If Donald Trump serves out his term as pr*sident, he has 1,063 days left in the White House
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Today’s comic by Matt Bors is Broken child, grown man:
• If a huge net can catch reusable gear, SpaceX could save $5 million per launch:
"It's like a giant catcher's mitt, in boat form," SpaceX CEO Elon Musk told reporters after the Falcon Heavy launch on Feb. 6, Space.com reported.
In particular, the giant net is designed to catch the payload fairings, also known as the nose-cone halves. During the Feb. 6 mission, the payload fairings held the now-famous midnight-cherry Tesla Roadster and its driver, a mannequin known as Starman.
• Evangelist Billy Graham dead at 99:
The Rev. Billy Graham, a North Carolina farmer’s son who preached to millions in stadium events he called crusades, becoming a pastor to presidents and the nation’s best-known Christian evangelist for more than 60 years, died on Wednesday at his home in Montreat, N.C. He was 99. [...]
Mr. Graham spread his influence across the country and around the world through a combination of religious conviction, commanding stage presence and shrewd use of radio, television and advanced communication technologies.
A central achievement was his encouraging evangelical Protestants to regain the social influence they had once wielded, reversing a retreat from public life that had begun when their efforts to challenge evolution theory were defeated in the Scopes trial in 1925.
• Donald Trump Jr., hawking luxury goods in India, expresses surprise that poor people in that country smile:
Speaking during an event hosted by CNBC’s India affiliate, Trump Jr. said, “I think there is something about the spirit of the Indian people that is unique here to other parts of the emerging world.”
“You go through a town, and I don’t mean to be glib about it, but you can see the poorest of the poor and there is still a smile on a face, you say hello — it is a different spirit than that which you see in other parts of the world where people walk around so solemn, and I think there is something unique about that,” he added.
• Attack on public sector workers funded by small group of donors:
In a new paper, EPI Labor Counsel Celine McNicholas and research assistant Zane Mokhiber report that the Supreme Court case Janus v AFSCME Council 31, along with previous cases challenging unions’ right to collect “fair share” fees from nonmembers, have been financed by a small group of foundations with ties to the largest and most powerful corporate lobbies. Analyzing Internal Revenue Service documents, the authors find that several of the foundations supporting anti-union litigants share the same donors—including the Sarah Scaife Foundation, The Lynde and Harry Bradley Foundation, the Ed Uihlein Family Foundation, and the Dunn’s Foundation for the Advancement of Right Thinking.
Working people who choose not to join their workplace’s union, but are still covered by a collective bargaining agreement, do not pay union dues. Instead, they pay “fair share” fees to cover the basic costs that the union incurs representing them. If the court finds in favor of the plaintiffs in Janus, unions representing public-sector workers could be prohibited from collecting these fees. The authors explain that if this happens, unions will be forced to operate with fewer and fewer resources. This will lead to reduced power—at the bargaining table and in the political process.
MIDDAY TWEET
• Gov. Scott Walker, WI Senate eagerly make war on the poor:
One bill ups existing work requirements for food stamps. Another sets humiliating new conditions for eligibility to live in public housing. Others set aside money to pay private companies that contract with the state if those companies can realize further savings.
Food stamps recipients are already required to work to receive the meager stipend SNAP provides. Though media coverage often portrays legislation like Wisconsin’s as a new corrective action, the truth is SNAP families already work. When unemployment reaches a crisis level in a given geographic area, state administrators are allowed to waive the federal requirement that able-bodied adults without dependents (ABAWDs) work or volunteer at least 20 hours per week. That flexibility is essential to the program’s ability to cushion recessions. If there are no jobs and a family that can’t find work loses food benefits, the program can’t do what it’s supposed to, and poor people will go hungry.
• Safety of U.S. food sparks British outcry over hygiene breaches at meat plants: Newly-released records show numerous safety failures at U.S. packing plants. This includes packaging of diseased poultry meat and the discovery of fecal matter in meat headed for the grocery shelves. The British organization Sustain found that every year about 15 percent of Americans suffer from foodborne illnesses. In the U.K., that figure is only about 1.5 percent. The U.K. saw only about 10,000 cases of salmonella contamination in 2016 compared with one million in the U.S. "We cannot allow this to be a race to the bottom. We should insist the U.S. raises its standards, and guarantees food safety, before we are prepared to allow in U.S. meat imports," said Kerry McCarthy, a former member of parliament and shadow environment minister.
• 236 U.S. mayors urge feds not to can Clean Power Plan’s limits on greenhouse gas emissions:
Hundreds of U.S. mayors, representing one in seven Americans, have told EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt that they need the Clean Power Plan's emissions rules in order to fight climate change and protect their cities.
In a letter released on Tuesday, 236 mayors from 47 states urged Pruitt not to repeal the plan, which was a centerpiece of President Obama's effort to tackle climate change by cracking down on emissions from electric power plants. The rule has been in limbo during litigation, and President Trump wants it revoked, as Pruitt has proposed to do.
On today’s Kagro in the Morning show, Greg Dworkin and Joan McCarter chime in on top stories: Parkland kids march on; the alt-right & gun nuts team up (Again! Man, that’s weird!) to attack them. Things might change if we saw the damage guns do. But who else would display it, and to what end?
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