#Anthony C. Zinni

[candy--heart]

By  Emily Price

So I decided to do a little research into the $750/day figure I’d heard a private company was charging the US government per each detained migrant child. I wanted to, with my own eyes and brain, 1. verify this figure was accurate; 2. verify it was indeed a private company instead of a non-profit charging this, if true, as both have managed these detention centers (not that it really matters, ultimately, but stay with me); 3. try to figure out where this per diem sum — more than my monthly mortgage — was going, if not to even buy these tortured children toothbrushes and soap, which are about the cheapest basic necessities on the market, and which no individual has to replace every day.

$750/person A DAY should cover a lot of necessities, right? Right. So where the hell is all this money going? This can’t be true...

Well here’s what I found:

1. Yes, it’s a private company called Comprehensive Health Services (a subsidiary of Caliburn International). CHS operates the largest child migrant detention center, which is in FL and was already getting horrible press — especially from local FL papers — last year. But that didn’t matter, because CHS recently opened up a few more child prisons in TX, as it snagged a new government contract, despite many documented concerns about conditions there.

2. $750/day per child is an accurate sum of CHS’s CLAIMED operating costs, and what our federal tax dollars are paying for. A sum that was agreed to upon award of the contract. In fact, it was actually on the record as $775 last summer.

3. So where is this money going, you wonder, if not to soap and toothbrushes? Yeah, I did too, and it was quite easy to dig up. CHS, via Caliburn, is controlled by the private equity firm DC Capital Partners. For those of you who don’t know how private equity firms work, look it up, or ask me in the comments.

4. While I would not be able to find out vested shareholders in the DCCP portfolio, we do not have to assume they’re making some nice returns on these CHS operations and government contracts that line their pockets instead of covering even basic human needs for children. That’s clear, because why would a private company keep their costs down so low that they completely disregard humanity, even though they say they’re experts in “healthcare?”

PROFIT. FOR THEIR PRIVATE INVESTORS.

5. While I can’t name for you the private investors getting rich off of this humanitarian crisis, I can name for you members of the advisory board of DCCP, which approves everything in the portfolio.

First up: Trump’s former Chief of Staff, John Kelly, who was named to the board LAST MONTH, and photographed riding a golf cart into a CHS child prison. So with his own eyes, he saw the conditions there. And he was cool with it all, because hey, there’s money to be made for his rich investor friends, and maybe even himself! Who knows! Can’t say for sure, so feel free to reasonably assume what you wish. I’m just stating facts here.

Coincidentally, prior to joining Trump in the WH, he was also a paid lobbyist for DCCP. Hmmmm...

6. So next up on the DCCP board: Richard L. Armitage, former U.S. deputy secretary of state; Michael Corbin; former ambassador to the United Arab Emirates; Michael V. Hayden, former director of the Central Intelligence Agency and of the National Security Agency; Donald M. Kerr Jr., former deputy director of science and technology at the CIA; Anthony C. Zinni, former commander-in-chief of the U.S. Central Command and former U.S. Envoy to the Middle East; and Stephen F. Loftus, former director of the Office of the Budget for the United States Navy.

Are y’all seeing any patterns here?

7. Michael Hayden, last June, said on the record he sees “commonality” between Nazi Germany’s separation of children at concentration camps and the Trump administration policy that is forcing children to be separated from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border.

"I know we’re not Nazi Germany, alright. But there is a commonality there, and a fear on my part ... We have standards we have to live up to,” Hayden told CNN’s “New Day.”

It appears he left those standards at the boardroom door, along with many other individuals that dance with greed and corruption on the line of the private and public sectors COMPLETELY UNCHECKED.

8. Last month, the same month Kelly got his new gig, the government awarded CHS a brand new, hush-hush contract worth $341 million, even though there had been tons of pressure to close it due to its conditions.

THERE WAS NO COMPETITIVE BIDDING FOR THE CONTRACT, and it happened under the radar.

9. Just two months before this, in March, CHS/Caliburn cancelled its IPO after registering with the SEC to sell $100m public shares. The CEO cited “market forces,” yet made it clear the company was thriving and growing.

——————

I’ll leave you to come to your own conclusions about all of this, or do more research. And I’ll post a ton of sources in the comments for those who actually think this administration is “draining the swamp,” or who want to debate the semantics of whether these ”centers” can reasonably be called child concentration camps or not without offending some non-brown people.

And for those of you who think children don’t deserve the most basic human rights because they’re not American: There’s a special place in hell for you, and I imagine hell to be a whole lot like this situation.

For those of you who are cool lining the pockets of private citizens in DC with YOUR tax dollars while dirty, hungry, sick children live imprisoned and stacked in cages without even a dime of your money going to pay for soap and toothbrushes for these kids like it was supposed to: I’m ashamed to share this country with you as legal citizens, and I think you’re disgustingly dumb. We failed you, too, but at least you got to go to school when you were a kid, and didn’t spend childhood dying in a cage.

America, NONE OF THIS IS OK. WAKE UP.

——————

FRIDAY NIGHT UPDATE (!!)

1. As mentioned upon writing this, I originally posted my sources at the beginning of the comments thread at time of publishing -- before it became a large discussion. For your convenience and further reading, I am now moving my sources here + some extra homework for everyone to do (no particular order):

https://www.bloomberg.com/profile/company/CLBR:US https://www.miamiherald.com/…/immigra…/article229744049.html https://www.cbsnews.com/…/john-kelly-joins-board-of-calibu…/ https://news.littlesis.org/…/wall-street-banks-former-def…/… https://thehill.com/…/392727-hayden-sees-commonality-betwee… https://www.npr.org/…/florida-shelter-is-scrutinized-for-th… https://www.nytimes.com/…/migrant-shelters-border-crossing.… https://heavy.com/news/2019/05/caliburn-international/… https://www.thedailybeast.com/doj-is-investigating-whether-… https://thebaffler.com/…/retirement-brought-to-you-by-priso… https://www.floridatoday.com/…/cape-canaveral-de…/717375002/ https://www.chsmedical.com/compliance

The people have spoken, so hope that helps you all wrap your minds around this in a more complete and credible way. Thank you to all who have participated in civil dialogue and shared this post. Let's keep it constructive, as we do not need to be even more destructive than the current situation.

2. THE POST IS ALREADY PUBLIC + SHAREABLE. Please do not ask me if you can share it -- I made it public, which is why you can see it. You should be able to share the original version. If you can't, refresh your app, run your updates or make sure you aren't still viewing a friend's protected share of the original itself. There is no possible way I can instruct all individuals on how to share it -- but I appreciate all of you who are moved by these words, and want to raise awareness about this distressing situation.

3. Your concern has given me hope. Do your homework. Look into your group investment portfolios, pensions, etc. Know where your money is invested. Call your legislators. Do anything but freak out to the point of being unproductive and histrionic. DO ANYTHING BUT BE AWFUL TO EACH OTHER.

Thank you. We are in this together..

By  Emily Price

[phroyd]

The row over Donald Trump’s alleged remarks denigrating American soldiers has now seen the US president target one of his core areas of support as he called for a Fox News journalist who reported details of the scandal to be fired.

The Atlantic magazine published a story that described how Trump said he cancelled a visit to pay respects at an American military cemetery outside Paris in 2018 because he thought the dead soldiers were “losers” and “suckers”. Other outlets confirmed the news and detailed more incidents of Trump’s insulting attitude to American soldiers.

'He is a coward': Trump condemned for reportedly calling US war dead ‘suckers’Read more

Among those was the Fox News national security correspondent, Jennifer Griffin, who confirmed in a Twitter thread that Trump called soldiers “suckers”, had questioned why anyone would want to become a soldier and had not wanted to honor war dead at the Aisne-Marne cemetery in France.

