#U.S. Representative Seth Moulton

[minnesotafollower]

U.S. Senators and Representatives Demand Ending U.S. Designation of Cuba as State Sponsor of Terrorism     

On January 2, the two U.S. Senators from Massachusetts (Elizabeth Warren and Edward Markey) and five U.S. Representatives from that state (Jim McGovern, Ayanna Pressley, Lori Trahan, Seth Moulton and Stephen Lynch) released a letter (dated December 14, 2023) they had sent to President Biden demanding the cancellation of the U.S. designation of Cuba as a state sponsor of terrorism.[1] That letter…

[mariacallous]

A decision by US House Intelligence Committee (HPSCI) chair Mike Turner to sound the alarm over space-based Russian military research was far more extraordinary than previously reported.

A WIRED review of an internal messaging system used by the United States Congress shows that HPSCI rarely sends members invites to review classified documents and has not—in at least 15 years—alarmed lawmakers by announcing an “urgent” threat against the United States.

The Dear Colleague system is widely used by congressional committees and lawmakers individually to circulate internal memos, invites, and other announcements. This week, WIRED obtained all messages sent House-wide by HPSCI since 2009. Copies of Dear Colleague messages sent since then are backed up by the system. The source of the messages was granted anonymity because their disclosure was not authorized.

The messages reveal that only on a handful of occasions has HPSCI sent letters informing members of classified documents available for review. Of those, none had previously demanded “urgent” attention.

The urgency with which Turner and other HPSCI members characterized the disclosure—only later revealed to concern Russian military research—has been downplayed by fellow lawmakers and Biden administration officials. As a result, criticism has fallen on Turner over the announcement, which generated a slew of provocative headlines and gave life to vague concerns by US officials over the protection of classified sources and methods.

A Washington Post headline that remains visible to users on Google wildly declares: “U.S. officials say Russia has deployed a nuclear weapon in space.” Covering the story for CNN, national security reporter Jim Sciutto was far more tempered, telling TV viewers: “This is something that Russia is experimenting with, looking into designing. This is not a clear and present danger.”

Democratic representative Seth Moulton, who serves on the Armed Services Committee, lambasted Turner during the same CNN segment, labeling him an “intelligence leaker.” Moulton added that two years had passed since he’d first been briefed on the Russian research. “I haven’t had a problem keeping it a secret,” he said.

WIRED reported on Friday that sources on Capitol Hill had begun accusing Turner and his Democratic counterpart on HPSCI, Jim Himes, of issuing the disclosure to influence a vote happening simultaneously to reauthorize a controversial surveillance program, Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). Turner and Himes, after both signing the “Dear Colleague” message the night before, failed to appear at a Rules Committee hearing on Wednesday just as news of the Russian threat went viral.

House speaker Mike Johnson abruptly canceled the vote shortly after, under what sources describe as intense pressure from Turner.

HSCPI spokesperson Jeff Naft—who did not respond to an inquiry prior to WIRED’s story on Friday—later refuted the allegation, calling the implication of ties between the surveillance vote and the Russian intel “way off base.”

The spokesperson said it was a screenshot of HPSCI’s Dear Colleague letter—posted by reporters online less than a day after it was sent—that forced Turner to issue a press release about the supposed Russian threat.

Turner’s press release notably went further than HPSCI’s letter, pressing US president Joe Biden to personally “declassify all information” concerning the threat. The next day, Turner issued a second statement declaring he’d worked closely “with the Biden administration” before notifying Congress. Naft, the HPSCI spokesperson, clarified by email that Turner had worked with the Office of the Director of National Intelligence on the language describing the threat contained in the Dear Colleague letter. (Naft stressed Turner had “NEVER” stated he’d cooperated with the White House.)

Turner’s second statement added that HPSCI had voted 23–1 to make the disclosure. According to the committee’s own rules, a vote is not required to bring classified material to the attention of the chairmen and ranking members of other committees; only House-wide alerts require a vote. It is unclear which HPSCI member voted against the disclosure, as no official roll call was taken.

A senior congressional source tells WIRED the Dear Colleague letter was always destined to cause panic. It is widely understood that the letters are not a secure form of communication and are often disclosed to reporters and others working off the Hill.

Only four times in the past decade and a half, according to WIRED’s review of the system, has HPSCI used a Dear Colleague letter to draw attention to classified material—outside of routine budgetary concerns.

The first such message is dated March 2009 and pertains to two classified Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) reports. The subject of the reports is undeclared. A second letter was issued by HPSCI and signed by former congressperson Devin Nunes on January 10, 2017, informing members of a classified report on “Russian activities and intentions in the recent US election.”

Neither letter is marked urgent.

A third letter informing members about the option to review classified material is dated February 24, 2010; however, it makes clear the material was made available at the request of the intelligence community (IC). It is one of numerous letters in which HPSCI is seen lobbying on the spy agencies’ behalf—in this case, to support a renewal of the 9/11-era USA PATRIOT Act, today defunct due to a lack of support in Congress.

A plurality of HPSCI’s Dear Colleague letters are aimed at whipping support for bills that reauthorize or advance US spy powers. Others urge lawmakers to vote against legislation that would enhance Americans’ privacy protections. One such letter reads simply: “Don’t Handcuff the FBI and Intelligence Community.”

