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“This was in the good old days, when monsters were fantasy.” ― Hollis Seamon




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A word about Islamic insurgency trends in Africa: "In 2010, there were five recognized militant Islamist groups operating on the continent: al Qaeda (in Egypt and Libya), al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), al Shabaab, Hizbul Islam, and Boko Haram," the Africa Center for Strategic Studies wrote almost a week ago off one of their summer reports.
The update: "By the end of last year, there were over 20."
On the more recent bright side, "While fatalities linked to militant Islamist groups have increased 288% since 2010, they have dropped by almost half since 2015… almost entirely due to the decline in deaths associated with Boko Haram." Dive into that report, here. [The D Brief, September 11, 2018]



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NIKKI HALEY    
United States Ambassador to the United Nations      





State Department Spent $52,701 on Curtains for Residence of U.N. Envoy    
Editors’ Note: September 14, 2018
An earlier version of this article and headline created an unfair impression about who was responsible for the purchase in question. While Nikki R. Haley is the current ambassador to the United Nations, the decision on leasing the ambassador’s residence and purchasing the curtains was made during the Obama administration, according to current and former officials. The article should not have focused on Ms. Haley, nor should a picture of her have been used. The article and headline have now been edited to reflect those concerns, and the picture has been removed.
WASHINGTON — The State Department spent $52,701 for customized and mechanized curtains for the picture windows in the new official residence of the ambassador to the United Nations.
The residence is in a new building on First Avenue in Manhattan. For decades, American ambassadors to the U.N. lived in the Waldorf Astoria hotel. But after the hotel was purchased by a Chinese insurance company with a murky ownership structure, the State Department decided in 2016 to find a new home for its top New York diplomat because of security concerns.
The government leased the apartment, just blocks from the delegation’s offices, with an option to buy, according to Patrick Kennedy, the top management official at the State Department during the Obama administration. The full-floor penthouse, with handsome hardwood floors covering large open spaces stretching nearly 6,000 square feet, was listedat $58,000 a month.

The current ambassador, Nikki R. Haley, is the first to live in the new residence, which has spectacular views. But a spokesman for Ms. Haley emphasized that plans to buy the mechanized curtains were made in 2016, during the Obama administration. Ms. Haley had no say in the purchase, he said.
While ambassadors around the world are given residences, there are only two such residences in the United States — for the U.N. ambassador and the deputy ambassador.
The ambassador’s new residence is particularly grand since it is used for official entertaining. But her deputy’s is also very nice, having served as the location for Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s intimate steak dinner in May with Kim Yong-chol, North Korea’s top nuclear weapons negotiator. During the dinner, Mr. Pompeo used its sweeping views to point out various features of New York City’s skyline to the senior official from the world’s most reclusive country.
The new curtains themselves cost $29,900, while the motors and hardware needed to open and close them automatically cost $22,801, according to the contracts. Installation took place from March to August of last year, during Ms. Haley’s tenure as ambassador.
The new curtains are more expensive than the $31,000 dining room set purchased for the office of Ben Carson, the secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development. That purchase became so controversial that President Trump considered firing Mr. Carson, though the spending rules covering agency chiefs are different from those for ambassadors.

Rex W. Tillerson, the Trump administration’s first secretary of state, froze hiring, pushed out many of the department’s most senior diplomats and proposed cutting the department’s budget by 31 percent. In embassies around the world, projects were eliminated and jobs were left unfilled, and the delegation to last year’s United Nations General Assembly meeting was slashed.
“How can you, on the one hand, tell diplomats that basic needs cannot be met and, on the other hand, spend more than $50,000 on a customized curtain system for the ambassador to the U.N.?” asked Brett Bruen, a White House official in the Obama administration.
But Mr. Kennedy, his colleague from the Obama administration, defended the purchase, saying that it would probably be used for years and that it was needed for both security and entertaining purposes.
“All she’s got is a part-time maid, and the ability to open and close the curtains quickly is important,” Mr. Kennedy said.
Mr. Pompeo will soon receive government housing himself, after the Defense Department agreed to rent him a flag officer’s home on a military base in the Washington area. The State Department said the unusual move would save on security costs. Mr. Pompeo is one of the few members of Mr. Trump’s cabinet of modest means.

While the State Department would not say where Mr. Pompeo’s house would be located, a United States official and a former top State Department official said he would live at Fort Myer, a small Army post near Arlington National Cemetery in Virginia.

















