pensionplan 2 bak

SEE THREE 11 23

also txt 1217

1/20 tag pensn in honor of perry ETP! and jason chaffetz fox gig

AHA NEWSMAX OANN ONLY RUDY AND SIDNEY EXEMPT?

see resurrected

see also revolving door

medical marijuana 180 sellout GOP eg price

bak 1119

---

this refers to lifetime guarantee of work via RWI

expand 6/17 to include zombie/pundit ability to be useful/paid even after outed eg happer, soon

note that some seem to be going for academia heads vs corp boards etc, maybe more prestige (also can attract funding, since feds cut aid to states? in Gt rec, sequester?)

eg Boren,(u okla, deny frack earthquake suppress) John Graham at Indiana Univ, starr pepperdine

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AN 12 25

President Donald Trump's most recent "bizarre" pardon seems to have been negotiated in part thanks to his frequent golf habit, according to an analysis from MS NOW.

Trump is no stranger to controversial pardons, often appearing to hand them out to loyalists or those convicted of crimes he looks favorably upon. Even so, some of his more recent pardons have managed to turn heads, including those of former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández, who was convicted in one of the largest drug trafficking cases in US history. At least one recent pardon, that of real estate developer Timothy Leiweke, contradicts his own Justice Department, and seems to have been decided over a round of golf, according to MS NOW contributor and Rachel Maddow producer Steve Benen.

According to Benen's analysis of the situation, Trump's DOJ pursued charges against Leiweke over allegations that he attempted to rig the bidding process for a $375 million basketball arena that was ultimately built at the University of Texas. Despite his own administration launching the case, Trump issued a pardon for Leiweke last week.

White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt claimed that this decision was made after “a very thorough review process,” done by “qualified lawyers.” Benen, however, called this "one of the most laughable claims Leavitt has ever made" and added that, "in this administration, 'pardons' and 'utmost seriousness' clearly do not belong in the same sentence."

To back up that argument, Benen highlighted reports from the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times, which both noted that Trump made the decision after Leiweke's case was brought up to him by Trey Gowdy, a former South Carolina congressman turned Fox News contributor.

"While the Journal’s report has not been independently verified by MS NOW, Gowdy, who became a Fox News host after stepping down from Congress in 2019, effectively confirmed the reporting, telling the paper on the record that he played a round of golf with the president on Nov. 16, at which point Trump asked Gowdy if there was anything he needed," Benen wrote. "The former Republican congressman brought up his client, Leiweke, arguing that he’d been treated unfairly."

Gowdy reportedly suggested a nonprosecution deal for Leiweke, but Trump ultimately opted to give him a full pardon.

The president's decision flies in the face of efforts directly tied to two of his most high-profile administration officials: the investigation against Leiweke was led by an FBI official appointed by Director Kash Patel, and charges were eventually brought by a DOJ prosecutor appointed by Attorney General Pam Bondi.

---

mma

February 11, 2025, edition of Newsmax's Finnerty

BOB BROOKS (HOST): Now you know their intentions — erase the whole Trump presidency. That will be their goal at the end. For reaction, let's welcome in former U.S. Attorney in Washington, D.C, Joe DiGenova and the host of The Tudor Dixon Podcast, the one, the only Tudor Dixon. Good to see you both.

JOE DIGENOVA (GUEST): Good to see you.

BROOKS: Joe, I want to start with you. You know, the courts. You know D.C, who's running things now? Judges or the President of the United States. What's going on?

DIGENOVA: Well, what you've seen over the last few days, both in New York, Washington, D.C, and Boston, are a group of federal district court judges who don't understand their role. They have overreached. They have done things which are clearly in error. They are interfering in the executive function. And I think President Trump ultimately will win. The problem is, there's going to be a time delay in his victory, but he will win. What he's doing is perfectly legal. There's no legitimate constitutional objection to what he's doing. And in particular, Judge Engelmayer in New York, who said that the Secretary of the Treasury could not look at certain accounts — he should be impeached for that.

Let me just tell you something right now. There needs to be a new project started in the House of Representatives, and that's to start getting names of federal district court judges who need to be impeached.

BROOKS: Well, hey, House members, maybe they're listening to Joe tonight because we got some problems. If the president can't control our websites — my God.

:{===

fraudit oann -->

lara RNC fires ethnic outreach hires election integrity BS BOBB

https://www.mediamatters.org/lara-trump/lara-trump-says-she-wants-hire-qanon-conspiracy-theorist-scott-presler-work-rnc

ethic violation lying

Just when you think the Arizona Republican Party couldn't ...

The Arizona Republic

https://www.azcentral.com › laurieroberts › 2024/04/28

jake hoffman arizona gop from www.azcentral.com

Apr 28, 2024 — Opinion: The Arizona GOP elected indicted Sen. Jake Hoffman and expelled Rep. Liz Harris to the RNC. Could this party get any more nutty?

---

Raj Shah, Fox exec exposed in Dominion lawsuit, to lead House GOP comms | Media Matters for America

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['I don’t care': Kyrsten Sinema plans to cash in on Senate infamy if she loses reelection in 2024 - Alternet.org'I don’t care': Kyrsten Sinema plans to cash in on Senate infamy if she loses reelection in 2024 - Alternet.org](https://www.alternet.org/kyrsten-sinema-cash-in/)

---

penalty box?

https://www.mediamatters.org/matt-walsh/daily-wires-matt-walsh-hires-gregg-re-former-tucker-carlson-producer-history-liking

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aha doh 2 cont: talk radio and evang last bastions of pen plan:

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https://www.marijuanamoment.net/former-anti-marijuana-congressman-and-top-trump-health-official-joins-cannabis-company-board-documents-show/

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jeff bossert clark fired from legal CTT

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does it count if unpaid?

an 6 22 badash

Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-GA) has hired a far right-wing agitator and activist who appeared to support sexual “relationships” between boys as young as 13 and older men.

In 2016 Milo Yiannopoulos said, “I think in the gay world some of the most important, enriching and incredibly life-affirming, important shaping relationships very often between younger boys and older men.”

Those remarks were part of a video in which “Yiannopoulos discussed romantic relationships between teenage boys and adult men while being interviewed for the Drunken Peasants podcast in early 2016,” NBC News had reported in 2017. “Asked whether he was advocating for ‘cross-generational relationships,’ Yiannopoulos said: ‘Yeah, I don’t mind admitting that.'”

At that time, Heavy also reported: “In the video, Yiannopoulos describes how he feels sexual relationships between boys and older men can be positive. He denies he was defending pedophilia in the video, saying that term refers to younger children, not ‘someone who is 13-year-old, who is sexually mature.’ He also says, ‘We get hung up on this sort of child abuse stuff to the point where we are heavily policing consensual adults.'”

Yiannopoulos said in an apology, “I do not advocate for illegal behavior,” and, “I do not support child abuse. It’s a disgusting crime of which I have been a victim.”

Monday afternoon The Hill reported: “Right-wing provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos is working as an unpaid intern in the Congressional office of Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene (R-Ga.).”

“Yiannopoulos, 37, announced the job on his Telegram account Monday with a photo of his official intern congressional badge,” The Hill added, noting “Greene’s office confirmed to The Hill that Yiannopoulos is indeed their intern.”

“At the end of April,” The Daily Beast also reports, “the hate-spewing ideologue—once a ubiquitous MAGA figure until he appeared to defend pedophilia in a YouTube video—attended a Greene press conference and, after it wrapped, was escorted with the congresswoman into the Capitol building through a ‘members only’ entrance.”

Rep. Greene has repeatedly attacked the LGBTQ community, and expanded her attacks to the larger liberal voting bloc, suggesting Democrats and anyone who supports LGBTQ people is a pedophile or supports pedophilia. Earlier Monday she posted this, one of several of her tweets calling people “groomer” or using the term “grooming.”

trump baby jail?

Additionally, IRLI, FAIR’s legal arm, hired Tom Homan as a senior fellow. During the Trump administration, Homan served as the acting director of ICE from January 2017 to June 2018. Through their new roles, both Morgan and Homan have used media appearances to excoriate the Biden administration’s immigration policies, while lauding and promoting the preservation of Trump administration policies.

Across 2021, FAIR has focused its attention on increasing its influence on state and local public officials, particularly sheriffs.On June 25, 2021, FAIR organized a “Rally to End Biden’s Border Crisis,” at a segment of the U.S. border in Hereford, Arizona. The speakers at the event included Mark Morgan,Tom Homan, local sheriffs and Brandon Judd, president of the National Border Patrol Council. On April 8, 2021, FAIR promoted a letter signed by 275 sheriffs from across 39 states attacking the Biden Administration’s immigration strategy.The letter is filled with talking points routinely espoused by groups like FAIR.

