I'd like to know who insisted on defunding public schools with the CARES ACT.

After a bill is passed into law, the law is then written into rules. In this case THE RULE that was written from the CARES ACT misinterpreted the new law and was handing out bonuses to private schools while the public schools were defunded.

The RULE is egregious. The law was intentionally interpreted wrong. It is amazing what the Trump administration will seek to get away with if given a chance. This is another reason why having a criminal for president only victimizes the people more and more. It isn't enough, as with Moscow Mitch, to obstruct law, it is now a matter of ethical and moral behavior within the ranks of the cabinet and those that interpret law.

Criminal leadership begets criminal following. It is no different than the multitudes of violations of the Hatch Act (click here) by the RNC within their convention. They were all criminal acts, but, I don't see subpoenas, arrests and perp walks as the crimes were being committed or afterward.

It is no different than the police and their deadly conduct in the deaths of African American men, the apprehension of those committing the crime is not speedy enough nor are the arrests and perp walks all over social media. It is as if anyone can break the law and get away with it.

Justice is supposed to be swift enough to make an impression on society and it no longer happens that way. At least 50 percent of the people at the White House for the abuse of power within the Hatch Act should have been arrested as they left. Detained in cells until charges could be written and people presented to a judge for disposition. What occurred in violation of the Hatch Act was at the very least civil disobedience in a display to promote the power Trump has that he can get away with. The only people that should have been left behind as the police vans roared up the streets to it's precinct is the president and vice president. The First Lady, Ivanka and Jared should have been included in those arrested and detained. But, let citizens protest in civil disobedience in outrage of another racial killing and the vans show up with officers in riot gear, National Guard and vigilants that are tolerated at the scene. 

Justice is not equal in the USA and here is another clear violation of rule making that is grossly illegal depriving public schools of much needed funding.

Augsut 27, 2020

A California federal judge (click here) put a temporary stop to a U.S. Department of Education rule that would require public school districts to share coronavirus relief funds with private school students, citing how it would harm at least two Michigan school districts.

The rule misinterpreted language in the CARES Act to give nonpublic schools a greater share of the funding, resulting in at at least $16 million of the federal to be diverted from Michigan public schools to the state's 700 non-public schools, according to a group of state attorney generals that included Michigan's Dana Nessel.

Nessel, one of the Democratic attorneys general on the case filed in California, had argued the CARES Act formula required schools districts to share coronavirus funding with low-income students attending private schools in the district, not any and all private school students....

...“Losing (nearly $16.5 million) of federal funding to private schools would be the equivalent of laying off 466 teachers from public schools in Flint, Michigan,” he wrote.

Nessel and Gov. Gretchen Whitmer praised the decision and promised to continue the lawsuit until the matter is fully resolved....

Racism is getting noticed in other areas of the world.

August 29, 2020
By Tom Dilane

A Māori man (click here) has been left angry and "overwhelmed with emotion" after a Hamilton florist allegedly questioned whether he was an elderly customer's slave.

Tama Dean says the owner of The Plant Place, Bruce Sanson, casually asked a woman in her 70s, who Dean had let in front of him in the line at the counter, "is that your slave?"

When questioned about it, Dean said Sanson claimed the 53-year-old Hamilton resident was only angry "because Black Live Matter is trendy at the moment"....

Cover-ups are illegal. Maybe the police and their unions need to address that among themselves first.

The Kenosha police union is also talking about police actions and still has not addressed the wrongful use of the gun to fire seven shots into a human body. The police would have been better off if they shot out the tires on the getaway car. The responsible police officer should be on leave immediately upon witnessing the illegal use of his gun.

No police officer has a right to shoot a person in the back. The use of that gun was illegal. And all those determined to defend the actions of an illegal act is using the preceding events to justify an illegal act.

The cop was wrong. The police union in Kenosha needs to practice saying, "The officer was wrong and used his gun illegally," before addressing the public to THE FACTS.

It is a complicated circumstance, but, these facts are important.

August 28, 2020

By Jamelle Bouie

...This is a complicated situation, (click here) but a few things are clear. Wisconsin isn’t a “Stand Your Ground” state, and Rittenhouse was in illegal possession of a weapon — under Wisconsin law, it is a Class A misdemeanor for a minor to carry a deadly weapon in the open. There is also no legal right in the state to use deadly force for the protection of property you do not own. And in any case the “Castle Doctrine” only applies to the use of deadly force in one’s home, vehicle or business....

The militias are breaking the law. They are nothing more than vigilantes and are carrying out illegal activities as self-assigned PROTECTORS of property.

...To the conservative media, however, what happened in Kenosha was eminently justifiable and even cause for celebration....

