Whistleblower's lawyer questions GOP senator's whistleblower protection caucus membership

A lawyer representing the whistleblower, whose complaint filed to Congress was the impetus for the impeachment inquiry, questioned why Sen. Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.) remains a member of the whistleblower protection caucus following a November comment about his client who brought attention to President Trump's dealings with Ukraine.

"Sen #Whistleblower Protection Caucus was launched by bipartisan group in 2015 to raise awareness of need for adequate protections against retaliation for govt employees who call attention to wrongdoing," attorney Mark Zaid tweeted on Thursday.

"Why is Sen @MarshaBlackburn still member given her hostility towards #WBers?" he added.

Zaid particularly referred to a Nov. 22 tweet by Blackburn in which she referred to impeachment witness Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman as the "whistleblower's handler."

Many Republicans criticized the anonymous whistleblower, whose complaint eventually led to the impeachment inquiry into Trump and called on the person to testify.

In 2015, a group of bipartisan Senators launched the Whistleblower Protection Caucus to "foster bipartisan discussion on legislative issues affecting the treatment of whistleblowers and serve as a clearinghouse for current information on whistleblower developments of interest."

Blackburn became a member of the group this year.

https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/475974-ukraine-whistleblowers-lawyer-questions-gop-senators-whistleblower-protection

Looks like Blackburn was over the target…

Gas leak in DC prompts evacuations and Metro delays

A gas leak near the Washington, D.C., Navy Yard Metro station Thursday afternoon shut down a portion of the transit system’s Green Line and forced the evacuation of some nearby high-rise buildings, according to WTOP.

“What we found when we arrived is that a construction crew had breached a high-pressure gas line,” Vito Maggiolo, public information officer for D.C. Fire and EMS Department, told the news network earlier in the afternoon. “Right now, we’re being told it’s 4 inches in diameter, and we had gas flowing freely.”

Officials attributed the leak, as well as the evacuations of several local high-rise buildings, to a “large outside gas line breach” in the 1200 block of Half Street Southeast, adding that the safety perimeter extended a block in all directions, according to WTOP.

Maggiolo said there were no injuries but that nearby buildings and a construction site were evacuated out of “an abundance of caution.”

D.C. Fire and EMS tweeted that it had stopped the leak around 2:51 p.m.

https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/475975-gas-leak-in-dc-prompts-evacuations-and-metro-delays

Everytime I see "gas leak" or 'family health issues' in the news I smell a sulfurous aroma…

California Faces Lowest Population Growth Since 1900 After Decades Of Economically Ignorant Policies

As reported by the LA Times, according to data recently released by the Department of Finance, California’s population growth rate for the year ending July 1, 2019, was the lowest the state has experienced since 1900. Estimates indicate the Golden State’s population grew by 0.35 percent over the course of the year (or by 141,000 people), down from 0.57 percent for the previous year ending July 1, 2018.

California’s growth in population was buoyed by the net difference between births and deaths in the state, which amounted to 180,800 people. However, this number was tempered by net losses in migration, which indicate more people are exiting the state than entering it.

While international migration or legal immigration into the state added to California’s population, there was significant negative domestic migration — or rather, people leaving California for other states — amounting to nearly 40,000 residents. According to the Department of Finance, this phenomenon represents “the first time since the 2010 census that California has had more people leaving the state than moving in from abroad or other states.”

What Happened to California’s Population Growth?

https://thefederalist.com/2019/12/26/california-faces-lowest-population-growth-since-1900-after-decades-of-economically-ignorant-policies/

California population growth slowest since 1900 as residents leave, immigration decelerates

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-12-21/california-population-continues-to-decline-with-state-emigration-a-major-factor

This COMPLETELY contradicts the census 2020 stories implying that CA will get twenty something extra House seats… wtf is going on here…

‘A saboteur of international order’: Beijing rebukes US over anti-China defense-spending law

Washington’s own track record exposes it as a destructive force on the international stage, China’s defense ministry has said, after the US adopted a law that addresses Chinese issues such as the Hong Kong protests and Huawei.

The defense ministry’s spokesperson Wu Qian said that America’s 2020 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), recently adopted by the US, violates the ‘One-China Policy’ and is an open attempt to meddle in Chinese domestic affairs.

“The United States pursues unilateralism and protectionism,” Wu stated, offering also a reminder of how the US under President Donald Trump has abandoned the landmark Paris climate accord and the 2015 deal on the Iranian nuclear program, as well as having left UNESCO.

“This behavior makes it clear to the international community that the United States is the saboteur of the current international order.”

Wu urged Washington to drop “its Cold War mentality and hegemonic logic,” and to stop interfering in Chinese affairs.

The NDAA, among other things, reaffirms restrictions on Chinese telecom giant Huawei, calls for bolstering defense ties with Taiwan and allows the US to “impose consequences” on Beijing over its handling of the anti-government protests in Hong Kong, a self-governing region. Washington had earlier adopted a separate law that allows it to sanction Hong Kong and Chinese officials for violating the rights of the demonstrators.

