I Thought Bernie's Iowa Numbers Seemed Unrealistically High. Then I Saw His Rallies

29 January 20

---

An Urgent Call to Supporters

We do not need huge support, but we have to have the bare minimum. We are not getting the donations this month. There must be a good reason. Take a moment to make a contribution.

Thank you.

Marc Ash
Founder, Reader Supported News

Sure, I'll make a donation!

---

Update My Monthly Donation

---

If you would prefer to send a check:
Reader Supported News
PO Box 2043
Citrus Hts, CA 95611

28 January 20

It's Live on the HomePage Now:
Reader Supported News

Give Us a "Fighting Chance" - We are holding our own right now along side of high-powered political fundraising machines using very sophisticated methods ... and we are holding our heads above water. If you come here, if you believe what we do makes a difference, help out with what you can afford. In peace and solidarity. / Marc Ash, Founder Reader Supported News

Sure, I'll make a donation!

---

I Thought Bernie's Iowa Numbers Seemed Unrealistically High. Then I Saw His Rallies

Art Cullen, Guardian UK
Excerpt: "Pundits keep warning about a Sanders 'ceiling' - but here in the midwest he looks strong and getting stronger."
READ MORE

NPR headquarters in Washington, D.C. (photo: Stephen Voss/NPR)

Now Trump Is Coming for NPR
Paul Blest, VICE
Excerpt: "A reporter pressed Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Ukraine, and then reported that he lost his temper with her. Now the President is asking why NPR exists at all."
READ MORE

Peace activist Frida Berrigan (left) talks with Maz Burbank of New Haven before delivering a Promoting Enduring Peace talk on her family's long opposition to nuclear weapons. (photo: Arnold Gold/Hearst Connecticut Media)

Frida Berrigan | Sometimes We Can Make Our Own Hope: Running for Office in the Age of Donald Trump and Climate Change
Frida Berrigan, TomDispatch
Berrigan writes: "I'll cut to the chase: I lost. I am not the mayor of New London, Connecticut."
READ MORE

United States Supreme Court. (photo: Eric Baradat/Getty)

The "Financial Motive" Behind SCOTUS Case Aimed at Killing Consumer Bureau
Igor Derysh, Salon
Derysh writes: "The vast majority of amicus briefs filed in support of a lawsuit seeking to gut the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) came from parties with an 'axe to grind' against the agency, according to a report by the government watchdog group Allied Progress that was provided exclusively to Salon." 

The CFPB, which has collected more than $12 billion for consumers from companies accused of wrongdoing after it was created in the wake of the 2008 financial crisis, could be dissolved entirely after Seila Law, a law firm that ran afoul of the agency, argued that it was unconstitutional for the CFPB to have an independent director who can only be removed "for cause" by the president, according to CNBC.

Kathleen Kraninger, the Trump-appointed CFPB director, notified lawmakers last year that she would not defend the constitutionality of her position in the Seila Law v. CFPB case, prompting Democrats to take up the court battle. House Democrats filed an amicus brief in defense of the CFPB last week. They were joined by the attorneys general of 24 states in arguing that the agency should survive.

"The independence of the Consumer Bureau is essential to curb the fraud and abuse that led up to the Great Recession and wreaked havoc on the economic strength and stability of countless American seniors, servicemembers, veterans, students and consumers across the country," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said in a statement.

But while President Trump and some Republicans have argued that the CFPB is a "rogue agency," Allied Progress' analysis of the amicus briefs found that 78 percent of the briefs were drafted by CFPB-regulated entities, Republican lawmakers who have accepted campaign contributions from those industries, or think tanks and legal foundations funded by industry money or led by industry leaders.

One company that filed an amicus brief is owned by Mike Hodges, who was caught in a recording obtained by Allied Progress last year bragging that his campaign fundraising bought him access to the White House and the Republican Party. Hodges' company has spent hundreds of thousands lobbying the administration to ease the CFPB's regulations of the payday lending industry. Another brief was filed by a business owner who was sued by the CFPB for "allegedly scamming 9/11 heroes out of money intended to cover medical costs, lost income, and other critical needs."

"The vast majority of those questioning the CFPB's constitutionality have some financial motive in seeing the bureau stripped of its independence," Allied Progress director Derek Martin told Salon. "Many apparently have an axe to grind after the bureau dared to hold them accountable in the past for ripping off consumers, including 9/11 heroes. Those seeking to undermine the CFPB should make their true motivations clear."

The case began in 2016 after the CFPB called for a federal judge to hold Seila Law in contempt of a court order that barred firms from certain illegal practices, arguing that the firm was "founded just weeks" after the court order and was working in "active concert" with those firms.

