A few climate models are now predicting an unprecedented and alarming spike in temperatures — perhaps as much as 5 degrees Celsius

New projections suggest the doubling of CO₂ in the earth's atmosphere could lead to an increase in global temperatures around 5°C. Gian-Reto Tarnutzer/Unsplash

A handful of climate projections are predicting much higher rise in global temperatures than scientists have seen in the models before.
While there's concern over the number, some scientists hope the latest projections are outliers. 

A 2-degree rise in temperature could lead sea level to jump, coral reefs to die, and water to become dangerously scarce in some parts of the world. Some models right now predict a 5-degree rise.

Several recent climate models have suggested the Earth's climate could warm to a far higher temperature than scientists previously predicted, according to a report from Bloomberg.

The startling anomaly first appeared in models from the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), which suggested that if Earth's atmospheric carbon-dioxide concentration doubles (as it's expected to do by the end of the century), the planet could wind up 5.3 degrees hotter. That's 33% higher than the group's previous estimate.

About a fifth of new climate-model results published in the past year have indicated similarly stark global temperature spikes, according to Bloomberg. The UK-based Met Office Hadley Center predicted a 5.5 degrees of warming, the US Department of Energy calculated a 5.3°-degree jump, French scientists estimated a 4.9-degree increase, and a model from Canadian scientists predicted the largest rise: 5.6 degrees

Scientists hope the models are an "overshot," Bloomberg reported. It will take scientists a significant amount time – at least months – to figure out how to interpret the results.

The climate models estimate "climate sensitivity," which tells scientists how much warmer the planet will get as a result of rising CO₂ concentrations. For four decades, the expected temperature rise if CO2 levels double has been about 3 degrees.


These models have a proven track record of accurately forecasting climate change. A recent study from the American Geophysical Union found that climate projections over the past five decades have largely been accurate — actual climate observations aligned with the models' predictions.

Still, there's a hope among climate scientists that the new projections are outliers. About a dozen other models are still due to be released, Bloomberg reported, and they could help paint a clearer picture.

"We hope it's not the right answer," Klaus Wyser, a senior researcher at the Swedish Meteorological and Hydrological Institute told Bloomberg.

In the 2015 Paris climate agreement — from which President Donald Trump has started to withdraw the US —countries pledged to reduce carbon emissions in order to keep global temperatures from rising more than 2 degrees. It also established a more ambitious goal of limiting warming to 1.5 degrees, but that's likely now out of reach given that the planet has already warmed by about 1 degree.

If global temperatures rise by 2 degrees, models predict, sea levels would get 1.6 feet higher, global heatwaves would become far more common, and subtropical areas could lose a third of their supply of fresh water. Nearly all aquatic life in oceans worldwide would be impacted; 99% of coral reefs could die.

---30---

It’s T-Shirt Weather in Antarctica as Temperature ...

https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2020/02/its-t-shirt-weather-in-antarctica-as.html

Global warming to blame for hottest day in Argentina Antarctica
https://plawiuk.blogspot.com/2020/02/global-warming-to-blame-for-hottest-day.html

LOOKING FOR A GREAT LEADER

Xi Jinping has turned invisible during China's coronavirus epidemic, likely to cover his back in case things go badly wrong

Alexandra Ma

A screen showing Chinese President Xi Jinping at a symposium

 in Hong Kong in February 2019. Kin Cheung/AP


China has framed its fight against the Wuhan coronavirus as a national struggle and a "people's war."
But its leader, President Xi Jinping, has been nowhere near the front lines.
His right hand man, Premier Li Keqiang, has been dispatched instead.
Some Communist officials have sought to portray Xi as an invisible force guiding the fight from afar.
But experts say Xi could be staying hidden to protect himself from public anger.
Citizens have accused the government of suppressing information about the virus, and punishing people who did speak out.

The outbreak of the deadly Wuhan coronavirus is sorely testing the Chinese Communist Party's grip on power.

With more than 630 people dead, citizens have turned their anger on their rulers, accusing the government of covering up the epidemic in its early days.

And the country's leader, President Xi Jinping, is nowhere to be found.

Xi has issued multiple statements about the virus, characterizing the battle against the disease as a patriotic national struggle, but has made no public or on-camera appearances.

