Trump Ejects Russians, Stormy Sues Again
Tuesday, March 27, 2018
Vol. 7, No. 82
Get Out: President Trump ordered 60 Russian diplomats out of the US, joining western allies in punishing Russia for a nerve agent attack on a former Russian spy and his daughter in England. The “diplomats” are all believed to be intelligence agents.
The American order also closes the Russian consulate in Seattle near a US submarine base and the Boeing aircraft factory. The Russians and their families have seven days to get out of the country.
President Trump has played footsie with Russia so far during his presidency, and done nothing about Russian election meddling. This is the toughest action he’s taken against them.
Britain has already expelled 23 Russian diplomats and 14 members of the European Union have announced ejections as well.
Russian President Vladimir Putin announced an internet vote on which US consulate in Russia his citizens would like to see closed in retaliation.
Academic Probation: Michigan State dean William Strampel was arrested yesterday in connection with the handling of complaints against Dr. Larry Nassar, the infamous sports doctor who sexually molested young female athletes. Strampel was Nassar’s boss and has been accused of bungling the situation, but there’s no announcement so far on what crime he may have committed. He’s up for arraignment today.
What Goes Down: The Dow Jones spiked by nearly 670 points yesterday on news that the US and China are negotiating to avert a trade war. It was the third biggest one-day jump in Dow history. The US and South Korea also appear to be on the verge of adjusting a trade agreement that President Trump deemed “horrible.”
Stormy Weather: Porn actress Stormy Daniels filed a slander lawsuit against President Trump’s personal lawyer Michael Cohen for calling her a liar about having had a sexual fling with Donald Trump in 2006.
The filing came just a day after Daniels’ splashy and trashy interview with Anderson Cooper on “60 Minutes.”
Daniels, whose real name is Stephanie Clifford, also amended her complaint in federal court to say that Trump and Cohen “aggressively sought to silence Ms. Clifford as part of an effort to avoid her telling the truth, thus helping to ensure he won the Presidential Election.” The new language goes on to say, “the Hush Agreement was entered with the illegal aim, design, and purpose of circumventing federal campaign finance law.”
The legal tactic here is to get Daniels’ non-disclosure agreement out of arbitration to reveal the details of her story in open court. Her lawyer, Michael Avenatti, is a warrior who has said they have a “litany of more evidence” to prove Daniels’ story.
President Trump has said nothing about the Daniels story, but tweeted yesterday, “So much Fake News. Never been more voluminous or more inaccurate. But through it all, our country is doing great!”
Mystery Train: Speculation is rife that North Korean leader Kim Jong-un arrived in Beijing on an unidentified train for a high-level meeting with Chinese officials. All the security movements suggest that it’s a big fish on that train. If it’s Kim, this is believed to be the first time that he has ever left his country.
Talks with the Chinese would be a run-up to separate summits with South Korea in late April and the United States in May, including a proposed meeting with President Trump.
Out of Ammo: Remington Arms, the 200-year-old gun maker, announced that it filed for bankruptcy. This didn’t come as a surprise. Remington has been hurt by the softening market for guns and a massive lawsuit after the Sandy Hook School massacre. Remington made the AR-15 rifle used to kill 20 children and six adults in the 2012 mass killing.
The Obit Page: Linda Brown, whose father succeed in having the family name forever enshrined in the 1954 Supreme Court case, Brown v. Board of Education, died Sunday in Topeka, Kan. at age 75.
Brown’s father Oliver brought the suit when his daughter was denied entry to the all-white school in in their neighborhood and forced to make the trek to an all-black school. Her parents were recruited by civil rights activists to engineer a test case about “separate but equal” education. Linda Brown recalled. “They were told, ‘Find the nearest white school to your home and take your child or children and a witness, and attempt to enroll in the fall, and then come back and tell us what happened.’ ”
In 1954 the Supreme Court ruled unanimously that segregated schools were inherently unequal, ending one of the most vicious practices of the segregation era.
I said, Bon Appétit!: A French waiter fired from a Vancouver, BC restaurant for being “aggressive, rude and disrespectful” has sued for wrongful dismissal claiming “discrimination against my culture”.
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