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Jared Kushner, one of Trump s senior advisers and his son-in-law, has come under FBI scrutiny in the Russia investigation so the probe is hitting close to home for the current occupant of the White House. Officials say that the probe does not mean that Kushner is suspected of a crime or that they intend to charge him, but investigators believe Trump s son-in-law has significant information relevant to their inquiry.Earlier this month it was revealed that law enforcement agents are scrutinizing a senior White House adviser who is close to the president as a person of interest in their investigation of Trump s Russian influence scandal. That person was not named at the time but many speculated that it was Kushner, however, with so many in Trump s administration having ties to Russia, it could have been anyone. That speculation was confirmed on Thursday.One White House staffer responded to the news, saying that Kushner is f*cked. WH staffer upon learning from NBC News that Jared Kushner is under FBI investigation in the Russia probe: "Jared is so fucked."#JailJared Jon Cooper (@joncoopertweets) May 25, 2017As The Washington Post notes, it isn t just about collusion with Russia in the 2016 election in regards to Kushner. It goes beyond Kushner meeting with Russian officials after Trump was elected.In addition to possible coordination between the Kremlin and the Trump campaign to influence the 2016 presidential election, investigators are also looking broadly into possible financial crimes but the people familiar with the matter, who were not authorized to speak publicly, did not specify who or what was being examined.But Russia is a problem, too, for Kushner who is usually very quiet and sits silently in meetings next to his father-in-law.Kushner met with Russian Ambassador Sergey Kislyak and then with Sergey Gorkov, the head of Vnesheconombank, which faced U.S. sanctions after Russia s annexation of Crimea.Trump will be raging about leaks any minute now, but this highlights the dysfunctionality of White House. Trump believes, even though he s filed for bankruptcy multiple times and hasn t paid some of his own contractors, that he s a brilliant manager and businessman, but his own staffers are at battle with each other. The alleged president aids that by throwing them under the bus as he considers staff shake-ups at the White House. Adding to that, after Trump denies something, he is defended on TV by his staff, then he implicates himself later on Twitter, thus denying his own White House s defense.Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images. | 0 |
The president is expected to formally announce this week that the U. S. will exit the Paris climate agreement, a move that will have negligible impact on the environment but will have major benefits for the U. S. economy. [The Paris climate agreement was deeply flawed from its start. It was legally and constitutionally suspect, based on politics rather than science, and contained unrealistic goals. It promised not only a dramatic expansion of the administrative state and a huge increase in the regulatory burden on American businesses, it threatened to put the brakes on U. S. economic output at a time when most economists think the U. S. will struggle to achieve even a meager two percent growth. It’s likely that it was already acting as a drag on the U. S. economy. After President Barack Obama unofficially committed the U. S. to the Paris agreement, businesses began preparing for its impact. Knowing that it would diminish U. S. economic output, businesses invested less and directed more investment toward technology to meet the climate deal’s mandates. Banks and financiers withdrew capital from sectors expected to suffer under the climate deal and pushed it toward those expected to benefit. A classic example of malinvestment. The Paris climate agreement was adopted on December 12, 2015 at the conclusion of the United Nation’s Climate Change Conference. Parties to the agreement are expected to begin taking measures to reduce emissions in 2020, mainly by enacting rules that sharply reduce carbon emissions. Countries are supposed to publicly announce “Intended Nationally Determined Contributions” to combat climate change and periodically report on their progress. The Obama administration announced the U. S. would commit to reduce emissions by 26 to 28 percent below 2005 levels by 2025, a quarter of which was supposedly achievable by the implementation of the previous administration’s Clean Power Plan. To get the rest of the way, the U. S. would have to make major investments in renewable energy, energy efficiency, and cleaner motor vehicles. This likely explains why the Paris climate deal was so popular with many in Silicon Valley and many on Wall Street. It promised a bonanza of spending and investment, most likely subsidized by taxpayers, in technologies that wouldn’t otherwise be attractive. It was practically calling out for making solar powered cars mandatory. Dropping out of the agreement will let the U. S. avoid several deleterious effects of the agreement. The Paris deal was, in short, a disaster for America and a for climate. | 0 |
NIAMEY/DAKAR (Reuters) - Chad has withdrawn hundreds of troops from neighboring Niger, where they were helping local forces fight Boko Haram Islamist militants, humanitarian sources and officials said. The pull-out over the past two weeks could weaken a region-wide struggle against the militants who have killed tens of thousands of people, forced many more to flee and triggered a humanitarian crisis. There was no immediate explanation or comment from defense officials in Chad. But the move came a month after the vast central African country complained about an unexpected U.S. travel ban imposed on its nationals. Chad warned at the time the order could affect its security commitments - which include its involvement in the U.S.-backed fight against Boko Haram. Residents said the withdrawal had already had an impact on Niger s Diffa region, which has seen a string of attacks by Boko Haram militants crossing over from their base in neighboring Nigeria. Ibrahim Arimi from the border village of Bosso said banditry had increased since the Chadian troops started leaving and he had been temporarily moved to another village for safety. Diffa parliamentarian Lamido Moumouni said residents had started complaining. They have come to rely on the forces so there is a perception that security will be lacking, he said by telephone. At its peak in 2016 after an attack in Bosso, Chad had 2,000 troops in Niger to help counter Boko Haram although security sources said this has fallen since. Boko Haram has attacked Chad, Niger and Cameroon from its base in northeast Nigeria. Its eight-year bid to carve out an Islamist caliphate has driven millions from their homes - more than 200,000 of them are now based in Diffa, with little prospect of returning home. Thousands of them are camped alongside an unfinished highway in the middle of a barren savannah with few resources. Chad s soldiers also occupy front-line positions in a peacekeeping force in northern Mali. Falling oil revenues after the price crash in 2014 has also sapped Chad s appetite for expensive regional security commitments, analysts say. | 1 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Senate Republicans narrowly agreed on Tuesday to open debate on a bill to end Obamacare, but the party’s seven-year effort to roll back Democratic President Barack Obama’s signature healthcare law still faces significant hurdles. The Senate deadlocked 50-50 on moving forward with the healthcare debate, forcing Vice President Mike Pence to cast the tie-breaking vote. Senator John McCain, who was diagnosed this month with brain cancer and has been recovering from surgery at home in Arizona, made a dramatic return to the U.S. Capitol to cast a crucial vote in favor of proceeding. The outcome was a huge relief for President Donald Trump, who had pushed his fellow Republicans hard in recent days to live up to the party’s campaign promises to repeal the 2010 Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare. Minutes after the vote, Trump called it “a big step.” But the narrow victory on a simple procedural matter raised questions about whether Republicans can muster the votes necessary to pass any of the various approaches to repeal. Moderates are worried repeal will cost millions of low-income Americans their insurance and conservatives are angry the proposed bills do not go far enough to gut Obamacare, which they consider government overreach. In a first vote of the many likely to come this week, the plan to repeal and replace Obamacare that Senate Republicans have been working on for months failed to get the 60 votes needed for approval on Tuesday night. The vote was 43 in favor and 57 against. Nine Republicans, ranging from moderates such as Susan Collins of Maine to conservatives such as Rand Paul of Kentucky, voted against the bill, which would have made deep cuts to Medicaid, the health insurance program for the poor, and reduced Obamacare subsidies to lower-income people to help them defray the cost of health insurance. Earlier McCain, 80, received an ovation from his fellow senators when he entered the chamber to cast a vote to open debate. After that vote, he decried growing partisanship in the Senate and urged members to learn how “to trust each other again.” Collins and Senator Lisa Murkowski were the only Republicans to oppose the measure to open debate, and with Republicans controlling the Senate by a 52-48 majority, those were the only votes the party leadership could afford to lose. Democrats were united in opposition to the motion to proceed. Republican Senator Ron Johnson, who cast the last and deciding vote to open debate, engaged in a heated discussion with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell before casting his vote and ending the suspense. A loss on the vote to open debate on Tuesday could have been a death blow for Republican efforts to repeal Obamacare and cast doubt on Trump’s prospects to achieve any of his other top legislative agenda items, including tax reform. “We have a duty to act,” McConnell told senators before the vote, reminding Republicans they had promised to repeal Obamacare in four straight elections. “We can’t let this moment slip by.” Republicans have found it difficult to fulfill their campaign promises to repeal Obamacare, which enabled 20 million more Americans to get health insurance. Polls show Obamacare is now far more popular than the Republican alternatives. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has estimated the Senate’s replacement bill could lead to as many as 22 million fewer Americans being insured. The health industry has watched the debate nervously, and after the vote some groups urged the Senate to reconsider its approach. America’s Essential Hospitals, a group representing safety-net hospitals, said in a statement it strongly opposed all the Republican plans and feared the big cuts in Medicaid in the bills “would jeopardize the health and financial security of millions of working people and families.” Shares in health insurer Centene Corp (CNC.N) turned sharply lower after the Senate vote. Earlier on Tuesday, the company had reported a better than expected profit as it benefits from a strong Obamacare business. As the debate vote opened, more than two dozen protesters in the Senate chamber chanted “kill the bill” before they were removed. Senators said several approaches have been discussed, including a straight repeal of Obamacare with no replacement plan, or repealing and replacing the law while also overhauling Medicaid. Senate Republicans also could consider a shortened version of repeal, called a “skinny repeal,” which would end the mandates in Obamacare on individuals and employers to obtain or provide health insurance, and a medical device tax, a Senate aide and a lobbyist said. “Some of us want clean repeal, some of us want the Senate leadership bill, they’re both going to get a vote early on and I think that’s a fair way to do it,” Republican Senator Rand Paul said. “If either one of them fails and another one succeeds, maybe we can find something in between that actually succeeds.” Republican Senator Bob Corker said the goal was to gain enough votes to get a bill through the Senate and send it to the House of Representatives, which passed its own bill to replace Obamacare in May, for negotiations. “Everybody understands this is just a first step,” he said. Several of the Democrats opposing the motion for debate were from conservative states that backed Trump in 2016 and face tough re-election bids next year, including Senators Joe Manchin of West Virginia, Heidi Heitkamp of North Dakota and Jon Tester of Montana. “We have a good chance to beat this,” Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer told reporters after the vote. Dick Durbin, the No. 2 Senate Democrat, praised Collins and Murkowski for taking a principled stand against the Republican move to open debate. “That wasn’t easy,” Durbin said. “That was an act of political courage on their part; I’m sure they were under tremendous pressure.” | 1 |
Coexist, assimilation, religious tolerance these are all foreign concepts to Muslims immigrants and Muslims living in countries who refuse to offer them refuge in their countries .FIVE OF THE WEALTHIEST MUSLIM COUNTRIES HAVE TAKEN NO SYRIAN REFUGEES IN AT ALL, ARGUING THAT DOING SO WOULD OPEN THEM UP TO THE RISK OF TERRORISM.Lebanon, which has 1.1 million Syrian refugees, shut her borders to the Syrians in June of last year. Jordan, host to another 630,000, followed suit in August last year, preventing more Syrians from abandoning their country.Sherif Elsayid-Ali, Amnesty International s Head of Refugee and Migrants Rights, has slammed their inaction as shameful .He said: The records of Gulf countries is absolutely appalling, in terms of actually showing compassion and sharing the responsibility of this crisis It is a disgrace. Via: Conservative Post | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. derivatives regulator will move on from reforms undertaken after the 2007-09 financial crisis to a new focus on U.S. competitiveness and the potential for shocks to the global $710 trillion swaps markets under President-elect Donald Trump. J. Christopher Giancarlo, in line to head the Commodity Futures Trading Commission once Trump is inaugurated on Jan. 20, has said the agency should look beyond mandates from the 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform law to current trends in financial markets. He counts among those cyber threats, liquidity risk, market concentration and de-globalization. As the sole Republican on the CFTC, Giancarlo will at least temporarily run the commission where he is currently the minority member. Even if Trump later nominates someone else for the permanent post, Giancarlo, who was previously an executive vice president at GFI Group, a wholesale brokerage that runs electronic trading platforms, will be influential in the coming months. In a speech in London on Friday, he said regulators should foster best practices for new trading technologies, address diminishing liquidity, and review regulations that could cause market fragmentation as they enter “the new year and, perhaps, a new regulatory environment.” This week, he forced the commission to delay limits on the positions that traders can hold on physical commodity futures and swaps. Redrawn position limit rules are likely to reappear in 2017, as are the following other agenda items. Giancarlo has often argued the United States should not move too far ahead of other countries in tightening regulations governing the swaps market, which the United States dominates. That could put U.S. firms at a disadvantage and drive up trading costs, he says. In August he warned the CFTC could create a liquidity crunch by sticking to its September deadline for implementing a new swaps margin rule, given European regulators had delayed start dates for their similar rules. Indeed, in September Asian swaps markets foundered and trades fell through as the U.S. rules came online. The CFTC then gave swap dealers an extra month to comply. “Championing American markets means no longer asking U.S. market participants to go it alone and take it on the chin in implementation of global regulatory reform,” Giancarlo later told the conservative American Enterprise Institute. “Rather, it means standing up for America’s capital and risk transfer markets and treating them as the vital national interests that they are.” Giancarlo sees the CFTC as “stuck in a 20th Century time warp” when it comes to technology. He can be expected to push the CFTC toward giving industry space for breakthroughs in artificial intelligence guiding trade execution, “smart” contracts that calculate payments and value in real-time, and distributed ledger technology, known as Blockchain. In November he voted against the “Reg AT” - Regulation Automated Trading - to update oversight of fast computer trades, criticizing it for not adequately protecting algorithmic trading companies’ prized source codes and being too prescriptive. Giancarlo says regulators in other countries, notably Britain, are leading the way in financial technology and the CFTC must follow in making room to experiment. Since 2012, any dealer with more than $8 billion in swap activity has had to register with the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, which subjects it to stricter federal oversight. That activity value in dollars, known as the “de minimis” threshold, was poised to fall to $3 billion by the end of 2017, but the CFTC recently delayed the drop by a year. Under Giancarlo, the threshold may never fall - or could disappear altogether. He has called the thresholds “made up numbers” lacking policy justification. He also said that in general, a specific de minimis level may not do anything to optimize “the safety, soundness, liquidity or vibrancy of U.S. swaps markets.” In March, Giancarlo failed to launch recommendations on regulating energy markets made by a committee he led, which was dominated by people from the energy sector. Reform proponents said the suggestions were sops to industry and he withdrew its report. When he is in charge, Giancarlo could turn back to the committee’s work. It questioned the need for new position limits and suggested an alternative “accountability system,” where exchanges could grant exemptions to limits. | 1 |
The Washington Post published a propaganda organizing piece for the Democrat Party: Democrats resistance calls for a July 4th recess push to kill GOP billFrom the article: The moment that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) told Republicans that there could be no vote on the party s health-care bill this week, Senate Democrats were in a familiar position headed to a protest.In the Senate swamp, a well-kept lawn across from the Capitol, hundreds of activists from Planned Parenthood, AFSCME and smaller progressive groups were hooting and cheering their latest mini-victory. The People s Filibuster, scheduled to last all week, had triumphed in its first few minutes. The delay of BRCA, which Republicans had hoped to vote on this week, came after disagreements inside the majority party. But it was egged on by the Resistance, the loose collection of more than 1,000 groups working to stop the Republican agenda that sprang out of Trump s surprise election. A bill designed by wealthy white men, for wealthy white men will only further marginalize disenfranchised communities, said the organizers of the Jan. 21 Women s March in a statement. While a delay on the vote is a small victory, it s time to crank up the outrage and tell all Senators to vote NO. The call to action that has everyone on social media laughing however was a tweet by Michael Moore who suggested liberals storm ( nonviolently ) the local offices of Senators and pack their town halls. Hmmm .Is there such a thing as nonviolently storming someone s office? Perhaps someone should tell the irrelevant Michael Moore that the Senators don t work over the July 4th weekend.I call upon EVERYONE to observe this 4th of July week by nonviolently storming the local offices of your Senators, pack town halls, RISE UP! Michael Moore (@MMFlint) June 28, 2017Moore got called out on Twitter by several people who were smart enough to figure out the Senate would be on recess or that storming offices of US Senators was anything but nonviolent :His EVERYONE = Flint's & #OFA Soros paid violent protesters.BTW, storming is violent.#July4th @FBI adnilhoom (@adnilhoom) June 29, 2017What is the point in storming offices that are going to be completely empty because July 4th is a holiday, you utter moron? https://t.co/o8eIaKkr4f Paul Joseph Watson (@PrisonPlanet) June 29, 2017Yes, YES! Storm offices that will be closed on the 4th of July. pic.twitter.com/owUNMI7C5y The Mental Recession (@rustyweiss74) June 29, 2017The most embarrassing propaganda piece we could find was USA Today s piece titled:USA Today joined in with other leftist propaganda rags in an effort to help the left organize agains our President and the GOP. Yesterday, they ran a one-sided fear mongering article that was clearly designed to motivate Democrats to spend their extended holiday weekend harassing Republican Senators to change their votes on the replacement bill for the failed Obamacare.In an effort to discredit the efforts of the GOP, USA Today s propaganda piece mentions how Republican Senators are not 100% on board with the bill. USA Today even offers their readers a George Soros resource to help them find ways to resist our President and the GOP agenda.USA today also offered their readers a heavy dose of fear with a Youtube video featuring a woman named Priscilla and her 38-year-old daughter who has cerebral palsy and could die from seizures without health insurance.USA Today also featured 2 tweets in their article showing Americans who are singing the praises of Obamacare. Every day, we see horror stories about Americans who were financially devastated by Obamacare, not one of those stories appeared in the lopsided USA Today article. These 2 tweets were apparently the only examples a major publication like USA Today could find in their embarrassing propaganda piece:B/c of the ACA I was able to give a kidney to my husband @kevinbehr when he needed it. This is us post op '15 and now #HowTheACASavedMyLife pic.twitter.com/ilX6ikEva3 Erica Behr (@the_erica) June 27, 2017#ACA ensures my Chemo Baby and I will always have coverage despite me surviving being #pregnantwithcancer #HowTheACASavedMyLife #FacesOfACA pic.twitter.com/9L3f3O9HvU Beth KACM (@elizebethtown) June 26, 2017Here s the extent of USA Today s balanced reporting, as they mention the GOP near the end of the article, but only in a negative light, as they make a point to say the GOP is attacking Democrat Senator Elizabeth Warren. They also point out that according to polls, most Americans disagree with the GOP and want taxpayers to pay for everyone s health care: Republicans will have their own messaging campaign, as they try to tie all Democrats to comments made by Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who is pressing for a single-payer health care system, in which the government would run a health insurance program available to any American.Republicans plan to have their own digital campaign and hold press conferences that include testimonials from Americans who ve been negatively impacted by Obamacare, said Republican National Committee spokesman Rick Gorka.Yet McConnell has acknowledged if Republicans can t pass a bill soon, they may have to work with Democrats, who will demand preserving the current Obamacare program by shoring up the individual market exchanges. People get really emotional about health care, but Republicans have clearly lost the narrative on this, and the discussion has moved towards Who are you taking health care away from? said former Republican House member Tom Davis of Virginia, who previously headed reelection efforts for his party.Republicans worry Democrats will ultimately push for a single-payer system that is anathema to their limited-government, free-market driven ideology. Once a politically toxic prospect Hillary Clinton faced significant blow back as first lady for her 1990 s flirtation with universal health care that stopped short of single payer polls now show modest increases in support for such a system.A recent survey by the Pew Research Center found 33% of respondents favor a single-payer system. More relevant to the current debate, 60% said the federal government is responsible for providing healthcare coverage to all Americans. In an interview on MSNBC, Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan, D-OH, who represents a working-class area including Youngstown, also expressed support for single-payerAdditional polling also suggests Democrats have a running start on public opinion heading into the break. According to a USA TODAY/Suffolk University poll, just 12% of Americans support the Republican plan, a similar number other major surveys including by Marist. NBC News/Wall Street Journal found just 16% of adults believe the House bill was a good idea. | 1 |
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With just days to go until the election, the Democrats are trying to salvage what little remains of Hillary Clinton’s reputation. Time Magazine is now trying to defend the left-wing candidate with a last resort–using the sexism card.
As we get closer to Election Day, the left seems to be running out of excuses for their floundering candidate. Left-wing heads are on the verge of exploding. Not unlike the Galaxy S7. So, in Time Magazine’s latest attempt to play off Hillary Clinton’s FBI investigation , they’re digging deep and pulling out… the sexism card ?!
I am mad. I am mad because I am scared. And if you are a woman, you should be, too. Emailgate is a bitch hunt, but the target is not Hillary Clinton. It’s us.
No it isn’t. Emailgate, or my preferred term “Dikileaks” is about a candidate mishandling confidential email. A flagrant abuse of the law and our national security. Also, Hillary Clinton doesn’t represent all women. But nice try, dummy. 1
The only reason the whole email flap has legs is because the candidate is female. Can you imagine this happening to a man? Clinton is guilty of SWF (Speaking While Female), and emailgate is just a reminder to us all that she has no business doing what she’s doing and must be punished, for the sake of all decent women everywhere. There is so much of that going around.
Actually yes, we can imagine this happening to a man. Men cannot hide behind their vagina, or Time readers’ stupidity. Which means they’re usually punished. See also General Petraeus . Hillary Clinton, on the other hand, is running for President. She might even win. While under FBI investigation. So “muh sexism” charges are lazy. And insulting to anyone who has three brain cells (like the writer of the Time article).
The people are demanding Clinton act like moral exemplars, thundering from the pulpit like Jonathan Edwards or Cotton Mather. But Donald Trump, Rudy Giuliani, Chris Christie, Newt Gingrich, Rush Limbaugh and their many conservative friends are not remotely Clinton’s moral superiors. They are simply bullies, using gender discrimination to give a veneer of plausibility to their accusations.
“Moral exemplars”? “Thundering from the pulpit”? No, Time Magazine feminist shill, Robin Lakoff. People are demanding Hillary Clinton not be a criminal liar. Not really that much to ask of someone who wants to lead the country.
Trump and the other men on Time Magazine’s list haven’t done anything illegal. That’s the difference, not their sex organs. Not their fashion choices. Evidence is piling up against Hillary more and more each day. Even the mainstream media is turning against her . Which means pantsuits or regular suits enter not into the Hillary is a Criminal equation. Her investigation isn’t about sexism. It’s about Hillary breaking the law.
But desperate Time calls for predictable, desperate measures: SEXISM! Just as any criticism of Obama was deemed RACISM.
Leftists are running out of defenses for the pantsuited devil-spawn. So they resort to old hat tactics. Just like they do when they say Wikileaks is the product of Russian hackers.
If we had a brick for every Clinton scandal and misdeed, the wall wouldn’t cost a cent. There’s nothing sexist about holding someone, male or female, accountable for their actions. In fact, it’s kind of the opposite. It would be sexist NOT to hold Hillary to the same standards as all the boys. This is absolutely ridiculous. It’s not that we are against having a woman for president. We’re just against that woman being Hillary because she is corrupt and a pathological liar. Related Items | 0 |
JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - South African President Jacob Zuma hosted Zimbabwe s former vice president Emmerson Mnangagwa in Pretoria on Wednesday, eNCA television footage showed. The ruling ZANU-PF party nominated Mnangagwa to fill the vacancy left by Robert Mugabe, who resigned as president on Tuesday, ending nearly four decades in power. Mnangagwa has said he fled Zimbabwe for his own safety, and he is expected to return to Harare on Wednesday. | 1 |
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When Ella Dawson started a blog discussing her trials with genital herpes, along with STI stigma, she expected prudes to come out of the woodwork and snipe at her for putting such a personal topic out for all to see. What she didn t expect was for the dangerous alt-right to find her and make her a target for their sick form of entertainment.When she decided to write about that, she likely also didn t expect to catch the attention of Hillary Clinton, let alone grab it enough to receive a personal letter back.The letter starts with: Thank you for the brave and insightful piece on Medium this week. I am so grateful for you for not only speaking out against the stigma surrounding sexually transmitted infections, but for also taking a courageous stand against the ridiculous, but very real, barrage of hate you have received online. She reiterated that love and kindness are among the central components of her campaign, and that the decline of civil public discourse is one of the more alarming problems in the digital age. Then she dropped this truth bomb: It s going to take all of us, working together, to restore our discourse and that work starts by calling out the bullies, chief among them Donald Trump and the alt-right. Read the whole letter below:Thank you, @HillaryClinton, for reading. I m incredibly moved. To be accurate, I m ugly crying. #ImWithHer pic.twitter.com/kt5tAVWrFX Ella Dawson (@brosandprose) September 6, 2016The blog post that caught Hillary s attention discusses Dawson s very real and terrible problems with the alt-right. Her broader discussion, though, is about how rape threats, death threats, doxxing, shaming, and more, happen to women all over the Internet because we dare to Internet while female. The sheer gall of us to have an opinion and put it out there we should, in the eyes of the misogynistic alt-right, stay silent. We bring the harassment on ourselves in their view.What s worse is that some of the people harassing Dawson aren t the typical cretins that inhabit the alt-right. Mike Cernovich, who s a lawyer, but more well-known for his sexist Internet presence, tweeted: Ugly and has herpes. Maybe an SJW male might actually be able to get at these table scraps. (Doubtful). Paul Joseph Watson, an editor-at-large at Alex Jones InfoWars, recorded a five-minute YouTube video talking about how vile were the women who were tweeting under the hashtag #ShoutYourStatus for STD Awareness Month. He ended it with the typical sexist attack of: I don t think we should be that surprised that feminists are bragging about their STDs. After all, they re so fat and ugly, the mere fact that they re having any kind of sex at all is a massive achievement. Because the women the alt-right considers to be their eye candy all know their places and would never be so hateful towards men as to become a feminist. Sure.The response to that video caused Dawson to lock her Twitter account, lest Breitbart writers, and other misogynistic writers, embed her tweets in their stories, causing an ever-growing cycle of harassment. A man writing about this stuff would never receive this treatment. Ever.That s what Hillary knows, and has dealt with as a strong woman in a position of power for most of her life. Hillary stood up in Reno and read off Breitbart headlines while many other women are afraid to even mention that cesspool of a news site. Dawson has been a Hillary supporter for years, but her admiration for Hillary went through the roof when she witnessed this speech.Dawson ended her post with a thank-you to Hillary for having the guts (yes, it takes guts to stand up to the hate of the alt-right) to call the alt-right out for what it is. Misogyny, racism, white nationalism, white supremacy, anti-Semitism, and all-around hate are what the alt-right is about. That s despite the fact that, according to Dawson, they delusionally bill themselves as: [A] trendy new generation of conservatism, pushing boundaries and buttons in response to political correctness and liberal oversensitivity. Please. That is vile on its face.Bravo to Dawson for continuing to Internet while female, and bravo to Hillary for standing with her. That is what makes a president.Featured image by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images | 0 |
Theme: 9/11 &‘War on Terrorism’ , Crimes against Humanity , US NATO War Agenda Two years ago, “Majd” wrote these words on a Facebook posting: “ I am Syrian… living in Syria in the middle of everything. We have seen horrors. It was never a revolution nor a civil war. The terrorists are sent by your goverment. They are al Qaeda Jabhat al Nusra Wahhabi Salafists Talibans etc and the extremist jihadists sent by the West, the Saudis, Qatar and Turkey. Your Obama and whoever is behind him or above him are supporting al Qaeda and leading a proxy war on my country. We thought you are against al Qaeda and now you support them. The majority here loves Assad. He has never committed a crime against his own people… The chemical attack was staged by the terrorists helped by the USA and the UK, etc. Everyone knows that here. American soldiers and people should not be supporting barbarian al Qaeda terrorists who are killing Christians, Muslims in my country and everyone. Every massacre is committed by them. We were all happy in Syria: we had free school and university education available for everyone, free healthcare, no GMO, no fluoride, no chemtrails, no Rothschild IMF- controlled bank, state owned central bank which gives 11% interest, we are self-sufficient and have no foreign debt to any country or bank. Life before the crisis was so beautiful here. Now it is hard and horrific in some regions. I do not understand how the good and brave American people can accept to bomb my country which has never harmed them and therefore help the barbarian al Qaeda. These animals slit throats and behead for pleasure… they behead babies and rape young kids. They are satanic. Our military helped by the millions of civilian militias are winning the battle against al Qaeda. But now the USA wants to bomb the shit out of us so that al Qaeda can get the upper hand. Please help us American people. They are destroying the cradle of civilization. Stop your government. Impeach that bankster puppet you have as president… support Ron Paul or Rand or anyone the like who are true American patriots. but be sure of one.thing..if they attack and I think they will….it will be hell. Be sure that if it were to be a world war, many many will die. Syria can and will defend itself and will sink many US ships. Iran will go to war..Russia and China eventually if it escalates… and all this for what ? For the elites who created al Qaeda through the US government and use it to conduct proxy wars and destabilize countries which do not go along with their new world order agenda !!? American people…you gotta regain control of your once admirable country. Now everyone hates you for.the.death you bring almost everywhere. Ask the Iraqis…the Afghans…the Pakistanis…the Palestinians…the Syrians…the Macedonians and Serbs…the Libyans…the Somalis…the Yemenis ….all the ones you kill with drones everyday. Stop your wars, Enough wars. Use diplomacy..dialogue…help..not force.” Consistent testimonies from Syrians, as well as well-documented, open-source Western sources, and historical memory, all serve to reinforce the accuracy of the aforementioned testimony. Syrians are living the horror brought to them by the criminal West. They can not afford the complacency of shrugging their shoulders in indecision, not when their lives and their ancient civilization is being threatened by Western-paid terrorist mercenaries of the worst kind. “Our” proxies, slit throats, chop heads, and take no prisoners as we waffle in indecision, ignore empirical evidence, and take the comfortable easy road of believing the labyrinth of lies promulgated by Western media messaging. The veil of comfortable confusion, nested in an unconscious belief that our government knows best or that it is patriotic to believe the lies and fabrications implicit in the hollow words of politicians (who no longer represent us) and the false pronouncements of Imperial messengers, is concealing an overseas holocaust . Western societies are rotting from the inside out because of these lies and this barbarity. We are protecting a criminal cabal of corporate globalists who do not serve our interests and never will. Our democracies, which we should be protecting, have long disappeared – except in the hollow words of newspaper stenographers. Instead we are supporting transnational corporate elites and their delusional projects. Poverty and unemployment are all soaring beneath the fakery of government pronouncements, as the public domain evaporates beneath words like “efficiency” or the “economy” — all false covers that serve to enrich elites and destroy us. Internal imperialism at home is a faded replica of the foreign imperialism abroad. As countries are destroyed, and its peoples are slaughtered — think Syria, Libya, Ukraine, and others — by abhorrent Western proxies — public institutions are contaminated, and ultimately replaced by parasitical “privatized” facsimiles. Public banking is looted and destroyed in favour of transnational banksterism, World Bank funding, and IMF usury. Food security is destroyed and replaced by biotech tentacles and engineered dependencies on cash crops and unhealthy food. Currencies are destroyed, sanctions are imposed, and the unknown, unseen hand of totalitarian control imposes itself, amidst the cloud of diversions and confusions, aided by comprador regimes, oligarch interests, and shrugging domestic populations. Syria refuses to submit. That is why the West is taught to hate her, and the rest of the world learns to love and respect her. Yet, Syria’s struggles are our struggles. Syria represents international law, stability, and integrity: the same values that western peoples overtly cherish but stubbornly reject, as our countries wilt beneath suffocating veils of lies and delusions . I support Syria, because I respect what remains of international law. I support Syria because I reject Wahhabism, Sharia law, and terrorism. I support Syria because I reject the undemocratic, transnational oligarchies that are subverting our once flourishing, now dead, democracies. I reject the lies of our propagandizing media , the hollow words of our politicians, and the fake “humanitarian” messaging that demonizes non-belligerent countries and their populations. In the name of justice, humanity, and the rule of law, I support the elected government of Syria led by its President, Bashar al-Assad. Syria, an ancient cradle of civilization, is leading the way towards a better future for all of us. All we have to do is open our eyes. The original source of this article is Global Research Copyright © Mark Taliano , Global Research, 2016 NOTE: ALL IMAGE CAPTIONS, PULL QUOTES AND COMMENTARY BY THE EDITORS, NOT THE AUTHORS | 1 |
Mike Pence Purges Transition Team of Registered Lobbyists
Choose the term you like the best: “Drain the Swamp,”“Clear the Decks,”“Throw the Bums Out,”“Clean House,” or just plain “Purge.” They are all good descriptors of what Mr. Trump has assured us would happen to the leftists when he arrived in DC.
