Federal courts block Trump Adminstration's attempt to cut grants to Planned Prenthood's pregnancy prevention programs.

Courtesy of The Hill: 

A federal judge has blocked the Trump administration from cutting short grants awarded to Planned Parenthood through a federal teen pregnancy prevention program. 

U.S. District Judge Thomas Rice on Tuesday issued a permanent injunction preventing the administration from ending the grants two years earlier than originally planned, saying that doing so would cause public harm. 

"The Court determines that the public interest weighs in favor of Plaintiffs, as it would prevent harm to the community ... and prevent loss of data regarding the effectiveness of teen pregnancy prevention," Rice wrote. 

Planned Parenthood sued the administration after it ended Teen Pregnancy Prevention grants for 81 organizations across the country last summer. 

The grants were originally supposed to run through 2020, but the administration said the grants would end in 2018 instead, arguing that the program was ineffective. 

The program, created under former President Obama, funded organizations working to cut teen pregnancy rates and mostly focused on comprehensive sex ed, which can include contraception and abstinence teachings.

Of course this is a program created during the Obama Administration because Trump is laser focused on undoing EVERYTHING that Obama accomplished during his two terms in office. 

And he doesn't care who it hurts.

Somehow I don't think Ronny Jackson is going to be the next head of the VA. Update!

Courtesy of Business Insider:  

New details about the alleged conduct of White House physician Ronny Jackson emerged on Tuesday night, nearly 24 hours after the first public allegations against him came to light. including a claim that he banged on the hotel-room door of a female employee while intoxicated. 

According to four people familiar with a 2015 incident involving Jackson, the doctor allegedly caused a ruckus by banging on the door of one employee's hotel room during an overseas trip, CNN reported. Jackson reportedly caused so much of a scene that the Secret Service intervened out of concern that he would wake then-President Barack Obama.

 A former staffer said that the "middle-of-the-night" incident made the employee uncomfortable and that it was "definitely inappropriate," CNN reported. 

The incident adds to a series of other allegations against Jackson, who was scheduled to go before the Senate Committee on Veterans' Affairs on Wednesday. The hearing was postponed on Monday, amid multiple allegations stemming from his time as the White House physician.

Some of those allegations include claims of excessive drinking at work, creating a hostile work environment, and improperly dispensing medication, according to a CBS News report published Monday night.

Substance abuse,  inappropriate contact with a female subordinates, you might think this would make Jackson a perfect fit for the Trump White House swamp, but that is likely not how the Senate is going to respond to them.

And if Jackson was hoping that Trump had his back, he may not want to rely to heavily on that.

lol. Bye, Ronny pic.twitter.com/y1QDxhLVWt

— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) April 24, 2018

Yeah, Ronny Jackson meet the undercarriage of the Trump bus.

By the way this excessive drinking totally explains how Jackson was able to examine Donald Trump and think that he was healthy enough to live to two hundred years old.

Update: Oh this doesn't look good.

From Veterans Affairs Committee summary on Ronny Jackson, which says it is based on interviews with 23 current and former Jackson colleagues.

These quotes are apparently from those colleagues: pic.twitter.com/TiBAnX8k4C

— Rachel Maddow MSNBC (@maddow) April 25, 2018

Hard to see him coming back from this.

Trump Administration shifts funds away from comprehensive sex ed classes to those that teach abstinence.

Courtesy of The Hill: 

The Trump administration will shift federal funding aimed at reducing teen pregnancy rates to programs that teach abstinence. 

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) announced Friday the availability of grants through the Teen Pregnancy Prevention Program, (TPPP) a grant program created under former President Obama that funds organizations and programs working to reduce teen pregnancy rates. 

Trump's HHS announced, however, that unlike under the Obama administration, grants will be geared toward organizations that teach abstinence education to teens instead of the comprehensive sex ed approach the previous administration supported. In a funding announcement released Friday, the administration announced two tiers of funds for the TPP program. 

