Category Archives: Just strange

Donald Trump’s Remarks Show He’s Mistaken on Sexual Assault in Military – The New York Times

Speaking at a candidates’ forum, Mr. Trump defended one of his Twitter posts from 2013 concerning the high number of sexual assaults in the military, and he said that he had been “absolutely correct” in sending out a message that said, “What did these geniuses expect when they put men & women together?”Mr. Trump also suggested that the solution to the problem was the formation of a separate military justice system — although one is already in existence. That system sits at the center of the debate over how to tackle sexual assault.His comments displayed what was apparently a misunderstanding of the Pentagon’s decades-long struggle to curb such assaults and the military justice system already in place to prosecute them.

Source: Donald Trump’s Remarks Show He’s Mistaken on Sexual Assault in Military – The New York Times

Air Force, Running Low on Drone Pilots, Turns to Contractors in Terror Fight – The New York Times – Using mercenaries is just so wrong – Remember the Hessians? 

Over the next two years, the Pentagon plans to add six more operated by contractors, the officials said. The number and identities of contractors working on the drone flights are considered classified information, the Air Force said. But Pentagon officials said there at least several hundred contractors, many of them former drone or fighter pilots who are making double or triple their military salaries.

“This is opening up a whole new can of worms — we have seen problems with security contractors on the battlefield since 9/11, and there’s been an improvement in oversight in that area, but that came after a decade of problems,” said Laura A. Dickinson, a law professor at George Washington University, who has written extensively about the United States’ use of military contractors. “With drones, this is a new area where we already do not have a lot of transparency and with contractors operating drones there’s no clearly defined regime of oversight and accountability.”

Source: Air Force, Running Low on Drone Pilots, Turns to Contractors in Terror Fight – The New York Times

Trump launches new personal attacks against ‘Morning Joe’ co-host Mika Brzezinski – The Washington Post

Donald Trump launched a new round of aggressive personal attacks against MSNBC host Mika Brzezinski Friday morning, airing an unsubstantiated claim before his more than 11 million Twitter followers.”Just heard that crazy and very dumb @morningmika had a mental breakdown while talking about me on the low ratings @Morning_Joe. Joe a mess!” Trump tweeted.

Source: Trump launches new personal attacks against ‘Morning Joe’ co-host Mika Brzezinski – The Washington Post

A Deep, Shady Dive Into Trump’s Alleged Mob Ties: Gothamist

Trump’s connection to Shapiro was scrutinized again in 1984. Shapiro told a grand jury that he funneled thousands of dollars in contributions from Trump to Atlantic City mayor Michael J. Matthews, who Trump was barred from contributing to on his own because of his casino ownership. While Trump denied the charge, telling the Journal “I’m not interested in giving cash, OK?”, Shapiro’s brother Barry said that Trump never reimbursed Kenneth for his illegal contributions on Trump’s behalf. Trump refusing to pay a bill is of course, more believable than Trump not being interested in donating money to politicians.There was also the case of Robert LiButti, a major horse race gambler who talked about John Gotti as his “boss” and was a major gambler at Trump Plaza in the late 80s. Trump denied having anything to do with LiButti in an interview with the paper, but LiButti’s daughter told Yahoo that she rode on Trump’s helicopter and yacht, and that Trump came to her 35th birthday party. “I like Trump, but it pisses me off that he denies knowing my father. That hurts me,” she told the site earlier this year.And while most of Trump’s mob connections happened back in the 1980s, the Journal also brought up the case of Felix Sater, who worked with Bayrock Group, a real estate company that leased space in Trump Tower. Bayrock helped Trump brand his name on properties like the Trump SoHo condos and a Florida hotel, and the Journal reports Sater described himself as the number two person in the company. Sater also had been convicted in 1998 as part of a Mafia-linked boiler room scheme.Added up, it doesn’t suggest that Trump knows where the bodies are buried. On the other hand, for a man who’s been making his case that as a businessman and political neophyte he’ll just hire the right people to help him make decisions, it’s part of a pattern of a startling lack of vetting by the man. But hey, I’m sure that when he needs contractors and cheap labor for his big beautiful wall he’ll do the the most fabulous vetting we’ve ever seen.