Seila Law claimed in its briefs that it provides a "variety of legal services to consumers, including assistance with the resolution of consumer debt." In February 2017, the CFPB launched an investigation into whether the firm engaged in "unlawful acts or practices" in selling its debt assistance services. The firm objected to the CFPB's request for documents, arguing that the agency's single-director structure was unconstitutional. The 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against Seila Law in May of last year, but the Supreme Court announced it would take up the case in October.

With Kraninger, the Trump-appointed CFPB director, declining to defend her own agency, numerous companies that have run afoul of the CFPB have seized on the opportunity to urge the Supreme Court to rule the agency's structure unconstitutional.

Roni Dersovitz and his companies, who were sued for allegedly "scamming 9/11 heroes out of money," filed an amicus brief arguing that the agency was "too insulated from accountability to the political branches, and though them to the People, to pass constitutional muster." The filing came after the CFPB and the New York attorney general argued that Dersovitz's companies bilked 9/11 heroes out of money intended to cover their medical costs and lost income.

Another amicus brief came from Harpeth Financial Services, a payday lender that tried to lobby the CFPB to remove limits on how often a lender can access a consumer's checking account in 2018, according to American Banker. After coming up empty, the company filed an amicus brief arguing that the agency's structure violates the separation of powers.

The brief came after Harpeth founder Mike Hodges was caught on tape telling fellow payday lenders that raising large sums of money would buy him access to the Trump administration. Advance Financial, a subsidiary of Harpeth, also paid $350,000 to Al Simpson, a former aide to current acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, to lobby the administration to ease CFPB rules, according to disclosures obtained by Allied Progress.

Another amicus brief came from Daniel Lipsky, who was hit with a $7.93 million civil penalty after the CFPB accused his companies of misleading customers about the savings from its biweekly mortgage payment program and about the cost of the program. Lipsky's companies filed an amicus brief in the case seeking to "terminate enforcement actions taken by the unconstitutionally structured agency" in an apparent bid to have the penalty thrown out.

"Setting aside past agency action also is necessary to provide meaningful relief to litigants," the brief said.

Numerous think tanks and legal foundations with ties to industries regulated by the CFPB also filed amicus briefs in the case.

One such brief came from the Competitive Enterprise Institute, whose 35th-anniversary dinner last year was sponsored by the Financial Service Centers of America, a payday loan industry group.

Another brief was filed by the Cato Institute and several other right-wing organizations. John Allison, who sits on the Cato board and previously served as the organization's president, is the former chairman of BB&T Corporation, the "10th-largest financial services holding company headquartered in the United States," according to his Cato Institute bio.

The Buckeye Institute, which argued in its brief that the agency's structure is unconstitutional, has taken more than $3 million from organizations linked to the billionaire Koch family, which funded one of the "most outspoken scholars against the CFPB" as part of the "Koch's weaponized academics," researcher Ralph Wilson told the International Business Times in 2017.

The Pacific Legal Foundation, which argued that the agency's structure violates the Constitution, is one of numerous libertarian think tanks that have taken millions of dollars from William Dunn, the founder of a financial firm with more than $1 billion in assets under management, according to The American Prospect.

Dunn similarly contributed to the Landmark Legal Foundation, which argued in its amicus brief that the CFPB is a "dangerous innovation in the government that violates the Constitution's separation of powers."

Trade associations that filed amicus briefs in the case also appear to have a financial interest in the outcome.

The Consumer Bankers Association, whose member banks have been ordered to pay hundreds of millions in CFPB enforcement actions, argued in its brief that the Supreme Court should eliminate the entire section of the Dodd-Frank Act that created the CFPB.

Another brief filed by the Credit Union National Association came after the organization fought a CFPB enforcement action ordering the Navy Federal Credit Union to pay a $5.5 million civil penalty and provide $23 million in redress to victims.

Along with various companies and trade groups, 27 House Republicans argued in their amicus brief that the CFPB is an "unprecedented threat to the separation of powers and to the democratic legitimacy of the federal government." Disclosures obtained by Allied Progress show that the 27 Republicans have received a combined $67.9 million in campaign contributions from the finance, insurance and real estate industries that are overseen by the CFPB.

Three Republican senators — Mike Lee of Utah, James Lankford of Oklahoma and Mike Rounds of South Dakota — argued in their amicus brief that if the court finds the court structure unconstitutional they should leave the broader issue of how to structure the CFPB to Congress. Financial data from the Center for Responsive Politics shows that Lee has received $1.69 million from agencies regulated by the CFPB, while Lankford received $1.37 million and Rounds received $1.92 million.

Democrats accused the agency's opponents of using the case not out of concern for the Constitution but in an effort to roll back consumer protections. New York Attorney General Letitia James, who was joined by 23 other attorneys general in urging the court to save the CFPB, vowed to fight the effort.

"Following the great recession, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was created as an independent enforcer of consumer protection laws to ensure that consumers could never again be so egregiously defrauded, deceived, or misled by private companies," James said in a statement. "Opponents are now asking the Supreme Court to undo years of financial and consumer protections that have saved Americans hundreds of millions of dollars and remedied countless abusive and fraudulent practices."