I sincerely believe the right-wing media is engaged in roles no different than the journalists of Rwanda. A journalist does not have to give explicit directions to kill in order to inspire to kill.

4 December 2003

...Phrases like "go to work" (click here) and "the graves are not yet full" were read by radio DJs during the spring of 1994. A newspaper called on citizens to exterminate the "cockroach Tutsis".

Ferdinand Nahimana, who was sentenced to life in jail, was a founding member of Radio Television Libres des Mille Collines, as was Hassan Ngeze, 42, the owner and editor of the Hutu extremist newspaper, Kangura, who also got life.

"Let whatever is smouldering erupt," Ngeze wrote in the newspaper days before the genocide....

Reporting the facts is not the same as rooting them on. It is a real head trip. Having the power of media and getting results by inspiring killing for the sake of killing. 

I did say reporting the FACTS, right?

Where are the prosecutions for the production of these products? Warnings are fine, but, the recklessness is criminal.

August 27, 2020
By Rachael Rettner

Some hand sanitizer products (click here) are being packaged in containers typically used for food and drinks, leading to concerns that people may accidentally ingest the products, according to health officials.

On Thursday (Aug. 27), the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) warned consumers about these hand sanitizer products, which have been packaged in a variety of potentially misleading containers, including beer cans, water bottles, juice bottles, vodka bottles and children's food pouches, the agency said in a statement. In addition, officials have found hand sanitizers with food flavors, such as chocolate and raspberry.

Hand sanitizers typically contain 60% to 70% alcohol, so can be toxic when ingested, particularly for young children who may develop alcohol poisoning....

People are still in need of help.

Hurricane Laura has been downgraded to a tropical storm, but not before it claimed the lives of at least four individuals since it made landfall Thursday morning.

August 28, 2020

By Bill Chappell

Hurricane Laura (click here) unleashed terrible winds on the Louisiana coast, but its effects are "looking relatively tame from an economic perspective" – especially when compared with other powerful storms, according to an early analysis by Moody's Analytics.

Laura is blamed for at least 10 deaths, including five people who died from carbon monoxide poisoning — at least one case involving the use of a generator without proper ventilation. Four people died from trees falling on homes, Gov. John Bel Edwards said. And a man drowned after the boat he was on sank, NPR member station WWMO reported.

The storm is estimated to have caused anywhere from $4 billion to $12 billion in damages to Louisiana and Texas. While Laura showed a staggering amount of power, its damage tally isn't likely to come close to other strong storms such as hurricanes Katrina and Harvey — the two costliest storms in U.S. history.

Katrina caused an estimated $160 billion worth of damage in 2005; Harvey caused $125 billion in damages in 2017.

A key reason for Laura's smaller price tag is that while the hurricane came ashore with 150-mph winds — crashing large trees into houses, ripping roofs off buildings and tossing vehicles around – it avoided densely populated areas such as Houston and New Orleans....

Racial injustice is being addressed by many sports champions.

Naomi Osaka is a professional tennis player who represents Japan. Osaka has been ranked No. 1 by the Women's Tennis Association and is the first Asian player to hold the top ranking in singles. She has won five titles on the WTA Tour, including two titles at both the Grand Slam and Premier Mandatory levels.

Donald John Trump should never have provided the Russians with top secret information.

August 26, 2020

By David Brennan

There is a reason the Russians are smiling. They have successfully breached the stealth technology which COMPROMISES the USA and any ally that purchased those jets.

The CEO of a Russian technology firm (click here) has claimed that his company's radar product enabled the Iranian military to identify and track American stealth fighter jets during the standoff that followed the assassination of Major General Qassem Soleimani in January.

Alexander Stuchilin, the CEO of the Rezonans research center, told Russia's state-backed Tass news agency Monday Iranian forces used the Rezonans-NE radar system to track American F-35 aircraft; fifth generation jets that are the most advanced in the U.S. arsenal.

"At the beginning of 2020 this radar identified U.S. F-35 planes and tracked them," Stuchilin claimed on the sidelines of the Army-2020 military technology forum in Moscow....

Make a plan to vote. I find this outreach to citizens a wise decision. It is called VOTING EMPOWERMENT.

Some county authorities are doing their level best to protect voters. High risk for contracting the SARS-CoV-2 virus resulting in COVID-19 should vote by mail. There is no doubt about it. Voting by mail is the safest method and it begins soon if not started already. Masks work. Handwashing and good hygiene are very important. Don't touch the face without the very least washing hands with hand sanitizer.

The police leadership have to be actively involved in addressing the grievances with resolve to end police brutality.