Six other letters are invitations to classified briefings held by intelligence agencies. HPSCI routinely acts as a mediator between the agencies and members of Congress, arranging briefings and other events on the intelligence community’s behalf.

HPSCI sent an additional three Dear Colleagues letters the morning after its “urgent” warning about Russia went out: Each asked members to support various amendments to a FISA bill during an upcoming vote that HPSCI’s chair was, simultaneously, working to get called off.

Sources told WIRED that Johnson’s decision to delay the vote on FISA came amid a sudden threat by Turner to kill the bill the moment it got to the floor. Turner was motivated to stop the bill’s progress at any cost, they said, due to the growing odds of a rival committee passing amendments of their own—to dramatically curtail the FBI’s domestic surveillance abilities.

[association-of-freed-people]

Here’s the bipartisan list of slime you need to shit on this November if given the chance.

Davos 2022 includes the usual components of WEF’s “you’ll own nothing and you’ll be happy” totalitarian eco statist agenda. Topics discussed and panels at the 2022 meeting will include:

Experience the future of cooperation: The Global Collaboration Village

Staying on Course for Nature Action

Future-proofing Health Systems

Accelerating the Reskilling Revolution (for the “green transition”)

The ‘Net’ in Net Zero

The Future of Globalization

Unlocking Carbon Markets

And of course, a Special Address by Volodymyr Zelenskyy, President of Ukraine

The American contingent will include 25 politicians and Biden Administration officials. U.S. Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo will join Climate Czar John Kerry as the White House representatives there. They will be joined by 12 democrat and 10 republican politicians, including 7 senators and two state governors

Without further delay, I’ve provided the entire list of attendees who are showing up to Davos next week. I’ll list the Americans below and the rest are linked below that in an attached document.

Gina Raimondo Secretary of Commerce of USA USA

John F. Kerry Special Presidential Envoy for Climate of the United States of America

Bill Keating Congressman from Massachusetts (D)

Daniel Meuser Congressman from Pennsylvania (R)

Madeleine Dean Congresswoman from Pennsylvania (D)

Ted Lieu Congressman from California (D)

Ann Wagner Congresswoman from Missouri (R)

Christopher A. Coons Senator from Delaware (D)

Darrell Issa Congressman from California (R)

Dean Phillips Congressman from Minnesota (D)

Debra Fischer Senator from Nebraska (R)

Eric Holcomb Governor of Indiana (R)

Gregory W. Meeks Congressman from New York (D)

John W. Hickenlooper Senator from Colorado (D)

Larry Hogan Governor of Maryland (R)

Michael McCaul Congressman from Texas (R)

Pat Toomey Senator from Pennsylvania (R)

Patrick J. Leahy Senator from Vermont (D)

Robert Menendez Senator from New Jersey (D)

Roger F. Wicker Senator from Mississippi (R)

Seth Moulton Congressman from Massachusetts (D)

Sheldon Whitehouse Senator from Rhode Island (D)

Ted Deutch Congressman from Florida (D)

Francis Suarez Mayor of Miami (R)

Al Gore Vice-President of the United States (1993-2001) (D)

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

August 24, 2021

Heather Cox Richardson

Since August 14, just ten days ago, the U.S. has facilitated the evacuation of 70,700 people from Afghanistan; more than 21,000 flew out in the last day alone. President Biden maintains that the U.S. will be out of Afghanistan by the August 31 deadline.

The evacuation, which began chaotically as the Afghan army and government crumbled and the Taliban took over the country in less than two weeks, has become far more orderly and efficient. (If there’s one thing the military does exceedingly well, it’s move large numbers of people!)

The administration has refused to say how many Americans remain in the country— the State Department urged employees to leave the country beginning in April—but its reluctance is likely out of concern about passing that information on to the Taliban. This evening, Ned Price, the State Department spokesperson, said that the department has called every American who has expressed an interest in leaving Afghanistan, identifying them through a repatriation form on the website of the U.S. Embassy in Kabul.

News broke today that the director of the Central Intelligence Agency, William J. Burns, met secretly on Monday in Kabul with a Taliban leader, Abdul Ghani Baradar, to discuss the continuing evacuation efforts. Regardless of what they discussed, it seems to me a sign that the U.S. feels secure enough about the safety of Kabul to risk sending the country’s top spy there for a parley.

Another demonstration of that security came today when two Representatives, Peter Meijer (R-MI) and Seth Moulton (D-MA), took it upon themselves to fly to Kabul, unannounced ("to conduct oversight on the mission to evacuate Americans and our allies," Moulton’s office said). The State Department and U.S. military personnel were said to be furious that they had to "divert resources to provide security and information to the lawmakers.” “It’s as moronic as it is selfish,” a senior administration official told the Washington Post. “They’re taking seats away from Americans and at-risk Afghans—while putting our diplomats and service members at greater risk—so they can have a moment in front of the cameras.”

Although no Americans have yet been hurt in the evacuation, that state of affairs is precarious. Threats of an attack on the Kabul airport from ISIS-K, which would like to destabilize the Taliban before it cements its power, continue to loom.

Meanwhile, Congress is busy at home. The House of Representatives has a number of major bills before it. It has the $1 trillion bipartisan infrastructure bill for road, bridges, broadband, and other so-called “hard” infrastructure projects, and its counterpart, the $3.5 trillion list of Democratic priorities for “soft” infrastructure, including child care, housing, funding for measures addressing climate change, education, and so on.

