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WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump is considering appointing Wall Street financier Anthony Scaramucci, a long-time supporter, to be his White House communications director, a senior White House official said on Thursday. The position has been vacant since Michael Dubke resigned in May as communications director. Sean Spicer has been serving a dual role as press secretary and communications director since Dubke left. The official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Scaramucci is being interviewed for the job but that it had not yet been offered. Scaramucci, a Republican fundraiser and founder of Skybridge Capital, had been offered to be the U.S. ambassador to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in Paris. | 1 |
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WASHINGTON — The F. B. I. director, James B. Comey, on Tuesday recommended no criminal charges against Hillary Clinton for her handling of classified information while she was secretary of state, lifting an enormous legal cloud from her presidential campaign less than two hours before she boarded Air Force One for her first joint campaign appearance with President Obama. But on a day of political high drama in Washington, Mr. Comey rebuked Mrs. Clinton as being “extremely careless” in using a private email address and server. He raised questions about her judgment, contradicted statements she has made about her email practices, said it was possible that hostile foreign governments had gained access to her account, and declared that a person still employed by the government — Mrs. Clinton left the State Department in 2013 — could have faced disciplinary action for doing what she did. To warrant a criminal charge, Mr. Comey said, there had to be evidence that Mrs. Clinton intentionally transmitted or willfully mishandled classified information. The F. B. I. found neither, and as a result, he said, “our judgment is that no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case. ” The Justice Department is highly likely to accept the F. B. I. ’s guidance, which a law enforcement official said also cleared three top aides of Mrs. Clinton who were implicated in the case: Jake Sullivan, Huma Abedin and Cheryl D. Mills. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said last week that she would accept the recommendation of the F. B. I. and career prosecutors in the case after a storm of criticism about an impromptu meeting between her and former President Bill Clinton on an airport tarmac in Phoenix. Mr. Comey’s announcement, delivered with no advance warning only three days after his investigators interviewed Mrs. Clinton in the case, riveted official Washington and is likely to reverberate for the rest of the campaign. In offices across the capital, all eyes turned to television screens to hear the outcome of a yearlong investigation that could have thrown the 2016 presidential election into disarray and changed history. As Mr. Comey strode to the lectern at the F. B. I. headquarters at 11 a. m. Mrs. Clinton was waiting backstage a few blocks away to address the National Education Association. Her aides said she did not know what Mr. Comey was going to say. Five minutes into Mr. Comey’s remarks, and before he announced that the F. B. I. would not seek charges, a smiling Mrs. Clinton began her speech. By 2:45 p. m. she and Mr. Obama were descending the stairs of Air Force One for a campaign rally in Charlotte, N. C. while back in Washington the State Department spokesman, John Kirby, was fending off questions from reporters about what Mr. Comey described as the department’s lax security in handling classified information. White House officials said Mr. Obama also did not know about Mr. Comey’s plans ahead of time. The F. B. I. director said he did not coordinate the statement with the Justice Department or any other agency. “They do not know what I am about to say,” he declared. A Republican former federal prosecutor, Mr. Comey seemed at first to be laying the groundwork for some kind of legal charge. Speaking sternly, and in far more detail than he usually does, he listed several previously undisclosed findings from the F. B. I. ’s investigation: ■ Of 30, 000 emails Mrs. Clinton handed over to the State Department, 110 contained information that was classified at the time she sent or received them. Of those, Mr. Comey said, “a very small number” bore markings that identified them as classified. This finding is at odds with Mrs. Clinton’s repeated assertions that none of the emails were classified at the time she sent or received them. The F. B. I. did not disclose the topics of the classified emails, but a number of the 110 are believed to have involved drone strikes. ■ The F. B. I. discovered “several thousand” emails that were not in the original trove of 30, 000 turned over by Mrs. Clinton to the State Department. Three of those contained information that agencies have concluded was classified, though Mr. Comey said he did not believe Mrs. Clinton deliberately deleted or withheld them from investigators. ■ In saying that it was “possible” that hostile foreign governments had gained access to Mrs. Clinton’s personal account, Mr. Comey noted that she used her mobile device extensively while traveling outside the United States, including trips “in the territory of sophisticated adversaries. ” ■ Mrs. Clinton used multiple private servers for her personal and government business, not just a single server at her home in New York that has been the focus of media reporting for more than a year. Her use of these servers — some of which were taken out of service and stored — made the F. B. I. ’s job enormously complicated as it struggled to put together, in Mr. Comey’s words, a jigsaw puzzle with “millions of email fragments” in it. Despite all that, Mr. Comey said the F. B. I. did not find that Mrs. Clinton’s conduct revealed “intentional misconduct or indications of disloyalty to the United States or efforts to obstruct justice. ” But a person in her position, he said, “should have known that an unclassified system was no place” for the emails she was sending. And he said it raised troubling questions about how the State Department handled classified information. The White House press secretary, Josh Earnest, declined to comment, except to say it was clear from Mr. Comey’s remarks that “they’ve looked at this in excruciating detail. ” Mr. Obama, he said, remained “enthusiastic” about Mrs. Clinton’s candidacy. The Clinton campaign clearly hoped that the announcement would bring to a close a saga that has haunted Mrs. Clinton since March 2015, when the existence of her personal email account surfaced. “We are pleased that the career officials handling this case have determined that no further action by the department is appropriate,” said the campaign’s spokesman, Brian Fallon. “As the secretary has long said, it was a mistake to use her personal email and she would not do it again. We are glad that this matter is now resolved. ” Republicans seized on Mr. Comey’s sharp criticism, saying it raised doubts about Mrs. Clinton’s fitness for high office. Donald J. Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee, asserted in a post on Twitter that David H. Petraeus, the former C. I. A. director, had been charged for doing far less than Mrs. Clinton, and the lack of charges showed that the system was “rigged. ” In fact, F. B. I. officials have long said that what Mr. Petraeus did — knowingly handing a diary with classified information to his biographer and lover, then lying about it to investigators — was worse than what Mrs. Clinton did. In the Petraeus case, the F. B. I. recommended a felony indictment, but the Justice Department allowed him to plead to a misdemeanor. The deal that Mr. Petraeus received shadowed Mrs. Clinton’s case from the start because it appeared to set a higher bar for bringing charges against her. “In looking back at our investigations into the mishandling or removal of classified information,” Mr. Comey said, “we cannot find a case that would support bringing criminal charges on these facts. ” Congressional Republicans swiftly called for the F. B. I. to release more details about its findings. “If it wants to avoid giving the impression that the F. B. I. was pulling punches,” said Senator Charles E. Grassley, the Republican chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, “the agency must now be more transparent than ever in releasing information. ” Speaker Paul D. Ryan was equally critical. “While I respect the professionals at the F. B. I. this announcement defies explanation,” he said in a Twitter post. “No one should be above the law. ” For an agency that seemed to be in no rush, the F. B. I. ’s investigation wrapped up quickly. By the time the investigators interviewed Mrs. Clinton in three and a half hours of questioning on Saturday, they had compiled months of findings. Mrs. Clinton appeared to say nothing to contradict what they had already discovered about how the private server was used, a law enforcement official said. The investigators then worked with Mr. Comey through the holiday weekend to review her testimony and determine whether there was any new information that might warrant criminal charges, law enforcement officials said. They found none. For weeks, F. B. I. agents expected the investigation would not yield charges. They shared Mr. Comey’s conclusion that Mrs. Clinton had showed poor judgment but that she had not committed a crime. In the spring, Mr. Comey declared that the campaign calendar would not dictate the pace of the investigation. But the Democratic National Convention begins on July 25 in Philadelphia, and F. B. I. officials did not want to be seen as influencing the outcome of the election after the nomination. Mr. Comey’s announcement was believed to be the first time that the F. B. I. had ever publicly disclosed its recommendations to the Justice Department about whether to charge someone in any case, let alone a presidential candidate. His decision to announce the results of the investigation was made before the uproar over Ms. Lynch’s meeting with Mr. Clinton, according to a law enforcement official. He decided to make his findings public, the official said, because he wanted to make the F. B. I. ’s position clear before referring the case to the Justice Department. While the F. B. I. ’s recommendation spares Mrs. Clinton and her aides criminal charges, it does not remove the possibility that they could be denied security clearances if Mrs. Clinton is elected and she appoints them to jobs that require such clearance. The State Department plans to conduct its own administrative review after the Justice Department acts. “We don’t share the broad assessment made of our institution that there’s a lax culture here when it comes to protecting classified information,” said Mr. Kirby, the State Department spokesman. “We take it very, very seriously. ” | 0 |
Now, typically no one should be mocking a teenager in their place of education, but since it is a place of education, perhaps this can be seen as the child learning something valuable. And while it s never okay to bully, pointing out to someone that they re wearing the hat of a bigoted bully should be mandatory.That being said, one high school sophomore in Portland, Maine, is catching a lot of criticism for wearing his Donald Trump Make America Great Again hat, and rightly so.Conner Mullen says that everyone is wearing their Bernie pins, so he should be able to wear his Donald Trump hat. However, his fellow classmates are apparently relentless in their taunting, and even a teacher called him out, allegedly saying, Thank God you can t vote. When Mullen took his grievance to the assistant principal s office, the solution offered was simply to leave the hat at home.Mullen said: I knew kids would pick on me about it, that s just kids being kids, but when the adults started doing it I thought that s problematic. This is a school that preaches equality. Oh dear. Yes, he actually said that. He just equated himself to the plight for equality because he s being teased for wearing a bigot s hat. The irony is palpable.According to Mullen, the reason he wants Trump to be president is: I want a job where you can help people, and I ve heard Trump say how important he thinks veterans and (people in law enforcement) are. Oh, dear boy, please, oh please don t believe the pandering nonsense that comes out of Trump s mouth. And as far as his love for veterans, how much he s been supposedly giving veteran groups is highly questionable.Here s the thing, the school isn t telling him he shouldn t wear the hat, but they are suggesting if he d like to stop being relentlessly mocked for such a poor fashion decision, that he should probably just leave the hat at home. Trump is a bigot and probably the worst choice this country could ever have for the role of Commander-in-Chief.The bigger concern here is, what is this student being taught that he believes Trump is a good option? Maybe that should be the real story.Watch the story via WCSH out of Portland, Maine:Featured image via video screen capture | 0 |
WASHINGTON — The Congress opened the turbulent Trump era in Washington on Tuesday, as the new Senate moved instantly to begin the repeal of President Obama’s signature health care law while the House descended into chaos in an attempt to gut an independent congressional ethics office. On a day usually reserved for pomp, constitutionally mandated procedure and small children parading around in fancy dresses, Congress instead pitched itself into partisan battles. Speaker Paul D. Ryan easily won but not before the embarrassment of having his members defy him by voting to eliminate the ethics office, only to then abandon that effort after a flood of criticism from constituents and Twitter messages from Donald J. Trump that criticized House Republican priorities. It was a rocky start to a period in which Republicans had promised an end to Washington gridlock if they controlled both Congress and the White House. There was intraparty conflict and a sense that Mr. Trump, who ran against the Republican establishment, would continue to be openly critical of his own party at times. As Democrats in both chambers seethed, Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the majority leader, unveiled the legislative language that could decimate the Affordable Care Act before the crocuses start to bloom in the spring, even if any replacement of the law could take years. Budget language released on Tuesday gives House and Senate committees only until Jan. 27 to produce legislation that would eliminate major parts of the health care law. Under arcane budget procedures, that legislation would be protected from a Democratic filibuster and could pass the Senate with a simple majority. And debate will begin on Wednesday, before senators have even moved into their new offices. The dueling over the health law’s fate will pull in both the departing and incoming White House administrations as well. On Wednesday, Mr. Obama will visit with congressional Democrats to plot how to resist the planned repeal, and Mike Pence, the vice will meet with Republicans to gird them for the fight ahead. While the Senate action showed Republicans on course to keep campaign promises, the House got off to a messy start, brought on by Republicans who had moved largely in secret on Monday to gut a congressional ethics office against Mr. Ryan’s wishes. That provoked an outcry from both Democrats and voters who flooded House offices with angry calls. “Every organization is calling my office,” said Representative Pete Sessions, Republican of Texas. “And we’ve told them: ‘Thank you very much. We appreciate your feedback. ’” After a hastily called meeting on Tuesday morning among Republicans, the matter was dropped before it could go to the full House floor for a vote. As the Senate moved to larger legislative matters, the House kerfuffle seemed to cast a shadow over Mr. Ryan, but he tried to brush it off. “There’s no sense of foreboding in the House today,” Mr. Ryan said after his “only the sense of potential. ” The fight over the House rules was already acrimonious thanks to a piece of the package that would impose $2, 500 in fines for filming events on the House floor, a response to Democrats who streamed their overnight over guns last June using cellphones and video cameras. In the Senate, Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. swore in seven new members and all the incumbents who won their races last year, their colleagues looking on cheerfully, as a cold rain pelted the newly refurbished Capitol dome. Members of the House and Senate brought along their families — elderly parents with canes, small children tugging at uncomfortable lacy hems — as well as former senators and other special guests. Former Vice President Dick Cheney accompanied his daughter Liz to her as a member of the House elected from Wyoming. Senator Chuck Schumer of New York officially became the Democratic leader and quickly warned Republicans that the minority would be vocal, if not operatic, in resisting much of their agenda and many of Mr. Trump’s nominees. “It is our job to do what’s best for the American people, the middle class and those struggling to get there,” he said. “If the proposes legislation on issues like infrastructure, trade and closing the carried interest loophole, for instance, we will work in good faith to perfect and, potentially, enact it. When he doesn’t, we will resist. ” He added, “If Trump lets the members of Congress and his cabinet run the show, if he adopts their timeworn policies — which benefit the elites, the special interests and corporate America, not the working man and woman — his presidency will not succeed. ” On Tuesday, the House also adopted rules clearing the way for legislation to roll back the health care law. The budget blueprint introduced on Tuesday in the Senate is not sent to the president and does not become law, but still clears the way for subsequent legislation that Republicans say will repeal major provisions of the Affordable Care Act. Republicans bypassed the Budget Committee so they could immediately bring the measure to the floor. Such resolutions are normally developed after weeks of work in the Budget Committee. Under the plan, four congressional committees — two in the House and two in the Senate — have until Jan. 27 to develop legislation that will be the vehicle for repealing the health care law. The document does not specify which provisions of the law may be eliminated and which ones may be preserved. Nor does it specify or even suggest how Republicans would replace the Affordable Care Act, which the Obama administration says has provided coverage to some 20 million people who were previously uninsured. Republicans have said they may delay the effective date of a repeal bill, to avoid disrupting coverage for people who have it and to provide time for Republicans to develop alternatives to the 2010 health law. The budget blueprint allows Republicans to use savings from repealing major provisions of that law to help offset the cost of future, unspecified measures to help people obtain coverage. “Americans face skyrocketing premiums and soaring deductibles,” said Senator Mike Enzi, Republican of Wyoming and chairman of the Senate Budget Committee. “Insurers are withdrawing from markets across the country, leaving many families with fewer choices and less access to care than they had before — the opposite of what the law promised. ” The American Medical Association urged Congress on Tuesday to explain how it would replace the Affordable Care Act. “Before any action is taken through reconciliation or other means that would potentially alter coverage, policy makers should lay out for the American people, in reasonable detail, what will replace current policies,” the chief executive of the association, Dr. James L. Madara, said in a letter to congressional leaders. Representative Nancy Pelosi of California, who engineered the House passage of the health law in 2010, promised this week that Democrats would be just as aggressive in fighting its repeal. Republicans have said they may delay legislation to replace the health law for several years. Ms. Pelosi said that such a delay would be “an act of cowardice on the part of Republicans,” and that “they don’t even have the votes to do it” because they have not agreed on a replacement plan. Democrats also vowed to give Mr. Trump’s cabinet nominees rigorous scrutiny. Senator Dianne Feinstein of California, the Democrat on the Judiciary Committee, has written to Senator Charles E. Grassley of Iowa, the committee chairman, asking to postpone the first scheduled confirmation hearing, set for next week for Senator Jeff Sessions of Alabama, whom Mr. Trump has chosen as attorney general. | 0 |
The State Department has ordered an internal audit of its recordkeeping, officials said Friday, outlining a top-to-bottom look at the agency's practices in the aftermath of revelations that former Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton used a private email account and server during her tenure.
The department released a letter that Secretary of State John Kerry sent to the department's inspector general earlier this week, asking for the review and calling it critical to "preserve a full and complete record of American foreign policy" and for the U.S. public to have access to that information. Among the questions he outlined were how best to retain records in light of changing technology, the agency's global presence and increasing demands from Congress.
Department spokesman Jeff Rathke told reporters Friday the review would include the archiving of emails as well as Freedom of Information Act and congressional inquiries. He said it was not specific to Clinton, a likely presidential candidate who has been dogged by questions since it became clear she didn't use a government email account while in office and only provided the State Department with copies of work-related emails late last year.
The full trove of Clinton emails will be published on a website after they are reviewed. She says they contain no classified information. The State Department says emails pertaining to a congressional panel's examination of the deadly 2012 attack on a U.S. diplomatic facility in Benghazi, Libya, will be released in advance of the others.
In the letter, Kerry said his department has undertaken significant efforts to promote preservation and transparency, including through better technology and training of staff. But he said the burden was significant, with more than 18,000 FOIA requests arriving each year that put a "significant strain" on diplomats whose main job is the advancement of U.S. foreign policy. In addition, he said, congressional investigations and requests have "greatly increased."
Kerry also didn't mention Clinton specifically, but noted that officials were "facing challenges regarding our integration of record-keeping technologies and the use of nongovernment systems by some department personnel to conduct official business."
He asked Inspector General Steve Linick to make several recommendations. They range from how to make improvements across more than 280 diplomatic posts worldwide to ways to streamline efforts to preserve appropriate documents. Kerry questioned whether the agency has even the resources and tools necessary to meet its obligations.
The department has particularly struggled with the backlog of public records requests. Some have languished for years without being met.
Earlier this month, The Associated Press sued to gain access to Clinton's correspondence after repeated FOIA requests to the department went unfulfilled. They included one request made five years ago.
An inspector general's report in 2012 criticized the State Department's practices as "inefficient and ineffective," citing a heavy workload, small staff and interagency problems.
