Strange: I'm frustrated with Washington

Florence Times Daily

U.S. Sen. Luther Strange said Washington is a frustrating place, and the behavior of some of his colleagues only makes matters worse.

Strange, a Republican, is only a few months into the job, and faces challenges to hold onto the position in Tuesday's primary election.

He spoke Thursday during a lunch meeting of the Shoals Chamber of Commerce, where one of his rivals, U.S. Rep. Mo Brooks, spoke the day before.

"I'm just as frustrated as I can be," he said. "We've spun our wheels and accomplished nothing."

Strange, who was endorsed this week by President Donald Trump via Twitter, said the only hope of addressing health care and the Affordable Care Act is for Republicans and Democrats to come together and hash out their differences.

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Sens. Franken, Wyden Lead Push to Stop Trump Administration From Ending Protections for Nursing Home Residents

Washington, D.C. - August 11, 2017 (The Ponder News) -- Sens. Al Franken and Ron Wyden are leading a major effort to push the Trump Administration's Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) to abandon a proposal to scrap protections that prevent nursing homes and long-term care facilities from locking residents into forced arbitration agreements.

"Forced arbitration clauses in nursing home agreements stack the deck against residents and their families who face a wide range of potential harms, including physical abuse and neglect, sexual assault, and even wrongful death at the hands of those working in and managing long-term care facilities," the Senators wrote in a letter Monday to CMS Administrator Seema Verma. "These clauses prevent many of our country's most vulnerable individuals from seeking justice in a court of law, and instead funnel all types of legal claims, no matter how egregious, into a privatized dispute resolution system that is often biased toward the nursing home."

The Senators, joined on the letter by 29 of their colleagues, went on to write, "Therefore, we strongly urge CMS to fully protect many of our nation's most vulnerable individuals by withdrawing this proposal and sustaining and fully enforcing the existing restrictions on pre-dispute arbitration clauses in long-term care facility contracts."

You can read the full letter by clicking HERE

Senators to Treasury: Crack Down on Corporate Inversions

Washington, D.C. - August 11, 2017 (The Ponder News) -- Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) joined with Senate Democrats to call on the Treasury Department to strengthen efforts to prevent corporate inversions, which occur when companies move overseas on paper in order to avoid paying taxes in the United States. It is estimated that inversions cost the federal government more than $100 billion in lost tax revenue each year.

“These schemes are deeply unfair to American taxpayers who fund the programs and protections that many of these corporations use to grow and thrive as they make significant profits,” the senators wrote. “In return, these corporations choose to desert their tax responsibility here at home, further eroding the U.S. tax base.”

In Pursuit of Justice: Do Away with Planned Parenthood Gag Order!

Washington, D.C. - August 11, 2017 (The Ponder News) -- David Daleiden and The Center for Medical Progress (CMP) has petitioned the Supreme Court to appeal the unconstitutional gag order issued by Judge William Orrick III – an Obama-appointed judge with numerous explicit ties to Planned Parenthood – against the publication of undercover footage of top-level Planned Parenthood leaders. Daleiden explained his appeal by claiming there is information being suppressed that is of significant public interest and concern.

David Daleiden and his team contend the gag order restricts their First Amendment rights and was ordered at “the behest” of Planned Parenthood and the National Abortion Federation. The appeal was made weeks after Daleiden and his team was ordered to pay a $137,000 fine and held him in contempt in court. Rep. Trent Franks reacted with the following statement:

“I pray the Supreme Court can bring transparency to this extremely dark and troubling affair in California. The attempt by Planned Parenthood and the National Abortion Federation to bury the truth contained in now infamous videos is offensive to every American sensibility. I am thankful David Daleiden has the opportunity to gain a national profile and plead for an end to his persecution before the highest court in the land.

“We should commend people like David Daleiden for his heroism in telling the truth, and we should throw those who murder helpless children and sell their body parts in jail. Not the other way around.”

