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During Obama s campaigning in 2008, he spoke of his total devotion to the job as president if elected. One of the things he said he would give up is vacations. Well, we now know that was one of many, many big lies Obama s told since day one of his presidency. Not only has Obama vacationed, he s vacationed in lavish style racking up HUGE tabs compliments of the American taxpayer. Just listen to the video below from 2008 and know that he s lying through his teeth:When he was a candidate for president in 2008, Barack Obama said during an interview that as the occupant of the Oval Office his vacations, his leisure, even his need for sleep, would be gone in a dedication to the American people that such a position requires.Then he had American taxpayers spend in excess of $70 million on his vacations.The comment he made came during an interview with New York Times columnist Bob Herbert. It was recorded in 2008 but apparently not published online until 2012.In context, Obama said, You have to understand that if you seek that office, you have to be prepared to give your life to it. Essentially the burden that any president, I think, strikes, with the American people is, um, you give me this office and in turn my, fears, doubts, insecurities, foibles, need for sleep, family life, vacations, leisure is gone. I am giving myself to you. He continued, The American people should have no patience for whatever is going through your head because you ve got a job to do. How I think about it is, um, that you don t make that decision unless you are prepared to make that sacrifice that bargain. And he noted, I think what s difficult and important for somebody like myself, who has a wonderful forbearing wife, and two gorgeous young children, is that they end up having to make some of those sacrifices, too. However, the partial expenses for taxpayers even before the Obama family s extended and lavish vacation in Hawaii over the 2015 Christmas holiday, and the vacations for Vice President Joe Biden and his family, totaled $70,563,336.75, according the Washington watchdog Judicial Watch, which has been keeping tabs on the president s vacationing.Total costs are simply not available because some security-related expenses never are released. But a significant part of the costs are the taxpayer-funded jet travel for the Obama family.Only a few weeks ago, Judicial Watch said, You may want to sit down for this one. We have new records from the U.S. Department of the Air Force revealing that Barack Obama and family had a busy 2015, vacationing on the American taxpayers dime. The unnecessary travel included an Obama Palm Springs golf trip in June, a trip to New York City in July and a family trip to Martha s Vineyard in August all of which cost taxpayers $3,115,688.70 in travel expenses alone. The documents regarding the Obama travel expenses came in response to three Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, the first was filed on June 30, 2015, the second on July 23, 2015, and the third on August 24, 2015. The report said the June 20 golf outing for Obama to Palm Springs required 10.6 hours of flying time, costing taxpayers $2.1 million. Then a July 18 outing for Obama and his daughters to New York cost $309,000. And the Obama family s August trip to Martha s Vineyard cost taxpayers about $620,000 in flight time alone.Separate security costs include the salaries and expenses of the various Secret Service and other teams that the government provides. For example, during his annual Hawaii getaway over Christmas going on now, an ambulance remains on stand-by while Obama vacations.Reported Judicial Watch, In Palm Springs, Obama played golf at the plush, private golf course of Oracle billionaire Lawrence Joseph Larry Ellison. The golf course is located on Ellison s 249-acre Porcupine Creek estate, which features a golf club and course, a huge 18,400 square-foot main residence, eight guest houses, a pool, spa, gym and an amphitheater. It was Obama s fifth golf outing to Palm Springs in the past two years. The West Coast trip reportedly included political fundraising and one speech to the U.S. Conference of Mayors. The New York trip was to allow Obama some time hanging out with his girls, according to an ABC report.Read more: wnd | 0 |
ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkey urged the United States on Monday to review its suspension of visa services after the arrest of a U.S. consulate employee sharply escalated tension between the two NATO allies and drove Turkey’s currency and stocks lower. Relations between Ankara and Washington have been plagued by disputes over U.S. support for Kurdish fighters in Syria, Turkey’s calls for the extradition of a U.S.-based cleric and the indictment of a Turkish former minister in a U.S. court. But last week’s arrest of a Turkish employee of the U.S. consulate in Istanbul marked a fresh low. Turkey said the employee had links to U.S.-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen, blamed by Ankara for a failed military coup in July 2016. Gulen denies any connection with the coup. The U.S. embassy in Ankara condemned Ankara’s charges as baseless and announced on Sunday night it was halting all non-immigrant visa services in Turkey while it reassessed Turkey’s commitment to the security of its missions and staff. Within hours, Ankara announced it was taking the same measures against U.S. citizens seeking visas for Turkey. The U.S. ambassador said the duration of the visa services’ suspension would depend on talks between the two governments about the reasons for the detention of local staff in Turkey. In a written statement late on Monday, Ambassador John Bass said the length of the suspension would also depend on “the Turkish government’s commitment to protecting our facilities and personnel here in Turkey”. He noted that the move was not a visa ban on Turkish citizens, that valid visas could still be used and visa applications could be made outside of Turkey. The U.S. Embassy had been unable to learn the reasons for the arrest of its Turkish staff member last week or what evidence exists against the employee, Bass said, adding that he had not been allowed sufficient access to the employee’s lawyer. Justice Minister Abdulhamit Gul said that if Washington had serious security concerns about its missions in Turkey, steps would be taken to address them. “But if it’s an issue regarding the arrest of the consulate employee, then this is a decision the Turkish judiciary has made,” Gul told A Haber television. “Trying a Turkish citizen for a crime committed in Turkey is our right.” The Turkish foreign ministry summoned a U.S. diplomat to urge the United States to lift the visa services suspension, saying it was causing “unnecessary tensions”, and President Tayyip Erdogan also criticized the U.S. move. “For the (U.S.) embassy in Ankara to take such a decision and implement it, it is upsetting,” Erdogan told a news conference during a visit to Ukraine. State-run Anadolu news agency said another U.S. consulate worker had been summoned to testify over his wife and daughter’s suspected links to Gulen - which it said had emerged during the questioning of Metin Topuz, the employee arrested last week. The diplomatic spat spooked investors. The lira dropped 3.4 percent and stood at 3.7385 against the dollar after being quoted overnight as touching a level of 3.9223. The main BIST 100 stock index fell as much as 4.7 percent, closing the day down 2.73 percent at 101,298 points. Airline shares were particularly hard hit, with flag carrier Turkish Airlines falling 9 percent. The central bank said it was following developments closely. “This looks like a really serious situation,” said Blue Bay Asset Management strategist Timothy Ash. He added that the central bank would need to move quickly to calm market nerves and possibly hike interest rates - something Erdogan has resisted. Turkey’s leading business association, TUSIAD, warned that the dispute would harm bilateral economic, social and cultural ties, and called for disagreements to be settled calmly. The row with the United States coincides with deep strains in Turkey’s relations with Germany, another key ally, and with Turkish military activity at the Syrian and Iraqi borders, though their market impact has so far been limited. U.S.-Turkish tensions have risen in recent months over U.S. military support for Kurdish YPG fighters in Syria, considered by Ankara to be an extension of the banned PKK which has waged an insurgency for three decades in southeast Turkey. Turkey has also pressed, so far in vain, for the United States to extradite Gulen, viewed in Ankara as the mastermind behind the failed coup in which more than 240 people were killed. Friction with the United States has also arisen from the indictment last month by a U.S. court of Turkey’s former economy minister Zafer Caglayan on charges of conspiring to violate U.S. sanctions on Iran. Sinan Ulgen, an analyst and former Turkish diplomat, said those underlying disputes had created a crisis of confidence which made this latest fall-out particularly bitter. “This harshness is a result of a build-up,” he said. “We should not consider this as solely a reaction to the detentions of consulate employees”. | 0 |
Shawn Helton 21st Century WireAnother active-shooter false alarm made the headlines this past week, as war propaganda images continue be dispensed by Western media multiple narratives that have contributed to an environment of confusion, fear and uncertainty in the War On Terror era.The timing of these current events cannot be overstated, revealing a deeper social engineering agenda at play underneath the larger geopolitical drama unfolding worldwide PULP FICTION Photo illustration 21WIRE s Shawn Helton The Nonexistent Shooter & Loud Noises This past weekend, according reports, another active shooter scenario played out at LAX International Airport, a story which dovetailed an alleged active-shooter hoax at JFK International Airport earlier in August. CBS s Los Angeles affiliate CBSLA, described the latest incident at LAX in the following passage: The LAX Airport Police Department on Sunday discounted reports of a shooter at the airport saying loud noises apparently set off a panic. Several terminals were evacuated. Many people went on social media to say they were standing on the tarmac surrounded by tons of police.The incident was first reported just after 8:30 p.m.The LA Airport PD cannot confirm an active shooter was ever identified. The CBS article continued by discussing eyewitness accounts of the alleged active shooter event at LAX, as well as JFK airport, two incidents which oddly resulted in the same bizarre conclusion out of law enforcement as the panic was supposedly caused by loud noise: Earlier this month, JFK officials said an elaborate hoax was perpetuated there, as well. Reports of a shooter at JFK were discounted as bogus, according to the New York Times.KCAL9 Anchor Leyna Nguyen was at the airport returning to Los Angeles from Atlanta. She said it was surreal to see so many people running.LAFD is also on scene investigating and noted no significant incident has been noted thus far as of 8:47 p.m.At of 9:40 p.m., police officially said there was no shooter and no incident. It will still take some time to re-screen all the passengers, officials said. Interestingly, even though individual accounts of this week s LAX event varied, a Yahoo News reporter named JP Mangalindan, stated that he was in the terminal at the time of the shooting. However, following the panic inducing incident, he posted to social media with the following message, after police had already confirmed there was no shooter two hours earlier: Shooters at LAX running around. Cops running around. I m down on the ground, at 11:51pm.Question: Why would Mangalindan state that multiple shooter s were running around at 11:51pm when cops disclosed that the situation was basically a non-incident by 9:40pm?It s possible that Mangalindan was confused during the heat of the moment but however you look at it, his messages may have caused additional panic, potentially creating a greater risk for passengers fleeing the airport to safety.Here s a string of tweets confirming Mangalindan continued to heighten the situation from inside LAX Eventually Mangalindan conceded that the event was in fact a false alarm (was this a potential drill?) at 1:08am, according to the Daily Mail as he readied himself for a future pizza delivery.As this story rapidly unfolded, there proved to be other bizarre aspects associated with the official narrative, as a man dressed as the fictional character Zorro (armed with a plastic sword), was initially apprehended in dramatic fashion following the reported active shooter scenario at LAX. He was then promptly released by authorities after the strange incident. ZORRO? An unidentified actor dressed as Zorro was an initial suspect during an active-shooter alarm at LAX. (Image Source: Daily Mail)Active Shooter or Live Drill?The Daily Mail described the LAX false alarm in the following manner: An actor returning from an audition dressed as masked hero Zorro, complete with plastic sword, shut down LAX airport and sparked fear of an active shooter situation on Sunday night.The unidentified, middle-aged black man dressed in an all black satin costume with gloves, hat and large belt was apprehended on a bench as he waited for a ride home .Police were initially responding to claims that a man had opened fire near a baggage reclaim, and set about evacuating thousands of passengers and grounding flights.After a thorough search and the eventual arrest of the costumed man outside a terminal, LAPD admitted the entire incident was a false alarm. The Daily Mail article continued by adding that, LAX also tweeted that the reports of a shooting had not been confirmed and police were investigating, before adding which parts of the airport have been shut. Upper/Departures & Lower/Arrivals levels of Central Terminal Area (CTA) closed. Pls check w/ airlines if heading to LAX (sic), a tweet read. Was it possible that the event at LAX was a drill? EVACUATION Passengers ordered to evacuate after reports of an active-shooter at LAX. (Image Source: twitter)LAX International Airport is no stranger to active shooter situations and drills Back in 2002 according to reports, Hesham Mohamed Hadayet [a person previously known to Egyptian authorities with multiple ID s] 41, went to the ticketing counter of El Al, Israel s national airline, at Los Angeles International Airport July 4 carrying two handguns and a hunting knife. He opened fire at midmorning, killing two people and wounding three others before he was killed by an El Al security guard. The incident occurred days after the airport was slated for a $9.6 billion airport security redesign proposal, something that would require passengers to go through screening prior to reaching their terminal for boarding a plane. The event conveniently underscored new security measures put in place after 9/11, insuring the continued growth of the TSA. Additionally, the Hadayet shooting displayed many of the conflicting aspects reported following other high profile shootings today.In 2013 21WIRE reported that the LAPD conducted an active shooter drill in October with the Los Angeles Airport Police Department at the L.A./Ontario International Airport, acting out an almost exact scenario that played out during a TSA-related shooting at LAX in November.According to a report by the San Bernardino Sun, written by Doug Saunders, the active shooter drill had an armed man shooting three people before officers locked down the scene. THE AIRPORT SHOOTER LAPD shooting drill at L.A./Ontario International Airport, month prior to LAX shooting in November of 2013.Setting the StageFollowing a major LAPD airport drill a month earlier, it was reported that Paul Ciancia moved through a crowded LAX airport terminal asking people if they were TSA agents or not, supposedly letting go those who were not agents prior to opening fire.It was also alleged that Ciancia, was carrying anti-government and anti-TSA writings contained in a bag on his person, one such paper was even an apparent reference to the global conspiracy meme NWO (New World Order), adding a conspiratorial twist to the dramatic shootout.All too often we see the stage persona of any alleged killer being touted as hard evidence, despite the fact that even strong circumstantial evidence of any apparent crime would likely result in many hours of analysis and debate, potentially without a definitive conclusion, even if the evidence eventually reached a court room setting.Mass media appeared to have worked out their own formula for laying out a familiar series of polarizing political points in the aftermath of this tragic mass-shooting, as they have with many others since. Appearing once again, to purposefully redirect the public to look at a ready-made laundry list of hateful rhetoric and random writings as an ironclad motive for the crime. Rapidly descending into an overindulgent barrage of media speculation and theorizing. UNNATURAL BLOOD Incredibly thick, red acrylic paint-like blood appears next to what is meant to be the shooter allegedly a person said to be Paul Ciancia. The image in question was initially released by the NY POST immediately after the incident.Some critics of the event stated that Ciancia s blood could have been mixed with a coagulant called Celox, noting that this blood also looked suspiciously like the blood left at scene of the Boston Bombing.Watch the LAPD describe 2013 s dramatic TSA involved shooting which was allegedly carried out by Paul Ciancia Not more than 3 weeks ago we practiced the exact scenario that played out today we played out today. the LAPD s response to 2013 s LAX shooting The photographs below were obtained from a Facebook page by the name of Team LAX that was referenced in an article by Digital Journalism Saturday, November 2nd, 2013.The Team Lax page, is the official event page for the LAX Airport Police and the images below were posted on October 8th of 2013. Here s a description of the photos from the same post on Facebook: As we posted previously, this past weekend Airport Police officers participated in an active shooter drill at Ontario Airport. An integral part of this training were the many volunteers who brought reality to the scenario by acting as victims. These victims were actually Youth Cadets from Airport Police and several divisions of the LAPD. The LAPD cadets came from the following divisions: Pacific, Hollenbeck, Southwest, Mission, Devonshire, Hollywood, West L.A., Topanga, Central, Rampart, Wilshire and 77th. Leading the cadets were Youth Services Officers (YSO s), William Lara and Ericka Holliday from LAXPD and LAPD Sgt. Stephen Showler, Pacific Division Training Coordinator. 69 cadets participated on Saturday and 115 on Sunday. We d like to thank all the Youth Cadets for their participation and boundless energy in making this training so realistic for our officers. MOCK SHOOTING Youth Cadets with L.A. airport police act out an active shooter drill in October of 2013. (Image Source: SocioEconomic History).The actors used in these drills (photo, above) might as well be mannequins, because the idea that you can recreate a real-life defensive strategy from a choreographed shooting scenario is far-fetched, especially when you consider the video game, Hollywood film style, hair-trigger, shoot first narrative repetitively on observed during these staged events offering very little in terms of a defensive game plan.There is no question that active shooter drills have been used to get the public to accept and acquiesce to new rules of engagement in the War On Terror era and arguably, they ve flatlined in terms of public safety while continuing the steady growth of the security apparatus in America and abroad. SHELTER IN PLACE The strange scripted scene at JFK International Airport in August after false reports of an active shooter running loose. (Image Source: mashable)The Panic RoomWhile the recent LAX/JFK airport active shooter situations were fear inducing in and of themselves, we once again saw the larger role played by mass media in distorting fact, which was also on display earlier this summer, when they inaccurately claimed there was an active shooter at a US military facility.In July of 2016, while US media including ABC, CNN and other went into a code orange alert mode for over 2 and a half hours, 21WIRE had already recognized that an apparent active shooter situation at Joint Base Andrews was only a drill, and called it correctly when the news first broke.Here s a passage from 21WIRE discussing the nature of the Joint Base Andrews drill: We re told that initial reports of a active shooter were prompted by an emergency 911 call to outside law enforcement about a gunman seen on the base. The fact that this alleged distress call came from a staff member at the Malcolm Grow Medical Facility located inside Andrews (one of the country s most secure closed military facilities) should have raised some pertinent questions like why base security were not informed first, as one would expect. Furthermore, any reports by the US mainstream media characterizing the event as a genuine active shooter crisis should have been immediately squashed by the fact that Joint Base Andrews was also running a no-notice Active Shooter Exercise scheduled for 9am that morning. Sadly, this did not happen, and all US media outlets began their crisis reporting complete with the usual panel of security experts and justice correspondents on CNN and other mainstream networks. In an article from the LA Times, we see that the controversial think-tank Rand Corporation is observing the psychological effects of mass shooter/active shooter situations, no doubt gauging the social engineering aspects of these events: For all the investments in post-9/11 security improvements and training, the confusion and chaos stemming from a false report of violence can actually be harder to handle than dealing with a gunman, officials say. The hunt for a gunman takes much longer when there is no one to find. To keep people calm, you d like to say that there s nothing going on, but you don t know that, and you can t say that, said Brian Jenkins, a security and terrorism expert at Rand Corp., the Santa Monica think tank. People do unpredictable things in panic situations. Adding to the danger of these modern active shooter events, it was recently reported that local law enforcement in Punta Gorda, Florida, accidentally used live rounds during a so-called shoot/don t shoot scenario, fatally shooting one woman participating in the drill that suddenly went live. Punta Gorda Police Department (Facebook)Staged Propaganda, False Imagery & Embedded Journo s As staged active shooter drills and mass casualty incidents have become the norm, we ve also seen an escalation in war time images meant to polarize the public, something aimed at shifting attitudes politically.In February 2015, 21WIRE reported how British journalist John Cantlie s video message From Inside Aleppo was part of an elaborate PR effort to humanize ISIS and its future generation of fighters. The decidedly pro-ISIS video was heavily promoted by the intelligence group SITE as well as the ISIS media arm, Al Hayat Media Center.Mainstream pundits and broadcast journalists maintain that Cantlie is and was under duress, having been forced into operating as a crack reporter for the ISIS terror brand. The narrative borders on the ridiculous, yet it has been totally accepted without question.Cantlie s prominent role in the YouTube video series Lend Me Your Ears, prompted some in new media circles to question the British journo, along with his links to USAID connected reporter, James Foley one of the as of yet, forensically unproven deaths at the hands of the estranged terror persona Jihadi John .Nothing in the video appeared to be authentic, as Cantlie failed to disclose the true nature of the West s role in inciting terror in the region, through its various arms trafficking and Train and Equip programs linked to so-called moderate rebels in Syria.Recently, 21WIRE contributor Branko Mali of Kali Tribune, deconstructed another active Gladio-style shooting in Munich, Germany, and its apparent relation to the bizarre incident in Nice, France. In fact, rather uncannily, journalist Richard Gutjahr, was in France to capture the white lorry truck rampage on Bastille Day as well as the strange shooting incident in Munich. Here s a passage from his report, an article which outlines deep media and political ties: He [Richard Gutjahr] is a M nchen based journalist, talk show moderator, blogger and new media technologies enthusiast, currently employed by Bavarian TV company, BR 24. For uninitiated into Gutjahr s impressive, if somewhat bizarre, CV his name will probably remain in memory simply because he decided to visit Nice for an extended weekend to experience the July, 14. Bastille Day celebration and, quite accidentally, found himself on the balcony of his hotel room, when white lorry driver commenced his rampage. While driving through M nchen, Richard got the call from a friend informing him that there s a shootout in the Olympia-Einkaufszentrum.The whole episode reminds one of Goran Tomasevic, a Serbian photographer who works with Reuters and has also captured pivotal political events over the past 20 years, such as his picture of a U.S. Marine witnessing the toppling of a Saddam Hussein statue, the Arab Spring, so-called moderates in Aleppo and the suspiciously staged Westgate Mall massacre in Kenya in 2013.Similarly, new forms of subliminally arresting and deceptive propaganda have appeared recently in Western media and more broadly, over the past year from NGOs linked to the military alliance NATO and to known Islamist terrorist groups.Over the last two weeks, an emotionally charged scene supposedly depicting a Syrian child rescued after an airstrike became a polarizing story exploited by Western media.Here we see 21WIRE contributor, Jay Dyer of Jay s Analysis discuss the dust boy propaganda Aleppo Syria Dust Boy Image StagedWhile watching the entire video footage of the event, the dust-covered boy who appears to be bleeding after an apparent airstrike (yet the blood has already coagulated) is left unattended, as he is oddly propped up in an ambulance seat while being photographed by Mahmoud Raslan an alleged media activist who has been seen fraternizing with terrorist groups in Aleppo. This has prompting some critics to charge that Raslan may actually be linked to the White Helmets, a group funded largely by NATO and an NGO embedded with Al-Qaeda members, who regularly dispense staged humanitarian media images and video for public consumption.From this information, we might observe that the recent so-called rescue operation in Aleppo, was specifically produced for maximum emotional impact and internet viral capability, and always dovetailing with the West s regime change plot in Syria with the support of a so-called first-responder or human rights NGO.The strange and disembodied footage of a blood and dust-covered boy, was also reminiscent of last year s migrant crisis image of a child washed ashore yet the mainstream media failed to question the geopolitical angle behind the photograph as well as the engineered migrant crisis itself.In many ways, this type of drive-by shock and awe imagery is linked to past political staging in the Middle East, as well as other hotbed areas around the world. STAGING WAR An allegedly staged war image from the Ukraine. (Image Source: rt)It was also recently revealed that a war image in the Ukraine had supposedly been staged just as things have been politically been heating up in that region. RT explains:The dramatic picture in question which went viral this month shows two Ukrainian soldiers, carrying their wounded comrade, while a huge explosion is visible behind their backs, sending a plume of smoke into the air.The author of the photo Dmitry Muravsky, an amateur photographer who served as an adviser to the Ukrainian Defense Minister claimed it was made on June 4 in the village of Shirokino, located on the firing line between the government forces and rebels in east Ukraine.However in an open letter signed by numerous Ukrainian journalists and photographers, people claimed it was a fake and said they strongly condemn such manipulative activities. Interestingly, in 2014, The UK s Express discussed a book entitled Five Came Back by movie historian Mark Harris that revealed a handful of legendary Hollywood directors had faked combat footage in Second World War documentaries that have been considered genuine for almost 70 years. John Ford, John Huston, Frank Capra, William Wyler and George Stevens all enlisted despite their glittering Hollywood lifestyles and joined other filmmakers recording the Allied advance across occupied Europe and in the Pacific.Their films were allegedly created to boost morale among troops and cinema audiences the world over, including apparently staging much of the epic scenes during the Pearl Harbor attack in 1944.Additionally, the report states that Decades later both Capra and Huston admitted in interviews that some of their bogus work was disgraceful but Huston was less frank publicly about the authenticity of his acclaimed documentary The Battle Of San Pietro, which, in 1991, was selected for America s prestigious National Film Registry of the Library of Congress because it was considered historically significant. The West continues to see a media blitz of false, fake and doctored criminality often masking many real-life conspiracies READ MORE DAILY SHOOTER NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire Daily Shooter Files | 1 |
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Poll-watching junkies are having a field day. There is one poll or another publishing its results on an almost hourly basis. As this is being written on noon Sunday, for instance, Investors Business Daily (IBD), which touts its survey as “the most accurate poll in recent presidential elections," has Donald Trump ahead of Hillary Clinton by one point. The USC Dornsife/ Los Angeles Times ’ “Daybreak” poll shows Trump ahead of Clinton by five points.
Nate Silver, in his FiveThirtyEight 2016 Election Forecast, has Clinton’s chance of winning at 64.7 percent versus Trump’s 35.3 percent. Silver predicts Clinton will win 48.4 percent of the popular vote (versus Trump’s 45.5 percent, which will give her 291 Electoral College votes to Trump’s 246.
In its running summary of other polls, Real Clear Politics shows Clinton up by 1.8 percent over Trump in the popular vote, while in the Electoral College it’s Clinton with 216 and Trump with 164, leaving 158 votes as “toss ups."
There are at least two other prognosticators who don’t rely on polls at all, and they are predicting Trump will win on Tuesday. The first was explained by Tyler Durden at ZeroHedge back in January when he said that the stock market would predict November’s winner: This relationship occurs because the stock market reflects the economic outlook in the weeks leading up to the election. A rising stock market indicates an improving economy, which means rising confidence and increases the chances of the incumbent party’s re-election. Therefore, your time might be better spent from August through October watching the stock market rather than the debates if you want to know who will be President for the next four years.
Right on cue the stock market has declined nine days in a row (through last Friday), the first time that has happened since 1980. But more importantly is how it has behaved since Monday, August 1. The S&P 500 Index has declined by 4.5 percent which, according to Durden, translates into an 86 percent chance of Trump’s winning on Tuesday.
And then there’s the professor from Stony Brook University, Helmut Norpoth, and his “Primary Model”. Writes Norpoth on his website: Winning early primaries is a major key for electoral victory in November. Trump won the Republican primaries in both New Hampshire and South Carolina, while Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders split the Democratic primaries in those states…. For the record the Primary Model … has correctly predicted the winner of the popular vote in all five presidential elections since it was introduced in 1996…. For elections from 1912 to 2012 the Primary Model [has retroactively picked] the winner … every time except in 1960.
Accordingly, Norpoth gives Trump an 87 percent chance of winning Tuesday’s election.
There’s also his “pendulum” model: What favors the GOP in 2016 as well … is the cycle of presidential elections. After two terms of Democrat Barack Obama in the White House the electoral pendulum is poised to swing to the GOP this year…. Donald Trump is predicted to defeat Hillary Clinton by 52.5 percent to 47.5 percent.
In the “for what it’s worth” category, as this is being written, futures for Monday’s open are also turning negative. If the market closes down again on Monday, the 10th day in a row, it will only add validity to both Durden’s and Norpoth’s prediction: Trump will win on Tuesday.
Also, Professor Norpoth has such confidence in his models that he is using his own money to bet on Trump to win.