Kerry asked if outside expertise might be advisable on how best to manage, preserve and make transparent its documents. He asked the inspector general to conduct "an expedited review of these issues." | 1 |
Bikers for Trump leader Chris Cox spoke with FOX s Stuart Varney regarding the shut down of Ann Coulter s speech at the University of California Berkeley:The Bikers for Trump leader Chris Cox is now ready to take action on the University of California Berkeley after conservative commentator Ann Coulter cancelled her speech on the campus Thursday: We are certainly not looking for a fight We are here on the defense, not the offense Cox met with Berkeley police to discuss their plan of action going forward. He made great points about the need for law and order over violence: From what I understand, any rumors that they ve been told to stand down will be squashed today. They are not going to allow this disobedience, they are not going to allow the ski masks we ve been seeing around the country, so we still have a presence here at Berkeley today. We don t want to do anything that is going to give us a public relations black eye. We ve stayed within the framework of the law and I intend that protesters will continue to stay within the framework of the law I DIDN T SEE AN UPSIDE IN COMING TO BERKELY AND STANDING TOE TO TOE WITH TWINKLE TOES AND BUTTER CUPS | 1 |
We recently reported on Venezuelans taking trash bags and eating the contents the end result of socialism isn t pretty. Here s a stopped truck being robbed of farm chickens: | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Donald Trump is receiving foreign policy advice from a former U.S. military intelligence chief who wants the United States to work more closely with Russia to resolve global security issues, according to three sources. The sources, former foreign policy officials in past administrations, said retired Lieutenant General Michael Flynn, who was chief of the Defense Intelligence Agency under President Barack Obama from 2012-2014, has been informally advising Trump. Trump, who is leading the Republican race to be the party’s presidential candidate in November’s election, said earlier this month that he would soon release a list of his foreign policy advisers, but has yet to do so. The Trump campaign did not respond to a request for comment about Flynn. Flynn declined to comment when asked by Reuters whether he is advising Trump. Asked to describe his views about ties with Russia, he referred Reuters to his public statements. The question of who has been advising Trump on national security issues has become more pertinent as prospects that the New York real estate mogul will secure the Republican nomination, possibly within weeks, have increased. Trump won the surprise endorsement of New Jersey Governor Chris Christie on Friday, the most prominent mainstream Republican to come on board. Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, who won popularity for his handling of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, has also been in regular contact with Trump, said a former top aide to Giuliani. A close associate of Flynn said that Trump was not the only presidential hopeful who had consulted the former DIA chief. “He responds to one and all but is not working for any one,” the associate said. Trump has struck a notably different stance on Russia from his main rivals for the nomination, calling President Vladimir Putin “highly respected” and advocating a warming of now icy bilateral ties. Other Republican candidates have frequently taken to bashing Putin and have cited his military interventions in Ukraine and Syria as evidence that President Barack Obama has been weak in standing up to the Russian leader. Trump has vowed to destroy Islamic State and to undertake an aggressive rebuilding of the U.S. military, but has signaled more flexibility than his rivals on some issues - for example, by not vowing to tear up the Obama administration’s nuclear deal with Iran. Flynn resigned from his position as the head of the Pentagon’s main intelligence agency a year before his term was officially due to end. Flynn raised eyebrows among some U.S. foreign policy veterans when he was pictured sitting at the head table with Putin at a banquet in Moscow late last year celebrating Russia Today, an international broadcasting network funded by the Russian government. His son Michael G. Flynn, who acts as his chief of staff, declined comment on the banquet and on the reasons for his father’s departure from the Pentagon. Flynn told Russia Today in an interview published on Dec. 10 that the United States and Russia should work together to resolve the Syrian civil war and defeat Islamic State. The Obama administration has protested Russia’s military intervention on behalf of Syrian President Bashir al-Assad, accusing Moscow of hitting opposition forces rather than ISIS. “Right now we have essentially the U.S. strategy and we have a Russian strategy in the region that does not appear to be in line with each other. And I think we have to step back and try to figure out how do we align those,” Flynn told Russia Today. Flynn was also quoted this month as telling German magazine Der Spiegel that the Iraq war launched in 2003 by then-President George W. Bush was a mistake that gave rise to Islamic State. Trump has often strongly condemned the Iraq invasion. A former U.S. intelligence official who worked with Flynn said the retired general believes in a more aggressive approach to U.S. interests around the world. “He’s a sharp guy, he understands foreign policy and national security and really understands intelligence,” said the official. “His positions and opinions are not always in line with popular thinking.” Giuliani’s office did not respond to a request for comment on his relationship with Trump. Randy Mastro, a New York lawyer who was a deputy mayor in Giuliani’s New York City administration, said Giuliani has close ties to Trump. “I know that Rudy and Donald Trump have a long-standing relationship and personal friendship that goes back many years, and they do speak to each other on a regular basis,” said Mastro. (Editing by Stuart Grudgings and Martin Howell) This article was funded in part by SAP. It was independently created by the Reuters editorial staff. SAP had no editorial involvement in its creation or production. | 1 |
There is no debating the fact that tensions between the United States and North Korea have reached a boiling point. But what s still being continuously debated is how to handle these tensions.President Trump threatened to use fire and fury against North Korea after it was revealed that North Korea successfully created a miniaturized nuclear weapon designed to fit inside its missiles. In an interview with NBC s Tim Russert in 1999, then businessman Donald Trump voiced his support for a pre-emptive military strike against North Korea.Trump told Russert that if he was President, a Trump administration would negotiate like crazy to get the best deal possible. If a deal was not possible, Trump said he would order a pre-emptive strike. He went on to successfully predict that that they re [North Korea] are going to have those weapons pointed all over the world and specifically at the United States. He goes further by saying that it only does the U.S. minimal good to discuss the economy and Social Security without addressing the biggest problem: nuclear proliferation. He also calls out previous politicians including Jimmy Carter for not facing this situation head on and negotiating properly.Following President Trump s warning North Korea over further provocations, the Hermit Kingdom has announced it is considering striking Guam. The North Korean military warned it may carry out a preemptive operation once the US shows signs of provocation , and that it is seriously considering a strategy to strike Guam with mid-to-long range missiles. As Trump moves forward, this interview serves as evidence that his strategy will hold up against North Korea.Read more: The Gateway Pundit | 1 |
The full economic impact of the horrific new anti-gay law passed by North Carolina s bigoted legislature will not be known for quite some time, but we are already seeing numerous ways that the geniuses who place hatred over the needs and the good of the people are damaging their state.North Carolina s Public Facilities Privacy and Security Act, something that came into existence as a response to the city of Charlotte s attempt to create a fair and equal environment for all citizens, including transgender individuals, by granting the LGBT community equal rights pertaining to public accommodations as the rest of the world enjoys, nullifies the Charlotte ordinance and bans localities from expanding protections for the LGBT community. It also requires everyone to use bathrooms corresponding to their gender at birth.This horrific and blatant attempt to deprive a segment of the population of equal rights has not only angered the public, but the Obama administration as well. At this moment, the Justice Department is in the process of determining if the law violates federal civil rights statutes. If it does, the state could lose billions (with a B) of dollars that would otherwise go to fixing highways, education, and housing funding.Cities and states have banned taxpayer-funded travel to North Carolina and production companies have left the state over the law, depriving the state of tax dollars and a boost to local economies where filming took place. Recently, Lionsgate Films canceled filming of a new Hulu show and moved production to Canada.In short, yes. On Tuesday, PayPal announced that it has withdrawn plans for a new blogal operations center in Charlotte the city that attempted to be inclusive in the first place that would have employed 400 people in skilled jobs. The new center was announced just weeks ago. In the short time since then, legislation has been abruptly enacted by the State of North Carolina that invalidates protections of the rights of lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender citizens and denies these members of our community equal rights under the law, PayPal said in a statement. Our decision is a clear and unambiguous one. But we do regret that we will not have the opportunity to be a part of the Charlotte community and to count as colleagues the skilled and talented people of the region. As a company that is committed to the principle that everyone deserves to live without fear of discrimination simply for being who they are, becoming an employer in North Carolina, where members of our teams will not have equal rights under the law, is simply untenable. The company says the new law perpetuates discrimination and it violates the values and principles that are at the core of PayPal s mission and culture, leaving them unable to open a center in the state. PayPal is in the process of determining where the new location will be, and says it regrets not having the opportunity to be part of the Charlotte community. They remain committed, however, to working with the LGBT community in North Carolina to overturn this discriminatory legislation, alongside all those who are committed to equality. PayPal is not the first to refuse to do business in North Carolina, nor will they be the last. This new law will ultimately be damaging to the state, and everyday people will be the ones who are hurt the most.Featured image via Getty/PhillyMag | 1 |
CNN host Fareed Zakaria explained how he thought President Donald Trump rose to power: The election of Donald Trump is really a kind of class rebellion against people like us, educated professionals who live in cities, who have cosmopolitan views about things. WTH??? But that wasn t it Zakaria decided to further offend just about every Trump supporter out there: There s a part of America that is sick and tired of being told what to do by this overeducated population that Hillary Clinton perfectly represented. That s why they re sticking with him, he continued.Zakaria also blamed racism and diversity on Trump s rise. He knew that the election of a black president had stirred a kind of ugly racial animus. A small subset but he knew how to get them Zakaria said. A real sense of cultural alienation, older, white, noncollege education Americans have, a sense that their country is changing because of immigrants. Because maybe blacks are rising up to a central place in society, because gays being afforded equal rights. Because of, frankly, working women. Everybody is muscling in on the territory that the white working man had, Zakaria said.THIS GUY HAS NO IDEA OF WHO MAKES UP AMERICA HE SHOULD BE FIRED FOR SUCH A DISGUSTING RANT!Via: WFB | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump came under fire on Sunday for criticizing London’s mayor in the aftermath of attacks in the city that killed seven people and injured at least 48 others. In a tweet, Trump seized on comments by London Mayor Sadiq Khan, who said Britons should not be alarmed to see more police in the streets after three men drove a van into pedestrians on London Bridge before stabbing others nearby. “At least 7 dead and 48 wounded in terror attack and Mayor of London says there is ‘no reason to be alarmed!’” Trump tweeted. “We must stop being politically correct and get down to the business of security for our people. If we don’t get smart it will only get worse,” Trump said. In response, a spokesperson for the London mayor said Khan “is busy working with the police, emergency services and the government to coordinate the response to this horrific and cowardly terrorist attack.” “He has more important things to do than respond to Donald Trump’s ill-informed tweet that deliberately takes out of context his remarks urging Londoners not to be alarmed when they saw more police - including armed officers - on the streets,” the spokesperson said. Former Vice President Al Gore, speaking on CNN’s “State of the Union” program, said he thought Trump’s tweet misrepresented what the mayor had said. “I don’t think that a major terrorist attack like this is the time to be divisive and to criticize a mayor who’s trying to organize his city’s response to this attack,” Gore, a Democrat, said. Senator Mark Warner, a Democrat and vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, told CNN that it “troubles” him to see the kinds of tweets Trump has put out in the aftermath of the London attacks. Trump did not mention the mayor when speaking after a gala event at Washington’s Ford’s Theatre later on Sunday, where he condemned the attacks as an “evil slaughter.” He said the United States would do everything in its power to assist the UK in bringing those responsible to justice. “This bloodshed must end. This bloodshed will end,” Trump said, adding he would “do what is necessary” to prevent the threat from reaching the United States. Islamic State on Sunday claimed responsibility for the London attack. Trump also spoke with British Prime Minister Theresa May to offer condolences and offered Washington’s “full support,” the White House said in a statement. Earlier in the day, Trump cited the London attacks to push his March 6 executive order that would temporarily ban entry into the United States of people from six predominantly Muslim countries. The ban has been blocked in the courts and Trump’s legal team has asked the Supreme Court to reinstate it. Trump has said the travel ban is needed to protect Americans from terrorist attacks. Critics say his reasoning is flawed and assail the ban as discriminatory. Speaking on NBC’s “Meet the Press” program, former Secretary of State John Kerry said on Sunday: “A travel ban will be cannon fodder to the recruiters. It’s the worst thing we could do.” Republican Senator Susan Collins told the CBS program “Face the Nation” that she thought Trump’s travel ban was “not the right way to go” because it was too broad. The U.S. State Department said it was monitoring the security situation and advised Americans in Britain to heed the advice of local authorities and maintain their security awareness. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security issued a statement late on Saturday saying: “At this time, we have no information to indicate a specific, credible terror threat in the United States.” Law enforcement officials in major U.S. cities said they were not aware of any threats but were on alert. | 1 |
SEOUL (Reuters) - South Korean President Moon Jae-in had initially suggested on Tuesday that U.S. President Donald Trump make a visit to the demilitarized zone (DMZ) between North and South Korea, a Blue House official told reporters on Wednesday. Trump had told Moon he had been considering such a trip, and Moon said he would accompany Trump should the U.S. president decide to visit the DMZ, the official said. The U.S. president aborted a surprise visit to the DMZ on Wednesday morning due to fog after two attempts. | 0 |
You know what s adorable? When a white supremacist Christian attempts to Jesus his or her way out of trouble after getting caught being him or herself. In this case, we re talking about West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey s now-former spokeswoman s participation in an extremely popular white supremacist propaganda video. THE Stop White Genocide Video features a bunch of women reciting lines from The Mantra, a sort of ode to whiteness written by popular South Carolina racist Bob Whitaker. The video, which boasts that is has previously been removed from YouTube and that it is banned in 18 countries, features Carrie Bowe reciting many lines that will surely embarrass everyone she holds dear. One line spoken by Bowe lays the groundwork for a string of hate speech even your racist, drunk uncle wouldn t break out at Thanksgiving dinner:I ve been thinking a lot about a phrase I ve been hearing: that anti-racist is a code-word for anti-white.The women, including Bowe, complain about the obvious truth about the ongoing program of genocide against the white race. In fact, the former spokeswoman even has the final speaking line: Anti-racist is a code word for anti-white. Bowe, who started working for WV s Republican attorney general in January 2015, was fired within hours of the Charleston Gazette-Mail exposing her role in the racist video. The employee s conduct and statements, which occurred years before being employed by the attorney general s office, were not previously disclosed until today, which is contrary to the transparency requirements for being a member of this office, do not reflect the opinion or the perspective of the attorney general or this office, Morrisey spokesman Curtis Johnson wrote in a statement regarding the termination.Bowe inexplicably claims that she didn t know what the finished product would look like despite the horrific phrases she personally spouts off in the white supremacist garbage video. In a post on Facebook, she attempts to garner sympathy from her friends by not even mentioning what she did:Bowe told West Virginia Public Broadcasting that she is embarrassed and heartbroken because she thought the video was meant to further discussion on race relation from a white perspective an assertion easily disproved by the very choice phrases she spoke. Growing up, you could not question why some races could talk or behave a certain way and it was seen as OK, whereby if the behavior was repeated by a white person, it was automatically racist, Bowe explained. As a child and a teenager, the inability to even question this was confusing and, really, the opposite of the honest dialogue we need to have in order to understand different cultures and their history better. She has not explained how the final solution to the black problem she references ties into an open, healthy discussion on race relations.One must wonder: was she fired because she spouted off KKK rhetoric, or was it because Morissey wants to be re-elected? In any case, we re sure there s a spot for her with the Trump campaign.Watch the video below:Featured image via screengrab | 0 |
Hundreds of Justice Department staff and lawyers gathered in the Great Hall of the Robert F. Kennedy Building Friday to give the nation's first African-American attorney general a send-off.
It was a more tightly-scripted version of the thunderous welcome he received in 2009 when Holder entered the building. The goodbye ceremony included a nine-minute video lauding the attorney general for his six-year tenure.
"I think we can say now Eric Holder is free," the attorney general said to laughs, after tossing to the crowd wristbands he has been wearing as he waited months for his successor, Loretta Lynch, to win Senate approval . The wristbands, the idea of an aide, were an inside joke that read "Free Eric Holder."
Holder was tearful, shaking hands, hugging and taking selfies with some of the crowd, which numbered about 200.
This was his third going-away ceremony -- one in February included President Barack Obama and a performance by Aretha Franklin. As in his speech when he took office six years ago, Holder laid claim to helping restore the Justice Department's reputation, a tacit shot at the Bush administration and the political scandal that hung over former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales after the firings of U.S. attorneys. Holder said he was proud of the department's work, which he said was done "free of politicization." He told the Justice staffers they were responsible for a new "golden age" at the Justice Department. He cited the department's role in the Obama administration's decision to stop defending the Defense of Marriage Act, which has quickened the acceptance of same-sex marriage. He called same-sex marriage the "civil rights issue of our time." He also lauded the department's active role in civil rights enforcement, which has become a major focus in light of a national spate of police shootings and excessive use-of-force incidents. While Holder listed his accomplishments, much of the ceremony also served as a reminder of the rocky relationship he has had with Republicans, who made him the first sitting cabinet member to be held in contempt of Congress and who regularly used him as the stand-in to take shots at President Obama in political fights. U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder attends a meeting with the My Brother's Keeper Task Force to receive a 90-day report on its progress in the Roosevelt Room of the White House in May 2014. Holder's resignation was announced in September 2014, but his replacement, Loretta Lynch, was not confirmed by the Senate until April 23, 2015. Holder talks with his father, Eric Holder Sr., after being sworn in as the U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia in 1993. Holder shakes hands with then-President Bill Clinton as Attorney General Janet Reno, Holder's boss, looks on at an American Bar Association event at the White House in 1999. Holder walks with Caroline Kennedy, daughter of former President John F. Kennedy, in June 2008 after they were tasked with searching for a running mate for then-Sen. Barack Obama. Holder is sworn in as attorney general by Vice President Joe Biden in February 2009. Holder's wife, Dr. Sharon Malone, is by his side. Holder announces in November 2009 that five men accused of the September 11 terror attacks would be tried in a New York civilian court. He said the government would seek the death penalty against Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four others. Holder is greeted by members of Congress as he arrives at the U.S. House of Representatives in May 2010. Holder answers a student's question after a speech commemorating the 100th anniversary of the Duquesne University School of Law in February 2011. Holder talks to reporters after meeting with U.S. Rep. Darrell Issa, chairman of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, in June 2012. Issa and Holder met to discuss releasing documents related to the botched Fast and Furious investigation. Holder takes questions at a news conference in May 2013. He said he recused himself from a national security leak investigation in which prosecutors obtained the phone records of Associated Press journalists. Holder leaves after speaking of his disappointment in a Supreme Court ruling that declared a key part of the Voting Rights Act unconstitutional in June 2013. Holder talks with Capt. Ron Johnson of the Missouri State Highway Patrol in Ferguson, Missouri, in August 2014. Holder traveled to Ferguson to oversee the federal government's investigation into a police officer's shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown. Holder wipes away tears in September 2014 as his resignation is announced by President Barack Obama in Washington. Holder, who led the Department of Justice for six years, stayed in the position until his replacement, Loretta Lynch, was confirmed. Holder testifies at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing on Thursday, January 29, on oversight of the Justice Department and reform of government surveillance programs. Holder and his wife, Sharon Malone, look on as artist Simmie Knox unveils Holder's official portrait during a ceremony at the Justice Department in Washington on Friday, February 27. Holder delivers remarks about the shooting of two police officers in Ferguson, Missouri, at the Department of Justice in Washington on Thursday, March 12. | 0 |
The case of a New York Conservative Party leader and her Muslim tenant has gone viral after people the world over were left stunned by perhaps one of the most horrifying cases of modern-day racism reported in the U.S.Last September, 33-year-old Morrocon-born woman Hasna Jalal moved into the $1,500 a month apartment in the Pompey Avenue building of MaryLou Shanahan, former chair of an NY branch of the Conservative Party. It was to be the beginning of months of racial abuse that would end with Shanahan facing felony charges of grand larceny, being in possession of $425,000 worth of stolen property of Jalal s, and a lawsuit for evicting Jalal because she was Muslim. It is however, the details of the harassment that take our breath away.Images via NY Post/SiliveThe suit alleges that the situation began on Sept 6 2015, when Shanahan overheard Jalal in the hall speaking Arabic to her Moroccan relatives. Shanahan reportedly screamed: I don t need anybody speaking Arabic in my house! The neighbors will think you re from Al Qaeda. From this day on, Shanahan launched a campaign of terror against Jalal. It seemed every time Jalal left her apartment, Shanahan would be there. As they passed, Shanahan would hurl insults such as nasty Arab , and slut! Next, Jalal would come home to find offensive notes pinned to her door. One read, Get the f*ck out of my house. You re a f king nasty Arabic pig. This continued to escalate for nearly one month, before matters reached a horrifying climax.On Oct 4, Jalal returned home to find herself locked out of the apartment. The locks had been changed. She began calling on neighbors to try to establish what happened, and they told her they had seen Shanahan clearing the contents of the apartment with removal men earlier in the day. The landlord had emptied Jala s apartment and locked her out while she had been at work.All-in-all, Shanahan had confiscated $425,000 worth of Jalal s property.Jalal went to the police and Shanahan was arrested later the same day for grand larceny and possession of stolen property. But the conservative wasn t done yet. She took to Facebook to begin harassing Jalal all over again, posting: The police will not touch a sociopath, foreigner, Moroccan, muslim. Jalal has since filed a lawsuit against Shanahan for evicting her on racial grounds, and the former Conservative Party chair will appear in court on the federal charges on Tuesday.This case comes amid a backdrop of hate crimes against Muslims in New York, which have risen sharply in the last year. Attacks against Muslim Americans and mosques in the state have tripled since the Paris Attacks and San Bernardino shootings. According to The New York Times:The spike includes assaults on hijab-wearing students; arsons and vandalism at mosques; and shootings and death threats at Islamic-owned businessesThese attacks have no doubt been incited by conservatives like Shanahan, who prey on the fear and prejudice of others for their own political ends. The same is playing out on the national stage, with the entire GOP clown car adopting a fundamentally racist, bigoted stance toward non-whites, and non-Christians. The result is the daily oppression and trauma suffered by the likes of Hasna Jalal and others, who simply want to get on and live the American dream.Featured Image via Flickr | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democrat Doug Jones, who scored an upset victory last week in the U.S. Senate race in Alabama, said on Sunday he did not believe President Donald Trump needed to resign over sexual misconduct allegations against him. “I don’t think that the president ought to resign at this point,” Jones told CNN’s State of the Union program. “Those allegations were made before the election, and so people had an opportunity to judge before that election. I think we need to move on and not get distracted by those issues.” More than a dozen women have accused Trump of making unwanted sexual advances against them before he entered politics. Accusations of sexual harassment against high-profile men in politics, media and the entertainment industry have put a new spotlight on the allegations against Trump, and several Democratic senators have called on him to resign. Trump and White House officials have denied the allegations. The accusations emerged during the 2016 presidential campaign, when a videotape surfaced of a 2005 conversation caught on an open microphone in which Trump spoke in vulgar terms about trying to have sex with women. Trump apologized for the remarks but called them private “locker-room talk” and said he had not done the things he talked about. Jones prevailed in the Senate race against Republican Roy Moore, who himself had been accused of sexual misconduct. Jones’ victory in the deeply conservative state of Alabama was a political blow to Trump, who had endorsed Moore. | 1 |
MEXICO CITY — Municipal police officers encircled the bus, detonated tear gas, punctured the tires and forced the college students who were onboard to get off. “We’re going to kill all of you,” the officers warned, according to the bus driver. A policeman approached the driver and pointed a pistol at his chest. “You, too,” the officer said. With a military intelligence official looking on and state and federal police officers in the immediate vicinity, witnesses said, the students were put into police vehicles and taken away. They have not been seen since. They were among the 43 students who vanished in the city of Iguala one night in September 2014 amid violent, chaotic circumstances laid bare by an international panel of investigators who have been examining the matter for more than a year. The reason for the students’ abduction remains a mystery. Despite apparent stonewalling by the Mexican government in recent months, the panel’s two reports on the case, the most recent of which was released on Sunday, provide the fullest accounting of the events surrounding the students’ disappearance, which also left six other people dead, including three students, and scores wounded. The reports describe a night of confusion and terror for the students and city residents, and a seemingly clinical, coordinated harvest by Mexican law enforcement officials and other gunmen operating in and around Iguala, in Guerrero, one of Mexico’s poorest and most violent states. The government said 123 people, including 73 municipal police officials, had been detained on charges in relation to the night’s events, and the Mexican authorities have linked the Iguala police force to a powerful drug gang. The 43 students were undergraduates at Escuela Normal Rural Raúl Isidro Burgos, a teachers college, in Ayotzinapa, with a history of activism. They were among about 100 students who headed out on the evening of Sept. 26, 2014, with a plan to steal some buses. This was a tradition that students at the school had done for many years: They would take the buses, use them to transport their peers to an event and then return them when they were done. The bus companies and the authorities mostly tolerated it. The plan for the outing that evening was to secure several buses to carry students to a march in Mexico City several days later to commemorate a student massacre that had occurred in 1968. Riding in two buses they had commandeered on earlier occasions, they stationed themselves on a main road on the outskirts of Iguala, planning to intercept a few buses. “All of us were happy, having a blast, relaxed, happy with the drivers, playing,” a student later testified, according to the panel’s first report. It relied on testimony from survivors, government security officials and other witnesses as well as reports from an interagency government command center. But the region’s security forces were already onto the students’ plans. The federal police stepped up patrols near the buses, and the command center linking local, state and federal police forces, as well as the military, kept tabs on the students. At 8:15 p. m. the students made their first strike, boarding a bus that had stopped in front of a restaurant. The driver knew the drill bus companies generally instruct drivers that in the event of a student hijacking, they should remain with the buses to ensure their safe return. The bus driver said he needed to make a pit stop at Iguala’s central bus station. At the station, the driver surprised the students and locked them in the bus. Around 9:15 p. m. the students in the two other buses arrived at the station and freed their classmates. The group commandeered three more buses, leaving behind one that had no driver. The five buses then left for Ayotzinapa, three heading toward Iguala’s northern beltway, two toward the southern beltway. Then the shooting began. Several police cars pursuing the three northbound buses started firing warning shots into the air. But the threat of violence did not deter the students. A group of them left the buses and started throwing rocks at a police car that had blocked their path until the car drove away. At another point, a student sneaked up behind a police officer and tried to disarm him. As other police officers came to their colleague’s aid, the student ran away, and a police bullet ricocheted and struck him, lightly wounding him. As the convoy resumed its northward course through the city, police bullets hit the buses. The students threw themselves flat on the floor but ordered the drivers to keep going. Near the beltway, however, the police had blocked the road with a vehicle. Several students got off the buses and tried to lift the cruiser out of the roadway, but officers posted on the highway opened fire on the group, forcing the students to seek cover behind the buses. Investigators later counted 30 bullet holes in one of the buses. As bullets flew and windows shattered, one of the students, Aldo Gutiérrez, was shot in the head. The first call to an emergency dispatch number was received at 9:48 p. m. Police officers shot at students who tried to rush to Mr. Gutiérrez’s aid. Another student was shot in a hand the bullet sheared off several fingers. He sought shelter behind a truck, where two police officers ran over to him, and kicked and punched him. A third student was struck in an arm by a bullet. Ambulance crews managed to retrieve the three wounded students and take them to a hospital, along with a fourth student who suffered an asthma attack. “They all felt confusion, terror and helplessness,” wrote the panel, five lawyers and human rights experts from around Latin America. At one point, the police made a group of students who were hiding in the third bus disembark and lie on the ground. About 10:50 p. m. they were taken away in six or seven patrol cars. They are among the 43 students who disappeared. Meanwhile, the two buses that took the southerly route had also run into trouble. About 9:40 p. m. just as the convoy was intercepted near the northern beltway, the police cut off one of the southbound buses, shattered its windows with tree branches and shot tear gas inside to flush out the passengers. The passengers were pulled from the bus and taken away: the rest of the 43 missing students. Elsewhere in the city, the police had stopped the other southbound bus. The students on board, who had received word by telephone of the other attacks, got off the bus and fled into woods. In a measure of the violent pandemonium that overcame Iguala that night, another bus and several other civilian vehicles came under attack even though they had nothing to do with the students. Los Avispones, a soccer team of high schoolers from the city of Chilpancingo, had played a match that night against a local team in Iguala. By 11:15 p. m. the players were aboard their bus and heading home. Their route out of Iguala took them through a state police roadblock where they were rerouted because of the confrontation between the students and the police, witnesses said. About seven miles outside Iguala, gunmen fired on the bus, killing a soccer player and the driver, and wounding seven other passengers. The attackers also fired at other passing cars, killing a woman who was riding in a taxi. Witnesses said the gunmen had included police officers, and ballistic tests found that some of the weapons used in the attack belonged to the Iguala municipal police department. “The most probable hypothesis is that the bus had been confused for one of those carrying the student teachers,” the investigators wrote. Some soccer players, including one who had been wounded in the eye and was bleeding profusely, managed to drive to a nearby army battalion but were offered no help. “They indicated that they couldn’t do anything because it wasn’t in their jurisdiction,” a witness testified. Elsewhere, on routes leading from Iguala to Ayotzinapa, at least two roadblocks were set up by unidentified gunmen, and one by police officers from the city of Huitzuco. Two civilians were wounded by gunfire at one of the roadblocks. The expert panel concluded that “the joint action shows a coordinated modus operandi to stop the flight of the buses. ” Meanwhile, at the entrance to the northern beltway, students who had survived the police fusillade against the convoy began to emerge from their hiding places and regroup at the scene around 11 p. m. The police had left by then, and the students sought to record the evidence of the attack while trying to communicate with their classmates in the other buses. Journalists, as well as some teachers, began to show up, and by midnight an impromptu news conference was taking shape in the middle of the road. About 12:30 a. m. a white sport utility vehicle and a black car drove by, their occupants taking photos of the gathering. Some were wearing bulletproof vests and hoods. Some witnesses said they also had seen a police car in the area. Fifteen minutes later, the vehicles returned, and three men jumped out and fired on the news conference from close range. Two young men were killed, and other people, including students and teachers, were wounded. The survivors fled into the surrounding blocks. A teacher and several students ran to a clinic to find help for the wounded. No doctor was present, but despite their appeals to emergency dispatchers and to military personnel who appeared at the clinic, an ambulance did not arrive for more than an hour. As late as 3 a. m. the bodies of the two young men still lay in the street, uncovered, in the pouring rain. By dawn, the situation had calmed down, and the surviving students who had been hiding across the city received word by telephone that it was safe to come out. Over the course of the morning, they gathered at the local offices of the attorney general, where they met with the authorities. That morning, the authorities also found the body of another student, Julio César Mondragón, who had been at the news conference. He had fled when the shooting began and had become separated from the group. His facial skin and muscles had been torn away from his head, his skull was fractured in several places, and his internal organs were ruptured. His condition, the investigators wrote, “shows the level of atrocities committed that night. ” | 0 |
Washinton’s Blog – by David Swanson
Officially, of course, the national bird of the United States is that half-a-peace-sign that Philadelphia sports fans like to hold up at opposing teams. But unofficially, the film National Bird has it right: the national bird is a killer drone.
