So I guess 2016 claimed its biggest victim yet - America

Amy Goodman interviewed Jeremy Scahill (Intercept) about the DevOs issues earlier today.

Now, what Senator Hassan was focused in on is pretty incredible. I would say directly that Betsy DeVos lied in her testimony to the Senate, because she tried to imply, repeatedly, that she has nothing to do with her very extreme right-wing mother’s foundation. And when Hassan rightly asked her, you know, “Aren’t you an official in this foundation?” Betsy DeVos said no. I started then tweeting about it. I posted excerpts of the 990 tax forms that the foundation filed. And then Maggie Hassan returned to the hearing, even though Lamar Alexander, the Republican chair of the committee—most of the hearing was dominated, actually, by Lamar Alexander trying to figure out a way to justify not letting the Democrats ask questions. So, once we then posted parts of the 990, Maggie Hassan then came back, and Patty Murray, the ranking member, gave her part of her time. She then says to Betsy DeVos, “Wait a minute. I would like to clarify something, as we just heard. You know, you were—OK, you weren’t on the board. You were the vice president of it.” And she says, “No, I wasn’t,” and then says, “It was a clerical error.” Now, there’s probably a cleric somewhere in Michigan that’s like—

AMY GOODMAN: This is when Maggie Hassan pushed her on it and said, “I’ve got the form right here.”

JEREMY SCAHILL: Right. She says, “These are—we have the 990s all the”—because, see, what happened is, Betsy DeVos was listed as a vice president. This wasn’t just one tax filing. This is a decade worth of tax filings where Betsy DeVos and Erik Prince are listed as vice presidents of their mother’s foundation, specifically during the time when they were pouring money into what the Southern Poverty Law Center says was an anti-LGBTQ hate group. And Betsy DeVos, she lied to those senators. Now, that’s not the most scandalous thing at all about Betsy DeVos being named as education secretary, but it should be an immediate disqualifier.

The only thing that will disqualify a Trump appointed candidate from a cabinet position is being a Democrat. The Republicans have far more than the 51 seats needed to ensure any candidate voted on is approved, regardless of what shows up in the hearings.

Eh, maybe. It only takes one or two Senators to flip, which is possible. Graham and McCain could do it between themselves.
They wont, but they easily could.

Hmm…I was thinking Republicans had like 56 Senate seats, but a quick internet check shows they only have 52, with 46 Dems and 2 Independents (who usually vote with Dems). 51 votes are needed to confirm and appointment, so yeah, I suppose McCain and any other Republican with a conscience could team up to stymie the vote at 50-50 and nullify an appointment. That’s assuming any of them have a conscience, AND that there isn’t an idiot Dem somewhere who would vote YEA.

I’m hoping the GOP approves every single one of these crazy-ass appointees. It’s the only way we’re going to swing the pendulum back to the center.

Look at what happened to GW after his FEMA appointee shit the bed. Now multiply that across every other department in the Federal government.

Nope, he picked that Kennedy guy who is a democrat anti-vaxxer.

The only disqualification is seemingly competence. Not sure how Mattis slipped past the goalie.

Did you just jinx us? I feel like you just jinxed us. Now it’s going to turn out that Mattis is actually a complete idiot and his various subordinates have just been covering up for him, while he takes all the credit.

This shit is happening.

No doubt.

I hope everyone has seen this:

That’s actually a burn that would get on his nerves.

lol as my son would say, “oooh harsh burrrrn!!”

  • We are doomed.
  • All of the above.

0 voters

Yes it is. Today America stands on the verge of becoming what it once fought so valiantly against.

Our only hope is that the everyday people who are responsible for the inner workings of everything government have the common sense and decency to say “No” when ridiculous things like this are floated. That second paragraph reads to me like a couple of horrified military advisors were like “Holy shit, think how awful that would look to everyone. Yeah but does team Trump care about optics? Good point, let’s tell them it will destroy the roads, they’ll buy that.”.

10:00am. It’s obviously the weather…

I’m really looking forward to the comparison pictures for tomorrow.

For those not aware, tomorrow (Sat, Jan 21) is the “Women’s March”… which is really a conglomeration of a bunch of anti-Trump protests of which the Women’s March is simply the largest. I was surprised to find out that of my six high school buddies that still live in the area, five are planning on heading into DC to take part in the march… as far as I know, none of them have ever so much as attended a political rally in the past.

A couple friends from out of town are meeting at my place tomorrow at some stupid dawn-like hour so that we can all head in early tomorrow on the metro (subway). If you happen to see any photos of the event tomorrow, I’m the tall guy wearing jeans.

[quote]
HEWILLNOTDIVIDE.US is a participatory performance by LaBeouf, Rönkkö & Turner that invites the public to deliver the words “He will not divide us” into a camera mounted on a wall outside the Museum of the Moving Image, repeating the phrase as many times, and for as long as they wish. The performance commences at 9:00 a.m. on January 20, 2017, the day of the inauguration of the 45th President of the United States.

Open to all, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, the participatory performance will be live-streamed continuously at www.hewillnotdivide.us for four years, or the duration of the presidency. In this way, the mantra “HE WILL NOT DIVIDE US” acts as a show of resistance or insistence, opposition or optimism, guided by the spirit of each individual participant and the community.[/quote]

Part of me is all for stuff like this.

The other part of me is like “Oh. Jaden Smith and Shia LaBeouf. Fuck that.”

All of me is for anyone who resists the orange.

Police using tear gas to break up protesters outside WAPO headquarters?