Source: A Deep, Shady Dive Into Trump’s Alleged Mob Ties: Gothamist

Trump visit to Mexico: I have never seen a Mexican begging in the US | In English | EL PAÍS

Rather than undocumented, 40% of Mexican and Central American immigrants are  really refugees. They are boys and girls fleeing hunger, rape, extreme poverty and threats against their lives by criminal gangs back home. They have been denied a job and a safe and dignified life by their own countries. Rather than a problem of security and terrorism, it is a humanitarian crisis.Yet never in my life have I seen a Mexican begging on the street in the United States. They are honest, hardworking people who contribute to and benefit the economies of both countries in invaluable ways. But, in the interests of both sides, they will remain a community of 11 million invisible people.Rather than undocumented, 40% of Mexican and Central American immigrants are refugeesOur government should have named Trump ‘persona non grata’ a long time ago. Because he preaches hate and division in his own country and shamelessly distorts reality, countless US television stations, international corporations, heads of states and members of his own party have ended relationships and contracts with an individual whose terrifying sociopathic and fascist outbursts have polluted the world and hurt the fundamental values that Americans are proud of.Yet, unexpectedly, our president has asked him to visit our country, giving him an opportunity and a platform that Trump has used to crown himself in Arizona, jokingly promising his followers that the “amigo” who had just opened the door of his house to him did not know yet that he was going to pay for a wall, or that Trump was going to send him back millions of his dirty and criminal people.Our president, with his insubstantial shyster language, did not articulate or demand anything specific from his visitor. Trump has had the unprecedented honor of being the first American presidential candidate to visit our country, thus soiling the memory and history of our nation.One hundred and sixty-eight years ago, Antonio López de Santa Ana gave away almost half of our territory. President Peña Nieto has just given away the little bit of dignity that was left us.

Source: Trump visit to Mexico: I have never seen a Mexican begging in the US | In English | EL PAÍS

Milwaukee Police Forcibly Arrested Two Men Last Night for Doing Nothing Wrong. They Got a Surprise When One Was A State Rep and the Other Was From the ACLU. | American Civil Liberties Union

At about 9:30 p.m., a handful of people, including Mr. English and Rep. Brostoff, stood on the northeast corner of Sherman Boulevard and Auer Avenue, observing a large contingent of police officers who had blocked off Auer on the west side of Sherman. The street has been the gathering place for community members since the fatal police shooting of Sylville Smith on August 13.Numerous officers then forcibly arrested Mr. English as he was walking away as instructed. He was handcuffed, forced to the ground, involuntarily searched, and placed in a paddy wagon with Rep. Brostoff. After officials became aware that they had arrested a state legislator, the two were released without charges.When I had the chance of speaking with Jarrett, he told me this:“The situation was confusing, because I really did not know what I was being arrested for. It was embarrassing and dehumanizing, and I did not feel that I was being treated with the dignity and respect that should be afforded any individual. But I was mostly thinking about all of the young people this happens to every day who don’t have anyone to call to get free. We cannot continue doing this to our people.

The Milwaukee Police Department has once again demonstrated its preference for occupation, excessive force, and belligerence over genuine engagement, civil dialog, and de-escalation. People have a right to stand on a street corner – to observe and record the police, as Jarrett was doing, or for any other reason. Unfortunately, rather than protecting people and their rights, law enforcement in this community all too often engages in the sort of destructive behavior to which Jarrett and Jonathan were subjected to last night.

Source: Milwaukee Police Forcibly Arrested Two Men Last Night for Doing Nothing Wrong. They Got a Surprise When One Was A State Rep and the Other Was From the ACLU. | American Civil Liberties Union

Trump Allegedly Used Foreign Models Working In America Without Visas: Gothamist

When it comes to Donald Trump and immigration, there’s one thing we know: if you came here without following the law, you’re out! Unless you’re an undocumented Polish laborer building Trump Tower. But hey, that was thirty-five years ago. Trump wouldn’t keep exploiting workers. Like, say, models. He definitely wouldn’t run a modeling agency that encouraged models to be here without visas, right? Oh, uh, I guess he would do that.Mother Jones spoke to three models who worked for Trump through his Trump Model Management company, all three of whom told the magazine that the company employed them despite the fact that they didn’t have work visas when they began modeling. One model, Rachel Blais, told Mother Jones she worked for six months in 2004 without a visa after coming to New York from Canada, but at least in her case the company helped her get one.Two other anonymous models who spoke to the magazine said that they didn’t ever have work visas during their time modeling for Trump Model Management.