It looks like it’s more than just Donald Trump who is cleaning house. Mike Pence is now handing out pink slips to transition team members as they get the group ready to do its work of moving Trump into the Oval Office. It’s a breath of fresh air in an environment that has been politically and ethically toxic for the past eight years.
More the purge on page two. | 1 |
This is Stephen Crowder at his best So smart and so funny! | 1 |
Julian Assange has claimed the Hillary Clinton campaign has attacked the servers being used by WikiLeaks. Despite the Ecuadorian embassy shutting down his internet until the US election is over, the website will continue publishing, according to Assange. “Everyday that you publish is a day that you have the initiative in the conflict,” Assange said via telephone at a conference in Argentina on Wednesday.
The whistleblowing website has been releasing emails from Clinton’s campaign chair, John Podesta, on a daily basis since early October.
Assange claimed the release “whipped up a crazed hornet’s nest atmosphere in the Hillary Clinton campaign” leading them to attack WikiLeaks.
“ They attacked our servers and attempted hacking attacks and there is an amazing ongoing campaign where state documents were put in the UN and British courts to accuse me of being both a Russian spy and a pedophile,” he added.
Ecuador’s decision to shut down his internet was described by Assange as a “strategic position” so that its “policy of non-intervention can’t be misinterpreted by actors in the US and even domestically in Ecuador.”
He said he was sympathetic with Ecuador, insisting they face the dilemma of having the US interfere with their elections next year if they appear to interfere with the US elections next month.
Assange, who claimed the embassy will be without internet until the election is over to avoid accusations of interference, said he did not agree with Ecuador’s decision but did understand it. WikiLeaks will not be affected by the decision as they do not publish from Ecuador, he said.
He did, however, reject the idea that WikiLeaks is interfering with the US election, claiming, “this is not the interference of electoral process, this is the definition of electoral process – for media organizations and, in fact, everyone to publish the truth and their opinion about what is occurring. It cannot be a free and informed election unless people are free to inform.”
He also attacked US TV networks, many of whom he accused of being “controlled by Clinton supporters.”
The Podesta emails will make no difference to the election result, according to Assange. “I don’t think there’s any chance of Donald Trump winning the election, even with the amazing material we are publishing, because most of the media organizations are strongly aligned with Hillary Clinton,” he said.
Assange said journalists and people who work in the media are predominantly middle class and view Trump as representing “what in their mind is white trash.”
Source: RT News | 0 |
Donna Brazile lets it rip on the Hillary Clinton campaign in her new book about the 2016 election. She s definitely not holding back in her scathing review of the Clinton operation during 2016. She says she felt like a slave and felt disrespected by the Clinton campaign members. What s the most interesting is that she had two people in mind when she was discussing replacing Hillary after the fainting spell on 9/11. She says she just couldn t do it because she didn t want to let women down LOL! Sure!SECRET DELIBERATIONS Donna Brazile held secret deliberations to discuss using her power as interim chair of the Democratic National Committee to replace Hillary Clinton as the party s nominee after the former first lady suffered a fainting spell on the campaign trail last September, she writes in her bombshell memoir.The Washington Post reports that Brazile reveals in her memoir that she considered replacing Clinton with then-Vice President Joe Biden or New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker because of the former secretary of state s anemic campaign.JOE BIDEN THE GROPERClinton s effort, which carried with it an odor of failure, was struggling to appeal to white working-class voters, writes Brazile in the book, Hacks: The Inside Story of the Break-ins and Breakdowns That Put Donald Trump in the White House. The Post obtained an advance copy of the 288-page memoir, which will be released on Tuesday.REMEMBER THIS?Brazile, a longtime Democratic consultant who managed Al Gore s 2000 White House bid, says that she first became concerned about Clinton s health on Sept. 9, following an event in Manhattan.Brazile said that Clinton appeared wobbly on her feet with a rattled cough, according to The Post.As acting chairwoman of the DNC, Brazile had the power to replace the party s nominee if they became disabled. Brazile reminded the Clinton campaign of that authority, which was included in the DNC charter.Clinton s fainting spell triggered talk inside Democratic circles that Brazile could exercise that authority. She said that Biden s chief of staff contacted her a day after Clinton passed out. Gee, I wonder what he wanted to talk to me about? she said to herself, she recalls in her book.Brazile writes that she heavily considered appointing Biden but could not pull the trigger to replace the first female nominee for president. Again and again I thought about Joe Biden, Brazile writes, according to The Post. No matter my doubts and my fears about the election and Hillary as a candidate, I could not make good on that threat to replace her. I thought of Hillary, and all the women in the country who were so proud of and excited about her. I could not do this to them. I FELT LIKE A SLAVE As one of her party s most prominent black strategists, Brazile also recounts fiery disagreements with Clinton s staffers including a conference call in which she told three senior campaign officials, Charlie Baker, Marlon Marshall and Dennis Cheng, that she was being treated like a slave. I m not Patsey the slave, Brazile recalls telling them, a reference to the character played by Lupita Nyong o in the film, 12 Years a Slave. Y all keep whipping me and whipping me and you never give me any money or any way to do my damn job. I am not going to be your whipping girl! READ MORE: WAPO | 0 |
BREAKING: Trump Jumps in FL, Takes 4 Point Lead in OH
Williams, who has publicly stated that he was not a Trump supporter, is nevertheless a man of honor and integrity. He doesn’t sell his values to common thugs who use bylines as weapons.
According to both Williams and his attorney, Jonathan Franks, Jacob Bernstein from The Times approached Williams, asking for cooperation on a story alleging that people who live in Trump-branded buildings want the Trump name removed in light of the very difficult and contentious 2016 election season.
Williams, an independent who lives in a Trump-developed New York building, declined to cooperate.
According to Franks, Bernstein replied to a specific request not to print Williams’ address by stating he “would be more likely to extend that courtesy if Montel gave an interview.”
Protecting another person’s privacy, especially the privacy of the ballot box, is not a special courtesy. It’s simply common decency.
The Washington Examiner took their colleagues at The Times to task for this low-life journalism, noting that Williams identifies as a conservative but is not a registered Republican. He endorsed Ohio Gov. John Kasich in the 2016 GOP primary and has publicly credited Kasich for bringing him back into the conservative fold.
Please share this article on Facebook and Twitter to help expose the media’s liberal bias. | 1 |
HAZIMA, Syria (Reuters) - The few bullet-marked schools Islamic State did not flatten or booby trap around its former Syrian stronghold of Raqqa are buzzing for the first time in years with the sound of children learning. In the village of Hazima, north of Raqqa, teachers gave ad-hoc alphabet lessons to crammed classrooms on a recent summer s day before the start of term. Right now, the most important thing is to get children into class, said teacher Ahmed al-Ahmed, standing next to a hole in the school stairwell left by a mine blast that wounded a colleague. The ultra-hardline Islamic State closed this school and many others in northern Syria after it seized control of the region in 2014, three years into the country s civil war. Instead it taught children extremist thought in mosques. But now that the group has been ousted from most territory it held in and around Raqqa by a U.S.-backed military alliance, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a growing debate over education points to the ethnic tensions expected to follow. What is taught in areas under the control of the SDF, which includes Arab militias but is dominated by the Kurdish YPG, is one of many questions over how predominantly Arab parts of northern Syria will be run as they come into the Kurdish fold. Schools around Raqqa will this year teach a new curriculum that is based on old textbooks but erases the Baathist ideology of President Bashar al-Assad, a decision agreed on by Arab and Kurdish teachers alike. But an official in the SDF has floated the immediate introduction of Kurdish lessons in Raqqa schools, an idea that makes local officials bristle. In contrast with other areas under SDF control that have for years taught Kurdish, there are no plans yet to teach the language in mostly Arab Raqqa. Officials say it would need broad consensus, hinting at concerns that its introduction too quickly would cause unrest. We wouldn t object to Kurdish teaching. But if it s imposed on schools then there will be problems, Ahmed said. The YPG has held areas of northeast Syria since early in the six-year-old war which are now under a self-run administration opposed by Assad, who holds the main population centers in the west and is also advancing against Islamic State, and Turkey, a YPG foe which borders Syria. Raqqa is likely to join the administration, officials say. All ethnic groups are represented in the local bodies that run majority Arab regions captured by the SDF as it ousted IS fighters but critics say Kurds dominate decision-making. Reuters interviews with SDF officials and local authorities suggest resentment over Kurdish power is brewing over education plans. A senior SDF adviser and coordinator with the U.S. coalition said he believed Kurdish would be taught to Kurdish pupils around Raqqa this year, following the model for other schools in SDF territory. No one has opposed this ... every (ethnic) group has the right to study in its own language, Amed Sido said via the internet. Officials in the Raqqa Civil Council, the newly-formed local governing body, were taken aback. No, that won t happen without consultations with us and agreement in the council, Ammar Hussein, an education committee official, said at its office in the town of Ain Issa. For now it s in Arabic, with English and French lessons. Echoing several council members, he said Kurdish would be taught only if families requested it, there were enough qualified teachers and the Arab-Kurdish council approved it. If the people here agree ... there won t be any objection, said Ali Shanna, another education committee official. But the Kurd knows the Kurdish language, why does he need to learn it? A former Kurdish teacher privately derided Shanna s comments. I hate that attitude. It s ignorance, it s the same thinking as Daesh (Islamic State), said the teacher, who had been jailed under Assad for writing a Kurdish-language journal. The sensitivity over language has already caused unrest in Hasaka to the northeast, an area controlled for years by the YPG where a new curriculum is taught in Arabic and Kurdish, both now official languages. In demonstrations reported by a monitoring group, protesters called for Arab children not to have to learn Kurdish. Mostafa Bali, an SDF official, said there was no intention to force Kurdish on Arabs, or to suppress Arabic. We don t support racism over language. But there are many Kurds who would like to see Arabic teaching banned in Kurdish areas as revenge for the Baath (teaching), he said. The Baathist curriculum championed Arab nationalism over ethnic identity. Kurdish pupils were punished for speaking their mother tongue in school playgrounds. Now, even in some Arab-majority towns, Kurds are taught Kurdish. Officials in Raqqa are determined to do things their way, regardless of what they say are potential military threats from Assad or neighboring Turkey. We won t let Turkey or anyone else interfere in our internal affairs. We decide what we ll teach or not teach, Leila Mostafa, the Kurdish co-president of the Raqqa Civil Council said. At Hazima school, teachers worry about both the legacy left by Islamic State and Assad, and future political upheaval. One kid turned up singing Islamic State chants, teacher Ahmed Saoud said. The teachers say racist Baathist modules help fuel Syria s conflict and are anxious to begin the new curriculum. It s urgent we start teaching. The next phase will be difficult - there ll be a reckoning between factions, Ahmed al-Ahmed said, without specifying which groups he was referring to. A reckoning, in general. | 0 |
Via Yournewswire
Let the swamp draining begin. And when the murky stench begins to clear we all know what we will see – a bloated, slimy creature called Hillary Clinton shivering in the shallows. SPONSORED LINKS
Removed from the corridors of power, she won’t be able to say “I don’t recall” 357 times to FBI investigators and get away with it. Her people won’t be able to plead the fifth every time they are asked an incriminating question. Hillary is going down, and a lot of her cronies are going with her.
The arrogance of the Democratic establishment in thinking the country would endorse these people is staggering. Podesta, essentially a foreign agent for Saudi Arabia – with a brother, Tony, a Spirit Cooker who is actually on Saudi books as an agent. You can’t make this stuff up.
And don’t forget Huma Abedin, thrown off the the campaign in a disastrous, scandal-riddled final week, exposed as being lax with national security – and having close ties to the Muslim Brotherhood. Her only experience prior to employment as a Hillary State Dept aide? 10 years working at a radical Islamic journal with links to jihad. The Democrat campaign was a dumpster fire. Burn, baby, burn.
The Democratic establishment should never have nominated such a liability for president. The people wanted Bernie Sanders. The DNC should have let the primary election play out democratically, as their name suggests they would. But no, they interfered, suppressed the voice of their people, and forced a flawed, roundly disliked and distrusted candidate into the full glare of a brutal election season.
On election night the Democratic establishment got the pounding they deserve.
Never let the mainstream media’s disgraceful collusion with the Clinton campaign be forgotten. May the ignominy live forever. Funneling questions to Clinton so she could defeat her primary rival in debates, colluding with Clinton’s campaign manager John Podesta – at his house – to “frame the message” and “frame the race,” lying to the American people about their first amendment rights, attempting to scare the population away from being informed.
CNN is a PR firm, the propaganda arm of the establishment, not a member of the fourth estate. They have been thoroughly exposed by WikiLeaks in 2016. RIP Clinton News Network. Go to hell.
Don’t forget about the ongoing FBI investigation into the corrupt Clinton Foundation. When Comey cleared her of wrongdoing this week, he was referring to her email scandal. The less publicized Clinton Foundation investigation is still ongoing. The probe was going to hound her into the White House, but now it’s going to throw her in the jailhouse. | 0 |
HARARE (Reuters) - Zimbabwe s state broadcaster ZBC was on Monday put on stand-by for an expected address by the military, a day after President Robert Mugabe failed to announce his resignation to an expectant nation, workers at the broadcaster said. The military seized power last week saying this was meant to arrest criminal elements around the president and on Sunday the ruling ZANU-PF party re-called Mugabe from his position as president and first secretary. | 0 |
Big Cannabis – on the lines of Big Pharma – is on the cards. At least that’s what Germany-based pharmaceutical giant Bayer’s $66 billion takeover of America-based agrichemical giant Monsanto (a leading producer of RoundUp Ready genetically modified crops) indicates. Financed from a consortium of corrupt, in-debt, and influential banks (including Goldman Sachs, HSBC, JP Morgan, and Bank of America), the multi-billion-dollar deal (negotiated by the Rothschild Banking Cartel) brings Bayer ( famous for selling heroin to children and financing Nazi concentration camps ) closer to the multi-billion-dollar cannabis market through its ”mission” to create a one-stop shop for seeds, crop chemicals and computer-aided services to cannabis growers .
#Cannabis is Non Toxic but #Monsanto will make it toxic by making a GMO version. #SaveCannabis #VoteNoOn64
— David (@rskls) September 6, 2016
Cannabis proponents believe the largest all-cash deal on record will destroy the infant marijuana industry by introducing genetically modified cannabis seeds, highly expensive cannabis-based drugs, monopolistic use of patents, and restrictive business practices. Leafly notes:
“The worry is that the combined firm will have the financial and political influence to do to cannabis what it has already done to corn, tobacco, and other cash crops — namely, use pricey patented cannabis seeds (Roundup Ready Blue Dream, anyone?) that favor large-scale operators and rigidly control how all cannabis farmers farm. The merger, in other words, could be the first step toward Big Cannabis .”
Monsanto’s decades old intimate ties with the Scotts Miracle-Gro Company — a leading producer of pesticides for commercial and consumer lawn and garden use (who was ordered to pay $12.5 million in criminal fines and civil penalties for violations of Federal Pesticide Laws in 2012) — is especially a matter of concern. Monsanto and Scotts Miracle-Gro have long been partners with the DEA to produce hormones and carcinogenic chemicals used in the wars against marijuana and coca plants.
Jim Hagedorn, who took over Scotts Miracle-Gro in 2001, shared his intention to “invest, like, half a billion in the pot business” with Forbes in July, calling cannabis the biggest thing he has ever seen in lawn and garden. Forbes reports:
Scotts Miracle-Gro shelled out $135 million last year on two California-based businesses [including the $130 million buyout of General Hydroponics] that sell fertilizers, soils and accessories to pot growers. It recently spent another $120 million on a still-undisclosed lighting and hydroponics equipment company in Amsterdam and promises to invest about another $150 million by the end of 2016.
Altogether, the deals are bigger than the largest single acquisition in the history of Scotts Miracle-Gro, which takes in $160 million of profit on $3 billion in sales annually. | 1 |
Region: USA in the World When countries are in trouble they always react the same way. If they have economic troubles their governments take ever greater control of the public finances, whether through austerity or centrally-dictated spending programmes. When there is civil strife the government calls out the army and restricts liberties to regain control of the situation. When wars are taking place elections are cancelled so the government of the day remains in power to deal with the conflict. These measures have the effect of entrenching the “Establishment”, whoever that may be at a given time, and excluding others. People can only play a part in addressing the problems of the country at the whim of the Establishment, with appointments replacing elections in many such scenarios. Only when the Establishment is secure does it allow greater freedom of debate, action and participation, which are regarded as the hallmarks of stable countries . Now Donald Trump has been elected President of the United States on an avowedly anti-Establishment platform. He tapped into those disaffected by the political system and found the issues on which he could make the most noise. That in itself was a virtue with the constituency he was trying to attract. Too many people have become disaffected with politics everywhere because someone has decreed certain views to be unacceptable, without giving a reason why, and Trump was only too happy to give voice to those who have been told that their views don’t entitle them to one. But is Trump’s election the democratic revolution he claims? Does it actually give a voice to the voiceless and power to the powerless? In order to exercise any power President Trump will have to do all the things he accuses his opponents in the Establishment of, but worse. For a while he might get away with it, but he will never have the resources to win in the longer term. All we will have is the methods, with no returns: Establishment oppression on a scale beyond the worst nightmares of the enforced nobodies who now think they are somebody, but are in fact Donald Trump. Who do you think you are? As it turned out, Hillary Clinton failed to get past a problem she would not have had as a Republican. If you are on the conservative end of the political spectrum you are expected to act like you belong in power when you have it. People in more progressive parties claim to represent the interests of the broad mass of people who will never be rich and powerful. If they stay in power for too long, they create a distance between themselves and that mass which erodes their natural support. Hillary Clinton has been a national figure in the US for a generation. Her accession to the Democratic nomination was seen as almost dynastic, a factor which harmed Senator Edward Kennedy when he ran for the Democratic nomination against Jimmy Carter in 1980. She was referred to as the “Establishment candidate” throughout the campaign, particularly by members of her own party who preferred socialist Bernie Sanders, who complained throughout the primary process that the voting was being rigged and that the media were falsely reporting that she had won the nomination before it was mathematically certain . For a Republican, all this would play well, except in extreme circumstances such as Watergate. For a Democrat it was bound to depress enthusiasm in the party’s voter base, and either drive it to another candidate or persuade it to stay at home, particularly when enough scandal attaches to Clinton as it is due to her business and government dealings. Clinton was about her nice office in Washington, not the problems of real Democrats. Keeping her there would have solved nothing. This was seen most clearly in Wisconsin, a traditional Democratic mainstay which voted for Trump despite the fact exit pollsters were showing that a large numbers of voters greatly disliked both he and Clinton . Many of those who disliked Trump still voted for him because they felt disliked themselves by politicians such as Clinton, who had let them down more than a newcomer had been able to do. He was “the-none-of-the-above” candidate from early on in the primary election period. Poacher turns gamekeeper Whether Trump would have got anywhere near the Republican nomination had there been a Republican president for the last eight years is unlikely. Only as an outsider could he gain any traction within a party which thinks of itself as the natural party of government, and would pick an insider every time to maintain its hold on power. The Republican Party will remain largely embarrassed by Trump, despite his victory. He may be the voters’ idea of a president, but he isn’t what Republican politicians see as a Republican president. As the Huffington Post published underneath every article about Trump from January until election day, “Donald Trump regularly incites political violence and is a serial liar , rampant xenophobe , racist , misogynist and birther who has repeatedly pledged to ban all Muslims – 1.6 billion members of an entire religion – from entering the US.” Ask most Republican Congressmen, who control both houses, whether this describes a Republican President and you know what the answer will be, though Trump himself revels in such depictions. Well before the end of his term Trump will have become the Establishment himself. So to achieve anything in the checks and balances system the US has he will either have to carry the party and the military-industrial establishment with him, and become more embedded than Clinton is to do it, or try and purge the very many who will oppose him. Throughout his “business career”, if repeated bankruptcy, con, robbing of contractors and tax avoidance can be dignified with such a term, Trump has relied on bluster and a stubborn refusal to face reality to prosper. Whether he can get away with that with the military and intelligence staff who have ruined America’s global reputation with impunity is another matter. Presidents who spent lifetimes working the system have not been able to control the CIA or the industrial and media barons. If Trump tries, he will have to exert extreme control to do it, and become more exclusive than the Establishment itself. Jimmy Carter was elected in 1976 as an antidote to a corrupt political establishment. Despite his long years of public service, he was discarded four years later for being exactly what he was elected to be – a good man out of his depth in murky Washington. Trump has never held any elected office. Is he going to take on those same forces and turn them into public servants? More than he can chew out
One of Trump’s selling points with poorer Americans is that he pledged to stop US involvement in costly foreign wars. In particular, he said he could work with Russia and saw no need for the continual war rhetoric coming out of every Western government. Obviously this plays well with those who can’t afford to feed their families. The money will be spent on them, not bombs. But is it even possible to reduce the US military commitment, with so many bases, so many troops employed, so many weapons which will be manufactured and sold regardless? Trump may well find that the best way to stop foreign wars is to buy up all the weapons so that potential enemies don’t get them. The War on Terror would greatly diminish if the US didn’t supply arms to its favourite terrorists whilst pretending to fight them. But there is a vast industry devoted to maintaining armament and troop levels, which can only be justified by fighting wars against enemies real or imagined . So how would Trump go about achieving such a goal? Trump and his supporters are sons and daughters of the Bolsheviks. Convinced they are right, they think they can say what they like, do what they like and everyone else just has to put up with it because any opponent is part of the corrupt Establishment. It is no coincidence that Nigel Farage, former leader of UKIP and the main proponent of the UK leaving the European Union, has described Trump’s victory as a “ Supersized Brexit . Farage’s supporters behave the same way: everyone they don’t like hasn’t got the right to an opinion anymore, because they lost, and were inherently bad to begin with. Based on all we have seen so far, if someone stands in the way of Trump’s ambitions as president they will be told that they are holdovers from a corrupt system, serving masters who are now enemies of the people, and must therefore be removed. In order to get rid of them he would have to use extralegal measures in many cases, and deny them an opinion or another job. The “people” Trump would be referring to are the dispossessed whose votes he courted, who by definition don’t have levers of power of their own. It hardly gives those people more power to demonise certain individuals on presidential say-so, but that is all Trump has offered so far, or may ever be capable of offering. Trump has enjoyed spreading hatred of various minority groups. As many commentators have pointed out, he has broken all the usual rules of presidential candidate conduct and got away with it. But this simply makes anyone a potential victim, and encourages such behaviour to go on unchecked. A system which was there long before a here-today-gone-tomorrow politician has all the levers his supporters don’t to maintain itself. But if attacked, it will have no alternative but to fight fire with fire. A battle for control fought behind the scenes would empower Trump’s supporters even less, whilst not addressing the specific problems which made them see Trump as the solution. Not beating them, only joining them This presidential election campaign was the ugliest within living memory. This played into Trump’s hands: it brought those who were told they couldn’t behave like that into the mainstream, and Trump as the outsider reaped the benefit. But it also created the expectation that this will be followed through: if you start such a process, you are expected to finish it. A poll taken just before Election Day showed that if Bernie Sanders had been running against Clinton and Trump he would have won by a landslide . Sanders supporters remain angry that he was denied the nomination by what they thought was an establishment fraud. Now Clinton has lost, they will make further efforts to ensure that anyone with Clinton credentials is neutralised so that they can present a more credible candidate in 2020, and will have much moral weight and grassroots sympathy behind this effort. As Clinton supporters will fight back in the same terms, the Democratic Party is likely to spend the next four years fighting itself rather than Trump, trying to exclude its own members in the same way Trump supporters want to get rid of everyone they don’t like. The Republicans have the same problem. Trump was as offensive to his intra-party opponents as he was to Clinton. Those who think themselves “real” Republicans will be emboldened by the pro-Sanders Democrats to seek to reclaim the party and its voters from the Trump constituency in the same way. This will generate more exclusion and counter-exclusion, even through Republican Congress versus Republican President battles, with each trying to show themselves to the public as More Republican Than Thou. Both Trump and Sanders supporters will now feel that they are the new “Establishment” because they have been backed by their respective publics to overthrow the old one. Though both Trump and Sanders were the none-of-the-above candidates, they will be the above from now on. To justify their initial behaviour, and satisfy their support, they will have to be even worse Establishments than the ones they have removed, more intolerant, more exclusive …more arbitrary. If the old guard is going to come back, they will have no choice but to adopt the same tactics. The choice at the next election will be between groups of battle-hardened intolerants who are more interested in serving their friends and stuffing their enemies than in the disaffected people in their midst. Trump has not overthrown the failed political Establishment and methods which created the disaffection he has exploited, he has confirmed their validity. Trump may change the personnel, but the Establishment will be the same animal, all the more dangerous for its delusions to the contrary. Seth Ferris, investigative journalist and political scientist, expert on Middle Eastern affairs, exclusively for the online magazine “ New Eastern Outlook ”. Popular Articles | 1 |
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - California lawmakers, responding to outrage over the six-month jail term given to a former Stanford University swimmer after his conviction for sexually assaulting an unconscious woman, passed legislation on Monday closing a loophole that allowed the sentence. The bill now goes to Democratic Governor Jerry Brown for his approval. He has not indicated whether he will sign it into law. Trump hovers over McCain, Rubio senate races U.S. job market 'very close' to full strength: Fed's Fischer North Carolina, Florida brace for brewing tropical storms The measure was introduced in response to the sentence given to 20-year-old Brock Turner by Santa Clara County Superior Court Judge Aaron Persky in June, which was widely condemned as too lenient. Prosecutors had asked that Turner be given six years in state prison. He is scheduled to be released on Friday from jail in Northern California. “Sexually assaulting an unconscious or intoxicated victim is a terrible crime and our laws need to reflect that,” Democratic Assemblyman Bill Dodd, a co-author of the legislation, said in a written statement following its passage. Turner was convicted of assault with intent to commit rape, penetration of an intoxicated person and penetration of an unconscious person in the January 2015 attack. Under California law, those charges are not considered rape because they did not involve penile penetration. The uproar over the sentence, fueled in part by the victim’s harrowing letter in which she detailed the assault in graphic terms, comes amid growing outrage over sexual assault on U.S. college campuses. “This bill is about more than sentencing, it’s about supporting victims and changing the culture on our college campuses to help prevent future crimes,” Dodd said. The case has also led to efforts to remove Persky from the bench. Earlier this month, the judge asked for a transfer to civil court. According to the legislators, current California law calls for a mandatory prison term in cases of rape or sexual assault where force is used, but not when the victim is unconscious or severely intoxicated and thus unable to resist. The bill, which faced no serious opposition in the Democratic-controlled legislature, would eliminate a judge’s discretion to sentence defendants convicted of such crimes to probation. Under its provisions, Turner would have faced a minimum of three years behind bars. | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Donald Trump’s call for a temporary ban on Muslims entering the United States does not tarnish the U.S. commitment to religious freedom in the eyes of foreigners, a State Department official said on Wednesday. On Dec. 7, the week after a Muslim couple killed 14 people in San Bernardino, the Republican called for “a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country’s representatives can figure out what is going on.” Speaking as he presented the State Department annual report on religious freedom, David Saperstein, the U.S. ambassador at large for that issue, was asked whether the comments made his job of promoting religious tolerance in foreign nations harder. “Countries across the globe ... they see clearly the basic constitutional, institutional constraints against violations of religious freedom in the United States, and I think see clearly and believe deeply in America’s promise to be a model about treating all people equally without regard to religion,” Saperstein said. “That is clear and that is not tarnished by the statements here,” he added. “No matter who is elected, the institutions and the United States’ constitutional constraints will ensure that we continue along the line we have for the last 200 years.” At the time, Trump’s comments were condemned by the White House, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and some of the candidates then vying with Trump for the Republican presidential nomination. More recently, the parents of a Muslim American Army captain killed in Iraq took Trump to task at the Democratic National Convention over his rhetoric on Muslims, prompting a spat that triggered renewed criticism of the Republican candidate. Democratic presidential nominee Clinton’s lead over Trump in the Nov. 8 presidential election increased to more than 7 percentage points in a Reuters/Ipsos poll released on Tuesday, from less than 3 points on Thursday. | 1 |
Bill Clinton spent 13 minutes yesterday forcefully responding to Black Lives Matter activists who were heckling him. Speaking in an overwhelmingly African American neighborhood of Philadelphia, the city that will host this summer’s Democratic National Convention, the former president offered a spirited defense of his record on civil rights, his signature crime bill and his wife.
One of the protesters held a sign that declared, "Black youth are not super predators.” That’s a reference to when Hillary Clinton spoke in 1996 of “the kinds of kids that are called ‘super-predators’” and said “we have to bring them to heel.”
Clinton pointed to the signs. “This is what’s the matter,” he said. “I don't know how you would characterize the gang leaders who got 13-year-olds hopped up on crack and sent them out onto the street to murder other African American children. Maybe you thought they were good citizens. She didn't! … You are defending the people who kill the lives you say matter! Tell the truth! You are defending the people who caused young people to go out and take guns.”
The 69-year-old went on an extended riff about why he and his wife are the ones who have really fought to make black lives matter:
"Because of that [crime] bill we had a 25-year low in crime, a 30-year low in the murder rate, and because of that and the background-check law, a 46-year low in deaths of lives by gun violence,” he said. “And who do you think those lives were that mattered? Whose lives were saved that mattered?"