Amid furious denials of the story from the White House and Trump allies, Griffin’s reporting probably touched a nerve as it came from the usually reliably pro-Trump Fox News, whose conservative leanings and pro-Trump opinion show hosts are reliable cheerleaders for the president.

In a tweet Trump said: “Jennifer Griffin should be fired for this kind of reporting. Never even called us for comment. Fox News is gone!”

The White House has moved to deny the report unusually forcefully perhaps fearful of the scandal’s impact on military-supporting conservatives. Trump himself dismissed it as a politically motivated “hoax”.

“There is nobody feels more strongly about our soldiers, our wounded warriors, our soldiers that died in war than I do,” he told reporters at the White House on Friday. “It’s a hoax,” he said on Friday night.

The first lady, Melania Trump, also weighed in, in a rare political intervention tweeting that the Atlantic story “was not true”.

But Trump’s former chief of staff John Kelly, a retired marine corps general, has remained notably silent about the president’s comments.

The Atlantic reported that Trump accompanied Kelly, who was the homeland security secretary at the time, to Arlington National Cemetery on Memorial Day 2017. While standing at the grave of Kelly’s son, who was killed in Afghanistan in 2010, Trump reportedly turned to Kelly and said: “I don’t get it. What’s in it for them?”

Multiple reports say that close friends and associates of Kelly have encouraged him to speak out, but Kelly has refused on-the-record interviews about the comments.

Anthony C Zinni, a retired marine corps general and close friend of Kelly, told the New York Times that Kelly is likely trying to “avoid taking a position that might be perceived as political”.

“I also think he takes to heart the commitment to confidentiality in matters related to their interaction with the president,” he said.

Meanwhile, Trump, who has speculated that Kelly might have been a source for the Atlantic story, said on Friday that Kelly “was totally exhausted” and “wasn’t even able to function in the last number of months” during his time in the Oval Office.

Other senior military officials, including Jim Mattis, also a retired marine corps general and Trump’s former secretary of defense, have been silent about the comment.

Trump’s Democratic challenger, the former vice-president Joe Biden, pounced on the news amid broad-ranging condemnation of Trump’s reported remark. Biden called the alleged comments “disgusting” and said Trump was “not fit to be commander-in-chief”.

“When my son volunteered and joined the United States military – and went to Iraq for a year, won the Bronze Star and other commendations, he was not a sucker,” Biden said in emotional remarks in Wilmington, Delaware.

His son Beau, who died of brain cancer in 2015, deployed to Iraq in 2008.

Phroyd

[antiporn-activist]

Not my work, found on Facebook

“So I decided to do a little research into the $750/day figure I’d heard a private company was charging the US government per each detained migrant child. I wanted to, with my own eyes and brain, 1. verify this figure was accurate; 2. verify it was indeed a private company instead of a non-profit charging this, if true, as both have managed these detention centers (not that it really matters, ultimately, but stay with me); 3. try to figure out where this per diem sum — more than my monthly mortgage — was going, if not to even buy these tortured children toothbrushes and soap, which are about the cheapest basic necessities on the market, and which no individual has to replace every day.

$750/person A DAY should cover a lot of necessities, right? Right. So where the hell is all this money going? This can’t be true...

Well here’s what I found:

1. Yes, it’s a private company called Comprehensive Health Services (a subsidiary of Caliburn International). CHS operates the largest child migrant detention center, which is in FL and was already getting horrible press — especially from local FL papers — last year. But that didn’t matter, because CHS recently opened up a few more child prisons in TX, as it snagged a new government contract, despite many documented concerns about conditions there.

2. $750/day per child is an accurate sum of CHS’s CLAIMED operating costs, and what our federal tax dollars are paying for. A sum that was agreed to upon award of the contract. In fact, it was actually on the record as $775 last summer.

3. So where is this money going, you wonder, if not to soap and toothbrushes? Yeah, I did too, and it was quite easy to dig up. CHS, via Caliburn, is controlled by the private equity firm DC Capital Partners. For those of you who don’t know how private equity firms work, look it up, or ask me in the comments.

4. While I would not be able to find out vested shareholders in the DCCP portfolio, we do not have to assume they’re making some nice returns on these CHS operations and government contracts that line their pockets instead of covering even basic human needs for children. That’s clear, because why would a private company keep their costs down so low that they completely disregard humanity, even though they say they’re experts in “healthcare?”

PROFIT. FOR THEIR PRIVATE INVESTORS.

5. While I can’t name for you the private investors getting rich off of this humanitarian crisis, I can name for you members of the advisory board of DCCP, which approves everything in the portfolio.

First up: Trump’s former Chief of Staff, John Kelly, who was named to the board LAST MONTH, and photographed riding a golf cart into a CHS child prison. So with his own eyes, he saw the conditions there. And he was cool with it all, because hey, there’s money to be made for his rich investor friends, and maybe even himself! Who knows! Can’t say for sure, so feel free to reasonably assume what you wish. I’m just stating facts here.

Coincidentally, prior to joining Trump in the WH, he was also a paid lobbyist for DCCP. Hmmmm...

6. So next up on the DCCP board: Richard L. Armitage, former U.S. deputy secretary of state; Michael Corbin; former ambassador to the United Arab Emirates; Michael V. Hayden, former director of the Central Intelligence Agency and of the National Security Agency; Donald M. Kerr Jr., former deputy director of science and technology at the CIA; Anthony C. Zinni, former commander-in-chief of the U.S. Central Command and former U.S. Envoy to the Middle East; and Stephen F. Loftus, former director of the Office of the Budget for the United States Navy.

Are y’all seeing any patterns here?

7. Michael Hayden, last June, said on the record he sees “commonality” between Nazi Germany’s separation of children at concentration camps and the Trump administration policy that is forcing children to be separated from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border.

"I know we’re not Nazi Germany, alright. But there is a commonality there, and a fear on my part ... We have standards we have to live up to,” Hayden told CNN’s “New Day.”

It appears he left those standards at the boardroom door, along with many other individuals that dance with greed and corruption on the line of the private and public sectors COMPLETELY UNCHECKED.

8. Last month, the same month Kelly got his new gig, the government awarded CHS a brand new, hush-hush contract worth $341 million, even though there had been tons of pressure to close it due to its conditions.

THERE WAS NO COMPETITIVE BIDDING FOR THE CONTRACT, and it happened under the radar.

9. Just two months before this, in March, CHS/Caliburn cancelled its IPO after registering with the SEC to sell $100m public shares. The CEO cited “market forces,” yet made it clear the company was thriving and growing.

——————

I’ll leave you to come to your own conclusions about all of this, or do more research. And I’ll post a ton of sources in the comments for those who actually think this administration is “draining the swamp,” or who want to debate the semantics of whether these ”centers” can reasonably be called child concentration camps or not without offending some non-brown people.

And for those of you who think children don’t deserve the most basic human rights because they’re not American: There’s a special place in hell for you, and I imagine hell to be a whole lot like this situation.

For those of you who are cool lining the pockets of private citizens in DC with YOUR tax dollars while dirty, hungry, sick children live imprisoned and stacked in cages without even a dime of your money going to pay for soap and toothbrushes for these kids like it was supposed to: I’m ashamed to share this country with you as legal citizens, and I think you’re disgustingly dumb. We failed you, too, but at least you got to go to school when you were a kid, and didn’t spend childhood dying in a cage.

America, NONE OF THIS IS OK. WAKE UP.”

——————

FRIDAY NIGHT UPDATE (!!)