An Ivy League graduate and former investment advisor, Bob is a regular contributor to The New American magazine and blogs frequently at LightFromTheRight.com, primarily on economics and politics. He can be reached at This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. . | 1 |
LONDON — His voice sometimes close to cracking, his expression strained and grim, former Prime Minister Tony Blair spent much of the past two days responding to the damning judgment of an inquiry into how he led Britain into the Iraq war, engaging in an extraordinary public mix of soul searching, regret and defensiveness. Judging by much of the media reaction, he would have done better to save his breath. “A Monster of Delusion,” read the headline over a picture of Mr. Blair in The Daily Mail on Thursday. The Sun, another British tabloid, described him as a “Weapon of Mass Deception,” a reference to the incorrect assertions by Mr. Blair and President George W. Bush before the invasion that Iraq had an arsenal of unconventional weapons. Nine years after stepping down from office, Mr. Blair — the most successful politician of his generation, who led the Labour Party to three consecutive general election victories with a centrist message — is widely loathed in Britain, his legacy defined overwhelmingly by the Iraq war and its bloody aftermath. He has few defenders, especially within his own party, which was split at the time by his support for the war and has since shifted leftward again, repudiating much of what he stood for. Mr. Blair is such a pariah on the left, said Steven Fielding, director of the Center for British Politics at the University of Nottingham, that “if he says ‘black,’ almost everyone else will say ‘white.’ ” Mr. Fielding added, “In the party he once led, to be described as Blairite is the greatest insult that can be leveled. ” More broadly, Mr. Blair has failed to rehabilitate his image since leaving office, and in some ways has added to his problems. Though he set up the Tony Blair Faith Foundation, intended to counter religious conflict and extremism, its work has been overshadowed by his business interests. Mr. Blair’s wealth, and his willingness to advise nations with poor human rights records such as Kazakhstan, has fueled another strand of criticism: that he was always too impressed by those with power and money. And his diplomatic work, trying to bring peace to the Middle East, ran up against the intractability of the conflicts in that region. “There will not be a day of my life where I do not relive and rethink what happened,” Mr. Blair said, referring to the Iraq war. “People ask me why I spend so much time in the Middle East today. This is why. This is why I work on Middle East peace, on the dialogue between faiths on how we can prevent young people growing up with hatred in their hearts towards those who look, think or believe differently from them. ” The 2. report released on Wednesday was a savage indictment of Britain’s involvement in Iraq, condemning it as ill prepared and poorly executed, and concluding that it was based on flawed and unchallenged intelligence. In confronting the charges against him, Mr. Blair spoke sometimes in confessional terms, acknowledging those failings with “more sorrow, regret and apology and in greater measure than you can know or may believe. ” But what he did not do was to accept the fundamental premise of many of his critics: that he had been wrong to sanction military action against Saddam Hussein. The view of many of the protesters who gathered on Wednesday waving placards reading “BLIAR,” and of relatives of some of those who died in the conflict, is that he is culpable for taking Britain into a disastrous war on false pretenses. There have been attempted citizens’ arrests of him on war crimes charges. As one of his Labour Party critics, Diane Abbott, said on Thursday, Mr. Blair’s reputation had “bled to death in the sands of Iraq. ” Mr. Blair was always unpopular among the left of the party, who felt he had gone too far in abandoning core principles for the center ground while embracing central elements of Thatcherism. Even they would admit that he was good at winning elections: He scored his third victory in 2005, after the invasion of Iraq. Mr. Blair presided over a generally healthy economy and helped build peace in Northern Ireland. But many Britons found it inexplicable that he chose to go to war alongside Mr. Bush. In 2003, Mr. Bush was unpopular in Britain, and so was going to war in Iraq. Mr. Blair has sought to address his critics previously, but not at such length and with such public emotion as he has since the publication of the new report on Wednesday. The gist of his response was that his job as prime minister was to make tough decisions and that while he regretted many of the consequences of this one, he stood by it as the best available option at the time. “The world is better off without Saddam,” Mr. Blair told reporters in London, adding that had the Iraqi leader been left alone, he would have remained a threat to peace. And, had Mr. Hussein survived until the Arab Spring of 2011, he would have clung to power “with the same deadly consequences as we see in the carnage of Syria,” Mr. Blair suggested. “I will never agree that those who died or who were injured made their sacrifice in vain,” said Mr. Blair, while acknowledging that some of the families of those casualties “cannot and do not accept this is so. ” In that he is correct. After the report’s publication, Sarah O’Connor, the relative of one victim, called Mr. Blair “the world’s worst terrorist. ” Reg Keys, another victim’s relative, described Mr. Blair as a “consummate actor” and said that his long public statement resembled “the ramblings of a madman. ” While the report, seven years in the making, provides a damning indictment of sloppy cataloging a host of policy and other failings, it does not accuse Mr. Blair of lying — a point to which the former prime minister returned frequently. Over the years, Mr. Blair has been accused by critics of deceiving Parliament and the public, and on Wednesday he said accusations of “bad faith, of lying or deceit or deliberate misrepresentation” should be laid to rest. “I did not mislead this country,” Mr. Blair said. “I made the decision in good faith on the information that I had at the time. ” His unequivocal support for Mr. Bush was essential to prevent the United States from pursuing a unilateral foreign policy, Mr. Blair argued, rejecting the characterization of himself as the president’s “poodle. ” He defended a message sent to Mr. Bush, before the decision to invade, including the phrase: “I will be with you, whatever. ” That statement was, Mr. Blair said, “not a blank check. ” Yet 13 years after Mr. Blair ordered British troops into action, his response to the latest inquiry is unlikely to bring closure because he is not budging on one central point. “What I cannot do and will not do,” Mr. Blair said, “is say we took the wrong decision. ” Mr. Fielding said history’s judgment on Mr. Blair’s premiership may be more positive, but that Mr. Blair has refused to do the one thing that might soften the damning verdict of his contemporaries. “If he was ever going to, this was the moment for him to apologize and say, ‘We should not have done this,’ ” Mr. Fielding said. “If he isn’t going to say this now, he will take this to his grave. ” | 0 |
Patriots owner Robert Kraft tells Brian Kilmeade of Fox and Friends about the special friend that Trump was to him and how he went out of his way to help him after his beloved wife died, I m loyal to my friends, I remember who the people are there when the tough times are there and he did that for me. "I remember who the people are there when the tough times are there and he did that for me." -Robert Kraft on his friendship with Pres Trump pic.twitter.com/pQiBWDYCtF FOX & friends (@foxandfriends) February 3, 2017 | 1 |
Americans need to know that gun control is not just an issue leftist legislators are pushing. Educators and school administrators are making it clear that even the suggestion or thought of a gun by students, regardless of age, is evil and will be punished. When this story first came out in the news, we thought it had to be fake. Once we realized it was a real story and that a 2nd grader had actually been suspended for chewing a pop-tart into the shape of a gun, we applauded his father for taking the matter to court. We assumed any reasonable judge would rule against the irresponsible parties involved in their reckless decision to suspend this 7 year old boy, and that the boy s suspension would be reversed. Were we ever wrong The suspension of second grader who chewed his breakfast pastry into the shape of a gun was upheld by a circuit court judge last week.Joshua Welch was suspended from Anne Arundel County s Park Elementary in March 2013 after chewing his pastry into the shape of a gun and [pretending] to fire it. The student s father, B.J. Welch, took the matter to court in hopes of having the suspension reversed and expunged from his son s record.But WJZ 13 reports that an Anne Arundel County circuit judge upheld the suspension, ruling that Joshua s actions were disruptive. Anne Arundel County Schools reacted to the ruling by releasing a statement which said, We have believed from the outset that the actions of the school staff were not only appropriate and consistent, but in the best interests of all students. Welch family attorney Robin Ficker lamented the ruling and pointed out there was no violence, no real weapon, no ammunition. But the suspension will now be on [Joshua s] record in school every time he goes into a new grade. Via: Breitbart News | 1 |
We all love seeing Alec Baldwin portray Donald Trump on Saturday Night Live, but last night he pulled another ace out of his sleeve when he debuted as Bill O Reilly. But it gets better Baldwin s Bill O Reilly interviews Baldwin s Donald Trump!As the sketch opens, O Reilly addresses his audience on a serious note: Hello, I m Bill O Reilly, and I hope you are having a terrific evening, The subject of tonight s Talking Points Memo is a scandal everyone s been talking about all week. A scandal no one thought I would have the guts to address head on. It appears he s going to address his sexual harassment issues, but instead he reveals his true talking point: The shocking allegations of the abuse of power that have been leveled against the Obama administration. He then attempts to introduce Fox News reporter Laurie Dhue (one of the actual women who received a settlement after filing a sexual harassment suit). After he s told that she no longer works for Fox News, O Reilly asks, Well, did she receive the check? After speaking to another female reporter who, for obvious reasons, had to stay 500 yards away from him, he goes on to address the issues he s having with sponsors leaving the show. As you know, 60 of our sponsors have pulled ads from the program, O Reilly said, before going to commercial break. No word as to why yet. We thank the following for sticking with us. After that, fake ads played for dog cocaine and horse Cialis. Now this is hard for me to discuss, but I also have been in the news this week, Baldwin s O Reilly said after the break. Several women have come forward and accused me of offering them exciting opportunities here at Fox News. Beyond that, the details are fuzzy, but one man was brave enough to come to my defense. A man who is unimpeachable on all female issues. Cue Donald Trump who did, in real life, come to O Reilly s defense this past week. The two then appear together in split screen. I actually see a lot of myself in you, Bill, Baldwin s Trump said, calling himself a big fan of the host. O Reilly then thanks him for his support and asks him if he is actually familiar with the case. I m more familiar with this case than, say, health care, but I didn t really look into it much, no. I was busy being super presidential by bombing a bunch of shit. Baldwin s O Reilly then thanked him for promoting Sexual Assault Awareness Month and Trump said: That s right, Bill. It s a subject near and dear to my hands. Watch the full video below:Featured image via video screenshot | 0 |
VATICAN CITY (Reuters) - Pope Francis urged U.S. President Donald Trump to be a peacemaker at their first meeting on Wednesday after they exchanged sharp words last year, and Trump promised he would not forget the pontiff’s message. Under clear blue skies, Trump received a tribute from the Swiss Guard in a Vatican courtyard when he arrived. He entered a small elevator taking him to the third floor of the Apostolic Palace and, after a long ceremonial walk past frescoed corridors, shook the pope’s hand at the entrance to the private study that the frugal pontiff uses only for official occasions. Before the door of the wood-lined elevator closed, a Vatican protocol official was heard quipping to the president that it was not “like Trump Tower in New York”. Francis smiled faintly as he greeted Trump outside the study and was not as outgoing as he sometimes is with visiting heads of state. Trump, seeming subdued, said, “It is a great honor.” Even when the two were sitting at the pope’s desk in the presence of photographers and reporters, the pope avoided the small talk that usually occurs before the media is ushered out. The two spoke privately for about 30 minutes with translators. Both men looked far more relaxed at the end of the private meeting, with the pope smiling and joking with Trump and his wife Melania. Francis’s interpreter could be heard translating a comment by the pope to the First Lady: “What do you give him to eat?” Francis then gave Trump a small sculptured olive tree and told him through the interpreter that it symbolized peace. “It is my desire that you become an olive tree to construct peace,” the Pope said, speaking in Spanish. Trump responded: “We can use peace.” Francis also gave Trump a signed copy of his 2017 peace message whose title is “Nonviolence - A Style of Politics for Peace”, and a copy of his 2015 encyclical letter on the need to protect the environment from the effects of climate change. “Well, I’ll be reading them,” Trump said. During his election campaign, Trump said scientific findings that human economic activity contributed to global warming were a hoax. As president, he has proposed deep cuts for the Environmental Protection Agency and the elimination of many environmental regulations. Trump gave the pope a boxed set of five first-edition books by murdered U.S. civil rights leader Martin Luther King. As Trump and the pope said goodbye at the door of the study, Trump told him: “Thank you, thank you. I won’t forget what you said.” Asked how the meeting with the pope went, Trump said: “Great. He is something. He is really good. We had a fantastic meeting.” A Vatican statement said the meeting was “cordial” and that the Vatican hoped there could be “serene collaboration” between the U.S. government and the American Catholic Church, including “assistance to immigrants”. The U.S. Catholic Church hierarchy opposes Trump’s attempt to cut federal assistance for cities that give sanctuary to illegal immigrants. It also opposes his plan to build a wall on the U.S. border with Mexico. The pope said last year a man who thinks about building walls and not bridges is “not Christian”. Trump, who was a candidate at the time, responded that it was “disgraceful” of the Argentine-born pope, who represents just over half of the world’s two billion Christians, to question his faith. The meeting with the pope was the third stop on Trump’s nine-day foreign tour, and part of his world tour of religions after meeting leaders of Muslim nations in Saudi Arabia and visiting holy sites in Jerusalem. Trump at first did not plan to stop in Rome during his visit to Europe, which some in the Vatican saw as a snub. When he changed his mind, the Vatican squeezed him in at 8:30 a.m. on a Wednesday morning, an unusual day and an unusually early time. He later flew to Brussels where he was to meet Belgium’s king and prime minister on Wednesday evening before a day of meetings with European Union and NATO leaders on Thursday. | 0 |
ZAGREB (Reuters) - A Croatian court on Tuesday sentenced a Serb former paramilitary commander to 15 years in prison for torturing and killing soldiers and civilians during Croatia s 1991-95 independence war. Dragan Vasiljkovic, 62, who has dual Serbian and Australian citizenship, was charged with violating the Geneva Convention by torturing and killing captive Croatian soldiers and police in the rebel stronghold of Knin and for crimes near the towns of Glina and Benkovac in 1991 and 1993. Vasiljkovic, whose trial in the Adriatic city of Split took one year, denied he had committed any crimes and can file an appeal. He was extradited to Croatia in 2015 after losing a nine-year battle to block extradition. He had been living in Perth and working as a golf instructor under the name Daniel Snedden. Croatia declared independence from Yugoslavia in 1991 but its Serb minority, backed by Belgrade, seized a third of the country by force. Croatia retook its occupied territory in a 1995 offensive. | 0 |
Abigail Marsh almost lost her life in a car accident. She was avoiding a dog in the middle of the street, and suddenly found her own life in danger. But a complete stranger stopped, got out of his car, helped her to safety, and then drove off, never even telling her his name.
Why did he do it though? That was the biggest question Marsh found herself asking, and it changed the course of her life. She has since made a career out of understanding the human capacity to care for others; where it comes from; how it develops. Marsh wondered why people do selfless things, and resolved to find out. She soon realized very little work had been done on this topic.
Altruism is a voluntary, costly behaviour that benefits only the other. And Marsh wanted to know what made some people more altruistic than others:
The actions of the man who rescued me meet the most stringent definition of altruism, which is a voluntary, costly behaviour motivated by the desire to help another individual. So it’s a selfless act intended to benefit only the other. What could possibly explain an action like that? One answer is compassion, obviously, which is a key driver of altruism. But then the question becomes, why do some people seem to have more of it than others? And the answer may be that the brains of highly altruistic people are different in fundamental ways.
To really figure it out, she did the opposite of what one might expect, however. She started on the opposite end by analyzing psychopaths. People with this disorder are missing the desire to help other people. They are often cold, uncaring, and antisocial individuals. But they’re not typically insensitive to other people’s emotions, just to the signs that other people are distressed:
The part of the brain that’s the most important for recognizing fearful expressions is called the amygdala. There are very rare cases of people who lack amygdalas completely, and they’re profoundly impaired in recognizing fearful expressions. And whereas healthy adults and children usually show big spikes in amygdala activity when they look at fearful expressions, psychopaths’ amygdalas are underreactive to these expressions. Sometimes they don’t react at all, which may be why they have trouble detecting these cues. Finally, psychopaths’ amygdalas are smaller than average by about 18 or 20 percent.
But in her Ted Talk, Marsh brings us back to altruism. She says that her main interest isn’t about why people don’t care for others, but why they do. “ So the real question is, could extraordinary altruism, which is the opposite of psychopathy in terms of compassion and the desire to help other people, emerge from a brain that is also the opposite of psychopathy?” she asks.
Extraordinary altruists have done things like give a healthy kidney to a complete stranger. But why?
“T he brains of these extraordinary altruists have certain special characteristics,” she says. “ They are better at recognizing other people’s fear. They’re literally better at detecting when somebody else is in distress. This may be in part because their amygdala is more reactive to these expressions. And remember, this is the same part of the brain that we found was underreactive in people who are psychopathic.”
“And finally, their amygdalas are larger than average as well, by about eight percent,” she adds.
What’s intriguing is that, when people were asked why they gave their kidney to a complete stranger, they didn’t know how to answer. They didn’t consider themselves unique or special, but normal, just like everyone else. They just did it, because that’s who they are. Even more intriguing is that the people the donors were giving their kidneys to weren’t in a close circle that somehow already connected them through other loved ones. They were totally removed human beings. And that’s pretty extraordinary:
I think the best description for this amazing lack of self-centeredness is humility, which is that quality that in the words of St. Augustine makes men as angels. And why is that? It’s because if there’s no center of your circle, there can be no inner rings or outer rings, nobody who is more or less worthy of your care and compassion than anybody else. And I think that this is what really distinguishes extraordinary altruists from the average person.
But the main lesson of Marsh’t talk is even more fundamental than all of this. “ I also think that this is a view of the world that’s attainable by many and maybe even most people. And I think this because at the societal level, expansions of altruism and compassion are already happening everywhere,” she explains.
Marsh believes that we all have the ability to take ourselves out of the center of the circle and extend the circle of compassion outward, so it brings in even total strangers. It looks like a globe outlined with people from all over the world holding hands in unity, in support, in love.
Watch Marsh’s full Ted Talk below:
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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic and Republican U.S. governors on Wednesday urged the Trump administration, as well as Congress, to continue funding payments to health insurance companies that make Obamacare plans affordable, calling it critical to stabilizing the insurance marketplace. Republican President Donald Trump, frustrated that Obamacare survived attempts to repeal it, has threatened to cut off about $8 billion in subsidies that help control costs for low-income Americans under the Affordable Care Act, Democratic former President Barack Obama’s signature domestic initiative. “The Administration has the opportunity to stabilize the health insurance market across our nation and ensure that our residents can continue to access affordable health care coverage,” said a statement by the Health and Human Services Committee of the National Governors Association. “A first critical step ... is to fully fund CSRs (cost-sharing reduction payments) for the remainder of calendar year 2017 through 2018,” the statement said, adding this was needed as Congress and the administration address long-term reform efforts. The committee is led by Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe, a Democrat, and Massachusetts Governor Charlie Baker, a Republican. Earlier this year, the governors sent a letter calling on Congress to fully fund the cost-sharing payments. Some Congressional Republicans have joined Democrats in urging Trump to continue the payments. Republican Senator Lamar Alexander, chairman of the health committee, said Tuesday the president should pay the subsidies through September while lawmakers work on bipartisan legislation to fund the outlays for another year. But the Senate’s No. 2 Republican John Cornyn hesitated when asked Wednesday if he would support such legislation. “I’ve said before that I’m not in favor of throwing money at insurance companies without reform, so that’s going to be the nature of the conversation,” Cornyn told reporters outside his office. Asked what reforms he’d like to see, Cornyn mentioned the “skinny” Obamacare repeal bill the Senate voted down last week. Among other things, it would have repealed the requirement that every American have health insurance or pay a penalty. Insurers say that the cost-sharing payments are passed onto customers in the form of lower deductibles and co-pays that make care more affordable for low income Americans. Insurers are finalizing 2018 premium rates for the individual Obamacare market, with many saying their decision hinges on government guarantees for cost-sharing subsidies. Molina Healthcare Inc said on Wednesday it would stop selling Obamacare plans in Utah and Wisconsin, joining a slew of health insurers that have exited Obamacare markets amid uncertainty over the healthcare law. Anthem Inc, one of the largest sellers of these plans in 2017, has pared back offerings or mostly exited five states including California and may exit more. White House budget director Mick Mulvaney told CNN the administration was still considering whether to end cost-sharing subsidies. | 1 |
Can Huckabee Overcome The 'New Car Smell' Of Other Candidates?
This post was updated at 11:40 a.m. ET.
That's the message the GOP presidential hopeful is already conveying as he makes another bid for the presidency.
"We need the kind of change that really could get America from Hope to higher ground," he said, officially launching his campaign Tuesday in Hope, Ark.
To recapture the magic that propelled him to second place in 2008, he needs to re-embrace his roots and downplay the political celebrity he has created in the past eight years.
"What he's got to do is draw a contrast that shows, 'I'm not just a talk show host and I'm not just a Baptist minister, but I governed for over a decade and we achieved results in a very Democratic environment,' " said Iowa conservative activist Bob Vander Plaats, who chaired Huckabee's winning 2008 campaign in the first caucus state. He is so far undecided this go-around.
That message was also evidenced in the video that Huckabee rolled out last week.
The video was vintage Huckabee, harking back to how he took on the Clinton machine of the 1990s in what was then a very Democratic state. That's a valuable weapon he has now that he didn't eight years ago, with other Republican candidates now arguing they're best equipped to take on Hillary Clinton, the likely Democratic nominee.
Huckabee boasted of his populist record, touting his work raising family income and cutting taxes during his decade-long tenure as governor.
There were no clips of his eponymous talk show or his 2008 stump speeches except for the address he made to the GOP convention that year.
"I'm not a Republican because I grew up rich," he declared at the Republican National Convention in St. Paul. "I'm a Republican because I didn't want to spend the rest of my life poor, waiting for the government to rescue me."
His runner-up slot enabled him to dig out of his humble beginnings. A Fox News contract and radio show soon followed, and Huckabee and his wife were able to build a 8,224 square-foot Florida beachfront home worth $3 million.
"Janet and I, neither of us grew up thinking we'd see salt water in person," Huckabee told the Northwest Florida Daily News last year of the mansion he and his wife called home. "We both grew up dirt poor in Southern Arkansas ... For us, growing up, the thought that we would ever put our feet in salt water, no that would never happen."
The newfound financial freedom was reportedly one reason Huckabee passed on a 2012 bid, despite his rumored disdain for the eventual nominee, former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. In order to do so, he would have had to sever his media ties, which were his main source of income.
That's why it surprised many when he announced, without much warning, in January of this year that he would be stepping down from his Fox News Saturday evening show, Huckabee. But it was also a clear signal to those skeptical he would leave the lucrative private sector to re-enter the political arena that he was serious this time.
Huckabee was underestimated early on in 2008 in Iowa, too. He didn't even begin registering in polling there until the summer of 2007 and never surged into the lead until December of that year. He ended up winning the caucuses by 9 points.
He starts off the 2016 cycle not having to go from Pizza Ranch to Pizza Ranch praying supporters will show up, as Vander Plaats once recalled their team had to do, but with a sure buzz and a reservoir of good feelings once he heads to the state this week. He still trails Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio in the latest surveys, but there's no clear front-runner yet.
That's both good and bad news for Huckabee. There are higher expectations this time around, both on fundraising and the crowds he will draw and the poll numbers he can expect as he becomes a candidate yet again.
"While people still genuinely like Gov. Huckabee and they trust Gov. Huckabee," Vander Plaats said, "there's still a certain flirtation with the new car smell of new candidates." | 1 |
WASHINGTON/LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A U.S. Energy Department report calls for incentives to boost coal-fired and nuclear power plants following a slew of closures that it said undermined reliable sources of electricity. The findings of the study, released late on Wednesday, drew praise from the coal and nuclear industries and a mixed reaction from renewable energy groups - some of which said the report’s recommendations could help them too. President Donald Trump has promised to revive the ailing coal mining sector but has also said he welcomes all forms of energy development to shore up domestic production. Energy Secretary Rick Perry commissioned the grid study in April to evaluate whether “regulatory burdens” imposed by past administrations, including that of former President Barack Obama, had hurt the grid by forcing shutdowns of baseload plants, which provide nonstop power, like those fired by coal and nuclear fuel. Obama introduced regulations intended to slash emissions of carbon dioxide, which are blamed for climate change. This accelerated the retirement of coal-fired power plants and bolstered the nascent solar and wind sectors, which depend heavily on weather conditions for their power output. “It is apparent that in today’s competitive markets certain regulations and subsidies are having a large impact on the functioning of markets, and thereby challenging our power generation mix,” Perry said in a letter introducing the study. “It is important for policy makers to consider their intended and unintended effects.” The study, conducted by the department’s staff, said cheap natural gas was the main driver of the closure of baseload coal and nuclear plants, a trend that was putting areas of the country at greater risk of power outages. The department recommended giving baseload plants pricing advantages for their power, as well as making it easier and cheaper to get permits to build more such projects. The report differed from an earlier draft, which had said big increases in renewable power generation remained possible without undermining grid reliability, and which did not propose added support for baseload producers. The administration had not yet reviewed the earlier draft, which was written by department staff. Some coal and nuclear energy groups welcomed the final report’s findings. “This is a much-needed, pragmatic look at U.S. electricity reliability and resilience, including the priority of maintaining critical clean baseload power as electricity markets change,” said Rich Powell, director of ClearPath, which advocates for nuclear and hydropower. Renewable fuels supporters had a wide range of reactions. The Center for Biological Diversity called the report’s recommendations “dangerously misguided,” and the Sierra Club also bashed the study. But America’s biggest solar and wind power associations said they felt the study contained elements that were positive such as not singling out renewable energy as a big problem. “The report did not... lay the demise of coal at the feet of renewable energy, and that is an important finding,” Abigail Ross Hopper, president of the Solar Energy Industries Association, wrote in an email to the trade group’s members on Thursday. SEIA and other groups, including the American Wind Energy Association, said wind and solar could benefit from some of the report’s recommendations, such as a call for infrastructure development and market reforms. AWEA said in a blog post that technological advances could allow wind energy to provide reliability services, such as fast ramping to regulate the grid’s frequency signal. | 1 |
21st Century Wire says During yesterday s cabinet confirmation hearing in Washington DC, hawkish comments made by President-Elect Trump s Secretary of State nominee Rex Tillerson were very pleasing to pro-war Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham. Not so for Chinese war hawks Tillerson s remarks referred to the 3,000 acres of reclaimed land in the South China Sea in the Spratly Island chain, presumably for use by the Chinese Navy, but also as a shipping resource. China denies the new facilities will restrict freedom of movement for any international shipping.It s important to note that there is a tremendous amount of pressure being put to bear on the incoming Trump Administration by neoconservatives and perpetual war advocates like McCain, Graham, Tom Cotton, Marco Rubio and others. This relentless pressure appeared to affect Tillerson during yesterday s hearings.In response, a Chinese Communist Party publication penned a scathing OpEd in response to Tillerson s comments .Telegraphlocking Chinese access to islands in the South China Sea would require the US to wage war , an influential Chinese state-run tabloid said on Friday, after US Secretary of State nominee Rex Tillerson suggested the strategy on Wednesday. The media salvo from China is the latest sign of increased tensions between the countries since President-elect Donald Trump accepted a telephone call from Taiwan s leader, Tsai Ing-wen.Mr Tillerson told his confirmation hearing before the US Senate Foreign Relations Committee that he wanted to send a signal to China that their access to islands in the disputed South China Sea is not going to be allowed . He did not elaborate.The United States would have to wage a large-scale war in the South China Sea to prevent Chinese access to the islands, the Global Times said in an English language editorial.[ ] Tillerson had better bone up on nuclear power strategies if he wants to force a big nuclear power to withdraw from its own territories, the paper added Continue this story at The TelegraphREAD MORE CHINA NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire China FilesSUPPORT OUR WORK BY SUBSCRIBING & BECOMING A MEMBER @21WIRE.TV | 0 |
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Sunday on CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS,” President Barack Obama’s close friend and longtime adviser Valerie Jarrett said, “The president prides himself on the fact that his administration hasn’t had a scandal. ” When asked about the Obama’s public personas, Jarrett said, “I think that they behave as the people who they are. What you see in public is the same thing I see in private. Do they feel responsibility because they’re historic figures? Yes, they do. But I don’t think it has made them be different than who they are. The president prides himself on the fact that his administration hasn’t had a scandal and he hasn’t done something to embarrass himself. That is not because he is being someone other that who he is. That’s who he is. That is who they are. And that is what really resonates with the American people. ” ( NYP) Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN | 0 |
BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Finance ministers from Latvia, Luxembourg, Portugal and Slovakia bid on Thursday to replace Jeroen Dijsselbloem as the head of the euro zone finance ministers, the Eurogroup, before a vote next week among the 19 countries sharing the euro. The president of the Eurogroup chairs monthly meetings of finance ministers and heads the euro zone bailout fund which has saved Greece, Ireland, Portugal, Spain and Cyprus from bankruptcy during the sovereign debt crisis. Finance ministers Dana Reizniece-Ozola of Latvia, Pierre Gramegna of Luxembourg, Mario Centeno of Portugal and Peter Kazimir of Slovakia all submitted formal applications for the job on Thursday, officials told Reuters. The decision is expected to be taken on Monday. The current Eurogroup chairman, Dutchman Dijsselbloem will step down on Jan 13 after two terms since 2012. He is no longer a finance minister after Dutch national elections earlier this year. He confirmed on Thursday that he had received four applications. Asked if there was a frontrunner, Dijsselbloem said: I love them all . The chairman will be chosen by a simple majority of votes, so the winner has to secure the backing of 10 euro zone finance ministers. European socialists, of which Dijsselbloem is one, have been calling for the job to remain with a socialist because the European center-right already has many of the top EU jobs, such as European Commission president. Centeno is a socialist and has the backing of Italy, whose own finance minister Pier-Carlo Padoan also wanted the job, but dropped out because it is not certain he will stay in government after Italian elections due by May 2018. The Harvard-educated economist has led Portugal during a strong recovery from the country s 2011-14 debt crisis and bailout. The country is growing at its fastest pace in at least a decade and the budget deficit is set to fall to its lowest in many decades. In May, former German finance minister Wolfgang Schaeuble dubbed Centeno the Ronaldo of EU finance ministers a reference to the Portuguese soccer star as Portugal was about to exit the EU s disciplinary procedure for running excessive deficits. Some in the Eurogroup say, however, say a minister from a country that had to be bailed out because of past policy mistakes would have smaller chance of getting the job. Many also say that Centeno has not contributed much to Eurogroup discussions in the past. Slovakia s Kazimir, also a socialist, has run a tight fiscal ship at home and has been hawkish on bailouts for Greece. Some officials say that among socialist candidates he would have the backing of Germany and the Netherlands. Critics of his candidacy, however, say that he has not taken the opportunity of Slovakia s European Union presidency to drive his economic agenda harder and show leadership. Gramegna is a liberal and has more of a centrist stand, although some colleagues have criticized his view on EU cooperation on taxes. Tiny Luxembourg also already holds the prestigious position of European Commission president. Reizniece-Ozola, 36, is the only female candidate and her party associates itself with the European center-right, rather than socialists, which could win her the support of center-right finance ministers. She is a chess grandmaster. Her critics however, also mention that as in the case of Centeno, she has not been very vocal in Eurogroup meetings so far and that she had campaigned against Latvia s adoption of the euro in 2014. In an interview with Latvian Television in March 2015 she said she still hasn t changed her mind about Latvia joining the euro. | 1 |
WASHINGTON — In recent weeks, staff members for Bobby Rush, a Democratic congressman from Illinois, have asked fellow lawmakers to sign a letter opposing a Federal Communications Commission proposal to limit how broadband providers can share users’ personal data. Last month, 60 lawmakers signed a separate letter voicing their objections to an F. C. C. regulation that would open the market for cable television boxes. What the actions have in common: the financial connections and legwork of cable companies like Comcast. The National Cable Telecommunications Association, an industry lobbying group, said it had edited the letter shared by Mr. Rush’s staff. Cable industry lobbyists also helped gather the 60 signatures on the letter nearly all of the lawmakers who signed count cable and telecom companies as top campaign donors, according to federal disclosures. The activity by cable companies and their industry groups is part of the biggest lobbying push by the $115 billion industry in Washington since 2009, when the government drew up its net neutrality rules. These days, the cable and telecom industries are hiring more lobbyists, issuing warnings that they may sue federal agencies, and making speeches and writing scathing blog posts about policy makers. The trigger? A string of proposed regulations by the F. C. C. that has left cable companies feeling besieged. So far this year, the agency has proposed reforming rules on boxes so that people can pick any television device to receive cable and online video, which could cut into the industry’s $19. 5 billion in annual rental fees. The F. C. C. also unveiled broadband privacy rules that would make it harder to collect and share data on users for targeted advertising. And the agency also announced a plan to force cable and telecom companies to lease bandwidth to competitors in certain areas, with potential limits on how much they can charge, curbing revenue for such deals. “The policy blows we are weathering are not modest regulatory corrections,” Michael K. Powell, president of the N. C. T. A. said in a speech last month. “They have been thundering, tectonic shifts. ” The cable companies’ frustration has been compounded by concerns that the F. C. C. proposals punish them but reward tech companies like Google. The proposal could give those companies access to cable and satellite television programming for their devices and let them track viewer habits for their ad businesses. The broadband privacy rules apply only to cable and telecom companies tech companies are not included. The F. C. C. has largely adopted recommendations from Google on reforms, the cable and telecom companies said. ATT’s senior vice president for external affairs, Jim Cicconi, has called the plan the “Google proposal. ” The cable companies also said the F. C. C. ’s broadband privacy proposal would be much stronger than any restrictions placed on web companies. So the cable industry has harnessed its vast lobbying resources in Washington to fight back. In the first quarter, cable and telecom companies spent $22 million on lobbying, ranking 11th by industry, according to the OpenSecrets website, run by the Center for Responsive Politics. While the spending did not increase from a year earlier, much of the money has gone toward fighting F. C. C. proposals like the rules, with nearly $2 million paid just to outside lobbyists in the first quarter to work against the proposal, according to federal disclosures. ATT, Comcast, Verizon and the N. C. T. A. are also practicing softer forms of lobbying — such as sponsoring studies and consultants who write articles — that cannot be easily traced, analysts and public interest groups like Free Press, which supports several broadband regulations, say. The industry’s focus has been on helping members of Congress write letters of opposition to the F. C. C. including the critical letter shown by Mr. Rush’s staff. The association said an employee contributed “minor suggestions” to the letter from Mr. Rush. Mr. Rush’s spokeswoman, Debra Johnson, said the N. C. T. A. edits “did not change the substance of the letter” and added that the congressman had a history of standing up for consumer protection issues. Some consultants for cable companies have also criticized the F. C. C. proposals. In March, Henry Waxman, a former Democratic congressman from California, wrote a harsh in The Hill slamming the plan, without disclosing that he was a consultant for Comcast and had business ties to the N. C. T. A. Mr. Waxman and other lawmakers who have been critical of the plan said they were not financially motivated to weigh in on the issue. “I don’t represent clients on issues I don’t believe in,” Mr. Waxman said. The cable industry has also responded with a new lobbying group, the Future of TV Coalition, which has been joined by media and movie companies as well as labor unions. The group was formed on the day the F. C. C. announced the proposal, with a website and statements from companies against the idea. So far, the organization has helped generate 300, 000 comments opposing the plan through a tool on its website that sends complaints directly to the F. C. C. Timothy Karr, a campaign director for Free Press, said, “There is a huge economy of cable lobbying that is in the dark. ” He added that “lawmakers and think tanks that come out on the side of cable say nothing is quid pro quo, but it’s hard to ignore the financial connections. ” Comcast and ATT declined to comment on their lobbying activities. The N. C. T. A. declined to comment specifically on lobbying but said the reform was widely unpopular and was also opposed by networks geared toward minority audiences as well as movie studios and labor unions. “We will continue to work with policy makers, companies, civic groups and other interested stakeholders on ideas to promote investment and innovation in today’s highly competitive marketplace for communications and media services,” said Brian Dietz, a spokesman for the association, which represents Comcast, Charter Communications and Cox Communications. The target of much of the cable industry’s ire is Tom Wheeler, chairman of the F. C. C. Mr. Wheeler has also been joined by President Obama, who endorsed the proposal in April. “The White House is intervening in order to direct an outcome that favors one company viewed by many as its political ally,” Mr. Cicconi of ATT said in a blog post at the time, in a reference to Google. Google declined to comment. The F. C. C. said its proposals were aimed at creating more competition in the broadband market and protecting consumers. “These proposals are technology neutral and do not target any one company or sector of the telecommunications industry,” said Kim Hart, a spokeswoman for the F. C. C. “Chairman Wheeler’s proposals are about one thing: promoting meaningful competition among service providers so that consumers can have meaningful choices. ” | 0 |
