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Recent Appearances...

Home Front: Politix

Bureau of Land Management to keep large Colorado office as HQ moves back to DC

2021-09-18

[Denver Post] Returning to the seats/whims of power rather than serving the areas of the people
Trump administration ordered the agency that manages federal land to Colorado in 2019

The U.S. Bureau of Land Management will no longer be based entirely out of Grand Junction, U.S. Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland announced Friday.

Instead, the agency headquarters will return to Washington, D.C., where it had been before a 2019 decision by former President Donald Trump, though BLM said it will maintain and expand its presence in western Colorado.

"It is imperative that the bureau have the appropriate structure and resources to serve the American public," Haaland said in a news release. "There’s no doubt that the BLM should have a leadership presence in Washington, D.C. — like all the other land management agencies — to ensure that it has access to the policy-, budget-, and decision-making levers to best carry out its mission.

"In addition, the BLM’s robust presence in Colorado and across the West will continue to grow."

Colorado politicians and Western Slope leaders who had lobbied to keep the headquarters here expressed mild disappointment on Friday, but also said they were pleased BLM will retain a presence in a state where about 36% is federally managed land.

The Interior Department said the move was to "improve the function of the bureau, help provide clarity for the BLM’s more than 7,000 employees across the country, maintain and increase access for stakeholders, and enable the bureau to better serve the American public and fulfill its mission as the steward of nearly one-fifth of the nation’s public lands."

The BLM director — Biden’s nominee for the job, Tracy Stone-Manning, has not yet been confirmed — and other leadership positions will be set in D.C. Other "senior personnel" will be based in Grand Junction, the Interior Department’s release said, "as part of the more than 95 percent of BLM employees that are already located outside of Washington, D.C."

Trump’s decision to shift BLM headquarters to Colorado in 2019, which came at the same time as the decision to move two U.S. Department of Agriculture research agencies to Kansas City, Missouri, was welcomed by many on the Western Slope and then-GOP U.S. Sen. Cory Gardner.

But more than 87% of the affected employees either resigned or retired instead of moving to Colorado, The Washington Post reported. And it didn’t lead to the promised 27 to 40 jobs; only three BLM employees are currently based at the agency’s leased offices in Grand Junction, said Christian Reece, the executive director of Club 20, an organization that advocates for western Colorado interests.

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Home Front: Politix

Chris Wallace Presses GOP Rep. On Claim That Republicans Defunded Police

2021-06-29

[DAILYCALLER] On "Fox News Sunday," Fox News anchor Chris Wallace repeatedly asked Republican Indiana Rep. Jim Banks if Republicans are responsible for defunding the police.

Wallace said that Banks and the GOP voted against the $350 billion in President Joe The Big Guy Biden
Joe <q>The Big Guy</q> Biden

...46th president of the U.S. Old, boring, a plagiarist, fond of hair sniffing and grabbing the protruding parts of women, and not whatcha call brilliant... or is that an act?...
’s American Rescue Plan that funds coppers, in turn asking if he and all the other Republicans that voted against the bill voted to defund the police. Wallace’s question came in response to his earlier guest, White House senior adviser Cedric Richmond, who made the claim that Republicans were indeed responsible.

Banks did not address Wallace’s question and instead explained how police forces are having a hard time recruiting new officers due to language from the Democrats.

Wallace asked, "Can’t you make the argument that it’s you and the Republicans who are defunding the police?"

"Not at all, Chris," Banks replied. "I mean let’s go back again and look at the last year and the record of comments that Democrats have made from Rashida Tlaib who said that policing is inherently evil."

"No, no, no," Wallace interjected. "Wait, sir, respectfully. Wait, wait, sir. Respectfully. I heard you make that point but I’m asking you, there’s $350 billion in this package the president says can be used for policing and I — let me put up some of the specific points he said."

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Home Front: Politix

CBC Chair Beatty: 'Can't Say' the Person Bryant Was Trying to Stab Would Have Died

2021-04-25

[BREITBART] On Friday’s broadcast of CNN
...formerly the Cable News Network, now who know what it might stand for...
’s "OutFront," Congressional Black Caucus Chair Rep. Joyce Beatty (D-OH) stated that "it’s appalling" that coppers are trained to always shoot for the center of the body, and if Ma’Khia Bryant "had a water gun, if she had a sandwich, if she had keys, if she had a cell phone, and it looks like she was going to hit or harm someone," the police would have shot her. Beatty also argued that we don’t know whether Bryant’s intention was to kill the person she was attacking with a knife and we can’t say whether the person Bryant was attacking would have been killed.

