Newsweek:
FBI Director James Comey attempted to go public as early as the summer of 2016 with information on Russia’s campaign to influence the U.S. presidential election, but Obama administration officials blocked him from doing so, two sources with knowledge of the matter tell Newsweek.In other words, contrary to many Leftist wet dreams, this is STRICTLY about the Russians' intentions and possible attempts to influence the election. Certainly, they might have initiated contacts with the Trump campaign members, but did any of those contacts bear fruit for them? If so, what could they possibly have offered? More importantly, WHY would a campaign member offer them anything?
Well before the Department of Homeland Security and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence accused the Russian government of tampering with the U.S. election in an October 7 statement, Comey pitched the idea of writing an op-ed about the Russian campaign during a meeting in the White House’s situation room in June or July.
“He had a draft of it or an outline. He held up a piece of paper in a meeting and said, ‘I want to go forward, what do people think of this?’” says a source with knowledge of the meeting, which included Secretary of State John Kerry, Attorney General Loretta Lynch, Department of Homeland Security secretary Jeh Johnson and the national security adviser Susan Rice.
The other national security officials didn’t like the idea, and White House officials thought the announcement should be a coordinated message backed by multiple agencies, the source says. “An op-ed doesn’t have the same stature, it comes from one person.”
The op-ed would not have mentioned whether the FBI was investigating Donald Trump’s campaign workers or others close to him for links to the Russians’ interference in the election, a second source with knowledge of the request tells Newsweek.
It certainly makes sense that the Russians would want to influence our election. So their motives are not in doubt. But I am sure the Chinese would like to do it also, and have actually done it in the past. Why the concentration on the Russians?
This should absolutely be investigated, but expectations should be tempered. Trump is a very wealthy man, and it is unlikely the Russians have the means to influence him. More likely, there could be a low-level Trump operative who might be influenced.
But even after you dig through all of this, the only thing that really matters was the Democratic National Committee emails and the Clinton campaign emails which were released. And they revealed a whole lot of illicit behavior as well as the Democratic Party's disregard for the American people. If the Democrats had behaved with integrity, there would have been nothing for the Russians to reveal.
In other news about news...
USA Today:
Fox News Network has been sued with new allegations the media giant failed to address racial discrimination against two black women who work for the company.Don't we all hate pedants? Admittedly, if Slater had an issue with their speech, she shouldn't have hired them. If she wasn't the one responsible for the hiring, she should have made sure those who did the hiring recognized her grammatical fetishes.
Tichaona Brown and Tabrese Wright sued the news organization Tuesday in a Bronx Supreme Court lawsuit in New York City that charged they and “other dark-skinned employees suffered years-long racial animus” from Judith Slater, a former senior vice president and company controller.
The lawsuit alleged that Slater “ridiculed black employees by mocking stereotyped speech” and forcing them to pronounce the words ‘mother,’ ‘father,’ ‘month’ and ‘ask’ correctly “in front of white employees.”
Continuing:
The former executive also claimed the Black Lives Matter movement is racist, “and wondered what would happen if there was a parallel ‘White Lives Matter’ movement, the lawsuit alleged.Bad news, social justice warriors: This is true. Heck, Leftists get upset because there is a "Blue Lives Matter" movement to support the police.
Citing this in a lawsuit as an example of racism is actually racist itself.
Continuing:
Aware that Wright had three children, Slater asked her if the children “were fathered by the same man,” the lawsuit charged.Sorry Slater, but you may have to eat this one.
Overall, minus the BLM comment, assuming the allegations are true, Slater sounds like she is on the losing end here. However, she isn't the one being sued. Fox News is.
Slater was fired on Feb. 28, Fox said, challenging the lawsuit’s allegation that the dismissal occurred as the case was going to court. Slater could not immediately be reached for comment.
Brown remains a company employee, Fox said. Wright was not demoted, but instead was transferred to a lateral position with the same work title, salary, and benefits, the company said.The big question is, did these women complain to higher-ups at Fox, or did they go straight to lawsuit mode? The article doesn't state that. To go after the "deep pockets", Fox News in this case, you have to actually give the deep pockets a reasonable chance to respond to your allegations.
There is no doubt this story will be followed closely by the MSM.
In other news not about news...
Associated Press:
House Republicans are taking aim at the Environmental Protection Agency, targeting the way officials use science to develop new regulations.In other words, assuming the bill passes the Senate, the EPA will no longer be able to use fake science to support their regulatory authority.
A bill approved Wednesday by the GOP-controlled House would require that data used to support new regulations to protect human health and the environment be released to the public.
Rep. Lamar Smith, R-Texas, said "the days of 'trust me' science are over," adding that the House bill would restore confidence in the EPA's decision-making process.
Connecticut Rep. Elizabeth Esty and other Democrats said the bill would cripple EPA's ability to conduct scientific research based on confidential medical information and risks privacy violations by exposing sensitive patient data.
Sadly, there is plenty of fake science out there:
Breitbart:
Fewer than 1 percent of papers published in scientific journals follow the scientific method, according to research by Wharton School professor and forecasting expert J. Scott Armstrong.
Professor Armstrong, who co-founded the peer-reviewed Journal of Forecasting in 1982 and the International Journal of Forecasting in 1985, made the claim in a presentation about what he considers to be “alarmism” from forecasters over man-made climate change.
“We also go through journals and rate how well they conform to the scientific method. I used to think that maybe 10 percent of papers in my field … were maybe useful. Now it looks like maybe, one tenth of one percent follow the scientific method” said Armstrong in his presentation, which can be watched in full below. “People just don’t do it.”
Armstrong defined eight criteria for compliance with the scientific method, including full disclosure of methods, data, and other reliable information, conclusions that are consistent with the evidence, valid and simple methods, and valid and reliable data.
...“Why is this all happening? Nobody asks them!” said Armstrong, who says that people who submit papers to journals are not required to follow the scientific method. “You send something to a journal and they don’t tell you what you have to do. They don’t say ‘here’s what science is, here’s how to do it.'”
Digging deeper into their motivations, Armstrong pointed to the wealth of incentives for publishing papers with politically convenient rather than scientific conclusions.If you want to know why, follow the money. Who pays for scientific research? In many fields,it is paid for by governments and Left-leaning educational institutions. So we end up with the science police being politicians and those people with a Leftist political ideology.
“They’re rewarded for doing non-scientific research. One of my favourite examples is testing statistical significance – that’s invalid. It’s been over 100 years we’ve been fighting the fight against that. Even its inventor thought it wasn’t going to amount to anything. You can be rewarded then, for following an invalid [method].”
Armstrong concluded his talk by arguing that scientific evidence should be required for all climate regulations.Maybe that EPA bill in the last news story was a good idea?
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