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Posted by Mary Chastain on January 19, 2017 5 Comments
Treasury Secretary nominee Steven Mnuchin faced the Senate Finance Committee on Thursday for his confirmation hearing, answering questions about the dollar and his own investments. Mnuchin worked at Goldman Sachs for 17 years before he "became an investor at ESL Investments and then with his own fund Dune Capital Management." He rescued IndyMac Bank for $1.6 million, renaming it to OneWest. The project succeeded for Mnuchin, who sold it to CIT Group for $3.4 billion in 2015. However, the project faced scrutiny over its foreclosure practices, which Mnuchin defended during his testimony:
About foreclosures, Mnuchin said OneWest extended 100,000 loan modifications to delinquent borrowers. "In the press it has been said that I ran a 'foreclosure machine.' This is not true. On the contrary, I was committed to loan modifications intended to stop foreclosures. I ran a 'Loan Modification Machine,'" Mnuchin said. He also sought to counter the idea that a foreclosure was financially beneficial to OneWest versus a modification.

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Posted by Leslie Eastman on January 19, 2017 21 Comments
I suspect the "Golden Age of Hollywood" would not have been so golden if today's technology were available. Back in the classic era of the American entertainment industry, actors and singers would have agents who would control their appearances to avoid embarrassing episodes that would go public and alienate potential fans. Now, armed with an i-phone and selfie sticks, there is no such layer of protection between celebrities and their buffoonery.

Posted by Mary Chastain on January 19, 2017 14 Comments
The Republican National Committee has chosen Ronna Romney McDaniel as its new chairwoman since President-elect Donald Trump took previous RNC chairman Reince Priebus as his chief of staff. McDaniel served as "chairwoman of the Michigan Republican Party," where she helped Trump win the typical blue state over Hillary Clinton. Both Trump and Priebus gave McDaniel their blessing:
Priebus gave McDaniel a strong endorsement in his final address to the committee, calling McDaniel “the right woman to lead the RNC" and pointed to her ability to turn Michigan red in the election.

Posted by Vijeta Uniyal on January 19, 2017 5 Comments
"The mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the Islamic faithful our soldiers," Turkey's President Recep Erdogan proclaimed these prophetic words during his 'wilderness years' in 1990s. Now firmly in power for well over ten years, Erdogan is executing this game-plan down to the last word. If German Federal Prosecutor is to be believed, mosques across Germany are running spy operations under the directions of Erdogan regime. On Wednesday, Germany’s top state attorney opened an investigation into the activities of Turkish-Islamic organisation known as 'Ditib,' that operates nearly 900 mosques in Germany. Imams in this particular case were reportedly following the orders from Turkey’s state-run religious agency, known as Diyanet, which reports directly to Turkey’s Prime Minister.

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on January 19, 2017 52 Comments
Mike Barnicle might not bring much to the table, but he is still capable of passing along nasty remarks by unnamed sources. On today's Morning Joe, discussing Nikki Haley's preparations for her confirmation hearing as UN Ambassador, Barnicle said, "I was told by somebody within the world of diplomacy and international relations that Nikki Haley makes Sarah Palin sound like Henry Kissinger." Joe Scarborough seemed to have intentionally teed Barnicle up to take his anonymous shot at Haley, asking him "what are you hearing about her?" After Barnicle's gossip, Scarborough weighed in, saying that he'd been hearing for weeks "real concerns with the people that had been prepping her over her complete ignorance of foreign policy."

LEGAL INSURRECTION QUICK TAKES

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UT Austin Funds Graduate Student Research on ‘Reproductive Justice’

Texas Tech Regents Eliminate Several Race, Gender Studies Courses

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Posted by Mary Chastain on January 19, 2017 36 Comments
Former Texas Governor Rick Perry, President-elect Donald Trump's pick to lead the Energy Department, will face the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources at 10AM EST. During the 2012 primary, Perry said he would abolish the Department of Energy if he became president. He also famously forgot the name of the department during one of the debates in November 2011. But that didn' bother Trump:
"As the Governor of Texas, Rick Perry created created a business climate that produced millions of new jobs and lower energy prices in his state, and he will bring that same approach to our entire country as Secretary of Energy," Trump said in a statement. "My administration is going to make sure we take advantage of our huge natural resource deposits to make America energy independent and create vast new wealth for our nation, and Rick Perry is going to do an amazing job as the leader of that process."

