TGIF 7/6/18

Back to business, after a short break, and yes, TGIFs are in order.

For example, TGIF to the Congressional Republicans who decided a partisan junket to Russia would be a great way to celebrate American Independence.

Who better to share a hot dog with than representatives of the country that interfered in our presidential election, right?  At least, that's what we can guess Senators Richard Shelby (AL) Steve Daines (MT), John Hoeven (ND), Ron Johnson (WI), John Kennedy (LA) Jerry Moran (KS), John Thune (SD) and Representative Kay Granger (TX) must have been thinking.

And if you're going to do that, I guess it's better to go it alone than expect bipartisan appreciation for the mission. And what exactly was the mission? From an article in the Washington Post, we learn it was important stuff, for sure.

Members of delegation set off on their trip late last week promising to be tough with Russian officials ahead of the president's visit, especially on matters of election interference. But they struck a conciliatory tone once there: the point of their visit, Shelby stressed to the Duma leader, was to "strive for a better relationship" with Moscow, not "accuse Russia of this or that or so forth."

My first thought was holy crap, this had to be a joke; my second thought was was that there must not be fireworks available in the states these folks represent.

Speaking of fireworks, I'm thinking Scott Pruitt's probably thinking TGIF. He may have set a record for the greatest number of ethics investigations against an administration official ever, which would surely be a feather in the cap of the most superlativest president ever. Birds of a feather or something. 

Perhaps the only thing more impressive than the lack of ethics of the former EPA administrator was his resignation letter - a doozy, for sure. There's a great commented version here, if you like; I'm just going to try and play it straight, I promise. I mean, I promise I'll try.

Mr. president, it has been an honor to serve you in the Cabinet as Administrator of the EPA. Truly, your confidence in me has blessed me personally and enabled me to advance your agenda beyond what anyone anticipated at the beginning of your Administration. Your courage, steadfastness and resolute commitment to get results for the American people both with regard to improved environmental outcomes as well as historical regulatory reform, is in fact occurring at an unprecedented pace and I thank you for the opportunity to serve you and the American people in helping achieve those ends. 

Damn, that's a hell of a resignation letter right there, isn't it?  He coulda stopped, but no-o-o-o. Pruitt had to keep going.

That is why it is hard for me to advise you I am stepping down as Administrator of the EPA effective as of July 6. It is extremely difficult for me to cease serving you in this role first because I count it a blessing to be serving you in any capacity but also because of the transformative work that is occurring.

Kinda like the graduation speech that has three or four or five natural endings, so too did Pruitt's letter. But first, let's get this next part out of the way.

However, the unrelenting attacks on me personally, my family, are unprecedented and have taken a sizable toll on all of us.

Oh for Pete's sake, pull up your tactical pants and get over your bad self, will you?  But wait -- there's MORE!

My desire in service to you has always been to bless you as you make important decisions for the American people. I believe you are serving as president today because of God's providence. I believe that same providence brought me into your service. I pray as I have served you that I have blessed you and enabled you to effectively lead the American people. 

Hold please.

Thank you again Mr. president for the honor of serving you and I wish you Godspeed in all that you put your hand to.

Wow.

And finally, speaking of wow, the Trump Baby will fly over London when the president visits later this month.  What is the Trump Baby, you ask?

The Trump Baby blimp is nearly 20 feel tall, wearing nothing but a diaper, and a grimace. A tuft of yellow hair tops his orange head. He is armed with a cellphone, ready to tweet. 

And, he has a Twitter account.

TGIF, everyone.

Wondering on Wednesday (v131)

A little late with tonight's Wondering; entertaining friends and doing some heavy-duty wondering ourselves, about winners and losers and loser winners, and a whole mess of other stuff.

One of the things I'm wondering about is how the president's doctor could be an over-prescribing, drunk-driving, on-the-job-boozing meanie, after all the time he's spent literally wandering around the bodies of presidents. I expect I might get some flack here, but why does this remind me of Anita Hill?