"Projects will clearly communicate that teen sex is a risk behavior for both the physical consequences of pregnancy and sexual transmitted infections; as well as sociological, economic and other related risks," the funding announcement reads. "Both risk avoidance and risk reduction approaches can and should include skills associated with helping youth delay sex as well as skills to help those youth already engaged in sexual risk to return toward risk-free choices in the future."

Well I think we can all look forward to a dramatic spike in teen pregnancy. 

As the product of a teen pregnancy, I can attest to the fact that the "just say no" approach is deeply flawed.

Former Trump staffers considered "too toxic" to get another job.

It's like a rogues' gallery of "Do not hires."

Courtesy of Buzzfeed:  

Trump administration officials looking to escape to the private sector are getting a rude awakening: No one wants to hire them. 

Companies and firms who used to recruit from presidential administrations and brag when they were successful in poaching an aide are making the calculation that the risks of bringing on a Trump administration official outweigh the rewards, according to interviews with 10 current and former administration officials, top recruiters, and lobbyists who did not want to be named to talk candidly. BuzzFeed News reached out to them after previously reporting during an especially chaotic stretch for the Trump White House that some officials were trying to leave but finding their job prospects to be “pretty bleak.” That’s especially pronounced for more junior staff. 

The leadership at a prominent, bipartisan Washington public affairs firm went as far as to make an active decision not to hire from the Trump White House because of the "reputational risk" associated with it, a former White House official was recently told. The official asked BuzzFeed News not to disclose the name of the firm. 

In another case, a White House official said he was rejected out of the blue for a job after being given indications he would be hired and was explicitly told his affiliation with the Trump White House had been a problem for some at the company. 

The realities of the grim job prospects have also become clear to two associates who worked for President Donald Trump’s campaign but never went into the administration. They told BuzzFeed News they’ve been offering some of their former colleagues who now work at the White House regular advice in recent months on how to land job opportunities, but so far those colleagues have been unsuccessful. Both also said they were glad they ultimately chose not to join the administration after seeing their friends struggle.

I can't say that I blame these companies.

If you are either ignorant, unethical, or immoral enough to actually work for Donald Trump I would not even trust you enough to care for a houseplant while I was on vacation. 

I want nothing to do with a person so lacking in intelligence that they voted for Donald Trump, I would certainly not want to work alongside a person who actually sold their soul to be employed by him.

Education Secretary Betsy DeVos wants to prosecute whistle blowers, while EPA chief Scott Pruitt is punishing high ranking officials who question his decision making.

Courtesy of WaPo: 

Education Secretary Betsy DeVos asked her department’s Office of Inspector General whether grounds existed to prosecute employees who leaked budget data to The Washington Post and unclassified information to Politico, according to an internal department report. 

The response: It would be challenging, because the department has “little” written policy or guidance on how employees are supposed to handle information. 

“While evaluating the . . . incidents of alleged unauthorized releases of non-public information, we identified challenges to criminal prosecution or taking significant administrative actions against individuals responsible for the release of this type of information,” the report said.

Actually whistle blowers are supposed to be protected, and have provided a valuable service throughout the history of this country. (Remember Watergate?)

You would think that a person in charge of education might have known that.

However as it turns out this punish the dissidents idea is rampant throughout the Trump Administration.

Courtesy of TPM: 

EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt reassigned or demoted at least five high-ranking officials who questioned his spending and other leadership decisions — including the purchase of pricey office furniture and Pruitt’s desire to use sirens to cut through D.C. traffic — according to a New York Times report Thursday afternoon. Four of the officials were career staff and one was a political appointee. 

The Times reports that the political appointee, Kevin Chmielewski, was put on administrative leave without pay after Chmielewski raised concerns about Pruitt’s behavior with the White House’s presidential personnel office. 

Additionally, Chmielewski and three of the career staffers are reported to have confronted Pruitt directly about his use of taxpayer dollars — particularly, a proposal to buy a $100,000-a-month charter aircraft membership that was eventually scuttled, and an effort to shell out $70,000 to replace two desks in Pruitt’s office. 