Bill noted that Hillary, unlike Bernie Sanders, did not vote for the crime bill. "She was spending her time trying to get health care for poor kids,” he said. “Who were they? And their lives matter!”
He also highlighted the Democratic front-runner's work for the Children's Defense Fund as a young attorney in Alabama and her work to stop the spread of HIV in Africa as secretary of state. "I'll tell you another story about a place where black lives matter: Africa," he said.
-- In a year when the drama has mostly been on the Republican side, it made for great political theater. And it gave Bill Clinton another unforgettable “Sister Souljah Moment.” In May 1992, the hip-hop artist suggested that killing white cops might not be so bad in the wake of the Los Angeles riots. Speaking at a convention organized by Jesse Jackson’s Rainbow Coalition, the then-governor of Arkansas ripped into her. "If you took the words ‘white’ and ‘black’ and reversed them, you might think David Duke was giving that speech,” he said. “We have an obligation, all of us, to call attention to prejudice whenever we see it.” (C-SPAN’s archive has the video.)
Calling her out became legendary and helped Clinton pivot from the Democratic nominating contest he was wrapping up, when he needed base voters, to the general election, when he needed independents. Twenty-four years later, we are at a very similar phase in the campaign cycle.
-- Yesterday’s showdown in Philadelphia quickly became a Rorschach Test. Republicans and liberal activists inclined to dislike WJC called it evidence of him being out of touch and over the hill, while Clinton loyalists said it was the Big Dog at his best. The majority of the crowd of 400 cheered Clinton as he made the protesters his foils.
-- Most mainstream media outlets are covering the comments as another off-message embarrassment for his wife’s campaign, but let’s dispense once and for all with the fiction that Bill Clinton does not know what he’s doing. He knows exactly what he’s doing.
-- A year ago, most D.C. pundits would have bet that the 2016 general election would pit Hillary versus Jeb, and that Democrats could win by making the campaign about whether voters wanted to give Bill or W. a third term. The Bushes are now long gone. Indeed, both Donald Trump and Ted Cruz criticize the former president to varying degrees. Because the Democratic primaries turned out to be more competitive than anticipated, it’s been hard for the Clintons to lean on nostalgia for the 1990s. Instead the former president and first lady have been pressed constantly from the left on everything from NAFTA to DOMA.
-- Bill’s comments about the Black Lives Matter movement suggest that a major pivot in the campaign’s messaging is on the way.
Smarting from the 2008 defections of African Americans to Barack Obama and recognizing that securing the Democratic nomination this time would depend on running up the score among minority voters, the Clintons set out in the spring of 2015 to inoculate themselves from criticism over the crime bill. “We overshot the mark,” Bill wrote in the foreword to a book on mass incarceration that came out exactly one year ago. The same month, Hillary gave a speech at Columbia University -- in the wake of the Baltimore riots – to promise that criminal justice reform to end sentencing disparities -- which were made worse by her husband’s bill – would be a top priority as president.
Last July, the former president told the NAACP convention that he deeply regretted sending minor criminals to prison “for way too long.” "I signed a bill that made the problem worse, and I want to admit it," he said.
Yesterday, the former president instead blamed congressional Republicans for the parts of the law that have increased mass incarceration. He said then-Sen. Joe Biden told him it could not pass if the tough-on-crime provisions were not added in.
After Hillary was confronted this February by a protester about the “super predator” comment, she expressed regret. “Looking back, I shouldn’t have used those words, and I wouldn’t use them today,” she said in a statement.
-- Now, as the general election looms, polls show that his wife is badly underperforming with white voters in key battleground states compared to 2008. But Bill’s strategy is not without risk. Hillary needs high African American turnout to beat Bernie in New York on April 19 and in the Pennsylvania and Maryland primaries on April 26. She also needs to keep the Obama coalition activated through November.
WHILE YOU WERE SLEEPING:
-- Bernie Sanders is going to speak at the Vatican next week, John Wagner scoops. He'll leave for Rome immediately after his debate with Clinton on April 14 for a conference on social, economic and environmental issues.
-- Sanders turned his stump speech into comedy on “The Late Show with Seth Meyers”: The Vermont senator offered a comedic twist on his disdain for the billionaire class, roasting the “one percenters” alongside Meyers on a segment called “Ya Bernt.” “One percent -- what do you need all that money for?” Sanders asked. “If I didn’t know any better, I’d think you were trying to compensate for something.” As for the big banks, Sanders had this to say: “My advice is the same advice I give to a couple contemplating an open relationship. It’s time to break up.” (John Wagner)
-- Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper -- who could be a contender in the veepstakes -- hosted Hillary for a fundraiser at his home in Denver last night. Isaac Slade, lead vocalist for The Fray, performed for the 530 attendees. A white noise machine was set up to prevent reporters standing across the street from hearing Hillary's comments in the governor's back yard, according to the local CBS affiliate.
-- Seven in 10 Americans now view Trump unfavorably, according to an AP-GfK poll. And the negativity transcends typical “voter blocs” of age, race and ideology: “It's an opinion shared by majorities of men and women; young and old; conservatives, moderates and liberals; and whites, Hispanics and blacks … a devastatingly broad indictment of [Trump]." The numbers also suggest Trump could be losing his core base: "In the South – a region where Trump has decisively won many primary contests – close to 70 percent of voters view him unfavorably. And among white voters without a college education, 55 percent have a negative opinion."
-- Not ready to make nice: Ted Cruz refuses to apologize to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell for publicly calling him “a liar” last year. “That ain't gonna happen," the Texas senator said on CNN last night. “And if the Washington lobbyists want to see that happen, they can hold their breath a long, long time." So much for trying to win over his Senate colleagues...
-- American Idol is finally over. "Less than two months after the curtain went down on #OscarsSoWhite — at least until 2017 — it seems that 'American Idol' may be too white as well. Or, more specifically, too deferential to 'generic' white guys, often wielding guitars. This was the consensus on social media after Trent Harmon, a self-described white 'dude from Mississippi,' defeated La’Porsha Renae, a black single mother from the same state." (Justin Wm. Moyer)
TRUMP SHAKES UP CAMPAIGN AFTER GETTING CAUGHT FLAT-FOOTED IN DELEGATE HUNT:
-- Trump announced yesterday that he is reorganizing his campaign, giving an expanded role to veteran strategist Paul J. Manafort. From Karen Tumulty and Dan Balz: "Manafort, who joined the Trump operation on March 29 as its convention manager, will now have broader responsibilities, and will 'oversee, manage and be responsible for all activities that pertain to Mr. Trump's delegate process and the Cleveland convention,' the campaign said in its announcement. Manafort, working from a new D.C. campaign office, will also be in charge of outreach efforts to members of Congress, the Republican National Committee and think tanks. While the campaign insisted there had been no reduction in the role of embattled campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, it was nonetheless seen that way in Republican circles. Manafort's new portfolio is the operation that could be most crucial to Trump's success in the coming months. Said one GOP strategist who has worked with Manafort, and who declined to be identified: 'I can assure you that Lewandowski should be looking for new employment at this point. He's half wiped out already.'"
“Trump is not a dumb man,” Chris Cillizza writes. “He didn’t get to where he is … by not grasping when things are slipping away from him … [T]he writing appears to be on the wall. Manafort will run things going forward.”
-- Smart frame --> “The strategist vs. the showman: Cruz and Trump run very different campaigns,” by Katie Zezima: “Cruz is the disciplined strategist who stays relentlessly on message and runs a by-the-book organization filled with aides and state chairs … Trump, by contrast, runs what amounts to a DIY presidential campaign. … While the approach has left Trump with little established infrastructure as the race turns into a brawl for delegates, it has also allowed him to be nimble … Cruz’s advance work will be on display this weekend in Colorado, one of five states that leave it up to party members to elect the state’s 37 delegates to the national convention. Organizers said much of the work has been done with little input from Cruz [headquarters in Houston]. ‘There are 50 different states with 50 different speeds,’ said Ken Buck, the senator’s Colorado state chairman.”
-- Trump and Cruz face their first test in the Virginia delegate fight tomorrow: “A few hundred Republicans are set to gather in Wytheville, a town of 8,000 in the state's southwest corner, to elect three delegates to the Republican convention,” the AP reports. “At first glance, the 9th Congressional District's local convention appears to be fertile ground for Trump … But the Cruz campaign is counting on a superior advantage with party insiders, both in Virginia and around the country, to get its preferred delegates elected. Political watchers say these types of party insiders who take the time to register for and attend regional party meetings are more likely to back Cruz. ‘The issue is who is going to these convention,’ said Terry Kilgore, a Republican state House delegate ... ‘The Cruz people understand the game a little bit better.’”
-- Trump leads Cruz by 7 points in California, according to the Field Poll. The front-runner has 39 percent, with Cruz at 32 percent and Kasich at 18 percent. Trump leads in the Bay Area and in the Southern California region outside of Los Angeles. Cruz is preferred over Trump in L.A. proper and among voters in the Central Valley and Sierra mountains, whereas supporters for Kasich are somewhat evenly dispersed across the state. The primary in June will award delegates by congressional districts. Former supporters of Arnold Schwarzenegger prefer Trump: Voters who backed his gubernatorial bid in the recall prefer Trump over Cruz by a three to one margin.
-- “Trump has more than math to worry about in Cleveland,” by Politico’s Kyle Cheney: “Every aspect of the Republican National Convention is a potential tripwire that motivated anti-Trump forces could deploy to waylay the mogul.” Five tactics Cruz could use to try denying Trump the nomination.
-- Ben Carson proved again to be a terrible Trump surrogate. When asked on CNN if Lewandowski should be running the show after being charged with battery, he responded that “a lot of people have been charged with various things … You’ve probably been charged with things.” (The interviewer replied that he has not.)
-- Jeff Sessions, Trump's only supporter in the Senate, said he does not think Trump will pick him as VP. “I think that would not happen," he said. “Don’t bet any money on me.” (The Hill)
-- Rudy Giuliani told the New York Post that he will vote for Trump, hitting Cruz for his comments on "New York values." He quipped, “I can make fun of New York. But you can’t!"
MORE ON THE DEMOCRATIC RACE:
-- There is widespread and growing concern among Democrats that the Clinton-Sanders rivalry is doing lasting damage to the party and the eventual nominee. "With both candidates launching 10-day sprints ahead of New York’s April 19 primary, the strain and resentment of a hard-fought and unexpectedly long contest boiled over repeatedly in interviews, speeches and other public appearances," John Wagner, Abby Phillip and Anne Gearan report. "The senator from Vermont refused to retract his assertion that Clinton is not qualified to be president. Clinton dismissed that claim as 'silly' and countered that Sanders has repeatedly made promises he can’t keep. ... Sanders continued to blame Clinton for going on the attack and said he has simply been defending himself. And while he expressed regret for the tenor of the campaign over the previous 24 hours and said the acrimony will make it harder for Democrats to unite in the fall, he also said he does not regret his own statements. Clinton had raised questions in a television interview about whether Sanders was prepared to be president, but she repeatedly stopped short of saying he was unqualified."
"President Obama, who has sought to stay out his party’s nominating contest, weighed in Thursday though a spokesman. Traveling with Obama on Air Force One, White House spokesman Eric Schultz said Obama believes that Clinton 'comes to the race with more experience than any non-vice president' in recent campaign history. Schultz emphasized that Obama feels 'fortunate' that Clinton, whom he defeated in a sometimes nasty battle for the 2008 nomination, served as his secretary of state."
-- In an interview with The Post's John Wagner, Sanders stood by his view that Clinton is not qualified — but he also pledged to support her if she is the nominee. Three highlights:
-- Congressional Democrats expressed hope that the dust-up over whether Hillary is "qualified" serves as a warning for both candidates to tone things down and keep the party more cohesive than the Republicans. “It’s really important that everybody take a pause, that everybody calm down,” said North Dakota Sen. Heidi Heitkamp. “At this point in campaigns, people get tired, say things they don’t mean to, emotions get raw. I think a lot of this will dissipate with a couple good nights’ sleep.”
-- Why is Bernie throwing the kitchen sink right now? Because he must fundamentally disrupt the race to have any chance of ultimately prevailing. "Sanders still trails Clinton by more than 200 pledged delegates. The math is close to determinative -- and not in his favor. Barring a major cataclysm in the race, Clinton will be the nominee," writes Chris Cillizza. This chart compares Clinton's lead over Sanders to Obama's lead over her at this point in 2008:
-- “Panama financial scandal blows up into Democratic skirmishing over trade,” by David Nakamura:
-- President Obama took pains to describe Merrick Garland as a unifying figure during a speech at The University of Chicago Law School. Juliet Eilperin and Mike DeBonis: "In a carefully-orchestrated question and answer session with students and faculty – including several of Garland’s family members, the president said failure to confirm his court nominee would make the courts “just an extension of our … elections and our politics. And that erodes the institutional integrity of the judicial branch.”
One questioner pressed Obama about the lack of diversity on the bench and asked why he picked a white man. Obama said “that’s just not how I’ve approached it": “At no point did I say: ‘Oh, you know what? I need a black lesbian from Skokie in that slot. Can you find me one?’” (The Skokie Review notes that this comment sent the suburb north of Chicago trending online...)
-- Minority Whip Richard Durbin said Democrats are "actively considering" legislative maneuvers to push a vote on Garland. "Democrats have thus far refrained from holding up legislation or other Senate business to gain leverage on the court fight. An ultimate step would be to force a floor vote on Garland without committee action — a move that would almost certainly fail but would attract attention and put those vulnerable Republican incumbents on the spot. A Democratic leadership aide said that is being considered as a last resort, one that would not be deployed for months."
-- Lindsey Graham said he will meet with Garland, reversing course on his earlier pledge not to. Spokesman Kevin Bishop said it was a “courtesy” meeting, and the South Carolina senator “remains opposed to moving forward with the nomination.”
-- “Why a Va. senator told a teacher: ‘You do not know better than the parents,’” by Jenna Portnoy: “Sen. Richard H. Black doesn’t think of himself as squeamish. But the Northern Virginia Republican said he was so stunned by the ‘moral sewage’ in … Toni Morrison’s ‘Beloved’ that he did something he professes to never have done [in office]. He abandoned all diplomacy and told a constituent exactly what he thought. Black called the book ‘profoundly filthy’ and ‘smut.’” The screed is part of an extraordinary email exchange between Black and Loudoun County teacher Jessica Berg, who “wrote to Black to protest his vote for a bill that would have required teachers to give parents advance notice if they planned to assign material with sexually explicit content in class [allowing parents to ‘opt out’ their children from reading the offending books]. ‘It’s ridiculous that you are trying to control education when you have no idea what it entails,’ she wrote. ‘You do not want free thinkers.’ ‘I want teachers who won’t teach such vile things,’ he responded. ‘You do not know better than the parents.’” (Read the full back and forth here.)
Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), desperately trying to hold his seat, is one of only a handful of Republicans who would show off a handwritten note from Obama:
Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) joked about the Senate voting down a legroom amendment in the FAA reauthorization. (Like you, he gets his news from PowerPost):
Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.) did not look too happy wearing Villanova gear (read about his NCAA wager with Pat Toomey here):
Check out the scrum surrounding Clinton as she entered the NYC subway (here's the video, too):
Kasich ate his way through the Bronx (check out this video mashup from CNN):
Sanders ran into this character at Temple University:
Clinton allies, including the head of the lead super PAC supporting her, accused Sanders of sexism:
The Clinton campaign rapid response team noted that Sanders thought she was qualified enough to become Secretary of State:
Some in upstate New York were not so happy to have Cruz:
Two pictures of Obama back when he was a law professor:
D.C. Police Chief Cathy Lanier threw the first pitch at the Nats home opener:
Internet trolls from the fever swamps of the far right and the far left can be so disgusting and nasty, but this may take the cake:
-- Bloomberg, “McCain-Linked Nonprofit Received $1 Million From Saudi Arabia,” by Bill Allison: “A nonprofit with ties to Senator John McCain received a $1 million donation from the government of Saudi Arabia in 2014, according to documents filed with the [IRS]. [McCain] has strictly honorary roles with the McCain Institute for International Leadership, a program at Arizona State University, and its fundraising arm, the McCain Institute Foundation, according to his office. But McCain has appeared at fundraising events for the institute and his Senate campaign’s fundraiser is listed in its tax returns as the contact person for the foundation. Though federal law strictly bans foreign contributions to electoral campaigns, the restriction doesn’t apply to nonprofits engaged in policy, even those connected to a sitting lawmaker … The Saudi donation to the McCain Institute Foundation may be the first congressional instance of that trend coming to light ‘The extent of this practice is difficult to gauge, of course,’ Holman said, ‘because we only know about it when a nonprofit or foreign government voluntarily reveals that information.’” (We missed this story when it came out last week but it's caused a stir in Arizona, where McCain is up for reelection.)
On the campaign trail: Here's the rundown:
At the White House: President Obama headlines a DSCC fundraiser in Los Angeles, then travels to San Francisco for DNC and DCCC fundraisers. Vice President Biden travels from Las Vegas to Boulder, Colo., where he speaks at the University of Colorado for the "It's on Us Week of Action" against sexual assault and at an event for Sen. Michael Bennet (D-Colo.). In the evening, Biden departs Denver for Santa Fe, N.M.
On Capitol Hill: Neither the Senate nor the House are in session.
NEWS YOU CAN USE IF YOU LIVE IN D.C.:
-- A mild start to a chilly weekend. The Capital Weather Gang forecasts: “Arguably, today is nicer than anything we’ll see this weekend. Even with wind, it’s still fairly mild — at least comparatively. Clouds and rain showers move in tonight through at least tomorrow morning. We may even see a few snowflakes, but snow of note on Saturday is more of a long shot than sure thing. Hoping to get back outside? Sunday should be calmer and sunnier. Springtime should try to return next week. Whew. Hang on to your hats…”
-- The Golden State Warriors beat the San Antonio Spurs 112-101 to reach 70 wins.
-- The Capitals lost to the Pittsburgh Penguins 4-3.
-- D.C. police are FINALLY cracking down on illegal dirt bike riders, saying swarms of off-road bikes on the city's streets have become a “dangerous public menace.” (Peter Hermann)
-- Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D) abruptly withdrew support for his once-touted economic development strategy, after the Democratic Attorney General said the $35 million “Go Virginia” program probably violates the state constitution. McAuliffe, who gave a “full throated endorsement” of the program last summer, will try to amend the legislation, giving lawmakers the option to accept or reject his changes when they return to Richmond this month. (Jenna Portnoy)
-- Donna Edwards raised more than $1 million in the first quarter for her Senate campaign after struggling to get money last year. (Rachel Weiner)
-- Montgomery County police charged two men with kidnapping and sexually assaulting a 12-year-old girl in March. (Clarence Williams)
-- Two students, a chaperone, and a police officer were injured after a police cruiser and school bus crashed in Springfield. (Victoria St. Martin)
Watch a dramatic video of a knife-wielding man shouting “kill me!” at an Ohio police officer more than 40 times after he was shot in the abdomen. The hero cop shows incredible restraint in the face of danger:
Political hip hop duo Rebel Diaz confronted Cruz, saying he's not welcome in the neighborhood:
Clinton began running her first New York Spanish-language TV ad:
Kasich supporters targeted Cruz and his derision for "New York values" in this new spot:
The Washington Examiner's David Freddoso explained with post-it notes why he doesn't see Trump winning in a general election:
A woman secretly recorded what her doctors said during surgery:
A 12-year-old talked about getting thrown down by a school officer:
This stuffed animal was filmed making a trip to the Earth's stratosphere: | 0 |
VIENNA (Reuters) - Austria s far right Freedom Party, days before parliamentary elections which are expected to catapult it into government, has suspended a low-level party official over allegations he used a Nazi salute. The party is poised to become part of a coalition after the Oct. 15 vote with the conservatives expected to gain around a third of the vote. Both parties campaign with tough rhetoric on fighting immigration and closed Islamic communities. Austrian newspaper Der Standard reported, without citing names, that an independent local councillor in the province of Styria complained to her mayor about having seen her Freedom Party colleague raising his right arm in Nazi-fashion and saying the Nazi salute Heil Hitler . Owning objects or making statements that glorify Nazism is illegal in Austria, where Hitler was born and which was annexed into his Third Reich. Josef Riemer, the Freedom Party parliamentarian for the constituency, said in an emailed statement the party was taking the accusations very seriously and had suspended the official s membership until the case was resolved. He added the official rejects the allegations and had already hired a lawyer. The mayor s lawyer Dieter Neger, who declined to identify the town or anyone involved, said he would officially hand the case, which he said included two witness statements, to prosecutors in the city of Graz later on Tuesday. The Freedom Party, which was founded by former Nazis but says it has left its past behind, has repeatedly thrown out officials in recent years over Nazi allegations. Party chief Heinz-Christian Strache, who says anti-Semitism is a crime, has said Christian Europe shares an enemy with Israel in political Islam. Austria s anti-fascist Mauthausen Komitee, named after a Nazi concentration camp, published a brochure this year detailing 60 cases of Nazi-related incidents involving Freedom Party members. | 1 |
On this day in 1973, J. Fred Buzhardt, a lawyer defending President Richard Nixon in the Watergate case, revealed that a key White House tape had an 18... | 1 |
Thousands of people are joining protestors at Standing Rock today… Or so it seems. Though not appearing physically, thousands of supporters are checking in at the Indian reservation on... | 1 |
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Pediatrician Jim Smith is thrilled with his new career as a professional Clown. He specializes in children’s birthday parties but has the skill set to perform at kindergarten graduations as well. “Leaving the hospital was the best thing I’ve ever done. Can I say that again?” said an elated Dr. Jim Smith.
Dr. Jim Smith first became interested in becoming a Clown after suffering from extreme burnout. Catalysts included helicopter Moms, antivax Jenny Mccarthy supporters, and the general stress of saving the world. After dealing with one particularly overbearing soccer mom, he stormed out of the office ranting, “**** this noise; I can’t take this horse**** anymore!” and never returned. Using obscenities for the first time felt nothing short of liberating.
Dr. Jim Smith’s new lifestyle is entirely different from the clinic he used to work at. Previously, he woke up at 6am sharp but now he rolls out of bed in the neighborhood of 11:30am to ensure he is prompt for lunchtime birthday contracts. “I take my responsibilities very seriously,” said Dr. Jim Smith proudly. After a solid hour of challenging work, he practices his Downward Dog poses.
In spite of all the Clown perks, Jim has admittedly taken a rather large pay cut. As a pediatrician, the Doctor made $200,000.00 per year. Now he makes $17,500.00 a year if fully booked and tipped generously. However, Dr. Jim Smith says that eating Ramen noodles with his wife and kids is definitely worth the consistent joy he experiences performing slapstick routines. “Freedom really has no price tag,” said Clown Jim Smith.
Dr. Jim Smith’s favorite part of the job is showcasing his balloon skills. “Even though the kids cry sometimes, they don’t die,” he stated enthusiastically. Creating these balloon animals has proved to be significantly more meaningful than diagnosing heart defects.
Dr. Jim Smith sleeps soundly knowing the nurses aren’t “hunting (him) down like cattle.” Instead, parents and children alike watch him smile and laugh as if he’s the greatest entertainer in the world. He even gets to wear a red nose! And doing mime is endlessly entertaining and unpredictable too.
Dr. Jim Smith’s old colleagues have inquired what degree is needed to become a Clown. They’ve also expressed curiosity as to whether it is a high demand skill.
Dr. Jim Smith’s only regret is that he didn’t become a Clown sooner. 315 Shares | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - As the Senate began a two-week recess on Friday, the White House and its allies sought to turn up the heat on Republicans to reverse course and act on President Barack Obama’s Supreme Court nominee. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky has pledged not to hold confirmation hearings or a vote on Obama’s nomination on Wednesday of Merrick Garland, a centrist appeals court judge and former prosecutor, to the high court. Not all Senate Republicans want to block a vote on Garland. Senator Mark Kirk, locked in a tough re-election battle in Illinois, told WLS radio in Chicago that senators should “just man up and cast a vote” on the Garland nomination. Kirk broke with McConnell last month, calling for hearings and a vote on Obama’s nominee. Conservative activists, however, vowed to fight in support of Republican leaders who insist that the next president, to be elected on Nov. 8 and take office in January, make the appointment, hoping their party’s candidate wins. The conservative group Judicial Crisis Network said it would start a $2 million, three-week television, radio and digital advertising campaign in six states starting on Monday backing McConnell’s stance. Garland, 63, would replace conservative Justice Antonin Scalia, who died on Feb. 13, on the nine-seat court. His appointment could tip the court leftward for the first time in decades. Liberal groups, including CREDO Action and MoveOn.org Civic Action, said they would rally at various locations on Monday calling on Senate Republicans to “Do Your Job” and put Garland through a full confirmation process. One rally was planned for outside the Des Moines, Iowa office of Senator Chuck Grassley, chairman of the Judiciary Committee that would convene any hearings. The Iowa senator has said he opposes hearings but is open to meeting with Garland. The conservative ad campaign also is targeting Grassley. One senior Senate Republican aide, referring to pressures Grassley faces over the recess, speculated on the possibility he would return to Washington on April 4 more open to holding confirmation hearings. “Two weeks in Iowa with Iowans screaming at him?” the aide said. White House spokesman Josh Earnest indicated Vice President Joe Biden, a former Senate Judiciary Committee chairman, would lend his voice next week to administration efforts pressing for Garland’s confirmation. While Earnest said Biden “can be a pretty persuasive advocate,” Republicans have noted that Biden, as Judiciary Committee chairman in 1992, argued for postponing action on Supreme Court nominees during an election year. | 1 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump said on Sunday he expected Mexico to pay for the wall he has promised to build along the southern border, resuscitating a campaign promise that roiled U.S. relations with Mexico in the first week of his presidency. “Eventually, but at a later date so we can get started early, Mexico will be paying, in some form, for the badly needed border wall,” Trump said in a Twitter post. Trump returned to his Mexico demand on a morning in which he simultaneously tried to pressure congressional Democrats to include funding for the border wall in must-pass spending legislation needed to keep the U.S. government open beyond Friday. A spokesman for the Mexican president’s office said President Enrique Pena Nieto has repeated that Mexico will not pay for the wall. The Republican president’s demand that Mexico pay for the border wall triggered a diplomatic crisis with the southern U.S. neighbor during the first week of his presidency. Pena Nieto on Jan. 26 scrapped a planned trip to meet with Trump and the White House floated the idea of a 20 percent tax on goods from Mexico to pay for the wall. The two leaders agreed the following day not to talk publicly about payment for the wall, the Mexican government said. The White House said the two recognized they had differences over the proposed wall but agreed to “work these differences out.” Trump sought the wall, projected to cost more than $20 billion, as part of his effort to curb illegal immigration. Mexico has rejected payment for the construction project as out of the question. Attorney General Jeff Sessions told ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday the wall would get paid for one way or another. “I don’t expect the Mexican government to appropriate money for it but there are ways that we can deal with our trade situation to create the revenue to pay for it, no doubt about it,” Sessions said. | 1 |
The latest revelations on Hillary's emails again point to one thing → She is disqualified from being president. https://t.co/Wni9LmSPpR | 0 |
BELGRADE (Reuters) - Serbia wants to maintain its delicate balancing act between Russia and the West, its foreign minister said on Thursday, dismissing U.S. calls for it to pick a side. The largest of the states to emerge from the collapse of Yugoslavia in the 1990s, Orthodox Christian and Slavic Serbia has natural affinity with Moscow, but it is keen to join the European Union. This month, U.S. Deputy Assistant Secretary for European and Eurasian Affairs Hoyt Brian Yee told Belgrade it cannot sit on two chairs at the same time . His remarks sparked sharp criticism in the Serbian capital. Foreign Minister Ivica Dacic, who heads the co-ruling Socialists, once led by late strongman Slobodan Milosevic, said Belgrade would maintain balance with the West, Russia and China. What we do not want is that someone pulls our own chair from under us ... what is important is to see what is in our own best interest, Dacic told Reuters in an interview. Although the EU is Serbia s single largest trade partner and investor, Russia controls its oil and gas supplies. Moscow has also sought to bolster military ties with Belgrade with the donation of six MiG-29 fighter jets. At Serbia s request, Moscow blocked independent Kosovo from becoming a member of the United Nations. The ethnic Albanian-dominated Kosovo declared independence from Serbia in 2008 following a bloody 1998-1999 war. It has been recognized by 115 countries including the United States and most EU members, but not Serbia or Russia. Dacic likened Serbia s opposition to Kosovan independence to Spain s rejection of Catalonia s referendum on secession. If Spain can fight for its concept of Catalonia then we Serbs can fight for our country, he said. Serbia, which cherishes Kosovo as its historic birthplace, and the government in Pristina should seek a win-win solution and an international conference that would prevent future wars for a century, Dacic said. Earlier this year he suggested autonomy and delimitation for Serb areas in Kosovo. That would be the only possible, realistic and lasting ... solution of the problem, he said in the interview. There are around 120,000 Serbs in Kosovo and most of them, mainly in the north, just outside Serbia, oppose the Pristina authorities. | 0 |
YANGON (Reuters) - Members of U.S. Congress said on Tuesday they were disturbed by the harsh response of Myanmar s security forces to attacks by militants in August which they said bore all the hallmarks of ethnic cleansing against the Rohingya Muslim minority. We are profoundly disturbed by the violent and disproportionate response against the Rohingya by the military and local groups, Democratic Senator Jeff Merkley told reporters in Yangon at the end of a visit to Bangladesh and Myanmar. Merkley, a member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, led the five-strong congressional delegation, which over the last few days met with people affected by the military crackdown on Rohingya Muslims which has forced more than 600,000 people to flee to Bangladesh. In early November, U.S. lawmakers proposed targeted sanctions and travel restrictions on Myanmar military officials over the treatment of the Rohingya. | 1 |
Former President George W. Bush reportedly ripped into Texas Sen. Ted Cruz at a weekend gathering of donors to his brother's presidential campaign, according to a published report Monday.
Politico reported that Bush said of Cruz, "I just don't like the guy," at the event, which was held Sunday night in Denver.
According to the report, which cited at least six donors who were at the event, Bush said he did not like Cruz's de facto alliance with Republican front-runner Donald Trump, who has notably spared Cruz from the criticism he has ladled onto other members of the 15-candidate Republican field.
"He said he found it 'opportunistic' that Cruz was sucking up to Trump and just expecting all of his support to come to him in the end," one donor told Politico when asked to describe Bush's remarks about Cruz. The report added that the former president had been engaging with amiable discussions about the state of the GOP race when Cruz's name came up.
"I was like, 'Holy s---, did he just say that?'" the donor told Politico. "I remember looking around and seeing that other people were also looking around surprised."
The report also said that Bush warned the donors to not underestimate Cruz's strength in the South and in Texas, where his message of religious liberty is expected to play very well with voters.
Cruz, in a written statement put out by the campaign on Tuesday, said he would not be "reciprocating" after the comments.