He has called the fight against the coronavirus a "people's war" that requires "resolute actions," according to state media reports. Multiple officials have praised Xi's leadership in their speeches and meetings about the virus — but Xi has not been seen on the front lines once

Instead, he's sent his right hand man, Chinese Premier Li Keqiang. In late January Li visited Wuhan, where the virus originated, to rally workers at a local hospital and at a construction site of a new hospital panic-built to accommodate more patients.

Chinese Premier Li Keqiang, (center) wears a mask while speaking to medical worker at the Jinyintan hospital in Wuhan on January 27. cnsphoto via Reuters

Wuhan's mayor, Zhou Xianwang, has offered himself up as a scapegoat, offering lat month to step down to placate locals' anger at the outbreak.

Officials have been criticized for responding slowly, while punishing citizens for spreading "rumors" about the virus, and detaining journalists for covering it.

(One such citizen who was censured for discussing the virus was Li Wenliang, an ophthalmologist in Wuhan who warned his colleagues in late December of the outbreak. Local police later had him sign a letter admitting to "making false comments." He died of the coronavirus on Friday, sparking a public outpouring of grief.)


In other words, Xi is staying as far as possible from China's biggest crisis in years. In a country where he is considered the sole leader and dominant presence, it's obvious.

Xi in Paris in March 2019. Stephane Cardinale - Corbis/Corbis via Getty

Experts say he is likely trying to ensure he can keep his grip on power even if the coronavirus destroys citizens' faith in the Communist Party.

"If the situation improves, he will take credit. If it worsens the blame will be pinned on Li Keqiang," Willy Lam, an adjunct professor at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, told The Guardian.

"The central government may be still in an active process in gauging when it's appropriate for Xi to appear to take the reins of the coronavirus fighting efforts," Rui Zhong, a China expert at the Wilson Center, told CNN's James Griffiths.

Medical staff rally in Wuhan before starting work in a newly-built hospital. Feature China/Barcroft Media via Getty Images

Bill Bishop, author of the Sinocism newsletter, suggested that seeing Xi wear a mask in public — as almost the entire country is now required to do — could weaken his image as leader.

"One of the key political tasks of all party members is to protect the core, i.e. Xi Jinping, and while you would think the 'people's leader' would want to be seen close to the people, perhaps in this case the risk of him catching the virus may be too high, and images of him wearing a mask might be anathema to the propaganda wizards," he said.

"That said, I do not know what is going on," Bishop continued. "I will bet that Xi and the other top leaders in the Party and the military understand that they either all hang together in this crisis or they may all hang separately, to paraphrase Benjamin Franklin."

Steve Tsang, director of the China Institute at SOAS University of London, told Al Jazeera that Xi handled the crisis "very badly."

"You can't have him as the undisputed, unchallenged leader of China on one hand, and then say that in his watch, under his charge, the virus is being handled badly and it's got nothing to do with him," he said.

—TIME (@TIME) February 6, 2020

China's leadership appears to understand the gravity of the coronavirus and the challenge it presents to its power.

The official account of a Monday meeting of the Communist Party's Politburo Standing Committee — a body comprising the country's top leadership, chaired by Xi — said: "The outbreak is a major test of China's system and capacity for governance, and we must sum up the experience and draw a lesson from it."

The same meeting also acknowledged "shortcomings and deficiencies exposed in the response to this epidemic," and pledged to improve the country's emergency management system — a rare admission of fault in an authoritarian nation.

Members of the Politburo Standing Committee, including Xi and Li Keqiang (fourth and fifth from left) at Beijing's Great Hall of the People in October 2017. AP Photo/Ng Han Guan

But is it too late for the Communist Party to recoup its image?

Earlier this week, many people on Chinese social media had already started drawing attention to Xi's absence, asking euphemistically: "Where is that person?"


They posted images of former leaders responding to past crises on the ground, The New York Times reported, seeming to highlight the different approach taken by Xi.

An unnamed person in Wuhan wrote on Weibo earlier this week: "I know before long this country will go back to being a peaceful, prosperous society. We will hear many people screaming how proud they are of its prosperity and power ... But after what I have witnessed, I refuse to watch the applause and commendation."

It's a bold thing to say on Weibo, which often censors and removes content deemed politically sensitive, and in China, where people are frequently detained or disappeared.

After the death of Li — the doctor who died after being censored for spreading word of the coronavirus — Weibo was filled with outpourings of grief and anger at the government, which included the phrase: "We want freedom of speech."

