May 4, 2017


News and Views


NOT GOOD !!

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/north-korea-threatens-china-grave-consequences-nuclear-standoff/
AP May 4, 2017, 10:26 AM
For 1st time, North Korea directly threatens vital ally China

SEOUL, South Korea -- North Korea has issued a rare direct criticism of China through a commentary saying its "reckless remarks" on the North's nuclear program are testing its patience and could trigger unspecified "grave" consequences.

China, North Korea's largest trading partner and main benefactor, suspended imports of North Korean coal in line with U.N. sanctions earlier this year and has recently been urging its traditional ally to stop nuclear and missile activities amid U.S. pressure to use its leverage to resolve the nuclear standoff. Chinese state media have also unleashed regular and harsh criticisms on North Korea.

The commentary released Wednesday by the state-run Korean Central News Agency said that "a string of absurd and reckless remarks are now heard from China every day only to render the present bad situation tenser."

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Asked about the KCNA commentary during a regular briefing Thursday, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said Beijing's position on "developing good neighborly and friendly cooperation with North Korea is also consistent and clear."

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Trump's willingness to meet with Kim Jong Un sparks backlash

The North Korean article cited recent commentaries by Chinese state media that it said shifted the blame for deteriorating bilateral relations onto the North and raised "lame excuses for the base acts of dancing to the tune of the U.S."

"China should no longer try to test the limits of the DPRK's patience," the North Korean commentary said, using the acronym for its official name, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea. "China had better ponder over the grave consequences to be entailed by its reckless act of chopping down the pillar of the DPRK-China relations."

The article was not attributed to any government agency or official; the writer was identified only as Kim Chol. Still, it's unusual for the North to directly criticize China. Previously it has couched such criticism by referring to China only as "a neighboring country."

north-korea-soldiers.jpg
North Korean soldiers gesture at the Yalu River in Sinuiju, North Korea, which borders Dandong in China's Liaoning province, April 15, 2017. REUTERS

Analyst Cheong Seong-chang at South Korea's private Sejong Institute said the North's discontent at China appears to be on the "verge of exploding." He said North Korea will likely ignore China from now on while trying to strengthen ties with Russia and improve relations with a new South Korean government to be inaugurated next week.

The Global Times, an outspoken nationalist tabloid published by China's ruling Communist Party's flagship People's Daily, warned in a Thursday editorial that the North's actions threatened a 1961 treaty of non-aggression between the two countries. It called on the North to end its nuclear tests.

"China will not allow its northeastern region to be contaminated by North Korea's nuclear activities," the Global Times declared.

Kim Jong Un's North Korea military spectacle

In recent days, the paper also warned that China was able to strike back "at any side that crosses the red line" and would impose an oil embargo against the North in response to any more tests. The North Korean commentary said it's China that crossed "the red line."

The People's Daily declared Sunday - and again on Tuesday - that the North's nuclear ambitions "put itself and the whole region into dire peril."



I DON’T KNOW WHICH PART OF THIS STORY IS THE MOST IMPORTANT TO ME, THE DISCOVERY OF (PRESUMABLY TRUE) COPY OF THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE, OR THE BRILLIANT IDEA OF A SHELTER FOR ELDERLY DOGS. SEEING A DECREPIT ANIMAL DOES “TUG AT MY HEART STRINGS,” BECAUSE THEY SO PATIENTLY ACCEPT THEIR FATES, AND SOMETIMES IT IS A TERRIBLY CRUEL FATE. BLESS HER KIND SOUL!

http://www.wifr.com/content/news/Rockton-woman-selling-handwritten-copy-of-declaration-of-independence-to-open-senior-dog-shelter-421067714.html
Rockton woman wants to sell priceless copy of the Declaration of Independence

Copy of Declaration of Independence

Posted: Tue 4:11 PM, May 02, 2017 | Updated: Tue 5:48 PM, May 02, 2017

ROCKFORD (WIFR) -- The discovery of a copy of the Declaration of Independence may lead to more independence for old dogs.

"It was a great find," Chris Brigham said.

It’s a handwritten copy of the Declaration of Independence Chris Brigham stumbled across at an estate sale.

"It was rolled up inside this 1920's bedroom set," the Rockton woman said.

Brigham wasn't sure if it was real until she saw the reaction of a Chicago appraiser.

"She could hardly talk because she hadn't seen one in this good of condition at all and she was just speechless," she said.

Now Brigham hopes to turn her priceless piece of American history into some good for aging dogs.

"Seniors do not do well in shelters. They've lived in the comfort of your home for 10 or 12 years and now you're throwing them in a cage on a cement floor, they don't do well," Brigham explained.

She wants to use the money she makes by selling her copy of the Declaration of Independence to open a retirement home for senior pets.

"It’s comparable to an assisted living for people. There will be no cages, they'll have free run to be a pet."

Brigham says its the sweet faces of aging dogs that makes giving up the Declaration of Independence an easy choice.

"To me it's a piece of paper but it's also the dollars to do what we want to do and I would rather someone who appreciates that kind of stuff pass it onto them."

Although she's from Rockton Brigham and her husband want to move to Maine by their only daughter. They hope to open the shelter there later this year.

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THE DIFFERENCE HERE, BETWEEN A DEMOCRATIC INSURANCE PLAN AND A REPUBLICAN ONE, IS A CLEAR EXAMPLE OF THEIR WAR AGAINST THE POOR AND MIDDLE CLASS. THE IDEA OF A PER CAPITA CAP ON SPENDING BY INDIVIDUALS, NO MATTER THEIR MEDICAL NEED. THEY WANT TO PUSH ECONOMIC LIFE BACK TO THE 1920S AGAIN. I HAVE HOPE THAT THE SENATE WON’T PASS THIS.


SENATORS’ TAKE ON BILL

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/house-health-care-bill-gop-senators-signal-theyll-make-changes/
By REBECCA SHABAD CBS NEWS May 4, 2017, 4:46 PM
House health care bill - GOP senators signal they'll make changes

The early reaction from Senate Republicans to the House passage of the American Health Care Act (AHCA) to repeal and replace Obamacare signaled they're likely to make changes to the House bill.

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The chairman of the Senate Health, Education, Labor & Pensions Committee suggested that GOP senators could even pitch their own legislation to dismantle the Affordable Care Act.

"I congratulate the House on passage of its bills. The Senate will now finish work on our bill, but will take the time to get it right," Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tennessee, said in a statement.

Here's what's actually in the latest House GOP health care bill

The goals for the Senate bill, he said, include lowering premium costs, rescuing Americans trapped in the Obamacare exchanges, making sure those with pre-existing conditions have access to insurance and gradually giving states more flexibility with Medicaid.

House passes GOP health care bill to replace Obamacare
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House passes GOP health care bill to replace Obamacare

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell's, R-Kentucky, office said that the upper chamber will consider the measure once budgetary and procedural scorekeeping reviews* are completed. The House passed the latest GOP-sponsored version of the bill Thursday afternoon without a new score from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO).

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Still, McConnell praised it as "an important step."

"We are now closer to giving our constituents freedom from the increased costs, diminishing choices, and broken promises of Obamacare," he said in a statement.

He added that the status quo is "unacceptable," but McConnell's statement didn't say whether the Senate would take up the House bill. The Senate has to first review whether the House measure complies with budget reconciliation rules, which allow for a simple majority of senators to pass a bill rather than a supermajority. If the Senate crafts a different version, it will have to be reconciled with the House.

While other Senate Republicans stopped short of explicitly embracing the bill in its current form, they applauded their House counterparts for moving forward.

"I don't know what's in it," Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-South Carolina, said. "I'd be curious about the Medicaid provisions. South Carolina chose not to expand Medicaid which I thought was responsible. My test will be: is it good for the people of South Carolina? And is it good for the nation? I have no idea yet."

But Graham also criticized the House for rushing the measure to the floor.

"The bill has been out for less than 24 hours," Graham said. "No amendments. Debates for three or four hours. Any time you have a process like this that hasn't been scored you've got to be suspicious of the outcome."

Sen. John McCain, R-Arizona, said he thinks Congress needs to "reach a conclusion," but he also disapproved of the House decision to vote on the bill before a CBO score had been issued.

"I don't approve of it, but whatever they want to do. They spend their time criticizing me, but I won't," he said.

Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-Louisiana, said "it will be weeks to get a score" and Sen. Rand Paul, R-Kentucky, said that the Freedom Caucus made the bill "a lot less bad."

"That's the nicest thing I could think to say," Paul said. "Part of my problem with the bill is that the underlying premise of Obamacare is that the federal government for the first time would buy insurance for people. That fundamental premise of Obamacare is kept."

CBS News' Walt Cronkite contributed to this report.


SCOREKEEPING REVIEWS* -- MEANING

https://www.cbo.gov/publication/24915
Scorekeeping Rules and the Congressional Budget Process
June 9, 2009

Yesterday, I explained how CBOs cost estimates take into account behavioral responses* to proposed new federal laws, including the effects of such responses on spending for federal health care programs such as Medicare and Medicaid. In that discussion, I noted that exceptions to this practice occasionally occur because budget scorekeeping rules specify that only certain types of spending effects can be considered for Congressional budget enforcement purposes. These rules are potentially relevant for estimates of health reform proposals that aim to achieve budget savings by funding new prevention and wellness activities or by reducing waste, fraud, and abuse in Medicare or Medicaid.

Scorekeeping rules were set forth by the Congress in the conference report for the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 and are updated occasionally upon agreement by the full group of scorekeepers, a group that consists of the House and Senate Committees on the Budget, the Congressional Budget Office, and the Office of Management and Budget. The purpose of these rules is to ensure consistent treatment of spending authority, appropriations, and outlays across programs and over time.

When an agency is given significant new legal authority to identify and eliminate program waste, any estimated budget savings is counted, or scored, in assessing the budgetary impact of the legislation that provides that new authority. For example, CBO would estimate savings for a provision that required Medicare to suspend payments to a provider being investigated for fraudulent activity. In other examples, the Congress has occasionally given agencies new authority to use employment data to identify and stop federal payments for individuals who are not eligible for certain benefits.

However, potential cost savings in Medicare from an increase in funding for administrative activities aimed at reducing wasteful spending (rather than new investigative or enforcement authority with the same aim) would not be included in the official score of legislation. In particular, two of the scorekeeping rules prohibit counting any changes in mandatory spending as a result of changes in the amount of mandatory funding for administration or program management, or in the amount of discretionary appropriations for any activity. (A mandatory spending program is one that does not require annual appropriations; discretionary programs are funded each year in an appropriation bill.) The guidelines were adopted in part to avoid situations where hoped-for, but quite uncertain, savings are used to offset near-term, certain spending increases or revenue decreases in the same legislation.

Thus, new prevention and wellness activities funded from discretionary appropriations may generate eventual savings in Medicare or Medicaid, but those potential savings are not credited to the appropriation action as part of the budget scorekeeping process. Similarly, if a bill would increase either discretionary or mandatory funding for activities aimed at reducing fraud or waste, those added funds are included as a cost of the bill, but any potential savings in mandatory spending are not reflected for Congressional scorekeeping purposes. For either of these examples, if the bill becomes law, then the estimated savings in mandatory spending are factored into future CBO baseline projections; and of course, any realized savings in such cases will in fact reduce budget deficits unless they are used for other purposes.


BEHAVIORAL RESPONSES* -- WELFARE QUEENS?

Cognitive and behavioral distancing from the poor.
B Lott - American Psychologist, 2002 - psycnet.apa.org

... view of poor women, in particular, as in “need [of] sanctions and other coercive behavioral measures to ... These behaviors include a lack of effort, ambition, thrift, talent and morals” (Beck et al ... as an individual problem and to be preoccupied “with poor people's behavior, rather than ...
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DISSECTION OF THE HOUSE BILL

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/whats-in-the-latest-house-gop-health-care-bill/
By JAKE MILLER CBS NEWS May 4, 2017, 12:04 PM
What's actually in the latest House GOP health care bill?

The House of Representatives passed a bill Thursday to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, known as Obamacare, a development that brings Republicans one step closer to fulfilling one of President Trump's campaign promises and achieving a policy goal they've sought for years.

The bill passed by a thin margin: the 217 lawmakers who voted in favor were all Republicans, and the 213 who voted against it included all 193 House Democrats and 20 Republican members. The bill now heads to the Senate, where it's expected to face significant changes.

But what's in the bill that was passed Thursday?

The plan is largely similar to the bill crafted by GOP leaders earlier this year that was pulled from the House floor in March due to insufficient support. Lawmakers made a few crucial changes, however, won support from some members who didn't back the earlier legislation.

Here's a brief rundown of what's in the House GOP health care bill, and how it could affect you.

Revamped insurance tax credits

Under Obamacare, individuals in the private health insurance market obtain a tax credit to help them afford coverage. The size of that subsidy is determined by a variety of factors, including your age, where you live, and how much money you earn. Coverage is subsidized for anyone earning between 100 percent and 400 percent of the poverty level, with higher-earning individuals receiving less generous subsidies.

New health bill comes to a vote in the House today
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New health bill comes to a vote in the House today

The Republican plan would replace that system with a tax credit indexed mainly to a person's age – from a minimum of $2,000 annually for a young person to a maximum of $4,000 annually for someone in their 60s who can't yet access Medicare.

The tax credit would also diminish as income increases. An individual earning up to $75,000 or a household earning $150,000 would receive the full credit, but it would gradually decrease as for those with higher incomes, disappearing entirely for individuals with incomes above $215,000 and households with incomes above $290,000.

In an analysis of the earlier version of the GOP bill, the nonpartisan Kaiser Family Foundation examined how the change could shift costs within the health insurance market.

"Generally, people who are older, lower-income, or live in high-premium areas (like Alaska and Arizona) receive larger tax credits under [Obamacare] than they would under the American Health Care Act replacement," the group explained in their analysis. "Conversely, some people who are younger, higher-income, or live in low-premium areas (like Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Washington) may receive larger assistance under the replacement plan."

A "continuous coverage requirement" instead of an individual mandate

The Republican plan does away with Obamacare's requirement for individuals to purchase health insurance or pay a tax penalty to the government. However, it replaces that provision with another designed to incentive people to acquire and maintain health insurance.

Under the GOP health care bill, any person who goes without insurance for more than two months would be charged an additional 30 percent in premiums for one year when they re-enter the insurance market. One difference: that penalty would be paid directly to the insurers, rather than the government, as is currently the case.

Medicaid cuts and transfer to states

The GOP plan would dramatically transform Medicaid, the government-provided health insurance program for poorer Americans. Under Obamacare, states had the option to expand Medicaid by offering the program to people with incomes up to 138 percent of the federal poverty level. Thirty-one states and the District of Columbia opted to do so.

In Arizona, Trump supporters split on GOP health bill
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In Arizona, Trump supporters split on GOP health bill

The GOP plan would freeze Medicaid expansion in 2020. After that time, individuals who qualified for the program in its current form would be allowed to stay on the rolls, but if they leave the program, they wouldn't be allowed back in. The GOP plan would also change the formula used to determine how much money the federal government contributes to the program.

Business Insider's Harrison Jacobs offered a concise breakdown of the change. Under current law, he wrote, "Anyone who meets the eligibility requirements [for Medicaid] has a right to enroll, and if costs go up because of new, expensive treatments or increasing healthcare needs, states receive more federal money."

The GOP plan, Jacobs explained, would "change the federal Medicaid funding to a per-capita spending cap, meaning the federal government would send states a fixed amount of money per Medicaid enrollee, regardless of whether that would cover needs or care, starting in 2020."