The allegations are extreme, they are bizarre, and they are hard to believe, under the circumstances. Even if you don't like president Trump (as don't I) and even if you think Ronny Jackson might be uniquely unqualified like so many other Trump nominees (as do I), it would seem that there might be a better way to get your point across than accuse the guy of things that should be easy to disprove, right?

Speaking of Trump's choices, are we really going to see the end of EPA paranoiac-in-chief? You know, the guy with the $43,000 secure phone booth; the guy who flies first class because he's afraid the little people in the cheap seats will pick on him... you know, that guy. The GAO has said that the phone booth expenditure was done using an EPA credit card without prior approval, which is wrong, and appropriate punishment should ensue.

But I have to wonder why the issue at the GAO, and at Trey 'Benghazi' Gowdy's House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, isn't more about asking why the hell the EPA Administrator needs a secure phone booth in the first place?

I doubt he has many secrets to keep from us - drill baby drill, science = bad, clean air and water are over-rated, yadda yadda yadda - that's been his mantra since he was an industry lackey as Oklahoma Secretary of State, so why the need for the booth?

And not for nothing, but why did his cost $43,000 when you can get a nice one here for under $300?

And, I wonder, will he blame his wife like uniquely unqualified HUD Secretary Ben Carson did when he (I mean she) ordered that fancy dining room set for the conference room?

Finally, tonight, I'm wondering about this version of the Trump hand jive, also referred to as 'Dandruff diplomacy', and this version of the Trump hand jive, also referred to as 'Keep your filthy stinking porn-star fondling hands off me, you disgusting pig.'

That this is not the first time we've seen the latter move in public proves that the First Lady plays the game as well as the president - and I wonder if he enjoys this little turn of the table as much as the rest of us do?

Sunday School 4/8/18

I managed to catch a few classrooms today, paying attention to the group discussions where everyone gets to chime in, instead of focusing on the one-on-one interviews with oh so many of the usual suspects.

Topic one? Facebook, as Mr. Zuckerberg goes to Washington. The social media giant's founder and CEO is set to testify before the House and Senate this week, to talk about privacy and Cambridge Analytica and privacy and privacy, and likely, regulations. How did the gangs talk about it?

On Meet the Press (MTP), the general thinking was that Zuckerberg should have apologized earlier - immediately after the Cambridge Analytica story came out, before the news that it wasn't 50 millions users, maybe it was 87 million users. Maybe it's a trillion users, who knows. And we were reminded that this over-sharing actually started a few years ago. One reporter mentioned that sources will only talk face-to-face, won't put anything in writing anymore, harkening back to Watergate days and parking garages. That got a chuckle.

On This Week with George Stephanopoulos (TWwGS), where again Martha Raddatz was sitting in, one of the folks suggested that Zuckerberg was going into a 'Congressional gauntlet' (compared to MTP's 'ambush' language) and that being supportive of regulations calling for more transparency in political ads, for example, was good but was not going to be nearly enough to protect him from the wrath of a bunch of people who,in my opinion probably don't really have a good understanding of Facebook.

Topic two? Trade and tariffs. On Face the Nation (FTN) over on CBS, Margaret Brennan's group suggested we'd not see a revised NAFTA deal before or during Trump's visit to South America for the Summit of the Americas, noting that the president's incendiary tweets and border moves don't help, nor do his aluminum and steel tariffs or the many others he's threatening. And, surrounding himself with conflicting pro- and anti-NAFTA voices plays to how Trump likes things, but hurts our policy decisions. One noted that Trump, at his core, is a protectionist and NAFTA may not survive as a result. The stock market swings, which are driving everyone nuts, stem more from uncertainty than any single move Trump is making. And of course, you'll recall that uncertainty was a dirty word to Republicans throughout the Obama administration.