Read more:
Chinese citizens are furious at the death of the whistleblower doctor censored for talking about the coronavirus. His mother said she couldn't even say goodbye.
China's unprecedented quarantine of 11 million people in Wuhan is 2 weeks old. Here's what it's like in the isolated city.
Mistrust, low pay, and a tradition of bribery in China's healthcare system have crippled efforts to contain the Wuhan coronavirus

AN EXCITED JAMES CARVELL ON MSNBC

Defective software could have doomed Boeing's crew capsule

by Marcia Dunn

ANOTHER BOEING SOFTWARE SCREW UP

In this Sunday, Dec. 22, 2019 photo made available by NASA, Boeing, NASA, and U.S. Army personnel work around the Boeing Starliner spacecraft shortly after it landed in White Sands, N.M. On Friday, Feb. 7, 2020, NASA said defective software could have doomed the crew capsule during its first test flight that ended up being cut short. (Bill Ingalls/NASA via AP)

Defective software could have doomed Boeing's crew capsule during its first test flight, a botched trip that was cut short and never made it to the International Space Station, NASA and company officials said Friday.

The Starliner capsule launched without astronauts in December, but its automatic timer was off by 11 hours, preventing the capsule from flying to the space station as planned. This software trouble—which left the capsule in the wrong orbit just after liftoff—set off a scramble to find more possible coding errors, Boeing officials said.

Hours before the Starliner's scheduled touchdown, a second software mistake was discovered, this time involving the Starliner's service module. Flight controllers rushed to fix the problem, which could have caused the cylinder to slam into the capsule once jettisoned during reentry.

Such an impact could have sent the Starliner into a tumble, said Jim Chilton, a senior vice president for Boeing. In addition, damage to the Starliner's heat shield could have caused the capsule to burn up on reentry, he noted.

He also conceded they wouldn't have found the second problem without the first.

"Nobody is more disappointed in the issues that we uncovered ... than the Starliner team," said Boeing program manager John Mulholland.

These latest findings stem from a joint investigation team formed by NASA and Boeing in the wake of the aborted test flight. The capsule returned to Earth on Dec. 22 after just two days, parachuting down to a landing in New Mexico.

The mission was supposed to be the company's last major hurdle before launching the first Starliner crew.

NASA has yet to decide whether Boeing should conduct another test flight without a crew, before putting astronauts on board. Just in case, Boeing reported last week that it took a $410 million charge in its fourth-quarter earnings, to cover a possible mission repeat.

Douglas Loverro, head of NASA's human exploration and operations mission directorate, said Boeing needs to check and verify all of its flight software before any decisions are made on a possible reflight. He told reporters NASA shares some of the blame for the software problems.

"Our NASA oversight was insufficient. That's obvious and we recognize that," he said.

The investigation team also is looking into a third problem, an intermittent space-to-ground communication problem that hampered controllers' ability to command and manage the capsule early in the flight. Interference from cellphone towers may have exacerbated the matter, Boeing officials said.

NASA said the independent review should be completed by the end of February.

Outside of this ongoing review, NASA is taking an extensive look at Boeing's culture, according to Loverro. He said it was prompted in part by software issues elsewhere in the company, an apparent reference to the grounded 737 Max fleet.

A second private company is on track to launch astronauts for NASA as early as this spring. SpaceX successfully completed a launch abort test last month at Cape Canaveral.

NASA astronauts have not launched from home soil since the space shuttle program ended in 2011, instead riding Russian rockets to get to the space station. The Soyuz seats go for tens of millions of dollars apiece.

NASA has been paying billions of dollars to Boeing and SpaceX to develop capsules capable of transporting astronauts to and from the space station. Even before Boeing's software issues, the commercial crew flights were years behind schedule. The space agency deliberately opted for two companies for redundancy, an advantage cited repeatedly Friday by NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine.

Boeing's crew capsule declared ready for 1st space flight

Multiple software errors doomed Boeing crew capsule test
AFP
Multiple software issues and a poor radio link doomed a test flight of Boeing's crew capsule late last year, NASA said Friday, revealing for the first time a glitch that could have destroyed the spaceship on its re-entry.

© HO The Starliner's December 20 mission, an uncrewed test flight, was ended early when it failed to engage its thrusters on time, due to a previously reported faulty timer

The Starliner's December 20 mission, an uncrewed test flight, was ended early when it failed to engage its thrusters on time, due to a previously reported faulty timer. 

NASA said in a statement Friday that the problem arose because it incorrectly pulled time from its Atlas V launch rocket, creating an 11-hour mismatch.