The upshot of that change in the funding formula? The government would save roughly $880 billion in Medicaid spending over the next decade, according to the Congressional Budget Office -- but those savings could leave poorer Americans with less access to health care.

The bill gives states the option to receive Medicaid funding as a block grant, rather than a dedicated funding stream. Proponents argue the change would give states more flexibility in administering the program, but critics worry it could erode Medicaid's funding -- and its ability to offer coverage -- over time.

The bill also allows states to impose a work requirement for able-bodied adult Medicaid recipients, and it would allow the federal government to offer higher payments to states to cover older and disabled Medicaid beneficiaries.

Allow states to opt out of some insurance regulations

Obamacare placed a number of regulations on insurance companies, like a ban on insurers declining to offer coverage to people with pre-existing conditions, a ban on insurers placing a lifetime cap on the amount of coverage someone can receive and a series of minimum coverage requirements that stipulate certain kinds of medical care that insurance policies must cover.

Trump's health care promise not backed up by GOP bill
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Trump's health care promise not backed up by GOP bill

The House GOP bill would roll back these regulations by allowing states to "opt out," or cease requiring insurers in their state to abide by them. Republicans have argued this could lower costs and expand the range of available insurance plans, but they've been sensitive to criticism that the bill would leave Americans with pre-existing conditions without access to coverage.

To address that, the House GOP bill allocates $138 billion over the next 10 years to help states and insurers set up "high-risk pools" that could extend coverage to people whose pre-existing medical conditions might prevent them from obtaining coverage otherwise.

It's unclear whether that proposal will be sufficient. As the New York Times notes, "The bill doesn't explain exactly how these high-risk pools would work. We also don't know how many states would choose to waive the Obamacare insurance regulations and set up high-risk pools instead. But several researchers have compiled estimates on what a well-run high-risk pool would cost, and $138 billion probably wouldn't be enough."

The House GOP bill does keep at least one insurance reform from Obamacare intact: a requirement that young adults be allowed to stay on their parents' insurance plan through age 26.

Repeal of Obamacare's tax increases

The House GOP bill would do away with a number of tax hikes that helped finance the cost of Obamacare, including a tax on some medical device manufacturers, a hike in payroll taxes and investment income taxes for wealthy households, a tax on indoor tanning, and a tax on high-deductible "Cadillac" insurance plans.

Allow insurers to charge older Americans more

Obamacare instituted a requirement that insurers could charge older Americans no more than three times what they charge younger Americans. The House GOP bill would allow insurers to charge older Americans up to five times as much as they charge younger Americans. And it would allow states to seek a waiver to permit insurers to charge older customers even more.

How would this bill impact the uninsured rate?

The Congressional Budget Office estimated that the earlier version of the GOP health care bill would cause 24 million Americans to lose health insurance coverage over a decade. The CBO did not have time to score the revised version of the bill before the House voted on it Thursday, but it's unlikely their earlier estimate would drastically change.

What would be the impact on the budget deficit?

An earlier version of the House GOP bill scored by the CBO would have reduced the budget deficit by $150 billion over 10 years, relative to current law. Again, the CBO did not issue a score on today's bill before the vote, but it's likely the fiscal impact of this latest proposal will be similar to that of earlier versions.



REPUBLICANS AND PSYCHOLOGISTS IN LAW MAKING – THIS SCIENTIFIC AMERICAN ARTICLE SAYS SOME THINGS WHICH I HAD SEEN BEFORE, FOR INSTANCE THAT REPUBLICANS ARE MEASURABLY MORE NEGATIVE THAN LIBERALS. BELOW IT SAYS THAT THEY ARE “MORE ATTUNED” TO “ASSESSING POTENTIAL THREATS.” I COULD CALL THAT PARANOID. WHEN I THINK OF THE POGROMS BASED ON THE “THREAT” FROM THE JEWS AND THE LYNCHING OF BLACK MEN (MOSTLY IN THE YEARS PRIOR TO 1980 OR SO) DUE TO THEIR PERCEIVED “THREAT” AS RAPISTS OF WHITE WOMEN. THEN THERE’S THE SIMPLE LACK OF CONCERN FOR PEOPLE WHO NEED SOME HELP. THEY AREN’T MODELING THEMSELVES AFTER THE GOOD SAMARITAN. THEY ARE THE WEALTHY CITIZEN WHO FEARED GETTING HIS HANDS OR CLOTHING SOILED BY TOUCHING AN INJURED MAN. BEING A LIBERAL, I CAN’T HELP THINKING THAT TO CARE AND TO INTERACT ON THE HUMAN LEVEL IS BASIC MORALITY. THE SOCIAL CLASS DIVIDE IS GROWING WIDER AND WIDER. SOMETHING ACTIVE NEEDS TO BE DONE ABOUT IT. WE’RE SACRIFICING HUGE NUMBERS OF PEOPLE IN OUR COUNTRY SO THE PRIVILEGED CAN REMAIN IN THAT STATUS.


https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/calling-truce-political-wars/
SA Mind
MIND
Unconscious Reactions Separate Liberals and Conservatives
Psychological insights might tone down the bitter feuding between Democrats and Republicans
By Emily Laber-Warren on September 1, 2012

Credit: ELLEN WEINSTEIN

BLUE STATE, red state. Big government, big business. Gay rights, fetal rights. The United States is riven by the politics of extremes. To paraphrase humor columnist Dave Barry, Republicans think of Democrats as godless, unpatriotic, Volvo-driving, France-loving, elitist latte guzzlers, whereas Democrats dismiss Republicans as ignorant, NASCAR-obsessed, gun-fondling religious fanatics. An exaggeration, for sure, but the reality is still pretty stark. Congress is in a perpetual stalemate because of the two parties' inability to find middle ground on practically anything.

According to the experts who study political leanings, liberals and conservatives do not just see things differently. They are different—in their personalities and even their unconscious reactions to the world around them. For example, in a study published in January, a team led by psychologist Michael Dodd and political scientist John Hibbing of the University of Nebraska–Lincoln found that when viewing a collage of photographs, conservatives' eyes unconsciously lingered 15 percent longer on repellent images, such as car wrecks and excrement—suggesting that conservatives are more attuned than liberals to assessing potential threats.

Meanwhile examining the contents of 76 college students' bedrooms, as one group did in a 2008 study, revealed that conservatives possessed more cleaning and organizational items, such as ironing boards and calendars, confirmation that they are orderly and self-disciplined. Liberals owned more books and travel-related memorabilia, which conforms with previous research suggesting that they are open and novelty-seeking.

“These are not superficial differences. They are psychologically deep,” says psychologist John Jost of New York University, a co-author of the bedroom study. “My hunch is that the capacity to organize the political world into left or right may be a part of human nature.”

Although conservatives and liberals are fundamentally different, hints are emerging about how to bring them together—or at least help them coexist. In his recent book The Righteous Mind, psychologist Jonathan Haidt of the N.Y.U. Stern School of Business argues that liberals and conservatives need not revile one another as immoral on issues such as birth control, gay marriage or health care reform. Even if these two worldviews clash, they are equally grounded in ethics, he writes. Meanwhile studies by Jost and others suggest that political views reside on a continuum that is mediated in part by universal human emotions such as fear. Under certain circumstances, everyone can shift closer to the middle—or drift further apart.

The Fear Factor

Psychologists have found that conservatives are fundamentally more anxious than liberals, which may be why they typically desire stability, structure and clear answers even to complicated questions. “Conservatism, apparently, helps to protect people against some of the natural difficulties of living,” says social psychologist Paul Nail of the University of Central Arkansas. “The fact is we don't live in a completely safe world. Things can and do go wrong. But if I can impose this order on it by my worldview, I can keep my anxiety to a manageable level.”

Anxiety is an emotion that waxes and wanes in all of us, and as it swings up or down our political views can shift in its wake. When people feel safe and secure, they become more liberal; when they feel threatened, they become more conservative. Research conducted by Nail and his colleague in the weeks after September 11, 2001, showed that people of all political persuasions became more conservative in the wake of the terrorist attacks. Meanwhile, in an upcoming study, a team led by Yale University psychologist Jaime Napier found that asking Republicans to imagine that they possessed superpowers and were impermeable to injury made them more liberal. “There is some range within which people can be moved,” Jost says.

More practically, instead of trying to change people's emotional state (an effect that is temporary), astute policy makers might be able to phrase their ideas in a way that appeals to different worldviews. In a 2010 paper Irina Feygina, a social psychology doctoral student at N.Y.U. who works with Jost, found a way to bring conservatives and liberals together on global warming. She and her colleagues wondered whether the impulse to defend the status quo might be driving the conservative pooh-poohing of environmental issues.

In an ingenious experiment, the psychologists reframed climate change not as a challenge to government and industry but as “a threat to the American way of life.” After reading a passage that couched environmental action as patriotic, study participants who displayed traits typical of conservatives were much more likely to sign petitions about preventing oil spills and protecting the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

Environmentalism may be an ideal place to find common political ground. “Conservatives who are religious have this mind-set about being good stewards of the earth, to protect God's creation, and that is very compatible with green energy and conservation and other ideas that are usually classified as liberal,” Nail says.

Moral Scorecards

On topics where liberals and conservatives will never see eye to eye, opposing sides can try to cultivate mutual respect. In The Righteous Mind, Haidt identifies several areas of morality. Liberals, he says, tend to value two of them: caring for people who are vulnerable and fairness, which for liberals tends to mean sharing resources equally. Conservatives care about those things, too, but for them fairness means proportionality—that people should get what they deserve based on the amount of effort they have put in. Conservatives also emphasize loyalty and authority, values helpful for maintaining a stable society.

In a 2009 study Haidt and two of his colleagues presented more than 8,000 people with a series of hypothetical actions. Among them: kick a dog in the head; discard a box of ballots to help your candidate win; publicly bet against a favorite sports team; curse your parents to their faces; and receive a blood transfusion from a child molester. Participants had to say whether they would do these deeds for money and, if so, for how much—$10? $1,000? $100,000? More? Liberals were reluctant to harm a living thing or act unfairly, even for $1 million, but they were willing to betray group loyalty, disrespect authority or do something disgusting, such as eating their own dog after it dies, for cash. Conservatives said they were less willing to compromise on any of the moral categories.

Haidt has a message for both sides. He wants the left to acknowledge that the right's emphasis on laws, institutions, customs and religion is valuable. Conservatives recognize that democracy is a huge achievement and that maintaining the social order requires imposing constraints on people. Liberal values, on the other hand, also serve important roles: ensuring that the rights of weaker members of society are respected; limiting the harmful effects, such as pollution, that corporations sometimes pass on to others; and fostering innovation by supporting diverse ideas and ways of life.

Haidt is not out to change people's deepest moral beliefs. Yet he thinks that if people could see that those they disagree with are not immoral but simply emphasizing different moral principles, some of the antagonism would subside. Intriguingly, Haidt himself has morphed from liberal to centrist over the course of his research. He now finds value in conservative tenets that he used to reject reflexively: “It's yin and yang. Both sides see different threats; both sides are wise to different virtues.”

This article was originally published with the title "Calling a Truce in the Political Wars"

(Further Reading)

The End of the End of Ideology. J. T. Jost in American Psychologist, Vol. 61, No. 7, pages 651–670; October 2006.
The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion. Jonathan Haidt. Pantheon Books, 2012.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR(S)

EMILY LABER-WARREN, a freelance writer in New Jersey, directs a science-reporting program at the C.U.N.Y. Graduate School of Journalism.



FINALLY, TO THE CONSTITUTIONAL MONARCHY, OUR PARENT PEOPLE, THE BRITS

ANOTHER GENERATION IS PASSING INTO RETIREMENT. I ALWAYS LOVED THE QUEEN AND PRINCE PHILIP. THEY ARE, AS FAR AS I AM ABLE TO TELL, GENTLE PEOPLE. OF COURSE, WHEN THEY ARE GONE, THERE MAY NOT BE ANOTHER RULER IN ENGLAND. I HOPE A RABBLE, RATHER THAN AN ENLIGHTENED CITIZENRY, DOESN’T TAKE OVER THERE AS THEY ARE TRYING TO DO IN THE US.

http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-39802636
Prince Philip to step down from carrying out royal engagements
By Peter Hunt, BBC royal correspondent
May 4, 2017

Photograph -- Prince Philip joked with a guest during an engagement, shortly after his retirement was announced

The Duke of Edinburgh is retiring from royal duties this autumn, Buckingham Palace has announced.
Prince Philip, who turns 96 in June, made the decision himself and the Queen supported him, a spokesman said.
"I'm sorry to hear you're standing down", one man told him at a royal lunch on Thursday. "Well, I can't stand up much," the duke quipped.
The duke will attend already scheduled engagements between now and August but will not accept new invitations.
The Queen "will continue to carry out a full programme of official engagements", the palace said.

As it happened: Royal announcement

Decades of royal duty
Prince Philip's memorable quips
Prince Philip's foreign travels in pictures

The duke carried out 110 days of engagements in 2016, making him the fifth busiest member of the royal family, according to Court Circular listings.
He is patron, president or a member of more than 780 organisations and will continue to be associated with them, but "will no longer play an active role by attending engagements", Buckingham Palace said.
In the statement, the spokesman said the duke "may still choose to attend certain public events from time to time".

Hours after the announcement, Prince Philip was at his 26th public engagement of 2017: a service and lunch for members of the Order of Merit at St James's Palace.
At the reception, the duke quipped to mathematician Sir Michael Atiyah that he "can't stand up much".

Analysis

Photograph -- The Duke of Edinburgh at St James's Palace on 4 MayImage copyrightPA
By Peter Hunt, BBC royal correspondent

This is Prince Philip acting on his own advice, nearly six years later.
When he turned 90 he told the BBC it was "better to get out before you reach your sell-by date".
From the autumn, he will follow a path into retirement which is trod by many non-royals once they are in their sixties.
Today's announcement is a significant moment in the recent history of the British Royal Family.

A prince of Greece - with Danish, German and Russian blood - he has served the ancient institution, very publicly, for seven decades.
As an outsider - who was viewed with suspicion by the aristocracy - he struggled at first.
To his critics, he is a gaffe-prone prince.
His many supporters argue that this nonagenarian senior royal has played a crucial role sustaining the monarchy.
It's little wonder then that the Queen once called him her strength and stay.

Read more from Peter Hunt

BBC royal correspondent Nicholas Witchell said the duke - the longest-serving consort in British history - "clearly feels he now wishes to curtail" his "familiar role" in support of his wife.
He stressed there were "no health considerations" behind the move - other than the normal health precautions for a man in his mid-90s.
The duke attended Lord's Cricket Ground to open a new stand on Wednesday and was heard joking at the event that he is the "world's most experienced plaque unveiler".
He is famed for off-the-cuff remarks he has made at royal engagements over the years.

Media caption Prince Philip feeds Donna the elephant at the opening of the Centre for Elephant Care at Whipsnade Zoo

Prime Minister Theresa May said she offered the country's "deepest gratitude and good wishes" to the duke and praised his "steadfast support" for the Queen.
Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn wished the duke "all the best in his well-earned retirement", saying: "His Duke of Edinburgh's Award scheme has inspired young people for more than 60 years in over 140 nations."
Prince Philip set up the awards in 1956 and they have become one of the UK's best-known youth programmes, with young people carrying out challenges to earn bronze, silver or gold awards.

The Duke of Edinburgh

96 years old next month
70 years as Queen's companion
110 days of engagements in 2016
785 organisations have him as patron, president or member
4 million people have taken part in Duke of Edinburgh Awards
Source: Buckingham Palace
PA
Liberal Democrat leader Tim Farron said it was a moment to "celebrate and take stock" of the duke's "enormous achievements".
Scotland's First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said the "steadfast support" the duke had given the Queen was "hugely admirable".

