Depressed (Part 2)

The Republicans’ new low, this time it is down in North Carolina where they lied to the Democrats and over road the governor’s veto.

NC GOP rocked the legislature with a surprise vote. What exactly happened, and why?
By Paul A. Specht, Dawn Baugartner Vaughan and Adam Wagner
September 11, 2019

RALEIGH
North Carolina legislators made national news Wednesday when they took a vote on the state budget with many Democrats absent.

The move prompted protests in the General Assembly in downtown Raleigh. It generated a video of a lawmaker’s angry outburst that quickly went viral. And it drew criticism from people across the country.
[…]
Wednesday morning’s controversial vote was over a state budget written by Republicans in the legislature.

The House and Senate passed the GOP-written budget, but Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper vetoed it on June 5.

Republicans don’t have a supermajority in the House or the Senate. In order to override Cooper’s veto, they needed Democrats to vote with them or wait until a day when enough Democrats were absent to give them the edge they needed.

Guess which option they chose?

Cooper produced a counteroffer to the budget, but instead the House put the budget veto override on the calendar every day, but didn’t call for a vote until Wednesday. Speaker Tim Moore, a Republican, repeatedly told the press and public he would call the vote when he thought he had enough votes for an override.

Why did he chose Wednesday?

It was because some of the Democrats were at a memorial service for the victims of 9/11.

Some headlines suggested that Democrats were at events commemorating the 9/11 attacks — the vote was taken at roughly the same time as the national moment of silence. But The News & Observer has confirmed only two Democrats attended 9/11 events.

There are some reports of a recording of the Republicans telling the Democrats that there would be no vote to override the veto that day.

Talk about under-handedness.

---

Then there are these worrying reports out of California.

Trump pushing for major crackdown on homeless camps in California, with aides discussing moving residents to government-backed facilities
The Washington Post
By Jeff Stein ,Tracy Jan, Josh Dawsey, and Ashley Parker
September 10, 2019

President Trump has ordered White House officials to launch a sweeping effort to address homelessness in California, citing the state’s growing crisis, according to four government officials aware of the effort.

The planning has intensified in recent weeks. Administration officials have discussed using the federal government to get homeless people off the streets of Los Angeles and other cities and into new government-backed facilities, according to two officials briefed on the planning.

But it is unclear how they could accomplish this and what legal authority they would use. It is also unclear whether the state’s Democratic politicians would cooperate with Trump, who has sought to embarrass them over the homelessness crisis with repeated attacks on their competency.

“Government-backed facilities” i.e. Concentration camps.

The question is; will the homeless be able to come and go as they please? Or will they be locked up like Trump is putting undocumented aliens in the concentration camps?

So Trump is focusing homelessness but…

Housing experts say homelessness in California has risen alongside housing and rental prices. That problem has been exacerbated by cuts to federal support for housing programs.

Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) criticized Trump’s push, saying that “yet again this is bravado for Trump’s base with no interest in the actual policy experts’ recommendations to solve an issue.”

Connecticut found that it was cheaper to house the homeless in apartment than in shelters but the funding for that was cut.

---

I bet Trump dreams of about being to do this,

Russia carries out mass raids on Kremlin critic Navalny's supporters
Reuters
By Andrew Osborn and Maria Tsvetkova

MOSCOW (Reuters) - Russian law enforcement authorities on Thursday carried out mass raids on the homes and offices of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny's supporters, as part of an investigation into money-laundering.

Searches took place in 39 towns and cities, four days after the ruling United Russia party, which supports President Vladimir Putin, lost a third of its seats in the Moscow city assembly while easily retaining its dominant nationwide position.

Navalny had urged his supporters to vote tactically in last weekend's local and regional elections to try to reduce the chances of Kremlin-backed candidates, a strategy that appears to have had some success in the capital.

"Putin is very angry," Navalny wrote on social media after the raids. "This is a case where the actions of the police are no different from those of burglars."

I bet you that Trump dreams of doing something like this against his opposition… Oh wait! Didn’t Trump try to get the FBI to investigate Mueller?