China, for its part, has been accusing the US of inciting riots in Hong Kong and of endorsing the unrest in the city.

https://www.rt.com/news/476871-china-us-international-saboteur/

>‘A saboteur of international order’: Beijing rebukes US over anti-China defense-spending law

There ya go anons.. President Trump's altering the international order is working and recognized by China.

Thank you Mr. President!!!

>>7626906

are you a…

Columbia University student first to file anti-Semitism complaint under Trump order

A student at Columbia University has filed a complaint with the Department of Education alleging anti-Semitism, with lawyers representing him saying he is the first to do so under a new executive order from President Trump.

A press release on the complaint from The Lawfare Project accuses Columbia's administration of knowing about a "hostile environment" but doing nothing to fix it.

The legal group last week filed the complaint with the Education Department's Office for Civil Rights on behalf of Jonathan Karten, a Jewish and Israeli American student.

President Trump earlier this month issued an executive order stating that the administration will take action against anti-Semitism "as vigorously as against all other forms of discrimination.” The White House has said the order is intended to counter a growing number of anti-Semitic incidents on college campuses and elsewhere.

Some Jewish groups praised the order as protecting Jewish students from discrimination, while others, particularly left-wing organizations, expressed concerns about free speech and Trump's past statements about Jewish people.

The Lawfare Project's executive director Brooke Goldstein said in a statement on Karten's complaint that the order creates "a legal avenue to stop this type of hatred from being perpetuated in our schools."

A Columbia University official declined to comment on the complaint.

https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/475980-columbia-university-student-first-to-file-anti-semitism-complaint

https://www.thelawfareproject.org/releases/2019/12/19/breaking-lawfare-project-files-ocr-complaint-against-columbia-university-on-behalf-of-jewish-israeli-student-first-since-issuance-of-presidents-executive-order-on-combating-anti-semitism

DeVos, DOJ Slam Campuses Behaving As "Mini Police States"

Mississippi community college is defending itself against allegations from the DOJ and Betsy DeVos that it positions itself as a “police state” and threatens the free speech rights of its students.

In September, the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education filed a lawsuit against Jones College after the school threatened to arrest student members of Young Americans for Liberty for their efforts to initiate a conversation about marijuana legalization on campus. The campus police stopped the YAL members from tabling to raise awareness about this issue. FIRE sued the school on behalf of YAL and student Michael Brown.

Now the Department of Justice is weighing in on the matter, releasing a statement insisting that “College campuses should not be mini police states.”

“The United States of America is not a police state,” said assistant attorney general for the Civil Rights Division Eric Dreiband, adding “Repressive speech codes are the indecent hallmark of despotic, totalitarian regimes. They have absolutely no place in our country."

US secretary of education Betsy DeVos also weighed in on the free speech of students at Jones County Junior College saying that the situation is “yet another concerning example of students encountering limits on what, when, where, and how they learn.”

“This is happening far too often on our nation’s campuses. This Administration won’t let students be silenced. We stand with their right to speak and with their right to learn truth through the free exchange of ideas—particularly those with which they might disagree,” DeVos added.

Jones County Junior College told Campus Reform that it “has reviewed the statement of interest filed by the federal government on this matter,” and that “At this time a preliminary motion to dismiss certain claims against certain defendants is pending before the court.”

“The plaintiffs’ allegations require the College to actively defend itself, its employees, and the Trustees from the position that no harm was done to the plaintiff by the College. Our mission is to teach the ideals of a democratic society. We focus every effort to ensure our students have access to their future through advanced affordable education that stands not only on free inquiry but promotes learning, advances knowledge, and promotes economic growth for the American family,” the college added.

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/devos-doj-slam-campuses-behaving-mini-police-states

>“The plaintiffs’ allegations require the College to actively defend itself, its employees, and the Trustees from the position that no harm was done to the plaintiff by the College.

Bwhahaha

Now, to get this college to admit this is the "D's" tactics used against POTUS…

Colleges are using cellphone data to track students and monitor attendance

Administrators tracking someone’s personal cellphone to monitor their location sounds like something the Communist Party might do in China. But it’s happening right here.

Multiple colleges across the country have started tracking the exact location of their students at all times, according to the Washington Post. In a move that school administrators claim will boost class attendance and student performance, colleges have installed Bluetooth sensors that connect to students’ phones to monitor their movements with extreme precision. Universities are now able to abandon traditional attendance-taking measures in favor of this invasive new technology, SpotterEDU.

SpotterEDU was developed by Rick Carter, a former basketball coach who received a protective order from DePaul University for allegedly threatening the school’s athletic director and head basketball coach. Carter originally developed the technology in 2015 to monitor student-athletes, but now colleges such as Syracuse University and Virginia Commonwealth University have taken things a step further and are monitoring the student population to track attendance.