FROM THE PORCH






TRUMP




In other business, Trump, who has never met a brutal dictator he didn't like, is at odds with his own Treasury and State Department officials and members of Congress who want to sanction China for its brutal supression of its Uighur ethnic minority that primarily practices Islam. China detains the Uighurs and other ethnic minorities in large internment camps, where human rights advocates say they are tortured, and forced to renounce their religion and pledge allegiance to the Chinese Communist Party. Many say it's the most brutal human rights abuse in China in decades. But Trump has resisted punishing China for its abuses or even leveling accusations. [Boston Globe, Fast Forward, September 11, 2018]








OPIOID VOTE LOOMING — The Senate is expected to vote on the Opioid Crisis Response Act of 2018 as soon as this week, following weeks of delays and disputes over the bipartisan legislation.
"The fact that so many senators across so many committees were able to put aside political differences to reach an agreement on this legislation, especially given our current political environment, speaks to the seriousness and pervasiveness of opioid and substance use disorders," Senate Finance Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch said in a statement on Friday.
— GOP senators will tweak opioid provision aiding PhRMA-backed group. Senate Republicans have agreed to change a provision in the chamber's final opioid bill that Democrats claimed would solely benefit a powerful advocacy group with deep ties to the pharmaceutical industry, aides from both parties confirmed to POLITICO's Brianna Ehley.
The provision, authored by Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn, authorizes $10 million in grants each year through 2022 to groups that focus on addiction advocacy. Democrats, who threatened to hold up the bill over the provision, said it was tailored to benefit the Addiction Policy Forum, a nonprofit organization that has been scrutinized for receiving millions of dollars from drugmakers.

The two parties struck a written agreement to expand eligibility on Thursday before Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell announced a deal on the final package, according to a Democratic aide. More for Pros. [POLITICO Pulse, September 10, 2018]





A scorecard for animals: The nonprofit group Animal Wellness Action is out with a new tool tracking how members of Congress vote on animal rights issues. Among the bills AWA has scored: legislation on using aircraft to hunt bears, domestic violence protections for pets and banning the sale of shark fins. [POLITICO's Morning Agriculture, September 10, 2018]

The House Rules committee will meet Wednesday at 5 p.m. to prepare H.R. 3798 (115), "The Save American Workers Act of 2017," for floor consideration.. The House is expected to vote on it later this week. The legislation would change the definition of "full-time employee" for purposes of minimum essential health care coverage under the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act from an employee who is employed on average at least 30 hours a week to one who is employed 40 hours a week. More info here. Read the bill here.[ POLITICO's Morning Shift, September 10, 2018]

PERDUE PUSHES FOR GUEST WORKERS IN IMMIGRATION TALKS: USDA Secretary Sonny Perdue on Monday urged Congress to pass an immigration bill that would expand the agricultural guest-worker program, Liz Crampton reports for POLITICO.
The bill, H.R. 6417 (115), sponsored by Rep. Bob Goodlatte (R-Va.), would rebrand and reform the current agricultural guest-worker program to address both seasonal and year-round labor needs and authorize initial stays of 36 months, Crampton says. It has more than 100 co-sponsors, and Perdue said the legislation would "provide needed certainty to farmers coping with a shortage of workers, and noted that agriculture's chronic labor problem is one of the issues that comes up most often when he travels the country, along with trade and regulations." More here. [POLITICO's Morning Shift, September 11, 2018]
ACTING ON DETERRENCE — The DETER Act (S. 2785) — not to be confused with, ahem, the DETER Act (S. 2313) — is getting Senate Judiciary consideration Thursday. The version of the the DETER Act due for a markup would deem "improper interference in U.S. elections" a condition for barring someone from coming to the U.S. Sponsored by Sens. Dick Durbin and Lindsey Graham, the legislation stems from special counsel Robert Mueller's indictment of Russians who traveled here in advance of the 2016 elections to research ways to influence its outcome. [POLITICO's Morning Cybersecurity, September 11, 2018]

FRIENDLY OVERTURES — The National Election Summit wraps up today in St. Louis, with highlights including a speech from Senate Rules Chairman Roy Blunt on post-2016 election security legislation. Blunt's committee has been wrestling to advance the Secure Elections Act (S. 2593), so far unsuccessfully. Election Assistance Commission Chairman Thomas Hicks, DHS Senior Cybersecurity Adviser Matt Masterson and a number of local election officials also will speak.

On Monday, DHS officials such as Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen and Chris Krebs, undersecretary of DHS's National Protection and Programs Directorate, pledged their support to local election officials at the conference and emphasized that the department prioritizes election security. While some believe the relationship between the federal government and state and local election officials has improved, it's not all hunky dory, given that those same state and local officials helped derail the Secure Elections Act out of fear the bill imposes too many federal mandates. [POLITICO's Morning Cybersecurity, September 11, 2018]



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CANDIDATES





"DeSantis, elected to represent north-central Florida in 2012 , appeared at the David Horowitz Freedom Center conferences in Palm Beach, Fla., and Charleston, S.C., in 2013, 2015, 2016 and 2017, said Michael Finch, president of the organization.
"At the group's annual Restoration Weekend conferences,hundreds of people gather to hear right-wing provocateurs such as Stephen K. Bannon, Milo Yiannopoulos and Sebastian Gorka sound off on multiculturalism, radical Islam, free speech on college campuses and other issues. 'I just want to say what an honor it's been to be here to speak,' DeSantis said in a 27-minute speech at the 2015 event in Charleston, a video shows.

"'David has done such great work and I've been an admirer. I've been to these conferences in the past but I've been a big admirer of an organization that shoots straight, tells the American people the truth and is standing up for the right thing.'" WaPo [POLITICO Playbook, September 10, 2018]



NOTE: I have no official connection to any organization from which information is shared.. Occasionally, I post informational material and/or an opportunity to donate or join as  a "community service" announcement.  These again are shared for their varying perspectives.


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