These bills represent the largest investment in America since at least the 1960s. They are also a signature effort for the Democrats. They reject the Republican policy of replacing government action with private investment spurred by tax cuts, returning the nation to the era before the Reagan Revolution.

The House is also considering two major voting rights acts. One is the For the People Act, which protects the right to vote, ends partisan gerrymandering; reduces corporate money in elections; and requires new ethics rules for elected officials. The other is the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act, which is more limited than the For the People Act but which has been carefully tailored to address the Supreme Court’s previous reasoning for gutting the 1965 Voting Rights Act in 2013 and again in July of this year.

The John Lewis Act would restore the power of the Department of Justice to prevent states from restricting the vote, as Republican-dominated states have been rushing to do since the 2020 election.

Democrats from different parts of the country and with different constituencies have different priorities. Holding them together, especially on the infrastructure bill, has not been easy. Progressives refused to agree to the bipartisan bill until they were assured it would not replace the larger package. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi agreed to move the two forward together, and then, on August 12, nine Democrats from moderate districts demanded a vote on the bipartisan bill without waiting for the larger measure.

Meanwhile, those who see voting rights as the single most important issue for Congress right now have been frustrated as the infrastructure bills have taken up so much of Congress’s time.

Negotiations led today to a House vote on a rule that folded together these concerns. It approved the start of the process of writing the $3.5 trillion bill, guaranteed a vote on the bipartisan bill by September 27, and called for a vote on the John Lewis voting rights measure. The vote on the rule was 220 to 212 with all Democrats voting yes and all Republicans voting no.

The House then passed the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act by a vote of 219 to 212. Not a single Republican voted yes. The bill now moves to the Senate, where Republicans plan to kill it with the filibuster.

Yesterday’s full approval of the Pfizer vaccine by the Food and Drug Administration has, as expected, led to more requirements for proof of vaccination in public spaces. Today, Louisiana State University announced that no one will be admitted to football games without proof of vaccination or a recent negative Covid test. Ohio State University explicitly said that the FDA's full approval of the vaccine meant it would require its staff, students, and faculty to be vaccinated. Biden’s efforts to combat the pandemic seem to be gaining ground again.

Each of these major news items shows a remarkably effective political party, especially since the Democrats are accomplishing as much as they are while—with the exception of a handful of Republicans willing to sign on to the bipartisan infrastructure package—Republicans are doing all they can simply to stop the Democrats.

This week, Republican lawmakers in Pennsylvania announced they are starting hearings on the 2020 election to address their concerns that it was fraudulent. Republicans in the Wisconsin legislature, too, are revisiting the 2020 election. An “audit” of the 2020 election in Arizona has been plagued with irregularities, errors, and problems: it was supposed to announce its “results” this week—three months behind schedule—but three of the five leaders from the Cyber Ninjas conducting the audit are sick with Covid.

—-

Notes:

https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/speeches-remarks/2021/08/24/remarks-by-president-biden-on-the-ongoing-evacuation-efforts-in-afghanistan-and-the-house-vote-on-the-build-back-better-agenda/

https://www.cnn.com/2021/08/24/politics/kabul-airport-us-evacuation-afghanistan/index.html

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/burns-afghanistan-baradar-biden/2021/08/24/c96bee5c-04ba-11ec-ba15-9c4f59a60478_story.html

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/congress-kabul-trip-evacuation/2021/08/24/77f7673a-0501-11ec-a266-7c7fe02fa374_story.html

https://clerk.house.gov/Votes/2021258

https://news.osu.edu/ohio-state-announces-vaccination-requirement/

https://www.npr.org/2021/08/24/1030430715/house-democrats-3-5-trillion-budget-pelosi-moderates

https://af.usembassy.gov/security-alert-u-s-embassy-kabul-afghanistan-august-7-2021/

https://apnews.com/article/joe-biden-elections-wisconsin-election-2020-subpoenas-3952211bd482a785d3a8fbe9cc4d7c86

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/pennsylvania-election-review-trump/2021/08/24/e2515ee0-04ef-11ec-8c3f-3526f81b233b_story.html

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[theliberaltony]

via Politics – FiveThirtyEight

House retirement season seems to be in full swing, particularly on the Republican side of the aisle. Over the past two weeks, six GOP House members have announced they are leaving office, including four members from Texas. In total, 11 House Republicans have said they are not running for reelection, including two members who are seeking higher office: Alabama Rep. Bradley Byrne is running for Senate, and Montana Rep. Greg Gianforte is running for governor.1 By contrast, only three Democrats have said they are retiring so far in the 2020 cycle.2

And given the high number of Republican retirements from the House in 2018 — at least 23, according to our count — which marked the most “pure” GOP retirements (in other words, excluding those who left to seek another office) since the 2008 election, we wanted to better understand what is driving Republican retirements this year. So here’s a look at how the members voted (including how often they were in line with the president’s stated position), the makeup of their districts and the margin by which they won reelection in 2018:

Nine ‘pure’ GOP retirements so far in the 2020 cycle

Republicans who declined to seek reelection, excluding those leaving to run for other office, as of Aug. 6, 2019

District Member Trump Score DW-Nominate score Partisan Lean* 2018 vote margin GA-07 Rob Woodall 100.0 0.605 R+17.2 +0.2 TX-23 Will Hurd 51.2 0.295 R+4.3 +0.4 TX-24 Kenny Marchant 95.2 0.602 R+17.3 +3.1 TX-22 Pete Olson 95.0 0.549 R+19.4 +4.9 IN-05 Susan Brooks 95.2 0.362 R+15.3 +13.5 AL-02 Martha Roby 95.2 0.362 R+31.0 +23.0 MI-10 Paul Mitchell 95.3 0.432 R+27.0 +25.3 UT-01 Rob Bishop 97.6 0.536 R+40.5 +36.7 TX-11 Mike Conaway 97.7 0.591 R+64.7 +61.7

Trump Score is just for the 116th Congress.

