Post by domeplease on Jan 15, 2019 14:19:28 GMT -5
Yes WE do have a National Emergency = IT IS DONALD!!!
And YES, there is a WALL Situation = The WALLS collapsing on & around Donald & his so-called Empire.
The News just gets Worst by the Day and the Dark Clouds are growing even more over America (Trump Land).
DONALD ARTICLES & RELATED ARTICLES:
--01-15-19 YOU SAID WHAT??? RIGHT, NO RUSSIA COLLUSION: www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/trump-discussed-pulling-us-from-nato-aides-say-amid-new-concerns-over-russia/ar-BBSfY97?ocid=U147DHP
WASHINGTON — There are few things that President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia desires more than the weakening of NATO, the military alliance among the United States, Europe and Canada that has deterred Soviet and Russian aggression for 70 years.
Last year, President Trump suggested a move tantamount to destroying NATO: the withdrawal of the United States.
Senior administration officials told The New York Times that several times over the course of 2018, Mr. Trump privately said he wanted to withdraw from the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
Current and former officials who support the alliance said they feared Mr. Trump could return to his threat as allied military spending continued to lag behind the goals the president had set.
In the days around a tumultuous NATO summit meeting last summer, they said, Mr. Trump told his top national security officials that he did not see the point of the military alliance, which he presented as a drain on the United States.
At the time, Mr. Trump’s national security team, including Jim Mattis, then the defense secretary, and John R. Bolton, the national security adviser, scrambled to keep American strategy on track without mention of a withdrawal that would drastically reduce Washington’s influence in Europe and could embolden Russia for decades.
Now, the president’s repeatedly stated desire to withdraw from NATO is raising new worries among national security officials amid growing concern about Mr. Trump’s efforts to keep his meetings with Mr. Putin secret from even his own aides, and an F.B.I. investigation into the administration’s Russia ties.
A move to withdraw from the alliance, in place since 1949, “would be one of the most damaging things that any president could do to U.S. interests,” said Michèle A. Flournoy, an under secretary of defense under President Barack Obama.
“It would destroy 70-plus years of painstaking work across multiple administrations, Republican and Democratic, to create perhaps the most powerful and advantageous alliance in history,” Ms. Flournoy said in an interview.
“And it would be the wildest success that Vladimir Putin could dream of.”
Retired Adm. James G. Stavridis, the former supreme allied commander of NATO, said an American withdrawal from the alliance would be “a geopolitical mistake of epic proportion.”
“Even discussing the idea of leaving NATO — let alone actually doing so — would be the gift of the century for Putin,” Admiral Stavridis said.
READ MORE…
01-12-19: www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/fbi-opened-inquiry-into-whether-trump-was-secretly-working-on-behalf-of-russia/ar-BBS83LZ?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=U147DHP
WASHINGTON — In the days after President Trump fired James B. Comey as F.B.I. director, law enforcement officials became so concerned by the president’s behavior that they began investigating whether he had been working on behalf of Russia against American interests, according to former law enforcement officials and others familiar with the investigation.
The inquiry carried explosive implications. Counterintelligence investigators had to consider whether the president’s own actions constituted a possible threat to national security.
Agents also sought to determine whether Mr. Trump was knowingly working for Russia or had unwittingly fallen under Moscow’s influence.
The investigation the F.B.I. opened into Mr. Trump also had a criminal aspect, which has long been publicly known: whether his firing of Mr. Comey constituted obstruction of justice.
Agents and senior F.B.I. officials had grown suspicious of Mr. Trump’s ties to Russia during the 2016 campaign but held off on opening an investigation into him, the people said, in part because they were uncertain how to proceed with an inquiry of such sensitivity and magnitude.
But the president’s activities before and after Mr. Comey’s firing in May 2017, particularly two instances in which Mr. Trump tied the Comey dismissal to the Russia investigation, helped prompt the counterintelligence aspect of the inquiry, the people said.
The special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, took over the inquiry into Mr. Trump when he was appointed, days after F.B.I. officials opened it.
That inquiry is part of Mr. Mueller’s broader examination of how Russian operatives interfered in the 2016 election and whether any Trump associates conspired with them.
It is unclear whether Mr. Mueller is still pursuing the counterintelligence matter, and some former law enforcement officials outside the investigation have questioned whether agents overstepped in opening it.
The criminal and counterintelligence elements were coupled together into one investigation, former law enforcement officials said in interviews in recent weeks, because if Mr. Trump had ousted the head of the F.B.I. to impede or even end the Russia investigation, that was both a possible crime and a national security concern.
The F.B.I.’s counterintelligence division handles national security matters.
If the president had fired Mr. Comey to stop the Russia investigation, the action would have been a national security issue because it naturally would have hurt the bureau’s effort to learn how Moscow interfered in the 2016 election and whether any Americans were involved, according to James A. Baker, who served as F.B.I. general counsel until late 2017.
He privately testified in October before House investigators who were examining the F.B.I.’s handling of the full Russia inquiry. READ MORE…
--01-02-19: www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/remember-china-china-china-acting-us-defense-chief/ar-BBRI4ym?li=BBnbfcL&OCID=msnHomepage
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Acting U.S. Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan told civilian leaders of the U.S. military on Wednesday to focus on "China, China, China," even as America fights militants in Syria and Afghanistan, a U.S. defense official said.
The comments came during Shanahan's first meeting with secretaries of the U.S. military branches since taking over for Jim Mattis, who left office on Monday after resigning as defense secretary over policy differences with President Donald Trump.
The U.S. official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, did not elaborate on Shanahan's views on China or what other guidance he gave during the meeting.
Other officials have described Shanahan as an advocate of the Pentagon's toughening stance toward Beijing. The 2018 National Defense Strategy branded China as a strategic competitor.
The Pentagon has said he played a critical role in developing the strategy, which singled out China and Russia as top threats, saying they wanted to "shape a world consistent with their authoritarian model."
The document said: "Long-term strategic competitions with China and Russia are the principal priorities for the Department, and require both increased and sustained investment."
The defense official said Shanahan told Pentagon leadership to follow the document's guidance, particularly regarding China.
"While we're focused on ongoing operations, acting Secretary Shanahan told the team to remember China, China, China," the official said.
Relations between the world’s two largest economies have plumbed new depths under Trump, with a trade war and disagreements over Taiwan and the South China Sea.
Shanahan, a former Boeing executive, had been Mattis' deputy and it was unclear how long he will remain acting secretary. Trump could face an uphill battle finding someone who can be confirmed by the Senate after Mattis' acrimonious departure.
Several candidates long rumored to be interested in the post had indicated in recent days, some publicly, that they did not want to succeed Mattis, who was respected in the Pentagon and enjoyed bipartisan support when he departed on Dec. 31.