House Speaker Paul Ryan was put on the spot last night during CNN s town hall, when a Republican attendee asked him a question that most of us would love to know how can anyone, Republican or not, justify standing by Donald Trump after all the horrible things he s said and done?Student Zachary Marcone, who stressed that he himself was a Republican but would NOT be voting for Trump, confronted Ryan by pointing out Trump s bigotry. Marcone said: It concerns me when the Republican leadership is supporting somebody who s blatantly racist and has said Islamophobic statements, wants to shut down our borders. Can you tell me, how can you morally justify your support for this kind of candidate, somebody who could be very destructive to our country? Ryan couldn t actually give Marcone a moral justification for why he continued to support Trump even though he d condemned several of the Islamophobic things Trump has said in the past. Basically accepting Marcone s description of Trump as a racist Islamophobic candidate, Ryan s only response was that carrying out the Republican party s agenda was more important to him than protecting America. Ryan fired back with notable irritation in his voice: That basically means you re going to help elect Hillary Clinton. And I don t think Hillary Clinton s going to support any of the things that you stand for, if you re a Republican. So according to the Speaker of the House, subjecting America to a blatantly racist and Islamophobic idiot isn t as bad as having Clinton leading the country even though she is far more qualified to do so and Ryan admitted that several of Trump s proposals were wrong and don t reflect the view of fellow conservatives and Republicans. Ryan said: She represents a third Obama term. I don t think that s good for America; I think that s the wrong direction. So, yes, things have been said that I, too, disagree with. Then I ll make that point, then, but I m going to go fight for the principles and these solutions that I believe in. And the candidate that I think is so much more likely to put those into law, because I know Hillary Clinton won t do that. It is a binary choice. It is either Donald Trump or Hillary Clinton. You don t get a third option. It s one or the other and I know where I want to go. You can watch Ryan expose how much the GOP doesn t give a damn about America below:Featured image via screenshot | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday ruled that Republicans in North Carolina unlawfully took race into consideration when drawing congressional district boundaries, concentrating black voters in an improper bid to diminish their statewide political clout. The justices upheld a lower court’s February 2016 ruling that threw out two majority-black U.S. House of Representatives districts because Republican lawmakers improperly used race as a factor when redrawing the legislative map after the 2010 census. The decision came in one of a number of lawsuits accusing Republicans of taking steps at the state level to disenfranchise black and other minority voters who tend to back Democratic candidates. The justices found that the manner in which the North Carolina voting district boundaries were sketched violated the U.S. Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection under the law. The ruling may offer a roadmap for challenging similarly drawn districts nationwide. The justices unanimously upheld the lower court on one of the districts and split 5-3 on the other, with three conservatives dissenting. “The North Carolina Republican legislature tried to rig congressional elections by drawing unconstitutional districts that discriminated against African-Americans and that’s wrong,” said North Carolina Governor Roy Cooper, a Democrat took office in January. Critics accused Republicans of cramming black voters into what the NAACP civil rights group called “apartheid voting districts” to diminish their voting power and make surrounding districts more white and more likely to support Republicans. Both districts are held by the Democrats. Of North Carolina’s 13 representatives in the U.S. House, 10 are Republican. “I don’t know how any legislature can perform this task when the rules change constantly from case to case, often after the fact,” Robin Hayes, chairman of the state Republican Party, said of redistricting. Democrats have accused Republicans of taking a number of actions at the state level, also including laws imposing new requirements on voters such as presenting certain types of government-issued identification, in a bid to suppress the vote of minorities, the poor and others who generally favor Democratic candidates. Republicans have said the laws are needed to prevent voter fraud. Race can be considered in redrawing boundaries of voting districts only in certain instances, such as when states are seeking to comply with the federal Voting Rights Act. That law protects minority voters and was enacted to address a history of racial discrimination in voting, especially in Southern states. Eric Holder, who was U.S. attorney general under President Barack Obama and now heads the National Democratic Redistricting Committee, a group backing Democrats in redistricting fights, welcomed the decision. “Today’s ruling sends a stark message to legislatures and governors around the country: Racial gerrymandering is illegal and will be struck down in a court of law,” Holder said, referring to altering political boundaries to give a party an unfair advantage. The ruling was a rebuke to North Carolina Republicans but the districts in question have already been re-drawn. The new districts already have been challenged in court. The Supreme Court has never said legislative districts cannot be mapped based on plainly partisan aims like maximizing one party’s election chances. North Carolina Republicans said one of the two districts, called the 12th congressional district, was drawn on purely partisan grounds to benefit Republicans at the expense of Democrats, and the other was drawn to comply with the demands of the Voting Rights Act. The split among the justices was over the 12th district. Conservative Justice Samuel Alito wrote in dissent that the court should have followed an earlier precedent in which a previous version of the same district was challenged. “A precedent of this court should not be treated like a disposable household item — say a paper plate or a napkin — to be used once and then tossed in the trash,” Alito wrote. Writing for the court’s majority, liberal Justice Elena Kagan countered that evidence at trial “adequately supports the conclusion that race, not politics, accounted for the district’s reconfiguration.” Conservative Clarence Thomas, the court’s only black justice, joined Kagan’s ruling. Justice Neil Gorsuch, who had not yet joined the court when it heard arguments in the case in December, did not participate. The justices last week rebuffed a Republican bid to revive a strict North Carolina voter-identification law that a lower court found deliberately discriminated against black voters. The Supreme Court in 2013 struck down a key part of the Voting Rights Act in a ruling driven by its conservative justices. Since then it has faulted some Republican redistricting efforts for racial reasons. In 2015, the Supreme Court ruled that Alabama’s Republican-backed legislature improperly crammed black voters into certain districts. The justices on March 1 ordered a lower court to reassess whether Virginia’s Republican-led legislature unlawfully tried to dilute the power of black voters. The justices threw out the lower court’s decision upholding 12 state legislature districts. | 0 |
LONDON (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Theresa May has not yet set a date for the next stage in the passage of legislation to sever ties with the European Union, her spokesman said on Wednesday after the BBC reported it would not be until November, later than many had expected. The EU withdrawal bill, which seeks largely to copy and paste EU law into British legislation to ensure Britain has functioning laws and the same regulatory framework as the bloc at the moment of Brexit, is the next major hurdle for May. Weakened by a June election when she lost her governing Conservatives majority and an ill-fated party conference that failed to reset her agenda, May wants to steer the bill through both houses of parliament with as little difficulty as possible. But lawmakers have already proposed several amendments to the bill, including some to hand parliament a vote at the end of the negotiating process with the EU and others to reduce the amount of power the government gives itself to amend laws. Asked whether the government was planning to introduce the legislation into the so-called committee phase of its lengthy passage towards the statute book in November, her spokesman told reporters: We haven t yet confirmed a date for the bill at the committee stage. But the leader of the house will set out (next week s business) tomorrow, he added, referring to a weekly procedure when the government sets out its agenda, which may, or may not, include the EU withdrawal bill. Earlier, the BBC cited sources as saying it would not be introduced until after a parliamentary recess ends on Nov. 13. Sources in both the Conservative and opposition Labour parties expect the government to offer some concessions to avoid a defeat, amending powers which allow ministers to rewrite some laws without consulting parliament. Several Conservative lawmakers said they would not vote on any amendment that had been backed by opposition Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn. But the sheer number of amendments could slow the progress of a bill which the government says is essential to ease Britain s departure from the EU in March 2019 and give certainty to business. | 1 |
Another racist just found out the hard way that racism will result in unemployment.Pamela Taylor thought she could get away with insulting First Lady Michelle Obama without consequences.Last month, she posted a racist comparison of Melania Trump and Michelle Obama on Facebook that drew national and local outrage. It will be refreshing to have a classy, beautiful, dignified First Lady in the White House, Taylor wrote. I m tired of seeing an ape in heels. Taylor worked at the Clay County Development Corporation, a non-profit taxpayer funded organization that works with the state and local government, including Mayor Beverly Whaling, who replied to Taylor post by telling her it made my day. Comparing black people to apes, monkeys, or gorillas has been considered a racial slur for decades.Whaling remained silent in the wake of being caught supporting Taylor s racism. Taylor, on the other hand, claimed that criticizing her for being a racist is a hate crime, which did not improve her situation in the slightest.In fact, she was suspended from her job and Whaling resigned in disgrace.And then she was reinstated to the disbelief of many who thought that Taylor would rightfully be terminated since it s clear she can t do her job fairly because of her hatred of black people.But justice soon prevailed as Governor Earl Ray Tomblin s office released a statement announcing that Taylor was removed after the state reached an agreement with the nonprofit s board of directors. And so, Pamela Taylor no longer has a job, thus creating a job opening for someone who has stronger character and human decency.When will racists learn that what they say and write can be read by their employers? More recently, a firefighter in Michigan was fired for calling a black woman the N-word on Facebook after the remark was brought to the attention to the fire chief.Clearly, it is time for racists to slither back to the fringes of society where they belong. Some will undoubtedly whine that their freedom of speech is being attacked, but freedom of speech doesn t mean you can t be fired for saying something stupid, especially when what you say alienates and angers potential customers or opens your organization up to accusations of discrimination.So racists, beware. People on social media can see what you write, and if they can see it, your boss will end up seeing it, too.Featured Image: Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images | 1 |
BERLIN (Reuters) - Chancellor Angela Merkel s conservatives are rallying around her despite the failure of talks to form a three-way ruling coalition, buying her time in office and putting the onus on her Social Democrat rivals to break Germany s political impasse. Resolute conservative support for Merkel is significant, as some members of the Social Democratic Party (SPD) have said privately their price for a re-run of its grand coalition with the conservatives would be Merkel s head. The collapse late on Sunday of the coalition talks, which followed an inconclusive Sept. 24 election, has plunged Germany into the worst political crisis since the end of World War Two. President Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who is trying to broker a deal, is keenly aware the source of Germany s international clout is its economic power and that businesses want a stable coalition soon to end the uncertainty and avoid another poll. SPD leader Martin Schulz, whose party is the second biggest in Germany and was the junior coalition partner to Merkel s conservative bloc in the last parliament, has insisted the SPD should rebuild in opposition after heavy losses in September. But with Merkel secure for now at the helm of her Christian Democrats (CDU), the pressure shifts to the SPD to help form a coalition after the failure of the chancellor s three-way talks with the liberal Free Democrats (FDP) and Greens. Surveys suggest going to the polls again would deliver a similar outcome to September s result. Furthermore, 58 percent of voters want Merkel to remain chancellor, an Infratest Dimap poll for broadcaster ARD showed this week. While the SPD prevaricates, Merkel looks reasonable for trying to resolve the impasse. One thing is clear: Angela Merkel s position in the CDU is very strong. She is our Number One, David McAllister, a CDU executive committee member, told Reuters. Her party believes she did all she could to forge a three-way coalition. Merkel s efforts also improved ties with the CDU s Bavarian allies in the conservative bloc, the Christian Social Union (CSU), which had been strained over immigration. Another senior CDU official said there was no question of sacrificing Merkel as the party had no credible alternative. A third senior CDU official, Volker Kauder, leader of the conservative parliamentary group in the lower house of parliament, said he hoped the Social Democrats would change their minds about rejecting another grand coalition.[nL8N1NT1PP] Steinmeier is due to meet Schulz on Thursday at 1400 GMT as part of his efforts to help facilitate a coalition government and avoid more elections. Asked about the possibility of the SPD supporting a Merkel-led minority government or entering a new grand coalition, an SPD spokesman pointed to Schulz s meeting with Steinmeier and said, then we will see what comes afterwards . A former SPD leader, Steinmeier is meeting leaders from all parties in parliament this week and wants them to make agreement on a new government possible in the near future . Only after a new government has formed is Merkel s position likely to come under pressure - and even then, not immediately. Her mentor, Helmut Kohl, and Konrad Adenauer, who led Germany s rebirth after World War Two, are the only post-war chancellors to have ruled Germany longer than her. Merkel, 63, only decided to run again last November after thinking long and hard. She said then she was seeking to stay on if health allows . In 1998, she was quoted as saying: I don t want to be a half-dead wreck when I leave politics. She appears in robust health, but given she has already held power for 12 years, questions will inevitably arise about who will succeed her before she is half way through any new four-year term. Potential successors are not circling just yet. She will have probably a year or so after a government is formed before the question of her succession becomes an overwhelming issue in German domestic politics, said Jan Techau at the American Academy in Berlin. The moment that starts, her power will be greatly diminished. But first, Merkel must form a new government. If Steinmeier fails to convince the SPD to enter a new grand coalition, other options include a three-way coalition after all, a Merkel-led minority government, or new elections. Since snap elections won t change relative strengths, my prediction is ... another grand coalition between the only two parties that have learned to compromise, said Josef Joffe, publisher-editor of weekly Die Zeit. Bild newspaper reported on Wednesday that some SPD deputies were now questioning their party s rejection of a renewed grand coalition. [nL8N1NS1PN] Changing course and teaming up with Merkel again may require a change of leadership at the SPD and there could yet be a shake out at a party conference in early December. The pressure needs to build up within the Social Democratic party, said Techau. He said Merkel should focus on being a responsible caretaker chancellor until a new government forms. She just needs to play her own game well and then she can survive. | 1 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama’s fiscal 2017 budget will call for an 11 percent increase in funding for the Securities and Exchange Commission and a 32 percent increase for the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, a White House official said on Monday. Obama will propose that the SEC be given $1.8 billion and the CFTC $330 million in the budget, economic adviser Jeffrey Zients said in a blog post on the White House website. “Last year the Administration fought hard to keep Congressional Republicans from using must-pass budget legislation to roll back Wall Street Reform,” he wrote, referring to fiscal 2016. “We also fought to increase funding for financial regulators and to maintain their independence. But even these gains aren’t enough.” “And while the Administration is pushing for more funding for these regulators, we’ll also continue to oppose efforts to restrict the funding independence of the other financial regulators, including the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau,” he wrote. The Republican-controlled Congress is likely to oppose these and many other proposals in Obama’s budget. In addition to the proposed increases from the previous fiscal year, the budget will offer support again for user fees to fund the CFTC in a similar way to other financial regulators, Zients said. “Fee funding would shift the costs of regulatory services provided by the CFTC from the taxpayer to the very firms that benefit from the CFTC’s oversight. This is a commonsense change that is long overdue,” he said. The budget would also take steps to reduce risk in the financial sector by assessing a fee against large financial institutions based on their liabilities. “We learned the hard way in 2008 just how damaging risk and leverage in the financial system can be, and we’ve done a lot to curb excessive risk on Wall Street since,” Zients said, referring to the global financial crisis. “This fee is another way to further those reforms, ensuring that taxpayers aren’t on the hook for risky Wall Street gambles.” Federal fiscal 2017 begins on Oct. 1 of this year. | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Senate Armed Services Committee backed the nomination of Eric Fanning to be secretary of the U.S. Army on Thursday and forwarded the recommendation to the full Senate for a final vote. Fanning, who previously worked as undersecretary of the Air Force and chief of staff to Defense Secretary Ash Carter, would be the first openly gay leader of a U.S. military service branch if his nomination is approved by the full Senate. | 1 |
JAKARTA (Reuters) - Hardline Muslim groups in Indonesia burned photos of U.S. President Donald Trump, as well as U.S. and Israeli flags, on Monday during a protest outside the U.S. embassy against Trump s decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel. Indonesia, home to the world s largest Muslim population, has joined a global chorus of condemnation of Trump s controversial move on Israel, which they say threatens security and stability in the Middle East and the world. The status of Jerusalem, a city holy to Jews, Muslims and Christians, is one of the thorniest barriers to a lasting Israeli-Palestinian peace. Jerusalem s eastern sector was captured by Israel in a 1967 war and annexed in a move not recognized internationally. Palestinians claim East Jerusalem for the capital of an independent state that they seek, while Israel maintains that all of Jerusalem is its capital. Hundreds attended the protest outside the U.S. embassy in Jakarta, which was barricaded by barbed wire and dozens of police officers. Let us witness the destruction of Israel s hegemony, one protest leader shouted into a megaphone as protesters burned an Israeli flag. We will support Palestine with our blood. Many protesters waved Palestinian flags and carried banners supporting intifada , or an uprising against Israel, and rally leaders also shouted anti-Semitic slogans. The protest was led by the Islamic Defenders Front, an aggressive vigilante group that calls for sharia, or Islamic religious law, to be imposed in Indonesia, a secular country. The demonstration followed a much larger protest at the weekend, where thousands called for diplomatic relations with the United States to be severed and for the U.S. ambassador to be expelled. Indonesia supports a two-state solution in the Israel-Palestine conflict. | 0 |
One of the countries Mooch and her taxpayer funded mom and daughters will be visiting was devastated by Ebola less than two years ago. I m sure the first thing on their minds (after wondering where their next meal will come from or if they ll live past the age of 15 years) is gender inequality! Way to waste hundreds of thousands of taxpayer dollars that could be spent to help unemployed Americans find jobs or to improve the health care for veterans. Actresses Meryl Streep and Frieda Pinto are set to join First Lady Michelle Obama and First Daughters Sasha and Malia Obama for a trip to Liberia and Morocco in late June to promote the White House s Let Girls Learn female education initiative. The First Family who will also be joined by Obama s mother, Mrs. Marian Robinson will visit Margibi County, Liberia, Marrakech, Morroco and Madrid, Spain from June 27 July 1, according to a White House press release.Pinto, 31, perhaps best known for her role in the Oscar-winning film Slumdog Millionaire, will join Michelle Obama at a school in Unification Town in Liberia on June 27 to meet with young girls to discuss the obstacles they face in attaining an education. Pinto will moderate the discussion, and the pair will be joined by Liberian President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf.Obama is also scheduled to visit a Peace Corps training facility in Kakata while in Liberia.The following day, Streep will join Obama and Pinto in Morocco for a discussion centered on girls education moderated by CNN s Isha Sesay. On the final day of the trip, Obama will visit Madrid to deliver a speech highlighting the White House s Let Girls Learn initiative. The First Lady will also meet Queen Letizia while in Spain.According to a rough cost estimate of the trip conducted by the Daily Mail, the First Family s overseas visit could cost as much as $300,000 in taxpayer funds for airfare alone. The outlet reports that the First Lady s plane generally costs $11,684 per hour to operate; with roughly 25 hours of flight time scheduled, the airfare alone could come out to just under $300,000.The Mail notes that the First Lady s 2011 trip to Botswana and South Africa cost $424,142 in travel and plane crew fees.The three-country trip in late June could be Michelle Obama s final overseas trip as First Lady, as President Obama has just seven months left in office.Streep and Michelle Obama have teamed up to discuss gender equality before; in 2015, the pair gave a joint interview to More magazine in which the Oscar-winning actress said that women in America have not yet reached full equality with men.- BreitbartHas anyone else ever noticed how carefully Marian Robinson is covered up in all of the 5-star vacation photos that are taken by the mainstream media? It s almost as if they don t want the American taxpayer to see that we re footing the bill for her to accompany her greedy daughter and ungrateful grandchildren on their 5-star vacations. Can you spot Granny above? | 1 |
Thierry Meyssan Voltaire NetIt is a scandal without precedent.The White House Secretary General, Reince Priebus, was part of the plot designed to destabilise President Trump and prepare for his destitution. He was the source of daily leaks which trouble the political life of the United States, in particular those concerning the alleged collusion between Trump s team and the Kremlin [1]. By dismissing him, President Trump has entered into conflict with the establishment of the Republican party, of which Priebus is the ex-President.Let s note as we go that none of these leaks concerning the agendas and the contacts between those concerned have provided the slightest proof of the allegations made.The reorganisation of the Trump team which followed was exclusively to the detriment of Republican personalities and to the benefit of the military personnel who are opposed to the guardianship of the deep state. The alliance which was concluded making the best of a difficult situation by the Republican party with Donald Trump during the inaugural convention on 21 July 2016, is now worthless. We therefore find ourselves faced with the equation with which we started one one side, the outsider President of the People s America , and on the other, all of the Washington ruling class supported by the deep state (meaning that part of the administration charged with the continuity of the state over and above political alternances).It is apparent that this coalition is supported by the United Kingdom and Isra l.So what had to happen happened the Democrat and Republican leaders came to an agreement to thwart President Trump s foreign policy and preserve their imperial advantages.To do so, they adopted, in Congress, a 70-page law which officially set up sanctions against North Korea, Iran and Russia [2]. The text unilaterally promulgates that all other states in the world must respect these commercial restrictions. The sanctions therefore apply equally to the European Union and to China as to the states officially targeted.Only five parlementarians dissociated themselves from this coalition and voted against the law representatives Justin Amash, Tom Massie and Jimmy Duncan, and senators Rand Paul and Bernie Sanders.The dispositions of this law more or less forbid the Executive to ease these commercial interdictions by any means whatsoever. Theoretically, therefore, Donald Trump is tied hands and feet. Of course, he can use his veto, but according to the Constitution, it would be enough for Congress to revote the text in the same terms in order to be able to impose it on the President. He will therefore sign it, thus avoiding the insult of being called to order by Congress. In the next few days, we shall see the start of a war unlike any other.The political parties of the United States have every intention of destroying the Trump doctrine , according to which the United States must evolve faster than other states in order to conserve world leadership. On the contrary, they intend to re-establish the Wolfowitz doctrine of 1992, according to which Washington must conserve its advance over the rest of the world by hindering the development of all potential competitors [3].Paul Wolfowitz is a Trotskyist who worked for Republican President Bush the Elder to help with the war against Russia. He became Assistant Secretary of Defense ten years later, under Bush Junior, and then President of the World Bank. Last year, he gave his support to Democrat Hillary Clinton. In 1992, he wrote that the most dangerous competitor of the United States was the European Union, and that Washington should destroy it politically, even economically.The law casts doubt on everything that Donald Trump has accomplished over the last six months, notably the fight against the Muslim Brotherhood and their jihadist organisations, the preparation of the independence of Donbass (Malorossiya), and the re-opening of the Silk Road.As a first reprisal, Russia asked Washington to reduce the staff of its embassy in Moscow to the level of its own embassy in Washington, in other words, 455 people, expelling 755 diplomats. In this way, Moscow intends to remind us that even if it had interfered in US politics, their interference has no comparison to the importance of US interference in Russia s own political life.While we are on this subject, it was only on 27 February that the Minister for Defence, Serge Cho gou, announced to the Douma that the Russian armies now have the capability to organise colour revolutions , 28 years behind the United States.The Europeans now realise with stupefaction that their friends in Washington (the Democrats Obama and Clinton, the Republicans McCain and McConnell) have just put a full stop to any hope of growth within the Union. This is certainly a nasty shock, and yet they still have not felt able to admit that the allegedly unpredictable Donald Trump is in reality their best ally. Completely stunned by the vote, which rained on their summer holidays, the Europeans have opted for the on hold position.Unless they react immediately, the companies who have invested in the European Union s solution for their energy supply are now ruined. Wintershall, E.ON Ruhrgas, N. V. Nederlandse Gasunie, and Engie (ex-GDF Suez) had all committed to the doubling of the gas pipeline North Stream, which is now forbidden by Congress. They not only forfeit the right to respond to US calls for tender, but they also lose all their assets in the United States. They are refused entry to international banks and are forbidden to pursue their activities outside the Union.For the moment, only the German government has expressed its confusion. We do not know whether they will be able to convince their European partners and rouse the Union against its US suzerain.Such a crisis has never arisen before, and as a result, there exists no element of reference which could enable us to anticipate what is to come. It is probable that certain of the member states of the Union will defend US interests those who think according to Congress, against their European partners.The United States, like any state, can forbid their companies to do business with foreign states and foreign companies to do business with them. But according to the Charter of the United Nations, they may not impose their own choices in terms of allies and partners. But this is what they have been doing since their sanctions against Cuba. At that time, under the influence of Fidel Castro who was not a Communist the Cuban Revolutionary Government launched an agrarian reform which Washington chose to oppose [4]. The members of NATO, who couldn t have cared less about that tiny Caribbean island, followed obediently along. Progressively, the West, full of itself, considered it normal to starve out any states which resisted their all-powerful suzerain. So here, for the first time, the European Union is affected by the system which it helped set up.More than ever, the conflict between Trump and the Establishment takes on a cultural form. It opposes the descendants of the immigrants who came seeking the American dream to those of the Puritans of the Mayflower [5]. This, for example, is the root of the denunciation by the international Presse of the vulgar language used by the new man responsible for White House communications, Anthony Scaramucci. Until now Hollywood was perfectly at ease with the manners of New York businessmen, but suddenly this uncouth language is presented as incompatible with the exercise of Power. Only President Richard Nixon talked that way, and he was forced to resign by the FBI who organised the Watergate scandal to bring him down. Nonetheless, everyone now agrees that he was a great President, who put an end to the Vietnam War and rebalanced international relations with the Peoples Republic of China, faced with the USSR. It is surprising to see the Press of old Europe take up the religious, Puritan argument against the vocabulary of Scaramucci in order to judge the political competence of Donald Trump s team; and President Trump himself would send him away barely appointed.But behind what may seem to be no more than a class struggle, the future of the world is at stake. Either relations steeped in confrontation and domination, or cooperation and development.Translation Pete Kimberley***FOOTNOTES:[1] State Secrets : How an Avalanche of Media Leaks is Harming National Security , Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, July 6, 2017.[2] H.R.3364 Countering America s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act[3] US Strategy Plan Calls For Insuring No Rivals Develop , Patrick E. Tyler, New York Times, March 8, 1992. The daily NYT also publishes large extracts from Wolfowitz s secret report on page 14 : Excerpts from Pentagon s Plan : Prevent the Re-Emergence of a New Rival . Further information is provided in Keeping the US First, Pentagon Would preclude a Rival Superpower Barton Gellman, The Washington Post, March 11, 1992.[4] The Biggest Theft Committed by One Sovereign State against Another , by Jorge Wejebe Cobo, Translation Anoosha Boralessa, Cuban Agency News , Voltaire Network, 21 July 2017.[5] United States reformation or fracture? , by Thierry Meyssan, Translation Pete Kimberley, Voltaire Network, 26 October 2016.READ MORE RUSSIA NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire Russia FilesSUPPORT OUR WORK BY SUBSCRIBING & BECOMING A MEMBER @21WIRE.TV | 1 |
«La colección más completa de objetos de la actriz»
★★★
El Patronato de Preservación de la Imagen de Lydia Bosch ha abierto este museo en la misma casa que Lydia compartió con su primer novio, Chema, de 1983 a 1984. La exposición cuenta con el traje que Bosch llevaba cuando era azafata del “Un, dos, tres…” (así como un pañuelo con lágrimas de su primera bronca de Chicho Ibáñez Serrador), comida que robó de la cocina de “Médico de familia” y todo el papeleo de su divorcio de Miki Molina. Mi hija me comentó que el lavabo de chicas también era una metáfora de la carrera de Lydia, ya que fue incapaz de encontrar ningún tipo de papel.
FRANCISCO MÉNDEZ «Barcelona no es sólo playa»
★★★★
Algo alejado del centro (una agradable caminata de 126 horas, o 124 a paso ligero), Madrid es un barrio que bien merece una visita aparte. Con la masificación turística, muchos ciudadanos han optado por mudarse a las afueras. Me sorprendió que no llegara el metro, quizá por ello Madrid sigue siendo uno de esos barrios por descubrir. Sus callejones estrechos, como La Castellana; sus jardincillos como El Retiro, o su propio Chinatown: Lavapiés. No olvide probar las joyas culinarias catalanas como el calçot circular (conocido como porras), el pantumaca (bocadillo de calamares) o los panellets (cemento armado con piñones por encima).
JOAQUINA VISCOCHÉ | 1 |
Dr. David Duke and Prof. Kevin MacDonald on Duke’s overwhelming victory in the debate November 3, 2016 at 10:24 am
Dr. David Duke and Prof. Kevin MacDonald on Duke’s overwhelming victory in the debate
Today Dr. Duke talked about his senatorial debate last night, including the attempt by Black Lives Matter activists to attack him and his police escort and the so-called moderator debating with him. Despite him being the target of attacks from all sides, Dr. Duke was judged the winner by 95% of the respondents to the NBC on-line poll.
Professor Kevin MacDonald then joined the show and talked about the significance of the debate and the election. This is an amazing show that you don’t want to miss.
Our show is aired live at 11 am replayed at ET 4pm Eastern and 4am Eastern.
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And please spread this message to others. | 1 |
ERBIL, Iraq (Reuters) - The Iraqi government asked the autonomous Kurdish region on Sunday to hand over international border posts and its international airports, retaliating to a Kurdish independence referendum to be held on Monday in northern Iraq. It also asked the foreign countries to stop oil trading with the Kurdish region and to deal with the central government in regards to airports and borders, said a statement published by Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi s office. | 0 |
PARIS (Reuters) - French far-right leader Marine Le Pen congratulated the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) party on its breakthrough result in Sunday s German parliamentary election. Bravo to our AfD allies for this historic showing! It is a new sign that the people of Europe are waking up, tweeted Le Pen, the leader of France s National Front who reached the run-off of the French presidential election in May. According to early projections, the AfD was set not only to enter the national parliament for the first time, but to become Germany s third-biggest party with 13.5 percent. It is the first time that the far-right has been represented in the parliament for more than half a century. | 1 |
GENEVA (Reuters) - In a thinly veiled reference to U.S. President Donald Trump, the top U.N. human rights official on Thursday condemned populists who spread hatred through tweets . Britain criticised Trump on Wednesday after he retweeted anti-Islam videos originally posted by a leader of a far-right British fringe party who was convicted this month of abusing a Muslim woman. There are the populists political hooligans who through their incitement which is the equivalent of hurling racist insults, throwing bottles onto the field, attacking the referee and, as we saw yesterday, spreading hatred through tweets seek to scramble our order, our laws, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Zeid Ra ad Al Hussein said in a speech in Geneva. A U.N. official, who declined to be identified, said that Zeid s remarks were clearly a reference to Trump tweets but also others using social media in this way . (Refiles to add dropped full name of official) | 1 |
WASHINGTON — Former Senator Bob Dole, acting as a foreign agent for the government of Taiwan, worked behind the scenes over the past six months to establish contact between Taiwanese officials and Donald J. Trump’s staff, an outreach effort that culminated last week in an unorthodox telephone call between Mr. Trump and Taiwan’s president. Mr. Dole, a lobbyist with the Washington law firm Alston Bird, coordinated with Mr. Trump’s campaign and the transition team to set up a series of meetings between Mr. Trump’s advisers and officials in Taiwan, according to disclosure documents filed last week with the Justice Department. Mr. Dole also assisted in successful efforts by Taiwan to include language favorable to it in the Republican Party platform, according to the documents. Mr. Dole’s firm received $140, 000 from May to October for the work, the forms said. The disclosures suggest that Trump’s decision to take a call from the president of Taiwan, Tsai was less a diplomatic gaffe and more the result of a plan by Taiwan to use the election of a new president to deepen its relationship with the United States — with an assist from a seasoned lobbyist well versed in the machinery of Washington. “They’re very optimistic,” Mr. Dole said of the Taiwanese in an interview on Tuesday. “They see a new president, a Republican, and they’d like to develop a closer relationship. ” The United States’ One China policy is nearly four decades old, Mr. Dole said, referring to the policy established in 1979 that denies Taiwan official diplomatic recognition but maintains close contacts, promoting Taiwan’s democracy and selling it advanced military equipment. The phone call between Mr. Trump and Ms. Tsai was a striking break from nearly four decades of diplomatic practice and threatened to precipitate a major rift with China, which admonished Mr. Trump in a editorial in the overseas edition of People’s Daily. The disclosure documents were submitted before the call took place and made no mention of it. But Mr. Dole, 93, a former Senate majority leader from Kansas, said he had worked with transition officials to facilitate the conversation. “It’s fair to say that we had some influence,” he said. “When you represent a client and they make requests, you’re supposed to respond. ” Officials on Mr. Trump’s transition team did not respond to requests for comment. The documents suggest that Mr. Dole helped the government of Taiwan establish early access to Mr. Trump’s inner circle during the campaign, when Mr. Dole worked to involve Mr. Trump’s aides in a United States delegation to Taiwan and to facilitate a Taiwanese delegation to the Republican National Convention in Cleveland in July. The effort has continued in the weeks since the election, with Mr. Dole on Tuesday saying he was trying to fulfill a request from a special envoy from Taiwan who was visiting Washington to see Reince Priebus, tapped by Mr. Trump to be White House chief of staff, and Newt Gingrich, who is close to the . (The Priebus meeting, Mr. Dole said, would most likely have to wait until Mr. Trump is inaugurated.) Mr. Dole, the only former Republican presidential nominee to endorse Mr. Trump, arranged a meeting between Senator Jeff Sessions, Republican of Alabama, whom Mr. Trump has chosen to be his attorney general, and Stanley Kao, Taiwan’s envoy to the United States, and convened a meeting between Taiwanese officials and Mr. Trump’s transition team, the documents say. Mr. Dole, who said he first took an interest in Taiwan as a senator when Congress was considering the 1979 Taiwan Relations Act that established the current policy, has lobbied for the Taiwanese government for nearly two decades. In a letter in January, Mr. Dole laid out the terms of his agreement to represent the Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office in the United States, Taiwan’s unofficial embassy, including a $25, 000 monthly retainer. That letter and the document detailing Mr. Dole’s work for the Taiwanese were filed at the Justice Department, which requires foreign agents to register and detail their efforts at influencing the United States government. Among his duties, the letter said, were helping Taiwan achieve its “military goals” and obtain membership in the Partnership, the trade deal that Mr. Trump has promised to withdraw from. Mr. Dole was also to arrange for Taiwanese officials to meet with members of Congress from both parties and arrange access to Republican presidential contenders and to the party’s national convention. The government of Taiwan has retained a powerful bipartisan constellation of former members of Congress to promote its interests in Washington. Richard A. Gephardt, a Missouri Democrat and former House majority leader, also signed a $ contract to represent the Taipei office this year, as did Thomas A. Daschle, Democrat of South Dakota, a former Senate majority leader, in 2015. Mr. Trump’s transition team has sent mixed messages about the call with Ms. Tsai, whether it was meant as a mere gesture of good will or a provocation aimed at drawing Taiwan closer to the United States as a way of challenging China, which considers Taiwan a breakaway province. Vice Mike Pence suggested in the days after the call that Mr. Trump had merely been affording a courtesy to another “democratically elected leader. ” But in a series of Twitter posts on Sunday, Mr. Trump suggested a more confrontational motive, criticizing China for unfair trade practices and aggressive military moves. “Did China ask us if it was OK” to take such actions, Mr. Trump asked rhetorically, appearing to counter suggestions that the United States must ask Beijing’s permission to communicate with Taiwan. Several senior advisers to Mr. Trump have long advocated stronger United States support for Taiwan, arguing that it would help to counterbalance Beijing’s influence. Alexander Grey and Peter Navarro, Trump transition advisers, wrote an article last month in Foreign Policy branding the Obama administration’s treatment of Taiwan “egregious. ” Over the weekend, Taiwan’s official Central News Agency said that Edward J. Feulner, a member of Mr. Trump’s transition team and the former president of the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank that supports stronger ties with Taiwan, had played a crucial role in bringing about the call with Mr. Trump. Mr. Feulner met with Ms. Tsai in Taiwan in October. Even before the phone call, Taiwan had succeeded in accomplishing important goals with Mr. Trump’s team. At their convention in Cleveland in July, Republicans adopted a platform that for the first time enshrined the “six assurances” to Taiwan made by President Ronald Reagan in 1982, including that the United States would not set a date for ending arms sales to the Taiwanese. | 0 |
Republican front runner Donald Trump has ignited a media sh*tstorm with his recent comments about abortion. On Wednesday, the GOP candidate decided to announce that women seeking abortions should be punished during an interview with MSNBC host Chris Matthews. Although he later tried to furiously backpedal in a pathetic attempt to control the damage and bad press, it was too late. Trump is being blasted left and right, and now his supporters are rallying around him and going nuts trying to defend their misogynistic, sexist idol. Of course, they re more than willing to place the blame on everyone and everything but the business mogul.One of Trump s devout defenders is political commentator Scottie Nell Hughes, who went on CNN on Thursday night to blame liberal media for using abortion as a trap to trick The Donald into saying something stupid (not that he needs any help). In an interview with Wolf Blitzer, Hughes claimed that Trump had further clarified his statement about a punishment for women who got abortions, but Blitzer was ready to call her out. He reminded her that Trump had completely flip-flopped when he said, No, it was a real reversal. Hughes replied: The one thing we have learned is that the liberal mainstream media that have been anti-Republican and anti-conservatives for so long use the issue of the pro-life/pro-choice abortion issue to trap Republicans, because there s usually no way to win. Making a not-so-subtle jab at Trump s blatantly obvious inexperience as a politician, Blitzer pointed out that Trump should have been prepared to answer questions about abortion. Hughes remained in denial and completely dismissed that valid point, calling Matthews inquiries on abortion hypothetical gotcha questions. Hughes said that at the end of the day, all that matters is that Trump claims he s pro-life (which is yet another thing he s flip-flopped on over the years). She said, What more do you need to know ?You can watch the interview below: Featured image via Getty Images / Scott Olson | 1 |
MIAMI -- Fighting for Florida and beyond, Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders tangled in an intense debate Wednesday night over who's the true friend of American Hispanics, trading accusations over guest worker programs "akin to slavery" and the embracing of "vigilantes" against immigrants.