The Bipartisan Heroin Task Force Calls for Immediate Action to Address Opioid Epidemic

Washington, D.C. - August 11, 2017 (The Ponder News) -- The Bipartisan Heroin Task Force, led by Representatives Tom MacArthur (R-NJ), Annie Kuster (D-NH), Brian Fitzpatrick (R-PA), and Donald Norcross (D-NJ) is calling on Congress and the Administration to take immediate, meaningful action to address the opioid epidemic. The Task Force is committed to working in a bipartisan way and with the Administration to advance solutions to this national crisis. The recently released report by the White House’s Commission on Combating Drug Addiction and the Opioid Crisis details specific recommendations for fighting the opioid crisis in the United States. Many of the proposals included in the report mirror the Bipartisan Heroin Task Force’s agenda, which includes:

Immediately addressing the IMD exclusion

Enhancing medical education for prescribers and providers

Encouraging the wide-spread use and accessibility of Medication-Assisted Treatment (MAT).

Enhancing Narcan availability

Prioritizing funding to DHS’s Customs and Border Protection to improve drug detection technology

Ensuring federal health care systems share data with Prescription Drug Monitoring Programs (PDMP).

Making it easier to share addiction-specific medical information with healthcare providers.

Additionally, the Bipartisan Heroin Task Force supports the Commission’s recommendation of declaring a National Public Health

Emergency and enforcement of mental health parity laws. The Task Force is committed to working together across party lines and with the Administration to move these efforts forward.

“In my home state of New Jersey, 2,000 people died from overdoses in 2016, surpassing car accidents, shootings and suicides combined,” said Congressman MacArthur. “It’s clear this epidemic is hurting so many lives. Throughout the year, the Bipartisan Heroin Task Force has been working together to find commonsense solutions to this crisis and I’m thankful to see much of our agenda aligns with the Administration’s proposals. This report is an aggressive step and I would encourage my colleagues on each side of the aisle to continue to focus on helping those struggling with addiction, specifically in curbing the supply of drugs coming into our country. ”

“It’s time for real action from the Administration on the opioid epidemic,” said Congresswoman Kuster. “I’ve been encouraged by my colleagues on the Bipartisan Heroin Task force and their willingness to come together and work toward real solutions to this crisis. Earlier this year, our Task Force announced legislative proposals, some of which were outlined in President Trump’s own Opioid Commission findings. We need a comprehensive approach that expands access to prevention, treatment, and recovery services if we’re going to stem the growth of this epidemic. Law enforcement officials agree that we can’t simply arrest our way out of this crisis. I urge the Administration to listen to our Task Force and work with Congress to pass our bipartisan agenda and make a real difference for people in New Hampshire and across the country.”

“There are few issues more pressing in our own neighborhoods than the devastation caused by the growing epidemic of opioid and drug abuse,” said Congressman Fitzpatrick. While community groups, local government and law enforcement have undertaken the Herculean challenge of addressing this issue from all its sides, it is clear there is a crucial role for Congress to play in supporting and expanding these efforts.”

“The disease of addiction is a national emergency and every delay means more loved ones will die,” said Congressman Norcross. “The Bipartisan Heroin Task Force has been offering commonsense legislative solutions to deal with this national emergency and the Administration’s own Commission is now suggesting many of the same solutions. There’s no time to wait to put these policies in place.”

Frustrated with White House, McCain unveils Afghan strategy

Englewood:Sun Herald

In a rebuke of President Donald Trump, Republican Sen. John McCain declared Thursday that “America is adrift in Afghanistan” as he promoted a war strategy that would expand the U.S. counterterrorism effort and provide greater support to Afghan security forces.

McCain, chairman of the Armed Services Committee, said the U.S. needs to put strict conditions on continued assistance to Afghanistan, and require the Kabul government to demonstrate “measurable progress” in curbing corruption, strengthening the rule of law and improving financial transparency.

“Nearly seven months into President Trump’s administration, we’ve had no strategy at all as conditions on the ground have steadily worsened,” said McCain, a leading voice in Congress on national security matters. “The thousands of Americans putting their lives on the line in Afghanistan deserve better from their commander in chief.”

McCain said bluntly, “We are losing in Afghanistan and time is of the essence if we intend to turn the tide.”

The Arizona lawmaker said he’ll seek a vote on his “strategy for success” in Afghanistan when the Senate returns in September and takes up the annual defense policy bill.

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In new threat, Trump demands NKorea ‘get their act together’

Eureka Times-Standard

Issuing a new threat to North Korea, President Donald Trump demanded that North Korea “get their act together” or face extraordinary trouble. He said his previous warning of “fire and fury” if Pyongyang threatened the U.S. again might have been too soft.