The second problem was intermittent space-to-ground communications, impeding the flight control team's ability to command and control the vehicle.

A third issue was confirmed by NASA and Boeing for the first time: a coding error in the program that governs Starliner's preparation for reentry into Earth's atmosphere.

The error would have caused the service module, which contains the spacecraft's support systems and is supposed to detach prior to re-entry, to be pushed toward the crewed module.

This could have resulted in impact, destabilizing the ship or damaging its heat shield, said Jim Chilton, senior vice president of Boeing's Space and Launch division.

The error was caught and fixed via a software patch the night before landing, said John Mulholland, project manager for the Starliner.

Douglas Loverro, a senior NASA official, said the multiple errors pointed to "insufficient" oversight by his agency, but he also added: "It looks as if there could possibly be process issues at Boeing. And so, we want to understand what the culture is at Boeing, that may have led to that."

Starliner's failure was the latest serious setback for Boeing, which is still reeling from two fatal crashes of its 737 Max aircraft. The crashes, in October 2018 in Indonesia and in March 2019 in Ethiopia, claimed a total 346 lives.

The findings of an independent review into the latest failure will be ready in late February.

NASA officials have refused to be drawn on what it all means for the future of Starliner, which is scheduled to take its first astronauts to the International Space Station in the coming months.

Meanwhile, Boeing's space rival SpaceX is preparing for its first crewed flight with its Crew Dragon, likely in the second quarter, according to boss Elon Musk.

NASA has committed to pay the two companies $8 billion in return for six trips carrying four astronauts each to the ISS. The US has relied on Russian rockets to carry its crews to the space station since ending the Space Shuttle program in 2011.

Amazon deforestation for January hits record

A handout picture released by the Communication Department of the State of Mato Grosso shows deforestation in the Amazon basin in the municipality of Colniza, Mato Grosso state, Brazil, on August 29, 2019

Deforestation in the Amazon rainforest in Brazil more than doubled in January compared with the previous year, according to official data published Friday.

More than 280 square kilometers (110 square miles) were cleared, an increase of 108 percent. It was the largest area cleared in the month of January since 2015, when such data started being collected, according to Brazil's National Institute for Space Research (INPE).

The data was collected by the INPE's satellite-based DETER system, which monitors deforestation in real time.

In comparison, 136 square kilometers were cleared in January 2019, 183 square kilometers in 2018 and 58 square kilometers in 2017.

INPE data published in mid-January found that deforestation in the Amazon in northern Brazil had soared 85 percent in 2019, clearing 9,166 square kilometers—the highest number in at least five years—versus 4,946 square kilometers cleared in 2018.

The sharp increase overlapped the first year in office of President Jair Bolsonaro, a climate change skeptic who has eased restrictions on exploiting the Amazon's vast riches.

Bolsonaro made headlines in August when he attempted to minimize the resurgence of forest fires that had shocked the world.

On August 2, INPE then-president Ricardo Galvao was sacked by Bolsonaro's administration, which accused him of exaggerating the extent of the deforestation.

On Wednesday, Bolsonaro unveiled a sweeping plan for the Amazon rainforest that would open indigenous lands to mining, farming and hydroelectric power projects.

Many NGOs said this would further increase deforestation.

The bill, which has yet to be approved by Congress, is a "dream" for the far-right leader but a "nightmare" for environmentalists and tribal leaders.

Deforestation in Brazil's Amazon up by more than double: data

Yarn created from skin cells can be woven into human textiles

SOUNDS LIKE THE WEAVING HUMAN SKIN INTO PANTS AND COVERS OF BOOKS ALA HP LOVECRAFT DREAMS IN THE WITCH HOUSE


by Bob Yirka , Phys.org
 

Credit: CC0 Public Domain

A team of researchers from France, Columbia and the U.S. has developed a type of yarn from human skin cells that can be woven into human textiles. In their paper published in the journal Acta Biomaterialia, the group describes the process they used and applications for the materials they produced.


Medical textiles are materials that can be used to heal skin and other body parts. They can also replace parts of damaged organs. But not all patients have the same reactions to all textiles, because the materials are often treated as foreign agents by the immune system. So scientists continue to look for ways to create textiles that the human body will accept. In this new effort, the researchers have created textiles out of human fibroblasts—cells that normally assist with the production of collagen and other fibers. The body will not reject them because they are natural human cells.