Source: Trump Allegedly Used Foreign Models Working In America Without Visas: Gothamist

Colonial nostalgia is back in fashion, blinding us to the horrors of empire | Kehinde Andrews | Opinion | The Guardian

Lest we forget: far from being a benevolent saviour, the British empire was based on the exploitation, murder and devastation of people across the globe. Some notable atrocities include, but are by no means limited to: transatlantic slavery, famines in the British Raj, and brutal settler colonial regimes in Zimbabwe and Kenya. Hundreds of millions of people died as a result of Britain’s vicious regime. The empire collapsed after campaigns, rebellions and revolutions from the people who were oppressed by Britain. The natives did not happily accept colonial rule; they resisted at every turn because they understood the cost of the system to their nations.Walter Rodney’s classic book How Europe Underdeveloped Africa, goes into forensic detail as to how colonialism set back the continent by creating political and economic systems that impoverished Africa, with the direct purpose of enriching Europe. Even after independence, Kwame Nkrumah, the first president of liberated Ghana, explained in the 1960s that the economic policies of the country had an “Alice in Wonderland craziness about them”, with Britain extracting all the wealth from the resources of the nation.It is essential that the legacy of the British empire is understood because it still plays a key role in the world today. The devastation of nations by European colonialism goes a long way to explaining extreme poverty and conflict in many parts of the world, and is continued in manifestly unjust trade relations. Reminiscing about the days of empire and pining for Britain to be great again is a device to avoid any reckoning with Britain’s terrible colonial legacy and debt.Perhaps a recognition of the brutality, violence and horror at the dark heart of empire would shake the nation out of its postcolonial melancholia. To acknowledge the dark side of colonialism, however, would destroy the nostalgia that is such a strong part of British imperial identity. It is far easier to get lost in national pride from Olympic success than to reckon with Britain’s history and real place in the world.

Source: Colonial nostalgia is back in fashion, blinding us to the horrors of empire | Kehinde Andrews | Opinion | The Guardian

Danish MP: EU a bigger threat than Russia – The Local – You have to wonder – who is paying who for good words about Putin? Or are these people who would have also welcomed support for their ideas by Hitler or Stalin?

In an interview with Mandag Morgen, Krarup said that the EU is an existential threat to Denmark and is a much bigger problem than Russia. “For Denmark? Yes, without a doubt. Just Schengen alone is a catastrophe. It’s something that will make Denmark disappear from the world map if we don’t pull ourselves together. That national borders have been disbanded is a threat against Denmark’s existence,” she told the magazine.  She went on to that although she views Russian President Vladimir Putin as “an exponent of an despotic, non-democratic system that we don’t want in Denmark”, she would welcome his help in dismantling the EU in its current form.  “I don’t want an EU like the one we have time. I want the EU buried and replaced by a forum for free trade. That’s our policy. If Putin or Marine Le Pen [France’s most powerful Eurosceptic, ed.] can help with that, that’ just fine,” she told Mandag Morgen, adding she’d also except help from “Satan himself”. This isn’t the first time that Krarup, who is DF’s defence spokeswoman, has made controversial comments about Russia. Last month, she told broadcaster DR that Russia should be viewed as a “future ally” and accused the West of “a demonizing of Putin that has been grotesquely ridiculous and really stupid”.

Source: Danish MP: EU a bigger threat than Russia – The Local

Donald Trump Cues Up Another Conspiracy – The New York Times

Mr. Trump did not invent paranoia; he did not create the Republican meme of fraudulent minority voting. He just took it — as he so often does — to an extreme. Senator John McCain made similar warnings in 2008, and murmurings of cheating go back at least to 2000, a close national election, botched in Florida, decided for George W. Bush by the conservative majority of the Supreme Court. And long before Mr. Trump entered the presidential race, Republican legislators were busy passing voter ID laws based on the fallacy of widespread fraud.Mr. Trump’s brain is a pincushion for conspiracy theories, so maybe it’s no surprise that he thinks the Clinton campaign will be sending African-Americans and foreigners into booths across the country to fake their votes over and over, millions of times.Now, more than ever, the country needs responsible political leaders and the courts to defend and expand voting rights, rather than sitting silently while Mr. Trump further demolishes public confidence in the foundations of our government.

Source: Donald Trump Cues Up Another Conspiracy – The New York Times