They had even worse things to say about Republican front-runner Donald Trump.
Facing off just six days before Florida gives its verdict on the presidential race, Clinton faulted Sanders for repeatedly voting against a 2007 comprehensive immigration reform bill; he faulted her for opposing a 2007 effort to let people who were in the country illegally obtain driver's licenses.
Had the immigration package passed back then, Clinton said, "a lot of the issues we are still discussing today would be in the rearview mirror."
Sanders retorted that he opposed the legislation because it included a guest worker program "akin to slavery."
The debate opened with a question that appeared to startle Clinton.
Univision's Jorge Ramos asked her if she would drop out of the race if indicted over the handling of her email while secretary of state.
"Oh for goodness, that is not going to happen," Clinton declared. "I'm not even answering that question."
The FBI is investigation the possibility of mishandling of sensitive information that passed through Clinton's private email server.
Sanders, as he has in the past, declined to bite on the issue, saying, "The process will take its course." He said he'd rather talk about the issues of wealth and income inequality.
Both candidates were bedding for momentum after Sanders startled Clinton with an upset victory in Michigan on Tuesday.
Clinton stressed that she has a strong lead in the delegates, declaring, "This is a marathon, and it is a marathon that can only be carried by the kind of campaign I am running."
Sanders said his Michigan surprise was evidence that his message is resonating.
"We are going to continue to do extremely well," he said, adding that he expects to convince superdelegates who are backing Clinton to switch to his column.
Immigration commanded considerable attention for good reason: Florida is home to nearly 1.8 million Hispanics, including about 15 percent of the state's Democrats.
Hispanic voters have made up about 10 percent of voters in the Democratic primaries so far this year, and Clinton has been getting about two-thirds of their votes to about one-third for Sanders. The Vermont senator, for his part, stresses that he's making progress on winning over younger Hispanics.
Clinton at one point accused Sanders of supporting legislation that would have led to indefinite detention of people facing deportation, and for standing with Minutemen vigilantes. He called that notion "ridiculous" and "absurd," and accused Clinton of picking small pieces out of big legislative packages to distort his voting record.
"No, I do not support vigilantes and that is a horrific statement and an unfair statement to make," he said, adding: "I will match my record against yours any day of the week."
For all the disagreements, the overall tone of the candidates was considerably less tense than their Sunday faceoff. Sanders even paused at one point to make fun of his own pronunciation of "huge" as "yuge."
Both found agreement in pointing to GOP front-runner Trump as markedly worse on immigration than either of them.
Clinton mocked the Trump's plan for a wall on the Mexican border, saying he'd build "the most beautiful tall wall, better than the great wall of China" to be "magically" paid for by Mexico. That, she said, is a fantasy.
Sanders largely agreed, adding his hope that in the immigration debate "we do not, as Donald Trump and others have done, resort to racism and xenophobia and bigotry."
The candidates squared off soon after a testy debate in Michigan on Sunday in which they argued about trade and economic issues of particular interest in the industrial Midwest.
With Missouri, Illinois, Ohio among the states that will be voting on Tuesday, the candidates returned to a pointed matter they'd already argued about three days earlier, scuffling over Sanders' vote against 2009 legislation that bailed out the auto industry, among others. Sanders said he opposed the bill because it also bailed out big banks that had fueled the recession to begin with. Clinton stressed she'd made a different judgment to side with the automakers.
Overall, 691 delegates are at stake on Tuesday, including 99 in Florida, which awards all its delegates to the winner rather than dividing them up proportionately..
Clinton has won 762 pledged delegates compared to 549 for Sanders, with 10 delegates from recent primaries still to be allocated. When superdelegates are included, Clinton leads 1,223 to 574, more than halfway to the 2,383 needed to win the Democratic nomination.
___
Benac reported from Washington. AP Writers Sergio Bustos and Ken Thomas in Miami, and Hope Yen in Washington contributed to this report.
(Copyright 2016 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed).
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Hello America Are we awake yet?AUSTIN, Texas Texas Sheriffs, the Lieutenant Governor, and experts in immigration related issues met at the State Capitol on Wednesday to discuss the federal government s creation of a sanctuary state for criminal aliens through its Priority Enforcement Program (PEP).Jackson County Sheriff Aj (Andy) Louderback, immediate past president of the Sheriff s Association of Texas, told Breitbart Texas that the federal government s PEP program has created a sanctuary state for criminal aliens because it has gutted the immigration system. A press conference was held on the crisis facing Texas that was created by the new immigration policies of the federal government. The sheriffs complained that aliens are being brought into the criminal justice system in Texas but are being released into the community because of the federal policies.In the past, ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) could place a 48-hour hold on illegal immigrants when they were wanted on immigration related issues. The PEP program replaced the U.S. Department of Homeland Security s (DHS) Secure Communities plan and now that is no longer possible.The policy was released by Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson in November, 2014. In January, the program went into effect and Breitbart Texas Managing Director Brandon Darby exclusively reported leaked training documents detailing how the program would be implemented. Darby dubbed the program, Catch and Release 2.0. Breitbart Texas has reported many examples of criminal illegal aliens who have been previously deported many times only to come back and commit even more serious crimes.In July, Breitbart California s Michelle Moons reported on the murder of Katheryn Steinle. She was killed by an illegal alien who was released by the San Francisco sheriff despite an ICE detainer in effect. Her killer had been deported several times.The same week as Steinle s murder, Darby reported on the murder in Laredo, Texas, of a woman who was killed by her criminal illegal alien husband. He had been deported four times. Despite numerous domestic violence calls to the Laredo Police Department, he was allowed to remain in Laredo until he finally killed her.There have been many other such reports in the past month about violent criminal illegal aliens who commit more heinous crimes after returning from being deported.The lieutenant governor, Texas sheriffs, and the director of policy studies for the Center for Immigration Studies spoke at the press conference in Austin, Texas. Their message the federal government has placed the public in danger through its policies, and these policies have essentially tied the hands of Texas law enforcement.Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick (speaking) joined Sheriff Aj Louderback; Chambers County Sheriff Brian Hawthorne; Victoria County Sheriff Michael O Conner, and Jessica Vaughan, Director of Policy Studies for the Center for Immigration Studies. (Photo: Breitbart Texas/Lana Shadwick)Sheriff Louderback told Breitbart Texas, This federal program (PEP) replaced a Congress-mandated program and replaced it with a program that now prioritizes criminal behavior and is excluding thousands of criminal aliens. He says the program is forcing Texas sheriffs to sometimes release even violent offenders.Louderback said that criminal aliens know that law enforcement officials in Texas have their hands tied because of these new federal policies. They know they can come into the country illegally and stay here with impunity.He said illegal aliens cannot be held until after there is a final conviction. He said, These criminals bond out and disappear into the country. These policies, say the immediate past sheriff s association president, mean that local jurisdictions have to deal with the costs. Victoria County Sheriff Michael O Connor said criminal aliens are traversing over the border and coming in throughout the country. He said that the sheriffs intend to connect, communicate, and collaborate with community stakeholders to deal with the problem.Victoria County, Texas, is located about halfway between Houston and the Mexico/Texas border. He said his county is a fatal tunnel between Harris County and the rest of the U.S. Sheriff Hawthorne told Breitbart Texas, This is about a secure community program. He said in 2008, law enforcement were able to do that. He said, PEP is, and will be, a failure by this [federal] administration. Lt. Gov. Patrick promised that the senate would pass legislation to deal with the problems of sanctuary cities in the next legislative session. He said that he was confident that the senate now has the votes to deal with this issue. Sanctuary cities legislation was a contentious topic in the senate this past session.Via: Breitbart News | 1 |
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqi forces removed on Monday the Kurdish flag that was hoisted on the governorate building in April next to an Iraqi flag, said residents, adding that only the Iraqi flag was flying. A U.S.-trained Iraqi elite unit took control of the governorate building earlier in the day, meeting no opposition from Kurdish forces deployed in the city. They were welcomed by cheering crowds of Turkmen residents of the city who drove around in convoy firing, sometimes burst of gunfire into the air to celebrate the Iraqi military operation launched in the early hours of Monday to take control of Kurdish-held positions in the oil-rich region. | 0 |
A heartbroken nation’s tension turned to mourning Thursday afternoon as news broke that the suspected gunman in an attack on a Charleston, South Carolina, church had been arrested, and the identities of his nine victims were released.
Dylann Roof, 21, allegedly entered the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church during a weekly Bible study meeting and opened fire around 9 p.m. Wednesday. Eight people were found shot to death at the scene, police said. Two others were transported to a hospital, where one later died.
In a statement at the White House, President Barack Obama mourned the victims and lamented the steady stream of mass shootings he has had to address while in office. "Once again, innocent people were killed in part because someone who wanted to inflict harm had no trouble getting their hands on a gun," he said. "At some point, we as a country will have to reckon with the fact that this type of mass violence doesn’t happen in other countries."
“The only reason someone could walk into a church and shoot people praying is out of hate,” said Charleston Mayor Joe Riley at a news conference. “It is the most dastardly act that one could possibly imagine.”
According to Mullen, the suspect sat in the church with other attendees for about an hour before he began firing. In an interview with NBC, a cousin of Pinckney said she spoke with a survivor, who reported that the suspect had reloaded his gun five times. When the survivor's son tried to talk him out of shooting more, he reportedly replied, "'I have to do it. You rape our women and you're taking over our country. And you have to go.'"
Cornell William Brooks, the president and CEO of the NAACP as well as an African Methodist Episcopal minister, released a statement on Thursday in which he expressed outrage about the "mass hate crime."
"The senselessly slain parishioners were in a church for Wednesday night Bible study," Brooks stated. "There is no greater coward than a criminal who enters a house of God and slaughters innocent people engaged in the study of scripture."
South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (R) urged people to pray for the victims and their families. “While we do not yet know all of the details, we do know that we’ll never understand what motivates anyone to enter one of our places of worship and take the life of another,” she said. “Please join us in lifting up the victims and their families with our love and prayers.”
Worshippers and other community members gathered Thursday to mourn and pray throughout a town so known for its churches that it's often referred to as "Holy City."
The historic black church, commonly referred to as "Mother Emanuel," has "one of the largest and oldest black congregations south of Baltimore, Maryland," according to the church's website. One of the church's founding members was Denmark Vesey, who organized a slave uprising that started in 1821. Civil rights leaders also visited the church during the 1960s. | 1 |
When you think of civil rights activists, it s not likely that Glenn Beck will ever enter your conscious, except perhaps as a cautionary tale. It does seem, though, that he s had a moment of clarity, even an epiphany. The man who has played a large part in demonizing Black Lives Matter finally gets it. At least he gets part of it. He gets why All Lives Matter is a really bad response.In the past, Beck has been especially critical of Black Lives Matter, who he accused of inciting terrorism. Beck s comments were sparked by discussion over Black Lives Matter protesters recent invasion of a Dartmouth College library, where the activists harassed white students, calling one girl a filthy white bitch. They are terrorizing you, Beck said of the incident. What do you think that is when when one of the girls, who supported Black Lives Matter at Dartmouth. And she was in the library, and she was studying. And they pulled her out of her seat. She started crying. Beck said filling people with fear is the first step to terrorism. I think we need to start calling it that, Beck concluded. We need to start being very, very clear. In the past, he even led a march for All Lives Matter. Things have changed somewhat, though, at least for Beck. While he s still not officially a Black Lives Matter supporter, he understands why All Lives Matter is stupid. In a news conference covered by the Washington Post, Beck relayed this analogy: All of us are sitting around a table, and we re all friends, he said. It s time for dessert, and everybody gets pie except for me and you. And you say, I didn t get any pie. Everybody at the table looks at you and says I know. All pie matters. You say, but I don t have any pie! What about my pie?' Beck still says that the leaders of Black Lives Matter are communists and anti-capitalists, but he says that most supporters are not and that we really need to learn to speak to each other.For that, some conservatives are throwing Beck under the bus. Blue Lives Matter accused Beck of pandering to Black Lives Matter.Breitbart.com, whose CEO was just named Trump s campaign CEO, didn t like Beck s analogy either: While Glenn Beck would like people to believe he s insightful, critics of Black Lives Matter don t need his hectoring, wrote Breitbart s Lee Stranahan, who is also based in Dallas. The reason many people including black critics of Black Lives Matter like [Milwaukee County] Sheriff David Clarke say All Lives Matter in response to Black Lives Matter is to reject the underlying notion of identity politics. Beck is not a supporter of Trump. Is this a sign that the #NeverTrump movement can bring out a more rational right-wing? Conservatives are certainly in the midst of an existential crisis and many of them appear to be soul searching. Whether Beck has dug deep enough to find his soul or whether he happened to get his meds right that day will be sorted out over time, but for now, it s refreshing to hear someone on the right *sort of* get it.Featured image via J. Pat Carter with Getty Images. | 0 |
21st Century Wire says Did Mitt Romney just make an incredible mistake?Fox News contributor Judge Jeanine Pirro has unleashed a scathing attack on Mitt Romney after his recent moves to try and put a halt to Donald Trump s presidential run: There s an insurrection coming, Mitt Romney just confirmed it, Mitt Romney will always be remembered as the one who put us over the edge and awoke a sleeping giant the silent majority the American people, Fact the establishment is panicked. The military industrial complex is certainly panicked as Trump, the Republican frontrunner, just said that he wants to get along with foreign countries , particularly Russia, instead of going to war with them.Watch Judge Jeanine unload on the failed Republican candidate, who, in her words, choked during the 2012 election, in the following video:GET THE FULL STORY ON THIS YEAR S ELECTION: 21st Century Wire Election Files | 0 |
ATHENS (Reuters) - Greek police fired teargas on Wednesday at youths marching in Athens to mark the ninth anniversary of the killing of a teenager by police in an incident that sparked the worst riots for decades in a country with a history of street violence. Before Wednesday s march, Reuters witnesses saw young people wearing hoods smashing paving stones to use as projectiles and street poles to break window displays. A few hundred students, among them dozens of black-clad youths, marched through central Athens chanting Resist! , waving red and black flags in a tribute to 15-year old Alexandros Grigoropoulos who was shot dead in 2008. Some of the protesters set garbage containers on fire and hurled stones at police who responded with teargas and had formed protective cordons outside parliament and hotels in central Athens. More than 2,000 police were deployed in Athens, a day before a visit by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. On Wednesday evening, hundreds of protesters marched outside parliament chanting This bullet did not fall by accident, keep your hands off the youth and held banners reading These days belong to Alexis . After the march, police clashed with protesters hurling petrol bombs at them in the bohemian Exarchia district, where the unarmed boy was shot dead. There were more demonstrations in other cities across the country. Clashes broke out during protests in the northern city of Thessaloniki. On the night of December 6, 2008, hours after Grigoropoulos was shot dead, thousands took to the streets of Athens, torching cars and smashing shop windows. The riots, that were also fueled by anger over unemployment and economic hardship in the prelude to Greece s debt crisis, lasted for weeks. | 0 |
Rachel Maddow decided to scrap a segment and go off-script to warn her viewers about Lieutenant General Michael Flynn. Donald Trump has offered Flynn the position of National Security Advisor and the MSNBC host finds this revelation too worrying to put off discussing. At this point in the show, I had something else we were going to cover, but I scrapped it because there s a thing I feel like I need to say about the Mike Flynn security announcement, Maddow said.Maddow explained that no one, such as Congress, has to approve this appointment in any way. Trump makes the offer and if Flynn accepts, then boom, it s a done deal. She then told America just why it is that this is such concerning news. So, this Mike Flynn thing is done, Maddow explained. But the choice of Mike Flynn is a different kettle of fish than anything we might have expected from the Trump campaign. Mike Flynn calls Islam a political ideology hiding behind a religion. He calls Islam a malignant cancer. He really did sit next to President Putin and take money to go to a gala. He s been a frequent guest on Russian state television, and says he sees no difference between Russian state television, and for example, MSNBC. After laying out her list of reasons why Flynn shouldn t be considered for any government position, let alone at the top of national security, Maddow explained to viewers what he will be doing in this position if he accepts it. He will now be the closest person to the president on a day-to-day basis on all foreign policy issues, on all military issues, on all national security issues, and he is way outside anything that anybody on the left, right or center might consider to be the mainstream, either in thought or temperament in terms of national security issues, and it s done, Maddow said.Maddow laid out Flynn s shady business dealings with Turkey. She also slammed his habit of handing out classified information that he wasn t even supposed to have in the first place, which has happened at least twice. Two former government officials with direct knowledge of the issue tell CNN that while Flynn oversaw intelligence in Afghanistan, he shared classified information with Pakistan on terror networks responsible for killing American troops, CNN recalled this week when Flynn s name was floated. The intelligence, the sources say, came from another agency. Flynn wasn t supposed to share it. They say he was trying to convince Pakistan to stop sheltering terrorists. Maddow concluded: I know he s not going to get as much coverage as the other people who have to get confirmed over the next few days but stick a pin in that. It s really, really important. Watch Rachel Maddow issue her dire warning about Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, here:Featured image via video screen capture | 1 |
Pa. — The line to see Donald J. Trump snaked back and forth on itself hours before his arrival. There was a carnival atmosphere with people in costumes, including one man with a sign, “Don’t let the media elect crooked Hillary. ” A cavalcade of motorcycles roared up, and there were cheers and laughter for a man shouting, “Donald Trump is going to make America great! He hasn’t paid taxes in 20 years!” A day after Mr. Trump defended himself at the second presidential debate for making vulgar comments about women, amid a wave of polls showing an increasing lead for Hillary Clinton, thousands of Trump supporters turned out with undimmed fervor for the Republican nominee and optimism about his electoral prospects. They echoed nearly verbatim Mr. Trump’s defense that his lewd comments about women on a 2005 recording were merely “locker room talk,” calling them harmless words compared with the actions Mrs. Clinton and her husband had taken to shame women. They reiterated Mr. Trump’s claim that national polls showing him behind by double digits were “rigged” and that he was heading to victory in November. In the campaign’s last weeks, at such rallies, Mr. Trump is sealed in a hermetic bubble with his most fervent supporters. They are people passionate enough to wait hours to attend a rally where the candidate and the crowds draw energy and affirmation from each other, while dismissing any discouraging information. His supporters routinely pointed, as the nominee did, to the huge crowds still flocking to see him as evidence that his campaign remains strong. “I don’t believe anything the media says,” said Brad Chilson, 47, a truck driver from Bradford County, Pa. who waited hours with his wife outside the Mohegan Sun Arena in for Mr. Trump. “Look at the turnout we’ve got here. ” Mr. Trump was in high spirits on Monday night in northeastern Pennsylvania, in the heart of a largely white, region that he has visited regularly, running a campaign sustained by a visceral feel for his audience while ignoring abstractions like data and research. “I think the state of Pennsylvania, we’re going to win so big,” he said. A New York Times polling average shows Mrs. Clinton 7. 2 percentage points ahead in the state. “Everybody in Pennsylvania wants Trump, you know,” he said. “We get crowds like this everywhere. ” He boasted of a rally planned for Florida with an expected 25, 000 people. As he spoke, Katie Packer, a strategist for Mitt Romney in 2012, posted a photograph on Twitter of 30, 000 people at an Ohio rally four years ago a week before Mr. Romney’s defeat. “None of the Trump crowds so far in the general election surpass what we regularly had in ’12,” Ms. Packer wrote. “They are so naïve. ” Yet Mr. Trump whipped the crowd to anger at the news media and its “crooked” polls. At one point, he falsely claimed that CNN had turned off its live coverage as he was accusing the network of manipulating a focus group. The crowd then chanted an epithet. He also read the results of unscientific, online surveys. “Trump 70, Clinton 30,” Mr. Trump quoted from a reader survey by the Drudge Report on which candidate had won the second debate. “Oh, listen to this,” he said, reading from an iPhone. “Time magazine. You think Time magazine likes me?” He cited the result: 89 for Trump, 11 for Clinton. “Oh, here’s a good one,” he added. “Well, they’re slightly conservative — Breitbart. 93 to 7,” he read. Mr. Trump’s supporters who were waiting to hear him speak cited alternative sources of information they preferred, dismissing even Fox News in favor of emails from commentators like Allen B. West, a former congressman, and Dennis Lynch, who makes films about illegal immigration. They also repeated conspiracy theories that flourish online. “A lot of people affiliated with Hillary have died over the years, and nobody says nothing about it,” said Eric Bulger, a retired police officer with the Port Authority for New York and New Jersey. There were equal numbers of women and men at the rally, and many dismissed as insignificant Mr. Trump’s private comments, caught on the 2005 recording, about being able to grab women by their genitals because he was a “star. ” “When all this baloney came out about Trump, I understand it’s a scandal,” said Brenda Stchur, 56, a Democrat from Hudson, Pa. who supports Mr. Trump. “But John F. Kennedy wasn’t innocent, either, and everyone loves John F. Kennedy. ” Marilyn Sevigny, a retiree from Lake Ariel, Pa. said that “as a woman, I don’t like what he said, I’m not defending it. ” But she added that there was a double standard at work. “If a Democrat says it, it’s just words. If a Republican says it, it’s an assault,” she said. Before Sunday’s town debate, David Quinn, an electronics engineer, told his wife that Mr. Trump should drop out, as some senior elected Republicans were calling on the candidate to do. But Mr. Quinn changed his mind, he said, after Mr. Trump’s apology for his comments from 11 years ago. “The only thing that tape shows is he’s a healthy heterosexual,” he said. Those at the rally agreed that Mr. Trump had won the debate. Many cited as their favorite moment Mr. Trump’s retort that Mrs. Clinton would “be in jail” if he were president. They dismissed the F. B. I. ’s recommendation that Mrs. Clinton should not be prosecuted over her use of a private email server as secretary of state. They faulted the news media for not highlighting that Mrs. Clinton had deleted thousands of emails after receiving a congressional subpoena, as Mr. Trump charged in the debate. Mike Pisano, 65, a factory worker, echoed Mr. Trump’s contention that Mrs. Clinton had escaped indictment because Bill Clinton had met privately with Attorney General Loretta Lynch. “He was on the plane with her fixing that,” Mr. Pisano said. Still, outside the bubble of such devoted followers, Mr. Trump’s prospects in northeastern Pennsylvania are less certain. On ’s Public Square, whose sidewalks filled during lunch hour on Monday, several Republicans and Democrats said they were appalled by Mr. Trump and would skip the election, or vote for a candidate. “I just think he’s a pig,” said Janice Kontur, 44, a registered Republican, who manages an apartment complex. She said she could not bring herself to vote for Mrs. Clinton and planned to sit out Election Day. “As a matter of fact, if he’s elected, me and my daughter will be moving to a different country,” she said of Mr. Trump. Melinda Thompson, a controller for an insurance company, said she would vote for Gary Johnson, the Libertarian candidate. She said of Mr. Trump, “I think his temperament would backfire on the United States. ” Paul Galante, a lawyer on a smoking break across from a statue of Christopher Columbus, said he was a registered Democrat but had consistently voted for Republican presidential nominees. Not this year. “All people want is a reason to like the man, and he doesn’t give them a reason,” he said of Mr. Trump. He called the Republican Party “a joke” for nominating Mr. Trump from a field of 17. In the primary, Mr. Galante wrote in a protest candidate, and he is considering voting for Mrs. Clinton in November. “She’s a sneak and a liar,” he said. “But so what at this point? He’s worse. ” The Trump campaign is counting on doing well in the region, where factories have closed and the presence of immigrants has caused tensions. But Mr. Galante, a longtime resident, was deeply skeptical of Mr. Trump’s prospects. “He’s going to get slaughtered,” he said. | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump’s push to create safe zones in Syria could force him to make some risky decisions about how far to go to protect refugees, including shooting down Syrian or Russian aircraft or committing thousands of U.S. troops, experts said. Trump said on Wednesday he “will absolutely do safe zones in Syria” for refugees fleeing violence. According to a document seen by Reuters, he is expected in the coming days to order the Pentagon and the State Department to draft a plan to create such zones in Syria and nearby nations. The document did not spell out what would make a safe zone “safe” and whether it would protect refugees only from threats on the ground - such as jihadist fighters - or whether Trump envisions a no-fly zone policed by America and its allies. If it is a no-fly zone, without negotiating some agreement with Russia Trump would have to decide whether to give the U.S. military the authority to shoot down Syrian or Russian aircraft if they posed a threat to people in that zone, which his predecessor, former President Barack Obama, refused to do. “This essentially boils down to a willingness to go to war to protect refugees,” said Jim Phillips, a Middle East expert at the Heritage Foundation think-tank in Washington, noting Russia’s advanced air defenses. Trump promised during his campaign to target jihadists from Islamic State, and he has sought to avoid being dragged deeper into Syria’s conflict - raising the question of whether he might be satisfied by assurances, perhaps from Moscow, that neither Russian nor Syrian jets would target the zone. In Moscow, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Trump did not consult with Russia and warned that the consequences of such a plan “ought to be weighed up.” “It is important that this (the plan) does not exacerbate the situation with refugees,” he said. Phillips and other experts, including former U.S. officials, said many refugees would not be satisfied by assurances from Moscow, while any deal with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who also is backed by Iran, might not go over well with America’s Arab allies. The Pentagon declined comment on Thursday, saying no formal directive to develop such plans had been handed down yet, and some U.S. military officials appeared unaware of the document before seeing it described in the media on Wednesday. “Our department right now is tasked with one thing in Syria, and that is to degrade and defeat ISIS,” said Captain Jeff Davis, a Pentagon spokesman. Trump’s call for a plan for safe zones is part of a larger directive expected to be signed in coming days that includes a temporary ban on most refugees to the United States and a suspension of visas for citizens of Syria and six other Middle Eastern and African countries deemed to pose a terrorism threat. During and after the presidential campaign, Trump called for no-fly zones to harbor Syrian refugees as an alternative to allowing them into the United States. Trump accused the Obama administration of failing to screen Syrian immigrants entering the United States to ensure they had no militant ties. Any safe zone in Syria guaranteed by the United States would almost certainly require some degree of U.S. military protection. Securing the ground alone would require thousands of troops, former U.S. officials and experts say. Anthony Cordesman, a military expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank, cautioned that a safe zone inside Syria could become a diplomatic albatross that would force a Trump administration to juggle a host of ethnic and political tensions in Syria indefinitely. Other experts said jihadists could be attracted to the zone, either to carry out attacks that would embarrass the United States or to use the zone as a safe haven where militants could regroup. Such a zone also would be expensive, given the need to house, feed, educate and provide medical care to the refugees. “I think these people really have no idea what it takes to support 25,000 people, which is really a small number, in terms of the (internally displaced) and refugees” in Syria, Cordesman said. The draft document gave no details on what would constitute a safe zone, where one might be set up and who would defend it. Jordan, Turkey and other neighboring countries already host millions of Syrian refugees. The Turkish government pressed Obama, without success, to create a no-fly zone on Syria’s border with Turkey but now is at odds with Washington over its support for Kurdish fighters in Syria. | 1 |
You d think that in the year 2016, companies would no longer be bullied by those who advocate for fewer rights for women, but to the contrary, Lands End has just proved that simply not to be the case.The company recently featured legendary women s rights advocate and feminist Gloria Steinem in their catalog and on their website for their Legend Series featuring individuals who have made a difference in both their respective industries and the world at large. However, many anti-choice advocates were not amused by Lands End promoting someone who pushes for women to have control over their own bodies. They were, quite literally, bullied into ending their relationship with Steinem.One pro-lifer commented on the Lands End Facebook page: Those of us who love family, love children, are completely puzzled why you would promote a very vocal pro abortion celebrity. Is this who you are LandsEnd? Are you anti-child? You want to kill off possible future customers? Is this your message to those of us who give their very lives to feed, love and clothe our children, some of these children who also live with special needs? Clearly not, and whoa, what a devious guilt trip, but upon their threat of boycott and shipping everything Lands End back, the company took no chances and succumbed to the harassment and gave in to the bullying. Apparently, a Catholic school also threatened to end their relationship with the company as their uniform supplier as well.Here s Lands End official statement: We understand that some of our customers were offended by the inclusion of an interview in a recent catalog with Gloria Steinem on her quest for women s equality. We thought it was a good idea and we heard from our customers that, for different reasons, it wasn t. For that, we sincerely apologize. Our goal was to feature individuals with different interests and backgrounds that have made a difference for our new Legends Series, not to take any political or religious stance. They literally just said, We thought it was a good idea to feature someone who stood for women s equality, but it wasn t, and we apologize.Way to stand with women, Lands End. Sure, you may have lost a few religious zealots, but you could have gained a hell of a lot more back in those who admire your courage to uphold a woman s right over her own body and be equal amongst her peers in society.Here s the thing: Lands End is still going to lose customers, but this time from people who stand with women s rights, which is the majority of America.Featured image via Flickr | 0 |
The social media director for Trump called them out on it:Now we have the Washington Post accepting a videotape from crazy environmentalists who carved six feet tall letters into the 5th green on Trump s golf course. They were so proud of their vandalism that they gave details to the Post of how long it took to vandalize the property.When I went to the article to read it, there was a disclaimer at the top. Well, if you go to the comments section at the end of the article, the comments are mostly ripping on the environmentalists AND the articles reference to the vandalism as a DARING ACT OF DEFIANCE . So the editor replaced the phrase with a more accurate term of VANDALISM WHAT THESE PEOPLE DID IS DISGUSTING AND SO WRONG GLORIFYING DESTRUCTION OF PRIVATE PROPERTY IS NEVER OK SHAME ON YOU WAPO!Editor s note: The beginning of this story was changed to more accurately reflect the nature of the actions taken by a protest group against the Trump golf course in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif.The group which labels itself an anonymous environmental activist collective snuck into Trump National Golf Club in Rancho Palos Verdes, Calif., and carved a message into the green with six-foot-tall letters that said: NO MORE TIGERS. NO MORE WOODS. The 18-hole, 7,300-yard course is set among cliffs overlooking the Pacific Ocean just south of Los Angeles. Last year, Golf Digest ranked it the 43rd best course in California.In a statement sent to The Washington Post, the group said the vandalism was carried out in response to the Trump administration s blatant disregard for the environment: Tearing up the golf course felt justified in many ways, the member said. Repurposing what was once a beautiful stretch of land into a playground for the privileged is an environmental crime in its own right. In response to the president s recent decision to gut our existing protection policies, direct action was conceived and executed on the green of his California golf course in the form of a simple message: NO MORE TIGERS. NO MORE WOODS, the statement said.Read more: WaPo | 1 |
Good morning. (Want to get California Today by email? Here’s the .) Let’s turn it over to Jennifer Medina, a correspondent based in Los Angeles, for today’s introduction. Another day, another example of California’s continued fight with the Trump administration. The State Senate overwhelmingly approved legislation Monday that essentially turns California into a “sanctuary state” for undocumented immigrants. The bill expands protections for immigrants at a time when the Trump administration has expanded who is considered a priority for deportation. The legislation prohibits any state or local law enforcement agency from using resources to investigate, detain, report or arrest people for immigration violations. Under the legislation, county jails would not be able to allow officers from Immigration and Customs Enforcement to work inside the jails or notify them when a prisoner is being released. After the bill came under fierce criticism from the California State Sheriffs’ Association, it was amended to allow local law enforcement officials to notify ICE of the release date of serious and violent felons. It also enables local law enforcement officers to alert federal officials if they come across someone who has a violent felony record and has been previously deported. Language in the bill was also changed to explicitly allow local agencies to participate in task forces even if they include immigration enforcement in investigations. The amendments did little to mollify the opposition. One Republican senator warned that the Legislature would be “kicking the president right in the groin,” with the law and warned that “he will strike back. ” After the vote, Kevin de León, the leader of the state Senate and sponsor of the bill, said, “Our communities will become more, not less, dangerous if local police are enlisted to enforce federal immigration laws. ” He called the passage of the bill a “rejection of President Trump’s false and cynical portrayal of undocumented immigrants as a lawless community. ” Just before the Senate passed the sanctuary state bill, lawmakers approved legislation to start a fund that would pay for lawyers for undocumented immigrants facing deportation. Several Republicans spoke out against the legislation, saying it was an unfair use of taxpayer money and also contradicted the idea that the state wants to stay out of immigration enforcement. Both bills will now move to the Assembly. Gov. Jerry Brown has not indicated whether he would sign either one. (Please note: We regularly highlight articles on news sites that have limited access for nonsubscribers.) • Fight, negotiate or beg: California Democrats are debating how to respond to President Trump. [The New York Times] • For struggling Kern County, Mr. Trump represents hope and change. [San Francisco Chronicle] • Slide Show: A first look at proposals for a border wall with Mexico. [San Diego ] • With uncertainty over a program that lets tech companies import foreign workers, a rush for visas has become an scramble. [The New York Times] • Calexit might be but redrawing California’s state boundaries isn’t. [Opinion | The New York Times] • Today, Los Angeles voters are choosing a member of Congress to fill the vacancy left by Xavier Becerra. [Los Angeles Times] • A Los Angeles County judge denied a bid from Roman Polanski to have his sexual abuse case resolved in his absence. [The New York Times] • Studying surfers could offer clues to whether antibiotic resistant genes move from the seas into humans. [The New York Times] • Tesla surpassed Ford in market value for the first time and moved within striking distance of General Motors. [The New York Times] • Gary Austin died at 75. He helped changed the shape of American comedy as the founder of the theater company the Groundlings. [The New York Times] • The Athletics opened the baseball season with new optimism — on a field named after Rickey Henderson. [San Francisco Chronicle] • Photos: What 10 gallery crawlers wore to an opening in downtown Los Angeles. [The New York Times] • Vin Diesel decided to make himself a star after Hollywood didn’t give him a chance. [The New York Times] Some visitors to Big Sur go bird watching or relax with a novel at a seaside resort. Others suspend themselves high above the Pacific’s crashing waves on a narrow strip of nylon known as a slackline. Billy Rudiger, a reader in Carmel, shared a photo he captured of a slackliner traversing a cove just south of Monterey last November. Rope walking has existed for centuries. But the origins of the modern slackline, flat webbing strung loose enough to bounce like a trampoline, usually between two trees, is traced to Yosemite rock climbers in the early 1980s. It quickly grew into a sport. In the last five or so years, social media has helped to propel its popularity. The pinnacle of the sport is a variation known as highlining, meaning the line is affixed at height. Highliners wear tethers, though a small number of elite practitioners sometimes go without. Injuries can happen, but they are usually of the sprained ankle variety and involve lines a few feet off the ground, said Sonya Iverson, president of Slackline U. S. a group that promotes the sport. “We aren’t daredevils or ” she said. Slackliners talk about the practice as a metaphor for the art of living — “balancing everything on the line to demonstrate life’s possibilities,” as the famed climber and highliner Dean Potter put it. For Ryan Robinson, 34, the highliner in Mr. Rudiger’s photo, the blue ocean juxtaposed against the jagged rocks represented a cathedral of sorts. “It’s such a beautiful place,” he said. “It’s nice to pay respect in a very unique way. ” California Today goes live at 6 a. m. Pacific time weekdays. Tell us what you want to see: CAtoday@nytimes. com. The California Today columnist, Mike McPhate, is a Californian — born outside Sacramento and raised in San Juan Capistrano. He lives in Davis. Follow him on Twitter. California Today is edited by Julie Bloom, who grew up in Los Angeles and graduated from U. C. Berkeley. | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The White House said on Monday that Anthony Scaramucci, named by President Donald Trump as communications director only 10 days ago, was leaving the post. The change comes days after Scaramucci delivered a profanity-laced tirade against other top Trump aides - and hours after Trump swore in John Kelly, a new chief of staff, to bring discipline to his West Wing. “Mr. Scaramucci felt it was best to give Chief of Staff John Kelly a clean slate and the ability to build his own team,” the White House said in a statement. | 1 |
