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Here Comes The First Suit Challenging Trump’s "Muslim Ban"

by GaryBriscoe Posted on January 28, 2017

Mother Jones

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Within hours of President Donald Trump signing his “Muslim ban” executive order Friday, the Council on American-Islamic Relations announced that it is about to file a lawsuit challenging the ban.

The order, called “Protection of the Nation From Foreign Terrorist Entry Into the United States,” denies entry to the US to anyone from Iran, Iraq, Sudan, Syria, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen, according to CNN. The order also freezes refugee admissions for 120 days.

“There is no evidence that refugees—the most thoroughly vetted of all people entering our nation—are a threat to national security,” CAIR national litigation director Lena Masri said in a release. The group says it will announce details of the lawsuit Monday.

Demonstrators have been protesting the order ever since a draft was leaked on Wednesday.

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Here Comes The First Suit Challenging Trump’s "Muslim Ban"

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Julian Assange Shaping Up To Be Next Conservative Hero

by ElizbethMendez9 Posted on January 4, 2017

Mother Jones

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There’s always a certain level of hypocrisy in politics. When you’re in the majority, the filibuster is an obstructive, anti-democratic abomination. When you’re in the minority, it’s an important bulwark against mob rule.

But have we ever seen anything like the recent lovefest among conservatives for WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange? “Julian, I apologize,” cooed Sarah Palin. Sean Hannity poses the question of the day: “Who do you believe? Julian Assange or President Obama and Hillary Clinton.” Donald Trump approvingly passed along Assange’s contention that “a 14 year old could have hacked Podesta”1 and then asked, “why was DNC so careless? Also said Russians did not give him the info!”

So far, this sudden outpouring of affection for Assange hasn’t gone beyond the inner circle of Trump sycophants. But it might not be long before it does. If a third of Republicans can decide they think Vladimir Putin is a great guy as long as he’s anti-Clinton, why not Julian Assange too?

1Just for the record: yes, a 14-year-old could have hacked Podesta. But in fact, a 14-year-old didn’t hack Podesta. Here’s the story.

Ben Stevens/i-Images via ZUMA

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Julian Assange Shaping Up To Be Next Conservative Hero

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Crude oil is flooding Texas rivers

by KraigV0096 Posted on May 3, 2016

Flooding in Brookshire, Texas, U.S. April 20, 2016. Handout via REUTERS TPX IMAGES

Crude oil is flooding Texas rivers

By on May 2, 2016Share

Dramatic, deadly flooding is the new normal for parts of Texas and Louisiana this past year. This weekend, a single flash flood killed six people. But the damage often doesn’t end when the skies are finally clear. In Texas — a state dotted with oil wells — extreme flooding can also mean contaminated water.

According to El Paso Times, chemicals and oil from overfilled wells and fracking sites have flushed into majors rivers. Texas officials have reportedly taken dozens of images of waterways polluted with crude oil and fracking chemicals, which show the “sheens and plumes spreading from tipped tanks and flooded production sites.” Affected waterways include the Sabine River on the Texas-Louisiana border, which flooded in March, and the Trinity, Red, and Colorado rivers, which flooded last year.

“That’s a potential disaster,” Dr. Walter Tsou, a physician and past president of the American Public Health Association, told the El Paso Times. “I’m sure it will get into the groundwater and streams and creeks.”

Fracking, of course, is the inherently toxic and increasingly common industry practice of injecting massive amounts of water laced with cocktail of chemicals into the earth to fracture underground shales with deposits of oil or natural gas. Crude oil spills are never pretty, least of all when they destroy habitats.

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Crude oil is flooding Texas rivers

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Harriet Tubman Was a Republican!

by t07c6o Posted on April 21, 2016

Mother Jones

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Conservatives have finally found something to like about the Obama administration:

Perhaps some of the voices calling for Tubman on the $20 just wanted any prominent African-American woman to replace one of the white males on our currency. If it was political correctness that drove this decision, who cares? The Obama administration has inadvertently given Tubman fans of all political stripes an opportunity to tell the story of a deeply-religious, gun-toting Republican who fought for freedom in defiance of the laws of a government that refused to recognize her rights.

Yeah. That’s the ticket. All those folks in the Obama administration had no idea who Harriet Tubman really was. They were all like, check this out, Jack: black, female, helped slaves, done. Boxes checked. Identity politics satisfied. Put her on the twenty.

The poor fools. She was religious! She carried a gun while helping slaves escape! She was a Republican! She fought for freedom against a tyrannical government! If you think about it, she’s basically the poster child of the modern-day Tea Party. And none of those idiots in the White House had a clue.

