Statement from @PressSec to me regarding @FLOTUS response to @realDonaldTrump’s tweet directed at @GretaThunberg :

(CNN)Dave McAdams and his wife, Tina, opened their coffee shop in Oak Grove, Oregon, a year ago, but he's been an active part of the community for years as a youth pastor, a baseball coach, the Rotary Club and even the Portland Ghostbusters group.

So, when Dave went into hospice care with terminal cancer, loyal customers of The Local Coffee Company and people in the community wanted to help. He has inoperable cancer in his lymph nodes and doctors say he has only a few weeks left.

On Wednesday, the owner of a nearby coffee shop came to support the family by working in the store for free.

"She closed her own shop for a day and ran ours," Tina McAdams told CNN.

https://www.cnn.com/2019/12/13/us/oregon-coffee-hospice-trnd/index.html?utm_source=twCNN&utm_content=2019-12-13T18%3A24%3A15&utm_medium=social&utm_term=link

A high school senior decided recently that she wants to become sexually active with her boyfriend. But she is not yet comfortable talking to her mom about birth control and would be unable to get to a doctor’s appointment on her own. Instead, she walked over to the new well-being center at school during a free period.

It was easy. Planned Parenthood runs a sexual healthcare clinic at Esteban Torres High School in East L.A. once a week. Other days educators are available for stress management and students’ other health concerns, including substance abuse.

The clinic is part of an initiative — funded by the L.A. County departments of public health and mental health and Planned Parenthood Los Angeles — to open 50 such centers in schools throughout the county in the next year.

The effort, which will cost at least $12 million in its first year, is designed to bring much-needed health and wellness care to underserved teenagers at a time when Los Angeles and other districts are struggling to meet the basic needs of their students to help free them to focus on learning.

The high school senior, who asked not to be named to protect her privacy, said that with the clinic’s counseling she decided to start the birth control pill. Without this help, she said, she may not have sought out any expertise.

“It being on campus — there was no excuse not to go,” she said.

The centers include reproductive health clinics where students can get birth control pills and condoms, tests and treatment for sexually transmitted infections, emergency contraception such as Plan B, and pregnancy testing and referrals — services far beyond what is typically offered by school nurses. Planned Parenthood is running five of the 34 sites that are open, offering more extensive birth control options including intrauterine devices and arm implants.

Because California law allows minors older than 12 to obtain confidential treatment and birth control, students can access the services at these clinics without parental consent.

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-12-12/50-new-sexual-health-wellbeing-centers-in-l-a-high-schools

After 11 years of preparation, Michael is ready to debut his action movie.

We present to you THREAT LEVEL MIDNIGHT

After secret agent Michael Scarn (played by Scott) is forced into retirement due to the death of his wife Catherine Zeta-Scarn, the President of the United States of America (played by Darryl Philbin) requests that he prevent Goldenface (played by Jim Halpert) from blowing up the NHL All-Star Game and killing several hostages. Scarn goes undercover and learns how to play hockey, killing another hockey player (played by Oscar Martinez) to make it into the game, but after confronting Goldenface, he is shot. He later recuperates but learns that the President was in on it all along. Depressed, he goes to a bar to drown his sorrows. The patrons of the bar sing a song called "The Scarn" which he danced to with his wife, which cheers Scarn up immensely. With his courage restored, Scarn is able to save the day and blow up Goldenface in the process.

Lawrence VanDyke is just the latest Trump nominee whom Republicans confirmed despite a “Not Qualified” rating.

The Senate confirmed Lawrence VanDyke to a lifetime appointment on the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Wednesday by a vote of 51–44. Every Republican present except Sen. Susan Collins voted for the nomination; every Democrat present opposed it. Like Sarah Pitlyk, a judicial nominee confirmed just last week, VanDyke received a rare “Not Qualified” rating from the American Bar Association. After conducting 60 interviews, the ABA found that VanDyke has a reputation as “arrogant, lazy, an ideologue, and lacking in knowledge of the day-to-day practice including procedural rules.” Video of VanDyke lecturing, scolding, and interrupting judges during oral argument while serving as Nevada solicitor general lends credence to that assessment.

VanDyke has a long record as an anti-LGBTQ activist. He wrote in 2004 that marriage equality “will hurt families, and consequentially children and society.” As the solicitor general of Montana, he advocated for the state to join two briefs alleging that legal recognition of same-sex relationships would harm children. The first claimed that prohibiting same-sex marriage promoted “optimal childrearing” because same-sex couples “cannot provide” the optimal “family structure.” And the second asserted that states “may rationally conclude” that “it is better” for parents to have a “biological” connection to their children. (The Supreme Court disagreed, ruling that a same-sex marriage ban “humiliates” the children of gay couples.) In 2010, VanDyke also filed a brief urging the Supreme Court to rule that student groups at public universities have a First Amendment right to discriminate against LGBTQ students.

In light of this record, the ABA expressed concern over whether “VanDyke would be fair to persons who are gay, lesbian, or otherwise part of the LGBTQ community.” During VanDyke’s confirmation hearing, Missouri GOP Sen. Josh Hawley asked him if the ABA was right to worry. Do you believe, Hawley asked sympathetically, that you would treat LGBTQ litigants unfairly? “I do not believe that,” VanDyke said. Then he started crying. “It is a fundamental belief of mine that all people are created in the image of God,” he insisted. “They should all be treated with dignity and respect.” The victimizer had become the victim.

VanDyke, a longtime member of the Federalist Society, brought that group’s priorities to the Montana solicitor general’s office. He threw the state into a case challenging a federal law banning those under 21 from buying handguns, arguing that the ban “probably does violate the original meaning of the Second Amendment” because “18-year-olds were part of the ‘militia.’ ” He also defended a bizarre Montana statute that attempted to nullify federal law by declaring Montana-made firearms “not subject to federal law or regulation.” In internal emails, VanDyke acknowledged that his argument may not pass “the straight-face test.” Unsurprisingly, VanDyke also co-authored a brief defending 20-week abortion bans and urging the Supreme Court to reconsider Roe v. Wade wholesale.

https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2019/12/lawrence-vandyke-ninth-circuit-not-qualified.html?via=rss_socialflow_twitter

MARK YOUR CALENDARS: @DNC announces the dates and sponsors of four debates in January and February — including the first @CBSNews debate Feb. 25 in Charleston, South Carolina.