The official Thread for Trash/Repug CRAPICATION of America, the planet

[boutons_deux]

Betsy DeVos proposes rules that would cut student loan relief by an estimated $13 billion

Students who are defrauded by their schools would have a harder time getting their federal loans erased under new rules proposed by the Trump administration Wednesday.

The proposal, which aims to

replace a set of Obama-era rules

that were never implemented,

drew applause from the for-profit industry

but sharp criticism from advocacy groups that represent student borrowers.

students would be eligible for loan relief if they can prove their schools knowingly misled them with statements or actions that directly led them to take out loans or enroll at the school.

That would be a higher bar than the borrower defense rules finalized under Obama in 2016 after the collapse of two for-profit schools, Corinthian Colleges and ITT Technical Ins ute. Those rules allowed relief in a wider range of cases dealing with breach of contract.

DeVos' proposal argue that while students should be protected from fraud,

they also have an obligation to do research before picking schools.

to save nearly $13 billion over the next decade compared with spending estimates under the Obama rules, primarily by reducing the amount of loan relief awarded to students.

allow schools to force students into arbitration agreements

barring them from suing the school. Some for-profit colleges use that practice, which would have been banned under Obama's rules.

Opponents blasted the proposal, saying it places schools ahead of students and discourages victims from pursuing financial relief.

“It encourages abusive and predatory ins utions to continue to rip off students with impunity,

while slamming the door on the debt relief that Congress has instructed the department to provide to cheated students,”

the most damaging action Betsy DeVos has taken since assuming office.”

“These changes would effectively strip students of their right to recourse

if they believe that a college or university has misled them,

making it next to impossible for defrauded students to get the relief they are en led to,”

hailed as an improvement by the for-profit college industry and some Republicans.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-devos-student-loans-20180725-story.html#nws=mcnewsletter

[boutons_deux]

A coal lobbyist is running the Environmental Pollution Agency

The EPA just made toxic coal ash more dangerous

a six-foot-high wave of sludge spilled into the Tennessee countryside.

As it rolled, it buried porches, broke down trees, snapped power lines and shot fish out of the river. It pushed one house completely off its foundation.
The sludge, of course, didn't really come from a giant. It came from a coal-powered power plant down the road.

the EPA created some new regulations to close down problematic ash dumps.

Now, the Trump Administration is taking away those regulations.

In an effort that the administration says will help the coal industry,

state regulators can now opt to ignore water quality standards.

“It’s not like EPA has granted us free pass here," said James Roewer, the executive director of a utility company that has been lobbying for this deregulation.

Andrew Wheeler, a former coal lobbyist and (naturally) the EPA's current acting administrator says that

this change will save utilities $30 million a year.

Incidentally,

cleaning up the Tennessee goop has cost over $1 billion so far.

And hundreds of coal ash cleanup workers are claiming that the pollution has made them sick (and in some cases, taken lives).

https://www.treehugger.com/environme...dangerous.html

[boutons_deux]

I’m a Small Farmer From Iowa, Why Does Trump What to Take Away My Health Care?

For my family, “pre-existing conditions” are more than a technicality. They’re a matter of life or death, of sickness or health.

My wife and I are Iowa family farmers. I have diabetes, and Kristi has a heart murmur.

Without the Affordable Care Act (ACA) and its guarantees for people with pre-existing conditions, there’d be nothing standing between us and the insurance corporations.

My wife and I disclosed our health conditions and were approved.

Each month we religiously paid the $700 premium.

After months of back-and-forth, my insurer denied the claim, citing a pre-existing condition. They dropped me.

Then my wife had pre-approved tests for her heart, and the insurer dropped her, too.

It took us 14 years to pay those medical bills with no help from the insurer.

After years of us sending them monthly premium payments, they’d left us holding the bag.

Then came the ACA. Kristi and I finally got quality, affordable health care, like many other small-business owners.

The law isn’t perfect, but it provided a measure of stability we needed to keep our business going strong.

Trump is using that as an excuse to ask a judge

to throw out the ACA’s pre-existing condition protections, too.

