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Jaffe held a facebook Town Hall yesterday:

A reminder:

Democrats divide on Bernie’s 2020 plans

Many top Democrats are furious that Bernie Sanders appears to be running for president again, or at least planning to drag out his decision long enough to freeze the race around him.

He’s frustrating alumni of his 2016 campaign, some of whom would like him to run again, by showing no interest in raising early money or locking down lower level staff — moves they say would indicate he recognizes the need for a different kind of campaign operation in 2020. Outside of his tighter-than-ever inner circle, friends and staffers who’d be happy to back him again say they rarely, if ever, speak to Sanders these days.

Sanders hasn’t made any decision, and he tends to dismiss the discussion about 2020 as dumb. He hasn’t even fully committed to running for re-election to the Senate next year.

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Former DNC chair Donna Brazile warned party leaders against relying on Sanders, unless they’re willing to give in on opening the party to more independents like he wants.

“He’s not someone who we should go to, to build or rebuild or expand our party unless he’s willing,” she said.

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Jeff Weaver, Sanders’ 2016 campaign manager and now the president of his Our Revolution group, still speaks with the senator all the time. He dismissed any speculation about 2020 as ridiculously early, but added that the door is wide open, and said those who worry about how he might tilt the party need to wake up.

“What is their goal, some kind of defense of the Democratic Party’s newfound centrism? If that’s what they’re looking to do, I guess that they would consider it a disaster. If they want to win the White House, I think it would be a good thing,” Weaver said.

Was the Election Rigged Against Bernie Sanders? DNC Lawsuit Demands Repayment for Campaign Donors

A class action lawsuit alleging the Democratic National Committee worked in junction with Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign to keep Bernie Sanders out of the White House has been raging on in the courtrooms for months on end–and yet, most people have no idea of its existence, in large part thanks to the mainstream media’s total lack of coverage.

Jared Beck, a Harvard Law graduate and one of the several attorneys who filed the suit against the DNC and its former chairperson Debbie Wasserman Schultz, want retribution for donations made by supporters to the Vermont senator’s campaign, citing six legal claims of the DNC’s deceptive conduct, negligent misrepresentation and fraud. The DNC violated Article 5, Section 4 of its own charter by working with a single campaign to effectively choose who would win the Democratic ballot, the attorneys stated in the suit.

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The court decision could have major consequences for a party internally grappling with how to define itself in Trump’s America. Sanders, who represented a leftward shift from the Clinton and Obama centrists who typically receive large backings from wealthy Democratic donors, has become the symbolic face of the resistance under the new White house administration. He’s also the most popular politician alive in the U.S., according to recent polling.

At a time when most Americans no longer feel represented by the Democratic or Republican Party, a class action lawsuit could prove millions of supporters of an embattled progressive campaign right, or further support President Donald Trump’s notion that the 2016 election was, in fact, rigged.

Bernie Sanders blasts ‘reckless and dangerous’ Trump for reportedly sharing classified information

Bernie Sanders fiercely condemned President Donald Trump on Monday following reports that the president shared highly classified information with Russian officials during their White House visit last week.

The Vermont senator called Trump’s actions “reckless and dangerous” in a statement released Monday evening.

“President Trump, in a reckless and dangerous manner, has revealed highly classified information to the Russians at a meeting in the Oval Office, information that could expose extremely important sources and methods of intelligence gathering in the fight against ISIS,” Sanders said in the statement.

“Protecting our national security is one of the most important tasks a president has, and Trump is failing at it.”