“Maybe that statement wasn’t tough enough,” Trump said on Thursday.

Trump, speaking to reporters from the New Jersey golf resort where he’s vacationing, said North Korea had been “getting away with a tragedy that can’t be allowed.” Still, he declined to say whether the U.S. was considering a pre-emptive military strike, arguing that his administration never discusses such deliberations publicly.

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Feinstein Statement on North Korea

Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) issued the following statement in response to reports that North Korea has successfully produced a miniaturized nuclear warhead that can fit inside its intercontinental ballistic missiles:

“Isolating the North Koreans has not halted their pursuit of nuclear weapons. And President Trump is not helping the situation with his bombastic comments. There is no question that North Korea is seeking to add a nuclear warhead to an ICBM capable of reaching the United States.

“What this tells me is that our policy of isolating North Korea has not worked. The United States must quickly engage North Korea in a high-level dialogue without any preconditions. Hopefully, Secretary Tillerson is already discussing the possibility of reopening talks with our Asian partners during his current trip. In my view, diplomacy is the only sound path forward.”

EFF Urges Supreme Court to Take On Unconstitutional NSA Surveillance, Reverse Dangerous Ruling That Allows Massive Government Spying Program

Washington, D.C. - August 11, 2017 (The Ponder News) -- The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) asked the Supreme Court to review and overturn an unprecedented ruling allowing the government to intercept, collect, and store—without a warrant—millions of Americans’ electronic communications, including emails, texts, phone calls, and online chats.

This warrantless surveillance is conducted by U.S. intelligence agencies under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. The law is exceedingly broad—Section 702 allows the government to conduct surveillance of any foreigner abroad­—and the law fails to protect the constitutional rights of Americans whose texts or emails are “incidentally” collected when communicating with those people.

This warrantless surveillance of Americans is unconstitutional and should be struck down.

Yet the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, ruling in U.S. v. Mohamud, decided that the Fourth Amendment doesn’t apply to Americans whose communications were intercepted incidentally and searched without a warrant. The case centered on Mohammed Mohamud, an American citizen who in 2012 was charged with plotting to bomb a Christmas tree lighting ceremony in Oregon. After he had already been convicted, Mohamud was told for the first time that information used in his prosecution was obtained using Section 702. Further disclosures clarified that the government used the surveillance program known as PRISM, which gives U.S. intelligence agencies access to communications in the possession of Internet service providers such as Google, Yahoo, or Facebook, to obtain the emails at issue in the case. Mohamud sought to suppress evidence gathered through the warrantless spying, arguing that Section 702 was unconstitutional.

In a dangerous and unprecedented ruling, the Ninth Circuit upheld the warrantless search and seizure of Mohamud’s emails. EFF, the Center for Democracy & Technology, and New America’s Open Technology Institute filed a petition today asking the Supreme Court to review that decision.

“The ruling provides an end-run around the Fourth Amendment, converting sweeping warrantless surveillance directed at foreigners into a tool for spying on Americans,” said EFF Senior Staff Attorney Mark Rumold. “Section 702 is unlike any surveillance law in our country’s history, it is unconstitutional, and the Supreme Court should take this case to put a stop to this surveillance.”

Section 702, which is set to expire in December unless Congress reauthorizes it, provides the government with broad authority to collect, retain, and search Americans’ international communications, even if they don’t contain any foreign intelligence or evidence of a crime.

“We urge the Supreme Court to review this case and Section 702, which subjects Americans to warrantless surveillance on an unknown scale,” said EFF Staff Attorney Andrew Crocker. “We have long advocated for reining in NSA mass surveillance, and the ‘incidental’ collection of Americans’ private communications under Section 702 should be held unconstitutional once and for all.”

For the petition: Click Here


For more on Section 702: Click Here


For more on NSA spying: Click Here

EFF To Court: Border Agents Need Warrants to Search Contents of Digital Devices

New Orleans, LA - August 10, 2017 (The Ponder News) -- Searches of mobile phones, laptops, and other digital devices by federal agents at international airports and U.S. land borders are highly intrusive forays into travelers’ private information that require a warrant, the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) said in a court filing.