Amy Schumer uses her upcoming Netflix premiere The Leather Special to mock “gun nuts” for opposing her gun control efforts. [Schumer began to speak publicly for gun control after John Russell Houser allegedly shot and killed two persons during an airing of Schumer’s Trainwreck in a theater in Lafayette, Louisiana. According to The Daily Beast, Schumer talks about gun control in her new special, then hedges her statements by saying “What I learned was, no matter what you say, as soon as you say the word ‘gun,’ what gun nuts hear is, ‘She wants to take all our guns! ’” What Schumer misses is that she has worked with her cousin Senator Chuck Schumer ( ) to push expanded background checks because of the shooting, although the shooter passed a background check to get his gun. “Gun nuts” fail to see the sense in pushing to expand what already failed. But Schumer tries to explain her calls for more background checks by pointing to the mental condition of the Lafayette shooter. She suggests that “even someone who is mentally ill and has been convicted of domestic violence can still obtain a firearm due to various loopholes. ” To be fair, this is not true. Individuals who are involuntarily committed for mental illness treatment are barred from buying guns — involuntarily commitment is a threshold that must be crossed. But the judge who handled John Russell Houser’s mental oversight — Carroll County Probate Judge Betty Cason — said she never ordered him involuntarily committed. So, there already is a mechanism for keeping the mentally ill from obtaining guns, but they have to meet a certain threshold before being barred from gun purchases. Instead of admitting this, Schumer just mocks the system. She points to blind people and people on the terror watch list buying guns, then says, ““I’m all about equal rights for the disabled, but if Stevie Wonder calls me and he’s like, ‘Do you want to go shooting today?’ I’m going to be like, ‘Hard pass! ’” Schumer does not mention the fact that neither the terror attack in San Bernadino (December 2, 2015) nor Orlando (June 12, 2o16) would have been stopped by adding the terror watch list to background checks because none of the attackers in either case were on the list. AWR Hawkins is the Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and host of Bullets with AWR Hawkins, a Breitbart News podcast. He is also the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart. com. | 0 |
MADRID (Reuters) - Jailed Catalonia leader Santi Vila, among the nine Catalan leaders ordered to be held in custody on Thursday pending a potential trial over the region s independence drive, was free to leave jail after paying bail, a court document showed. Vila, who stepped down from the Catalan cabinet before a unilateral declaration of independence last Friday and has since been pushing for a negotiated solution with the government, was granted bail of 50,000 euros ($58,300) on Thursday. | 1 |
By Anthony Brian Logan . James O Keefe of Project Veritas has released undercover, button-camera video that outlines the process of bird-dogging and how it is being used to rig the 2016 Presidential election of the United States in favor of Hillary Clinton and the Democrat Party. The central focus of the video, which is a collection of various undercover videos with commentary, is the process of bird-dogging which refers to essentially hiring people to behave as the equivalent to crisis actors. Except for the fact that there is no actual crisis, and these people are used to simply incite violence, among other things, to goad the media into giving Donald Trump s campaign negative coverage.Various people appear in the video, complete with both audio and video, saying how they skirt the laws of our nation to engage in corruption. Hillary Clinton s campaign is not allowed to directly collude with the phony actors on the ground, so they use degrees of separation by hiring consultants. These consultants then go on to sub contract work on the ground such as the actors who engage in fake riots and protests. Everyone is aware of each other, and in some cases, answer to those all the way at the top, either in the Clinton campaign or the DNC itself Watch this brilliant video investigation here:. READ MORE ELECTION NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire 2016 Files | 1 |
Thank God Hillary never worked in a rape clinic or with women who were victims of sexual abuse One of Bill Clinton s rape victims, Juanita Broaddrick tweeted this in January:I was 35 years old when Bill Clinton, Ark. Attorney General raped me and Hillary tried to silence me. I am now 73 .it never goes away. Juanita Broaddrick (@atensnut) January 6, 2016After Hillary came out feigning shock over Trump s WORDS about women, Juanita Broaddrick struck back here:Hillary calls Trump's remarks "horrific" while she lives with and protects a "Rapist". Her actions are horrific. Juanita Broaddrick (@atensnut) October 8, 2016And here:How many times must it be said? Actions speak louder than words. DT said bad things!HRC threatened me after BC raped me. Juanita Broaddrick (@atensnut) October 8, 2016It is commonly believed by Clinton victims that Hillary was behind the siccing of private investigators on the many women who accused her husband of rape, sexual assault or infidelity in the 1990s.Hillary Clinton revealed her hidden hand when she menacingly issued a clear warning of intimidation to her husband s accusers (and those who would pursue their charges) on the nationally broadcast Today Show in early 1998 in the days after the Monica Lewinsky scandal broke.The Today Show interview with Matt Lauer on January 27, 1998 is famous for Hillary s claim that a vast right-wing conspiracy was behind the allegations of an affair between her husband President Clinton and White House intern Monica Lewinsky. (Transcript source.) This is the great story here for anybody willing to find it and write about it and explain it is this vast right-wing conspiracy that has been conspiring against my husband since the day he announced for president. A few journalists have kind of caught on to it and explained it. But it has not yet been fully revealed to the American public. And actually, you know, in a bizarre sort of way, this may do it. Later in the interview, Hillary bluntly issued her threat: I think we re going to find some other things. And I think that when all of this is put into context, and we really look at the people involved here, look at their motivations and look at their backgrounds, look at their past behavior, some folks are going to have a lot to answer for. Here s the video Video from Today Show video hosted by C-SPAN.https://youtu.be/BEEIimRCp4EVia: Gateway Pundit | 0 |
OTTAWA (Reuters) - Canada, which has been accused of sharing intelligence that led to the torture of prisoners abroad, on Monday issued rules to prevent its security agencies from disclosing or requesting information from other countries if it would result in mistreatment. The rules also prohibit Canada s spy agency, border services agents and federal police from using information likely obtained through torture, unless it is necessary to prevent death or significant injuries. The directions replace 2011 rules put in place by the previous Conservative government that was replaced by Prime Minister Justin Trudeau s Liberals in 2015. The Liberals appear to have publicized the rules to repair the government s reputation, according to experts who noted that it is unusual for a country to publicly disclose such guidelines. Canada has taken the lead in this regard, partly because it has been stung by past history, said University of Ottawa professor Wesley Wark. In one high-profile case, the Conservative government in 2007 apologized and paid C$10.5 million to compensate Maher Arar, who was deported to Syria by U.S. agents after Canadian police mistakenly labeled him an Islamic extremist. Earlier this year, Canada apologized to three Canadian men of Arab descent who said they had been tortured in Syria and blamed Canadian secret services for their ordeal. The Canadian Security Intelligence Service, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and the Canada Border Services Agency will be prohibited from disclosing or requesting information that would result in a substantial risk of mistreatment, the government said. Information that was likely obtained through torture also cannot be used if there is a risk it would lead to further mistreatment. The government of Canada unequivocally condemns in the strongest possible terms the mistreatment of any individual by anyone for any purpose, Public Safety Minister Ralph Goodale said in a statement. Alex Neve, Secretary General of Amnesty International Canada, said the clearer rules were an improvement over the previous directions that allowed for information to be shared with other countries in exceptional circumstances. There s been a lot of pressure in Canada over the last several years as the previous guidelines came to light and all of the inadequacies in those guidelines gathered quite a bit of concern, said Neve. | 1 |
American pride and American exceptionalism is back. It shows in the confidence our military has in their newly elected Commander in Chief and in the confidence Americans have in the private sector, thanks to our President and in his hard-working administration. For anyone who needs evidence, watch brave 94-yr old Pearl Harbor veteran Donald Stratton thank Trump for bringing the USA back together again after 8 long divided years under Barack Obama Lauren Bruner and Donald Stratton visited the White House on Friday, a trip they would have missed if a man named Joe George had not defied orders more than 75 years ago at Pearl Harbor.Bruner, 96, Stratton, 94, along with Ken Potts, 95, were survivors of the USS Arizona, a battleship destroyed during the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941. The three men reunited Friday at Arlington National Cemetery and then met with President Trump at the White House.It was 94-yr. old Donald Stratton s comments to President Trump that really struck a cord with him, as Trump asked Stratton to repeat his comments, as they would have likely been edited by the mainstream media in attendance at the special event. Trump told the press, You ll want to hear this folks, it s very it s just a very beautiful statement. Stratton then told the cameras: All the people we met today, and all the people that were lined along as we went along, you could tell with the military and everything, that this country s coming together again, and we re gonna be there! Stratton then gave a mini-fist pump as he fought back the tears of pride over our new Commander in Chief:MUST WATCH Pearl Harbor survivor Donald Stratton fights back tears as he thanks Trump for bringing the USA together! pic.twitter.com/ZIVPP8AtVb Newt-Trump Fan Club (@NewtTrump) July 23, 2017As the number of Arizona survivors has dwindled to five Bruner, Potts, Stratton, Lou Conter, 95, and Lonnie Cook, 96 the group is increasingly vocal about their experience and in advocating for recognition of George, who saved the lives of Stratton and Bruner but never received any honors for doing so.Coming to Washington, for the three survivors, meant more than time to honor those who were lost in the attack: It was also a chance to advocate for recognition for George.Stratton said he was unable to ask Trump to honor his friend but was able to speak about George and feels like progress was made. We didn t actually get any conversation with the president but all the conversation was in front of the press and we spoke about Joe George, Stratton said. I think we accomplished a lot today through that and getting his story out there. Stratton and Bruner survived the wreckage thanks to George s bravery. George was on a neighboring ship, the Vestal, when the bombs hit the Arizona. He defied orders from an officer to leave the area and instead saved six men who were in a gunner s control tower while their ship was engulfed in flames.The six escaped when George threw a weighted rope to the Arizona and the men climbed hand over hand down it to the Vestal. Bruner was the second-to-last man to leave the ship.Both Stratton and Bruner suffered severe burns and spent weeks in the hospital before returning to serve. The burns on Stratton s hands smoothed his fingertips, removing the grooves and his ability to make an identifiable fingerprint.Because George did not obey orders to leave the area, the Navy did not ever issue him a medal. Stratton believes he should receive a Navy Cross posthumously.Trump thanked the veterans for their heroic service. There are many remarkable things that I witness as president, but nothing can take the place of meeting heroes like those with us today, Trump said. In them we see the strength of our nation, the courage of our men and women in uniform, the resolve to never accept failure, and the belief that justice will always triumph. The meeting was an honor Stratton says he never envisioned. This is something I never expected in my whole life I met some very interesting people, Stratton said. This country is so apart and this is something which brings us together. The men were honored with a certificate memorializing their visit to the cemetery and a coin from the Old Guard Third Infantry Regiment, who guard the tomb. AZ CentralWatch President Trump s speech honoring the Pearl Harbor vets: | 0 |
Well, the moment we have all been anticipating has come to pass. Donald Trump and the bigots in his administration have rolled out a new Muslim Ban. There are very few differences. It excludes Iraq, thanks to their vital role in helping the United States government in the fight against the Islamic State. It also will not be rolled out immediately, so that we won t have people being detained mid-travel. It also excludes Green Card holders and those with legal visas prior to January 27, 2017 the date of the original order that was struck down by the courts. there is also language striking down the first order. However, make no mistake this is still a Muslim ban. The intent is the same, and there is one person who wants to make sure that everyone knows it: New Jersey Senator Cory Booker.Just moments after the news broke that Trump had signed the new order behind closed doors, Senator Booker took to Twitter to go all in on Trump and what he and his goons are doing. This truly an extraordinary rebuke of a sitting Senator of a sitting President. Here are is the flurry of tweets sent out by a clearly furious Booker:A rebranded #MuslimBan is still a Muslim ban.Plain and simple. Sen. Cory Booker (@SenBookerOffice) March 6, 2017It s clear that the Trump administration s intent with this executive order is the same as it was with the first. Sen. Cory Booker (@SenBookerOffice) March 6, 2017They are trying to exclude refugees and immigrants of a certain religion from entering the United States. Sen. Cory Booker (@SenBookerOffice) March 6, 2017The previous Muslim ban was rejected by millions of Americans and blocked by the federal courts. Sen. Cory Booker (@SenBookerOffice) March 6, 2017This reckless and un-American executive order once again blatantly defies our nation s highest ideals and makes our country less safe. Sen. Cory Booker (@SenBookerOffice) March 6, 2017I will fight every step of the way, this renewed attempt to play the worst kind of politics at the expense of our most cherished values. Sen. Cory Booker (@SenBookerOffice) March 6, 2017As history has shown us, so will the American people. Sen. Cory Booker (@SenBookerOffice) March 6, 2017See you in court (again), @realDonaldTrump Sen. Cory Booker (@SenBookerOffice) March 6, 2017Indeed, we will see Trump in court. Just as the first order was rejected, so should the second order. There s really no difference at all, and the claims by Trump and his administration are doing this because of national security concerns have been shown to be baseless by Trump s own Department of Homeland Security.This is the most fundamentally un-American action Trump has taken yet, and considering the things he has done, that s saying something. Senator Booker is right we ll see him in court.Featured image via Justin Sullivan/Getty Images | 1 |
Top GOP Official Ed Rollins was interviewed by a very angry Lou Dobbs. He was furious with the ringside performance of John Kelly aka drama queen during President Trump s UN speech (some are saying it was before the speech). The Chief of Staff should be behind the scenes How about he should be fired because he s not even a supporter of President Trump! HE VOTED FOR HILLARY CLINTON!Ed Rollins: At least what I ve heard from sources inside who know Kelly, he is an honorable man and a good general. He didn t vote for him. He voted for Hillary. So I don t think basically he is a Trump supporter or ideologically a Trump supporter.Whaaaaaat????? How can President Trump have a Chief of Staff that doesn t even follow his belief in policy?There is controversy over whether Kelly was was drama queen during or before Trump s speech. If it was before then this is a great case of the Democrats trying to sabotage Trump again. No matter what happened, it s still shocking that Trump would have a Chief of Staff who isn t on bird with his policy. | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The National Security Agency risks a brain-drain of hackers and cyber spies due to a tumultuous reorganization and worries about the acrimonious relationship between the intelligence community and President Donald Trump, according to current and former NSA officials and cybersecurity industry sources. Half-a-dozen cybersecurity executives told Reuters they had witnessed a marked increase in the number of U.S. intelligence officers and government contractors seeking employment in the private sector since Trump took office on Jan. 20. One of the executives, who would speak only on condition of anonymity, said he was stunned by the caliber of the would-be recruits. They are coming from a variety of government intelligence and law enforcement agencies, multiple executives said, and their interest stems in part from concerns about the direction of U.S intelligence agencies under Trump. Retaining and recruiting talented technical personnel has become a top national security priority in recent years as Russia, China, Iran and other nation states and criminal groups have sharpened their cyber offensive abilities. NSA and other intelligence agencies have long struggled to deter some of their best employees from leaving for higher-paying jobs in Silicon Valley and elsewhere. The problem is especially acute at NSA, current and former officials said, due to a reorganization known as NSA21 that began last year and aims to merge the agency’s electronic eavesdropping and domestic cyber-security operations. The two-year overhaul includes expanding parts of NSA that deal with business management and human resources and putting them on par with research and engineering. The aim is to “ensure that we’re using all of our resources to maximum effect to accomplish our mission,” NSA Director Mike Rogers said. The changes include new management structures that have left some career employees uncertain about their missions and prospects. Former employees say the reorganization has failed to address widespread concerns that the agency is falling behind in exploiting private-sector technological breakthroughs. A former top NSA official said he had been told by three current officials that budget problems meant there was too little money for promotions. That is especially important for younger employees, who sometimes need two jobs to make ends meet in the expensive Washington D.C. area, the official said. “Morale is as low as I’ve ever seen it,” said another former senior NSA official, who maintains close contact with current employees. Asked about the risk of losing talent from NSA and other agencies, White House spokesman Michael Anton said Trump had sought to reassure the intelligence community by visiting the CIA headquarters on his first full day in office. Anton also pointed to the military spending increase in Trump’s budget proposal released on Monday. It will likely take more than a visit to the CIA to patch up relations with the intelligence community, the current and former officials said. Trump has attacked findings from intelligence agencies that Russia hacked emails belonging to Democratic Party operatives during the 2016 presidential campaign to help him win, though he did eventually accept the findings. In January, Trump accused intelligence agencies of leaking false information and said it was reminiscent of tactics used in Nazi Germany. The breadth of any exodus from the NSA and other intelligence agencies is difficult to quantify. The NSA has “seen a steady rise” in the attrition rate among its roughly 36,000 employees since 2009, and it now sits at a “little less than six percent,” according to an NSA spokesman. NSA director Michael Rogers said last year that the attrition rate was 3.3 percent in 2015, suggesting a sharp jump in departures since then. Several senior NSA officials who have left or plan to leave, including deputy director Richard Ledgett and the head of cyber defense, Curtis Dukes, have said their departures were unrelated to Trump or the reorganization. Some turnover is normal with any new administration, government and industry officials noted, and a stronger economy has also improved pay and prospects in the private sector. “During this time the economy has been recovering from the recession, unemployment rates have been falling and the demand for highly skilled technical talent has been increasing,” an NSA spokesman said, when asked to comment on the reports of employee departures. In a statement, Kathy Hutson, NSA’s chief of human resources, said the agency continues “to attract amazing talent necessary to conduct the security mission the nation needs.” Some NSA veterans attribute the morale issues and staff departures to the leadership style of Rogers, who took over the spy agency in 2014 with the task of dousing an international furor caused by leaks from former contractor Edward Snowden. Concern about Rogers reached an apex last October, when former Defense Secretary Ash Carter and former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper recommended to then-President Barack Obama that Rogers be removed. The NSA did not respond to a request for comment on the recommendation last fall that Rogers be replaced. Rogers is now expected to retain his job at NSA for at least another year, according to former officials. Rogers acknowledged concerns about potential morale problems last month, telling a congressional committee that Trump’s broadsides against the intelligence community could create “a situation where our workforce decides to walk.” Trump’s criticism of the intelligence community has exacerbated the stress caused by the reorganization at the NSA, said Susan Hennessey, a former NSA lawyer now with Brookings Institution. The “tone coming from the White House makes an already difficult situation worse, by eroding the sense of common purpose and service,” she said. A wave of departures of career personnel, Hennessey added, “would represent an incalculable loss to national security.” | 0 |
Topics: Twitter , Pies Wednesday, 26 October 2016
Greggs bakery shops in Ashton, Manchester, Salford and Liverpool were targeted by angry mobs yesterday, after a hoax message on Twitter, announced that the company were withdrawing pasties from their product range.
The Greggs pastie is renowned as the staple diet of the working classes, and its devotees can been seen walking around town centres clutching its famous blue bag with the ubiquitous hot, greasy snack poking out of the top.
Thousands of the treats are consumed daily, by the lower ends of society, who cannot afford luxury foods such as baked beans or spaghetti hoops, and fears grew that there would be mass cases of starvation as low earners and benefit claimants were priced out of the food chain completely.
A Red Cross spokesman told us that the situation was so bad, that they were flying back 50,000 corned beef hash and 25,000 sausage and baked bean slices that were on their way to Syrian refugee camps.
Riot police and fire fighters were deployed in the affected areas, and police told us that by late afternoon the crowds had been dispersed and order had been restored. They did however say that there was still some areas of disorder in Liverpool, but they were hoping to restore order soon, as the police helicopter had circled low over the crowd dropping thousands of job application forms, which seemed to be scattering the rioters away from the trouble spots.
Late yesterday afternoon the chairman of Greggs, Sir Fred Battenburg, told a hastily gathered press conference that they had been the victims of a malicious hoax, and that the company had no intentions of withdrawing its best selling product. He went on to say that the company did intend to remove an item from their shops next month, namely the fruit scone, as this was not a big seller with mainstream pastie eaters. He appealed for calm in the affected areas, and assured customers that the fire damaged stores would be open for business as soon as possible.
Last night police reported that groups of angry pensioners and housewives had gathered outside Greggs shops in the stockbroker areas of Hale, Wilmslow, Bowden and Alderly Edge. A spokesman said the protesters were angrily tapping on the shop windows with umbrellas and shoe heels, and shouting "shame on you""how dare you" and "do you know who I am" at staff who had locked the doors in panic.
An elderly woman, believed to be chair of the Dunham Massey Womens Guild, Lady Dorothy Schiffer-Brains, was arrested by police and later charged with 'aggressively prodding a police officer with a rolled up copy of Cheshire Life.
Lady Schiffer-Brains is due to appear before Knutsford magistrates later today. Make dulcie gabbani's day - give this story five thumbs-up (there's no need to register , the thumbs are just down there!) | 0 |
NEW YORK (Reuters) - A U.S. judge will hear arguments on Thursday over whether to grant final approval to a $25 million settlement of fraud lawsuits against President Donald Trump over his Trump University real estate investment seminars, with at least one former student objecting to the deal. Sherri Simpson of Fort Lauderdale, Florida, who paid $19,000 to learn Trump’s investing “secrets,” filed court papers earlier this month arguing the class action settlement should not have contained a provision barring her and other students from opting out and suing Trump on their own. The objection raises the possibility the litigation could continue to dog Trump’s presidency. During the campaign, Trump vowed to fight the fraud claims but agreed to the settlement soon after the election. Under the deal, Trump admitted no wrongdoing. Lawyers for Trump and those representing thousands of other students in two class actions will urge U.S. District Judge Gonzalo Curiel in San Diego to overrule the objection and approve the deal. The students, who paid as much as $35,000 for the seminars, are expected to recover more than 80 percent of the money they paid. Though Simpson’s lawyer, Gary Friedman, called the settlement “laudable,” he said his client wanted to press for a full recovery, as well as punitive damages and other relief. He is planning to argue the deal should be rejected unless she is allowed to do so. “What Ms. Simpson seeks is her day in court,” Friedman said in court papers. Simpson and other students claim they were lured into the seminars by false promises that they would learn Trump’s investment strategies from his “hand-picked” instructors. Trump admitted he did not personally select the instructors but said the claim was sales “puffery.” Rachel Jensen, a class action lawyer for the students, said in a court filing that some 3,730 students submitted claim forms. Two filed objections but only Simpson’s lawyers are expected at the hearing. In court papers, both Jensen and Daniel Petrocelli, a lawyer for Trump, suggested Simpson’s objection might be politically motivated. They noted she appeared in an anti-Trump political ad in February 2016. “Defendants paid $25 million to avoid the uncertainty that political opponents might solicit opt-outs to force a high-profile trial,” Jensen said. Friedman denied any political motive and said he would appeal if the judge overruled the objection. Trump accused Curiel of bias last year based on the Indiana-born judge’s Mexican ancestry. | 0 |
California Governor Jerry Brown has formally requested federal assistance from President Donald Trump to deal with the evacuation of nearly 200, 000 people from the area below the Oroville Dam, where a spillway is near structural failure. [The Associated Press, via Bay Area news station KRON 4, reports: OROVILLE, Calif. (AP) — Gov. Jerry Brown is asking the Trump administration for federal assistance in responding to a potential failure of a spillway at the Oroville Dam in Northern California. In a letter to President Donald Trump released Monday, Brown asks for help for the three Northern California counties affected. Brown says aid is needed to assist the 188, 000 residents of Butte, Sutter and Yuba counties who were ordered to evacuate Sunday after concerns an emergency spillway could give way, unleashing a gush of water to downstream towns. Though vowing to fight the Trump administration on a variety of issues — Obamacare, immigration, climate change — Brown has been less hostile than the members of the California state legislature and has openly welcomed President Trump’s plans to spend on infrastructure. Brown’s letter reportedly stated: “I have determined this incident is of such severity and magnitude . . . that federal assistance is necessary to save lives and to protect property, public health and safety” According to the East Bay Times, Brown told a press conference on Monday that he had not been aware until news reports emerged earlier this week that the state and federal government had resisted calls to improve the dam spillway in 2005. Critics charge that Brown has not shown sufficient interest in upgrading the state’s dams or expanding water storage. Officials are racing to lower the level of the lake behind the dam by 50 feet before a week of wet weather arrives Wednesday and Thursday. | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - With U.S. Congress members focused during their August recess on finding ways to lower the corporate tax rate, industry groups and other sectors of society are gearing up to fight proposed changes to the personal income tax. While tax cuts for business have garnered the most headlines, lobbyists and lawmakers have conceded that rewriting the corporate tax code will be a long slog. Tackling personal tax rates will be easier, many argue. Looking for an easier legislative win ahead of the 2018 midterm elections, most lawmakers in the Republican majority want to cut individual incomes taxes. President Donald Trump has been pushing hard for tax changes this year. Still, proposed changes to the personal tax code have already stirred opposition from realtors, home builders, mortgage lenders and charities. These groups say proposed changes will hurt home sales and cut charitable contributions. The National Association of Realtors issued an “August Recess Talking Points” circular imploring members to remind lawmakers that “Homeowners must be treated fairly in tax reform” to avoid “another housing crash.” The group cited a report it commissioned from PwC that estimated home values could quickly dive more than 10 percent if the tax plan becomes law. To simplify the tax code, Republicans have proposed eliminating nearly all tax write-offs including those for state and local taxes, then doubling the standard deduction. This would eliminate the incentive to itemize and should drastically reduce the number of taxpayers who do so. Currently, many taxpayers use itemized deductions, claiming write-offs for things like charitable contributions, interest paid on a mortgage and state and local taxes. If the standard deduction becomes larger, fewer taxpayers will need to itemize, reducing the incentive to hold a mortgage or contribute to charity. Currently, about 30 million taxpayers claim the mortgage interest deduction, with about $70 billion in total claims, according to Robert Dietz, an economist with the National Association of Homebuilders. Estimates suggest more than half of taxpayers would stop itemizing under the proposed plan, Dietz said, warning that this would create a large ripple effect through the economy. He said people in early years of a mortgage would suffer most, along with prospective home buyers. Home builders are also fighting the proposed tax code changes. “I don’t think I would call that a cakewalk,” said Jerry Howard, the head of the National Home Builders Association, saying the proposal will face fierce resistance from his group, which represents 130,000 builders. He noted that members operate in every congressional district and employ more than 7 million people. Charitable organizations are not arguing against increasing the standard deduction. But they are asking members of Congress to consider creating a “universal deduction,” so taxpayers taking the standard deduction can get additional credit for donations without itemizing. Taxpayers claim an estimated $13 billion each year in charitable deductions. Charities fear giving would plummet if the standard deduction were doubled without creating a universal deduction. Gail McGovern, president and CEO of the American Red Cross, said reducing charitable deductions would be “devastating.” If lobbyists defeat the reform effort, Congress could try to cut rates without structural tax code changes, said Charles Boustany, a former Republican member of the tax-code writing House Ways and Means Committee who left Congress in January. “The path of least resistance becomes an old-fashioned tax cut on the individual side,” said Boustany. “The pressure is just going to be relentless as we get later in the fall.” | 1 |
His accusation that President Obama wiretapped him has been thoroughly debunked but Donald Trump attacked NBC anchor Chuck Todd for not covering the fake story.Last month, Trump posted a series of tweets openly accusing President Obama of wiretapping him.Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my wires tapped in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 4, 2017Is it legal for a sitting President to be wire tapping a race for president prior to an election? Turned down by court earlier. A NEW LOW! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 4, 2017How low has President Obama gone to tapp my phones during the very sacred election process. This is Nixon/Watergate. Bad (or sick) guy! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 4, 2017Trump s accusation set off a firestorm around the country because Trump literally accused a former president of a felony.As it turns out, Trump s accusation was totally wrong. FBI Director James Comey dropped a bombshell on Trump s claim by stating under oath that there was no such wiretap. Furthermore, when given a deadline to provide evidence to Congress supporting Trump s claim, the Justice Department didn t deliver because there is no such evidence.Trump s claim was merely meant to distract Congress and the media from focusing on the growing Russia scandal.NBC anchor Chuck Todd was not distracted by Trump, and that s why Trump attacked Todd on Saturday and repeated his accusation against President Obama in yet another embarrassing rant on Twitter.When will Sleepy Eyes Chuck Todd and @NBCNews start talking about the Obama SURVEILLANCE SCANDAL and stop with the Fake Trump/Russia story? Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 1, 2017It is the same Fake News Media that said there is no path to victory for Trump that is now pushing the phony Russia story. A total scam! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) April 1, 2017Again, Trump is falsely accusing President Obama of wiretapping him even though the claim has been debunked by high level authorities. Also, Comey told Congress that the FBI is investigating Trump for colluding with Russia during the 2016 Election.And the evidence against Trump continues to pile up. Even disgraced former National Security Adviser Michael Flynn is asking for an immunity deal. His testimony could blow the lid off the Russia scandal and put Trump behind bars for high treason.Thus far, Todd has not responded to Trump s attack, but Twitter did it for him.@realDonaldTrump @NBCNews I love how the president calls people names. You should reassess your life and learn to be an adult & do your job. Mike P Williams (@Mike_P_Williams) April 1, 2017@realDonaldTrump @NBCNews If this is your idea of an April Fool joke, you re the fool. There is NO surveillance scandal (ask the FBI) and #TrumpRussia is very real Jack Schofield (@jackschofield) April 1, 2017@realDonaldTrump @NBCNews So the dead Russians who have connections to you and Putin is all just a coincidence right? Brandon Neely (@BrandonTXNeely) April 1, 2017@realDonaldTrump @NBCNews The only scandal around Obama surveillance is the fact that you invented it, and @DevinNunes traded his credibility to falsely support it. Tom Bonier (@tbonier) April 1, 2017@realDonaldTrump @NBCNews Your behavior is that of a guilty man. Rob Taub (@robmtaub) April 1, 2017@realDonaldTrump @NBCNews pic.twitter.com/YPCuRCoxxa JoeMyGod (@JoeMyGod) April 1, 2017Featured Image: Olivier Douliery-Pool/Getty Images | 1 |
21st Century Wire says Reframing the current diplomatic crisis in North Korea is essential if genuine progress is to be made in diffusing the current tense situation.Former US President Jimmy Carter is suggesting just that. But will the hawks in Washington listen?. The Carter CenterThe harsh rhetoric from Washington and Pyongyang during recent months has exacerbated an already confrontational relationship between our countries, and has probably eliminated any chance of good faith peace talks between the United States and North Korea. In addition to restraining the warlike rhetoric, our leaders need to encourage talks between North Korea and other countries, especially China and Russia. The recent UN Security Council unanimous vote for new sanctions suggests that these countries could help. In all cases, a nuclear exchange must be avoided. All parties must assure North Koreans they we will forego any military action against them if North Korea remains peaceful.President Jimmy CarterI have visited North Korea three times, and have spent more than 20 hours in discussions with their political leaders regarding important issues that affect U.S.-DPRK relations.In June 1994, I met with Kim Il Sung in a time of crisis, when he agreed to put all their nuclear programs under strict supervision of the International Atomic Energy Agency and to seek mutual agreement with the United States on a permanent peace treaty, to have summit talks with the president of South Korea, to expedite the recovery of the remains of American service personnel buried in his country, and to take other steps to ease tension on the peninsula. Kim Il Sung died shortly after my visit, and his successor, Kim Jong Il, notified me and leaders in Washington that he would honor the promises made by his father. These obligations were later confirmed officially in negotiations in Geneva by Robert Gallucci and other representatives of the Clinton administration.I returned to Pyongyang in August 2010, at the invitation of North Korean leaders, to bring home Aijalon Gomes, an American who had been detained there. My last visit to North Korea was in May 2011 when I led a delegation of Elders (former presidents of Ireland and Finland and former prime minister of Norway) to assure the delivery of donated food directly to needy people.During all these visits, the North Koreans emphasized that they wanted peaceful relations with the United States and their neighbors, but were convinced that we planned a preemptive military strike against their country. They wanted a peace treaty (especially with America) to replace the ceasefire agreement that had existed since the end of the Korean War in 1953, and to end the economic sanctions that had been very damaging to them during that long interim period. They have made it clear to me and others that their first priority is to assure that their military capability is capable of destroying a large part of Seoul and of responding strongly in other ways to any American attack. The influence of China in Pyongyang seems to be greatly reduced since Kim Jong Un became the North Korean leader in December 2011.A commitment to peace by the United States and North Korea is crucial.When this confrontational crisis is ended, the United States should be prepared to consummate a permanent treaty to replace the ceasefire of 1953. The United States should make this clear, to North Koreans and to our allies.READ MORE NORTH KOREA NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire North Korea FilesSUPPORT OUR WORK BY SUBSCRIBING & BECOMING A MEMBER @21WIRE.TV | 1 |
As Calais "Jungle" Burns, Refugees Try To Storm Their Way Back In Source: Zero Hedge
It has been a harsh week for the 8,000 refugees inhabiting the Calais "Jungle" camp.