"I have great respect for George W. Bush, and was proud to work on his 2000 campaign and in his administration," he said in the statement. "It's no surprise that President Bush is supporting his brother and attacking the candidates he believes pose a threat to his campaign. I have no intention of reciprocating. I met my wife Heidi working on his campaign, and so I will always be grateful to him."
Freddy Ford, a spokesman for George W. Bush, did not deny that the former president had made the disparaging remarks about Cruz when asked to comment by Politico.
"The first words out of President Bush's mouth [Sunday] were that Jeb is going to earn the nomination, win the election, and be a great President ... He does not view Senator Cruz as Governor Bush's most serious rival."
Ford denied further requests by Fox News to address Bush's reported "I just don't like the guy" remark.
Cruz joined George W. Bush's presidential campaign in 1999 as a domestic policy adviser and helped put together the legal team that argued Bush v. Gore before the Supreme Court in the aftermath of the controversial election. He later served as an associate deputy attorney general in the Justice Department before becoming Solicitor General of Texas in 2003.
Click for more from Politico.
Fox News' Mike Emanuel and Serafin Gomez contributed to this report. | 0 |
Donald Trump s first trip overseas was an absolute disaster, and it s becoming obvious that Trump has full intention of making his second one just as bad.Trump kicked off his second international tour with a joint press conference with Poland s President, Andrzej Duda, and it seemed as though Trump totally forgot which country he is supposed to be leading. When Trump was questioned about Russia by MSNBC White House Correspondent Hallie Jackson, Trump betrayed America in front of the entire world.Jackson asked Trump, Will you once and for all, yes or no, definitively say that Russia interfered in the 2016 election? Trump responded by trashing U.S. intel and former President Barack Obama: I think it was Russia and I think it could have been a lot of people interfered. I said it very simply. I think it could very well have been Russia, but I think it well could have been other countries, and I won t be specific, but I think a lot of people interfere.I think it s been happening for a long time. It s been happening for many years. Now, the thing I have to mention is that Barack Obama when he was president found out about this in terms of if it were Russia. Found out about it in August. Now, the election was in November. That s a lot of time. He did nothing about it. Jackson pressed Trump further, asking the unhinged POTUS why he refused to agree with what U.S. intel is currently saying about Russia: Your intelligence agencies have been far more definitive. They say it was Russia. Why won t you agree with them and say it was? Trump made U.S. intel look like a joke: Let me start off by saying I heard it was 17 agencies. I said boy, that s a lot. Do we even have that many intelligence agencies? Let s check it. We did some heavy research. It turned out to be three or four, and many of your compatriots had to change their reporting and had to apologize and correct. You can watch Trump throw U.S. intel and Obama under the bus below:This disgusting move has been condemned by many already. Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough called Trump s comments nothing short of disgusting. As we ve said before, you re on foreign soil. This is remarkable. For a sitting president of the United States to be on foreign soil. You can t really underline this enough, and attack America s intel community, on foreign soil, and attack America s free press on foreign soil For him to attack American institutions two days after the fourth of July on foreign soil, the day before we meet America s chief adversary is nothing short of disgusting. Trump never ceases to surprise us by taking the country to new lows.Featured image via Drew Angerer / Getty Images | 0 |
LONDON (Reuters) - British police said a bomb was used during an explosion at a London metro station which injured 18 people in what officers described as a terrorist incident. We now assess that this was a detonation of an improvised explosive device, Britain s top counter-terrorism officer Mark Rowley said on Friday. London s police is being supported by Britain s MI5 intelligence service, he said. | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Trump administration wants to tax imports from countries that put tariffs on the United States, said Gary Cohn, director of President Donald Trump’s National Economic Council. “Fair means we treat our trading partners the way they treat us,” Cohn told a conference on the sidelines of the IMF and World Bank’s spring meetings in Washington on Thursday. “If you want to insist on having a tariff on a product, which we prefer you not, the president believes that we should treat you in a reciprocal fashion and that we should tax your product coming into the United States.” | 1 |
DELBRUECK, Germany (Reuters) - Turks can safely come to Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Sunday, dismissing a warning from Ankara that its citizens should take care when traveling there due to what it said was an increase in anti-Turkish sentiment. Tensions between Berlin and Ankara have been bubbling for months and Turkey s warning on Saturday came after Germany s foreign ministry said on Tuesday Germans traveling to Turkey risked arbitrary detention even in tourist areas. I want to say very clearly that all Turkish citizens can travel here, Merkel said in the northwestern German town of Delbrueck during a campaign event ahead of a Sept. 24 election. No journalists get arrested here and no journalists get put in custody. Freedom of opinion and the rule of law prevail here and we re proud of that, Merkel said. She pointed to German-Turkish journalist Deniz Yucel, who has been detained in Turkey for more than 200 days. He is one of 12 German citizens now in Turkish detention on political charges, four of them holding dual citizenship. We think there s no justification at all for him being in prison and the same applies to at least 11 other Germans, Merkel said. Merkel, who infuriated the Turkish government last weekend by saying she would seek an end to Turkey s membership talks with the European Union, is expected to win a fourth term in the upcoming election. Polls give her conservatives a double-digit percentage lead over their rival Social Democrats (SPD). | 0 |
Donald Trump has p*ssed off so many people, it s really hard to keep track (unless you re The Donald himself, in which case you ll never let it go). One person he s irritated arguably more than others is Mexico s former president, Vicente Fox, who has being railing against Trump since the very day the disgraced presumptive GOP nominee made his horrifically offensive rapist and drug dealer comments about Mexican immigrants.Fox reminded everyone that he still hates Trump with a passion, and has even come up with some creative nicknames for the business mogul. In an interview on the Kickass Politics podcast, Fox told host Ben Mathis: He is the ugly American. He is the hated gringo because he s attacking all of us. He s offending all of us. Fox also reaffirmed the fact that Mexico would have nothing to do with Trump s idiotic proposed border wall. Restating his opposition to Trump s wall just as strongly as he did the first time, Fox said: I m not going to pay for that f*cking wall. And please don t take out the f*cking full word. Here s the Facebook post with Fox and Mathis, sending a brilliant message to Trump for all of us:During the interview, Fox also had some other amazing choice words for Trump such as crazy and false prophet. He also compared Trump to Latin American demagogues who destroy economies and warned that Trump s proposals could start another war.While many of Trump s opponents have eventually cozied up to the candidate (cough cough Ben Carson) and learned to be somewhat civil with him, Fox is making no apologies and wants to make sure that everyone knows where he stands when it comes to the reality TV star.It s clear that Trump has f*cked with the wrong guy and Fox wants to make sure that Trump knows it. Fox warned: Don t play around with us. We can jump walls. We can swim rivers. And we can defend ourselves. You can listen to Fox s full Trump-bashing interview on iTunes here!Featured image via David Paul Morris / Getty Images | 1 |
(Reuters) - U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and Republican candidate Donald Trump are in a tight race ahead of the Nov. 8 U.S. presidential election. Following is a weekly roundup of financial market analysts’ views on the U.S. elections and the likely implications of a Trump or Clinton win on financial markets. MORE COVERAGE: bit.ly/2dOgcoE SEE RELATED FACTBOX: reut.rs/2d9cl4q DAVID KOSTIN, U.S. PORTFOLIO STRATEGY RESEARCH, GOLDMAN SACHS “A so-called ‘wave election’ would occur if one party registers large congressional seat gains and has the potential to implement policy changes... Following six prior ‘wave elections,’ S&P 500 typically fell during the subsequent 1 and 3 months. Our strategies: buy health care equipment and services/sell pharma and biotech; own firms with high government sales; (and) own high overseas cash.” “Whether it’s Hillary or Trump, the U.S. is unlikely to break out of secular stagnation. With respect to the election, our focus will remain on the impact that the next U.S. president will likely have on fiscal and monetary policies, as well as the global growth outlook. Unfortunately, we don’t see either candidate as likely to purse a true ‘pro-growth’ agenda that will break the U.S. economy out of its current malaise.” Interest rates: “We see rising upside risk for longer-term U.S. rates, regardless of the outcome in November. The biggest upside risk for a sustained increase in longer-term rates is rising risk premiums.” Credit growth: “With Trump’s negative comments regarding Dodd-Frank, our sense is a Trump victory could jumpstart lending. We believe a Hillary win would create even stiffer headwinds and more regulation for the financial services industry.” Sector recommendations: - Buy on Clinton win, sell on Trump win: alternative energy, housing and REITs, hospitals and managed care, exporters and companies with international exposure - Buy on Trump win, sell on Clinton win: exploration and production, banks, big pharma and biotechnology, high tax rate companies - Potential upside in either scenario: infrastructure companies, cash repatriation companies, defense, gun manufacturers Infrastructure spending: “In a rare example of bipartisan support, both candidates have discussed the need to repair crumbling infrastructure... The correlation between infrastructure spending and equity returns has deteriorated in recent years, but candidates’ outsized plans could still be a tailwind for infrastructure-levered stocks.” Names “overweight”-rated Eaton Corp and “equal-weight”-rated Pentair preferred plays, given both companies’ leverage to infrastructure investments and attractive relative valuation. Utilities and clean energy sector: “Hillary Clinton has been an outspoken advocate of renewable energy and improving resiliency of the electric grid, while Donald Trump has made numerous statements in support of fossil fuels. We see a Trump presidency as largely maintaining the current level of utility infrastructure spend, while a Clinton presidency could result in meaningful upside, particularly in clean energy. Thus, from the standpoint of long-term growth, we see a positive risk/reward for utilities going into the election.” Market moves: “In this presidential election, there is no social mandate coming from economic dislocation, nor a likelihood of any party receiving a super majority that would cause major legislative change. As a result, any election-based (market) movement – before and after – should prove temporary. Clearly, there is a lot of rhetoric, but that does not equal legislative success.” Global markets: “We analyzed equity returns before and after the U.S. election. The Hang Seng tends to do well one month before the election and then performs till the end of the year. The Nikkei 225 tends to do well one month afterwards. Interestingly, the VIX consistently rises one and three months before the election while the dollar tends to strengthen. Bonds tend to do better after the election result going into the year-end.” Clinton win: “If elected, we believe that Hillary Clinton would push for expanded trade deals, including a revised or modified TPP-like agreement, albeit these deals would likely include increased protections for US workers, as well as expanded provisions for trade adjustment assistance.” Trump win: “Donald Trump, if elected, is likely to actively oppose any expansion of trade, and he plans to withdraw from TPP, direct the Secretary of Commerce and Treasury to identify violations of trade agreements and unfair trade practices, renegotiate NAFTA, and ‘use every lawful presidential power to remedy trade disputes’.” CHRIS KRUEGER, COWEN WASHINGTON RESEARCH GROUP, COWEN AND COMPANY Trump win (GOP Sweep): Positive for consumer discretionary, energy, industrials, IT, telecom and materials sectors; negative for healthcare; neutral for consumer staples, financials and utilities Clinton win with GOP House: Positive for industrials, IT, materials and utilities sectors; negative for energy and telecom sectors; neutral for consumer discretionary and staples, financials and healthcare Clinton win with a Democratic House: Positive for industrials, IT and materials sectors; negative for energy, financials, health care and telecom sectors; neutral for consumer discretionary and staples, and utilities | 1 |
(CNN) Donald Trump and Bernie Sanders are confronting the same paradox: the fate of their insurgent campaigns built on scorn for the political establishment rests on how well they play the inside game.
For Trump, the challenge is shifting from a strategy of piling up state primary wins to one that also takes into account states that award delegates in a more intricate fashion. Trump's organizational weakness in that type of contest was underscored Saturday when he was swept by Ted Cruz in the Colorado Republican convention.
Sanders, meanwhile, has to win not only more pledged delegates but also more superdelegates -- party officials and other elites who can vote however they choose -- if he wants to take the Democratic battle for the White House to the convention floor.
Trump is already making the case that the system is inherently unfair and is a symptom of the insider politics practiced by distant elites that disenfranchises grass-roots voters like those who have flocked to his campaign.
"You see what's happening to me and Bernie Sanders," Trump said Sunday in Rochester, New York. "It's a corrupt deal going on."
The 2016 campaign's shift from a simple hunt for primary wins is more than a sign that the electoral calendar is running out and routes to the nomination for both parties are beginning to narrow. It's proof that for all of its busted conventional wisdom and broken political rules, the wild presidential campaign is at a point where insurgent politics are no longer sufficient to win.
"The nuts and bolts of presidential politics is an archaic language and very few people understand it. Outsiders need insiders to be successful," said Republican political strategist Ford O'Connell. "If you want to crack the Da Vinci code, you need insiders."
Trump is doing just that. Last week, he hired Paul Manafort, a master of insider politics, to run his convention strategy.
Still, Trump and Sanders start at a disadvantage in the inside game.
Cruz, whose only real hope of heading the GOP ticket lies in a convention fight, is rolling out a delegate hunting operation years in the planning. Though he's built a political brand on being an outsider himself, Cruz has demonstrated a savvy understanding of the hidden ways of Washington and the mechanics of a presidential primary race.
The Cruz campaign has recruited delegates in Arizona and sought delegates won in Louisiana by Sen. Marco Rubio -- prompting a bewildered Trump, who won the state, to threaten legal action. Cruz also secured all of the final 13 delegates who were selected in Colorado this weekend.
The strategy is designed to prepare the way for multiple rounds of convention balloting when delegates awarded to Trump could be freed up to migrate to another candidate. It prompted more sniping between the campaigns on Sunday.
Manafort accused the Cruz campaign of "Gestapo tactics" and "not playing by the rules" in its efforts to wrangle delegates.
"I win a state in votes and then get non-representative delegates because they are offered all sorts of goodies by Cruz campaign. Bad system!"
He followed up with another tweet later in the day.
"How is it possible that the people of the great State of Colorado never got to vote in the Republican Primary?" he wrote. "Great anger - totally unfair!"
"More sour grapes from Trump who continues to lash out in tantrums every time he loses. We are winning because we've put in the hard work to build a superior organization," she said in a statement.
Trump's decision to hire Manafort, who helped quell the Ronald Reagan-inspired delegate uprising against President Gerald Ford at the 1976 convention, was a sign of evolution in his campaign.
"This is an example of Donald Trump managing," Manafort said Friday on CNN's "New Day." "Because the campaigns come in stages, he also understood that there comes a time when winning isn't enough. But it's how you win and how much you win. He recognized that this was the time."
It's unclear whether the move will be enough to help Trump secure the 1,237 delegates he'll need to win the nomination going into the GOP convention this summer. But the new direction is being praised as a smart move, even by Republicans strongly opposed to Trump.
"Paul Manafort is a seasoned professional and he is a smart guy," Stuart Stevens, senior strategist for Mitt Romney's 2012 GOP campaign, told CNN on Friday. "This is make or break for Donald Trump. He has to get to 1,237. I think if he doesn't go to Cleveland with 1,237, it's doubtful that he will be able to come out of there as the nominee of the party."
Part of Manafort's job will be to forge links with local state party chiefs and officials influential in populating delegate slates, and to ensure that Trump is not outmaneuvered in the rules committee that will set out the parameters of the convention.
"The challenge that the Trump campaign faces right now is that Ted Cruz has spent two years working every single one of those members, every single state party chair," said Republican strategist Doug Heye. "The Trump campaign is just getting to know those people."
Trump's campaign confronts a challenge beyond Cruz's camp and the more long-shot possibility of facing down a convention coup from Ohio Gov. John Kasich, who is positioning himself as an alternative should both his Republican rivals fail to corral a majority of delegates in a split party.
Republican establishment insiders, who in some cases failed to thwart Trump on rival campaigns, are still trying to stop him, some with super PAC efforts targeting the billionaire with millions of dollars in advertising.
These efforts are also now increasingly turning to influence delegate slates, said Tim Miller, a former senior Jeb Bush aide now working for the anti-Trump Our Principles PAC.
"There is a role we can play, whether it is directly speaking or directly messaging to delegates or potential delegates in these states," Miller said.
While the Republican primary campaign has claimed much of the media coverage so far this year, an insurgent versus establishment dynamic is playing out in the Democratic primary race.
Sanders, the self described democratic socialist, has always been a political free spirit, caucusing with Democrats in the Senate as an independent but inhabiting ground to left of the mainstream party.
That leaves him with few insider credentials with the party establishment, which could become a liability as he tries to lure superdelegates.
His outsider campaign has posed a much stronger than expected challenge to one of the most powerful names in American politics.
But he faces an uphill climb to the nomination -- he would need to win 77% of the remaining delegates at stake to win the nomination.
Clinton is much further along than Trump and Sanders in the process of locking up delegate support — especially among Democratic superdelegates — many of whom have decades of stored up loyalty and connections with her family.
Clinton lost in 2008 to Barack Obama's outsider campaign that toppled her insider machine. Her 2016 campaign team has learned from its mistakes, paying far more attention to delegate calculations and individual state electoral math than she did earlier.
This has meant that even when she has lost to Sanders, she has minimized the deficit in delegates — as happened in Wisconsin last week when she lost by 13 points but only collected 10 fewer delegates than her rival. Sanders beat Clinton by more than 10 points in the Wyoming Democratic caucuses on Saturday but they both walked away with seven delegates.
"The Clinton campaign infrastructure that is in place has done a phenomenal job of securing pledged superdelegates very early on in the process," said Tharon Johnson, a senior Democrat from Georgia, who was southern regional director for Obama's 2012 re-election campaign. "They have a very full, comprehensive, ground organization in states that matter the most to close out the nomination."
Clinton currently enjoys a lead of 1,304 to 1,075 pledged delegates over Sanders. And she has also secured the endorsements of 486 super delegates compared to 38 who have declared for the Vermont Senator, according to CNN estimates.
The Clinton campaign maintains that there is no realistic route for Sanders to win the nomination. To do so, he would have to claim almost every remaining nominating contest into June by large margins, in a way that would ensure that neither he nor Clinton would approach the 2,383 delegates needed to win the nomination.
Then, Sanders would have to pull off an intricate inside game to persuade hundreds of superdelegates to desert Clinton and support him as the party's standard bearer.
That's a tall order for Sanders even if he and his allies insist the senator is best positioned to be a Republican in the November general election.
"This is what superdelegates have to grapple with, they want to win," Sanders campaign manager Jeff Weaver said on CNN last week. "We are going to an open convention. Everybody is talking about a Republican open convention (but) the Democrats are going to an open convention." | 0 |
BEIRUT/PARIS (Reuters) - France can play a productive role in the Middle East by taking a realistic and impartial approach , Iranian President Hassan Rouhani told his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, in a phone call on Tuesday, according to Iranian state media. Tensions between Iran and France increased last week after Macron said that Tehran should be less aggressive in the region and should clarify its ballistic missile program. His foreign minister also denounced Tehran s hegemonic temptations during a visit to Saudi Arabia. Iranian state media said Rouhani told Macron that the Islamic Republic was ready to develop its relations with France on all bilateral, regional and international issues based on mutual respect and shared goals. Rouhani referred to the adventurism of some inexperienced princes in the region - an allusion to Iran s arch geopolitical rival, Saudi Arabia - and said France could play a positive role in easing the situation. We are against adventurism and creating division in the region and believe that France, by keeping an independent vote and its position in the region, can, with a realistic and impartial approach, have a productive role, he said. In a rare statement on both calls, Macron s office said he had talked to Rouhani and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu separately, telling them both that it was vital to keep Lebanon disassociated from regional crises. He also said France was attached to the 2015 Iran nuclear deal with world powers, but that regional and ballistic issues should be discussed separately and constructively. Macron also stressed the importance for the countries of the region to work collectively to reduce tensions, the statement said. The foreign ministers of Saudi Arabia and other Arab states criticised Iran and its Lebanese Shi ite Muslim ally Hezbollah at talks in Cairo on Sunday, calling for a united front to counter Iranian influence. Rouhani also highlighted the importance of maintaining stability in Lebanon and, in the phone call with Macron, noted what he characterized as the threat posed by Israel. Hezbollah are a part of the Lebanese people and are incredibly loved in this country. Their weapons are only defensive and are only for use in the face of a potential attack, Rouhani said. Now we have to try so the Lebanese groups can, with security, have a government that can help advance their country. Macron, whose country has called for Hezbollah to disarm, has tried to mediate in a regional crisis that erupted after Lebanese Prime Minister Saad al-Hariri announced his resignation in a broadcast from Saudi Arabia on Nov. 4, accusing Tehran and Hezbollah - which was part of his coalition government - of sowing strife across the Middle East. Macron spoke on Monday with Netanyahu, who is due in Paris in December, according to diplomatic sources. According to the Iranian state media, Macron invited Rouhani to Paris for a climate summit on Dec. 12. Macron s office did not respond when asked to confirm the invite. | 1 |
COPENHAGEN (Reuters) - Police on Wednesday identified a headless female torso washed ashore in Copenhagen as that of Swedish reporter Kim Wall, who they believe was killed by a Danish inventor on board his home-made submarine. Wall, who was researching a story on inventor Peter Madsen, went missing after he took her out to sea in his 17-metre (56-foot) submarine on Aug. 10. He denies killing her, saying she died in an accident. Announcing the results of tests on the torso, discovered by a passing cyclist on Monday, police spokesman Jens Moller said it had suffered damage suggesting an attempt to make sure air and gas inside should leave the body so that it would not rise from the seabed . He added: There was also some metal attached to the body, allegedly also to make sure the body would sink to the bottom. The arms, legs and head had been sawn from the body. Analysis showed a match with Wall s DNA, which the police had gathered from a toothbrush and a hairbrush, and with blood found in the submarine, Moller said. Police still do not know the cause of death, and divers are searching for more body parts. Madsen, 46, is charged with manslaughter, which carries a sentence of between five years and life in prison. His lawyer Betina Hald Engmark told Reuters he was maintaining his innocence and sticking to his account that Wall s death was accidental. The macabre case has riveted Swedish and Danish media, and made headlines around the world. It is with boundless sadness and dismay we received the message that the remains of our daughter and sister Kim Wall have been found, Wall s mother Ingrid Wall said on Facebook. During the horrendous days that have passed since Kim disappeared, we have received countless evidence of how loved and appreciated she was, both as a person and friend and as a professional journalist. From all corners of the world comes proof of Kim as a person who made a difference. Madsen has told a court that following the alleged accident, he buried Wall at sea - changing his initial statement to police that he dropped her off alive in Copenhagen. A day after taking Wall out on his UC3 Nautilus submarine, the inventor was rescued after the vessel sank. Police found nobody else on board. The submarine is one of three constructed by Madsen and one of the largest privately built ones in the world. It can carry eight people and weighs 40 tonnes when fully equipped. Madsen was already well known in Denmark as an entrepreneur and aerospace engineer, as well as for his submarines. He founded the association Copenhagen Suborbitals, with the goal of sending a person into space in a home-built rocket, and wrote a blog under the nickname Rocket Madsen . He is not violent, he does not drink, does not do drugs, Thomas Djursing, who wrote a book about him, told Danish tabloid B.T. earlier this month. On the other hand, he quarrels with everyone and I have argued with him too. But that is how it often is with people who are deeply driven by a passion. Wall, 30, was a freelance journalist whose work had appeared in Harper s Magazine, The Guardian, The New York Times, Foreign Policy, the South China Morning Post, The Atlantic and TIME. Originally from Sweden, she held degrees from New York s Columbia University and the London School of Economics and was based between New York and Beijing. She had written about topics ranging from gender and social justice to pop culture and foreign policy, according to her LinkedIn profile. She had also received training in hostile environments and emergency first-aid, she said on the profile. Her mother said she had uncovered stories all over the world. She gave a voice to the weak, the vulnerable and marginalized people. That voice would have been needed for a long, long time. Now it won t be so. | 0 |
Abby Martin Exposes What Hillary Clinton Really Represents ‹ › Since 2011, VNN has operated as part of the Veterans Today Network ; a group that operates over 50 plus media, information and service online sites for U.S. Military Veterans. Woodward On Clinton Foundation “It’s Corrupt” By VNN on October 28, 2016 He’s correct: The Clinton Foundation is corrupt, and voters should be troubled by Clinton’s role in the unethical pay-for-play scandals.
Conservative Tribune
Voters have been concerned about Democrat presidential nominee Hillary Clinton’s involvement in the scandal-ridden Clinton Foundation.
Liberal journalist Bob Woodward legitimized those concerns Sunday on Fox News by pointing to the Foundation’s “ pay-for-play ” scandals while Clinton served as secretary of state as something that should trouble voters.
Woodward, who broke the Watergate story that led to the downfall of President Richard Nixon, told host Chris Wallace in no uncertain terms that the Clinton Foundation is “corrupt” and a “scandal.”
Watch Woodward’s comments on Fox News Sunday here:
“There are allegations about the Clinton Foundation and pay-for-play,” Wallace said. “When you see what seems to be clear evidence that Clinton Foundation donors were being treated differently than non-donors in terms of access, when you see this new revelations (sic) about the $12 million deal between Hillary Clinton, the Foundation and the King of Morocco, are voters right to be troubled by this?”
“Yes,” Woodward responded. “ It’s corrupt . It’s a scandal.”
Wallace had attempted to get answers from Clinton about the issue at the final presidential debate with Republican candidate Donald Trump.
But of course Clinton ducked the moderator’s question and instead talked about the organization’s charitable donations rather than its extreme conflicts of interest — something Woodward took note of and criticized her for.
“She didn’t answer your question at all,” Woodward told Wallace. “And she turned to embrace the good work that the Clinton Foundation has done.”
Woodward apparently didn’t want to discredit the “good work” done by the organization, but pointed out that even its “good work” is compromised by the overwhelming evidence of corruption.
“(T)he mixing of speech fees, the Clinton Foundation and actions by the State Department — which she ran — are all intertwined and it’s corrupt,” he argued.
He’s correct: The Clinton Foundation is corrupt, and voters should be troubled by Clinton’s role in the unethical pay-for-play scandals.
Unfortunately Clinton has an acute ability to avoid being held accountable for her scandals, but we have faith in the American people and their desire to be led by a person with integrity and respect for the office he holds, not someone who continuously looks for ways for his political power to benefit his personal life.