Trump acknowledged that Shanahan could be in the job for a long time. The Pentagon appeared to be taking steps to prepare for an extended tenure. This included naming David Norquist, the Pentagon's comptroller, to perform deputy defense secretary duties provisionally as well as retaining his current title.
Shanahan sat next to Trump during a cabinet meeting on Wednesday. In a statement on Tuesday shortly after taking over the job, Shanahan said he looked "forward to working with President Trump to carry out his vision."
That vision includes a surprise withdrawal from Syria and an expected drawdown in Afghanistan, America's longest war. Those decisions ran against Mattis' guidance and were believed to have factored into his resignation.
Shanahan, best known for his focus on internal Pentagon reform and his private-sector experience, had spent three decades at Boeing and was general manager for the 787 Dreamliner passenger jet before he joined the Pentagon last year.
During Shanahan's tense Senate confirmation hearing, the committee's then-chairman, John McCain, voiced deep concern about giving the deputy job to an executive from one of the five corporations accounting for the lion's share of U.S. defense spending.
"I have to have confidence that the fox is not going to be put back into the henhouse," said McCain, who died in August.
The United States is Taiwan's top weapons supplier, something that has long irked China, which claims the self-ruled island as its own.
Earlier on Wednesday, Chinese President Xi Jingping warned that China reserves the right to use force to bring Taiwan under its control but will strive to achieve peaceful "reunification."
--01-06-19: www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/xi-jinping-tells-chinese-army-to-be-ready-for-battle/ar-BBRQL4n?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=U147DHP
Chinese President Xi Jinping ordered the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) to prepare for battle on Friday, as Taiwan’s President Tsai Ing-Wen called for international support to defend the island’s democracy amid renewed threats of unification from the mainland.
Xi’s comments were made during a meeting with top officials from the Central Military Commission (CMC).
“All military units must correctly understand major national security and development trends, and strengthen their sense of unexpected hardship, crisis and battle,” he said, according to the South China Morning Post.
“[China must] prepare for a comprehensive military struggle from a new starting point… Preparation for war and combat must be deepened to ensure an efficient response in times of emergency," Xi said.
The comments come just days after Xi declared that Taiwan is absolutely a part of China, encouraged unification between the two territories and reserved the right to use force to bring the self-ruled island under the mainland's control.
Tsai condemned Xi’s comments and rejected the Chinese President’s “one country, two systems” proposal, telling reporters in Taipei: “We hope that the international community takes it seriously and can voice support and help us.”
If a democratic country under threat does not receive assistance, “we might have to ask which country might be next?” Tsai said.
Last March, Xi Jinping echoed the same sentiment at the National People’s Congress, where he warned Taiwan that those who wish to split China will be “doomed to fail” and will experience “the punishment of history.” READ MORE…
--01-13-19: www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/white-house-sought-options-to-strike-iran/ar-BBSaBnj?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=U147DHP
WASHINGTON—On a warm night in early September, militants fired three mortars into Baghdad’s sprawling diplomatic quarter, home to the U.S. Embassy.
The shells—launched by a group aligned with Iran—landed in an open lot, harming no one. But they triggered unusual alarm in Washington, where President Trump’s national security team conducted a series of meetings to discuss a forceful American response.
As part of the talks, Mr. Trump’s National Security Council, led by John Bolton, asked the Pentagon to provide the White House with military options to strike Iran.
The request, which hasn’t been previously reported, generated concern at the Pentagon and State Department, current and former U.S. officials say.
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“It definitely rattled people,” said one former senior U.S. administration official. “People were shocked. It was mind-boggling how cavalier they were about hitting Iran.”
The Pentagon complied with the National Security Council’s request to develop options for striking Iran, the officials said. But it isn’t clear if the proposals were provided to the White House, whether Mr. Trump knew of the request or whether serious plans for a U.S. strike against Iran took shape at that time.
Garrett Marquis, a spokesman for the National Security Council, said the body “coordinates policy and provides the president with options to anticipate and respond to a variety of threats.”
“We continue to review the status of our personnel following attempted attacks on our embassy in Baghdad and our Basra consulate, and we will consider a full range of options to preserve their safety and our interests,” he said.
Mr. Bolton’s request reflects the administration’s more confrontational approach toward Tehran, one that he has pushed since taking up the post last April.
As national security adviser, Mr. Bolton is charged with providing a range of diplomatic, military and economic advice to the president.
Former U.S. officials said it was unnerving that the National Security Council asked for far-reaching military options to strike Iran in response to attacks that caused little damage and no injuries.
Last year, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis argued against strikes that might hit Russian and Iranian forces when Mr. Trump and his national security team were looking at ways to punish Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for a chemical-weapons attack, according to people familiar with the debate.
Mr. Mattis, who resigned last month amid a dispute with Mr. Trump over the president’s national security decisions, pushed for a more modest response that Mr. Trump eventually embraced.
In talks with other administration officials, Mr. Bolton has made it clear that he personally supports regime change in Iran, a position he aggressively championed before joining the Trump administration, according to people familiar with the discussions.
As a think-tank scholar and Fox News commentator, Mr. Bolton repeatedly urged the U.S. to attack Iran, including in a 2015 New York Times op-ed titled, “To stop Iran’s bomb, bomb Iran.” READ MORE…
--01-13-19: www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-confronts-the-prospect-of-a-%e2%80%98nonstop-political-war%e2%80%99-for-survival/ar-BBSb33j?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=U147DHP LIKE a Trapped/Cornered/Wounded Animal = He MIGHT do something very STUPID & DANGEROUS to all Americans and to the World…
WASHINGTON — So it has come to this: The president of the United States was asked over the weekend whether he is a Russian agent. And he refused to answer.
The question, which came from a friendly interviewer, not one of the “fake media” journalists he disparages, was “the most insulting thing I’ve ever been asked,” he declared. But it is a question that has hung over his presidency now for two years.
Those who thought the now 23-day government shutdown standoff between Mr. Trump and Congress has been ugly have not seen anything yet. The border wall fight is just the preliminary skirmish in this new era of divided government. The real battle has yet to begin.
With Democrats now in charge of the House, the special counsel believed to be wrapping up his investigation, media outlets competing for scoops and the first articles of impeachment already filed, Mr. Trump faces the prospect of an all-out political war for survival that may make the still-unresolved partial government shutdown pale by comparison.
The last few days have offered plenty of foreshadowing. The newly empowered Democrats summoned the president’s longtime personal lawyer to testify after he implicated Mr. Trump in an illegal scheme to arrange hush payments before the 2016 election for women who claimed to have had affairs with him. Legal papers disclosed that Mr. Trump’s onetime campaign chairman shared polling data with an associate tied by prosecutors to Russian intelligence.