The researchers have created a variety of textiles out of the material for use in a wide variety of applications. The researchers first grew skin cell fibroblasts into sheets of material. The sheets were then fashioned into desired shapes. In many instances, they were cut into strings for applications such as suturing wounds. The strings could also be twisted or knotted to create braids or used like yarn for knitting or crochet applications. One notable advantage of the new technique is that it does not require the use of scaffolds to create parts of organs—they can simply be fashioned in ways similar to knitting a hat or scarf.

The new material has already been tested on animals, and the researchers are ready to start testing on human patients. They suggest it could be used to create pouches, valves or tubes, in addition to serving as a suture material for skin or organs after surgery. As an example, they created a tube out of the material and grafted it onto an artery in a test sheep. They also sutured open wounds in rats. The researchers claim the new material works as well as others currently in use.

Invention of shape-changing textiles powered only by body heat

More information: Laure Magnan et al. Human Textiles: a cell-synthesized yarn as a truly "bio" material for tissue engineering applications., Acta Biomaterialia (2020). DOI: 10.1016/j.actbio.2020.01.037


* The Dreams in the Witch-House | The H.P. Lovecraft Wiki ..
"The Dreams in the Witch House" is a short story by H. P. Lovecraft, part of the ... Keziah Mason was an old woman of Arkham who was arrested as part of the ...

Keziah Mason | The H.P. Lovecraft Wiki | Fandom
During the Salem witch trials of 1692, an old woman by the name of Keziah ... and when he took a room in her house she revealed to that same knowledge to ...

The Dreams in the Witch House - Tor.com
Jul 7, 2015 - Welcome back to the Lovecraft reread, in which two modern Mythos writers get girl ... Today we're looking at “The Dreams in the Witch House,” written in ... What's Cyclopean: The alien city of the elder things, that Gilman visits while ... My understanding is that HP wrote this work after being introduced to the ...

Nábrók - Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org › wiki › Nábrók
Nábrók (calqued as necropants, literally "corpse britches") are a pair of pants made from the skin of a dead man, which are believed in Icelandic witchcraft to be capable of producing an endless supply of money. It is unlikely these pants ever existed outside of folklore.


Necropants: Did Icelandic Sorcerers Really Make Magic Pants ...
https://www.ancient-origins.net › unexplained-phenomena › necropants-ic...
Jun 27, 2018 - A museum in Iceland is home to the only known pair of necropants: pants made out of human skin. Legend has it that Icelandic sorcerers would tear the skin off of a dead friend’s body and clothe themselves in their flesh. They called them Nábrók, or necropants -- a type of dark ...


The Creepy Icelandic Pants Made of Human Skin
https://www.thevintagenews.com › 2018/08/24 › necropants
Aug 24, 2018 - Post-death, “you must dig up his body and flay the skin of the corpse in one piece from the waist down. As soon as you step into the pants they ...

Necropants and Other Tales of 17th-Century Icelandic Sorcery ...
https://www.atlasobscura.com › articles › objects-of-intrigue-necropants
... has been buried, dig up the body, and then skin the lower half of the corpse without creating any holes or tears, thus creating a pair of gruesome skin pants.


HUMAN SKIN BOOK COVER

NECRONOMICON FROM EVIL DEAD

In suspending Global Entry, a spiteful Trump makes us all less safe (opinion)
 Opinion by Ruth Ben-Ghiat 

Ninety seconds. That's my record for getting through border controls at John F. Kennedy International Airport, armed with my Global Entry card. Customs took an additional two minutes (Global Entry card holders have their own line). This streamlined processing by the Trusted Traveler program allowed me to plan same-day business, rather than spend hours in line. 

The Trump administration's suspension of Global Entry, NEXUS and other Trusted Traveler programs for residents of New York state, announced Wednesday by Chad Wolf, the acting secretary of Homeland Security, will change all that. According to Wolf, new enrollments and re-enrollments for the service that costs $100 every five years are no longer possible, although current card holders can in theory continue to participate in the program until their special status expires.

While the official reason Wolf gave for the move was national security, in reality an authoritarian cocktail of spite, corruption and racism drives this decision -- one that will make America less secure and less efficient.