---

ref no lnx

https://www.thedailybeast.com/even-donald-trump-cant-make-sense-of-his-own-dark-money-maze

[Pay Dirt is a weekly foray into the pigpen of political funding. Subscribe here to get it in your inbox every Thursday.

An inquiry from the feds has thrown new light on the murky relationships between a dozen Trump-aligned groups. And the problem traces back, as do so many other problems in Trumpworld, to a familiar name: former top aide Corey Lewandowski.

When Lewandowski got himself fired from a pro-Trump super PAC last fall—after allegedly sexually assaulting a big donor—the group brought in a clean-up crew. When Lewandowski refused to step down, they opened up a new super PAC without him.

That super PAC—the preposterously titled “Make America Great Again, Again!”—was the 12th in a sprawling labyrinth of political groups and nonprofitsthat comprise the Trump fundraising network. And in terms of the incestuous confusion, it may have been the one that finally tipped the scales; federal election officials now want to know why some of the super PAC’s payments aren’t being properly reported.

[Trump’s Dark-Money Machine Gets a Makeover—and New Owners

BILL OF GOODS

Roger Sollenberger]

Brendan Fischer, deputy executive director of good government group Documented, said the extent of Trump’s network is unparalleled.

“It is worth emphasizing: All of this is totally unprecedented for a former president,” Fischer told The Daily Beast. “Even if Trump kept it simple, and just had one hard money PAC, a single super PAC, and a pair of 501(c)(3)/501(c)(4) nonprofits, there would be no parallel with any former president in American history.”

Anyone who’s taken even the quickest of peeks at Trump’s personal financial disclosures would recognize the pattern.

His first such disclosure revealed positions with more than 500 entities, nearly 400 of which used his name or initials. And Trump has “organized” the mess in a stultifying Russian-nesting-doll structure—companies within companies within companies. Frequently, one company will be held under multiple Trump companies at the same time, each with stakes in still other Trump companies.

This isn’t an accident. The structure gave the Trump Organization an enormous amount of financial flexibility, while making it difficult to follow the billions of dollars that Trump, his family, and his accountants move across the organization.

When Trump hauled his private life into politics, he brought this practice with him, too.

The full Trump-aligned apparatus counts a dozen separate political committees and dark money organizations. Almost all of them share one of three names.

Here they are:

Make America Great Again PAC (converted from the old Trump campaign)

Make America Great Again Action (super PAC)

Make America Great Again, Again! (super PAC)

Trump Make America Great Again (small-dollar joint fundraising committee)

Make America Great Again Policies Inc (a 501(c)(4) nonprofit)

America First Policy Institute (a 501(c)(3) nonprofit)

America First Works (formerly America First Policies; a 501(c)(4) nonprofit)

America First Legal Foundation (a 501(c)(3) nonprofit)

America First Action (super PAC)

Save America (leadership PAC)

Save America JFC (joint fundraising committee)

Trump Victory (high-dollar joint fundraising committee)

“Typically, former presidents focus on their presidential library, or start a charitable foundation, but Trump is staying in the political game and raising a staggering amount of cash,” Fischer said.

It is staggering.

Want a closer look inside the pockets of the government’s most powerful players? Subscribe to the Pay Dirt newsletter here for exclusive reporting every Thursday.

For instance, the Trump-endorsed America First Action super PAC pulled in nearly $200 million between 2017 and 2020. Its sister nonprofit, America First Works—formerly America First Policies—posted $51.3 million in revenue for 2020, doling out nearly $40 million in grants.

[Dark-Money Group Paid Former Trump AG to Ask for Pardons

BEG YOUR PARDON

Roger Sollenberger]

The TMAGA PAC raised $884 million for 2020, with Trump Victory tossing in another $336.3 million. Those guns mostly fell quiet last year, while Trump’s three new PACs built up a $124.4 million stash, with another $12.5 million in the MAGAA! super PAC.

And we won’t know how much those other dark money nonprofits raised in 2021, or what they did with it, until after the midterms.

As Trump and the Republican Party gear up for 2024, these groups are in various stages of repair. However, that also appears to have created some internal problems. In fact, according to a filing on Wednesday, even the Trump campaign admits it isn’t always able to follow its own money.

Fischer chalked up the mess to a few factors, including Trump’s will-he-or-won’t-he candidate status, his relationship with the Republican National Committee, and disarray among his associates.

But Brett Kappel, a specialist in campaign finance and nonprofit law at Harmon Curran, perceived something more designed.

“The central lesson of Watergate is ‘Follow the money,’” Kappel told The Daily Beast. “And this byzantine structure of different types of legal entities—which are subject to different fundraising restrictions and file different reports with different agencies according to different filing schedules—appears to be designed to make that task as difficult as possible.”

To illustrate, these organizations can be divided into two groups: PACs and joint fundraising committees, and “dark money” nonprofits.

The PACS and joint fundraising committees are Trump’s political organizations. They disclose their finances to the Federal Election Commission. But they don’t all follow the same filing schedule, and, depending on what kind of committee they actually are, they can raise and transfer different amounts of money from different types of people and organizations.

[The GOP Dark Money Group Giving Big to White Supremacists

UNWORTHY CAUSES

Roger Sollenberger]

Of these groups, Save America leadership PAC is currently Trump’s main squeeze. Most of the money he raises goes there.The Save America JFC is a joint committee that splits donations between Save America and MAGA PAC, which used to be the Trump campaign. Weirdly, MAGA PAC doesn’t get much out of this joint arrangement—more than 90 percent of every contribution goes to the Save America PAC.

And the super PACs are, as mentioned above, something of a mess.

As for the “dark money” nonprofits, unlike the PACs, these groups file with the IRS. They don’t have to disclose their donors at all (hence “dark money”). They also only file once a year, and because those deadlines are so late, it can take nearly two years for a transaction to become visible to the public.

The IRS restricts their activities, too. Some groups have leeway to be political (the 501(c)(4) groups). Some must focus on social welfare (the 501(c)(3) groups). The Trump network has a healthy helping of both.

Sometimes, however, these PACs and nonprofits can overlap, even sharing employees and office space, like America First Action and America First Policies did during the Trump administration.[shuffle?]

And while they appear to be giving that another go, as the FEC found, it hasn’t been so clean this time.

Enter Lewandowski.

After Trump left the White House, the industriously sycophantic Lewandowski wormed his way back into his graces, winning the right to run the Make America Great Again Action super PAC. At the same time, he quietly created a Florida nonprofit, Make America Great Again Policies Inc.

But MAGA Policies didn’t appear to do anything—at all. There has been no reporting on any actual activity since it was created. Zero. It is a black box.

Then Lewandowski reportedly sexually assaulted a Trump donor and got himself booted from orbit. More experienced hands took over the new MAGAA! super PAC, led by former Florida attorney general Pam Bondi, and that also got complicated.

[Trump PAC Lavishing $37K a Month on Trump Tower Rent: WaPo

DONATIONS WELL SPENT

According to a new corporate filing in Florida, Bondi—who also happens to lead the massive America First Policy Institute nonprofit—also took over Lewandowski’s mysterious MAGA Policies nonprofit, adding former Trump administration officials Ric Grenelland Matt Whitaker, as well as Donald Trump Jr. paramour Kimberly Guilfoyle. All of those people are also on the new super PAC’s payroll.

But here’s the rub: The super PAC hasn’t been paying them directly. The nonprofit has, as part of a “cost share agreement.”

On Tuesday, the FEC sent the super PAC a letter saying that’s not cutting it. The group needs to explain exactly what they mean by “cost share agreement,” the letter said, because what they provided is not adequate.

Kappel said the FEC may be trying to figure out whether the two groups are “financially and operationally independent.” If the super PAC was found to be “connected” to the MAGA Policies nonprofit, he said, that meansit can only raise money from people tied to the nonprofit—and not from the general public. That would be a death blow, and the group would be forced to reorganize itself yet again.

Fischer said he wouldn’t be surprised to see more groups strategically shut down, like Trump Victory began doing last year.

“It might be more straightforward for Trump to shut down MAGA PAC,” he said, though he pointed out that MAGA PAC appears to own the campaign’s valuable supporter data, which might make it more cost-effective to retain for joint fundraising efforts.

But, Fischer pointed out, even though the constellation of Trump-aligned groups is basically unnavigable, it always could have been worse.

“Recall that Brad Parscale also started the ‘American Greatness’ super PAC in 2021, which never really got off the ground,” he said.