Still on the diary

Photograph -- The Queen and Duke of Edinburgh Image copyrightAFP/GETTY
Image caption
The Queen and Duke of Edinburgh celebrate their 70th wedding anniversary later this year

Buckingham Palace publishes details of official engagements up to eight weeks in advance. For the Duke of Edinburgh, these include:

Visiting Pangbourne College, Berkshire, for its centenary - 9 May
Presenting prizes at the Royal Windsor Horse Show - 14 May
Attending a dinner marking the 70th anniversary of the founding of Pakistan - 18 May
Visiting the Chelsea Flower Show - 22 May
Holding receptions for young people who have achieved a gold Duke of Edinburgh award - 24 May
Attending evensong to celebrate the centenary of the Companions of Honour - 13 June
Presenting the Prince Philip Award at ZSL London Zoo - 27 June
Hosting King Felipe of Spain during his state visit - from 12 July
US President Donald Trump is also due to make a state visit to the UK later this year, but no date has been announced for his trip.
The duke and the Queen celebrate their platinum wedding anniversary - their 70th - in November.

They have called a halt to long-haul travel in recent years, with younger royals carrying out those duties.
Royal commentator Dickie Arbiter said the duke is in "robust health", adding: "He is not giving up on life, just stepping [down] from full-time public engagements".

To date, the duke has:
Carried out 22,191 solo engagements
Taken part in 637 solo overseas visits
Given 5,493 speeches
Authored 14 books

The Queen and Duke of EdinburghImage copyrightGETTY IMAGES
Image caption
Photograph -- The Duke of Edinburgh and the Queen waved as they made their way to an engagement on Thursday

Former royal butler Grant Harrold said: "I love his wit and I think people will miss seeing that on a day-to-day basis. But I don't think it's him disappearing, I think it's just him being very sensible, he's 95 years old. "He's slowing down and I'm sure we will still hear and see of him from time to time."


THE YOUNG ROYALS DEALING WITH RACE IN A MODERN AND PROGRESSIVE WAY, THOUGH IN THE CASE OF PRINCE HARRY THE BRITISH PRESS CALLED IT “SCANDALOUS.”

https://www.attn.com/stories/7892/british-royals-hid-racist-painting-from-obamas
This Is the Painting the Royal Family Had to Hide Before the Obamas' Visit
APRIL 29TH 2016
By: Tricia Tongco, @triciatongco

Picture this: You’re British royalty, and the Obamas are coming over for dinner.

Michelle and Barack Obama
WIKIMEDIA COMMONS
There’s so much to do — ask about food allergies, iron those curtains, and oh yeah...

Take down the racist label affixed to that one massive painting hanging in the sitting room.

wow shocked damn oh shit

This is the exact dilemma one aide to the British royal family faced last week when President Obama and Michelle Obama visited Kensington Palace for a dinner hosted by Prince William and Duchess Kate.

Prince William and President Obama
KGC-375/STAR MAX/IPX

Prior to their visit last Friday, the assistant realized a massive oil painting in William and Kate’s sitting room bore the title ‘The Negro Page,’ etched onto a plaque attached to the artwork’s frame, according to The Sun.

"The Negro Page" painting
WIKIPEDIA
Duchess Kate reportedly chose The 1652 painting by Dutch artist Aelbert Cuyp from the Royal Collection.

Screenshot of Royal Collection website
Depicting an African servant guarding horses and dogs as his presumable masters carry a conversation nearby, the work is listed on the Royal Collection’s website under its more politically correct title, “A Page with Two Horses.”

While the painting remained, someone had to hastily remove the plaque with a screwdriver and cover up the discoloration on the artwork with a potted plant, according to The Sun.

It appears, however, that dinner went off without a hitch.

Whew, time for a drink.

prince drink william
[h/t Hyperallergic and The Sun]


HARRY’S BIRACIAL LADY FRIEND IS NOT REALLY BLACK, SHE IS THE BEAUTIFUL SHADE OF A CAFÉ AU LAIT WITH PLENTY OF LAIT. SHE IS ALSO A KNOCKOUT.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/nov/02/prince-harry-britain-race-royals
Monarchy Opinion
Meghan Markle, Prince Harry and the myth of royal purity
Afua Hirsch
Wednesday 2 November 2016 11.49 EDT

The prince’s new black girlfriend has set tongues wagging. But despite talk of ‘blue blood’, the aristocracy has a history of mixed-race relationships

Photograph -- ‘The very concept of the royal family is the antithesis of diversity. If Harry was previously oblivious to the complex world of race and identity, he’s about to get a crash course.’ Photograph: Joe Giddens/PA

It’s a subtle point, easily missed. Meghan Markle, Prince Harry’s apparent new love, is a “glamorous brunette”, “a departure from Prince Harry’s usual type” and “not in the society blonde style of previous girlfriends”, according to the Daily Mail. I think what they are trying to say is that Markle, actor, global development ambassador and lifestyle blogger, is black.

Or, to be more precise, Markle is what Americans call “biracial”. The actor, who grew up in LA but lives in Toronto, has spoken extensively about her dual heritage – her father white and a mother she describes as “100% black” – and her quest for her identity over the years.

Meghan Markle
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Meghan Markle Photograph: Ian West/PA

The British press have a different approach. They have made it clear that her relationship with Harry is scandalous, for a number of reasons: she is divorced; she is older (Markle is 35, Harry 32); she’s played raunchy scenes in the US TV series Suits – and her mother is visibly black, with dreadlocks.

These details would be unremarkable – irrelevant, inappropriate, even – were it any other celebrity romance. But Prince Harry, fifth in line to the British throne, is a different matter. The very concept of the royal family is the antithesis of diversity. The terminology says it all: “blue blood”, from the Spanish sagre azul, coined in the late 1500s to distinguish between the racially superior white Christian nobility (with pale skin revealing blue veins) and the Jews, Muslims and West Africans whom Europeans were increasingly ousting from their continent.

In spite of its roots, we are apparently still perfectly comfortable using the phrase, even though royal blood has probably been mixed for centuries. There have been Africans throughout Europe since at least Roman times, and marriages between European royals, with their fondness for black servants, slaves and extramarital reproduction, make it unsurprising that Queen Charlotte, wife of George III – described, in an era when slaves were omnipresent, as “ugly”, with a dark complexion and flared nostrils – may well have had some African heritage. So might Queen Philippa, wife of Edward III, described as having broad nostrils and a wide mouth, and as being “brown of skin all over”.

We are as unwilling to embrace the ethnic heritage of the royal family as we are to investigate their centuries-old links with the slave trade. When asked about Queen Charlotte’s origins a few years ago, the royal historian Hugo Vickers assured Brits that even if African blood had penetrated the royal bloodline “there would be no shame attached to it” and “it certainly wouldn’t show that they are significantly black”. What a relief.

As for the Markles of this world – black people who are linked to the aristocracy in modern times – there is some evidence of what awaits. Emma McQuiston, the mixed-heritage socialite who married the heir to the 16th-century Longleat estate, Viscount Weymouth, faced blatant racism, with the viscount’s mother allegedly asking him: “Are you sure about what you’re doing to 400 years of bloodline?” McQuiston told Tatler she faced prejudice on multiple fronts. “There’s class,” she said, “and then there’s the racial thing.”

Other “aristoblacks”, as some call them, have had their share of grief. Nimmy March, adopted daughter of the Duke and Duchess of Richmond, has spoken about the discrimination she faced as a child. And I’ve heard of the MP Chuka Umunna, whose maternal grandfather was Sir Helenus Milmo QC, prosecutor at Nuremberg, being dismissed disparagingly for embracing a black identity when he is descended from posh English stock. The two, in the British imagination, are often still seen as mutually exclusive.

Aristocratic bloodlines sullied – how do the well-to-do sleep?
Hugh Muir

Who knows whether it’s intentional racism or just ignorance, but our society’s most privileged members seem to be sufficiently lacking in education that Prince Philip could liken the Nigerian president’s traditional costume to pyjamas (“You look like you’re ready for bed,” he told Olusegun Obasanjo); and Prince Harry could, unforgettably, don a Nazi outfit to a fancy dress party.

If Harry was previously oblivious to the complex world of race and identity, he’s about to get a crash course. News of his latest relationship threatens to bring Britain’s simmering, unresolved issues with the myth of royal racial purity into the open. Markle may have found peace in the grey spaces of mixed identities, and has spoken of both her positive experience of blackness and the negative – seeing her mother called the N-word, and being passed over for acting roles by an industry that regarded her as too black to play a white role and too white to play a black one.

Markle is proud of her heritage. And that’s the real difference between her and the royals – a family who have ignored questions about their history, swept them under the carpet and, frankly, hoped no one would notice.



THE ELDER BRITISH ROYALS ON RACISM – SOME COMMENTS THAT ARE UNFORTUNATE, INCLUDING ONE BY THE QUEEN. WE ARE A RACIST SOCIETY; THE HUMAN BEING IS A RACIST ANIMAL. ONE BY ONE, WE MUST TRY TO DO BETTER. GROUPS ARE MADE UP OF INDIVIDUALS, EACH OF WHOSE INNER SELF ADDS TO AN OPEN AND CARING SOCIETY/WORLD.

https://sputniknews.com/europe/201606131041245266-uk-monarchy-royal-racism/
Racism and the Monarchy: 10 Times the UK Royals Went a Little Too Far
15:37 13.06.2016(updated 13:35 15.06.2016)

A VIDEO TRIP THROUGH HISTORY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=irbZbqDJXB4

May 3, 2017


News and Views


THIS DOESN’T MAKE ME FEEL THAT COMEY IS ANYTHING LESS THAN COMPLICIT IN A CYNICAL RUSSIAN/REPUBLICAN/TEA PARTY CONSPIRACY TO STEAL THE ELECTION FROM HILLARY CLINTON AND THE DEMOCRATS BY DECEIT. WAS GETTING TRUMP INTO OFFICE THAT IMPORTANT TO THEM? I WONDER IF THEY ALL THINK IT WAS WORTH IT NOW. COMEY SHOULD BE FIRED AND PUT IN PRISON FOR TREASON AND TAMPERING WITH THE ELECTION. FOR HIM TO SAY NOW THAT IT MAKES HIM “MILDLY NAUSEOUS,” IS PURELY DISGUSTING. IT SHOULD GIVE HIM AN ULCER.


http://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/comey-decision-reopen-investigation-was-right-nauseous-n754251
POLITICS MAY 3 2017, 3:26 PM ET
Comey: ‘Mildly Nauseous’ FBI’s Clinton Probe Could Have Impacted Election
by ANDREW RAFFERTY


FBI Director James Comey said Wednesday that it makes him "mildly nauseous" to think his decision to reopen the bureau's investigation into Hillary Clinton's emails just days before the election could have impacted voters, but added he would make the same choice again.

In his most detailed explanation and strongest defense of his actions to date, Comey said it was a choice between "really bad and catastrophic" to inform lawmakers about the discovery of additional Clinton emails found on the computer of former Rep. Anthony Weiner, the husband of Clinton aide Huma Abedin.

Play FBI Director Details Reasons for October Letter in Clinton Investigation Facebook Twitter Embed
FBI Director Details Reasons for October Letter in Clinton Investigation 5:22

Democrats pressed Comey on why he chose to make the renewed investigation public, despite the FBI's general policy not to comment on ongoing investigations.

"Why didn't you just do the investigation as you would normally, with no public announcement?" Democratic Sen. Dianne Feinstein asked.

Comey said he had the choice to either "speak" or "conceal."

"I faced a choice," Comey said. "And I've lived my entire career by the tradition that if you can possibly avoid it, you avoid any action in the run-up to an election that might have an impact, whether it's a dog-catcher election or president of the United States. But I sat there that morning and could not see a door labeled 'no action here.'"

He called the decision — which quickly became public — "one of the world's most painful experiences," but said making it was the right move.

"It makes me mildly nauseous to think we might have had an impact on the election. But, honestly, it wouldn't change the decision," Comey said in testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee.

He said he did not take into account the political impact of the move "because down that path lies the death of the FBI as an institution in America."

Comey sent a letter to lawmakers on October 28 announcing the FBI had reopened its probe into Clinton's emails.

Clinton has, in part, has blamed her loss on Comey's decision. "If the election had been on October 27, I would be your president," Clinton said during an appearance Tuesday.

Comey also indicated during his hearing Wednesday that the FBI may be investigating whether any members the agency leaked information related to the Clinton probe.

When asked about statements during the campaign by former New York City Mayor and Trump supporter Rudy Giuliani indicating direct knowledge of the investigation, Comey hinted he was looking into the matter. "I don't know yet, but if I find out that people were leaking information about our investigations, whether to reporters or to private parties, there will be severe consequences," he said.

Comey is appearing in front of the Senate Judiciary Committee for a routine oversight hearing. But the appearance comes just one day after both President Donald Trump dismissed "phony" ties between his campaign and Moscow, and Clinton partially blamed Comey's handling of the investigation for her stunning loss.

Follow
Donald J. Trump ✔ @realDonaldTrump
FBI Director Comey was the best thing that ever happened to Hillary Clinton in that he gave her a free pass for many bad deeds! The phony...
10:51 PM - 2 May 2017
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Donald J. Trump ✔ @realDonaldTrump
...Trump/Russia story was an excuse used by the Democrats as justification for losing the election. Perhaps Trump just ran a great campaign?
11:06 PM - 2 May 2017
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Clinton's comments Tuesday spurred Trump to respond on Twitter, calling Comey "the best thing that ever happened to Hillary Clinton" for not prosecuting the Democratic nominee.

White House press secretary told reporters later on Wednesday that Trump "has confidence" in Comey, despite the tweets.

In an appearance before the House Intelligence Committee in March, Comey confirmed the FBI was investigating possible collusion between Russia and Trump's presidential campaign. U.S. intelligence agencies have concluded Moscow interfered in the 2016 election and hacked emails from the Democratic National Committee and a top Clinton campaign official.

"Was it appropriate for you to comment on one investigation repeatedly, and not say anything about the other?" Democratic Sen. Patrick Leahy asked about how Comey treated the investigation into Trump's campaign and Clinton's.

"We treated it like we did the Clinton investigation," Comey maintained. "We didn't say a word about it months into it, and the only thing we have confirmed so far about this is same thing with the Clinton investigation, that we are investigating."

The director said he has been interviewed by the Justice Department inspector general as part of the investigation into the FBI's conduct leading up to the election. Comey said he looks forward to telling more of his side of the story as he continues to draw bipartisan criticism.

During his wide ranging testimony, the FBI head reiterated that he has still seen no evidence into Trump's claims that President Barack Obama surveilled Trump Tower ahead of the campaign. And he warned of the impact of Wikileaks and said Russia is still attempting to influence U.S. elections.

Comey called Wikileaks "intelligence porn" that simply pushes out information with no regard to how it's used. He also warned that Russia will likely attempt the same types of interference in the 2018 midterm elections.

Andrew Rafferty ANDREW RAFFERTY TWITTERFACEBOOKGOOGLE PLUSEMAIL
TOPIC POLITICS NEWS
FIRST PUBLISHED MAY 3 2017, 11:08 AM ET



http://www.cbsnews.com/news/james-comey-testifies-senate-judiciary-fbi-oversight-live-updates/
By REBECCA SHABAD CBS NEWS May 3, 2017, 9:31 AM
Watch Live: FBI Director James Comey Senate Hearing

Members of the Senate Judiciary Committee grilling FBI Director Jim Comey at a 10 a.m. hearing on FBI oversight Wednesday morning on the federal investigation into Russian meddling in the 2016 U.S. election. He might also be asked about possible collusion between Trump associates and Russian officials.