Like and share on Facebook and Twitter if you agree with Bob Woodward about Hillary Clinton and her family’s scandal-ridden Clinton Foundation. What do you think about Woodward’s criticism of Clinton? Scroll down to comment below! | 1 |
It s long been said that the War on Drugs is a fiction created by certain interests in society, in order to attack particular segments of the American population. There s been plausible deniability for a while, but now the truth is revealed by someone who was there when it was engineered.Harper s ran a piece written by Dan Baum, who was writing in support of drug legalization, in which a very honest and completely damning quote was given by former Nixon policy advisor John Ehrlichman. The quote will give even the most ardent anti-drug naysayers pause when they realize that the whole war on drugs that they ve completely bought into is a total lie.The quote is below:At the time, I was writing a book about the politics of drug prohibition. I started to ask Ehrlichman a series of earnest, wonky questions that he impatiently waved away. You want to know what this was really all about? he asked with the bluntness of a man who, after public disgrace and a stretch in federal prison, had little left to protect. The Nixon campaign in 1968, and the Nixon White House after that, had two enemies: the antiwar left and black people. You understand what I m saying? We knew we couldn t make it illegal to be either against the war or black, but by getting the public to associate the hippies with marijuana and blacks with heroin, and then criminalizing both heavily, we could disrupt those communities. We could arrest their leaders, raid their homes, break up their meetings, and vilify them night after night on the evening news. Did we know we were lying about the drugs? Of course we did. I must have looked shocked. Ehrlichman just shrugged. Then he looked at his watch, handed me a signed copy of his steamy spy novel, The Company, and led me to the door.Source: JezebelThis false war has been carried on for decades by subsequent presidents, as a useful tool to continue suppressing anti-establishment segments of society. Just look at Ronald Reagan s crack epidemic. Former CIA officials have come forth to admit the drug was funneled into black neighborhoods as a form of social sabotage. It also provided an excuse for brutal over policing and mass incarceration of a majority of their young people for a growing profitable prison industrial complex.Baum also goes on to explain a huge reason why Republicans are so strongly against the legalization of marijuana, despite its obvious success:The citizens of the U.S. jurisdictions that legalized marijuana may have set in motion more machinery than most of them had imagined. Without marijuana prohibition, the government can t sustain the drug war, Ira Glasser, who ran the American Civil Liberties Union from 1978 to 2001, told me. Without marijuana, the use of drugs is negligible, and you can t justify the law-enforcement and prison spending on the other drugs. Their use is vanishingly small. I always thought that if you could cut the marijuana head off the beast, the drug war couldn t be sustained. Source: JezebelWith the legalization of marijuana, a process has been started in America that would bring an end to a long-used secret Nixonian tool that was used for decades to attack liberal progressive and minority communities. This is exactly why Republicans are so strongly against it. It s time for this secret war on America by the right-wing to come to a permanent end.Featured image via Flickr | 0 |
LUSAKA (Reuters) - Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) government forces have been killing civilians in an insurgency-hit region, prompting the latest influx of refugees into northern Zambia, a senior U.N. official said, citing accounts of asylum seekers. Zambia fears a looming humanitarian crisis after more than 6,000 refugees fleeing turmoil in the DRC entered its territory in one month. [L5N1M32S5] Pierrine Aylara, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) chief representative in Zambia, told Reuters that the latest asylum seekers had said they were fleeing Congolese government forces. It is the government of the DRC that is said to be persecuting its own people by killing, maiming and torching houses, as well as committing rape and looting food stored in granaries, Aylara said. Thousands of people have been killed and more than one million forced to flee their homes in the DRC s eastern Kasai region since the start of an insurrection nearly a year ago by the Kamuina Nsapu militia. Kamuina Nsapu is demanding the withdrawal of military forces from Kasai. But U.N. monitors noted in a report that the conflict has shifted away from an insurrection of a specific community towards a wider upheaval far beyond its initial confines. A rebel group known as Elema was fighting the government mainly with machetes, bows and arrows in Congo s Haut Katanga and Tanganyika provinces, Aylara said. The group is not targeting civilians and aims to protect them, but is rather targeting government soldiers, the police as well as government establishments, she said. The insurgency poses the worst threat yet to the rule of DRC President Joseph Kabila. His refusal to step down at the end of his constitutional mandate last December prompted a wave of killings and lawlessness across the vast central African nation. In turn, government soldiers have become increasingly brutal to the civilian population as they are unable to tell who does and does not belong to this (rebel) group, Aylara said. DRC government forces were fighting alongside a tribe known as the Abatembo and targeting the Luba and Tabwa tribes who were believed to be sympathetic to the Elema rebels, she said. Southern African leaders plan to appoint a retired African president to oversee a process aimed at bringing about free and all-inclusive elections in the DRC to help heal the tensions that have caused internal strife and the refugee crisis. | 1 |
PARIS (Reuters) - The Paris climate change deal does not infringe on U.S. sovereignty, France’s ambassador to the United States said on Wednesday after multiple sources said President Donald Trump would pull his country out of the global pact. “The Paris accord is a political agreement. It doesn’t infringe on U.S. sovereignty. National commitments are voluntary and may be amended,” Ambassador Gerard Araud said in a tweet. He added that major American corporations had expressed their support for the deal. | 1 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - One in four registered voters in the United States live in areas that will use electronic voting machines that do not produce a paper backup in the November presidential election despite concerns that they are vulnerable to tampering and malfunctions, according to a Reuters analysis. The lack of a paper trail makes it impossible to independently verify that the aging touch-screen systems are accurate, security experts say, in a year when suspected Russian hackers have penetrated political groups and state voting systems and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has said the election may be “rigged.” Election officials insist the machines are reliable, but security experts say they are riddled with bugs and security holes that can result in votes being recorded incorrectly. A Reuters analysis of data from the U.S. Census Bureau, the Election Assistance Commission and the Verified Voting Foundation watchdog group found that 44 million registered voters, accounting for 25 percent of the total, live in jurisdictions that rely on paperless systems, including millions in contested states such as Georgia, Pennsylvania and Virginia. The picture has improved gradually since the 2008 presidential election, when 31 percent of U.S. voters lived in areas that used paperless touch-screen systems. In 2012, 27 percent lived in jurisdictions that used paperless systems. “Clearly we still have a long way to go to ensure that all Americans have access to a form of voting technology they can trust,” said Alex Halderman, a University of Michigan computer-science professor who has helped to uncover security flaws on touch-screen systems. (Graphic showing different types of voting systems across the U.S. -- tmsnrt.rs/2cZiKQ5) Most of these machines are nearing the end of their expected life span, making them more vulnerable to problems. And Congress has not authorized money for upgrades since 2002, just after the disputed 2000 presidential recount battle in Florida highlighted flaws in aging punch-card and lever-voting systems. In some states, a divide has emerged between poorer areas that continue to use paperless touch-screen systems and wealthier areas that have bought new optical scan systems that process paper ballots, which many experts say are a better way to ensure accurate elections. In Virginia, for example, counties that still use touch-screen systems have a poverty rate of 23 percent, while those that have switched to optical-scan systems have an average poverty rate of 11 percent. “I would have liked to have had the new machines, but the county says we don’t have the money,” said Patsy Burchett, the top election official in rural Lee County, which has been hit hard by the decline of the coal and tobacco industries and is the poorest county in the state. “These machines are on their last legs,” she said. U.S. election officials have known about the shortcomings of touch-screen systems since shortly after they were widely adopted in the early 2000s, when researchers showed that vote results could be manipulated with tools as simple as a magnet and a Palm Pilot-style handheld device. The systems have produced questionable results in some elections. In Florida, more than 18,000 iVotronic machines did not record a vote in a 2006 congressional race in which the margin of victory was less than 400 votes. In Fairfax County, Virginia, electronic machines subtracted one vote for every hundred cast for one candidate in a 2003 school-board race. More than 4,400 electronic ballots in Carteret County, North Carolina, were lost and never recovered in the 2004 presidential election. Since 2008, states such as Maryland have traded in their touch-screen machines for optical-scan systems. Others like California and Ohio have added printers to their touch-screen machines which produce a backup paper trail, while Washington and Colorado moved to mail-in ballots. Absentee balloting is also cutting into the use of paperless systems. In 2012, for example, roughly 1 in 10 voters who lived in areas that used paperless systems cast absentee ballots. Election officials say the touch-screen machines that remain in use are more secure now than they were a decade ago whether they are fitted with printers or not, thanks to extensive testing and better poll-worker training. They say that a hacking incident is unlikely because the machines are not connected to the Internet. “Voters should have confidence in whatever systems are being used in their jurisdiction because election officials have taken the necessary steps to secure these systems and ensure the integrity of the process,” said Matthew Masterson, a commissioner with the U.S. Election Assistance Commission. Although there has so far been no confirmed major incident of U.S. voting machines being hacked, security experts say that those aiming to manipulate votes could spread a virus through memory cards, with no Internet connection needed. The best way to stop that is to switch to paper-based systems, they say. With 55 percent of all U.S. registered voters living in areas that use systems that are no longer in production, according to the Reuters analysis, election officials must rely on a dwindling supply of spare parts. Virginia Beach, Virginia, for example, pulled 32 of its 820 Accuvote TSX touch-screen machines in a 2014 election after residents complained that the machines were registering votes for candidates they didn’t support. The city has since purchased a new optical-scan system. Lacking fresh federal funds, some states have opted to upgrade on their own. Louisiana aims to switch to an iPad-based system by 2019, while Los Angeles and Austin, Texas, are designing systems from scratch. Others see no reason to switch. In Georgia, Secretary of State Brian Kemp said he hasn’t asked the state legislature for money to replace its fleet of paperless AccuVote TS touch-screen machines. “It’s working just fine and all these so-called experts that are making these accusations about our system haven’t seen it,” he said. | 0 |
Alex Jones Declares Trump Landslide Victory 10/27/2016 In today’s video, Christopher Greene of AMTV reports on Alex Jones Prediction of a Donald Trump Landslide Victory. 10/27/2016 TRUTH REVOLT http://youtu.be/PsVNKmb6jEc There’s a lot of accusations going around that the 2016 election is r ... Netflix Ceo: TV’s Future includes Hallucination Pills 10/27/2016 INDEPENDENT The future of TV might everyone taking hallucinogenic drugs, according to the head of Netflix. The thr ... | 1 |
The report also discloses new details relevant to Clinton's motives and her assertion that the use of a private server was simply a matter of convenience. While criminal charges still remain highly unlikely, the inspector general's report is significant and unquestionably damaging to Clinton's public defense.
Most crucially, the inspector general directly contradicts Clinton's repeated assertions that she complied both with federal law and State Department policies. "At a minimum," the report finds, "Secretary Clinton should have surrendered all emails dealing with Department business before leaving government service and, because she did not do so, she did not comply with Department's policies that were implemented in accordance with the Federal Records Act."
The report goes further, noting that while Clinton's subsequent production of 55,000 pages of emails in response to State Department demands partially corrected these violations, the records Clinton turned over were incomplete. Remarkably, the report includes reference to a previously unreleased 2010 email in which Clinton, responding to her deputy chief of staff for operations, Huma Abedin, directly addresses her lack of an official State Department email account and voices a fear of the "risk of the personal being accessible" if she had one. In a briefing, State Department officials were unable to confirm the source of this email, but if it was omitted from the records Clinton produced, it again would raise questions about the process she used to distinguish between "federal records" and "personal records" before destroying the latter.
The inspector general also reveals the comments of State Department records management staff in late 2010 expressly raising concerns that Clinton's private email server "could contain federal records that needed to be preserved in order to satisfy federal record-keeping requirements." A senior official rebuffed these concerns, claiming that Clinton's email arrangement "had been approved by the department legal staff" -- an assertion the inspector general concluded was untrue -- and directed staff "never to speak of the secretary's personal email system again."
Such facts undermine the argument that the significance of maintaining a private server and the negative effects it could have, including on responses to Freedom of Information Act requests or congressional subpoenas, were simply overlooked. Clinton's response to the report is further complicated by the fact that the State Department did not contest the inspector general's findings, concurred with its recommendations, and even acknowledges in its response that "the department could have done better at preserving emails." All of this would serve to undermine assertions by Clinton that the inspector general's conclusions are biased or politically motivated. Indeed, thus far Clinton's response has focused on the argument that other secretaries of state also used private email. "Well there may be reports that come out," Clinton commented, "but nothing has changed. It's the same story. Just like previous secretaries of state I used a personal email, many people did. It was not at all unprecedented." And, it is true that the inspector general does not spare former Secretary Colin Powell from similar allegations, documenting his use of private email and his admitted failure to preserve those emails. In a nasty campaign, can politicians play nice? (Opinion) Yet this arguably only furthers the perception that the inspector general's review was both balanced and non-biased. And Clinton's response highlights how her defense -- which began with confident assertions that she followed all the rules and broke no laws -- has now been reduced to the argument that "others did it too" or that the rules she violated were not significant. Despite the inspector general's report, criminal charges against Clinton remain highly unlikely. While the report provides previously nonpublic information relevant to Clinton's motivations, the available public evidence remains insufficient to illustrate two facts needed for a criminal charge -- that she knew that emails on her private server were classified and that she intentionally mishandled classified information. Who in the world really wants Donald Trump to win? Yet the inspector general's report also highlights the uncertainty that surrounds the precise scope of the current FBI investigation. To the extent the FBI has limited its inquiry to security issues and the possible mishandling of classified information, for example, the inspector general's report finding violations of the federal records laws potentially implicates a different criminal statute. Removing, concealing, or destroying federal records, regardless of whether they are classified, can constitute a federal felony. But again, courts have generally required prosecutors pursuing this charge to prove that defendants knew they were violating the law, for which the evidence against Clinton appears to be lacking. In the end, extracting the truth in the Clinton email controversy in the current polarized political environment remains a nearly impossible task. Some have already begun to seize upon the inspector general's report, mischaracterizing it as clear evidence of a crime. And when the Department of Justice announces that it is not filing criminal charges -- as is both expected and perhaps inevitable -- Clinton will likely argue that it constitutes proof that she did nothing wrong. Based on the publicly available evidence, the reality appears to be nuanced in a way that is satisfying to neither side. Clinton violated the law, but committed no crime. | 1 |
By Brianna Acuesta Indoor farming is quickly becoming a growing trend because of consumers’ mistrust in GMOs, the yearning to buy as local as possible, and a decline in usable land. There are a... | 1 |
Email
The verdict is in and all charged with impeding federal officials with force at the armed occupation of the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge were exonerated. The Prophet Ammon must feel vindicated that his prophecies are true, taking it as a sign as he, Ryan and others head to Nevada for their February pageant.
The feds have struggled with the fringe Mormons since Buchanan’s Blunder, the folly of their Short Creek ways culminating in Malheur through a lack of establishing a secure perimeter, allowing them free travel, of FBI HRT coverup, narrow charges, and finally in the surreal tazing of attorney Marcus Mumford. The verdict and their collective ineptitude should give them pause regarding as they proceed to the Bunkerville trail in February.
I’ve argued that those involved in the Malheur takeover were engaging in Seditious Conspiracy , a charge that is both broad and carries a sentence of 20 years, defined as:
If two or more persons in any State or Territory, or in any place subject to the jurisdiction of the United States, conspire to overthrow, put down, … or by force to seize, take, or possess any property of the United States contrary to the authority thereof, they shall each be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than twenty years, or both.
Certainly, a larger net with many more conspirators with more plea deals to roll for information to convict the leadership. Anyone providing material, financial, recruiting, or other support would be captured by the dragnet.
I have evidence of material and other support that was given to the occupation leadership by the Utah contingent that met them the weekend of January 7-9, 2016. This group prepared press releases, brought supplies, discussed roles on how each could assist in cleaning up PR messaging after Tarpman and advising for legal issues like weapons. Many have not been contacted by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.
What is also forgotten and confirmed by sources is the Church knew Ammon would leave if they asked him to do so, the reason for a midnight run meeting with them to Salt Lake City where Utah contingent members who lead the rancher permit renouncing Storm Over Rangelands during the occupation, Todd MacFarlane and Jon Pratt, appealed to them to ask Ammon to leave. The Church did not, an indictment of how a ‘God fearing benevolent religion’ did not accept the role of ending an armed standoff that had a high likelihood of ending in bloodshed – and did.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints must feel anxious regarding their inaction. No doubt the combined Bundy standoffs in Nevada and Bunkerville with radical prophets pontificating unofficial doctrine, discredited the Church and its agricultural business interests – the largest in the nation. Perhaps with the exoneration they can continue to put the LDS Malheur contingent’s excommunication on hold.
The Bundys must feel empowered but beyond seditious fundamentalist theo-constitutionalist sagebrush Mormons from Dixie and Deseret, so, too, must Constitutional Sheriffs, militias, white supremacists, grazing permit renouncing ranchers, and other Trump voters around the country.
In fact, activists of any stripe are now free to use guns to ensure “they are taken seriously”. Perhaps forest defenders, particularly the brave women, need protection. Maybe those people of color at Black Lives Matter protests need to ensure for their safety. Maybe the climate and water defenders involved in the Dakota Access Pipeline action need to get serious defending mother earth.
I fear for law enforcement and public lands officials who in the future will be constantly facing armed protesters, standoffs, and remain distrusted by all sides. The same for our legal system, as today, with the Malheur verdict, it certainly has not won the trust of any as, yet another of a thousand cuts to efficacy in the American system of civil government.
I can’t wait to get the Hillary Rodham Clinton administration underway.
To leave on a positive note, I believe the Malheur occupation has strengthened the resolve of public lands advocates and all citizens who cherish the freedom and biodiversity of our public lands. All of us have been largely complacent, unaware of the very real threats people like the Bundy theo-cons and their corporate extractive business interests are to the public interest. It appears we still have a lot of work to do. | 1 |
Donald Trump is known for starting fights with people on his favorite social media platform, Twitter. The Republican presidential primary frontrunner may have started a fight that might land him in jail.Trump s latest feud is with the Marlene Ricketts, one of the owners of the Chicago Cubs. Ricketts donated $3 million dollars to a SuperPAC, that has the intent of taking down Donald Trump. The SuperPAC called the Our Principles PAC is being run by Katie Packer. Packer is a former advisor to Mitt Romney. Here s the Tweet:Ricketts responded to the Tweet, saying: It s a little surreal when Donald Trump threatens your mom but you know, the fact is whether it s my mom or my dad on his spending stuff or my sister on marriage equality or my brothers on what they do or what we do with the team, we re pretty much an open book. We stand up for what we believe in, we support the cause we think is important, and that s what America should be. Robert Reich wrote about the matter on his Facebook page on Friday night. That s where he said that one of his friends thinks that Trump violated the law when he put that Tweet out. After noting Trump s statements that he would prosecute Hillary Clinton over her private email server, Reich writes: My friend Arthur Ferguson, a former federal prosecutor, thinks Trump s statement violates the federal law criminalizing extortionate threats. 18 USC Section 875(d) reads: Whoever, with intent to extort from any person anything of value transmits any communication containing any threat to injure the property or reputation [of anyone] shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than two years, or both.' I m doubtful that anyone would actually consider prosecuting Trump over the matter, though Republicans are working double time to try and prevent a Trump presidential nomination. They are all looking for a way to take down his campaign, and a criminal investigation might do just the trick. Featured image from Gage Skidmore via Flickr | 1 |
RICHMOND (Reuters) - Virginia Republicans on Monday sued to nullify Democratic Governor Terry McAuliffe’s order restoring voting rights to 206,000 felons, a move that could affect the November presidential election. The lawsuit in the Virginia Supreme Court asked justices to require the voting registrars not to sign up felons based on McAuliffe’s April 22 order and to cancel felons’ registrations since the order was issued. Republicans argued that McAuliffe’s order was unconstitutional. The lawsuit was headed by leaders of the Republican-controlled state legislature. “The Governor is authorized to restore the voting rights of any convicted felon through an individualized grant of clemency, but he may not issue a blanket restoration of voting rights,” the lawsuit said. Virginia is considered a key swing state in the 2016 election. The governor’s order could tip the balance in favor of the Democratic candidate who wins the party’s nomination. House Speaker William Howell said in a statement that McAuliffe’s order violated 240 years of practice. “Governor McAuliffe’s executive order defies the plain text of the Constitution, flouts the separation of powers, and has no precedent in the annals of Virginia history,” Howell said. McAuliffe and other Democrats have hailed the restoration of rights to felons who have served their sentences and completed probation as being long overdue. Since signing the order, McAuliffe has said that nearly 80 percent of the felons whose rights were restored are nonviolent offenders who have been free for more than a decade. Caucasian felons made up 51.5 percent of the total whose rights were restored, and African-Americans 45.9 percent. Before McAuliffe’s order, felons had to petition the governor individually for restoration of their voting rights. About two dozen states have eased restrictions on felons casting ballots over the past two decades, according to the Sentencing Project, a prison reform advocacy group. | 1 |
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Mayors from the largest U.S. cities warned President-elect Donald Trump on Wednesday of the potential economic harm he might cause if he wipes out a program that allows young illegal immigrants to remain in the United States. They warned in a letter that as much as $9.9 billion in tax revenue would be lost over four years and $433.4 billion in U.S. gross domestic product would be wiped out over 10 years if he cancels a policy aimed at protecting these people from deportation. DACA, or The Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals policy, was created through an executive order in 2012. It allows undocumented young people brought to the United States before the age of 16 to remain without fear of deportation as they pursue a higher education, work or engage in military service. The deferred action is subject to renewal every two years. The mayors asked for the program to allow for initial applications and renewals to continue until “Congress modernizes our immigration system and provides a more permanent form of relief for these individuals.” As president, Trump would have the authority to undo DACA. “This program helps foster economic growth and enhances public safety and national security,” said the letter, written by the Democratic Mayor of Chicago, Rahm Emanuel, and signed by mayors of other major U.S. cities including New York, Los Angeles, and Houston. “We are clear as mayors that these are dreamers who are seeking the American Dream, and we should embrace them rather than do a bait-and-switch,” Emanuel said after presenting Trump the letter at a meeting in New York. Trump has called for the deportation of illegal immigrants, an estimated 11 million people, and promised to build a wall on the border with Mexico. According to the letter, which was made available to the press, nearly 742,000 undocumented youths have participated in DACA. DACA is part of the broader immigration issue of municipalities that offer themselves up as “sanctuary cities,” where local law enforcement refuse to report to federal authorities undocumented immigrants they encounter. Trump has threatened to cut off federal funding for those municipalities. While he would have the authority to cut some kinds of funding, mayors of those cities have said they will not be pressured to report migrants to federal agents. Santa Ana city council voted on Tuesday to declare their community in Southern California of 325,000 people, half of whom are foreign born and 80 percent of Hispanic descent, a sanctuary city. In Los Angeles, the County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday voted to ask county departments to provide plans for shielding undocumented immigrants from U.S. immigration authorities, said Jessie Gomez, a spokeswoman for Supervisor Hilda Solis. The board oversees health, law enforcement and social welfare departments that operate county-wide but it does not administer the city of Los Angeles. Nearly one million residents of Los Angeles County are believed to be undocumented immigrants, according to Solis’ office. White House spokesman Josh Earnest on Wednesday said he could not address the incoming president’s potential actions but that the current administration was working to ensure Trump’s team understood why Obama pursued the policy. “The president’s been crystal clear, both in words and deeds, about his view that young people who are American in every way but their papers shouldn’t be deported ... A policy of deporting them would be inconsistent with our values,” Earnest said of DACA. | 1 |
The terrorist who killed three people and injured dozens in Westminster on Wednesday was a married 52-year-old living with his family in an inner city suburb of Birmingham, according to police and a neighbour.Khalid Masood was born in Kent on Christmas Day 1964 and was described by a neighbor in Winson Green on Thursday as very calm and part of a very reserved family . But in fact the man who crashed a rented Hyundai into dozens of people on Westminster Bridge and stabbed PC Keith Palmer to death was a violent convicted criminal with multiple offenses to his name, including assaults, grievous bodily harm, possession of offensive weapons and public order offenses.His first conviction was in November 1983 for criminal damage and his last conviction was in December 2003 for possession of a knife, according to Scotland Yard, who finally named him on Thursday afternoon. They were a nice family very reserved, said his neighbour Iwona Romek, a factory worker, who confirmed his identity to the Guardian. He was very calm. I saw the photos on the TV and knew it was the man who lived here. The attack in Westminster came out of the blue not only for police, who stressed he had never been convicted of any terrorism offenses, but also for some who knew him in Birmingham, where he and his family lived on the modern Quayside estate about a mile from the city centre.However, he was once investigated in relation to concerns about violent extremism . May described that case as historic , but Downing Street declined to say whether that was during her time as home secretary between May 2010 and June 2016, repeating May s position that it was some years ago .Watch Brigette Gabriel explain how non-assimilation plays a major role in terror attacks by Muslims:He had lived in Winson Green, Romek said, before moving out, it is believed to a flat above a restaurant on Hagley Road, which was raided on Wednesday night. He regularly wore traditional white Islamic robes, the neighbor said. The Guardian | 0 |
Florida’s “deceptive” solar initiative, backed by utilities companies, loses support ‘It's a monopoly wolf in solar sheep's clothing’ By Nika Knight Posted on November 4, 2016 by Nika Knight
As utilities companies funnel millions of dollars into a last-ditch effort to convince Florida voters to pass an anti-solar initiative, the latest polling data shows support for the measure falling .
Florida’s Amendment 1 is “ deceptive ,” environmentalists argue, as it is written in pro-solar language but would in actuality block widespread adoption of solar power in the Sunshine State.
The measure is backed by a political committee formed by utilities companies, which has so far raised more than $26 million to fund the campaign.
“As we like to say, ‘it’s a monopoly wolf in solar sheep’s clothing,’” Dr. Stephen Smith, executive director of Southern Alliance for Clean Energy and a founding member of Floridians for Solar Choice, told the Sierra Club’s Sierra magazine. “We are in a pitted battle to stop the utilities from choking off citizen-owned solar.”
The initiative would “write people’s right to own or lease solar panels and other equipment into the state constitution,” InsideClimate News explains . “But it would also make it unconstitutional to require a utility’s non-solar customers to subsidize those who do go solar. Those subsidies have helped make home solar affordable and are the best incentive to push the fast-growing energy source to widespread use.”
Support for the measure fell markedly after an audio recording leaked to the public last month in which a lobbyist working for electric companies bragged about the measure to industry insiders.
The Miami Herald/Times , which released the recording, reported :
Sal Nuzzo, a vice president at the James Madison Institute in Tallahassee, [ . . . ] called the amendment, which has received more than $21 million in utility industry financing, “an incredibly savvy maneuver” that “would completely negate anything they [pro-solar interests] would try to do either legislatively or constitutionally down the road,” according to an audio recording of the event supplied to the Herald/Times .
He offered others a recommendation: “As you guys look at policy in your state, or constitutional ballot initiatives in your state, remember this: Solar polls very well,” he said.
“To the degree that we can use a little bit of political jiu-jitsu and take what they’re kind of pinning us on and use it to our benefit either in policy, in legislation or in constitutional referendums—if that’s the direction you want to take—use the language of promoting solar, and kind of, kind of put in these protections for consumers that choose not to install rooftop.
“I’m discouraged as a citizen how far we have slipped and see Amendment 1 as a means of accelerating that decline in solar in Florida,” Graham said, according to the Miami Herald
And Graham’s far from the only prominent voice to condemn the measure: “Former Vice President Al Gore, speaking at a rally for Hillary Clinton, described the amendment as ‘ phony baloney. ‘ Carl Hiassen, Florida’s best-known opinion journalist, has called the proposal a ‘ slick, oily fraud, ‘ and even the usually apolitical Jimmy Buffett has urged a no vote, noted
Such statements from opponents of the initiative have gone far to quell support, according to a new poll
One of those voters was “Barbara Waks, a retiree who had already mailed in her early-voting ballot when the Herald story appeared. She said that she thought she was supporting renewable energy,” the New York Times reported
“I felt so stupid,” she told the Times. “I’m familiar with the political arena and the garbage that exists, but this is beyond the pale.
Nika Knight is a Common Dreams | 0 |
Eric Holder in a skirt Obama s Department of Justice is working on more than a dozen new gun control regulations it plans to begin implementing apart from Congress. Some of the regulations are set to be put in place by November, others simply by the end of the Obama administration.According to The Hill, the regulations range from new restrictions on high-powered pistols to gun storage requirements and the issuance of new rules expanding criteria for people who do not quality for gun ownership. Part and parcel to this new criteria will be an ATF-implemented ban on gun ownership for anyone convicted of a misdemeanor domestic violence. Gun Owners of America s Michael Hammond warns that under this rule the person barred from gun ownership could be [someone] who spanked his kid, or yelled at his wife, or slapped her husband. The new regulations will also include ATF enlargements on mental health-based gun ownership bans. Hammond summed this up by saying, The Obama administration is trying very hard to disqualify people from owning a gun on the basis that they are seeing a psychologist. And the NRA pointed out that because most mentally ill persons pose no threat to society, the new regulations will actually become snares [for] masses of mostly harmless individuals. The NRA added: Not only is this unjust and stigmatizing, it creates disincentives for those who need mental health treatment to seek it, increasing whatever risks are associated with untreated mental illness. In other words, people who might actually need some minor mental health attention may refuse to pursue it for fear of losing their guns.The ATF is also working on rules that would require gun dealers to report gun thefts, provide gun storage and safety devices. In March the NRA warned that then Attorney General nominee Loretta Lynch would be Eric Holder 2.0. Yet in April, ten Republican Senators sided with Democrats and confirmed Lynch as AG. The Hill reports that those Republicans included:Sen. Kelly Ayotte (R-NH)42% Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC)49% Sen. Jeff Flake (R-AZ)40% Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY)54%Via: Breitbart News | 1 |
Hillary Clinton hasn t given up all the e-mails? | 0 |
In a complete 180 degree turn, a church that was the site of numerous mind boggling anti-gay rants will now be home to a shelter designed specifically to help at-risk LGBT youth. How s that for karma?Reverend James David Manning has become notorious for the awful sermons he delivers from his Harlem-based Atlah Worldwide Church. Outside, he frequently puts up massive signs denouncing homosexuality and anyone who supports gay rights. One sign claimed supporting same-sex marriage would give a person cancer or syphilis. Another declared Obama had released homo demons to attack black men.Thankfully, Manning s time being able to spew insane garbage from the pulpit appears to be over. Manning, busy as he was spreading hate, seems to have massively mismanaged his finances. His church is reportedly over $1 million in debt and the property it sits on will now be auctioned off.Enter the Ali Forney Center, an organization dedicated to providing help to homeless and at-risk LGBTQ youth. Since hearing about the recent vacancy they have been fundraising to buy Manning s old church. In just 12 days they raised over $200,000. It s likely they will soon be able to acquire it. We re confident we ll be able to go into the auction with a partner that will allow us to have not just an entry-level bid, said Carl Siciliano, the Center s founder and executive director. Because the building is historic, it is subject to zoning laws that make it almost impossible for the lot to be used to erect something like luxury housing or office buildings. If the building still manages to fall into the hands of a developer, Siciliano and his colleagues have a back-up plan: they will try to rent space there for $30,000 a month.Hilariously, Manning seems to be in pure denial that his church is being sold. He insists he s not leaving. In a disturbing video, Manning took aim at his enemies that want to take him down just because he hasn t paid over a million dollars in taxes. He does, however, appear to be dimly aware that his church will soon be a homeless shelter for LGBTQ youths. All kinds of stuff is being spread around [about how] they re going to turn this church into a bathhouse. How they re going to turn it into a homeless building for the sodomites. It s mainly the sodomites. The soulful minded people aren t doing anything. It s not soulful people or sodomites doing this to Manning it s the government. In December, a judge ordered the foreclosure after over a decade of Manning s church deliberately not paying his taxes. Records show that he has a whopping nine separate tax liens against him. Some going as far back as 2002.Manning is always quick to point out parts of the bible that speak against homosexuality, but he seems to have overlooked the parts that condemn greed. Maybe he should have paid more attention.Feature image from YouTube | 0 |
Norwegian Government to Deport White Patriot While Nation is Swamped by Tens... Norwegian Government to Deport White Patriot While Nation is Swamped by Tens of Thousands of Non-White Invaders By 0 129
Seven policemen searched Norwegian Nordic Resistance Movement member Ronny Bårdsen’s apartment to find the Norwegian-Russian nationalist Yan Petrovskiy (also knnown as Veliki Slavian; pictured). He will be deported from Norway. The police informed Petrovskiy that he has two days to get a flight ticket and five to leave the country.
The police wanted to see Petrovskiy’s passport and know if he accepts the decision and leaves Norway voluntarily or if he has to be forced. Petrovskiy answered that according to the advice of his lawyer, Nils Christian Nordhus, he doesn’t keep the passport in his apartment, and he will talk with his lawyer before giving an answer concerning his departure.
After this Petrovskiy attempted to call his lawyer while the police were waiting, but because his lawyer didn’t pick it up, the police decided to arrest Petrovskiy and search Bårdsen’s apartment. Petrovskiy has lived in the address for some time and has been registered as a Norwegian resident.
The real reason behind the search was to acquire Petrovskiy’s passport, as without it he cannot be deported. Despite the efforts of the police, the passport was not uncovered.
The decision about the deportation was made by the Directorate of Immigration (Utlendingsdirektoratet) after the Norwegian Police Security Service (PST) sent a letter to the directorate. In the letter PST stated that Petrovskiy was “a threat to national security.” The police — in Norway, Rotherham, or anywhere… | 1 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. lawmakers this week will consider three Republican-backed measures targeting the Obama administration’s nuclear agreement with Iran, which bitterly divides Washington a year after it was announced and could play a role in November’s elections. One bill would impose new sanctions on Iran over any sponsorship of terrorism or human rights violations. Another would bar the purchase from Iran of “heavy water,” a non-radioactive byproduct from making nuclear weapons and nuclear energy. The third would block Iran’s access to the U.S. financial system, including the use of the dollar. Republican lawmakers, who control the House of Representatives and Senate and unanimously opposed the nuclear deal announced last July 14, have said the measures are necessary to send Iran a strong message that it will face consequences if it violates international agreements. Many, joined by several Democrats, have been especially concerned by Iran’s actions since the deal was officially implemented in January, including its test-firing of ballistic missiles in March. “It makes sense to do all we can to check this very dangerous Iranian activity,” Republican Representative Ed Royce, the chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, told the Rules Committee, which sets up rules for debate of bills headed to the House floor. Thanks in part to the nuclear agreement, Iran has begun to rejoin global politics and economics after more than three decades of isolation. Business and political leaders are visiting the country, which is also hosting trade conferences. In his first report on the deal, United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said Iran’s ballistic missile launches “are not consistent with the constructive spirit” of the nuclear deal. He said it was up to the U.N. Security Council to decide if the launches violated the resolution backing the agreement. However, he also said he was “encouraged by Iran’s implementation of its nuclear commitments.” Republicans worry that President Barack Obama is so eager to preserve the pact as a legacy that his administration will give Tehran too much leeway before he leaves office in January. ELECTION-YEAR POLITICS? Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, backs the nuclear deal. Republican candidate Donald Trump has promised to tear it up if he is elected on Nov. 8. Most of Obama’s fellow Democrats in Congress backed the agreement. They say the new legislation is intended to undermine or even derail it. The White House issued a threat on Monday to veto all three bills, saying they would affect the continued viability of the nuclear agreement. The deal “is critical to ensuring that Iran’s nuclear program is and will remain exclusively peaceful, which is profoundly in the national security interest of the United States and the international community,” it said in a statement. The bills are not expected to win enough votes to advance in the Senate, even if they pass the House. And if they did pass the Senate, they would lack enough support to override a veto. Backers of the Iran deal said Republicans were trying to appeal to voters just days before the convention where Trump is due to become the party’s presidential nominee. Polls show an overwhelming majority of Americans have an unfavorable view of Iran. Dylan Williams, vice president for government affairs at J Street, a pro-Israel group that supported the nuclear deal, said such legislation plays into voters’ frustration with what they see as a do-nothing Congress. “This kind of grandstanding not only endangers our security by endangering the deal, it’s exactly the type of politics that people are sick of,” he said. | 1 |
https://soundcloud.com/davidcnswanson/talk-nation-radio-james-marc-leas-on-canceling-the-f-35
James Marc Leas is a founding member of the Stop the F-35 Coalition in Burlington Vermont. He has published some two dozen articles on the F-35 and F-35 basing. To highlight the F-35 issue statewide, he ran for the office of Vermont Adjutant General, the leader of the Vermont National Guard, in 2013, which is elected by the legislature.
