I loved this on last night’s Real Time with Bill Maher – Piers Morgan being told to fuck off after defending Donald Trump.
Bill Maher began by asking for an apology from all those folks who said “Hillary as lesser of two evils” now that we see the hot cup of crazy we have in the White House now.
After comedian Jim Jeffries told Morgan he was sucking up to Trump just because he won The Celebrity Apprentice and enjoys having a famous friend, Morgan called Jeffries ridiculous, unpleasant, and “losing his audience.”
Check how the audience reacts when Jeffries asks the audience for their opinion. Here’s a hint: not so great for Morgan.
In truth, most Americans had no idea who Piers Morgan was until his run on Celebrity Apprentice. He owes a lot of his U.S. fame to the Donald. No wonder he’s so “loyal.”
According to Business Insider, there’s more bad news on the retail front for the Trump organization:
Sears’ and Kmart’s websites no longer sell products from the Trump Home line, which is owned by the Trump Organization. As of Friday, a search for Trump Home items on both retailers’ sites yielded no results, except items sold by third-party sellers.
“As part of the company’s initiative to optimize its online product assortment, we constantly refine that assortment to focus on our most profitable items,” a Sears Holdings spokesperson told Business Insider. “Amid that streamlining effort, 31 Trump Home items were among the items removed online this week. Products from the line are still offered online via third-party Marketplace vendors.”
During the presidential campaign, Donald Trump initially suggested he supported transgender rights during the campaign, but later retreated saying it should be left to the states.
Now, just two days after Jeff Sessions became Attorney General, his administration is signaling a step back from support for trans protections in a current lawsuit in the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals.
The Justice Department took a step back Friday from its prior position of advancing transgender people’s rights under existing civil rights laws. On just the second day of Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ tenure at the helm of the Justice Department, the federal government filed a notice in the lawsuit Texas and other states had brought against the Obama administration’s pro-transgender policies.
The moves taken in the filing — a joint filing made with the states — suggest that the federal government’s position on the pending legal questions surrounding transgender people’s rights could be changing soon. At the least, it suggests the new administration is pulling back while it determines the position it will be taking in the case.
The Justice Department announced in the short filing that it was withdrawing its request that the US Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit limit a lower court’s nationwide injunction of the pro-transgender policies to instead cover only those states that had brought the litigation. Then, in a joint request with the states challenging the policy, the states and the Justice Department both requested that the oral arguments on that issue be removed from the court’s calendar.
• First things first – from sexiest math teacher turned model Pietro Boselli’s Instagram (above). #dead #woof
• North Carolina state lawmakers have filed bills that would repeal anti-LGBT law, HB2.
• A new poll shows 35% of Americans don’t know “Obamacare” and the Affordable Care Act are the same thing.
• Melania Trump was conspicuously absent earlier today when Prime Minister Abe Shinzo and his wife visited the White House. First Ladies traditionally welcome and host the spouses of visiting leaders – but not today.
• Check out these 5 buzz-worthy off-Broadway shows you should see – including my pal Ed Dixon’s new hit show, Georgie: My Adventures With George Rose.
• Dance your way into the weekend with Hercules & Love Affair’s “Controller” featuring vocals by Faris Badwan. Check out the catchy, hypnotic sex anthem below:
Earlier today I reported that President Trump had hinted he might issued a new executive order on immigration instead of fighting his current losing battle in the courts.
Trump again gave a nod to a new executive order while traveling with reporters today onboard Air Force One.
The decision to not go to the Supreme Court comes as the White House is examining several options to save President Donald Trump’s controversial executive order on immigration.
“We will win that battle. The unfortunate part is that it takes time statutorily, but we will win that battle. We also have a lot of other options, including just filing a brand new order,” Trump told reporters onboard Air Force One Friday evening.
Asked if his plan might be to issue a new executive order, POTUS said: “It very well could be. We need speed for reasons of security, so it very well could be.”
In the aftermath of a federal appellate court’s decisive blow to Trump’s move to ban citizens of seven majority-Muslim countries from entering the United States, the White House is working on “possible tweaks” to the executive order, according to a source in close contact with the White House on national security issues.