Topic three? Embattled EPA administrator Scott Pruitt, he of the 50 bucks a night rental in DC, and the travel, and the phone booth, and the raises, and so on. The group at Fox News Sunday had mixed opinions. On the one hand, we were told, there's this giant double standard because Obama's people did the same thing, spending money on travel, and besides his policies are what people wanted, so let's tell the president to stay away from Pruitt. This thought was echoed by folks on FTN, who noted that with the mid-term elections coming up, now is not the time to keep Republicans in Washington trying to fill Cabinet positions.

Back to Fox, the point was also made that if Trump is all about draining the swamp, keeping Pruitt is the wrong thing to do, whether he's right from a policy perspective or not. On ABC, the comparison was made to how Christian evangelicals were willing to overlook Trump's bad behavior because they like his policies. It was also noted that, as EPA rules don't change that often or quickly, pretty much anyone could implement the policy changes that Pruitt is making, while having none of the ethical issues.

All of this sort of leads us to topic four: Trump's personal General John Kelly. According to some reports, which Trump denies as being fake news, Kelly is ready to go, has offered to go, has threatened to go. Kelly has two jobs, we're told on TWwGS: keeping an eye on Trump and keeping an eye on the Cabinet. Both roles may be shrinking; Kelly did take Jared's security clearance away, and if he's truly told Trump to get rid of Pruitt and/or told Pruitt to behave, neither is having any impact.

This was echoed by Brennan's group, and one even suggested that Pruitt would replace Kelly as Chief, instead of replacing Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III as Attorney General. And, we're told, Kelly's not being invited to meetings, his team seems more willing to speak out, and so on - so maybe Kelly will be the next one to go?

Finally, a little extra credit. One guest on FTN suggested that the reason he sleeps so well at night is because he doesn't follow Trump's tweets as closely as do many others.

See you around campus.

Syria, Nicaragua, and US?

Late last night, the Tweeter in Chief sent this message out, signaling an end to his game of Will We? Won't We? Stay in the Paris Accord.

Pretty  much everyone thinks we're going to back out of the voluntary agreement, and join only Syria and Nicaragua as non-participants - I haven't seen anything suggesting we're going to stay in, even though Trump "learned a lot" when we met with world leaders on his #MAGAWorldTour.

A bunch of Republican senators -- illustrious leaders all -- sent a letter to the president encouraging him to back out, so that we can grow our economy (see the discussion with Scott Pruitt there) and become so flush with #winning and #jobs and #deregulation that we won't even realize we have #crappyhealthcare and we won't even be able to see all of the #oilrigs and #miningscars in our #NationalParks -- it'll be great! 

We have been encouraged by the steps you have taken to reduce the regulatory burdens facing this country. From your many Executive Orders to the signing of 14 laws rolling back regulations from the previous administration, it is clear that you share our commitment to reducing the regulatory burdens our businesses face in order to create jobs and grow the economy.

One of the most important executive orders you signed is EO 13783 Promoting Energy Independence and Economic Growth wherein, among other things, you instruct the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to unwind President Obama's Clean Power Plan regulations.

We applaud this objective and encourage you to take every action necessary to ensure it is accomplished.

A key risk to fulfilling this objective is remaining in the Paris Agreement. 

The stated reason? Litigation under the terms of the Paris Agreement could prevent the Trump administration from fulfilling its duty to destroy the environment and obscure our purple mountain majesties and all those amber waves of grain. The hell with the fruited plain too -- that's all out the window.

If all goes according to plan, this afternoon the president will stand in the Rose Garden -- yes, a garden -- likely with the 22 Republicans who sent him that letter - to announce we're joining Syria (an international pariah not allowed to travel because of sanctions, and, you know,  kinda busy with that little war thingy that's been tearing that country apart for the past several years), and Nicaragua (the fourth most at-risk country, which didn't sign on because the Paris Agreement is voluntary, not mandatory) and not participate.

North Korea does. Russia does. China does. Afghanistan does. Libya does. Venezuela does. Japan does. And Germany, Iran and Iraq, Norway and Switzerland and Swaziland and everyone except Syria, Nicaragua, and ...