New reports over the weekend added to the sense of siege at the White House. The New York Times reported that after Mr. Trump fired the F.B.I. director, James B. Comey, in 2017, the bureau opened an investigation into whether the president was working for the Russians.
And The Washington Post reported that Mr. Trump has gone out of his way as president to hide the details of his discussions with President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia even from members of his own administration.
What all this adds up to remains unclear. Whether it will actually lead to a full-blown impeachment inquiry in the House has yet to be decided.
But it underscores the chance that with candidates already lining up to take him on in 2020, Washington will spend the months to come debating the future of Mr. Trump’s presidency and the direction of the country.
“The reality,” said Andy Surabian, a Republican strategist and former special assistant to Mr. Trump, is “that the next two years are going to be nonstop political war.”
The White House has begun recruiting soldiers. The new White House counsel, Pat Cipollone, has hired 17 new lawyers, according to The Post, as he prepares for a barrage of subpoenas from House Democratic committee chairmen.
But Mr. Trump’s inner circle has shrunk, and he has fewer advisers around him whom he trusts. His White House chief of staff is still serving in an acting capacity, and the West Wing is depleted by the shutdown.
As he himself wrote on Twitter this weekend, “There’s almost nobody in the W.H. but me.”
Mr. Surabian said the rest of the party must recognize the threat and rally behind the president. “Republicans need to understand that Democrats in Congress, beholden to the ‘resistance,’ aren’t interested in bipartisanship, they’re out for blood,” he said. “It’s a war we can win,” he added, “but only with fortitude, unity, coherent messaging and a willingness to fight back.”
Democrats, for their part, insist they are out for accountability, not blood, intent on forcing a president who went largely unchecked by a Republican Congress during his first two years in office to come clean on the many scandals that have erupted involving his business, taxes, campaign and administration.
They plan to get started in the coming days. On Tuesday, they will grill former Attorney General William P. Barr, who has been nominated by Mr. Trump to assume his old office again, about his approach to the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III. Mr. Barr wrote a private memo last year criticizing Mr. Mueller’s investigation, and Democrats will use his confirmation hearings to press him on whether the special counsel will be allowed to finish his work and report it to Congress.
Senator Chuck Schumer of New York, the Democratic minority leader, also plans to force a vote in the Senate this week on the Trump administration’s plans to lifts sanctions on the companies of Oleg V. Deripaska, a Russian oligarch close to Mr. Putin’s government, if he reduces his ownership stakes. Democrats plan to use the issue to argue that Mr. Trump has been soft on Russia.
Even committees that are not usually in the investigation business are jumping into the fray. Representative Eliot L. Engel, Democrat of New York and the new chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told The New Yorker last week that he was eliminating the subcommittee on terrorism in favor of a subcommittee aimed at investigating Mr. Trump’s foreign policy.
Lost in all this may be any chance of bipartisan policymaking. At stake in the current fight is just $5.7 billion for Mr. Trump’s promised border wall, roughly one-eighth of one percent of the total federal budget.
If one-eighth of one percent of the total budget can prompt the longest government shutdown in American history, then the potential for further clashes over the remaining 99.87 percent seems considerable. On issues like health care, taxes, climate change, guns and national security, the two sides start this era of divided government far apart.
“That’s the flashing yellow light here,” said Mayor Rahm Emanuel of Chicago, a former top White House aide to Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama.
“If you can’t do Government 101, what makes you think you’re going to do Advanced Placement Government like finding the money for an infrastructure bill?”
Julian Epstein, who was the counsel for Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee during Mr. Clinton’s impeachment fight 20 years ago, said big issues like a shrinking middle class largely untrained for the 21st-century economy would go unaddressed during the battles to come.
“The political class is now addicted to Manichaean conflict as a way of life,” Mr. Epstein said. “It’s become the mother’s milk — for base voters in both parties who together make up a minority share of voters, for cable television and for social media.”
Given the investigations, Mr. Trump may prefer a battle over the border wall as more favorable ground to fight even with 800,000 federal workers furloughed or forced to work without pay. Polls suggest he is not winning with the broader public but has rallied his base behind him in the fight.
More Americans blame Mr. Trump for the government shutdown than blame Democrats, and most oppose a border wall, according to a new survey by The Post and ABC News. READ MORE…
01-14-19: www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/donald-trump-lashed-out-at-mick-mulvaney-during-shutdown-meeting-with-democrats/ar-BBScVpX?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=U147DHP Donald, as we have ALL seen/heard eats his own…
President Donald Trump lashed out at acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney during a Situation Room meeting with Democrats, including House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, earlier this month, a White House official said Sunday.
According to the official, Trump cut Mulvaney off toward the end of an unproductive meeting on re-opening the federal government, as Mulvaney was attempting to negotiate up from the $1.3 billion Democrats offered the White House.
"Stop, stop, just stop -- What are you doing? You're f***ing it all up, Mick," Trump said, according to the official who was in the room for the negotiations.
The interaction was first reported by Axios.
According to the source, there was "shockingly no reaction at all" in the room.
"It was so awkward, I was looking down, like I couldn't watch," said the source. READ MORE…
--01-13-19: www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/trump-has-concealed-details-of-his-face-to-face-encounters-with-putin-from-senior-officials-in-administration/ar-BBS9Mky?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=U147DHP THIS IS VERY TROUBLING...
President Trump has gone to extraordinary lengths to conceal details of his conversations with Russian President Vladimir Putin, including on at least one occasion taking possession of the notes of his own interpreter and instructing the linguist not to discuss what had transpired with other administration officials, current and former U.S. officials said.
Trump did so after a meeting with Putin in 2017 in Hamburg that was also attended by then-Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. U.S. officials learned of Trump’s actions when a White House adviser and a senior State Department official sought information from the interpreter beyond a readout shared by Tillerson.
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The constraints that Trump imposed are part of a broader pattern by the president of shielding his communications with Putin from public scrutiny and preventing even high-ranking officials in his own administration from fully knowing what he has told one of the United States’ main adversaries.
As a result, U.S. officials said there is no detailed record, even in classified files, of Trump’s face-to-face interactions with the Russian leader at five locations over the past two years.
Such a gap would be unusual in any presidency, let alone one that Russia sought to install through what U.S. intelligence agencies have described as an unprecedented campaign of election interference.
Special counsel Robert S. Mueller III is thought to be in the final stages of an investigation that has focused largely on whether Trump or his associates conspired with Russia during the 2016 presidential campaign.
The new details about Trump’s continued secrecy underscore the extent to which little is known about his communications with Putin since becoming president. PLEASE READ…
--01-05-19: www.msn.com/en-us/news/factcheck/ap-fact-check-trumps-super-talkative-fact-busting-week/ar-BBRPxsq?li=BBnbfcL&ocid=U147DHP Donald Lies & Lies; then he even LIES MORE…
WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump held forth on all manner of things this past week as he emerged from a "lonely" spell over the holidays.
