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Looks like we?re about this close to Trump shooting a perfect 18 this weekend, if you know what I mean.

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Donald Trump, not the sharpest tool in the shed, sat down for yet another exclusive interview with his nemesis, The New York Times. This should produce a bit of ?real news? today, so go ahead and read the excerpts to soak in the dumbness. Six months in, Trump hasn't passed a single bill of 10 he promised to pass in his first 100 days, not even TreasonCare. Trump can?t make a health care deal because he doesn?t understand health care. Not much Gop legislation is probably a good thing, but that leaves David Waldman and KITM to explore the seamy underbelly of the Trump organization? Irakly ?Ike? Kaveladze is the 8th person to pop out of the Russian collusion meeting tied to Donald Trump Jr., and might be most important in defining what happened. Did wishful thinking and conspiracy sites lead Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner, and Paul Manafort to arrange the meeting? Paul Manafort owed big bucks to pro-Russia interests before he became President Donald Trump?s campaign chairman?then he made (exactly the same number of) big bucks. Then there?s Dana Rohrabacher, who hooked up with Putin before it was cool. Rohrabacher?s aide was tossed under the bus over Russia connections, but that won?t be enough to cover Dana?s tracks to Moscow last year, a secret document he received, his attempt to alter sanctions legislation and to set up a virtual show trial on Capitol Hill. Dana Rohrabacher is dirty? very, very dirty. Banks made billions of student debt disappear with this one weird trick.

(Thanks again to Scott Anderson for the show summary!)

Need more info on how to listen? Find it below the fold.

Donald Trump?s comments during an interview this week with The New York Times reveal a president who believes he is above the law and who has no qualms about hinting at the firing of special counsel Robert Mueller. Indeed, as The New York Times reports:

President Trump?s lawyers and aides are scouring the professional and political backgrounds of investigators hired by the special counsel Robert S. Mueller III, looking for conflicts of interest they could use to discredit the investigation ? or even build a case to fire Mr. Mueller or get some members of his team recused, according to three people with knowledge of the research effort.

Here is The New York Times editorial board on the interview:

In less than an hour on Wednesday afternoon, President Trump found a way to impugn the integrity and threaten the livelihoods of nearly all of the country?s top law enforcement officials, including some he appointed, for one simple reason: They swore an oath to defend the Constitution, not him. 

For a president who sees the rule of law as an annoyance rather than a feature of American democracy, the traitors are everywhere. [...]

In the end, Mr. Trump is concerned with nothing so much as saving his own hide, which means getting rid of the Russia inquiry for good. He previously said this was why he fired Mr. Comey, and it may yet be the undoing of Mr. Sessions, Mr. Rosenstein and Mr. Mueller.

The Boston Herald:

The New York Times interview published yesterday was a scary ? but perhaps not surprising ? look into the mindset of a man who is playing the political game by his own rules ? loyal to no one, other than family perhaps, and unbound by convention.

That is, of course, part of why he was elected in the first place. Many voters found that appealing. But at the six month mark of his presidency the Trump quirkiness has turned to anger and to grievance. Even his most loyal supplicants ? those charged with the grunt work of carrying out the Trump agenda even as he tweets himself into a frenzy ? are suspect.

Essayist and media critic Chris Lehmann at The Baffler writes?More Mush from the Taste Police:

AMID THE GENERAL COLLAPSE of liberal governance, it remains an unshakable article of faith among our pundit class that liberal sensibilities possess a vicelike stranglehold on our cultural life. This fanciful belief may be, at bottom, a kind of wish-fulfillment fantasy: since political commentators must, as a matter of professional pride, hold that their studiously branded mode of thought leadership sternly guides our republic through its many travails and challenges, the attitudes and taste preferences of our opinion makers are a matter of great political moment.

It is, at any rate, a cinch that the prescription of first resort for professional prognosticators of our national politics is this peculiar pundit brand of mind-cure. In this backward-spooling cosmology of our public life, the more stubborn and deep-seated challenges of structural reform, painstaking political organizing, and demanding long-term strategizing yield magisterially to the modulations of attitude, taste, and Zeitgeist fealty that the Vox Populi supposedly demands from its pundit class and the allied liberal cognoscenti. The penalty for noncompliance is severe: a land rush of taste monitors will deem you fatally out-of-touch with the tenor of daily life in these United States.

The first noteworthy paradox in the taste-policing racket is that it?s a singularly lucrative and prestigious one?one that frequently elevates its adepts into the very cultural elite they profess to scorn as they deliver their camera-ready talking points. Charles Murray crafted a stupendously useless book from it, David Brooks has made a career of it, and pollsters lovingly dote over it.