EFF urged the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit to require law enforcement officers at the border to obtain a warrant before performing manual or forensic searches of digital devices. Warrantless border searches of backpacks, purses, or luggage are allowed under an exception to the Fourth Amendment for routine immigration and customs enforcement. Yet EFF argues that, since digital devices can provide so much highly personal, private information—our contacts, our email conversations, our work documents, our schedules—agents should be required to show they have probable cause to believe that the device contains evidence of a violation of the immigration or customs laws. Only after a judge has signed off on a search warrant should border agents be allowed to rifle through the contents of cell phones, laptops, or tablets.

Digital device searches at the border have more than doubled since the inauguration of President Trump. This increase, along with the increasing number of people who carry these devices while traveling, has highlighted the need for stronger privacy rights while crossing the U.S. border.

“Our cell phones and laptops provide access to an unprecedented amount of detailed, private information, often going back many months or years, from emails to our coworkers to photos of our loved ones and lists of our closest contacts. This is light years beyond the minimal information generally contained in other kinds of personal items we might carry in our suitcases. It’s time for courts and the government to acknowledge that examining the contents of a digital device is highly intrusive, and Fourth Amendment protections should be strong, even at the border,” said EFF Staff Attorney Sophia Cope.

EFF filed its brief with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit in U.S. v. Molina-Isidoro. In that case, Maria Isabel Molina-Isidoro’s cell phone was manually searched at the border, supporting her prosecution for attempting to import methamphetamine into the country.

The Supreme Court has held that cell phones hold “the privacies of life,” and police need a warrant to search the contents of a phone seized during an arrest. The same principle should apply to the digital devices seized at the border, EFF told the appeals court.

“Any search of data stored on a digital device, whether performed using special forensic software or conducted manually after obtaining and entering the owner’s password, provides access to a person’s entire private life,” said EFF Senior Staff Attorney Adam Schwartz.

EFF is urging the court to find that the extraordinary privacy interests that travelers have in their digital devices render warrantless searches of those devices unreasonable under the Fourth Amendment. Border agents should be required to show they have sufficient cause for this immense invasion of privacy.

The Persuader Rule would have shined a spotlight on the union-avoidance industry—but the Trump administration is rescinding it

Washington, D.C. - August 10, 2017 (The Ponder News) -- In a new comment submitted to the Department of Labor, EPI Associate Labor Counsel Marni von Wilpert argues that the “Persuader Rule,” which is designed to add transparency to union elections by requiring companies to disclose when they hire professional union busters, should not be rescinded.

Von Wilpert notes that up to 87 percent of employers fight their employees’ efforts to unionize by hiring professional anti-union consultants—“persuaders”—to thwart union organizing drives. Union-busting firms promise to equip employers with campaign strategies and opposition research, as well as produce anti-union videos, literature, and PowerPoint presentations for employers to deploy. Employers spend large amounts of money to hire these anti-union consultants—sometimes hundreds of thousands of dollars. The union-avoidance industry has been estimated to be a $1 billion industry.

Despite a federal law that requires employers and anti-union consultants to publicly disclose their persuader activities, a significant amount of anti-union organizing has gone unreported because of a loophole in DOL’s regulations. DOL issued the Persuader Rule in 2016 to close that loophole, so that employees in the workplace can understand the source of the anti-union information they are given during a union election campaign.

“As we saw recently in Mississippi, companies can employ all sorts of anti-union tactics, which in this case resulted in the National Labor Relations Board filing an unfair-labor-practice complaint against Nissan. But without the Persuader Rule, employees and the public have no way of knowing what role anti-union persuaders may have played behind the scenes,” said von Wilpert. “The Department of Labor should hold employers accountable for disclosing their anti-union activities, which is required by federal law, and is in the best interest of American workers.”

DOL’s mission is to safeguard the welfare of America’s workers by, among other things, “strengthening free collective bargaining.” The Persuader Rule furthers that mission by taking a modest step toward leveling the playing field for workers during organizing drives, ensuring that they receive the information they deserve before choosing whether or not to form a union.

“Working people should be free to join together to bargain collectively to negotiate for higher wages and better benefits,” said von Wilpert. “An important reason behind the past four decades of stagnant wages is the decline of workers’ ability to join together and negotiate for better pay. If the DOL rescinds the Persuader Rule, it will be further evidence that Trump administration is on the side of corporations over working people.”