Roger Dorn wrote:Each day that passes I'm more worried about 2020...He seems to be getting more senile and I'm convinced he will contest the election and call on half the country to deny the results. This basically keeps me up at night.

CalvinBall wrote:Can someone read this and give me a recap. Got through some but it's kind of confusing because I don't really know who all the people are.

https://www.buzzfeed.com/josephbernstei ... hqrllrXY32

wwry wrote:yeah i've had a bad feeling trump will win again. i think his cult of personality is that strong and as his opposition its hard to even reckon his existence as a viable candidate to combat him in ways that actually hurt him.

CalvinBall wrote:Can someone read this and give me a recap. Got through some but it's kind of confusing because I don't really know who all the people are.

https://www.buzzfeed.com/josephbernstei ... hqrllrXY32

Donald J. Trump‏ @realDonaldTrump
Ralph Northam, who is running for Governor of Virginia, is fighting for the violent MS-13 killer gangs & sanctuary cities. Vote Ed Gillespie!

Ralph Northam‏ @RalphNortham
TBH I've been expecting this. Donate here: http://bit.ly/2ggnAY8

slugsrbad wrote:http://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/354170-trump-told-hhs-to-deny-request-to-fix-iowa-obamacare-market-report

jerseyhoya wrote:The Mercer family is deserving of every insult the left levies against the Koch brothers (American heroes unfairly maligned). They are utterly repellent humans who are, with terrible motives, funding institutions that are designed to destroy American society.

JFLNYC wrote: and let Pence rum the country.

A Koch-owned cellulose facility in Taylor County Florida was responsible for two successivevchlorine dioxide chemical leaks in May, 2014.

Koch Pipeline Company spilled 17,000 gallons of crude oil (400 barrels) near Austin Texas in October, 2013. A road had to be built to access the spill site for cleanup, which contaminated livestock ponds. Months before the spill, Koch Pipeline was gifted it’s second annual “Environmental Performance Award”from the American Petroleum Institute, the top U.S. oil and gas lobbying organization.

Subsidiaries of Koch Carbon have accumulated massive piles of petroleum coke in U.S. cities like Detroit and Chicago, where the toxic dust has blown into peoples’ homes from a 5-story-tall pile of petcoke. Petcoke is a byproduct of refining tar sands that is usually burned like coal. Petcoke, which is more carbon-intensive than coal, is typically exported and burned in other countries with little to no air or climate regulations. While Detroit’s mayor ordered Koch to move its petcoke pile, Chicago regulators and politicians have not acted with the same urgency despite sustained local protests from community members, nurses, andthreats of lawsuits from environmental groups. In response, Koch claims it will add protections to its unlined pile, which could take two years.

Facing “enormous” cleanup costs for soil and groundwater contamination and high crude oil prices, Flint Hills announced in 2014 that it would permanently close its North Pole refinery outside of Fairbanks, Alaska. Koch blames contamination on the refinery’s previous owner, Williams Companies.

Ongoing, permitted releases of hazardous chemicals including benzene, sulfuric acid, hydrogen cyanide from Koch’s oil refinery in Corpus Christi, Texas, where refinery communities experience high rates of illnesses known to be associated with the chemicals released.

Millions of gallons of toxic paper mill waste from Koch-owned Georgia-Pacific facility in Crossett, Arkansas. A 2011 complaint to regional and national Environmental Protection Agency offices, filed by Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility (PEER) and Ouachita Riverkeeper, alleged that Koch’s plant was “Discharging 45 million gallons per day of paper-mill waste, including ammonia and chloride, and metals such as zinc, copper, and mercury.” The EPA dismissed the complaint on the grounds that Koch’s pollution was permitted. PEER and Ouachita noted that, “Koch Industries has persuaded the State of Arkansas to issue the Georgia-Pacific mill a permit that in essence removes water quality standards for the creek, on the self-fulfilling grounds that it can never be restored to a biologically viable stream.”

In 2009, the US Justice Department and EPA announced in 2009 that Koch Industries’Invista subsidiary would pay a $1.7 million penalty and spend $500 million to fix environmental violations at facilities in seven states, in an agreement with the US EPA and Department of Justice.

In May 2001, Koch Industries paid $25 million to settle with the US Government over a long-standing suit brought by Bill Koch – one of the brothers bought out in 1983 – for the company’s long-standing practice of illegally removing oil from federal and Indian lands. The value of oil that brother Bill Koch accused Koch Industries of stealing was worth $133 million – over $255 million in 2014 dollars.

In late 2000, the company was charged with covering up the illegal releases of 91 tons of the known carcinogen benzene from its refinery in Corpus Christi. Initially facing a 97-count indictment and potential fines of $350 million, Koch cut a deal with then-Attorney General John Ashcroft to drop all major charges in exchange for a guilty plea for falsifying documents, and a $20 million settlement. Informing the federal case, a former Koch employee blew the whistle on the company for allegedly falsifying its emissions reports, downplaying the amounts of toxic chemicals it released.

In 2000, the EPA fined Koch Industries $30 million for its role in 300 oil spills that resulted in more than three million gallons of crude oil leaking into ponds, lakes, streams and coastal waters.

In 1999 a Koch subsidiary pleaded guilty to charges that it had negligently allowed aviation fuel to leak into waters near the Mississippi River from its refinery in Rosemount, Minnesota, and that it had illegally dumped a million gallons of high-ammonia wastewater onto the ground and into the Mississippi.

Koch’s negligence toward environmental safety has led to tragic losses of life. In 1996, a rusty Koch pipeline leaked flammable butane near a Texas residential neighborhood. Warned by the smell of gas, two teenagers drove their truck toward the nearest payphone to call for help, but they never made it. Sparks from their truck ignited the gas cloud and the two burned alive. The National Transportation Safety Board determined that “the probable cause of this accident was the failure of Koch to adequately protect its pipeline from corrosion” and the ineffectiveness of Koch’s program to educate local residents about how to respond during a pipeline leak.

Koch Industries spent part of $3.1 million to help confirm Scott Pruitt as head of the EPA, filings show