DNC Faces Another Class Action Lawsuit After $1 Million in Bonuses Given Out

The Democratic National Committee and former DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz are currently facing a class action lawsuit filed on behalf of Bernie Sanders supporters in federal court for rigging the Democratic primaries in favor of Hillary Clinton. On May 12, CBS reported another class action lawsuit was filed against the DNC for stiffing dozens of field organizers all over the country for overtime work during the 2016 election while the DNC gave out $1 million in bonuses, including more than $300,000 to Democratic National Convention Host Committee Executive Director Kevin Washo. The lawsuit was filed by Justin Swidler of Cherry Hill, N.J. on behalf of 40 to 50 field organizers against the DNC, Pennsylvania state Democrats, and five other state Democratic Parties. “These workers were out there in a campaign that was promising $15 an hour minimum wage and expanding the overtime rights of workers,” Swidler told CBS. He added the lawsuit seeks “fair pay for fair work” and to hold the Democratic Party accountable to the ideals it markets itself with.

Chair of the Democratic National Convention Host Committee and former Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell alleged that the Democratic National Convention was separate from the operations noted in the lawsuit. Many of the plaintiffs in the class action lawsuit worked 80 to 90 hours a week for Hillary Clinton’s campaign and were compensated only $3,000 a month.

Congressional Candidates Stump in the Flathead as Election Nears

For Gianforte, Donald Trump, Jr., the president’s eldest son, has paid multiple visits to campaign on the Republican’s behalf, while Vice President Mike Pence also turned up. In Bigfork on May 15, U.S. Rep. Kevin McCarthy, the Republican House Majority Leader from California, attended a fundraising event at a private residence. He’s also received support from state Attorney General Tim Fox, who is the subject of speculation about challenging Tester in 2018.

In addition to the endorsement from Tester, Quist has received support from former Democratic Gov. Brian Schweitzer, while actress Alyssa Milano hosted a get-out-the-vote drive during which she drove voters to the polling stations in Bozeman and Missoula.

On May 20, U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vermont, will launch a two-day barnstorming tour of the state, appearing alongside Quist at events in Missoula, Butte, Billings, and Bozeman. On May 15, Quist addressed members of the Kalispell Chamber of Commerce.

Libertarian candidate Mark Wicks, a rancher from Inverness, rounds out the ballot, and although he’s considered a long shot to win the race, his strong performance at last month’s sole debate for the seat may earn him an uptick in support that could potentially shift the balance.

Keystone XL operator will reassess interest of U.S. producers

TransCanada Corp. is reassessing whether oil producers in North Dakota and Montana are still interested in shipping crude through its long-delayed Keystone XL pipeline now that they have other new options to ship their product, including the Dakota Access pipeline.

The Calgary-based company’s announcement this month comes with the Keystone XL still needing approval of its proposed route through Nebraska and with the Dakota Access, which was designed to transport about half of North Dakota’s oil production, expected to be fully operational by June.

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Work on that access line was never started, and TransCanada spokesman Matthew John said the company plans to re-engage with prospective shippers “because of a lot of changes in the oil market.”

John said the company also would be surveying Canadian shippers to firm up support for the entire Keystone XL.

“We are confident the project still has a need, absolutely,” he said.

Opponents of oil pipeline try going after the money

Opposition to the Dakota Access oil pipeline has persuaded some banks to stop supporting projects that might harm the environment or tread on indigenous rights, but calling the divest movement a success might be a stretch.

It doesn’t appear to be hurting the ability of energy companies to get financing and it doesn’t seem to concern lenders broadly. Yet pipeline opponents see victory in the fact that they have made financial institutions more aware of indigenous rights — and they’re intent on keeping up the fight on projects such as Keystone XL even after failing to stop the Dakota Access line.

“We aren’t ignoring the fact we couldn’t stop that pipeline,” said Vanessa Green, a campaign director with the DivestInvest initiative. “There’s a battle, and then there’s a war.”

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In the meantime, opponents of such projects continue to seek to broaden their efforts to educate people about the potential effects not only on the environment, but on Native Americans.

“There’s a whole widening narrative woven into what was once an environmental movement,” said Green, with the DivestInvest initiative. “Now it’s much more integrated, with a social justice, indigenous rights focus.”