The sidelined officials also incurred Pruitt’s ire by pushing back on his desire to use sirens in his motorcade in non-emergency situations, including en route to dinner at the chic restaurant Le Diplomate, and were hesitant to approve his frequent first-class and charter flights, his unprecedented 20-member security team, and his request for a bulletproof sport utility vehicle.

So the real sin in the Trump Administration is not the wasting of taxpayer money, but reporting the wasting of taxpayer money.

Drain the swamp my ass!

New talking points from the EPA minimize human impact on climate change.

Whoa, whoa, whoa, I don't understand all of those sciencey words you keep using.

Courtesy of WaPo: 

Environmental Protection Agency staffers received a list of “talking points” this week instructing them to underscore the uncertainties about how human activity contributes to climate change. 

A career employee in the department’s Office of Public Affairs distributed the eight talking points to regional staffers. The list offered suggestions on ways to talk with local communities and Native American tribes about how to adapt to extreme weather, rising seas and other environmental challenges. 

Employees crafted the email, first disclosed Wednesday by HuffPost, on the basis of controversial — and scientifically unsound — statements that EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt has made about the current state of climate research.

“Human activity impacts our changing climate in some manner,” reads one of the talking points. “The ability to measure with precision the degree and extent of that impact, and what to do about it, are subject to continuing debate and dialogue.”

Another states that while there has been “extensive” research and numerous reports on climate change, “clear gaps remain including our understanding of the role of human activity and what we can do about it.”

In other words the Trump Administration is saying that since they do not understand, or really trust, science they are simply going to do nothing, and hope that the world does not burn to a cinder before Trump can run for reelection.

Personally I think that the EPA folks who start spewing this bullshit in front of the ALASKAN native community better have one hand on the doorknob of the conference room, because those folks know exactly who to blame for the changing weather patterns, and it ain't them.

Another one bites the dust as Trump ousts VA Secretary, and replaces him with some doctor walking around the White House.

....In the interim, Hon. Robert Wilkie of DOD will serve as Acting Secretary. I am thankful for Dr. David Shulkin’s service to our country and to our GREAT VETERANS!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 28, 2018

And THAT was how the world learned that Donald Trump had kicked another contestant off Survivor Island.

Courtesy of CNN: 

President Donald Trump announced Wednesday he will replace his Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin with Ronny Jackson, who currently serves as physician to the President. 

Trump thanked Shulkin via Twitter for his "service to our country and to our GREAT VETERANS" and said Robert Wilkie, the under secretary of defense for personnel and readiness, will serve as acting secretary until Jackson is confirmed. 

A White House official said the embattled Shulkin was no longer effective in his role, saying his "distractions were getting in the way of carrying out the President's agenda."

In other words Shulkin must have disagreed with Trump once or twice and that simply cannot be allowed.

The White House is claiming that the former VA Secretary was told about his firing in a note or email, before the tweet, but of course they just say shit and expect us to believe it.

For his part Shulkin wrote an op-ed for the New York Times in which is hurt feelings were more than apparent.

This is how that op-ed ended: 

I have fought to stand up for this great department and all that it embodies. In recent months, though, the environment in Washington has turned so toxic, chaotic, disrespectful and subversive that it became impossible for me to accomplish the important work that our veterans need and deserve. I can assure you that I will continue to speak out against those who seek to harm the V.A. by putting their personal agendas in front of the well-being of our veterans. 

As many of you know, I am a physician, not a politician. I came to government with an understanding that Washington can be ugly, but I assumed that I could avoid all of the ugliness by staying true to my values. I have been falsely accused of things by people who wanted me out of the way. But despite these politically-based attacks on me and my family’s character, I am proud of my record and know that I acted with the utmost integrity. Unfortunately, none of that mattered. 

As I prepare to leave government, I am struck by a recurring thought: It should not be this hard to serve your country.

Shulkin was also opposed to privatization of the VA which Trump and his supporters seem to feel is the best possible step in fucking up the agency even further.

As for Shulkin's replacement, well that is the same Dr. Dreamy that raved about Trump's health and mental acuity. The lesson for today boys and girls is that if you are truly gifted at sucking up to this president you might earn yourself a cabinet position.