Beatty said, "Well, I think we have to be in a better position to say that we should be saving all lives. We can’t say that the lady in the pink would have been killed. Here’s what I believe: You see in eleven seconds, four shots and a teenager on the ground dead. I think there has to be a better way. One size can’t fit all. When I hear the police say that they are trained to go to the center of the body and to shoot, here is a situation where the police had been called. They knew they were coming into a situation with girls, a teenager and two women. We should have been in de-escalation mode. It should not be that the car pulls up, an officer gets out, and within 10 seconds. Now, there was another lady that was already on the ground and Ma’Khia had the kitchen knife in her hand. I can’t say that I know that her intentions were to kill this person. I think we should be saving all lives. ... We have to learn how to de-escalate. We have to have a better practice, policy, and procedure than it is to go in and put four bullets in a child’s chest with a kitchen knife."

She added "I don’t support a system of one size fits all. I don’t support a system that you drive up and the automatic thing is to put four bullets in the chest of a 16-year-old. I don’t support one size [fits] all. I think that it’s appalling that we can have someone say, our system is to train officers to go to the center of the body no matter what. So, if she had a water gun, if she had a sandwich, if she had keys, if she had a cell phone, and it looks like she was going to hit or harm someone, the answer is four bullets, six bullets in the back, in the chest? That’s not acceptable."

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-Lurid Crime Tales-

Border Stories: New Mexico police officer shot in the head during routine stop in February, new video shows

2021-04-11

[FoxNews] A New Mexico police officer was tragically shot and killed during a traffic stop that set off a 40-mile chase earlier this year, ending with the suspect also dying in a shootout with police.

Officer Darian Jarrott initiated the February traffic stop on Omar Felix Cueva, who police say was on his way to Las Cruces for a drug deal.

Police said Cueva had a "violent criminal history," including drug charges involving cocaine and meth.

When Officer Jarrott, who was speaking to Cueva through the passenger window, asked him to step out of the vehicle, Cueva got out of the pickup truck with an AR-15-style rifle and fired a shot at Jarrott.

Jarrott fell to the ground, at which point Cueva fired several more shots at him, including one at point-blank range to the back of the head.

Less than a minute after Cueva fled the scene, a Homeland Security Investigations agent arrived on the scene and notified dispatch that Jarrott was down.

A 40-mile chase ensued as officers from New Mexico State Police, the Cruces Police Department, the Dona Ana County Sheriff’s Office, and U.S. Border Patrol pursued Cueva, exchanging gunfire along the way.

Law enforcement eventually stopped Cueva by blowing out his tires with tire deflation devices.

Before Cueva's pickup truck even came to a stop, bystander video shows him exit his vehicle with a pistol and open fire on officers, who returned fire and killed Cueva.

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-Obits-

Rep. Alcee Hastings dies, narrowing Democratic House majority to just 7

2021-04-07

[CNBC] Rep. Alcee Hastings, D-Fla., died Tuesday after a more than two-year bout with pancreatic cancer, NBC News confirmed.

Hastings, who served in the House for nearly three decades, was 84. Throughout his career, he held several key committee assignments and leadership positions, most recently as vice chairman of the rules committee. He had also been Florida’s first Black federal trial judge, appointed to the bench in 1979 by President Jimmy Malaise Carter
...only the second worst president ever...
"As an attorney, civil rights activist and judge, and over his nearly thirty years in Congress, he fought tirelessly to create opportunities to lift up working families, communities of color, children and im~~migrants~~ colonists," House Speaker Nancy San Fran Nan Pelosi
Congresswoman-for-Life from the San Francisco Bay Area, born into a family of professional politicians. On-again-off-again Speaker of the House. It's not her fault when they lose, but it's her accomplishment when they win. Noted for her heavily botoxed grimace and occasional senior... uhhh... moments...
wrote in a statement.

President Joe The Big Guy Biden
Joe <q>The Big Guy</q> Biden

...46th president of the U.S., who gives the geriatric a bad name...
reacted to Hastings’ death on Tuesday afternoon. "Across his long career of public service, Alcee always stood up to fight for equality, and always showed up for the working people he represented," he said in a statement. "Jill and I are saddened to learn of his passing."

Democrats now hold a narrower advantage in the House, 218-211, giving the party a smaller margin of error in passing legislation. Six seats are vacant, four of which were previously held by Democrats and two by Republicans.