---

BOARD

As of 2021, Heritage was governed by a 21-member board, which included the president, Kay C. James. Some additional members of the 2021 board are listed below:[132]

Barb Van Andel-Gaby is the board chair. As of 2021, she was also the co-trustee (along with Richard Gaby) of the eponymous Richard & Barbara Gaby Foundation and a board member of Alticor (the parent company of Amway). She is a former vice-president of the Amway Hotel Corporation, and the daughter of the late Jay Van Andel, co-founder of Amway. She became a Heritage board member in 1996. [133] [134] [135]

Michael W. Gleba is the board vice-chair. As of 2021, Gleba was the CEO/chairman of the Sarah Scaife Foundation and had held board or advisory positions with several additional center-right policy organizations. He joined the Heritage board in 2016. [136]

Trustee Edwin Feulner was the founder of the Heritage Foundation and its president from 1977 until 2013. He reprised this role as interim president in 2017, prior to the hiring of James. [137]

Thomas Saunders III is another trustee and the former board chair. Saunders was the chair of the Heritage board for a decade, until 2018. He is an investment fund manager and the founder of two firms in this field. [138]

Edwin Meese III is another trustee. Meese served as U.S. Attorney General during the Reagan administration and a close political advisor, employee, and friend of the former president for all of Ronald Reagan’s political career. Meese took on the first of his formal roles with Heritage in 1988, the final year of the Reagan presidency. He became the founding chair of its Center for Legal and Judicial Studies in 2001 and held the post until what he referred to as “semi-retirement” in 2013. He became a Heritage board member in 2017. [139]

Trustee Steve Forbes is a former Republican presidential candidate, journalist, business executive, and frequent cable television news commentator. He is the president and CEO of Forbes, Inc., the publisher of Forbesmagazine and parent of other eponymously named media properties. He joined the Heritage board in 2001. [140]

William Middendorf II is a former Secretary of the Navy, has held three different posts as a foreign ambassador for the United States, and advises federal politicians on foreign affairs, trade and defense policy. He became a Heritage trustee in 1989. [141]

Rebekah Mercer is a private business owner, the director of the Mercer Family Foundation, and a board member for several additional center-right organizations. She is the daughter of computer scientist and hedge fund manager Robert Mercer. [142]

Abby Spencer Moffat is the CEO of the Diana Davis Spencer Foundation and a board member for other policy organizations. [143]

Staff

As of March 2021, the staffing page of the Heritage website listed at least 250 individuals. Notable staff included:[144]

Tommy Binion was listed as vice president for government relations. [145]

Robert Bluey was listed as vice president for communications and the executive editor for the Daily Signal, Heritage’s daily news outlet. [146]

James Carafano was listed on the Heritage website as the “vice president of Heritage’s Kathryn and Shelby Cullom Davis Institute for National Security and Foreign Policy and the E. W. Richardson Fellow.” [147]

Ken:{Cuccinelli was the deputy secretary of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security in the Trump administration and is a former attorney general of Virginia. He joined Heritage in 2021 as a visiting fellow for national security and foreign policy issues. [148]}:

Becky Norton Dunlop was the vice president for external relations at Heritage from 1998 until 2016, and a member of the Trump administration transition team. As of 2021 the Heritage website described her as “special projects” and traveling as “an ambassador” for Heritage as the “Heritage Foundation’s Ronald Reagan Distinguished Fellow.” [149]

Mike Gonzalez was listed on the Heritage website as the “senior fellow in Heritage’s Allison Center for Foreign Policy and the Angeles T. Arredondo E Pluribus Unum fellow.” [150]

Kim Holmes was listed as executive vice president of the Heritage Foundation and is a former assistant secretary of state for international organization affairs during the George W. Bush administration. [151]Holmes announced his resignation alongside Heritage president Kay C. James in March 2021. [152]

John Malcolm was listed as a senior legal fellow and director of Heritage’s Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies. [153]

MikePence began his role as a visiting fellow at Heritage in 2021, after four years as the vice president of the United States. He is also a former governor of Indiana and former U.S. Representative. [154]

Jack Spencer was listed as the vice president for Heritage’s Institute for Economic Freedom and Opportunity. [155]

Hans A. von Spakovsky was listed as a senior legal fellow and the manager of Heritage’s election law reform initiative. [156]

Genevieve Wood was listed as a senior advisor and spokesperson. [157]

Bridgett Wagner was listed as the vice president for policy promotion. [158]

---

an 10 21

no lnx

Now that former President Donald Trump's reign is over, the members of his administration have been forced to take their careers in different directions. So, where are the members of the Trump administration now? According to The Intelligencer, many are doing an array of different things; some of which are synonymous with the questionable activities that long-haunted the Trump administration.

Here's where the top Trump White House officials are now:

1. Former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director and U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is still trying to distance himself from the kidnapping of Julian Assange. According to Pompeo, he had nothing to do with it.

Pompeo is adamantly denying any involvement in the plot to kidnap Assange. A report published by Yahoo! News back in September, suggested that Pompeo was livid when he learned Assange divulged U.S. national-security secrets. In fact, the report also claimed that he participated in discussions with members of the Trump administration on how to get retribution.

However, Pompeo is still suggesting the reports are not true. "There's pieces of it that are true," Pompeo said during an appearance on The Megyn Kelly Show. "We tried to protect American information from Julian Assange and WikiLeaks, absolutely, yes … We're not permitted by U.S. law to conduct assassinations. We never acted in a way that was inconsistent with that."

2. Former U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin has been milking his access to the Secret Service.

Thanks to Trump's order extending the use of the Secret Service to members of his administration, Mnuchin has used the professional perk to his benefit. The publication reports that in his first six months out of office, Mnuchin has racked up the highest Secret Service tab. The Washington Post detailed how Mnuchin managed to rack up more than $150,000 in Secret Service expenses.

The receipts showed that agents spent $114,000 over the six months to rent rooms at a W Hotel in Los Angeles, where Mnuchin has a home. They also followed Mnuchin on three trips to the Middle East, where Mnuchin is reportedly seeking to raise money from sovereign wealth funds for a new venture called Liberty Strategic Capital…

Mnuchin's travels with the Secret Service weren't all business, however. Over the six months, the records show three separate trips to Cabo San Lucas — the Mexican resort, where Mnuchin had also vacationed during Trump's presidency.

To guard Mnuchin during those three trips, the records show, the Secret Service paid $56,000 for hotel rooms and $2,000 to rent golf carts.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Mnuchin is planning to use the $2.5 billion he has raised traveling so he can invest in technology and cybersecurity investments, along with "new forms of content." It remains unclear what Mnuchin specifically describes as "new forms of content" but "many big tech companies are pushing virtual- and augmented-reality hardware and content products and digital gaming."

3. Wilbur Ross is reportedly fantasizing about putting "Trump condos on the moon."

Back in February after the Trump administration transitioned out of the White House, Ross spoke with Bloomberg and shared his upcoming post-government plans; which involve "Trump condos on the moon."

On this particular afternoon, he's sitting in the living room of his 80-year-old home filled with Magrittes and Picassos, sipping a cappuccino, dressed in cashmere sweater, slacks and velvet slippers embroidered with octopuses.

Ironically, it's while ensconced in this paradise of earthly delights that Ross is gearing up to invest in space, among other possibilities. He sees opportunity in extraterrestrial tourism, manufacturing, research and habitation.

Habitation? When asked whether space would be a gold-plated real estate opportunity for Trump, Ross didn't disagree.

"Why not Trump condos on the moon?" he quipped back.

Ross' remarks came just months after the U.S. Commerce Department's inspector general released a scathing report about the former Trump official's behavior. According to The Washington Post, the IG's report "concluded that Ross had made many inaccurate statements to federal officials about his assets before taking office, though he did not willfully violate conflict-of-interest laws."

4. Ben Carson is launching a venture similar to Boy Scouts of America.

After departing Washington, D.C., Ben Carson —the former Housing and Urban Development Secretary— launched an organization called the American Cornerstone Institute.Carson's new think tank reportedly places an emphasis on discovering "commonsense solutions to some of our nation's biggest problems."

The American Cornerstone Institute

youtu.be

Carson has also created the Little Patriots program, which is described as a partisan organization for children. Speaking to The Washington Post, Carson explained the organization's initiative. "It will be something like the Boy Scouts," Carson told the publication. "But heavily exposed to the real history of America.

"You probably notice when ISIS goes into a place, they destroy the history, they destroy the monuments," Carson explained. "History is what gives you identity."

5. Elaine Chao contributed to calls for Kroger to be boycotted.

Chao —wife of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and former transportation secretary— worked for several of the country's top corporations prior to her role with the Trump administration. But Intelligencer reports that "she and other Trump Cabinet alums were having a hard time finding cushy landing spots after exiting the administration. 'The feedback was 'It's too soon,' said one of the headhunters involved in an unsuccessful effort to find companies willing to work with Chao."