Comey had previously testified before the House Intelligence Committee in late March about the Russia investigation. Hillary Clinton pointed the finger at him during an event Tuesday in which she blamed her election loss on the letter Comey sent to Congress just days before the election as well as WikiLeaks' effort to expose private emails from campaign officials.

Follow below for live updates.

1:44 p.m. Comey says "it's possible" that a special prosecutor would be recommended to lead the investigation when asked by Sen. Richard Blumenthal, Blumenthal hopes Comey will argue forcefully and vigorously for a special prosecutor.

1:33 p.m. Franken said it was a "shame" that Cornyn suggested that Clinton blamed everyone but herself during the Tuesday event. She did take responsibility, too, for the mistakes in her campaign.

1:14 p.m. Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vermont, points out that President Trump's threat to block all Muslims from the U.S. is still on his campaign website today. Leahy asked Comey if this threatens the U.S., and Comey said he didn't want to address his specific statement, but he said that targeting of various groups, including Muslims, makes the FBI's job harder.

1:01 p.m. Comey said that more technology companies are understanding the need to protect public safety compared to the need to protect privacy.

12:36 p.m. Comey said that he's been interviewed by the inspector general about his actions in the course of what he suggested was the Clinton email investigation.

"I don't have any regrets," he said.

Blumenthal asked Comey if he believes universal background checks are important to prevent gun violence. Comey said that from the perspective of law enforcement, more information is always helpful to keep guns out of the hands of criminals.

12:30 p.m. Sen. Richard Blumenthal, D-Connecticut, asked Comey if he can rule out people from the Trump campaign, including the president, from the investigation into the Trump campaign and possible collusion with Russia. Comey said that he didn't want to reveal anyone because then it would lead down a slippery slope toward who they're targeting. He said he briefed Grassley and Feinstein on who is being investigated.

12:18 p.m. In an exchange with Sen. Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii, Comey said he was not concerned about the political ramifications of his decision to speak about the restarted investigation into Clinton's emails last October.

"I find that hard to believe that you did not contemplate that there would be political ramifications to your comments," Hirono said.

Comey said that he knew there would a "huge storm" that would come.

12:04 p.m. Coons said that Comey had a third door available to him ahead of the election, and that was that there was an investigation into the Trump campaign and Russian interference. Comey rejected that idea and said that he wouldn't want to confirm an investigation in its early stages, but that he did call out the Russians for its attempt to mess with the U.S. election.

12:01 p.m. Sen. Chris Coons, D-Delaware, asked what the U.S. can do to protect against its elections in the future. Comey said that the government should tell election officials what techniques Russians can use and to equip the American people and allies that this is even going on, amid all of the Russian propaganda.

11:54 a.m. Comey is describing "incidental collection" whereby a terrorist outside the U.S. could be discovered if that person is in touch with an American.

Sen. Jeff Flake, R-Arizona, asked what the FBI is doing to protect its own systems amid the threat of data breaches. Comey said a "whole lot," but he doesn't want to get into specifics.

"A ton of work has gone into protecting our systems," Comey said, but the weak link are the people.

Comey said that Congress could do more to protect its systems.

"I'm sure that Congress's is not good enough," he said.

11:48 a.m. Sen. Al Franken, D-Minnesota, asked Comey about why Russia favored Donald Trump in the 2016 election. Comey said that Russian President Vladimir Putin "hated" Hillary Clinton and that he preferred a businessman like Trump to make deals rather than Clinton who spent much of her life in politics.

11:38 a.m. Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., asked how likely is it that the Senate IT system has been targeted by foreign adversaries.

"I would estimate it's a certainty," Comey said.

Speaking about WikiLeaks, Comey said he couldn't confirm whether there are charges pending against Julian Assange and that he has sought refuge in the Ecuadorian embassy.

11:21 a.m. Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-South Carolina, asked if he agrees that if sequestration goes back into effect in the next fiscal year, it would be devastating to the FBI. Comey agreed.

Graham asked if he ever spoke to Sally Yates about Gen. Michael Flynn being compromised. Comey said she did, but that he wasn't sure he could elaborate in a public setting.

Comey said he can't say whether Fusion is part of the Russian intelligence apparatus. Graham said that someone should be prosecuted for allowing Anthony Weiner to have access to classified information.

Comey agreed that it's fair to say that Russia actively provides safe haven to cyber criminals and that Russia should still pay a price for interfering in the U.S. political system.

"In my view, the greatest threat of any nation on earth given their intention and capability," Comey said, describing Russia.

Comey said that "it's fair" to say that Russia could eventually be capable of changing vote tallies if the U.S. doesn't stop them.

11:07 a.m. Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, said it was unfortunate that Clinton blamed Comey for her election loss during an event a day earlier. Speaking about 702*, Comey said that "really bad" people around the world use devices and infrastructure built by the U.S. and that 702 allows the FBI to immediately track these people in terrorism cases.

11:02 a.m. Comey said that he expects the FBI won't make "a peep" about the investigation into Russia's meddling in the election until they finish the probe. Comey reiterated that the FBI has "high confidence" that North Korea hacked into SONY and that Russia hacked into the Democratic National Committee (DNC).

10:46 a.m. Feinstein said that most people have looked at this investigation and have concluded that the FBI did affect the outcome of the election. After lawyers raised the concern that he could help one of the candidates win, Comey said that he couldn't consider that because it would kill the independence of the FBI.

Comey: FBI's impact on election makes him "mildly nauseous"

10:41 a.m. Feinstein asked Comey why it was necessary for him to announce 11 days before the election that he was announcing a new investigation on Oct. 28. On Oct. 27, Comey said he met with investigators who said they can see thousands of emails from the Clinton email domain and they said they think they needed a search warrant to look at those. Then he said, he faced a choice.

Comey said that he saw two doors that said "speak" and the other said "conceal." To restart in a "hugely significant way," Comey said that it would be "catastrophic" to conceal the restarted investigation but "really bad" to speak before the election.

He said his team found thousands of emails, including a "lot of new stuff," but nothing changed their view of Clinton's intent.

"This was terrible," Comey said. "It makes me mildly nauseous to think that we had an impact on the election."

10:38 a.m. Comey said that the shadow created by the problem of "going dark" is affecting about half of the FBI's work. He said that half of the devices the FBI encounters in terrorism cases, gang-related cases and child pornography cases cannot be opened with any technique.

Comey said there continues to be a "huge collision" between privacy and public safety.

10:33 a.m. Grassley asked Comey if he has ever been an anonymous source in the Trump investigation or Clinton investigation.

"Never," Comey said, adding that he has never authorized anyone else to be an anonymous source.

Grassley asked if there's an investigation into the leaking of any classified information relating to Trump or his associates. Comey said he doesn't want to answer that question.

"I don't want to confirm in an open setting whether there are any investigations open," Comey said.

Grassley asked what the difference is between this case and the Valerie Plame case, and Comey said he doesn't have the authority.

10:28 a.m. Comey has begun his opening statement and he said that oversight of the FBI is "essential" by having people ask hard questions. He said he appreciates the conversation about reauthorizing FISA Section 702 authority. He said the program is "essential."

"If it goes away, we will be less safe as a country," Comey said.

He also spoke about the threats faced by Jewish Community Centers throughout the first half of the year.

Comey said he "loves this work" and "I love this job."

10:22 a.m. Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-California, the top Democrat on the panel, began her opening statement and called Comey's letter to Congress on Oct. 28 about new emails found related to the investigation into Hillary Clinton's use of a private email server an "October surprise." The FBI concluded that the emails found on a computer owned by Anthony Weiner did not warrant any new charges or any new investigation.

Feinstein said lawmakers need to hear how the FBI will regain the trust of Congress and the American public.

10:00 a.m. ET The hearing has begun and Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, the chairman of the panel, has been talking about the election and Russia's interference in the election as well as FBI's efforts to thwart terror attacks in the U.S.

"Unfortunately, the FBI has provided me materially inconsistent information about these issues. That is why we need to know more about it and how much the FBI relied on it. Once you buy into its claims of collusion, then suddenly every interaction with a Russian can be twisted to seem like confirmation of the conspiracy theory," Grassley said.

"Now, obviously I don't know what the FBI will find. For the good of the country, I hope that the FBI gets to the truth soon, whatever that may be. If there are wrongdoers, they should be punished. And the innocent should have their names cleared. In the meantime, this Committee is charged with oversight of the FBI, and we can't wait until this is all over to ask the hard questions. Otherwise, too many people will have no confidence in the FBI's conclusions."



WHAT IS 702*? – IT’S CONSIDERED BY SOME TO BE A “BACK DOOR” TO THE FISA ACT ALLOWING PRETTY MUCH ANYTHING IF THE SITUATION IS RIGHT. COMEY IS DEFENDING IT AS AN IMMEDIATE WAY TO TRACK SUSPECTS IN SERIOUS CASES OF TERRORISM, ETC. IN THE WORST SITUATIONS, WE DO NEED VERY GOOD TRACKING TOOLS, OF COURSE, BUT IT SHOULDN’T EVER BE USED TO HARM A PRIVATE CITIZEN WITHOUT “PROBABLE CAUSE.” IT’S LIKE A GUN – USEFUL, BUT DANGEROUS.

https://cdt.org/insight/section-702-what-it-is-how-it-works/
FEBRUARY 15, 2017 Section 702 of FISA Security & Surveillance

What Is It? Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) is a statute that authorizes the collection, use, and dissemination of electronic communications content stored by U.S. internet service providers (such as Google, Facebook, and Microsoft) or traveling across the internet’s “backbone” (with the compelled assistance of U.S. telecom providers such as AT&T and Verizon). Section 702 sunsets on December 31, 2017.

Are There Any Restrictions? Unlike “traditional” FISA surveillance, Section 702 does not require that the surveillance target be a suspected terrorist, spy, or other agent of a foreign power. Section 702 only requires that the targets be non-U.S. persons located abroad, and that a “significant purpose” of the surveillance be to obtain “foreign intelligence information” (the primary purpose of the surveillance can be something else entirely).

…. submit these certifications to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) for approval. These certifications 1) identify categories of foreign intelligence information to be gathered, 2) contain Targeting Procedures and the Minimization Procedures approved by the AG that are meant to ensure 702 acquisition is limited to non-U.S. persons abroad, 3) attest that the targeting and minimization procedures and additional guidelines adopted to ensure compliance are consistent with the Fourth Amendment, 4) attest that a “significant purpose” of the program is to obtain foreign intelligence information, 5) attest that the program uses a U.S. electronic communications service provider, and 6) attest that the program complies with the limitations spelled out by the statute. . . . .

The Backdoor Search Loophole: The NSA, CIA, and FBI are all permitted to search 702-acquired information with U.S. person identifiers (such as names or addresses). Critics have dubbed this the “backdoor search” loophole, because it enables the government to obtain information that would have otherwise required a warrant. Today, the NSA and CIA can only query 702-gathered information with a U.S. person identifier after creating a “statement of facts showing that a query is reasonably likely to return foreign intelligence information.” However, this restriction does not apply to the FBI.

Use in Criminal Court: 702-acquired information may be used as evidence against U.S. persons in criminal court for certain broad categories of “serious crimes.” For investigations that do not fall into one of those categories, there is no restriction on using 702-acquired information to obtain other evidence that can be used in court. The use of information gathered under 702 without a warrant against U.S. persons creates an end-run around the Fourth Amendment, which requires a probable cause finding by an independent body.

For more information, please contact Gregory T. Nojeim, Director of CDT’s Freedom, Security & Technology Project, at gnojeim@cdt.org and view CDT’s Statement for the Record about Section 702 reauthorization: https://cdt.org/?p=78385.



13 REASONS WHY:

WHAT IS THE PURPOSE OF EMOTIONALLY INTENSE DRAMA IN ART? I’VE HEARD IT SAID, AND I AGREE, THAT ITS’ PURPOSE IS TO GO INSIDE US TO OUR INNER CORE AND “TOUCH” OUR PAIN. THIS IS, I BELIEVE, A NECESSARY PART OF HEALING. THAT IS, PROBABLY, WHAT CONFESSION IN RELIGION DOES, AS WELL.

ARTISTIC PORTRAYALS OF LOSS, DEPRESSION OR RAGE SHOULDN’T BE ENDLESSLY PROLONGED OR WITHOUT A CONCLUSION, AND SHOULD LEAD TO A RESOLUTION OF THE SADNESS THAT THE PROTAGONIST/VIEWER IS FEELING, ESPECIALLY BY A HEALING INSIGHT, RATHER THAN BY THE OLD “DEUS EX MACHINA” ENDINGS OF MANY OLD PLOTS. IN ITS’ PLACE SHOULD BE A MORE REALISTIC AND HEALTHY INSIGHT PROCESS WHICH ENABLES THE CHARACTER TO UNDERSTAND AND ACCEPT THE PAINFUL SITUATION AND GO BEYOND IT. THE URGE TO COMMIT SUICIDE WILL FREQUENTLY MELT AWAY INTO A HEALTHY ABILITY TO ANALYZE ONES’ THOUGHTS, REACTIONS AND IMPULSES, LEADING TO A MUCH MORE SUCCESSFUL LIFE WITH PROPER MEDICATION AND TALK THERAPY.

THE ARGUMENT THAT THE SHOW IS BAD BECAUSE IT MAY CAUSE SOME PEOPLE TO HAVE A FASCINATION WITH SUICIDE THAT WASN’T THERE TO BEGIN WITH, THOUGH THAT CAN HAPPEN, IS LESS THAN LIKELY IN MY VIEW, AND LESS IMPORTANT TO ME THAN THE DISTURBING FREQUENCY IN HIGHLY COMPETITIVE CULTURES SUCH AS OURS, IN WHICH THE FAILURE TO BE A WHOPPING BIG SUCCESS CAN RESULT IN TOTAL DESPAIR, BULLYING, SCORN FROM OTHERS. THE PROBLEM WITH THE URGE TO SUICIDE IN MANY CASES IS THAT IT RARELY EXISTS WITHOUT BOTH EXTERNAL AND INTERNAL CAUSE. “HAPPY” PEOPLE JUST DON’T GO INTO THE EMOTIONAL DOLDRUMS LIKE THOSE WHO HAVEN’T BEEN ABLE TO RATIONALIZE THEIR WAY OUT OF EMOTIONAL PAIN.

THE JAPANESE CULTURE, IN THE PAST AT LEAST, WAS SAID TO BE SUCH A SOCIETY, AND THE RITUALIZED SUICIDE CALLED HARIKARI OR SEPPUKU AS A SORT OF SELF-PUNISHMENT FOR THE “SIN” OF FAILING TO LIVE UP TO A SOCIETAL EXPECTATION WAS NOT ONLY COMMON, IT WAS EXPECTED BY THE SOCIETY AS A WHOLE. THAT WAS DONE AS A MEANS OF RESTORING THE FAMILY’S HONOR, AS INDIVIDUAL “DISHONOR” WAS TRANSFERRED TO THE FAMILY GROUP AS WELL. ANY FORM OF PUBLIC EXPOSURE FOR A REAL SIN OR A SIMPLE FAILURE TO PERFORM AT A HIGH LEVEL WAS THOUGHT TO BRING SHAME TO THE WHOLE FAMILY. I TEND TO THANK THE HIGHER POWER THAT THOSE THINGS AREN’T SO COMMON ANYMORE, BUT THEY DO STILL EXIST, ESPECIALLY IN OUT OF THE WAY, POVERTY STRICKEN, CULTURALLY UNDEVELOPED PLACES.

