Trump supporter, told the newspaper. "She started to challenge why I was at the Trump rally since I was a grown man. I told her I was at the Trump rally because I was a grown man and I cared about my country." Ellis said the girl could also face charges for punching Crandall. …. On Monday night, six protesters were arrested by the Janesville Police Department after refusing to leave the venue's lobby as part of an anti-Donald Trump protest. …. Trump stuck by Lewandowski after the charge, even threatening to sue the reporter after she tried "to grab me and shout questions."


Every day there’s more. It’s a disgusting spectacle and a really dangerous sign of the sort of things that may be to come. Interestingly, the police usually arrest the anti-Trump faction and not the radical Rightists behind Trump. I wonder why that is?



http://www.cbsnews.com/news/nypd-commissioner-bill-bratton-harsh-words-mailman-arrest-brooklyn/

NYPD commish has harsh words over mailman's arrest
CBS NEWS
March 30, 2016, 10:35 AM

Photograph -- A still from a cellphone video showing mailman Glenn Grays' arrest in Brooklyn on March 17, 2016.
Play VIDEO -- NYPD investigating after postal worker arrested


NEW YORK -- Police Commissioner Bill Bratton had some harsh words for the officers accused of handcuffing a postal worker while he delivered packages on his route in Brooklyn.

CBS New York reports Bratton said he was "very concerned" about the March 17 confrontation between 27-year-old Glenn Grays and four plainclothes officers and a lieutenant.

"I'm very concerned about the performance of the officers, about the leadership role of the lieutenant involved and about the processing of the arrest at the precinct stationhouse," Bratton said Tuesday.

He also questioned the legitimacy of Grays' arrest for disorderly conduct.

"Based on what I witnessed on that, the various videos I've reviewed now, I have strong concerns about the charge against the individual," Bratton said.

The entire incident was captured on cellphone video.

DNA info reports the officers involved have been "removed from their normal posts as the NYPD investigates the incident."

Grays was in the middle of his shift on Saint Patrick's Day when he claims an unmarked police car nearly ran him over in Crown Heights. He said he then shouted at the officers, who stopped and demanded identification.

"My ID right there on the side of the truck," Grays can be heard saying in the video.

"Let's go get your ID," an officer says.

"I'm not going nowhere," Grays responds. "I'm delivering my postal route."

The video then shows the officers telling Grays to "stop resisting" even though it doesn't appear that he is resisting.

"I'm not resisting!" Gray yells back.

Grays is then handcuffed and put in the unmarked patrol car, his mail truck left unattended. That's when the video ends.

Bratton said the NYPD's Internal Affairs is investigating. He said the officers were members of a conditions unit and were supposed to work in uniform.

"Out of the investigation into that incident will be why were they in plainclothes, for what purpose, who authorized it," he said.

The commissioner was also concerned that a USPS truck was left unattended.

Grays said he hasn't yet returned to work.

In an interview with "CBS This Morning," Grays said: "The only thing I think saved me is that it was on videotape."

"Never been arrested, never received a summons. I was extremely terrified. I wouldn't say afraid - I passed the stage of afraid," Grays said. "I was afraid that if I didn't comply that something was going to happen to me."

The NYPD has been hit with other caught-on-camera incidents of alleged police harassment against people of color, including the 2014 death of Eric Garner.

Grays said he wants justice. To him, that means disciplinary action.

"I don't want them to be jobless because they might have family, kids they need to support," Grays said. "It's sad that I thought that when I put on a uniform that I'll be treated a little different, but it's no difference. You know, I'm just another brother with a uniform."



Thank goodness for cell phone cameras, and for Bratton’s action on the part of good over evil. Not only did four officers who were NOT supposed to be in plain clothes at all rough the man up and charge him with resisting arrest. Many times with police these days people are shot for “resisting arrest.” That should be grounds for a murder charge unless the officer is injured. These officers will, I hope, be disciplined soundly, if not fired. Personally I think officers who do these pointlessly aggressive things should be fired and never hired again on a police force in the US. They’re the “bad apples” that we’re supposedly trying to “weed out.” That means stop these incidents!



http://www.cbsnews.com/news/donald-trump-flip-flops-on-pledge-to-support-any-gop-nominee/

Donald Trump flip flops on pledge to support any GOP nominee
By STEPHANIE CONDON CBS NEWS
March 29, 2016, 11:56 PM


Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump on Tuesday said he is no longer committed to supporting the GOP nominee, regardless of who it is.

"Do you continue to pledge whoever the Republican nominee is?" CNN moderator Anderson Cooper asked Trump during a televised town hall in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Trump replied, "No. I don't anymore."

Last year, Trump signed a pledge to the Republican National Committee (RNC) that he would not run as a third-party candidate, should he lose the GOP nomination.

"I have been treated very unfairly," Trump said, "I think by, basically, the RNC, the Republican party, the establishment."

Donald Trump: Republican Party "not treating me right"

He pointed to Mitt Romney's active efforts to campaign against him as an example of the unfair treatment against him.