Despite her struggles to re-enter the corporate world, Chao was appointed to Kroger's board of directors. But given her history of abusing her power and position with the government, social media users quickly expressed outrage and urged Kroger to drop the former Trump cabinet member from its board.

6. Alex Azar is reportedly conspiring against his former colleagues.

Former Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar is at odds with many of his former colleagues. In fact, several of them including —former FDA commissioner Stephen Hahn, former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) director Robert Redfield, former Medicare chief Seema Verma, and former White House COVID coordinator Deborah Birx— have reportedly joined forces to prepare their statements regarding the Trump administration's handling of COVID-19.

According to Politico, they've done so out of caution and concern about Azar possibly using them as "scapegoats" to clear themselves.

"I know the way this goes — everyone has a different perspective," Hahn said in an interview. "I wanted to tell what it was that happened and why it happened and the perspective that we had."

In calls and text messages, members of the group have swapped notes, compared recollections, and sent updates on media requests and interview opportunities, four people with knowledge of the matter said …

And in a nod to their individual battles with Azar, some have jokingly referred to the group in private as "AAA," or Alex Azar Anonymous, according to a person in direct contact with multiple members.

From the looks of it, many Trump administration officials are still conducting shady business as they did while in office.

---

pension plan

no lnx

Paul Ryan Is Poised to Earn Millions When He Retires Next Year

BLOOMBERG

April 12, 2018

Paul Ryan will easily add to his already considerable net worth if he opts to stray from his native Wisconsin to join a corporate board or dabble in Washington power struggles when he retires next year as speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives.

“The kind of board that he would go after would probably pay between $250,000 and $300,000 a year and he could probably get three or four of them,” said Fred Foulkes, a professor of at Boston University’s Questrom School of Business. “There would be dozens that would like to have him, particularly companies that have part of their business in key relationships with certain parts of government.”...

Ryan, 48, who said he was retiring to be more than a “weekend dad,” could easily follow the path of previous congressional leaders, including Newt Gingrich and Richard Gephardt, who became corporate directors. Former Speaker John Boehner, his immediate predecessor, recently joined the advisory board for U.S. cannabis producer Acreage Holdings and is already serving on the board of Arizona Mining Inc. and the advisory board to JBS USA, the American arm of a Brazilian food giant. That’s in addition to being a senior strategic adviser at the law firm of Squire Patton Boggs LLP.

Ryan cannot jump right into lobbying, there’s a one-year cooling-off period for representatives, two for senators. But nothing bars him from joining boards.Since 1992, 44 percent of senators and 11 percent of representatives who’ve departed Capitol Hill have ended up in boardrooms, according to research from Harvard University and Boston University that was published before the 2016 election.

From Capitol to Capital

A Bloomberg analysis before that election showed that among directors who had previously served in Congress there were 31 Democrats and 33 Republicans, with the average pay more than $330,000.

Ryan will no longer be making his speaker’s salary of $223,500, but he will be eligible for a pension in a few years, and has an estimated net worth of slightly more than $6 million, according to a Center for Responsive Politics analysis of his 2016 financial filings. AshLee Strong, a Ryan spokeswoman, didn’t respond to an email seeking comment on her boss’ potential future employment.

Bloomberg Data: The Lucrative Road From Congress to Corporate Boards

When he accepted the speaker’s post in 2015, Ryan said he would do so only under certain conditions — including that he would reduce the amount of travel involved. He said he wanted to spend most weekends at home in Janesville, Wisconsin, where he and his wife, Janna, have three school-age children.

Ryan managed to spend most weekends sleeping in his brick home on a quiet street, although it meant his political team had to schedule fundraising and other events during the week.

“Basically, the guy is viewed as Mr. Middle America — he’s a capitalist who wants companies to do well — board service would make a lot of sense for him,” said Tom Flannery, who leads the global chief executive board services practice at Boyden, the executive recruiter. “It’s something he could do very well and still get to spend a lot of time with his family and hunting and fishing and whatever else he does.”

Corporations aren’t the only option. Since giving up the gavel in 1998, Gingrich has had more than a dozen books on the New York Times bestseller list and earned millions in consulting fees from health care, financial and other interests. When he ran for the Republican presidential nomination in 2012, he released his 2010 tax return, which showed adjusted gross income of $3.2 million.

Ryan would have no trouble finding work back in Washington, even if he chose to limit the time he spent in the capital, said Ivan Adler, principal at the McCormick Group Inc., an executive search firm. “A part-time Paul Ryan is better than full-time of lots of other people in Washington,” he said.

“He’s very well-connected to the business community and he’s a substance-based thinker on policy issues,” Adler said. That kind of experience will earn a premium. “He’s a million-dollars-plus easily, and people will be glad to pay it.”

Former New York congressman Thomas Reynolds, who entered the House in the same 1999 freshman class as Ryan and is now a lobbyist, said he believes Ryan’s immediate post-congressional aspirations will be different from that of his recent predecessors.

“At 48, I don’t see him going to work right away as a lobbyist, though he certainly is capable of that,” said Reynolds, a senior policy adviser at Holland & Knight LLP.

Rather, Reynolds said he expects Ryan to “keep his options open” for a re-entry into politics. And he said that could be as a highly paid speaker, or as a policy expert at a think-tank, and possibly serving on some corporate boards.

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https://www.alternet.org/2021/04/mike-pompeo/ fox 20204

1020 an

lackeys from the Trump administration aren't one teensy bit concerned about the mess they'll leave behind should their impeached president lose reelection in just under 20 days. Oh no, the fact that they're all on a superspreader tour of the country is proof of that. Like their boss, what they're concerned about instead are their own sorry asses.

Trump staffers, The Washington Post reports, "are hoping the Trump presidency isn't a disqualifying blemish on their resumes or Google footprint as the door revolves the other way and they seek to land, once again, in the private sector." Considering the kinds of horrific crimes this administration has carried out, they should be grateful that not being able to find a six-figure job at a fancy D.C. firm is the worst thing they have to worry about.

Some of former officials have already gotten a taste of a post-Trump life. For former White House press secretary Sean Spicer, "[t]here's been no cushy landing on K Street or high-profile consultancy at a major lobbying or public relations firm," The Postsaid. While he published a book about being a taxpayer-funded liar, it flopped. Another one of his post-Trump jobs wasn't too pretty either—no really, he wore some hideous dollar store piñata for the 28th season of Dancing with the Stars, where he was the sixth contestant eliminated.

But just because Sean "This was the largest audience to ever witness an inauguration, period!" Spicer had trouble doesn't mean other former Trump officials have had the same experience. "Ex-White House chief of staff Reince Priebus is president of the Michael Best & Friedrich law firm," The Post continued. Former Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Sec. John Kelly continued cashing in on cruelty and joined the board of a company that operated the now-closed prison camp for migrant children in Homestead, Florida. His successor, Kirstjen Nielsen, didn't really stray far and joined a government council.

Kelly and Nielsen in particular tried rehabilitation tours that really just continued exposing them as liars. They probably wished for the luck of Nielsen's former chief of staff Miles Taylor, who got a CNN contributor's gig after managing to convince enough people that he was shocked, shocked!about shenanigans he saw at DHS even though he was there for two years, from 2017 and 2019. Taylor didn't speak out then as a moral whistleblower to expose hateful policies, but instead until this past summer when it was convenient for him. Nor has Taylor fully apologized for many of the policies he helped carry out.

"The longtime GOP strategist who runs a public affairs firm recalled coming close to hiring a former Trump White House staffer until a Google search revealed the prospective hire's track record defending Trump on race and immigration," The Post continued. "It ground the interview process to a halt, the strategist said." But, at the same time, "Americans have short memories," a former Bush and Clinton staffer continued to The Post.

The fact is that from White House aide Stephen Miller to unlawfully appointed acting DHS Sec. Chad Wolf, these officials deserve to become pariahs when the administration is at last finished. They brought it on themselves because they knew what they were signing up for from the start: a vulgarian who bragged about committing sexual assault and a racist who vowed to deport millions of undocumented immigrants even as he exploited many at his own businesses. Don't feel sorry for these officials. Feel sorry for the many people they hurt.