A new Trump-appointed Supreme Court justice like Brett Kavanaugh just might help him do it.

Meanwhile, Republicans in Congress are advancing

a budget that cuts health care and raises prices for all of us enrolled in Medicare, Medicaid, and the ACA.

https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/07...y-health-care/

[boutons_deux]

This century's Repugs are corrupt, rotten to the core, in total d obeisance to the oligarchy.

OSHA to reduce Obama-era injury report requirements for large companies

The Trump administration has proposed rolling back an Obama-era Labor Department rule requiring companies with 250 or more workers to submit detailed forms to the agency on workplace injuries, a move labor advocates say will allow companies to cover up the extent of injuries.

The department's Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) issued a notice on Friday stating that it is seeking to

roll back the rule passed under the Obama administration

that greatly increased the amount of detail supervisors are supposed to provide to the federal government on workplace injuries.

Some of that information was then posted publicly by the Labor Department under the rule, and included summaries of incidents that occurred in larger-scale companies.

A spokesperson for the Labor Department told NBC News that the

rule change would not alter the agency's ability to collect information from companies

on workplace injuries and safety violations.

"This proposal maintains safety and health protections for workers while protecting sensitive worker information from public disclosure," communications director Megan Sweeney told NBC. "

The data OSHA continues to collect is robust and enables the agency to most effectively protect workers on the job."

The Labor Department argued that the original rule violated workers' privacy by exposing incidents that they were involved in to Freedom of Information Act requests.

Public safety advocates argued that the rule's rollback would only hurt workers.

"The existing rule is in place to protect workers,"

said Sean Sherman, an attorney at the Public Citizen Litigation Group which is involved in a lawsuit over the rule.

"The idea that you can protect workers by rolling back a strong worker protection is absurd."

http://thehill.com/regulation/labor/...arge-companies

[koriwhat]

if trump is trash then does that make obama the landfill? i mean he ing blew balls as a president but you all bought into it because he hung out with jay-z and played rec ball at the local DC YMCA.

[boutons_deux]

Here's a perfect example of a Repug politician/judge implementing Christian Sharia with no legislative complications or laws

Federal Judge Sides With New York Anti-Choice Protesters, Dismissing Clinic Workers’ Testimony as ‘Unreliable’

Federal Judge Carol Bagley Amon "diminished, she negated, she threw under the bus every lived experience of the staff, myself, and the escorts," said clinic founder Merle Hoffman.

A federal district court judge last week denied a preliminary injunction to prevent anti-choice protesters from demonstrating outside a clinic in Queens, New York,

saying they did not “harass, annoy, or alarm” people during Saturday protests

that have become routine since 2012.

Protesters outside the Choices Women’s Medical Center have for years

blocked the sidewalk with large posters of dismembered fetuses,

preaching loudly,

forcibly handing out fliers, and

issuing veiled death threats,

Judge Carol Bagley Amon of the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York in Brooklyn

denied the request for preliminary injunction, saying

she did not find the center’s security camera videos and testimony to be “credible.”

Amon has freed a married couple who conspired to help a man who gunned down an abortion care provider in 1998.

One of them, Dennis Malvasi, was a long-time anti-choice activist with a long arrest record. He had served time for trying to bomb New York-area clinics,

Judge Amon’s use of loaded language like “pro-abortion movement” in the decision betrays an inherently anti-choice viewpoint.

“The message is that it is free speech

to call a woman a baby killer,

to tell a mother and her child that her mother is coming in to kill her baby brother or sister,

to tell somebody they are desecrating the legacy of Martin Luther King,

to shame, to stigmatize, to bully, and to harass.”

https://rewire.news/article/2018/07/...as-unreliable/

This one of those "district less important than appeals" Federal judges.

[boutons_deux]

Americans can legally download 3-D printed guns starting next month

Gun-rights activists have reached a settlement with the government that will allow them to post 3-D printable gun plans online starting August 1.

The settlement ends a multi-year legal battle that started when Cody Wilson, who describes himself as a post-left anarchist, posted plans for a 3-D printed handgun he called "The Liberator" in 2013.