Before becoming a patent attorney James was an engineer at IBM, and he holds over 40 patents for his inventions. While an IBM employee he led a vigorous campaign among employees to end IBM sales to South Africa. He also served as a staff physicist for the Union of Concerned Scientists in its Washington, DC office for a year in the aftermath of the accident at the Three Mile Island nuclear plant. He is a graduate of MIT and completed all but the dissertation toward a PhD in physics from the University of Massachusetts. He is a member of the Vermont Bar Association, the American Bar Association, and the National Lawyers Guild.
Sign the petition to cancel the F-35: | 0 |
VIDEO : Sean Hannity “The American People Have Finally Been Heard” VIDEO : Sean Hannity “The American People Have Finally Been Heard” Videos By TruthFeedNews November 10, 2016
Sean Hannity Reacts to Trump’s Historic Victory.
“The Washington Establishment is TERRIFIED and they should be. These people do NOT get it. I’m going to try to explain it to them.”
Watch the video:
Support the Trump Presidency and help us fight Liberal Media Bias. Please LIKE and SHARE this story on Facebook or Twitter. | 1 |
Any guesses as to who is playing our criminal Secretary of State or our lying Commander in Chief? The movie, based on Mitchell Zuckoff s 2014 book 13 Hours: The Inside Account of What Really Happened in Benghazi, tells the story of the September 11, 2012 attack on the U.S. diplomatic compound in Benghazi, Libya in which four Americans U.S. Ambassador J. Christopher Stevens, U.S. Foreign Service s Sean Smith and CIA contractors Glen Doherty and Tyrone S. Woods were killed by Islamist terrorists.Bay is directing the film from a script by Chuck Hogan (FX s The Strain). James Badge Dale, John Krasinski, Pablo Schreiber, Toby Stephens, David Denman, Max Martini, and Dominic Fumusa star.The trailer conveys a strong sense of dread before the classic Bay-inspired action kicks in. When everything went wrong, six men had the courage to do what was right, the text in the trailer reads.With a budget reportedly in the range of $30-$40 million, Bay is working on 13 Hours with a lot less money than he usually gets to play with on blockbuster films like Transformers. Here s hoping the result is a return to form for Bay and a tight, focused action film that honors the memories of the American heroes who sacrificed their lives on that day.13 Hours: The Secret Soldiers of Benghazi hits theaters January 15.Via: Breitbart News | 1 |
(CNN) CNN Opinion asked a range of contributors for their take on the CNN debate of Republican presidential candidates. Who were the winners and losers? The opinions expressed in these commentaries are theirs.
The Republican race for president just got a lot more serious.
At the second Republican presidential debate, there was minimal name-calling and personal insults by Donald Trump, and all of the candidates not named Donald Trump rushed into the void, taking advantage of an opportunity to make a good impression -- succeeding more often than not.
The clearest winner of the debate was Carly Fiorina, who successfully challenged Trump -- criticizing his wisecracks about her personal appearance and challenging his credentials as a global businessman by deftly ticking off hotspots around the world and suggesting ways she would tackle them.
But other candidates took turns at laying out specific plans and contrasting their ideas with those of their rivals. Sen. Rand Paul, a libertarian, took issue with Jeb Bush's vow to crack down on recreational marijuana, and Chris Christie jumped into the conversation to warn about the dangers of marijuana use leading to abuse of harder drugs -- a point underscored by Fiorina, who talked about the death of her stepdaughter, who was a drug user.
The big news in all of this was that the field of candidates weren't dancing to Trump's tune. Instead, they talked in a serious way about serious issues, and for considerable swaths of the debate it was possible to forget Trump was onstage at all: Marco Rubio and Christie went back and forth on climate change, and Ted Cruz debated Bush over the process and criteria for naming Supreme Court justices. Ben Carson argued for a two-tier minimum wage.
It remains true that a large percentage of the Republican voting base is disgusted by politicians and convinced that a brash straight-talker like Trump might fix this. But the debate served as a reminder that Trump's 30% support also means that 70% of Republican voters are looking for a different candidate to support. The debate proved they have plenty of viable choices.
To be taken half as seriously as a man, goes an old adage, a woman must be twice as good. Her male rivals ought to be taking Carly Fiorina a lot more seriously than that today because she was better -- a lot better -- than most of them in the CNN debate.
She came prepared with crisp, coherent responses to nearly every issue raised and delivered two of the best monologues of the night -- one when she spoke movingly about burying a child lost to drug addiction, the other about empowering every woman to realize her aspirations. She also put down Donald Trump on his slur about her face; he lamely praised her looks when, instead, he should have apologized.
Trump seemed tight at the start, needlessly picking fights, but he got his bearings halfway through and finished upbeat. I doubt he will pay much of a price for his early bombast but he may well see Fiorina, more than Ben Carson, soon nipping at his heels.
A debate that seemed long did have one major virtue: it allowed other candidates far more openings to distinguish themselves. Marco Rubio and Chris Christie took the most advantage: both were much more effective than in the first debate. The race itself, like the debate, is likely to seesaw back and forth for many weeks to come.
David Gergen is a senior political analyst for CNN and has been a White House adviser to four presidents. A graduate of Harvard Law School, he is a professor of public service and co-director of the Center for Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School.
Carly Fiorina won on style and substance. Unlike Marco Rubio, who dominated the few times he spoke, Fiorina made sure she had more than a few bites at the mic. Unlike Jeb Bush, who could only politely respond to Donald Trump's insults, while still losing most of the exchanges, Fiorina proved to be the only candidate who could effectively push back on Trump and his substance-free assertions.
Her perfectly calibrated and classy response to his insult of her face was an instant classic destined to dominate debate highlight reels. Now Trump is calling Carly Fiorina a "wonderful person" and "beautiful." That's the Trump-English definition for "apology. " That's Fiorina-English for "a win."
Fiorina handled the attacks on her business record deftly and then attacked Trump's habit of hanging creditors out to dry in the wake of his bankruptcies. For a GOP generally in trouble with women, she's the only candidate that could get away with calling the move to change the face on the $20 bill a pander. And she's right. We should know our history and make new history -- today -- by considering Carly Fiorina the breakout top tier candidate of Round 2.
Margaret Hoover is the president of the right-leaning advocacy group American Unity Fund, and author of "American Individualism: How a New Generation of Conservatives Can Save the Republican Party." She is the host of SiriusXM's "Get It Right with Margaret Hoover."
Trump came out swinging -- but ended up missing. Not only wasn't he substantive -- again -- but he made some pretty bizarre statements. He thinks a flat tax is more complicated than a regressive tax. He said that vaccines cause autism. He wants Syria and ISIS to fight each other. He will get along with Putin. This stuff doesn't hold up to scrutiny. The question is whether any is ever applied to Trump.
Ben Carson also suffered some serious stumbles that will likely hurt him, namely the bizarre suggestion that a "bully pulpit" would have been a better response to 9/11 than fighting terrorists. Saying that Americans aren't willing to perform agriculture jobs, that our Air Force isn't "capable" and our Marines aren't "ready," is pretty irresponsible stuff.
I think Carly Fiorina, on the other hand, managed to beat already high expectations. She was sharp, quick on her feet and delivered more than one great applause line. Particularly effective was her emotional plea to defund Planned Parenthood. And she used every opportunity to get as granular and specific on policy as she could. I expect her poll numbers to rise.
S.E. Cupp is the author of "Losing Our Religion: The Liberal Media's Attack on Christianity," co-author of "Why You're Wrong About the Right" and a columnist at the New York Daily News.
No big themes, no clear sense of vision emerged from the three hours of jawing in tonight's debate. Such are the downsides, I suppose, of putting 11 candidates on a stage and divvying up 1-minute slots for each candidate to make a mark.
So we saw flashes of Christie the populist, Fiorina the Trump slayer, Kasich the sunny multilateralist, Trump the bombast, Rand the constitutionalist, Carson the logician. But their claims didn't add up to much that was especially comprehensible, certainly not memorable.
To be sure, there were moments -- the best, perhaps, being Fiorina telling Trump that women across America know exactly what he meant when he insulted her looks. Rubio gave another strong performance, though it remains unclear whether he can capitalize on these performances on the campaign trail. Huckabee and Walker, by contrast, couldn't seem to nudge the conversation much at all.
My wish for the next debate on October 28? We narrow down the list, dig a little deeper and force the candidates to say something serious about the confluence of urban challenges associated with class, race and drug enforcement that, just now, only Rand Paul seems willing to discuss.
Biggest winner: George W. Bush, long forgotten, who was invoked as the man who kept America safe -- a claim that received the loudest applause of the night.
Biggest disappointment: Once again, no serious or sustained discussion of issues involving race, poverty, and violence in American cities. These were barely recognized last go around. They weren't so much as mentioned tonight.
William Howell is the Sydney Stein professor in American politics at the University of Chicago.
Carly Fiorina was the big winner tonight. She is the only candidate to date to take on Trump and come out a winner. She was polished, showed policy depth and has the outsider bio that is so in vogue this year. Fiorina now has more momentum than any Republican candidate not named Trump has had in this campaign.
Rubio was also very sharp tonight, but he seems unable to have the sorts of moments that get shared online and talked out around the dinner table, which is why he went down not up in the polls after a similarly solid performance in the last debate.
Jeb Bush was markedly better than the last debate (which is like being the tallest of the seven dwarves), but his most memorable moment was passionately defending his brother whose legacy is an albatross around his neck.
Ultimately, the eventual Democratic nominee was the biggest winner, because the Republican's continue to unlearn all the lessons of 2012 by taking far right positions on immigration, women's health, and climate change
Dan Pfeiffer is a former senior adviser to President Barack Obama and served in the White House in a variety of roles, including communications director.
At nearly three hours, this was a debate for the true political junkies. To me, the most resonant memory was that of the various Republican presidential candidates, on and off the camera, crying "Jake! Jake!" to moderator Jake Tapper, signaling their desire to jump into the discussion.
Ironically for a debate that took place at the Ronald Reagan library, the 2016 hopefuls showed that they differ in style from our 40th president. Reagan was known for his sunny disposition. He was a genial man who did not hurl insults at his rivals. He appealed to Americans' best selves with his innate optimism. By contrast, the Republicans on the stage tonight presented a gloomy vision of our nation, and at time acted peevish and petulant with one another -- a far cry from the courtly Reagan.
Yet for all the attacks on each other, the candidates also missed opportunities to call each other out. Nobody pointed out that, for much of her adult life, Carly Fiorina did not bother to vote at all. Nobody mentioned that, under Sen. Marco Rubio's proposed overhaul of our immigration policies, people like his working class parents would not have been allowed in the country. Nobody asked Mike Huckabee about the religious liberties of American Muslims or Mormons.
The immigration portion of the debate, meanwhile, was a disappointment. The immigration proposal that merited the most discussion was Donald Trump's impractical, inhumane plan for mass deportations. It was disheartening to see legitimate questions about immigration reform devolve into sniping about speaking Spanish, birthright citizenship and -- of course -- border security.
Any serious consideration of what to do with the estimated 11 million undocumented people already here was missing -- as was any mention of the fact that conservative icon Reagan signed the Immigration and Control Act of 1986, which allowed nearly 3 million undocumented immigrants to get amnesty after entering the country illegally.
Equally troubling was the fact that the "Black Lives Matter" movement -- one of the most powerful social justice movements of our time -- did not merit any discussion.
The winner tonight? That would be Fiorina. She faced up to personal and professional attacks with aplomb. Her experience in corporate America has clearly given her the skills necessary for making a strong presentation. Not at all hesitant about asserting herself, she proved that she belonged on the big stage tonight.
The loser tonight was Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker. He has been fading in the polls lately, and this was his chance to show potential supporters and donors that he is still a major player. Instead, between Trump's bravado and the occasional flourishes of the other candidates -- Rubio on foreign policy, Fiorina on her business record -- Walker seemed to get lost in the shuffle. Unlike nearly every other candidate, Walker did not have one strong "moment."
Like most, I thought Carly Fiorina was tonight's big winner. I think her strongest moment had nothing to do with Donald Trump.
The weak field helped. Trump kicked Jeb Bush around like a failed prospect on "The Apprentice." Bush's biggest applause line was defending his brother, which I'm sure the Hillary Clinton campaign loved. Nearly all rushed to promise magical toughness fixes to the Middle East and more deportations, while failing to mention the economy until it was an excuse not to act on climate change.
Fiorina reminds me of a more human Mitt Romney. She is a polished and poised debater. The question is whether her business track record of mass layoffs comes back to haunt her, as it did Romney.
But on Wednesday tonight, she combined personal stories with policy specifics better than anyone else on the stage. Asked about drug policy reform, she gave a heartbreaking account of the loss of a child that moved every watching parent of all parties -- and then transitioned seamlessly into a conservative case for reforming our criminal justice system.
That answer was all the more impressive because it came in the midst of a number of strong responses that showed the broad consensus on scaling back our system of mass incarceration. Kudos to CNN's Jake Tapper for posing a question that moved us past Trump's noisy racism, and provoked Bush's apology to his mom, Fiorina's tearjerker and a healthy dose of substance.
Julian Zelizer: Rivals figure out how to undercut Trump
In the first half of the debate, Donald Trump succeeded in his basic campaign strategy: make the entire contest about him. When most people were watching, Trump was continually a focal point of the discussion. Early, on he launched a series of ad hominem attacks, like telling Rand Paul he shouldn't even be on the stage and making quips about his looks.
This has been his strategy since entering the race -- constantly attack and constantly be attacked. Either way, the result is that Trump is the story. In an age of media-driven politics, where video clips and quick sound bites are the currency of choice, he advances his cause.
During the first two hours, the moderators often used Trump's statements (on immigration or on Fiorina's business record for example) as the basis of their questions to other candidates. Very often the split screen would show answers by someone like Christie, with the other half of the screen still on Trump whether or not this was relevant.
But during the last hour of the debate, when fewer people were watching, his opponents started to show that the best way to undercut is to talk about issues. Besides all the blows Trump suffered, including the basic message that he is an entertainer rather than a leader, the camera was no longer focused on him.
Many of the candidates had their moments. Carly Fiorina scored points with conservatives when she talked about defunding Planned Parenthood, as well as her call for policies to help women in the workplace. Her overall performance, including her retort to Trump's comments about her appearance, won applause. Sen. Marco Rubio offered emotional answers to the questions about immigration and showed his chops on foreign policy.
Sen. Ted Cruz got in a few criticisms of the Supreme Court, while John Kasich boasted of his deep experience and ability to move to the center.
Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker touted the record of his administration, while New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie finally had a chance to talk about issues other than scandalous bridges, including economic growth and law and order. His performance gave a boost to a dying candidacy.
Paul discussed drugs and criminal justice as well as the need to limit American involvement overseas. Ben Carson spoke about vaccine policies and defending free markets and wealth. Jeb Bush had a chance to defend his brother's policies after 9/11, connecting his statements to how he would address terrorism.
Whenever foreign policy came up, Trump almost seemed to duck down behind his lectern. Just as important, all of the candidates started to make tougher statements about former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, remembering that ultimately she would be the main target of the GOP. "Who will prosecute Hillary Clinton?" asked Christie.
While this debate probably won't knock Trump off from his pedestal, it offers a road map to his opponents about how to undercut his success. Shifting to issues and shifting to policies -- not allowing him to shape the entire conversation -- is the best way to trump Trump.
Winner: Anyone but Trump, although Trump was not a clear loser.
Maria Cardona: Rivals knew it was make or break
Tonight's debate finally started to break the Trump fever! The other GOP candidates found their inner adults, stood up to Trump -- somewhat -- and importantly, demonstrated their command and experience on policy details and their more realistic solutions to the country's problems.
While they are all wrong on the issues -- their immigration divisiveness and their focus on defunding Planned Parenthood to the point of forcing a government shutdown are dangerous territory and weaken the party's general election viability -- it was clear they all knew how much was riding on their performances.
Carly Fiorina was masterful throughout the debate. She was adroit, witty and showed she would not back down, but did so in a very graceful way. She also schooled Donald Trump and many of the others on foreign policy and other issues. She played and looked the part.
Marco Rubio shone brightly when discussing foreign policy, and his and Fiorina's command of subject matter was a stark contrast with Trump, who was completely absent from the discussion.
Jeb Bush did a much better job this time around, but still lost tonight. He is such a cringe-worthy, awkward candidate. And while he went toe to toe with Trump at times (and had a good, funny line towards the end when asked what Secret Service code name he would choose -- Eveready, he said looking at Trump, because it's "high energy" ), he looked uncomfortable in his own skin every time he tried to defend himself or get tough with Trump.
Will this be the beginning of the dimming of Trump, who up until now had gotten away with myths, bluster, distortions and outright lies in the place of facts, solutions, pragmatic approaches, respect and grace? Still early to say, but at least the candidates scored some important points against Trump and used the opportunity to let voters get to know them better.
The biggest winner from Thursday night's CNN Republican presidential candidate debate: Carly Fiorina. Not only did she speak with expertise and fluency on policy, but Fiorina added some emotional inflection and personal touches to connect with the voters. Most importantly of all-- she managed to be the first candidate to go toe-to-toe with Trump on stage and come out the clear victor.
Fiorina was joined by several other candidates with standout performances. Sen. Marco Rubio (who if not the eventual president, might make a great secretary of state) came off as polished on stage and wonky on policy. The same was true for Sen. Ted Cruz, who burnished his constitutionalist credentials at every opportunity and focused his fire on President Barack Obama's administration rather than his fellow GOP candidates. Gov. Chris Christie, for his part, also turned in a solid performance, as he managed to pull off both bravado and charm -- even managing to sound earnestly conservative a few times.
The biggest loser tonight? Donald Trump, not only because he clearly didn't win, but he even failed to be the center of attention beyond the opening minutes of the debate. Trump is, of course, style over substance, but even his style faltered tonight.
And while he had a few entertaining, humorous moments, Trump also had some head-shaking blunders. His non-apology to Fiorina, where he called her "beautiful," crashed and burned -- you could almost hear the groans across America.
Others in the "not good enough" category were: Sen. Rand Paul, Gov. Scott Walker and Gov. John Kasich, all of of whom may be following Gov. Rick Perry's lead in exiting the race much sooner than they anticipated.
Surprisingly, this was not episode No. 2 of the "Trump and Friends" reality show that many expected (and frankly some hoped for from an entertainment point of view.)
This was much more of a substantive debate, in part because the candidates refused to fight with each other or the moderators -- with a few exceptions, i.e., Donald Trump versus Rand Paul. This allowed the debate to reveal a contrast between the candidates who were pandering, offering conservative GOP primary voters red meat on issues, and those candidates who were being realistic and responsible, such as on issues like immigration and the Iran nuclear deal.
For example, Jake Tapper challenged Donald Trump (using a quote of Ben Carson) about his plan to deport the 11 million plus undocumented immigrants as being unworkable. We heard Ted Cruz boast that he would tear up the Iran deal if elected president. But Trump and Ohio Gov. John Kasich focused on enforcing the agreement. And Carly Fiorina called out Trump's proposal to end birthright citizenship as being wholly impracticable because it would require amending the 14th Amendment.
The race is now moving from the reality show mode to one of substance, which might be a little less exciting, but better for voters in assessing the candidates.
Once again, Carly Fiorina stole the show. Her comfort level on stage, command of the issues and her ability to deliver razor sharp responses, cut down Donald Trump with the precision of a political scalpel. Fiornia accomplished something no other candidate on that stage was yet to do: She made Donald Trump and his egomaniacal, larger than life candidacy look small.
While Trump engaged in his typical nonsequitur, ad hominem attacks, Fiorina came across thoughtful, prepared and tough on issues both foreign and domestic. When Jake Tapper asked Fiorina to respond to Trump's insult of her face during a Rolling Stone interview, and his attempt to walk it back by claiming that he meant her persona not her looks, she simply said to thunderous applause, "I think women all over this country heard very clearly what Mr. Trump said."
At that point, Trump pulled up lame. He responded, "I think she has a beautiful face. She's a beautiful woman," which was met with crickets and collective incredulity from the audience. It was one of the most memorable exchanges of the night. It felt as though Trump showed up prepared for a Comedy Central roast, not a debate to help decide the next leader of the free world.
Another standout moment came during a discussion on defunding Planned Parenthood over its fetal organ harvesting controversy when Fiorina looked into the camera and challenged President Obama and Hillary Clinton to "watch these tapes. ... Watch a fully formed fetus on the table, its heart beating, its legs kicking while someone says we have to keep it alive to harvest its brain. ... This is about the character of our nation, and if we will not stand up and force President Obama to veto this bill, shame on us." A man sitting next to me said, "I just got goose bumps." As did I.
Both Carly Fiorina and Sen. Marco Rubio, who in his own right had another very strong night, especially on foreign policy matters, came across as the adults in the room and delivered powerful performances on issues that resonate with the American people. We'll see if that's reflected in the polls moving forward.
Tara Setmayer is former communication's director for Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, R-California, and a CNN political commentator. | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson plans to skip a meeting with NATO foreign ministers next month in order to stay home for a visit by China’s president and will go to Russia later in April, U.S. officials said on Monday, disclosing an itinerary that allies may see as giving Moscow priority over them. Tillerson intends to miss what would have been his first meeting of the 28 NATO allies on April 5-6 in Brussels so that he can attend President Donald Trump’s expected April 6-7 talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, four current and former U.S. officials said. Skipping the NATO meeting and visiting Moscow could risk feeding a perception that Trump may be putting U.S. dealings with big powers first, while leaving waiting those smaller nations that depend on Washington for security, two former U.S. officials said. Trump has often praised Russian President Vladimir Putin, and Tillerson worked with Russia’s government for years as a top executive at Exxon Mobil Corp, and has questioned the wisdom of sanctions against Russia that he said could harm U.S. businesses. A State Department spokeswoman said Tillerson would meet on Wednesday with foreign ministers from 26 of the 27 other NATO countries — all but Croatia — at a gathering of the coalition working to defeat the Islamic State militant group. NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg was due to have arrived in Washington on Monday for a three-day visit that was to include talks with U.S. Defense Secretary James Mattis and to take part in the counter-Islamic State meetings. The State Department spokeswoman said Tillerson would not have a separate, NATO-focused meeting the 26 foreign ministers in Washington but rather that they would meet in the counter-Islamic State talks. “After these consultations and meetings, in April he will travel to a meeting of the G7 (Group of Seven) in Italy and then on to meetings in Russia,” she added, saying U.S. Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Tom Shannon would represent the United States at the NATO foreign ministers meeting. Representative Eliot Engel, the senior Democrat on the U.S. House of Representatives foreign affairs committee, said that Tillerson was making a mistake by skipping the Brussels talks. “Donald Trump’s Administration is making a grave error that will shake the confidence of America’s most important alliance and feed the concern that this Administration simply too cozy with (Russian President) Vladimir Putin,” Engel said in a written statement. “I cannot fathom why the Administration would pursue this course except to signal a change in American foreign policy that draws our country away from western democracy’s most important institutions and aligns the United States more closely with the autocratic regime in the Kremlin,” he added. A former U.S. official echoed the view. “It feeds this narrative that somehow the Trump administration is playing footsie with Russia,” said the former U.S. official on condition of anonymity. “You don’t want to do your early business with the world’s great autocrats. You want to start with the great democracies, and NATO is the security instrument of the transatlantic group of great democracies,” he added. Any Russian visit by a senior Trump administration official may be carefully scrutinized after the director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation on Monday publicly confirmed his agency was investigating any collusion between the Russian government and Trump’s 2016 presidential election campaign. Trump has already worried NATO allies by referring to the Western security alliance as “obsolete” and by pressing other members to meet their commitments to spend at least 2 percent of gross domestic product on defense. Last week, he dismayed British officials by shrugging off a media report, forcefully denied by Britain, that the administration of former President Barack Obama tapped his phones during the 2016 White House race with the aid of Britain’s GCHQ spy agency. A former U.S. official and a former NATO diplomat, both speaking on condition of anonymity, said the alliance offered to change the meeting dates so Tillerson could attend it and the Xi Jinping talks but the State Department had rebuffed the idea. The former diplomat said it was vital to present a united front toward Moscow. The North Atlantic Treaty Organization was created in 1949 to serve as a bulwark against the Soviet Union. “Given the challenge that Russia poses, not just to the United States but to Europe, it’s critical to engage on the basis of a united front if at all possible,” the diplomat said. | 1 |
Your tax dollars up in smoke thanks to the USDA. The two culprits are food stamps and the school lunch program. We cannot afford to feed the entire world or the millions of illegals crossing our border. The U.S. spent a record $80.4 billion on giving free groceries to Americans but also to non-citizens. The bloated federal agency charged with feeding the poor and eradiating food insecurity in the U.S. blew nearly $7 billion to provide ineligible recipients with the welfare benefit and there appears to be no end in sight to the fleecing.In fact, the agency, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), has for years violated a measure known as the Improper Payments Elimination and Recovery Act (IPERA) that requires agencies to conduct annual risk assessments to identify programs that make significant improper payments of $10 million or more. Not only has the USDA violated IPERA in the last four years, it also refuses to implement a more efficient verification process before doling out benefits by asserting that it would create barriers for families that need help. Last year the USDA made an astounding $6.9 billion of improper payments, according to a scathing report made public this week by the agency s inspector general. Two programs accounted for a chunk of the money that was wasted; food stamps, officially known as Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) to eliminate the stigma of welfare and the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) which cost American taxpayers a whopping $16 billion in 2014. Of the $6.9 billion in fraudulent payments made by the USDA, those two programs accounted for $4.2 billion. Thus, they have been coined high-risk programs, according to the USDA watchdog.The overwhelming majority of improper payments go to provide ineligible recipients with goods or services, the report confirms. This is par for the course at the USDA and the agency seems to have no intention of cleaning up its rolls. In fact, the agency goes out of its way to cover up wrongdoing in four of its most fraud-infested programs. USDA is noncompliant with the improper payment requirements for a fourth consecutive year, the report says. Not coincidentally, a separate probe conducted by the investigative arm of Congress, also found that the USDA needs to improve its verification process for program access. That report, also made public this week, focuses only on the National School Lunch Program, which is notorious for wasting millions of taxpayer dollars.Also this week, Congress held a special hearing to address waste, fraud and abuse in child nutrition programs operated by the USDA. At the hearing, held by the House Subcommittee on Early Childhood, Elementary and Secondary Education, witnesses identified misused taxpayer dollars in three of the nation s largest child nutrition programs, which include school lunch and breakfast. The Forensic Audits and Investigative Service director at the Government Accountability Office (GAO) testified that both programs have been designated as high-error by the Office of Management and Budget (OMB). In fact, nearly half of the households that received benefits were not eligible because their income exceeded eligibility guidelines, according to the director Jessica Lucas-Judy.Judicial Watch has reported extensively on the pervasive fraud and corruption in the government s various food assistance programs, especially food stamps, which has grown immensely under President Obama. Last year JW reported that the government spent a mind-boggling $80.4 billion to give a record number of people many who didn t even qualify for the welfare benefit free groceries. A few years ago JW uncovered documents that show illegal immigrants also receive food stamps from Uncle Sam under an outrageous initiative with the Mexican government to promote participation by undocumented aliens.Via: Judicial Watch | 0 |
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The European Commission on Wednesday stepped up legal action against Hungary over restrictions on foreign funding likely to affect civil society groups funded by the billionaire investor George Soros. The EU executive believes the law, passed in June, violates the right to freedom of association and to protection of private life and personal data enshrined in the EU s Charter of Fundamental Rights, as well as breaching the principle of free movement of capital. Hungary s right-wing prime minister, Viktor Orban, has long criticized organizations funded by the Hungarian-born Soros, accusing them of working as paid activists advocating Soros s political goals, notably by opposing Orban s tough immigration policy. When Soros in June praised the courageous way Hungarians have resisted the deception and corruption of the mafia state Orban has established , Orban called it a declaration of war , and accused Soros of running a mafia-like network. The Commission expressed its concerns over the law on non-governmental organizations (NGOs) to Budapest in July, the latest in a long line of grievances about what Brussels and many member states see as a track record of flouting fundamental EU values. Having carefully analyzed the explanations put forward by Hungary, the European Commission concludes that its serious concerns have not been addressed, it said in Wednesday s statement. The Commission s next step in the infringement procedure is to issue a so-called reasoned opinion, giving Hungary one month to take the requested measures. If Hungary fails to reply satisfactorily to the reasoned opinion, then the Commission may refer the case to the Court of Justice of the EU, the statement said. The Commission has already issued a similar ultimatum to Hungary over an education law that Brussels says infringes academic freedom and could result in the closure of a Budapest university founded by Soros. Since coming to power in 2010, Orban has eliminated checks on his power by taking control of much of Hungary s media, curbing the powers of the constitutional court and placing loyalists in top positions at public institutions. While Brussels can open cases against EU states violating common rules, they are lengthy and often have little impact. That means the EU executive has little leverage over Orban, who has been in office since 2010 and faces an election next year. | 0 |
LONDON (Reuters) - Around 10,000 finance jobs will be shifted out of Britain or created overseas in the next few years if the UK is denied access to Europe s single market, according to a Reuters survey of firms employing the bulk of workers in international finance. Frankfurt was by far the most popular destination for the new roles, the survey showed, with Paris a distant second. The results from 123 firms came from the first comprehensive public survey to ask the biggest banks, insurers, asset managers, private equity firms and exchanges in Britain about the specific details of their plans so far in case of a so-called hard Brexit. Canvassing was conducted by email and telephone interviews between Aug. 21 and Sept. 15, weeks after companies submitted detailed plans on their Brexit preparations to the Bank of England as required on July 14. The Bank declined to comment on the results of that survey. Nearly half of the companies surveyed told Reuters they would have to move staff or restructure their businesses because of Brexit, which is due to take place in March 2019. Another third said it would have no impact, and the remainder said they were still deciding on their plans or declined to comment. The number of jobs to be moved or created overseas was based on answers from 39 companies employing at least 350,000 people. About 1.1 million people work in Britain s financial sector. The findings suggest that the first wave of job losses from Brexit may be at the lower end of estimates by industry lobby groups and firms, which could mean London will keep its place as the continent s top finance center, at least in the short term. Most respondents said bigger moves could be in store in a decade or more, however. If it is going to happen it won t be in one big bang, said a senior executive at one of Europe s largest banks, which took part in the survey. There will be a slow drain of jobs from London over a number of years. The survey also suggests some financial institutions may be delaying decisions, hoping a soft Brexit can be negotiated in talks currently going on in Brussels. BoE Governor Mark Carney has specifically warned companies against that approach, saying it s important to start planning now. They would like to think there is going to be a mutually easy way of dealing with financial services across the EU-UK border, said Andrew Gray, global head of Brexit for financial services at PwC. So firms are finding it hard to land on precise plans. London s future as Europe s premier financial hub is one of the biggest issues in Brexit talks because the sector is the UK s biggest source of corporate tax revenue. (For details from the poll, please read) For its survey, Reuters approached 158 of the largest and most internationally focused financial firms in Britain and received responses from all but 35. Those included the 20 investment banks that earned the most fees from investment banking in Europe, the Middle East and Africa in 2016, according to Thomson Reuters data. Many participants gave only partial answers to the survey questions, however, and some asked not to be named and for their data to be used only in aggregate. The number of workers employed by the 75 organizations who provided their staffing numbers added up to 484,578, the bulk of employees in the internationally focused financial sector. The 39 who gave information on their Brexit staffing plans included many of the companies most likely to be affected by losing the EU financial passport mechanism because London is their base to sell services across the EU. The survey indicated 9,777 banking roles would be affected. Many of those would be shifted out of the UK, but some would be new roles in Europe, resulting in a period of duplication, the executives surveyed said. Insurance companies said they planned to move or create about 98 jobs overseas and the asset management sector 311 roles, the survey showed. U.S. and British banks would see the biggest impact because many use London as their EU investment banking base, which has increased in importance since the 2008 global financial crisis, when banks tried to simplify their international structures into a few main hubs. The impact on Spanish, Italian and Dutch banks was muted because they don t use London as a hub and have less of a focus on investment banking, the survey showed. Japanese lenders such as Nomura, Daiwa Securities and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group plan to set up subsidiaries in Frankfurt, according to the survey. One said it planned to move about 100 jobs, but asked not to be identified. Bank of America (BAC.N) and Credit Suisse (CSGN.S), two of the biggest investment banks in London, declined to say how many jobs would be affected. But BofA did say it would pick Dublin as its EU hub if there was a hard Brexit. Most in the financial industry picked Frankfurt as their preferred place to put jobs, with 5,470 roles, most of which are the up to 4,000 anticipated moves from Deutsche Bank. Paris came second with 1,800 roles, of which 1,000 were planned by HSBC (HSBA.L). The true impact of Brexit will only become clear in ten or twenty years because most firms are implementing a two-stage contingency plan, senior executives in London said. The first phase will involve relatively small numbers to make sure the requisite licenses and infrastructure are in place. The next will require longer-term thinking about what the companies European business will look like. The final impact will also depend on the details of the Brexit deal, Europe s economic growth and whether Frankfurt and Dublin prove to be successful alternatives to London. Previous forecasts for jobs losses in a hard Brexit scenario have ranged from about 30,000 jobs estimated by the Brussels-based Bruegel research group in February to up to 75,000 by Oliver Wyman in October and as many as 232,000 by London Stock Exchange chief executive Xavier Rolet in January. The Bruegel estimate was for a three-year period starting from when divorce proceedings were formally triggered in March, according to Dirk Schoenmaker, an author of the report. The Oliver Wyman forecast is up to 2022. The London Stock Exchange forecast is up to 2024. Some politicians, financiers and academics say bankers have exaggerated the threat to the economy from Brexit. Brexit presents an inconvenience to their operations but also an opportunity to wrangle tax and rule changes to stay, according to Robert Jenkins, a professor at London Business School and a former Bank of England policymaker. They will play this for all it s worth. Several banks have heavily scaled back their estimates compared with a year ago. JPMorgan, for example, is currently planning to move fewer than 1,000 roles, whereas before the Brexit referendum the bank had said about 4,000 jobs might be at risk. Paul Venables, the finance director of Hays, the largest recruiter for financial services in the City, said the job market for financial services in London is gradually improving. Where there s been a lot of public pronouncements from the banks, we ve seen very little action, we re not seeing a large number of jobs go outside of the UK to Europe, he said. We re beginning to see tentative signs of that market returning to normalcy. (For a graphic on Brexit banks click tmsnrt.rs/2x8CKZq) | 1 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House said on Monday it planned later this week to establish four “Skype seats” for its regular media briefings to allow news organizations outside of Washington to participate. “We’re excited to open up into ... the fold here a diverse group of journalists from around the country who may not have the convenience or funding to travel to Washington,” White House spokesman Sean Spicer told reporters. “I think this can benefit us all by giving a platform for voices that are not necessarily based here.” | 0 |