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https://www.alternet.org/2020/09/heres-why-cory-gardner-and-other-gop-senators-are-still-all-in-for-trump-even-if-it-costs-them-the-election/

alex h

recent polls have not been looking good for Colorado Sen. Cory Gardner, who is trailing his Democratic opponent, former Gov. John Hickenlooper, by 9%, according to Morning Consult as well as Public Policy Polling. Trumpism is not serving Gardner well, begging the question: why is the Colorado Republican doubling down on his support of President Donald Trump even though it appears likely to cost him the election? Never Trump conservative journalist Jonathan V. Last answers that question in an article published in The Bulwark over Labor Day Weekend. And Last’s explanation applies not only to Gardner, but also, to Sen. Martha McSally of Arizona, Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa and other incumbent GOP senators in swing states who refuse to say a word against the president.

“Gardner is running behind Trump in a state that Trump is going to lose,” Last observes. “And yet, Gardner remains almost wholly beholden to Trump. Why is that?”

Last, citing polling data from Morning Consult, stresses that Gardner’s “political career is over” in Colorado — where “Democrats loathe him, independents are repelled by him, and Republicans see him as a cuck for not supporting Trump from the start.”

“He almost certainly realizes that there is no path forward for him in Colorado politics,” Last argues. “The state is changing, demographically and politically, and he’s on the wrong side of everything: he’s not where the main body of voters are, and he’s not where the party base are, either. He’s both too Trump and not QAnon enough…. So why is Gardner still all-in for Trump?'

the answer, according to Last: Gardner is putting “party over country.” Gardner, Last emphasizes, is the type of Republican who sees “the Republican Party as a higher priority than the country itself” — and when he loses to Hickenlooper, he “is going to have to make due with raking in the Benjamins in the private-sector sinecures reserved for washed-up politicos.”

Last doesn’t discuss McSally in his Bulwark article on Gardner. But taking the conservative journalist’s arguments a step further, one could say that Gardner is thinking long-term: even if he is “washed up” in Colorado, he could still have a place in Republican politics in general — perhaps as a pundit at Fox News, perhaps writing books, perhaps hosting a radio program. The same applies to McSally. Although poll after poll shows her losing to Democrat Mark Kelly in Arizona’s 2020 U.S. Senate race, she isn’t about to criticize Trump because she knows there could be money-making opportunities for her down the road in the right-wing media.

After being voted out of office in 2006, former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum was never elected to public office again yet remained a prominent figure in right-wing politics. CNN, in the Trump era, has often featured Santorum as a pro-Trump pundit. And former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, the late Sen. John McCain’s running mate in the 2008 presidential election, made millions of dollars as a pundit even though she never became vice president and never ran for political office again after 2008. Palin is an embarrassment, but in the right-wing media, she is taken seriously.

The “private-sector sinecures reserved for washed-up politicos,” as Last describes them, can be incredibly lucrative. Palin is the butt of jokes outside of the GOP/Fox News/AM talk radio bubble, but that hasn’t stopped her from making millions of dollars.

If recent polls are accurate, Trumpism will cause Gardner and McSally to be voted out of office in November — even if Trump himself manages to pull off a narrow victory in the Electoral College. But the right-wing media often find ways for wingnuts to prosper after they lose elections, from Fox News appearances and AM talk radio shows to book deals. And cable news viewers will probably be seeing a lot of Gardner and McSally in 2021 no matter how badly they lose in November.

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mma 720

As is the case in most cities across the United States, protests against police brutality have taken place in St. Louis, Missouri, for the past several weeks. In a since deleted video, Lyda Krewson, the Democratic mayor of St. Louis announced the names and home addresses of some residents who had contacted the mayor’s office about defunding the police. In response, last weekend, protesters took to the streets to demand the resignation of the mayor and continue protests against police brutality. In the midst of the protest, two people emerged from a nearby mansion and pointed guns at the peaceful protesters. A man pointed an AR-15-style rifle directly at protesters, while a woman pointed a handgun with her finger directly on the trigger.

This week, many right-wing media figures took the opportunity to defend the couple. Some figures praised the couple for defending their homes, while others asserted that the couple’s actions were justified because of panic caused by the recent coverage of protests and left-wing demonstrators around the country.

Here are just a few examples of right-wing media figures defending the couple::

Far-right commentator Cassandra Fairbanks tweeted: “I am absolutely in love with them. These people are the American dream.” In another tweet, Fairbanks attacked the peaceful protesters for entering the gated community, calling them a “black lives matter mob.”
The View’s Meghan McCain complained the media reaction revealed an “elitist disdain” for “gun culture in red states.”
Conservative radio host and former NRATV personality Dana Loesch tweeted in defense of the couple, writing, “Considering the broadcasts, violence, fire, and weeks of angry mobs, of course they’re scared.”
Right-wing commentator Jesse Kellytweeted that the couple was “trying to protect their property from the zoo animals.”

aha doh, had not considered evang, but big cash cow, presumably perry gets a cut of what he raises:

PPP rww 720

Perry Joins Capitol Ministries Project to ‘Disciple’ Local Officials to Right-Wing ‘Biblical Worldview’

Former Texas Gov. and U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry is partnering with a religious-right effort to “disciple” 500,000 local officials into a conservative Christian “worldview” and shape public policies in 40,000 U.S. localities. Perry’s undertaking was announced in a June letter to supporters of Capitol Ministries from the organization’s president Ralph Drollinger, whose weekly Bible studies teach members of Trump’s Cabinet and the U.S. Congress that the Bible instructs public officials to support right-wing social, economic, environmental, and criminal justice policies.

“I am passionate about Capitol Ministries’ efforts to reach today’s 500,000 elected local government leaders with the Gospel of Jesus Christ and disciple them with the Word of God, so they may form a Christian worldview in their hearts,” Perry is quoted in the Drollinger letter. “I see this effort as critically important. America’s ideological future hangs in the balance.”

Drollinger and Capitol Ministries have aggressive expansion plans in multiple directions. Drollinger has previously announced Capitol Ministries’ goal of establishing “discipleship” ministries in 200 nations, all 50 states, and all 40,000 localities in the U.S. With help from Vice President Mike Pence and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, Capitol Ministries is expanding its presence among high-level officials in foreign capitals. Perry has become the group’s “spokesman for Local Government Ministries.”

As part of the partnership, Perry has begun emailing local officials offering to send them a weekly Bible study taken from Drollinger’s“Oaks in Office,” a guidebook for conservative Christian public officials.

“This is a critical time for our nation,” Perry declared in an invitation included with Drollinger’s letter. “Spreading secularism is threatening to smother the very values that our founding fathers based out country upon—values that you and I hold very dear.”

Perry wrote that Capitol Ministries’ Bible studies that he participated in as a cabinet member were “in-depth, theologically sound and they drilled deep in Scripture.” He added, “They helped us all understand more about God, biblical truths, and what God expects of us as leaders.”

Drollinger’s letter affirmed that the studies being sent to local officials who respond to Perry’s emails “examine crucial policy issues through the timeless lens of God’s Word”—meaning scripture as interpreted by Drollinger.

Drollinger is not humble about his approach to the Bible, dismissing those who interpret scripture and its demands differently than he does. He has demonstrated contempt for liberal Christians and the “social gospel,” and he has described the Catholic Church as “one of the primary false religions in the world.” He teaches that legislators who do not share his worldview cannot be counted on to do the right thing because, he has written, “the longer a person rejects Christ, the greater his depravity becomes.”

Drollinger’s Bible studies, which are available online, instruct public officials that the government’s job is to “quell evil” and punish sin; that “as a lawmaker it is incumbent on you to stand for the death penalty”; that entitlement programs lack “any basis of biblical authority”; that“radical environmentalism” is a “false religion.**:{” Drollinger recruits only men to run Capitol Ministries Bible studies, because he believes women are not permitted to teach men about the Bible.}:

In March, Drollinger complained about “evil pork” in coronavirus relief legislation, fretting that unemployment benefits in the bill might be an “impetus to slothfulness” and “antithetical to free-market capitalism.”

Drollinger, who insists that he is not a Christian nationalist, tells Christian public officials that they should refuse to participate in interfaith “syncretistic” prayer breakfasts; syncretism refers to the blending of belief systems. According to Drollinger, “God only hears the prayers of leaders and citizens who are upright, who live righteously through faith in Jesus Christ.”

When Perry was a member of Trump’s cabinet and participating in Drollinger’s weekly Bible studies, other cabinet members called Perry the “teacher’s pet,” Drollinger told Intercessors for America’s prayer warriors in 2018. Perry was among the featured speakers at Capitol Ministries’ global training session for ministry leaders that was held at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C. in December.

Drollinger asked IFA’s intercessors to pray that cabinet officials would use their platforms to fulfill the “Great Commission”—the biblical command by Jesus to his followers to “make disciples of all nations.” U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Sonny Perdue and Trump-appointed NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine have both raised money for Capitol Ministries.