Leaving Scars: TransCanada Took Their Land for the Keystone XL

Dakota Access Pipeline’s First Oil Spill Will Be One of Many to Come

It recently came to light that the controversial Dakota Access Pipeline experienced a leak in April. Though the incident involved only 84 gallons -– a relatively small amount by oil pipeline spill standards –- it certainly casts doubt on the safety of the DAPL project as a whole.

On behalf of South Dakota’s Department of Environmental and Natural Resources, Brian Walsh stated that the leak was essentially anticipated. Additionally, the state remains content with the way the spill was handled and will not level fines against the pipeline’s developer.

Unsurprisingly, a spokesperson for DAPL developer Energy Transfer Partners issued a statement in an attempt to reassure the public that the pipeline is safe and the spill was dealt with “as designed.”

These attitudes — that view oil spills as routine and negligible — are concerning, to say the least.

Dave Archambault, a chairman of the Standing Rock Sioux tribe, claims this recent incident, though minor, is indicative of a future crisis: “These spills are going to be nonstop.” The tribe has been engaged in an ongoing lawsuit against the developer of DAPL over such concerns.

Trump Escalates Attack on Healthcare, Women With Rebranded and Expanded Global Gag Rule

President Donald Trump spent part of his first Monday in office following in the footsteps of other Republican presidents by reinstating the Global Gag Rule, officially known as the Mexico City Policy.

The Reagan-era rule bars U.S. aid from going to international NGOs that offer abortion services or even provide information about it as an option—even when they use non-U.S. funds to do so. It’s been criticized for devastating not only reproductive healthcare services but primary healthcare services as well, as clinics, faced with budget shortfalls, are forced to cut back or shut down completely.

And it was made clear, from that January memorandum, that Trump’s order would mark an expansion of the rule, as it directed the Secretary of State “to implement a plan to extend the requirements of the reinstated Memorandum to global health assistance furnished by all departments or agencies.” As Human Rights Watch explained in March:

Under previous Republican administrations, the restrictions in the Mexico City Policy applied specifically to U.S. family planning funds, approximately U.S.$575 million.

Trump’s policy extends restrictions to all U.S. global health assistance…

On Monday, CBN reported that “Trump is taking the pro-life policy to a whole different level,” as the rule, rebranded as the “Protecting Life in Global Health Assistance” program, will affect $8.8 billion in funding.

Hillary Clinton launches political action group Onward Together

Hillary Clinton is out of the woods and back in the game.

Clinton on Monday announced the launch of Onward Together, a political action organization that is dedicated to supporting progressive causes, ending months of speculation about whether the vanquished presidential nominee would return to political life.

“From the Women’s March to airports where communities are welcoming immigrants and refugees to town hall meetings in every community, Americans are speaking up and speaking out like never before,” Clinton wrote in an email to supporters.

“The challenges we face as a country are real. But there’s no telling what we can achieve if we approach the fights ahead with the passion and determination we feel today, and bring that energy into 2017, 2018, 2020, and beyond. Onward!”

Clinton made the announcement in a series of tweets on Monday afternoon, starting with a playful reference to her post-election, meditative hikes in the woods near her Chappaqua home.

Middle East allies at physical and political risk from Trump leak

Among intelligence partners, two maxims govern how business is done: don’t disclose more than is needed, and never allow a source to be compromised.

This code of conduct has been especially relevant in the campaign against Islamic State (Isis), where regional and global powers have collaborated to quash the terrorist group, often at enormous risk to individuals.

The Five Eyes alliance, comprising the US, Britain, Australia, Canada and New Zealand and which acts as the eyes and ears of the western world, has spent much of the past decade trying to penetrate Isis. But for all its hi-tech edge, it still relies heavily on local partners for real human sources who can reveal terrorist plots, particularly in Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Iraq’s Kurdish areas and Turkey.

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As well as the potential physical risk to an informant, there are clear political risks to well-intentioned regional allies who may have passed on such information. The tech ban has struck a heavy blow against state-owned airlines in the United Arab Emirates and Qatar, which have lost business to other carriers flying to the US and UK to which the ban does not apply.