Every autocrat has an obsession, and one of President Donald Trump's is targeting immigrants as part of a crusade to rally his base and keep America a majority-white and Christian territory. His Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is targeting New York state because of its Green Light Law that allows undocumented immigrants to obtain drivers' licenses and forbids government officials from turning over Department of Motor Vehicles records to federal officials.
Without that information, Wolf claims, the government can't vet people for Trusted Traveler status.
National security experts and former Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials say that's not just untrue but also dangerous. Trump's action will place vetted and non-vetted travelers together in lines for protracted periods of time. "This makes all air travelers less safe," tweeted Marco Lopez, who served as CBP chief of staff when Global Entry program launched. "Best crime fighting tool in the skies."

Revoking Global Entry has less to do with security than with the latest retaliation by Trump against a state that contains New York City, a place he felt has never really accepted him. More precisely, the New York City area, home to two busy international airports, Newark and JFK, is now a sanctuary for immigrants -- and to a state attorney general's office that under Barbara Underwood and now Letitia James has investigated him for alleged corruption and forced him to dissolve his Trump Foundation for what Underwood said was a "shocking pattern" of illegal behaviors.

"No one is above the law, not even the President," says James. Trump feels differently: he uses the law as a weapon against his enemies.

What does Trump really want to obtain with this power play? As always with authoritarians, the people and businesses that will lose time needlessly are just his pawns. His real targets are New York City and state politicians who have defied him: he hopes to make them unpopular and put pressure on them to renounce sanctuary cities, investigations and other measures that stand in the way of his personal and ideological goals. His further targets are other cities -- and whole states, such as California -- whose leaders must now be wondering: Are we next? And if so, what will the retaliation look like?

The Trump administration also knows well that taking away vetted status can mean more difficulties for his racial targets, opening travelers up to profiling if they have the wrong names or skin colors. As one of thousands wrongly placed on a State Department list after the 9/11 terrorist attacks merely for having a "Ben" name ("Ben" being too close to "Bin," as in Osama bin Laden), I have been through that, including special searches in cubicles.

What Trump wants is what all authoritarians want: conformity. He'll try and get it any way he can.

Guess who is not affected by the DHS ruling? The very rich, who travel in private jets and often have special VIP concierge services, like screening and entry protocols, if they travel commercially. Those people are Trump's real constituency, and they won't care about this change.

For the rest of us, there is the partial comfort of DHS's Mobile Passport application, or the private program Clear. Yet the suspension of Global Entry is not really about travel but about the erosion of principled government and the triumph of a politics of revenge.

To remedy that, we'll all need to make our voices heard.

Yang tells Dem rivals: 'Donald Trump is not the cause of all of our problems'

2020 presidential candidate entrepreneur Andrew Yang told his fellow Democrats that President Trump is not the cause of all the country's problems during Friday's New Hampshire debate and advised against continuing to obsess over him heading into the November election. 

 

© FoxNews.com 

Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang joins Neil Cavuto on 'CAVUTO Live.'

"You are missing the lesson of Donald Trump's victory," he began. "Donald Trump is not the cause of all of our problems and we are making a mistake when we act like he is. He is a symptom of a disease that has been building up in our communities for years and decades. And it is our job to get to the harder work of actually curing the disease."

Yang said voter frustration is driving traditionally Democrat voters into the arms of the GOP in states like Iowa and Ohio.

"Most Americans feel like the political parties have been playing, 'You lose, I lose. You lose, I lose' for years," he continued. "And you know who's been losing this entire time? We have. Our communities have. Our communities' way of life is disintegrating beneath our feet.

"That's why Iowa, a traditional swing state, went to Trump by almost 10 points. That's why Ohio, a traditional swing state, is now so red -- that I'm told we're not even going to campaign there," Yang added.

He also went after Amazon for not paying its fair share in taxes and said automation has hurt employment prospects for millions of Americans.

"These communities are seeing their way of life get blasted into smithereens," Yang explained. "We've automated away 4 million manufacturing jobs and counting. We're closing 30 percent of New Hampshire's stores and malls. And Amazon, the force behind that, is literally paying zero in taxes.

"These are the changes that Americans are seeing and feeling around us every day. And if we get to the hard work of curing those problems, we will not just defeat Donald Trump in the fall but we'll actually be able to move our communities forward."

AOC, Omar, Jayapal say DNC boss Tom Perez should be ‘held accountable’ for Iowa failure

Dom Calicchio FOX NEWS

The drumbeat for Democratic National Committee boss Tom Perez to be “held accountable” for recent party failures appears to be getting louder.

