According to aides who were present when Trump discussed the issue, but who choose to remain anonymous for fear of retribution, Trump said he was sick of Vance and wanted to fire him. “I wanted him to be my attack dog,” said Trump, “but he appears foolish on television. He dropped the college football trophy. He met with Pope Francis and the next day the pope died. Vance is toxic, and I don’t want him to come near me. He just doesn’t look as good on television as I thought he would.”   read more

The worst of the proposals from a human rights standpoint is one put forward by Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-California), the FISA Improvements Act. Her plan would codify the use of current bulk collection programs, would allow intelligence gatherers to query information without prior approval by the FISA Court and would permit the use of intelligence by law enforcement agencies.   read more

The Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction (SIGAR) says that of the $4 billion allotted by the State Department from 2002 to 2013, 69.3% went to DynCorp. In terms of actual dollars, DynCorp took in $2.8 billion. Giving so much to one company might not have been a good idea, given DynCorp’s record. The Project on Government Oversight (POGO) notes the contractor’s “colorful history” includes instances of labor smuggling, overpayments, and botched construction.   read more

In 1999, California Governor Gray Davis (D) appointed Contreras-Sweet secretary of Business, Transportation and Housing. In that role, she managed 44,000 employees and a $14 billion budget. When Arnold Schwarzenegger took over the governor’s office in 2003 after the recall of Davis, Contreras-Sweet left public service and founded Fortius Holdings, a private equity and venture fund aimed at the Latino community.   read more

This comes even though the United States is still the world’s richest country. However, increasing income inequality in the U.S. has caused median incomes to drop even as average incomes increase because of huge gains at the high end of the scale. Poor people in the United States fare even worse, as they are far behind the median incomes of those living in Canada and much of Europe.   read more

Judge Rosemary M. Collyer ruled that, based on a 1979 decision by the Supreme Court, people have no expectation of privacy when dialing phone numbers. However, American Civil Liberties Union staff attorney Patrick C. Toomey told The Washington Post that the 1979 case, Smith v. Maryland, involved the records of one criminal suspect collected over several days. “That case looked nothing like the NSA’s phone-records program," he said.   read more

While O’Brien was undergoing treatment, a state police investigator, trying to help O’Brien’s wife, Stephanie Cannon O’Brien, attempted to file disability retirement papers with the New York State and Local Retirement System from three different hospital fax machines. However, O’Brien died seven minutes before the papers—on the ninth attempt—were successfully received.   read more

Westphal served on Obama’s transition team for defense in 2008. Also that year, he worked with The New School University in New York. Obama made Westphal under secretary of the Army in 2009, where he served until recently. In that post, he was the Army’s chief management officer. Westphal, who speaks Spanish fluently, also had several missions to Latin American, working with the armies in several nations.   read more

Since taking his post in Washington, Cui has seemingly become immersed in American culture. He took his wife, Ni Peijun, to the Super Bowl last February and was photographed on the sidelines. In March 2014, he told a panel in Beijing “I have seen both seasons of ‘House of Cards,’ which I think embodies some of the characteristics and corruption that is present in American politics.”   read more

A small but expanding group of federal judges has thwarted efforts by law enforcement to have carte blanche to pry into the personal communications of suspects. These judges have made it clear that protecting constitutional rights is more important in some cases than helping police conduct broad searches into cell phone and email data. Facciola has characterized some law enforcement efforts to access entire contents of email accounts as “repugnant” to the U.S. Constitution.   read more

The class action lawsuit filed by the city targets the New York and Chicago stock exchanges, NASDAQ and many of the most powerful banks and investment firms in the country: Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Morgan Stanley, Citigroup, Credit Suisse, and Charles Schwab, among others. The alleged fraud involving sophisticated high-frequency trading (HFT) firms resulted in the diversion of “billions of dollars annually from buyers and sellers of securities to themselves.”   read more

JPMorgan Chase recently notified customers who work in adult films that they must close all of their accounts with the bank by May 11. Chase gave no reason for the closures in the hundreds of letters they sent out. Banks have been able to take this stand since a 2012 warning by the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation that included adult entertainment on a list of businesses that might have a higher risk of consumer fraud.   read more

Gilbert’s nomination was approved by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and it now awaits approval by the full Senate. A major campaign bundler, he raised $1.2 million for Obama’s various campaigns. Gilbert was on Obama’s team long before he was on Obama’s campaign and diplomatic teams. Gilbert played seven games in 1985 for the Chicago White Sox, whose most famous fan is the president.   read more

Nahón was named Argentina’s secretary of International Economic Relations in December 2011. She held that post until her posting in Washington. Nahón’s appointment was seen by many Argentinean observers as more evidence that the La Cámpora movement, which grew out of Perónist values and espouses policies of social justice and state intervention, is gaining ground, as some of the old guard are being pushed out in favor of younger La Cámpora members.   read more

“You have people who say, ‘Ewww, I am drinking someone else’s toilet water,’” said Teresa Rose. “But...everyone downstream is already drinking someone else’s toilet water.” The plan “is a bit grotesque,” said Pastor Bob McCartney. “Nobody is excited about taking a leak and seeing it come back at you in the shower,” agreed George Berre.“ Yet converting sewage into drinking water may indeed be the wave of the future.   read more

After years of intense opposition from industry, Vermont is about to become the first state in the nation to require labels on food containing genetically modified organisms. “Genetically engineered foods potentially pose risks to human health and the environment," said Vermont House speaker Shap Smith. "I am proud to be the first state in the nation to recognize that people deserve to know whether the food they consume is genetically modified or engineered.”   read more

The Pentagon informed the Egyptian military, which still controls the country, that 10 Apache helicopters will be heading its way. The decision to ship the Boeing-made hardware was made despite the admission of Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel that the U.S. is “unable to certify that Egypt is taking steps to support a democratic transition.” Secretary of State John Kerry also said that he could not offer any evidence that Egypt was heading back towards democracy.   read more