Tuesday, January 30, 2018

Here is another great American newly out of the hospital that was completely forgotten in the President's speech.

January 30, 2018

Italy, Texas (AP) — Officials say a 15-year-old girl (click here) shot at a North Texas high school is out of the hospital and back with her family a week after the shooting.

In social media postings, the Italy (IT’-lee) Independent School District says its students were told Monday that the girl is continuing her recovery with her family at an undisclosed location. The district says the family is optimistic about the girl’s recovery but asks for continued prayers for her.

Authorities have not released her name.

She was shot multiple times Jan. 22 in the Italy High School cafeteria. A 16-year-old boy who attended the school has been charged with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon. He remains in juvenile custody.

Italy is 42 miles (68 kilometers) south of Dallas and has about 1,900 residents.

It was a lone wolf attack. THERE ARE TOO MANY GUNS ON THE STREET.

December 24, 2017
By Julia Manchester

...El-Mofty (click here) allegedly opened fire on police officers in three different locations in the state's capital on Friday. The FBI and the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives were reportedly investigating whether the shootings could be considered an act of terror. 

Houlton said the attack in Pennsylvania and another case in which a suspect was arrested on terror-related money laundering charges “highlight the Trump administration’s concerns with extended family chain migration.”...          

Propaganda or no propaganda?

Invoking "Old Glory" as a unique agenda is irrelevant. Bringing up judges is to say something will change when legislation about the flag burning is challenged and defeated.

Trump is attempting to build nationalism. No different than Putin's Russia.

During the 1984 Republican National Convention, (click here) respondent Johnson participated in a political demonstration to protest the policies of the Reagan administration and some Dallas-based corporations. After a march through the city streets, Johnson burned an American flag while protesters chanted. No one was physically injured or threatened with injury, although several witnesses were seriously offended by the flag burning. Johnson was convicted of desecration of a venerated object in violation of a Texas statute, and a state court of appeals affirmed. However, the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals reversed, holding that the State, consistent with the First Amendment, could not punish Johnson for burning the flag in these circumstances...

We have seen this misinformation before. Whoever is advising him is making much out of nothing.

April 26, 2016

FCA (Fiat Chrysler Automobiles) CEO Marchionne: (click here) "We ran the optimization exercise with a very clear view of not losing one unit of sales for Ram and not losing one unit of sales for Jeep."

Fiat Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne confirmed Tuesday after months of speculation that the automaker plans to move production of its Ram pickups  to Sterling Heights from Warren and move production of a Jeep SUV to Toluca, Mexico, from Belvidere, Ill....

July 28, 2016
By Brent Snavely and Matt Dolan

Fiat Chrysler Automobiles (click here) plans to spend $1.49 billion to retool its Sterling Heights Assembly Plant so it can build the next-generation Ram 1500 pickup truck there after it stops producing the Chrysler 200.

The investment plans were disclosed today  in Lansing when the Michigan Strategic Fund board approved a tax break valued at $11.38 million over a 15-year period to help secure the automaker's commitment. The board unanimously approved the request after about a 15 minute discussion....

I will tell you what is going on here. It is called a shell game to 

"Make Trump look Great Always."

Chrysler is not doing anything differently. As a matter of fact Chrysler figured out it would cost less to improve the plant in Warren, Michigan opposed to Sterling Heights, Michigan.


There is absolutely nothing coming back from Mexico to the USA. Wall Street loves this guy. They showered every elected House and Senate member with campaign contributions to let them know Trump is the man they need to follow.


I hope the union has the bonus being issued by Chrysler in writing as they do the profit sharing plan, because, after all the lies are discovered the company might change it's mind about the bonus.


Wall Street CEOs are happier than pigs in shit. Maybe that is being harsh on pigs. The CEOs don't know what to do with all the money they have now that the tax structure is changed, so to prevent issues with exceptional profit margins, they are giving it away as a tax deduction.


Trump and the Republicans have instilled corruption systemically and no different than Roger Goodell, the CEOs are attempting to "shine everyone on." That is all this is. It is corruption of the government by Trump's financial professionals in his administration.


January 11, 2018
By Eric D. Lawrence

Detroit -- Citing President Trump's and Congress' new tax law, (click here) Fiat Chrysler Automobiles said Thursday that it's going to move some of its production back from Mexico.