Finally, finally, finally, somebody allowed me to see this movie. And finally somebody made this movie. There have been several drone movies worth seeing , most of them fictional drama , and one very much worth avoiding ( Eye in the Sky ). But National Bird is raw truth, not entirely unlike what you might fantasize media news reports would be in a magical world in which media outlets gave a damn about human life.
The first half of National Bird is the stories of three participants in the U.S. military’s drone murder program, as told by them. And then, just as you’re starting to think you’ll have to write that old familiar review that praises how well the stories of the victims among the aggressors were told but asks in exasperation whether any of the victims of the actual missiles have any stories, National Bird expands to include just what is so often missing, and even to combine the two narratives in a powerful way.
Heather Linebaugh wanted to protect people, benefit the world, travel, see the world, and use super cool technology. Apparently our society did not explain to her in time what it means to join the military. Now she suffers guilt, anxiety, moral injury, PTSD, sleep disorder, despair, and a sense of responsibility to speak out on behalf of friends, other veterans, who have killed themselves or become too alcoholic to speak for themselves. Linebaugh helped murder people with missiles from drones, and watched them die, and identified body parts or watched loved ones gather up body parts.
Even while still in the Air Force, Linebaugh was on a suicide watch list and had a psychologist recommend moving her to a different sort of job, but the Air Force refused. She has episodes. She sees things. She hears things. But she’s forbidden to discuss her work with friends or even with a therapist who doesn’t have the proper “security clearance.”
We let Daniel down even more than Heather. He says he actually opposed militarism but was homeless and desperate, so he joined the military. We could have given him a house for much less than we paid him to help murder people at Fort Meade.
Lisa Ling worked on a database filled by drone surveillance that compiled information on 121,000 “targets” in two years. Multiply that by a dozen years. With 90% of victims not among the targets, add up how many people would die in the targeting of the whole list. That’d be over 7 million. But it’s not numbers that have poisoned the souls of these three veterans; it’s children and mothers and brothers and uncles lying in pieces on the ground.
Ling travels to Afghanistan to see the place at ground level and to meet with drone victims. She meets a little boy who lost his leg and his 4-year-old brother and his sister and his father. On February 2, 2010, drone “pilots” at Creech Air Base murdered 23 innocent members of one family.
The filmmakers have voices read the written transcript of what the drone operators said to each other before, during, and after sending in the missiles that did the damage. This is worse than Collateral Murder . The people whose job it is to identify children and others who should not be murdered have identified children among the group of people being targeted. The “pilots” at Creech are eager to reject this information and to get onto killing as many people as they can. Their lust for blood drives the decision process. Only after they’ve killed 23 people do they recognize children among the survivors, and the lack of guns.
We see the bodies brought home to bury. Those injured describe their suffering, physical as well as mental. We see people being fitted with artificial legs. We hear Afghans describe their perception of drones. They imagine, just as many Americans may imagine, and just as viewers of Eye in the Sky would imagine, that drone operators have a clear, high resolution view of everything. In fact, they have a view of fuzzy little blobs on a computer screen that looks like it was created in the 1980s.
Linebaugh says there is no way to distinguish the little “civilian” blobs from little “militant” blobs. When Daniel hears President Obama claim that there is always near certainty that no civilians will be killed, Daniel explains that such knowledge is simply not possible. Linebaugh says she was often on the side of the conversation telling the “pilots” at Creech not to murder innocents, but that they always pushed for permission to kill.
Jesselyn Radack, attorney for whistleblowers, says in the film that the FBI told two whistleblowers that a terrorist group had put them on a kill list. She said that the FBI has also contacted Linebaugh’s family and warned her that “terrorists” have been searching for her name online, suggesting that she fix this problem by shutting up. (She had written an op-ed in the Guardian ).
The FBI also raids Daniel’s house, arriving with 30 to 50 agents, badges, guns, cameras, and search warrants. They take away his papers, electronics, and phone. They tell him he is under investigation for a possible indictment under the Espionage Act. This is the World War I-era law for targeting foreign enemies that President Obama has made a routine of using to target domestic whistleblowers. While Obama has prosecuted more people under this law than did all previous presidents combined, we probably have no way of knowing how many people have been explicitly threatened with the possibility.
While we should be apologizing to, comforting, and aiding these young people rather than denying them the right to speak to anybody and threatening them with decades in prison, Lisa Ling did manage to find some kindness. Victims of drone strikes in Afghanistan told her that they forgave her. As the film ends, she’s planning another trip to Afghanistan. | 1 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Education Secretary Betsy DeVos faced hostile questions from a Senate committee on Tuesday as she tried to win lawmakers over to President Donald Trump’s proposal to slash her department’s funding by 13 percent. DeVos, a Republican who narrowly won Senate approval for her post in February after strident opposition from Democrats and a few fellow party members, testified before the Senate appropriations subcommittee on education about the proposed budget Trump submitted to Congress last month. Trump’s plan to cut $9 billion from the Education Department’s budget would “improve educational opportunities” and shift the federal role in education, DeVos told the panel. “I understand those figures are alarming for many,” she said. “However, this budget refocuses the department on supporting states and school districts in their efforts to provide high-quality education to all our students.” Democrats took turns asking DeVos about the bigger budget line-items and talking about students who they say could be hurt by large spending cuts. The most pointed exchanges were on whether private schools that receive federal funds would have to agree not to discriminate against students. DeVos would only repeat that schools taking federal money must abide by U.S. law. But Senator Jeff Merkley and his fellow Democrats said she was refusing to answer the question because federal law is unclear in many areas of possible discrimination, such as the rights of transgendered people. Lawmakers are expected to alter Trump’s proposed budget before voting on it. The subcommittee’s chair, conservative Republican Roy Blunt, said he believed Congress would not approve the budget as proposed. “Such a significant cut to the department’s budget is likely untenable,” Blunt said, pressing specifically to preserve funds for technical programs, work-study financial aid and the Special Olympics. Civil rights groups and Democrats say the budget would send public dollars to private companies, disband after-school care, hurt schools in poor neighborhoods, shrink the ranks of teachers, and make it harder for many to afford college. DeVos is currently working on major transformations in student loans. The budget suggests changing income-based repayment plans and ending loan forgiveness for workers in the public sector, which DeVos said would clear up confusion around the loans. With the stated aim of giving parents more choices for their children’s education, DeVos and Republicans support charter schools, which are publicly funded but operate independently, frequently by corporations, as well as subsidies to help pay private-school tuition. Many Republicans on the panel applauded the budget’s proposal to boost such “school choice” programs. But the subcommittee’s senior Democrat, Patty Murray, said the cuts “highlight the ways that the policies and priorities you and President Trump are pushing would hurt students, hurt communities, and represent a clear broken promise to workers and the middle class.” | 1 |
I owe our readers an apology.
In covering the ludicrous letter sent by FBI Director James Comey to Republicans that misleadingly suggested new emails had been uncovered implicating Hillary Clinton in criminal activity, out of an abundance of caution I gave Comey the benefit of the doubt . Maybe this wasn’t overtly partisan electioneering by a Republican FBI director abusing his position? Maybe he just screwed up massively?
That generous interpretation has all but been torched by Comey himself. Days after his letter made its way to Hillary’s political enemies (including Donald Trump), Comey has yet to set the record straight. The scandal has completely fallen to pieces around him. His own behavior in producing the letter, legal experts say, bordered on criminal . But Comey remains silent. He doesn’t even have the decency to admit he screwed up.
And that silence has enabled Republicans to continue lying about what is happening. Trump himself tells his supporters that the FBI director is pursuing a “criminal investigation” against Clinton – a blatant lie that could easily be snuffed out with a single message by the suddenly bashful Comey. We are now leading in many polls, and many of these were taken before the criminal investigation announcement on Friday – great in states!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) October 30, 2016
Instead of setting the record straight, and doing a small part to repair the damage to American democracy he had done, Comey is telling sources that he will refuse to clarify the anti-Hillary letter until after the election . Trump is probably high fiving his campaign staff right now.
NBC’s Pete Williams (whose track record covering the botched FBI letter has been impeccable): Pete Williams reports that Comey is UNLIKELY to say anything more before the election
— Sam Stein (@samsteinhp) October 30, 2016
So having felt totally comfortable with hurting Hillary Clinton’s campaign (over what amounts to nothing), Comey now decides it would be unfair to Trump to come out with the truth. That is a level of partisanship that is hard to wrap one’s head around.
And sadly, many people seem to be unaware that this new Clinton scandal has been completely manufactured by Comey and the Republican Party. According to poll expert Nate Silver, the post-“FBI letter” polls show Clinton’s lead dropping. If Democrats keep their eyes on the prize, it shouldn’t cost her the election, but it may diminish her chances of succeeding in creating the landslide required to completely eradicate “Trumpism” from American politics.
You may not find that on the law books anywhere, but that is a crime nonetheless.
Featured image via Alex Wong/Getty Images Share this Article! | 1 |
As the divisions in the nation bubble over, it seems that one person has snapped, and done the unthinkable: opened fire on a baseball practice full of Congressional Republicans in Alexandria, Virginia. Reports are steadily coming in, and it has been confirmed that House Majority Whip Steve Scalise has been shot. He is currently en route to a nearby hospital and is said to be in stable condition. There are also reports that Capitol Hill police officers and possibly Congressional aides have been injured as well. There is currently no reporting available on their condition. Reports suggest that the shooter was either taken down by Capitol Hill police or taken into custody.The really sad thing about this incident is that this practice was in preparation for a bipartisan baseball game that is supposed to promote unity between the two parties. Further, things would have been much worse if Rep. Scalise had not been there because Capitol Police would not have been present without a member of leadership in attendance.This is seriously the work of someone truly sick. No one should be killing anyone, for any reason, but certainly, this targeting of lawmakers at a baseball practice that was designed to help the nation take a break from ugly partisan politics is truly beyond the pale. Political violence is never acceptable, period.If this isn t proof that we really need to turn down the temperature when it comes to the rhetoric and divisions in this nation posthaste, I don t know what is.This is a developing story. Stay tuned to Addicting Info for continued updates.Here is the live feed monitoring this tragedy, via CNN:Featured image via Alex Wong/Getty Images | 1 |
You almost have to feel sorry for Whoopi Goldberg. Her emotional arguments are no match for the very smart conservative Brian Kilmeade, who prefers to use facts and rely on actual history to support his positions.On the 16th anniversary of 9/11, Fox News Brian Kilmeade asked Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke about the future of the 9/11 Memorial given the current climate of removing memorials that negatively affect some snowflake s politically correct sentimentalities. Do you worry 100 years from now that someone s going to try and take that memorial down like they re trying to remake our memorials today? Kilmeade asked. I m one that believes we should learn from history, Zinke responded, and I think our monuments are part of our country s history. We can learn from it. And since we don t put up statues of Jesus, everyone s going to fall morally short, and I think reflecting on our history, both good and bad, is a powerful statement and part of our DNA. The next day on The View, co-host Whoopi Goldberg had a few choice words for Kilmeade Victims, 9/11. Perpetrators, Confederacy. You understand the difference? Goldberg said, referring to the Fox News host. When you see something that is put together to intimidate and that is celebrating a group of people who decided that they wanted to fight for their right to own slaves. I think it s kind of you can t it s beyond apples and oranges. Get a book, read a book, crack a book, read something. But Kilmeade wasn t about to take any of it lying down. Firing back on his radio show, The Brian Kilmeade Show, that afternoon, the Fox News host said he couldn t wait to clarify something that they skewed. They are now putting a definer on the Jefferson Memorial in Washington DC. They are now defiling the Lincoln Memorial in Washington DC. They are chopping off heads of Columbus who I don t think fought in the Civil War but I gotta crack a book according to Whoopi Goldberg, Kilmeade said. To put your values on people that lived 200 years ago, I think it shows the arrogance of our generation, Kilmeade responded. What about all those people who thought it was perfectly okay for women not to vote? Kilmeade asked. What about all those people that thought it was perfectly okay for blacks to go to the back of the bus? Are they all horrible people? They re brought up in a time where for some reason that was considered the norm. But as a society, we kept getting better. We always keep improving. But you can t say that Thomas Jefferson and Andrew Jackson are bad because you don t agree with everything that they did. BizPacReviewWatch Kilmeade s epic response below, via Fox News Radio: | 0 |
The party s over or is it? Hillary Clinton and her aides will need to decide whether to lie or tell the truth to the FBI about her e-mail and official business. This puts them in a position of choosing between being honest about those emails, or lying to the FBI, which is a crime, said Matthew G. Whitaker, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Iowa from 2004 to 2009. He is presently executive director of the Foundation for Accountability and Civic Trust (FACT) in Washington, D.C.Federal agents are preparing to schedule interviews with Clinton s longtime and closest aides about her use of the private email and server throughout her tenure as the nation s chief diplomat from 2009 to 2013, the Los Angeles Times reported Monday.Despite Clinton s repeated denial she ever sent or received classified information via her private email, federal investigators said more than 2,000 of the 55,000 pages of emails she turned over to the Department of State did include classified material. More than 20 of those emails contained information so sensitive and classified members of Congress were not allowed to read them.Whitaker s group made public its list of what it judges to be the top 10 most ethically challenged Hillary emails March 10, 2016:Nepotism: Clinton intervened Aug. 22, 2012, on behalf of her son-in-law, Marc Mezvinsky, in an effort to secure State Department assistance for one of his business associates with ties to a Clinton Foundation donor. FACT filed a complaint with the U.S. Office of Government Ethics on this issue. Favoring Insiders: Clinton impressed billionaire donor George Soros with his easy access to her, according to a May 12, 2012, email to her from Neera Tanden, veteran Clinton adviser and president of the liberal think tank Center for American Progress. Above The Law: Clinton told aide Jake Sullivan in a June 17, 2011, email to disregard classification security regulations and send information for a speech via a non-secure email system, which forced the aide to either break the law or disobey an order. Special Interests: In a July 26, 2010, email exchange with Clinton, Sullivan forwarded a message from Jeffrey Farrow, an influential lobbyist for a Pacific island government. The exchange raises red flags about whether Farrow had made requests, according to FACT. Selling Access: A Dec. 10, 2009, email discussed attempts by Clinton campaign and foundation donor Brian Greenspun to set up a meeting between Clinton and a top Israeli official who had been trying to meet with [Clinton] to no avail. The email suggests certain campaign and foundation donors had a privileged back door to Clinton. Conflicts Of Interest: Clinton pushed for the State Department to work with the Clinton Foundation and the Red Cross on a project in Haiti. The Jan. 19, 2010, email from Clinton to Chief of Staff Cheryl Mills indicates a clear conflict of interest, according to FACT. Helping Political Allies: Mark Penn, Clinton s 2008 presidential campaign pollster and long-time political adviser, complained about not having timely access on a corporate event in China. His complaints were apparently resolved after a Feb. 22, 2010, email from Clinton aide Kris Balderston that set up a telephone call with Clinton. Trading Favors: Barely a week after the Penn complaint, Balderston reported in a March 2 email to Clinton that major corporations, including Boeing, CITI and Blackstone, agreed to provide financial support for the event. Even the appearance of this sort of favor trading, involving the public, private and political sectors, is a bad ethics practice, according to FACT. Abuse Of Position: A Sept. 15, 2011, email forwarded to Clinton, Sullivan and aide Huma Abedin listed multiple State Department officials attending the Clinton Foundation Global Initiative conference despite having no official role. Robert Hormats, a department official, was also a speaker at a dinner co-hosted by the Goldman Sachs Wall Street investment firm that later paid Clinton $675,000 for three speeches. The dinner focused on investing in women, Clinton s favorite Clinton Foundation project. Duping Obama: In a Sept. 20, 2011, email to Clinton, Mills forwarded a draft of President Barack Obama s planned remarks to the Clinton Foundation Global Initiative. FACT contends that Clinton doesn t appear to have routinely received copies of the President s draft speeches, and it sends bad ethical signals to treat a speech given to her family s organization differently. Read more: biz pac | 1 |
How sweet is this? Chris Matthews had to admit that there s no case in the witch hunt on Trump. Chris Matthews talks about how the theory came apart : The assumption of the critics of the president, of his pursuers, you might say, is that somewhere along the line in the last year is the president had something to do with colluding with the Russians to affect the election in some way. And yet what came apart this morning was that theory Flynn wasn t central to the Russian investigation, and secondly, that kills the idea that Flynn might have been in a position to testify against Trump. And if that s not the case, where s the there-there? How great is today when all of the media big headed pundits have to admit that this entire drama-filled scam is a lie! | 0 |
A few weeks ago, Rachel Maddow did a comparison of Donald Trump and notorious racist George Wallace on her show. One of the points she made about the 2016 candidate and the 1968 candidate is how violent they both are. Like George Wallace, Trump is able to get his crowds riled up into such a frenzy that they start attacking protesters. At the beginning of his campaign, The Donald would do it by screeching GET HIM OUTTA HERE, but during a recent event, he actually said he d like to punch a protester in the face.During a campaign event in Nevada on Monday night, Trump flipped out after he was interrupted by some hecklers and said: You know what I hate? There s a guy, totally disruptive, throwing punches we re not allowed to punch back anymore. In the old days, you know what they used to do with guys like that when they were in a place like this? They d be carried out on a stretcher, folks. Yeah, that imbecile thinks that protesting at one of his events warrants being carried out on a stretcher. But he wasn t finished. When one of the protesters was removed by security, the man was smiling and this really pissed Trump off, he said, I d like to punch him in the face, I ll tell you that. There s a guy throwing punches, nasty as hell, screaming and everything else when we re talking, and we re talking out we re not allowed, the guards are very gentle with him, he s walking, like, big high fives, smiling, laughing I d like to punch him in the face. According to Politico security admitted that nobody was throwing punches. Instead, it looks like Trump made that up to justify his violent words. This is, of course, not surprising coming from a man who once applauded his supporters for kicking and punching a Black Lives Matter protester. It is, however, frightening that this man is in first place in the GOP polls. A man who stands on a stage and incites violence. A man who that is how a president should behave. This is what the Republican Party is offering up to the country: a schoolyard bully. Seriously? And they wonder why their party is slowly dying Watch:Featured image via video screenshot | 0 |
BAGHDAD/CAIRO (Reuters) - A global backlash against U.S. President Donald Trump’s immigration curbs gathered strength on Sunday as several countries including long-standing American allies criticized the measures as discriminatory and divisive. Governments from London and Berlin to Jakarta and Tehran spoke out against Trump’s order to put a four-month hold on allowing refugees into the United States and temporarily ban travelers from Syria and six other Muslim-majority countries. He said the move would help protect Americans from terrorism. In Germany - which has taken in large numbers of people fleeing the Syrian civil war - Chancellor Angela Merkel said the global fight against terrorism was no excuse for the measures and “does not justify putting people of a specific background or faith under general suspicion”, her spokesman said. She expressed her concerns to Trump during a phone call and reminded him that the Geneva Conventions require the international community to take in war refugees on humanitarian grounds, the spokesman added. Merkel’s sentiments were echoed in Paris and London; “Terrorism knows no nationality. Discrimination is no response,” said French Foreign minister Jean-Marc Ayrault, while his British counterpart Boris Johnson tweeted: “Divisive and wrong to stigmatize because of nationality.” Along with Syria, the U.S. ban of at least 90 days affects travelers with passports from Iran, Iraq, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen, including those with dual nationality that includes one of those countries. Trump said his order, which indefinitely bans refugees from Syria, was “not a Muslim ban”, though he added he would seek to prioritize Christian refugees fleeing the country. The Arab League - whose members include many of the countries included in the ban as well as allies of Washington such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Jordan - expressed deep concern and said the restrictions were unjustified. The government in Iraq, which is allied with Washington in the battle against ultra-hardline Islamist group Islamic State and hosts over 5,000 U.S. troops, did not comment on the executive order. But some members of its parliament said Baghdad should retaliate with similar measures against the United States. In Baghdad, influential Shi’ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr said American nationals should leave Iraq, in retaliation for the travel curbs. “It would be arrogance for you to enter freely Iraq and other countries while barring to them the entrance to your country ... and therefore you should get your nationals out,” he said on his website. There was no immediate reaction to the curbs from Islamic State, although in the past it has used U.S. monitoring of Muslim foreigners to stoke Muslim anger against Washington. The Tehran government vowed to respond in kind to the U.S. ban on visitors from Iran, but on Sunday Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Twitter that Americans who already hold Iranian visas can enter the country. “Unlike the U.S., our decision is not retroactive. All with valid Iranian visa will be gladly welcomed,” Zarif said. Authorities in Sudan, which is also targeted by the ban, summoned the U.S. charge d’affaires in Khartoum. They said the order sent a “negative message”, coming two weeks after Washington announced it would ease economic sanctions on the country. Trump’s executive order on Friday took effect immediately, wreaking havoc and confusion for would-be travelers with passports from the seven countries and plunging America’s immigration system into chaos. The Department of Homeland Security said about 375 travelers had been affected by the order, 109 of whom were in transit and were denied entry to the United States. Another 173 were stopped by airlines before boarding. Fuad Sharef, his wife and three children were among the first victims. They had waited two years for a visa to settle in the United States, selling their home and quitting jobs and schools in Iraq before setting off for a new life they saw as a reward for working with U.S. organizations. They were prevented from boarding their connecting flight to New York from Cairo airport on Saturday, detained overnight and forced to board a flight back to northern Iraq. “We were treated like drug dealers, escorted by deportation officers,” Sharef told Reuters, likening Trump’s decision to the dictatorship of former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein. “I am broken, I am totally broken.” A 32-year-old Syrian man, Nail Zain, was among dozens of people at Istanbul’s Ataturk Airport prevented from flying to the United States on Sunday. He told Reuters he was supposed to fly to Los Angeles, but officials said his visa was canceled. “My wife and my son are in the United States. My son has American nationality. And we have been waiting for this moment for two years. Finally when I got the chance, they prevented me as a Syrian passport holder from traveling,” he said. He was later taken out of the terminal by authorities. Trump, a businessman who successfully tapped into American fears about militant attacks during his campaign, had promised what he called “extreme vetting” of immigrants and refugees from areas the White House said the U.S. Congress deemed high risk. He said on Saturday of his order: “It’s working out very nicely. You see it at the airports, you see it all over.” The travel curbs, however, also drew criticism from several other countries around the globe. In Jakarta, Indonesian Foreign Minister Retno Marsudi said the Muslim-majority nation deeply regretted Trump’s plans for “extreme vetting” of people from some Muslim countries. Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni said “open society, plural identity, no discrimination” were the “pillars of Europe”, while the Danish, Swedish and Norwegian governments also registered their opposition. Danish foreign minister Anders Samuelsen tweeted: “The U.S. decision not to allow entry of people from certain countries is NOT fair.” Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said his country welcomed those fleeing war and persecution, even as Canadian airlines said they would turn back U.S.-bound passengers to comply with an immigration ban on people from seven Muslim-majority countries. “To those fleeing persecution, terror & war, Canadians will welcome you, regardless of your faith. Diversity is our strength #WelcomeToCanada,” he tweeted. | 0 |
Absent parent Cashin in McDonald was the teen who was shot by the Chicago officer 16 times, some while he was apparently incapacitated on the ground. His family, namely his mother and sister were paid $5 million in a settlement from the city. But they were not taking care of him, the city effectively was. He was removed from his home at age 5 and grew up in foster homes. One has to wonder was he removed from the home because of the molestation?CHICAGO (CBS) Who was Laquan McDonald? CBS 2 s Dorothy Tucker takes a look at his complicated life from the view of educators and family friends.Yolanda Hoskins speaks affectionately about the Laquan McDonald. He was her son s best friend. Happy and just wanted to be around somebody and feel loved, she said.The 17-year-old she knew liked basketball, tacos and gym shoes, but he also had a troubled past. He was a ward of the state, she said. He was molested too. His death at the hands of a Chicago Police officer who s accused of shooting him 16 times prompted Hoskins to join community activists in a call for justice.There have been questions raised about the failure to release the video earlier and some have accused Rahm Emanuel of holding it back to not hinder his election, and paying the family off. The family apparently was shown the video but did not seek to make it public, in fact, said they would prefer it not to be public as what mother would want to see the execution of her son over and over . As part of the settlement they agreed to keep it confidential.Update:Here s more on the short life of Laquan McDonald. His mother at every point failed him, mother s boyfriend abused him and he had to be removed from the home. And you wonder how he became a druggie and ended up high on PCP? Sure makes me happy his mother got $5 million dollars for how much she failed him Via: Weasel Zippers | 0 |
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There isn’t a question that the Clintons are the most corrupt politicians in United States history. There also isn’t a question that Bill Clinton is a womanizing, philandering piece of filth. Apparently, one of the women Bill had an affair with while Governor of Arkansas, Gennifer Flowers, has released a series of taped conversations with Bubba from that time.