Drollinger’s letter asks for financial contributions to support the “massive effort” which, he wrote, “will impact not only the eternal souls of local political leaders but the very future of the United States.”

Perry’s ill-fated bid for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination was unofficially launched with a prayer rally backed by religious-right leaders and many of the “apostles” and “prophets” who are now among Trump’s strongest supporters.

Tags: Ralph Drollinger Rick Perry Christian Nation Church-State Capitol Ministries

pension plan / crony capitaLISM

Rick Perry Rejoins Pipeline Company Energy Transfer’s Board of Directors

omg brooks bro to vlad:

https://russiabusinesstoday.com/economy/russias-state-run-bank-veb-hires-trump-insider-to-help-avoid-sanctions/

9/14/19

Vnesheconombank, or VEB, Russia’s state-controlled development institute facing potential U.S. sanctions, has hired a well-positioned lobbyist in Washington – Trump insider and former Republican House member named John Sweeney, Politicoreports.

With Congress mulling legislation to slap new sanctions on Russia for its attack on the 2016 American election, Sweeney signed a whopping contract in August to lobby on behalf of the Russian bank to stave off sanctions from the U.S. government. The lobbyist, who formerly represented a district near Albany, filed paperwork late last month with the Justice Department’s Foreign Agents Registration Act unit to represent Vnesheconombank.

The filing says that Sweeney will “engage in meetings and other communications with U.S. government officials regarding potential new sanctions legislation…that could affect” the bank.

VEB’s chair, Igor Shuvalov, a former deputy minister in the Russian government, was appointed last year by President Vladimir Putin, who gave him orders to increase funding of national development projects.

The Obama administration sanctioned VEB in 2014 as part of the U.S. response to Russia’s invasion of Crimea.

Shuvalov, along with all members of the bank’s supervisory board, was also included on a January 2018 Treasury Department reportlisting officials closely affiliated with the Russian government. That report, which Congress required Treasury to issue, did not lead to sanctions against those individuals. But the bank could be hurt by pending legislation.

Sweeney will do legal work for VEB, which “may include potential meetings with U.S. government officials regarding potential new sanctions legislation (not existing sanctions) that could affect” the bank, according to a copy of the contract filed with the Justice Department. The lucrative contract lasts a year and is worth $62,500 — which adds up to $750,000 for the whole year.

Sweeney already has experience lobbying for Russian interests. Sweeney, who worked on President Donald Trump’s transition team, has lobbied since 2017 for Nord Stream 2 AG, the company behind a natural gas pipeline under construction between Germany and Russia. He’s lobbied the White House and the State Department on Nord Stream’s behalf, according to disclosure filings. Nord Stream is controlled by Gazprom, which is in turn partially owned by the Russian government.

1219

his ticket back into pension plan? aha-let, everyone has their niche/function eg renta-X; eg kellyanne defends 1st lady melania on fake outrage on barron

impeach trump so toxic fail?

EPA appointee faces blowback in move to academia

Sean Reilly, E&E News reporter

Published: Friday, November 22, 2019

Last month, former deputy EPA air chief Clint Woods took a newly minted job at Ohio State University to forge "strategic partnerships" with outside organizations.

PEOPLE

EPA appointee faces blowback in move to academia

Greenwire: Friday, November 22, 2019

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https://www.alternet.org/2019/10/cnn-hired-a-habitual-liar-as-the-republicans-strategy-to-work-the-refs-pays-off/

no lnx

CNN hired a habitual liar as the Republicans’ strategy to ‘work the refs’ pays off

Written by Eric Boehlert / Daily Kos October 23, 2019

Former Republican Rep. Sean Duffy, recently hired by CNN to be a paid political commentator, can’t stop fabricating facts when he goes on the air. Since making his CNN debut on Sunday, Duffy has lied about the shooting of Rep. Gabby Giffords. He’s lied about Joe Biden trying to fire a Ukraine prosecutor in order to protect his son. And Duffy’s helped spread the preposterous lie about the Democratic National Committee’s email servers from 2016 somehow ending up in a foreign country.

Sean Duffy, who staked his congressional reputation in recent years on being an undying Trump loyalist, is not a serious person. And Sean Duffy appears to be a habitual liar. (He once claimed George Soros was rigging voting machines, and that Hillary Clinton’s longtime aide had ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.) You would think those unfortunate traits would represent two large check marks against someone who wanted to be in the business of commenting on the news.

And yet, here we are.

CNN executives, having surveyed the political landscape in search of new voices to add to its discussions, decided to hire Duffy, which says a lot more about CNN than it does Duffy. What’s newsworthy about Duffy’s hiring is the timing. It just seems odd since much of the press, including CNN, has moved to toughen up Trump coverage in recent weeks and temporarily abandon the hallmark timidity that has defined so much of the reporting and commentary over the last two-plus years.

“The mainstream media seems to have quietly removed its Trump-normalizing gloves in the past few weeks,” wrote Washington Post media columnist Margaret Sullivan.

CNN anchors and commentators have often been part of that change. They have been out front since the Ukraine collusion scandal broke last month, emphasizing that Trump’s pronouncements and denials are almost always wrapped in lies and deceptions. That’s a good thing.

So why now, of all times, would CNN decide to shift into reverse and hire another Trump loyalist who cannot be trusted to be honest or state anything factual each time he appears on air? Why would CNN want to go back to playing the silly and time-consuming game of blocking off lots of airtime so conservative contributors can make stuff up, which CNN anchors then have to point out is, y’know, made up? What does CNN hope to accomplish with this?

It’s all just a colossal waste of time, and CNN already tried to pull off that losing strategy for two years. Looking to capture the cable news “middle” between Fox News and MSNBC, CNN often obsesses over its Both Sides presentation. And on paper, there’s nothing wrong with that. (Think: Crossfire format.) The problem is trying to find honest conservatives these days and, specifically, the nearly impossible task of finding honest conservatives who are also Trump loyalists, since that’s the Both Sides debate CNN often wants to present.

CNN has hired many such Trump loyalists who have chewed up the cable news scenery, spreading lie after preposterous lie. That includes people like Jason Miller, Jack Kingston, Ed Martin, Jeffrey Lord, and Corey Lewandowski, among others. None of them, to be generous, covered the network in glory. Following the 2018 school massacre at Parkland High School in Florida, Kingston claimed on the air that students who rallied against gun violence were being taken advantage of by “left-wing gun control activists” led by billionaire George Soros.

It all badly muddies the waters, because by allowing—and paying—people like Duffy to disseminate nonsense like he’s already spewed about DNC servers, CNN is legitimizing that lie, even when it’s fact-checked. “First of all, what you are stating is completely inaccurate and factually wrong,” CNN contributor Jen Psaki told Duffy when he started in with the server conspiracy. “It’s a conspiracy theory on the right-wing blogs.” And frankly, that’s where that garbage should stay.

By hiring someone like Duffy at this juncture, it appears CNN has learned very little since 2017, and specifically very little about how to cover a liar like Trump. It’s not up to CNN and other media players to hire bad actors simply because the conservative movement is filled with bad actors. All news outlets ought to have easily identifiable standards, and if would-be paid contributors can’t meet those standards, they should not be hired.

Keep in mind that CNN remains under constant bullying attacks from Trump and the entire conservative movement. Last year, the White House lashed out at CNN by pulling reporter Jim Acosta’s press pass. Trump routinely defames the network on Twitter. And just last week, Trump’s personal attorney sent a ridiculous threat to CNN, threatening to sue the network for its “biased” coverage of Trump. (“Never in the history of this country has a President been the subject of such a sustained barrage of unfair, unfounded, unethical and unlawful attacks by so-called ‘mainstream’ news, as the current situation,” etc.) Lawyers everywhere mocked the move as deeply unserious, but the cumulative effect adds up.

And that makes Duffy’s hiring even more distressing. It certainly seems to send a signal that “working the refs” is an effective strategy, and that if Republicans complain loudly and long enough, the cable news channel will bend, in small ways, to the GOP’s will.

Recall that back in January, CNN seemed to make a similar and equally misguided concession to Trump when it hired a hyper-partisan Republican flack with no experience in journalism to oversee the network’s campaign news coverage. After a public outcry, CNN changed the Republican’s job duties.

Note to CNN: It’s not too late to do the same with Duffy.

Eric Boehlert is a veteran progressive writer and media analyst, formerly with Media Matters and Salon. He is the author of Lapdogs: How the Press Rolled Over for Bush and Bloggers on the Bus. You can follow him on Twitter @EricBoehlert.

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Department of Agriculture launched an absurd pro-Trump podcast; the first guest was Fox contributor Sarah Sanders.

maybe not?