April 27, 2020
By Rebecca Ellis

With two months left (click here) until he faces voters, Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler has pledged to take a different tack to leading his city.

Speaking behind a podium in an empty City Hall chamber Wednesday, the mayor issued a mea culpa of sorts, promising to lead both better and more visibly. Wheeler said he felt he hadn’t been focused enough on the crises facing the city and had failed to engage with Portlanders “enough or in the right way.”

“Frankly, I have not been focused enough on the two issues that are the most important to the city of Portland,” he said. “And right now, that is ending the nightly violence and getting our community back on its feet. And number two, it’s about economic recovery, both for our households and our small businesses. I need to focus like a laser beam on those two issues.”

The mayor said he planned to start this new direction with two meetings.

The first would take place Wednesday evening with the police bureau, when he planned to ask if they needed more resources to bring protests to “a peaceful conclusion.” Wheeler said he also wanted to see what ideas the bureau has to hold officers accountable “in real time” rather than through the city’s Independent Police Review, where a complaint against an officer can take months to work its way through the system. The mayor did not specify with whom he was meeting inside the bureau.

Having grievances answered in real-time will provide the protesters with less reason to protest. The protests are happening for real reasons. The resolve by police and citizen leadership has to be just as real as the grievances. Democracy is about people, not the ultimate control of them. Every one of those protests wants peaceful lives, but, it is interrupted by real reasons to protest.

The police violence toward protesters is not helpful when it is simply violence due to power and not governance.

The second meeting will be Thursday with “key stakeholders” from the business community to ask what the city can do to help downtown. The announcement comes on the heels of Williamette Week reporting that a prominent downtown property owner had delivered a heated letter to the City Council saying they were abdicating their duties and endorsing lawlessness in the area....

“tumultuous”

The police, especially those in Portland, have found a new word in their vocabulary to justify violence against protesters.

A riot - when six or more persons engage in tumultuous and violent conduct,”

Here again, the police are identifying police work and definitions without addressing the grievances of the protesters. So long as there is a complete breakdown of accountability by the police that causes the protests, there is every indication they will continue. The police chief needs to identify the reason for the protesters' grievance and what is going to be done to end police brutality. This is nothing more than justification by the police to attack people with real grievances.

It has gotten to be a regular event with both sides expecting the worst from each other. That is dangerous for a democracy. The civilian mayor and council has to take up the grievances of these people and provide a real reason to enact change of policy by police officers.

It is unrealistic to believe police will never be needed in any city in the USA, but, there MUST be an address of grievance in real ways that brings about the end of police brutality.

More layoffs are coming as well as companies facing closures.

August 27, 2020
By Lauren Zumbach

United Airlines will furlough 2,850 pilots (click here) this fall as it faces a sharp decline in travel because of the coronavirus pandemic.

While Chicago-based United still hopes furloughs can be avoided if the federal government gives airlines additional funding to help cover labor costs, “we need to prepare and plan for the future should an extension not be granted,” Bryan Quigley, senior vice president of flight operations, said in a message to pilots Thursday....

The police caused the protests that lead to deaths. The police were RESPONSIBLE for the protests.

There were no protests until the wrongful use of a gun against a black man. That is the direct responsibility of the police and Chief Miskinis has not addressed that police brutality yet.

August 28, 2020

By Dan Hinkel, John Keilman and Stacy St. Clair

Kyle Rittenhouse, (click here) who is charged with shooting and killing two men during this week’s violent demonstrations in Kenosha, will remain in Lake County for another month after a judge on Friday allowed a delay in the court process that could send him to Wisconsin to face the allegations.

Meanwhile, Kenosha police Chief Daniel Miskinis on Friday defended police after they allowed Rittenhouse, 17, of Antioch, to leave the scene of Tuesday’s deadly shooting in the protest-wracked city even though the teen was holding a rifle and had his hands up in what many interpret as a gesture of surrender.

In another development, an attorney for Jacob Blake (click here) told CNN that handcuffs restraining Blake, who is in a Wisconsin hospital, have been removed.

The shooting of Jacob Blake was blatantly wrong. That degree of dangerous police handling of an arrest is what upsets people. The people are right to be upset. The Chief of Police in Kenosha needs to address the loose handling of guns. Make no mistake, the uprising of the people was directly due to police brutality and the wrongful use of guns.

While the police are talking about police work and putting their own understanding "out there," that is as inappropriate as the repeated gunshots that have disabled Jacob Blake. The police officer was wrong and gratefully Blake is still alive. But, the Chief of Police has to address the blatant wrongful use of a gun against an unarmed black man and WHAT IS BEING DONE TO END THAT VIOLENCE AGAINST UNARMED BLACK MEN.