The single-shot pistol was made almost entirely out of of ABS plastic -- the same stuff they make Lego bricks out of -- that could be made on a 3-D printer. The only metal parts were the firing pin and a piece of metal included to comply with the Undetectable Firearms Act.

The US State Department told Wilson and his non-profit group Defense Distributed to take down the plans. It said the plans could violate International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), which regulate the export of defense materials, services and technical data.

Almost all of the pieces of this pistol can be made with a 3D printer.


In essence, officials said someone in another country -- a country the US doesn't sell weapons to -- could download the material and make their own gun.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/07/19/us/3d...rnd/index.html

Make America Murder Again

[dabom]

Americans can legally download 3-D printed guns starting next month

Gun-rights activists have reached a settlement with the government that will allow them to post 3-D printable gun plans online starting August 1.

The settlement ends a multi-year legal battle that started when Cody Wilson, who describes himself as a post-left anarchist, posted plans for a 3-D printed handgun he called "The Liberator" in 2013.

The single-shot pistol was made almost entirely out of of ABS plastic -- the same stuff they make Lego bricks out of -- that could be made on a 3-D printer. The only metal parts were the firing pin and a piece of metal included to comply with the Undetectable Firearms Act.

The US State Department told Wilson and his non-profit group Defense Distributed to take down the plans. It said the plans could violate International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR), which regulate the export of defense materials, services and technical data.

Almost all of the pieces of this pistol can be made with a 3D printer.


In essence, officials said someone in another country -- a country the US doesn't sell weapons to -- could download the material and make their own gun.

https://www.cnn.com/2018/07/19/us/3d...rnd/index.html

Make America Murder Again

Possible to have plastic parts pass and then have metal small parts in something dumb like belt or keys or part of phone.

[boutons_deux]

Possible to have plastic parts pass and then have metal small parts in something dumb like belt or keys or part of phone.

there is supposed to be a piece of steel included for detection, but once the person printing has the file, he can edit it, and/or just not include the detectable steel

[dabom]

there is supposed to be a piece of steel included for detection, but once the person printing has the file, he can edit it, and/or just not include the detectable steel

That's what I was saying. And hide that metal part in inconceivable places to pass detection.

[boutons_deux]

That's what I was saying. And hide that metal part in inconceivable places to pass detection.

I don't think the metal part is required to shoot. It's embedded as a superfluous part

Thousands download 3D-printed gun designs

Blueprints for 3D-printed guns, published online four days early amid last-minute attempts to ban them, have been downloaded thousands of times.

The designs were not due to be made public until Wednesday, following a ruling from the US Justice Department.

But blueprints for nine types of gun were uploaded to the Defense Distributed website on Friday.
And, on Monday, multi-state legal action was filed seeking to block the ruling that Americans could see them.

Joining forces

The controversy began in 2013 when self-styled crypto-anarchist Cody Wilson showed off the world's first 3D-printed gun.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-45018513

[dabom]

I don't think the metal part is required to shoot. It's embedded as a superfluous part

Thousands download 3D-printed gun designs

Blueprints for 3D-printed guns, published online four days early amid last-minute attempts to ban them, have been downloaded thousands of times.

The designs were not due to be made public until Wednesday, following a ruling from the US Justice Department.

But blueprints for nine types of gun were uploaded to the Defense Distributed website on Friday.
And, on Monday, multi-state legal action was filed seeking to block the ruling that Americans could see them.

Joining forces

The controversy began in 2013 when self-styled crypto-anarchist Cody Wilson showed off the world's first 3D-printed gun.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-45018513

That's even worse. Wtf.

[boutons_deux]

Republican Senate candidate's spokesman called majority-black cities ' holes'





So about that whole "civility" thing: How does this fit?

Virginia Republican Senate candidate Corey Stewart,

who has a bit of a white nationalist problem,

also has a campaign spokesperson,

Rick Shaftan,
who wants to be the embodiment of Trump in that

he thinks it's cute to call places " -holes."