The shortcoming of these prim re-education sermons is that even their hypothetical purchase on the public weal is plainly well past the sell-by date. We have, after all, endured a devastating recession, followed in short order by an austerity-driven upward distribution of wealth, and a white-nationalist uprising on the American right, all within the past decade. On what imaginable planet should the question of how and where liberals feed, entertain, and irksomely congratulate themselves for their reading habits be a subject that any sane person gives a shit about?

Yet, there the pointless, tail-chasing sport of liberal-taste-baiting hulks, smack dab in the center of our approved political discourse. A mere fortnight ago, the tirelessly chastising Pastor Brooks took to his New York Times column to relate the harrowing saga of how the less educated yeoman citizens of the working-class republic are menaced by the specter of Italian cold cuts. (Yes, really.) 

And now, in a sort of clickbaity apotheosis of the genre, comes Business Insider columnist Josh Barro, fretting over a point made by National Review editor Rich Lowry, about how liberals never win credibility among the horny-handed sons and daughters of toil because their cultural preferences are so resolutely foppish. As Barro argues, ?Liberal moralizing tends to read as college-educated people in cities arguing that everyone should behave more like them. Usually, that?s the substance of the moralizing, too.?

And this substantive elite moralizing is just about everywhere, by Barro?s account. Meddlesome cultural Stalinists on the left want you to stop eating hamburgers at home, since meat-intensive agribusiness makes climate change worse (and because every pundit on earth has evidently staked out a position on meat sandwiches). They want you to refrain from watching football, since the sport is retrograde, racist, and dangerous. And the worst part is that they?re just getting started! [...]

If you?re condemned, as I am, to engage in the thankless scut work of media criticism, you?ll discover that the damning hyperlinks Barro supplies to document his case against ?a movement? consist of a fashion-glossy advice column, a CNN explainer video, and a pair of click-bait offerings from British dailies. If this is what constitutes a PC police state in the making, then the HGTV channel must be broadcasting wall-to-wall North Korean agitprop. [...]

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BLAST FROM THE PAST

At Daily Kos on this date in 2006?Bush and African Americans:

Headline: "Bush laments poor Republican relations with blacks."

"I consider it a tragedy that the party of Abraham Lincoln let go of its historic ties to the African American community," Bush said. "For too long my party wrote off the African American vote and many African Americans wrote off the Republican Party."

Republicans didn't "write off" blacks, they used them as a demonizable prop to bring the Dixiecrat vote into their fold.

And who is Bush to talk, given the disaster he ignored in New Orleans? He could rush to DC on a midnight flight to sign the "let's meddle in the Schiavo family's affairs" bill, but couldn't be bothered to cut his six-week vacation short when Katrina hit.

Abraham Lincoln would be no more a modern-day Republican than Strom Thurmond or Jesse Helms would be modern-day Democrats.

You would think this sort of thing had been stamped out, in the futuristic-sounding year of 2017, but apparently we're quite determined to roll back the national clock a few more decades: If you find yourself arrested on drug charges in White County, Tennessee, a judge may reduce your jail time if you agree to have a vasectomy or get a birth control implant so that you do not reproduce.

Judge Benningfield told NewsChannel 5 that he was trying to break a vicious cycle of repeat offenders who constantly come into his courtroom on drug related charges, subsequently can?t afford child support and have trouble finding jobs. [...]

?I understand it won?t be entirely successful but if you reach two or three people, maybe that?s two or three kids not being born under the influence of drugs. I see it as a win, win,? he added.

So if you come into Judge Benningfield's courtroom on drug charges that you can't afford to fight or facing jail time you cannot stomach, you may instead choose to be sterilized so that you cannot have children in the future.

If this sounds to you to be coercive?an offer to get out of an extremely bad situation if you agree to have a medical procedure done on your person?the ACLU agrees with you. The county District Attorney sounds none too happy about it either, so the policy may be reversed rather quickly, now that the national press has gotten wind of it.

Wearing sashes reading ?No hate? and ?United Families,? 15 Latina teens protested Texas?s racist ?show me your papers? law in a quinceañera-themed demonstration organized by grassroots group Jolt. Quinceañeras are traditional celebrations marking a young girl?s transition into adulthood. Quinceañeras "are also about uniting community in celebration,? which became the demonstration?s inspiration. ?SB4 makes simply being brown a crime,? said 17-year-old Magadelena Juarez, one of the quinceañeras. ?We will resist by celebrating our families and our culture. We will resist by standing in unity?:

The protest included speeches by several of the girls and a choreographed dance to traditional music, as well as modern hits like the rap song ?Immigrants? by artists K?naan and Snow Tha Product.

