When a nation’s children marched, and their President ignored them - Trump cont.

[TheClaws]

For me, the Parkland children being belittled and abused in so many ways is utterly heartbreaking to witness. But they have been more adult than the adults in their response. They have shown us what faith means, and bravery. POTUS? He is made much, much smaller.

www.mumsnet.com/Talk/am_i_being_unreasonable/3198255--In-politics-stupidity-is-not-a-handicap-We-know-this-now-Trump-thread-cont

of

Thanks for all the links everyone, interesting reading.

Trump's obsession with Amazon continues

www.vanityfair.com/news/2018/04/trump-war-with-amazon-and-the-washington-post-is-personal

Spencer Hsu
@hsu_spencer
NEW Special counsel Robert Mueller's office defends Manafort prosecution from defense challenge, telling court that Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein explicitly approved it in Aug. 2, 2017 memo, after AG Jeff Sessions recused himself from the Russia probe.

assets.documentcloud.org/documents/4429548/Rosenstein-Memo-Mueller.pdf

A thread on this:

southpaw
@nycsouthpaw
New filings from the Special Counsel, responding to Manafort's motion to dismiss his indictment, include a new heavily redacted document from Rosenstein dated last August confirming that Manafort is within his remit.

mobile.twitter.com/nycsouthpaw/status/981023752405356545

Pruitt is engaging in more environmental vandalism over at the EPA.
This seems like such a retrograde step, even for someone deep in the pockets of the fossil fuel industry.
Won’t this make it more difficult to export American cars, given that regulations are tightening everywhere and with a strong legislative push to electric elsewhere in the world (Europe anyway).

uk.reuters.com/article/us-usa-epa-autos/epa-to-relax-fuel-efficiency-standards-for-autos-idUKKCN1H91OD

Wendy Siegelman
@WendySiegelman
🚨A senior leader in Russia’s spy agency, Dmitry Dokuchaev, wanted by FBI and suspected to be linked to Russian meddling in 2016 US election, has agreed to plead partially guilty to sharing information with foreign intelligence, by @KevinGHall

amp.mcclatchydc.com/news/nation-world/national/article207723644.html

“one of the individuals about whom Dokuchaev shared information was alleged Russian hacker Yevgeniy Nikulin” who was extradited to California on Friday and has pleaded not guilty

That’s at odds with a report from another Russian news outlet last year, which said that one of the individuals about whom Dokuchaev shared information was alleged Russian hacker Yevgeniy Nikulin. On Friday, it became public that the United States had succeeded in its attempt to extradite Nikulin from the Czech Republic – an effort bitterly fought by Moscow. Nikulin faces charges in California for allegedly hacking the databases of LinkedIn, Dropbox and Formspring in 2012.

David Carroll 🦅
@profcarroll
Replying to @WendySiegelman and @KevinGHall
whoa whoa whoa why is putin invited to the white house again?

U.S. intelligence believes the high-profile hacks of U.S. tech-firm databases allowed Russia to mine hundreds of millions of user accounts for personal information on election officials and U.S. political activists. This data could be used to try to enter secure websites or hypothetically to gather compromising information.

Anne Applebaum
@anneapplebaum
Costs of Russian political influence in Ukraine:
$100-$300: hacking an email account
$50-$5,000: bringing down a website
$130,500: plan to “demotivate enemies” on social media and amass personal data of targeted individuals in Kharkiv....

www.thetimes.co.uk/article/operation-troy-russia-s-blueprint-for-spreading-chaos-in-ukraine-x2bqv7hbg

$120,460: to stage local council election campaign for 30 banned ex-communist figures, including deposits, payments and media material
$19,200 Price to stage a month of rallies in Kharkiv, with 100 participants and bribes to police

$181,000 for "Troy," a strategy to expand the rebellion in Ukraine into the Zaporizhzhia region
$40,000 for organising pro-Russian protests in the region
$10,000 for maintaining agents in the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) and interior ministry

Important to note, of course, that the 'Troy' operation failed, the rebellion did not spread - and the money was wasted

Cambridge Analytica, despite scrutiny, still pitching Colorado political campaigns for business

amp.thedenverchannel.com/2541911955/cambridge-analytica-despite-scrutiny-still-pitching-colorado-political-campaigns-for-business.html

John Santucci
@JTSantucci
I think we're up to 4 Pruitt stories in last 30 minutes so let's review - WSJ = White House investigating / Times = business was conducted in favor landlord / Politico = Kelly talked about firing Pruitt / DailyBeast = landlords held fundraisers for GOPers at the same location

And

Kyle Griffin
@kylegriffin1
By my count, 5 separate stories have come out in the last couple hours about Scott Pruitt. That doesn't seem like an accident.

Re:amazon

Caroline O.
@RVAwonk
U.S. president is using his Twitter account — which he says is an official source of government information —to try to hurt American companies. Incredible.

And

Brian Klaas
@brianklaas
The President is openly attempting to go after the owner of a private business because that person also owns a newspaper that accurately reports unflattering stories about the White House. This is literally what Erdogan & Putin did. Republicans in Congress are enabling this too.

And a very prescient thread about trump and how he would treat the media by sarah kendzior:

mobile.twitter.com/sarahkendzior/status/729681003162132480

And
(Small sign of resistance)

Jon Passantino
@passantino
It appears a Sinclair-owned TV station in Wisconsin has refused to run the controversial "biased and false news" anchor promo

FOX 47 Madison
@fox47madison
In response to the Sinclair message aired: "WMSN/FOX47 Madison did not air the Sinclair promotional announcement during our 9pm news this weekend. Rather, we stayed true to our commitment to provide our Madison area viewers local news, weather and sports of interest to them."