Three of the four Democratic House seats were vacated by appointments to positions in President Joe Biden’s Cabinet. Deb Haaland, of New Mexico, was appointed secretary of the Department of Interior; Marcia Fudge
...Dem Congresswoman for Ohio's 11th congressional district since 2008. She won a special election to succeed Stephanie Tubbs Jones, who gave up her office when carried out feet first. The strangely-shaped, but really not gerrymandered, district includes most of the black-majority areas between Cleveland and Akron. Fudge was Chairwoman of the Congressional Black Caucus in the 113th Congress...
, of Ohio, was named head of the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and Cedric Richmond, of Louisiana, became senior advisor to the president and director of the White House Office of Public Engagement.

One of the two vacant GOP seats is no longer up for contest. Julia Letlow of Louisiana was elected in late March but has yet to be sworn in. Julia will replace her late husband, Luke Letlow, who was elected to the seat but died before being sworn in due to Covid-19 complications.

In 1983, when Hastings was a federal judge, he was acquitted in criminal court on a charge of conspiring to solicit a bribe in exchange for leniency in a sentencing.

Nevertheless, the House impeached Hastings in 1988 amid accusations that he perjured himself during that criminal trial. The Senate voted to convict him, removing him from the bench, but did not vote to disqualify him from holding future office.

Hastings appealed the impeachment conviction in 1992. A federal judge overturned the conviction, on the grounds that a 12-member Senate committee, rather than the full Senate, conducted the impeachment trial. This was the first time a Senate conviction was overturned by a federal judge.

The next year, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled federal courts do not have the authority to review the procedures of a Senate impeachment trial. Hastings’ legislative career, which began with his election in 1992 and continued until his death, was unaffected by the decision.

Link

-Obits-

Florida Rep. Alcee Hastings dead at 84

2021-04-06

[Just the News] Rep. Hastings passed away due to complications from stage 4 pancreatic cancer. He has been in Congress since 1992.

Link

-Land of the Free

America Has Exceeded Anyone's Wildest Dreams

2020-09-11

[FrontPage] In matters of race and other social phenomena, there is a tendency to believe that what is seen today has always been. For black people, the socioeconomic progress achieved during my lifetime, which started in 1936, exceeded anyone's wildest dreams. In 1936, most black people lived in gross material poverty and racial discrimination. Such poverty and discrimination is all but nonexistent today. Government data, assembled by Robert Rector of the Heritage Foundation, shows that "the average American family ... identified as poor by the Census Bureau, lives in an air-conditioned, centrally heated house or apartment ... They have a car or truck. (Indeed, 43% of poor families own two or more cars.)" The household "has at least one widescreen TV connected to cable, satellite, or a streaming service, a computer or tablet with internet connection, and a smartphone. (Some 82% of poor families have one or more smartphones." On top of this, blacks today have the same constitutional guarantees as everyone else, which is not to say that every vestige of racial discrimination has been eliminated.

The poverty we have today is spiritual poverty. Spiritual poverty is an absence of what traditionally has been known as various human virtues. Much of that spiritual poverty is a result of public and private policy that rewards inferiority and irresponsibility. Chief among the policies that reward inferiority and irresponsibility is the welfare state. When some people know they can have children out of wedlock, drop out of school and refuse employment and suffer little consequence and social sanction, one should not be surprised to see the growth of such behavior. Today's out-of-wedlock births among blacks is over 70%, but in the 1930s, it was 11%. During the same period, out-of-wedlock births among whites was 3%; today, it is over 30%. It is fashionable and politically correct to blame today's 21% black poverty on racial discrimination. That is nonsense. Why? The poverty rate among black husband-and-wife families has been in the single digits for more than two decades. Can anyone produce evidence that racists discriminate against black female-headed families but not black husband-and-wife families?

For most people, education is one of the steppingstones out of poverty, and it has been a steppingstone for many black people. Today, decent education is just about impossible at many big-city public schools where violence, disorder, disrespect and assaults on teachers are routine. The kind of disrespectful and violent behavior observed in many predominantly black schools is entirely new. Some have suggested that such disorder is part of black culture, but that is an insulting lie. Black people can be thankful that double standards, and public and private policies rewarding inferiority and irresponsibility, were not broadly accepted during the 1920s, '30s, '40s and '50s. There would not have been the kind of intellectual excellence and spiritual courage that created the world's most successful civil rights movement.