Seriously. That seems to be what they think. Next they’re going to remind us that Abraham Lincoln was a Republican too.

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Harriet Tubman Was a Republican!

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Donald Trump Is Right: The GOP Primary System Is Rigged

by SheritaClune Posted on April 20, 2016

Mother Jones

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I hate to agree with Donald Trump about anything, but he’s got a point: the Republican primary process is really unfair. Just look at New York: Kasich and Cruz won 40 percent of the vote but only 4 percent of the delegates. It’s an outrage.

And it’s been that way all along. In the early contests, Trump’s opponents won 68 percent of the vote but only 38 percent of the delegates. On Super Tuesday they won 66 percent of the vote but only 57 percent of the delegates. In early March they eked out a fair result: 63 percent of the vote and 66 percent of the delegates. But on Super Tuesday II it was back to business as usual: they crushed Trump with 60 percent of the vote but won only 38 percent of the delegates.

I’m glad Trump is helping shine a media spotlight on this gross inequity—and he deserves special credit since he’s the one benefiting from it. It’s a pretty selfless act. Maybe someone will finally start paying attention to the way the Republican establishment is so obviously in the bag for Trump.

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Donald Trump Is Right: The GOP Primary System Is Rigged

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Factlet of the Day: Youth Turnout in New York Wasn’t Much Different Than in 2008

by MaureenHoffmann Posted on April 20, 2016

Mother Jones

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For the record, here’s the Democratic turnout in New York in 2008 and 2016:

Total Turnout

18-29 Turnout

2008

1.82 million

273 thousand

2016

1.81 million

322 thousand

The turnout rate among all residents aged 18-29 was up from 9.8 percent to 11.5 percent. That’s a nice increase, but as I recall, Obama didn’t spend a whole lot of time in New York in 2008. When you take that into account, it’s hard to see much evidence here of a massive surge in youth interest caused by the Bernie Sanders campaign.

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Factlet of the Day: Youth Turnout in New York Wasn’t Much Different Than in 2008

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Another Pension Fund Goes South After the Great Recession

by RoxannaGuest Posted on April 20, 2016

Mother Jones

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Here’s the latest big pension fund in trouble:

More than a quarter of a million truckers, retirees and their families could soon see their pension benefits severely cut — even though their pension fund is still years away from running out of money.

….Like many other pension plans, the Central States Pension Fund suffered heavy investment losses during the financial crisis that cut into the pool of money available to pay out benefits. While the stock market has recovered since then, the improvements were not enough to make up for the shortfall….That imbalance left the fund paying out $3.46 in pension benefits for every $1 it received from employers. The shortfall has resulted in the fund paying out $2 billion more in benefits than it receives in employer contributions each year.

One of the big criticisms of 401(k) style retirement plans is that they can lose a bundle when the stock market tanks. And sure enough, that’s exactly what happened during the Great Recession. The value of 401(k) plans fell dramatically, causing a lot of pain for people who were close to retirement.

But don’t let that make you nostalgic for the good old days of defined-benefit pensions. Sure, they promise a steady retirement income, but promises are only as good as the money to back them up. This means that pension funds which lost a lot of money during the Great Recession are in no better shape than 401(k) plans that did the same. There’s no magic here.

What’s more, 401(k) plans have rebounded since the depths of the recession: taking into account both their losses and their subsequent gains during the recovery, the average 401(k) balance has grown more than 10 percent per year between 2007 and 2013. Apparently that’s not the case for the Central States Pension Fund. Perhaps those much-maligned 401(k) plans are a better retirement vehicle than their critics give them credit for?

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Another Pension Fund Goes South After the Great Recession

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Donald Trump Is Very Easily Disgusted

by FletchePyh Posted on April 18, 2016

Mother Jones

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Consider the following five anecdotes about Donald Trump:

On Hillary Clinton’s late return from a debate break in December: “I know where she went — it’s disgusting, I don’t want to talk about it. No, it’s too disgusting. Don’t say it, it’s disgusting.”
On Megyn Kelly’s tough questioning during a debate in August: “She gets out and she starts asking me all sorts of ridiculous questions. You could see there was blood coming out of her eyes, blood coming out of her wherever.”
On Elizabeth Beck’s request to take a breast pump break during a deposition in 2011: “He got up, his face got red, he shook his finger at me and he screamed, ‘You’re disgusting, you’re disgusting,’ and he ran out of there.”
On his well-known germaphobia: “Trump doesn’t even like to push a ground floor elevator button because it’s been tapped by so many people….Trump especially avoids shaking hands with teachers, since they are likely to be have been ‘in touch’ with too many germy kids. Trump has what he calls a borderline case of germaphobia — aka msyophobia — that the American Psychological Association defines as one of the more common forms of obsessive-compulsive disorder.”
On his one-time friendship with notorious lawyer Roy Cohn: “By virtually all accounts, one of Trump’s closest friends early in his career was Roy Cohn….When Cohn was facing disbarment in the mid-’80s, Trump testified on his friend’s behalf as a character witness. For a while, according to Vanity Fair, the two men spoke ’15 or 20 times a day.’ Then Trump found out Cohn was HIV-positive. He moved swiftly to cut ties with his mentor, seeking out new attorneys and transferring his legal business to them. The sudden rejection stunned Cohn.”

This brings to mind Jonathan Haidt’s theory of moral foundations, which suggests that although liberals and conservatives share a set of five innate moral roots, they prioritize them quite differently. Conservatives, for example, are especially sensitive to moral foundation #5:

Sanctity/degradation: This foundation was shaped by the psychology of disgust and contamination….It underlies the widespread idea that the body is a temple which can be desecrated by immoral activities and contaminants.

I wonder how strongly Donald Trump scores on this particular moral foundation? Pretty strongly, I’d guess. I wonder how much it explains his approach to politics? And I wonder how much it explains his popularity with a certain subset of conservatives?

It’s just a thought. But perhaps one of the things that unites so many of Trump’s longtime obsessions (immigrants, crime, kicking out protesters, anything to do with foreigners) is a fear of growing impurity in the body of the country. It might explain a lot.

UPDATE: I see that Alexander Hurst got here first. His take on Haidt’s moral foundations and Trump’s sensitivity to disgust is here.

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Donald Trump Is Very Easily Disgusted

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Weekly Flint Water Report: April 9-15

by VanColbygtoflcf Posted on April 18, 2016

Mother Jones

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Here is this week’s Flint water report. As usual, I’ve eliminated outlier readings above 2,000 parts per billion, since there are very few of them and they can affect the averages in misleading ways. During the week, DEQ took 905 samples. The average for the past week was 10.63.

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Weekly Flint Water Report: April 9-15

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Will Twitter Soon Be Overrun With Silicon Trolls?

by Hildred15C Posted on April 18, 2016

Mother Jones

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Hugh Hancock muses today about the remarkable effectiveness of efforts to turn Microsoft’s (now) infamous Tay chatbot into an asshole. It didn’t take much. Mostly the people who did it were just having a laugh, and Tay took it from there. It turns out that being an asshole is a pretty easy thing to emulate.

So what does this mean for the future? Not the far future, mind you, but next year. Hancock has an unnerving answer:

Everyone Can Have Their Own Twitter Mob

Right now, if you want to have someone attacked by a horde of angry strangers, you need to be a celebrity. That’s a real problem on Twitter and Facebook both, with a few users in particular becoming well-known for abusing their power to send their fans after people with whom they disagree.

But remember, the Internet’s about democratising power, and this is the latest frontier. With a trollbot and some planning, this power will soon be accessible to anyone.

There’s a further twist, too: the bots will get better. Attacking someone on the Internet is a task eminently suited to deep learning. Give the bots a large corpus of starter insults and a win condition, and let them do what trolls do — find the most effective, most unpleasant ways to attack someone online. No matter how impervious you think you are to abuse, a swarm of learning robots can probably find your weak spot.

There are some details to be worked out, of course, like setting up all the accounts your trollbot would need. Hancock addresses that. He figures the bots will be pretty good at this stuff too.

The unnerving part of this is that although Hancock is writing in a chatty tone, this is all very plausible. And for something like Twitter, where a bot doesn’t need much intelligence to fit right in, it’s a pretty serious near-term possibility.

So what happens? Behind Door 1, Twitter becomes an abattoir of filth and verbal war. Only the bravest dare enter. Behind Door 2, Twitter mobs become so frequent that no one cares about them anymore. Even the most sensitive among us just shrug them off. Behind Door 3, it all becomes a tedious war between semi-intelligent trollbots and semi-intelligent trollbot filters. It’s just Act II of the online production that began with email spam.

On the bright side, this might put actual trolls out of commission. How can they compete? And what will they do with all their newfound free time?

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Will Twitter Soon Be Overrun With Silicon Trolls?

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