“Our country has major problems with its drinking water supplies. Nearly one quarter of people living in the United States get their drinking water from one of the 18,000 water systems in all 50 states that reported violations of the Safe Drinking Water Act in 2015, according to a new report. This news comes as the Trump administration eyes deep budget cuts to programs safeguarding drinking water and public health.” More …
Month: May 2017
Inside Trump’s War on Regulations
“The chaos of Donald Trump’s first four months as president has overshadowed a series of actions that could reshape American life for decades — efforts to rewrite or wipe out regulations affecting everything from student loans and restaurant menus to internet privacy, workplace injuries and climate change.” More …
Sen. Orrin Hatch: ‘The public wants every dime they can be given’
“Utah Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch warned Tuesday that efforts to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act in the Senate might be complicated because once the public ‘is on the dole, they’ll take every dime they can.'” Editor’s note: Pot meet kettle. Senator Hatch has been on the public dole since 1977 (40 years). More …
Trump’s “America First“ Infrastructure Plan: Let Saudi Arabia and Blackstone Take Care of It
” …. But the third [deal struck in Saudi Arabia], which was rolled out much more quietly, is no less stunning: The Saudi kingdom joined forces with a top outside adviser to Trump to build a $40 billion war chest to privatize U.S. infrastructure. The vehicle would employ the same kind of public-private partnerships, known as P3s, the Trump administration has endorsed for its trillion dollar infrastructure plan. The deal hands over control of projects to rebuild American roads and bridges to the private sector [Blackstone] and a foreign country [Saudi Arabia]. More …
Paul Ryan Makes It Clear That Cutting Medicaid to Pay for the Health Bill’s Tax Cuts for the Wealthy Enables Deeper Corporate Tax Cuts in Tax Legislation to Follow
“House Speaker Paul Ryan has made a key Republican motive for pushing ahead with the House GOP health plan explicit in recent interviews: passing the health package first facilitates deeper tax cuts for the wealthy and corporations in subsequent tax legislation.” More …
Kushner Met With Russian Banker Who Is Putin Crony, Spy School Grad
“The Russian banker Trump son-in-law Jared Kushner met with in December is viewed by U.S. intelligence as a “Putin crony” and a graduate of a “finishing school” for spies who was often tasked with sensitive financial operations by Putin, according to multiple U.S. officials and documents viewed by NBC News.” More …
G7 Leaders Took a Stroll in Sicily — and Trump Followed Them in a Golf Cart
Low energy. Sad! More …
Meet the Real Jared Kushner: He’s a Lot Tougher Than He Looks
” … It was Kushner who reportedly pushed for the firing of FBI Director James Comey over the objections of Bannon. And it was Kushner who was the lone voice urging for a counterattack after Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein announced the appointment of a special prosecutor, according to the New York Times. And it is now Kushner whose family’s business activities leave him open to the same level of conflict-of-interest charges that have dogged his wife and father-in-law, and Kushner who appears to be as closely tied to the Russian government as anyone serving in the White House… ” More …
Donald Trump’s Europe Tour Leaves World Leaders Strangely Shaken
“He crunched hands, shoved shoulders and struck poses. He scoffed chocolates, ignored protocol and harangued heads of state. He denied saying things he had said, then said things that showed he did not understand. It may, mercifully, have passed off without apocalyptic mishap, but Donald Trump’s first transatlantic trip as US president still left European leaders shaken.” More …
Trump’s Budget Relies on Magic Economic Growth
“While the Congressional Budget Office expects the economy to settle into a pattern of growing at about 1.9 percent per year by 2021, the White House says growth will rise to 3 percent — way out of line with what forecasting experts in the private sector, at central banks, and at international institutions think will happen.” More …