American Politics 101

[alohasand]

The state of Hawaii has filed a lawsuit against the revised travel ban that will take effect on March 16 (guess someone figured out not to put a washout on March break trips by visitors to the US next week).

On Wednesday U.S. District Judge Derrick Watson granted the state’s request to move forward with the case, setting a hearing for March 15, the day before the ban is scheduled to go into effect.

In addition to the amended complaint, the state on Wednesday filed a motion for a temporary restraining order against the ban, becoming the first state to intervene in court against the revised executive order, which blocks individuals from six predominantly Muslim countries if they lack valid U.S. visas.

http://www.staradvertiser.com/2017/03/0 ... -ban-suit/

[deja vu]

I am all for legal hunting, but if this law is over turned the US is taking a huge step backwards. Luring animals away, shooting them and their cubs while they sleep in their dens isn't hunting, it's a slaugther. Trumps sons love hunting and it's passed it's first hurdle, so most are thinking there isn't much in Trumps way to allow this to go on. Soon there will be no wildlife to kill because open season would have been declared. Controlled hunting is one thing, but this suggests just going out and mass slaughter and not caring if they are a nuisance animal or not.

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/hou ... es-n722481

Hunters could once again go after bears, wolves and other predators in national wildlife refuges across Alaska if an Obama-era federal law is overturned by Congress and gets the president's approval.

Supporters of repealing the rule, which was issued by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in August, got a boost Thursday when the House voted 225-193, mostly along party lines, to undo the law.

Rep. Don Young, R-Alaska, is behind the resolution to strip away some of the federal government's control over Alaska's 76 million acres worth of federal wildlife refuges. Under the federal law, hunters are prohibited from shooting or trapping wolves while at their dens with cubs, using airplanes to scout for potential grizzly bear targets, trapping bears with wire snares and luring bears with food to get a point-blank kill.

[CielOnTap]

Hawaiian tourism is concerned about the impact of visa rejections will have for a corporate convention in which 40% of the attendees have been refused US visas to come to Hawaii.

Hawaii will host its largest incentive travel group from China next month, but roughly 40 percent of Nu Skin’s top distributors won’t be joining their peers because their visa applications were rejected.

More than 6,000 Nu Skin distributors in China and Hong Kong qualified for the trip, but fewer than 4,000 of them were able to get approved to travel to Hawaii, said Jadie Goo, who was born and raised in China and currently serves as the Hawaii Tourism Authority’s brand manager for China and Taiwan. The Honolulu Star-Advertiser could not reach Nu Skin, a direct-sales company, before deadline because of the time difference between Hawaii and its Provo, Utah, headquarters.

http://www.staradvertiser.com/2017/03/3 ... 57c1d59e9e

[pretzels]

Ask the Native Americans how they feel about US changes to hunting rules. There has to be some discussion about respecting life cycles and certain rules
of hunting to give wildlife chances to live and to breed.

Sport hunters will clash with hunters living off the land and off game meat.

[deja vu]

I am still trying to wrap my brain around what this person said and with a straight face. He should be fired, and the more he tries to dig himself out of a hole, the deeper it gets. There is ZERO excuse for this, because after he said it, he didn't blink or stop and correct himself. He only tried after all was said and done and the walls came crashing in around him.

http://globalnews.ca/news/3371807/sean- ... l-weapons/

White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer told reporters Tuesday that Adolf Hitler did not use chemical weapons during the Second World War when addressing concerns over Russia’s links to Syria.

During Spicer’s daily press briefing, the press secretary compared Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to Hitler, suggesting the Nazi leader didn’t “sink to using chemical weapons.”

“We didn’t use chemical weapons during World War Two. You had someone as despicable as Hitler who didn’t even sink to using chemical weapons,” Spicer said.

[CielOnTap]

The US Coast Guard has had increasing costs providing protection for Mar-A-Lago whenever President Trump is visiting.However, the Coast Guard does not have specific funding for the presidential protection and the service was facing a possible budget reduction. Now it seems that last year's funding is going to be this year's funding level as well.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics ... d9777c30d8

So what services are facing less activity as a result of the funding being redirected to presidential security?

[CielOnTap]

Former acting US attorney general, Sally Yates, delivered a speech at the commencement ceremony for Harvard Law graduates.

She explains how she handled the legal implications of making a decision for the Department of Justice concering the travel ban
announced on January 27, 2017.

But the experience, so far, does constitute a valuable lesson—for her, and for the 500 future lawyers sitting with loved ones in Holmes Field: “You never know when a situation will present itself in which you will have to decide who you are and what you stand for.” And quickly.

Yates said she had no time for self-reflection, or to examine the “weighty constitutional-law concepts at issue.” She had to act. Defending the order would have required Department of Justice (DOJ) lawyers to argue that it “was not intended to disfavor Muslims, despite the numerous prior statements by the president and his surrogates regarding his intent to effectuate a Muslim ban” that would have required “us to advance a pretext—a defense not grounded in truth."

http://harvardmagazine.com/2017/05/comm ... ally-yates

[burnt fare]

It's a long weekend in the USA for Memorial Day (Monday May 29). How well do you know the origins and reasons
behind this popular May holiday?

http://www.denverpost.com/2017/05/26/qu ... orial-day/

Find it curious that some of us know the joys of having a weekday off but not know the history that led-
to the day. Don't worry about wearing white clothing before Memorial Day: clothing rules have relaxed somewhat.

[CielOnTap]

Vice President Mike Pence used to govern the state of Indiana. Carrier company was held up as an example by President Trump as a company that would stay in the US to keep over 1000 jobs. However, reality check-the company notified the state that the jobs are going to Mexico so layoffs will begin during the summer.

The number of Carrier jobs that will be eliminated is twice the size of the imminent job loss at Rexnord, the ball bearing factory about a kilometre away from the Carrier facility. Trump has slammed that company on Twitter, too, for outsourcing work to Mexico — but the firm has stuck to its plan and is dismissing the last hundred of its 300 employees in Indianapolis this summer.

http://www.thespec.com/news-story/73348 ... -hundreds/

[CielOnTap]

Not under the radar, considering Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg was another Harvard commencement speaker this week at the school. Zuckerberg is a contender for the 2020 US Presidency by doing a nationwide tour right now?
http://www.marieclaire.com/politics/new ... dent-2020/

You can see his commencement speech as well. It's very funny.