*FiveThirtyEight’s partisan lean metric is the average difference between how a state votes and how the country votes overall, with 2016 presidential election results weighted at 50 percent, 2012 presidential election results weighted at 25 percent and results from elections for the state legislature weighted at 25 percent. Note that the partisan leans in this article were calculated before the 2018 elections; we haven’t calculated FiveThirtyEight partisan leans that incorporate the midterm results yet.

Source: ABC News, U.S. House of Representatives, VoteView

As you can see, these retirements have come from very different corners of the GOP. All but one of them has voted overwhelmingly with Trump during the 116th Congress, but the members range from being quite moderate to fairly conservative, based on the ideological measure DW-Nominate. And although the partisan lean of all these districts is at least somewhat Republican, the retirees also experienced a mix of results in 2018, ranging from extremely narrow wins to easy victories. But broadly speaking, these retirements fall into three main groups — those who have disagreed with the president, those who faced tough reelection odds and those who would likely lose their seniority status. Some members, of course, fall into more than one category.

First, there are the four Republicans who have criticized Trump or, at the very least, opposed him on key votes, suggesting a level of discomfort with the direction Trump is taking the GOP. Texas Rep. Will Hurd is the most obvious such case, in that he has the lowest Trump score among the Republicans retiring and the second lowest among Republicans in the 116th Congress. Hurd was one of 14 Republicans who voted to override Trump’s declaration of a national emergency on the U.S.-Mexico border, and was one of just four Republicans who voted in favor of a resolution that condemned Trump’s tweets about four Democratic congresswomen of color as racist. There is also Indiana Rep. Susan Brooks, who is one of the three other Republicans who voted to condemn those tweets. Brooks voted more in line with the president than Hurd, but as the co-chair of the Tuesday Group, a caucus of moderate Republicans in the House, she and other members of that group have had difficulties navigating Trump’s polarizing presidency.

And while Michigan Rep. Paul Mitchell didn’t vote to condemn the president over his tweets, he was openly critical of them. It may have been the last straw for Mitchell, too, as he announced his retirement about a week later, telling Politico that he was tired of the “rhetoric and vitriol.” Lastly, even though Alabama Rep. Martha Roby hasn’t been critical of Trump recently, and has a very pro-Trump voting record overall, she did say she wouldn’t vote for him in 2016 after the release of an Access Hollywood video tape showed Trump talking about groping women. And this hurt her reelection chances: she faced opposition from a write-in candidate in 2016 and had to survive a primary runoff in 2018.

This brings us to our next group of retirements: those who faced tough reelection bids. At least five of the Republicans retiring fall into this category (including Hurd and Roby), but for most of them, the general election looked to be their trouble spot and not the primary. Hurd, in particular, was vulnerable, as his seat is only 4 points more Republican than the country as a whole, according to FiveThirtyEight’s partisan lean metric,3 and he’s one of only three Republicans in districts Hillary Clinton won in 2016 who didn’t lose their seats in the 2018 midterm elections. Hurd barely held on in 2018, too, winning his seat by just 0.4 points, so he may have decided he didn’t want a rematch against his Democratic opponent, Gina Ortiz Jones, who is running again in 2020. As for the other Republicans in this category, their districts are redder than Hurd’s, but similar to Hurd, they faced close reelection bids in 2018. Georgia Rep. Rob Woodall, for instance, only held onto his seat after a recount. And two other Texas Republicans — Reps. Kenny Marchant and Pete Olson — won reelection in 2018 by fewer than 5 points. There are also signs that the largely suburban districts Marchant, Olson and Woodall represent are moving away from the GOP in the age of Trump, as part of more suburban districts voting Democratic.

As for the other two GOP retirements, they perhaps were unavoidable because of Republican conference rules that do not allow members to lead committees for more than three consecutive terms, unless they get a special waiver (which is rare). That meant the jig was up for both Texas Rep. Mike Conaway and Utah Rep. Rob Bishop, as each was in his third term as a ranking member or chairman (when the GOP had a majority) of his respective committee. In other words, even if Republicans won back the House majority in 2020, Conaway and Bishop wouldn’t become chairmen of the committees where they currently hold the top GOP spots. Given that they both represent safe Republican seats, they weren’t in electoral danger, so they may have just decided it wasn’t worth sticking around any longer.

Of course, these early retirements don’t necessarily signal a wave of future exits. But considering we’re still many months away from passing the deadlines to run for federal office in all 50 states, the retirement train may keep chugging along in the coming weeks. Other rumored potential retirees include veteran members like 17-term Michigan Rep. Fred Upton, who also voted to condemn the president’s tweets. More possible retirees include the two other Republicans holding onto seats Clinton won in 2016 — New York Rep. John Katko and Pennsylvania Rep. Brian Fitzpatrick. In fact, Fitzpatrick, who also voted to condemn Trump’s tweets, already has a prospective primary challenger lining up to take him on for being insufficiently pro-Trump. There’s also the fact that the last time a party flipped the House in a presidential cycle was in 1952. With that history in mind, as well as the misery of minority status in a hyper-partisan atmosphere on Capitol Hill, don’t be shocked if more Republicans decide to exit stage right.

