Absolutely despicable: Boater picked up stranded Hawaii flood victims, demanded money to save them

There were many of good deeds on the Hawaiian island of Kauai over the past week and one particularly bad one.

Hawaii’s stunning “garden island” is not yet recovered from its worst flooding in decades following a powerful storm that surged through the island over the weekend. The wild weather produced dramatic scenes as helicopters and boats evacuated some 340 residents and visitors stranded in their ordinarily idyllic surroundings.

Among the strangest sites was a herd of buffalo, from a ranch near the town of Haena, fleeing in terror into the ocean. Jet Ski cowboys took to the sea with lassos to round them up and tow them to shore, where they were moved to safer, higher ground.

More than two feet of surging rain in 24 hours produced landslides that buried the narrow coastal Kuhio Highway snaking across the lush northern reaches of the island, separating isolated and usually idyllic communities like Haena on one side from the more developed town of Hanalei on the other, famous for its sweeping white-sand beach where the classic film South Pacific was filmed.

https://www.denverpost.com/2018/04/20/hawaii-floods-victims-money-demanded-rescue/

Absolutely despicable: Boater picked up stranded Hawaii flood victims, demanded money to save them

Southwest sends apology, $5K, to passengers on damaged jet

PHILADELPHIA — Southwest has sent a letter of apology, a $5,000 check and a $1,000 travel voucher to passengers who were on a flight that made an emergency landing in Philadelphia after an engine exploded.

“Please accept our deepest apologies,” Chairman Gary Kelly wrote in a letter dated April 18, a day after the accident.

An engine on a Southwest jet exploded Tuesday while the plane was flying from New York to Dallas, and debris hit it, causing extensive damage. Banking executive Jennifer Riordan, 43, of Albuquerque, New Mexico, was fatally injured when she was sucked partway through a shattered window, sending passengers scrambling to help her as the aircraft shook violently and went into a rapid descent.

“We value you as our customer and hope you will allow us another opportunity to restore your confidence in Southwest as the airline you can count on for your travel needs,” Kelly wrote in his letter. “In this spirit, we are sending you a check in the amount of $5,000 to cover any of your immediate financial needs.”

https://www.denverpost.com/2018/04/20/southwest-airlines-engine-explosion-apology-voucher/

Suncor oil refinery spews 8.5 tons a year of cyanide gas over low-income north Denver neighborhoods,

Suncor Energy’s oil refinery is spewing 8.5 tons a year of invisible hydrogen cyanide gas over low-income north Denver neighborhoods, state records show.

Community groups in Globeville, Swansea and Elyria this week petitioned the Environmental Protection Agency to require Colorado health officials to set a limit that protects people and at least require Suncor to disclose emissions of the gas to local emergency responders.

CDPHE air quality control officials in January approved a change to Suncor’s air pollution permit that exempts the company from a federal requirement to disclose hydrogen cyanide emissions. The officials set an emissions limit of 12.8 tons a year — higher than the 8.5 tons Suncor reported it emits — for the purpose of letting Suncor use a legal loophole that lets companies with permitted limits avoid disclosure of those emissions, a state document shows.

This CDPHE action overrode objections by Adams County Commissioners, who raised health concerns and said transparency is vital for emergency crews to be able to respond to potential hazards.

https://www.denverpost.com/2018/04/19/suncor-energy-cyanide-gas-poor-denver-neighborhoods/


This is just as fucked up ......................

Colorado CEOs earn in three days what the typical worker earns in a year, new disclosures show

It takes just three workdays, on average, for the CEO of a public company in Colorado to earn as much money as the typical worker at the same firm does in an entire year.

That’s because CEOs in Colorado earn 94 times the median annual pay of their employees, according to a Denver Post analysis of filings of nearly three dozen of the largest companies in the state.

Companies are reporting “CEO pay ratios” that highlight the gap between company leaders and employees for the first time this spring, based on last year’s pay numbers. In Colorado, those ratios range from a high of 814 times for Steve Ells, former CEO of Chipotle Mexican Grill, to zero for Dave Liniger, former co-CEO of Re/Max Holdings, who didn’t take any pay at the real estate brokerage franchisor he founded after it went public in 2013.

The disclosures are the result of a law passed in 2010 during then-President Barack Obama’s first term. It was controversial at the time — companies argued it would be burdensome to calculate and difficult to use to draw meaningful conclusions — and remains so today.

https://www.denverpost.com/2018/04/20/colorado-ceo-worker-pay-gap/


This is just totally fucked up..................

Senators worry Koch brothers have too much influence in Trump administration

WASHINGTON
A group of Democratic senators is asking the administration to explain its ties to Charles and David Koch after the conservative, wealthy brothers bragged to donors that they were responsible for some of President Donald Trump’s policies his first year in office.

The senators sent a letter asking for information this week following the distribution of a report to the Seminar Network, a group of donors that fund Koch brothers political and policy efforts, that takes credit for more than a dozen new policies, including replacing the Clean Power Plan, which cut greenhouse gas emissions from power plants, revoking monument designations, streamlining permits for infrastructure projects, repealing limits on short-term health insurance plans; and implementing tax cuts.