Should it write a new order, it would be more narrowly tailored than the one issued two weeks ago, the source said, such as explicitly stating that it does not apply to legal permanent residents.
President Trump apparently went back into “voter fraud” mode yesterday during a bipartisan meeting of U.S. Senators meant to shore up support for Trump’s nominee for SCOTUS, Judge Neil Gorsuch.
Reporters were allowed in the room, but it was after the journalists were escorted out that Trump went on another rant saying he’d have won the popular vote in the presidential election if not for fraud.
As soon as the door closed and the reporters allowed to observe for a few minutes had been ushered out, Trump began to talk about the election, participants said, triggered by the presence of former New Hampshire Sen. Kelly Ayotte, who lost her reelection bid in November and is now working for Trump as a Capitol Hill liaison, or “Sherpa,” on the Supreme Court nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch.
The president claimed that he and Ayotte both would have been victorious in the Granite State if not for the “thousands” of people who were “brought in on buses” from neighboring Massachusetts to “illegally” vote in New Hampshire.
According to one participant who described the meeting, “an uncomfortable silence” momentarily overtook the room.
Trump also teased Ayotte by saying, “You’d have won if you’d been on my train.”
National Security Adviser Michael Flynn is in the hot seat as transcripts indicate he discussed easing sanctions on Russia with the Russian ambassador before Trump took office.
Flynn has maintained that, prior to the inauguration, he had not communicated with Russia other than to begin planning for a phone call between then President-elect Trump and Russian President Putin.
Any discussion of easing sanctions while President Obama was still in office could be considered a potential violation of the Logan Act, which prohibits private citizens from negotiating with foreign governments in disputes involving the American government.
Throughout the discussions, the message Mr. Flynn conveyed to the ambassador, Sergey I. Kislyak — that the Obama administration was Moscow’s adversary and that relations with Russia would change under Mr. Trump — was unambiguous and highly inappropriate, the officials said.
The accounts of the conversations raise the prospect that Mr. Flynn violated a law against private citizens’ engaging in diplomacy, and directly contradict statements made by Trump advisers. They have said that Mr. Flynn spoke to Mr. Kislyak a few days after Christmas merely to arrange a phone call between President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia and Mr. Trump after the inauguration.
But current and former American officials said that conversation — which took place the day before the Obama administration imposed sanctions on Russia over accusations that it used cyberattacks to help sway the election in Mr. Trump’s favor — ranged far beyond the logistics of a post-inauguration phone call. And they said it was only one in a series of contacts between the two men that began before the election and also included talk of cooperating in the fight against the Islamic State, along with other issues.Trump
Some officials regarded the conversation as a potential violation of the Logan Act, which prohibits private citizens from negotiating with foreign governments in disputes involving the American government, according to one current and one former American official familiar with the case.
Federal officials who have read the transcript of the call were surprised by Mr. Flynn’s comments, since he would have known that American eavesdroppers closely monitor such calls. They were even more surprised that Mr. Trump’s team publicly denied that the topics of conversation included sanctions.
Earlier today, President Trump hinted that his administration may come up with a new executive order to replace/address issues with his immigration policy which has been put on hold by two federal courts.
“We’ll be doing something very rapidly having to do with additional security for our country,” Trump said during a joint press conference with Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe. “You’ll be seeing that some time next week.”
You can watch Trump’s comments at The Hill. The video was auto=play, and nobody likes that 😉
It’s called the Tennessee Natural Marriage Defense Act, with bills filed by Sen. Mae Beavers in the Senate and Rep. Mark Pody in the House.
The bills define marriage as between one man, and one woman in Tennessee, despite what outside courts decide.
Both Sen. Beavers and Rep. Pody declined comment on the bill, telling News 2 that questions would be answered at a press conference next week.
They argue that despite the Supreme Court’s 2015 ruling, same sex marriage is unlawful and all unlawful orders “remain unlawful and should be resisted.” The time and date for the Tennessee Natural Marriage Defense Act has not been set.