Fiat Chrysler Automobiles will invest more than $1 billion to modernize the company's Warren Truck Plant in metro Detroit, adding 2,500 jobs and moving production of its Ram Heavy Duty trucks from Mexico.

The changeover is to be complete in 2020.

The company said that the new federal tax law made the shift possible. That legislation, signed into law in December, cut the corporate tax rate from 35% to 21%.

Fiat Chrysler also announced $2,000 bonuses that will be paid in the second quarter of this year to 60,000 hourly and salaried employees in the U.S., excluding senior leadership. Those bonuses are to be in addition to any profit sharing or performance bonuses the employees would receive this year.

"These announcements reflect our ongoing commitment to our U.S. manufacturing footprint and the dedicated employees who have contributed to FCA's success," Fiat Chrysler CEO Sergio Marchionne said in a statement. "It is only proper that our employees share in the savings generated by tax reform and that we openly acknowledge the resulting improvement in the U.S. business environment by investing in our industrial footprint accordingly."...

Is he still talking? Oh, the immigration law that doesn't apply to Russian Pregnancy Tourism.

My pet peive; the robbing of the poor of their children to serve the middle class and upper class. Don't do anything about poverty and the working poor, simply displace their children to 'great Americans' that want their children.


Trump made a huge error in bringing up Syria and the US Casualities there. We don't belong there and now Turkey is fighting the USA rebels.


January 30, 2018
By Jamie Dettmer

Turkey’s latest military incursion (click here) into northern Syria which it says is aimed at reining in Kurdish separatists will speed up the return of Syrian refugees to their homes, Turkish officials say. But Kurds are fearful Ankara plans to use the returnees to displace them and engineer a population shift.

Kurd officials say Ankara wants to re-shape the demographics of the borderlands in a bid to establish a “corridor of stability” populated by fewer Kurds and with Sunni Arab refugees currently in Turkey taking their place.

That would weaken the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), which Ankara dubs an affiliate of Turkey’s outlawed Kurdish separatists, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK)....

Turkey has a large number of refugees and there is a problem with violence because of it. There are currently at least 3 million Syrian refugees in Turkey. But, Turkey has frequently attacked the Kurds because PKK is considered a terrorist organization. The Kurds have been instrumental in ending Daesh in the region. Turkey cannot start another war with the Kurds simply because it believes the refugee crisis will be ended.

Turkey should be grateful to the Kurds for the very fact they defeated Daesh without any help from Turkey.

Trump cannot stand the idea that South Korea and Japan might be burgeoning into peace talks with China and North Korea. Peace with North Korea is not on Trump's political agenda. He has a lot of generals in his administration that have known the Korean War and have a desire to continue the tensions. It is ludicrous for the USA to attempt to end any peace talks with North Korea. Trump is about his politics and that is exactly what his speech today has conducted.

The USA is in danger because of Trump's administration and election committee. That is the truth and it is not being addressed tonight. The country has lost many of the people that were within it's brain trust under this administration. That is dangerous. Trump is not a good president and is a problem for this country. The US House and Senate need to impeach.

Something new here? Singling out Black and Hispanic citizens as lazy until Trump took office is racism.











The trend in USA employment is headed downward.

...Over the year, (click here)  job growth totaled 2.1 million, compared with a gain of 2.2 million in 2016....

The US Labor Department always discusses jobs added each month, but, there are significant job losses as well.

The wealth of Wall Street is not the picture of the country.

The picture in December of most any year is always better than any other month of the year because of the holidays. The overall view is different.

Another interesting measure is the labor force participation rate: which in the last quarter of 2017 shows chronic low rates.

Predictions for 2018 are not much better. (click here)

Oddly enough, December 2017 didn't meet expectations. Nearly 25 percent below expections. The largest gain in employment was food service workers.

Non-farm (click here) payrolls in the US increased by 148K in December of 2017, below market expectations of a 190K. Solid gains were reported in construction, manufacturing and health care while retail trade continued to cut jobs.

In 2017, payroll employment growth totaled 2.1 million, compared with a gain of 2.2 million in 2016.

Employment in health care increased by 31,000 in December. Employment continued to trend up in ambulatory health care services (+15,000) and hospitals (+12,000). Health care added 300,000 jobs in 2017, compared with a gain of 379,000 jobs in 2016....