Many whites are ashamed, saddened and guilt-ridden by our history of slavery, Jim Crow and gross racial discrimination. They see that justice and compensation for that ugly history is to hold their fellow black Americans accountable to the kind of standards and conduct they would never accept from whites. That behavior and conduct is relatively new. Meet with black people in their 70s or older, even liberal politicians such as Charles Rangel (age 90), and Reps. Eddie Bernice Johnson (85), Alcee Hastings (83) and Maxine Waters (82). Ask them whether their parents would have tolerated their assaulting and cursing of teachers or any other adult. I bet you the rent money their parents and other parents of that era would not have accepted the grossly disrespectful behavior seen today among many black youngsters who use foul language and racial epithets at one another. These older blacks will tell you that, had they behaved that way, they would have felt serious pain in their hind parts. If blacks of yesteryear would not accept such self-destructive behavior, why should today's blacks accept it?

Black people have made tremendous gains over the years that came as a result of hard work, sacrifice and a no-nonsense approach to life. Recovering those virtues can provide solutions to many of today's problems.

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Home Front: Politix

Ethics panel investigating Rep. Hastings over relationship with staffer

2019-11-16

[THEHILL] The House Ethics Committee
...think of a nudibranch pretending to be a vertebrate...
revealed on Thursday that it is investigating Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-Fla.) over whether his relationship with a member of his staff breaks House rules.

Hastings has admitted to being in a relationship with his aide, Patricia Williams, who serves as his deputy district director.

The committee is now investigating whether Hastings violated House rules with that relationship and if he received any improper gifts from that employee.
like Nookie?
The House last year adopted a rule preventing members of Congress from having a sexual relationship with a member of their staff.

"The Committee is aware of public allegations arising out of Representative Alcee Hastings’ personal relationship with an individual employed in his congressional office," House Ethics Committee Chairman Ted Deutch (D-Fla.) and the panel's ranking Republican, Rep. Kenny Marchant (Texas), said in a joint statement, without identifying the staffer.

The statement said that the committee had begun an investigation on May 14, but did not reveal it publicly until Thursday.

Hastings has dismissed ethical concerns about his relationship, telling the Palm Beach Post "it’s been looking like that for 25 years" according to a story published last month.

Williams previously served as counsel to Hastings when he was accused of accepting bribes as a federal judge in the 1980s. Hastings was later impeached.

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-Lurid Crime Tales-

Tlaib frantically asked campaign for personal money, messages show, as ethics probes announced

2019-11-15

Rancida Tlabia is a criminal wh0re

Oh? Fascinating.

Potential solution to vexing car problem.
[Fox News] The House Ethics Committee on Thursday released a trove of striking internal campaign communications sent in 2018 by Michigan Democratic Rep. Rashida Tlaib, in which Tlaib urgently requested money from her congressional campaign to defray personal expenses -- and, a government watchdog said, possibly violated federal law in the process.
"Impeach the Motherf*cker!" doesn't sound so tough now, does it, Paleotrash?
The document dump was related to the committee's ongoing ethics probe into Tlaib, which the panel said on Thursday would be "expanded" based on a referral from the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE). Additionally, the Ethics Committee acknowledged for the first time on Thursday an investigation into Florida Democratic Rep. Alcee Hastings concerning a "personal relationship with an individual employed in his congressional office."

Texts and emails released by the Ethics Committee show Tlaib frantically contacting members of her staff for financial help.

In one April 2018 email offered as an exhibit by OCE, Tlaib wrote that she was "struggling financially right now" and was "sinking." She continued: "So I was thinking the campaign could loan me money, but Ryan said that the committee could actually pay me. I was thinking a one time payment of $5k."

In another email, on April 4, 2018, Tlaib wrote: "I am just not going to make it through the campaign without a stipend."

"With the loss of a second income to lean back on," she wrote. "I am requesting $2,000 per two weeks but not exceeding $12,000. The cost of living stipend is going towards much needed expenses due to campaigning that includes car maintenance, child care and other necessities. Please let me know if I can proceed."

In August of that year, Tlaib texted her future chief of staff Ryan Anderson at 6:38 a.m.: "Sorry for the early text but do you think the campaign can still pay me a stipend until the general. Trying to get out of debt."

"I think we definitely afford to do so. But we need to really clearly define your time and space," Anderson responded, noting that the arrangement could arouse "concern" among the media.

The OCE also attached scans of checks made out to Tlaib from her campaign, totaling thousands of dollars.

Talib's lawyers said in August there was no evidence that she violated the law on purpose or otherwise, and insisted there were no bad intentions. They noted that Federal Election Commission (FEC) regulations permit campaigns to "pay limited salary to candidates who curtail outside employment to focus on their campaigns" in certain limited conditions that, the lawyers said, were met in this instance.

The attorneys went on to say it was "most irregular" for OCE to call for a probe into a member of Congress based on pre-election activities, and argued that there was no "conscious disregard of any law or regulation." Tlaib was paid by her campaign after Election Day, the attorneys conceded, but they asserted that the money was for services performed before Election Day.

