Thursday News: “Greenhouse Gas Emissions Accelerate Like a ‘Speeding Freight Train’ in 2018”; “Trump Worried About Mean Comments at Bush Funeral”; “Republicans Have a Problem With Democrats. But More So With Democracy”

by Lowell

Here are a few national and Virginia news headlines, political and otherwise, for Thursday, December 6.

• Saudi-funded lobbyist paid for 500 rooms at Trump’s hotel in late 2016 (“U.S. veterans who stayed in the rooms were sometimes unaware of the Saudi government’s role in funding the lobbying trips. These bookings fueled a pair of federal lawsuits alleging the president violated the Constitution by taking improper payments from foreign governments.”)
• UK Parliament just dealt a blow to Theresa May. What’s next for Brexit? (“The UK Parliament voted to give itself more say if the Brexit deal fails. It’s going to make things interesting.”)
• Greenhouse Gas Emissions Accelerate Like a ‘Speeding Freight Train’ in 2018 (Sure looks like humanity is a fatally flawed species.)
• Carbon Dioxide Emissions Are Up Again. What Now, Climate?
• North Korea Is Expanding Missile Base With Eye Toward U.S., Experts Warn (The two things that could – will? – destroy us: 1) climate change; 2) nuclear weapons.)
• Global Stocks Fall, and Oil Slides as OPEC Weighs Cuts
• Top Huawei executive arrested on U.S. request, clouding China trade truce
• 2 U.S. Marines rescued, 5 missing after mid-air crash off Japan
• Don’t condemn white nationalists, VA’s diversity chief was told after Charlottesville (“The tense exchange at the Department of Veterans Affairs occurred when President Trump blamed “many sides” for last year’s clash in Charlottesville without singling out white nationalists and neo-Nazis.”)
• Trump on Coming Debt Crisis: ‘I Won’t Be Here’ When It Blows Up
• The Weekly Standard’s demise is a reminder that there are some ideas worse than Trumpism (“The most principled resistance to Trump comes from conservatism’s most dangerous faction.”)
• Dow set to fall by over 400 points at the open as market sell-off continues
• Chris Wallace: ‘A chill’ descended on front row upon Trump arrival at Bush funeral
• George H.W. Bush’s funeral was a powerful renunciation of Trump (“What made him a great leader are the very traits that, by their absence, make Trump so woefully inadequate.”)
• Trump sits with fellow presidents but still stands alone
• The still-unanswered questions surrounding Matthew Whitaker (“He should not have been acting attorney general for a day. It is time the Senate demanded a reasonable replacement.”)
• The long fallout of President George H.W. Bush’s complicated racial legacy (“Bush’s tough-on-crime stance in his 1988 campaign has been cited by historians as helping to drive decades of politics low on justice or equity.”)
• Election expert: Wisconsin GOP’s power grab is “a textbook example of how democracies die” (“A professor at the University of Wisconsin-Madison discusses how Republicans in the state are strangling democracy”)
• Trump’s slow-motion staff ‘shakeup’ stunts 2019 planning (“The president has left top officials in a state of limbo and top jobs without permanent occupants, creating ‘a sense of chaos.'”)
• Wisconsin Republicans Approve 82 Scott Walker Appointees In 1 Day (“The move hinders the incoming Democratic governor from choosing his own people.”)
• Republicans Have a Problem With Democrats. But More So With Democracy (“Wisconsin Republican rhetoric shows a deep contempt for the intellect of anyone over the age of 5.”)
• ‘A big problem’: Congress bickers over what makes a border wall (“Lawmakers are fighting over the definition of a ‘wall’ as the shutdown deadline approaches.”)
• Would-be 2020 Dem candidates head for the exits (“New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo ruled out a run late last month, while former Massachusetts Gov. Deval Patrick — a favorite of some former senior aides to former President Obama — said he wouldn’t enter the race on Tuesday.”)
• George H.W. Bush Campaigned as a Demagogue. Twice. (“Taking the oath of office did not abracadabra all that away.”)
• Michael Flynn Has Been Singing the Full Score of a German Opera (“Robert Mueller is clearly immortalizing his work against any White House shenanigans.”)
• These companies claimed the GOP tax bill would ‘boost jobs.’ Now they’re laying off employees.
• Republicans are silent on shady North Carolina election after worrying about imagined voter fraud
• A major U.S. electric utility has finally realized climate change is reality (“Xcel Energy says building new wind farms with battery storage is now cheaper than running existing coal plants” Dominion, on the other hand…)
• Over a thousand absentee ballots possibly destroyed in controversial North Carolina House race: report
• We finally found election fraud
• The Latest Facebook Revelations Expose the Real Mark Zuckerberg (“Facebook’s attitude toward user privacy—at least when it comes to opportunities to make a buck—is ruthless.”)
• Joe Biden Blames Rise In Anti-Semitic Incidents Firmly On Donald Trump’s Administration
• Facebook CEO backed sharing customer data despite second thoughts: documents
• Sen. Warner to Propose National Cybersecurity Doctrine
• Hileman: Northam should reinstate air board members (Immediately.)
• Editorial: Rayner is retiring as RTD Editorial Pages editor (The RTD editorial page is absolutely abysmal.)
• Virginia election officials: House GOP’s request to delay 2019 primaries is ‘premature’
• Dominion hears concerns about Chesterfield coal ash at town hall
• New proposed food-sales threshold for Virginia’s liquor-ratio rule won’t help small businesses, owners say
• Mothers Deliver Letters to Dominion re: Fears About the Huge Rate Increases Due to the Construction of Dominion’s Atlantic Coast Pipeline
• As Arlington rezones schools, communities fight to stay together
• Virginia Republican Who Lost House of Delegates Special Election Nomination by One Vote: “I am neither encouraging nor discouraging write-in votes”
• Cheap labor, light rail and a stadium (but only if Bezos wants it!): How Richmond and Hampton Roads tried to woo Amazon
• Marchard: To keep Virginia infrastructure costs low, lawmakers must maintain truck limits
• Fralins give $50 million to Virginia Tech to hire scientists and hasten pace of Roanoke’s economic growth
• Editorial: The Roanoke Valley’s Amazon (“The big news locally today is that Virginia Tech has received the biggest donation in the school’s history. The $50 million from The Horace G. Fralin Charitable Trust and Cynthia and Heywood Fralin is twice as big as the previous biggest gift Tech has received.”)
• Medical marijuana dispensary will open in Portsmouth in spring 2019
• Carnival announces 2020 cruises to Cuba out of Norfolk
• Man arrested after Cheesecake Factory giveaway gets out of hand in Northern Virginia (For the record, my least favorite desserts ever include Key Lime pie and…yep, cheesecake. Barf.)
• Calm and cold through Saturday, and Sunday’s storm is still a wild card