WASHINGTON/BEIJING (Reuters) - The election of climate change skeptic Donald Trump as president is likely to end the U.S. leadership role in the international fight against global warming and may lead to the emergence of a new and unlikely champion: China. China worked closely with the administration of outgoing President Barack Obama to build momentum ahead of the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change. The partnership of the two biggest greenhouse gas emitters helped get nearly 200 countries to support the pact at the historic meet in France’s capital. By contrast, Trump has called global warming a hoax created by China to give it an economic advantage and said he plans to remove the United States from the historic climate agreement, as well as reverse many of Obama’s measures to combat climate change. He has appointed noted climate change skeptic Myron Ebell to help lead transition planning for the Environmental Protection Agency, which has crafted the administration’s major environmental regulations such as the Clean Power Plan and efficiency standards for cars and trucks. Beijing is poised to cash in on the goodwill it could earn by taking on leadership in dealing with what for many other governments is one of the most urgent issues on their agenda. “Proactively taking action against climate change will improve China’s international image and allow it to occupy the moral high ground,” Zou Ji, deputy director of the National Centre for Climate Change Strategy and a senior Chinese climate talks negotiator, told Reuters. Zou said that if Trump abandons efforts to implement the Paris agreement, “China’s influence and voice are likely to increase in global climate governance, which will then spill over into other areas of global governance and increase China’s global standing, power and leadership.” Chen Zhihua, a representative of the Chinese delegation and official in the climate change division of the National Development and Reform Commission, the country’s economic planning agency, said Chinese and other countries’ efforts will not change if the United States withdraws from the agreement. “Action by the international community will not stop because of the new government of the United States. We still have confidence the international community will join hands and continue our efforts on climate change,” he told reporters at the 200-nation U.N. meeting being held in Marrakesh to start fleshing out the implementation of the 2015 Paris Agreement. The Paris Agreement seeks to phase out net greenhouse gas emissions by the second half of the century and limit global warming to “well below” 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels. Each country has put forward national plans to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions. Some have raised concerns that without involvement and financial support from the United States, emerging economies like India may feel inclined to back out. One of the key advisors to Obama’s team on climate change said he hoped China would take on the mantle and keep the global climate deal alive. Beijing should “continue to work in the spirit that we worked together in and before Paris,” said Andrew Light, former senior adviser to previous U.S. Special Envoy on Climate Change Todd Stern. It is an ironic twist for the government of the world’s second-largest economy. For years, Beijing fought attempts by foreign governments to limit carbon emissions, claiming it should be allowed the same space to develop and pollute that industrialized nations had. But with its capital often choked by smog and its people angry about the environmental devastation that rapid development has wrought across the country, Beijing has become a proponent of efforts to halt global warming rather than a hindrance. “China is acting on climate for the benefit of its own people,” said Erik Solheim, executive director of the UN Environment Programme. “I am confident China will take a lead role.” China has powerful domestic and global imperatives to play a high-profile role in continued global climate change talks, meant to avert more heat waves, droughts, floods and rising sea levels that could cause trillions of dollars of damage by 2100. China sees a perceived role as global climate leader as way to bolster its aspiration to become a “clean energy superpower” by leading in renewable energy technology such as wind and solar power and asserting itself as a key geopolitical power. Dealing with the pressures of continued urbanization in some of the world’s largest cities has already put China ahead, said Andrew Steer, the president of environmental think tank the World Resources Institute. Beijing is innovating to build low-carbon cities, he said. “It sees carbon as an indicator of economic inefficiency,” Steer said. Trump’s victory over Democrat Hillary Clinton darkened the mood of delegates attending the current round of climate talks in Marrakesh. Some delegates at the talks say that China is already setting an example. “China is surprising us daily. Whatever they’ve promised they’re delivering,” said Tosi Mpanu Mpanu, of Democratic Republic of Congo, who heads the 48-nation group of least developed countries at the talks. | 0 |
Rajiv J. Shah, a trustee of the Rockefeller Foundation, was asked about six months ago to join the committee that would select the foundation’s next president. He said no. Instead, Mr. Shah, who until recently had been the administrator of the United States Agency for International Development, ultimately said he wanted to be considered for the post. He got the job. On Thursday, the Rockefeller Foundation, one of the country’s largest and most influential philanthropies, will name Mr. Shah to succeed Judith Rodin, who has been president for 12 years. The appointment will make Mr. Shah one of the most powerful forces in charitable giving, overseeing a foundation that donates roughly $200 million each year and corrals governments, companies and organizations to contribute money and resources in tandem. Mr. Shah, 43, will be the first to lead the Rockefeller Foundation, which has gained stature in recent years through some prominent projects but has sometimes been criticized as being more interested in its publicity than its grantees. Founded in 1913 by the oil tycoon John D. Rockefeller, the foundation says it has given away the equivalent of more than $17 billion in today’s dollars. Its first grant was to the American Red Cross, and it went on to play pivotal roles in establishing the field of public health, creating vaccines for yellow fever and malaria, and bringing agricultural advances to the developing world. In recent years, the foundation has focused on the themes of “resilience” and “inclusive economies. ” That has resulted in programs aimed at establishing “resilience officers” in 100 cities to focus on disaster relief and a plan that is sending 100, 000 students to see the musical “Hamilton. ” These efforts have struck critics as public relations stunts more than meaningful agents of change. And Ms. Rodin has drawn fire for spending too much time with corporate partners and not enough time with the recipients of grants. Much of the foundation’s work concerns improving health and in Africa, aiding economic development in impoverished areas and developing strategies to combat climate change. It was these diverse causes that attracted Mr. Shah to the job. With advanced degrees in medicine and health finance from the University of Pennsylvania, Mr. Shah worked at the Bill Melinda Gates Foundation for nearly a decade, rising to be director for agricultural development. From 2009 to 2015, he ran U. S. A. I. D. leading the response to disasters including the 2010 earthquake in Haiti and the 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa. After leaving the agency, he founded Latitude Capital, a private equity firm focused on emerging markets. In those roles, Mr. Shah said, he came to understand the power of partnerships, a strategy that Ms. Rodin has embraced at the Rockefeller Foundation. “I’ve seen what’s possible when people come together,” he said in an interview this week. “We were able to save tens of thousands, if not millions, of lives. ” Ms. Rodin was not involved in the search for her successor but has known Mr. Shah for years. They worked together on an agricultural project when he was at the Gates Foundation, and he joined the Rockefeller Foundation board in 2015. “He’s a marvel,” Ms. Rodin said in an interview this week. “He’s very strategic and very innovative. He shows an interpersonal dexterity that is well beyond his years. ” Ms. Rodin said she believed that Mr. Shah was a good fit for the job thanks in part to his time at U. S. A. I. D. which required that he forge alliances with a vast array of governments, organizations and companies. “One of the things we tried to emphasize during my time at Rockefeller was broadening the scope of partnerships,” Ms. Rodin said. “We see in Raj someone who has the capacity to take advantage of this, and has the capacity to be a great partner. ” Richard Parsons, the chairman of the Rockefeller Foundation board, said Mr. Shah was the unanimous choice of the search committee after a competitive process that considered hundreds of candidates. “Raj is the perfect guy to come in after her,” Mr. Parsons said in an interview. “He’s a performer. You put him up in front of a group and people come away impressed. Now, he’s got a platform. ” Mr. Shah said he was committed to the broad themes of resilience and inclusive economies. “That core concept of resilience is extraordinarily important going forward,” he said. “It gives us the opportunity to evolve into the future. ” But he said he would look for opportunities to address schisms in the American electorate in this divisive political moment. “It is a different time today than it was 10 or 15 years ago,” he said. “We live in a more fractured world. ” The Rockefeller Foundation is viewed by some has having a liberal bent. During Ms. Rodin’s tenure, the foundation donated money to the Clinton Foundation. Mr. Shah is close with President Obama but said he maintained good relations with Republicans in the House and Senate and believed that the foundation’s core mission had bipartisan appeal. “It’s widely acknowledged that tackling hunger and ensuring health around the globe are in our own national interest,” Mr. Shah said. “I have always been passionate about delivering social justice results at a massive scale. ” He will now have a $200 million a year to try to deliver those results. | 0 |
Celebrities including Susan Sarandon, Dulé Hill and Lizzy Caplan know why President Donald Trump issued an executive order last week temporarily prohibiting some immigration to the United States — it’s because he’s working from an alternative, “cursed” Constitution. [In the latest political PSA from comedy website Funny or Die released this week, a number of celebrities — including Shailene Woodley, Cara Delevingne, Jamie Chung and others — lay out the case for why they believe Trump is relying on an old “alternate” Constitution found in a musty old cave. “We only know of two copies [of the alternative Constitution] one of which archaeologists found cradled in the mouth of a large golden deity hidden in a deep underground cave,” explains West Wing star Hill. “Trump was accidentally given the other copy when he was a teen. ” “He’s working from the wrong Constitution and he doesn’t even know it,” says Delevingne. In the supposed “alternative” Constitution from which Trump is working appears the clause: “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, but if a handsome, brave, scared president makes an executive order that favors one religion over another, he shall only experience pure ecstasy. ” The PSA marks the latest entry from Funny or Die after the Will Ferrell and Adam comedy website became nearly the premiere destination for such videos during the election. offerings from the website included Tom Green’s parody music video “Do the Donald” and Katy Perry’s “Vote Naked” political PSA. Last year, the site released a “lost” made for TV movie based on Trump’s bestselling book The Art of the Deal, with Johnny Depp starring as Trump. Watch the full “Alternative Constitution” sketch above. Follow Daniel Nussbaum on Twitter: @dznussbaum | 0 |
Obama s goal of making gun control a reality in the United States of America is one step closer, thanks to this radical judge A Connecticut judge ruled Thursday that a lawsuit against the manufacturer of the gun used in the Sandy Hook shootings, and other companies, can move forward.A Connecticut Superior Court judge denied a motion to dismiss the lawsuit against the companies involved in the manufacturing, distribution and sale of the rifle used in the deadly 2012 shootings.Adam Lanza used a Bushmaster AR-15 rifle in the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings on Dec. 14, 2012 to kill 26 people in less than five minutes. The families of the victims, which included 20 children, have sued the maker, distributor and seller of the rifle, arguing that the military-style gun should have never been available for civilians to purchase.Connecticut State Judge Barbara Bellis rejected the gun companies argument that a 2005 federal law can protect gun businesses from civil lawsuits.Remington Arms Co., the manufacturer of the rifle, is named in the suit. Also named is Camfour Inc., a distributor of firearms, and the now-defunct Riverview Gun Sales, a dealer in East Windsor, Conn., that sold the rifle to the Lanza s mother in 2010. Via: Washington ExaminerNolan Finley, The Detroit News The lawsuit, filed by nine victim families, claims Remington is liable for making and selling to the public a rifle unfit for civilian use.The claim plays right into the anti-gun lobby s latest end-around of the Constitution. It follows the strategy laid out in last week s Democratic debate by Hillary Clinton, who wants to open up both gun manufacturers and gun retailers to product liability lawsuits.While Clinton chortles derisively whenever it s pointed out that the threat of such litigation would become an effective ban on gun sales, and ultimately on gun ownership, that is precisely the desired outcome.Clinton s charge that gunmakers enjoy unique protection from liability isn t true. All manufacturers of defect-free, legal goods enjoy a broad shield against damage resulting from the intentional misuse of their products.Still, gun opponents compare firearm manufacturers with automakers, who are routinely sued when their cars and trucks are involved in a fatal accident. But those suits center around product malfunctions or design flaws. If someone gets drunk and plows an automobile into a group of children at a bus stop, the automaker is only liable if something was defective on the vehicle that contributed to the carnage.The weapons used by Lanza were not defective. The were misused. Neither the manufacturer nor the retailer, who is also being sued, sold them to Lanza. The emotionally troubled teen took them without permission from his mother s home. A negligence case could be made against the mother. She should not have allowed her deranged son access to her extensive arsenal; I m all for holding gun owners responsible for properly securing their firearms.Unfortunately, his mother was Lanza s first victim.Judge Barbara Bellis permitted the suit against Remington to proceed based on her gross misunderstanding of firearms.She agreed with the plaintiff s attorneys depiction of the Bushmaster AR-15 semi-automatic rifle as a military weapon not intended for civilian use.That s just wrong. The difference between the Bushmaster and a common hunting rifle is cosmetic. It looks more lethal, but it operates the same way, firing one bullet with each pull of the trigger. It s not a machine gun; it doesn t fire rounds in bursts.If the military were to arm its soldiers with Bushmasters, it would lose every battle.Lanza used legal weapons that were sold within the strict confines of Connecticut s gun laws, but taken without the owner s permission.If that becomes the flimsy standard for manufacturer and retailer liability, as both this lawsuit and Hillary Clinton hope, it will be the end of gunmaking and sales in this country. And that s just what backers of this strategy want. | 0 |
Donald Trump has been getting heavy media coverage as of late regarding his taxes and sketchy business dealings, with USA Today detailing in a recent analysis decades worth of tax evasion and ongoing court battles with the government.But now ABC News has obtained New Jersey records that show something even more damaging: In 1978 and 1979, Trump paid zero dollars in federal income taxes, and posted net negative earnings in those years. Remember, this is the guy who s supposed to be the financial guru who will save the American economy.As ABC details:Trump claimed negative income in both those years: losses of $406,379 in 1978 and $3,443,560 in 1979. In 1975, 1976, and 1977, he claimed $76,210, $24,594, and $118,530 in income, respectively, paying $18,714, $10,832, and $42,386 in federal taxes, according to the document, the Report to the Casino Control Commission.Now, were these negative postings and subsequent tax evasions before or after his four bankruptcies and court appearances?In 1979, Trump lost the $3.4 million after losing HUGE in investments on real-estate holdings in New York City:The Division notes that in 1978 and 1979 Trump incurred no federal income tax liability. In 1979, the lack of such liability is primarily attributable to losses incurred by Trump in the operation of rental properties located at Third Avenue, Fifth Avenue, East 56th Street, East 57th Street, East 61st Street and East 62nd Street, New York City, New York.Were these failed investments part of his art of the deal? Considering Trump and his business cronies are notorious for overvaluing their properties, this might explain why he lost big in 1979.So not only did Trump screw himself over, he (once again) screwed over investors an creditors involved in the process.Along with Panama Paper mentions, multiple instances of tax evasion, overvalued properties and now this, no wonder Trump has been using every excuse in the book, including an ongoing audit, to not release his taxes which the head of the IRS has now completely debunked. With all these bombshell reports coming out regarding his taxes, land values, and evasions, how many more years did Trump lose an exorbitant amount of money thus paying nothing back to society? This is highly suspect and a big clue about why he won t release his returns.But with all this information being public if people just take the time to dig, what is he really hiding that could only be found in the documents he won t release?Featured image via John Sommers II/Getty Images | 0 |
Attacks Destroyed Villagers' Homes, Burned Farms by Jason Ditz, October 30, 2016 Share This
While the biggest single Saudi airstrike over the weekend in Yemen targeted a prison in Hodeidah, dozens of other strikes were reported over the weekend by villagers around Taiz and in the Maarib Province, with attacks killing at least 27 civilians , and wounding a number of others.
Most of the casualties were in Taiz, where attacks destroyed several homes and caused a large number of injuries. With hospitals in the area having very limited access to medicine because of the naval blockade, many of those injuries proved fatal.
The attacks in Maarib and Saada, however, may prove more devastating to the country in the long run, targeting some of the very limited farmland Yemen has, destroying a number of villagers’ homes and burning a lot of that farmland. Yemen has to import some 90 percent of its food under normal circumstances, with such imports severely limited by the blockade, and the loss of farmland just adds to food insecurity in the nation.
Saudi Arabia has been coming under growing international criticism for its air war against Yemen, with massive numbers of civilians killed and little sign that the promised improvements to targeting will ever amount to anything. Last 5 posts by Jason Ditz | 1 |
ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkey s measures against northern Iraq will not target civilians and instead focus on those who organized the referendum on Kurdish independence, Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said on Friday. The comments appeared to back-track from those of President Tayyip Erdogan, who warned this week that Iraqi Kurds would go hungry if Ankara halted the flow of trucks and oil across the border. Iraqi Kurds overwhelmingly backed independence in the historic referendum on Monday, defying neighbors, including Turkey, who fear the vote could renew regional conflict. In no way we will make the civilian residents there pay the price of the referendum, Yildirim said in a speech in the northwestern Turkish province of Canakkale. All the measures we will take will be against those who took the decision to hold the referendum. Ankara has vowed economic, security and political steps, but has so far specified little action. In the immediate aftermath of the vote, Erdogan said it could stop the flow of trade across the border, warning that Kurds would go hungry. (They) will be left in the lurch when we start imposing our sanctions, he said in a speech on Tuesday. It will be over when we close the oil taps, all (their) revenues will vanish, and they will not be able to find food when our trucks stop going to northern Iraq. Hundreds of thousands of barrels of oil a day flow across Turkey along a pipeline from northern Iraq, connecting the region to global oil markets. Iraq, including the Kurdish region, was Turkey s third-largest export market in 2016, with exports totaling $8.6 billion. Economy Minister Nihat Zeybekci said on Friday there were currently no obstacles for exports to Iraq. Turkey has the region s largest Kurdish population and is fighting a three-decade-old insurgency in its largely Kurdish southeast. It fears the referendum will inflame separatist tensions at home. The Turkish military killed three Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants in a clash in northern Iraq near the border with Turkey on Thursday evening and one Turkish soldier was killed, security sources said. They said four Turkish soldiers were wounded in the firefight in the Kanimasi area of Iraq s Dohuk district, across the border from Turkey s Cukurca district. The clash occurred as Turkish and Iraqi troops held military exercises some 100 km (60 miles) to the west at the Habur border gate, part of coordinated steps by the two countries in response to the independence referendum. Turkish soldiers have for years been deployed in various parts of northern Iraq, including at Kanimasi, to prevent PKK militants crossing the border into Turkey, security sources say. Commanders of the PKK, which is designated a terrorist group by Turkey, the United States and European Union, are based in the mountains of northern Iraq. Turkish warplanes frequently carry out cross-border air strikes against PKK targets there but reports of clashes on land are rare. More than 40,000 people have been killed in the conflict since the PKK launched its separatist insurgency in 1984. | 1 |
Our children are at risk, people! Fortunately, there is one woman who is willing to take a brave stand and confront this danger head-on Trump education secretary pick Betsy DeVos. On Tuesday, supergenius DeVos was asked a very simple question: Do you think guns have any place in or around schools? Now, most of us would have answered that question with a simple no, but not DeVos. She sees a danger the rest of us are missing: bears.But never fear! Trump would never appoint someone who is completely unqualified to any position. Sure, she doesn t know that the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act is a thing, but DeVos has the perfect answer to this hidden and severe threat against our children a whole bunch of motherf*cking guns.DeVos says the decision to allow guns in schools is best left to locales and states to decide because bear attacks are apparently a thing, and we wouldn t want students undefended while Yogi searches their school for a pic-a-nic basket, would we? I will refer back to Senator Enzi and the school he was talking about in Wyoming, DeVos said. I would imagine that there is probably a gun in the schools to protect from potential grizzlies. As it turns out, Wyoming schools do not keep a pile of guns around to deal with an ever-looming threat of bear attacks.UPDATE: Teacher at Wyoming school Betsy DeVos said needed guns to shoot "grizzlies" says that's "absolutely" untruehttps://t.co/dWneudD0Tf pic.twitter.com/oVb8kEdAgL Tom McKay (@thetomzone) January 18, 2017But, hey, at least the folks on Twitter are having fun:Screenshot from the National Geographic special Betsy DeVos watched to prove grizzly bears are a threat to schools pic.twitter.com/c3ATfOdMJy Guy Fi-hairy (@ih8_mayo) January 18, 2017Betsy DeVos took @StephenAtHome very literally. #GrizzlyBears #DeVosHearing pic.twitter.com/OKpsE3UQNk FooseBallsOFire (@FooseBallsOFire) January 18, 2017We can't tell you how many times in the past year we've had a lockdown because #grizzlybears. ? #NotMySOE #StopDeVos #DeVosHearing Wa Badass Teachers A (@WaBATs_) January 18, 2017Maybe grizzly bears can home school your kids. Grizzlies aren't that bad and they're quite good at quadratic equations. #DeVosHearing Imani Gandy (@AngryBlackLady) January 18, 2017Betsy DeVos said we need to have guns in schools to protect children from grizzly bears. What is wrong with these people? #DeVosHearing pic.twitter.com/eLeagUHrDo nnydi g ? (@bennydiego) January 18, 2017DeVos: Guns in schools so kids can protect themselves from grizzly bears. 200+ school shootings since 2013, 0 grizzly attacks. Peter Ambler (@PeterMAmbler) January 18, 2017#BetsyDeVos says we need guns in schools to protect kids from grizzly bears.Not even kidding. #DeVosHearing pic.twitter.com/SIeTT0pusL Chad R. MacDonald (@ChadMac19) January 18, 2017Guys, I'm very worried about grizzly bears in Ohio's public schools. John Scalzi (@scalzi) January 18, 2017DeVos won't say guns shouldn't be in schools.Because sometimes kids need to be defended against grizzly bears.SERIOUSLY SHE SAID THAT S Dynarski (@dynarski) January 18, 2017The Bible teaches us that God uses bears to kill children who disrespect elders. (2 Kings 2:23-24) Why is Betsy DeVos against God's plan? Alexandra Erin (@alexandraerin) January 18, 2017I'm confused. Betsy DeVos wants to bring God into schools but also guns because I guess God isn't powerful enough to stop grizzly bears. Sarcasticsapien (@Sarcasticsapien) January 18, 2017COMMITTEE: Yes or no. Would you enforce a school-wide fight to the death like Battle Royale? DEVOS: (breathing heavy) oh god yes Mike Drucker (@MikeDrucker) January 18, 2017Betsy DeVos answering questions at the senate hearing was like listening to a 4 year old try to explain what happens while you're asleep. Johnny Taylor, Jr. (@hipsterocracy) January 18, 2017We need a Secretary of Education that will work hard to end all of the grizzly bear on bear crime in schools.OHHHHH BETSY DEVOS! Tony Posnanski (@tonyposnanski) January 18, 2017Asked if she would support Trump s plan to allow guns in schools, hospitals, day cares, and anywhere else a federal ban on gun-free zones would allow people to bring their firearms, DeVos explained that her heart bleeds and is broken for those families that have lost any individual due to gun violence. She did not say whether or not this includes the children who will be slaughtered as a result of Trump s policies.Watch what is quite possibly the dumbest thing you will hear from DeVos until the next time she opens her mouth:Featured image via Getty Images (Drew Angerer)/screengrab | 0 |
There have been many reactions to the horrific shooting at a Republican baseball game this week, but the one that was just given by Congressman Mark Sanford (R-SC) is one of the most shocking.While many Republicans have been quick to blame Democrats and Liberals for the shooter s actions, Sanford went on Morning Joe today to point the finger at America s president, Donald Trump. Sounding like a Republican who might actually have a tiny grip on reality, Sanford argued that Trump helped create a toxic political environment, which may have motivated yesterday s attack. Sanford said: I think we have to watch out as a society because, if we don t watch out, civility is indeed a part of civilized government and an open political system. If you let these forces play out, I think we end up at a very, very bad spot. I think what happened yesterday was symptomatic of it. Sanford then turned his focus on Trump, stating that he is part of the reason America has become so deeply divided, and his rhetoric has undoubtedly had an effect on the country. Sanford didn t mince his words when he said: I would argue that the president is at least in partially not totally but partially to blame for demons that have been unleashed. The fact that you have the top guy saying I wish I can hit you in the face. Why don t you and I ll pay your legal fees. That s bizarre. We ought to call it as such. What I ve said back home, some of these people have been frankly weird and different in a town hall meeting. I say what is going on. They ll say look, if the guy at the top can say anything to anybody at any time, why can t I? I think we all need to look for ways to learn from what happened yesterday and to say, wait a minute, this is a pause moment. What might I do a little differently in the way I reached out to other members. Finally, a Republican who has the guts to point out just how insane and inappropriate Trump s behavior is, and to acknowledge that there are consequences to having a POTUS who is this unhinged. You can watch the interview below:Featured image via Joe Raedle/Getty Images | 0 |
The actress Taissa Farmiga (“The Bling Ring,” “American Horror Story: Murder House”) reads “Friends Without Benefits” by Hannah Selinger, an essay about romantic infatuation and learning to finally let someone go. You can also hear the episode on iTunes and Stitcher. Afterward, we’ll talk with Ms. Selinger, a freelance writer and wine sales representative living in New York, and the Modern Love editor Daniel Jones. Ms. Farmiga stars, with Ethan Hawke, John Travolta and Karen Gillan, in “In a Valley of Violence. ” Follow Hannah Selinger on Twitter and Taissa Farmiga on Twitter and Instagram. | 0 |
MADRID (Reuters) - A Spanish judge has not yet issued a European arrest warrant for ousted Catalan leader Carles Puigdemont and would most likely do so on Friday, a senior court source said on Thursday. Puigdemont s Belgian lawyer had previously said the warrant had already been issued. The reason for the differing accounts was not immediately clear. | 1 |
This is what having no freedom of speech looks like This guy is awesome! I use whatever flag I want because I am free. I am not a hypocrite, not like all the Cubans marching yesterday [the 2016 May Day march] all those Cubans are hypocrites, he told his detractors. He went on to praise the U.S. flag as the pride of the Americans and assert, I don t fear the government. Daniel Llorente is the brave pro-American Cuban dissident who interrupted Monday s May Day parade in Havana, running in front of the marching throngs waving an American flag. A communist mob attacked him, beating him and dragging him away.The man, identified as Daniel Llorente, has previously waged similar protests against the communist regime of dictator Ra l Castro and has expressed vocally his support for the American government.Video of the incident shows that Llorente took off running in front of the throngs, waving an American flag before the likeness of mass murderer Ernesto Che Guevara in the Plaza of the Revolution, waiting to march just moments before the May Day parade was to begin, shouting anti-government slogans. A group of men waiting on the sidelines, who have not been identified in reports, restrained, beat, and dragged Llorente away. Every major Cuban government leader, including dictator Castro, was in attendance.The Miami-based outlet Mart Noticias identified the man as Llorente, a freelance cab driver and dissident, but does not belong to any dissident organizations. Instead, he has used his American flag to protest on previous occasions by waving it before public congregations. A year ago, Llorente protested before a crowd awaiting the first American cruise ship s arrival in Havana, the Adonia. Llorente greeted the ship waving an American flag and shouting Yes we can! , the famous slogan of President Barack Obama s first presidential campaign. The government organized a rabble to berate Llorente with racial epithets, and Llorente responded by asserting his freedom.Read more: Breitbart | 1 |
JUBA (Reuters) - A judge of South Sudan s Supreme Court resigned on Tuesday, saying a lack of independence from the executive had turned the judiciary into a mockery and complaining of poor working conditions. All of South Sudan s judges went on a five-month strike in May over poor pay, raising the risk of impunity in a country already convulsed by criminality and war. South Sudan, the world s youngest country, descended into civil war in 2013 after President Salva Kiir fired his deputy, unleashing a conflict that has spawned a patchwork of armed factions. The independence of the judiciary, in the Republic of South Sudan, has become a mockery, Kukurlopita Marino Pitia, a Supreme Court judge, said in his resignation letter. The war in South Sudan cannot be used as an excuse to interfere and silence and silence the judiciary, Pitia said, adding that the judiciary was expected to protect many rights that are jeopardized by conflict. Government officials were not available immediately for comment on his letter. The conflict in South Sudan has slashed oil revenues and paralyzed agriculture, spurring hyperinflation that has rendered many civil servants salaries almost worthless. Arop Malueth, secretary for the steering committee for Judges and the Justice Union, told Reuters that two more judges from the lower courts had also resigned. Many of us feel that the judiciary is not independent as it should be, Malueth said, adding that some judges had been dismissed unconstitutionally, at the behest of the executive. EX-ARMY CHIEF Separately, the government said on Tuesday the former chief of the army, General Paul Malong, would be allowed to leave the country, six months after placing him under house arrest in the capital following a falling out with President Kiir. Kiir s spokesman Ateny Wek Ateny told UN radio in South Sudan that Malong was free to go to any country for medical treatment on grounds of humanity . Malong led the army s war effort against rebels from 2014 but Kiir sacked him in May and placed him under house arrest. Earlier this month, Kiir sent troops to disarm Malong s bodyguards at his house in Juba, but they refused. Kiir s troops then surrounded Malong s house, sparking fears of clashes, before withdrawing a week later. Malong is under U.S. sanctions and has been accused, along with Kiir, by a U.N. panel of experts of leading troops who murdered and raped civilians during the civil war.(This version of the story was refiled to correct reporter s name in signoff) | 1 |
A Colorado public school is facing the wrath of parents after they received an email urging them to bring their daughters to an event designed to turn them into pure Christian wives who submit to their husbands.Mesa Valley School District 51 sent an email to parents promoting an event called Wake Up Sleeping Beauty: Worship At His Feet, and includes a Bible verse from Luke 7:38 which seems to tell women and girls as young as 11-years-old to submit to their husbands. The event also aims to train girls to remain pure until they find a husband. In other words, indoctrinate them from a young age to hold strict religious views on sex, marriage, and gender roles. As she stood behind him at his feet weeping, she began to wet his feet with her tears. Then she wiped them with her hair, kissed them and poured perfume on them. A video posted on Wake Up Sleeping Beauty Facebook page suggests that fathers keep an eye on their daughters to make sure they remain virgins until marriage, and features a creepy image of a father watching his daughter put on makeup.A girl then praises the event Especially going through the time that I was, being cheated on. That was really hard for me but it also made me realize a lot that I needed to forgive him and he didn t have the qualities I was looking for in a husband. The image of a woman crying at a man s feet before wiping the tears dry with her hair was of particular concern to one parent. The idea of a woman or girl crying at a man s feet, then using her hair to wash his feet, then kissing his feet, seems pretty demeaning to me. Apparently the irony of this imagery used to promote an event which purports to strengthen or support girls/women is lost on all involved. Here s the video via YouTube.Indeed, it s also a violation of the Constitutional tenet of separation of church and state, because school officials used the district mailing system to promote a religious event.But District 51 Communications Specialist Jeannie Smith made a bullshit claim about the email not being religious at all. Having reviewed the flyer and KHB-R per your request, we do not find that the flyer promotes a religious organization or demeans a person or group on the basis of gender, she wrote in an email to an angry parent.But the flyer did actually promote a religious event and a religious organization. The program is put on by Wake Up Ministries, which is a religious organization.So, Mesa Valley School District 51 flat out lied to parents.Schools are supposed to protect our kids from religious organizations, but Mesa Valley school officials allowed their own email system to be hijacked for religious purpose in an effort to indoctrinate young girls to their beliefs. It s outrageous and sickening. Someone needs to lose their job for this. At the very least, an independent investigation needs to be waged.Female students already have to put up with enough sexist bullshit from school officials as it is, particularly from unfair dress codes that blame teen girls for how boys act around them. The last thing they need is a school that shoves religion down their throats.Featured Image: Pixabay | 0 |
BENGHAZI, Libya (Reuters) - Four foreign engineers working for the Turkish construction firm Enka were kidnapped in southwest Libya on Friday, a Libyan state electricity official said. The men, who were Turkish and South African, were seized while traveling from the airport in the town of Ubari to a power plant they were helping to build, the official said, asking not to be named. There was no immediate indication who had abducted them. In a statement on its website, Enka referred to three Turkish citizens being kidnapped. Around midday today in Libya three of our citizens, two of them our personnel who were temporarily working in the country, were kidnapped by unidentified people while they were traveling outside the building site, the statement said. Our company is following the subject closely, in contact with Turkish and Libyan authorities, it added. Kidnapping is rife across Libya, which has been in turmoil since an uprising unseated autocratic leader Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. Work at the Ubari plant has been going on for years, disrupted periodically by tribal clashes or other security problems. | 0 |
October 28, 2016 at 9:00 PM
Why would Putin aim Russian nuclear weapons at Washington D.C, maybe because of BO and Hillary strategic US foreign policy ? The White House has a bullseye on it thanks to enept foreign policy by the two above mentioned criminals.