[freepressjournals]

WHITE HOUSE DISCUSSES REINSTATING TRUMP’S TERROR DESIGNATION FOR YEMEN’S HOUTHIS

A terrorist designation for the Houthis could trigger “devastating” sanctions on Yemen.

WHEN JOE BIDEN came into office, one of his first moves was to reject the Trump administration’s last-minute designation of the Houthis as a terrorist organization, after warnings from the United Nations and aid groups that imposing sanctions would exacerbate the famine in war-torn Yemen. “The revocations are intended to ensure that relevant US policies do not impede assistance to those already suffering what has been called the world’s worst humanitarian crisis,” said Secretary of State Antony Blinken in a statement in February 2021.

Now the Biden administration is considering reversing that reversal and redesignating the Houthis as a terrorist group at the request of the oil-rich United Arab Emirates, despite what experts say would be disastrous consequences for Yemeni people. The Houthi rebels who have controlled Yemen’s capital since 2014 recently launched a rare attack on the UAE for its participation in the Saudi-led war in Yemen.

Biden first brought up the possibility of redesignating the Houthis at a press conference on January 19, saying, “We are taking a close look internally within the U.S. government to determine what would best serve our national security interests; what would best serve our desire to be a partner to Saudi Arabia, to the UAE, to other countries that are threatened by these Houthi attacks.”

The White House appears to be seriously considering the change. In late January, Biden’s National Security Council circulated a memo exploring the possibility, according to a U.S. intelligence official and a think tank official familiar with the matter. The memo, a policy options paper produced by the NSC, considers labeling the Houthis as a Foreign Terrorist Organization, Specially Designated Global Terrorists, or a combination of both, the two sources told The Intercept on condition of anonymity to discuss sensitive matters.

High-level administration officials discussed the paper during a Friday, February 4 meeting of the National Security Council Deputies Committee, a senior interagency forum for the consideration of national security policy matters, the sources said. The officials who discussed the paper were split, with representatives from the State Department expressing strong opposition to the designations.

Biden may also face pressure from members of Congress pushing for the terror designation. House Armed Services Committee Members Reps. Seth Moulton, D-Mass., and Mike Waltz, R-Fla., are planning to send a letter to Biden pressing him on the matter, which Politico reported last week.

Experts warn that either designation could usher in punishing sanctions. Both designations would likely make it difficult or impossible for nongovernmental organizations to deliver humanitarian assistance to the country. The major difference between the two categories is that the Treasury Department maintains the Specially Designated Global Terrorists list and seizes the assets of any individuals or groups on it, whereas the State Department controls the Foreign Terrorist Organizations list.

“Designating the Houthis as an FTO could have a devastating impact on efforts to get humanitarian assistance to the Yemeni people which is precisely why the Administration reversed the Trump designation a year ago,” said Bruce Riedel, a senior fellow in the Brookings Institution’s Center for Middle East Policy.

Scott Paul, senior manager of humanitarian policy for Oxfam America, echoed Riedel’s concerns, pointing to the harmful effect that sanctions have had on even humanitarian goods. As a result of Trump administration sanctions, “even imports covered by licenses were severely impacted and vital goods like food and medicine were becoming more scarce,” Paul said.

The Yemen war pits the poorest country in the region against the wealthiest, Saudi Arabia. After Houthi rebels seized control of Yemen’s capital and ousted the Saudi-backed government in 2014, Saudi Arabia intervened, leading an air coalition that sought to bomb the Houthis out of power. The air campaign, nearing its seventh year, comprised over 24,000 air raids that have killed almost 9,000 civilians and wounded an additional 10,000 people, according to the Yemen Data Project, leading to accusations of war crimes. Despite the fierce campaign, the Houthis remain in control of the capital and much of northern Yemen.

The Houthis have embarked on several recent offensives targeting the UAE, opening a new front in the war. “The missile attacks happened because in December to early January, the UAE and Saudi Arabia stepped up their attacks on Yemen,” said Trita Parsi, executive vice president of the Quincy Institute. The UAE, a key member of the Saudi-led military coalition against Yemen, has contributed mercenary fighters as well as fighter jets. The coalition has said that its airstrikes in recent weeks had hit the capital, Sanaa, as well as several other provinces.

“We shouldn’t be taking any side, whether it’s the side of the Houthis or the Saudis,” Parsi said.

The U.S. intelligence official said that the Biden administration policy paper was crafted in response to the Houthi drone attack on Al Dhafra Air Base in Abu Dhabi on January 24. “Obviously, with each attack the impetus [to impose sanctions] rises,” the U.S. think tank official who is familiar with the paper said. Houthi forces launched ballistic missiles at the air base, which were reportedly intercepted. Though there were no casualties, U.S. Central Command noted the presence of U.S. troops on the airbase in a press release. The attack was unusual in its targeting of the UAE, a desert kingdom that until now has enjoyed a relative peace by the standards of the region and has attracted considerable foreign investment. Within hours of the attack, the UAE’s stock markets fell.

