Trump aides tried to peddle “nuclear weapons starter kit” to Arab government

Israel won't be happy about this
By Benjamin Locke

Two weeks before Donald Trump’s inauguration as president, three of his closet aides – Steve Bannon, Jared Kushner, and Michael Flynn – held a secret meeting with the king of Jordan in New York City where they discussed security concern, terrorism, ISIS – and Flynn pitched a for-profit plan to build a nuclear reactor in the Middle Eastern nation.

The idea of placing a nuclear reactor in the explosive middle east – part of a larger plan to place nuclear plants all over the region – is obviously a very dangerous idea considering that even a peaceful power plant could later become a  source of fuel for nuclear weapons in the volatile region.

Alexandra Bell, senior policy director at the nonprofit Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation told Buzzfeed it was “comparable to “providing a nuclear weapons starter kit.”

The madness of Donald Trump

"A duty to warn" and the dangerous case of Donald Trump

By Bill Moyers, Robert Jay Lifton for Common Dreams

EDITOR'S WARNING to those with only Twitter-length attention spans. This is a LONG article. It needs to be to cover the subject of the mental health of Donald Trump in depth. 

There will not be a book published this fall more urgent, important, or controversial than The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump, the work of 27 psychiatrists, psychologists and mental health experts to assess President Trump’s mental health. 

They had come together last March at a conference at Yale University to wrestle with two questions. One was on countless minds across the country: “What’s wrong with him?” The second was directed to their own code of ethics: “Does Professional Responsibility Include a Duty to Warn” if they conclude the president to be dangerously unfit?

As mental health professionals, these men and women respect the long-standing “Goldwater rule” which inhibits them from diagnosing public figures whom they have not personally examined.

At the same time, as explained by Dr. Bandy X Lee, who teaches law and psychiatry at Yale School of Medicine, the rule does not have a countervailing rule that directs what to do when the risk of harm from remaining silent outweighs the damage that could result from speaking about a public figure — “which in this case, could even be the greatest possible harm.”

It is an old and difficult moral issue that requires a great exertion of conscience. Their decision: “We respect the rule, we deem it subordinate to the single most important principle that guides our professional conduct: that we hold our responsibility to human life and well-being as paramount.”

Hence, this profound, illuminating and discomforting book undertaken as “a duty to warn.”

The foreword is by one of America’s leading psychohistorians, Robert Jay Lifton. He is renowned for his studies of people under stress — for books such as Death in Life: Survivors of Hiroshima (1967), Home from the War: Vietnam Veterans — Neither Victims nor Executioners (1973), and The Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing and the Psychology of Genocide(1986). 

The Nazi Doctors was the first in-depth study of how medical professionals rationalized their participation in the Holocaust, from the early stages of the Hitler’s euthanasia project to extermination camps.

The Dangerous Case of Donald Trump will be published Oct. 3 by St. Martin’s Press.

Here is my interview with Robert Jay Lifton — Bill Moyers

All in the family

From the Worm Ladies of Charlestown

Your best resource for everything vermiculture! ABOUT LEARN SHOP EVENTS CONTACT The Worm Ladies of Charlestown, Inc.  Change your world!   Worm Castings and the tea you can make with them are both high in nutrients and beneficial soil organisms that help plants thrive. Benefits higher germination rates                 faster plant growth higher yields dosease and pest resistance macro and micro nutrients beneficial soil biology organic chemical free How They're Made Our castings are made by thousands of red wiggler composting worms at our worm farm where they feast on food scraps (mostly fuit and vegetable pulp) and other organics.  Once the worms, bacteria, and fungi have broken down the material, the worms naturally migrate towards fresh food, and the castings left behind are screened to 1/8 or 1/4 inch and ready to use. How To Apply Castings can be blended directly into garden soil or potting mix or used to top-dress the soil around the base of the stem before watering.  Castings can also be used to make aerated compost "tea" that can be directly applied to plants and soil, ideal for greenhouses and nurseries; applied as a foliar spray or injected through irrigation manifolds. If you are interested in visiting our worm farm for demonstrations, give us a call at 401-742-5915 or visit www.wormladies.com. How They're Sold The Worm Ladies have found that fresh castings make a world of difference.  We ensure our castings are fresh, are never dried out, or are put in air-tight containers.  We partner with local nurseries and garden supply retailers to offer fresh castings sold in 5 gal pails, 2lb bags, or from self-serve display containers.  We are also assisting retailers in setting up in-store worm tea brewers so that worm tea can be sold fresh to customers.    If you are interested in setting up a castings or tea display in your nursery or store, please give us a call at 401-742-5915 or visit www.wormladies.com. Our Website North Carolina State's 18th Annual Vermiculture Conference  October 26-27, 2017 The James B. Hunt Jr. Library Duke Energy Hall, 1070 Partners Way    Raleigh, North Carolina 27606 Registration is now open. Register Now Volunteers are needed to help with the worms and the castings as well as with social media.  Call 401-742-5915 or email wormladiesri@gmail.com.  Ready to begin vermicomposting--let us help you. Ready to begin making your own aerated compost tea--we are here to help. The Worm Ladies are located in the fourth hoop house on the west side of the property 4W 161 East Beach Road Charlestown, Rhode Island 02813

Three seals returned to the ocean from Blue Shutters Beach

Mystic Aquarium sends healed seals home

By Dale Wolbrink

A kiss goodbye?