Were one of these states to learn that a regional ally had been responsible, recriminations of some sort would be likely to follow. That, in turn, could damage trust in other areas, such as intelligence cooperation.

‘Those are our Eiffel Towers, our pyramids’: Why Standing Rock is about much more than oil

On May 15, the Dakota Access Pipeline is scheduled to start delivering oil. The indigenous community of Standing Rock, North Dakota, has protested the pipeline for two years since its re-routing. Media coverage has largely portrayed the protest as an environmental movement and discussion of indigenous religion is rare. However, while environmental protection is a central and connected issue, discussions of Standing Rock that do not include an understanding of Native American religious traditions are missing important context.

Over 5,000 years ago, the inhabitants of a village along the Green River, Kentucky, practiced the Cult of the River Keepers. Skeletons show evidence of auditory exostoses, a growth of cartilaginous tissue on ear bones that is found in humans who are repeatedly exposed to cold water – suggesting they frequently performed religious ceremonies in the river. Today, Native American cultures in the midwest and south regard rivers are sacred entities, known as the Long Man or Long Snake, and continue to perform religious ceremonies in them. In the Missouri River, indigenous Water Protectors have tried to prevent the Dakota Access Pipeline from passing through a sacred landscape. Understood in its religious context, the Standing Rock Sioux are not anti-industry protestors, but practitioners of religious elements that may predate Judaism, Christianity, and Islam by centuries.

38 million pieces of plastic waste found on uninhabited South Pacific island

One of the world’s most remote places, an uninhabited coral atoll, is also one of its most polluted.

Henderson Island, a tiny landmass in the eastern South Pacific, has been found by marine scientists to have the highest density of anthropogenic debris recorded anywhere in the world, with 99.8% of the pollution plastic.

The nearly 18 tonnes of plastic piling up on an island that is otherwise mostly untouched by humans have been pointed to as evidence of the catastrophic, “grotesque” extent of marine plastic pollution.

Nearly 38m pieces of plastic were estimated to be on Henderson by researchers from the University of Tasmania and the UK’s Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, weighing a combined 17.6 tonnes.

‘Where Are the Tapes, Sean?’: As Spicer Demurs, ACLU Requests Comey Records

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) on Monday requested that the White House hand over any records pertaining to President Donald Trump’s firing of former FBI director James Comey amid investigations into alleged Russian meddling in the U.S. presidential election.

The ACLU filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the U.S. Department of Justice, saying it was impossible to know the truth with the Trump administration’s constantly-changing stories, “each of which is increasingly troubling.”

“White House interference with any FBI investigation is incompatible with democratic safeguards, and that’s especially the case when the investigation involves the president or his associates,” said Hina Shamsi, director of the ACLU’s National Security Project. “Political meddling with law enforcement investigations is a recipe for abuse of power.”

WaPo Columnist Condemning Sanders’ Drug Importation Bill Doesn’t Realize Canada Can Expand Its Regulatory Agency

The Washington Post ran a column by Leona Aglukkaq, a former member of Canada’s House of Commons and Canadian health minister, which complained that Senator Bernie Sanders proposal to allow mass importation of drugs from Canada would overburden the country’s regulatory agency. As the piece tells readers:

“Canadian authorities do not inspect every shipment of products headed for the U.S. marketplace to ensure that packages don’t contain adulterated, counterfeit or illegal drugs. Canada does not have the resources to undertake such comprehensive searches, and the Canadian and U.S. governments are not currently set up to facilitate such a program. Canada’s health-inspection regime is designed to ensure the safety of medications for Canadians, not for other countries.”

While this is undoubtedly true, there is a little secret that fans of economics and logic have long known. With additional money, Canada could expand the size of its regulatory agency so it would have the resources to undertake such comprehensive searches.

And, where might Canada get the additional money? It can tax the drugs being sold to people in the United States. With the price of drugs in the United States often two or three times the price of drugs in Canada, there is plenty of room to impose a tax to cover the additional inspection costs and still leave massive savings for people in the United States.