The problem of course is that being Secretary of Veteran's Affairs is a very complicated job, which no amount of cupping a commander-in-chief's testicles and saying "cough" could ever prepare you to undertake.

It is black hole from which careers rarely reemerge intact.

So I imagine that the next time we hear from Dr. Dreamy here is when Trump tweets that he is stepping aside to allow THIS guy to take over the VA instead.

Because don't we know THAT is where all of this is eventually headed?

Trump confidante says that White House changes are not over yet. Oh goody.

Christopher Ruddy in a super relaxed pose with Donald Trump.

Courtesy of WaPo: 

A friend of President Trump said Sunday that the president has told him he expects to make one or two more major personnel changes in his administration soon, amid mounting signs that Veterans Affairs Secretary David Shulkin is on the way out. 

Christopher Ruddy, chief executive of Newsmax, said others in the White House, but not Trump, have told him that Shulkin is “likely to depart the Cabinet very soon.” 

Ruddy, who speaks frequently to Trump, said on ABC News’s “This Week” that Trump believes that, on the whole, the White House is operating “like a smooth machine” and has been “perplexed” by news reports of chaos. 

“He did say that he’s expecting to make one or two major changes to his government very soon,” Ruddy said.

If this White House is running like a "smooth machine" than I would hate to see what it would look life if it were falling apart at the seams.

Hang on, we are actually witnessing EXACTLY what that would look like.

There are already so many people jumping ship or being thrown overboard that if there are any more Rachel Maddow will have to stand outside on the street so that all of the names can be beamed onto the side of 30 Rock in order to fit in one graphic.

That is NOT what a "smooth machine" of a presidency looks like.

That is what train wreck of a presidency looks like.

Or to put a finer point on it, that is what a Donald Trump presidency looks like.

Saudi prince bragged that Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner was "in his pocket."

Courtesy of The Intercept:

In June, Saudi prince Mohammed bin Salman ousted his cousin, then-Crown Prince Mohammed bin Nayef, and took his place as next in line to the throne, upending the established line of succession. In the months that followed, the President’s Daily Brief contained information on Saudi Arabia’s evolving political situation, including a handful of names of royal family members opposed to the crown prince’s power grab, according to the former White House official and two U.S. government officials with knowledge of the report. Like many others interviewed for this story, they declined to be identified because they were not authorized to speak about sensitive matters to the press. 

In late October, Jared Kushner made an unannounced trip to Riyadh, catching some intelligence officials off guard. “The two princes are said to have stayed up until nearly 4 a.m. several nights, swapping stories and planning strategy,” the Washington Post’s David Ignatius reported at the time. 

What exactly Kushner and the Saudi royal talked about in Riyadh may be known only to them, but after the meeting, Crown Prince Mohammed told confidants that Kushner had discussed the names of Saudis disloyal to the crown prince, according to three sources who have been in contact with members of the Saudi and Emirati royal families since the crackdown. Kushner, through his attorney’s spokesperson, denies having done so.

On November 4, a week after Kushner returned to the U.S., the crown prince, known in official Washington by his initials MBS, launched what he called an anti-corruption crackdown. The Saudi government arrested dozens of members of the Saudi royal family and imprisoned them in the Ritz-Carlton Riyadh, which was first reported in English by The Intercept. The Saudi figures named in the President’s Daily Brief were among those rounded up; at least one was reportedly tortured. 

And then there was this:

One of the people MBS told about the discussion with Kushner was UAE Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed, according to a source who talks frequently to confidants of the Saudi and Emirati rulers. MBS bragged to the Emirati crown prince and others that Kushner was “in his pocket,” the source told The Intercept.

So is it possible that Jared Kushner shared top secret information, that he is not even cleared to access, with a Saudi prince which allowed him to move on his potential enemies/family members and grab power?

Is that even really a question?

What's more the Trump Administration's support for the UAE over Qatar might have something to do with Kushner's financial situation:

Kushner's support for Saudi Arabia and the UAE over Qatar in the Gulf crisis has raised questions about a possible conflict of interest. Kushner backed the blockade a month after Qatar’s ministry of finance rebuffed an attempt by Kushner’s real estate firm, Kushner Companies, to extract financing for the firm’s troubled flagship property at 666 Fifth Avenue.

