Koch

Pelosi is serious when she appoints members to the House Science Committee. Ryan and Boehner always thought it was a time for humor. Imagine the laughs when Ryan appointed Scientologist and Big Oil puppet Lamar Smith chairman. How about Orange County crackpot, stoner Dana Rohrabacher? Webster (FL), Loudermilk (GA), Biggs (AZ)... all laughingstocks. Ryan just put another Arizonan on the committee last week, newly elected crazy person Debbie Lesko (AZ).

After publicly humiliating VA Secretary David Shulkin and letting him twist in the wind for a week or two, as rumors swirled that he's on the way out-- just like Trump is doing to John Kelly and Ben Carson right now-- Señor T finally tweeted Wednesday that Shulkin, the only Trump cabinet appointee who had been confirmed by the Senate 100-0, was out.

A couple of weeks ago, Wisconsin's far right governor, Scott Walker, warned that Patty Schachtner's upset win over state Rep. Adam Jarchow in a deep red state Senate district was a "wake up call" for the GOP. And he's now figured out how to answer that call. He's refusing to allow special elections to fill vacant seats in the state legislature.

21st Century Wire says…
News broke Sunday night that Meredith Corp., publisher of Better Homes & Gardens and other popular magazine brands, agreed to purchase all of Time Inc.’s assets in a cash deal valued at $2.8 billion.
Grabbing all the headlines is the $650 million investment from Koch Equity Development (KED). This is the private equity firm of Charles and David Koch, aka the “Koch Brothers.”

"To Pence, Trump is just a stepping stone to theocracy"Jane Mayer has a piece in the new New Yorker, The Danger of President Pence, that needs to be factored into everyone's impeachment calculus. "The worse the President looks," she wrote, "the more desirable his understudy seems.

Iraqi Kurds unfurl a giant Kurdish flag during Nawruz celebrations in Dahuk, 260 miles (430 kilometers) northwest of Baghdad, Iraq. (AP Photo)
WASHINGTON, D.C. (Analysis) — Years before the U.S. illegally invaded and then occupied Iraq, plans were circulating within the Pentagon to partition the country along “sectarian” lines, with the express purpose of allowing the U.S. and its regional allies to better control oil resource production and movement within the Middle East.

I was elected freshman class president at college and the first vote I remember taking on the student council was to oppose spending student funds on moleskin-- a cotton fabric some sports team wanted because it's resistant to wind and abrasion. Let them get their own moleskins; I had Fugs, Doors, Country Joe & the Fish, Who and Otis Redding concerts in mind, not to mention lectures by Timothy Leary and Julian Bond.

John Calhoun came from a southern colonial family that opposed the federal constitution. He was elected to Congress from South Carolina in 1810 and immediately joined the ranks of the most hawkish, pro-war elements and he was instrumental in dragging the U.S. into the War of 1812. He was named Secretary of War-- the 5th choice-- by James Monroe in 1817.

Cover image from the New York Magazine feature story, "The Uninhabitable Earth." by Gaius PubliusWe need new Cassandras to warn us of new disasters, even though they'll never be believed.—Richard Cla

Remember how the first version of TrumpCare in the House wasn’t quite good enough for the far right savages in the Republican caucus? So they called in Freedom Caucus lunatic Mark Meadows to work with spineless south Jersey multimillionaire Tom MacArthur and they came up with a far worse and more deadly version that the radical right could-- and did-- get behind. That same process is playing out in the Senate now.