1. As mentioned upon writing this, I originally posted my sources at the beginning of the comments thread at time of publishing -- before it became a large discussion. For your convenience and further reading, I am now moving my sources here + some extra homework for everyone to do (no particular order):

https://www.bloomberg.com/profile/company/CLBR:US

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/immigration/article229744049.html

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/john-kelly-joins-board-of-caliburn-international-company-operating-largest-unaccompanied-migrant-children-shelter/

https://news.littlesis.org/2019/02/13/wall-street-banks-former-defense-officials-looking-to-cash-in-on-child-detentions/?fbclid=IwAR3VPG3U1VqOlHvAus6mZwT5X42YR0946O-9ALtwFh-P-2i8P_ZxLQ8QvwE

https://thehill.com/latino/392727-hayden-sees-commonality-between-zero-tolerance-border-policy-and-nazi-germany?fbclid=IwAR1XcPVz72-f1ju70gdibR-H6-3tI8dOh_9yqfjZtNx-kfQJb6AMuf-gemI

https://www.npr.org/2019/02/13/694175061/florida-shelter-is-scrutinized-for-the-way-it-handles-migrant-children?fbclid=IwAR2Sq1vPOSLs0LPxkI6723lMKipsI12orZWMqxSzw9kqUqqTfM18gpo6xaU

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/21/us/migrant-shelters-border-crossing.html

https://heavy.com/news/2019/05/caliburn-international/?fbclid=IwAR1tsUMn2noGPGWEZxdwOlGwwCj-eDjaIR2I2pCNPd6qgehjCKs0lJpIJuQ

https://www.thedailybeast.com/doj-is-investigating-whether-us-payoffs-to-iraqi-officials-opened-the-door-for-isis?fbclid=IwAR2fXGNE328gvAi6bp7mD7SzKYo5wCY-x2lODw4fKDNrssupd-FGcOfmjnY

https://thebaffler.com/latest/retirement-brought-to-you-by-prisons-inc?fbclid=IwAR3STKgqiMOtVUho4QPq21zXRNovBl8_gvKpFdX3rUWahrOuZmBLJ9pO_m0

https://www.floridatoday.com/story/news/local/2018/06/20/cape-canaveral-detention-center/717375002/

https://www.chsmedical.com/compliance

The people have spoken, so hope that helps you all wrap your minds around this in a more complete and credible way. Thank you to all who have participated in civil dialogue and shared this post. Let's keep it constructive, as we do not need to be even more destructive than the current situation.

2. THE POST IS ALREADY PUBLIC + SHAREABLE. Please do not ask me if you can share it -- I made it public, which is why you can see it. You should be able to share the original version. If you can't, refresh your app, run your updates or make sure you aren't still viewing a friend's protected share of the original itself. There is no possible way I can instruct all individuals on how to share it -- but I appreciate all of you who are moved by these words, and want to raise awareness about this distressing situation.

3. Your concern has given me hope. Do your homework. Look into your group investment portfolios, pensions, etc. Know where your money is invested. Call your legislators. Do anything but freak out to the point of being unproductive and histrionic. DO ANYTHING BUT BE AWFUL TO EACH OTHER.

Thank you. We are in this together.

From the Facebook page of Emily Price.

[bespangeled]

Child Prison Profits

So I decided to do a little research into the $750/day figure I’d heard a private company was charging the US government per each detained migrant child. I wanted to, with my own eyes and brain,

1. verify this figure was accurate

2. verify it was indeed a private company instead of a non-profit charging this, if true, as both have managed these detention centers (not that it really matters, ultimately, but stay with me);

3. try to figure out where this per diem sum — more than my monthly mortgage — was going, if not to even buy these tortured children toothbrushes and soap, which are about the cheapest basic necessities on the market, and which no individual has to replace every day.

$750/person A DAY should cover a lot of necessities, right? Right. So where the hell is all this money going? This can’t be true...

Well here’s what I found:

1. Yes, it’s a private company called Comprehensive Health Services (a subsidiary of Caliburn International). CHS operates the largest child migrant detention center, which is in FL and was already getting horrible press — especially from local FL papers — last year. But that didn’t matter, because CHS recently opened up a few more child prisons in TX, as it snagged a new government contract, despite many documented concerns about conditions there.

2. $750/day per child is an accurate sum of CHS’s CLAIMED operating costs, and what our federal tax dollars are paying for. A sum that was agreed to upon award of the contract. In fact, it was actually on the record as $775 last summer.

3. So where is this money going, you wonder, if not to soap and toothbrushes? Yeah, I did too, and it was quite easy to dig up. CHS, via Caliburn, is controlled by the private equity firm DC Capital Partners. For those of you who don’t know how private equity firms work, look it up, or ask me in the comments.

4. While I would not be able to find out vested shareholders in the DCCP portfolio, we do not have to assume they’re making some nice returns on these CHS operations and government contracts that line their pockets instead of covering even basic human needs for children. That’s clear, because why would a private company keep their costs down so low that they completely disregard humanity, even though they say they’re experts in “healthcare?”

PROFIT. FOR THEIR PRIVATE INVESTORS.

5. While I can’t name for you the private investors getting rich off of this humanitarian crisis, I can name for you members of the advisory board of DCCP, which approves everything in the portfolio.

First up: Trump’s former Chief of Staff, John Kelly, who was named to the board LAST MONTH, and photographed riding a golf cart into a CHS child prison. So with his own eyes, he saw the conditions there. And he was cool with it all, because hey, there’s money to be made for his rich investor friends, and maybe even himself! Who knows! Can’t say for sure, so feel free to reasonably assume what you wish. I’m just stating facts here.

Coincidentally, prior to joining Trump in the WH, he was also a paid lobbyist for DCCP. Hmmmm...

6. So next up on the DCCP board: Richard L. Armitage, former U.S. deputy secretary of state; Michael Corbin; former ambassador to the United Arab Emirates; Michael V. Hayden, former director of the Central Intelligence Agency and of the National Security Agency; Donald M. Kerr Jr., former deputy director of science and technology at the CIA; Anthony C. Zinni, former commander-in-chief of the U.S. Central Command and former U.S. Envoy to the Middle East; and Stephen F. Loftus, former director of the Office of the Budget for the United States Navy.

Are y’all seeing any patterns here?

7. Michael Hayden, last June, said on the record he sees “commonality” between Nazi Germany’s separation of children at concentration camps and the Trump administration policy that is forcing children to be separated from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border.

"I know we’re not Nazi Germany, alright. But there is a commonality there, and a fear on my part ... We have standards we have to live up to,” Hayden told CNN’s “New Day.”

It appears he left those standards at the boardroom door, along with many other individuals that dance with greed and corruption on the line of the private and public sectors COMPLETELY UNCHECKED.

8. Last month, the same month Kelly got his new gig, the government awarded CHS a brand new, hush-hush contract worth $341 million, even though there had been tons of pressure to close it due to its conditions.

THERE WAS NO COMPETITIVE BIDDING FOR THE CONTRACT, and it happened under the radar.

9. Just two months before this, in March, CHS/Caliburn cancelled its IPO after registering with the SEC to sell $100m public shares. The CEO cited “market forces,” yet made it clear the company was thriving and growing.

——————

I’ll leave you to come to your own conclusions about all of this, or do more research. And I’ll post a ton of sources in the comments for those who actually think this administration is “draining the swamp,” or who want to debate the semantics of whether these ”centers” can reasonably be called child concentration camps or not without offending some non-brown people.

And for those of you who think children don’t deserve the most basic human rights because they’re not American: There’s a special place in hell for you, and I imagine hell to be a whole lot like this situation.

