Trump announced that from now on the NFL will be known as the NTL: The National Trump League. The Super Bowl will be renamed the Trump Bowl, and professional players must be called Trumpball Players. Anyone, on any level, who refuses to comply with Trump’s orders will be arrested and charged with being a threat to national security.   read more

As the U.S. presence in Afghanistan continues, so does the reduction in the U.S. government’s ability to monitor the contractors. DynCorp, which has made more than $6 billion there since 2009, was found to have overbilled the government. Both DynCorp and Fluor are being investigated for human trafficking in their recruitment of workers. Defense budget expert Todd Harrison estimates that the 5,500 troops heading there in 2017 will cost about $20 billion, with much of that going to contractors.   read more

In the 2013-14 election cycle, candidates for 19 states’ highest courts received $34.5 million in contributions. About a third, $10.1 million, came from special interest groups. Twenty-one of the 23 seats up for grabs were won by the candidate on whose behalf the most money was spent. “The result is heightened secrecy and less accountability,” said the report. “Outside spenders frequently take advantage of weak disclosure laws to shield their donors from public scrutiny."   read more

The largest retirement nest egg is held by former Yum Brands CEO and current executive chairman David Novak. The executive of the company that owns Kentucky Fried Chicken, Taco Bell and Pizza Hut has $234 million in retirement savings. Most of the employees of his fast food chains have none. The retirement assets of the 100 CEOs with the most put away come to $4.9 billion. That total equals the amount of 41% of American families, more than 116 million people.   read more

More than half of the donors first identified as participants in what was called the “Fat Cat Hotel” two decades ago have contributed to Hillary Clinton’s 2016 presidential campaign. “Of the 66 original ‘Fat Cats’ still living, 34 have donated a total of $1.15 million to Hillary Clinton’s campaign or the super PACs supporting her since January 2013,” Liz Essley Whyte wrote. Most of the 34 individuals gave Hillary’s campaign $2,700, the maximum allowed under federal law during the primaries.   read more

There is a deep rural-urban divide when it comes non-discrimination protections for LGBT people,” said Ineke Mushovic. “Vast geographic stretches in this country—mostly in rural areas—lack LGBT-inclusive nondiscrimination laws. Advocates have done impressive work extending local protections, but an LGBT person in a state that lacks statewide protections is fifty times more likely to be covered by local laws if he or she lives in an urban rather than a rural area.”   read more

“People whose best-self concepts were activated felt better and were more resilient to stress, more resistant to disease and burnout, better at creative problem solving and performance under pressure, and formed stronger long-term relationships with their employer,” researchers Daniel M. Cable, Francesca Gino, Jooa Julia Lee and Bradley R. Staats wrote. The researchers also concluded that when employers remind their workers about their “best selves,” they’re less likely to burn out or quit.   read more

In 2002, she and another prosecutor used the federal racketeering laws (RICO) to convict 15 pimps who targeted children aged 12 to 17. One of her most prominent was the successful prosecution of pro wrestler Harrison Norris Jr., aka “Hardbody Harrison,” who kept eight women as sex slaves in his Georgia home, forcing them into prostitution. She also has worked with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime in the development of a database for tracking human trafficking prosecutions.   read more

In Algiers, his task included trying to convince Muslim religious leaders to publicly condemn acts of terrorism. From his post there, he also warned that the U.S. had intercepted a letter from Ayman al-Zawahiri to Abu al-Zarqawi that outlined Al-Qaeda’s plans to turn Iraq into their base for overthrowing moderate regimes in the region and establish a caliphate. In Cairo, Sievers found himself having to do such things as deny the existence of a plot by the U.S. against the Egyptian government.   read more

Her early assignments included posts in the Czech Republic and Denmark. She returned to Washington in 2002 as Director for South and Central Asian Affairs on the National Security Council staff. She moved again to South Asia two years later as the Deputy Chief of Mission in Kathmandu, Nepal. Her tour there coincided with the last part of the Maoist battle against the Nepalese government that ended in 2006 and left more than 13,000 dead.   read more

The survey also asked people what they think CEOs and workers should be paid. For CEOs, it was $200,000 and for workers it was $30,000, giving a wage gap of 7 to 1. “The actual wage gap between a CEO and the average unskilled worker is about 830 to 1," wrote Leopold. "Yet Americans believe it should be only 7 to 1. Perhaps the biggest reason we are so misinformed is that it is not in the interests of our political parties for us to see the truth."   read more

People on Kili say their home has become uninhabitable because global warming has created more frequent “king tides” and severe storms that are swamping their island. "It’s getting to the point where people are tired of having water in their living rooms and trying to deal with the waves and the water coming over the island," said Bikini Officer Jack Niedenthal. Bikini refugees want to come to the U.S. and call it home, but they need the U.S. government to pay for their second relocation.   read more

Ramon Ochoa probably isn’t laughing now. Ochoa, who had previously served about six years for firearms possession by a felon, got into trouble with his probation officer, which resulted in Ochoa being back inside a Fresno courtroom. Standing before Judge Lawrence O’Neill, Ochoa received a one-year sentence for violating his probation after he mouthed off at the staff of the halfway house. Ochoa’s mouth got him into more hot water when he laughed at O’Neill’s sentence and said...   read more

In 2000, Macrae became Associate Administrator for the Office of Performance Review in HRSA, overseeing agency staff around the country. He returned to the Bureau of Primary Care in 2006, this time as its leader, managing a $5 billion budget that supports the health-care safety net for millions of people. He also oversaw the School-Based Health Center Capital Program, which provides funding for equipment for school-based health centers.   read more

Hankins joined the Foreign Service, with his first overseas posting coming as a vice consul in Recife, Brazil, in 1985. Thailand was another early posting. From 1989 to 1991, Hankins worked in Sudan and by 1992 he was consul in Haiti. There he dealt with boat people who had been returned to that country by order of President George H.W. Bush. As consul, he took requests for asylum from those wanting to leave the then-violent country. Few requests were granted.   read more

Deciding it needed to smuggle spy gear into North Korea to monitor its nuclear weapons program, the Pentagon launched a secret operation using the services of a Christian charity. Given that the charity operated in more than 30 countries, the Pentagon felt the operation could be replicated elsewhere around the world, according to a former military official. Rep. Jan Schakowsky said using "people who genuinely do humanitarian work, to turn their efforts into intel collection is unacceptable."   read more

State Senate minority leader Jennifer Shilling said the bill was “a gross abuse of political power. Republicans should be less concerned about covering up Governor Walker’s political scandals and more focused on helping hardworking Wisconsin families." Common Cause's Jay Heck said the new law “exempts from the John Doe process crimes that are committed involving elections, campaign finance and ethics. In other words, the crimes that politicians would be most likely to commit."   read more