Sunday School 4/2/17

We're going to spend some time in the Fox News Sunday classroom, as we did not have time to get to them last week.

Right off the bat, I was intrigued by the opening segment, reported by Kevin Corke from Washington, speaking to host Chris Wallace. I mean, who would have thunk that someone at Fox News other than Shepard Smith, would say this?

Chris, as usually is the case in Washington scandals, it's the cover-up and not the crime that usually ensnares. And there are legitimate questions about that with respect to the ongoing controversy over what House Intelligence Committee Chair Devin Nunes knows about possible surveillance of Trump aides and how he came about getting that information, Nunes you may recall claiming to have such compelling information he needed to rush to the White House and tell the president himself. But he did that without sharing what he found with fellow members of the Intelligence Committee, which is highly unusual. 

This as FOX News has confirmed that Nunes received key information from a pair of White House aides, calling into question no only his relationship with the administration, but his ability to be impartial.

Scandals? Cover up? Crime? Controversy? Claiming to have compelling information? Highly unusual? Calling into question the Republican's ability to be impartial?  Holy Horrors, Batman!

Also on the show today, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who talked about why we don't need an independent investigator on Russia.

We've got a bipartisan investigation underway now. It's called the Senate Intelligence Committee. Senator Burr and Senator Warner had a joint press conference this week. I think they clearly laid out that they're going wherever the facts take them. We don't need another investigation We know the FBI is looking at it from their perspective. It's being handled appropriately and it will be handled well. 

He also promised we would see Supreme Court Justice nominee Neil Gorsuch confirmed this week -- one way or another.  Wallace questioned whether McConnell would use the nuclear option if he can't stop a filibuster.

Look, what I'm telling you is that Judge Gorsuch is going to be confirmed. The way in which that occurs is in the hands of the Democratic minority. And I think during the course of the week, we'll find out exactly how this will end.

He reminded us that even with the "most controversial Supreme Court nomination in history" (Clarence Thomas), "not a single senator, not one, not Ted Kennedy, not Joe Biden, no one said you had to get 60 votes." With that, McConnell threw the ball firmly in Chuck Schumer's court, pardon the pun.

The big deal of the show was EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt, who as we know is head of an agency with a suggested 31% cut in funding, who visited to talk about that environment thing. Wallace outlined some data presented during (or by) the Obama administration as the Clean Power Plan was being developed:

• there would be 90,000 fewer asthma attacks per year and
• 300,000 fewer missed work and school days and
• 3,600 fewer premature deaths a year
• half of all Americans - 166,000,000 people - now live in counties with unhealthy air
• carbon pollution from the power sector would be reduced by 2005, would be 1/3 lower than in 2005

In a nutshell, here's Pruitt's response:

• The president is keeping his promise to reduce overreach
• pro-jobs and pro-growth and pro-environment are not mutually exclusive
• the EPA and the federal government should not pick winners and losers
• fuel diversity is important
• we have shown leadership
• pro-jobs and pro-growth and overreach and tools in the toolbox

Wallace also challenged Pruitt on his comment about the interview during which he was asked whether he believed "that it's been proven that CO2 is the primary control knob for climate." Pruitt's answer, in case you've forgotten:

No, I would not agree that it's the primary contributor to the global warming that we're seeing.

When pressed on this, Pruitt said

No, look, Chris - I said... in my confirmation process, to individual senators as well, that there's a warming trend, the climate is changing. And human activity contributes to the change in some measure.  The real issue is how much we contribute to it and measuring that with precision. But then also, what is the process as far as the response, what can we do about it, the tools in the toolbox to address the CO2 issue?

One last question from Wallace:

Under the president's new budget, the EPA is cut 31 percent, that is more than any other agency And I want to put up some of the cuts that are included in the president's budget. Here are some of the 56 programs that would be scrapped: Great Lakes restoration, water runoff control for farmers, pesticide safety. What does that say about the commitment of this administration and you to cleaning up the environment when you're making a 31 percent cut of in your agency and cutting things like that, water runoff for farmers?