Blake, who is Black, was shot by Kenosha police on Sunday, and it was during protests over that shooting that Rittenhouse allegedly shot three people, two of them fatally. Police have been criticized for failing to apprehend Rittenhouse sooner.

“There were a lot of people in the area, a lot of people with weapons, and unfortunately, a lot of gunfire,” Miskinis (Chief of Police) said at a news conference Friday. “What the officers were ... driving into was a shots fired complaint, not a shooting, not a person down complaint. We have had many of those over the course of this unfortunate event.

“They’re responding to that, they see someone walking toward them with their hands up,” Miskinis said. “That, too, isn’t out of the ordinary given all the events going on. ... We have armed individuals out protesting, or counterprotesting, or simply walking around exercising their right, (who) will put their hands up. It might have been abnormal two weeks ago. It’s no longer abnormal. There’s nothing to suggest this individual was involved in criminal behavior.”

Russia needs to back off the USA troops. No major ally is backing the activity of the USA in Syria.

Russia can have Syria. Russia is Syria's ally. 

The USA military needs to carry out the extraction of the USA troops being surrounded by Russian soldiers. The USA has a "No Fault" policy when it comes to military traffic incidents.

I don't care who's fault it is. Russia can have Syria and the USA military needs to extract it's soldiers from the area. I think a good place for the troops is Jordan and/or Saudi Arabia so they can find a ride home to see their families.

The Kurds can go back to northern Iraq. Someone needs to give them a ride home to Iraq. 

The boys have roughed up each other enough. Time to break it up and go home.

August 27, 2020

The Russian and US governments (click here) have blamed each other for a collision between Russian and US armoured vehicles in north-eastern Syria in which several US troops were injured.

Video of the collision was broadcast by a Russian nationalist website, Rusvesna.su, then widely retweeted.

The video appears to show a Russian military vehicle in a desert convoy ramming a US armoured car, as a Russian helicopter flies low overhead.

Russia says the US obstructed a patrol.

A US defence official told BBC partner CBS News that Russian forces had entered a "security zone" that they had agreed to stay out of.

The White House said the vehicle's crew sustained minor injuries in the collision....

Russia has been Syria's ally for a long time. Russia is attempting to stabilize Syria and this is the result. Russia is interested in "stable states." They don't fuss about the leadership so long as Russia has control over STABILITY. Until Russia has that reassurance in the era of Daesh, it will be a continuous struggle for any force attempting to overrun Assad. The USA is not needed in Syria. If the USA wants to provide a homeland for the Kurds, they need to give them a safe ride back home to northern Iraq.

5 March 2020

By Jonathan Marcus

...He decided early on to deploy air power (click here) to prevent the collapse of the Syrian regime. And, once the position of President Bashar al-Assad was stabilised, Russia used its air power to help the regime to recover territory from the rebels. Idlib is now the last major battleground.

Unlike Western interventions in Afghanistan and Iraq, the Russians had a clear vision of what they wanted to do in Syria and were willing to be single-minded enough (some might say brutal enough) to achieve it....

Trump is putting on a show for the sake of votes. Trump has already done all the damage he is going to cause. People are dead and the land was lost. Trump retreated; the retreat needs to be completed and now he is putting on a show for what might be votes. It is time the USA concludes its business and bring the Americans home. Russia has Syria when it comes to stabilizing it during a very long and deadly civil war.

November 14, 2019

By Uri Friedman

...The same official noted that Syrian Kurdish forces (click here) have been partners in the U.S.-led multinational military campaign against the Islamic State, and that “what happens [in Syria] is being called ‘other people’s business’ even though ‘other people’s business’ will affect in all likelihood America’s European allies.” Then the official posed the fundamental question raised by the U.S. position, one that will linger over the gathering of anti-ISIS coalition members in Washington, D.C., this week: “What does that mean for our confidence that in a time of crisis or challenge we will have the backing of our American allies?” (The official, like several others in this article, asked to speak about the situation in Syria on condition of anonymity.) “It’s too early to say how this will play out. It will depend on whether the risks can be curtailed. But it’s a question that is the writing on the wall right now.”...

Dr. Redfield needs to appear before Congress.

Dr. Robert Redfield, Director of the CDC, has vacillated on CDC recommendations regarding testing for the SARS-CoV-2. Additionally, the website is inconsistent with his latest statements in returning to testing of those believed to have contact with anyone with COVID-19.

Why the inconsistency? And also important is insurance company responsibility with the testing. If the CDC website states testing is not important the insurance companies will see that as a reason not to pay for it which will suppress people from testing when it should continue to increase the testing rate to better understand the spread of the virus.