Supreme Court Turns Away Suit by Terrorism Victims

Setback is latest for private efforts to hold sponsors and financiers of international terrorism legally accountable

www.wsj.com/articles/supreme-court-turns-away-suit-by-terrorism-victims-1522709407

Kyle Griffin
@kylegriffin1
The Justice Department has notified immigration judges that it will begin evaluating their job performance based on how quickly they close cases, setting quotas for the first time according to WSJ.

t.co/sVnfd6EwA

Michael Avenatti
@MichaelAvenatti
We will vigorously oppose the just-filed motion by DJT and MC to have this case decided in a private arbitration, in a private conf room, hidden from the American public. This is a democracy and this matter should be decided in an open court of law owned by the people. #sunlight

Renato Mariotti
@renato_mariotti
THREAD: What does the motion by Trump lawyer Michael Cohen's company to compel @StormyDaniels to privately arbitrate her lawsuit mean for her case?

[cant copy it all but the rest is here: mobile.twitter.com/renato_mariotti/status/980949285415079936 ]

Preet Bharara
@PreetBharara
What if Jeff Bezos bought Twitter with the change in his pocket and shut Trump's account?

I find parscale’s face hard to look at - it has a reptilian coldness about it that I find difficult to countenance. Plus, he appears to be a twat

‘Pull his credentials’: Trump campaign manager says CNN should suspend reporter for asking question

thinkprogress.org/trumps-campaign-manager-suspend-reporter-for-asking-question-d760762828c3/amp

That Rasmussen poll is an outlier.

All others show approval in the -10s.

Even Fox had him at -7 on the 21st.

www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/president_trump_job_approval-6179.html

This whole thread is interesting

François Chollet
@fchollet
The problem with Facebook is not just the loss of your privacy and the fact that it can be used as a totalitarian panopticon. The more worrying issue, in my opinion, is its use of digital information consumption as a psychological control vector. Time for a thread

mobile.twitter.com/fchollet/status/976563870322999296

And

Your own devices will give the next Cambridge Analytica far more power to influence your vote
Greater connectivity, more data, and auto-generated content will make today’s manipulation techniques look primitive.

www.technologyreview.com/s/610741/your-own-devices-will-give-the-next-cambridge-analytica-far-more-power-to-influence-your/

Stocks' Second-Quarter Start Is the Worst Since the Great Depression

www.bloomberg.com/amp/news/articles/2018-04-02/stocks-second-quarter-start-is-worst-since-great-depression

Julia Davis
@JuliaDavisNews
#Russia's state TV: Dep. Dean of World Politics at Moscow's State University:
"Unfortunately, Trump didn't reach the level of Abraham Lincoln & didn't drive the U.S. to civil war. That's sad. Hopefully, he'll become Herbert Hoover and at least drive them into a Great Depression."
Embedded
8:44 pm · 11 Feb 2018

Julia Davis
@JuliaDavisNews
Look who's hoping Trump will drive the U.S. into another Great Depression - his "best friends," the Russians.

Maggie Haberman
@maggieNYT
per @Joshnasspr, Mike Flynn is the featured speaker at a London Center for Policy Research event in Manhattan on April 19. And that's Herb London, conservative and repeated statewide hopeful in NY, not the city.

nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/04/corruption-is-trumps-greatest-political-liability.html?utm_source=tw&utm_medium=s3&utm_campaign=sharebutton-t

'“My whole life I’ve been greedy, greedy, greedy,” declared Donald Trump during the 2016 campaign. “I’ve grabbed all the money I could get. I’m so greedy. But now I want to be greedy for the United States.” To the extent that Trump’s candidacy offered any positive appeal, as opposed to simple loathing for his opponent, this was it. He was a brilliant businessman, or at least starred in a television show as one, and he would set aside his lifelong pursuit of wealth to selflessly serve the greater good. This was the promise that pried just enough Obama voters away from Hillary Clinton in just enough upper-Midwest states to clinch the Electoral College.'

Quite Interesting
@qikipedia
In 1990, the satirical magazine, SPY, sent cheques for 13 cents to some of the world’s richest people. Only two cashed them, the Saudi Arabian arms dealer Adnan Khashoggi, and Donald Trump.

www.cnbc.com/2018/04/03/trump-investigation-mueller-questioned-wikistrat-on-work-with-uae.html

White nationalist to speak about diversity at University of Alabama
Jared Taylor will reportedly talk about whether "diversity is a strength."

thinkprogress.org/white-nationalist-set-to-speak-at-university-of-alabama-79b6dde381e3/

I can't stop thinking about the person who became an informant on ms-13 and is being deported from the US to face near-certain death. It is unbearably inhumane

Sinclair Chairman Claims Entire Print Media Has ‘No Credibility'

nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2018/04/sinclair-chairman-entire-print-media-has-no-credibility.html

Jill McCabe: The president attacked my reputation. It’s time to set the record straight.

www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/jill-mccabe-the-president-attacked-my-reputation-its-time-to-set-the-record-straight/2018/04/02/e6bbcf66-366b-11e8-8fd2-49fe3c675a89_story.html

Not there yet.