Trying to Explain the Disdain for Poor Americans

Americans with wealth and power don’t generally care about the middle and lower classes. Even worse, they are doing real damage to the people they don’t care about.

But why? Either these well-positioned people are 100 percent out of touch with the realities of middle-class life in our country, or they’re contemptuous of those they consider inferior, or they believe so strongly in individual ‘freedom’ that even the word ‘social’ is repugnant to them. Or perhaps they’re just not smart enough to see the value of people who are different from them.

The assault continues non-stop: Taking away healthcare, either by disposing of the Affordable Care Act or slashing Medicaid; weakening consumer protection laws; repealing fair wage and workplace safety laws; cutting overtime pay; jeopardizing civil rights in the name of “religious freedom”; putting low-income mothers at risk by cutting their maternity care; increasing penalties for minor drug offenses; giving our public lands — including the homes of Native Americans — to oil companies; and even denying kids healthy lunches.

Trump’s New Bank Regulator: Lawyer Who Helped Banks Charge More Fees

In the early 2000s, banks successfully sued to stop Iowa from limiting their ability to charge ATM fees to non-customers. They also fought off states’ attempts to stop them from charging non-customers to cash checks drawn on the banks’ accounts. In another case, they stopped California from forcing two banks to conduct audits of their own residential mortgages.

What do all these cases have in common? The winning argument in each was that states had no right to impose their laws on federally regulated national banks. And the man who helped make that powerful argument was Keith Noreika — President Trump’s pick to head the federal agency that oversees national banks.

Noreika, a prominent Washington attorney who specializes in financial regulatory law, has made a career out of representing banks as they sought to fight back consumer-friendly state regulations and class-action lawsuits accusing banks of deceptive practices.

He is now the acting head of the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, a position he can serve for 130 days without Senate approval and during which he does not have to abide by stricter ethics rules governing permanent appointees.

As head of the OCC, Noreika will be well-positioned to lighten regulations on banks — without the need for Congress to pass legislation.

 Can Senator Jeff Merkley Help Democrats Reclaim the Health-Care Narrative?

 Recently, Merkley has become a much more visible force in the Democratic caucus. He was the sole senator to endorse Bernie Sanders during the presidential primary and, after Hillary Clinton secured the nomination, was mentioned as a possible vice-presidential pick. After the election, he was elevated to chief deputy whip, becoming the first Oregon senator since 1944 to assume a leadership role. Since then, Merkley has embraced the movement calling for all-out resistance to President Trump’s agenda. In April, he committed what The New York Times called a “feat of congressional masochism,” speaking overnight for more than 15 hours against the confirmation of Neil Gorsuch to the Supreme Court.

 Merkley’s rise comes at a crucial time for Democrats. In the Senate, one of their most urgent tasks is resisting Trumpcare. “The path is clear for Senate Republicans to do something very unhelpful to the quality of life of working Americans, and we’re very worried about it,” Merkley said a few days after the House vote. Whether or not a GOP overhaul of Obamacare makes it into law, a more complicated task for Democrats in the next two years will be articulating an alternative. It’s the kind of project that has excited Merkley since he was the minority leader of the Oregon House, which he helped flip to the Democrats in 2006, after a 16-year slump. Last fall, after Aetna announced that it would pull out of most Obamacare insurance exchanges run by individual states, Merkley re- ignited the conversation about a public option. He thinks Democrats should keep talking about that, about fixing the real holes in Obamacare and lowering the Medicare eligibility age—a sort of bridge to a single-payer system. “We should be laying out that vision and not just trying to send off the bad stuff,” he told me.

How can Democrats harness the energy of the Trump backlash? That’s the underlying question, and one that Merkley is well-positioned to answer. He’s an experienced legislator and progressive wonk with a close connection to working-class and rural people, as well as to grassroots organizers. Oregon AFL-CIO president Tom Chamberlain, who has worked with Merkley throughout his political career, told me that he knows a lot of politicians who support working people’s issues, at least rhetorically. “What’s rare,” Chamberlain continued, “is to find one whose default is working people’s issues.”

