Light News

Second Whistleblower Comes Forward in the Trump-Ukraine Controversy | Mark Zaid, the attorney representing the whistleblower who sounded the alarm on Trump's dealings with Ukraine and triggered an impeachment inquiry, tells ABC News that he is now representing a second whistleblower who has spoken with the inspector general. Zaid tells ABC News' Chief Anchor George Stephanopoulos that the second person -- also described as an intelligence official -- has first-hand knowledge of some of the allegations outlined in the original complaint and has been interviewed by the head of the intelligence community's internal watchdog office, Michael Atkinson.
https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/06/politics/second-whistleblower-trump-ukraine/index.html
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/06/us/politics/second-whistleblower-trump-ukraine.html

Trump associates did exactly what they baselessly accused Biden’s son of doing: As Rudy Giuliani was pushing Ukrainian officials last spring to investigate one of Donald Trump’s main political rivals, a group of individuals with ties to the president and his personal lawyer were also active in the former Soviet republic. Their aims were profit, not politics. This circle of businessmen and Republican donors touted connections to Giuliani and Trump while trying to install new management at the top of Ukraine’s massive state gas company. Their plan was to then steer lucrative contracts to companies controlled by Trump allies, according to two people with knowledge of their plans. Their plan hit a snag after Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko lost his reelection bid to Volodymyr Zelenskiy, whose conversation with Trump about former Vice President Joe Biden is now at the center of the House impeachment inquiry of Trump. But the effort to install a friendlier management team at the helm of the gas company, Naftogaz, would soon be taken up with Ukraine’s new president by U.S. Energy Secretary Rick Perry, whose slate of candidates included a fellow Texan who is one of Perry’s past political donors.
https://apnews.com/d7440cffba4940f5b85cd3dfa3500fb2

DeVos violated a court order to stop collecting on the debts of Corinthian College students. Now, they want her held in contempt.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/education/2019/10/04/devos-violated-court-order-stop-collecting-debts-corinthian-college-students-now-they-want-her-held-contempt/

Judge orders White House to preserve records of Trump's dealings with foreign leaders
https://www.politico.com/news/2019/10/05/judge-trump-records-foreign-leaders-031255

Trump threatens second whistleblower
https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/464524-trump-criticizes-supposed-second-whistleblower

Trump’s Team Texted About Doing the Exact Ukraine Thing Trump Says Didn’t Happen
https://www.rollingstone.com/politics/politics-news/donald-trump-ukraine-text-messages-evidence-impeachment-894822/

Beto Says He Has "No Fears" About Bernie's Fitness for Office: "There Isn't a More Energized, Energetic Candidate"; "Grateful that he's a candidate and grateful to be in this race with him," Beto O'Rourke told reporters Saturday
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/10/06/beto-says-he-has-no-fears-about-bernies-fitness-office-there-isnt-more-energized

Another 4,200 truck drivers lost their jobs in September as a recession slams America’s $800 billion trucking industry
https://www.businessinsider.com/trucking-truck-drivers-job-loss-september-2019-10

Trump scapegoats Ukraine call on Energy Secretary Rick Perry
https://www.axios.com/trump-blamed-rick-perry-call-ukraine-zelensky-8178447a-0374-4ac6-b321-a9454b0565d4.html

(These People Voted For It...): Rural Hospital Closings Are Leaving Millions of People in a Health Care Crisis
https://truthout.org/articles/rural-hospital-closings-are-leaving-millions-of-people-in-a-health-care-crisis/

US Attorneys General from 24 states and Washington, D.C. launched a lawsuit against Purdue Pharma this week in an attempt to block the OxyContin maker from avoiding thousands of lawsuits after filing for bankruptcy, Reuters reported.
https://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/464521-24-state-attorneys-general-launch-legal-challenge-against
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-purduepharma-bankruptcy/u-s-states-fight-back-against-purdues-bid-to-halt-opioid-lawsuits-idUSKBN1WJ19V

The Yankees are 101-37 against the Twins since 2002, including 15-2 in the postseason.