BO the community agitator is way over matched in this conflict. Putin will not let the declining Russian people die in a retaliatory nuclear strike with the US. If Putin’s
Russia feels threaten they will strike first on America. In a game of chicken BO will flinch because he is of weak character, he will be in ball and chains come 2017.
Stacking and packing | 1 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson spoke on Thursday with Myanmar’s army chief and expressed concern over reported atrocities against Rohingya Muslims in Rakhine state, the U.S. State Department said in a statement. Tillerson urged the army chief, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, to support the Myanmar government in ending the violence and allowing the safe return of ethnic Rohingya who have fled the area, the statement said. More than 600,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled Rakhine state in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, mostly to neighboring Bangladesh, since security forces responded to Rohingya militants’ attacks on Aug. 25 by launching a crackdown. The State Department is considering formally declaring the crackdown on Rohingya Muslims to be ethnic cleansing. In his call with Min Aung Hlaing, Tillerson also urged the Myanmar military to facilitate humanitarian aid for displaced people, allow media access and cooperate with a U.N. investigation into allegations of human rights abuses, the State Department said. Pressure has mounted for a tougher U.S. response to the Rohingya crisis ahead of President Donald Trump’s maiden visit to Asia next month when he will attend a summit of Southeast Asian countries, including Myanmar, in Manila. | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - There was nothing inappropriate about a meeting President Donald Trump’s son had with a Russian attorney during the presidential campaign last year, the White House said on Monday, adding it was short and produced “absolutely no follow-up.” “The only thing I see inappropriate about the meeting was the people that leaked the information on the meeting after it was voluntarily disclosed,” White House spokeswoman Sarah Sanders told a briefing, adding that it was routine during political campaigns for people to call offering information. “Don Junior took a very short meeting from which there was absolutely no follow-up,” Sanders said. | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A convoy of Islamic State fighters and their families remains in the Syrian desert after turning back from the Iraqi border, the U.S.-led coalition said on Friday. The coalition said in a statement that it has asked Russia to tell the Syrian government that the coalition will not allow the convoy of 17 buses to move further east to the Iraqi border. The Syrian army and Lebanon s Hezbollah group gave safe passage to the jihadists after they surrendered their enclave on Syria s border with Lebanon. The U.S.-led coalition says it was not a party to the deal. | 1 |
REAL journalism hit Washington today! One of our favorite citizen journalists went at the main stream media full force. The video below is what happens when you turn the tables on the press they freak out. They can t handle it. Notice how the reporters in the video below are a little shocked when the tables are turned and someone yells a question to them. You ll love the question too! This is a classic!WASHINGTON The journalist who scooped the establishment media and unmasked Susan Rice as a key figure in the Obama administration spying scandal turned the tables Monday and grilled White House reporters about how they are doing their jobs.Or not doing them As soon as Press Secretary Sean Spicer concluded his daily briefing and left the room, documentary filmmaker Mike Cernovich addressed reporters and loudly asked, Why will nobody here cover the violence against Trump supporters? A confused hush fell over the room as reporters, unaccustomed to being on the receiving end of shouted questions, tried to figure out what was going on.But Cernocivh immediately continued, And why won t you demand that leaders of the Democrats disavow the violence by Antifa the way you demanded Trump disavow violence from his supporters? He then answered his own question by telling the room: This has been completely covered up. You have no answer. Are you a journalist? asked April Ryan, White House correspondent and Washington bureau chief for American Urban Radio Networks. I am, madame. I am a reporter, I am a documentary filmmaker, he repliedAfter today's press briefing was compete, a journalist asked about political violence by the left. Real journalism, finally! pic.twitter.com/EjLuBk3dZR Mike Cernovich (@Cernovich) May 1, 2017THEN THE ATTACKS CAME FROM THE ANGRY LEFTTHE TYPICAL NAME CALLING YOU D EXPECT FROM THE LEFT She must be one of Liz Warren s Nasty Women Read more: wnd | 0 |
Bias bashers Ukraine Stunned as Vast Cash Reserves of Political Elite Are Made Public
Ukraine is the latest country to discover that cronyism and corruption in politics pays - a lot - and is very unhappy about it. Originally appeared at Zero Hedge
As a result of an anti-corruption reform requiring senior Ukrainian officials to declare their wealth online, the local population has been been exposed to the vast difference between the fortunes of politicians and those they represent.
As Reuters reports , some declared millions of dollars in cash. Others said they owned fleets of luxury cars, expensive Swiss watches, diamond jewelry and large tracts of land - revelations that will crush public confidence in the authorities in Ukraine, where the average salary is just over $200 per month. Officials had until Sunday to upload details of their assets and income in 2015 to a publicly searchable database, part of an International Monetary Fund-backed drive to boost transparency and modernise Ukraine's recession-hit economy.
As in the US, the corruption starts (and ends) at the top, and the value of Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko's assets soared despite economic crisis and conflict while those of other tycoons shrank in an annual wealth list published Friday. The 50-year-old Western-backed president 's business empire ranges from chocolates to media holdings still under his control. Poroshenko - a prominent fixture of the Panama Papers - retains control of a top TV channel and has failed to follow through on his promise to sell off his Roshen chocolate empire due to a lack of foreign interest and a dearth of rich-enough investors in Ukraine itself.
The Novoye Vremya weekly showed the Ukrainian leader, often criticised for failing to curb the political powers of fellow tycoons, ranked as the country's sixth-richest man. Perhaps Poroshenko should be more criticized for focusing mostly on his own net worth at the expense of the general population: his reported assets rose by 20% to $979 million, only just supporting his claim he is no longer a billionaire.
The president's official spokesman did not pick up his phone when contacted repeatedly by AFP.
How did Poroshenko's wealth grow by hundreds of millions? Chocolate.
"Poroshenko's (wealth) rose thanks to the rise in value of his candy business that- even in the midst of the deepest of crises - is developing quickly, building new capacities and conquering new markets," the weekly said.
Poroshenko promotes himself as a Western-style businessman who built his empire from the ground up and kept to transparency standards that most others simply ignored. Many of Ukraine's other mega-rich scooped up their holdings at cut-price rates in pre-arranged privatisation deals in which which they rewarded the government by funding its parliamentary parties and campaigning for them in the media.
Now, the people finally are starting to see right through it: "This will not benefit the president's ratings or help improve Ukraine's image as a nation run by oligarchs," Vadym Karasyov of Kiev's Institute of Global Strategies told AFP.
Poroshenko is not the only oligarch to take advantage of the "crony capitalist chaos" unleash in Ukraine with the US-backed 2014 presidential coup. Prime Minister Voldymyr Groysman, who last week likened the declarations process to jumping out of an airplane, revealed that he and his wife had a total of $1.2 million and 460,000 euros in cash and a collection of luxury watches.
The database also shows that Groysman, a former businessman and provincial mayor, is not alone in preferring to keep much of his money out of Ukraine's banking system. Reuters calculations based on the declarations show that the 24 members of the Ukrainian cabinet together have nearly $7 million, just in cash .
The declarations of two brothers in President Petro Poroshenko's faction, Bohdan and Yaroslav Dubnevych, show holdings of over $26 million, also in cash only .
"When the Economy Ministry says that in some areas around 60 percent of the economy is in the shadows, then this is accounted for by the volume of cash registered by civil servants, officials and lawmakers," said Taras Kachka, deputy executive director at George Soros's International Renaissance Foundation. "This is a reflection on the state of our society."
Justice Minister Pavlo Petrenko, who declared $1 million in a bank account and a further $500,000 in cash, said officials' decision to hold cash pointed to a mistrust in the banks that many Ukrainians could relate to. It also points to a burning desire not to have one's wealth easily confiscatable when another political regime emerges.
"Of course to EU countries it seems uncivilised that people hold cash," he said. "But it is linked to the fact that the banking system could, let's say, be doing better. This is a problem for many Ukrainians who lost their savings in the bank."
* * *
Not everyone's wealth is soaring, however. The wealth list is topped by 49-year-old metals magnate Rinat Akhmetov, a controversial figure accused by some local media of impeding Poroshenko's efforts to halt the 18-month war in the pro-Russian east. Novoye Vremya said Akhmetov's fortunes had plunged by 56 percent to $4.5 billion due in part to the sharp recent fall in global commodity prices.
Poroshenko's sworn political foe and banking giant Igor Kolomoyskiy came in third with an estimated fortune of $1.9 billion. The 52-year-old grey-bearded and fiercely outspoken figure finds himself in the peculiar position of being at odds with both Kiev and Moscow. Russia's state media accuse him of funding Ukrainian neo-Nazi combat units that commit grave crimes in the separatist east.
Poroshenko's fight against Kolomoyskiy began with efforts to strip him of his indirect control of a state-owned oil company and culminated in the businessman losing his seat as governor of the industrially important Dnipropetrovsk region in March. Kolomoyskiy's wealth reportedly slipped by 17 percent due to the country's financial woes.
* * *
While the online declaration system has been intended to represent a show of good faith that officials are willing to open their finances up to public scrutiny, to be held accountable, and to move away from a culture that tacitly allowed bureaucrats to amass wealth through cronyism and graft, the public reaction has been one of shocked dismay at the extravagant lifestyles conjured up by many of the disclosures according to Reuters .
"We did not expect that this would be such a widespread phenomenon among state officials. I can't imagine there is a European politician who invests money in a wine collection where one bottle costs over $10,000," said Vitaliy Shabunin, the head of the non-governmental Anti-Corruption Action Center.
Something tells us Vitaliy would be surprised, although considering that some European politicans are "allegedly" even more corrupt than their Ukrainian peers, a similar exercise in transparency would never take place in Brussels as it would lead to revelations that put the Panama Papers to shame.
Among the disclosures, it emerged that opposition bloc lawmaker Mikhail Dobkin's declaration included 1,780 bottles of wine and an antique copy of Russian novel Anna Karenina worth at least $5,500. Roman Nasirov, the head of the State Fiscal Service, disclosed that he and his wife owned Swiss watches, diamond jewellery, fur coats, fine porcelain and crystal glassware, an assault rifle and cash in euros and dollars worth $2.2 million.
The declaration of Oleh Lyashko, the head of the populist Radical party who has styled himself as a representative of the common man, showed he rented a house and land in Kiev's most exclusive district and his household had cash worth the equivalent of over $1 million.
* * *
Other forms give an insight into particular hobbies and interests of Ukraine's elite. Ihor Hryniv, the head of Poroshenko's faction, has a collection of icons dating from the 14th century and several works by Ukrainian impressionist masters. Lawmaker Ihor Mosiychuk declared an array of antique weapons, including a 16th century Turkish scimitar, an English broadsword and a Nazi SS dagger .
Many senior politicians filed their forms in the last two days before the deadline, resulting in a crescendo of surprise and anger on social media over the weekend.
Some of the angriest responses came from members of the army.
"I personally feel unwell. Or rather, like someone who has been beaten and is therefore unwell. I had no illusions about our political and official elite. But all the same, what's come out is beyond the pale ," Roman Donik, a volunteer to Ukraine's frontline troops, said on Facebook.
Needless to say, Ukraine's corrupt politicians better watch out: the last group they want to anger with their show of wealth is the army, which will have no problem in "redistributing" it once .
Actually, they should probably avoid any public contact for a while: the average Ukrainian citizen has been hit hard by the economic crisis that unfolded in the wake of the 2014 pro-European 'Maidan' uprising and subsequent pro-Russian separatist conflict. The national hryvnia currency has plummeted to 25 to the dollar from 8 in 2013 and energy tariffs have soared under the IMF-backed economic reform programme.
As Reuters concludes, the latest revelations will likely add to public dissatisfaction with the current leadership's progress on reforms. A September poll showed that only 12.6 percent would now vote for Poroshenko's faction, down from 21.8 in the last election. Meanwhile support for populist and opposition parties has risen. The anti-corruption agency says it will now start verifying the declarations, but with over 100,000 forms submitted, it is unclear how thorough the process can be.
* * *
Ukraine's economy is on track to shrink by about 12 percent this year and only return to marginal growth should the eastern campaign end in 2016.
So what's next: a presidential coup that brings back the ousted President Yanukovych under whom most were just as poor, but at least equally so? While purely hypothetical, it would be a fitting end to yet another disastrous US intervention in a foreign state's internal affairs. | 1 |
Donald Trump just got BURNED for using Twitter so much.During an appearance on MSNBC with Lawrence O Donnell, conservative radio host Charlie Sykes was very blunt about what he thinks about Trump s intellect.O Donnell said that Trump s tweets don t mean anything but mentioned that his tweets are causing concern because a single tweet about Boeing caused its stock price to drop.Trump s use of Twitter is causing anxiety among millions of Americans, including conservatives, especially after he picked a fight with China and sucked up to Russia while declaring his intention to expand America s nuclear weapons stockpile in what he terms a new arms race. You just don t know, Sykes replied. I mean, when does this jump the shark? I mean also, this is going to encapsulate, and this is really going to symbolize the quality of this man s thought. I mean, there was a time when we had presidents who read books. Now we have presidents who write in one hundred and forty character messages. You know we once had presidents who were eloquent, who could rally the nation. But, you know, here is a president who does feel comfortable on Twitter because I do think that that is the perfect venue for the quality of his thinking. And I think that that is going to be something that s going to be a defining element in his presidency. Here s the video via MSNBC:In other words, Trump is not smart enough to get his message across to the American people in more conventional ways. He would rather lazily use Twitter and the 140 character limit, which allows Trump to avoid providing details or evidence of his claims.We all know that Trump gets crushed whenever he has to debate someone in person or gets interviewed by a journalist who does their damn job.But on Twitter, Trump presents his opinions as facts and attacks anyone who criticizes him, unleashing his deplorable supporters upon the people he targets.But Twitter is not a forum for critical thinking, and Trump has demonstrated over and over again that he is not a critical thinker. He speaks before he thinks and often lashes out over the smallest slights or any other thing Fox News bitches about in the morning.Americans are sick and tired of Trump s reliance on Twitter. They want real answers and they want details, not a meaningless blurb devoid of evidence and civility.Featured Image: Mark Wilson/Getty Images | 0 |
Republicans have spent the last few years in a frenzy, passing pro-gun legislation at every opportunity even while mass shootings continue to plague the country. At the moment, conservatives in almost every state are spending enormous amounts of energy passing so-called guns everywhere bills that allow people to go to places like bars, national parks, churches, and schools strapped with a firearm. They say this will keep people safe because more guns means more good guys with guns. But when it comes to their own events, their opinion suddenly drastically changes. Thousands of Tea Party patriots and conservative fanatics crammed into a small conference center? Organizers would rather they left their guns at home. After all, they may be hypocrites, but they re not suicidal!Republicans have flocked to the Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center in Maryland to attend the Conservative Political Action Conference, one of the biggest Republican events of the year. At the event, attendees will hear right-wing talking points spoken by some of their favorite Republican politicians and drilled into their heads over loudspeakers. Without a doubt, CPAC will feature lots of pro-gun mania. A few years ago, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell was actually given a musket on stage to the delight of the audience. (Yeah, CPAC is really weird.)But this year before they can get in, attendees are greeted with this sign.At CPAC there will be no good guys with guns :/ pic.twitter.com/Kn8tUWyubs Betsy Woodruff (@woodruffbets) March 3, 2016They then must walk through a metal detector just to ensure they aren t still bearing arms.Why ban guns? Well, because having that many gun carriers packed into a small area practically begs a tragedy to happen. Whether by accident or on purpose, the chances of a shooting skyrocket. This year will be particularly tense, because the Republican Party is in the process of imploding. Trump fans, known for roughing up their critics, and Republican establishment fans, known for hating Trump, will be crammed into Standing Room Only venues. Weapons are the last thing these people need.Inside, they ll probably feel a bit naked without their guns, but they will be covered head-to-toe in hypocrisy. Gun free zones are for liberal places like churches, universities, and elementary schools. This is CPAC, where conservatives can roam in the comfort of their own warped ideology. Everyone should have a Bible in their breastpocket and a gun on their hip. Conceding that guns make a place dangerous is counter to their most sacred belief: Guns keep us safe.It s unclear whether the no guns allowed policy came from CPAC organizers or the convention center they rented. Either way, it looks bad. Republicans want guns to be around school children but can t tolerate them during their weekend event.Featured image via Flickr | 1 |
Here is the screen shot we took of his vile and hateful tweet just before he deleted his account on Twitter:We also took a screen shot of his profile before he deleted it, showing him bragging about being a Hillary volunteer and Obama supporter :A Twitter follower sent us the name of the company where he worked, so we sent them a copy of our story within 10 minutes of Grilo deleting his Twitter account:You must be really proud of Dan Grilo who mocks the wife of deceased Navy Seal https://t.co/rVtbyMHUoq 100% FED UP! (@100PercFEDUP) March 1, 2017Here is a screen shot of Dan Grilo s profile on the Liberty Advisor Group website before he was fired by them:Kudos to Liberty Advisor Group for their swift action in announcing the next day that Dan Grilo was no longer working for them in this tweet:https://twitter.com/LibertyAdvisor/status/837022201924714496 | 1 |
The hate for our law enforcement is at an all time high. The blame for the injuries suffered and murders of innocent law enforcement officers falls squarely on the shoulders of Eric Holder, Eric Sharpton and Barack Hussein Obama | 1 |
Some day, when things calm down, I'll tell the real story of @JoeNBC and his very insecure long-time girlfriend, @morningmika. Two clowns! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) August 22, 2016FOX News host Sean Hannity exposed the rabid liberal anti-Trump vitriol that MSNBC hacks spew daily on their show. Hannity offered to pay for therapy for one year for both of them, as a way to help them cope with Trump s presidency:Today, President Donald Trump turned his ire on MSNBC s Joe Scarborough and his fianc Mika Brzezinski once again, branding them with new nicknames and dishing embarrassing details about their relationship.Trump called Scarborough Psycho Joe on Twitter Thursday morning and labeled his co-host Brzezinski low I.Q. Crazy Mika. I heard poorly rated @Morning_Joe speaks badly of me (don't watch anymore). Then how come low I.Q. Crazy Mika, along with Psycho Joe, came.. Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 29, 2017He recalled that the television couple both wanted to join him during a New Year s Eve party at his Mar-a-lago club, but he refused. to Mar-a-Lago 3 nights in a row around New Year's Eve, and insisted on joining me. She was bleeding badly from a face-lift. I said no! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) June 29, 2017Trump again insisted that he did not watch their show anymore but was told that the couple speaks badly of me. Prior to Trump s tweets, the pair sneered mockingly at Trump because of his healthcare bill and started ridiculing the president because of a fake TIME magazine cover spotted in his golf club.Brzezinski mocked the photo of the cover, calling Trump s hands teensy and said he was lying every day and destroying the country :First lady Melania Trump s office also reacted to the news. As the First Lady has stated publicly in the past, when her husband gets attacked, he will punch back 10 times harder, the statement from the first lady s office read.In January, news of Scarborough s visit to Trump s club leaked, prompting mockery from fellow journalists. In response, an outraged Scarborough insisted he was not there to spend time with Trump socially but wanted to set up an interview. BreitbartPaul Joseph Watson of Infowars responded brilliantly to critics of President Trump s tweet:Same media that viciously attacked Trump over his appearance (hair, hands) for 2 years is whining over Trump's tweet about Mika's appearance Paul Joseph Watson (@PrisonPlanet) June 29, 2017It's OK to lie about Melania doing porn or to mock Barron for being autistic, but don't you dare say Mika Brzezinski had a facelift. Paul Joseph Watson (@PrisonPlanet) June 29, 2017Watson also (rightly) points out in another tweet that there is more outrage from the left over Trump s tweet about the MSNBC hack team, than about the attempted massacre of Republicans only a few weeks ago:There's more outrage over Trump's Mika Brzezinski tweet than the attempted massacre of Republicans. That's not a clich . There genuinely is. Paul Joseph Watson (@PrisonPlanet) June 29, 2017 | 0 |
LUXEMBOURG/BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Theresa May will make a pitch to fellow EU leaders in Brussels on Thursday as she tries to break a deadlock in Brexit talks that has left Britain s future trading position up in the air. But EU officials expect no movement in negotiating positions from either side before the other 27 leaders deliver a verdict on progress on Friday that will say Britain must up its offer on divorce terms before they will even talk about trade. We do not expect at this stage any new initiatives between now and the European Council, said an EU official, who said May had asked to address the summit. The others will not negotiate with her but will discuss Brexit after May leaves on Friday. They plan to reject her call for an immediate start to talks on a future trade relationship but make a gesture recognizing the concessions May offered in a speech at Florence last month by telling EU staff to prepare for talks on a transition period. Stepping personally into the breach after Brexit Secretary David Davis s four months of discussions struck deadlock last week, May had dinner in Brussels on Monday with EU Commission chief Jean-Claude Juncker and his negotiator Michel Barnier. But she came away with just a joint pledge to accelerate the process. There is a catch: the EU will not discuss relations in the future until London agrees to pay tens of billions of euros (dollars) in a divorce settlement for obligations incurred in the past. May, beset by demands from hardline Brexit supporters to simply walk away without any deal, says the bill can be worked out only when the future relationship is clearer. It takes two to accelerate, Barnier told reporters as he arrived to brief EU ministers in Luxembourg. One step after another... We are not finished with the first step. May s spokesman said she was pleased with a dinner that ended with an embrace at the door from Juncker. But he added: We can only resolve the financial implications of the UK s withdrawal ... as part of the settlement of all the issues. MERKEL-MACRON FRONT May came away similarly empty-handed from telephone calls to German Chancellor Angela Merkel and French President Emmanuel Macron, leaders of the Union s leading powers whose diplomats have taken a hard line this month in limiting the scope of the gesture on transition preparations which Barnier had proposed. People familiar with those calls on Sunday and Monday said May echoed emotional complaints from British negotiators last week that her Florence speech, offering to honor commitments made by Britain, deserved a more generous response from the EU. Macron and Merkel, who are coordinating closely, were clear that they will negotiate at the stage only through Barnier, a former French foreign minister, officials said. And they insisted Britain settled outstanding issues first, despite increasingly vocal calls from business on both sides of the English Channel for clarity by early next year at the latest in order to plan investments for after Brexit in March 2019. BusinessEurope, which represents employers federations across the continent including Britain s CBI, was the latest, saying it was extremely concerned with the slow pace of negotiations and telling EU summit chair Donald Tusk in a letter that business wants to avoid a cliff edge . EU leaders plan to issue a statement after May leaves on Friday saying that they hope a deal can be struck at their next summit in December and that things can move swiftly then. But after losing her majority in June, May has little room for maneuver at home: It s all about the money and if she ups the bid now, that is a really hard sell politically, a senior source in her Conservative Party told Reuters. British efforts to remind continental neighbors of how much they also have to lose if trade is disrupted are showing little return, even among close trading partners with most at stake. Sometimes it s very difficult to see and understand what Britain really wants from these negotiations, Finnish minister Samuli Virtanen said. Brexit minister Davis, who long campaigned to take Britain out of the EU, said London had no plan to walk away from talks but should maintain the option in negotiations. Yet interior minister Amber Rudd, who opposed Brexit in the referendum, said shortly afterward that it was unthinkable that the two sides would fail to strike a deal as it was in their own interests. | 1 |
(Reuters) - The Louisiana legislature on Wednesday passed a bill requiring women to wait three days before receiving an abortion, tripling the state’s existing waiting time in one of the most stringent regulations of its kind nationally. Governor John Bel Edwards, a Democrat, has said he plans to sign the bill championed by anti-abortion groups. It passed with wide support from the Republican-controlled legislature. The bill requires a woman to wait at least 72 hours after a state-mandated ultrasound for the procedure. The current waiting time is 24 hours, the same as in most states with waiting periods. Only five other states require 72-hour waiting periods: Missouri, North Carolina, Oklahoma, South Dakota and Utah. The measures are among a wave of laws being adopted by states as conservatives seek to chip away at the U.S. Supreme Court’s landmark 1973 Roe v. Wade decision to legalize abortion. Advocates of extending the Louisiana waiting period say women need more time to consider alternatives and the consequences of ending a pregnancy. “Many of them come to regret their decision later in life,” Deanna Wallace, legislative director for Louisiana Right to Life, said in a telephone interview. The measure is “empowering them with additional time to consider all of the options.” Opponents of the legislation see it as the latest attempt to block women’s access to abortions. “Politicians in Louisiana have made it their mission to restrict access to safe and legal health care — with women in the state left to pay the price,” Amanda Allen, senior state legislative counsel at the Center for Reproductive Rights, said in a statement, urging the governor to veto the measure. Louisiana also requires women to make two separate visits to a clinic to obtain an abortion, seen as an additional burden on women forced to take extra time off work and away from families, according to the Guttmacher Institute, which tracks reproductive health policy. Missouri, South Dakota and Utah have similar policies, while North Carolina and Oklahoma allow women to receive the initial counseling by phone. The Louisiana legislation includes an exception for women living 150 miles or farther from an abortion clinic. They will remain under the current 24-hour waiting requirement. | 1 |
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