In another attack, on January 17, missiles and drones blew up several fuel tankers in Abu Dhabi, killing three people. Yahya Saree, a spokesperson for the Houthis, has said that attacks on the UAE would continue until the UAE ends its involvement in the war in Yemen.

“The Emirates and the Saudis have managed to make this our fight, when it never was [the United States’s] fight in the first place,” Parsi, of Quincy Institute, said. “Bottom line is we shouldn’t be involved in this war, we should only be involved in ending it.”

[billmaher]

HBO Real Time Guests: Friday Aug. 10, 2018

Guest List: August 10, 2018

The Interview:

Lawrence O'Donnell is the host of MSNBC's "The Last Word with Lawrence O'Donnell"and author of “Deadly Force: A Police Shooting and My Family's Search for the Truth.”

Twitter: @Lawrence

The Panel:

Rep. Seth Moulton (D) is the U.S. Representative for Massachusetts’ 6th Congressional District. He served four tours in Iraq as a Marine Corps Infantry Officer.

Twitter: @sethmoulton

D.L. Hughley is an actor, stand-up comedian and radio host of “The D.L. Hughley Show.”He is performing at the Comedy Get Down show in Los Angeles on August 17th.  

D.L. Hughley is an actor, radio host, stand-up comedian and author of the new book, “How Not To Get Shot: And Other Advice from White People”. He is performing at the Comedy Get Down show in Los Angeles on August 17th.  

Twitter: @RealDLHughley

Christina Bellantoni is an incoming Professor of Journalism at USC Annenberg and former Assistant Managing Editor at the Los Angeles Times, where she focused a spotlight on California’s power players and congressional delegation.

Twitter: @cbellantoni

Mid-Show Interview:

Steven Pinker is an experimental cognitive psychologist at Harvard University and the author of “Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress.”

Twitter: @sapinker

Submit a question for this week’s guests using #RTOvertime and watch them answer LIVE after the show on the Real Time YouTube channel.

[96thdayofrage]

Veterans Day legislation targets GI Bill racial inequities

In honor of Veterans Day, a group of Democratic lawmakers is reviving an effort to pay the families of Black service members who fought on behalf of the nation during World War II for benefits they were denied or prevented from taking full advantage of when they returned home from war.

The new legislative effort would benefit surviving spouses and all living descendants of Black WWII veterans whose families were denied the opportunity to build wealth with housing and educational benefits through the GI Bill.

Since 1944, those benefits have been offered to millions of veterans transitioning to civilian life. But due to racism and discrimination in how they were granted through local Veterans Affairs offices, many Black WWII veterans received substantially less money toward purchasing a home or continuing their education.

A House version was introduced by Rep. Jim Clyburn of South Carolina, the Democratic majority whip, and Rep. Seth Moulton of Massachusetts.

“This is an opportunity for America to repair an egregious fault,” said Clyburn of the bill introduced last week. “Hopefully it can also begin to lay a foundation that will help break the cycle of poverty among those people who are the descendants of those who made sacrifices to preserve this democracy.”

Moulton, a Marine veteran who served four tours during the Iraq War, said: “There are a lot of Black Americans who are feeling the effects of this injustice today, even though it was originally perpetrated 70 years ago.”

“I think that restoring GI Bill benefits is one of the greatest racial justice issues of our time,” he said.

A Senate bill was to be introduced later this month by Sen. Rev. Raphael Warnock of Georgia, the son of a WWII veteran.

“We’ve all seen how these inequities have trickled down over time,” Warnock said, adding that the bill “represents a major step toward righting this injustice.”

The legislation, authored by Moulton, would extend the VA Loan Guaranty Program and GI Bill educational assistance to Black WWII veterans and their descendants who are alive at the time of the bill’s enactment. It would also create a panel of independent experts to study inequities in how benefits are administered to women and people of color.

Lawrence Brooks, who at 112 years old is the oldest living U.S. veteran, was drafted to serve during WWII and assigned to the mostly-Black 91st Engineer General Service Regiment.

The Louisiana native, who has 12 grandchildren and 23 great-grandchildren, always believed that serving his country was the only way he could leave behind his life as the son of sharecroppers, said his daughter, Vanessa Brooks.

But after he was discharged in August 1945 as a private first class, he did not realize his dream of going to college, working instead as a forklift driver before retiring in his 60s. “He always wanted to go to school,” his daughter said.

And when he bought his home, he used his retirement fund, not GI Bill benefits, she said .

President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Servicemen’s Readjustment Act into law in 1944, making generous financial subsidies available to 16 million WWII veterans pursuing higher education and buying their first homes. Irrespective of race, veterans who served more than 90 days during the war and had been honorably discharged were entitled to the benefits.

But after returning from the war, Black and white veterans faced two very different realities.

Because the GI Bill benefits had to be approved by local VA officers, few of whom were Black, the process created problems for veterans. This was particularly acute in the Deep South where Jim Crow segregation imposed racist barriers to homeownership and education.

Local VA officers there either made it difficult for Black veterans to access their benefits or lessened their value by steering them away from predominantly white four-year colleges and toward vocational and other non-degree programs. Meanwhile, the nation’s historically Black colleges and universities saw such a significant increase of enrollment among Black veterans that the schools were forced to turn away tens of thousands of prospective students.