Trey Gowdy, Who Led Republicans in Investigating Benghazi, Joins Trump Legal Team

ImageTrey Gowdy of South Carolina served four terms in the House before resigning in January.

Trey Gowdy of South Carolina served four terms in the House before resigning in January.CreditCreditErin Schaff for The New York Times

By Maggie Haberman

Published Oct. 9, 2019

Updated Oct. 10, 2019, 7:16 a.m. ET

WASHINGTON — Trey Gowdy, the former South Carolina congressman who led the committee that investigated the terrorist attack on the American diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya, that killed four Americans, will join President Trump’s legal team as an outside adviser.

The move — which had been widely anticipated — was announced Wednesday night by Mr. Trump’s personal lawyer Jay Sekulow.

“I have known Trey for years and worked with him when he served in Congress,” Mr. Sekulow said in a statement. “His legal skills and his advocacy will serve the president well. Trey’s command of the law is well known and his service on Capitol Hill will be a great asset as a member of our team.”

Mr. Gowdy, a former prosecutor who served four terms in the House before resigning in January, met with Mr. Trump for lunch on Tuesday at the White House. He is expected to be a presence on television defending the president.

As chairman of the House Select Committee on Benghazi, Mr. Gowdy led a two-year investigation into the 2012 attack in Libya that was sharply criticized by Democrats as a vehicle for Republicans to investigate Hillary Clinton, who was secretary of state at the time and went on to become the 2016 Democratic presidential nominee. Among the members of the committee was Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, then a Republican congressman from Kansas.

Mr. Gowdy was particularly critical of the State Department for not complying with requests for documents, and those past comments about the importance of responding to document requests are likely to resurface in any defense of Mr. Trump.

Mr. Trump’s legal team is not expected to expand substantially. Another of his personal lawyers, Rudolph W. Giuliani, is himself at the center of a controversy over Mr. Trump’s phone call with the Ukrainian president asking for an investigation into Hunter Biden, the younger son of one of his leading 2020 Democratic rivals, former Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.

In addition to Mr. Sekulow, the president had relied heavily on a small group of lawyers with experience as federal prosecutors to deal with the investigation led by the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, into Russian election interference.

But the impeachment inquiry, announced last month by House Democrats, might require a lawyer who can aid with a Senate trial.

A version of this article appears in print on , Section A, Page 18 of the New York edition with the headline: Gowdy Joins Legal Team For President As an Adviser.

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speedbump in pension plan? b43 dmin pundits incl nichole wallace comms msnbc

https://www.alternet.org/2019/09/ex-dhs-head-kirstjen-nielsen-leaves-atlantic-ideas-festival-stage-after-outrage-from-grassroots-movement/

Former House Speaker Paul Ryan has been appointed to the board of the new ...Ryan will be joining the board along with Anne Dias, founder of the investment firm Aragon Global Holdings and the ex-wife of hedge fund billionaire Ken Griffin; Chase Carey, chairman and CEO of Formula One; and Roland Hernandez, CEO of Hernandez Media Ventures, the company announced Tuesday. Previously announced board members include Rupert Murdoch and his son Lachlan and Jacques Nasser, a former Ford executive.

“We look forward to working with and being guided by them as we begin a new chapter, steadfastly committed to providing the best in news, sports and entertainment programming,” said Lachlan Murdoch, chairman and CEO of Fox Corp.

Class B shares of the new Fox Corp. were down more than 3 percent by late morning Tuesday. Disney announced in 2017 that it was purchasing many parts of 21st Century Fox for $52.4 billion in stock. Under the deal, a new holding company called New Disney became the parent company of Disney and 21st Century Fox.

Ryan, 49, was House speaker before Democrats took control in January. The Wisconsin Republican announced early last year that he was retiring from Congress to spend more time with his family. After leaving his post, he rebuked Washington’s “broken politics.”

Ryan recently faced criticism from fellow Republicans for claiming he believedthat some Democrats could beat President Donald Trump in the 2020 presidential elections. He has since walked back his statements, saying the United States is “clearly” better off because of Trump. ...Trump has been a longtime fan and avid watcher of Fox News and has close ties with some of the personalities on the network, including Sean Hannity and Jeanine Pirro..

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oops

..Two conservative former Democratic senators, Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota and Joe Donnelly of Indiana, have launched the One Country Project, a 501(c)(4) not-for-profit organization that aims to attract rural voters to the Democratic Party. However, according to Maplight’s Andrew Perez, working in partnership with The Intercept, the organization is also a “dark money” group, using the two former lawmakers to push an anti-Medicare-for-all agenda.

Perez found that “the One Country Project’s website is registered to an executive at Forbes Tate Partners, a lobbying and public relations firm founded by former Clinton administration officials.” Forbes Tate Partners is leading lobbying efforts for Partnership for America’s Health Care Future (PAHCF), which, according to Maplight, is a “health industry-backed nonprofit created to crush momentum for a comprehensive universal health care system.”

Heitkamp had previous ties to Forbes Tate Partners, hiring a subsidiary called Columbia Campaign Group for polling and media campaign consulting for her 2018 Senate bid. Her former chief of staff, Tessa Gould, is now a partner there. The Heitkamp campaign, Perez reports, paid Gould $35,000 for consulting in March, part of the over $6 million the campaign had left over from a last-minute infusion of donations after Heitkamp declined to confirm Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court.

Heitkamp railed against Medicare-for-all in a May op-ed for The Washington Post, writing that “polling indicates that most Americans are satisfied with the health care they receive and do not want their coverage options taken away and replaced with a one-size-fits-all government program.” Both Heitkamp and Donnelly campaigned against such a proposal in their reelection bids, and both lost to Republicans.

Two conservative former Democratic senators, Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota and Joe Donnelly of Indiana, have launched the One Country Project, a 501(c)(4) not-for-profit organization that aims to attract rural voters to the Democratic Party.However, according to Maplight’s Andrew Perez, working in partnership with The Intercept, the organization is also a “dark money” group, using the two former lawmakers to push an anti-Medicare-for-all agenda.

Before Donnelly left the Senate, he told CNN’s Dana Bash that “when you talk Medicare-for-all … you start losing the people in my state.” He added, “When we start talking about, ‘Hey, we’re going to work together with the insurance companies to lower premiums,’ that’s what connects.”

In addition to his work with the One Country Project, Donnelly joined lobbying Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP, which also has ties to anti-Medicare-for-All efforts through its lobbying for health care industry clients, who have also donated to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC).

According to reporting by Alex Kotch in Sludge, “Vic Fazio, a senior advisor at lobbying firm Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld and former California Democratic congressman, has raised nearly $130,000 for the DCCC this year. He has lobbied for Pharmaceutical Research and Manufacturers of America (PhRMA), a PAHCF member and the nation’s largest pharmaceutical trade association.”

Support for broader health coverage is growing among Americans, though they remain divided on terminology, and on whether to abolish private insurance. According to an April 2019 poll from the Kaiser Family Foundation, 56% of Americans support a national health plan or Medicare-for-all.

“Yet,” the KFF report continues, “how politicians discuss these different proposals does affect public support.” The poll found 63% of respondents said they support Medicare-for-All or universal coverage, while 59% say they support a national health plan, and 46% support socialized medicine. The most common theme, researchers report, “is a desire for universal coverage.”

A February poll from The Hill-HarrisX found that just 13% of respondents favored a health care system controlled entirely by the government with no private insurance and 32% of respondents favored universal coverage, operated by the government, that still included room for supplemental private insurance. Another 26% want a public option that doesn’t compete with private insurance.

Mostly, there’s a lot of confusion. As Mohamed Younis, editor-in-chief of Gallup, told The Hill TV’s Krystal Ball, “Folks are clearly saying the system is still sort of broken to some degree, but there isn’t a lot of consensus around how to fix it in one way or another.”

Neither Heitkamp nor Donnelly responded to Maplight’s requests for comment.