For those of you who are cool lining the pockets of private citizens in DC with YOUR tax dollars while dirty, hungry, sick children live imprisoned and stacked in cages without even a dime of your money going to pay for soap and toothbrushes for these kids like it was supposed to: I’m ashamed to share this country with you as legal citizens, and I think you’re disgustingly dumb. We failed you, too, but at least you got to go to school when you were a kid, and didn’t spend childhood dying in a cage.

America, NONE OF THIS IS OK. WAKE UP.

——————

FRIDAY NIGHT UPDATE (!!)

1. As mentioned upon writing this, I originally posted my sources at the beginning of the comments thread at time of publishing -- before it became a large discussion. For your convenience and further reading, I am now moving my sources here + some extra homework for everyone to do (no particular order):

https://www.bloomberg.com/profile/company/CLBR:US https://www.miamiherald.com/…/immigra…/article229744049.html https://www.cbsnews.com/…/john-kelly-joins-board-of-calibu…/ https://news.littlesis.org/…/wall-street-banks-former-def…/… https://thehill.com/…/392727-hayden-sees-commonality-betwee… https://www.npr.org/…/florida-shelter-is-scrutinized-for-th… https://www.nytimes.com/…/migrant-shelters-border-crossing.… https://heavy.com/news/2019/05/caliburn-international/… https://www.thedailybeast.com/doj-is-investigating-whether-… https://thebaffler.com/…/retirement-brought-to-you-by-priso… https://www.floridatoday.com/…/cape-canaveral-de…/717375002/ https://www.chsmedical.com/compliance

The people have spoken, so hope that helps you all wrap your minds around this in a more complete and credible way. Thank you to all who have participated in civil dialogue and shared this post. Let's keep it constructive, as we do not need to be even more destructive than the current situation.

2. THE POST IS ALREADY PUBLIC + SHAREABLE. Please do not ask me if you can share it -- I made it public, which is why you can see it. You should be able to share the original version. If you can't, refresh your app, run your updates or make sure you aren't still viewing a friend's protected share of the original itself. There is no possible way I can instruct all individuals on how to share it -- but I appreciate all of you who are moved by these words, and want to raise awareness about this distressing situation.

3. Your concern has given me hope. Do your homework. Look into your group investment portfolios, pensions, etc. Know where your money is invested. Call your legislators. Do anything but freak out to the point of being unproductive and histrionic. DO ANYTHING BUT BE AWFUL TO EACH OTHER.

Thank you. We are in this together.

[autismgavemychildvaccines]

A quick peek inside Satan’s quivering anus.

Also known as the company running ICE detention centers. So, all of us already know that these places are concentration camps. Most of us also know that these are incredibly inhumane places that show the true character of what we have allowed ourselves to become. And some of us have even heard that it’s costing $775 per day, per inmate to house these detained individuals. $775. That’s a lot. In fact, that means if 2 families of 2 parents and 3 kids are detained for a year (360 days actually), we as taxpayers are paying more for these people to be locked up in bullshit conditions than we are allotting funds to prevent public health emergencies in the average ENTIRE FUCKING STATE (California and New York excluded in this, because they are special cupcakes with super high populations and extra threat sprinkles on top).  Now, the humanitarian side of me has had my grits boiling since this shit started going down, but if there are any libertarians or fiscal conservatives reading, that bottom line, if nothing else, should piss you the fuck off too. Not just for the theoretical bit of it, but for the fact that the average detention stay per immigrant in 2019 has been 91 days, and nearly half of immigrants detained stay in detainment from 2 to 4 years. Sources sort of vary at how many are detained at CHS facilities (I’ll get to them in a moment, but for now know they are the reason for the $775 figure), but the ballpark spans from 20,000 to roughly 52,000 people. So let’s do some quick math here and do a best/worst/average. Say that figures have been inflated (that happens) and there’s only 9,000 people incarcerated at CHS facilities. Average length of stay has been 91 days this year, so we have a nice, simple... Carry the one... Holy fucking shitballs. 819,000 person-days. That’s $634,725,000.  That is $14 Million dollars more than the CDC spends during a full FUCKING YEAR in ensuring that EVERY health department can protect the WHOLE GODDAMN POPULATION with medical countermeasures to a terror event or pandemic outbreak. FOR 9,000 FUCKING PEOPLE. FUCK THE OTHER EXAMPLES, THAT’S THE BEST CASE, FUCK.  I’m just going to step away for a moment..   Okay.. Deep breaths. Back on track. Right. Ahem. So. Everyone else finish changing their pants after shitting bricks over the fact we’re spending national level budgets on a population smaller than  Anaconda-Deer Lodge County, Montana (I swear on any God you believe in, that’s a real name) ? Good.

I mentioned CHS earlier. Amazingly, it doesn’t stand for Child Herder Services, or Cold Heartless Sinners, or Cheeto Humping Slimeballs, though they’d all be more fitting. They are a private company, called, and get your asscheeks ready for this one: Comprehensive Health Services. 

COMPREHENSIVE HEALTH SERVICES  ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME?

So this  company. Thiiiiis fucking company, owned by Caliburn International has the FUCKING BALLS to put health in their name despite keeping populations in cages with no water outside of the toilet, with no hygiene supplies, and the absolute minimum in terms of keeping people alive (with the most common issue being, you fucking guessed it, HEALTH complications) is charging us to detain people that most of us don’t even want detained, $775 a day. We’ve seen good chunks of these facilities, and they look fucking awful. Understaffed, overcrowded, minimal resources, and the treatment of (some) workers and (all) detainees as livestock. Does that sound, I don’t know, AT.  ALL. FUCKING. FAMILIAR?  So where is our money going? Our over half a billion dollars, of which even the tiniest scrap could give these people at least decent fucking detention areas (not that I believe they should be there as Asylum seekers anyways, mind you)? Let’s actually make this a game. Is it:  A) Corporate Interests with a heavy Lobbying Presence B) Some group of mostly anonymous investors that would likely feast on a newly starved child’s cheeks as they are “delectable and tender” if cooked properly   C) Some Trump Lackeys that got the contract  D) A company that also sells health insurance services Okay, 10 seconds on the clock.  And time! Okay, so how many picked A? Nice, nice. B? Okay.. Keep in mind I don’t know if they actually eat babies but they may just as well. It’d at least make them less human and thus easier to identify as an enemy. C? Aaah, that’s the high number I was expecting and that means D comes in with a small but decent following. WELL CONGRATS, YOU’RE ALL WINNERS! Here’s how:  A) CHS is part of Caliburn, which also owns DC Capital Partners, one of the bigger and well established lobbying firms in the country. And as any lobbying group does, they ensure that politicians bend to their will, increase their dividends, and weed out competition where they can to avoid a power struggle. Ever wonder why the NRA can never be competed with by a gun owners organization that doesn’t simultaneously deep throat their glocks while twisting their heads into their own asses?  B) Frankly, a lot of these funds are going straight to the private market and boy oh boy, does cruelty mean big business gains and a sturdy portfolio. That being said, you cannot separate the act of investing from the actions of the company you are investing in. If they do something fucked, you are essentially an enabler and an accessory to that action. Well, this isn’t ENTIRELY true. As it happens, some months ago they closed off an IPO of CHS specifically (an odd thing to do for a growing company) and cited “market forces” as the reason. How very suspicious.  C) Does this surprise anyone? So, while the actual list of investors is made private, there are an executive board of orange cocksuckers d’jour that have made this their golden parachute, or in the case of one asshole, was a lobbyist for DCCP, then in the Trump Cabinet, then went over to CHS. Here’s a quick list:  Former Chief of Staff John Kelly (aforementioned lobbyist)  Former Deputy Secretary of State Richard L. Armitage Former Ambassador Michael Corbin Former Commander-in-Chief of CENTCOM, Anthony Zinni Former Director of Science and Tech for CIA, Donald Kerr Former Head of CIA Michael Hayden (WHO PUBLICLY DENOUNCED THESE SORT OF PLACES AND ACTIONS AS BEING SIMILAR TO NAZI EFFORTS LAST YEAR) 