Well, said Pruitt.

Well, part of -- part of the issue, Chris, is that over the last several years, there has been a lack of commitment to state partnership. You know, we have state Departments of Environmental Quality across the country have the resources and the expertise to deal with clean water and clean air issues and so, renewing that partnership -- 

I've met with several governors, in fact within the first week of being on the job, I met with 20-plus governors. And those governors across the country are committed to pro-jobs and pro-environment. They have to serve their people in those states as well.

And I will tell you this, Chris, this attitude in Washington, DC, that people in Texas and Oklahoma and Kansas and Colorado and the rest of the country don't care about the water they drink or the air they breathe and are not going to take care of the water locally and (in their) states, I just don't believe that. That narrative is something we reject and we look forward to partnering with states across the country to achieve good outcomes.  

So there you have it. Seems in the eyes of the EPA administrator, each state can handle things individually. Just like students in our Sunday School classrooms have to handle their work individually. Well, maybe not the same; the latter seems more logical than the former, doesn't it?

See you around campus.

Sidebar: Trump in Transition (v6)

In my most recent Trump in Transition (TiT) post, I talked about the POTUS-elect tapping Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt to dismantle, er, I mean, to head the EPA. At about the same time that news came out, there was another bit of news regarding the EPA and what we can expect during the Trump Administration.

As reported by the Washington Post and others, the Celebrity Transition Team is looking to do some data-mining over at EPA - sort of like their version of clean coal, or something:

Donald Trump's transition team has issued a list of 74 questions for the Energy Department, asking agency officials to identify which employees and contractors have worked on forging an international climate pact as well as domestic efforts to cut the nation's carbon output.

Brrrr.... that's a chilling howdy-do, don't you think?

Actually, it looks like there are only 65 questions (one page was included twice in the document) and some of them are logical questions an incoming administration, with limited 'in the weeds' knowledge would ask for, such as:

• a list of open positions
• a list of all Presidential employees requiring Senate confirmation
• a list of reports due to Congress or other external parties in 2017

Nothing too nefarious in that type of question, I don't think. Here are a couple of the ones that garnered attention:

• Can you provide a list of all Department of Energy employees or contractors who have attended any Interagency Working Group on the Social Cost of Carbon meetings? Can you provide a list of when those meetings were and any materials distributed at those meetings, emails associated with those meetings or material created by Department employees or contractors in anticipation or as a result of those meetings?
• Can you provide a list of Department employees or contractors who attended any of the Conference of Parties (under the UNFCCC) in the last five years? (Note: the UNFCCC is commonly referred to as the Paris Agreement, something Trump has said the US will withdraw from, not participate in.)
• Is there a readily available list of any products or technologies that have emerged from DOE  programs or the labs that are currently offered in the market without any subsidy?
• Which programs within DOE are essential to meeting the goals of President Obama's Climate Action Plan?
• Does the Department have any thoughts on how to reduce the bureaucratic burden for exporting US energy technology, including but not limited to commercial nuclear technology?

There are also questions that raise issues with the reliability and independence of reports coming from the Energy Information Agency (EIA), including these somewhat passive-aggressive ones:

• EIA is an independent agency within DOE. How has EIA ensured its independence in your data and analysis over the past eight years? In what instances do you think EIA's independence was most challenged?
• In the Annual Energy Outlook for 2016, EIA assumed the Clean Power Plan (CPP) should be in the reference case despite the fact that the reference case is based on existing laws and regulations. Why did EIA make that assumption, which seems to be atypical of past forecasts? (Note: implementation of the CPP was stayed by the Supreme Court in February 2016)
• EIA's assessments of levelized costs for renewable technologies do not contain back-up costs for the fossil fuel technologies that are brought on-line to replace the generation when those technologies are down. Is this a true representation of levelized costs?