“Americans have a right to know if special interests are unduly influencing public policy decisions that have profound implications for public health, the environment, and the economy,” the senators write in their letters obtained by McClatchy.

The letters launch a larger effort by Democratic lawmakers to reveal the extent of the Koch brothers’ influence in the Trump administration.

http://www.mcclatchydc.com/news/politics-government/white-house/article209373184.html


These two fascist plus others are a danger to this country and the Constitution

Early 787 test plane is dismantled for reuse, recycling, or scrap

Boeing’s Dreamliner No. 5, one of the six flight-test 787s, was too heavily re-worked to sell. Finally, Boeing is dismantling the aircraft, in a reminder that the now-popular jet had major birthing pains.

Built in 2009 at an enormous cost of just over $600 million, Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner No.5 at last has arrived at its embarrassing final destination — the boneyard.

Boeing long ago abandoned any hope of finding a buyer for the jet. Now an airplane parts and recycling contractor is cutting the carbon fiber jet to pieces at Paine Field in Everett and dismantling it for scrap.

While Boeing pitches this ignominious end as an exploratory step forward in recycling technology, it’s also a cruel reminder that the now popular 787 had a ruinously difficult and expensive birth.

By now Boeing has sold more than 1,300 Dreaminers, and nearly 700 are flying worldwide. The planemaker is delivering the innovative jet at the fast clip of a dozen jets per month, expected to rise to 14 per month in a year or two.

https://www.seattletimes.com/business/boeing-aerospace/early-787-test-plane-is-dismantled-for-reuse-recycling-or-scrap/

Ahead of Arizona vote, Republican Debbie Lesko holds a clinic in tamping down expectations

"This is going to be a battle this year. The Democrats are motivated," Lesko said.

ADDY BAIRD APR 21, 2018, 3:00 PM

Debbie Lesko put on a masterclass in expectations setting early Saturday.

Lesko, a Republican, is locked in an increasingly tight race with Democrat Hiral Tipirneni to replace former Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ), who resigned from the House last year after news that he asked a staffer to be his surrogate became public.

On paper, Lesko has little reason to be nervous. Less than a year and a half ago, Trump won this Arizona district by 21 points, and in most polls in the weeks leading up to election day — next Tuesday — she’s led by double digits. But earlier this week, an Emerson college poll showed Tipirneni leading by one point, and Lesko appears to be feeling the heat.

“We have got to win because we cannot let this radical left with their radical agenda take over this country,” Lesko said Saturday morning at an Arizona GOP field office in Sun City, Arizona, where a group of about 70 people had gathered to hear her speak. “There’s radical left groups that have flown in from New York. She’s getting money from the unions. Money from all over the country, and she is lying.”

https://thinkprogress.org/ahead-of-arizona-vote-republican-debbie-lesko-holds-a-clinic-in-tamping-down-expectations-c40110d3b68b/


Hey Lesko....................where do you get your money from the fucking right wing like the Mercers, .........no, I remember you took money from a Trent Franks right ...................and you took his money because of his and your "values.............kinda like a hypocrite right, and as for a wall, your party thinks in Russian terms, they put up a wall called the Berlin Wall..................and they eventually lost..............

November 2018 cannot get here fast enough

Leadership gap opens at Alaska agency responsible for climate relocation

The head of the Denali Commission steps down at a crucial moment.

KYLA MANDEL APR 21, 2018, 8:03 AM

After 33 years working in the federal government, Joel Neimeyer handed in his work credentials to the Department of Commerce on Friday afternoon, April 20, in Washington D.C. For eight years, Neimeyer has served as the federal co-chair of Alaska’s Denali Commission, the agency tasked with funding rural infrastructure projects in the state. But he’s been with the agency much longer than that — in June 1999 he became its sixth employee.

But now the top job responsible for managing the relocation of communities threatened by climate change will be empty. And with no named successor, Neimeyer’s term is ending at a crucial moment for Alaska. Just weeks ago, when the 2018 omnibus spending bill was signed by President Trump at the end of March, the Denali Commission was awarded $30 million, half of which will be dedicated to relocating the town of Newtok.

Over the last month and right up to his final few hours in the job, Neimeyer has been busy signing his name to a flurry of documents in order to ensure the money is officially set in motion and the small coastal Alaskan village can begin the moving process.

Located along the banks of the Ninglick River, the land on which the community of roughly 350 people lives has been eroding away since the late 1950s. They have been trying to relocate since 1994 but securing funding has so far remained elusive and the effects of climate change — coastal erosion, sea level rise, stronger storms, and melting permafrost — have made the situation increasingly urgent.


https://thinkprogress.org/leadership-gap-opens-at-alaska-agency-responsible-for-climate-relocation-778d36f1f833/


Hey Murkowski, since you sold your soul to the oil companies for greed, did you by chance have meeting with that fuck head running the EPA or how about the serial sexual abuser gallivanting around the white house...............bet you haven't

Exactly how much do you make Murkowski per year being a do nothing lackey on the doles of the taxpayer.................

Samantha Bee explains Sean Hannity!