In separate town hall events, Trump's GOP rivals Ted Cruz and John Kasich both refused to pledge their support to any GOP nominee, though they didn't go as far as Trump did.

Asked whether he could support Trump, Cruz answered, "Donald is not going to be the GOP nominee. We're going to beat him."

He did, however acknowledge, "I'm not in the habit of supporting someone who attacks my wife and attacks my family. I think that is going beyond the line."

Kasich similarly refused to say explicitly whether or not he could support Trump as the nominee. If a candidate is "really hurting the country, I can't stand behind them," Kasich said.

Cruz insisted that he can win the 1,237 delegates needed to secure the GOP nomination. Kasich, however, is depending on a contested convention to win the nomination. The chances for a contested convention could increase next week, if Trump doesn't win the Wisconsin primary on April 5.



“Last year, Trump signed a pledge to the Republican National Committee (RNC) that he would not run as a third-party candidate, should he lose the GOP nomination. "I have been treated very unfairly," Trump said, "I think by, basically, the RNC, the Republican party, the establishment." …. Kasich similarly refused to say explicitly whether or not he could support Trump as the nominee. If a candidate is "really hurting the country, I can't stand behind them," Kasich said. Cruz insisted that he can win the 1,237 delegates needed to secure the GOP nomination. Kasich, however, is depending on a contested convention to win the nomination. The chances for a contested convention could increase next week, if Trump doesn't win the Wisconsin primary on April 5.”


I hope they do have a contested convention, but even if Trump were to be the nominee, either Sanders or Clinton will probably be able to beat him in a general election. He really isn’t “presentable” as our President and I think most Americans understand that.



http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/03/30/472412304/justice-department-reaches-agreement-with-newark-n-j-on-police-reforms

Justice Department Reaches Agreement With Newark, N.J., On Police
MERRIT KENNEDY
March 30, 20161:23 PM ET

Photograph -- People walk by a police car in downtown Newark, N.J., in May 2014.
Spencer Platt/Getty Images


The Department of Justice announced Wednesday that it has reached an agreement with Newark, N.J., on changes to the city's police department.

NPR's Carrie Johnson tells our Newscast unit that this comes after "civil rights investigators had uncovered a pattern of unconstitutional stops and property thefts." She adds:

"The Justice Department team studied thousands of unjustified stops and searches by the Newark police that had a disparate impact on minorities.

"Federal civil rights investigators also found law enforcement had used excessive force and stolen people's property.

"The new agreement between the Obama administration and authorities in Newark will impose more police training, change the way people are searched, and deploy body-worn cameras."

And as Carrie reports, the proposed consent decree requires the approval of a federal judge.

"We found practices that not only broke the law but also eroded trust," Vanita Gupta, head of the civil rights division, said at a press conference in Newark. "We found policies that not only harmed residents but also lacked accountability. And we found systems that not only failed the community but also failed officers themselves."

Paul Fishman, U.S. attorney for the District of New Jersey, said in a statement, "The department is challenged in fundamental ways and has engaged in a pattern and practice of unconstitutional policing in a broad range of areas." He added, "It is also clear that the Police Department's relationship with the people of the city has suffered dramatically from the combination of those practices."

Fishman called this agreement "a major step towards breaking that cycle."

NPR's Hansi Lo Wang reported last July that the Justice Department's investigation had found "that about 75 percent of stops made by Newark police were illegal, many targeting black residents for loitering or wandering."

Samuel Walker, an expert on police accountability, told Hansi at the time that "lasting change will come after the consent decree and a federally appointed monitor are in place to overhaul how Newark does policing."

Walker added that there's a "huge learning curve" when it comes to scrutinizing officer conduct. "It may take a while," he said.



“The Department of Justice announced Wednesday that it has reached an agreement with Newark, N.J., on changes to the city's police department. NPR's Carrie Johnson tells our Newscast unit that this comes after "civil rights investigators had uncovered a pattern of unconstitutional stops and property thefts." She adds: "The Justice Department team studied thousands of unjustified stops and searches by the Newark police that had a disparate impact on minorities. "Federal civil rights investigators also found law enforcement had used excessive force and stolen people's property. …. "The department is challenged in fundamental ways and has engaged in a pattern and practice of unconstitutional policing in a broad range of areas." …. NPR's Hansi Lo Wang reported last July that the Justice Department's investigation had found "that about 75 percent of stops made by Newark police were illegal, many targeting black residents for loitering or wandering." Samuel Walker, an expert on police accountability, told Hansi at the time that "lasting change will come after the consent decree and a federally appointed monitor are in place to overhaul how Newark does policing." Fishman called this agreement "a major step towards breaking that cycle."


Unfortunately, Newark is only one of the police departments that use illegal and unethical practices on a daily basis. That’s largely because there is not an honest and sufficiently forceful person as their head who issues strong discipline and thorough investigations. An article last year quoted an officer as saying anonymously that the lack of department discipline is the primary reason for all the illegal police behavior. They do it because they can.