Former director of the office of the Budget for the U.S. Navy, Stephen Lotus.  Wow, that’s a lot of love between Trump’s appointees and a contractor, who yes D) also sold insurance services.  So that’s pretty fucked. And sliiight detour now. So, when I started out, like really started out, my first task was dealing with budgets. I still help from time to time, and have to work with contractors fairly often. Now, it’s usual that even if we know suspect that these contractors will give us the best deal every time, we have to do something called “competitive bidding”. That’s where we essentially throw the offer to the air, and whoever gives us the best deal, wins. Now this can be kinda manipulated a bit but in general, these records are open to the public so it’s better for us to just waste the time and actually go through a competitive bidding process than have the explain how we aren’t corrupt while looking pretty corrupt.  You know what didn’t happen here? Competitive bidding. It was a closed off contract. Completely in the dark. How very peculiar, isn’t it?  So, all in all, we have a bunch of fuckwits booted from the White House, sent to a company that has perhaps the most profitable contract of all time, acting like literal nazis, stealing from taxpayers and profiting off racism, suffering and inhumane treatment, all because they could with some bullshit nationalism narrative that’s been pushed by an asshole who can’t even spell check his fucking twitter rants.  Do what you can. But certainly don’t complain to companies who are giving resources to these groups to continue their round ups, for instance, all those vans which are owned by Enterprise. Certainly don’t contact them at 855-298-0346, whatever you do. They are busy people trying to make lots and lots of money. Don’t call your representative and tell them if they support this, they will lose by going to this website: https://www.house.gov/representatives/find-your-representative . And above all, DO NOT use your available resources to try and disrupt this “carrying out of justice” in any way you can safely. Heavens no, because this is America, and children, America doesn’t care if you’re an immigrant or a nationalized citizen. Nooo no no no. It cares about whether you can turn a profit. 

[rjzimmerman]

Put troops out there so we can thank them — leave tanks for Red Square.

Gen. Anthony C. Zinni, a retired four-star Marine general and former head of United States Central Command, who until earlier this year served in the Trump administration as a special envoy to help resolve disputes in the Persian Gulf.

In addition, the following from John Kirby, a retired Navy admiral who is now a commentator for CNN:

I, for one, will not be watching any of this shit on TV. Let the MAGAsaurs enjoy themselves.

[ladyninasayers-ish]

So I decided to do a little research into the $750/day figure I’d heard a private company was charging the US government per each detained migrant child. I wanted to, with my own eyes and brain, 1. verify this figure was accurate; 2. verify it was indeed a private company instead of a non-profit charging this, if true, as both have managed these detention centers (not that it really matters, ultimately, but stay with me); 3. try to figure out where this per diem sum — more than my monthly mortgage — was going, if not to even buy these tortured children toothbrushes and soap, which are about the cheapest basic necessities on the market, and which no individual has to replace every day.

$750/person A DAY should cover a lot of necessities, right? Right. So where the hell is all this money going? This can’t be true...

Well here’s what I found:

1. Yes, it’s a private company called Comprehensive Health Services (a subsidiary of Caliburn International). CHS operates the largest child migrant detention center, which is in FL and was already getting horrible press — especially from local FL papers — last year. But that didn’t matter, because CHS recently opened up a few more child prisons in TX, as it snagged a new government contract, despite many documented concerns about conditions there.

2. $750/day per child is an accurate sum of CHS’s CLAIMED operating costs, and what our federal tax dollars are paying for. A sum that was agreed to upon award of the contract. In fact, it was actually on the record as $775 last summer.

3. So where is this money going, you wonder, if not to soap and toothbrushes? Yeah, I did too, and it was quite easy to dig up. CHS, via Caliburn, is controlled by the private equity firm DC Capital Partners. For those of you who don’t know how private equity firms work, look it up, or ask me in the comments.

4. While I would not be able to find out vested shareholders in the DCCP portfolio, we do not have to assume they’re making some nice returns on these CHS operations and government contracts that line their pockets instead of covering even basic human needs for children. That’s clear, because why would a private company keep their costs down so low that they completely disregard humanity, even though they say they’re experts in “healthcare?”

PROFIT. FOR THEIR PRIVATE INVESTORS.

5. While I can’t name for you the private investors getting rich off of this humanitarian crisis, I can name for you members of the advisory board of DCCP, which approves everything in the portfolio.

First up: Trump’s former Chief of Staff, John Kelly, who was named to the board LAST MONTH, and photographed riding a golf cart into a CHS child prison. So with his own eyes, he saw the conditions there. And he was cool with it all, because hey, there’s money to be made for his rich investor friends, and maybe even himself! Who knows! Can’t say for sure, so feel free to reasonably assume what you wish. I’m just stating facts here.

Coincidentally, prior to joining Trump in the WH, he was also a paid lobbyist for DCCP. Hmmmm...

6. So next up on the DCCP board: Richard L. Armitage, former U.S. deputy secretary of state; Michael Corbin; former ambassador to the United Arab Emirates; Michael V. Hayden, former director of the Central Intelligence Agency and of the National Security Agency; Donald M. Kerr Jr., former deputy director of science and technology at the CIA; Anthony C. Zinni, former commander-in-chief of the U.S. Central Command and former U.S. Envoy to the Middle East; and Stephen F. Loftus, former director of the Office of the Budget for the United States Navy.

Are y’all seeing any patterns here?

7. Michael Hayden, last June, said on the record he sees “commonality” between Nazi Germany’s separation of children at concentration camps and the Trump administration policy that is forcing children to be separated from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border.

"I know we’re not Nazi Germany, alright. But there is a commonality there, and a fear on my part ... We have standards we have to live up to,” Hayden told CNN’s “New Day.”

It appears he left those standards at the boardroom door, along with many other individuals that dance with greed and corruption on the line of the private and public sectors COMPLETELY UNCHECKED.

8. Last month, the same month Kelly got his new gig, the government awarded CHS a brand new, hush-hush contract worth $341 million, even though there had been tons of pressure to close it due to its conditions.

THERE WAS NO COMPETITIVE BIDDING FOR THE CONTRACT, and it happened under the radar.

9. Just two months before this, in March, CHS/Caliburn cancelled its IPO after registering with the SEC to sell $100m public shares. The CEO cited “market forces,” yet made it clear the company was thriving and growing.

——————

I’ll leave you to come to your own conclusions about all of this, or do more research. And I’ll post a ton of sources in the comments for those who actually think this administration is “draining the swamp,” or who want to debate the semantics of whether these ”centers” can reasonably be called child concentration camps or not without offending some non-brown people.

And for those of you who think children don’t deserve the most basic human rights because they’re not American: There’s a special place in hell for you, and I imagine hell to be a whole lot like this situation.

For those of you who are cool lining the pockets of private citizens in DC with YOUR tax dollars while dirty, hungry, sick children live imprisoned and stacked in cages without even a dime of your money going to pay for soap and toothbrushes for these kids like it was supposed to: I’m ashamed to share this country with you as legal citizens, and I think you’re disgustingly dumb. We failed you, too, but at least you got to go to school when you were a kid, and didn’t spend childhood dying in a cage.

America, NONE OF THIS IS OK. WAKE UP.

——————

FRIDAY NIGHT UPDATE (!!)

