January 12, 2020

White House says Trump will issue new rules to expand 'constitutional prayer' in public schools

https://twitter.com/RawStory/status/1216448919368015872

https://www.rawstory.com/2020/01/white-house-says-trump-will-issue-new-rules-to-expand-constitutional-prayer-in-public-schools/

January 12, 2020

Trump Insider: Melania Truly Believes She's the 'Most Bullied Person in the World'

https://www.politicalflare.com/2020/01/trump-insider-melania-truly-believes-shes-the-most-bullied-person-in-the-world/



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Melania Trump says she is “the most bullied person in the world.”

And according to someone who knows Melania well, she really believes this.

The First Lady told ABC News in 2018 that personal attacks on her inspired her to launch the “Be Best” anti-bullying initiative.

“I could say that I’m the most bullied person in the world,” she said in an interview recorded during her tour of Africa. “One of them – if you really see what people are saying about me.”

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But many have questioned the choice of subject, given her husband’s well-known habit of insulting his critics on Twitter.

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Bennett was interviewed by The Washingtonian about her new book, “Free, Melania” and was asked about Melania claiming she is the most bullied person in the world.

Bennett responded, “I think she really believes it.”

She then followed up and said, “Well, you have to also remember she’s a Trump. She lives in that bubble—like, “We’re constantly under attack.” Sometimes she remarkably does the wrong thing. But I’ve gone with her to see detained [migrant] kids, and she really does get down on her hands and knees and gets dirty and holds kids and plays with them.”

January 11, 2020

small woman in pink speaks her mind, it takes 6 to carry her out

https://twitter.com/45rapedkatie5/status/1216098894888800268

January 11, 2020

He Left a Museum After Women Complained; His Next Job Was Bigger

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/01/10/arts/design/joshua-helmer-philadelphia-museum-art-erie-art-museum.html?action=click&module=News&pgtype=Homepage

He Left a Museum After Women Complained; His Next Job Was Bigger
A Philadelphia Museum of Art boss who quietly resigned now directs the Erie Art Museum, where a woman also objected to his conduct.

Gina Ciralli, an employee at the Philadelphia Museum of Art who dated Joshua Helmer, a young manager, said that he had made her feel as if he had the power to make or break her career — telling her she “wasn’t smart enough to work at a museum” but that he could help her have “a great trajectory.”

Another woman, Alicia Parks, said he took her for drinks on her second day of work and told her that if she wanted to succeed she should “get to know him.”

“I worked in the N.F.L. for five years,” said Ms. Parks, a former Philadelphia Eagles cheerleader, “and no one spoke to me in a way that made me feel that uncomfortable.”

Neither of those women worked directly for Mr. Helmer, but they were his subordinates in rank, and three employees who were familiar with their accounts said they reported their concerns to museum managers, starting as early as 2016.

They were never quite sure what happened to their complaints, but in early 2018, Mr. Helmer resigned for reasons that have not been disclosed.

Just a few months later, though, he resurfaced, this time with an even bigger job, as the director of the Erie Art Museum in Erie, Pa., making him one of the youngest museum chiefs in America.

Shortly after, Mr. Helmer texted a college student working at the Erie museum, suggesting she come to his house. “Coffee my place I have a cool back deck,” it said, according to a screenshot the woman, Asla Alkhafaji, provided to The New York Times. After she told him she could only meet in public, Ms. Alkhafaji said, he began ignoring her at work and one day told her, “You’re the most useless intern we have.”

January 11, 2020

Trump: "I'm TAKING THE OIL, we're taking the oil."

https://twitter.com/Bill_Maxwell_/status/1215844098789142529

January 11, 2020

Gov. Greg Abbott Says New Refugees Won't Be Allowed To Settle In Texas

Gov. Greg Abbott announced on Friday that his state will not accept new refugees this year, making Texas the first state to reject resettlements under a new rule from President Trump.

Trump signed an executive order in September, saying that states and municipalities must give written consent before refugees can be resettled.

"Texas has carried more than its share in assisting the refugee resettlement process," Abbott, a Republican, said in a letter to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Friday.

"Since FY2010, more refugees have been received in Texas than in any other state. In fact, over that decade, roughly 10% of all refugees resettled in the United States have been placed in Texas," Abbott noted.