There other questions seeking info on offshore wind generation, something we know Trump does not like (eagle-killing, ugly, China, monsters, etc.).

There are questions about Yucca Mountain, the nuclear waste repository outside Las Vegas; funding for that project was stopped by the Obama Administration. Now that Harry Reid is out of the Senate, there's opportunity for this issue to be pressed forward.

• Are there any statutory restrictions to restarting the Yucca Mountain project?
• Does DOE have a plan to resume the Yucca Mountain license proceedings?

There's more - some of the questions only a Department or Congressional insider, or an energy lobbyist, would understand. But it seems like the transition team is honing in on things that the current administration liked,  that are global in nature, or that are not fossil fuel and nuke friendly. 

Brrr, I say again. 

Trump in Transition (v6)

In this picture, Trump looks like he's ready to unleash the mother of all f-bombs -- and in a way, that's what he did this week.

Yeah, he and FDOTUS Ivanka met with Al Gore, the guy who invented the Internet, er, I mean, the guy who has been championing environmental issues for years, which resulted in Gore calling it a "lengthy and very productive session" and saying, according to the press pool report

It was a sincere search for areas of common ground. I found it an extremely interesting conversation, and to be continued, and I'm just going to leave it at that

Apparently that search for common ground was fruitless, because it wasn't all that much later that the POTUS-elect named his choice to run the Environmental Protection Agency: Scott Pruitt, Oklahoma's Attorney General.

Pruitt has a long history of not being a fan of regulations related to energy and climate issues, having frequently joined or supported from the sidelines cases against the Obama administration's efforts.

The OK Attorney General's media page is full of references to clean energy, clean water, fossil fuels, and the like; pretty generally, if the current Administration is for something, looks like Pruitt and his office are against it.

He co-authored, along with Alabama's AG Luther Strange, an article published in the National Review a few months back, in which it was noted

Healthy debate is the lifeblood of American democracy, and global warming has inspired one of the major policy debates of our time. That debate is far from settled. Scientists continue to disagree about the degree and extent of global warming and its connection to the actions of mankind. That debate should be encouraged — in classrooms, public forums, and the halls of Congress. It should not be silenced with threats of prosecution. Dissent is not a crime.

According to an investigation by the NY Times back in 2014, Pruitt in his official capacity as AG, sent a letter to the EPA that was written by energy lobbyists, and they've helped with drafts of other letters to multiple federal agencies; he and other AGs are collaborating with corporations to craft legal strategy against the Administration; and industries regulated by his office have joined lawsuits filed by his office.

There's really no surprise in the choice. Here are just a few of the bullet points in his energy plan:

• Make America energy independent, create millions of new jobs, and protest clean air and clean water. We will conserve our natural habitats, reserves and resources. We will unleash an energy revolution that will bring vast new wealth to our country.
• Unleash America's $50 trillion in untapped shale, oil, and natural gas reserves, plus hundreds of years in clean coal reserves.
• Open onshore and offshore leasing on federal lands, elimination moratorium on coal leasing, and open shale energy deposits.
• Encourage the use of natural gas and other American energy resources that will both reduce emissions but also reduce the price of energy and increase our economic output.
• Rescind all job-destroying Obama executive actions. Mr. Trump will reduce and eliminate all barriers to responsible energy production, creating at least half a million jobs a year, $30B in higher wages and cheaper energy.

Promises of millions of high paying energy jobs in Trump's plan seem to assume that prices of domestically produced energy will go high and stay high indefinitely as we pump drill and dig and frack our brains out - which seems unlikely to be the case, doesn't it?  And if it is in fact unlikely, those jobs and all that economic input will disappear, just as they have over the past year or so, in Texas, and in North Dakota, when the price dropped and there was nothing in it for the energy companies to keep working. (Hey - when the price goes down, production goes down, employment goes down, economic input goes down. Is that what trickle-down economics is all about?)

Trump is no fan of the EPA, and I think this choice only adds clarity to what we can expect going forward.