According to Breitbart :
On October 1991, Clinton announced his bid for the Oval Office, with rumors of extramarital affairs threatening to derail his campaign.
Flowers recently provided this reporter with complete original cassette recordings of her taped conversations with Clinton, recordings that take on renewed significance as the issue of Clinton’s alleged treatment of women has reemerged during the 2016 presidential campaign.
The sections of the audio recordings related to the state job are not exclusive to Breitbart News. Those excerpts were played for the news media in 1992, one day after Bill and Hillary Clinton appeared side by side on 60 Minutes , where Bill denied a relationship with Flowers.
Clinton later admitted to one sexual encounter with Flowers in a 1998 deposition for the Paula Jones lawsuit.
You can hear the recordings here:
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It’s not just that Clinton had an affair, he was also trying to help his lover get a job with the state. Pay to play on her part or his? Maybe a little of both. Why not take advantage of screwing the married governor of a state and getting something other than an STD from it? Flowers just had to make sure she didn’t tell anyone the governor, her married lover, was helping her to get the job.
This is just one other aspect of the corruption and despicableness that is the Clintons. They care little for actually governing, care absolutely nothing about the people they actually represent or govern, and care nothing about the consequences, because other than fines for their criminal activity or behavior, they have PAID NO consequences for their lifetime of corruption.
Unfortunately, it won’t matter what comes out about Bill and Hillary Clinton. The main stream media won’t report it and even if it’s a criminal act, Obama’s Department of Justice won’t prosecute them.
That’s the reality of the Clintons. They aren’t representatives of the people, they are representatives for themselves and the moral bankruptcy that has invaded our country. | 1 |
(Reuters) - The Interior Department’s Bureau of Land Management on Friday announced its plans to update 30-year-old rules for oil and gas production on federal land to limit the “wasteful release” of natural gas and curb methane emissions. The effort is part of President Barack Obama’s broader climate change strategy based on executive actions, which includes a goal to reduce oil and gas sector methane emissions by up to 45 percent from 2012 levels by 2025. The rule also comes one week after the agency announced its first major review of the country’s coal program in three decades, including a pause on issuing coal-mining leases on federal land. “By asking operators to take simple, common-sense actions to reduce waste, like swapping out old equipment and checking for leaks, we expect to cut this waste almost in half,” BLM Director Neil Kornze said. Between 2009 and 2014, oil and gas producers on public and Indian lands vented, flared and leaked about 375 billion cubic feet (Bcf) of natural gas, the equivalent supply for about 5.1 million households for a year, the BLM said. Here is a look at the BLM’s proposed rule to crack down on methane waste on federal lands: Proposal highlights: Benefits expected by the BLM: | 1 |
LONDON (Reuters) - Britain wants to reach an agreement with the European Union that would secure a frictionless border between EU member Ireland and Northern Ireland to avoid any need for queues on either side, junior Brexit minister Robin Walker said on Wednesday. Settling the border with Northern Ireland has become one of the main sticking points in Britain s talks on leaving the European Union. | 0 |
ISIS, the world understands, is a violent jihadist group driven by twisted religious devotion and its dream of radical Islamist conquest. ISIS's own members understand the group that way. But what if they're wrong? What if ISIS is not a spontaneous religious movement, but rather was constructed by a shadowy group of secular military leaders to fulfill their secret agenda?
Explosive new documents uncovered by Der Spiegel's Christoph Reuter, published on Saturday, reveal that there is a dark secret at the heart of ISIS. It was not radical Islamists who conceived and created ISIS, they suggest, but rather a small group of senior Iraqi officers in Saddam Hussein's brutal police state. Their plan appears to have been to use ISIS to reconquer Iraq. For them, jihadism was simply a means to the end of retaking the country they had lost, a counterattack to the 2003 US-led invasion that toppled them from power.
Der Spiegel says it uncovered the documents from a house in Syria that was used by a former Iraqi military intelligence official who, before he was killed in a 2014 firefight, went by the name Haji Bakr. The documents show the blueprint for the creation of the Islamic State, written before the group became what it is today and executed to detail. While we have known for some time that former officers in Saddam's military were working with ISIS — they shared a Sunni background and a hatred of the new American-installed government — these documents suggest the officers were far more involved in planning and launching the Islamic State than previously thought.
As Der Spiegel's stunning investigation found, ISIS was organized in much the same way as Saddam's police state. Haji Bakr's goal was to use the chaos and extremism of the Syrian war to build up this new group in Syria, giving it a beachhead from which it could invade and conquer much of Iraq. Once there, it would set up an intricate and Orwellian system of control in the mold of Saddam's Iraq.
ISIS, in other words, would replace one totalitarianism with another. Though Saddam's Iraq had been Sunni and secular and ISIS's Iraq would be Sunni and Islamist, this same group of former Saddam officials would remain at the top. For Haji Bakr and the other officers working with him, the group's apocalyptic jihadism would simply be a vehicle for their return to power.
There is a simple reason why there is no mention in Bakr's writings of prophecies relating to the establishment of an Islamic State allegedly ordained by God: He believed that fanatical religious convictions alone were not enough to achieve victory. But he did believe that the faith of others could be exploited. In 2010, Bakr and a small group of former Iraqi intelligence officers made Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, the emir and later "caliph," the official leader of the Islamic State. They reasoned that Baghdadi, an educated cleric, would give the group a religious face. [Haji] Bakr was "a nationalist, not an Islamist," says Iraqi journalist Hisham al-Hashimi.
Bakr's journey from serving in a violently secular regime to helping found a violently Islamist group began in 2003, after the US-led invasion of Iraq. One of America's first decisions on taking Iraq — a terrible mistake that has haunted the region ever since — was to disband Iraq's enormous army, leaving its officers and soldiers with no income. Haji Bakr was left "bitter and unemployed," a source who knew him told Der Spiegel, as were many officers like him.
This speaks to a terrible irony of the 2003 American-led invasion of Iraq. The war was premised in part on the assertion that Saddam's regime was linked to anti-American jihadist terrorists. This was a falsehood. But the invasion made this falsehood true — and in more terrible fashion than we ever imagined possible.
Haji Bakr, desperate after 2003 to defeat the Americans and the new Shia-majority government, fought alongside Sunni extremists in Iraq. Later, he began constructing ISIS. As Der Spiegel's investigation found, he was able to use his knowledge of running an oppressive security state to build up ISIS into more than just another jihadist group.
Bakr had something else that proved essential: deep contacts with Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad's military and intelligence services. This allowed him to arrange the unofficial alliance of convenience between ISIS and Assad, as the two tacitly tolerate one another in Syria and fight their mutual enemies there.
As Der Spiegel's Reuter writes, there are unmistakable parallels in the architectures of ISIS and of Saddam's Iraq. "The two systems ultimately shared a conviction that control over the masses should lie in the hands of a small elite that should not be answerable to anyone," he writes. "The secret of [ISIS's] success lies in the combination of opposites, the fanatical beliefs of one group and the strategic calculations of the other." | 0 |
CNN was quick to scoop up Corey Lewandowski after Donald Trump kicked him out of his role as campaign manager, but his first week on the job is going pretty much exactly how you would expect it to go terribly.Not only has Lewandowski proven himself to be pretty much like a paid spokesman for Trump, but his defense of the disgraced GOP candidate isn t being received well. Earlier this week, Lewandowski revealed that he was under contract and couldn t criticize The Donald, even after being fired from the campaign. Today, Lewandowski got called out by Hillary Clinton surrogate Christine Quinn for hyping Trump up to be an expert on the Brexit decision a suggestion that was clearly false.On Monday s edition of CNN s New Day, Lewandowski made another pathetic defense of Trump by trying to reframe the candidate s disgusting reaction to Brexit, where he mostly spoke about how much the decision would be good for his Scotland golf resort. Lewandowski s defense was: Obviously the U.S. dollar has become much stronger now against the British pound. If you re going to spend money in Europe, now would actually be a good time to go with the fall of the pound.What you have is a world view, so what you have is someone who is saying, Let s look at this from the U.S. perspective. If you want to go and travel overseas just from a monetary perspective now is the right time to do that because what you re getting is more for your dollar. Quinn wasn t having it. She ripped into Lewandowski, firing back, Donald Trump is not running to be travel agent of the world, he s running to be president of the United States. She continued: What he said wasn t a commentary on international markets, it was, When the pound goes down, more people will come to my golf course. Donald Trump s main concern isn t the international markets, it isn t the impact that Brexit will have on hard working Americans 401Ks, it s himself. How can he make more money, how can he put more money in his bank account? Lewandowski compared the Brexit decision to Trump s rise in the GOP, and Quinn once again called him out and put him back in his place. She said: Trump touted that he saw this coming. That s ridiculous because when he was first asked about Brexit by the press, he didn t appear to know what it was. Lewandowski tried to counter by insisting that People are too smart, they are tired of being told what to do. He then tried to commend Trump for being a selfish moron: You know what Donald Trump said about Brexit? What he said was, you don t have to listen to me because it s not my decision. He didn t weigh in like Hillary Clinton did, like Barack Obama did, saying that you can t do this. Quinn fought back, Because he didn t know what it was. Lewandowski was fighting a losing battle. Trump s reaction to Brexit was just as terrifying as it was humorous it truly proved that Trump knows nothing about foreign affairs, and hasn t spent any time educating himself since the beginning of his presidential candidacy. If only some of the hours he spent getting into fights on Twitter were being used for learning about how the world works. But instead, he once again exposed himself as an unfit choice for President. And when people like Lewandowski try to make sense of his idiocy, they only make themselves look equally foolish.You can watch the embarrassing video below:Featured image via screen capture | 0 |
Isn t it great when the day after a major terror attack in France, citizens can wake up in America, and fear more organized chaos and violence in cities across the nation? A group claiming to be the hacktivist group Anonymous, along with a number of other radical activist groups, is calling for a nationwide day of protesting on Friday, July 15th. Day of Rage protests are being planned by various groups in dozens of major cities throughout the country and police are gearing up for some major problems. Off Grid SurvivalScott Air Force Base has posted a warning to Facebook about a possible protest this Friday at the St. Louis Arch. The Day of Rage protests are planned at the same time in cities across the United States. A group calling itself part of Anonymous is planning protests on Friday, July 15th to stand with the Black Lives Matter movement. Other members of Anonymous say the planned protests are not going to happen.Scott Air Force Base origionally posted this message to Facebook at around 10am Thursday: Please be advised that the Air Force Office of Special Investigations has posted a safety warning not to be at the Gateway Arch in St. Louis, at 6 p.m. on Friday, July 15 due to potential protests and criminal activity. Please be safe and avoid this area during that time. They have updated the post since it went viral with this message:The potential protests are in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement and the victims of police brutality. It is a reaction to last week s officer involved shootings of Alton Sterling and Philando Castile. Anonymous posted a YouTube warning on Saturday: We are calling on a collective day of rage. A day of action centered around civil disobedience and the right to protest.To police departments across the United States. We are not your enemy. However, it is in your hands if you want us to stay that way or not. We will not be silenced and we will not be intimidated.To the St. Anthony and the Baton Rouge Police Departments, we ve already launched attacks on your virtual infrastructure. We are prepared to release every single piece of evidence that will expose your corruption and blatant disregard for human life.Once again we are calling upon the citizens of the United States, in conjunction with the Black Lives Matter movement as well as other civil rights activists, to participate in a day of action against the injustices of corrupt officers. On Friday, July 15th, we will all flood the streets at strategic locations in order to maximize our voice. The locations and times will be located in the description below. Tell your family, tell your friends. We will change the world together. Our freedom depends on it. Fox2NowHere is the list of cities where the #DayOfRage is supposedly planned:Please be careful if you live in these cities, and you may want to consider getting out of town on Friday:Phoenix: 5:00PM (EASTLAKE PARK, 1549 E Jefferson St , Phoenix, AZ 85034) Tuscon: 5:00PM (CATALINA PARK, 900 N 4th Avenue, Tucson, AZ 85705) Little Rock: 6:00PM (OUTSIDE STATE CAPITOL BUILDING, Dr Martin Luther King Jr Dr., Little Rock, AR 72201) San Francisco: 4:00PM (CIVIC CENTER PLAZA, 355 Mcallister St, San Francisco, California 94102) Oakland: 4:00PM (FRANK OGAWA PLAZA, 1 Frank H Ogawa Plaza, Oakland, CA 94612) Los Angeles: 4:00PM (LEIMERT PLAZA PARK, 4395 Leimert Blvd., Los Angeles, CA 90008) Denver: 5:00PM (CIVIC CENTER PARK, 100 W 14th Ave Pkwy, Denver, Colorado 80204) Washington DC: 7:00PM (OUTSIDE WHITE HOUSE, 1600 Pennsylvania Ave NW, Washington, DC 20500) Atlanta: 7:00PM (OLD DECATUR COURTHOUSE, 101 E Court Sq, Decatur, GA 30030) Tampa: 7:00PM (OUTSIDE HILLSBOROUGH COURTHOUSE, 800 E Twiggs St, Tampa, FL) Orlando: 7:00PM (LAKE EOLA PARK, 195 N Rosalind Ave, Orlando, Florida 32801) Miami: 7:00PM (GWEN CHERRY PARK, NW 71 St., Miami, Florida, 33147) Chicago: 6:00PM (RICHARD J DALEY CENTER, 50 W Washington St, Chicago, Illinois 60602) Des Moines: 6:00PM (IOWA STATE CAPITOL, 1007 E Grand Ave, Des Moines, IA 50319) New Orleans: 6:00PM (LAFAYETTE SQUARE, New Orleans, LA 70130) Baltimore: 7:00PM (201 E Pratt St, Baltimore, MD 21202) Boston: 7:00PM (MASSACHUSETTS STATE HOUSE, 24 Beacon St, Boston, MA 01233) Detroit: 7:00PM (Campus Martius Park, Detroit, Michigan 48226) Lansing: 7:00PM (STATE CAPITOL BUILDING, Capitol Avenue at Michigan Avenue, Lansing, MI 48933) Ann Arbor: 7:00PM (THE DIAG, Burns Park, Ann Arbor, MI 48109) Minneapolis: 6:00PM (MINNEAPOLIS URBAN LEAGUE, 2100 Plymouth Ave N, Minneapolis, MN 55411 St. Louis: 6:00PM (GATEWAY ARCH, St. Louis 63102) Carson City: 4:00PM (NEVADA STATE CAPITOL BUILDING, 101 N Carson St, Carson City, Nevada 89701) Manhattan, NY: 7:00PM (TIMES SQUARE, Manhattan, NY, 10036) Newark: 7:00PM (NEWARK CITY HALL, 920 Broad Street, Newark, New Jersey 07102) Durham: 7:00PM (200 E. Main St. Durham, North Carolina) Columbus: 7:00PM (GOODALE PARK, Columbus, Ohio 43215) Cleveland: 7:00PM (CLEVELAND PUBLIC LIBRARY, 325 Superior Ave E, Cleveland, Ohio 44114) Portland: 4:00PM (PIONEER COURTHOUSE SQUARE, 701 SW 6th Ave, Portland, Oregon 97204) Philadelphia: 7:00PM (LOVE PARK, 1599 John F Kennedy Blvd, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 19102) Pittsburgh: 7:00PM (PITTSBURGH CITY-COUNTY BUILDING, 414 Grant St, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 15219) Nashville: 6:00PM (801 Broadway Nashville, TN 37203 Estes Kefauver Federal Building) Memphis: 6:00PM (Health Sciences Park Memphis, TN) Austin: 6:00PM (TEXAS STATE CAPITOL, Outside South Gate-11th and Congress Ave.) Salt Lake City: 5:00PM (SALT LAKE CITY COMMUNITY COLLEGE, 4600 S Redwood Rd, Salt Lake City, Utah 84123) Seattle: 4:00PM (QUEEN ANNE BAPTIST CHURCH, 2011 1st Ave N, Seattle, Washington 98109) Milwaukee: 5:00PM (DINEEN PARK, Milwaukee, Wisconsin)h/t Off Grid Survival | 1 |
JERUSALEM (Reuters) - The Israeli military said it attacked a Hamas training compound in Gaza on Monday in response to rocket strikes from the Palestinian enclave, which have surged since U.S. President Donald Trump recognized Jerusalem as Israel s capital on Dec 6. Neither side reported any casualties in the overnight shelling exchange, which occurred days before U.S. Vice President Mike Pence visits Israel and neighboring Egypt, which also borders Gaza and is involved in its internal politics. Militants in Gaza, territory controlled by the Hamas Islamist group, have launched more than a dozen rockets into southern Israel over the last two weeks, the most intensive attacks since a seven-week-long Gaza war in 2014. Two rockets were fired late on Sunday, one of them exploding inside an Israeli border community and the other hitting an open area, the military said. Another rocket launched early on Monday fell short inside Gaza, it said. Three structures in a Hamas training camp were hit in the Israeli counter-strike, the military said. Hamas usually evacuates such facilities when tensions rise, and Israel s choice of the low-profile target appeared to signal a desire to avoid more serious confrontation with the group. Israel does not seek escalation, Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked said on Army Radio. But Zeev Elkin, another member of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu s security cabinet, said in an interview with the radio station that Israel s military response would have to be harshened if the rocket fire did not stop. Israeli officials have blamed the fire on smaller militant groups in Gaza and called on Hamas to rein them in. Should Hamas fail to do so, both Shaked and Elkin said, Israel could eventually target the group s leadership for attack. | 0 |
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq hanged 38 Sunni Muslim militants on Thursday after they were sentenced to death on terrorism charges, the justice ministry said in a statement. The mass executions were carried out at a prison in the southern Iraqi city of Nassiriya, the statement said quoting the Justice Minister. On Sept. 24, Iraq executed 42 Sunni Muslim militants on terrorism charges ranging from killing members of security forces to detonating car bombs. The justice ministry said all the convicted were members of Islamic State. Officials have said all the appeal options available to the condemned had been exhausted, according to the statement. | 0 |
WASHINGTON — President Trump plans to take executive action on a nearly daily basis for a month to unravel his predecessor’s legacy and begin enacting his own agenda, his aides say, part of an extended exercise of presidential power to quickly make good on his campaign promises. But in a reflection of the improvisational style that helped fuel his rise, he has made few, if any, firm decisions about which orders he wants to make, or in which order. That is a striking break from past presidents, who have entered office with detailed plans for rolling out a series of executive actions that set a tone for their presidencies and send a clear message about their agendas. It was plain that Mr. Trump had devised no such strategy by his first day in office, as advisers expressed doubt until the last moments about whether he would issue any directives on Friday. “It’s going to be a decision,” Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary, told reporters that afternoon. Then, around 7 p. m. reporters were suddenly summoned to the Oval Office. After sprinting from the briefing room, they watched Mr. Trump sign a directive to federal agencies to begin scaling back parts of the Affordable Care Act. “There are a number that are being looked at, but it’s just a question of which ones he feels like doing, and when,” Mr. Spicer had said of executive orders earlier on Friday. In recent days, he had said that Mr. Trump’s top aides were still deciding on the “sequencing” of the unilateral actions. Still, there is little doubt about the policy areas in Mr. Trump’s sights: international trade deals, illegal immigration, the fight against the Islamic State, climate change and Washington lobbying. In his first in office, Mr. Trump focused on health care, ordering the machinery of government to look for every opportunity to pull back on President Barack Obama’s signature achievement by waiving fees or granting exemptions to states, businesses, individuals and insurance companies. He also moved quickly to freeze the Obama administration’s unfinished regulations, a routine step for an incoming president of the opposite party. During the campaign, Mr. Trump railed against Mr. Obama’s use of executive authority to sidestep an uncooperative Congress on issues like immigration and health care. After his victory, Mr. Trump vowed to use those same powers to quickly reverse the country’s ideological course. Aides said they hoped to group Mr. Trump’s executive actions thematically for maximum impact. They gave few other details, though some advisers suggested that executive actions on illegal immigration could be among the first issued after the inaugural weekend. Advocates for undocumented workers are anxiously waiting to see what Mr. Trump will do. If he moves aggressively, he could immediately overturn Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA — the program Mr. Obama created to protect young immigrants who were brought illegally to the United States as children, giving them legal status and access to work permits. Ending that program would put as many as 800, 000 of them at risk of being removed from their families and sent to the countries they had left as children. The White House could instead unwind the program slowly, giving the young people, often called Dreamers, more time before their immigration protections and work permits expire. Senator Richard J. Durbin, Democrat of Illinois, said on Friday that in a brief conversation with the new president, Mr. Trump had given him assurances about the program. The president, Mr. Durbin said, told him that “we don’t want to hurt those kids we’re going to do something. ” “Thank goodness he said that,” the senator added. The president could also order federal agents to conduct workplace raids to crack down on immigration violations. He could take action against sanctuary cities, those that shield undocumented immigrants from deportation. Or he could issue an order reinstating a program known as Secure Communities, in which the local authorities cooperated with federal agencies to detect and deport illegal immigrants. And he could order work to begin, at least symbolically, on a wall at the southern border. Financing construction of the entire wall would require congressional action, however. But on the border wall and other promises, Mr. Trump now faces the challenge of translating slogans into action. He has already missed the deadline for a vow he made in August to start deporting illegal immigrants with criminal records on his first day in office. “We will begin moving them out, Day 1,” he said during a rally in Phoenix. “My first hour in office, those people are gone. ” Mr. Trump’s approach to using his newly minted executive power mirrors his often chaotic transition to the White House. The nature of the new president’s first 24 hours reflected his management style, both in his business empire and in the campaign, which went through four as aides fell into and out of favor. His travel schedule was rarely planned out more than a few days in advance, and Mr. Trump did not hesitate to tear it apart when he wanted to. Decisions would be telegraphed by top advisers, only to be pulled back within hours, or never formally announced. The lack of planning stands in stark contrast to the approaches of past presidents, who have sought to demonstrate the change in direction they hope to lead and maximize the effectiveness of their unilateral actions. Ronald Reagan retreated to the President’s Room just off the Senate floor only moments after being sworn in and signed an order freezing federal hiring, echoing the declaration in his inaugural address that “government is not the solution to our problem government is the problem. ” Mr. Obama also decided well in advance which executive actions he wanted to take in his first days, after a team of lawyers led by Gregory B. Craig, his first White House counsel, spent much of his transition planning what he could do without Congress to illustrate a stark break with George W. Bush’s presidency. On his second full day in office, Mr. Obama ordered the closing of the Guantánamo Bay prison — a directive still unfulfilled — and banned torture by mandating that terrorism interrogations be guided by the Army Field Manual. Mr. Obama’s embrace of executive orders — early in the administration and later, when a Congress blocked his legislative agenda — may have helped pave the way for Mr. Trump to take quick action. Since many of Mr. Obama’s achievements were put in place with executive action, Mr. Trump can reverse them, at least over time, the same way. | 0 |
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump picked up the endorsement on Monday of the union representing 5,000 federal immigration officers, a boost of support for his immigration policy ahead of his first debate with Democrat Hillary Clinton. Trump has laid out a hardline position on illegal immigration, proposing to build a wall along the U.S. southern border with Mexico and take other steps to crack down on the flow of undocumented people crossing into the United States. With immigration likely to be discussed at the debate, the National Immigration and Customs Enforcement Council, a union representing 5,000 federal immigration officers and law enforcement support staff, announced it would support Trump, in what was described as its first endorsement of a candidate for elected office. The union’s president, Chris Crane, outlined in a statement why his group is backing Trump, saying his union members are “the last line of defense for American communities” and that his members “are prevented from enforcing the most basic immigration laws.” A CNN/ORC poll released on Sept. 7 said that among registered voters, 49 percent said they trusted Clinton to handle immigration, a slight advantage over Trump, who was at 47 percent. Crane said the endorsement was conducted by a vote of the union’s membership and that Clinton received only 5 percent of the vote. | 0 |