After the dance, the women delivered gift baskets to legislators who voted against SB4. They then delivered photos of 16-year-old protester Jennifer Ramirez posing as the statue of liberty to legislators who voted for SB4. During the protest, Ramirez recited the poem ?The New Colossus,? which is engraved on the Statue of Liberty.

?They built the Statue of Liberty for freedom,? Ramirez said. ?For them to write this law, it doesn?t give us that freedom that they supposedly stand for.?

Gov. Greg Abbott?s SB4 is a clear attack on the state?s Latino and immigrant communities, who make up nearly 40 percent of the population. But for some of the quinceañeras, it gets even more personal. ?I am undocumented, and SB4 is a law that is racist and that has a lot of people scared,? Daniela Rojas, another quinceañera, told the Daily Dot. ?It?s important for the community to fight back. It?s important for us to show our cultural heritage and be proud of it.? 

Senate Republicans are learning that when you try to take health coverage from tens of millions of people, you get some protests. On Wednesday, 155 people were arrested at Republican senators? offices for seeking to defend health care for all of us:

Police officials said in a statement that officers responded to ?demonstration activity? at 45 separate locations in Senate office buildings beginning about 2:15 p.m. Authorities said demonstrators were warned ?to cease and desist with their unlawful demonstration activities? before police made arrests, the statement said.

Officials reported that the 155 people had been charged with crowding, obstructing, or incommoding. Five demonstrators also were charged with resisting arrest.

These people are not just fighting for their own health coverage, they?re fighting for everyone who is on Medicaid, who has a pre-existing condition, who might need care including the essential health benefits Republicans want to make optional. Everyone who is on an Obamacare plan or has used any of the services Obamacare made insurance companies include in every plan. We owe them gratitude and our own action.

Time to jam the phone lines?Republicans are still planning a vote to repeal Obamacare, and this time without a replacement. Call your senator at (202) 224-3121 and tell them repealing Obamacare is SICK, MEAN and CRUEL. Then, tell us how it went.

Indonesian police have opened fire on peaceful protesters in Jayapura, with at least four gunshot wounds and one death. West Papuan activists and families have been forced to flee to the jungle for safety. Indonesian security forces are conducting scores of raids, sweeps and offensives against West Papuan civilians. The attacks are happening during the visit of National Police Chief General Sutarman with over 200 people arrested across West Papua. Journalists have also been attacked by Indonesian police according to Amnesty International...Read more at San Fransisco Bay Area Indymedia. The Indonesian Police chief says any plans to free Papua from Indonesia won't be tolerated, including Flag raising ceremonies on the West Papuan national Day, December 1st.

Calls for Independence by West Papuans have been made since the sham "Act of Free Choice in 1969". They have suffered a neglected genocide at the hands of the Indonesian military (2004) with continued Repression (2007). Thousands of Papuans took to the streets in 2010 and in 2011 rejecting special autonomy, demanding a referendum on independence. Indonesia plans to build 1,500 km of new roads in the next two years to accelerate ?development', increase military presence, and open up more illegal logging. Three Papuans highlighted the human rights abuses at the APEC meeting in Bali this year by scaling the Australian Consulate?s fence in the dead of night and hand-delivering a personal plea to open the Indonesian province to world scrutiny.

A new academic law and human rights report A slow-motion genocide: Indonesian rule in West Papua (PDF), details the extent of the genocide and abuse of human rights. (Review by Greenleft) Activists have called for Australia to End pragmatic complicity in West Papua in response to comments by new conservative Prime Minister Tony Abbott. Imprisoned Papuan leader Selpius Bobii also responded saying, "We Live In Terror, Mr Abbott".

Related: Waging Nonviolence: Flotilla unsettles Indonesia?s occupation of West Papua | West Papuan National Day Goes Global | West Papuans to join commemoration of Eureka Rebellion in Ballarat
More Information: West Papua media Alerts | Freedom Flotilla

Civil society organisations abandoned the COP19 climate change negotiations in Warsaw on mass. Members from Greenpeace, Oxfam, WWF, Actionaid, Friends of the Earth, the International Trade Union Confederation (statement) and 350.org all started leaving the conference at 2pm. This is an unprecedented action, the first time several major civil society groups have staged a mass walkout.