The story is that Kusher's dad made a pitch to Qatar to gain financing for a Kushner property that is about to go under, when that deal fell through the Trump Administration suddenly sided with the UAE in setting up a blockade of Qatar.

Remember this photo?

This was the meeting that precipitated that blockade.

So to put it bluntly, diplomacy with other countries is apparently being determined by how they might benefit Trump and Kushner businesses.

And none of it has anything to do with what is good for America. 

Oh goody.

Russian hackers breach power grids, water processing plants, and air transportation facilities all over the United States.

Courtesy of Bloomberg:  

Russian hackers are conducting a broad assault on the U.S. electric grid, water processing plants, air transportation facilities and other targets in rolling attacks on some of the country’s most sensitive infrastructure, U.S. government officials said Thursday. 

The announcement was the first official confirmation that Russian hackers have taken aim at facilities on which hundreds of millions of Americans depend for basic services. Bloomberg News reported in July that Russian hackers had breached more than a dozen power plants in seven states, an aggressive campaign that has since expanded to dozens of states, according to a person familiar with the investigation. 

"Since at least March 2016, Russian government cyber actors" have targeted "government entities and multiple U.S. critical infrastructure sectors," including those of energy, nuclear, water and aviation, according to an alert issued Thursday by the Department of Homeland Security and Federal Bureau of Investigation. 

Critical manufacturing sectors and commercial facilities also have been targeted by the ongoing "multi-stage intrusion campaign by Russian government cyber actors." 

Cyber-attacks are "literally happening hundreds of thousands of times a day," Energy Secretary Rick Perry told lawmakers during a hearing Thursday. "The warfare that goes on in the cyberspace is real, it’s serious, and we must lead the world."

In other reporting it was made clear that the Russians had gained control over some of these facilities, and could turn off power to millions of Americans or interfere in air travel at will.

This means that the Russians can render us helpless with a literal flip of the switch.

No phone, no internet, no lights, no nothing.

And while all this was going on the Trump Administration did NOTHING to protect us.

But hey they finally moved on those old sanctions to punish the Russians for interfering in the 2916 elections.

Courtesy of CNN:

The Trump administration announced Thursday it is enacting new sanctions on Russia, including individuals indicted last month by special counsel Robert Mueller, in a sweeping new effort to punish Moscow for its attempts to interfere in the 2016 US election. 

In enacting the sanctions, the administration is finally meeting a congressional mandate to impose measures punishing Moscow for its cyber intrusion. The delay had led to questions over President Donald Trump's willingness to punish Moscow. The new measures, however delayed, amount to the most stringent punishment yet by Trump for Russia's election interference.

This is the very definition of "A day late, and a dollar short." 

By doing nothing for over a year the administration empowered the Russians to keep right on hacking into our systems and now they have gained control over our communications, air travel, and security. 

I have felt we were fucked before, but this is a whole new level of fucked.

The Jeff Sessions Justice Department looking for way to take authority away from Federal Courts.

Courtesy of Mother Jones: 

Last April, when a federal judge in Hawaii blocked the Trump administration’s effort to ban entry to people from six Muslim-majority nations, Attorney General Jeff Sessions took to conservative talk radio to vent his frustration. “I really am amazed that a judge sitting on an island in the Pacific can issue an order that stops the president of the United States from what appears to be clearly his statutory and constitutional power,” he told host Mark Levin. 

Residents of Hawaii pointed out that it was every bit as much a state as the other 49, but Sessions was making a broader legal point, one that the Supreme Court will now consider. The Justice Department wants to permanently remove the ability of federal judges to issue nationwide injunctions—orders that stop a policy from taking effect until the court has officially ruled on its legality. Instead, a Hawaiian judge overseeing a travel ban case brought by the state of Hawaii would be able to block the ban only in that state. The implications, if the Supreme Court agrees with the Justice Department, will be enormous for the future of judicial review and the federal government’s balance of power. 