One of Trump’s Top Picks for FBI Chief Pooh-Poohed the Trump-Russia Scandal

Americans generally accept the claim that lethal injection is a humane and painless way to kill convicted murderers. A 2014 Gallup poll found that 65 percent of Americans believe that lethal injection is the “most humane” form of capital punishment. According to a 2015 YouGov poll, just 18 percent of respondents described lethal injection as “cruel and unusual punishment,” which is prohibited by the Eighth Amendment. But, despite its widespread use, there is virtually no scientific data to suggest that lethal injection is humane. There’s been very little research done on the effects of lethal injections on humans at all—but the science that is available suggest that inmates may actually experience immense pain before dying.

On a recent episode of our Inquiring Minds podcast, Kishore Hari interviews Teresa Zimmers, an associate professor of surgery at Indiana University School of Medicine. Zimmers, who has spent years researching lethal injection, is sharply critical to the ways in which states kill the condemned.

“What we have here is masquerade,” says Zimmers. “Something that pretends to be science and pretends to be medicine but isn’t.”

This is making the internet rounds so… discuss away:

Slain Democratic Staffer Seth Rich Contacted Wikileaks Before Mystery Murder
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Slain Democratic staffer Seth Rich contacted Wikileaks before he was mysteriously gunned down near his Washington D.C. home last summer, a private investigator revealed.

Rob Wheeler, a sleuth hired by Rich’s grieving family, suggested to Fox News that the baffling murder was not a botched robbery as police have claimed.

“My investigation up to this point shows there was some degree of email exchange between Seth Rich and Wikileaks,” Wheeler told Fox. “I do believe that the answers to who murdered Seth Rich sits on his computer on a shelf at the D.C. police or FBI headquarters.”

A federal investigator said an FBI probe of Rich’s computer in the days after the July 10 slaying revealed that Rich was in contact with Wikileaks.

“I have seen and read the emails between Seth Rich and Wikileaks,” the federal investigator told Fox News.

The White House Just Responded to a Report Claiming Trump Divulged Classified Info to the Russians

Early Monday evening, national security adviser H.R. McMaster dismissed an explosive Washington Post report alleging that President Donald Trump shared highly classified information with Russia’s foreign minister Sergei Lavrov and Russian ambassador to the US Sergey Kislyak at a White House meeting on May 10.

“I was in the room. It didn’t happen,” McMaster said.

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Trump Admits Passing Intel to Russia

President Trump admitted Tuesday morning that he did share highly classified information with two of Russia’s top diplomats during an Oval Office meeting last week. The extraordinary disclosure, which was first reported by The Washington Post, was initially denied by the White House. This morning, the 45th president of the United States contradicted his staff by admitting, via Twitter, that he shared information on terrorism with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, and Ambassador Sergey Kislyak during their meeting.

Democrats Collide as Tom Perriello and Ralph Northam Face Off in Virginia

It’s 2016 all over again in the Virginia gubernatorial primary, as Bernie Sanders and Elizabeth Warren are backing populist and super-charged campaigner Tom Perriello while the state’s two senators, Mark Warner and Tom Kaine, are with Ralph Northam, the pediatric neurosurgeon and current Lt. Governor who lacks the charisma and populist appeal of Perriello.

Sound familiar?

Like Hillary and Bernie, Virginia’s competing Democrats—voters will decide between them in less than a month—are farther apart stylistically than on the issues. But just as the Clinton-Sanders contest exposed the fault line between the populist wing and the centrist or corporatist wing of the Democratic Party, those contours are playing out between Party favorite Northam and Perriello, a former one-term congressman who achieved near mythic stature when he became the only House member President Obama campaigned for in 2010. Perriello lost his seat, and Democrats lost the House.