And were the jobs added high paying jobs? The blue lines are for the month of December and the gray lines are for the 2017 average.


Leisure and hospitality employment continued to trend up in December (+29,000), adding a total of 306,000 jobs in 2017. This industry accounted for 15 percent of all total nonfarm jobs added in 2017. Employment in food services and drinking places was little changed in December (+25,000). In 2017, employment in the industry increased by 249,000, after rising by 276,000 over the prior year.  

And what no American will hear tonight is the increase in the homeless population. It is up because of the loss of good paying jobs, replaced with low paying jobs and housing is far too expensive. When Trump was inaugurated I stated to watch the homeless rate. Here we are and it took no time at all.

December 6, 2017
By Christopher Weber and Geoff Mulvhill

Los Angeles — The nation's homeless population increased this year (click here) for the first time since 2010, driven by a surge in the number of people living on the streets in Los Angeles and other West Coast cities.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development released its annual Point in Time count Wednesday, a report that showed nearly 554,000 homeless people across the country during local tallies conducted in January. That figure is up nearly 1 percent from 2016.

Of that total, 193,000 people had no access to nightly shelter and instead were staying in vehicles, tents, the streets and other places considered uninhabitable. The unsheltered figure is up by more than 9 percent compared to two years ago.

Increases are higher in several West Coast cities, where the explosion in homelessness has prompted at least 10 city and county governments to declare states of emergency since 2015....

The 2017 family income numbers won't be in for a while yet, but, under President Obama 2016 was a record high.

Real income per capita measures the per person income. The household income reflects more than one wage earner.

...Current Average Income (click here)
The 2016 nominal median income per capita was $31,099. The mean income per capita was $46,550. The Census Bureau reports those in the Current Population Survey, Table PINC-01.
Real median household income was $59,039 in 2016. That's the first time income exceeded the 2007 level of $58,149. It's also slightly higher than the 2015 income of $57,230. The first increase since the Great Recession was in 2015. All are reported in 2016 dollars. The Census report household income in Table A-1.
The federal government uses the median household income to establish poverty levels. That determines eligibility for Obamacare subsidies and welfare programs. 
Real median family income was $72,707 in 2016. That's higher than the 2007 peak of $71,024 (as measured in 206 dollars). It's also more than the 2015 level of $71,590. The government uses the family income for statistical purposes, such as reporting the poverty threshold....
This is the definition of household and family. Households can have other than a family living within them.
A family (click here) consists of two or more people (one of whom is the householder) related by birth, marriage, or adoption residing in the same housing unit. A household consists of all people who occupy a housing unit regardless of relationship. A household may consist of a person living alone or multiple unrelated individuals or families living together.

When an employee receives a raise, they expect to see it in their paychecks not their deductions.

This is interesting. Health care insurance is too expensive. The companies are pricing themselves out of business. There is no reason why large corporations such as these can't self-insure. They should. 

Amazon had over a half of a million employees
JP Morgan Chase and Company has another quarter million employees
Berkshire Hathaway has over 350,000.

That is easily over a million people. I am confident the three corporations can find good health care options for their employees.

Illustrated in the graph above is the employee contribution for health care insurance. The wages are not keeping up with the cost of health care insurance subscription costs. While the country is looking toward increasing the minimum wage it only makes sense that prudent CEOs look to the final outcome for their employees as their wages increase.

I am not saying these companies pay minimum wage as Walmart does, but, just that as minimum wages increase other wages increase to keep pace with it. This decision is impressive and I look forward to hearing more about the final outcome and decisions.

January 30, 2018
By Mike Snider


Amazon, Berkshire Hathaway and JP Morgan Chase & Co. (click here) are combining efforts to improve health care and lower its cost for their hundreds of thousands of U.S. employees. 

The three companies announced Tuesday they are teaming up to explore "ways to address healthcare for their U.S. employees, with the aim of improving employee satisfaction and reducing costs," according to a news release about the venture.

An independent company, which "is free from profit-making incentives and constraints," they say, will initially tackle technological solutions to deliver "simplified, high-quality and transparent" health care to employees at a economical prices.

"Tackling the enormous challenges of healthcare and harnessing its full benefits are among the greatest issues facing society today," Jeff Bezos, Amazon's founder said in a statement. "By bringing together three of the world’s leading organizations into this new and innovative construct, the group hopes to draw on its combined capabilities and resources to take a fresh approach to these critical matters."...
            