THAT WAS A PHILOSOPHICAL PART OF JAPANESE SOCIETY A HUNDRED YEARS OR MORE AGO – PERHAPS EVEN TO THIS DAY, THOUGH I HAVEN’T READ OF ANY MODERN CASES; BUT IT WAS ALSO THE CASE IN THE USA UNTIL THE MODERN MENTAL THERAPY INDUSTRY EMERGED, AND AN IMPULSE TO COMMIT SUICIDE BECAME TREATABLE ILLNESS RATHER THAN “THE UNFORGIVEABLE SIN.” BELIEVE IT OR NOT, DEATH FROM “SHAMEFUL” AND HORRIFIC DISEASES LIKE END STAGE CANCER WAS IN THE SAME CATEGORY, BECAUSE THERE ARE CHRISTIAN GROUPS EVEN NOW WHO CONSIDER SUCH THINGS TO BE A “PUNISHMENT FROM GOD.” THAT’S WHY, SOME HAVE SAID, THAT THE ACTUALLY VERY CONSERVATIVE PRESIDENT RONALD REAGAN HELD BACK FROM GIVING GOVERNMENT FUNDS TO AIDS RESEARCH, AND RELIGIOUS CONSERVATIVE CHRISTIANS WITHIN THE LAST TEN YEARS HAVE FOUGHT ANY HELP OF ANY KIND TO GAY PEOPLE, ESPECIALLY THE “NORMALIZATION” OF THE CONDITION AND GAY MARRIAGE. UP UNTIL RECENTLY IT WAS LISTED IN PSYCHIATRIC DIAGNOSIS DESCRIPTIONS AS BEING “MENTALLY DISTURBED.” MOST LIBERAL AND EDUCATED PEOPLE NOW SEE IT AS A PART OF THE NORMAL SPECTRUM RATHER THAN MENTAL ILLNESS.

THE FRIGHTENING DISEASE AIDS WAS NOT GIVEN GOOD MEDICAL TREATMENT NOR EXPERIMENTAL STUDY, IN THE 1980S WHEN IT FIRST EMERGED ON THE HORIZON OF AMERICAN CONSCIOUSNESS. IT WAS CONSIDERED “A GAY DISEASE,” AND BEING GAY WAS ONE OF THE MOST HORRIBLE OF SINS. WE ARE WORKING OUR WAY BACK FROM THAT POSITION TO ONE OF UNDERSTANDING AND CARING FOR GAYS AND OTHER DISADVANTAGED INDIVIDUALS NOW.

THAT SOCIETAL REVULSION AGAINST A NUMBER OF DIFFERENT PHYSICAL OR MENTAL PROBLEMS MAY HAVE A BASIS IN THE IDEA THAT MENTAL ILLNESS, AND EVEN A TENDENCY TO CERTAIN “SINS,” IS “BORN IN” RATHER THAN RELATED TO ENVIRONMENT, A KILLER GENE, FOR INSTANCE, AND IS INHERITED DOWN THROUGH THE FAMILY LINE. IT IS ALSO, THOUGH, THAT MAINTAINING OUR “STATUS RANKING” IS VERY IMPORTANT IN CONSERVATIVE SOCIETIES, WHICH LIKE IT OR NOT, IS WHAT WE ARE. A YOUNG WOMAN WOULD NOT, PERHAPS, BE CHOSEN BY HER ELDERS TO MARRY A YOUNG MAN, IF HER FAMILY IS CONSIDERED TO BE INFERIOR OR MERELY “TAINTED” BY “SHAME.” IN THIS TIME PERIOD, I THINK, THIS IS NOT SO STRONG A PREJUDICE, AS IT WAS IN SAY, 1920, HERE IN THE USA, BUT I THINK THAT IN PLACES LIKE INDIA IT PROBABLY STILL EXISTS STRONGLY.

I’M NOT SURE THAT A SHOW LIKE THIS “13 REASONS,” WHICH GOES ON FOR SEASON AFTER SEASON WITH NO EMOTIONAL PROGRESS AND WITH NO PSYCHOTHERAPEUTIC GUIDANCE, I HEARD, SUCH AS TALKS BETWEEN THE “PATIENT” IN A SHOW ABOUT HIS/HER PSYCHIATRIC ISSUES; OR, EVEN MORE IMPORTANTLY, A PATIENT’S RECONCILIATION OF A DAMAGED PERSONAL RELATIONSHIP, OR OTHER SUCH AID IN HEALING. I WATCHED A DOCUMENTARY SHOWING A GROUP THERAPY SESSION BETWEEN RAPISTS ON WHAT THE EMOTIONS AND TRIGGERS ARE FOR THEM. THAT WAS IN A MENTAL HOSPITAL SETTING, AND IT WAS BOTH INTERESTING AND MOVING. SEE THE GUARDIAN ARTICLE BELOW ON “13 REASONS WHY”.


https://www.theguardian.com/society/2017/may/02/netflix-13-reasons-why-rise-in-charity-counselling-for-children-nspcc-childline
Netflix's 13 Reasons Why prompts rise in charity counselling for children
NSPCC says some children who have received Childline counselling said series triggered memories of suicidal thoughts.
Sally Weale Education correspondent
Tuesday 2 May 2017 14.20 EDT

Photograph – Katherine Langford as Hannah Baker in a scene from the series 13 Reasons Why on Netflix. Photograph: Beth Dubber/AP

A children’s charity is providing a growing number of counselling sessions for young people concerned about the content of the Netflix drama 13 Reasons Why.

The NSPCC said some children who had received counselling via its Childline service said the series had triggered memories of suicidal thoughts. Others were worried that the programme did not offer advice on how to help someone who was feeling suicidal.

The drama has been criticised by mental health groups for its portrayal of a 17-year-old’s suicide, which they say could encourage young people to take their own lives.

A number of schools have sent letters to parents alerting them to the series, among them St Catherine’s independent girls’ school near Guildford in Surrey. The letter says the series has an 18 rating but that younger girls have watched it and may be encouraging others to do so.

Netflix show condemned for 'romanticising' teenager's suicide

“We don’t want to scaremonger but we do want to flag up what’s out there,” a spokeswoman for the school said. “It was a step we took along with other schools we work with to alert parents to the risks. We’ve had a very positive response from parents.”

Netflix has added an additional warning at the start of the series – on top of warnings already in place for specific episodes – in response to concerns from mental health campaigners.

An NSPCC spokesperson said: “No child should ever feel so helpless that they find themselves at such a crisis point, and we want young people to know they can talk to Childline about anything, anytime on 0800 1111 or childline.org.uk.”

The US-set series is based on a novel of the same name by Jay Asher and is made up of 13 episodes featuring 13 friends of the central character, Hannah Baker, listening to a tape she made for each of them, explaining the difficulties she faced that prompted her to kill herself.

The NSPCC spokesperson said: “Schools must be alive to issues that are affecting their children, and we welcome open communication between teachers and parents.

“Raising concerns, sharing information, and flagging worries can all help adults care for young people and stay abreast of the issues that young people face online. If any adult has a concern about a child they can always call the NSPCC Helpline on 0808 800 5000.”

In the UK, the Samaritans can be contacted on 116 123. In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Hotline is 1-800-273-8255. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is on 13 11 14. Hotlines in other countries can be found here



https://www.nspcc.org.uk/what-we-do/what-we-stand-for/

NSPCC stands for the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children
It means that each of us has a responsibility to keep childhood free from abuse, and we must do everything possible to protect children and prevent it from happening.

So if a law needs to change, or if more needs to be done to protect children, we demand it. The fact we’re independent – relying on the public to fund our work – means we can push for change when others can’t.


SEE ALSO:

http://www.indiewire.com/2017/04/13-reasons-why-romanticizes-suicide-netflix-glorifies-1201805690/
http://www.mindframe-media.info/__data/assets/pdf_file/0005/6494/Suicide-and-the-entertainment-media.pdf



MAY 8 2017 HEAR FOR YATES AND CLAPPER ON RUSSIAN MEDDLING IN 2016 ELECTION

http://www.politico.com/story/2017/04/25/sally-yates-james-clapper-russia-testimony-schedule-237568
Senate Judiciary sets date for Yates, Clapper testimony on Russia
By ELANA SCHOR 04/25/17 08:58 AM EDT Updated 04/25/17 12:38 PM EDT

Photograph -- Senate Judiciary sets date for Yates, Clapper testimony on Russia
By ELANA SCHOR 04/25/17 08:58 AM EDT Updated 04/25/17 12:38 PM EDT

Former acting Attorney General Sally Yates, fired from President Donald Trump’s Justice Department in January, and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper are set to testify on Russian meddling in the 2016 election at a May 8 hearing of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The panel announced the testimony Tuesday morning. Meanwhile, the House intelligence committee continues to work on rescheduling previously slated testimony from Yates and Clapper that its chairman, California GOP Rep. Devin Nunes, canceled before announcing he would cede control of the panel’s probe of Russian intervention in the election. Yates and Clapper are expected to appear in an open House intelligence panel hearing sometime after May 2, the date the committee is set to hear from FBI Director James Comey in a closed session.

The Senate intelligence committee has held one open hearing on Russian involvement in American elections since the Trump administration began, featuring outside experts, but has not scheduled testimony since early January from the key players in its investigation of Russia's electoral disruption. Democrats on the panel are starting to publicly air their frustration with the pace.

Yates and Clapper will appear before the Senate Judiciary subpanel on crime and terrorism, chaired by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), a Russia hawk and occasional Trump critic. Additional witnesses are possible at the May 8 hearing, titled “Russian Interference in the 2016 United States Election,” the committee stated on Tuesday.

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Author: Elana Schor eschor@politico.com @eschor



http://time.com/4764293/sally-yates-michael-flynn-congress-testimony/
CONGRESS
Sally Yates Will Testify She Warned White House About Michael Flynn's Russia Connection
Eric Tucker / AP
Updated: May 02, 2017 11:45 PM ET

Photograph -- WASHINGTON, DC - JUNE 28: Deputy Attorney General Sally Q. Yates speaks during a press conference at the Department of Justice on June 28, 2016 in Washington, DC. Volkswagen has agreed to nearly $15 billion in a settlement over emissions cheating on its diesel vehicles. (Photo by Pete Marovich/Getty Images) Pete Marovich—Getty Images

(WASHINGTON) — Former acting attorney general Sally Yates is expected to testify to Congress next week that she expressed alarm to the White House about President Donald Trump's national security adviser's contacts with the Russian ambassador, which could contradict how the administration has characterized her counsel.

Yates on Monday is expected to recount her Jan. 26 conversation about Michael Flynn and to say that she was concerned by discrepancies between the administration's public statements on his contacts with ambassador Sergey Kislyak and what really transpired, according to a person familiar with that discussion and knowledgeable about Yates's plans for her testimony.

The person spoke on condition of anonymity so as not to pre-empt the testimony.

Yates is expected to say that she told White House counsel Don McGahn that she believed Flynn's communications with Kislyak could leave Flynn in a compromised position because of the contradictions between the public depictions of the calls and what intelligence officials knew to be true, the person said.

White House officials have said publicly that Yates merely wanted to give them a "heads-up" about Flynn's Russian contacts, but Yates is likely to testify that she approached the White House with alarm, according to the person.

"So just to be clear, the acting attorney general informed the White House counsel that they wanted to give a 'heads up' to us on some comments that may have seemed in conflict with what he had sent the Vice President out in particular," White House press secretary Sean Spicer told reporters at a Feb. 14 press briefing.

Flynn resigned in February after published reports detailed Yates's conversation with the White House. White House officials initially maintained that Flynn had not discussed Russian sanctions with Kislyak during the transition period, but after news reports said the opposite, they then admitted that he had misled them about the nature of that call.

"The issue, pure and simple, came down to a matter of trust," Spicer told reporters.

Flynn was in frequent contact with Kislyak on the day the Obama administration slapped sanctions on Russia for election-related hacking, as well as at other times during the transition period, a U.S. official has said.

Yates's scheduled appearance before a Senate Judiciary subcommittee, alongside former national intelligence director James Clapper, will provide her first public account of the conversation with the White House. It will also represent her first testimony before Congress since Yates, an Obama administration holdover, was fired in January for refusing to defend Trump's travel ban. She was previously scheduled to appear in March before a House committee investigating Russian interference in the presidential election, but that hearing was canceled.



SHARP RISE IN RELIGIOUS HATE CRIMES IN 2017

THESE RELIGIOUS HATE CRIMES SHOULD BE A CALL TO ARMS. I THINK THE FBI ET AL SHOULD BE LOOKING ELSEWHERE THAN JUST AT ISIS AND AL-QAEDA FOR THE CULPRITS – YES, AT US INSTEAD -- WHITE ANGLO SAXON PROTESTANTS AND CATHOLICS WITH MENTAL HEALTH ISSUES AND PERHAPS GUN COLLECTIONS. OUR BIG BROTHER STREET SURVEILLANCE METHODS SHOULD HELP WITH THIS. SYNAGOGUES, MOSQUES ETC., NEED TO HAVE CAMERAS LOCATED THERE, AND CONNECTED TO LOCAL POLICE DEPARTMENTS AS WELL AS FBI, SO THESE CRIMINALS CAN BE CAUGHT, OR AT LEAST IDENTIFIED BY CAMERA. I UNDERSTAND THAT WITH COMPUTER ENHANCEMENT THEY HAVE IMPROVED THE CLARITY OF SUCH FOOTAGE. THERE ARE OTHER POSSIBLE AVENUES THAT I CAN BRING TO MIND, ALSO. THE FOLLOWING IS A STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS LIST OF SUCH POTENTIALLY DANGEROUS INDIVIDUALS AND GROUPS.

I THINK WE NEED TO BE LOOKING CLOSELY AT INDIVIDUAL WHITE SUPREMACIST GROUP MEMBERS; SKINHEADS, BIKER GANGS AND HIGHLY TATTOOED MEN (BECAUSE THAT IS USUALLY A SIGN OF CONSIDERABLE ANGER); MEN EXHIBITING GENERAL PSYCHIATRIC SYMPTOMS, INCLUDING EXTREME INTROVERSION OR GETTING INTO FIGHTS; EX-PRISONERS OF ANY TYPE; STREET GANGS; VIEW CLOSELY THE WEBSITES THAT CATER PHILOSOPHICALLY TO THIS WILD CROWD OF BREITBART ADHERENTS AND ALLOW THEM TO COMMUNICATE WITH EACH OTHER THERE; NOTING THE INTERNET HATE CROWD‘S HANDLES AND THE ISP FROM WHICH THEY ARE OPERATING, ALONG WITH THEIR ADDRESS AND PHONE NUMBERS; TAKE THEIR WEBSITES DOWN OFF THE NET SO THAT THEY NO LONGER WILL BE ABLE TO LINK UP TO EACH OTHER, AND VISIT THEM AT THEIR HOMES FOR A CHAT; NOTICE PARTICULARLY THOSE WHO ARE EXPRESSIVE OF GREAT ANGER OR BIZARRE STATEMENTS; RADICAL AND OTHERWISE ECCENTRIC RELIGIOUS GROUPS SUCH AS THE WESTBORO BAPTIST CHURCH OR OTHER “OFF BRAND” CHRISTIAN GROUPS, PARTICULARLY GROUPS THAT PROCLAIM THEMSELVES TO BE “CHRISTIAN IDENTITY” CHURCHES; AND WHATEVER ANYONE ELSE THINKS UP TO TRY AS LONG AS IT’S LEGAL.