House Financial Services Chairwoman Maxine Waters accused the agency's opponents of seizing on the case to push baseless legal claims in order to further their longstanding opposition to the agency's very existence.

"The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau was created by the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act following the 2008 financial crisis to ensure that consumers have a strong watchdog to protect them from harmful financial products and practices," Waters said. "The Trump administration and congressional Republicans continue to do all they can to eliminate this critical consumer protection agency, including by making desperate and baseless legal claims about the Consumer Bureau that other judges have rejected."

READ MORE

Women demonstrate against Trump's Muslim ban in front of the Supreme Court. (photo: Andrew

Supreme Court Allows Trump to Enforce New Hardline Immigration Policy
Pete Williams, NBC News
Williams writes: "The Supreme Court issued an order Monday allowing the Trump administration to begin enforcing new limits on immigrants who are considered likely to become overly dependent on government benefit programs."
READ MORE

Protesters gather on the Paso del Norte International Bridge in Ciudad Juarez, Mexico, on Saturday to demand justice for artist and activist Isabel Cabanillas, 26, who was killed in the streets of Juarez, Mexico. (photo: Paul Ratje/AFP)

Murder of Mexican Artist Isabel Cabanillas Highlights Endemic Issue of Femicide in Ciudad Juarez
Democracy Now!
Excerpt: "Less than two weeks ago, Isabel was reported missing on social media by her friends after she never returned home."







READ MORE

The Getty fire in Los Angeles, Oct. 28, 2019. (photo: Qian Weizhong/Xinhua)

Trump Admin Manipulated Wildfire Science to Encourage Logging
Jordan Davidson, EcoWatch
Davidson writes: "Respecting scientists has never been a priority for the Trump Administration"

Now, a new investigation from The Guardian revealed that Department of the Interior political appointees sought to play up carbon emissions from California's wildfires while hiding emissions from fossil fuels as a way to encourage more logging in the national forests controlled by the Interior department.

The appointees looked to frame a story around the fires that would encourage a thinning of the forest through logging, which President Trump has said would help prevent forest fires. Experts have refuted his assertion. 

The trove of emails that The Guardian uncovered show a coordinated effort to frame the carbon emissions from the 2018 wildfires as a blight that could be remedied by cutting down trees for logging. 

The Trump administration has tried to make it appear that over-regulation, mismanagement, and forest protection are responsible for the severity of recent wildfires. However, a recent review published two weeks ago has concluded that the changing climate is the main culprit behind the sharp increase in wildfire risk. 

"Overall, the 57 papers reviewed clearly show human-induced warming has already led to a global increase in the frequency and severity of fire weather, increasing the risks of wildfire," said Matthew Jones, senior research associate at University of East Anglia's Tyndall Centre and lead author of the review, in a statement. "This has been seen in many regions, including the western US and Canada, southern Europe, Scandinavia and Amazonia. Human-induced warming is also increasing fire risks in other regions, including Siberia and Australia."

In the same statement, Professor Iain Colin Prentice, Chair of Biosphere and Climate Impacts and Director of the Leverhulme Centre for Wildfires, Environment and Society at the Imperial College London, added: "Wildfires can't be prevented, and the risks are increasing because of climate change. This makes it urgent to consider ways of reducing the risks to people."

The Trump administration decided not to follow that science and to use the wildfires as a way to promote industry. James Reilly, the director of the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) who was once a geologist for the oil and gas industry, asked scientists to "gin up" emissions figures for him, according to The Guardian. Reilly also claimed the numbers would make a "decent sound bite," and decided to discuss only the trees that produced outsized emissions to make "a good story."

"Gin-up is an unfortunate phrase to be sure, but it might have been a very imprecise way to ask for an estimate. It certainly does not inspire confidence," said Mark Harmon, a professor emeritus at Oregon State University's College of Forestry, to The Guardian.

The Guardian presented the emails to scientists who concluded that Reilly either used misleading language or cherry-picked the data, or he intentionally exploited a disaster and manipulated the data for pro-industry purposes.

One expert told The Guardian that the numbers the interior department came up with are significant overestimates and that logging would not help prevent or lessen wildfires. In fact, logging could be deleterious as it negates the ability of forests to trap carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. 

A USGS spokesperson, however, replied to The Guardian that Reilly's emails were "intended to instruct the subject matter expert to do the calculations as quickly as possible based on the best available data at the time and provide results in clear understandable language that the Secretary could use to effectively communicate to a variety of audiences." The secretary at the time of the emails was Ryan Zinke who had to resign under an ethics scandal. 

Chad Hanson, an ecologist and co-founder of the John Muir Project, called the strategizing revealed in the emails a "blatant political manipulation of science," as The Guardian reported.

READ MORE

---

Contribute to RSN

Update My Monthly Donation