Botham Jean neighbor, key witness in Amanda Guyger trial, fatally shot outside apartment, police say
https://www.wsbtv.com/news/trending-now/botham-jean-neighbor-key-witness-in-amanda-guyger-trial-fatally-shot-outside-apartment-police-say/993988713

Zero members of Trump administration appear on Sunday talk shows
https://www.axios.com/trump-administration-sunday-shows-impeachment-c10c6dde-9211-4c1a-981f-8fa512ac774e.html

Trump is claiming the absolute right to demand investigations of any American by any country. | The president exerts unilateral control over the most powerful government on Earth. He is announcing to every foreign state that American relations with his government — and, should he prevail, every future government — can and will be influenced by their willingness to put their judicial or quasi-judicial systems at the disposal of his reelection campaign.
http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/10/trump-absolute-right-collusion-ukraine-biden-impeachment.html

Zharifa Ghafari, a 26-year-old who is one of the two first female mayors in Afghanistan, said she seriously expects to be assassinated on the job. That did not stop her from making sure everyone knows who she is — and even what she looks like.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/04/world/asia/zarifa-ghafari-afghanistan-maidan-shar.html

YEP: “Trump’s a criminal, and I will bring him to justice.” - that’s all the ex VP should say.
https://twitter.com/davidfrum/status/1180929916327677952

Guns from the United States are stoking a homicide epidemic in Mexico  | Of the 132,823 guns recovered at crime scenes in Mexico from 2009 to 2018, 70% came from the U.S. Mexico has a single heavily regulated gun store. One. The drugs flow north. The guns flow south. Mexico’s drug war is America’s drug war.
https://www.latimes.com/world/mexico-americas/la-fg-mexico-guns-20190430-story.html

Good thing um we don't really need the FBI+CIA to, I dunno, fight terrorists and organized crime & violent criminals, or to defend us against China/Russian espionage Republicans are tanking trust in law enforcement. This has bad consequences for trials&witnesses&intel gathering.
https://twitter.com/neal_katyal/status/1180893286313201666

YEP. Republican need to use the DoJ and FBI and House and Senate Committees and other standard legal tools at their disposal to investigate Joe Biden and Hunter Biden and all the other Democrats they want to investigate, not beg foreign countries to attack the United States..:Opposition lawmakers, intelligence officials question why the attorney general is working outside usual channels in review of Russia-probe origins
https://www.wsj.com/articles/barrs-requests-for-foreign-help-prompt-backlash-in-australia-italy-u-k-11570369938

Text messages involving Kurt Volker and other top U.S. diplomats in Ukraine show how President Trump pressured the country for investigations that could benefit his 2020 campaign. Here's a guide to the exchanges.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/10/04/us/politics/ukraine-text-messages-volker.html

The story of how a handful of New York businessmen used Chicago taxi permits to make hundreds of millions of dollars and helped ruin hundreds of immigrant drivers. The tale winds from Moscow to the Hamptons to Rogers Park.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/04/nyregion/taxi-medallions-chicago.html

The murder of Joshua Brown is devastating. Joshua was shot in the mouth and chest at close range? It doesn't take too active an imagination to imagine why a main witness being shot in the mouth might generate suspicions of a hit. Solve This Johnson!  #Justice4JoshuaBrown
https://twitter.com/RealTimBlack/status/1180910656599535623

Assassination with a message to other witnesses for intimidation. Remove the witnesses and easily win a retrial while Amber is out on bond. A young gifted young man lost his life for being a courageous witness. The whole thing is sickening
https://twitter.com/thehoracetowns/status/1180913097697091586

Snowden apologists: Why are you applauding the IC whistleblower but not Snowden?
The rest of us: the IC whistleblower complied with the law.