© Provided by FOX News 

The latest Democrats to criticize Perez include U.S. Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y.; Ilhan Omar, D-Minn.; and Pramila Jayapal, D-Wash., all backers of 2020 presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.

Recent party setbacks have included the vote-count fiasco at Monday’s Iowa caucuses and Tuesday night’s disclosure that two officials on the host committee of the party’s upcoming national convention in Milwaukee had been fired over non-specified allegations that they oversaw a work environment where staff members were not being “respected.”

IOWA MESS HAS PEREZ FACING DEM PARTY STORM, RESIGNATION CALLS

Previously, Democrats such as former Congressional Black Caucus Chairwoman Rep. Marcia Fudge of Ohio, Washington state Democratic chairwoman Tina Podlodowski and party strategist Neil Sroka spoke out against Perez’s leadership.

“He doesn’t lead on anything,” Fudge told Politico.

On Friday, Ocasio-Cortez, Omar and Jayapal shared their views on the party chairman.

“What’s happened in Iowa is a complete disgrace and someone needs to be held responsible,” Ocasio-Cortez said outside the U.S. Capitol, according to the outlet. “I think there’s a conversation needed around taking responsibility for Iowa and ensuring that this bungled process never happens again.”

Omar mentioned Perez by name in her remarks.

“I would say Tom Perez should be held accountable for this failure,” Omar told The Hill. “I believe it all starts from the top. These are things that Tom should do and should have done. If this was happening in my home state, we would be having a very serious conversation about what accountability would look like for our own chair."

Iowa Dems release '100 percent' of caucus vote totals showing Buttigieg ahead, amid calls for recanvass

Omar noted that the DNC had years to prepare for the Iowa caucuses and said it was “devastating” that more precautions weren’t in place to prevent this week’s vote-count situation.

Jayapal called the Iowa caucuses a “national embarrassment,” and said others deserved blame in addition to Perez.

“I’m sure there is shared blame to go around,” Jayapal told The Hill. “But Tom Perez is the head of the DNC, and I do think that there clearly was not the process in place to make sure all these [protocols] were going to be followed.”

The criticism of Perez followed a Twitter message the DNC leader posted Thursday, in which he blamed Iowa’s state-level Democratic Party for the caucus problems.

“Enough is enough,” Perez wrote. “In light of the problems that have emerged in the implementation of the delegate selection plan and in order to assure public confidence in the results, I am calling on the Iowa Democratic Party to immediately begin a recanvass.”

Podlodowski accused Perez of throwing Iowa officials “under the bus” after a long silence from the national DNC amid the vote-counting problems.

Neither news organizations nor the Iowa Democratic Party have been able to call a winner in Monday's Iowa caucuses while Pete Buttigieg and Sanders are both claiming victory in the state.

As of late Friday, Buttigieg held a narrow lead in state delegate equivalents (SDEs), which help decide how many delegates a candidate gets to bring to the Democratic National Convention in Milwaukee later this year

Sanders, on the other hand, led in the popular vote from both the "first alignment" and the "second alignment" phases of the caucuses.

Those numbers could change, however, as the IDP has noted many irregularities in its vote count and it is highly likely candidates will call for reexaminations of the numbers, as Perez already has.

Meanwhile, DNC convention host committee members Liz Gilbert and Adam Alonso were fired Tuesday evening after initially being placed on leave following allegations made in a Jan. 30 letter signed by committee staffers, Wisconsin Public Radio reported.

“Every employee has a right to feel respected in their workplace,” the host committee said in a statement, the outlet reported. “Based on the information we have learned to date, we believe the work environment did not meet the ideals and expectations of the Milwaukee 2020 Host Committee Board of Directors. Accordingly, Liz Gilbert and Adam Alonso are no longer employed by the organization, effective immediately.”

The staffers alleged that Alonso “consistently bullied and intimidated staff members,” in particular the women, the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reported, and accused Gilbert of allowing “a culture that coddles male senior advisers and consultants.”

Trump's Friday night massacre

Trump made no secret of his anger at Vindman's testimony, and the timing of Vindman's dismissal is likely no coincidence. Acquitted by the Senate on Wednesday, President Donald Trump feels emboldened to act on his every impulse, now that Congressional Republicans have shown him they will not hold him accountable -- no matter the risk.  Vindman was escorted off White House grounds, according to his attorney, and in a manner that was likely intended to publicly embarrass him. His brother Yevgeny Vindman, who also worked on the NSC and is also a lieutenant colonel, was fired as well. (When asked to comment on the departure of the Vindman brothers, NSC spokesman John Ullyot said, "We do not comment on personnel matters.")