Continuing an operation which began on Monday, workers ramped up demolition of France's notorious Calais "Jungle" on Wednesday after fierce blazes cut through a swathe of the camp overnight, sending migrants fleeing for safety. Fabienne Buccio, the prefect of Pas-de-Calais, said it was "mission accomplished" for the demolition.
However his assessment may have been premature as charities said many unaccompanied minors had not been processed and BBC reporters at the camp said groups of adults remained.
Wearing hardhats and orange overalls in the morning fog, a team of around 15 workers resumed tearing down tents and makeshift shelters at the camp that has become a symbol of Europe's migrant crisis.
As recounted by AFP reporters, a new fire threw black smoke into the sky as several dozen wood shacks smouldered on a main thoroughfare of the sprawling slum. "Someone burned our tents. Maybe they used petrol or something, I don't know, but the fires spread fast. We had to run out in the middle of the night," said Arman Khan, a 17-year-old Afghan. "I left all my things behind, I have nothing now."
Riot police had cordoned off the demolition area while aid workers and government officials checked that the dwellings were empty. Others carted away the debris and abandoned belongings - mattresses, multi-coloured blankets, supermarket trollies and so on - in small earth-movers. Gas canisters, sinks, refrigerators and other metal objects lay scattered across the desolate scene.
The fires spread just hours after workers moved in Tuesday to clear the squalid camp that has been home to an estimated 6,000-8,000 migrants, many with hopes of reaching Britain.
A local official played down the blazes, telling AFP: "It's a tradition among communities who set fire to their homes before leaving." Located next to the port of Calais, the Jungle has for years been a launchpad for migrants attempting to make it to Britain by sneaking onto trucks or jumping onto trains heading across the Channel.
Since Monday, 3,242 adults have been transferred to centres around France and 772 unaccompanied minors have been moved to shipping containers converted into temporary shelters in the Jungle, the interior ministry said. The numbers represent around half the camp's estimated population before the operation began, according to official figures.
The authorities have said those who agree to be moved can seek asylum in France. Those who refuse risk deportation. The fate of more than 1,000 unaccompanied minors is of particular concern.
Meanwhile, French Interior Minister Bernard Cazeneuve said Tuesday that all those "with proven family links in Britain" would eventually be transferred and that London had committed to reviewing all other cases where it was "in the child's interest" to settle across the Channel.
* * *
However, not all are seeking to rush back. Many inhabitants of the camp attempted to break through the police line and storm back into the camp, which is being demolished by the authorities, according to RT's reporter on the ground. Inhabitants break through police line to storm back into #Calais camp. pic.twitter.com/fb1aQSVh99
— Harry Fear (@harryfear) October 26, 2016
Sky News also said that migrants were returning to the “Jungle.” Migrants are returning to the 'Jungle' camp in Calais following fires during demolition at the site
— Sky News Newsdesk (@SkyNewsBreak) October 26, 2016
A migrant child, who was among those returning to the camp, waved a cricket bat and shouted: “Jungle is not dead! Jungle is not dead!” according to the British Express newspaper. “It’s chaos with these ongoing fires and plumes of smoke [across the camp],” Harry Fear reported from the scene.
“The police line was broken by migrants wanting to enter back in,” he said, adding that it appears new fires have been set across the camp.
According to the RT correspondent, the operation to clear Calais looks much like a failure, despite claims of its complete success by the French authorities. He said that fire brigades on site have been working “quite slowly” to put out the fires. The RT crew also noticed “uncontrolled gas canisters [at the camp’s territory], which haven’t yet been secured by the authorities,” Fear added.
According to an unnamed regional official, the authorities will be able to shut down the processing center, which is dispersing migrants to different locations in France until the end of the day. Fires keep burning in many locations around the camp as some migrants set fire to the camp in response to government actions.
— Jonathan RT France (@Jonathan_RTfr) October 26, 2016
The demolition of tents and wooden structures, which the residents had used as shelter, started at the site on Tuesday. Violent clashes between the police and the inhabitants were reported, with tear gas deployed by officers. The camp was set ablaze last night by refugees displeased with the demolition. The flames caused several explosions of portable gas, with four migrants arrested over the incident. Cette partie de la #Jungle a été rasée au tractopelle #Calais pic.twitter.com/somJBNNkKy
— Jonathan RT France (@Jonathan_RTfr) October 26, 2016
Thousands of hopeful migrants, many of whom are now homeless, are looking to cross the English Channel to find asylum in the UK have been holed up at the camp for months. Britain, however, only agreed to take in around 1,000 migrant children from the camp who have relatives in the UK.
On Wednesday, almost 40 councils in England refused to accept any of the child refugees evacuated from the camp.
Meanwhile, with the UN warning that the recent attack on Mosul may unleash up to another million refugees in the coming weeks, Europe's migrant crisis is about to get even worse. | 1 |
While honoring Native American Code Talkers today at the White House, President Trump took a jab at Democrat Senator Elizabeth Warren, who is best known for the lie she told to Harvard University on a job application, where she told them she was of Native American heritage, in order to receive special consideration, by allowing her to skip over more qualified candidates simply because of her fake Native American heritage. While running for her Senate seat in Massachusetts, her lie was uncovered, and shortly after that, the name Pocahontas was born, and it has stuck with her ever since.On Monday, the president decided to air the attack one more time alongside aging Native American veterans who helped fight fascism, in a White House ceremony attended by White House chief of staff John Kelly and other officials. Trump told the honorees, You were here long before any of us were here. Although we have a representative in Congress who they say was here a long time ago. They call her Pocahontas. Watch:Here's the video: Trump calls Elizabeth Warren 'Pocahontas' while honoring Native American code talkers: "You were here long before any of us were here. Although we have a representative in Congress who they say was here a long time ago. They call her Pocahontas." pic.twitter.com/hjZ5MInDDf Kyle Griffin (@kylegriffin1) November 27, 2017During his remarks, Trump recalled a time when Kelly asked him: How good were these code talkers? He said sir, you have no idea. You have no idea what they ve done for this country. And the strength and the bravery and the love that they have for the country. That was the ultimate statement from General Kelly on the importance. The president spoke as code-talkers stood by him at a podium, while another was seated in a wheelchair.Peter MacDonald, a WWII veteran and former chairman of the Navajo tribe, gave introductory remarks by going through the history of the code talkers in the Pacific theater, including at the battles at Guadalcanal and Iwo Jima. Daily Mail Warren immediately began shooting arrows at Trump during an appearance on one of the Democrat propaganda networks, MSNBC.After huffing and puffing to MSNBC about Donald Trump, and how he took a jab at her dishonesty by calling his Pocahontas remark a racial slur , (an insult to Pochahontas, maybe, but a racial slur? Sorry Liz, we just don t see it) the dishonest Democrat Senator and wannabe President, Elizabeth Warren staged a dry run at Donald Trump for the Oval Office. Look, Donald Trump has done this over and over again in the past, thinking he s going to shut me up with it. It hasn t worked in the past, it s not gonna work now. Warren exclaimed in her nails-on-a-blackboard voice. Shut her up with it?Watch:WATCH: Elizabeth Warren responds to Trump's "Pocahontas" remark on @MSNBC:"It is deeply unfortunate that the President of the United States cannot even make it through a ceremony honoring these heroes without having to throw out a racial slur." pic.twitter.com/au1QntxDzR NBC News (@NBCNews) November 27, 2017Last year, a video Native Americans made a Youtube video, slamming Warren and her lie about her Native American heritage. Watch:Warren obviously forgot that only months ago, liberal comedian Bill Maher referred to Warren as Pocahontas during an appearance on his show to push her book. Does anyone remember Warren appearing on MSNBC to call Maher s comments a racial slur? | 0 |
LONDON (Reuters) - Iran carried out a cyber attack on British lawmakers earlier this year, The Times newspaper reported on Saturday, citing an intelligence assessment of the incident. The report came the day after Britain joined other European countries in warning the United States against harming a nuclear deal with Iran. Britain s parliament was hit by a sustained and determined cyber attack in June, designed to identify weak email passwords, just over a month after a ransomware worm crippled parts of the country s health service. The Times said that the attack was Iran s first significant cyber attack on a British target after the hack was initially blamed on Russia. Britain s National Cyber Security Centre was not immediately available for comment. The Iranian government had no immediate comment. While the motive for the attack has not yet been established, the hackers were not seeking simple financial profit, The Times said. | 0 |
Chinese may become Russia’s second largest ethnic population by 2050 26 October 2016 TASS The number of unemployed people in China is more than the entire Russian population. Facebook russia , china , migration
Experts predict a possible growth in the migration flow from China into Russia, by 2050 the Chinese may become the second largest population group in Russia, Scientific Director of the Center for Migration Research of the Institute of National Economic Prediction of Russia’s Academy of Science Zhanna Zayonchkovskaya said.
"The number of unemployed people in China is more than the entire Russian population," she noted at an international conference at the North Caucasus Federal University in the Russian city of Stavropol, dubbed as "Migration processes.""If we maintain solid relations with China then I think by 2050 the Chinese may become the second largest population group in Russia and surpass the Central Asian populace as far as migration goes," the expert said.
Zayonchkovskaya said the reason for this process was that after 2030 the migrant inflow from Central Asian countries would decline as a large part of young people had already left these countries to work or study in the neighboring states.
Tajikistan and Uzbekistan are the main countries whose citizens come to Russia, Ukrainians migrate in large numbers, too. "If we think of other countries from where migrant labor can be obtained, I can think of none other than China," Zayonchkovskaya noted, emphasizing that "Russia will need foreign workers to ensure its economic development."
According to the expert, the changes in the pension legislation would not balance the situation given the decrease in the working-age population. "Raising the retirement age will neither level out the demographic waves, nor will it solve the labor shortage problem, as it only solves the problem of the Pension Fund, though the demographic situation still remains problematic," Zayonchkovskaya added noting that according to the Federal Migration Service, the international migration flow into Russia in 2015 had amounted in 9.8 mln people.
First published by TASS . | 1 |
SYDNEY (Reuters) - A senior Australian government minister on Thursday called Donald Trump’s campaign for the U.S. presidency “terrifying” and warned it risked casting the Republican Party into the wilderness if he wins nomination. Australian government ministers rarely make critical comments about elections in other countries, especially stalwart allies like the United States, which Australia relies on heavily for military backing in the Asia-Pacific. Australian Industry Minister Christopher Pyne, a cabinet member of the ruling conservative Liberal-National coalition, criticized the violence at recent Trump rallies and said that his rise was casting a pall over American democracy. “Now, democracy should be robust but it certainly shouldn’t be violent,” Pyne said in an interview on Australia’s Channel Seven television network. “And I think the Donald Trump phenomenon is a real problem for the United States, making their democracy look kind of weird,” he said. Republican front-runner Trump warned on Wednesday of riots if he is denied the party’s presidential nomination, only days after Trump supporters and protesters clashed at a rally for the Republican in Chicago that was later scrapped. Republican Party leaders are appalled at Trump’s incendiary rhetoric and reject policies such as his vow to deport 11 million illegal immigrants, temporarily ban Muslims from the United States and build a wall along the Mexican border. The party tried to play down Trump’s riot comments, which have raised the temperature even more in a heated White House race. | 1 |
Chicago residents are living a nightmare. The murder and crime statistics are what you would expect to see in a war torn Middle Eastern nation.These Chicago residents have had enough and they re speaking out against Barack Obama and the Democrat party that has sold them a bill of goods:Click HERE to see more Chicago residents speak out: The liberal agenda is not the black agenda, it is not the family agenda and it s not the American agenda. Seven people were killed and at least 35 others including a 5-year-old girl were wounded in shootings across Chicago between Friday night and Monday morning.The weekend s latest homicide happened Sunday morning in the Englewood neighborhood on the South Side.About 8:35 a.m., an officer on patrol found 32-year-old Dwayne T. Triplett slumped over at the wheel of a vehicle near his home in the 1100 block of West 72nd Street, according to Chicago Police and the Cook County medical examiner s office.He suffered gunshot wounds to the head and chest, and was pronounced dead at the scene at 8:53 a.m., authorities said.Earlier Sunday, two men, ages 34 and 42, were slain on a Brainerd neighborhood porch on the South Side. Officers responding at 1:13 a.m. to a call of shots fired in the 9000 block of South Marshfield found them dead, one shot in the head and the other in the neck, police said.Authorities have not released their names. Family members identified the older man as Antwon Brooks, a father of two.Late Saturday in Back of the Yards, a 17-year-old boy was killed and a 19-year-old man was wounded in more South Side gunfire.They were standing in the street about 10:20 p.m. in the 5200 block of South Sangamon when a silver Audi pulled up and someone inside fired shots, police said. The 17-year-old, identified as Christopher Fields, was shot in the back and taken to Stroger Hospital, where he died at 11:17 p.m., authorities said. He lived in the 6200 block of South Csangamon. Via: CBSlocal | 0 |
ASTANA (Reuters) - Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Friday he hoped U.S. President Donald Trump would make a balanced decision on whether to remain engaged in the international deal to curb Iran s nuclear program. It is very important to preserve it in its current form and of course the participation of the United States will be a very significant factor in this regard, Lavrov told reporters on a visit to Kazakhstan. Under the deal, Iran agreed to restrict its nuclear program in return for lifting most international sanctions that had crippled its economy. Trump is expected to announce soon that he will decertify the deal, a senior White House official said on Thursday, in a step that potentially could cause the 2015 accord to unravel. Trump, who has called the pact an embarrassment and the worst deal ever negotiated , has been weighing whether it serves U.S. security interests as he faces an Oct. 15 deadline for certifying that Iran is complying with its terms. If Trump declines to certify Iran s compliance, U.S. congressional leaders would have 60 days to decide whether to reimpose sanctions on Tehran suspended under the agreement. | 1 |
It s not the first time that the name of Vladimir Putin has been brought up in the US presidential campaign, but this time the US president used this argument while openly campaigning for Clinton against Trump. The situation has become really ludicrous and it borders on the ridiculous, believes Gregory R. Copley, editor of Defense & Foreign Affairs. In my 50 odd years covering the US government, I have never seen this level of partisanship within the administration where a sitting president actually regards the opposition party as the enemy of the state, Copley told RT.The analyst said that the democrats are blaming the messenger to revert the attention from the message. The message which Donald Trump delivered on RT was unambiguous in his campaign. Just like the fact that WikiLeaks revelation of the hacked emails was very explicit in showing up what the Democratic party itself was doing, Copley added.The US establishment is sacrificing key bilateral relationships in order to win [a] domestic election, believes Copley. He added that neither Obama nor Clinton are interested in unifying the country, but they are rather interested in winning and engaging in what modern democracy seems to have become the tyranny of the marginal majority over the marginal minority. When you think about the number of times that the Clinton campaign has brought up President Putin and the alleged Russian hacking of Hillary Clinton s service, it makes you wonder just how desperate they are, Copley noted. President Obama has lost literally all prestige in an international community with the loss of prestige he has become desperate. Read more: RTAnother round of hacked Democratic National Committee documents have been released. Provided by an anonymous representative of a hacker, Guccifer, the 500 megabytes detail the DNC s information technology infrastructure and internal reports on donors.Forbes reports that on Tuesday in London at the Future of Cyber Security Europe conference, Guccifer addressed cybersecurity experts through an unknown and remote transcriber.The notorious hacker then shared a trove of documents ostensibly obtained via a breach of the DNC s cybersecurity. According to Forbes, a password and login was given to them, and the documents they accessed appeared to show details of DNC donors and finances as well as the information technology setup to protect the sensitive data.In July, just as the Democratic National Convention was getting underway, WikiLeaks released the results of the first DNC hack carried out by Guccifer. That hack revealed signs of bias in favor of Hillary Clinton over her primary opponent Bernie Sanders, and consequently led to the resignation of the DNC chair, Debbie Wasserman Schultz, as well as several other top officers.The DNC responded to the latest hack claim Tuesday through its Interim Chair Donna Brazile, who stated that the DNC is the victim of a crime, which she blamed on Russian state-sponsored agents, while also cautioning that the hacked documents were still being authenticated by the DNC legal team, as it is common for Russian hackers to forge documents. | 1 |
CANNES, France — Filmmakers find inspiration in love, nature, faith, trauma, other people, other movies. The German director Maren Ade discovered a muse for her latest, the sensational “Toni Erdmann” — a critical favorite at the 69th Cannes Film Festival — in an American comic who died in 1984: “I fell in love with Andy Kaufman. ” Maren Ade (pronounced ) also fell for Kaufman’s most outrageous creation, the belligerent insult comic Tony Clifton, whose first name she borrowed for the title character of her new movie. Toni is the fabrication of Winfried (Peter Simonischek) a music teacher who uses this outsize persona to infiltrate the life of his only child, Ines (Sandra Hüller) a corporate strategist on assignment in Bucharest. Toni emerges after Winfried pays a brief, awkward visit to Ines, who barely makes time for her father. Exit Winfried, enter Toni, a lout with a wolfish leer, a fright wig and false teeth who claims to be a “consultant and coach” for the chief executive of Ines’s company. “Toni Erdmann” quickly lifted the festival mood and Ms. Ade’s international profile, though it was shut out on awards night. “It’s nice and weird at the same time,” she said of the attention the day after her movie’s first press screening. While here, she racked up 30 hours of interviews with 60 journalists from more than 15 countries. Seated on a terrace in the festival headquarters overlooking a marina, she seemed remarkably at ease, especially given that she had been working on the movie days before the festival opened. “It was very, very crazy to just get it here. ” We met again a few days later in a small Italian restaurant. She was at once alert and relaxed, although also hoarse, either from all the interviews or, she thought, tending to her . She had brought both her sons — the other is 6 months old — along with her partner and assorted grandparents. That afternoon, she and her family planned to take a boat to a nearby island for a break before heading to a friend’s house. Sipping warm milk with honey to soothe her throat, and speaking in English, she seemed pleased by the praise, if somewhat exasperated that the movie had been described as arriving out of the blue. “In your own life,” Ms. Ade said, “nothing is out of the blue. ” Some of this surprise doubtless stems from the movie’s comedy, a quality not always associated with German cinema, especially in a temple of seriousness like Cannes. In addition, until now, Ms. Ade, 39, has been largely known only inside rarefied cinephile circles and it has been seven years since her last feature, “Everyone Else. ” Since then, she has produced movies and had her children she was pregnant with one son while writing “Toni Erdmann” and pregnant with the second while working on it in postproduction. As she once put it, “I became a mother, which is also like making one film at least. ” The textured realism in “Toni Erdmann” also needed time. “It took long to develop the characters and to really find that story,” Ms. Ade said. “It came step by step, going deeper and deeper into the game they’re playing. ” As a character, Toni enables Winfried to insinuate himself into Ines’s life. He barges into her workplace and social events, becoming a classic trickster, that mischievous, subversive figure who upends the status quo. Lewis Hyde, a scholar of tricksters, argues that they emerge from need: “There are large, devouring forces in this world, and that trickster’s intelligence arose not just to feed himself but to outwit these other eaters. ” With a demented smile and oversize teeth, Toni the trickster sets out to sabotage the forces devouring his daughter. Most obviously, “Toni Erdmann” is a story, if one thankfully without the familiar therapeutic platitudes and psychological tidiness. Ms. Ade had been interested in the dynamic “for a long time,” she said. “I found out that during writing it’s difficult to escape your own family. ” The inspiration for Toni’s teeth came from a gag set she was given at a premiere of “Austin Powers” when she was 20 and working for a production house. She gave the teeth to her father, who she knew would make good use of them, and together they, with Andy Kaufman and Tony Clifton, became part of her exploration of role playing. “Toni Erdmann” is only Ms. Ade’s third feature, after “The Forest for the Trees” (2003) and “Everyone Else,” which shared the Silver Bear (second place) at the 2009 Berlin Film Festival. Ms. Ade began making amateur movies with a camcorder when she was a teenager and attended the University of Television and Film Munich. There, she and another student, Janine Jackowski, founded Komplizen Film, which produces Ms. Ade’s work along with those of other names like Miguel Gomes. (A third partner, Jonas Dornbach, joined Komplizen in 2010.) Having her own company, Ms. Ade said, gives her the freedom she wants — and the control she seems to like — including the luxury to rehearse on location. “Everything had to come out of the characters,” Ms. Ade said. “Maybe that’s also why the film needs time. ” The movie runs a comfortable, perfectly calibrated two hours and 42 minutes, although she did try to shorten it. “I went back into the editing room three weeks after giving birth, because I wanted to be sure that it’s the right length. ” But when she tried to cut it, she felt the movie lost its complexity. It makes sense. Ms. Ade is a pointillist, and over the span of “Toni Erdmann,” you don’t only watch Ines and Winfried, you also learn to read their looks, to inhabit their silences and to recognize the weight of their seemingly meaningless moments. Last November, after her second son was born, Ms. Ade sat down with her and asked them to be honest about whether the film had a shot at being selected for Cannes. It’s an index of this event’s significance to a filmmaker like Ms. Ade, whose importance isn’t measured in box office numbers, that she powered ahead to finish the movie by the festival’s deadline. Her persistence and work paid off, because long after this year’s juries have disbanded and the world has forgotten who won this year’s awards, the 2016 edition will best be remembered as the year Ms. Ade gave us “Toni Erdmann,” a work of great beauty, great feeling and great cinema. | 0 |
BEIJING (Reuters) - Late U.S. President Abraham Lincoln, who freed the slaves, would have approved of China s policy to end serfdom in Tibet, a senior Chinese official said on Thursday. China considers devoutly Buddhist Tibet an inherent part of its territory and routinely rejects accusations from exiles and rights groups of repression and human rights abuses. Chinese forces entered Tibet in 1950 in what the government terms a peaceful liberation, and says its rule has brought prosperity and freedom to what was a backward and feudal society, including freeing a million people from serfdom, an event marked in Tibet as Serfs Emancipation Day. Speaking on the sidelines of China s 19th Communist Party Congress, Supervision Minister Yang Xiaodu, who helps fight corruption, said the United States and Tibet had much in common with their human rights experiences. Yang recounted a tale of meeting a person he described as a former assistant U.S. secretary of state during a visit to the United States. I said, In Chinese people s minds, Lincoln is a hero, as he freed the slaves, and on this issue Chinese and American people s recognition is the same, it s a human rights issue , Yang said. In Tibet we freed the serfs, and how are American friends not able to understand this? This is also a human rights issue. If you look at it from Lincoln s point of view, he would have approved of China overturning the serfdom system in Tibet. Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation freeing slaves in the United States in 1863. China keeps a tight grip on Tibet due to periodic anti-Chinese unrest, and all foreigners require permission to visit, including foreign reporters. Penpa Tashi, Tibet s propaganda chief, told reporters at a separate event that it would like to have more foreign visitors. But Tibet is a high altitude area, he said. Our receiving capability is still being improved. | 0 |
CAIRO (Reuters) - Personnel assigned to the U.S. Mission in Egypt are prohibited from visiting religious sites outside greater Cairo until further notice, the U.S. embassy said on Monday in a security message posted on its website. “Terrorists have attacked targets associated with the Christian community in Egypt. Incidents have occurred in both urban and isolated settings. Additional attacks may be possible,” the message said. “Until further notice, personnel assigned to the U.S. Mission in Egypt are prohibited from visiting religious sites outside greater Cairo. U.S. citizens residing in or visiting Egypt should take prudent steps to enhance their personal security,” it said. Gunmen attacked a group of Coptic Christians travelling to a monastery in central Egypt on May 26, killing at least 29 people and wounding 24. Many children were among the victims. Islamic State took responsibility for the attack, which came on the eve of the Islamic holy month of Ramadan. It followed other church bombings claimed by the militant group in a campaign of violence against Christians. | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A woman who has said that U.S. President Donald Trump groped her during a 2007 meeting has subpoenaed his presidential campaign for any documents concerning similar allegations, according to a subpoena filed in New York State Supreme Court. Summer Zervos, a former contestant on Trump’s reality TV show “The Apprentice,” sought all documents from his campaign pertaining to “any woman alleging that Donald J. Trump touched her inappropriately,” identifying nine by name, the subpoena said. Trump has denied Zervos’ accusation in the past. On Monday, asked about the subpoena at an impromptu White House news conference, Trump called it “totally fake news.” “It’s just fake. It’s fake. It’s made-up stuff, and it’s disgraceful, what happens, but that happens in the - that happens in the world of politics,” he said. The Trump campaign did not immediately return a request for comment on the subpoena. Last October, shortly before the Nov. 8 presidential election, Zervos held a news conference to say that Trump kissed her, touched her breast and tried to get her to lie down on a bed with him during a meeting about a possible job. The accusation came a week after a 2005 video emerged showing the Republican candidate bragging about groping and making unwanted sexual advances. While Trump said at the time the video was just talk and he had never behaved in that way, several women subsequently went public with allegations of sexual misconduct against the New York real estate magnate going back three decades. Trump denied all the allegations. Zervos sued Trump for defamation in New York State Supreme Court after he denied her account of their meeting and accused her and other women of lying. The subpoena, part of that lawsuit, was served in March and entered into the court file in September. Trump’s lawyers agreed to preserve the pertinent documents, but they are also trying to have the lawsuit dismissed or delayed. “We served it simply to make sure that the documents get preserved,” Mariann Wang, one of Zervos’ lawyers, said in a phone interview on Monday. BuzzFeed website first reported on the subpoena late on Sunday. | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - By picking fellow Republican South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley to serve as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, U.S. President-elect Donald Trump’s pick rounded out his early Cabinet choices with his first woman and ethnic minority. But he also opted for a state politician with little experience in the federal government or international diplomacy who has been a sharp critic, backing two of his rivals and criticizing the harsh rhetoric of the presidential campaign. In tapping the popular governor of a state that supported him, Trump’s choice could signal an attempt to reach out to minorities in the wake of his Nov. 8 victory following a bitterly divisive campaign. His victory has sparked protests and concerns by those worried that his denunciation of immigrants, Muslims and Hispanics during the campaign could translate into policies eroding civil rights. Trump said on Wednesday that Haley could bring people together and was “a proven dealmaker” who “will be a great leader representing us on the world stage.” Haley, 44, represents what some Republicans have said could be the new face of the Republican Party: a younger, more diverse generation of leaders who could help bolster conservatives as U.S. demographics shift. The daughter of Indian immigrants, she drew national attention in 2015 when she led a push to remove the Confederate battle flag from the state capitol grounds in Columbia after a white gunman killed nine people at a historic predominantly African-American church in Charleston. But Haley, now serving her second four-year term as governor, has little experience in foreign policy and the diplomatic issues likely to come before the United Nations. In a statement on Wednesday, she praised the state’s residents for taking “a chance on a little-known, 38-year old, minority, female governor” when she took office six years ago. Like Trump, Haley came to politics as an outsider. After years working in her family’s gift shop in Bamberg, a small town an hour south of the state capital, she ran for state representative in 2004 and defeated a nearly 30-year incumbent, touting her fiscal conservatism while brushing off racial slurs. She won her gubernatorial bid in 2010 on a platform of reform, receiving the endorsement of former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, a former Republican vice presidential nominee and darling of the party’s Tea Party wing. Still, Haley has not hesitated to call out fellow Republicans, including Trump. In January, she offered the party’s rebuttal to President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address, seizing the spotlight in what was seen as a strong rebuke of Trump. Haley called for tolerance and civility in her remarks. Although she never mentioned Trump by name, she urged Americans not to “follow the siren call of the angriest voices,” adding: “No one who is willing to work hard, abide by our laws, and love our traditions should ever feel unwelcome in this country.” But she told the Federalist Society recently that although she was not an early or vocal supporter of Trump, she did vote for him and was “thrilled” that he won. Born to Sikh parents who emigrated to South Carolina from India, she is no stranger to U.S. racial and ethnic tensions. While Trump won with the lowest minority vote in decades,, Haley has scolded Republicans for not working harder to broaden their appeal beyond white Americans. “Our approach often appears cold and unwelcoming to minorities. That’s shameful and that has to change,” she said in a 2015 National Press Club speech. “It’s on us to communicate our positions in ways that wipe away the clutter of prejudices.” Although she worked to heal the racial tensions that exploded after the gun attack at the Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in 2015, she has also been critical of the Black Lives Matter movement that gained ground after a series of high-profile shootings of unarmed African-Americans by police. “Some people think you have to yell and scream in order to make a difference. Well, that’s just not true,” she told the National Press Club. “When the sound is quieter, you can actually hear what someone else is saying and that can make a world of difference.” On Wednesday, Haley said, “When the President believes you have a major contribution to make to the welfare of our nation, and to our nation’s standing in the world, that is a calling that is important to heed.” Her international experience is largely centered on her efforts to draw foreign businesses to South Carolina, including at least eight overseas trips, local media reported. One - a June 2011 trip billed as an economic development mission to Europe and the Paris Air Show - cost the state $158,000 and drew criticism back home over its luxury accommodations and a hotel party. She said afterwards she did not know how much was spent and had learned a lesson, even as she pledged to keep up the sales pitches, the Charleston Post and Courier reported at the time. “There is a method to the madness,” she said, according to the newspaper. “I am selling the state the only way I know how.” The Post and Courier said her trips included trade show visits and economic development meetings, including stops related to BMW (BMWG.DE) and Volvo (VOLVb.ST), two automakers with facilities in South Carolina. She has visited Germany, Sweden, Britain, Japan, Canada and India, it reported. As governor, she has also been embroiled in the thorny issue of nuclear waste amid federal facilities in the state aimed at storing and converting such materials. Earlier this year, she fought to have some nuclear material from Japan headed for South Carolina moved to New Mexico. “Critics will ask if Nikki Haley has been engaged in int’l affairs. I’ve had convos w/her on & off over the years. She has a strong worldview,” Dan Senor, a former adviser to 2012 Republican Presidential nominee Mitt Romney, said on Twitter. | 1 |
Professor Olga Cox, who teaches Human Sexuality at Orange Coast College, told her class in December that the election of Donald Trump was an act of terrorism. Despite this, Cox was recently nominated and selected by her fellow faculty members for the Professor of the Year award.According to students, it is an Orange Coast College tradition for the recipient of the annual Professor of the Year award to be the keynote speaker at the school s graduation ceremony each year. It s an act of terrorism, Professor Cox said to her class in December regarding President Trump s election. One of the most frightening things for me, and most people in my life, she continued, is that the people committing the assault are among us. It is not some stranger from some other country coming in and attacking our sense of what it means to be an American and the things that we stands for. And that makes it more painful. Here s the video that captures Professor Olga Cox s disgusting remarks:Her comments were videotaped by OCC student Caleb O Neil, who was suspended by the school for allegedly unlawfully recording the indignant professor until the school retracted its punishment in the face of backlash.The selection for the Professor of the Year award is made by a committee that consists of faculty, staff, and administrators, and is based on a rubric that takes into account multiple factors including teaching, service to the campus, and community involvement. Despite the nationwide negative attention and condemnation from the community in the wake of these incidents, this committee recommended Professor Cox as their choice to receive Professor of the Year and the OCC administration accepted the committee s nomination.Doug Bennett, the Executive Director of College Advancement for OCC, confirmed to Red Alert Politics in an email that Professor Cox had won the nomination for Professor of the Year award but declined to accept it. A member of the campus community nominated Professor Cox for the award, the committee selected her through the rubric, but the award isn t being made because she has declined, says Bennett. Red Alert Politics | 1 |