Not just random places, but American cities like Memphis, New Orleans, and Baltimore—three cities with populations that are majority African American.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/201...tail=emaildkre

[boutons_deux]

House Republicans want to tax bicycle tires, transit, and electric vehicle batteries

House Republicans have an insane fix:

tax all the things that take cars off the road.

And yes, that includes bicycle tires. In addition to the 10 percent tax hike on those tires—for adult bikes alone, apparently—

Republican Bill Shuster, chair of the House Transportation Committee is also pushing

a hike to the gas tax of 15 cents per gallon over the next three years, and

impose fuel taxes on transit agencies.

But it's the taxes on bicycles and transit that make this bill a joke,

giving Republicans just one more chance to "own the libs" and their crazy conservationist ways.

That bicycle tire tax is estimated to raise, get this, $15 million a year by 2021.

the tax hikes on transit agencies is real.

Since 1978, transit agencies have been exempted from federal fuel taxes, but this bill would end that exemption:

"Transit agencies running diesel buses would have to start paying the existing 24.5-cent per gallon diesel tax,

plus the 20-cent hike on diesel as well.

Agencies operating diesel trains would also be newly subject to a smaller 4.3-cent per gallon tax."

transit agencies used 603 million gallons of diesel fuel in 2017,

meaning this tax would cost them in excess of $200 million annually, for diesel alone.

That would undoubtedly result in service cuts and

fare hikes for most of the transit operations in the country.

And would undoubtedly put more cars on the roads.

Which would create more wear and tear that needs to be fixed, without even taking into consideration the environmental costs.

Shuster says this is necessary because

"a number of surface transportation system users do not currently pay into the system,

even though they benefit from it."

Like bicyclists, those free-riders. Using the roads like they owned them or something.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/7/30/1784657/-House-Republicans-want-to-tax-bicycle-tires-transit-and-electric-vehicle-batteries?detail=emaildkre

Repugs a sociopathic sickos.

[boutons_deux]

crap so-called pastor spewing total crap, like his crappy father

Jerry Falwell Jr. Lists Clinton, Soros, Hitler as ‘Progressives Elites’ Waging War Against ‘Freedom Loving’ Americans



“Instead of conservative v liberal, the future will be progressive elites (think Woodrow Wilson, Margaret Sanger, HillaryClinton, Hitler, Soros) v freedom loving average Americans!”

was immediately mocked by Washington Free Beacon reporter (and Mediaite alum)

Alex Griswold, who called it “a dumb, blind, idiotic political take,” joking that Falwell “forgot to mention Christianity.”

https://www.mediaite.com/online/jerr...ing-americans/

It's a job, pays in the multi $Ms, and infinite job security.

[boutons_deux]

Senators want an investigation into Mar-a-Lago members getting their own Air Force One tours

four U.S. senators (all Democrats, of course) are asking the Department of Defense to investigate media reports that Donald Trump has been giving dues-paying members of his private clubs their own tours of the presidential plane.

"If true,

these reports could mean that the President or his family have used government property for private gain —

giving tours of Air Force One as a perk for club membership —

or that some citizens have potentially been able to buy access to Air Force One

via their personal payments to the President's private club," the letter states.

It is normally difficult for Regular Folks to get a tour of Air Force One due to, ahem,

it being a military aircraft and

not a goddamn pony ride.

But if you're a Mar-a-Lago member and have ponied up the steep cash to hang out with Donald during his "presidency,"

it looks like your chances of getting a private tour get substantially boosted.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2018/8/3/1785439/-Senators-want-an-investigation-into-Mar-a-Lago-members-getting-their-own-Air-Force-One-tours?detail=emaildkre

[boutons_deux]

The descent of the Repugs and right wing hate media into paranoid fantasies and dom to the oligarcy is ing America

10 signs the Republican Party is now a full-blown cult

1. The leader is the ultimate authority
If you’re not allowed to criticize your leader, even if the criticism is true, you’re probably in a cult.


2. The group suppresses skepticism
If you’re only allowed to study your organization through approved sources, you’re probably in a cult.


3. The group delegitimizes former members
If you can’t think of a legitimate reason for leaving your group, you’re probably in a cult.