Opinions | Trump is the ultimate sore winner. Now he’ll seek revenge.
Donald Trump has always been a sore loser, but if we’ve learned anything over the past three years of his presidency, it’s that he’s also a sore winner. Not content with being elected, he’s still angry at his 2016 opponent and cannot stop talking about her. He’s angry at his predecessor for having respect from the global community and most Americans that Trump himself has not earned. He’s even angry at Republicans like his former attorney general Jeff Sessions, who’ve publicly humiliated themselves to demonstrate fealty to him, for not publicly humiliating themselves enough.

Trump’s quest for revenge could mean the end of whistleblowing
President Trump and some of his allies in the Senate are kicking off the post-impeachment era with vengeance on their minds. In a speech on Thursday, Trump condemned “leakers and liars” and declared that “this should never, ever happen to another president, ever.” On Capitol Hill, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) said Republicans plan to launch an investigation of the whistleblower who disclosed President Trump’s effort to coerce Ukraine to investigate a political rival. Graham threatened that they are “going to get to the bottom of all of this to make sure this never happens again.”
If they carry out this threat of state-sponsored retaliation, whistleblowing as we know it may be over. That would be a disastrous blow to government integrity.
Do not doubt that the eyes of our nation are watching this situation unfold. Federal officials will now think twice before reporting any wrongdoing they witness. Their reticence will only be magnified if Republicans exact a price by grilling the Ukraine whistleblower in a Senate hearing “to make sure this never happens again.” The same will be true if Congress lets executive branch officials fire or otherwise punish the whistleblower — as the Trump administration did to Marie Yovanovitch, the former ambassador to Ukraine.

Trump's disturbing 'celebration'
The tip-off was the fake, breathy voice -- call it Mister Rogers-on the-dark side -- that the President uses whenever he is enraged but wants us to think he's calm. He smiles and leans forward, and then spews venom in a treacly tone. Although he called it a "celebration" of his acquittal in the Senate impeachment trial, Trump's hourlong ramble in the White House on Thursday sounded more like a recriminating diatribe.
President Donald Trump recapped the many investigations against him over the last three years and directed his vitriol at those who dared oppose him. They are "evil and sick people," said Trump.
Rep. "Adam Schiff is a vicious, horrible person," he said, and Speaker of the House "Nancy Pelosi is a horrible person." Mitt Romney "used religion as a crutch," Trump said, after Romney cited his Mormon faith in his decision to become the only senator in US history to vote to remove a president of his own party. Trump went on and called the investigations into Russian interference in the 2016 elections "bullsh**."
Even his decision to hold up the front page of the Washington Post, displaying the headline "Trump acquitted," struck a sour note, since it reminded the world that he is only the third US president to be impeached -- a process that has sown deep divisions in the country. Let's not forget -- the trial was rigged. His acquittal had been guaranteed by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell before it even began. Boasting about it was akin to former North Korean dictator Kim Jong Il bragging about the 11 holes-in-one he scored in a round of golf.
Like Kim, Trump is not like most people. We would expect any other president in his circumstance to express relief and perhaps a little happiness before promising to heal the nation's wounds

Trump, true to his deviance, chose to babble on about his years-ago election victory, and to curse his opponents and critics. You would hardly know that he was the billionaire who occupied the highest office in the country and had just dodged a bullet the size of a bunker-buster.

People are comparing Trump's firing of 2 officials involved in impeachment him to an episode straight out of the Watergate scandal

Alexander Vindman Fired and Escorted From the White House

Trump hasn’t offered any reason beyond the obvious for punishing Alexander Vindman

Impeachment witness Alexander Vindman and his twin brother were abruptly fired and escorted from the White House as part of Trump's payback

'I'm not happy with him': Impeachment witness Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman was escorted from the White House on Friday

#marshablackburnistrash is trending on Twitter after Sen. Marsha Blackburn labeled Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman unpatriotic and 'vindictive'

Biden to Trump: Give Vindman, not Rush Limbaugh, a medal
2020 presidential candidate Joe Biden took a shot at President Trump during the Democratic debate in New Hampshire Friday night and said he should have awarded the Medal of Freedom to Lt. Col. Alexander Vindman instead of nationally syndicated radio host Rush Limbaugh.