THE INTERFERENCE WITH INTERNET FREEDOM THAT THIS WOULD POTENTIALLY ENTAIL IS OBVIOUS, BUT AT LEAST IT TARGETS AMERICAN PEOPLE AND GROUPS RATHER THAN JUST FOREIGN TERRORISTS. THE PEOPLE WHO GO IN AND BREAK UP TOMBSTONES IN A JEWISH CEMETERY ARE AMERICAN CITIZENS AND RESIDENTS, AND THEY’LL DO IT AFTER DARK. STATIONING A GUARD MIGHT MAKE SENSE. AN ACTION LIKE THIS WON’T BE POPULAR, BUT IT SEEMS TO ME THAT THE FISA AND RICO LAWS MAY BE USEFUL. GOOD DEMOCRATS WILL OBJECT EN MASSE, BUT THE LINK IN MOST OF THE MISCHIEF THESE DAYS IS THE INTERNET. WE NEED TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT THAT.

IF A PERSON USES THE NET TO DO JUST ONE ABUSIVE OR CRIMINAL ACTIVITY THEY SHOULD BE REMOVED UNCEREMONIOUSLY, BANNED FROM GETTING FUTURE WEBSITES, AND THEN THOSE WHO ARE HEAD HONCHOS OF THE INTERNET COMMUNITY (WHOEVER THEY ARE – MICROSOFT, PERHAPS – WHO SET UP WEBSITES, SHOULD BE WATCHING FOR THE VIOLENT GROUPS OF ALL KINDS. THE SOUTHERN POVERTY LAW CENTER AND THE ACLU COULD HELP WITH THAT, AND THE FBI SHOULD BE ABLE TO DO IT IF WE’RE GOING TO BE USING ANTITERRORISM LAWS FOR INTERNATIONAL TERRORISTS AND HATE CRIMES. THE USA HAS BEEN SLOW TO RECOGNIZE THE POWER AND SCOPE OF THE HATE CRIMES OF OUR OWN OVERLY PATRIOTIC OR XENOPHOBIC GROUPS IN THESE SITUATIONS, BECAUSE THEY ARE ON THE RIGHT RATHER THAN ON THE LEFT. COMMIE PINKOS ARE BAD, AND NRA MEMBERS ARE ALL OKAY, SEEMS TO BE OUR VIEW OF THE WORLD.

SEE THE ARTICLE BELOW ON RELIGIOUS HATE ACTIONS IN THE USA JUST THIS YEAR.


http://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/why-a-spike-in-religious-hate-crimes-should-worry-all-of-us-76262/
Why a spike in religious hate crimes should worry all of us
By Matt Hadro

Photograph -- Credit: Hernan Pinera via Flickr (CC BY-SA 2.0).

Washington D.C., May 3, 2017 / 03:20 pm (CNA/EWTN News).- Civic and religious leaders this week addressed a disturbing rise in religious hate crimes in recent years, especially harassment and violence perpetrated against Jews, Muslims, and Sikhs.

“While it is clear that Sikh Americans are not alone in experiencing a rise in hate crimes, the experience of our community is important to understand how dangerous this current era of inflammatory rhetoric promises to be if action is not taken,” Dr. Prabhjot Singh, a Sikh physician, said in his May 2 written testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

The Senate Judiciary Committee heard testimony from representatives of the Anti-Defamation League, a Sikh doctor, and the civil rights division at the Justice Department on “responses to the increase in religious hate crimes” in the U.S.

“Crimes against Jews are the most common religious hate crimes and they have increased,” Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), chair of the committee, noted, but Islamophobic incidents rose the sharpest amongst all religious groups with a 67 percent spike from 2014 to 2015 according to FBI statistics.

Although overall hate crimes, including crimes based on race, sexual orientation, religion and ethnicity, went down in number from 2000 to 2015, religion-based hate crimes went up 23 percent from 2014 to 2015, Eric Treene, special counsel for religious discrimination at the Justice Department’s civil rights division, pointed to [sic] FBI statistics.

Dr. Singh, in his written testimony, told of how Sikhs are only one of many religious groups in the U.S., yet violence against them is representative of a worsening in religious bigotry.

Singh was violently beaten by a mob on the streets of New York City in 2013. As he lay awaiting treatment for his injuries in the hospital, he learned that the Muslim woman lying next to him in the emergency room wearing a hijab, or a religious headscarf, was attacked by the same group of young men.

“They threw a bottle of urine at her face, cutting her nose,” he said. Yet reporters who documented Singh’s attack in a story did not mention the assault on the Muslim woman because, in Singh’s words, “they said it would complicate the story, which was about a professor and doctor who was ‘mistakenly’ attacked in his own neighborhood.”

“We cannot accept this premise,” he insisted in his Tuesday testimony. “There is no such thing as a ‘mistaken’ hate crime. No one should ever be targeted. The only mistake is thinking otherwise.”

The attack, he continued, was only the latest incident in a rash of harassment and violence against Sikhs in the U.S. since the 9/11 attacks in 2001.

“Some of our fellow Americans,” Singh said, “call us 'ragheads and towelheads,' or 'ISIS and Al Qaeda.'”

“Ominously, the Sikh Coalition has consistently found that a majority of Sikh students in our nation's public schools experience bias-based bullying and harassment,” he added. “Some of our children are accused of being 'terrorists.' Others have had their turbans ripped off.”

Sadly, these attacks are part of a larger landscape of “threats, arson, assault, and murder” against Muslims, Jews, Hindus, African-Americans, and LGBTQ persons, he said.

“We seem to be backsliding into a new nativist era. This endangers us all,” he said.

Anti-Semitic and Islamophobic acts rose in 2016 in the presidential election and have continued in 2017, Jonathan Greenblatt, CEO and national director of the Anti-Defamation League, explained in his testimony.

Anti-Semitic incidents rose by over one-third in 2016 with “1,266 acts targeting Jews and Jewish institutions,” according to the ADL 2016 audit of incidents.

The campaign only intensified tensions that had already been aggravated, he added.

“And anti-Semitic abuse has soared on social media,” he noted, as “hateful, anti-Semitic invective” flourished on the mediums during the election season as well as harassment of Jewish journalists by white supremacists including the use of “triple parentheses, to publicly 'tag' Jews online.”

The election “featured harshly anti-Muslim rhetoric and anti-Semitic dog whistles,” he said, “and fostered an atmosphere in which white supremacists and other anti-Semites and bigots feel emboldened and believe that their views are becoming more broadly acceptable.”

President Trump's “initial reluctance to address rising anti-Semitism” has helped normalize this bigotry, Greenblatt said, and some of his supporters played a direct role in it.

“Much of the vandalism and harassment used slogans sourced from the Trump campaign such as 'Make America Great Again,'” he said. Incidents during and after the election – anti-Semitic graffiti and assault – were perpetrated with expressed support for Trump.

In addition, in the election there were “stereotyping of many groups, including women and immigrants, threats to ban Muslims from entering or living in the country, pronouncements that Islam ‘hates’ America, mocking of disabled people, and political candidates attacking one another based on their physical appearance,” he said.

Dr. Singh said he “was horrified to hear our President last weekend telling thousands of people at a rally that immigrants are snakes waiting to bite America,” he referred to Trump’s words at a recent rally in Harrisburg, Pa.

“Words matter, and when political leaders divide and dehumanize us, this lays the groundwork for hate to infect our society,” he stated.

All this has not only continued in 2017, but the number of incidents has spiked sharply, Greenblatt said.

He noted 161 bomb threats against Jewish synagogues or buildings so far and three reported desecrations of Jewish cemeteries.

“The bomb threats against JCCs, schools, ADL offices, and other community institutions in dozens of states across the country attracted very considerable attention,” he said, “causing evacuations, significant service disruptions, program cancellations, and deep community anxiety.”

Some of the threats were graphic in nature, warning of a “bloodbath” or the decapitations of Jews in explosions.

Action must be taken to stem these incidents, witnesses insisted. Preventative measures could include mandatory reporting laws for hate crimes, a federal inter-agency task force on hate crimes, and public officials speaking out against bigotry.

Dr. Singh shared how his son will soon enter Kindergarten, yet according to statistics, will probably be the victim of bigotry.

“These young years are formative, and how children are treated tells us so much about who we are as a nation, and who we aspire to be,” he said.



IN RELATION TO GETTING RID OF INTERNET ABUSIVENESS AND WORSE, SEE THE FOLLOWING WEBSITE:
https://www.justice.gov/criminal-ccips/reporting-computer-internet-related-or-intellectual-property-crime,
REPORTING COMPUTER, INTERNET-RELATED, OR INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY CRIME

Internet-related crime, like any other crime, should be reported to appropriate law enforcement investigative authorities at the local, state, federal, or international levels, depending on the scope of the crime. Citizens who are aware of federal crimes should report them to local offices of federal law enforcement.

Show Reporting computer hacking, fraud and other internet-related crime
Show Reporting Intellectual Property Crime


General Information - Computer Crime & Intellectual Property Section
LEADERSHIP
John Lynch
Chief, Computer Crime & Intellectual Property Section
CONTACT
Department of Justice Main Switchboard
(202) 514-2000


CONTACT THE CRIMINAL DIVISION

By Mail

Correspondence to the Department of Justice, Criminal Division including the Assistant Attorney General, may be sent to:

U.S. Department of Justice
Criminal Division
950 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20530-0001

By E-Mail

Correspondences by e-mail may be sent to Criminal.Division@usdoj.gov (link sends e-mail)

By Phone

Department of Justice Main Switchboard - 202-514-2000
Criminal Division Citizen Phone Line - 202-353-4641
Criminal Division officials, see the Directory of Department Officials

May 1 and 2, 2017


News and Views


PERHAPS IF THE PENTAGON GET’S BEHIND CARBON DIOXIDE REDUCTION, THE REPUBLICANS WILL TOO ….

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/research-severe-turbulence-could-get-worse-aeroflot-plane/
CBS NEWS May 2, 2017, 6:24 AM
Researchers predict major spike in transatlantic turbulence

An Aeroflot plane bound for Bangkok encountered severe turbulence Monday that left 27 of its passengers injured, some with broken bones.The airline confirmed the incident was the result of clear-air turbulence, the most difficult type to detect. New research suggests transatlantic turbulence could become up to three times worse in the coming decades.

For nervous fliers, nothing about this research is reassuring. Clear-air turbulence strikes without warning and, because of climate change, is only going to get worse, reports CBS News correspondent Mark Strassmann.

The sudden drop on the Aeroflot plane came without warning and anyone not strapped down was shot toward the ceiling, then slammed against the aircraft floor. Video of the aftermath shows the plane scattered with debris.

Unlike conventional turbulence that occurs when planes fly near weather systems, clear-air turbulence happens without the presence of clouds. Making it nearly impossible for pilots to detect, until it's too late.

Dr. Paul Williams is an atmospheric scientist at the University of Reading in England.

"We've calculated that the amount of severe turbulence which is strong enough to hospitalize people could double or even as much as triple by the end of this century on transatlantic flight routes because of climate change," Williams said.

According to researchers, rising carbon dioxide levels could destabilize the fast moving air currents of the transatlantic jet stream, an area that currently sees up to 3,000 flights each day.

They predict a 149 percent spike in severe air turbulence, along with longer travel times, increased delays and, inevitably, higher ticket prices.

"It's very distressing for pilots precisely because they have no indication or very little indication that the turbulence is sitting out there and that the plane is just about to hit it," Williams said.

Aerospace engineer Pat Anderson took Strassmann inside a flight simulator to demonstrate different levels of turbulence from the pilot's perspective.

When asked to describe "extreme" turbulence, Anderson said, "When I think you get to a point where you say extreme, you're worried about being in a situation where the air plane is in jeopardy."

Modern airliners are designed to withstand all kinds of turbulence, but experts warn that even airplanes have a breaking point.

"Well the integrity of the plane is something that's going to have to be checked," Anderson said. "Airplanes don't have infinite lives, they have some limit and if we see more turbulence that's going to be drawn in closer."

Turbulence already presents the greatest safety risk for the traveling public. In 2016, the FAA investigated 44 turbulence-related injuries, more than double the amount from the year before.


# # # #


FOX’S “BAND OF PIRATES MENTALITY” ON ITS’ WAY OUT, AND CIVILIZATION TAKING OVER?

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/22/business/media/murdoch-family-21st-century-fox.html?_r=0
In House of Murdoch, Sons Set About an Elaborate Overhaul Since taking over two years ago, James and Lachlan Murdoch seem determined to rid the company of the old-guard culture on which their father built his empire.
By BROOKS BARNES and SYDNEY EMBER APRIL 22, 2017

Photograph -- From left, James, Lachlan and Rupert Murdoch. Credit Illustration by Robert Carter for The New York Times
Photograph -- James Murdoch, 44, chief executive of 21st Century Fox, during a presentation on Wednesday in Manhattan for National Geographic. Credit Kevin Hagen for The New York Times
Photograph -- Outside Fox News Corporation’s headquarters in Manhattan. Analysts estimate that the news division generated 25 percent of 21st Century Fox’s $6.6 billion in operating income last year. Credit Sam Hodgson for The New York Times
Read -- the Times Investigation That Led to Bill O’Reilly’s Dismissal


The sun was setting in New York as James Murdoch, looking confident in cream pants and a dark blazer, stepped before 350 guests in a glass-walled concert hall and waxed poetic about his pet TV channel and its dedication to “scientific literacy.”

The event on Wednesday night was an advertising showcase for National Geographic, which Mr. Murdoch, 44, has doted on since becoming chief executive of its parent company, 21st Century Fox. As a person who cares deeply about “issues related to the environment, conservation, exploration and education,” he told the crowd, “I’m personally grateful for the important work National Geographic does.”

Across town at that same moment, his 86-year-old father, Rupert — who once called climate change “alarmist nonsense” — was still dealing with fallout at his most cherished channel, Fox News. Bill O’Reilly, the pugnacious and top-rated talk show host, had been ousted that day after allegations of sexual harassment involving multiple women.

It was James Murdoch — the one looking so unperturbed at the NatGeo presentation, posing for photos as waiters milled about in yellow suspenders and guests ate skirt steak and shrimp cocktail — who had most aggressively moved against Mr. O’Reilly. The same had happened in July, when Roger Ailes, who founded Fox News with Rupert Murdoch, was forced to resign amid his own sexual harassment scandal.

This is what generational change at one of the globe’s most powerful media conglomerates looks like.

With James and his elder brother, Lachlan, 45, who is the executive chairman of 21st Century Fox, firmly entrenched as their father’s successors, they are now forcibly exerting themselves. Their father remains very involved, but his sons seem determined to rid the company of its roguish, old-guard internal culture and tilt operations toward the digital future. They are working to make the family empire their own, not the one the elder Murdoch created to suit his sensibilities.

“They are both young enough to see and understand that the company has to change,” said Doug Creutz, a media analyst at Cowen and Company. “At some media companies, there is a feeling that people are being dragged kicking and screaming into the digital future. I don’t get that sense with the brothers at all.”

Fox executives either did not return calls or declined to comment for this article. But a picture of a new Murdoch era emerged in interviews with more than a dozen people who work at the company or are friendly with James and Lachlan, most of whom spoke anonymously for fear of reprisals.

Over his storied career, Rupert Murdoch repeatedly showed that he was willing to trade workplace culture for profits — ride people hard, overlook putrid behavior as long as the results are there, reward infighting. When his sons took over two years ago, however, they immediately set about creating a warmer and fuzzier workplace, at least in parts of the company, and moving away from an anti-politically correct environment that, at least in the case of Fox News, seemed to enable the kind of behavior of which Mr. Ailes and Mr. O’Reilly have been accused. Both men deny the allegations.

