Former White House photographer Pete Souza has announced a new book of his photography titled, Shade: A Tale of Two Presidents.
In announcing the book earlier this year, the publisher shared that the book would contrast the two presidents with “unforgettable images of President Obama delivering new power and meaning when framed by tweets, headlines, quotes, and other material from the first 500 days of the Trump administration.”
In revealing the cover via his Instagram, Souza wrote, “If OBAMA: An Intimate Portrait is a coffee table book, then SHADE is an every table book. If you’ve been following my Instagram feed since the last inauguration, then you have an idea what this book is about (but of course there will be some surprises.”
With a drop date of October 16, you can pre-order the new book here.
The photographer, who currently has almost 2 million followers on Instagram, regularly uses the platform to troll Donald Trump via photos from Obama’s presidency and contrasting with whatever is in the current news cycle.
At one point last year, he shared a series of 15 Time Magazine covers captioned: “Someone has a lot of catching up to do.”
If you don’t follow him there, you should. He’s very clever.
As the public battle about family separations at the U.S. southern border rages on, reports show the Trump administration is taking money from HIV/AIDS programs to fund further separations.
The Office of Refugee Resettlement is looking ahead at the possibility that 25,450 more beds for immigrant children could be needed by year’s end.
The office, part of the Department of Health and Human Services, was apparently surprised when U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the new “zero tolerance” policy that families would be separated if caught crossing the border without authorization.
Under the policy, parents are imprisoned and children have been placed in cages that Sen. Jeff Merkley, who visited a facility, described as resembling “dog kennels.”
Now, in preparation for a new surge of family separations, the HHS is not only asking for supplemental funds, but according to news website Slate is also planning to reallocate money from the Ryan White HIV/AIDS Program.
The Ryan White CARE Act was introduced in 1990 by Sen. Ted Kennedy weeks after the death of its namesake Ohio teen, who had been infected with HIV via a blood transfusion to treat his hemophilia. The bill was signed into law by President George H.W. Bush.
According to the program’s website, the Ryan White HIV/AIDS program “provides a comprehensive system of care that includes primary medical care and essential support services for people living with HIV who are uninsured or underinsured.”
Slate’s reporting indicates the process of transferring those HIV/AIDS funds has already begun.
This is just one more example of the Trump/Pence administration’s bias against the LGBTQ community which is massively impacted by the HIV/AIDS epidemic.
On his 2000 Congressional campaign website, Pence posted:
“Congress should support the reauthorization of the Ryan White Care Act only after completion of an audit to ensure that federal dollars were no longer being given to organisations that celebrate and encourage the types of behaviours that facilitate the spreading of the HIV virus.
“Resources should be directed toward those institutions which provide assistance to those seeking to change their sexual behavior.”
Additionally, HHS is moving $79 million from refugee resettlement programs. The loss of those funds will undercut medical assistance and social services for refugees in the United States.
You may recall the sad tale of Dwight Hammond Jr. and his son Steven Hammond who, in 2012, were convicted in of arson.
The two men were sentenced to five years in prison in 2016 for setting fire to public land over a dispute regarding grazing rights for their cattle. The incident escalated giving rise to an armed takeover of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge.
Today, the White House announced that Donald Trump has commuted the mens’ sentences calling them ‘devoted family men’ and ‘respected contributors to their local community.’
From the White House:
The Hammonds are devoted family men, respected contributors to their local community, and have widespread support from their neighbors, local law enforcement, and farmers and ranchers across the West. Justice is overdue for Dwight and Steven Hammond, both of whom are entirely deserving of these Grants of Executive Clemency.
Some Trump pardons:
1) Sheriff who refused to comply with court orders
2) Political activist who committed campaign finance fraud
Twice this past month, Trump has added “firefighters” to the usual list of people he says he’s standing up for, along with ICE and the military. Steven Hammond was convicted of setting a 2006 fire that jeopardized the lives of four federal firefighters he knew were nearby.
As an American, I am dismayed to learn of the pardons issued to Dwight and Steven Hammond. As an Oregonian, I’m disgusted. They are arsonists and have caused nothing but harm to our state and country. What of the jobs lost, the laws broken and the money spent on these criminals?
CNN’s Brian Stelter breaks down the very unusual relationship between Fox News and Donald Trump.
From Trump’s regular appearances going back to 2011 to consulting with Fox News host Sean Hannity on a regular basis, Stelter goes into how odd it is.
Stelter sees the conservative network’s support for Trump as a sort of “merger between a culture-war TV station and a culture-war president.”
Many are beginning to call Fox News the ‘state-run news organization.’
Watch below.