1. As mentioned upon writing this, I originally posted my sources at the beginning of the comments thread at time of publishing -- before it became a large discussion. For your convenience and further reading, I am now moving my sources here + some extra homework for everyone to do (no particular order):

https://www.bloomberg.com/profile/company/CLBR:US

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/immigration/article229744049.html

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/john-kelly-joins-board-of-caliburn-international-company-operating-largest-unaccompanied-migrant-children-shelter/

https://news.littlesis.org/2019/02/13/wall-street-banks-former-defense-officials-looking-to-cash-in-on-child-detentions/?fbclid=IwAR3VPG3U1VqOlHvAus6mZwT5X42YR0946O-9ALtwFh-P-2i8P_ZxLQ8QvwE

https://thehill.com/latino/392727-hayden-sees-commonality-between-zero-tolerance-border-policy-and-nazi-germany?fbclid=IwAR1XcPVz72-f1ju70gdibR-H6-3tI8dOh_9yqfjZtNx-kfQJb6AMuf-gemI

https://www.npr.org/2019/02/13/694175061/florida-shelter-is-scrutinized-for-the-way-it-handles-migrant-children?fbclid=IwAR2Sq1vPOSLs0LPxkI6723lMKipsI12orZWMqxSzw9kqUqqTfM18gpo6xaU

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/21/us/migrant-shelters-border-crossing.html

https://heavy.com/news/2019/05/caliburn-international/?fbclid=IwAR1tsUMn2noGPGWEZxdwOlGwwCj-eDjaIR2I2pCNPd6qgehjCKs0lJpIJuQ

https://www.thedailybeast.com/doj-is-investigating-whether-us-payoffs-to-iraqi-officials-opened-the-door-for-isis?fbclid=IwAR2fXGNE328gvAi6bp7mD7SzKYo5wCY-x2lODw4fKDNrssupd-FGcOfmjnY

https://thebaffler.com/latest/retirement-brought-to-you-by-prisons-inc?fbclid=IwAR3STKgqiMOtVUho4QPq21zXRNovBl8_gvKpFdX3rUWahrOuZmBLJ9pO_m0

https://www.floridatoday.com/story/news/local/2018/06/20/cape-canaveral-detention-center/717375002/

https://www.chsmedical.com/compliance

The people have spoken, so hope that helps you all wrap your minds around this in a more complete and credible way. Thank you to all who have participated in civil dialogue and shared this post. Let's keep it constructive, as we do not need to be even more destructive than the current situation.

2. THE POST IS ALREADY PUBLIC + SHAREABLE. Please do not ask me if you can share it -- I made it public, which is why you can see it. You should be able to share the original version. If you can't, refresh your app, run your updates or make sure you aren't still viewing a friend's protected share of the original itself. There is no possible way I can instruct all individuals on how to share it -- but I appreciate all of you who are moved by these words, and want to raise awareness about this distressing situation.

3. Your concern has given me hope. Do your homework. Look into your group investment portfolios, pensions, etc. Know where your money is invested. Call your legislators. Do anything but freak out to the point of being unproductive and histrionic. DO ANYTHING BUT BE AWFUL TO EACH OTHER.

Thank you. We are in this together.

[napoleoninrags]

Worth a read for better understanding of the child detention centers and the profiteers behind them. I truly appreciate the research and documentation.

So I decided to do a little research into the $750/day figure I’d heard a private company was charging the US government per each detained migrant child. I wanted to, with my own eyes and brain, 1. verify this figure was accurate; 2. verify it was indeed a private company instead of a non-profit charging this, if true, as both have managed these detention centers (not that it really matters, ultimately, but stay with me); 3. try to figure out where this per diem sum — more than my monthly mortgage — was going, if not to even buy these tortured children toothbrushes and soap, which are about the cheapest basic necessities on the market, and which no individual has to replace every day.

$750/person A DAY should cover a lot of necessities, right? Right. So where the hell is all this money going? This can’t be true...

Well here’s what I found:

1. Yes, it’s a private company called Comprehensive Health Services (a subsidiary of Caliburn International). CHS operates the largest child migrant detention center, which is in FL and was already getting horrible press — especially from local FL papers — last year. But that didn’t matter, because CHS recently opened up a few more child prisons in TX, as it snagged a new government contract, despite many documented concerns about conditions there.

2. $750/day per child is an accurate sum of CHS’s CLAIMED operating costs, and what our federal tax dollars are paying for. A sum that was agreed to upon award of the contract. In fact, it was actually on the record as $775 last summer.

3. So where is this money going, you wonder, if not to soap and toothbrushes? Yeah, I did too, and it was quite easy to dig up. CHS, via Caliburn, is controlled by the private equity firm DC Capital Partners. For those of you who don’t know how private equity firms work, look it up, or ask me in the comments.

4. While I would not be able to find out vested shareholders in the DCCP portfolio, we do not have to assume they’re making some nice returns on these CHS operations and government contracts that line their pockets instead of covering even basic human needs for children. That’s clear, because why would a private company keep their costs down so low that they completely disregard humanity, even though they say they’re experts in “healthcare?”

PROFIT. FOR THEIR PRIVATE INVESTORS.

5. While I can’t name for you the private investors getting rich off of this humanitarian crisis, I can name for you members of the advisory board of DCCP, which approves everything in the portfolio.

First up: Trump’s former Chief of Staff, John Kelly, who was named to the board LAST MONTH, and photographed riding a golf cart into a CHS child prison. So with his own eyes, he saw the conditions there. And he was cool with it all, because hey, there’s money to be made for his rich investor friends, and maybe even himself! Who knows! Can’t say for sure, so feel free to reasonably assume what you wish. I’m just stating facts here.

Coincidentally, prior to joining Trump in the WH, he was also a paid lobbyist for DCCP. Hmmmm...

6. So next up on the DCCP board: Richard L. Armitage, former U.S. deputy secretary of state; Michael Corbin; former ambassador to the United Arab Emirates; Michael V. Hayden, former director of the Central Intelligence Agency and of the National Security Agency; Donald M. Kerr Jr., former deputy director of science and technology at the CIA; Anthony C. Zinni, former commander-in-chief of the U.S. Central Command and former U.S. Envoy to the Middle East; and Stephen F. Loftus, former director of the Office of the Budget for the United States Navy.

Are y’all seeing any patterns here?

7. Michael Hayden, last June, said on the record he sees “commonality” between Nazi Germany’s separation of children at concentration camps and the Trump administration policy that is forcing children to be separated from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border.

"I know we’re not Nazi Germany, alright. But there is a commonality there, and a fear on my part ... We have standards we have to live up to,” Hayden told CNN’s “New Day.”

It appears he left those standards at the boardroom door, along with many other individuals that dance with greed and corruption on the line of the private and public sectors COMPLETELY UNCHECKED.

8. Last month, the same month Kelly got his new gig, the government awarded CHS a brand new, hush-hush contract worth $341 million, even though there had been tons of pressure to close it due to its conditions.

THERE WAS NO COMPETITIVE BIDDING FOR THE CONTRACT, and it happened under the radar.

9. Just two months before this, in March, CHS/Caliburn cancelled its IPO after registering with the SEC to sell $100m public shares. The CEO cited “market forces,” yet made it clear the company was thriving and growing.

——————

I’ll leave you to come to your own conclusions about all of this, or do more research. And I’ll post a ton of sources in the comments for those who actually think this administration is “draining the swamp,” or who want to debate the semantics of whether these ”centers” can reasonably be called child concentration camps or not without offending some non-brown people.

And for those of you who think children don’t deserve the most basic human rights because they’re not American: There’s a special place in hell for you, and I imagine hell to be a whole lot like this situation.