No actual verifiable evidence is available, but hey in a world where PC rules the day who needs to verify a story? ****Strong language warning (video)****Here s the WWE s statement:WWE terminated its contract with Terry Bollea (aka Hulk Hogan). WWE is committed to embracing and celebrating individuals from all backgrounds as demonstrated by the diversity of our employees, performers and fans worldwide.Why is not completely clear yet, although obviously the statement points to him saying or doing something that they found offensive.Some have speculated that it is due to this video from 2012, in which he talks about people s use of the term nigga :https://youtu.be/oVyTgh_kBD0One would hope that they would not act so thoroughly and completely to sever the 30 year relationship over something as benign as that. But in present PC climate, one wouldn t doubt it.Others are pointing to another story, that he supposedly used the terminology fucking n**gers repeatedly on a tape filed in a deposition in a Florida court, this one would be much more problematic, where he calls himself a racist:At that point on the tape, the former Hogan Knows Best star bemoaned how a black billionaire guy had offered to fund his 27 year old daughter Brooke s music career.He also attempts to use bizarre, twisted logic in an attempt to justify his bigotry at the man. I don t know if Brooke was f*cking the black guy s son, Hulk raved, the sources add. I mean, I don t have double standards. I mean, I am a racist, to a point, f*cking n*ggers. But then when it comes to nice people and sh*t, and whatever. Then, in a tirade to rival the racism embarrassments suffered by Mel Gibson and Dog The Bounty Hunter, Hulk unloaded even more hatred!According to sources, he said: I mean, I d rather if she was going to f*ck some n*gger, I d rather have her marry an 8-foot-tall n*gger worth a hundred million dollars! Like a basketball player! I guess we re all a little racist. Fucking n*gger. Of course, according the original news source, THE NATIONAL ENQUIRER, these records are sealed in a Florida court so there is no actual evidence available to the public that can be used to verify this story.Via: Weasel Zippers | 0 |
Former FBI Director James Comey testified under Senate oath May 3rd that the Trump administration had not pressured his agency to halt any investigation for political purposes. Comey admitted that the FBI has always been free to operate without political interference flying in the face of Democrats paranoid delusions about Russia and President Donald J. Trump, and exposing for what it is a new political witch hunt Wednesday by enemies within the president s own Justice Department.On Wednesday, DOJ appointed a special prosecutor, former FBI Director Robert Mueller, to drum up more hype about Trump s imaginary collusion with Russia during the general election.On May 9th, President Trump fired Comey, who has spent 15 years shilling for Hillary Clinton.Videotaped testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee blows apart the phony narrative New York Times reporter Michael Schmidt wove on Tuesday, which resulted in Mueller s appointment. Schmidt s only sources were anonymous. They claimed that on Feb. 14th, the day after National Security Adviser Michael Flynn resigned, Trump had asked Comey to end an investigation into Flynn s connections to Russia. Got NewsNick Short was first to expose Comey s testimony on May 3rd, where under oath where he stated that, as it relates to Trump or his administration asking him to halt an investigation for political purposes: It s not happened in my experience .If Trump told Comey to "stop investigating" as Comey memo alleges then why did Comey state this on May 3 under oath? https://t.co/5A1Zq5rpgs pic.twitter.com/rp9V4qb1hq Nick Short (@PoliticalShort) May 17, 2017 | 1 |
You’ve probably been cleaning your hands all wrong. They must be filthy. Scientists have found that a common technique for applying hand sanitizer, one that is even recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is inferior to an alternative method with twice as many steps. The C. D. C. way: Step One: Apply the sanitizer to one palm. Step Two: Rub both palms together. Step Three: Rub product over your hands until dry. In a study published in the journal of the Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America, scientists in Scotland found that an alternative technique, recommended by the World Health Organization, was significantly more effective in reducing the median bacteria count on participants’ hands. It was also more . The C. D. C. method takes 35 seconds on average to complete the alternative, 42. 5 seconds. You may notice that while the instructions include applying the sanitizer and allowing your hands to dry, the technique ignores both actions. (The diagramed W. H. O. method actually contains 11 intensive steps. The study only counted Steps 2 through 7.) Here’s how you do it the (much more laborious) W. H. O. way: Step One: Rub palms together. Step Two: Rub each palm front to back over the back of the other hand, interlacing fingers. Step Three: Twist palms with fingers interlaced, and rub between fingers. Step Four: Interlock your fingers, (thumbs should be on opposite sides) and twist again, this time, backs of fingers against palms. Step Five: Clasp your left thumb in your right hand and move thumb in circular motion — then switch thumbs. Step Six: (Still with us?) Press your right fingers together and rub them in a circular motion on your left palm, then switch. You’re done! Jacqui Reilly of the Glasgow Caledonian University, the lead author of the study, which focused on workers, stressed that the way the steps were counted emphasized the precision of the superior W. H. O. technique. “The difference between them is that the W. H. O. guidance gives you six maneuvers to do, instead of just saying, ‘Apply it all over your hands,’ ” she said. Hand hygiene, she added, remained “the single most important intervention that you can do to prevent health infection but also to protect yourself and your family from infections and viruses. ” Certain antibacterial soaps may do more harm than good, experts say. Some have come under scrutiny for using chemicals like triclosan. The Food and Drug Administration has recommended using hand sanitizers that contain at least 60 percent alcohol if soap and water is unavailable. Dr. Reilly said that while her study focused only on hand sanitizer, the technique applied equally well to hand washing with soap and water. O. K. so maybe you have been persuaded but are reluctant to memorize and do all those new steps? You’re not alone. According to the study, even the professionals who participated had trouble with all the steps. Nearly a third of them were unable to complete the entire process despite “having instructions on the technique in front of them and having their technique observed. ” | 0 |
Parker covered the Trump campaign and transition for the Times. | 0 |
NEWARK — The acknowledged culprit behind the closing of traffic lanes leading to the George Washington Bridge in September 2013 was “protected by Chris Christie,” the executive director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey agreed during court testimony on Thursday. That culprit, David Wildstein, is now the prosecution’s star witness against two former top officials in the administration of Mr. Christie, the governor of New Jersey. The officials are accused of closing access lanes at the bridge to punish the mayor of Fort Lee, N. J. for refusing to endorse the governor’s bid, then covering the plot up. While Mr. Christie is not charged, prosecutors have said he knew about the lane closings as they were happening, contrary to what the governor has said in the three years since. The closed lanes caused gridlock in the town, stymying ambulances, commuters and schoolchildren for four days. Lawyers for the two defendants have argued that their clients are scapegoats in a political game involving players with far more power. Testimony on Thursday morning by Patrick J. Foye, the executive director of the Port Authority, which operates the bridge, described a frenzied effort to cover up the punitive purpose of the closings in the three months afterward. Mr. Christie won a broad that fall, becoming a for the Republican nomination for the presidency and prompting more interest, and more questions from reporters, about the events. Mr. Foye testified that he conducted an internal review of the closings, talking to just three people at the Port Authority. But he could not ask Mr. Wildstein, a top official at the agency and a close ally of Mr. Christie’s, even a single question, he testified. “Because you couldn’t?” asked Michael Critchley, a lawyer for one of the defendants, Bridget Anne Kelly, who was a deputy chief of staff to Mr. Christie. “He was protected by Chris Christie, correct?” “Yes,” Mr. Foye said. A Port Authority board member appointed by Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo, Democrat of New York, had wanted to fire Mr. Wildstein for a year, Mr. Foye testified. Mr. Wildstein was “abusive and untrustworthy,” he said, and “hated by hundreds, thousands of people at the Port Authority. ” But Mr. Wildstein could not be terminated, Mr. Foye said, because it was “complicated. ” Mr. Wildstein ultimately resigned in December 2013, amid increasing scrutiny of the lane closings and the Christie administration’s involvement. Mr. Christie personally edited the public statement announcing his resignation, adding praise for his service. Mr. Wildstein then refused to give up his Port Authority cellphone and iPad, Mr. Foye testified. Mr. Foye sent an email asking David Samson, a confidant of Mr. Christie’s who was chairman of the Port Authority board, for help getting them back. “Because you are closest to him,” Mr. Foye wrote. Mr. Wildstein pleaded guilty in 2015 to masterminding the lane closings, and is now cooperating with prosecutors against Ms. Kelly and Bill Baroni, Mr. Christie’s top staff appointee at the Port Authority. Mr. Foye, who was appointed to his position by Mr. Cuomo, described a toxic relationship between the two states at the Port Authority that only got worse after the lane closings. He told Mr. Samson that he should recuse himself from an investigation into Mr. Wildstein’s conduct because, as he wrote in an email to the chairman, “you have substantial and irreconcilable conflicts. ” And Mr. Foye complained to a colleague that Mr. Christie’s office wanted him to “step back on the matter,” referring to the closed lanes. To which Mr. Critchley added, “And you said that your hands were tied and it was driving you crazy. ” (Mr. Foye said he could not recall this, but agreed that his colleague had no reason to lie.) Mr. Foye said he knew that Mr. Christie’s administration had long wanted him fired. Still, Mr. Foye wrote to a colleague that he had “no reason to believe that Bill Baroni had knowledge of Wildstein’s troubling and aberrant behavior” in closing the lanes. Throughout the days that the lanes were closed, Mr. Baroni refused to return increasingly agitated calls from the mayor of Fort Lee, Mark Sokolich, a Democrat, warning him of the threats to public safety presented by the lane closings. An aide to Mr. Baroni in charge of dealing with local towns testified that this was highly unusual for her boss. When the aide, Tina Lado, emailed him to ask if she should return the mayor’s calls, Mr. Baroni called her up, she said, and was “rather curt and very short on the phone, not his usual demeanor. ” He advised her that there were concerns that her department had been racking up high phone charges for calls to local municipalities “and we needed to be careful and not make any outgoing calls. ” “What I took from that was that we would not call back Fort Lee. ” Never before or since then, she added, had anyone raised concerns about high telephone costs. Three months later, Mr. Baroni had testified before the New Jersey Legislature about the lane closings, insisting they were part of a legitimate traffic study. Mr. Baroni’s believed this to be false. But Mr. Christie’s office was reportedly happy with his performance. John Ma, Mr. Foye’s chief of staff, testified that he bumped into Mr. Baroni soon after and said something about it being “some hearing. ” Mr. Baroni replied that he had “showed them up,” Mr. Ma said. “I would describe him as really pumped up about it. ” | 0 |
BEIRUT (Reuters) - Syria s army and its allies, spearheaded by Lebanon s Hezbollah, captured Islamic State s last stronghold in Syria on Wednesday, a commander in the alliance said, bringing the self-declared caliphate close to complete downfall. The last stronghold of Daesh (Islamic State), Albu Kamal, is free of the Daesh organization, said the commander in the military alliance supporting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Islamic State has been all but destroyed over the past two years. At the height of its power in 2015, it ruled an expanse of Iraq and Syria, eradicating the border, printing money, imposing draconian laws and plotting attacks across the world. On Wednesday, after a months-long advance through central and eastern Syria, the Syrian army and allied Shi ite militias encircled and attacked Albu Kamal. Hezbollah was the foundation in the battle of Albu Kamal , said the commander, adding that hundreds of the elite forces of the Iran-backed Shi ite group took part in the battle. Syrian state television declared Albu Kamal is liberated . But a war monitor, the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, said it was not true that Albu Kamal was taken and there was still fighting in the area. Albu Kamal is located on the border with Iraq on the bank of the Euphrates. During the battle, Hezbollah forces entered Iraq and the Iraqi Popular Mobilisation Forces crossed into Syria to help capture the town, the commander said. Islamic State retains control over some areas of desert and villages nearby, as well as a town and some other villages in adjacent areas of Iraq, and in scattered pockets elsewhere in both countries. Despite its losses, Islamic State still has a territorial presence in Libya and elsewhere, and many governments expect it to remain a threat even after it loses the caliphate it declared from Mosul, Iraq, in 2014. It has already carried out guerrilla operations in both Iraq and in Syria, and has continued to inspire lone militants to attack civilian targets in the West. In Syria, the end of major operations against Islamic State may only prefigure a new phase of the war, as the rival forces which have seized territory from the jihadists square off. The Syrian army, alongside Hezbollah and other Shi ite militias, and backed by Iran and Russia, have seized swathes of central and eastern Syria in the advance against Islamic State this year. Russian official media have in recent weeks reported a surge of strategic bombing and cruise missile strikes on Islamic State targets in eastern Syria as the army advanced. A U.S.-backed coalition has supported a rival campaign by the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), an alliance of Kurdish and Arab militias that have pushed Islamic State from much of the country s north and east. The Syrian government has sworn to recapture territory held by the SDF, including Islamic State s former capital Raqqa and oil and gas fields east of the Euphrates. In areas controlled by the SDF in northern Syria, Kurdish-led groups have established autonomy, announcing elections and setting internal policies. On Tuesday, Bouthaina Shaaban, a senior adviser to Assad, described the U.S. forces aiding the SDF as illegal invaders. Washington has not spelled out how its military support for the SDF would evolve after Islamic State s defeat. Shaaban also pointed, in a television interview, to the example of Iraq, where the government retaliated against an autonomous Kurdish region after it held an independence referendum. Iraqi military officials say small groups of Islamic State militants are still entrenched in the town of Rawa and the border desert strip with Syria. Scattered villages near al-Qaim, close to Albu Kamal, are still under militant control in an area called Rummana. The Iraqi Popular Mobilisation Forces (PMF), an alliance of militias, earlier on Wednesday denied it had crossed the Syrian border and was attacking Albu Kamal. Our movements are carried out under orders from the commander in chief of the armed forces and our key objective is to liberate Iraq s territories from Daesh. We have no orders to cross the borders, PMF spokesman Ahmed al-Asadi said. | 0 |
As Marco Rubio settles into his new role as a rising top-tier candidate, most of his opponents in the Republican presidential race are showing a reluctance and even an unwillingness to engage him directly on the national stage.
The spotlight on Rubio is intensifying in the media as journalists investigate the senator’s political record and background. But he otherwise is left facing relatively low hurdles for now, bypassing the kind of heated personal clashes that have shaped the 2016 nomination race.
For Rubio, it is a return to the lofty status he had after he burst onto the national scene five years ago. Many Republican elites are once again celebrating him as the party’s golden boy, if not its strongest general-election candidate, and fear seeing him bruised too badly during the primary season.
“He’s articulate, attractive and young. His rivals don’t want him to win, but no one wants to lose him,” said Vin Weber, a prominent Jeb Bush supporter. “Of course, politics is a rough-and-tumble sport, and he’ll need to take a few punches. But at the end of the day, this is a party that needs to find ways to appeal to Hispanic voters, and having him on our side is an asset.”
The other candidates have not figured out how to deal with what some are calling “the Marco moment,” hinting at critiques and possible anti-Rubio ads to come but hesitating to make Rubio their main target.
[Dan Balz: Ten months in, the GOP race has no obvious front-runner.]
Donald Trump has castigated Rubio on the stump and in Twitter messages as a “total lightweight” who is “weak” on immigration. But under the prime-time glare of Tuesday night’s Republican presidential debate, the outspoken mogul fell silent about the senator from Florida.
When Sen. Ted Cruz (Tex.) tried to draw a contrast, he did so only with a thickly veiled line about sugar subsidies, something few voters could connect to Rubio.
And although Bush’s campaign previewed a litany of possible attacks on Rubio, the former Florida governor didn’t say a word in Milwaukee about his onetime protege.
Bush sees Rubio as a direct competitor for the support of wealthy donors and party leaders. Bush’s campaign and its allied super PAC, Right to Rise, have signaled possible lines of attack: In a strategy presentation to donors a couple of weeks ago, the Bush campaign branded Rubio disparagingly as a “GOP Obama.”
In the candidates’ Oct. 28 debate, Bush lunged at Rubio over his spotty Senate voting record, even suggesting that he resign his seat. But the offensive backfired, and in the two weeks since, Bush has steered away from Rubio. The dilemma is further complicated by pressure from many of Bush’s Florida-based financial backers, who also like Rubio and want Bush to go easy on him.
Asked why Bush did not scrutinize Rubio during the Milwaukee exchange, campaign manager Danny Diaz said the debate “was a serious one where important issues were discussed,” and he urged reporters to stay tuned for the next debate on Dec. 15. “We look forward to catching up with all our good friends in Las Vegas,” Diaz said.
Bush’s surrogates indicated that more heat on Rubio would arrive in short order.
“It’s a long campaign,” Al Cardenas, a Florida-based Bush supporter who also is close to Rubio, told reporters in Milwaukee. “Everybody’s going to be scrutinized. Those who do well will get scrutinized more.”
GOP strategist Ari Fleischer put it more bluntly: “The candidates will chop each other up if they thought it would help them. Every one of those candidates think it should be them, and they can give you every reason why it shouldn’t be Rubio.”
[Fourth GOP debate is more about party fault lines than personal attacks.]
The mostly substantive nature of Tuesday’s debate, sponsored by Fox Business Network and the Wall Street Journal, did not invite many personal skirmishes. In one exception, Rand Paul went after Rubio for wanting to increase military spending. But in a tense exchange with the senator from Kentucky, Rubio responded by articulating a hawkish worldview and portrayed Paul as championing an “isolationist” foreign policy.
Trump described the debate’s atmosphere as lacking fireworks. “It was amazing, because the lights went on and you never know what’s going to happen — are you going to be attacked and do you go for the kill, right?” he said Wednesday on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe.” “That was not really necessary.”
Trump’s campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, said the billionaire contender will continue to talk about his differences with Rubio, especially on immigration.
“People are going to keep looking at Rubio’s record,” Lewandowski said. “They’re going to ask themselves if they really want another first-term senator as president, someone who may not have the right experience. Those concerns aren’t going away.”
Rubio’s advisers presented the lack of engagement Tuesday night as a sign of Rubio’s strength.
“The phrase where I come from is ‘There’s no education in the second kick of the mule,’ ” Terry Sullivan, Rubio’s campaign manager, told reporters. “I kind of feel like folks figured out that taking on Marco isn’t such a great idea. . . . I don’t think anybody’s really itching to take on Marco on the debate stage.”
Perhaps the best encapsulation of Rubio’s good fortune came when moderator Maria Bartiromo asked him how his résumé stacks up against Democrat Hillary Rodham Clinton’s decades of service. Rubio could not help but grin. It was the softest of softballs — an opening for the 44-year-old senator to cast himself as the candidate of the future.
Eric Fehrnstrom, who was an adviser to 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney, said Rubio “has a gift of the golden tongue.”
But he added: “I don’t think any candidate on that stage thinks that they’re somehow immune from political attacks. Rubio’s biggest vulnerability is immigration. While he did not address that at length [in Tuesday’s debate], I would expect when the attacks go up on TV that immigration will be in the mix.”
Supporters of rival campaigns voiced surprise that Rubio was not drawn into the immigration discussion, considering his leadership in 2013 on the Senate’s “Gang of Eight” pushing for comprehensive immigration reform. Rubio has since disavowed the legislation and has hardened his immigration positions overall.
“There should be more scrutiny of Rubio, no doubt about it,” said Bob Smith, a former senator from New Hampshire who is backing Cruz. “It’s almost as if the media is ignoring his immigration record, or at least not giving it much coverage. Conservatives up here, however, are well aware of it, and my sense is that they’ll continue to vet Rubio on their own.”
Dan Pfeiffer, a former senior adviser to President Obama, said other Republican candidates may be afraid of tangling with Rubio in a debate.
“Rubio is skilled at delivering a scripted, rehearsed counterpunch, and they had to know he would be prepared,” Pfeiffer said. He added that Cruz seems to be “patiently waiting for his moment to make this attack. Cruz wants to see the whites of Rubio’s eyes before he fires his biggest guns.”
Indeed, Cruz has been laying the foundation for the contrast he hopes to make with Rubio if the nominating contest narrows to the two of them, as some pundits predict. In debate after debate, Cruz has positioned himself as a hard-line opponent of amnesty, and more generally as a conservative purist.
In his immigration comments Tuesday night, Cruz did not single out Rubio. But his advisers did with reporters afterward.
The freshman Texan “will draw contrasts on issues,” Cruz spokesman Rick Tyler said. “Senator Rubio was for the Gang of Eight. Senator Cruz wasn’t. Right now, we’re just beginning that, and we’ve got three months till Iowa.”
Jose A. DelReal in Washington contributed to this report. | 0 |
Russia’s super secret spy submarine returns to sea…. AFTER 16 YEARS. Tweet
Earlier this month, a Russian ballistic missile submarine (SSBN) called Podmoskovie slipped out of its pier at Severodvinsk for the first time in 16 years.
But BS-64 Podmoskovie—which was commissioned in 1986 as a Project 667BDRM Delfin-class (NATO: Delta IV) SSBN designated K-64—is no ordinary boomer. Over the course of nearly two decades, the massive submarine was modified to conduct special missions. But exactly what those missions might be remains somewhat of a mystery.
Podmoskovie was photographed leaving the shipyard for contractor sea trials on Oct. 22 by Oleg Kuleshov, who writes for the BMPD blog—a product of the Moscow-based Centre for the Analysis of Strategies and Technologies. | 1 |
UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Wednesday called on authorities in Myanmar to end violence against the majority-Buddhist country s Rohingya Muslims and acknowledged the situation there is best described as ethnic cleansing. The humanitarian situation in Myanmar was catastrophic, Guterres said, and called on all countries to do what they could to supply aid. I call on the Myanmar authorities to suspend military action, end the violence, uphold the rule of law and recognize the right of return of all those who had to leave the country, Guterres said at a news conference. Pressure has been mounting on Myanmar to end violence that has sent about 370,000 Rohingya Muslims fleeing to Bangladesh, with the United States calling for protection of civilians and Bangladesh urging safe zones to enable refugees to go home. Asked if the situation could be described as ethnic cleansing, Guterres replied: Well I would answer your question with another question: When one-third of the Rohingya population had to flee the country, could you find a better word to describe it? The secretary-general also said he has spoken to Aung San Suu Kyi, Myanmar s national leader, several times. This is a dramatic tragedy. People are dying and suffering at horrible numbers and we need to stop it. That is my main concern, he said. Suu Kyi canceled a trip to the upcoming U.N. General Assembly to deal with the crisis, her office said on Wednesday. The U.N. Security Council is to meet on Wednesday behind closed doors for the second time since the crisis erupted. British U.N. Ambassador Matthew Rycroft said he hoped there would be a public statement agreed by the council. The government of Myanmar, also known as Burma, says its security forces are fighting Rohingya militants behind a surge of violence in Rakhine state that began on Aug. 25, and they are doing all they can to avoid harming civilians. The government says about 400 people have been killed in the fighting, the latest in the western state. The U.N. s top human rights official earlier this week denounced Myanmar for conducting a cruel military operation against the Rohingya, branding it a textbook example of ethnic cleansing. | 1 |
Thank goodness there are still a few courageous, conservative actors in Hollywood like Mel Gibson, Vince Vaughn, Patricia Heaton and Clint Eastwood, to name a few. Gibson and Vaughn were in attendance last night at the Golden Globe awards, and by the looks on their faces, they were obviously were NOT impressed with Streep s anti-Trump rant (video of her embarrassing speech can be seen below):Hollywood conservatives/libertarians #MelGibson & #VinceVaughn listening to #MerylStreep speech slamming @realDonaldTrump. #LockHerUp pic.twitter.com/i3sdtSbz1f Jacob Engels (@JacobEngels) January 9, 2017Here is Streep s rant:"As my friend Princess Leia said to me once: take your broken heart, make it into art." #MerylStreep pic.twitter.com/GzOHo7O729 #GoldenGlobes Richard Hine (@richardhine) January 9, 2017 | 1 |
Al-Qaeda's Assault on Aleppo Continues Despite Lack of Progress
Rebels are doing a lot of dying but not taking much ground so far Print Originally appeared at The Moon of Alabama
For four days now al-Qaeda in Syria (aka Jabhat al Nusra aka Fatah al-Sham) and assorted other "rebel" groups have tried to attack Aleppo from the west to break the siege on al-Qaeda associated groups in east-Aleppo. The New York Times in now openly admitting that CIA supported groups are acting under al-Qaeda's operational command. The piece though, which belonged on page one, was in the back of the paper. There is no public outcry over this disturbing fact.
The attack on west-Aleppo had been talked about for over two weeks and the defenders are well prepared. waleppoattack.jpg
As can be seen on the map above the areas al-Qaeda and its allies managed to capture so far are only small rural outskirts. Every attempt to attack actual city estate under roof was repelled by the defenders. Small infiltrations like shown in the map were immediately cleaned up. The marked area is back in the hands of the Syrian army. It is estimated that the several thousand attackers have so far lost more than 500 men. A 1,000 more are likely injured. Every attack has to be carried over mostly open land and is received by heavy artillery fire. Air attacks ravage their supply and preparation ares.