He opined for more than 90 minutes to the press, at the top of a Cabinet meeting, on the shutdown, immigration, drug prices, the Soviet history in Afghanistan, his approval ratings, Syria, oil prices, the nature of walls, the attractiveness of his generals ("better looking than Tom Cruise"), and much more.
He capped the week with a Rose Garden news conference that stretched for an hour. And he's been tweeting a lot.
Trump's accounts did not show tremendous fealty to the facts. Here's a sampling of what he said:
THE WALL
TRUMP: "We've already built a lot of the wall." — Rose Garden news conference Friday.
THE FACTS: He hasn't.
Trump's claim is only supported when counting work done under past presidents and ignoring the fact that fences from prior administrations are not the towering walls he promised.
The 2006 Secure Fence Act has resulted in about 650 miles (1,050 kilometers) of border barrier. Money approved by Congress in March 2018 is to pay for 84 miles (135 km), but that work is not done. Trump has achieved some renovation of existing barrier.
TRUMP: "The drugs are pouring into this country. They don't go through the ports of entry. When they do, they sometimes get caught." — Rose Garden news conference.
THE FACTS: He's wrong in saying drug smugglers don't or only rarely use official border crossings for their trafficking. Land ports of entry are their primary means for getting drugs into the country, not stretches of the border without barriers, says the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.
The agency said in a November report that the most common trafficking technique by transnational criminal organizations is to hide drugs in passenger vehicles or tractor-trailers as they drive into the U.S. though entry ports, where they are stopped and subject to inspection.
They also employ buses, cargo trains and tunnels, the report says, citing smuggling methods that would not be choked off by a border wall.
TRUMP: "The new trade deal we have with Mexico and Canada — what we save on that, just with Mexico, will pay for the wall many times over, just in a period of a year, two years or three years. So I view that as absolutely Mexico is paying for the wall." — Rose Garden news conference.
THE FACTS: Mexico is not paying for the wall and nothing in the trade agreement would cover or refund the construction cost.
Trump is assuming a wide variety of economic benefits will come from the agreement, but they can't be quantified or counted on. For example, he said the deal will dissuade some U.S. companies from moving operations to Mexico and he credits that possibility as a payment by Mexico for his wall.
The deal updates the North American Free Trade Agreement, in the main preserving NAFTA's liberalized environment of low or no tariffs among the U.S., Mexico and Canada, while making certain improvements for each country. Trump stated inaccurately that it's "brand new. It's totally different."
Moreover, it's not in effect. The deal has yet to be ratified in any member country and its chances of winning legislative approval are not assured.
Trump has argued repeatedly that Mexico is footing the bill even while insisting on $5.6 billion from the U.S. treasury to go toward wall construction. His demand and the refusal of Democrats to satisfy it are behind the budget standoff that has closed parts of the government.
SYRIA
TRUMP: "We had a fantastic meeting with the generals and the Syria situation. I mean, I'm the only person in the history of our country that could really decimate ISIS, say we're bringing the troops back home over a period of time. I never said so quickly, but over a period of time." — Cabinet meeting Wednesday.
THE FACTS: He's wrong about his past statements regarding the pace of withdrawal. In a video posted to his Twitter account on Dec. 19, for instance, Trump said of the roughly 2,000 troops in Syria: "They're all coming back, and they're coming back now."
TRUMP: "I read, when we pull out, 'Oh, Russia is thrilled.' Russia is not happy. You know why they're not happy? Because they like it when we're killing ISIS, because we're killing them for them, and we're killing them for Assad, and we're killing ISIS also for Iran." — Cabinet meeting.
THE FACTS: Russia says it's happy. A U.S. withdrawal opens opportunities for Moscow and Tehran to increase their influence and may help the Syrian government survive as a Kurdish-led opposition force loses its military ally on the ground.
Russian President Vladimir Putin says the U.S. "has done the right thing" in planning to pull out.
AFGHANISTAN
TRUMP: "The reason Russia was in Afghanistan was because terrorists were going into Russia. They (the Soviets) were right to be there." — Cabinet meeting.
THE FACTS: His assertion that the Soviet Union was experiencing a terrorist influx from Afghanistan when it invaded in 1979 is out of step with history. And his belief that the Soviets were right to invade is a stark departure from U.S. and world opinion.
The Soviets were trying to bolster communists in Afghanistan and possibly expand their influence against the United States and the West.
World condemnation was swift: The U.N. General Assembly voted 104-18 to deplore the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan. The U.S. supported the anti-communist rebels, giving them shoulder-fired rockets to down Soviet aircraft. The Soviets withdrew in 1989.
TRUMP: "Russia used to be the Soviet Union. Afghanistan made it Russia, because they went bankrupt fighting in Afghanistan." — Cabinet meeting.
THE FACTS: Afghanistan was far from the sole reason for the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991. The dissolution occurred in a time of ethnic and political troubles, economic woes and a series of revolutions that led Soviet republics to seek their independence.
The Soviet demise was accelerated by the heavy cost of competing with the West to wield influence around the world, including in Afghanistan.
OIL PRICES
TRUMP: "Do you think it's just luck that gas prices are so low, and falling? Low gas prices are like another Tax Cut!" — tweet Tuesday.
TRUMP: "It's not luck. It's not luck. I called up certain people, and I said, 'Let that damn oil and gasoline — you let it flow — the oil.' It was going up to $125. If that would've happened, then you would've had a recession, depression." — Cabinet meeting Wednesday.
THE FACTS: It's not all about him, or even mostly about him.
While Americans may end up paying somewhat less for gasoline this year, Trump's suggestion that he deserves all the credit and averted a U.S. economic depression is an exaggeration.
Oil prices, which peaked Oct. 3, have been generally falling on the realization that U.S. sanctions against Iran would not create a shortage and on fear that a global oversupply of oil will spill into 2019 if slower international economic growth depresses energy demand.
The president's supposed "let it flow" edict did not stop OPEC and its Russia-led allies from agreeing last month to cut oil production. That initially failed to stop oil prices from sliding further; they have since rebounded a few dollars in the past week. Continued OPEC production cuts would push prices higher.
Trump has pointed to his positive relations with Saudi Arabia, which remains the biggest oil exporter.
As a so-called swing producer with the ability to adjust production up or down relatively quickly, it can indeed influence the price of crude.
But the market is complex: Canada, for example, is actually the top source of U.S. oil imports, with Saudi Arabia second.
TARIFFS
TRUMP: "The United States Treasury has taken in MANY billions of dollars from the Tariffs we are charging China and other countries that have not treated us fairly. In the meantime we are doing well in various Trade Negotiations currently going on." — tweet Thursday.
