With Altered Map, Trump Insists He Was Right About Dorian Heading for Alabama

[skooly]

When President Trump displayed a large map of Hurricane Dorian’s path in the Oval Office on Wednesday, it was hard to miss a black line that appeared to have been drawn to extend the storm’s possible path into the state of Alabama.

That might have been intended to bolster Mr. Trump’s claim on Sunday when he tweeted that “in addition to Florida — South Carolina, North Carolina, Georgia, and Alabama, will most likely be hit (much) harder than anticipated.”

Never mind that the Alabama office of the National Weather Service quickly responded to Mr. Trump’s original claim by insisting that “Alabama will NOT see any impacts from #Dorian.”

“We repeat, no impacts from Hurricane #Dorian will be felt across Alabama,” the office tweeted. “The system will remain too far east.”
So did Mr. Trump — who frequently uses black Sharpie pens to sign legislation — add the mark to justify his unfounded claim about the dangers faced by residents of the Cotton State?

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/04/u...gtype=Homepage

[skooly]

[skooly]

[skooly]

[Beemer]

[Jared]

This is what happens when you surround yourself with people who aren't on your payroll; they actually call you on your bullshit.

[Plezercruz]

We've been having a lot of good laughs on this one at work.

Pete (sees a Sharpie advertising campaign in this story somewhere)

[skooly]

You know who’s making money hand over fist from this?

Come on, we all know the answer.

https://www.politico.com/story/2019/...arkers-1483644

[Plezercruz]

This all is happening just because for about a nanosecond I thought I had things figured out.

Pete (knows now that he knows nothing)

[Beemer]

[Beemer]

Commerce secretary urged to quit over #sharpiegate 'threats'

US Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross has been urged to resign after reportedly threatening weather officials who contradicted President Donald Trump.
Mr Ross' agency denied he intervened in #sharpiegate, the political storm over Mr Trump's erroneous claim that Hurricane Dorian might hit Alabama.
Alabama was initially forecast to be hit by Dorian, but was not on its path by the time Mr Trump said so.
The hurricane has battered the Bahamas, killing at least 50 people.

In an Oval Office briefing last Wednesday, Mr Trump updated the American public about the approaching storm, showing a six-day-old forecast map by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) from 29 August.
The map looked almost identical to the official NOAA map from that day, but the chart Mr Trump displayed had a black loop marked around Alabama that was not on the original version.
White House spokesman Hogan Gidley later confirmed the map had been altered with a black felt-tip pen, known as a sharpie in the US, but did not say who made the edit.
In the previous days, Mr Trump had repeatedly asserted that Alabama would be hit by the storm.
However, the National Weather Service (NWS) in Birmingham, Alabama, tweeted that the southern US state would "not see any impacts from Dorian".
Journalists said Mr Trump was incorrect, irritating the president.
The NWS and NOAA both fall under the US Department of Commerce, which Mr Ross oversees.

On Monday the New York Times reported that Mr Ross phoned from meetings in Greece last Friday threatening to sack top NOAA employees unless they publicly backed Mr Trump's position.
The newspaper says the threat is what prompted an unsigned statement by NOAA later that day, saying that Hurricane Dorian "could impact Alabama" and criticising,
the Birmingham NWS tweet as "inconsistent with probabilities from the best forecast products available at the time".
A spokesperson for the Department of Commerce said the New York Times story was false.
"Secretary Ross did not threaten to fire any NOAA staff over forecasting and public statements about Hurricane Dorian," the spokesman said.
The Department of Commerce's Office of Inspector General is examining NOAA's statement on Friday, according to the New York Times.

Democratic lawmaker Don Beyer called for Mr Ross to step down over "his direct attacks on the scientists and federal employees, whom he threatened to fire for doing their jobs by accurately reporting the weather".
The Virginia congressman called the episode "an embarrassing new low for a member of this [presidential] cabinet which has been historically venal and incompetent".
Sierra Club, an environmental group, echoed calls for Mr Ross to go.
The organisation called the commerce secretary's alleged intercession a "shameful abuse of power", saying he had "threatened to instil panic simply to give cover for Trump".
New York Democratic congressman Paul Tonko said Mr Ross had "put the safety of countless Americans at risk by compromising America's hurricane warning system just to protect the president's ego".
Another Democratic lawmaker, Jim Himes of Connecticut, told CNN if the report is true "that would be the most blatant use of an official position in the service of the ego and the political fortunes of the president that we have ever seen".
Republican Senator John Thune, who serves on the Senate Commerce Committee, did not join calls for Mr Ross to quit but said it would be inappropriate for the commerce secretary to threaten the public servants.
"We want the weather service to operate with integrity and without bias," he told CNN.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-49642658