Posted by Mike LaChance on January 19, 2017 9 Comments
You may remember that right after the election, Vice President Elect Mike Pence attended a performance of the show 'Hamilton' where he was booed by people in the audience and given a sanctimonious lecture from the stage. The creator of 'Hamilton,' Lin-Manuel Miranda, didn't deliver the speech to Pence, but he wrote it and no matter what anyone says, it was intended as a dig at Pence. Flash forward to now. Obama has granted clemency to convicted terrorist Oscar Lopez Rivera and Lin-Manuel Miranda couldn't be happier about it. He's even going to do a special performance of Hamilton for the man.

Posted by Mary Chastain on January 18, 2017 5 Comments
I live blogged Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt's senate hearing for the EPA, but three other cabinet choices had their own senate hearings today. That included Rep. Tom Price for Health and Human Services, Wilbur Ross for Commerce, and Nikki Haley for UN. Obamacare took control of Price's hearing, since the Republicans in D.C. want to repeal and replace it. Price told the committee that states should lead on a replacement.

Posted by Leslie Eastman on January 18, 2017 13 Comments
As President Obama spends the remainder of his presidency pardoning trangenders who disclosed vital security information, appointing fabulists to key positions, and releasing dangerous Gitmo detainees, people are beginning to mull over what we will remember most about this era. I assert that the damage caused by the rogue bureaucracy within the Environmental Protection Agency will float to the top of legacy cesspool. So, while Democratic politicos grill Scott Pruitt, the candidate likely to head the EPA in the Trump administration, the agency has finished its misrule under Obama appropriately enough.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 18, 2017 15 Comments
If you're a single Trump supporter looking for love, TrumpSingles promises to "make dating great again." I'm not one to knock online dating sites since I met my husband on the interwebs, but candidate-centric dating is just a tad bizarre and probably not a recipe for relationship success.

Posted by William A. Jacobson on January 18, 2017 21 Comments
Ballotpedia is one of our favorite reference websites. It is like Wikipedia for politics, but more in-depth and reliable. Ballotpedia just released a statistical analysis of federal judicial vacancies as Trump enters office, and likely to become available during his term. That takes on great importance given that Democrats in 2013 busted the filibuster ("went nuclear") for judicial nominees below the Supreme Court level, and even as to the Supreme Court it's likely Republicans might go nuclear. So to the extent federal judicial vacancies currently exist or become available in the next four years, Trump should be unstoppable in filling those seats (unless Republicans lose the Senate in 2018, which is unlikely). We pointed out the magnitude of this late last year, Dems’ Nuclear Option will allow Trump to fill over 100 court vacancies quickly.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on January 18, 2017 20 Comments
The nightmare casting has begun. Fresh off her second failed presidential bid, and Hillary's chances at running New York City are being weighed. A Quinnipiac poll released today tested a hypothetical Hillary mayoral race against that of incumbent, Mayor Bill de Blasio. Several other local politicians were thrown into the mix for fun.

Posted by Leslie Eastman on January 18, 2017 21 Comments
After a vigorous day of science and political punditry, I usually unwind with situation comedy shows. Wednesday nights, ABC's The Goldbergs, Speechless, and Modern Family are my usual fare.  Generally, I will turn it off before Black-ish airs, as the social justice messaging offered in the series about a black family man struggling with cultural identity while living in a predominantly white, upper-middle-class neighborhood tends to be more than I can bear.

Posted by Mark Finkelstein on January 18, 2017 27 Comments
Assessing President Obama's legacy, the panelists on today's Morning Joe seemed in competition to outdo each other with misplaced praise. Historian David Maraniss led off, calling Obama "the Jackie Robinson of American electoral politics." Next up was Joe Scarborough, who upped the ante by placing Obama in the same category as Martin Luther King, Jr. Batting clean up, Walter Isaacson hit one out of the hyperbole park, claiming that "Obama will go down as one of the great presidents we have ever had."

Posted by Mary Chastain on January 18, 2017 24 Comments
Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt, President-elect Donald Trump's nominee to lead the EPA, will face the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee at 10AM EST. This has potential to become one of the more feisty confirmation hearings because of his ties to everything Democrats hate: fossil fuels, skeptical of man-made climate change, and lawsuits against the EPA. Please watch live with us below and follow along as I live blog the hearing!

Posted by William A. Jacobson on January 18, 2017 13 Comments
The activists beyond the "Resistance" to Donald Trump's Inauguration are urging students nationwide to walk out of classes on Friday, January 20, 2017, just prior to Trump's swearing in. The College Fix reports:
A student socialist group has organized a nationwide walkout on Friday to protest the presidential inauguration of Donald Trump, fearing the new president and his party will “unleash a storm of attacks” on various segments of the American population. The National Student Walkout Against Bigotry & Hate is organized by Socialist Students, a campus arm of Socialist Alternative.
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