'Unfit to Sit': Rallies Demand Kavanaugh Impeachment on One-Year Anniversary of Senate Confirmation – "The public deserves to know the truth about whether Kavanaugh lied under oath, whether he committed sexual assault, and whether he really deserves to be on the Supreme Court."
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/10/06/unfit-sit-rallies-demand-kavanaugh-impeachment-one-year-anniversary-senate

The data on U.S. border stops of journalists with accompanying reports documenting the incidents, plus information on other attacks on the press, via @uspresstracker
https://pressfreedomtracker.us/

Trump's new national security adviser once called Trump's foreign policy remarks "extraordinarily dangerous statements at a time that the world does not need that sort of inconsistent and wavering American leadership given the threats that we're facing."
https://www.cnn.com/2019/10/05/politics/robert-obrien-extraordinarily-dangerous-kfile/index.html

Over a period of years, a convicted drug trafficker used specially rigged eyeglasses fitted with hidden cameras and a hollowed-out Bible with a lens peeking through the O in HOLY to capture the violent world inside this Florida prison.
https://www.miamiherald.com/news/special-reports/florida-prisons/article235623292.html

If this potus tried to make deals as hard as he tries to talk trash...he would actually not only be doing the job but creating a situation to show he is bigger than the dem efforts or that they won’t do deals. But instead...trash. Like the #Jets
https://twitter.com/ChrisCuomo/status/1180960152884846592

Sen. Cory Booker on Joe Biden: "The vice president is not a target on any investigation. The president has alleged a lot of things that are actually factually untrue. His attempts to sully the reputation of an American statesman is unacceptable."
https://twitter.com/thehill/status/1180860513162600454

Wonder why trump is quiet about volker? No one has gotten him in hotter water ... yet not a peep about him (which is good but unusual)
https://twitter.com/ChrisCuomo/status/1180959200366731265

This potus is disgusted by Biden’s son the private citizen...but his kid andnall-purpose son in law? $82 Million While Working in the White House Last Year
https://twitter.com/ChrisCuomo/status/1180958657376374784


Tencent, the digital rights holder of NBA in China, updated after they announced blacklist of Daryl Morey due to his 'Free HK' tweet: They will suspend all reports/streaming of Houston Rockets. Rockets subscribers are eligible to change service. NBA China market in trouble.
https://twitter.com/titan_plus/status/1180830746514079745

China accused of genocide over forced abortions of Uighur Muslim women as escapees reveal widespread sexual torture: Such abuses aimed at curbing women’s ability to reproduce are common in Xinjiang, experts say
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/china-uighur-muslim-women-abortions-sexual-abuse-genocide-a9144721.html

The Chinese Consulate-General in Houston denounced Morey's tweet
http://houston.china-consulate.org/eng/sgxw/t1705494.htm

Chinese companies have suspended ties with the Rockets, one of the NBA’s most popular teams in China, after Houston’s general manager tweeted his support of pro-democracy protests in Hong Kong
https://twitter.com/WSJ/status/1180965994375897093?s=19

Tencent Holdings, the massive Chinese conglomerate that operates as the “exclusive official digital partner of the NBA in China" suggested that effectively blackout of all Houston Rockets games could be on the horizon.
https://deadspin.com/china-abruptly-pulls-away-from-rockets-over-daryl-morey-1838823936

Teacher put on leave after making "sniper rifle" comment about Greta Thunberg on Facebook
https://www.newsweek.com/teacher-greta-thunberg-sniper-threat-facebook-1463301

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), a loyal of the president, did make an appearance on ABC's "This Week," where he suggested that Trump was joking when he publicly called for China to investigate the Bidens last week: Jordan's behavior during his appearance should be a reminder that while Trump is a problem, the root of that problem is the Republican party. Trump isn't a lone villain who infected the party. Just the opposite. Trump's bigotry and corruption is the Republican's bigotry and corruption. All Trump did was yank off the ornaments which adorned the party's public face and concealed their true nature. Trump has exposed the party's rotten core for all to see. There is no unseeing those horrors. Bigotry and corruption has been the foundation of Republican party policy for over 60 years. They will not vanish when Trump leaves office. Jim Jordan is as representative of his party as Trump. There is no redemption or salvage. We can only vote them out of office at every level of our government.