The attackers launched over 20 suicide-vehicle bombs so far but only a few reached their targets and their damage was limited. Yesterday one suicide vehicle bomb, ready to be launched for a new attack, was hit by a missile from a Syrian helicopter and exploded at its preparation and launching position. Over 60 "rebels" were killed by it and their attack had to be call off.
The good news is that the defense is holding. The bad news is that the al-Qaeda "rebels" received huge amounts of artillery missiles and launchers from their "western" and Gulf sponsors. Several hundred have been launched at the densely populated areas of west-Aleppo. More than a 100 civilians have been killed by them and several hundred civilians were wounded. Some of the missiles contained gas and people had to be taken to hospital with extreme breathing difficulties. The UN envoy condemned these attacks as "possible war crimes".
The whole attack operation was launched under the direct supervision of al-Qaeda in Syria leader Abu Muhammad al-Golani. He was shown in pictures at the "rebel" headquarter of the attack discussing further operations.
Despite any progress on their part the al-Qaeda forces seem far from giving up. More attacks to break the siege are expected. We can be sure that some of their surprises are still in store. But the defenders are ready and the Syrian army is said to prepare for a large counter operation which may include a serious effort to liberate east-Aleppo of the al-Qaeda occupation.
Other fronts in Syria are relatively quiet. The Turks have been told by Russia to stop all air attacks within Syria. The message has been received. The Turkish plan to occupy Al Bab east of Aleppo is unlikely to happen as it would be out of range of the Turkey based artillery and have no air support. The U.S. would like to go to Raqqa but has no proxy ground force to do that. Some Obama officials are now arguing for more U.S. boots on the ground in Syria. Will Obama agree to that mission creep? | 1 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. congressional panel next month will hold a hearing on violent extremism, including threats from domestic militants, following a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, that turned deadly. The chairman of the U.S. House of Representatives Homeland Security Committee, Republican Michael McCaul, announced the Sept. 12 hearing in a letter to the panel’s top Democrat, Bennie Thompson. The committee holds a hearing once a year, around the anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, to discuss worldwide threats. A committee aide said the Charlottesville protests had prompted the decision to broaden the hearing to include threats from domestic militants. But Thompson said the move was “not adequate or appropriate” to address his request for a hearing on threats from white supremacists and neo-Nazi groups. “The September 12 hearing to cover worldwide threats is an annual hearing that was already scheduled prior to the domestic attacks this weekend,” Thompson said. “It will not allow us to go into the depth necessary to address the far-ranging and multifaceted aspects of the threat posed by domestic terrorist threats from white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups.” The Homeland Security Committee will invite leaders of the Homeland Security Department, the Federal Bureau of Investigation and the National Counterterrorism Center, McCaul said. “We must stand together and reject racism, bigotry, and prejudice, including the hateful ideologies promoted by neo-Nazis, the KKK, and all other white supremacy groups,” McCaul wrote in his response to Democrats’ request for a hearing. A 32-year-old woman was killed on Saturday in Charlottesville when a car plowed into a rival protest to white supremacist demonstrators. A 20-year-old Ohio man said to have harbored Nazi sympathies has been charged with murder. President Donald Trump on Tuesday said both sides were to blame for the violence, drawing condemnation from both fellow Republicans and Democrats for failing to single out the white nationalists. | 1 |
BERLIN (Reuters) - Germans will vote on Sunday in a parliamentary election in which center-right Chancellor Angela Merkel is running for a fourth term. Here is an explanation of how the voting system works: Germany has a mixed-member proportional voting system under which voters cast two ballots: one directly for a candidate in his or her constituency and the second for a party. This second vote determines the distribution of seats in parliament. Merkel s name, for instance, does not appear on the national ballot but only in her constituency in the Stralsund/Ruegen district. She is running there as a direct candidate for her Christian Democrats (CDU) after winning the district seven times in a row since reunification in 1990. German voters sometimes split their ballots to give their preferred coalition extra support: They give their first vote to a direct candidate from one of the two main parties - the CDU and its Bavarian sister party CSU or the center-left Social Democrats (SPD) - and the second vote to a corresponding smaller partner such as the business-friendly Free Democrats (FDP), the left-leaning Greens, the far-left Die Linke or the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD). The smaller parties have little interest in the first ballot because Germany s 299 constituencies are won on a first past- the-post basis, which normally favors the larger ones. Supporters of smaller parties often give their first vote to one of the two bigger parties, while some CDU/CSU and SPD backers give their second vote to a preferred coalition partner. If the CDU/CSU or SPD wins more direct seats in a state than they would get based on their share of second votes, the Bundestag creates extra overhang seats. There are 299 seats in parliament for winners of the direct seats and another 299 seats based on parties relative strength via the second ballot. The number of overhang seats rose in recent elections because the two main parties, CDU/CSU and the SPD, won all but a handful of the 299 direct seats but had been receiving smaller shares of the second ballots. A new law compensates other parties for overhang seats, thus making it less interesting for the big parties to share support with smaller partners for second votes. In the 2013 election, the CDU/CSU won four extra overhang seats. Through the effect of balance seats, the size of parliament ballooned from 598 to 631 seats. Parties that fail to get more than 5 percent of the nationwide vote or win fewer than three seats by direct election are excluded from parliament. The shares of the other parties are recalculated accordingly. This effect can have major consequences for the process of coalition building. In 2013, the FDP and the AfD came in just below the 5-percent threshold. Since their share of the vote was attributed to the others parties, Merkel s conservatives were nearly able to govern alone with their unadjusted result of only 41.5 percent. In this year s election, six parties are forecast to enter parliament, up from four now. That would leave Germany marked by a more fractured political landscape. The next government will probably need a combined share of at least 47 percent or maybe 48 percent for a stable majority, depending on the voting share of those parties that fail to enter parliament. | 1 |
Around the world, markets are in chaos. Japan's stock market plunged 5 percent on Friday, while markets in France, Germany, and the UK all saw big losses on Thursday. The US stock market is doing better than most, but it is also down since the start of the year. Oil hit a new low on Thursday of $26 per barrel.
These declines reflect growing concerns that the world economy is headed for another recession. Before 2007 we’d say, "If things get bad, the Fed will cut interest rates." But with the Fed’s benchmark rate below 0.5 percent already, a substantial cut would mean rates that are below zero. That's an unorthodox strategy, and it might not even be legal, according to testimony by Fed Chair Janet Yellen before congressional committees this week.
The Fed needs a new strategy: Stop targeting interest rates and instead target the growth of the overall economy. Moving away from interest rate targeting would give markets confidence that the Fed has the tools to deal with the next economic downturn, which would reduce the danger of another 2008-style meltdown.
Unfortunately, there's little sign that the Fed is laying the groundwork for a shift in strategy. Instead, Yellen seemed to be in denial about the magnitude of the challenge she is facing.
"Let’s remember that the labor market is continuing to perform well," she said to the Senate Banking Committee on Thursday. "We want to be careful not to jump to a conclusion about what is in store for the economy." Maybe not — but the Fed needs to be prepared for the worst.
"The Fed needs to change their fundamental approach," argues Scott Sumner, a monetary policy expert at the Mercatus Center. Right now the Fed's policy discussions are all about where to set short-term interest rates. But not only does that approach stop working when interest rates fall to zero — as they did in 2008 — but interest rates aren't even what people actually care about.
Instead, Sumner argues, the Fed should start directly targeting a variable people do care about: either the inflation rate or (even better) the total amount of spending in the economy. He argues that the Fed should focus on setting long-run goals for these variables and then doing whatever it takes to meet those goals.
The Fed currently has an official target of 2 percent inflation. But the central bank's actions make it clear that it's not serious about this target. Last December, for example, the Fed's own forecast showed that inflation would be around 1.6 percent in 2016 — and the forecast inflation rate had actually been falling. Yet the Fed raised interest rates anyway. That was a pretty clear signal to the markets that the Fed cared more about returning to "normal" interest rates than it did about achieving its inflation target.
The problem isn't just that the economy will grow a little bit slower in early 2016 than it could have otherwise. By ignoring its own targets, the Fed sent a message that it wasn't really committed to robust growth over the long run, which undermines businesses' confidence in the recovery and discourages investment.
The solution, Sumner argues, is for the Fed to use a strategy called level targeting to make its own targets more credible. Under a level targeting regime, the Fed would compensate for missing its target in one year by overshooting the following year. For example, in 2015, the Fed's preferred measure of inflation came in at 1.4 percent — 0.6 percent below the Fed's 2 percent target. Under level targeting, the Fed would aim to achieve 2.6 percent inflation in 2016, delivering 2 percent inflation on average in 2015 to 2016. That would not only support faster economic growth in 2016, it would also give the markets more confidence in the Fed's forecasts for 2017, 2018, and beyond.
Abandoning interest rate targeting might seem radical, but the Fed has actually done it once before, in the late 1970s. Back then, it seemed that no matter how high the Fed raised interest rates, it couldn't get inflation under control. So in 1979, the Fed stopped targeting interest rates altogether.
Instead, it simply set a target for the total amount of money in the economy. Fed Chair Paul Volcker knew that if the amount of money in circulation stopped rising, the inflation rate would eventually have to stop rising too. It took a couple of years (and helped induce a major recession in 1980), but it worked.
A big reason the strategy worked is that markets believed Volcker was serious about the target. Targeting the money supply directly signaled he was willing to let interest rates go as high as they had to in order to get inflation under control. Once markets believed he was serious, they started doing a lot of his work for him — and businesses began to curtail price increases in the expectation that the overall inflation rate was going to decline.
Today we're facing the reverse situation. A big reason the economy has been recovering so slowly is that businesses are worried about sluggish growth — or, worse, another 2008-style meltdown — in the coming years. So they've been reluctant to invest, making slow growth a self-fulfilling prophecy.
If the Fed can convince businesses that it's serious about delivering consistent growth, businesses will start investing more in the expectation that demand for their products will grow — and that investment will itself produce growth.
Level targeting is a strategy for giving the market more confidence in the Fed's long-term targets. And while inflation-based level targeting would work better than what we're doing now, Sumner argues that the best strategy would be to target the total amount of spending in the economy. This approach, known as nominal GDP targeting, has been endorsed by prominent economists such as Christina Romer.
There are two big problems with the Fed's current strategy of focusing on interest rates. The obvious one is that once rates hit zero, the conventional approach to monetary policy becomes ineffective. After rates hit zero in 2008, the Fed was forced to use an ad hoc strategy known as "quantitative easing" to pump more money into the economy. Lacking experience with this new strategy, the Fed twice made the mistake of ending easing too early, slowing the economic recovery between 2010 and 2012.
The larger problem with zero interest rates, however, is politics. People are used to thinking of low interest rates as a sign of easy money and vice versa, so the zero interest rate struck many as a sign of recklessly easy monetary policy. In the years after the financial crisis, critics warned that Fed policies would create runaway inflation.
In retrospect, it's clear that these concerns were unfounded. The average inflation rate since 2008 has been well below the Fed's 2 percent target, while the economy has suffered from persistently slow job and wage growth. But fear of a political backlash for doing "too much" discouraged Yellen's predecessor, Ben Bernanke, from acting decisively to promote economic growth.
More recently, the Fed has come under a lot of pressure to "normalize" — that is, raise — rates above zero percent. After resisting these pressures for most of 2015, the central bank finally pulled the trigger in December, boosting its target rate from zero percent to 0.25 percent. It did this despite the fact that — as Vox's Matt Yglesias pointed out at the time — most economic indicators suggested that a rate hike would do more harm than good.
This is the flip side of the situation the Fed faced in the 1970s. Because interest rates were high, many people thought monetary policy was too tight, and the Fed faced a lot of pressure to cut rates. But cutting rates triggered another wave of inflation, forcing the Fed to raise rates once again. Interest rate targets had become a distraction, and abandoning them helped Volcker focus on the variable he really cared about: inflation.
Negative interest rates are one way the Fed could try to salvage the current regime of focusing on interest rates. But it's not a very good one.
Just as you might have a savings account with your bank, so a nation's banks all have accounts with their nation's central bank. The money deposited in these accounts is called reserves, and in recent years a lot of banks around the world have chosen to build up huge reserve war chests. That's frustrating to central bankers who have been trying to encourage banks to stimulate economic activity by lending out the money.
So recently Japan's central bank and some central banks in Europe have been experimenting with negative interest rates on reserves. Last month, the Japanese central bank announced that banks would be assessed a 0.1 percent penalty on their reserves — an interest rate of -0.1 percent. A bank with a billion yen deposited with the Bank of Japan will now have to pay 1 million yen per year for the privilege.
Obviously, 0.1 percent is not a very big number, so the direct effects of Japan's new policy won't be very large. But going negative breaks through an important psychological barrier — once a central bank has instituted a slightly negative interest rate, it's more likely to cut rates further in the future.
In her testimony before Congress this week, Yellen was pressed on whether the Fed would follow its European and Japanese counterparts and impose a penalty on reserves. Yellen demurred, saying that the Fed's experts were still studying whether negative interest rates would be legal and technically feasible.
But even if the Fed ultimately decides to adopt negative rates, there are real limits on how far they can go. If negative interest rates get too steep, banks have an obvious alternative: They can get physical cash and store it in a big warehouse. By definition, cash is worth as many dollars a year from now as it is today.
There are a couple of ways central banks could try to make negative interest rates more feasible. University of Michigan economist Miles Kimball, for example, advocates a shift to a new form of electronic money that would allow central banks to impose economy-wide negative interest rates. Others argue that the Fed should raise its inflation target so that real, inflation-adjusted interest rates can go lower. But not only do both of these approaches have technical challenges, they're also likely to be intensely unpopular with voters.
So even if the Fed adopted negative rates, it wouldn't improve the effectiveness of the current interest rate targeting regime very much. Just as the Fed got stuck at zero percent interest rates in 2008, it could get stuck at -1 percent interest rates in 2017 or 2018. So the Fed is going to need a new framework that's less dependent on interest rates regardless. It might as well get started. | 1 |
Fearing Election Day Trouble, Some US Schools Cancel Classes Newsmax, October 26, 2016
Rigged elections. Vigilante observers. Angry voters. The claims, threats and passions surrounding the presidential race have led communities around the U.S. to move polling places out of schools or cancel classes on Election Day.
The fear is that the ugly rhetoric of the campaign could escalate into confrontations and even violence in school hallways, endangering students.
“If anybody can sit there and say they don’t think this is a contentious election, then they aren’t paying much attention,” said Ed Tolan, police chief in Falmouth, Maine, which decided to call off classes on Election Day and put additional officers on duty Nov. 8.
{snip}
Schools are popular polling places because they have plenty of parking and are usually centrally located. It’s difficult to say how many school-based polling places have been moved this year, given how decentralized the voting process is across the country.
But state and local officials say voting has been removed or classes have been canceled on Election Day at schools in Illinois, Maine, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin and elsewhere.
“There is a concern, just like at a concert, sporting event or other public gathering, that we didn’t have 15 or 20 years ago. What if someone walks in a polling location with a backpack bomb or something?” said Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp, co-chairman of the National Association of Secretaries of State election committee. “If that happens at a school, then that’s certainly concerning.”
{snip}
Easton Superintendent John Reinhart wanted to get voting out of schools altogether but was rebuffed by county election officials. So the school board canceled classes on Election Day.
“If you take the personalities away and cast the emotion with the election aside, one has to ask the question: ‘Are our schools the best places for that activity to take place?'” he said. “I just think we’ve reached the point where we need to look at other locations.”
{snip} | 1 |
During last night s State of the Union, Republican politicians attempted to put on a brave face and avoid showing any sort of approval for a single thing that President Obama said. Some succeeded better than others.Speaker of the House Paul Ryan had the toughest job. Sitting directly behind the president, the camera was directly on his face throughout most of the speech. America cringed as Ryan desperately tried to keep his face emotionless and dead while Obama spoke. For the most part, the effect was to make Ryan seem nearly comatose. His dead eyes barely moved. His slackjawed expression radiated defiant stupidity. It was really hard to watch.The farce was blown apart, however, when Obama landed a particularly great zinger and Ryan couldn t help but break into a laugh. Knowing that even flashing a brief smile could send his fanatical Republican colleagues into a blood-thirsty rage, Ryan did everything in his power to stop himself from laughing. His face did things I didn t know a face could do. On live television, Ryan s face went to war with itself.Here s Paul Ryan trying reeeeally hard not to laugh at one of Obama s jokes pic.twitter.com/gqekuYJ1BF GQ Magazine (@GQMagazine) January 13, 2016At one point, Ryan appears to physically put his tongue in cheek in order to keep it from betraying its Republican values.But if Republicans were trying and failing to put on a brave face, President Obama was clearly enjoying himself. In his final State of the Union address he took time to go over the many successes his administration had been able to achieve. He also used the opportunity to blast Republicans for the childish games they continue to play in order to score cheap political points at the expense of real governance.It s unclear whether Obama had known ahead of time that Republicans would be obsessively focusing on not smiling throughout his speech or if he just guessed based on past behavior, but Paul Ryan s idiotic attempts to avoid giving Obama any sort of credit perfectly accented the president s point. Need an example of how delusional the GOP has gotten? The Republican Party, which once claimed to be the party of ideas, couldn t even applaud when the sitting president of the United States said America is the most powerful nation on Earth. Even agreeing with him on that point would be controversial for these partisan hacks.Thank you, Paul Ryan. Your weird facial expressions can be used whenever America needs a reminder of where your party s priorities really are. And we ll try not to laugh.Watch the full State of the Union address below (Ryan s failed attempt to stifle his laugh begins almost immediately):[youtube https://youtu.be/j4Qp7DxYWYY?t=57m21s]Feature image via C-SPAN | 1 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump said on Wednesday he was “disappointed and surprised” by the criticism and charges of racism he had received from Republican leaders for comments he made about the Mexican heritage of a federal judge. “I had just won more votes than anyone in the history of the party, so I was a little bit surprised when they said that,” Trump told Time. “I didn’t think it was necessary. But you know, they have to say what they have to say. I’m a big boy. They have to say what they have to say.” | 0 |
Something extraordinary happened that is certain to have Republicans and Republican voters everywhere furious Fox News just admitted that the United States deficit is at its lowest level since 2008. That s right, since the last Republican was in office. You have to admit, this must have taken a lot of courage on the behalf of Fox News to admit something like this. It goes directly against their bash President Obama for everything policy.However, there it is, in bold print on FoxBusiness.com:They even published this, which will make every Republican that follows Fox News as a religion and believe without question, do a double take: The U.S. ran a budget surplus in January, dropping the annual deficit to its lowest level since August 2008, the Treasury Department said Wednesday.The U.S. deficit fell to $405 billion over the 12-month period ended January, or around 2.2% of gross domestic product, boosted by a $55 billion surplus in January. The deficit figure was down from the year-earlier $495 billion, or 2.8% of GDP. Quite a change of heart when Fox News actually sees the results of Obama s actions. Unlike how they behaved years ago after the president first took office, which you can view here, when they completely ignored deficit reduction:Fox Business even explained how the reduction in deficit was achieved: Revenues stood around 6% above their year-earlier levels, while outlays were around 3% higher. Receipts of $314 billion collected by the Treasury was a record for the month of January.The latest report showed annual revenues posted their slowest rate of growth since August 2012. Corporate tax receipts for the fiscal year, which began Oct. 1., ran around 10% below their year-earlier level. Individual taxes withheld by employers and payroll tax revenues were up 3%, while other individual taxes, such as capital gains, were 8% higher. Funny how when you have a president that truly believes in math, they can actually achieve success in regards to deficit reduction, and understands that in order to pay for things, we need revenue coming in. Republicans have yet to figure that out.Now, if only we could get Republicans to actually look at the presidents latest budget, which as of now, they have simply refused to even entertain.The GOP is literally a vomit stain on the rug of America that we can t seem to remove.Featured image from Flickr | 0 |
TEL AVIV — The New York Times in recent days has run numerous articles and opinion pieces advocating against designating the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization amid reports the Trump administration is debating doing just that. [The Muslim Brotherhood openly seeks to establish a worldwide Islamic caliphate based on Sharia law. While many Brotherhood wings reject the use of violence as a strategic tactic, preferring instead a sophisticated gradualist strategy to achieve their aims, the Brotherhood has spawned terrorist organizations — most notably Hamas — that adhere to its philosophy of a world order based on Islam. The Brotherhood was also a central player in the Arab Spring, revolutions punctuated by violence across the Arab world. Designating the Brotherhood a terrorist organization would add the U. S. to the growing list of nations to do so, including Muslim countries like Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the UAE. The Times’ propagation of the Brotherhood culminated in an editorial board piece published Thursday titled, “All of Islam Isn’t the Enemy. ” In the editorial, the newspaper warned designating the Brotherhood as a terrorist organization “would be seen by many Muslims as another attempt to vilify adherents of Islam. ” The paper claimed that the possible designation “appears to be part of a mission by the president and his closest advisers to heighten fears by promoting a dangerously exaggerated vision of an America under siege by what they call radical Islam. ” The Times’ advocacy for the Brotherhood is particularly noteworthy since it separately posted a full Arabic document from 1991 in which an Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood member set forth a strategy for “eliminating and destroying the Western civilization from within,” with emphasis on operations inside the U. S. In Thursday’s editorial, the newspaper laid out its case for the Brotherhood: There are good reasons that the Brotherhood, with millions of members, doesn’t merit the terrorist designation. Rather than a single organization, it is a collection of groups and movements that can vary widely from country to country. While the Brotherhood calls for a society governed by Islamic law, it renounced violence decades ago, has supported elections and has become a political and social organization. Its branches often have tenuous connections to the original movement founded in Egypt in 1928. Addressing the Brotherhood’s support for the electoral process and purportedly becoming a political organization, an extensive report on the Brotherhood by the Meir Amit Intelligence and Terrorism Information Center at Israel’s Center for Special Studies explained the group’s use of some tools of democracy to advance the aim of achieving a world ruled by Sharia law, which is by definition . Drawing from founding Brotherhood documents and original literature by Brotherhood leaders, the Center explained: Unlike the militant factions of other Islamist movements, which completely rule out democracy on the basis of it being a Western, pagan, and ignorant idea, the Muslim Brotherhood does use the term “democracy. ” In its view, however, it has two main connotations: a tactical, instrumental means of taking over countries through the use of the democratic process, and an “Islamic democracy” based on Sharia law (i. e. Islamic religious law) and a model of internal consultation within the leadership, [Brotherhood Founder Sheikh Hassan] listed seven stages to achieve these objectives, each to be carried out in a gradual fashion. The stages are divided into social and political: the first three are based on educating the individual, the family, and the entire society of the Muslim world to implement Sharia laws in every aspect of daily life. The next four stages are political in nature, and include assuming power through elections, shaping a Sharia state, liberating Islamic countries from the burden of (physical and ideological) foreign occupation, uniting them into one Islamic entity (“new caliphate”) and spreading Islamic values throughout the world. Sharia law is explicitly . For example, under Sharia, cannot rule over Muslims a Caliph can come to rule through force and seizure of power a woman inherits half that of a man and cannot inherit from Muslims. In the Times editorial, meanwhile, the newspaper claimed that those “advising Mr. Trump seem unwilling to draw distinctions” between the Brotherhood and its violent adherents. The paper continued: Stephen Bannon, the chief White House strategist, once called the Brotherhood “the foundation of modern terrorism. ” And Frank Gaffney Jr. an analyst who heads a small think tank, recently told the Times that the Brotherhood’s goals are “exactly the same” as those of the Islamic State and Al Qaeda. Both of these statements are true. The Brotherhood’s historic ideological principles of establishing a worldwide Caliphate are indeed shared by the Islamic State and although their tactics greatly differ. And Brotherhood ideology has served as the foundation for groups like . The defining works of Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood leader, ideologue and theorist Sayyid Qutb, considered the Brotherhood’s intellectual godfather, greatly influenced Osama bin Laden and doctrine. An extensive March 23, 2003, article in the New York Times magazine by Paul Berman dissected Qutb’s writings as they relate to terrorist ideology. In the article titled “The Philosopher of Islamic Terror,” Berman documented the centrality of Qutb’s influence on : The organization ( ) was created in the late 1980’s by an affiliation of three armed factions — bin Laden’s circle of ”Afghan” Arabs, together with two factions from Egypt, the Islamic Group and Egyptian Islamic Jihad, the latter led by Dr. Ayman Al Qaeda’s top theoretician. The Egyptian factions emerged from an older current, a school of thought from within Egypt’s fundamentalist movement, the Muslim Brotherhood, in the 1950’s and 60’s. And at the heart of that single school of thought stood, until his execution in 1966, a philosopher named Sayyid Qutb — the intellectual hero of every one of the groups that eventually went into Al Qaeda, their Karl Marx (to put it that way) their guide. In recent days, the Times has featured numerous other articles arguing against branding the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization. An article on Tuesday warned, “Officially designating the Brotherhood as a terrorist organization would roil American relations in the Middle East. The leaders of some American allies — like Egypt, where the military forced the Brotherhood from power in 2013, and the United Arab Emirates — have pressed Mr. Trump to do so to quash internal enemies, but the group remains a pillar of society in parts of the region. ” “Critics said they feared that Mr. Trump’s team wanted to create a legal justification to crack down on Muslim charities, mosques and other groups in the United States,” added the Times. “A terrorist designation would freeze assets, block visas and ban financial interactions. ” A Times article on February 1 was titled, “Trump Pushes Dark View of Islam to Center of U. S. . ” The article lamented a worldview that “conflates terrorist groups like Al Qaeda and the Islamic State with largely nonviolent groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood and its offshoots and, at times, with the 1. 7 billion Muslims around the world. ” A January 26 editorial titled “‘I Think Islam Hates Us’” informed readers the Trump administration “reportedly is considering designating the Muslim Brotherhood, which is involved in Muslim politics in a number of countries, as a terrorist organization. Some experts see the move as a chance for the Trump administration to limit Muslim political activity in the United States. ” Aaron Klein is Breitbart’s Jerusalem bureau chief and senior investigative reporter. He is a New York Times bestselling author and hosts the popular weekend talk radio program, “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio. ” Follow him on Twitter @AaronKleinShow. Follow him on Facebook. With research by Joshua Klein. | 0 |