Fox Corp. board member Paul Ryan has been the subject of fawning praise from Fox News

Fox Corp., the parent company of Fox News, announced on March 19 that former Speaker of the House Paul Ryan (R-WI) will serve on its board of directors. Ryan had been the recipient of fawning praise from Fox News personalities in the past for his right-wing budget proposals and his selection by Mitt Romney as his vice presidential pick for the 2012 presidential election.

omfg

https://thinkprogress.org/green-new-deal-jack-abramoff-opposition-trump-ocasio-cortez-mcconnell-a9015688f09a/

Reports have emerged that Trump will nominate David Malpass, a Treasury Department official, to be the new head of the World Bank. Malpass is an outspoken critic of the World Bank, saying it is overly intrusive. Malpass previously worked on Wall Street as the chief economist of Bear Stearns. In 2007, he wrote a Wall Street Journal op-ed titled “Don’t Panic About the Credit Market”—less than a year before the collapse and subsequent sale of Bear Stearns amid the 2008 financial crisis.

also elliot frikkin abrams! OMFG

omg

Tim Huelskamp served for three terms in Congress, representing the 1st District of Kansas. During his time in congress, he worked on the Veterans Affairs Committee where, according to his profile at the Heartland Institute, he “was a leader in exposing the corruption and failures at the VA and pushing through a historic health care choice option for veterans.” He also chaired the Elections and Local Government, Information Technology, and Medicaid Reform committees.[2]

He was elected for his first term in November 2010, and subsequently re-elected in 2012 and 2014. Huelskamp was chairman of the the Tea Party Caucus from February 2015. He ran for re-election in 2016 to be defeated in the Republican primary by Roger Marshall. His House term ended January 3, 2017. [3], [4]

“In Congress, Congressman Huelskamp is a leading conservative advocate for life, marriage, cutting spending, reducing taxes, lowering regulatory burdens, and repealing Obamacare,” his archived Congressional biography reads. He also proudly declares “He leading the battle to reduce government regulations, such as the intrusive Waters of the United States rule and the Endangered Species Act.” Among his stances, Huelskamp has alsostrongly supported defunding Planned Parenthood and is against gay marriage. [3], [2], [5], [6]

In June, 2017, theHeartland Instituteannounced that Huelskamp would replace Joe Bast as the Institute's president, beginning his work in July 2017.Huelskamp maintains alifetime score of 5% with the League of Conservation Voters, with a score of 0% in 2016. A full list oflegislation sponsored or cosponsored by Huelskamp is available at Congress.gov. According to his voting record tracked at *OnTheIssues*, Huelskamp has consistently voted against any legislation that would combat fossil fuel emissions or climate change. [7], [8], [9], [10]

pension plan: Graham, Dudley, Bolten, ebharrison

see public pension and Divestment

i thought i made up a metaphor, but: There is so much money in conservatism these days that Karl Rove rightly boasts, “We can now go to students at Harvard and say, ‘There is now a secure retirement plan for Republican operatives.’” The young people who, like Jack Abramoff before them, have answered conservatism’s call over the past three decades were obeying their conscience, perhaps, but they were also making a canny career move. wrecking crew

full:

For some in winger Washington this is an idealistic business, but what gives it power and longevity is that it is a profitable business. I mean this not as polemic but as a statement of fact. Washington swarms with conservative ideologues not because conservatives particularly like the place but because there isan entire industry here that supports these people—an industry subsidized by the nation’s largest corporations and its richest families, and the government too. We are all familiar with the flagship organizations—Cato, Heritage, AEI—but the industry extends far beyond these, encompassing numerous magazines and literally hundreds of lobbying firms. There is even adaily newspaper—the Washington Times—published strictly for the movement’s benefit, a propaganda sheet whose distortions are so obvious and so alien that it puts one in mind of those official party organs one encounters when traveling in authoritarian countries.

There are political strategists, pollsters, campaign managers, trainers of youth, image consultants, makers of TV commercials, revolutionaries-for-hire, and, of course, direct-mail specialists who still launch their million-letter raids on the mailboxes of the heartland. Remember the guy who wrote all those sputtering diatribes for your college newspaper? Chances are he’s in D.C. now, thinking big thoughts from an endowed chair, or churning out more of the brilliant usual for one of the movement’s many blogs. The campus wingnut whose fulminations on the Red Menace so amused my friends and me at the University of Virginia, for example, resurfaced here as a columnist for the Washington Times before transitioning inevitably into consultancy. A friend of mine who went to Georgetown recently recalled for me the capers of his campus wingnut, whom he had completely forgotten until the guy made headlines as the lead culprit in a minor 2004 scandal called “Memogate.” Later he worked for the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad, teaching democratic civics to Iraqi politicians.

There is so much money in conservatism these days that Karl Rove rightly boasts, “We can now go to students at Harvard and say, ‘There is now a secure retirement plan for Republican operatives.’” The young people who, like Jack Abramoff before them, have answered conservatism’s call over the past three decades were obeying their conscience, perhaps, but they were also making a canny career move.

DESTROYS PENALTY FOR BAD CONDUCT; even nixon rehabbed? but also attractor // incubator: you can't fail ~ market dogma (irony) ; thus encourages more extreme behavior? (amply fdbk)

This is a somewhat ironic name for the phemomenon of all the different ways that an "ideological entrepreneur" can milk the RWI: a big part of this is the revolving door, another aspect is that the same output can be disseminated (and thus paid) over various media. The most important aspect, however, is that the right is the only ppl who have a lifetime guarantee for income, even if convicted of criminal offense, larry craig, scooter?

Related aspects: sometimes money is laundered by giving wife a sinecure (eg patrick henry college), see also nepotism

pvt intel corps also a retirement plan for retired military and gov't ppl? tho/and presumably huge homeland defense indisry (cf dana priest) and big data assure many lucrative gigs

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5/15

CRP’s revolving door data, which we will continue to update, shows that 42 of the 75 who left Capitol Hill at the end of the last Congress or sometime during that two-year term are currently employed — 18 of them by lobbying firms or law firms that also lobby.

They include, among others, former Sen. Mark Begich (D-Alaska), who lost his bid for re-election and is now a “strategic advisor” at Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck; Rep. Lee Terry (R-Neb.), one of only two incumbent GOP House members to lose his seat in the 2014 Republican wave and now a senior adviser at Kelley, Drye & Warren; and Reps. Jim Matheson (D-Utah) and Jack Kingston (R-Ga.), who were both poached by powerhouse firm Squire Patton Boggs. Matheson retired, while Kingston lost his bid for a Senate seat to David Perdue (R).

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kochtopus has its own HR:

Center for Shared Services: $8,500,387

As the Washington Post has put it, this is a "human resources hub" for the Koch network. It recruits job candidates and provides adminstrative services to Koch network affiliates.

Received money from: -

- Freedom Partners $6,738,000
- TC4 Trust $1,762,387

rt nation PENSION 169: rw college? paper to intern fellow at aei, u chic, ctt, admin post (each strain of rw has its own places). columns, fox, speechs eg D'Souza (bio of falwell)

In a third category are tactics and situations that will be very difficult for Democrats to emulate, and equally difficult to eliminate. The most important of these, well described in both books, is what Edsall calls “the merger between the Republican Party and business.” This is not just a matter of campaign contributions; that’s a very small part of it. There is, for example, the practice of getting businesses to hire Republican operatives and politicians, allowing Rove to exult, “We can now go to students at Harvard and say, ‘There is now a secure retirement plan for Republican operatives.’” one party to rule them all schmitt

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leftover, but interesting contrast: [social sec the biggest prize for privatization, aside maybe from education?

AMY GOODMAN: You write, "Deregulation is one of the greatest triumphs of America’s ruling class, but [for] middle-class workers and their families the fallout has been devastating." What about retirement and pensions?

JAMES STEELE: One of the most astonishing statistics that we think we have in the book, because we were not aware of this statistic: since 1985, almost 85,000 pension plans have been killed. In the '50s, the ’60s, the ’70s, even into the early ’80s, more and more people were eligible for pensions, defined benefit plans where you got a specific benefit when you did retire.But since the mid-'80s, corporations, with the great assistance of Congress, have been shifting people out of pensions into 401(k) plans. Now, there’s nothing wrong with 401(k) plans, but originally they were viewed just as a supplement to a pension. They were not viewed as a pension. But corporations saw this would be a lot cheaper for them. It would shift the responsibility totally to the employees and the workers. But it would also not contribute enough to really take care of their retirement needs.

So, what’s happened in—this is one of the greatest title shifts in the country, because we were going in a certain direction for decades, middle-class people—I mean, not everybody had a pension. We know that. But more and more did over time. But since the '80s, this has now been totally reversed. And it raises all kinds of questions about what retirement is going to be like for people. The main question is, people are going to have to work forever, and yet what are those jobs going to be? What are they going to pay? And it also puts pressure then on people coming into the workforce. How are they going to get a job if people are having to work between 65 and 75 years old? That's going to put even more pressure on the jobs that are left.

DONALD BARLETT: And the other irony of this is—this is almost another Sandy Weill incident. You have the current head of AIG, who was not there during the collapse. He had nothing to do with it. He worked for another global insurance company. He was brought in after AIG collapsed, and the taxpayers bailed them out, and they still haven’t paid everything back yet. He was quoted as saying earlier this year that people are just going to have to get used to the idea of working until they are 70 or 80. Now, he made that pronouncement from his villa in Dubrovnik in Croatia.

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