janea4old

They're still refusing to go through the metal detectors and/or refusing to be wanded. Per tweets from this reporter https://twitter.com/MEPFuller

A power sharing agreement is under discussion between Chuck Schumer and Mitch McConnell, but the two have hit a snag over McConnell's demands .... The VP can break a tie but because the number of Ds & Rs in the Senate are evenly split, there has to be an agreement on who gets to chair the various committees. With the agreement not yet reached, the cabinet confirmation hearings in the Senate committees today -- are being chaired by Republicans. That's because there's some sort of procedure/protocol they have to stick to -- that says that they must keep old committee chairs from the congress that just ended - until new agreement is in place for who chairs in this new congress.

Pittsburgh Mayor account: Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto retweeted this:

I keep watching this over and over.

After the fireworks, I started to come here to post about it ... but then the SON site went down for maintenance at that moment. That was perfect timing, @Errol The day was done.

I loved everything about yesterday and I slept well last night.

You're referring to Nancy Pelosi as Speaker and Patrick Leahy as President Pro Temp of the Senate ... But I'm not following your train of thought regarding Biden and Harris. What do you mean?

Presumably Patrick Leahy.

Are you watching the virtual inaugural parties/balls tonight? Asian-American and Pacific Islanders AAPI Inaugural Ball: Breaking Barriers In partnership with IMPACT and RUN AAPI, we are joining an Inaugural Ball celebrating the Asian American and Pacific Islander communities and the multitude of contributions they make to our nation. The event will feature remarks from AAPI organizers, political leaders, celebrities and musical, comedy, and cultural performances. Confirmed participants include OMB Director-designate Neera Tanden; Reps. Ami Bera, Pramila Jayapal, Andy Kim, and Raja Krishnamoorthi; former Olympian Michelle Kwan; actors Kal Penn, John Cho, Kumail Nanjiani, and Chloe Bennet; performances by Japanese Breakfast, Ari Afsar, Raja Kumari; and more. --------------------------------------- We Are One: The Presidential Inaugural Committee will host an evening celebration to honor and celebrate all within the Black Community and African Diaspora featuring powerful speakers, inspiring stories, and entertaining performances. The event will be hosted by Terrence J and feature appearances by Leslie Jones, Frankie Beverly, Stacey Abrams, Whip Jim Clyburn, Rep. Cedric Richmond, Congressional Black Caucus Chairwoman Rep. Joyce Beatty, Senator Cory Booker, Senator-Elect Rev. Raphael Warnock, Kim Fields, Erika Alexander, and Jason George. It will also feature a special performance by Tobe Nwigwe, in addition to performances by DJ D-Nice, The O’Jays, Rapsody, Step Afrika, the String Queens, the Texas Southern University Debate Team, and more. The event will also include a Battle of the Bands, featuring Florida A&M University Marching 100, Grambling State University World Famed Marching Band, Jackson State University Sonic Boom of the South, Louisiana Leadership Institute All-star Marching Band, South Carolina State University Marching 101, Southern University Human Jukebox Marching Band, and the Tennessee State University Aristocrat of Bands. Remember DJ D-Nice of the instagram live stay-home virtual DJ dance parties? He's playing music in between each speaker/performer The O-Jays! The HBCU marching bands- a montage of a minute or less from each band. Wish there was more. ---------------------------------------- Latino Inaugural 2021: Inheritance, Resilience & Promise In partnership with the Hispanic Federation and over 50 co-host organizations, we are joining an Inaugural tribute to tell the story of Latinos’ contributions to our nation. The event will be hosted by Eva Longoria and feature appearances by Lin-Manuel Miranda, John Leguizamo, Rita Moreno, Edward James Olmos, Ivy Queen, and Becky G. There will be musical performances from Gilberto Santa Rosa, Gaby Moreno featuring David Garza, and All-Star Tejanos United – Stefani Montiel, Jose Posada, Shelly Lares, DJ Kane, and Mariachi Nuevo Santander from Roma High School in Roma, Texas. The event will also include an Emilio Estefan produced performance of One World, One Prayer by the Wailers, featuring Skip Marley, Farruko, Shaggy and Cedella Marley. The Latino Inaugural 2021 event will stream live at bideninaugural.org/watch, The Choice channel on Peacock, Telemundo’s digital and social platforms, Univision’s digital and social platforms, and on Hispanic Federation and PIC social channels from 9:30-10:30 PM Eastern. Closed captioning will be provided on the Peacock stream.