Federal courts have repeatedly blocked the administration’s efforts to implement a hardline immigration agenda. More than a year into Donald Trump’s presidency, attempts to crack down on sanctuary cities, end Obama-era deportation protections for Dreamers, and block nationals from Muslim-majority countries have been stopped by federal judges enacting nationwide injunctions.

Okay this might actually be the MOST troubling thing we have learned about this administration.

The Founders wanted there to be three co-equal branches of government, executive, legislative, and judicial.

And the Judicial is the one that is tasked with protecting the constitutional rights of American citizens.

If the Trump Administration were actually successful in pulling this off, that would mean that each state's court system would determine what was a constitutionally protected right in their jurisdiction ONLY.

That means that some states could block gay marriage, women's rights, civil rights, equal pay, essentially EVERYTHING.

That would overwhelm the Supreme Court almost overnight, and if Trump gets one more judge on the panel they would be loathe to do anything to challenge a state's right to remain in the dark ages.

Trump Administration bringing back abstinence only education in public schools. Man the hits just keep on coming.

Courtesy of The Hill:

Abstinence-only education — encouraging adolescents to wait until marriage for sex — is making a comeback under President Trump. 

In a marked departure from the previous administration, conservatives at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) are putting an emphasis on abstinence to reduce teen pregnancy rates. 

“We definitely are seeing a shift,” said Kelly Marcum, a government affairs legislative assistant at the Family Research Council in Washington, which supports abstinence-only education. 

“We’re really excited to see that the administration is giving some tools back to us to keep pushing that fight.” 

So far, the administration has encouraged organizations applying for Title X federal family planning funds to include in their programs a “meaningful emphasis” on “the benefits of avoiding sex” when communicating with adolescents and to use programs that don’t “normalize sexual risk behaviors.” 

The Trump administration also plans to release its first report early this summer as part of a $10 million research project looking at ways to improve sex education programs, with a focus on the impact of “sexual delay.”

Yeah because that whole "wait until marriage" thing worked out so well in the past.

Telling kids that they cannot do something only makes that something even more desirable.

Anybody who has ever had, or ever been, a teenager knows that.

And if this approach is at all similar to past approaches it will focus mostly on shaming the girls, and give the guys a pass because they are not considered the gatekeepers of abstinence.

But hey if they are looking for an effective deterrent to sexual activity just show that image of Trump at the top of the page to the students.

One look at that and NOBODY is horny anymore.

Donald Trump fires Rex Tillerson, replaces him with Mike Pompeo. Update!

Mike Pompeo, Director of the CIA, will become our new Secretary of State. He will do a fantastic job! Thank you to Rex Tillerson for his service! Gina Haspel will become the new Director of the CIA, and the first woman so chosen. Congratulations to all!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 13, 2018

Courtesy of CNBC: 

Rex Tillerson is out as secretary of State, ending a tumultuous tenure as America's top diplomat that was marked by a series of public disagreements with his boss — President Donald Trump. 

Trump plans to appoint CIA Director Mike Pompeo to replace the former Exxon Mobil chief executive. The president picked deputy CIA Director Gina Haspel to run the spy agency.

That tweet up above was how the world learned that Trump was kicking Tillerson off the island, no press conference, no official statement, just a tweet. Because apparently that is how these things are done now.

There has of course been talk that Trump was displeased with Tillerson going way back to when he called Trump a "moron" back in October.

Though of course Trump responded to talk that Tillerson may be on his way out with this tweet:

The media has been speculating that I fired Rex Tillerson or that he would be leaving soon - FAKE NEWS! He’s not leaving and while we disagree on certain subjects, (I call the final shots) we work well together and America is highly respected again!https://t.co/FrqiPLFJ1E

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 1, 2017

I cannot say that I was ever a fan of Tillerson, but at least he comported himself like a grown up most of the time.

Mike Pompeo is just a Trump ass kisser and a rubber stamp on anything and everything that Trump will want to do going forward.

Clearly this administration is in free fall right now, and when it finally makes impact it is going to leave a hell of a crater.