CIA Director Pompeo Says Russia will influence the 2018 elections. "I haven't seen a significant decrease in their activity," he said.

I thought it the CIA Director's job to identify the people involved in subverting our government and end it. I find it very odd the CIA Director can't control the Russia subversives to the USA elections when the influence is online access and the USA has invested so heavily in internet monitoring.

Is Pompeo saying the multi-billion dollar complex to detect terrorist activity is a waste of time? I think Pompeo appreciates the effect of Russian influence in USA elections and looks the other way.

Why hasn't the activity ended or DECREASED since the very valid understanding the Russias effected the 2016 elections? As a CIA Director how can he state he is proud of an agency that can't even protect the integrity of foreign influence in our elections?

Pompeo has stated he has unleashed and unburdened the CIA. What the heck does that mean? What burden aren't they carrying anymore?

29 January 2018

The director of the CIA (click here) expects that Russia will target the US mid-term elections later this year.

Mike Pompeo told the BBC there had been no significant diminishing of Russian attempts at subversion in Europe and the US.

He also said North Korea may have the ability to strike the US with nuclear missiles "in a handful of months".

The US intelligence community has said that it believes Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election.

Mr Pompeo, who briefs the president most mornings, dismissed as "drivel" recent claims that US President Donald Trump was not up to the job.

The director's conference room on the seventh floor of the CIA's headquarters in Langley, Virginia, is lined with pictures of former directors and the presidents they served.

And Mr Pompeo is clear about his vision for the CIA under President Trump....


Congratulations to USA Today for bringing forth an issue that is more than a PR problem.

This state level medical review should be happening in every state when any medical-surgical practice becomes this dangerous. When protocols are breached there are all kinds of problems, besides infection. At what point does a victim of such crimes become a threat and find themselves not only under the influence of unwanted, dangerous medication, but, have their life in jeopardy when waking up to the attack?

The Cleveland Clinic is a world class hospital. One incident such as this does not change that reality. What changes such a reputation are cover ups and administrations that treat these incidents as trivial. These victims are real and need to receive the dignity and ethical standards of the best of medicine and not the worst. Hiding problems destroys quality treatment. 

This was a very dangerous reality. USA Today really did a great job at bringing the truth to light.

January 30, 2018
By Jayne O'Donnell

The Ohio Board of Medicine (click here) is investigating two alleged rapes by a former Cleveland Clinic colorectal surgeon following a Jan. 5 USA TODAY article and has subpoenaed Cleveland Clinic medical records for other procedures done by the surgeon in the same time period, USA TODAY has learned. 

Surgeon Tomislav Mihaljevic, who started as Cleveland Clinic’s CEO Jan. 1, is also now chair of a “conduct review” committee established after the article was published to review “serious incidents of harassment and misconduct to ensure appropriate action is taken.”  New committees are also developing policies on how to assess physicians’ conduct and govern the use of chaperones.

Williams was never charged with a crime in the cases of the two alleged rapes.

Chris Forshey, the medical board's investigations supervisor, interviewed a woman last week who suspects she could have been assaulted and asked to remain anonymous due to the nature of her allegation. Jennifer Davis, the woman's sister in law and a former Cleveland Clinic registered nurse, filed a medical board complaint on the alleged victim's behalf on Jan. 16....                      

Here is something real.

T
Greatest eclipse happens at the same instant worldwide, but our clocks say different times. Chart by Fred Espenak. (click here)

Is it the first Blue Moon total eclipse in 150 years, as some social media memes are now claiming? It is … if you’re not considering the whole world, but only the Americas.

I think Fred Espenak has the most important chart to the viewing of the "The Blue Total Eclipse Supermoon" will occur on January 31, 2018. The recent past has been a unique time for North America, especially the USA, with the total eclipse of the sun on August 21, 2017. So, tomorrow should be a really interesting event indeed. The best viewing is going to be the west coast of North America. No doubt California will make it fun.

Advertisers for the Superbowl can easily ask for their money back.

Fire, Goodell!

NOW!


Why bother watching the Superbowl. The winner has already been decided and the rings are probably already engraved. Jerry Jones was right to oppose the renewing of a five year contract extension, which included Goodell's own private jet. Enough is never enough.

It is a very sad day in the USA to realize everything is about money and more of it. This is ridiculous.