For those of you who are cool lining the pockets of private citizens in DC with YOUR tax dollars while dirty, hungry, sick children live imprisoned and stacked in cages without even a dime of your money going to pay for soap and toothbrushes for these kids like it was supposed to: I’m ashamed to share this country with you as legal citizens, and I think you’re disgustingly dumb. We failed you, too, but at least you got to go to school when you were a kid, and didn’t spend childhood dying in a cage.

America, NONE OF THIS IS OK. WAKE UP.

——————

FRIDAY NIGHT UPDATE (!!)

1. As mentioned upon writing this, I originally posted my sources at the beginning of the comments thread at time of publishing -- before it became a large discussion. For your convenience and further reading, I am now moving my sources here + some extra homework for everyone to do (no particular order):

https://www.bloomberg.com/profile/company/CLBR:US

https://www.miamiherald.com/news/local/immigration/article229744049.html

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/john-kelly-joins-board-of-caliburn-international-company-operating-largest-unaccompanied-migrant-children-shelter/

https://news.littlesis.org/2019/02/13/wall-street-banks-former-defense-officials-looking-to-cash-in-on-child-detentions/?fbclid=IwAR3VPG3U1VqOlHvAus6mZwT5X42YR0946O-9ALtwFh-P-2i8P_ZxLQ8QvwE

https://thehill.com/latino/392727-hayden-sees-commonality-between-zero-tolerance-border-policy-and-nazi-germany?fbclid=IwAR1XcPVz72-f1ju70gdibR-H6-3tI8dOh_9yqfjZtNx-kfQJb6AMuf-gemI

https://www.npr.org/2019/02/13/694175061/florida-shelter-is-scrutinized-for-the-way-it-handles-migrant-children?fbclid=IwAR2Sq1vPOSLs0LPxkI6723lMKipsI12orZWMqxSzw9kqUqqTfM18gpo6xaU

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/21/us/migrant-shelters-border-crossing.html

https://heavy.com/news/2019/05/caliburn-international/?fbclid=IwAR1tsUMn2noGPGWEZxdwOlGwwCj-eDjaIR2I2pCNPd6qgehjCKs0lJpIJuQ

https://www.thedailybeast.com/doj-is-investigating-whether-us-payoffs-to-iraqi-officials-opened-the-door-for-isis?fbclid=IwAR2fXGNE328gvAi6bp7mD7SzKYo5wCY-x2lODw4fKDNrssupd-FGcOfmjnY

https://thebaffler.com/latest/retirement-brought-to-you-by-prisons-inc?fbclid=IwAR3STKgqiMOtVUho4QPq21zXRNovBl8_gvKpFdX3rUWahrOuZmBLJ9pO_m0

https://www.floridatoday.com/story/news/local/2018/06/20/cape-canaveral-detention-center/717375002/

https://www.chsmedical.com/compliance

The people have spoken, so hope that helps you all wrap your minds around this in a more complete and credible way. Thank you to all who have participated in civil dialogue and shared this post. Let's keep it constructive, as we do not need to be even more destructive than the current situation.

2. THE POST IS ALREADY PUBLIC + SHAREABLE. Please do not ask me if you can share it -- I made it public, which is why you can see it. You should be able to share the original version. If you can't, refresh your app, run your updates or make sure you aren't still viewing a friend's protected share of the original itself. There is no possible way I can instruct all individuals on how to share it -- but I appreciate all of you who are moved by these words, and want to raise awareness about this distressing situation.

3. Your concern has given me hope. Do your homework. Look into your group investment portfolios, pensions, etc. Know where your money is invested. Call your legislators. Do anything but freak out to the point of being unproductive and histrionic. DO ANYTHING BUT BE AWFUL TO EACH OTHER.

Thank you. We are in this together.

[ffbhfbhfhfy]

(PDF) Read Dragon Days: Time for "Unconventional" Tactics by H. John Poole

  Read/Download Visit :

https://greatbooksonline12.blogspot.com/?book=096386954X

Book Details :

Author : H. John Poole

Pages : 454 pages

Publisher : Posterity Press (NC)

Language :

ISBN-10 : 096386954X

ISBN-13 : 9780963869548

Book Synopsis :

Read Online and Download Dragon Days: Time for "Unconventional" Tactics .Here's onr for America's finest her infantrymen and special operators When get cut off and surrounded in Iraq or Aghanistan, they could fight and escape like guerrillas. For the first time in America, there's an unconventional warfare tactical techniques manual that has been developed specifically for them. It's called Dragon Days: Time for 'Unconventional' Tactics. Through 162 illustrations and many examples, the author of The Last Hundred Yards explains how a tiny U.S. contingent could fend for itself when all else has failed. Retired Marine Maj.Gen. Ray E-Tool Smith again writes the foreword and highly recommends Dragon Days to all infantrymen and special operators. Retired Marine Gen. Anthony C. Zinni (the former head of CENTCOM) calls it another brilliant manual by an author with expertise in unconventional warfare. Covering events as recent as September 2007, Part One of Dragon Days additionally discusses the extent to which the Communist Chinese may be supporting or .

H. John Poole book Dragon Days: Time for "Unconventional" Tactics.

 sreading

[sinrau]

The row over Donald Trump’s alleged remarks denigrating American soldiers has now seen the US president target one of his core areas of support as he called for a Fox News journalist who reported details of the scandal to be fired.

The Atlantic magazine published a story that described how Trump said he cancelled a visit to pay respects at an American military cemetery outside Paris in 2018 because he thought the dead soldiers were “losers” and “suckers”. Other outlets confirmed the news and detailed more incidents of Trump’s insulting attitude to American soldiers.

Among those was the Fox News national security correspondent, Jennifer Griffin, who confirmed in a Twitter thread that Trump called soldiers “suckers”, had questioned why anyone would want to become a soldier and had not wanted to honor war dead at the Aisne-Marne cemetery in France.

Amid furious denials of the story from the White House and Trump allies, Griffin’s reporting probably touched a nerve as it came from the usually reliably pro-Trump Fox News, whose conservative leanings and pro-Trump opinion show hosts are reliable cheerleaders for the president.

In a tweet Trump said: “Jennifer Griffin should be fired for this kind of reporting. Never even called us for comment. Fox News is gone!”

The White House has moved to deny the report unusually forcefully perhaps fearful of the scandal’s impact on military-supporting conservatives. Trump himself dismissed it as a politically motivated “hoax”.

“There is nobody feels more strongly about our soldiers, our wounded warriors, our soldiers that died in war than I do,” he told reporters at the White House on Friday. “It’s a hoax,” he said on Friday night.

The first lady, Melania Trump, also weighed in, in a rare political intervention tweeting that the Atlantic story “was not true”.

But Trump’s former chief of staff John Kelly, a retired marine corps general, has remained notably silent about the president’s comments.

The Atlantic reported that Trump accompanied Kelly, who was the homeland security secretary at the time, to Arlington National Cemetery on Memorial Day 2017. While standing at the grave of Kelly’s son, who was killed in Afghanistan in 2010, Trump reportedly turned to Kelly and said: “I don’t get it. What’s in it for them?”

Multiple reports say that close friends and associates of Kelly have encouraged him to speak out, but Kelly has refused on-the-record interviews about the comments.

Anthony C Zinni, a retired marine corps general and close friend of Kelly, told the New York Times that Kelly is likely trying to “avoid taking a position that might be perceived as political”.

“I also think he takes to heart the commitment to confidentiality in matters related to their interaction with the president,” he said.