AUSTIN, Texas (Reuters) - Texas Governor Greg Abbott joked about shooting journalists while visiting a gun range on Friday to sign a bill lowering the cost of a handgun license, drawing criticism from gun-safety and free-press advocates who called his remarks “dangerous.” Abbott signed the bill at an indoor gun range in Austin, the state capital, then demonstrated his own shooting skills at an upstairs firing gallery before holding up his bullet-pocked target and quipping, “I’m gonna carry this around in case I see any reporters.” A photo of the moment, published by the Texas Tribune, showed the grinning first-term Republican governor pointing to the center of the paper target, where three rounds had pierced the bull’s eye circle. His comment drew sharp rebukes from Reporters Without Borders, headquartered in Paris, and the Washington-based Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence. Both said the incident was especially troubling as it came amid increasingly hostile rhetoric directed against the news media by Republican President Donald Trump and his supporters. “This joke was dangerous and out of line. Because it’s never just a joke to some,” Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence said in a statement. “Words matter. In a state and country where dangerous people can still so easily buy guns without a background check, leaders of every political stripe should be careful not to green light violence on their behalf.” The two groups also cited the misdemeanor assault charge filed on Wednesday against Republican Congressman-elect Greg Gianforte of Montana, accused of body-slamming a reporter who asked him about healthcare on the eve of his election. “Politicians must condemn this dangerous rhetoric against reporters as it can quickly escalate to physical violence like we saw in Montana,” Reporters Without Borders said in a Tweet. The group’s latest annual World Press Freedom Index of 180 countries ranks the United States at No. 43, one rung below the tiny West African nation of Burkino Faso. “We’re really seeing just how much America deserves that ranking right now,” said Margaux Ewen, the organization’s U.S. advocacy director. Abbott’s office did not respond to requests by Reuters for comment. The bill he signed will cut fees for a first-time license to carry a handgun from $140 to $40, and lower the renewal fee from $70 to $40, starting in September. It also waives the fees for peace officers and members of the military. “No law-abiding Texan should be priced out of the ability to exercise their Second Amendment rights,” Abbott said in signing the measure. | 1 |
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Saudi Arabia does not believe that Iran is abiding by the 2015 nuclear deal between the Islamic Republic and six world powers, the kingdom s foreign minister said on Wednesday, without elaborating. We expect the international community to do whatever it takes to ensure that Iran is in compliance, the minister, Adel al-Jubeir, told reporters at the United Nations. | 0 |
ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkish authorities summoned a U.S. consulate worker to testify on Monday over his relatives alleged links to last year s failed coup attempt, state-run Anadolu news agency said, days after the arrest of another consulate employee. Anadolu said the suspect was wanted for questioning after his wife and daughter were detained in the Black Sea city of Amasya. It did not say whether he had complied with the summons. The man s wife and daughter were detained over alleged links to the network of U.S.-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, Anadolu said, blamed by Ankara for orchestrating the abortive putsch. The two were later brought to Istanbul for legal procedures, it said. U.S. consulate worker N.M.C., husband and father of the suspects in question, has no diplomatic immunity and has been called to the prosecutor s office to testify, Anadolu quoted a statement from the Istanbul prosecutor s office as saying. On Sunday, the U.S. mission in Turkey and the Turkish mission in Washington cut back visa services after Metin Topuz, a U.S. consulate employee, was arrested in Turkey last week. Washington said the charges linking him to Gulen were baseless. The prosecutor s office said that testimony from Topuz pointed to the two suspects detained in Amasya being high-ranking members of Gulen s network. Gulen has denied any role in the failed coup. | 1 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Federal officials were focused on Monday on search and rescue operations and restoring power to millions of people after Hurricane Irma tore across the Florida Keys before moving north up the state with high winds and heavy rains, the acting Homeland Security secretary said. Acting DHS Secretary Elaine Duke told CNN 200,000 people remained in shelters and more than 5 million were without power, but the top priority was search and rescue as daylight revealed the damage from the storm overnight. Today will be our first time to get a glimpse of it. We do have flying weather and as the sun rises we ll be able to take a look at the Keys especially where we have the most area of concern, she said. | 0 |
Last night, the Republican Party did something truly disgusting they not only silenced Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren for opposing Alabama Senator Jeff Sessions, but they went ahead and confirmed him as Attorney General.When she was voicing her opposition to Sessions, Warren began to read the words of Coretta Scott King aloud, which had expressed resistance to Sessions in 1986. The GOP shut her down, prompting several hashtags such as #LetLizSpeak and #NeverthelessShePersisted to trend on Twitter, as well as national outcry.Later that night, Warren issued her own message to the Republican Party, and she officially put them on notice. Warning the GOP that they had just put a man with radical hatred in charge of the DOJ, Warren said:Then, she gave them a fair warning that this was far from the last time she would speak out about Sessions:And that wasn t all. Last night, Warren made a surprising appearance on The Daily Show, where she spoke about being silenced and the new unethical Attorney General. She said: Look, the main thing is that millions of people are now reading Coretta Scott King s letter. It is an amazing letter. It is a letter full of passion. It is a letter full of heart, and it is a letter full of advice to us. It talks about a moment in history when African-Americans were beaten away from the polls, and it talks about Jeff Sessions s role in that, and I think it has an important lesson today for all of America. Thanks to Warren s passion and courage, many Americans throughout the country now know the truth about Jeff Sessions, and will be watching his actions closely. Yesterday, the GOP showed Americans that the Republican Party truly does not care about racial justice and wants do everything it can to help Trump Make America White Again. We know that Warren and the Democrats behind her won t let them get away with it, and her warning to the GOP gives us hope.Read more:Featured image via Ethan Miller / Getty Images | 0 |
BERLIN (Reuters) - The number of Turks seeking asylum in Germany is up sharply this year and has been rising steadily since last year s failed military coup in Turkey, German government data showed on Monday. Germany got 4,408 asylum applications from Turkish citizens between January and August, compared with 2,836 in the same period of 2016, an increase of 55.4 percent, according the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF). There is an increase in asylum applications by Turkish applicants. However, I can not give the reasons for that because we do not make statistical surveys of why people flee, a spokeswoman of the German Interior Ministry said. In April, the Interior Ministry said at least 262 Turkish diplomats and army personnel have applied for asylum in Germany since the failed coup on July 15 last year. Following the coup attempt, Turkey has arrested more than 40,000 people and sacked or suspended more than 100,000 in the military, civil service and private sector. Germany s mainstream parties have been outspoken critics of Turkey s crackdown Turkish Defense Minister Fikri Isik urged Germany in January to reject asylum applications from 40 mostly high-ranking former soldiers suspected by Ankara of having links to the coup. Less than a quarter of Turkish asylum seekers have been granted protection in Germany since the beginning of 2017, although that is almost triple last year s 8.2 percent. | 0 |
Photo above by The U.S. Army | CC BY 2.0 H ere is a list of the noteworthy, ongoing results of the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq beginning in March 2003. (Recall that invasion was denounced by the UN as illegal, based entirely on lies, and—given the U.S.’s hegemonic position in the world, allowing it to act with impunity—the crime’s architects have never punished.) 1/ The principal achievement of the war and occupation was the dramatic expansion of the al-Qaeda network that had attacked the U.S. on January 11, 2001. An al-Qaeda franchise was established in Iraq for the first time, playing a key role in the Sunni “insurrection” against the occupiers and their Shiite allies, then expanding across the border into Syria where it split into the al-Nusra affiliate and its even more savage rival, ISIL. Iraq also served and serves as a training ground for jihadis now operating from Iraq to Libya and beyond. 2/ The invasion and its consequences encouraged the cause of Kurdistan , an imagined state straddling Iran, Iraq, Syria and Turkey. The Kurds are the largest stateless people in the world, victims of British and French colonialists who divided the region between them after World War I. After the Gulf War of 1991, the U.S. established a “no-fly” zone over northern Iraq to discourage Baghdad from deploying troops in the region. Iraqi Kurdistan had already obtained a degree of autonomy before the invasion but the status became official under the occupation and a referendum for independence is likely to pass soon. This would infuriate Iraq and perhaps provoke Turkey’s intervention. As it is, the autonomous region is locked in struggle with Baghdad over territorial claims and control over oil fields. 3/ The invasion destroyed the Iraqi state , causing it to fracture into three: Kurdistan, the Sunni zone in the west, and the Shiite-majority areas around Baghdad. The Baathist regime of Saddam Hussein had been extremely repressive and brutal. But it had maintained order; discouraged religion in politics; protected the Christian and other religious minorities; promoted women’s rights; imposed no dress code; enforced a criminal code modeled after the Napoleonic (not the Sharia); licensed rock n’ roll radio stations, allowed the brewing of beer and its sale etc. The Shiite-led regime boosted into power by the occupation has reversed much of this. (A bill to ban the production and sale of beer was just passed by Parliament last week.) But the regime’s power does not extend into much of Anbar Province, ISIL still governs Mosul, and again, Kurdistan has become autonomous. 4/ Because Shiites are the majority in Iraq (60%), and dominate Iran next door; and because the leaders of Shiite parties have studied in Iran or lived their in exile and are sympathetic to Iran’s mullah-led regime; and because the U.S. was forced by peaceful mass protests to allow elections and the emergence of Shiites as the leaders of the country, Iran’s power and influence in the region has expanded dramatically. (Apparently no one in the State Department thought about that.) Since Iran has not attacked another country in centuries—but was savagely attacked by Saddam Hussein in 1981, sparking a long war killing over half a million people—and since Iran’s friendliness to its neighbor, one of the few Arab countries in which its co-coreligionists hold power, is entirely natural, one can ask why anyone might be alarmed by this. But it does alarm some, the leaders of Saudi Arabia, that crucial U.S. Arab ally governed by Wahhabi Sunnis, most of all. 5/ The invasion produced a regional power struggle between Sunni Islamists on the one hand, and their Shiite (and other) enemies on the other. This is often portrayed as a contest between Saudi Arabia (whose government-backed clerics condemn Shiites as heretics, and who fear the prospects for rebellion in Saudi Arabia’s own oppressed Shiite minority) and Iran, depicted as the protector of Shiites in Syria, Lebanon, Yemen etc. (The so-called “Shiite Crescent” extending from Iran to Hizbollah-controlled areas of Lebanon in fact embraces states and movements that have little in common with the Islamic Republic of Iran. But they are all targeted by the medieval regime in Riyadh which tars them all with the Iranian brush.) The Saudis were keen advocates for a U.S. strike on Iran (on the false pretext of a nuclear threat); are major supporters of al-Nusra in Syria and have funded ISIL as well, preferring such Islamist forces to the secular if Alawite-led Syrian regime; and are bombing the hell out of Yemen with active U.S. and British assistance under the false pretext that the Shiite Houthi “rebels” are agents for an expanding Iran. These things would not be happening, had the U.S. not ripped the lid off Pandora’s box in Iraq in March 2003. 6/ The invasion has produced friction between the U.S. and its important NATO ally Turkey (which has the second largest military in the alliance). Turkish war planes are bombing Kurdish YPG (People’s Protection Units) militia in Syria who constitute the U.S.’s most reliable allies, producing U.S. protests (which the Turks ignore, arguing straight-faced that the YPG are just as terrorist as ISIL). The Turks warned before the invasion of Iraq that it would likely produce regional instability. But Ankara would have allowed the U.S. to attack from Turkish soil if Turkish forces as part of the “coalition of the willing” could be stationed around Mosul, once part of Turkey—the idea being to contain Kurdish nationalism. Fortunately the parliament rejected the deal. But the predicted instability has occurred. The Arab Spring of 2011 in Syria was not directly connected to the Iraq invasion, but gave the U.S. the opportunity to pontificate that “Assad has lost legitimacy,” demand his immediate resignation, and bankroll the armed opposition including the Kurds. The fact that U.S. efforts to find and recruit Syrian Arab forces as allies—who are not in bed with al-Nusra—to topple Assad have failed so dismally binds the Pentagon ever closer to forces that Turkey wants to wipe out. (The conflict and contradiction are embarrassing to Washington. Oh, by the way, did you notice that the Turkish foreign minister just announced that Turkey would invade Iraq if it “felt threatened”?) Having declared in 2011 that Bashar al-Assad must go, the U.S. was faced in 2014 with the horrible embarrassment of ISIL (that toxic fruit of its Iraq invasion) winning lightening victories from Raqqa to Fallujah, obliterating the Sykes-Picot line dividing Syria and Iraq. The now-Syria based terrorists were approaching Baghdad. So now the U.S. having withdrawn all troops in Iraq was back in action, bombing to prevent such a disaster. And it started bombing ISIL positions in Syria (although with far less efficacy than the later Russian efforts) in league with a list of largely reluctant allies dragooned into formal membership in what Washington likes to call a “coalition” to make its unilateral program for the region sound like the will of what they like to call “the international community” regardless of how many key nations that imagined “community” includes.
Michael Moore’s all-out campaign in support of Hillary, and his pathetic attacks on Assange (“ He’s a human Molotov cocktail” ), typify, all too well, and all too sadly, the despicable qualities of American liberals, especially their treachery and obtuseness when the going gets heavy. Moore, a man supposedly astute enough to do documentaries about American stupidity and chicanery, should know better than go around propagandizing for the Queen of Chaos. Nor render any service to the Democrats a party that he should know damn well betrayed the public interest by passing Obamacare instead of single payer which he himself postulated in his documentary SiCKO. The U.S. command that Assad step down was made in the summer of 2011. Turkey’s President Erdogan, hitherto a friend and even mentor of the Syrian leader, opportunistically took up the U.S. demand and demanded his resignation. And Ankara itself began to interfere big-time in the neighboring country it once dominated, targeting Kurds more than anyone else. Since the U.S. relies on these allies, how could there not be a sharp conflict here? 7/ The invasion of Iraq and aftermath resulted in four million Iraqi refugees fleeing the country as of 2007. Hundreds of thousands have poured into Europe, alongside people displaced by U.S. wars in Afghanistan and Libya, and by the turmoil in Syria exacerbated by U.S. actions, producing a massive continent-wide crisis. Many Europeans aptly blame the deluge on the U.S., pointing to the U.S.’s paltry record of admitting refugees from the Middle East and complaining of strained national resources to handle the humanitarian catastrophe. (Another embarrassment.) *** This is all what Buddhists call “karmic retribution” for past acts. Or what the Hebrew prophet Hosea referred to when he said “Those who sow the wind reap the whirlwind.” Or what the CIA meant when it invented the term “blowback.” It’s all heading towards something, unless decent people stop it. But when I watch people like Michael Moore line up behind the foremost advocate of war in U.S. politics, joining (consciously, philosophical) amoral thugs hell-bent on maintaining and expanding the empire when it’s in a stage of precipitous decline, I am not optimistic. Not only will she win, but she will rival Dick Cheney as a cold-blooded latter-day Cold Warrior, cynically exploiting fear and stupidity to try to bring Russia to its knees. Hillary doesn’t recognize any of these seven points, which to recapitulate are: • US actions have greatly strengthened al-Qaeda • US actions have encouraged Kurdish nationalism (with unpredictable ramifications) • The US through its vicious illegal actions has destroyed the modern Iraqi state • US actions have solidified ties between Iran and Iraq’s majority Shiite community, strengthening a country still targeted for “regime change” • The invasion of Iraq and the regime change there exacerbated the historical Sunni-Shiite divide, and encouraged Saudi Arabia as the ultra-Islamist protector of the shrines to redouble its efforts to support extremist Sunnis everywhere in the region • The results of the invasion place Turkey and the U.S. at loggerheads over the question of Kurdish nationalist movements in both Iraq and Syria • US interventions in the Middle East and North Africa since 2001 have produced a massive refugee crisis, inflicted mainly on Europe She does not acknowledge that George W. Bush’s invasion (that she so passionately endorsed, fully exposing her Valkyrie soul, was criminal and not somebody’s well-meaning “mistake”). She doesn’t have any analysis of the Kurdish question. (She is not—as sometimes alleged by supporters—a “policy wonk” but a lazy intellect who doesn’t know jack-shit about the real world.) She has never expressed regret for the horrific destruction of Iraq, nor given any attention to the plight of its women, who were (as she surely knows) much better off under Saddam Hussein. (To acknowledge that would be to suggest that sometimes U.S. imperialism favors misogynist Islamists over relatively progressive secularists, for its own pragmatic empire-building purposes. She can’t mention that publicly.) She deals with the rise of Iran—made inevitable by the U.S. invasion of Iraq—by doubling down on her crude clueless Iran rhetoric, which rests on the assumption—repeatedly debunked by U.S. intelligence agencies—that Iran might pose a nuclear weapons threat. She doesn’t understand the history of the Sunni-Shiite divide; I believe she rolls her eyes in irritation that these people have these differences so hard to understand, impeding the Exceptional Nation’s ability to straighten everything out by bombing, and conquering, and making people die. She doesn’t understand anything about the history of the Kurds and their fate in the region. She feels no guilt at all about her orchestration of the ruin of Libya. She sees no reason to link her own actions to the flooding of Europe with refugees fleeing terror. But she will probably be the next president, with fellow shieldmaidens Michele Flournoy (as “secretary of defense”) and Victoria Nuland or Samantha Power (as secretary of state). Never acknowledging what happened yesterday, never able to absorb historical lessons, determined to maintain and expend its global hegemony (just as that becomes absolutely impossible to do, because other nations rise too, and great nations like Spain and Britain actually get humbled over time), the U.S. under Clinton will likely head methodically towards a showdown with Russia. She wants so badly, to show she can do it. She’ll do it for women, everywhere, to show how strong a woman can be. And then there will be a sudden strange change in your environment. As you wonder what’s going on you’ll be painlessly vaporized, on account of Hillary’s passion to topple Assad, or forcibly reintegrate the Donbass into Ukraine. The brilliance of the 2003 invasion will be clarified as never before in that bright blast, as Hillary—a very strong woman—cackles in the background from her bunker about how she came, saw, and a million died. NOTE: ALL IMAGE CAPTIONS, PULL QUOTES AND COMMENTARY BY THE EDITORS, NOT THE AUTHORS PLEASE COMMENT AND DEBATE DIRECTLY ON OUR FACEBOOK GROUP CLICK HERE ABOUT THE AUTHOR Gary Leupp is Professor of History at Tufts University, and holds a secondary appointment in the Department of Religion. He is the author of Servants, Shophands and Laborers in in the Cities of Tokugawa Japan ; Male Colors: The Construction of Homosexuality in Tokugawa Japan ; and Interracial Intimacy in Japan: Western Men and Japanese Women, 1543-1900 . He is a contributor to Hopeless: Barack Obama and the Politics of Illusion , (AK Press). He can be reached at: [email protected] Note to Commenters Due to severe hacking attacks in the recent past that brought our site down for up to 11 days with considerable loss of circulation, we exercise extreme caution in the comments we publish, as the comment box has been one of the main arteries to inject malicious code. 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What will it take to bring America to live according to its own propaganda? =SUBSCRIBE TODAY! NOTHING TO LOSE, EVERYTHING TO GAIN.= free • safe • invaluable If you appreciate our articles, do the right thing and let us know by subscribing. It’s free and it implies no obligation to you— ever. We just want to have a way to reach our most loyal readers on important occasions when their input is necessary. In return you get our email newsletter compiling the best of The Greanville Post several times a week. | 1 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A quest by Republicans to open Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Reserve was slowed after a nonpartisan Senate official ruled late on Wednesday that the exploration was subject to environmental assessments by the Interior Department. Senator Lisa Murkowski, a Republican from Alaska and the head of the Senate energy panel, has been pushing a measure in the U.S. tax bill that would open a portion of the refuge on the coastal plain to two lease sales in 10 years for drilling. But the nonpartisan senate official took issue with the energy committee measure as it did not fully consider requirements under a national environmental law. The official ruled that oil exploration in the refuge is not exempt to an environmental law requiring the Interior Department to commission an assessment, a Democratic aide said. Such environmental assessments can take months or years to complete. “This is good news for us because it could slow down or prevent drilling,” the Democratic aide said. Republicans offered new language to the bill after the move and said that the drilling would still advance if the tax bill passes. “There was a little hiccup, but they fixed it in the amendment they just filed tonight, so full steam ahead,” a Republican Senate aide said. Murkowski said she was not concerned about procedural questions and that the issues would be fully resolved. The Arctic reserve, protected by the federal government since 1960, is home to wildlife populations including caribou, polar bears and millions of birds that migrate to six of the seven continents. The U.S. Geological Survey estimates the area Republicans want to drill in has up to 12 billion barrels of recoverable crude. | 0 |
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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Ben Carson, the new secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), on Monday referred to slaves brought to the United States against their will as “immigrants,” drawing quick condemnation from civil rights groups who cast his remarks as offensive. It was Carson’s first address to the staff at HUD. He was confirmed by the U.S. Senate last week. By way of introduction, Carson shared anecdotes from his past career as a neurosurgeon and praised immigrants who worked long hours to build a better life for their children. “There were other immigrants who came here in the bottom of slave ships, worked even longer, even harder for less,” said Carson, who is African-American. “But they too had a dream that one day their sons, daughters, grandsons, granddaughters, great-grandsons, great-granddaughters might pursue prosperity and happiness in this land,” he said. Enslaved Africans did not voluntarily come to the United States and were denied freedom for hundreds of years. “This is as offensive a remark as it gets,” said Steven Goldstein, executive director of the Anne Frank Center for Mutual Respect. The remarks sparked outrage on Twitter, including from the actor Samuel L. Jackson. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) also criticized Carson. A HUD spokesman later called the tempest “the most cynical interpretation of the secretary’s remarks to an army of welcoming HUD employees. No one honestly believes he equates voluntary immigration with involuntary servitude.” Carson was well received by the hundreds of HUD employees in the room and got a standing ovation at the close of his remarks. As housing secretary, Carson is in a position to play a leading role in reviving poor neighborhoods, as Republican President Donald Trump has promised. Carson occasionally stumbled as a Republican presidential candidate, such as when he said he did not believe a Muslim should be president. After dropping out of the race, Carson threw his support to Trump, who named him housing secretary after winning the November election. | 0 |
General Michael Flynn released the statement below: After over 33 years of military service to our country, including nearly five years in combat away from my family, and then my decision to continue to serve the United States, it has been extraordinarily painful to endure these many months of false accusations of treason and other outrageous acts. Such false accusations are contrary to everything I have ever done and stood for. But I recognize that the actions I acknowledged in court today were wrong, and, through my faith in God, I am working to set things right. My guilty plea and agreement to cooperate with the Special Counsel s Office reflect a decision I made in the best interests of my family and of our country. I accept full responsibility for my actions. | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States on Wednesday called the Myanmar military operation against the Rohingya population ethnic cleansing and threatened targeted sanctions against those responsible for what it called horrendous atrocities. The situation in northern Rakhine state constitutes ethnic cleansing against the Rohingya, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said in a statement, using a term he avoided when visiting Myanmar, also known as Burma, last week. The United States will also pursue accountability through U.S. law, including possible targeted sanctions against those responsible for the alleged abuses, which have driven hundreds of thousands of Rohingya into neighboring Bangladesh, he said. The United States shifted its stance in part to raise pressure on Myanmar s military and civilian leaders, who have shared power for the past two years under an uneasy arrangement after decades of military rule, to address the crisis. Rights monitors accused Myanmar s military of atrocities, including killings, mass rape and arson, against the stateless Rohingya during so-called clearance operations after Rohingya militants Aug. 25 attacks on 30 police posts and an army base. More than 600,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled Rakhine state in Buddhist-majority Myanmar, mostly to neighboring Bangladesh, since the crackdown, which followed the insurgent attacks. These abuses by some among the Burmese military, security forces, and local vigilantes have caused tremendous suffering and forced hundreds of thousands of men, women, and children to flee their homes, Tillerson said. While repeating U.S. condemnation of the insurgent attacks, he added: No provocation can justify the horrendous atrocities that have ensued. Myanmar s 2-year-old government, led by Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi, has faced heavy international criticism for its response to the crisis, though it has no control over the generals with whom it shares power. It s not a situation that is completely under her authority, but certainly we are counting on her to show leadership and also to work through the civilian government with the military to address the crisis, a senior U.S. official told reporters in a conference call. The term ethnic cleansing is not defined in international or U.S. law and does not inherently carry specific consequences, a second senior U.S. official said on the call. Murray Hiebert, a Southeast Asia analyst with the Center for Strategic and International Studies think tank in Washington, said the State Department s use of the term and threat of sanctions will likely have limited to no impact on the ground. It is likely to create more distrust between the United States and Myanmar s military and government and push them closer to China, Russia, and its more authoritarian neighbors in Southeast Asia, he added. The U.S. move came the same day as a U.N. tribunal convicted former Bosnian Serb military commander Ratko Mladic of genocide and crimes against humanity for massacres of Bosnian Muslims and ethnic cleansing campaigns, and imprisoned him for life. The second U.S. official said Washington was analyzing whether genocide or crimes against humanity had occurred in Myanmar, which would violate international law, but has made no determination on either and that this would take time to assess. In the end it s a court that has to decide that, as we ve just seen with the verdict against Mladic, he said. A top U.N. official in September described the military actions as a textbook case of ethnic cleansing, but the United States until Wednesday had avoided the term. Washington has sought to balance its wish to nurture the civilian government in Myanmar, where it competes for influence with China, with its desire to hold the military accountable for the abuses. U.S. officials also worry that the mistreatment of the Rohingya Muslim minority may fuel radicalism. The first U.S. official said Washington would work with Bangladesh and Myanmar to encourage the voluntary repatriation of Rohingya. We have focused on the issue of voluntary returns, the official said. We don t want people to be forced to return to a situation in which they feel uncomfortable. Congressional pressure for a tougher U.S. response to the Rohingya crisis mounted before President Donald Trump s first visit to Asia this month to attend a summit of Southeast Asian countries, including Myanmar, in Manila. U.S. government sources told Reuters in October that officials were preparing a recommendation for Tillerson that would define the military-led campaign against the Rohingya as ethnic cleansing, which could spur new sanctions. In early November, U.S. lawmakers proposed targeted sanctions and travel restrictions on Myanmar military officials. Rights group Amnesty International called for a comprehensive arms embargo against Myanmar as well as targeted financial sanctions against senior Myanmar military officials. | 1 |
WASHINGTON President Trump said on Thursday that his administration was answering a call to action by rolling back regulations on environmental protections, health care, financial services and other industries as he made a push to showcase his accomplishments near the end of his first year in office.The remarks highlighted an area where Mr. Trump has perhaps done more to change the policies of his predecessor than any other, with regulatory shifts that have affected wide sections of the economy. We are just getting started, Mr. Trump said, speaking from the Roosevelt Room of the White House. He described progress so far as the most far-reaching regulatory reform in United States history, a claim he did not back up. In 1960, there were approximately 20,000 pages in the Code of Federal Regulations. Today there are over 185,000 pages, as seen in the Roosevelt Room. Today, we CUT THE RED TAPE! It is time to SET FREE OUR DREAMS and MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!A post shared by President Donald J. Trump (@realdonaldtrump) on Dec 14, 2017 at 12:39pm PSTEchoing his days as a real estate developer with the flair of a groundbreaking, Mr. Trump used an oversized pair of scissors to cut a ribbon his staff had set up in front of two piles of paper, representing government regulations in 1960 (20,000 pages, he said), and today a pile that was about six feet tall (said to be 185,000 pages).His efforts his staff said that the rules already rolled back had saved $8.1 billion in regulatory costs over their lifetime, or a total of an estimated $570 million a year have brought cheers from the business community, most notably from companies that will benefit from the rollbacks.Several economic indicators and comments from companies large and small suggest that a shift in federal regulatory policy is building business confidence and accelerating economic growth, developments Mr. Trump certainly took credit for on Thursday.A survey of chief executives released this month by the Business Roundtable found that, for the first time in six years, executives did not cite regulation as the top cost pressure facing their companies. C.E.O.s appear to be responding to the administration s energetic focus on regulation, Joshua Bolten, the roundtable s president, said this month. New York Times | 0 |