4. The group is paranoid about the outside world
If you believe the end of the world is near, you’re probably in a cult.


5. The group relies on shame cycles
If you need your group in order to feel worthy, loved, or sufficient, you’re probably in a cult.


how Trump has weaponized shame.

Indeed, his skill is precisely this: to create an entire national theater of shame in which he induces that very emotion in his followers, on the one hand, while on the other saving them from having to acknowledge its pain by publicly shaming others instead. This has been the central action of his campaign from the outset. He tells people that “we don’t win anymore,” that we are losers, losers who “don’t even have a country,” because it has been overrun and “raped” by immigrants and foreign powers.

6. The leader is above the law

If you’re held to a different moral standard, specifically in regard to sex, you’re probably in a cult.


7. The group uses “thought reform” methods


If your serious questions are answered with cliches, you’re probably in a cult.



“MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN.”

“Fake news!”

“Drain the swamp!”

“Lock her up!”

8. The group is elitist


If your group is the solution for all the world’s problems, you’re probably in a cult.


Remember when Trump said “I alone can fix it” during the campaign?

I am your voice, said Trump. I alone can fix it. I will restore law and order.

9. There is no financial transparency

If you’re not allowed to know what the group does with their money, you’re probably in a cult.

10. The group performs secret rites

If there are secret teachings or ceremonies you didn’t discover until after you joined, you’re probably in a cult.

Does this count?

Insinuating a bizarre night time ritual, Wolff said Trump demanded a key to his bedroom,

locking his wife and the secret service out

so he could binge on cheeseburgers while watching not one but THREE televisions.

Wolff also alleges Trump likes to head beneath the duvet at 6.30pm.

Being that I am about as far from Trump’s inner circle as one can be, I have no idea what kind of, if any, bizarre rituals he has for his people.

We do know he demands loyalty oaths—an unprecedented ritual for a president.

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/201...tail=emaildkre

[boutons_deux]

Scandals Pile Up For Interior Chief Ryan Zinke

Former EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt resigned amid at least 18 federal investigations. Zinke has tallied up nearly a dozen.

1. His ties to a Montana real estate deal.

2. ‘Make America Great Again’ socks.

3. Keeping the public in the dark about personal meetings.

4. Flying in style.

5. Exempting Florida from offshore drilling plan.

6. His apparent effort to bully Sen. Lisa Murkowski.

7. He failed to disclose shares in a Montana gun company.

8. Staff shake-up that critics charge was politically motivated.

9. Mixing work with politics.

10. Halting health impact study of mountaintop mining.

https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry...b0fd5c73c65990

Trash only hires The Best Corrupt People

[boutons_deux]

Texas women wouldn't get gunned down their ex's if the judges and women weren't so unfair

Top Republican laments how men 'railroaded' by family courts end up shooting 'unfair' wives

a lamentation about how poor unfortunate men get “railroaded” into paying child support and … killing their wives?

“Dallas County, a few years ago, went through a number of terrible shootings.

And I gathered together, they were at the time Republican district judges, and

I said ‘guys, men, women, we’ve now had I think four or five shootings.’

One of them was from a big-time guy in Highland Park, who went and killed his wife, just gunned her down.

And that was because the judge was unfair, and the woman was unfair.

And she demanded something, and he was out.

And it was frustration,” Sessions said during a local GOP event earlier this summer.

“So now we go through the court system.

And unfortunately lives have to be lost and there has to be tragedy — there now is a better system.”

I’m gonna go ahead and guess that

a man whose response to unhappiness with family court proceedings was maybe not physically harming his wife for the first time when he “gunned her down.”

(Sessions) voted against the Violence Against Women Act because it got tough on men who rape Native American women).

No explanation of the sympathy he all too obviously feels for the poor “railroaded” murderer.

But, hey, no need, guys! Sessions is a member of the party of “legitimate” rape and “grab ‘em by the pussy.”

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/201...tail=emaildkre

[boutons_deux]

Betsy DeVos Is Making Life Harder for Students Screwed Over by Predatory For-Profit Schools

Obama’s Education Department went after colleges accused of fraud. So much for that.