(Reuters) - The American Civil Liberties Union sued the U.S. Department of Homeland Security in federal court on Thursday, seeking records the civil rights group contends provide accounts of hunger strikes at immigration detention facilities. The ACLU said in its filing that in recent weeks there have been a new series of hunger strikes at U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detention centers in Georgia, Oregon and Washington, adding hunger strikes have previously hit detention centers in Arizona, Florida, Louisiana and Texas. The suit comes as U.S. Republican President Donald Trump has promised a crackdown on illegal immigration and the Republican-dominated U.S. Congress this month agreed to fund an additional 5,300 detention beds for those suspected of illegally entering the country. “The Trump administration’s plans to expand detention and strip away existing structures for oversight of detention are likely to produce more protests both inside and outside the walls of detention facilities,” the lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia said. Immigration and Customs Enforcement spokeswoman Jennifer Elzea said in an email: “ICE is unable to comment on pending litigation.” The lawsuit said detention center inmates have launched the hunger strikes over the past few years as a non-violent way to bring attention to what they see as a lack of access to bond hearings and inhumane conditions of confinement. The suit also said that some inmates who have previously launched hunger strikes were met with extraordinarily punitive responses. From April 1-22, an average of 36,235 immigrants were in detention per day, according to the most recent statistics provided by ICE. The White House in March requested bringing the total number of beds up to 45,700, saying the additional capacity was necessary to achieve the president’s goal of “enhancing interior enforcement efforts and ending ‘catch and release’ for those apprehended at the border.” The agreement reached in Congress would increase the number of immigration detention beds to 39,324 from 34,000 currently, according to a summary provided by the House Appropriations Committee. In April, hundreds of detainees at an immigration detention center in Washington state began refusing meals in a hunger strike to protest conditions at the facility and delayed immigration hearings, activists said. The Geo Group Inc, the company that operates the Washington state facility and other detention centers around the United States, declined to comment on the lawsuit. | 1 |
BAGHDAD/ERBIL, Iraq (Reuters) - Government forces breached the city limits of Tal Afar in northwestern Iraq on Tuesday on the third day of a U.S.-backed offensive to seize it back from Islamic State militants. Tal Afar, a longtime Islamic State stronghold, is the latest objective in the war following the recapture of Mosul after a nine-month campaign that left much of that city in ruins. U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis, speaking just before arriving in Iraq on Tuesday, said the fight against IS was far from over despite recent successes by the Western-backed government. The Sunni Muslim jihadists remain in control of territory in western Iraq and eastern Syria. On Tuesday, however, army and counter-terrorism units broke into Tal Afar from the eastern and southern sides, the Iraqi joint operations command said. About three quarters of the city remain under militant control, including the Ottoman-era citadel in its center, according to an operational map published by the Iraqi military. The main forces involved are the Iraqi army, air force, Federal Police, the U.S.-trained Counter Terrorism Service (CTS), as well as units from the Shi’ite Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF), who began encircling the city on Sunday. Located 80 km (50 miles) west of Mosul, Tal Afar is strategic as it lies along the supply route between Mosul and Syria. It has produced some of IS’s most senior commanders and was cut off from the rest of IS-held territory in June. Up to 2,000 battle-hardened militants remain in Tal Afar, according to U.S. and Iraqi military commanders. “ISIS’ days are certainly numbered, but it is not over yet and it is not going to be over anytime soon,” Mattis told reporters in Amman. As was the case with the battle for Mosul, aid organizations groups are concerned about the plight of civilians in Tal Afar. U.S. Brigadier General Andrew Croft, chief of coalition air operations over Iraq, said between 10,000 and 20,000 civilians remained in Tal Afar. Up to 20,000 are thought to remain in the surrounding areas, but aid agencies say these are just estimates as they have been without access to Tal Afar since 2014. Waves of civilians have fled the city and villages under cover of darkness over the past few weeks. Those remaining are threatened with death by the militants, who have held a tight grip there since 2014. About 30,000 have fled Tal Afar since April, according to the United Nations. In Geneva, the U.N. refugee agency UNHCR said those fleeing this week were suffering from dehydration and exhaustion, having lived off unclean water and bread for the past three to four months. “Many talk of seeing dead bodies along the way, and there are reports that some were killed by extremist groups,” UNHCR spokesman Andrej Mahecic said. “Others appear to have died due to dehydration or illnesses.” People were also arriving at camps with wounds from sniper fire and exploding mines, he said. Several thousand civilians are believed to have been killed in the battle for Mosul, where Islamic State tried to keep them in areas it controlled to act as human shields against air strikes and artillery bombardments. Defense Secretary Mattis met Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi and Defence Minister Arfan al-Hayali in Baghdad to discuss the role of U.S. forces in Iraq after the recapture of the remaining cities under Islamic State. ‘’There are plans under consideration... that will look at residual presence in the future,” Lt. General Steve Townsend, the U.S.-led coalition’s commanding general, told reporters in a joint press briefing with Mattis. Croft said that over the past two or three months, he had seen a fracturing in the Islamic State leadership. “It just seems less coordinated. It appears more fractured, less robust, and sort of flimsy, is the word I would use... it is sporadic,” Croft told reporters. Islamic State leaders fled Mosul during the fighting there and the whereabouts of its chief, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, are unknown. Unconfirmed reports in the past few months have said he is dead. U.S. officials said that while big cities like Mosul have largely been cleared of Islamic State militants, there were concerns about the ability of Iraqi forces to hold territory. Pockets of resistance remained in west Mosul, including sleeper cells, Mattis said. Islamic State is also on the back foot in Syria, where Kurdish and Arab militias backed by the U.S.-led coalition have captured swathes of its territory in the north and are assaulting its main Syrian stronghold of Raqqa. McGurk said about 2,000 Islamic State fighters remained in Raqqa and as much as 60 percent of the city had been retaken. The jihadist group is now falling back deeper into the Euphrates valley region of eastern Syria. Mattis said the next step for forces fighting Islamic State in Syria would be a move against the middle Euphrates valley, a reference to the militants’ stronghold in Deir al-Zor province southeast of Raqqa. A U.S. official also said Mattis would press Massoud Barzani, president of the autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government, to call off a planned referendum on independence. Iraq’s Kurds have said they will hold the referendum on Sept. 25 despite concerns from Iraq’s neighbors who have Kurdish minorities within their borders and a U.S. request to postpone it. However, a senior Kurdish official said the Kurds may consider the possibility of a delay in return for financial and political concessions from the central government in Baghdad. The United States and other Western nations fear the vote could ignite a new conflict with Baghdad and possibly neighboring countries, diverting attention from the ongoing war against Islamic State militants in Iraq and Syria. For a graphic on the map of Iraq conflict, click: here | 1 |
The new Democrat party Godless Socialists, racists, illegal aliens and anti-Americans. Is it any wonder they re flocking to Bernie like flies to sh*t?A peaceful protest at Donald Trump s Sunday rally in West Allis, Wisconsin featured several Black Lives Matter supporters standing on the American flag.In the videos obtained by InfoWars protesters stated that the red, white and blue this shit is the new swastika. Via: Daily Callerh/t Weasel Zippers | 1 |
(Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump has interviewed several top prospects for the post of Chair of the Federal Reserve. A nomination could come within weeks as the term of current Chair Janet Yellen ends in February 2018. Yellen will meet with Trump about the job on Thursday. (For a graphic on the next chair of the Federal Reserve, click tmsnrt.rs/2yqJh2I) He faces a choice between two continuity candidates, Yellen and Governor Jerome Powell, and a clutch of outsiders, including Gary Cohn, currently his top economic advisor, former Fed Governor Kevin Warsh, and Stanford University economics professor John Taylor. Here are short profiles of the candidates: Gary Cohn, 57, Director of the National Economic Council Experience: Longtime Goldman Sachs employee and president and chief operating officer of the Wall Street bank from 2006 to 2017. Education: Bachelor’s degree in business, American University Policy positions: Cohn’s current job as director of the NEC has given him little reason to comment on monetary policy, but he has worried in the past that the Fed has been “constrained” by the actions of other central banks trying to keep their currencies weak. In his own words: “If we woke up tomorrow and every central bank in the world raised their interest rates by (3 percent), the world would be a much better place.” Pros to candidacy: A practitioner’s understanding of financial markets at a time the Fed is attempting to unwind its bond portfolio bought after the 2008 financial crisis The trust of the White House and many congressional Republicans given Cohn’s high-profile role in the Trump administration Cons to candidacy: No formal economics background at a time when the Fed leans ever more on econometric models to decipher mixed signals in inflation and employment data A decades-long career at Goldman Sachs and a personal fortune worth at least $260 million, which could raise eyebrows when it comes to confirmation by the Senate, where members on both sides see the investment bank as a symbol of financial industry excess Criticism of Trump in the wake of Charlottesville, Virginia, protests Jerome Powell, 64, Federal Reserve Governor Experience: Lawyer and investment banker; partner in private equity firm Carlyle Group from 1997-2005; Senior Treasury official under George H.W. Bush; Fed Governor since 2012 (appointed by President Obama) Education: Bachelor’s degree in politics, Princeton University; Law degree from Georgetown University Policy positions: Powell has never dissented while at the Fed, and in line with Yellen supports slowly raising interest rates as long as the economy continues growing and inflation is expected to rise. He advocates easing some aspects of the Dodd-Frank regulations and has discussed ways to revise the Volcker Rule. In his own words: “The Committee has been patient in raising rates, and that patience has paid dividends ... I would view it as appropriate to continue to gradually raise rates.” Pros to candidacy: An uncontroversial pick for the position, could be the compromise who both replaces Yellen and provides continuity Only Republican currently on the Board of Governors, has already helped guide the economy in its recovery and would likely get bipartisan support in Congress Familiarity with markets and financial regulation may be considered a plus Cons to candidacy: As a current Fed member identified with the more centrist wing of the Republican Party, may not provide enough of a change if Trump decides to replace Yellen Expertise is less in formal economics and more in markets and financial regulation, which may seem too much of an overlap with the new vice chair for supervision, Randal Quarles John Taylor, 70, Senior fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution Experience: Undersecretary of Treasury for international affairs in the George W. Bush administration from 2001 to 2005; member of Council of Economic Advisers under presidents Jimmy Carter and George H. W. Bush Education: PhD in economics, Stanford University Policy positions: Developer of the eponymous “Taylor Rule” for setting interest rates, Taylor feels the Fed should transition to a rules-based policy in order to make its decision-making “predictable-transparent-accountable.” In his own words: “It is very important to have a basic understanding of the monetary policy strategy. The FOMC should be required to adopt and explain its monetary strategy, and then compare that strategy with monetary policy rules that are out there in a transparent way.” Pros to candidacy: A trained economist whose elegantly simple research in the 1990s transformed the debate over how central banks set rates Support among key Capitol Hill Republicans who feel the Fed has too much discretion Well known in central banking circles, even if his ideas are not universally supported Cons to candidacy: A long-term member of the central banking and academic cliques Trump may want to disrupt Advocacy of rule-based policy may land with a thud in an institution that thrives on consensus and judgment Break with Yellen and current policy framework could disrupt markets if Taylor insists on broad reform Kevin Warsh, 47, Visiting Fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Institution Experience: Fed governor from 2006 to 2011; economic adviser to President George W. Bush from 2002 to 2006; M&A lawyer at Morgan Stanley for seven years Education: Bachelor’s degree in public policy, Stanford University; Law degree from Harvard University Policy positions: Warsh feels the Fed should not try to fine-tune the economy and argues policymakers have too much discretion. He feels the Fed should aim for inflation between 1 and 2 percent, effectively lowering its inflation target. In his own words: “We should not accept the Fed’s newfound conviction that a very low neutral equilibrium real short-term interest rate (r*) is a fixed feature of future monetary policy ... The central bank and the academic community should engage in a fundamental rethinking of the Fed’s strategy, tools, governance, and communications.” Pros to candidacy: Former banker and for several years former Fed Chair Ben Bernanke’s right-hand man on financial markets, has a familiarity with Wall Street Wife Jane Lauder Warsh is a daughter of cosmetics magnate Ron Lauder, a longtime friend of Trump Served on the president’s economic advisory council before it disbanded Cons to candidacy: May be seen as too hawkish by a president who calls himself a “low interest rate person” Not an academic economist like Yellen or Bernanke but has still maintained U.S. monetary policy needs a full makeover Worried about inflation even as the 2008 financial crisis hit, and quit the Fed over its second round of bond-buying, a possible black mark against his judgment given the success of the “quantitative easing” program Even while quitting over Fed bond buying, never dissented on FOMC decisions Janet Yellen, 71, Federal Reserve Chair Experience: Also served as a Fed governor, President of the San Francisco Fed, and the Fed’s vice chair from 2010 to 2014 Education: PhD in economics, Yale University Policy positions: Yellen steered the Fed towards “gradual” rate increases and a slow reduction of its balance sheet, dependent on evidence of a continued economic recovery. She argues that post-crisis financial regulation has made the economy more stable without sacrificing growth. In her own words: “My colleagues and I may have misjudged the strength of the labor market ... or even the fundamental forces driving inflation ... How should policy be formulated in the face of such significant uncertainties? In my view, it strengthens the case for a gradual pace of adjustments.” Pros to candidacy: After a career in the Fed system and four years as its head, has earned the trust of markets and shown she can shift policy without major disruption A growing economy, low unemployment, and strong stock markets make the case for continuity, while Trump has said publicly he feels she is doing a good job Cons to candidacy: Could be seen as a Democratic holdover by a President who may want to put his own stamp on the Fed Feels the core regulations approved after the financial crisis should remain intact, a possible friction with the administration’s deregulatory bent Some Republican leaders want the Fed to have less discretion over monetary policy, an idea Yellen resists | 1 |
MIAMI (Reuters) - Donald Trump on Friday called for disarming the bodyguards who protect his Democratic rival Hillary Clinton, and mused about the consequences of such a move by saying “Let’s see what happens to her.” The Republican presidential nominee was speaking at a rally in Miami, where he contrasted his supporters, who he said back police and want crime reduced, to Clinton, who he derided as someone who “lives behind walls and raises money from hedge funds.” “I think that her bodyguards should drop all weapons. They should disarm. I think they should disarm immediately, what do you think, yes?,” he said. “Take their guns away, she doesn’t want guns. Take them, let’s see what happens to her. Take their guns away, okay. It will be very dangerous.” Both candidates have been protected by the Secret Service for months, but Trump’s latest take on Clinton’s security detail brought swift denunciations, particularly from Clinton allies. “Tonight, Donald Trump once again alluded to violence against Hillary Clinton,” said Elizabeth Shappell, spokeswoman for Correct The Record, a pro-Clinton media watchdog group. “This is a truly deplorable comment that betrays our nation’s most fundamental democratic values,” Shappell said in a statement. Stuart Stevens, a Washington-based political consultant who worked on Republican Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign, tweeted: “The Secret Service should investigate this threat” Trump made a similar comment about Clinton and her armed protection in May while accepting the endorsement of the National Rifle Association, when he said Clinton would end the U.S. Constitution’s Second Amendment, which guarantees the right to bear arms. “Let’s see how they feel walking around without their guns or their bodyguards,” he told the gun lobby group, speaking about Clinton and her Secret Service detail. Trump was criticized by opponents last month when he suggested that gun rights activists could act to stop Clinton from nominating liberal U.S. Supreme Court justices, a comment some interpreted as encouraging a political assassination. “If she gets to pick her judges, nothing you can do folks,” Trump told a rally in North Carolina on Aug. 9. “Although the Second Amendment people, maybe there is, I don’t know,” he continued. Clinton has called for tighter access to guns, including universal background checks, but has never said she planned to get rid of the Second Amendment. Clinton campaign manager Robby Mook said Friday’s remarks fall into a pattern of Trump inciting people to violence. “Whether this is done to provoke protesters at a rally or casually or even as a joke, it is an unacceptable quality in anyone seeking the job of Commander in Chief,” Mook said in a statement. | 1 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Presumptive Republican U.S. presidential nominee Donald Trump on Wednesday unveiled the names of 11 judges - eight men and three women, all white and all conservative - he would consider, if elected, to replace the late Antonin Scalia on the Supreme Court. Six of them are judges who were appointed to federal appeals courts around the country by Republican former President George W. Bush. The other five serve on various state supreme courts. Scalia’s replacement could tip the ideological balance of the court, which now is evenly divided with four conservative justices and four liberals. Scalia, who died in February, was one of the court’s most conservative justices. “We’re going to choose from, most likely from this list,” Trump said in an interview with Fox News. But Trump said he could deviate from the list and added, “At a minimum we will keep people within this general realm.” All of Trump’s 11 judges are listed as affiliated with the Federalist Society on the influential conservative legal group’s website. The organization is known as a breeding ground for conservative legal thinkers. It is unusual for a presidential candidate to release names of potential Supreme Court or Cabinet nominees before winning an election. But Trump is working to assure conservatives in his own party that, if elected president on Nov. 8, he would not appoint a liberal or moderate to the court. Trump allies had encouraged him to announce the names of potential court nominees to allay fears among conservatives wary of a Trump presidency. Trump’s list includes: Steven Colloton of Iowa, a judge on the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals; Raymond Gruender of Missouri, also a judge on the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals; and Thomas Hardiman of Pennsylvania, a judge on the 3rd Circuit Court of Appeals. It also includes: Raymond Kethledge of Michigan, a judge on the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals; William Pryor of Alabama, a judge on the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals; and Diane Sykes of Wisconsin, a judge on the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals. The state supreme court jurists include: Allison Eid of Colorado; Joan Larsen of Michigan; Thomas Lee of Utah; David Stras of Minnesota; and Don Willett of Texas. Democratic President Barack Obama in March named centrist appellate court judge Merrick Garland to fill the vacancy. But the Republican-led Senate has refused to hold confirmation hearings or a vote, insisting that Obama’s successor should get to select Scalia’s replacement. Trump said in a statement that the 11 judges were “representative of the kind of constitutional principles I value” and said he would use the list as a guide for nominating a justice. Willett in the past year has posted several comments on Twitter mocking Trump, even referring to him as “Darth Trump,” a twist on the “Star Wars” villain Darth Vader. Willett last June posted about imagining Trump selecting a Supreme Court nominee. “The mind reels. *weeps—can’t finish tweet*,” Willett wrote, suggesting he was crying at the idea. Asked to comment on Willett’s Twitter remarks, Trump spokeswoman Hope Hicks said, “Mr. Trump’s sole focus is considering the best potential individuals based on their constitutional principles.” Lee is the brother of Republican Senator Mike Lee of Utah, one of the most conservative members of the U.S. Senate. “I don’t know everyone on the list, but those I do know would all be great Supreme Court Justices. Of course, I do believe one name on that list stands head and shoulders above the rest,” said Mike Lee, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee that would consider any nomination. Sykes is the former wife of conservative Wisconsin radio host Charles Sykes, who posted on Twitter that she would make a great justice but added, “I simply don’t believe Trump.” Several of the judges have ruled against abortion and reproductive rights. Sykes, Colloton and Pryor have ruled against the Obama administration regarding religious objections to the contraception coverage requirement of the Obamacare healthcare law. White House spokesman Josh Earnest said at his daily briefing that he would be surprised if any Democrat would describe any of Trump’s picks “as a consensus nominee.” “But the individual President Obama has put forward is somebody that Republicans have described as a consensus nominee,” Earnest said of Garland, adding that it would be wise for the Senate to act on Obama’s nominee. Liberal advocacy group People for the American Way said Trump’s list included “conservative dream justices.” Most of the 11 judges did not respond to requests for comment. “Joan Larsen is working along with the rest of Michigan’s Supreme Court to provide common-sense, rule-of-law justice. That is her focus and will remain her focus,” her campaign spokesman Stu Sandler said. Larsen was appointed to the post and is running for election to a full term. | 0 |
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THE Nation is still struggling to come to terms the fact an Irishman could ever join a terrorist organisation, several days after Irishman Khalid Kelly allegedly blew himself up in a suicide bomb attack in Iraq.
Kelly, originally from Dublin, recently lived in Longford and had been fighting for ISIS in Iraq, the news of which shocked communities that previously had no exposure to terrorism or terrorist organisations to their core.
“You just can’t credit it, can ye, some lad running around with guns and the like. Spouting all sorts of shite about redrawing maps and taking back what is rightfully theirs. Gas all the same,” shared Louth native Trevor Gorman, whose uncle would periodically go up north for something called ‘training’ in the 90s.
“Look, you’ll just have to give me some time. People in the Middle East are well accustomed to violent loonies hiding behind a religion to commit horrible acts, but this is all new to us, and him being Irish… that’s mad,” said Cavan man Sean Dignam, from the comfort of a stool in an IRA owned pub.
The view from across the country found people similarly shocked that an Irishman could find himself part of a morally compromised, ideologically bankrupt outfit.
“Their followers out there, they’re bold a pup from what I hear, but Muslims lads here shoudl really out denouncing that right now,” shared Dubliner Ciaran Mackey.