THE FACTS: Trump is off on two major issues. First, tariffs are taxes paid largely by U.S. business and consumers, not foreign countries.
And while Trump's "MANY billions" might sound like a lot, it's doing little to nothing to improve the federal balance sheet. The U.S. government spent $4.1 trillion last fiscal year and the budget deficit shot up, according to Trump's own Treasury Department.
Customs and duties generated $41.3 billion in revenues last year, up from $34.6 billion in 2017.
That $6.7 billion increase occurred in part because of the president's tariffs. But it amounted to just 0.16 percent of federal spending.
MATTIS
TRUMP, on Jim Mattis: "I wish him well. I hope he does well. But, as you know, President (Barack) Obama fired him and essentially so did I. I want results." — Cabinet meeting Wednesday.
THE FACTS: Actually, Mattis resigned as defense secretary in protest over Trump's decision to pull U.S. troops from Syria.
The retired Marine general announced on Dec. 20 in a resignation letter that he was stepping down after Trump's decision to withdraw 2,000 U.S. troops from Syria. Mattis said he would stay on the job until the end of February.
Three days later, Trump said he was replacing Mattis with the second-ranking defense official, Pat Shanahan, on Jan. 1.
As to the tenure under Obama, Mattis served as commander of the military's Central Command. He departed a few months earlier than expected in 2013, in part because of disagreements over Iran.
DRUG PRICES
TRUMP: "I think you're going to see a tremendous reduction in drug prices." — Cabinet meeting Wednesday.
THE FACTS: Prices continue to rise. Administration policies announced last year and currently being completed don't seem to have shifted that trend.
Figures on U.S. prescription drug price changes compiled by health data company Elsevier show that from Dec. 20 through Jan. 2, there were 1,179 product price changes.
Of those, 30 were price cuts and the remaining 1,149 were price increases, with 328 of them between 9 percent and 10 percent. All but one of the rest were by lower percentages. Elsevier spokesman Chris Capot said more companies will be announcing price increases this month.
Separately, a data firm whose software can help patients find the most cost-effective medications says its information shows price increases on many commonly used drugs for conditions such as high blood pressure and diabetes.
"In the first two days of January, prices have increased on more than 250 different products," said Michael Rea, CEO of Rx Savings Solutions. The average increase is about 6 percent, he added.
IMMIGRATION
TRUMP, on the number of immigrants living in the U.S. illegally: "I used to hear 11 million all the time. It would always stay right at 11. I said, 'Does it ever increase or go down?' 'No, it's 11.' Nobody knows.
It's probably 30, 35 million people. They would flow in, mostly from the southern border, they'd come in and nobody would talk about it, nobody would do anything about it." — Cabinet meeting Wednesday.
THE FACTS: It's nowhere close to 30 million to 35 million, according to his own Homeland Security secretary as well as independent estimates.
The nonpartisan Pew Research Center estimates there were 10.7 million immigrants in the U.S. illegally in 2016, the most recent data available. Advocacy groups on both sides of the immigration issue have similar estimates.
At a House hearing last month, Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen acknowledged the number was "somewhere" between 11 million and 22 million, significantly lower than Trump's claim of 35 million.
According to Pew, the number of immigrants in the U.S. illegally had reached a height of 12.2 million in 2007, representing about 4 percent of the U.S. population, before declining in part because of a weakening U.S. economy.
TRUMP: "The coyotes are using children to gain access into this country. They're using these children. They're not with families. They're using the children. They're taking the children. And then they dispose of the children after they're done. This has been going on for years. This isn't unique to us. But we want to stop it." — Cabinet meeting Wednesday.
THE FACTS: This does happen, though it's not as common as Trump suggests by talking about it so often.
He is referring to adults who come with children they falsely claim to be theirs, so that they won't be detained under a no-child-separation policy.
But such cases of fraud are rare. According to the Homeland Security Department, about 500 immigrants were found to be not a "legitimate family unit" and thus separated upon detention from April 19 to Sept. 30 of last year.
That's a small fraction of the 107,000 families apprehended in the last budget year, which ended Sept. 30. READ MORE…
AND MORE LIES: 01-08-19: www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/all-living-former-presidents-refute-trumps-claim-they-privately-voiced-support-for-border-wall/ar-BBRWzur?li=BBnbfcL&ocid=U147DHP
All four living ex-presidents have publicly rebuffed President Trump’s claim that they privately gushed about the need for a massive wall on the U.S.-Mexico border.
Trump made the questionable remark during a raucous press conference in the White House Rose Garden on Friday while defending his refusing to reopen the government without Congress first earmarking at least $5 billion for a behemoth barrier on the border.
“This should have been done by all of the presidents that preceded me and they all know it," Trump said of his wall obsession. "Some of them have told me that we should have done it.”
Angel Urena, a spokesman for Bill Clinton, quickly came out affirming the 42nd President had never told Trump anything to that effect. “In fact, they’ve not talked since the inauguration,” Urena said.
Freddy Ford, a spokesman for George W. Bush, followed suit and said the former President had never discussed such a thing with Trump.
Finally, former President Jimmy Carter came out Monday rejecting Trump’s claim.
“I have not discussed the border wall with President Trump, and do not support him on the issue,” Carter said in a statement.
--01-13-19: www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/congress-now-eyeing-the-other-trump-tower-once-planned-for-russia/ar-BBSaJht?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=U147DHP
WASHINGTON — Before Donald Trump's lawyer was pitching the Kremlin on building a Trump Tower in Moscow, the future president was negotiating to put his name on a building in a separate glitzy real estate development outside the Russian capital.
The Russians dubbed the proposed suburban development "Manhattan," and a "Trump Tower" would have been its centerpiece, according to congressional testimony and news reports.
Trump's partner in this earlier project was Aras Agalarov, an oligarch with close ties to Russian President Vladimir Putin, and the same man whose promise of dirt on Hillary Clinton set in motion the infamous June 2016 meeting at the original Trump Tower in New York.
Two Congressional aides told NBC News the Agalarov project is now drawing new scrutiny from House and Senate investigators in the wake of the revelation in court documents that Trump lawyer Michael Cohen lied to Congress about his dealings on a separate, competing Russia real estate project. Cohen was also negotiating to build a Trump Tower in a separate part of the city.
The Trump Organization asked for written questions and did not respond to them. A lawyer for the Agalarovs, Scott Balber, said it was misleading to suggest that Aras Agalarov is close to Putin, but he declined to respond to specific questions.
Trump's interest in the Agalarov proposal, which he and Agalarov began considering shortly after the men met at the Miss Universe Pageant in Moscow in 2013, reinforces the extent to which he repeatedly sought a business deal in Putin's Russia, despite his protestations during the 2016 election campaign that he had "nothing to do with Russia."