Update: Apparently Tillerson learned he was fired in the same tweet where everybody else learned about it. 

Quatari officials have evidence that Jared Kushner is compromised by the Saudis but did not tell Robert Mueller for fear of damaging relationship with Trump Administration.

Courtesy of NBC News: 

Qatari officials gathered evidence of what they claim is illicit influence by the United Arab Emirates on Jared Kushner and other Trump associates, including details of secret meetings, but decided not to give the information to Special Counsel Robert Mueller for fear of harming relations with the Trump administration, say three sources familiar with the Qatari discussions. 

Lebanese-American businessman George Nader and Republican donor Elliott Broidy, who participated in the meetings, have both been the focus of news reports in recent days about their connections to the UAE and Trump associates.

.........

Qatari officials believe the meetings — as well as fallout from Qatari business dealings with Kushner — may have influenced President Trump's public endorsement of a blockade of Qatar by its neighbors that began last year. 

A Qatari delegation came to Washington in late January and early February and met with Trump officials to discuss shared national security interests. Despite Trump's endorsement of the blockade in June, the Qataris felt the meetings with top advisers had been productive and decided against reaching out to Mueller in order to preserve the relationship, according to people familiar with the internal Qatari deliberations. 

A spokesperson for the Qatari embassy in Washington said in a statement last week that Qatar won't be providing materials to the Mueller investigation. 

The Qataris also met with FBI Director Chris Wray while they were in Washington, but never shared their information about the UAE's alleged influence on the administration.

Fear of sharing intelligence vital to an ongoing investigation, because it is assumed the American government will retaliate against you.

THAT is how America's relationship with other countries is damaged beyond repair.

By the way this means that Donald Trump clearly knows that his son-in-law is compromised, and yet he continues to let him sit in on classified briefings, and even put him in charge of solving the crisis in the Middle East.

And Trump had the gall to accuse Hillary Clinton of being careless with classified materials.

And the list...just...keeps...on...growing.

This never gets old. (via @maddow) pic.twitter.com/W31wrX49It

— Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) March 7, 2018

Seriously there are administrations that last the entire eight years and never see this level of turnover.

But remember, according to Trump "Everybody wants to work in the White House."

Ha ha ha ha ha!

Donald Trump would like his personal pilot to head the FAA. Why? Because he's his personal pilot, that's why.

Courtesy of Axios: 

The president’s personal pilot is on the administration's short list to head the Federal Aviation Administration. Trump has told a host of administration officials and associates that he wants John Dunkin — his longtime personal pilot, who flew him around the country on Trump Force One during the campaign — to helm the agency, which has a budget in the billions and which oversees all civil aviation in the United States. 

What I'm hearing: One industry insider equated this to the Seinfeld episode when Cosmo Kramer used his golf caddy as a jury consultant. A senior administration official told me that comparison is completely unfair. The source confirmed Trump recommended Dunkin and that he’s sat for an interview for the post. That source said he was impressive. 

“He’s on the list because he's the president’s pilot, but if he gets the job it won't be because he's the president's pilot,” the source said. 

In response to my questions for this story, another administration source stressed that while no decision has been made, Dunkin has the appropriate experience to get the job. 

“John Dunkin isn’t just a pilot," the administration official told me. "He’s managed airline and corporate flight departments, certified airlines from start-up under FAA regulations, and oversaw the Trump presidential campaign’s air fleet, which included managing all aviation transportation for travel to 203 cities in 43 states over the course of 21 months.”

You know it is typical for presidents to hand out some cushy jobs to their friends and supporters.

But typically these are relegated to ambassadorships in some faraway land that nobody really cares about.

They are NOT given jobs that are as vitally important as heading up the FAA.

Next up expect Trump to appoint his landscaper to head the Parks and Recreation Department.

So true it almost hurts.

The good news is that Defense Secretary Jim Mattis is keeping Trump from declaring war on Iran. The bad news is that he may not be able to do it for long.