“No TV host has ever had this kind of relationship with a US president before … Sure, Obama had big fans on MSNBC, but … no one ever thought Keith Olbermann was Obama’s ‘shadow Chief of Staff'”: @BrianStelter on the relationship between Trump and Fox’s Hannity pic.twitter.com/C46vYLryA8
— Reliable Sources (@ReliableSources) July 8, 2018
In a rare Saturday afternoon announcement, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said it will stop collecting and paying out money under the ACA’s “risk adjustment” program, drawing swift protest from the health insurance industry.
Risk adjustment is one of three methods built into the 2010 health-care law to help insulate insurance companies from the ACA requirement that they accept all customers for the first time — healthy and sick — without charging more to those who need substantial care.
In its announcement, CMS said that it is not going to make $10.4 billion in payments that are due to insurers in the fall for expenses incurred by insurers last year.
This is the latest step the Trump administration has taken in its attempts to dismantle the healthcare law via executive powers.
In 2017, the sign-up period for Americans to buy ACA health plans was cut in half by healthcare officials.
Also, the advertising campaign for the signup period was cut by 90 percent.
Last October, the president ended cost-sharing reduction payments to insurers, which helps balance the law’s requirement to provide discounts on deductibles and other out-of-pocket costs to low-income customers.
Donald Trump’s Saturday morning tweet shared the news that Twitter is now suspending or deleting fake accounts at a much higher pace than ever before in an attempt to stave the flow of fake news.
For once, he actually tweeted something true. At least, the first sentence is true. Then he goes into his used-car salesman routine.
“Twitter is getting rid of fake accounts at a record pace. Will that include the Failing New York Times and propaganda machine for Amazon, the Washington Post, who constantly quote anonymous sources that, in my opinion, don’t exist – They will both be out of business in 7 years!” wrote the Trumpster.
Ironically, the tweet was clearly inspired by this story in the (ahem) Washington Post.
Twitter is getting rid of fake accounts at a record pace. Will that include the Failing New York Times and propaganda machine for Amazon, the Washington Post, who constantly quote anonymous sources that, in my opinion, don’t exist – They will both be out of business in 7 years!
While Trump loves to say the ‘anonymous sources’ quoted by major newspapers and media outlets don’t really exist, the fact is the journalists at outlets like the New York Times and Washington Post love winning awards and being heralded for their work. And all it takes is one manufactured “quote” to ruin a lifetime of reputation.
No true journalist is going to commit professional suicide over Donald Trump. It’s just not going to happen.
People may make mistakes. And when it happens, we see outlets like the New York Times or the Washington Post print a retraction/correction.
Donald Trump took to Twitter today to, yet again, lie and contort facts.
In his post, the Trumpster seems to be gloating that he “Just won lawsuit filed by the DNC and a bunch of Democrat crazies trying to claim the Trump Campaign (and others), colluded with Russia.”
“They haven’t figured out that this was an excuse for them losing the election,” he added.
Now, there was a court case filed against Trump, but that’s about the only nugget of truth in his tweet.
The case was not brought by the Democratic National Committee but by two DNC donors and a former staffer.
The trio allege that Trump’s 2016 campaign conspired with Russian agents and WikiLeaks to publish emails hacked from the Democratic National Committee.
Trump didn’t ‘win’ the case, it was dismissed by federal Judge Ellen Huvelle on the grounds that, in her opinion, the case belonged not in federal court but in New York state courts where alleged meetings between campaign staffers and Russian agents are said to have taken place.
The judge pointedly wrote that her ruling was “not based on a finding that there was no collusion between defendants and Russia during the 2016 presidential election.”
Donald Trump went on a Twitter rant this morning railing against the concept of due process for immigrants who come to America.
In a series of tweets, the Trumpster demanded that Congress enact new laws that would allow law enforcement at the U.S. border to kick out people entering the country “just as they would if they were standing on your front lawn.”
Along the way, he called current laws “INSANE” and denouncing the process of legal proceedings by judges in immigration cases.
Congress must pass smart, fast and reasonable Immigration Laws now. Law Enforcement at the Border is doing a great job, but the laws they are forced to work with are insane. When people, with or without children, enter our Country, they must be told to leave without our……..
…..Country being forced to endure a long and costly trial. Tell the people “OUT,” and they must leave, just as they would if they were standing on your front lawn. Hiring thousands of “judges” does not work and is not acceptable – only Country in the World that does this!
On the occasion of the 242nd birthday of the United States of America, again recall the words of our foundational creed: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
Enter the current occupant of the White House, who devotes this nation’s potent energies to barricading the borders, to separating refuge-seeking mothers from children, to ordering parents to leave the country with or without their kids now that a court has ordered their reunion.
The Declaration of Independence spoke to such arbitrary cruelty, against an arrogant monarch who “has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither…”
The President who plays king won’t conquer the bedrock values this nation was founded on.