He added, "Texas has been left by Congress to deal with disproportionate migration issues resulting from a broken federal immigration system."

https://www.npr.org/2020/01/10/795414116/gov-greg-abbott-says-new-refugees-wont-be-allowed-to-settle-in-texas

January 10, 2020

'Like sending bees to war': the deadly truth behind your almond-milk obsession

Like most commercial beekeepers in the US, at least half of Arp’s revenue now comes from pollinating almonds. Selling honey is far less lucrative than renting out his colonies to mega-farms in California’s fertile Central Valley, home to 80% of the world’s almond supply.

But as winter approached, with Arp just months away from taking his hives to California, his bees started getting sick. By October, 150 of Arp’s hives had been wiped out by mites, 12% of his inventory in just a few months. “My yard is currently filled with stacks of empty bee boxes that used to contain healthy hives,” he says.

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Beekeepers attributed the high mortality rate to pesticide exposure, diseases from parasites and habitat loss. However, environmentalists and organic beekeepers maintain that the real culprit is something more systemic: America’s reliance on industrial agriculture methods, especially those used by the almond industry, which demands a large-scale mechanization of one of nature’s most delicate natural processes.



Honeybees thrive in a biodiverse landscape. But California’s almond industry places them in a monoculture where growers expect the bees to be predictably productive year after year.

Commercial honeybees are considered livestock by the US Department of Agriculture because of the creature’s vital role in food production. But no other class of livestock comes close to the scorched-earth circumstances that commercial honeybees face. More bees die every year in the US than all other fish and animals raised for slaughter combined.

“The high mortality rate creates a sad business model for beekeepers,” says Nate Donley, a senior scientist for the Center for Biological Diversity. “It’s like sending the bees to war. Many don’t come back.”

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jan/07/honeybees-deaths-almonds-hives-aoe

Now Arp finds himself in a vicious circle: he is constantly battling to keep enough bees alive to meet the requirements of his almond contract. But if he was not pollinating almonds, maybe his bees would be healthier.

This year Arp’s bees, like more than two-thirds of the United States’ commercial honeybee population, will spend February in the toxic chemical soup of California’s Central Valley, fertilizing almonds one blossom at a time.

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On top of the threat of pesticides, almond pollination is uniquely demanding for bees because colonies are aroused from winter dormancy about one to two months earlier than is natural. The sheer quantity of hives required far exceeds that of other crops – apples, America’s second-largest pollination crop, use only one-tenth the number of bees. And the bees are concentrated in one geographic region at the same time, exponentially increasing the risk of spreading sickness..

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2020/jan/07/honeybees-deaths-almonds-hives-aoe

January 10, 2020

Judge Wipes Out a Student Loan Tab $220K

https://www.newser.com/story/285409/judge-overturns-myth-wiping-out-a-student-loan-tab.html?utm_source=part&utm_medium=uol&utm_campaign=rss_top

Judge Wipes Out a Student Loan Tab
$220K decision reflects the rethinking of standards for helping borrowers

Kevin J. Rosenberg borrowed about $116,500 between 1993 and 2004 to get him through the University of Arizona, where he earned a history degree, and Cardozo Law School. With interest, that debt grew to $221,400, the Wall Street Journal reports. In 2018, Rosenberg filed Chapter 7 bankruptcy, unable to repay the loans. A bankruptcy judge this week told him not to worry about it. In wiping out Rosenberg's debt, Judge Cecelia G. Morris said that paying back the money would be an undue hardship for the Navy veteran. Educational Credit Management had argued that Rosenberg didn't meet that standard because he has no disability, isn't unemployable, and isn't using his law school education—he hasn't worked much as a lawyer. The company is a nonprofit that handles the government's Federal Family Education Loans. "I'm thankful that I get to recover from a crushing financial blow and have a chance to get up, dust myself off, and keep going," Rosenberg said.

Judges are becoming more willing to help borrowers awash in student debt, per the Journal, and Morris said she was acting to dispel the myth that it's "impossible to discharge student loans." She applied a different standard, the Brunner test, that's based on whether the borrower has tried to repay their loan but can't do that and keep a decent standard of living. The New York judge's ruling doesn't establish a precedent, but reflects the trend of rethinking how to apply bankruptcy standards. "If the district court affirms Chief Morris' order," a bankruptcy lawyer told the Times-Union, "there will be a lot more filers for bankruptcy all over the country." (Read more student loans stories.)

January 10, 2020

faux news reporter "wasn't ready for the camera angle to change showing that big empty space"

https://twitter.com/roper_93/status/1215447330494779392

January 10, 2020

possums eating bananas