Meanwhile, Trump, who has speculated that Kelly might have been a source for the Atlantic story, said on Friday that Kelly “was totally exhausted” and “wasn’t even able to function in the last number of months” during his time in the Oval Office.

Other senior military officials, including Jim Mattis, also a retired marine corps general and Trump’s former secretary of defense, have been silent about the comment.

Trump’s Democratic challenger, the former vice-president Joe Biden, pounced on the news amid broad-ranging condemnation of Trump’s reported remark. Biden called the alleged comments “disgusting” and said Trump was “not fit to be commander-in-chief”.

“When my son volunteered and joined the United States military – and went to Iraq for a year, won the Bronze Star and other commendations, he was not a sucker,” Biden said in emotional remarks in Wilmington, Delaware.

His son Beau, who died of brain cancer in 2015, deployed to Iraq in 2008.

Trump calls for Fox News journalist to be fired for report on war dead scandal

[reynard61]

Post by Sheila C. at “Love, Joy, Feminism” about who benefits from privately-owned immigrant detention centers.

Okay, here is a copy of the Facebook post: So I decided to do a little research into the $750/day figure I’d heard a private company was charging the US government per each detained migrant child. I wanted to, with my own eyes and brain, 1. verify this figure was accurate; 2. verify it was indeed a private company instead of a non-profit charging this, if true, as both have managed these detention centers (not that it really matters, ultimately, but stay with me); 3. try to figure out where this per diem sum — more than my monthly mortgage — was going, if not to even buy these tortured children toothbrushes and soap, which are about the cheapest basic necessities on the market, and which no individual has to replace every day.

$750/person A DAY should cover a lot of necessities, right? Right. So where the hell is all this money going? This can’t be true...

Well here’s what I found:

1. Yes, it’s a private company called Comprehensive Health Services (a subsidiary of Caliburn International). CHS operates the largest child migrant detention center, which is in FL and was already getting horrible press — especially from local FL papers — last year. But that didn’t matter, because CHS recently opened up a few more child prisons in TX, as it snagged a new government contract, despite many documented concerns about conditions there.

2. $750/day per child is an accurate sum of CHS’s CLAIMED operating costs, and what our federal tax dollars are paying for. A sum that was agreed to upon award of the contract. In fact, it was actually on the record as $775 last summer.

3. So where is this money going, you wonder, if not to soap and toothbrushes? Yeah, I did too, and it was quite easy to dig up. CHS, via Caliburn, is controlled by the private equity firm DC Capital Partners. For those of you who don’t know how private equity firms work, look it up, or ask me in the comments.

4. While I would not be able to find out vested shareholders in the DCCP portfolio, we do not have to assume they’re making some nice returns on these CHS operations and government contracts that line their pockets instead of covering even basic human needs for children. That’s clear, because why would a private company keep their costs down so low that they completely disregard humanity, even though they say they’re experts in “healthcare?”

PROFIT. FOR THEIR PRIVATE INVESTORS.

5. While I can’t name for you the private investors getting rich off of this humanitarian crisis, I can name for you members of the advisory board of DCCP, which approves everything in the portfolio.

First up: Trump’s former Chief of Staff, John Kelly, who was named to the board LAST MONTH, and photographed riding a golf cart into a CHS child prison. So with his own eyes, he saw the conditions there. And he was cool with it all, because hey, there’s money to be made for his rich investor friends, and maybe even himself! Who knows! Can’t say for sure, so feel free to reasonably assume what you wish. I’m just stating facts here.

Coincidentally, prior to joining Trump in the WH, he was also a paid lobbyist for DCCP. Hmmmm...

6. So next up on the DCCP board: Richard L. Armitage, former U.S. deputy secretary of state; Michael Corbin; former ambassador to the United Arab Emirates; Michael V. Hayden, former director of the Central Intelligence Agency and of the National Security Agency; Donald M. Kerr Jr., former deputy director of science and technology at the CIA; Anthony C. Zinni, former commander-in-chief of the U.S. Central Command and former U.S. Envoy to the Middle East; and Stephen F. Loftus, former director of the Office of the Budget for the United States Navy.

Are y’all seeing any patterns here?

7. Michael Hayden, last June, said on the record he sees “commonality” between Nazi Germany’s separation of children at concentration camps and the Trump administration policy that is forcing children to be separated from their parents at the U.S.-Mexico border.

"I know we’re not Nazi Germany, alright. But there is a commonality there, and a fear on my part ... We have standards we have to live up to,” Hayden told CNN’s “New Day.”

It appears he left those standards at the boardroom door, along with many other individuals that dance with greed and corruption on the line of the private and public sectors COMPLETELY UNCHECKED.

8. Last month, the same month Kelly got his new gig, the government awarded CHS a brand new, hush-hush contract worth $341 million, even though there had been tons of pressure to close it due to its conditions.

THERE WAS NO COMPETITIVE BIDDING FOR THE CONTRACT, and it happened under the radar.

9. Just two months before this, in March, CHS/Caliburn cancelled its IPO after registering with the SEC to sell $100m public shares. The CEO cited “market forces,” yet made it clear the company was thriving and growing.

——————

I’ll leave you to come to your own conclusions about all of this, or do more research. And I’ll post a ton of sources in the comments for those who actually think this administration is “draining the swamp,” or who want to debate the semantics of whether these ”centers” can reasonably be called child concentration camps or not without offending some non-brown people.

And for those of you who think children don’t deserve the most basic human rights because they’re not American: There’s a special place in hell for you, and I imagine hell to be a whole lot like this situation.

For those of you who are cool lining the pockets of private citizens in DC with YOUR tax dollars while dirty, hungry, sick children live imprisoned and stacked in cages without even a dime of your money going to pay for soap and toothbrushes for these kids like it was supposed to: I’m ashamed to share this country with you as legal citizens, and I think you’re disgustingly dumb. We failed you, too, but at least you got to go to school when you were a kid, and didn’t spend childhood dying in a cage.

America, NONE OF THIS IS OK. WAKE UP.

——————

FRIDAY NIGHT UPDATE (!!)

1. As mentioned upon writing this, I originally posted my sources at the beginning of the comments thread at time of publishing -- before it became a large discussion. For your convenience and further reading, I am now moving my sources here + some extra homework for everyone to do (no particular order):

https://www.bloomberg.com/p... https://www.miamiherald.com... https://www.cbsnews.com/new... https://news.littlesis.org/... https://thehill.com/latino/... https://www.npr.org/2019/02... https://www.nytimes.com/201... https://heavy.com/news/2019... https://www.thedailybeast.c... https://thebaffler.com/late... https://www.floridatoday.co... https://www.chsmedical.com/...

The people have spoken, so hope that helps you all wrap your minds around this in a more complete and credible way. Thank you to all who have participated in civil dialogue and shared this post. Let's keep it constructive, as we do not need to be even more destructive than the current situation.

2. THE POST IS ALREADY PUBLIC + SHAREABLE. Please do not ask me if you can share it -- I made it public, which is why you can see it. You should be able to share the original version. If you can't, refresh your app, run your updates or make sure you aren't still viewing a friend's protected share of the original itself. There is no possible way I can instruct all individuals on how to share it -- but I appreciate all of you who are moved by these words, and want to raise awareness about this distressing situation.

3. Your concern has given me hope. Do your homework. Look into your group investment portfolios, pensions, etc. Know where your money is invested. Call your legislators. Do anything but freak out to the point of being unproductive and histrionic. DO ANYTHING BUT BE AWFUL TO EACH OTHER.

Thank you. We are in this together.

https://www.patheos.com/blogs/lovejoyfeminism/2019/07/james-dobson-on-the-border-we-need-a-wall-to-keep-out-the-poor.html#comment-4523027341