The Center for Media and Democracy finds that Betsy DeVos does have some education experience after all -- she's invested in a student loan debt-collection agency that, of course, has lately failed to secure a government contract, possibly because of numerous consumer complaints against it. So, yeah, we'd want someone invested in that in charge of regulating that! It's also good to be reminded, though, that "a largely bipartisan consensus around 'education reform'" has enabled Betsy DeVos's ascension to begin with, and that our "liberal" media still enable this "bipartisan consensus," one built on the three-decade-plus-old lie that public schools are failing us.
Richard Eskow asks "Who'll Get Shafted" by President Trump's federal worker hiring freeze, and finds, unsurprisingly, that mostly regular folks will get the shaft. Social Security recipients will get shafted by not having enough workers to help them through their issues, workers will get hurt by having fewer OSHA inspectors, and veterans will get hurt by hiring freezes at the Veterans Administration (strangely not part of Mr. Trump's big military exemption) -- but small businesses will also be hurt by the stagnating demand the hiring freeze will bring about, and when the EPA doesn't have the people to keep air and water clean, everyone will be hurt. (Yes, there's also a "public safety" exemption to the freeze, but I doubt a Trump EPA Administrator would ever pressure Mr. Big about it.)
Speaking of Mr. Big, a lot of Mr. Trump's notorious Executive Orders may "run aground," simply because he didn't consult any of the agencies that would be affected by them. That raises the possibility that these Orders would conflict with existing, settled law. But, hey, nobody but George W. Bush is better at profiting off failure than Donald Trump! If his immigration-related Executive Orders, for example, wind up dying a quick death at the hands of some federal appeals court, and then terrorists launch a 9.11-sized attack on American soil, Donald Trump can blame all those "liberal" federal judges (most of whom were appointed by Republicans, but never mind). C'mon, if I could figure that out, I'm sure Mr. Trump's braintrust has already mooted it.
But in case you thought Donald Trump wasn't the only Republicans planning to wreak havoc wherever he can, Paul Ryan's House also has an, er, ambitious agenda, to unfold over 200 days, apparently, because Donald Trump really likes it when you try to go one bigger on him. He'd approve of most-if-not-all of this agenda -- Obamacare repeal, tax cuts for the rich and corporations, strangling good regulations in their cribs, a corporate welfare infrastructure program -- even if most of the American people wouldn't, which is the more pertinent question, really. Why does Paul Ryan want more methane in our air, anyway?
If George W. Bush had simply forgotten to mention Jews during his Holocaust Remembrance Day statement, as Mr. Trump did on Friday, you might have chalked it up to stupidity, though Mr. Bush wasn't stupid, and anyway Mr. Bush was far too attentive to folks' feelings to have ever have made that mistake. Not too many folks think of Donald Trump as stupid, of course -- they're more likely to think of him as mean, which isn't a good look for a President, and they're also more likely to think of him as a racist, given his multitudinous you-call-it-politically-incorrect-I-call-it-being-an-asshole statements about various minorities. Also, too, Steve Bannon probably wrote that statement, and Steve Bannon's not exactly Nobel Peace Prize-winning material.
Finally, Julia Angwin at ProPublica discusses "How to Protect Your Digital Privacy in the Era of Public Shaming." I'm a bit put off by the title, merely because I don't think shaming people who injure our communities is a bad thing, but what is a bad thing is people throwing bricks through your window because you criticized the President. That isn't shaming; that's vandalism. Anyway, make your passwords longer, update your software, use encryption, opt out of data brokers, get rid of ancient data, and other things. (Also, Ms. Angwin provides a link to this site advising you on surviving online harassment, which might be in your future if you're planning to speak out against this evil Administration; there's plenty of good advice there, too.)
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