Sgt. Joseph Maddox, one of two WWII veterans Moulton and Clyburn named their bill after, was denied tuition assistance by his local VA office despite being accepted into a master’s degree program at Harvard University.

“When it came time to pay the bill, the government just said no,” said Moulton, who himself attended Harvard on the GI Bill. “It actually is pretty emotional for vets who have gone through this themselves and, like myself, know what a difference the GI Bill made in our lives.”

The bill is also named for Sgt. Isaac Woodard, Jr., a WWII veteran from Winnsboro, South Carolina, who was brutally beaten and blinded by a small-town police chief in 1946 after returning home from the war. The acquittal of his attacker by an all-white jury helped spur the integration of the U.S. armed services in 1948.

In contrast to the treatment of Black veterans, the GI Bill helped home ownership rates soar among white veterans in a post-war housing boom that created a ripple effect their children and grandchildren continue to benefit from today.

Of the more than 3,000 VA home loans that had been issued to veterans in Mississippi in the summer of 1947, only two went to Black veterans, according to an Ebony magazine survey at the time.

The Federal Housing Administration’s racist housing policies also impacted Black WWII veterans, undoubtedly fueling today’s racial wealth gap. Typically referred to as redlining, realtors and banks would refuse to show homes or offer mortgages to qualified homebuyers in certain neighborhoods because of their race or ethnicity.

Preliminary analysis of historical data suggests Black and white veterans accessed their benefits at similar rates, according to Maria Madison, director of the Institute for Economic and Racial Equity at Brandeis University, who has researched the impact of racial inequities in the administration of GI Bill benefits.

However, because of institutional racism and other barriers, Black veterans were more limited in the ways in which they could use their benefits. As a result, the cash equivalent of their benefits was only 40% of what white veterans received.

After adjusting for inflation and for market returns, that amounts to a difference in value of $170,000 per veteran, according to Madison. Her ongoing research seeks to put a dollar amount on the wealth loss to Black families caused by racism and GI Bill inequities.

Black WWII veterans who were lucky enough to have gained full access to GI Bill benefits succeeded at building good lives for themselves and their families, said Matthew Delmont, a history professor at Dartmouth College. It’s a clear argument, he said, for why the new legislation is necessary.

“Because the GI benefits weren’t distributed more evenly among Black veterans, we lost an entire generation of Black wealth builders,” Delmont said. “After the war, we could have had even more doctors, lawyers, teachers and architects.”

Dovey Johnson Roundtree, a Black woman who was a WWII veteran, attended Howard University’s law school with GI Bill benefits. She then became a nationally known Washington criminal defense attorney who played a pivotal role in the desegregation of bus travel.

And WWII veteran Robert Madison, who served as a second lieutenant in the U.S. Army, credited his GI benefits for his success as a renowned architect.

____

Morrison reported from New York City. Stafford reported from Detroit. Both are members of the AP’s Race and Ethnicity team. Follow Morrison on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/aaronlmorison

[minnesotafollower]

Need To Prod Congress To Enact the Afghan Adjustment Act     

A recent Wall Street Journal editorial strongly endorsed enactment of the pending Afghan Adjustment Act to provide changes in U.S. immigration law to protect the 67,000 Afghans relocated to the U.S. after its withdrawal of forces from that country.[1] However, that editorial did not discuss the reasons why Congress has not done so. A recent column in the Philadelphia Inquirer by columnist Trudy…

[neekfu-zaoslo]

"2 U.S. Representatives Try to Explain Unauthorized Visit to Kabul" by Catie Edmondson via NYT U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/25/us/politics/seth-moulton-peter-meijer-kabul-afghanistan.html?partner=IFTTT

[letsmuiwjezaevbe]

"2 U.S. Representatives Try to Explain Unauthorized Visit to Kabul" by Catie Edmondson via NYT U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/25/us/politics/seth-moulton-peter-meijer-kabul-afghanistan.html?partner=IFTTT

[theliberaltony]

via Politics – FiveThirtyEight

In 2016, there were 17 prominent Republican candidates for president — an enormous total that seemed unlikely to ever be matched again. Ah, those were simpler times. It’s not even 2020 yet, but there are already 16 major candidates in the Democratic race for president. And the glut of candidates has some observers asking whether the incentives to run are not what they should be. That is, running for president raises a candidate’s profile and might give them the opportunity to fail up to a Cabinet post or a cushy cable-news gig after the election. As my colleague Galen Druke recently asked on Twitter, “Are there any reasons not to run for president even if you think you can’t win?”

As I see it, there’s one big reason not to run: if you stand to lose a prestigious job. Indeed, most of the people currently in the Democratic presidential race do not have to sacrifice their current jobs to run; the same is true of several prospective candidates. This fact could explain why so many lower-tier contenders are dipping their toes in the water despite having low odds of winning the nomination. Here’s a look at which candidates (and potential candidates) are risking their careers by running and which ones can fall back on their current jobs should they lose.

First, six of the Democratic candidates in the 2020 race are U.S. senators, and maybe that’s no surprise: Two-thirds of the Senate can effectively take a free shot at the presidency in 2020 because they aren’t up for re-election. Some of the race’s biggest names are drawn from this pool, including Kamala Harris, who does not face re-election in California until 2022, as well as Kirsten Gillibrand of New York, Amy Klobuchar of Minnesota, Bernie Sanders of Vermont and Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, who aren’t up until 2024. Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet, who is considering a run, is also not up for re-election until 2022. This means that each of these candidates can lose the presidential primary and still keep their seats in the Senate.