Betsy DeVos’ Education Department has reversed course in the past few weeks, sharply moving to undo Obama-era protections and effectively leaving students more vulnerable than ever before.

Two planned Education Department changes would make it more difficult for defrauded students to have their loans forgiven

reduce protections for current students.

“These new regulations are really a giveaway to predatory for-profit colleges, especially the large chains, that have defrauded students at the behest of individual borrowers,”

the department has recently overhauled protections for student borrowers and empowered for-profit colleges to act with impunity:

Eliminating debt relief rules

Ending the requirement of gainful employment

Gutting the unit that investigated fraud

Replacing full debt relief with partial forgiveness

https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2018/08/betsy-devos-education-department-for-profit-colleges-debt/

This what all y'all righwingnutjobs voted for, right?

To have Trash appoint swamp monsters, predatory Capitalists, to over students. Trash University!

[boutons_deux]

Betsy DeVos's multimillion yachts fly foreign flags because paying taxes isn't 'America first'

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/201...-America-first

[boutons_deux]

The White House Is Using California Wildfires as a Pretext to Seize Control of State Waterways

Donald Trump’s administration has moved to have the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration take control of California water management under the official rationale of fighting the state’s rampaging fires, saying that the water “should be prioritized for wildfire response instead of endangered species protections,”

state officials say that there is more than enough water to fight the fires.

The Commerce Directive announced a directive on Wednesday

ordering the National Marine Fisheries Service, a sub-agency of NOAA, to “facilitate access to the water needed to fight the ongoing wildfires affecting the State of California.”

That more or less cuts California Fish and Wildlife, which works with the NMFS to regulate state waters, out of the process. Per ABC News, said

directive would allow federal officials to overrule protections for threatened and endangered wildlife:

what Trump actually intends to accomplish as a result of the order is injecting itself into a fight between

the salmon fishing industry, which wants to reduce stress on populations critical to its future, and

industrial farmers that want access to protected waterways.

wildlife experts say the move is nothing more than a pretext to give the Trump administration the power to bypass laws protecting endangered species and redirect the water to “corporate agribusiness”:

“At this point, water supply hasn’t affected any of our operations,”

https://gizmodo.com/report-the-white...+%28Gizmodo%29

[boutons_deux]

EPA must have been paid my mesotheoloma doctors' lobbyists

The EPA Is Making It Easier to Use Asbestos Again. Why Is It Dangerous?

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) enacted a rule on June 1 making it easier for companies to use asbestos in products,

those tiny asbestos fibers can be inhaled and get trapped in a person's lungs, causing disease,

Technically, the EPA still allows the use of asbestos in certain products, including car and motorcycle brakes, fireproof clothing and certain construction materials.

But until recently there were still strict limitations on how it could be used.

Under the new rule, Fast Company reported, the EPA will make it much easier for companies to use asbestos, following a Trump administration "framework" for evaluating risks.

Instead of considering whether an asbestos product poses a risk to air, ground or water contamination,

the agency will restrict only the products

that pose a direct risk to workers

who come into contact with the material during the manufacturing process.

asbestos can cause mesothelioma, as well as lung, laryngeal and ovarian cancer.

The material can also cause asbestosis, or fibrosis of the lungs — a scarring of the lungs and thickening of the lung lining, both of which cause shortness of breath,

https://www.livescience.com/63280-epa-asbestos.html?utm_source=ls-newsletter&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20180809-ls

just ing amazing

[boutons_deux]

coal lobbyist overriding science, for profit

E.P.A. Staff Objected to Agency’s New Rules on Asbestos Use, Internal Emails Show




Top officials at the Environmental Protection Agency pushed through a measure to review applications for using asbestos in consumer products, and

did so over the objections of E.P.A.’s in-house scientists and attorneys,

The clash over the proposal exposes the tensions within the E.P.A. over the Trump administration’s efforts to roll back environmental rules and rewrite other regulations that industries have long fought.

The E.P.A. says it is toughening oversight.

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/08/10/c...stos-rule.html

the oligarchy wins again, people will suffer horribly and die, for profit

[dabom]

Sick s.