https://apnews.com/article/biden-inauguration-joe-biden-860c2c28bb3b45a28625352df50de294 Federal law enforcement officials have also been wary of increased surveillance of military and law enforcement checkpoints and other positions after National Guard troops reported people taking pictures and recording them, said the officials, who spoke to the AP on condition of anonymity to discuss ongoing security matters. The Secret Service issued a bulletin over the weekend about what it sees as an “uptick” in National Guard troops posting pictures and details of their operations online. The Associated Press obtained the “all concerned” message sent to all National Guard troops coming to Washington. Without getting into specific postings, the bulletin read: “No service members should be posting locations, pictures or descriptions online regarding current operations or the sensitive sites they are protecting” and urged them to stop immediately. Asked about the bulletin, a spokesperson for the Secret Service issued a statement saying it “does not comment on matters of protective intelligence.” Contacted by the AP Tuesday morning, the National Guard Bureau referred questions to the U.S. Secret Service and said: “Due to operational security, we do not discuss the process nor the outcome of the vetting process for military members supporting the inauguration.”

Biden selects transgender doctor Rachel Levine as assistant secretary of health. She is currently Pennsylvania’s secretary of health. https://www.washingtonpost.com/health/2021/01/19/rachel-levine-transgender-biden-hhs-pick/ archived copy - no log-in required: https://archive.is/piVOe

oops broken link never mind

archive of full WSJ article: https://archive.is/l0O8H

^ The New Yorker put the video on its youtube channel You can see free archive of the full original New Yorker article at this link: https://archive.is/8ng8f And yes it's worth reading. I recommend reading article AND watching but warning that it's terrifying. I had to take a break after watching. Fyi, the English subtitles on the Mediaite copy of the video capture every word clearly. The youtube subtitles are fuzzy. https://www.mediaite.com/news/where-the-fck-is-nancy-the-new-yorker-shares-stunning-new-capitol-mob-footage/

Parler is suing Amazon because Amazon evicted them from its platform. https://www.seattletimes.com/business/amazon/seattle-judge-to-rule-as-quickly-as-possible-on-whether-to-force-amazon-to-put-parler-back-online/ "Remaining offline would likely “kill Parler’s business — at the very time it is set to skyrocket,” the company said in its complaint. Parler had expected Trump would join the service after he was suspended from Twitter on Friday, likely bringing millions of new users with him, the company said in court filings this week. -- I don't even know how to comment on that.

You can see it at the bottom of this article: https://www.cnn.com/2021/01/13/politics/democrat-impeachment-plans-behind-the-scenes/index.html

Jennifer Lopez will also perform at the Jan. 20 swearing-in ceremony. -------------------------------------------

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/amberjamieson/capitol-riot-arrests-confederate-flag-man-ex-firefighter Quoting article Robert Sanford, a 55-year-old who recently retired from the Chester Fire Department, was arrested Thursday in Pennsylvania on four federal charges, including assaulting an officer, civil disorder, disorderly conduct on Capitol grounds, and knowingly entering a restricted building. According to court documents filed by the FBI, authorities believe video shows Sanford throwing a "red object, which appears to be a fire extinguisher" at a crowd of police officers, striking three of them. The incident is different than the one involving Capitol Police Officer Brian D. Sicknick, who was killed last week during the Capitol riot after reportedly being hit with another fire extinguisher.

The Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle is usually simply called "Fred Hutch". They one of the top medical research institutes. They collaborate with the University of Washington science departments and medical school in Seattle, along with a few other medical facilities in Seattle. The coordinated efforts of all this Seattle scientific/medical research makes the combined group very high ranking in reputation. Because of this research collaboration, some of the staff at Fred Hutch research medical stuff that isn't cancer. It's all sorts of medical research. Trevor Bedford is one of the Seattle research team scientists. He is one of the top scientists in the USA who specializes in influenza strains, virus strains, epidemics, and the genomes thereof. Bio: https://bedford.io/team/trevor-bedford/ He's been tracking the COVID-19 coronavirus for the past year. This is his lab website: https://bedford.io/ He works with Next Strain which is explain here: https://nextstrain.org/ I've been following his twitter since the first USA COVID case was announced in the news in early 2020. It's very scientific, and I don't know enough science to understand most of it. But if I read a news story about a new strain, I go to his twitter and there's usually something about whatever is happening -- if what is reported is real. He has a new twitter thread today (Thurs. Jan. 14, 2021) about the new South Africa COVID variant. It's a 19-tweet thread, complete with illustrations, and I won't pretend to explain it, but click to open the first tweet here, and then read all his replies to himself in the thread:

This is probably going to upset him more than many things. He really loves military parades. Remember when he visited Macron in Paris and he(Trump) thought the most important thing was when he got to see a military parade in Paris that was already scheduled and had nothing to do with him. He was so excited. Remember when he wanted some ginormous Soviet-style parade in his honor in 2018 but it was cancelled due to being extremely expensive. Remember when he said he didn't want to include wounded veterans in a military parade, on grounds that spectators would feel uncomfortable in the presence of amputees. “Nobody wants to see that,” he said. Remember when he he was visiting Europe but refused to visit the graves of soldiers who had died there in World War I. Remember when he referred to former President George H. W. Bush as a “loser” for being shot down by the Japanese as a Navy pilot in World War II. Remember when he said Senator John McCain was a loser because he had been a POW in Vietnam. Remember when he was standing with John Kelly at Arlington National Cemetery at John Kelly's son's grave -- and Trump said he couldn't understand why anyone would want a career as a soldier because he believes that nothing is worth doing without the promise of monetary payback, and that talented people who don’t pursue riches are “losers.” Damn straight, the Pentagon will not host a traditional Armed Forces Farewell tribute for him as he leaves. Edit to add: But he had no problem requesting the military to surround him at a photo op - he likes the military only if they can be used for his glorification.

More on DHS - Department of Homeland Security. Before the early 2000s, there was no DHS. There was only FEMA -Federal Emergency Management Agency. FEMA is known for helping with natural disasters and manmade disasters. Things like hurricanes or a bridge collapse, etc. DHS was formed after the Sept. 11. 2001 terror attacks. FEMA became a subsidiary of DHS. In recent years, Chad Wolf was a policy official at DHS, who was one of the ones responsible for the family separation policy, among other bad stuff. His official title was “Assistant Secretary of DHS for Strategy, Plans, Analysis & Risk”. In April 2019, the actual Director of DHS Kirstjen Nielsen stepped down. Kevin McAleenan was named temporary Acting Director of DHS. McAleenan was never ratified by the Senate, so never was officially the director. Later in 2019, stepped down. Chad Wolf became the "Acting Director" of DHS - unofficially. In normal times, the President should have immediately nominated a replacement who could have been Wolf or anyone else- and then the Senate would have to do a formal confirmation process of the nominee. There would be no new actual Director until the Senate confirms him/her. Trump didn't nominate anyone so there was nobody for the Senate to confirm. Chad Wolf continued functioning in the role of UNOFFICIALLY running DSH for more than a year, even though that wasn't legal. While in this unofficial role, Chad Wolf issued some racist directives/edicts/rules while "in office". There were legal challenges in the courts saying none of his edicts/directives were lawful - because he was never lawfully in the job - because he was never confirmed. The courts ruled in favor of the plaintiffs, which meant that all his racist directives/edicts were voided. In August 2020, Trump finally nominated Wolf, but the Senate never got around to confirming him. So he remained illegally functioning in the role. A few days ago (Jan. 11, 2021), Chad Wolf announced that he was stepping down as Director of DHS, because the courts had declared he was not a valid director. Nobody knew what that meant -- but people wondered if it had to do with the transition to Biden -- or because he was another rat leaving the ship of rats. Following what remained of the line of succession, FEMA Administrator Pete Gaynor has become the new Acting Director of DHS. Yesterday (Jan. 13, 2021), Chad Wolf reminded everyone that he hadn’t left DHS. He had merely stopped functioning as Director, and he has returned to his original job at DHS as “Assistant Secretary of DHS for Strategy, Polices, Plans” which is a position of some authority and does not require Senate confirmation. Furthermore, he says that the newt Acting Director of DHS (FEMA's Gaynor) has issued a directive giving Wolf additional powers which include ratifying Wolf's prior polices/edicts, and ratifying stuff started by prior DHS secretaries, including stuff from the prior unofficial acting secretary McAleenan, and other officials. Then Wolf says that he has analyzed all those policies, (including all of his previous racist edicts that the courts voided because he wasn’t in charge) and he declares them to be reasonable policies he hereby declares them ratified, and is putting them into action. So basically as @emptywheel tweeted, he's focused on harming as many immigrants as he can in his final week. Instead of doing his job which would be analyzing ACTUAL terrorists who are white Americans.

This is about DHS- Dept of Homeland Security which was formed in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 -- to protect the US from terror attacks. (and they try to accuse immigrants of crimes because of that) Regarding why DHS didn't warn anyone about the Jan 6, 2021 attack: quoting snippets of the article linked in the tweet: https://talkingpointsmemo.com/muckraker/why-dhs-failed-to-warn-the-country-about-jan-6 “Nobody wanted to write a formal intelligence report about this, in part out of fear that such a report would be very poorly received by the MAGA folks within DHS,” one former DHS official who served in the Trump administration told TPM, on condition of anonymity to speak freely. One whistleblower, ...... said that DHS officials had ordered him to stay away from the threat of white nationalism. Former officials at DHS echoed the whistleblower’s comments, saying that a climate of fear had been instilled in the office which made intelligence officers want to “keep their heads down” for fear of their jobs.