A couple of mayors and a governor also don’t have to worry about leaving their current jobs behind by running for president. Rumored hopefuls Montana Gov. Steve Bullock and New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio can’t seek re-election to their current positions anyway, because of term limits. And Miramar, Florida, Mayor Wayne Messam (who is an active presidential candidate but not yet a major one by our standards) was re-elected this year, so he has nothing to lose by running.

And then there are several candidates who don’t currently hold political office in the first place. Beto O’Rourke ran (unsuccessfully) for Senate in Texas last year rather than seek re-election to his U.S. House seat, so he’s been out of Congress since January. Julian Castro’s last political job was secretary of housing and urban development in the Obama administration, and that ended when President Trump’s tenure began. Term limits prevented John Hickenlooper from running for re-election as the governor of Colorado in 2018. And businessman Andrew Yang has never held political office (same with not-yet-major-candidate Marianne Williamson). Also in this category are some politicians who have yet to jump into the race, including former Georgia state House Minority Leader Stacey Abrams, former Vice President Joe Biden and former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe.

That leaves only a few presidential candidates who hold elected offices that are up for re-election this cycle. However, that’s not an automatic reason to rule out a presidential bid. Luckily for these hopefuls, a handful of states allow candidates to run for multiple offices in the same year — e.g., for both president and Congress. In New Jersey, allies of Cory Booker, whose Senate seat is on the ballot in 2020, passed a law last year clarifying that it is legal to accept a presidential or vice-presidential nomination and still be on the ballot for another office in New Jersey. Booker hasn’t said whether he plans to run for re-election to the Senate, but he has said he’s “grateful … that that possibility is there.”

The quixotic presidential bids by sitting U.S. representatives also make a little bit more sense when you consider that most of them are free to run for re-election at the same time because of the laws of their home states. Tulsi Gabbard can run for president and the U.S. House in Hawaii. And Tim Ryan, who entered the presidential race in early April, has said previously that he planned to take advantage of the fact that Ohio does not prohibit him from running for president and Congress at the same time. The same is true in Massachusetts, which could explain why Seth Moulton is openly considering a presidential campaign as well.

But there are two unlucky candidates who would have been up for re-election in 2020 but are not allowed to run for multiple offices at once: Washington Gov. Jay Inslee and former U.S. Rep. John Delaney. However, even Inslee might not be giving anything up by throwing his hat in the ring. Washington’s filing deadline isn’t until May 15, 2020, after most presidential primaries and caucuses will have taken place. That means that Inslee will likely know before his state’s filing deadline whether he’s on track to win the Democratic presidential nomination. If he’s not, he could easily exit the presidential race and run for re-election to the governorship instead. Indeed, he’s not ruling out doing exactly that.

That leaves Delaney as the only 2020 Democrat who, to my eyes, is really putting his political career on the line to run for president. Maryland law prohibits individuals from being a candidate for more than one public office, which means that Delaney couldn’t run for both president and re-election to his House seat in 2020. (The Maryland filing deadline is Feb. 5, 2020; only one state — Iowa — will have held its presidential nominating contest by then.) In fact, Delaney has already crossed the Rubicon and given up his seat in Congress; he announced his presidential bid in July 2017 and forwent re-election in 2018 to commit to his White House bid.1

Finally, there are a couple of cases where the answer to whether a candidate can keep his day job and still run for president is complicated. Under California law, Eric Swalwell might be able to run both for president and for re-election to his U.S. House seat, but the law is vague. Swalwell has gotten around the question by simply saying that he won’t try to run for re-election if he is still in the presidential race at the time of the California filing deadline. (Of course, he could decide to drop out of the presidential race before the filing deadline to run again for Congress.) And Pete Buttigieg’s obstacle is a logistical one, not a legal one. While Buttigieg could have run for re-election as South Bend mayor in November 2019 and then president in 2020, that would have either required him to campaign for both offices at once or to enter the presidential race extremely late. Practically speaking, he probably had no choice but to not seek a third term as mayor.

Still, the vast majority of Democratic candidates for president won’t have to give up their current job if they fail to win the nomination. This probably is one factor behind the massive size of the Democratic field, especially in the absence of a clear front-runner. However, it surely isn’t the only reason. After all, there are plenty of Democratic senators, House members and governors who could run for president without giving up their influential day job but are not. That reflects that there are some clear downsides to running for president, including the huge amount of work and the chance that a candidate’s reputation will come out worse, not better, in the end.

[louqno-beaqfo]

"2 U.S. Representatives Try to Explain Unauthorized Visit to Kabul" by Catie Edmondson via NYT U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/25/us/politics/seth-moulton-peter-meijer-kabul-afghanistan.html?partner=IFTTT

[siemsu-kuanri]

"2 U.S. Representatives Try to Explain Unauthorized Visit to Kabul" by Catie Edmondson via NYT U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/25/us/politics/seth-moulton-peter-meijer-kabul-afghanistan.html?partner=IFTTT

[dauyye-duivva]

"2 U.S. Representatives Try to Explain Unauthorized Visit to Kabul" by Catie Edmondson via NYT U.S. https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/25/us/politics/seth-moulton-peter-meijer-kabul-afghanistan.html?partner=IFTTT