"For the record, I have ZERO investments in Russia," Trump tweeted in July 2016.
It wasn't for lack of trying. The Agalarov deal was one of five ultimately unsuccessful efforts to put the Trump name on a building in Russia, dating back to his first trip there in 1987, as he laid out in his memoir, "The Art of the Deal."
A second attempt in 1996 fizzled, as did a 2005 plan with Felix Sater, the same Russian-born businessman who partnered with Cohen in another attempt in 2015 — one that wasn't abandoned until Trump had all but secured the Republican nomination for president. READ MORE…
--01-13-19: www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/manafort-developments-trigger-new-%e2%80%98collusion%e2%80%99-debate/ar-BBSaRBD?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=U147DHP
The revelation that President Trump's former campaign chairman Paul Manafort allegedly shared polling data with a Russian suspected of ties to Kremlin intelligence during the 2016 presidential race has triggered fresh debate about "collusion" in Washington.
Democrats on Capitol Hill see the detail as perhaps the starkest signal yet that the Trump campaign may have coordinated with Moscow to interfere in the election.
But their Republican counterparts, along with the president's attorney, say that's not the case.
"If sharing polling data with your former partner in political races in the Ukraine is collusion, then I guess it is. I don't perceive it as collusion," Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), the chair of the Senate Intelligence Committee leading the Russia investigation in the upper chamber, told The Hill.
Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani in an interview with The Hill dismissed the sharing of the polling information.
"Should he have done it? No. But there's nothing criminal about it," Giuliani said.
Still, the revelation, coupled with new details about a Kremlin-linked lawyer who met with the campaign at Trump Tower during the heat of the presidential race, has raised new questions about the Trump team's links to Russia.
And it has left many wondering what may have been done with the data, which Manafort allegedly handed over to his former business associate, Konstantin Kilimnik, amid a burgeoning effort by the Russian government to use hacking and social media to meddle in the presidential vote with the aim of tipping it in favor of Trump over Hillary Clinton.
Manafort's defense attorneys inadvertently disclosed in a court filing Tuesday that special counsel Robert Mueller had accused their client of lying about sharing polling data with Kilimnik "related to the 2016 presidential campaign."
They appeared to acknowledge that the interaction occurred but contested the notion that Manafort lied about it, noting he "was unable to recall specific details" before having his "recollection refreshed" by the special counsel.
The New York Times subsequently reported that Manafort and Rick Gates, his former business partner, sent the data to Kilimnik in spring 2016 and directed him to give it to two Ukrainian oligarchs, Serhiy Lyovochkin and Rinat Akhmetov. A spokesman for Manafort declined to comment on the Times report.
It remains unclear what was behind the transfer or what Kilimnik may have done with the information, but it has raised accusations from Democrats.
"Clearly, Manafort was trying to collude with Russian agents and the question is, what did the president know?" Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, said on CNN.
"What did Donald Trump know about this exchange of information? Did the Russians end up using this information in their efforts that took place later in the fall?"
--01-09-19: www.msn.com/en-us/news/opinion/trump-has-defeated-himself/ar-BBRZJxQ?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=U147DHP
Well, that was the shortest, most easily resolved national emergency in U.S. history. Twelve hours ago, the president was preparing to set aside the regular process of law. By 9 p.m. Eastern Time? Not so much.
Perhaps somebody pointed out that 15-year-long civil-engineering projects do not look very convincingly like emergency measures. “My house is burning!
Time to begin the process of calling for design proposals for a new fire station.”
President Trump is about to discover the reverse side of Richard Neustadt’s famous observation that the most important presidential power is the power to persuade.
Trump’s conduct as candidate and president long ago deprived him of any power to persuade anyone not already predisposed to support him.
To date, Trump has governed by leveraging his high approval rating within the Republican Party. From the point of view of former Speaker Paul Ryan and Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, Trump’s 90 percent approval rating among Republicans mattered a lot more than his 39 percent approval among Americans in general.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is not susceptible to that “majority of the minority” logic. What she has to worry about is Trump’s strength among Democratic-leaning voters. That strength, Trump squandered long ago.
There is a real immigration problem on the border. Central American migrants have figured out that by showing up at the border in family units, they will be admitted into the country pending the adjudication of an asylum claim.
The asylum system is overwhelmed, adjudications take months or years—and long before then, the would-be migrants can vanish into the U.S. labor market. Few Central Americans prevail in their asylum claims. Almost all end up staying, anyway.
The solution to that problem is not a lengthy process of design, tendering, land expropriation, grading, and construction. The solution is to get more adjudicators into the asylum system now.
If cases are resolved fast, and border-crossers removed promptly, the surge of asylum seekers will abate, as it abated in 2015 after the Obama administration cracked down on the 2014 Central American border surge.
But Trump has never wanted a solution. He has wanted a divisive issue and a personal monument. Futile though that monument may be, he could have gotten it, too, had he been willing to trade something attractive to Democrats.
But Trump was never willing to bargain. Senate Republicans would not let him: They saw no point in the border wall and were unwilling to barter for it.
More fatefully though, Trump’s vision of leadership allows no room for bartering. He imagines the presidency to operate on the principle: “I command, you obey.”
More even than his wall, he wanted to coerce the Democrats into a surrender by the sheer force of his mighty will. Except Trump did not have the clout to achieve that.
“Leverage: don’t make deals without it.” The words appeared under Donald Trump’s byline on page 55 of the 1987 bestseller, The Art of the Deal. Trump did not write them, and he seems not to have understood how to apply them.
In this budget shutdown, Trump discarded his leverage from the very start, by declaring for the cameras that the budget shutdown was his decision, his responsibility.
When the shutdown began to hurt, Trump and his surrogates hastily tried to transfer the onus—but it was too late. Everybody knew it was Trump’s doing, and that it was done for reasons rejected by large majorities of Americans.
The idea of invoking “emergency powers” was a last grasp for the leverage Trump had already abdicated, and it had to be abandoned for fear of what the courts and public opinion would say.
After the January 8 Oval Office address, there remains little doubt how this shutdown will end. Sooner or later—probably sooner—it will end the way Trump’s threats of nuclear war upon North Korea ended: with a sudden Trump about-face. It is now only a matter of time. The polls will arrive over the next hours.
Democrats and Republicans will both see that Trump did not move public opinion in his favor. They may see that Trump could not even motivate very many Americans to watch him.
The panic slowly building among congressional Republicans will boil. Trump, trapped without a decent exit in a predicament of his own making, will yield everything and get nothing.
Trump will cope by locking himself into the Fox News closed-feedback system of flattering disinformation, emerging only to emit enraged tweets pretending he won big and denouncing the media for reporting otherwise.
He may even convince himself to believe it. His political allies will repeat it without believing it.
