Trump's plan seems to be: 1) force Sessions to resign. 2) appoint Giuliani to be attorney general during the Senate recess session as a way to avoid the Senate confirmation process. 3) ask Giuliani to fire Mueller, who is investigating bribery, extortion, and money laundering in the Russo-Trump empire. 4) profit!
Attorney General Jeff Sessions, having been thrown under the bus by Donald Trump, has clearly run out of fucks to give, and so now he's not only reviving the feel-good anti-drug program that convinced kids to take drugs, not only directing fed cops to arrest people who take weed in states where it's legal -- he's also calling for more civil asset forfeiture, that being the polite name for the widespread, illegal practice of cops stealing your stuff and selling it off to fund off-the-books spending on surveillance gear and other goodies. Read the rest
CNN reports today that Patrick Leahy and Al Franken, two democratic senators on the Senate Judiciary Committee, asked former FBI Director James Comey to investigate Attorney General Jeff Sessions over concerns Sessions may have had an undisclosed private meeting with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak.
While US attorney general Jeff "Джеффри" Sessions is busy spreading phony anecdotes about the deadly effects of marijuana and pining for the days of the Reagan drug war, 61% of Americans think is should be legal for recreational purposes, according to a CBS poll released today. Eighty-eight percent think it should be legal for medical use.
Snip:
Read the restSeventy-one percent oppose the federal government’s efforts to stop marijuana sales and its use in states that have legalized it, including opposition from most Republicans, Democrats, and independents.
Sixty-five percent think marijuana is less dangerous than most other drugs. And only 23 percent think legalizing marijuana leads to an increase violent crime.
More generally on the topic of drug abuse, 69 percent think that should be treated as an addiction and mental health problem rather than a criminal offense.
Trump keeps saying that the media's relentless investigations into Russia's corrupting influence on the White House is "fake news," but the media keeps finding out more and more about how Trump and his inner circle have cozied up to Russian and eastern European mobsters and kleptocrats. This new infographic from Vox is a simple guide to what's been unearthed so far, but it doesn't include recent revelations into billionaire Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross' role as a vice chairman of the Bank of Cyprus, which is co-owned by a dear friend of Russian president Vladimir Putin, and is run by the former head of the mega-money-laundering Deutsche Bank. It also doesn't reveal this bit of news reported today in the NY Times: "Jared Kushner, Mr. Trump’s son-in-law and now a senior adviser, also participated in the meeting at Trump Tower with Mr. Flynn and Sergey I. Kislyak, the Russian ambassador." (Kislyak is quite the belle of the ball in Trumplandia.)
It's stinking to high heaven in the White House, and even the Trump Aftershave everyone is wearing can't mask the odor of large-scale malfeasance. Read the rest
This one goes out to Attorney General and volunteer Russia envoy Jeff Sessions.
Noted white supremacist and current United States Attorney General Jeff Sessions said under oath at his confirmation hearing that he'd had no contact with Russia during Trump's 2016 presidential campaign. That wasn't true, according to the Department of Justice.
Thanks, Trump.
”Do you think the U.S. Attorney General has a responsibility to say no to the president if he asks for something that is improper?,” asked Senator Jefferson Beauregard Sessions (R-Alabama) in 2015.
“I believe they have an obligation to follow the law and the Constitution,” replied U.S. Deputy Attorney General nominee Sally Q. Yates.
The man who will decide how law is enforced in America for the next four years was deemed too racist to be a judge, voted to allow American soldiers to torture people, and is a general hot mess on crypto, surveillance, net neutrality and press freedoms: EFF staffers will liveblog his confirmation hearing this morning. (Image: Gage Skidmore, CC-BY-SA) Read the rest