Friends of the Earth International highlighted that the Warsaw Climate Change negotiations were failing, with Tension high in Warsaw talks as G77+China walk out. The role of Australia and reduced ambition of Japan  have been widely mentioned. Australia and Canada are seen as the major wreckers, but there has been substantial intransigence from much of the developed world to progressing the negotiations forward on finance, ambition, and a loss and damage mechanism. Poland's Coal Summit has shown the fossil fuel corporatism entwined in this COP with widespread dismay at the coal powered negotiations of COP19 and at UNFCCC official Christiania Figueres who gave the keynote speech at the coal summit 

Related: Democracy Now: "Nature Does Not Negotiate": Environmentalists Walk Out of U.N. Climate Summit in Warsaw | "Polluters Talk, We Walk": Civil Society Groups Abandon Warsaw Talks over Inaction on Global Warming | "We Have to Consume Less": Scientists Call For Radical Economic Overhaul to Avert Climate Crisis
Analysis: The Warsaw walkout and the Climate Movement

The weekend of 16th and 17th November saw tens of thousands of people in Canada and Australia out in the streets in over 260 protests against the climate policies of these countries. Australia and Canada are seen as the major wreckers in Warsaw at COP19.

The Saturday protests in Canada occurred from coast to coast to Repulse Bay, Nunavut on the Arctic circle, more than 10,000 people gathered in over 180 events co-ordinated by Defend our Climate. Many protests focussed on stopping further expansion of the Alberta tar sands and pipelines to move the bitumenous oil south to Texas, east through Ontario and Quebec, and west through British Columbia. On Sunday, more than 60,000 people attended climate protests across Australia, protesting the attempt to repeal carbon pricing and clean energy programs by the conservative Government lead by Prime Minister Tony Abbott, elected on 7 September this year, who denied any link between climate change and bushfires as unusually early and intense bushfires raged around Sydney.

Civil Society NGO and local Polish activists also staged a Climate Justice march in Warsaw in association with the COP19 climate change negotiations taking place. Super Typhoon Haiyan set the initial mood at the negotiations with Philippines negotiator Naderev Saño (Yeb Saño) saying "time to take action. We need an emergency climate pathway". There is widespread dismay at the coal powered negotiations in Warsaw with Japan and Australia being particularly singled out.

Related: Australia Indymedia - Tens of Thousands rally for Climate Action across Australia

Authorities of Tacloban City with a population of 220,000 and capital of Leyte province, gave an early estimate that perhaps 10,000 people died from this one city. Many people were surprised by the huge storm surge tidal waves that inundated much of the city. Many smaller coastal villages were also devastated with most buildings destroyed or suffering severe damage. According to the UN Reliefweb report on 14 November the number of affected people has increased to 11.8 million. The official death count from Typhoon Haiyan is currently 4,460 but with numbers still increasing. There were 921,200 people displaced and 243,600 houses destroyed. A total of 2.5 million people are in need of food assistance.

Related: Climate IMC: Typhoon Haiyan: This is a climate crime | Time for turning tears into anger says Walden Bello | Philippine groups demand action on climate finance, loss and damage in Warsaw climate talks | Ejected from COP19 for expressing solidarity to the Philippines | Youth observers expelled from UN climate change talks for Philippines Solidarity | Indybay: Super typhoon Haiyan is climate wake-up call | They destroy We suffer Statement on Yolanda?s Aftermath
Non-corporate Typhoon Haiyan Relief Efforts: Waves for Water | Haiyan NYC Relief Project | Doctors without Borders | Oxfam International

Climate Negotiations are over for another year with little progress in Doha by any one's measure as the scientific statements on climate change and the impacts we are already feeling as evidenced in record Arctic melting, and extreme weather events like Hurricane Sandy and Typhoon Bopha in the Philippines, and Cyclone Evan in the South Pacific are growing much stronger.

Some of the latest scientific research shows:

• Sea Level rising 60% faster than IPCC projections
• Methane and CO2 in thawing Arctic permafrost a climate tipping point
• Collapse of Siberia's Coastline is Releasing Huge Amounts of CO2
• Greenland Ice sheet suffers unprecedented surface melt
• Indian Monsoon more likely to fail as global warming accelerates
• Southern Ocean warming impact on Antarctic Ice Sheet Stability and sea level rise

Photos: Photos by World Resources Institute | Photos by Oxfam | The Verb: Climate March in Doha | The Verb: COP18 Actions
Related: Deep emissions cuts urged at climate summit | Towards a Grand Compromise in the Climate Negotiations | COP18, another 'Conference of Polluters' | An open letter to governments and their negotiators | Climate compensation row at Doha | Forest Groups Protest False Solutions | IPCC's Planned Obsolescence: Fifth Assessment Report Will Ignore Crucial Permafrost Carbon Feedback! | Methane and CO2 in thawing Arctic permafrost a climate tipping point