There was the time Donald J. Trump told Larry King that he had been paid more than $1 million to give a speech about his business acumen when in fact he was paid $400, 000. Or the time he sought a bank loan claiming a net worth of $3. 5 billion in 2004, four times as much as what the bank found when it checked his math. Or the time he boasted that membership to Trump National Golf Club in Westchester County, N. Y. cost $300, 000 when the actual initiation fee was $200, 000. Or the time he bragged on CNBC about his new Trump International Hotel and Tower in Las Vegas, claiming, “We have 1, 282 units, and they sold out in less than a week. ” As Mr. Trump knew, more than 300 units had not been sold. Confronted in a court case about this last untruth, Mr. Trump was anything but chagrined. “I’m talking to a television station,” he said. “We do want to put the best spin on the property. ” As Mr. Trump prepares to claim the Republican nomination for president this week, he and his supporters are sure to laud his main calling card — his long, operatic record as a swaggering business tycoon. And without question, there will be successes aplenty to highlight, from his gleaming golden to his golf resorts, hit TV shows and books. But a survey of Mr. Trump’s four decades of wheeling and dealing also reveals an equally operatic record of dissembling and deception, some of it unabashedly confirmed by Mr. Trump himself, who nearly 30 years ago first extolled the business advantages of “truthful hyperbole. ” Indeed, based on the mountain of court records churned out over the span of Mr. Trump’s career, it is hard to find a project he touched that did not produce allegations of broken promises, blatant lies or outright fraud. Under the intense scrutiny of a presidential election, many of those allegations have already become familiar campaign fodder: the Trump University students and Trump condo buyers who say they were fleeced the public servants from New Jersey to Scotland who now say they rue the zoning approvals, licenses or tax breaks they gave based on Mr. Trump’s promises the contractors who say Mr. Trump concocted complaints about their work to avoid paying them the infuriated business partners who say Mr. Trump concealed profits or ignored contractual obligations the business journalists and stock analysts who say Mr. Trump smeared them for critical coverage. Taken as a whole, though, an examination of Mr. Trump’s business career reveals persistent patterns in the way Mr. Trump bends or breaks the truth — patterns that may already feel familiar to those watching his campaign. First and foremost is Mr. Trump’s tendency toward the fib — as if it were not impressive enough to be paid $400, 000 for a speech. What also emerges is a nearly reflexive habit of telling his target audience precisely what he thinks it wants to hear — such as promising Trump University students they will learn all his real estate secrets from his “handpicked” instructors. And finally, there is the pattern already deeply familiar to his political opponents — making spurious claims against adversaries under Mr. Trump’s theory that the best defense is a offense. Equally striking is his Houdiniesque ability to wiggle away from all but the most skilled and determined efforts to corner him in an apparent lie. In interviews, lawyers who have tangled with Mr. Trump in court cases are sometimes reduced to sputtering, astonished rage, calling him “borderline pathological” and “the Michelangelo of deception” as they attempt to describe the ease with which Mr. Trump weaves his own versions of reality. “He’s a bully, and bullies aren’t known for their veracity,” said Richard C. Seltzer, a retired senior partner at the law firm Kaye Scholer who confronted Mr. Trump in three real estate lawsuits. In a telephone interview on Friday, Mr. Trump defended his integrity as a businessman — “I shoot very straight” — and argued that those who accuse him of acting in bad faith are often the same people he has outmaneuvered in deals. “What, you’re going to quote people that I’ve beat? Are you going to quote people that I ?” he asked, adding, “I’ll give you hundreds of names of people that have dealt with me that say I’m very honest. ” Hillary Clinton, meanwhile, is already hard at work making the case that Mr. Trump’s business record is a harbinger of how he would mislead from the Oval Office. Her campaign has even put up a website: www. artofthesteal. biz. Mr. Trump’s business record may help explain why various have barely been able to keep pace with his false claims on the campaign trail. PolitiFact has labeled 34 of Mr. Trump’s assertions “Pants on Fire” lies. As of July 1, The Washington Post had 46 statements by Mr. Trump. It gave 70 percent of them its worst rating, four Pinocchios — a record so abysmal that the newspaper recently compiled a video of what it called “Donald Trump’s most outrageous claims. ” The taxonomy of Mr. Trump’s business deceptions has been the subject of legal and journalistic scrutiny for decades. A Fortune magazine article from 2000 memorably described Mr. Trump’s “astonishing ability to prevaricate” this way: “But when Trump says he owns 10 percent of the Plaza Hotel, understand that what he actually means is that he has the right to 10 percent of the profit if it’s ever sold. When he says he’s building a ‘ building’ next to the U. N. he means a building that has ceilings. And when he says his casino company is the ‘largest employer in the state of New Jersey,’ he actually means to say it is the eighth largest. ” The casino magnate Steve Wynn, a sometimes friend and sometimes foe of Mr. Trump’s, took up the subject of Mr. Trump’s honesty in an interview with New York magazine. “His statements to people like you, whether they concern us and our projects or our motivations or his own reality or his own future or his own present you have seen over the years have no relation to truth or fact,” Mr. Wynn said. Some of the earliest documented examples of Mr. Trump’s deceptive business tactics come from none other than Mr. Trump, who in books and in interviews sometimes seems to delight in describing the brazen bluffs and trickery he used to claw his way to the upper echelons of New York City’s cutthroat real estate world. “You have to understand where I was coming from,” Mr. Trump wrote in his 1987 “The Art of the Deal. ” “While there are certainly honorable people in the real estate business, I was more accustomed to the sort of people with whom you don’t want to waste the effort of a handshake because you know it’s meaningless. ” Mr. Trump was particularly proud of a stratagem he employed in 1982, when he was trying to entice Holiday Inn to invest in a casino he was building in Atlantic City. The board of directors decided to visit Atlantic City, which worried Mr. Trump because he had precious little actual construction to show off. So Mr. Trump ordered his construction supervisor to cram every bulldozer and dump truck he could find into the nearly vacant construction site. “What the bulldozers and dump trucks did wasn’t important, I said, so long as they did a lot of it. If they got some actual work accomplished, all the better, but if necessary, he should have the bulldozers dig up dirt from one side of the site and dump it on the other. ” A week later, when Mr. Trump escorted the Holiday Inn executives to the site, one board member wanted to know why a worker was filling a hole he had just dug. “This was difficult for me to answer, but fortunately, this board member was more curious than he was skeptical,” Mr. Trump wrote, boasting that weeks later Holiday Inn agreed to invest in his casino. “That’s called ‘business,’” Mr. Trump said on Friday of the episode. In court cases against Mr. Trump — USA Today counted 3, 500 lawsuits involving Mr. Trump, and Mr. Trump estimates he has testified more than 100 times — plaintiffs’ lawyers frequently return to the same two paragraphs from “The Art of the Deal. ” “I call it truthful hyperbole. It’s an innocent form of exaggeration — and a very effective form of promotion. ” In depositions, lawyers have repeatedly probed for the limits of Mr. Trump’s “truthful hyperbole,” or, as one lawyer framed it, the distinction Mr. Trump makes between “innocent exaggeration” and “guilty exaggeration. ” For example, in the Trump University litigation, Mr. Trump was asked in a deposition about a script that had been prepared for Trump University instructors. According to the script, the instructors were supposed to tell their students the following: “I remember one time Mr. Trump said to us over dinner, he said, ‘Real estate is the only market that, when there’s a sale going on, people run from the store.’ You don’t want to run from the store. ” No such dinners ever took place, Mr. Trump acknowledged. In fact, Mr. Trump struggled to identify a single one of the instructors he claimed to have handpicked, even after he was shown their photographs. Nonetheless, Mr. Trump was not bothered by the script’s false insinuation of real estate secrets shared over chummy dinners. Asked if this example constituted “innocent exaggeration,” Mr. Trump replied, “Yes, I’d say that’s an innocent exaggeration. ” On Friday, Mr. Trump argued that the script might fall under the legal concept of “puffery” — which many legal dictionaries define as an exaggeration or statement that “no reasonable person” would take as factual. And in any event, he continued, the true sinners in the Trump University case are the students who sued him even after giving rave reviews in their written evaluations of the seminars. “I think that’s dishonest,” he said. Mr. Trump has been repeatedly accused of bringing false legal claims to avoid paying debts and evade contractual obligations. As far back as 1983, a New York City housing court judge ruled that Mr. Trump filed a “spurious” lawsuit to harass a tenant into vacating a Trump building. Then there was the case Mr. Trump brought against Barbara Corcoran, the real estate broker best known for her appearances on “Shark Tank. ” In the Mr. Trump owed millions of dollars to Ms. Corcoran for helping him secure financing for a development. But when New York magazine published a cover story about the troubled project — “Trump’s Experience” — Mr. Trump sued Ms. Corcoran, accusing her and her associates of sharing damaging information with the magazine and thus violating a confidentiality agreement. He refused to pay her the millions he owed, claiming her breach had gravely damaged his business. At trial, Mr. Trump was unable to produce a single document showing harm to his business. But his certitude never wavered, even after Ms. Corcoran’s lawyer, Mr. Seltzer, confronted him with article after article in which Mr. Trump himself had discussed with reporters much of the same “confidential” information he accused Ms. Corcoran’s team of divulging. “There is something very belligerent about the way he presents facts, as if he thinks nobody will have the balls to stand up to him,” Mr. Seltzer said in an interview. (In dismissing Mr. Trump’s suit against Ms. Corcoran, the judge said the only damages he could identify were to Mr. Trump’s “bruised ego. ”) In Friday’s interview, Mr. Trump denied filing frivolous court cases, insisting, “I’ve won a massive majority of the litigation I’ve been involved in. ” He pointed to the USA Today survey of his 3, 500 legal cases. Although the newspaper could not determine who had prevailed in the vast majority of the cases, it did find Mr. Trump the clear winner in 450 suits and the clear loser in 38. And, indeed, for all of the litigation Mr. Trump has attracted or spawned, for all of the times he has been accused of ruinous dishonesty, the legal and regulatory record is surprisingly bare of official findings by judges, juries or regulators that Mr. Trump engaged in perjury or improper deception or actual fraud. A rare exception came after Mr. Trump decided to demolish a department store to make way for his Trump Tower in Midtown Manhattan. Mr. Trump’s demolition contractor hired about 200 unauthorized Polish laborers, paying them as little as $4 an hour to work 12 hours a day, seven days a week. The case ended up in federal court after some workers were shortchanged even these wages. Mr. Trump protested that he knew nothing about the use of unauthorized workers — even though workers testified that they saw him visiting the site and some witnesses said that Mr. Trump and the executive he assigned to oversee the demolition were well aware of what was going on. In 1991, a federal judge, Charles E. Stewart Jr. ruled that despite Mr. Trump’s denials, there was “strong evidence” that he and his subordinates and his contractor had conspired to hire the Polish workers and deprive them of employment benefits. He awarded them $325, 415 in damages. But in case after case, Mr. Trump has displayed a special talent for turning what should be cold hard facts into semantic mush. Perhaps the most famous example of this skill came when Mr. Trump was asked under oath a seemingly straightforward question: Had he ever lied about his net worth? Mr. Trump responded, “My net worth fluctuates and it goes up and down with markets and with attitudes and with feelings, even my own feelings. ” So, he explained in a deposition, when he said membership costs $300, 000 to his Westchester golf club, that included the $200, 000 initiation fee plus every cent he guessed that a member might spend on annual dues over the next 20 or 30 years. In other words, “The way I say it is more accurate. ” And when he told Larry King he was paid more than $1 million for a speech, it was not his fault if viewers failed to realize he was including not just his $400, 000 speaking fee but also the hundreds of thousands of dollars he assumed must have been spent promoting his appearance. Part of what makes Mr. Trump such an elusive target is that his paper trail is often minimal. Mr. Trump has repeatedly testified that he does not use computers. He says he also throws away his day planner each month, and just last year he testified that he did not own a smartphone. “Unlike Hillary Clinton, I’m not a big email fan,” he said, leaving open the question of how he posts to Twitter. Mr. Trump is also adept at deflecting blame to his staff. In two of his books, Mr. Trump made the startling and, as it turned out, bogus claim that he had once performed the remarkable feat of climbing out from under more than $9 billion in debt. Mr. Trump blamed his ghostwriter for the mistake. Asked if he reads his books before publication, Mr. Trump said, “I read it as quickly as I can because of time constraints. ” Mr. Trump is also the beneficiary of miraculously memory lapses. In suit after suit, the man who claims to possess one of world’s best memories suddenly seems to have chronic memory loss when asked about critical facts or events. Such was the case when Mr. Trump filed a libel lawsuit against Timothy L. O’Brien, the author of “TrumpNation: The Art of Being the Donald. ” Among other things, Mr. Trump asserted that “TrumpNation” cost him a “deal made in heaven” with a group of Italian investors, men he had met and who were on the brink of signing a business partnership that would have made him hundreds of millions of dollars. Their names? He could not recall. “TrumpNation” also cost him a hotel deal with Russian investors, he said. He could not remember their names, either. He was certain the book also ruined a deal with Turkish investors. Again, he could not recall any names. Polish investors also got cold feet after they read Mr. O’Brien’s book. Their names escaped him, too. The book also scared off investors from Ukraine. Alas, he could not think of their names either. Mr. Trump’s lawsuit was dismissed. | 0 |
CHENGDU, China — Strange food. Unintelligible natives. These are just some of the things that Bao Bao, the panda from the National Zoo in Washington, has grappled with since moving to China last month. But the culture shock is fading, her handlers say, as she settles into the land of her ancestors. On Friday, after 30 days of quarantine, Bao Bao made her first public appearance at the Dujiangyan base of the China Conservation and Research Center for the Giant Panda in Sichuan Province. Bao Bao’s new life in China has been not easy, according to Tang Cheng, one of her keepers during her quarantine. Over the past month, she has had to learn Mandarin with a Sichuan accent and get used to the local fare — including wowotou, or steamed cornbread buns, in place of the biscuits she was used to. By now, Bao Bao can understand some commands in Chinese, including “stand up” and “sit down,” Mr. Tang said. Mr. Tang was selected to work with Bao Bao in part because he speaks English as well as Chinese, an important skill to help haigui, or overseas returned, pandas to adapt to their new homes. At the ceremony on Friday, several United States diplomats and dozens of reporters and other guests were on hand to greet Bao Bao. Although they were clearly excited to see her for the first time, waving their hands and shouting her name to get her attention, Bao Bao seemed unimpressed. She spent most of the time sitting in her outdoor playground, munching on bamboo. From time to time, she would examine the rubber balls and tires hanging near her brick enclosure. According to Mr. Tang, Bao Bao spent her first few days in China overcoming jet lag and by now has settled into a routine: four to six meals a day, of bamboo, carrots, apples and wowotou. At first she did not like the wowotou and tended to throw it away. By now, though, Mr. Tang said, “she is adapting well to her new environment,” and has gained more than four pounds. Bao Bao is not the first panda to face the challenges of a new life. In November, when Mei Lun and Mei Huan, the first surviving panda twins to have been born in the United States, at Zoo Atlanta, came to China, the Chinese news media reported that they, too, had difficulties with the local language and food. According to the conservation and research center, 25 pandas have been born abroad since the 1990s, when China set up panda breeding programs in collaboration with 17 zoos in 12 countries. Of these, 18 have survived. By agreement, pandas provided by China are considered loans, and their offspring must be sent to China before their fourth birthday in preparation for breeding. Bao Bao was born on Aug. 23, 2013, to Mei Xiang and Tian Tian, two pandas on loan to the National Zoo. Her older brother, Tai Shan, who was born in 2005 and sent to China in 2010, is now her neighbor at the Dujiangyan base. A younger brother, Bei Bei, was born in 2015 and is still in Washington. A 2016 report by the International Union for the Conservation of Nature put the total number of giant pandas around 2, 060. While that is up from the 1, 596 counted in a census, the health of the population depends on continued conservation efforts. Each panda has a mission to spread the genes, and Bao Bao is no exception. Once she reaches sexual maturity, around 5 or 6 years old, she will acquire a boyfriend. “When Bao Bao gets to that age, we will arrange for her to meet many young males,’’ Mr. Tang said, “and their relationship will be based on love. ” | 0 |
TOKYO (Reuters) - Tokyo governor Yuriko Koike on Wednesday formally launched a new party promising conservative reform, stepping up her challenge to Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and adding to uncertainty about the outlook for a general election widely expected next month. But the popular former ruling party lawmaker, who is already upstaging Abe in the media and complicating forecasts, said she herself would not seek a seat in parliament s lower house now. Abe said on Monday he would call the snap election to reset his mandate, betting that his Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and junior coalition party can keep their majority in parliament s lower house, where they hold a two-thirds super majority . Abe will dissolve the lower house on Thursday for a vote expected on Oct. 22. At a news conference launching her Party of Hope, Koike repeated promises to form a party without ties to vested interests in order to reset Japan. If at this time we don t reset Japan, we won t be able to sufficiently protect our international competitiveness and national security, said Koike, a former defence minister who quit the LDP earlier this year. There had been speculation that Koike would choose to run in the election herself, but she said she would remain in her position as governor. Koike s new party is staking out a policy space similar to that of the conservative LDP and the right-wing of the main opposition Democratic Party, a mixture of conservatives and liberals. But her calls for open government, a freeze on a planned sales tax hike from 2019, an end to nuclear power and a promise to promote diversity give it a more populist tinge. The Nikkei business daily reported on Wednesday that Koike s party was in merger talks with the Democrats and she had met with Democratic Party leader Seiji Maehara on Tuesday for discussions, but Koike made no reference to the issue. The Nikkei said prospects for a merger were uncertain, since Koike has suggested she was not keen and the move could trigger a split in the Democratic Party. The party has been struggling with single-digit support rates and several members have defected to run for Koike s new party. The Democrats have also been in talks with the Japanese Communist Party about cooperating to run unified candidates but conservatives, including Maehara, are wary of that strategy. Koike, 65, defied the LDP to run successfully for the Tokyo governorship a year ago and fielded candidates who routed the LDP in an election for the metropolitan assembly in July. Koike has said she aimed to push reformist policies, open government and an end to reliance on nuclear power. She has also called for a freeze on a plan to raise the national sales tax to 10 percent from 8 percent in 2019. Abe said he would go ahead with the tax hike and spend some of the revenue on education and child care. Abe s decision to go to the polls is seen as an effort to take advantage of confusion in the opposition camp and an uptick in his support rates, which have rebounded to around 50 percent amid jitters over North Korea s nuclear and missile programmes. His support had fallen below 30 percent in July due to suspected cronyism scandals. | 1 |
Charles Payne and economist Liz Peek discuss the booming Trump economy and why the hateful media won t report on it: Payne: These are blue collar jobs maybe that s not sexy to the main stream media.Peek: How many of those economists are talking about how the market is up 13%?Payne is so correct about the media s lack of interest in the booming Trump economy. The American people see it and are feeling it too. As long as President Trump keeps his focus and continues improving the economy, he ll be great. | 0 |
KUALA LUMPUR (Reuters) - Handcuffed, wearing bulletproof vests and under heavily armed guard, the two women accused of murdering the half-brother of North Korea s leader were pushed around a Malaysian airport in wheelchairs on Tuesday during a court visit to the crime scene. Indonesian Siti Aisyah, 25, and Doan Thi Huong, 28, a Vietnamese, are charged with murdering Kim Jong Nam by smearing his face with VX, a chemical nerve agent, at Kuala Lumpur s budget international terminal on Feb. 13. Defense lawyers say the women thought they were involved in a prank for a reality TV show when they encountered a man at the airport and did not know they were handling poison. The two women were brought back to the scene as part of an entourage of court officials, led by trial judge Azmi Ariffin and accompanied by over 200 police officers and dozens of journalists, on a visit to retrace the events that unfolded before, during and after Kim Jong Nam s death. Defense lawyers requested the visit after video recordings of the women on airport closed-circuit television were screened in court. Gooi Soon Seng, Siti Aisyah s lawyer, said the visit was necessary to verify the surroundings and locations where the prosecution say the murder took place. The CCTV footages were taken from various cameras and various places, so from there we couldn t get a complete picture on how (the incident) took place, Gooi told a news conference after the visit. The site visit covered various locations in the terminal shown in the videos, such as a restaurant where Siti Aisyah was seen meeting an unidentified man, the toilets where police witnesses said both women had gone to after the attack on Kim Jong Nam, the clinic where the victim sought medical aid and the taxi stands where both suspects were seen after the attack. Huong appeared unwell midway through the three-hour site visit, while Siti Aisyah broke down in tears. Both women were then provided wheelchairs. Defense lawyers later said both Huong and Siti Aisyah were exhausted from being weighed down by their bulletproof vests. Recordings on Feb. 13 show Huong approaching Kim and grasping his face from behind near the airport s check-in counters before quickly leaving. Siti Aisyah could not be seen but was identified by a police witness as a figure running in another direction. The videos also show the women heading to separate bathrooms to wash their hands. Both women were seen meeting with two men, identified only as Mr. Chang and Mr. Y, before Kim Jong Nam s death. According to police, the men had applied liquid on the women s hands, and were among four suspects-at-large charged together with the women for the murder. CLOSELY-WATCHED TRIAL The airport visit comes as the high-profile trial entered its third week. Twelve witnesses have testified so far. Forensic and chemical weapons experts said Kim Jong Nam had died of nerve agent poisoning, and that VX had been found on Siti Aisyah and Huong s clothes. Traces of the poison were also found under Huong s fingernails. Prosecutors say Siti Aisyah and Huong conspired with four others who are still at large to kill Kim Jong Nam. South Korean and U.S. officials have said that Kim Jong Un s regime was behind his half-brother s death. Kim Jong Nam, who was living in exile in Macau, had criticized his family s dynastic rule of North Korea and his brother had ordered his execution, according to some South Korean lawmakers. The hearing resumes in court on Wednesday. | 1 |
The Economic Collapse – by Michael Snyder
Just when it looked like Hillary Clinton was poised to win the 2016 election , the FBI has thrown a gamechanger into the mix. On Friday, FBI Director James Comey announced that his agency has discovered new emails related to Hillary Clinton’s mishandling of classified information that they had not previously seen. According to the Associated Press , the newly discovered emails “did not come from her private server”, but instead were found when the FBI started going through electronic devices that belonged to top Clinton aide Huma Abedin and her husband Anthony Weiner. The FBI has been looking into messages of a sexual nature that Weiner had exchanged with a 15-year-old girl in North Carolina, and that is why they originally seized those electronic devices. According to the Washington Post , the “emails were found on a computer used jointly by both Weiner and his wife, top Clinton aide Huma Abedin, according to a person with knowledge of the inquiry”, and according to some reports there may be “potentially thousands” of emails on the computer that the FBI did not have access to previously. Even though there are less than two weeks to go until election day, this scandal has the potential to possibly force Clinton out of the race, and if that happens could Barack Obama delay or suspend the election until a replacement candidate can be found?
Let’s take this one step at a time. On Friday, financial markets tanked when reports of these new Clinton emails hit the wires. The following comes from CNN …
After recommending earlier this year that the Department of Justice not press charges against the former secretary of state, Comey said in a letter to eight congressional committee chairmen that investigators are examining newly discovered emails that “appear to be pertinent” to the email probe.
“In connection with an unrelated case, the FBI has learned of the existence of emails that appear pertinent to the investigation,” Comey wrote the chairmen. “I am writing to inform you that the investigative team briefed me on this yesterday, and I agreed that the FBI should take appropriate investigative steps designed to allow investigators to review these emails to determine whether they contain classified information, as well as to assess their importance to our investigation.”
At this point, we do not know what is contained in these emails. But without a doubt Huma Abedin is Hillary Clinton’s closest confidant, and I have always felt that she was Clinton’s Achilles heel. Journalist Carl Bernstein (of Watergate fame) is fully convinced that the FBI would have never made this move unless something significant had already been discovered …
We don’t know what this means yet except that it’s a real bombshell. And it is unthinkable that the Director of the FBI would take this action lightly, that he would put this letter forth to the Congress of the United States saying there is more information out there about classified e-mails and call it to the attention of congress unless it was something requiring serious investigation. So that’s where we are…
Is it a certainty that we won’t learn before the election? I’m not sure it’s a certainty we won’t learn before the election.
One thing is, it’s possible that Hillary Clinton might want to on her own initiative talk to the FBI and find out what she can, and if she chooses to let the American people know what she thinks or knows is going on. People need to hear from her…
If the FBI has indeed found something explosive, would they actually charge her with a crime right before the election?
It is possible, but we also have to remember that government agencies (including the FBI) tend to move very, very slowly. If there are thousands of emails, it is going to take quite a while to sift through them all. And of course Barack Obama has lots of ways that he could influence, delay or even shut down the investigation.
So those that are counting on this to be the miracle that Donald Trump needs should not count their chickens before they hatch.
But if Hillary Clinton were to be forced out of the race by this FBI investigation, the Democrats would have to decide on a new candidate, and that would take time. The following is from a U.S. News & World Report article that examined what would happen if one of the candidates was forced out of the race for some reason…
If Clinton were to fall off the ticket, Democratic National Committee members would gather to vote on a replacement. DNC members acted as superdelegates during this year’s primary and overwhelmingly backed Clinton over boat-rocking socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont.
DNC spokesman Mark Paustenbach says there currently are 445 committee members – a number that changes over time and is guided by the group’s bylaws, which give membership to specific officeholders and party leaders and hold 200 spots for selection by states, along with an optional 75 slots DNC members can choose to fill.
But the party rules for replacing a presidential nominee merely specify that a majority of members must be present at a special meeting called by the committee chairman. The meeting would follow procedures set by the DNC Rules and Bylaws Committee and proxy voting would not be allowed.
It would be extremely challenging to get a majority of the members of the Democratic National Committee together on such short notice. If Clinton were to drop out next week, it would be almost impossible for this to happen before election day.
In such a scenario, Barack Obama may attempt to invoke his emergency powers . Since the election would not be “fair” until the Democrats have a new candidate, he could try to delay or suspend the election. There would be a lot of controversy as to whether this is legal or not, but Barack Obama has not let the U.S. Constitution stop him in the past.
Meanwhile, new poll numbers show that the Trump campaign was already gaining momentum even before this story about the new emails broke. According to a brand new ABC News/Washington Post survey, Donald Trump is now only trailing Hillary Clinton by 4 points after trailing her by as much as 12 points last weekend.
And CNBC is reporting on a highly advanced artificial intelligence system that accurately predicted the outcomes of the presidential primaries and which is now indicating that Trump will be the winner in November…
An artificial intelligence system that correctly predicted the last three U.S. presidential elections puts Republican nominee Donald Trump ahead of Democrat rival Hillary Clinton in the race for the White House.
MogIA was developed by Sanjiv Rai, founder of Indian start-up Genic.ai. It takes in 20 million data points from public platforms including Google, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube in the U.S. and then analyzes the information to create predictions.
The AI system was created in 2004, so it has been getting smarter all the time. It had already correctly predicted the results of the Democratic and Republican Primaries.
Without Hillary at the top of the ticket, the odds of a Trump victory would go way, way up.
So if Hillary is forced out of the race by this investigation, Barack Obama and the Democrats will want to delay or suspend the election for as long as possible if they can.
At this point there is probably not a high probability that such a scenario will play out, but in this crazy election year we have already seen that just about anything can happen. | 1 |
The presidency of Donald J. Trump has been noteworthy for its speed. In his first week in office, as the president’s aides won’t tire of reminding us, Mr. Trump has already put in motion plans to do much of what he promised to do while campaigning. But it’s not just the politician who is moving fast. It’s the population, too. In a matter of hours on Saturday, thousands rushed to the nation’s airports, beckoned by tweets. The flash protests in response to Mr. Trump’s immigration ban, which continued to grow in many cities on Sunday, were as organized as they were instantaneous. Dispatched online, the protesters knew where to go, and they knew what to do once they arrived: to command the story by making a scene. Mr. Trump feeds off media attention. Throughout the campaign, the bigger a spectacle he created, the larger he loomed in the public consciousness. What has been remarkable during the last two weekends is how thoroughly Mr. Trump’s own media personage was blotted out by scenes of protesters. In a brief appearance on Saturday, the president assured the nation that his immigrant ban was “working out very nicely — you see it in the airports. ” But the pictures and videos flooding across our social streams put the lie to Mr. Trump’s breezy pronouncements. Things at the airports weren’t working out very nicely you could see it right there on Instagram. A similar story unfolded the weekend before. In his inaugural address Mr. Trump claimed the mantle of popular will. The next day, a far larger illustration of popular will was on display at marches across the country. The people who gathered for the women’s march hijacked the media narrative. Even for those who did not assemble on either weekend, the pictures carried special power. Amplified on social media and echoing across every TV network, they suggested something larger afoot, something . “Something’s happening out there,” Ana Navarro, the Republican and television pundit, declared on Twitter. Something sure is. We’re witnessing the stirrings of a national popular movement aimed at defeating the policies of Mr. Trump. It is a movement without official leaders. In fact, to a noteworthy degree, the formal apparatus of the Democratic Party has been nearly absent from the uprisings. Unlike the Tea Party and the “” the new movement has no name. Call it the or, if you want to really drive Mr. Trump up the wall, the . Or call it nothing. Though nameless and decentralized, the movement isn’t chaotic. Because it was hatched on social networks and is dispatched by mobile phones, it appears to be organizationally sophisticated and ferociously savvy about conquering the media. Over two weekends, the protests have accomplished something just about unprecedented in the nearly two years since Mr. Trump first declared his White House run: They have nudged him from the media spotlight he depends on. They are the only force we’ve seen that has been capable of untangling his singular hold on the media ecosystem. The movement is new and possibly fragile it could dissipate, like so much else that has come up against Mr. Trump. But in such a short time, the movement has proved unusually adept. It can marshal crowds quickly, as we saw over the weekend, and it can go big, as we saw in the women’s marches, which some crowd scientists believe were the largest day of protest in American history. The movement has other skills. It’s capable of coming up with catchy slogans, funny signs and even branding efforts to rival Mr. Trump’s own. The president has his Make America Great Again hats. Protesters at the women’s march had pink woolen hats with cat ears — “pussy hats,” a reference to the president’s confessed penchant for grabbing things. But unlike Mr. Trump’s hats, the pink caps came from the crowd. Thousands of knitters created them in the weeks between the election and the inauguration, then mailed them off to strangers who shared their views. There’s money, too. Since Mr. Trump’s win, the inchoate online movement has sparked millions in donations to progressive groups such as Planned Parenthood and the American Civil Liberties Union. Over the weekend, the A. C. L. U. raised more than $20 million. The movement can also compel the attention of elites. In large part because of pressure from their connected work forces, the leaders of many technology companies denounced Mr. Trump’s immigration orders. Between Friday and Monday, thanks to the movement, Silicon Valley was transformed. An industry that was once merely skeptical of Mr. Trump largely became opposed to him, only because crowds forced change. Most important, though, the movement can command the media narrative. The president has promised a lot of bold change. His boldness will involve lots of consequences. Millions might lose health care coverage if he repeals the Affordable Care Act. Many might be deported if he achieves his immigration proposals. If the last two weeks are any indication, though, none of this will happen quietly. There will be pictures and viral videos of real people facing hardship, and those pictures are sure to inspire hordes. When people are left with crippling medical bills in the absence of health insurance, or when people are deported to Mexico, you will see large gatherings on Facebook, and then on TV. Already, a group of scientists are planning to march on Washington in opposition to what they say is Mr. Trump’s disdain for science. There are other protests planned for Tax Day in April to remind the nation that the president once promised to release his tax returns, then reneged. You might wonder if the protests will achieve much. Americans have protested before (the war in Iraq comes to mind) and the protests did not, in themselves, alter national policy. But if Mr. Trump has proved anything, it’s that everything is different now. We live in a culture ruled by social media streams, one in which most people are skeptical of what they see and read in the “mainstream media. ” This explains why Stephen K. Bannon, the former executive chairman of Breitbart News who is a close adviser to Mr. Trump, has been seeking to paint the news media as Mr. Trump’s primary opposition. The weakened news media is an easy mark for Mr. Trump. If the media is his only opponent, he’s got nothing to worry about. Unlike the news media, though, protesters produce an undeniable reality. Protesters can’t easily be dismissed as “fake news. ” They come to you unmediated — not from The New York Times, but from your friends and friends of friends on Facebook. They are, in other words, just another version of your social network — the physical manifestation of an outraged News Feed. Because they’re people you know, they can’t easily be maligned as biased or unfair. When politicians take on political crowds rather than other politicians, it usually ends badly. Hillary Clinton had to apologize for calling Mr. Trump’s supporters “deplorables. ” After first bashing the women’s march on Twitter, even Mr. Trump had to praise the demonstrators. There’s another reason for believing that protests could prove effective against Mr. Trump’s policies: The protesters seem to drive him crazy. Mr. Trump is enamored of crowds. Throughout the campaign, he and his surrogates argued that the polls were rigged, and that his large rallies suggested there was a growing tide of support for his candidacy. The crowds, in other words, became the whole ballgame. They were the only reality that mattered. If he won the crowd, he’d win the election. Now Mr. Trump faces the same dynamic, in reverse. The crowds at his inauguration were supposed to certify his popularity. When they fizzled, and were then outmatched by opposition protests, he couldn’t help relitigating the matter for days. Things haven’t gotten better. Now there are crowds on every screen and every feed. The people aren’t saying nice things about him. And there’s something worse than that, too: They’ve stolen the limelight for themselves. | 0 |
Hillary Abruptly Stops At Rally, Couldn’t Hide What Happened Seconds Later Posted on October 27, 2016 by Robert Rich in Politics Share This
While speaking at her latest rally in Florida, Hillary Clinton’s speech took an abrupt turn as she just stopped in the middle of a sentence. Unfortunately for her, what happened just seconds later was all caught on tape – and she couldn’t hide it.
Despite what she would have you believe, Hillary is not as healthy as she claims. As we’ve seen strange eye movements that hint toward Parkinson’s disease and an ever increasing difficulty to get up or down a flight of stairs , it’s safe to say she won’t make it 4 years in our White House. Hillary Clinton
However, her most recent stunt has set a few people on edge as it goes to show that she’s suffering from more than just physical impairments. According to The American Mirror , the female presidential hopeful suffered an embarrassing moment as her brain seemingly froze mid-sentence.
All caught on video, Hillary was speaking in Lake Worth, Florida on the topic of solar energy when the crowd started to cheer. At that moment, Hillary stopped dead in her tracks and tried to stutter through her thoughts.
“They’re not exactly known as the sunshine states,” Clinton said. “There’s a lot of great things about those states, but think about the jobs that can be created, as well as contributing to what we need to do together to save…” she said before awkwardly pausing and finally adding, “…our country and the world.”
Unfortunately for her, not even she could hide the embarrassing brain freeze as it was all caught on camera. Although some people are saying she may have been distracted, that doesn’t seem to be the case as it has happened before.
In fact, there is also footage of the last ordeal that took place before she gained the nomination. While speaking at a rally where she was attacking Bernie Sanders, a similarly embarrassing series of events played out:
Many people have been saying how Hillary’s brain isn’t quite up to par, but we’re seeing more and more of it as her campaign progresses. She has been in the campaign spotlight for about a year now, and America is starting to catch on to her dirty little secret.
If she can’t handle one year on the campaign trail, how is she going to look in another few years after suffering the abuse that a presidential term comes with? Any responsible person would have dropped out long ago – like maybe, the first time she literally dropped in the streets at the 9/11 memorial event in New York City.
It just goes to show how far this woman is willing to go in her pursuit of power. Let’s just hope that Donald Trump shuts her down in November before she can do our nation any more harm. | 1 |
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