Today’s comic by Mark Fiore is Trump News Network:
What’s coming up on Sunday Kos:
- We now know that the current White House resident is a delusional autocratic crackpot, by Frank Vyan Walton
- Straight from GM’s mouth: Demand creates jobs (not tax cuts), by David Akadjian
- Donald Trump is morally bankrupt—and so are his supporters, by Mark E Andersen
- Mississippi voted as most expected them to, but all is not lost, by Egberto Willies
- Dear women on the U.S. mainland: Please support our sisters in Puerto Rico, by Denise Oliver Velez
- Why Time's Person of the Year should be the Democratic woman, by Sher Watts Spooner
- Here's how the new Democratic members of the House sort out ideologically, by David Jarman
- Democrats should make marijuana reforms a signature justice issue. New Jersey can show the way, by Ian Reifowitz
• Four-year-long data breach in Marriott hotel empire has compromised information of half a billion guests: Although the breach did not affect all guests’ equally, information exposed included mailing addresses, phone numbers, email addresses, passport numbers, Starwood Preferred Guest account information, dates of birth, gender, arrival and departure information, reservation dates and communication preferences, and credit card numbers. The affected hotel brands operated by Starwood before it was bought by Marriott in 2016 include W Hotels, St. Regis, Sheraton, Westin, Element, Aloft, The Luxury Collection, Le Méridien and Four Points. Starwood-branded timeshare properties are also included. No Marriott-branded hotel was affected.
• Tesla’s big $91 million South Australia battery celebrates first birthday: The lithium-ion battery, still the world’s largest, helps smooth the flow of electricity to the grid for the Australian Energy Market Operator and saves money that would otherwise be spent for cranking up fossil-fuel generators to do the smoothing:
[T]the 100MW/129MWh Tesla big battery—officially known as the Hornsdale Power Reserve—has defied the critics and naysayers and proved that it can make money, lower prices and boost grid security. More than that, it has become a major signpost to the future of faster, cheaper, smarter and cleaner grid. [...]
It is also making money, and lowering costs. The battery cost $91 million, but has likely lowered costs by around $50 million, according to Neoen CEO Franck Wotiez.
“It has been an amazing project,” Wotiez told RenewEconomy this week. “It is amazing, too, for us and for AEMO. It is really positive.
MIDDAY TWEET
• Complaint filed in Florida against Christian school that banned dreadlocks: Clinton Stanley Jr., age 6, was barred from school in August because the administrators disapproved of his hair style, which he wore in dreadlocks. No coming back until that was changed, they said. The private school in question—A Book’s Christian Academy―participates in several of the state’s voucher programs. These include publicly funded scholarships for kids to attend private schools based on factors like income, and Clinton was meant to receive one of those. The NAACP Legal Defense Fund and American Civil Liberties Union have filed a legal complaint with the state’s Department of Education on the grounds of racial discrimination. “A Book’s ban on ‘dreads’—a style that Black students are particularly likely to wear—does not advance any legitimate school objective,” the complaint states. “Therefore, A Book’s policy illegally discriminates against Black students.”
• Open enrollment in the Affordable Care Act ends in most states on December 15: If you’ve been delaying, there are only two weeks left if you need insurance! Free help is available. Answers to your questions about signing up and trained professionals who can talk your through your options are just a phone call or click away. Call 1-800-318-2596 or visit localhelp.healthcare.gov to make a one-on-one appointment now.
• DC clerk demands to see marriage license applicant’s New Mexico passport because the office doesn’t accept international driver’s licenses. Eventually, after two trips to a supervisor confirming that New Mexico has been a state for more than a century, Gavin Clarkson and his fiancée Marina got their license. Clarkson, a Republican who just lost his race for New Mexico secretary of state, resigned under pressure two weeks ago from his job as a senior Bureau of Indian Affairs official appointed last June by Secretary of Interior Ryan Zinke. Clarkson was jettisoned after an inspector general’s report and Human Rights Watch report blasted his role in a tribal loan program he had managed.
• Soaring U.S. oil production brings building boom and problems to Texas Gulf Coast: More than 80 new plants, terminals, and other facilities are being built from Port Arthur to Brownsville to handle the growing exports of crude oil and oil products. That boom in development has created thousands of new, well-paying jobs, but it’s adding to existing problems:
Much of the infrastructure is headed for just two regions: Houston — America’s oil capital — and Corpus Christi, where a port previously focused on oil imports is battling it out with Houston to be the country’s No. 1 location for moving crude to other nations. Each shipped out more than $7 billion in crude during the first nine months of the year, up from less than $1 billion two years earlier, according to U.S. Census Bureau figures. Terminals once used to bring oil in are pushing it the other direction. [...]
But it also intensifies a tragic quandary bedeviling the Gulf. Heavy industry there pumps out greenhouse gases warming the climate, upping the risks of powerful storms that, in turn, endanger those same facilities and everything around them. Harvey, which dumped more rain than any other U.S. storm on record, damaged hundreds of thousands of homes in Texas last year, killed at least 68 people and, particularly around Houston, sparked industrial spills, air pollution and explosions.
On today’s Kagro in the Morning show: Weekend prep! President Flight Risk is in trouble. Rep. Brenda Jones*: a short story. Ryan joins, then denies the voter fraud conspiracy. Procedural shenanigans in Michigan. A Khashoggi theory. And for levity, social media influencers are stupid.