Mystic Aquarium’s Animal Rescue Program was in full-bloom this morning as three rehabilitated Harbor seal pups were released in Charlestown, RI. 

After receiving compassionate and specialized care from Mystic Aquarium’s animal care professionals, Aster, Azalea and Ivy were released to the open ocean.

A large crowd of onlookers at Blue Shutters Beach helped the team at Mystic Aquarium give the trio a fond farewell. 

What was that they said about Hillary Clinton?

Trump’s voter fraud commission illegally uses private e-mail for official business.

By Jessica Huseman for ProPublica

President Donald Trump’s voter fraud commission came under fire earlier this month when a lawsuit and media reports revealed that the commissioners were using private emails to conduct public business. 

Commission co-chair Kris Kobach confirmed this week that most of them continue to do so.

Experts say the commission’s email practices do not appear to comport with federal law. “The statute here is clear,” said Jason Baron, a lawyer at Drinker Biddle and former director of litigation at the National Archives and Records Administration.

Essentially, Baron said, the commissioners have three options: 1. They can use a government email address; 2. They can use a private email address but copy every message to a government account; or 3. They can use a private email address and forward each message to a government account within 20 days. 

According to Baron, those are the requirements of the Presidential Records Act (PRA) of 1978, which the commission must comply with under its charter.

WJAR-Channel 10 exposed for right-wing disinformation

Sinclair owned station gives frightening daily terrorist updates whether there is an actual threat or not.

By Gryphen

Courtesy of Providence Journal:  

The company that owns WJAR-TV is mandating the broadcast of multiple programs favorable to President Donald Trump on the state’s most-watched television station. 

Sinclair Broadcast Group, a rapidly growing media company that bought Channel 10 in 2014, produces “must-run” segments and distributes them to its local stations nationwide. They must air during daily news programming, Sinclair executives said. 

Three of the segments have rattled viewers and WJAR’s own news reporters, according to Fletcher Fischer, the business manager and financial secretary of the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Local 1228, the union that represents broadcast workers there:

‒ The Terrorism Alert Desk, advertised as a daily news update about terrorist activity.

‒ News pieces from Epshteyn, Sinclair’s chief political analyst. 

‒ A clearly labeled opinion show featuring Mark Hyman, a former vice president of the company. 

These pieces are fed to Sinclair’s 174 stations in the United States every day. Sinclair’s insertion of the segments into news programming has been harshly critiqued by Rhode Islanders and national commentators.

Common sense gun law passes the General Assembly

Bill to protect domestic violence victims from gun owners passes General Assembly

By Steve Ahlquist in Rhode Island’s Future

The General Assembly passed The Protect Rhode Island Families Act (2017-H 5510Baa, 2017-S 0405Aaa) during the special session on Tuesday.

The legislation will “prohibit gun possession by domestic abusers convicted of misdemeanor domestic violence crimes and those subject to court-issued final protective orders, and ensure that all those subject to the prohibition actually turn in their guns when they become prohibited from possessing them.

The bill takes effect when Governor Gina Raimondo signs the bill, a bill she has vocally supported.

The Rhode Island Coalition Against Gun Violence (RICAGV) issued a statement saying, in part, “We’ve worked hard for the past four years with our 96 partner organizations to get a law protecting domestic violence survivors from gun violence passed. We are gratified that in 2017 the General Assembly recognized that the domestic abuser’s right to bear arms ends where the domestic violence victim’s right to safety and security begins, and that the Second Amendment does not protect the right of domestic abusers to threaten or harm their victims with firearms.”

It's all I drink

Wingnuts of the week

Squirrels and their nuts

Squirrels use 'chunking' to organize their favorite nuts

University of California - Berkeley

Like trick-or-treaters sorting their Halloween candy haul, fox squirrels apparently organize their stashes of nuts by variety, quality and possibly even preference, according to new UC Berkeley research.

The study, published in the Royal Society Open Science journal, is the first to show evidence of squirrels arranging their bounty using "chunking," a cognitive strategy in which humans and other animals organize spatial, linguistic, numeric or other information into smaller more manageable collections, such as subfolders on a computer.

Fox squirrels stockpile at least 3,000 to 10,000 nuts a year and, under certain conditions, separate each cache into quasi "subfolders," one for each type of nut, researchers said.

More invaders attack our trees

New Wave of Caterpillars Defoliating Oak Trees

By ecoRI News staff

Orange-striped oakworm caterpillar. (Wikipedia)

The Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management (DEM) recently reported that small concentrations of orange-striped oakworm caterpillars have begun defoliating trees in areas of western Rhode Island.

The caterpillars feed on the foliage of all species of oak trees, and have been detected in forested areas in central Scituate and Coventry and parts of Foster that were previously stressed by gypsy moth and forest tent caterpillars. 

Other areas in the state may also be affected, according to DEM.

Unlike gypsy moths, the orange-striped oakworm is native to North America and can be found throughout New York and New England.

Although outbreaks of orange-striped oakworm occasionally cause widespread defoliations lasting two to four years, insects, diseases and other natural enemies build up over time and reduce the population to tolerable levels, according to DEM. 

Pockets of defoliation are typically less than 1,000 acres. In 2005, nearly 16,000 acres were affected in central Scituate and Coventry, according to state officials.