Courtesy of WaPo: 

For weeks, Mattis had been resisting requests from the White House to provide military options for Iran. Now Trump made clear that he wanted the Pentagon to deliver a range of plans that included striking Iranian ballistic missile factories or hitting Iranian speedboats that routinely harassed U.S. Navy vessels. 

“Why can’t we sink them?” Trump would sometimes ask about the boats. 

National security adviser H.R. McMaster and his staff laid out the president’s request for Mattis in a conference call, but the defense secretary refused, according to several U.S. officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive internal deliberations. At that point, McMaster took Mattis off speakerphone, cleared his staff from the room and continued the conversation. 

“It was clear that the call was not going well,” one official said. In the weeks that followed, the options never arrived. 

In his first year in the Pentagon, Mattis has been one of the least visible and most consequential members of Trump’s foreign policy team. In Situation Room meetings, he has established himself as a commanding voice, reining in discussions before they devolve into chaos. State Department ambassadors say they have spent more face-to-face time with him than they have their own boss, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson. 

A foreign policy establishment that views Trump as erratic and unreliable uniformly praises Mattis.

The current opinion from White House sources is that Mattis in the one Trump cabinet member who is NOT afraid of him. 

The problem of course is that Trump sees himself as the master of all he surveys.

How long he is willing to accept the word "no" from Mattis remains to be seen.

He may eventually start to undermine and attack Mattis just like he has undermined and attacked Jeff Sessions, the FBI, and even his own staff members.

When that happens who draws the line in the sand that keeps him from attacking any country that he believes does not pay him the respect he feels he deserves?

Under Donald Trump black unemployment goes back up. You kind of knew this was going to happen, didn't you?

And in the blink of an eye, black unemployment rises to 7.7% in one of the largest increases in years. #JobsReport https://t.co/ApeCuVU2uj pic.twitter.com/O1R9CUlRC4

— Keith Boykin (@keithboykin) February 2, 2018

Oh Donald Trump should never have said this.

Somebody please inform Jay-Z that because of my policies, Black Unemployment has just been reported to be at the LOWEST RATE EVER RECORDED!

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 28, 2018

Because obviously that shifted everybody's attention to black unemployment, which was all but guaranteed to go up with a racist in the White House.

So gee, what does Donald Trump have to say to Jay Z now?

FEMA decides that they have done enough to help Puerto Rico. San Juan mayor disagrees. Strongly.

Courtesy of NBC News:  

The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) said in a statement that commercial supplies of food and water have been re-established in Puerto Rico and that private suppliers are “sufficiently available that FEMA commodities are no longer needed for emergency operations." The supplies were scheduled to end Wednesday; Washington's decision to end aid to the island was first reported by NPR.

FEMA said most grocery stores are open, as are transportation systems, gas stations, banks and ATMs. FEMA staging areas are still open and have provisions for local mayors to obtain for their citizens, FEMA said.

Not so fast FEMA.   

The mayor of San Juan on Tuesday denounced the U.S. government’s plan to end emergency food and water aid to Puerto Rico, saying she had just sent powdered milk to a school that was still without power and struggling to find the necessary supplies for its students. 

“Yesterday, I had to help — because it is a moral imperative to help — a school about 45 minutes from San Juan that still has no water, no electricity and no milk for their children,” the mayor, Carmen Yulín Cruz, said at the Latino Victory Summit, a gathering of Latino leaders and activists that seeks to boost the number of Hispanics in elected office.

“While I’m standing here with you there are children without food in Puerto Rico,” Cruz said at the summit. 

She said she continues to see women crossing rivers using a rope, because their bridge was washed away, to get medication for their children. 

“We need the help and it’s not help, we have paid for it,” Cruz said, noting that Puerto Ricans have fought in every U.S. military campaign.

"There is a need in Puerto Rico, and we ask the president to, for once, do the right thing and not take the aid away from Puerto Rico."

"During all the humanitarian crisis in Puerto Rico, there's been a feature of the Trump administration and that is that they take away the aid before it's done," Cruz said to reporters following her speech, citing the example of the withdrawal of the Army Reserve even though bridges still need building. 

Let's face it the people of Puerto Rico are simply not white enough for Trump to care about.