Link

-Lurid Crime Tales-

Convicted Money Launderer in Rep. Alcee Hastings's District Office Received Pay Increase for ‘Part-Time' Work Last Year

2018-03-07

[Free Beacon] A convicted money launderer employed by Democratic Rep. Alcee Hastings (Fla.) in one of his Florida district offices received a pay increase for "part-time" work last year, new salary data filings show.

Additionally, Hastings's longtime girlfriend Patricia Williams appears to have received a promotion, though she did not get a raise since she is already receiving the maximum salary that is allowed to be paid to congressional staffers.

Dona Nichols Jones, who has been listed as working in Hastings's Palm Beach County Office for the past four years, was paid nearly $40,000 last year for "part-time" work. Nichols Jones was previously listed as an aide out of the office, but is now listed as a community liaison.

When Nichols Jones first appeared on Hastings's payroll in 2014, she was paid $15,124.97. Nichols Jones was then given $20,499.96 in 2015. In 2016, her pay rose to $29,208.32. Last year, Nichols Jones received $38,666.66 from Hastings, according to new salary data posted by Legistorm.

Link

Home Front: Culture Wars

The Congressional Racist Caucus

2018-02-09

[Sultan Knish] When Obama met with Farrakhan, it was under the auspices of the Congressional Black Caucus. It wasn't the first or last time that the CBC had been caught in bed with the hate group leader. And CBC members have never been ashamed of their ties to a racist who had praised Hitler as a "great man".

"I’ve been to his home, done meetings, participated in events with him," Rep. Danny Davis declared. "I don’t regard Louis Farrakhan as an aberration or anything, I regard him as an outstanding human being."

The CBC won't sanction Rep. Davis for saying that. In an age when statues are pulled down and classic TV shows are censored, some forms of racism are more equal than others. Not to mention sexism.

The Congressional Black Caucus had a front seat to #MeToo with the revelation that $220,000 had been paid out to a staffer alleging sexual harassment by Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-FL), a former judge impeached for bribery whose girlfriend has been on his payroll to the tune of $2.4 million, and that Rep. Conyers (D-MI) had his own sexual harassment settlement. That scandal forced Rep. Conyers to resign and hand the seat to his son at the behest of his wife, Monica, who had been convicted of bribery.

Corruption, fraud and bribery are ongoing problems at the Congressional Black Caucus.

After two decades of financial scandals, Rep. Corrine Brown (D-FL) was convicted of running a fake charity and sentenced in December. Rep. Chaka Fattah (D-PA) was sentenced last December for bribery, fraud and money laundering. His son, Chaka Fattah Jr, was already in prison on unrelated bank fraud charges. Around the same time the wife of Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Il) had wrapped up her prison sentence after her husband had ended his prison term a year earlier on fraud charges.

Hardly a year goes by without a criminal case involving a member of the Congressional Black Caucus.

A former study suggested that a third of CBC legislators had faced an ethics probe.

That’s what a culture of political corruption looks like.

But the Congressional Black Caucus has consistently blamed all of its corruption troubles on racism. And CBC members would always play the race card. Rep. Corrine Brown had improbably claimed that Obama’s DOJ had targeted her because "I'm a black woman with a mouth."

The Congressional Black Caucus is uniquely destructive to black people and to the entire country. Its corrupt civil rights icons have long since become mirrors of the very thing they once fought against. And their accusations of racism are reflections of their own racism and their own racial privileges.

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-Short Attention Span Theater-

Dem. Congressman With Millions in Legal Bills Demands Pay Raise

2015-05-20

[Washington Free Bacon] A Democratic congressman who still owes millions of dollars in legal bills racked up while fighting corruption allegations said on Monday that members of Congress need a raise in order to cope with the District of Columbia's rising cost of living.

Rep. Alcee Hastings (D., Fla.) said at a Monday Rules Committee hearing that members of Congress, who make an average of $174,000 per year, "aren't being paid properly."
I agree with Alsea on the 'improper' comp. They should ONLY be paid while working on the Hill !
"Members deserve to be paid, staff deserves to be paid and the cost of living here is causing serious problems for people who are not wealthy to serve in this institution," he said.
Pack a sammich, live in Lorton and use the SLUG line.
Observers scoffed at the comments, saying congressional pay and benefits are quite generous.

"Aside from access to subsidized travel, gym memberships, haircuts, and the like, congressmen have a retirement plan which averages about $40,000 a year for retired members," said Ken Boehm, chairman of the National Legal and Policy Center, an ethics watchdog.

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