The idea of tracking students' locations is already concerning. Invasions of privacy for the purpose of micromanaging adults is a problem even if only used to track attendance. But the app’s extreme precision allows administrators to go further in following their students’ every move.

The app doesn’t just mark “present” or “absent,” like many professors do already. It also tracks when students leave the classroom, arrive late, or leave early. This means schools can monitor bathroom breaks and the exact timing of each student’s arrival.

Professors have been tracking attendance for decades, which is certainly useful for educators to encourage class attendance or intervene when students miss several classes. Methods such as sign-in sheets, roll call, or even a short quiz at the beginning of a lecture have always been effective ways to both monitor and encourage attendance. Suffice it to say, a digital dystopia is not needed to tell whether students are showing up to class.

Professors are also perfectly capable of seeing when students arrive to class or get up to leave. If a student’s behavior is a problem, the professor can address the issue by speaking to them or docking points from the student’s grade.

Now, the app has outsourced attendance-monitoring to administrators who cannot have knowledge of every classroom dynamic. Obvious privacy issues aside, schools have diminished the ability of professors to decide what’s best for their students in favor of invasive bureaucratic oversight. And it’s not just this one service doing so, either.

Another tracking technology, Degree Analytics, is currently used by 19 colleges to measure “student data” — a nice way of saying that every move a student makes is tracked.

Data scientist Aaron Benz created the technology in 2017, which uses algorithms to analyze student behavior and report “discrepancies.” Benz said that the algorithm measures a student’s “behavioral state,” so someone who fails to leave their dorm may be flagged for depression or someone who avoids the cafeteria flagged for an eating disorder.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/creepy-colleges-are-using-cellphone-data-to-track-students-and-monitor-attendance

Report: FISA Court Has Not Ordered FBI to Check FISA Applications Beyond One Lawyer

The court that granted the FBI surveillance warrants on former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page has only ordered that the FBI review all warrant applications related to one FBI attorney and not all FBI agents involved in misconduct, according to a report.

The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) earlier this month ordered the FBI to re-verify all previous Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant applications involving Kevin Clinesmith, the FBI attorney who falsified evidence in the FBI’s efforts to seek a renewed surveillance warrant against Page.

But according to a report by Fox News’s Gregg Re, the FISC did not order the FBI to recheck warrant applications involving other officials who made significant omissions and errors in warrant applications to surveil Page.

Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz found that Clinesmith had doctored an email that said Page was a source for the CIA to say that Page was “not” a source for the CIA.

However, Horowitz found many more examples of what the FISC itself has called “misconduct.”

In one example cited by Fox News, Horowitz found that an FBI supervisory special agent (SSA) responsible for ensuring that the bureau’s “Woods Procedures” were followed in this case — in that all factual assertions be independently verified and information contradicting those assertions be presented to the court — did not follow those procedures.

The SSA created a digital sub-file where reports by Christopher Steele, ex-British spy working for Fusion GPS, would be uploaded. Those reports were uncorroborated yet used to support the argument that Page was a foreign agent.

The SSA also suspected that Steele was a source for a news report that was included in warrant applications on Page, but he downplayed it in FISA applications. The SSA was also told by a State Department official that Steele was wrong about a claim but that information was not put in any FISA applications.

The SSA also failed to put in other information that was exculpatory for Page, such as Page denying to an FBI confidential human source (CHS) that he knew Russian officials Igor Sechin and Igor Divyekin, which Steele had alleged.

The SSA was also aware that Steele had provided his reports to the State Department, but the FISC was told that Steele “only provided this information to the business associate and the FBI.”

Despite this, the FISC’s Presiding Judge Rosemary Collyer only ordered the FBI to identify and review all matters that involved the participation of Clinesmith, and advise whether his conduct has been “referred to the appropriate bar association(s) for investigation or possible disciplinary action,” according to Fox News.

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/12/25/report-fisa-court-has-not-ordered-fbi-to-check-fisa-applications-beyond-one-lawyer/

Waiting for news on these other swampy creatures….

Foxnews.com is either down or being flooded with traffic… any other anons able to access?

>>7627298

nvm…

Indian PM Modi says memes 'most welcome' after tweeting pic of himself observing solar eclipse

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi joked that he does not mind being 'memefied,' after a photo of him gazing at the last solar eclipse of the decade has become viral.

"Like many Indians, I was enthusiastic about #solareclipse2019," Modi wrote, while posting several pictures of himself gazing at the sky wearing protective shades.

"Unfortunately, I could not see the Sun due to cloud cover but I did catch glimpses of the eclipse in Kozhikode and other parts on live stream."

https://www.rt.com/news/476841-modi-memes-solar-eclipse/

Here is another leader (besides POTUS) embracing memes… still have my doubts about Modi but this is refreshing…