Employees at the Fox broadcast network said they were pleasantly surprised, for instance, to be summoned to a town-hall meeting — something that had rarely if ever been done under the archly conservative Rupert Murdoch — where the brothers espoused transparency, workplace diversity and greater cooperation between divisions. In the fall, James and Lachlan introduced additional benefits, including more paid vacation, vastly enhanced reproductive coverage for women and “expanded coverage for our transgender colleagues.”

The brothers concluded the memo on a jaunty note: “Enjoy!”

James and Lachlan overhauled their international networks business, a collection of some 350 channels; changed leadership at their film studio, home to the “X-Men” movies; and poured money into National Geographic. They culled the company’s entertainment ranks of roughly 400 employees, something James described at the time as a “ventilation.” (While some people in Hollywood saw the move as ageist, grumbling was minimal; Fox offered relatively lavish buyout packages.)

21st Century Fox initially stood by Mr. O’Reilly as he faced a series of allegations of sexual harassment or other inappropriate behavior.

The brothers have even shaken up 21st Century Fox’s profile in Washington, replacing their father’s Republican lobbying chief with a Democratic one. One Hollywood friend equated their mind-set to moving into an outdated house and looking for wood rot.

Still, some of the most dramatic changes at 21st Century Fox over the last two years, including the ouster of Mr. O’Reilly, have been forced on them.

When they first took over, they stepped gingerly around Fox News. James and his progressive-minded wife, Kathryn, have long been embarrassed by certain elements of Fox News, associates said, while Lachlan’s views of the network have been more in line with his father’s. Both sons were willing to tolerate the freewheeling Fox News culture because of the enormous profit the channel generates. Analysts estimate that the division generated 25 percent of 21st Century Fox’s operating income last year, which was $6.6 billion.

Only last summer, when the former Fox News anchor Gretchen Carlson filed a sexual harassment suit against Mr. Ailes, did James and Lachlan, and eventually Rupert, force change. And even then the overhaul at Fox News was limited; control was given to longtime Ailes lieutenants, and the company continued to support Mr. O’Reilly in the face of repeated allegations of sexual harassment, even giving him a contract extension.

It was not until The New York Times disclosed financial settlements, which involved multiple women who alleged that Mr. O’Reilly had behaved inappropriately, and advertisers began leaving his show in droves, that the company forced him out. Maintaining a culture based on “trust and respect,” as 21st Century Fox promised when Mr. Ailes left, was easier said than done.


Rupert Murdoch spent decades As James and Lachlan move to modernize their company, several questions have emerged. The biggest: Can you truly change the culture without losing what made it so successful? It was Rupert’s band-of-pirates mentality that willed the Fox broadcast network into existence, and turned Fox News into a source of astounding profit and political muscle.

plotting and re-plotting which of his children would take over his empire. In 1997, Lachlan became the crown prince. When Lachlan quit in 2005 after sparring with Mr. Ailes, James ascended. But James was seen as badly mishandling the phone-hacking scandal at family-owned tabloids in Britain. For a time there was speculation that Rupert’s daughter Elisabeth, who founded the Shine reality TV juggernaut, had a shot.

The brothers eventually rose back to the top. Yet they have not entirely convinced Wall Street analysts that their pairing is workable in the long term. Some people do not see James and Lachlan as equals.

“James has a lot of experience in senior management, and he is capable of running a business,” said Mr. Creutz, the analyst. “Lachlan? I don’t know. People don’t know him as well. He is looked at a bit more skeptically by investors.”

Anthony DiClemente, an analyst at Nomura Instinet, challenged that notion. “As a manager, Lachlan has grown and developed quite a bit,” he said. “I think the brothers get along well, and that Lachlan’s views are falling into line with James’s.”

The brothers are radically different in style. James is a speed-talking, tightly wound technophile — cool and calculating, to the degree that he can come across as slick, several associates said. Fashion forward, James socializes with young technology kingpins like Elon Musk, a founder of Tesla Motors and SpaceX.

Lachlan, with his tattooed forearm, avoids the spotlight, rarely popping up in Hollywood watering holes like Tower Bar, where James has a signature table. Lachlan comes across as a more grounded guy’s guy. On his first day as executive chairman, he rolled onto the Fox lot in Los Angeles in a pickup truck.




http://www.refinery29.com/2017/05/152556/fox-news-sexual-harassment-allegations-timeline
A Timeline Of All The Horrible Allegations Against Fox News
LAUREN HOLTER
MAY 2, 2017, 1:00 PM

Since news broke of sexual harassment allegations against former CEO Roger Ailes last summer, Fox News has faced a constant PR nightmare. Three top employees, including Ailes, have left the network, and the allegations against the company's culture now include racial discrimination as well as sexual misconduct. This extended scandal gets more complicated each day, so we created a timeline of the Fox News allegations to help keep it all straight.

Since it's confusing just trying to remember which old white man is which, let's first walk through who each name is. Ailes, founder and former chairman and CEO of Fox, was one of the most powerful men in media before his downfall. He worked as a media consultant for Richard Nixon, Ronald Reagan, and George H. W. Bush, as well as advised Donald Trump during debate season. Bill O'Reilly hosted The O'Reilly Factor, which was the network's most popular show until it shuttered, bringing in about $200 million in ad revenue each year.

The second Bill to fall, Bill Shine, was a co-president at Fox and an ally of Ailes. Shine remaining at Fox after Ailes was ousted was seen by some as a signal that not much was changing at the network, and after Shine left, another executive close to Ailes was promoted.

Now, here's a full timeline of the allegations against Fox News.

2004: The First Known Claim Against O'Reilly

A producer on O'Reilly's show, Andrea Mackris, accused him of sexual harassment in a lawsuit after he sued her for allegedly trying to extort $60 million from him and Fox. Among her various claims, Mackris alleged O'Reilly sounded like he was masturbating when he called her, The Times reported. A public relations firm was brought in to portray Mackris in a bad light, but O’Reilly eventually paid her about $9 million after weeks of bad press.

2014: Allegations Against Ailes Begin

Gabriel Sherman's biography of Ailes, The Loudest Voice in the Room, mentioned stories of women claiming the media exec had sexually harassed them. However, not much came of the stories until later.

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Carlos Lozada ✔ @CarlosLozadaWP
THE LOUDEST VOICE IN THE ROOM by @gabrielsherman is out in paperback, w/ a new afterword on the fall of Roger Ailes:
10:07 AM - 7 Feb 2017
4 4 Retweets 15 15 likes

July 6, 2016: Gretchen Carlson's Lawsuit

The former Fox News anchor filed a lawsuit accusing Ailes of sexual harassment and claiming her former co-host, Steve Doocy, treated her in a "sexist and condescending" way after her contract with the network wasn't renewed. "Ailes has unlawfully retaliated against Carlson and sabotaged her career because she refused his sexual advances and complained about severe and pervasive sexual harassment," her official complaint read.
July 9, 2016: Six More Women Accuse Ailes

Gabriel Sherman reported for New York magazine that six more women described sexual harassment claims against Ailes, and more than a dozen women reportedly contacted Carlson's lawyer with similar allegations. The stories dated back to the 196os, but Ailes denied any wrongdoing.

July 21, 2016: Ailes Resigns

21st Century Fox confirmed Ailes had resigned. Rupert Murdoch, executive chairman of 21st Century Fox, took over as chairman and acting CEO of the network, and Ailes received $40 million to step down.

November 15, 2016: Megyn Kelly's Memoir Details Harassment

Kelly's memoir, Settle for More, came out, describing for the first time the sexual harassment she allegedly experienced from Ailes while at Fox News. She described one alleged encounter, writing, "Roger called me up to New York and we had a shocking exchange. I was nervous about going into his office, concerned he might start in again. Sure enough he did. And then he crossed a new line — trying to grab me repeatedly and kiss me on the lips."

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The Spectator Index @spectatorindex
Fox News departures, past 12 months:

- Roger Ailes
- Megyn Kelly
- Greta Van Susteren
- Gretchen Carlson
- Bill O'Reilly
4:30 PM - 26 Apr 2017
51 51 Retweets 71 71 likes

January 10, 2017: Another O'Reilly Settlement Surfaces

The New York Times reported that Fox News reached a settlement with on-air personality Juliet Huddy, who claimed O'Reilly sexually harassed her back in 2011 and then tried to damage her career when she refused his advances.

March 28, 2017: Racial Discrimination Claims

Two Black women who worked in the payroll department alleged in a lawsuit that they experienced “top-down racial harassment” stemming from comptroller Judith Slater (who Fox said was fired the month before, when executives learned of allegations against her).

April 1, 2017: A Damning O'Reilly Investigation

A New York Times report revealed that at least five women, including Huddy and Mackris, received money from O'Reilly or 21st Century Fox to not go public with their allegations of sexual harassment (or pursue legal recourse). The private settlements dated from 2002 to 2016, and according to The Times, the five women collectively received $13 million (at least $9 million of which came from O'Reilly himself). O'Reilly denied all allegations against him.

April 3, 2017: Another Lawsuit Against Ailes & Fox

Fox News contributor Julie Roginsky filed a lawsuit accusing Ailes of sexual harassment and subsequently retaliating against her when she refused a sexual relationship with him. Her lawsuit named Shine, as well, claiming he "aided and abetted the discrimination" by "failing to take reasonable measures to protect Roginsky from, and condoning, the unlawful conduct."

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Oliver Darcy ✔ @oliverdarcy
Internal memo that the Murdochs just sent out to all staff at Fox News
2:31 PM - 19 Apr 2017
620 620 Retweets 471 471 likes

April 19, 2017: O'Reilly Steps Down

The company announced O'Reilly wouldn't return to work, writing that he and Fox "agreed" on his departure — and praising his extensive career.

April 21, 2017: Sean Hannity Is Accused Of Similar Behavior

Former Fox guest Debbie Schlussel claimed in an interview that the host of Hannity previously invited her back to his hotel room after an event they both attended in Detroit. She claimed he never invited her back to his show after she turned him down. "This kind of stuff is all over the place at Fox News and anything that has to do with Sean Hannity,” Schlussel told radio host Pat Campbell.

Hannity denied the allegations, but The Daily Beast reported he might leave Fox, too.

April 25, 2017: Racial Discrimination Claims

Stemming from the initial racial discrimination lawsuit filed in March, a total of eleven current and former employees filed a class-action lawsuit alleging years of discrimination. The same day, another person filed a separate lawsuit alleging racial discrimination, and another filed a complaint with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission. Every claim named Slater, according to The Washington Post, and alleged top executives knew of the misconduct.

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Michael Calderone ✔ @mlcalderone
Statement from attorney representing current/former Fox News staff alleging racial discrimination http://huff.to/2p1PMjR
3:50 PM - 1 May 2017
7 7 Retweets 3 3 likes

May 1, 2017: Shine Resigns

Fox News announced Shine had resigned and would leave within a few weeks. Along with Roginsky, other women also alleged he knew about sexual harassment and misconduct at the company and did nothing about it.

The same day, Diana Falzone claimed in a new lawsuit that she wasn't allowed to appear on Fox News after writing an op-ed about having endometriosis and being infertile.

Needless to say, it's been a tumultuous ride. As all the current lawsuits play out, there's sure to be more news involving allegations against Fox, as well as criticism that not enough is being done to change the company's culture.



http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/fox-news-bill-shine-out_us_5903c3bfe4b02655f83d965d?ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009
MEDIA 05/01/2017 03:08 pm ET | Updated 21 hours ago
Bill Shine Is Out As Fox News Co-President
The network shake-up continues amid growing sexual harassment and racial discrimination claims.
By Michael Calderone , Michael McLaughlin

Embattled Fox News Co-President Bill Shine resigned Monday following intense scrutiny about his stewardship of the network in the wake of the Bill O’Reilly scandal and amid growing sexual harassment and racial discrimination allegations.

A veteran network executive, Shine was promoted to co-president just weeks after Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes’ downfall over widespread sexual harassment claims, and his departure comes two weeks after top-rated host O’Reilly left the network due to a similar scandal.

The New York Times revealed last month that 21st Century Fox paid settlements to O’Reilly’s accusers even after the Ailes mess, which undermined the contention from the network’s parent company that it was cleaning up a toxic workplace environment. Meanwhile, the legal threats against Fox News keep coming, with Shine accused in several lawsuits of covering up or downplaying allegations of sexual harassment and racial discrimination.


PHOTOGRAPH -- LUCAS JACKSON/REUTERS

Bill Shine was promoted last summer to Fox News co-president with Jack Abernethy, after Roger Ailes’ downfall amid sexual harassment allegations. Shine is accused in several lawsuits of covering up or downplaying allegations of harassment at Fox.

21st Century Fox Executive Chairman Rupert Murdoch praised Shine in a statement that unsurprisingly didn’t mention the recent turmoil.

“This is a significant day for all at Fox News,” Murdoch said. “Bill has played a huge role in building Fox News to its present position as the nation’s biggest and most important cable channel in the history of the industry. His contribution to our channel and our country will resonate for many years.”

In the shake-up, Murdoch announced that executive Suzanne Scott will be promoted to president for programming while Jay Wallace becomes president for news. Jack Abernethy, who was appointed co-president in August, will remain in that role overseeing business functions at Fox News and as CEO of Fox Television Stations.

The departure of Shine, an Ailes lieutenant who spent over two decades at the network, may be seen by critics as part of a long-overdue housecleaning. But Shine’s exit may not sit well well [sic] with some of Fox News’ top talent.

Fox New host Sean Hannity rallied around the executive on Thursday, following reports that his friend and former producer’s tenure appeared imperiled. On Twitter, he said that Shine is an “innocent man”and that “this is the total end of [Fox News] as we know it” if he were to be replaced.

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Sean Hannity ✔ @seanhannity
Somebody HIGH UP AND INSIDE FNC is trying to get an innocent person fired. And Gabe I KNOW WHO it is. Best Sean https://twitter.com/gabrielsherman/status/857604245197119488 …
4:50 PM - 27 Apr 2017
3,297 3,297 Retweets 5,630 5,630 likes

Hannity’s posts were in direct response to reporting by New York magazine’s Gabriel Sherman that Murdoch’s sons James and Lachlan, executives with the channel’s parent company 21st Century Fox, had turned down Shine’s request for their public show of support. (Sherman first reported Shine’s departure Monday).

21st Century Fox is under pressure on multiple fronts: The Fox News scandals could hurt its takeover of British satellite TV company Sky, and there’s a federal probe into whether the company properly disclosed paying settlements to Ailes accusers.

Fox News had been in a state of upheaval since Ailes, the longtime head of the network, was pushed out amid accusations that he had sexually harassed multiple women at the channel, including popular former host Megyn Kelly.

Last month, advertisers in droves stopped airing commercials during “The O’Reilly Factor” after the Times reported that the company and its star had paid $13 million to settle complaints against him from five female co-workers. Fox News parted ways with O’Reilly on April 19.

Both Ailes and O’Reilly have denied the allegations against them.

Photograph -- SUSAN BIDDLE/THE WASHINGTON POST VIA GETTY IMAGES
Host Bill O’Reilly and Chairman Roger Ailes both left Fox News in disgrace following sexual harassment scandals.

Following O’Reilly’s exit, the company faced additional accusations that it had created a toxic culture for people of color. On April 25, a group of 11 former and current Fox News employees, including anchor Kelly Wright, filed a class action lawsuit alleging that they’d been victims of racial discrimination in the newsroom. On Monday, Diana Falzone, a reporter for Fox News’ website, filed a lawsuit alleging gender and disability discrimination.