But he will have lost. Lost humiliatingly.
And he will have done it almost entirely to himself, before the amazed eyes of the opponents who, dumbfounded, watched him do it to himself, without a plan or even much of a reason, other than the empty and fleeting joy of feeling briefly powerful by inflicting pain.
--01-04-18: www.msn.com/en-us/money/markets/us-national-debt-reaches-a-new-high-under-trump/ar-BBRLPHW
The US national debt stood at $21.974 trillion at the end of 2018, more than $2 trillion higher than when President Donald Trump took office, according to numbers released Thursday by the Treasury Department.
The national debt has been rising at an accelerated rate in the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis, when Congress and the Obama administration approved stimulus funding in order to keep the economy afloat.
The debt began to level off at the beginning of Trump's term, but bounced up again last year as the tax cuts passed at the end of 2017 took effect and the dramatically lower corporate tax rate lowered Treasury revenues.
As a candidate, Trump promised to "get rid of" the national debt, telling the Washington Post in 2016 that he could make the US debt-free "over a period of eight years."
According to the Congressional Budget Office, total public debt stood at 78% of America's gross domestic product in fiscal year 2018, the highest percentage since 1950.
The deficit -- or the difference between what the government spends and what it takes in over any one year -- jumped to 3.8% of GDP in 2018, up from 3.5% in 2017.
That's particularly unusual in such a strong economy without major new expenditures. If no changes are made, the CBO projects that public debt will rise to 96% of GDP by 2028.
A big chunk of that -- $1.9 trillion between 2018 and 2028 -- will be due to the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, the CBO reported last April.
Asked about the rising debt on Thursday morning, Council of Economic Advisers chairman Kevin Hassett said Trump is "absolutely" concerned about it, which is why he demanded a 5% budget cut from each Cabinet agency for the coming budget cycle.
"We can disagree about a lot of things but we can agree maybe now is the time to get serious about the deficit," Hassett said.
A congressionally-imposed cap on national debt kicks back in on March 2. According to an analysis by the Bipartisan Policy Center, the Treasury will be able to finance the government's operations until at least mid-summer by moving money around from different pots.
01-09-19: www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/house-dems-to-subpoena-donald-trump-jr-first-in-russia-probe/ar-BBS0YiH?li=BBnbfcL&ocid=U147DHP
House Democrats probing allegations that the Trump presidential campaign worked with Russian operatives to win the 2016 election plan to issue their first subpoena to Donald Trump Jr., according to a top lawmaker.
Rep. Jackie Speier, a key member of the House Intelligence Committee, asked Tuesday night about who would be served first by the panel as it reopens the investigation, said, “Donald Trump Jr.”
Democrats on the panel, headed by Chairman Adam Schiff, have long questioned a report written by the previous GOP majority on the affair and believe that those who testified in private, including the president’s son, were not forthcoming.
“There are a number of persons that testified before the committee that I feel were not telling the truth,” said Speier, addressing the Women’s National Democratic Club in Washington.
Trump critics and special counsel Robert Mueller have focused on a 2016 meeting in New York’s Trump Tower, the president’s campaign and business headquarters, between Donald Trump Jr. and others, including a Russian-linked lawyer.
In a Senate meeting, Trump said the gathering was innocent and rejected charges of colluding with Russians to undermine Hillary Rodham Clinton’s campaign.
A House report on the affair also cleared Donald Trump Jr., who has steadfastly denied any charges of collusion with Russians.
But House Democrats want to go over that territory again. House Judiciary Committee Democrats also plan to play a role.
The lawmaker called the GOP report a whitewash and said the panel will subpoena key documents.
"Those documents were never subpoenaed by the Republicans and so they were able to just produce a whitewashed report that probably was written by someone on the presidential staff. I think it was truly a disturbing series of events over the last two years," she said.
Speier, who was promoting her life story in "Undaunted: Surviving Jonestown, Summoning Courage, and Fighting Back," said when she left one closed-door hearing on the affair a staffer told her, “They’re all lying.” READ MORE…
01-07-19: www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-01-05/mcconnell-hunkers-down-on-the-sidelines-as-shutdown-grinds-on?srnd=premium
Mitch McConnell, Senate majority leader and master legislative tactician, has retreated to the sidelines in the shutdown fight.
With the government closure entering its third week, the Kentucky Republican has made himself mostly a bystander to a scrum between President Donald Trump and the two congressional Democratic leaders, Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
At the conclusion of a White House meeting on Friday, Schumer and Pelosi went in front of cameras outside. Trump set up a Rose Garden news conference with the two top Republicans in the House, Kevin McCarthy and Steve Scalise, at his side. McConnell headed back to the Capitol.
He’s caught between Trump’s popularity among Republican voters -- McConnell himself is running for re-election next year in a state where Trump is popular -- and Democrats’ just-say-no strategy on the president’s signature border wall. It’s a political dilemma that Democrats have been happy to exploit.
"Why is Leader McConnell shuffling off to the sidelines, pointing his fingers at everyone else and saying he won’t be involved? Probably because he realizes this president, President Trump, is erratic, unreliable, and sometimes irrational," Schumer said on Friday. "America needs Leader McConnell to get involved to stop this shutdown."
Cracks in the Ranks
Schumer noted that McConnell is facing cracks in his own ranks. Colorado Republican Cory Gardner, also facing re-election in 2020, has called for votes on legislation to reopen the government while border talks continue.
McConnell’s spokesman said staff members will continue talks and that the majority leader has addressed his role in the negotiations in public remarks.
This wasn’t McConnell’s plan.
He had hoped to end last year with a deal on spending bills and a host of new federal judges. He openly mocked the idea of shutting down the government as a tried-and-failed strategy.
He ended up with no new judges and a government shutdown on his watch that he now concedes could linger on for weeks.
McConnell had a deal to keep the government open. After getting positive signals from the White House, he shepherded through the Senate stopgap legislation to keep the government open through Feb. 8, deferring a battle over funding for the border wall Trump wants. READ MORE…
01-09-19 AWFUL: www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/president-trump-says-hes-cutting-off-fema-money-for-california-fires/ar-BBS15Z2?li=BBnb4R7&ocid=U147DHP This Shows how MUCH Donald LIES and how Stupid he is = The majority of Forrest in California is on Federal Property = The Feds are responsible for Forrest Mgt. on Fedral Property
Go to your search engines and pull up a Blue/Red Map of California and you will see that the Majority of recent fires in California have occurred in RED AREAS = So he is Punishing/Hurting his OWN Voters.
No Surprise = For Donald is a Bully & a Bully likes hurting People, it doesn’t mind whom he hurts…
WASHINGTON – President Donald Trump said in a Wednesday tweet that he is cutting off federal money to fight California wildfires, claiming the money is being wasted.
"Billions of dollars are sent to the State of California for Forrest fires that, with proper Forrest Management, would never happen," Trump said. "Unless they get their act together, which is unlikely, I have ordered FEMA to send no more money. It is a disgraceful situation in lives & money!"
It's unclear whether Trump has already ordered the Federal Emergency Management Agency to cut off money for California fires or is threatening to do so as he has in the past.
Critics on Twitter questioned whether Trump could legally withhold FEMA money that has already been appropriated.
State officials have accused Trump of playing politics with the California wildfires, and said he does not understand the issues involved in fighting fires.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who has criticized Trump over firefighting policy, tweeted after the president's shutdown speech on Tuesday that "Trump's go-to is governing by fear and division."
Trump's declaration comes as he takes political heat over the ongoing partial government shutdown, which affects some of FEMA's operations.
In an initial post, the president misspelled the word "Forrest," He later tweeted the same message with the correct spelling of "forest."
Trump has been known to declare sudden policy decisions, only to change or modify them in subsequent days. Examples include the now-slowed-down withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria. READ MORE…AND 01-10-19: www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/trump-blames-california-for-wildfires-but-many-of-the-worst-have-been-on-federal-land/ar-BBS2ui6?ocid=U147DHP
--01-07-19: us.cnn.com/2019/01/07/politics/pennsylvania-coal-plants-weir-wxc/index.html
Monongahela, Pennsylvania (CNN) — It sits on the banks of the Monongahela River like a monstrous monument to extinction.
With no fire in its belly and no smoke in its stacks, the rusting power plant provides only one sign of its former inhabitants, scribbled on a white board in a padlocked guard booth.
"RIP Mitchell," the handwriting reads. "You gave us a good few years."
The Mitchell Power Station, just south of Pittsburgh, actually turned Pennsylvania coal into power for a good 65 years before the discovery of cheaper, cleaner forms of energy.
As fracked natural gas and renewables like wind and solar undercut the price of coal, both Mitchell and the nearby Hatfield's Ferry power plants were deactivated on the same day in 2013.
Many in this corner of coal country blamed Obama-era regulations on their demise, so when a candidate named Donald Trump promised to end a so-called "war on coal," they were ready to believe.
"We are putting our great coal miners back to work," he repeated to rally crowds waving "Trump Digs Coal" signs. "I'm coal's last shot."
Then-candidate Donald Trump pledged to help coal miners in 2016.
But thanks largely to free-market forces, more coal-fired power plants have been deactivated in Trump's first two years in office then in Obama's entire first term.
When asked about the President's claim to be the savior of coal, veteran miner and industry consultant Art Sullivan bristles.
"He's trying to get their votes," he says, standing by the fenced-off entrance to a mine not far from Mitchell where he once served as Face Boss, a coal industry term for managers. "He's lying to them."
Former miner and now mining consultant Art Sullivan says coal miners have the ability to transfer to other fields.
For 52 years, Sullivan worked in mines around the world and, like many in western Pennsylvania, he remembers Hillary Clinton's 2016 Ohio town hall where she said, "We're going to put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business."
In her book "What Happened," Clinton devoted an entire chapter to the gaffe, which eclipsed her early campaign promise to provide a $30 billion aid package to struggling coal communities.
Sullivan had his own thoughts. "What you need to say to coal miners is 'We're going to figure out a way to give you better, safer, healthier jobs.' These guys and the few gals are simply too good. They are too capable to simply say that we don't need you," he said.
Looking for a cure
Energy plants are increasingly powered by cheaper and cleaner alternatives to coal.
"They wanted hope," Blair Zimmerman says of his fellow miners in Greene County, Pennsylvania, who put their faith in Trump.
"If someone that has a sickness or a cancer and the doctor says 'I can cure that,' they believe ... I can't blame them or question them for trusting (Trump)."
Now a county commissioner, Zimmerman is part of a local group hoping to lure natural gas investors from Texas to drill in Pennsylvania and he scoffs at the Trump administration's efforts to deregulate coal-fired power plants.
"It will help this much," he says, holding his fingers an inch apart. "But it won't bring back coal as king."
Trump's EPA -- now led by former coal lobbyist Andrew Wheeler -- recently moved to lift Obama-era caps on how much poisonous mercury and heat-trapping carbon power plants would be allowed to pump into the sky.
The argument was that less regulation could boost the coal industry and perhaps lead to cheaper electricity.
EPA rolls back coal rule despite climate change warnings
The 2012 regulations should not be considered "appropriate and necessary," the EPA said, even though utility companies already spent billions installing pollution control technology and the agency's own reports say that the rule changes could lead to as many as 1,400 more premature deaths a year by 2030.
'Nothing can stop' transition to renewables
The EPA also joined 11 other national agencies -- from the Pentagon to the Smithsonian -- in the alarming Black Friday report that warns of a catastrophic future unless drastic steps are taken to slow down man-made climate change.
"I think there's enough resilience in the (Earth's) system that we can withstand one four-year term of Donald Trump," says Penn State climatologist Michael Mann. "I'm not sure we can withstand two."
Penn State climatologist Michael Mann does not believe coal jobs in the US are being saved or coming back.
Mann is among the chorus of international climate scientists who argue that to save life on Earth as we know it, wealthy nations like the US need to switch to carbon-free electricity by 2030. This would mean 80% of current coal reserves would need to stay in the ground, he wrote.
"We've undergone transitions like this before," Mann says on another unseasonably warm winter's day in State College, across Pennsylvania from the Mitchell Power Station.
"We got off whale oil because something better came along. That was fossil fuels," he says. "Now something better has come along and that's renewable energy and there's nothing that can stop that transition."
--01-09-19: www.nbcnews.com/politics/justice-department/manafort-says-he-didn-t-lie-federal-investigators-n956276
Manafort lied about sharing presidential polling data with Russian linked to intelligence services
The disclosure was made by Manafort's lawyers, in a poorly redacted section of court papers. READ MORE…
--01-06-19: www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/pentagon-chief-of-staff-announces-resignation/ar-BBRQJdE?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=U147DHP
MORE ADULTS LEAVING…
Department of Defense chief of staff Rear Adm. Kevin Sweeney announced Saturday that he is resigning from his post at the Pentagon.
"After two years in the Pentagon, I've decided the time is right to return to the private sector,” Sweeney said in a statement. “It has been an honor to serve again alongside the men and women of the Department of Defense.”
Just last month, former Secretary of Defense Jim Mattis resigned on principle after President Trump announced his intent to withdraw troops from Syria. Since then, other administration officials including Brett McGurk, the special presidential envoy for the global coalition to counter ISIS, and Pentagon spokeswoman Dana White have also departed their posts within the administration. READ MORE…