At least four lawsuits list Shine as a co-defendant, according to The New York Times. The various suits accuse him of mishandling complaints about Ailes’ sexual misconduct, concealing evidence of Ailes’ behavior and allowing racial discrimination to fester.

Shine has denied any wrongdoing.

Douglas Wigdor, the attorney representing 13 current and former Fox News staffers making discrimination claims, said that “while long overdue” the company had “taken a step in the right direction by permitting Bill Shine to resign and that our recent court filings apparently influenced that decision.”

“Much more needs to be done, however, including holding [Fox News general counsel] Dianne Brandi accountable for permitting a known racist to prey upon our clients and acknowledging and accepting responsibility for the harm our clients have and continue to suffer,” Wigdor said. (Fox News and Brandi have “vehemently” denied the allegations from Wigdor’s clients).

Nancy Erika Smith, the attorney for former “Fox & Friends” co-host Gretchen Carlson, whose July lawsuit against Ailes prompted other women to come forward, said in a statement that Shine’s departure, “although overdue, is a positive step.” Smith is also representing Falzone and contributor Julie Roginsky.

“To begin to change the future at Fox, there are others who have enabled and encouraged the sexism who should be next, starting with” Brandi, Scott and public relations chief Irena Briganti.

Angelo Carusone, president of progressive watchdog and Fox News antagonist Media Matters, said Shine’s departure proves that “the epidemic of sexual harassment at Fox News was not limited to the actions of a few well-known figures ― and that instead it was indicative of a deeper culture of harassment.”

“That culture was cultivated by Roger Ailes ― and perpetuated and maintained by Fox News executives, like Bill Shine,” Carusone said. “What took so long?”

This article has been updated with reactions to Shine’s departure.


# # # #


DOES THE RICO LAW APPLY HERE? DEPORTING THEM DOESN’T STOP THEM FROM COMING BACK INTO THE COUNTRY. CAN YOUNG PEOPLE OF THIS VIOLENT TYPE BE TRIED AS ADULTS AND GIVEN THE DEATH PENALTY?

http://www.cbsnews.com/news/ms-13-gang-violence-mounting-alarm-as-feds-respond/
By CRIMESIDER STAFF CBS/AP May 1, 2017, 11:14 AM
MS-13 gang violence: Mounting alarm as feds respond

BRENTWOOD, New York -- On Sept. 13, the day before her 16th birthday, Nisa Mickens' brutally beaten body was found on a tree-lined street in Brentwood, on New York's Long Island. The next day, the beaten body of her lifelong friend, 16-year-old Kayla Cuevas, was discovered in the wooded backyard of a nearby home.

1ateens.jpg
Nisa Mickens and Kayla Cuevas, students from Brentwood High School on Long Island murdered in possible gang-related attack CBS NEW YORK

The Brentwood High School students were walking on a street near their homes when men with baseball bats and a machete jumped out and attacked them, prosecutors said. Suffolk County police Commissioner Tim Sini said the level of brutality demonstrated in the slayings were "close to unmatched." Each was slashed and beaten, and suffered significant injuries to the head and face.

"To cause injuries of this nature, you have to have no regard for human life," Sini said.

The notoriously violent street gang MS-13 was to blame, prosecutors later said as they charged gang members with the crime. Prosecutors said that Cuevas was "marked for death" because she had apparently feuded with some MS-13 gang members over social media, and that Mickens was simply "in the wrong place at the wrong time."

MS-13 has been blamed for a trail of 11 corpses of mostly young people discovered in woods and vacant lots in Brentwood and neighboring Central Islip since the start of the school year. Among them were four young males whose bodies were found in a park this month, beaten and slashed.

Across the country, brutal crimes linked to MS-13 are capturing headlines, and the U.S. Department of Justice has announced a crackdown. Speaking in Central Islip Friday, Attorney General Jeff Sessions said President Trump is "very aware personally of the violence and murders here" and vowed to dismantle MS-13.

"I have a message for any gang that targets our young people: we are targeting you, and we are coming after you," Sessions said.

For MS-13, said FBI supervisory special agent Julian Igualada, violence is "a way of life – a way to maintain order and discipline within their ranks." The gang's motto is "kill, rape and control." Gang members or recruits use weapons like machetes or knives to carry out killings, and victims are often found with repeated slashes that leave them nearly unrecognizable.

"They want to make a statement about just how violent they are -- how bloody they can be," Luis Salinas, a University of Houston sociology professor, told Crimesider.

MS-13, also called Mara Salvatrucha or "gang of Salvadoran guys," is headquartered in El Salvador, according to the FBI. In 2012, MS-13 was designated a transnational criminal organization by the Treasury Department, which said the gang is involved in "serious transnational criminal activities, including drug trafficking, kidnapping, human smuggling, sex trafficking, murder, assassinations, racketeering, blackmail, extortion, and immigration offenses."

MS-13 gang appears to be surging again
Play VIDEO
MS-13 gang appears to be surging again

Transnational criminal organizations represent "one of the gravest threats to American public safety today," Sessions said on Friday.

"These groups enrich themselves by pedaling poison in our communities, trafficking children for sexual exploitation and inflicting horrific violence in the neighborhoods where they operate and slipping their ill-gotten wealth back to their home countries," Sessions said.

According to the FBI, MS-13 in the U.S. is comprised mostly of Salvadoran nationals or first-generation Salvadoran-Americans, but also Hondurans, Guatemalans, Mexicans, and other Central and South American immigrants. MS-13 hubs in the U.S. tend to center around pockets of immigrants from Central America. The gang has plagued immigrant communities in and around Washington D.C., on New York's Long Island, Newark, N.J., in Boston, Charlotte, Houston and other areas.

MS-13 has about 10,000 members in the U.S. and 30,000 abroad, Sessions said.

While MS-13 maintains close ties to Central America, according to the FBI, local "cliques" operating in the U.S. are largely self-governed. Neighborhood violence is often spurred by petty disputes or ire over perceived slights or disrespect, Salinas said.

For MS-13, loyalty to the gang is expected to replace family -- and any breach of that loyalty is punishable by death, Igualada said. Gang members believed to have shown disloyalty, members of rival gangs or anyone who is perceived to have slighted the gang are potential targets for killings.

The murders are a way to control people in their own ranks, Igualada said -- but they also want to intimidate the community by demonstrating their brutality.

"This is sending a message to their own ranks, that this is what happens to you if you don't follow the rules," said Igualada, who is part of an FBI team that works with authorities in El Salvador to combat the transnational gang threat. "It's also sending a message to the outside, that this is the biggest gang and the most violent gang you're dealing with."

ms13.jpg
In this Sept. 27, 2016 file photo, a memorial to best friends Nisa Mickens and Kayla Cuevas is seen near the spot where their bodies were found in Brentwood, N.Y. AP

MS-13 has migrated east from Los Angeles where it was founded in the mid-1980s by immigrants fleeing El Salvador's civil war. The gang's true rise began after members were deported from the U.S. back to El Salvador in the 1990s. There, the gang thrived and spread to Honduras. The Associated Press reports that MS-13 and rival groups there now control entire towns, rape girls and young women, massacre students, bus drivers and merchants who refuse to pay extortion, and kill competitors or youths who simply refuse to join.

That violence has prompted a mass migration of people trying to escape, especially children, who have streamed north because of a U.S. policy allowing people under 18 who arrive without parents to stay in the country temporarily with relatives or friends.

Since the fall of 2013, the U.S. has placed 165,000 unaccompanied minors. Long Island has been a frequent landing spot. Suffolk County, which includes Brentwood and Central Islip, has gotten 4,500. Neighboring Nassau County has received 3,800.

All told, nearly 200 suspected MS-13 members have been rounded up there since September. In a recent roundup of 13 suspected MS-13 gang members accused of murder and other charges, seven had entered as unaccompanied minors.

"There's no question that MS-13 is recruiting these unaccompanied children," said Sini, the Suffolk County police commissioner. The youngsters "don't have an established social network, at least many of them don't, and MS-13 is providing that network."

"They're also using coercion," Sini said. "They say, 'If you don't join the gang, we will kill you.'"

Mr. Trump has promised to eradicate the gang in the U.S. through strict enforcement of immigration law. But some residents say it's not about immigration politics but about making a community safer and providing support systems for vulnerable kids. In Long Island, parents say the 4,200-student Brentwood High School lacks the means to help young people who are often left alone after school because their parents work long hours. There are few social workers and guidance counselors, they say, and not enough security guards or cameras.

Children with unstable home lives or who live in poverty are particularly at risk, according to Salinas.

"They're offering these young kids an alternative lifestyle that might look really good to them, given their circumstances," Salinas said.

Investigators say the threat from MS-13 is increasing, and younger and younger children are being targeted for gang recruitment. Sessions said in remarks made this month that MS-13 has more than 10,000 members in at least 40 states in this country -- "up significantly from just a few years ago."

Trump rails against MS-13 and promises more immigration control
Play VIDEO
Trump rails against MS-13 and promises more immigration control

Sessions didn't point to specific numbers to account for the increase he cited, and in 2008 the FBI estimated about 6,000 to 10,000 members nationwide. Experts caution gang membership can be a difficult number to track. However Igualada says the FBI has noted an increase in MS-13 recruitment in the last five or six years based on intelligence they've collected in the country and on reports from state and local law enforcement.

The FBI says MS-13 is increasingly recruiting young children beginning as early as middle school and even elementary school.

The recruitment process can take up to two years, and in order to become a full-fledged gang member, the mostly teenage recruits are expected to commit a murder, Igualada said. These murders are usually ordered by a gang member to be carried out against a rival gang member or a member of the gang thought to have shown disloyalty or disrespect, Igualada said.

Boys are often favored over girls as recruits because the gang perceives girls to be more likely to cooperate with law enforcement, according to Igualada. But even girls with no ties to MS-13 are still at risk for getting caught in the crossfire, Igualada said, especially if they live in a gang-controlled area -- for example, by declining an offer to go out with a gang member.

In Long Island, some teens tell their parents they are afraid to go to school, reports the Associated Press.

"They can't walk the halls without fear," Evelyn Rodriguez, the mother of slain teen Kayla Cuevas, told the AP.

Rodriguez said her daughter had been bullied for two years before her slaying. She said Kayla stood her ground in disputes with MS-13, and wound up dead.

"It could happen to anybody's child, anywhere," Rodriguez said. "We all need to be aware of this, and we need stand together. Because I don't want it to be your child."


THE QUAKERS, MENTIONED IN HERE, ARE TO ME THE BEST OF THE LOT. THEY DO, OR USED TO, PRACTICE "SHUNNING" AS A PUNISHMENT FOR CERTAIN THINGS, HOWEVER, AND THAT'S NOT LIBERAL ENOUGH FOR ME. THAT'S WHY I'M A UNITARIAN. I DID LIKE SEEING THIS ARTICLE, THOUGH, BECAUSE THERE ARE A GOOD MANY PEOPLE NOWADAYS WHO HAVE RELIGIOUS FEELINGS AND BELIEFS, BUT WHO DON'T FIT ANY ONE GROUP, OR WHO DON'T WANT TO BE MORE OR LESS FORCED TO SAY THEY BELIEVE SOMETHING THAT THEY DON'T IN ORDER TO STAY IN THE GROUP.

http://www.refinery29.uk/liberal-christianity-problems
The Problem With Being A Liberal Christian...
STELLA HERVEY BIRRELL
11 APRIL 2017, 01:00

"Of course, the reason we have all these terror attacks is because there are more foreign people than English people in London now."

Where was I subjected to this lovely piece of hate speech? At a BNP march perhaps? Nope, it was after a Sunday service, in the most liberal church I can find. I’m reluctant to define myself as a Christian. Seriously, have you seen the kind of headlines we generate? So I add "liberal", despite there being several conflicting definitions of what a liberal Christian actually is. The definition here is a Christian who doesn’t use the Bible as an excuse; who doesn't use it as camouflage for particular attitudes about women, LGBTQ+ people, sex workers, people of other faiths, and atheists.

A liberal Christian takes the story of Jesus talking to a woman of Samaria seriously. Jews at that time didn’t talk to Samarians, but Jesus did. He even offered this woman living water. It’s an openness to difference, instead of insisting that every single word of the Bible is God’s law.

With a trans-niece and a gender non-conforming child, where is it safe for me to worship? How can I find people I align with politically and socially, as well as spiritually? Answer: hardly anywhere.

One place I have found is with The Quakers. The Quakers win hands down on ‘most willing to accept those of other faiths or no faith’, and ‘support for marginalised groups.’ But, on a purely selfish level, their services don’t contain enough familiar music, ritual or liturgy: the stuff that can spiritually fulfil those who were brought up in more formal church settings.

I was brought up Episcopalian, and when the first women were ordained in the Scottish Episcopal Church in 1994, my mother was one of them. As an adult, I attend the Church of Scotland most Sundays, with my children. But I couldn’t possibly become an elder (like a parish council member). For a start, The Church of Scotland doesn’t officially subscribe to "different paths, same god(s)", a central part of my belief system. During the Equal Marriage debate which raged in a small corner of Scotland, I took on my local minister, and lost. He toed the church’s line; I left the local village church where I had been married, and where both of my children were baptised. FYI, a rainbow appeared over the Scottish Parliament just before they passed the Equal Marriage Law. I’m just saying.

One of my favourite things is making a friend and later realising that they have a faith, or a Christian faith, but increasingly, I find I’m never fully relaxed in new friends’ company until I find out what kind of beliefs they hold.

Do they hate the sin, love the sinner? We’re talking the classic “homosexuals are all going to hell, but some of my good friends are gay.”

Do they blame the entire religion of Islam for acts of terror carried out by a tiny minority of religious fanatics?

Do they – and this will sound like I’m nit-picking – but do they believe in non-inclusive language?

For as long as I can remember, I have omitted the ‘men’ from the following line, whenever I’ve said it: "For us men and for our salvation" – because I’m not a man, and if you tell me that "men" is a generic term, I am likely to explode, in a non-liberal kind of way.

When I talked to some fellow liberals about their experiences, they all began by hesitating to accept the terminology of “liberal” Christian. Then, they all admitted that finding like-minded people and places to worship could be difficult.

One told me an excellent story about a Sunday school teacher, who was asked by a tweenager: "Why is it so embarrassing for me to tell my friends that I go to church?"

“Leadership is key,” says Josie, a liberal Christian living in Yorkshire. Theoretically, if the vicar/minister/priest is liberal enough, then one is at least spared from listening to what she calls “horrible offensive crap from the pulpit.” Also important though, is finding a like-minded congregation. “It can feel like physical training: it all works better when you have a training buddy,” said Nicola, an academic from Nottingham.

However, when I approached my mother about this article, her line was that, “Worship should bring together people who have different insights and different experiences.” And my own minister, Jennifer Macrae, agreed. “We don’t know the mind of God, nor are we entitled to limit God’s grace to like-minded folk.” And I was reminded that church is one of the few remaining places that I’m dragged out of my comfy bubble/echo chamber.

So why go to church at all? Why associate myself with what one of my interviewees called “an institutional dinosaur”? There are two reasons, one which I can explain, and one which words don’t really serve.

The first is, that for all my liberal credentials, I’m not a nice enough person to wander around this earth without having a weekly recap of them on a Sunday. As a Christian, I’m supposed to behave in particular ways. I’m supposed to have a moral, religious code. I’m meant to forgive people, and pray for them. And I’m certainly not meant to yell at the children all day.

The second is the spiritual nourishment from joining with a group of people, liberal or not, and raising our hearts, minds and voices in song and prayer. Sharing a ritualistic meal, listening to passages from an ancient text.

Hitting reset on my soul.