“The Jihadis go on and on about how there only concerns are Islamic terror and that, but then ya read they’re selling drugs too, which goes against everything they be saying or beliefs and that. And they do other awful stuff like abusing girls. I tell ya, we don’t have any terrorists in Ireland, but if we did, they wouldn’t be at that craic at all,” added Mackey. | 0 |
BEIJING (Reuters) - A top U.S. business lobby in China said on Tuesday it was concerned U.S. President Donald Trump’s administration was not making sufficient preparation for talks on imbalances in the bilateral economic relationship ahead of his November visit. Little advance work has been done for the visit, said William Zarit, chairman of the American Chamber of Commerce in China. He was referring to meetings by working level officials to negotiate outcomes on commercial issues for Trump’s meeting with his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping. “From what I understand, there really hasn’t been much of that for this visit, which makes us a bit concerned that there may not be much discussion on the structural issues,” Zarit told reporters in Beijing. U.S. Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross will bring a business delegation to Beijing during Trump’s visit. Some in the U.S. business community are worried that deals announced on the trip could distract from solutions to long-standing complaints over discriminatory Chinese policies and market access restrictions. Zarit said he hoped proposed deals from the business delegation “do not overshadow the real need for structural changes in the economic relationship”. Trump, who will stop in five Asian countries on his first visit to the region as president, will arrive in Beijing on Nov. 8. U.S. officials were “still waiting” for a Chinese response to issues raised during the U.S.-China Comprehensive Economic Dialogue in July, Zarit said, though he did not give specifics. He called Chinese officials “master negotiators” and said the U.S. government and business community had long suffered from a less strategic view of the economic relationship. “And I think there is no exception with this administration,” Zarit said. He added that it was “not unreasonable” to expect more progress 10 months into Trump’s presidency. Ross, has said the United States will be looking for “immediate results” and “tangible agreements” during Trump’s visit, but has acknowledged that market access, intellectual property rights, and tariffs are more complex and will take a longer time to negotiate. Washington and Beijing launched a 100-day economic plan during Trump’s first meeting with Xi in April, including some industry-specific announcements, such as the resumption of American beef sales in China. But U.S. business groups have expressed disappointment over the extent of the outcomes. Xi vowed on Monday that China would take more measures to open up the economy. He made the remarks at a meeting with members of an advisory board to Tsinghua University’s School of Economics and Management, including Apple Inc (AAPL.O) chief executive Tim Cook and Facebook Inc’s (FB.O) Mark Zuckerberg. China will make joint efforts with the United States to “take each other’s interests and concerns into consideration, resolve disputes and contradictions, and engage in win-win cooperation”, Xi said according to the official China Daily newspaper. But such frequently made pledges have done little to assuage foreign companies’ concerns over ownership caps in key sectors, such as autos, securities, insurance, and information technology. U.S. business lobbies argue that their members are restricted in those industries while Chinese companies operate freely in the U.S. market. They have also criticized Beijing’s “Made in China 2025” plan, which offers government backing for sectors the Chinese government deems strategic. Particularly galling to foreign tech firms are a slate of new national security and cyber security regulations that mandate companies store crucial data within China and pass security reviews they argue could put business secrets at risk. “Basically, when we look at that, what it boils down to for us is it’s a company competing against a country,” Zarit said. | 1 |
(Reuters) - Representative Chaka Fattah of Pennsylvania and several associates orchestrated a series of fraudulent schemes to enrich the congressman and preserve his political career, federal prosecutors said at the start of his corruption trial on Monday. “The congressman stole from federal agencies, from taxpayers, from nonprofit educational groups he created,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Paul Gray told a Philadelphia jury. “He even stole from his own political campaigns.” But defense lawyers said the government’s case relied almost entirely on the word of two convicted felons who received favorable plea deals. “Congressman Fattah had nothing to do with any of it,” said Mark Lee, a lawyer for Fattah. The 59-year-old Fattah, an 11-term congressman who represents parts of Philadelphia, lost the Democratic primary in April under the cloud of a wide-ranging indictment charging him with racketeering, bribery and fraud. Some of the alleged schemes stemmed from Fattah’s unsuccessful 2007 mayoral campaign, when prosecutors say he accepted a secret and illegal $1 million loan from Al Lord, former chief executive officer of student loan servicer SLM Corp, known as Sallie Mae. Following the race, Fattah convinced Karen Nicholas, who ran his nonprofit educational organization, to transfer charitable and federal grant money to pay Lord back, Gray said. Separately, Fattah owed consultant Thomas Lindenfeld more than $100,000. With no funds to repay him, Fattah encouraged Lindenfeld to apply for federal money for a nonprofit that didn’t exist, prosecutors said. In a third scheme, Fattah funneled campaign money through another consultant, Gregory Naylor, to pay off his son’s student debt, prosecutors said. The son, Chaka Fattah Jr., was convicted in an unrelated fraud case and sentenced earlier this year to five years in prison. Both Lindenfeld and Naylor have pleaded guilty in exchange for testifying against Fattah. Prosecutors also said Fattah accepted bribes from a close friend, retired businessman Herb Vederman, who was seeking a U.S. ambassadorship. Fattah personally appealed to President Barack Obama to appoint Vederman to an international post. “Congressman Fattah used Herb Vederman as a human ATM machine whenever he needed a little money,” Gray said. But lawyers for Fattah and Vederman said prosecutors had “cherry-picked” evidence to suggest a bribery scheme when the two men simply acted out of friendship. Nicholas, Vederman and two other Fattah associates, consultant Robert Brand and campaign treasurer Bonnie Bowser, are co-defendants in the trial, which is expected to last eight weeks. | 1 |
BRUSSELS/DUBLIN (Reuters) - The United Kingdom and Ireland could reach agreement in hours on how to run their post-Brexit Irish land border, paving the way for a deal that would remove the last obstacle to opening free-trade talks with the European Union. A carefully choreographed attempt to showcase the progress of Brexit talks collapsed at the last minute on Dec. 4 when the Northern Irish party which props up Prime Minister Theresa May s government vetoed a draft deal already agreed with Ireland. Since then, May has been scrambling to clinch a deal on the new UK-EU land border in Ireland that is acceptable to the European Union, Dublin, her own lawmakers and Northern Ireland s Democratic Unionist Party, which keeps her government in power. May and European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker could meet early on Friday to seal a border deal, the European Commission s chief spokesman said. We are making progress but not yet fully there, Commission spokesman Margaritis Schinas said. Talks are continuing throughout the night. Early morning meeting possible. A spokesman for PM May said Brexit discussions were ongoing while a senior Irish official said talks were moving swiftly and that a deal was possible in hours. It is moving quite quickly at the moment, the Irish official told a British Irish Chamber of Commerce event in Brussels. I think we are going to work over the next couple of hours with the UK government to close this off. I say hours because I think we are very close. Later on Thursday, the political editor of the BBC said the leadership of the DUP in Belfast had not signed off on the border deal, meaning it could yet stumble, but May continued to plan to meet Juncker and European Council President Donald Tusk early on Friday in Brussels to finalize the agreement. The political editor of Sky News, quoting a DUP source, said the party would continue to work on the border issue on Friday. Moving to talks about trade and a Brexit transition are crucial for the future of May s premiership, and to keep trade flowing between the world s biggest trading bloc and its sixth largest national economy after Britain leaves on March 29, 2019. But the EU will only move to trade talks if there is enough progress on three key issues: the money Britain must pay to the EU; rights for EU citizens in Britain and British citizens in the EU; and how to avoid a hard border with Ireland. As speculation swirled about whether London, Dublin and Brussels were about to clinch a border deal, European Council President Donald Tusk s office said he would brief reporters at 0650 GMT on Friday before departing for Hungary. The EU says May has an effective deadline of Sunday night if she wants to seal a deal and hope to have agreement on trade talks in time for the EU summit on Dec. 14-15. All sides say they want to avoid a return to a hard border between EU member Ireland and the British-ruled province of Northern Ireland, which might upset the peace established after decades of violence. The Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) insists that Northern Ireland, as part of the United Kingdom, must leave the EU in the same way as the rest of the United Kingdom. To clinch a deal, though, May must ensure she has the support of the DUP, whose leader told her bluntly on Monday that it would not support her minority government s legislation unless the Irish border draft deal was changed. She must also convince her divided Conservative Party that the deal she makes is acceptable. British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, a leader of the Brexit campaign, insisted the whole of the United Kingdom must take back control when it left the EU. Whatever way we devise for getting onto the body of the (Brexit) talks, it s got to be consistent with the whole of the United Kingdom taking back control of our laws, of our borders and of our cash, Johnson told reporters. | 1 |
Here are just a few examples of the empty or mostly empty NFL stands across America today:The stands appear to be mostly empty for the Atlanta Falcons V. Minnesota Vikings game, in what NFL fans were calling the biggest game of the week on Twitter.Lots of empty seats for the biggest game of the NFL week pic.twitter.com/kQDZySMFtU Brian Handke (@brianhandke) December 3, 2017Here s another shot of the empty seats at the Atlanta vs. Minnesota game in Atlanta:Caption: "What s up with ALL the empty seats? 30% empty? Could it be tix are too expensive? Fans don t want to pay the PSL?" (https://t.co/ceK9VSHPuT) pic.twitter.com/ZftCoDwwr8 Empty Seats Galore (@EmptySeatsPics) December 3, 2017It appears as though Jacksonville fans found something better to do than watch the Indiana vs. Jacksonville matchup.Pic via an Indiana talking head #INDvsJAX RT @cliffWISH8: available for the Jags playoff push. I repeat. pic.twitter.com/XfcVfkh5EJ Empty Seats Galore (@EmptySeatsPics) December 3, 2017Here s a close up of the empty seats in Jacksonville:What are those? pic.twitter.com/SYqmwKZyBl Jags Ghost (@Battle4Duval) December 3, 2017Meanwhile, back in the Midwest, a lot of empty seats can be found again this week in Chicago s Soldier Field, that is usually a sold out venue:There are some empty seats here at Soldier Field. It looks like the Lions game two weeks ago: pic.twitter.com/rEfsrT0hD9 Adam Jahns (@adamjahns) December 3, 2017Here s a close up of the empty seats in the upper deck at the Bears game:A lot of empty seats in the upper deck today. #Bears pic.twitter.com/eqdnpdDbl7 Zack Pearson (@Zack_Pearson) December 3, 2017The north end zone doesn t look any better:Good amount of empty seats in north end zone. pic.twitter.com/YQJwnpvwGv Jeff Dickerson (@DickersonESPN) December 3, 2017I know that I am a goat, but do I smell that bad? 49ers at Bears. Media deck. @EmptySeatsPics pic.twitter.com/7JiTEczWXh prof. goat (@ProfGoat) December 3, 2017The Buffalo Bills played the NE Patriots, 2017 Superbowl championship team, and former NFL fans didn t seem to care enough to show up and watch the game :A lot of empty seats came out to see the Bills play the Patriots today @EmptySeatsPics pic.twitter.com/NgGSwdEkqP Darin Weeks (@DarinJWeeks) December 3, 2017 | 1 |
Hampton Creek, a prominent that is trying to bring tech industry panache to the world of mayonnaise, ranch dressing and other food products, has come under scrutiny by regulators for its business practices. The Securities and Exchange Commission has opened a preliminary inquiry into Hampton Creek, according to a person briefed on the situation who asked not to be named because it had not been announced publicly. The S. E. C. inquiry is a response to a recent report from Bloomberg News that described an organized effort by Hampton Creek to buy large quantities of its Just Mayo product — a mayonnaise that uses a ingredient instead of eggs — by sending undercover contractors into stores. Kevin J. Callahan, a spokesman for the S. E. C. declined to comment. Bloomberg earlier reported the S. E. C. inquiry. Hampton Creek’s chief executive, Joshua Tetrick, said he had heard from the S. E. C. about the informal inquiry but declined to give further details. Bloomberg’s report said the product buyback effort, which took place in 2014, made Just Mayo seem more popular than it was, not long before Hampton Creek raised $90 million from venture capitalists and other private investors. The basic details of the program were confirmed by a former Hampton Creek employee, who asked for anonymity because of confidentiality restrictions with his onetime employer. After the report, Mr. Tetrick wrote in a blog post that the mayonnaise shopping spree was part of a quality control program that had minimal impact on overall sales. The inquiry puts a cloud over Hampton Creek, which has described itself as the food company in the world. It has promised to tackle the food industry with the gusto of a technology using some of the same big data tools to do so. One of its goals is to identify healthy, ingredients that can substitute for common foods like eggs, with less of a negative impact on the environment. Hampton Creek, based in San Francisco, has been praised by the likes of Bill Gates received financial backing from prominent Silicon Valley entrepreneurs and investors like Marc Benioff and Vinod Khosla and succeeded in getting its products widely distributed at Walmart, Costco, Whole Foods and other retailers. The inquiry may be only the start of tougher questions facing Hampton Creek. The company is believed to be losing significant amounts of money. It is raising up to $220 million from investors, according to a Delaware filing provided by Equidate, which tracks private company shares. It’s not uncommon, of course, for to bleed red ink in their early days. But Hampton Creek, founded in 2011, faces some basic challenges with the manufacturing costs for its products. According to one former employee, in 2014 the company had negative gross margins of about 20 percent on Just Mayo, meaning that the raw cost to the company for every $1 it got in sales was about $1. 20. The issue arises from Hampton Creek’s use of premium ingredients in its products without charging shoppers the often prices attached to such food products. The vegetable oil used in Just Mayo, for example, does not come from genetically modified organism sources, which adds significant cost, according to the former employee. But on Walmart. com on Friday, a jar of Just Mayo was selling for $3. 66 — 32 cents less than a jar of Hellmann’s mayonnaise of the same size. In an interview on Friday, Mr. Tetrick said the company planned to break even by the end of next year. “We are fortunate to be well capitalized,” he said, declining to disclose how much the company had in the bank. He added that some of Hampton Creek’s dressings, mayonnaise and food service cookie products were meaning they generated more revenue than they cost to make. “We’re not trying to optimize at every turn, thinking, ‘What’s the margin? ’” he said. “It’s about solving the bigger food problem. You know what we do about it? We attack it. ” The company’s program to buy its own mayonnaise has raised eyebrows among retail analysts. Food makers typically do quality checks through every step of production until the product lands on grocery shelves. Kurt Jetta, chief executive of TABS Analytics, a research firm, said that while he had heard of companies buying their own products off retail shelves, in most of those cases, “it’s to jack up the sales numbers, not for quality assurance. ” He also said paying retail prices to buy products for quality assurance made “zero financial sense. ” When food companies want to move a product off a grocery shelf to replace it with a reformulated or newly packaged version or because it has passed its expiration date, they issue a credit to the store manager — and then only to cover the price the retailer paid, not the consumer price. Some food industry consultants, though, said it was not for companies to buy their food products off shelves. Stericycle is a company that helps manufacturers with “audits” of their products for quality assurance purposes. “Manufacturers and retailers may need help with resolution, including handling consumer complaints, product quality evaluation and much more, but they may not have the internal staff to handle those things quickly and efficiently,” said Kevin Pollack, vice president and general manager at Stericycle. Word of the program was mentioned briefly in a lawsuit against Hampton Creek filed this year on behalf of two former contractors for the company who were seeking unpaid wages. The contractors worked in stores in 2014 and 2015, representing Hampton Creek and handing out samples of Just Mayo to spread word of the product. But according to the lawsuit, Hampton Creek required the contractors to also “buy out shelves of Defendant’s products. ” | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg on Thursday said she regrets making critical comments about Republican presidential contender Donald Trump. “On reflection, my recent remarks in response to press inquiries were ill-advised and I regret making them,” she said in a statement issued by the court. Ginsburg, the 83-year-old senior liberal member of the high court, inserted herself into the U.S. presidential election in recent days by making negative remarks about Trump in a series of media interviews. Her earlier remarks prompted criticism from Trump, who said she should resign. In one of a series of Twitter posts, he also said Ginsburg’s “mind is shot.” The Trump campaign did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Ginsburg’s statement. Legal ethics scholars also questioned Ginsburg’s actions, saying Supreme Court justices should stay out the political fray in order to maintain their judicial integrity. The New York Times and the Washington Post chided Ginsburg in editorial articles. “Judges should avoid commenting on a candidate for public office. In the future I will be more circumspect,” Ginsburg said. In a CNN interview posted on Tuesday, Ginsburg called the presumptive Republican nominee “a faker.” In a separate interview with the New York Times, Ginsburg joked about moving to New Zealand if Trump wins the White House. Under a code of conduct that federal judges - but not Supreme Court justices - are required to follow, judges are forbidden from publicly endorsing or opposing candidates for public office. Supreme Court justices generally shy away from discussing politics or other divisive issues in public. Ginsburg is one of the more outspoken members of the court but had never before made such pointed remarks about a political candidate. The controversy erupted as Trump prepared for the opening of the July 18-21 Republican convention, which will formally make him the party’s presidential nominee for the Nov. 8 election. The Supreme Court has been ideologically split between four liberals and four conservatives since conservative Justice Antonin Scalia died in February. | 1 |
Jimmy Carter s Democrat pollster Pat Caddell is predicting a Trump Tsunami, reminiscent of the Carter-Reagan election. Carter was ahead in all of the polls leading up to the election and Reagan shocked the world when he crushed him in a landslide Watch: | 0 |
MILAN/VENICE (Reuters) - Political leaders in northern Italy claimed an overwhelming mandate on Monday to seek greater autonomy from Rome after referendums that did not go as far as the independence vote in Catalonia declared illegal by Spain. Voters in Lombardy and Veneto, both run by the once openly secessionist Northern League, backed the party s autonomy bid by more than 95 percent, although in Lombardy less than half of the electorate turned out. In both regions, many people complain their taxes are wasted by the central government, accusing Rome of delivering low-quality public services and diverting money to the poor south widely seen by northerners as corrupt. This is the big bang of institutional reforms, Veneto Governor Luca Zaia told a news conference, announcing plans to begin negotiations on clawing back powers from the central government in 23 policy areas. Regional representatives would be ready to start discussions with Rome in a week, he said. Unlike the Catalonian referendum, which sparked a political crisis in Spain, the Italian votes were legal, but not binding on Rome. Foreign Affairs Minister Angelino Alfano said the government was ready to negotiate as long as the unity of the nation was not called into question. Italy s constitution does not allow regional fiscal autonomy, however, and Agriculture Minister Maurizio Martina said that while Rome was open to talks it would not give up tax proceeds from the rich regions. Lombardy, the region of financial hub Milan, accounts for about 20 percent of Italy s economy, which is the euro zone s third largest. Veneto, which includes the tourist magnet Venice, accounts for 10 percent. So any redistribution of tax revenues could have a negative impact on much poorer regions in the south. Lombardy Governor Roberto Maroni said tax was very much on the table. We can now write a new page: the regions that ask for more power will get it, he told journalists. I am talking for example about the power to discuss about tax proceeds that normally go to Rome ... this is the first step in a path towards big reforms. Voter turnout was around 38 percent in Lombardy and just above 57 percent in Veneto. The vote is a success for the Lega, Zaia and Maroni. It is an important victory but a dangerous one too, said Giovanni Orsina, history professor at Rome s Luiss University. The referendums could deepen north-south divisions that pre-date the modern, unified Italian state and many also backfire on the League, a centre-right party that is trying to broaden its appeal beyond the north ahead of national elections next year, Orsina said. | 1 |
Virginia Congressman Dave Brat is feeling the heat from his constituents, especially women. Republicans are moving to repeal Obamacare and his constituents are putting the pressure on him. Since Obamacare and these issues have come up, the women are in my grill no matter where I go, he told a conservative audience at an event on Saturday. They come up When is your next town hall? And believe me, it s not to give positive input. I had one woman on my Facebook say she was going to get up in my grill, he said. There s paid protesters paid activists on the far left, not my Democratic friends I go to church with. They re being paid to go around and raise havoc. We re getting hammered, Brat added.There is a Facebook page dedicated to the Virginia Republican which uses the hashtag #AskBrat so it doesn t appear that they re paid. Karen Conley of Henrico County said she called Brat s office recently to express support for the Affordable Care Act, which keeps her family insured. Nobody is being paid or put up to this by an outside organization, Conley said. Everybody is putting in their time and effort because they re dissatisfied with the representation. They feel dismissed, and that their concerns aren t valid because they re not being responded to. It s not just a partisan issue anymore. Alsuin Preis, another of Brat s constituents, said many of the people who are trying to meet with the congressman had supported him during his campaign. This is not about going to a town hall about haranguing Dave Brat or just throwing out jabs, Preis told WTVR-TV. We want to discuss our concerns. Brat plans to hold town hall meetings after the first 100 days of the Donald Trump administration. Over the past couple of weeks my office has been inundated with phone calls, and emails and comments on social media requesting a town hall meeting, and believe me, I fully intend to have plenty of town halls that are open and transparent as soon as our first 100 days agenda is implemented and we come up for a breath of air, Brat wrote on Facebook.Some of Brat s constituents are requesting a town hall meeting before the first 100 days of Trump s alleged presidency.Watch:(function(d, s, id) { var js, fjs = d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0]; if (d.getElementById(id)) return; js = d.createElement(s); js.id = id; js.src = "//connect.facebook.net/en_US/sdk.js#xfbml=1&version=v2.3"; fjs.parentNode.insertBefore(js, fjs);}(document, 'script', 'facebook-jssdk'));Dave Brat meets with District 1 at Hanover Tavern 1/28/17Thoughts?"When is the next Town Hall meeting?" is not an accusation, it's a question. Congressman Dave Brat, your constituents would like to hear from you. You ran on a platform that you would be more accessible and we could hold you accountable, right? We would love to hear more about things you talked about in this video. #AskBratPosted by 7th District Town Hall Meeting on Saturday, January 28, 2017The conservative audience laughed as Brat explained that women are concerned that their health care will be taken away. Because it s really funny to take away our health care without a viable replacement.Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images. | 0 |
Tyra for Trump lets it rip on the biased media and tells everyone to STOP listening to the lying reports on Trump!SPREAD THE WORD! DONE WITH MEDIA! US AGAINST THE MEDIA, WE MUST UNITE AND FIGHT BACK! pic.twitter.com/YpUtXpoTOu Tyra (@TRUMPVOTES) August 10, 2016 | 1 |
The left believes they are winning this war. Radical organizations funded by George Soros and other radical leftists are paying protesters to join anarchists in the war against America. This is a must watch debate with two conservative men who are unafraid to take on one of the mouthpieces of the left and call them out on their agenda.Steve Malzberg from NewsMax TV and Nomiki Konst, the radical executive director of the Accountability Project, joined Jim Hoft of Gateway Pundit to discuss the Ferguson mobs and myths and Barack Obama s stellar record on race relations.Nomiki is a committed leftist and accused Donald Trump of being a racist. Steve Malzberg let her have it. We ended with a discussion on how Barack Obama destroyed race relations in this country. Enjoy.Via: Gateway Pundit | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former Texas Governor Rick Perry has endorsed Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump and is open to being his running mate, CNN reported on Thursday. In September, Perry was the first member of the initially crowded Republican field to drop out of the 2016 White House race, following a failed bid in the 2012 race. The longest-serving governor in Texas history had languished near the bottom of the 17-strong Republican presidential pack since entering the current race in June. Trump is now the last one left and the presumptive Republican nominee. | 1 |
21st Century Wire says Could this be the real reason why Trump is so despised by the elite Republican establishment?Watch a video of this report here: Trump had this to say: Wouldn t it be nice if actually we could get along with Russia, that we could get along with foreign countries. The neocon political faction that has dominated the Republican Party during recent history believes there is little to be gained from cooperation in politics, and prefers confrontation and domination instead; as they amply demonstrated with their 2003 Iraq War.For Donald Trump to be specifically saying that he wants to get along with Russia is unparalleled, as Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican presidential candidate, said that Russia was without question our number one geopolitical foe .A world with an American President that wants to get along might certainly look a lot different to today s. Yet, as we are seeing, with the myriad of attacks against Trump, certain political and military industrial complex elite interests are not happy about the concept.Of course, we must remember that this is still just that a concept. However good of a concept it is, Trump may very well not deliver this goal.Still, it certainly is a very different, and somewhat sweeter, change to the tune of American foreign policy rhetoric than we are used to hearing.Do you believe Trump has the right foreign policy stance, and will he implement it?GET THE FULL STORY ON ELECTION 2016: 21st Century Wire Election Files | 0 |
The August 11, 2017 issue of Newsweek is one you might want to pick up. In fact, if you happen to own a golf course or two, you might even want to hang some copies up for decoration, because all that s missing from the cover is the golden club he got as a gift from the PM of Japan leaning against his easy chair.Accompanying the cover is a scathing op-ed from Brendan Smialowski that tears apart the legend Trump has tried to cultivate: He paints a picture of a successful presidency so far, with lots of accomplishments, admiration, deals with foreign leaders, and a jet-setting lifestyle befitting the king he surely thinks he is. Smialowski disagrees:The most impressive quality of Trump s myth is not just that it strays from reality but how thoroughly, even aggressively, it contravenes easily confirmable fact. When he was king, he was the King of Debt, and he may still owe as much as $1.8 billion to creditors. His casinos closed. His airline went bust. But even as he accrued failures, lawsuits and debts, Trump managed to turn Trump into a synonym for success. The letters were made of plastic, but they were dipped in gold.The article is a must-read, but it s the image on the cover, titled LAZY BOY, that steals the show:Image via TwitterThe composite image, the caption, the details in this picture it s almost too good to be true. I don t know if I would have depicted the corpulent commander with a diet soda, but the lazily-wiped Cheeto dust on his $250 Oxford shirt more than makes up for the forgiving choice of beverage.Beside the image is a damning round-up of his presidency by the numbers: SIX months in office, 40 days at golf clubs, ZERO pieces of major legislation. I wouldn t be surprised if all that fast food starts coming back on the president pretty quickly when this issue hits the stands.Featured image via Mario Tama/Getty Images | 0 |
As the national furor continues over a controversial religious freedom law in Indiana that critics say could allow businesses to discriminate against LGBT customers, one troubling fact is being left out of the debate: in 29 states, it's already legal for a store owner to deny service to a gay person based on his sexual orientation.
While legal experts doubt Indiana's Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) could be used to justify discrimination when it takes effect on July 1, most states, including Indiana, have long allowed it to happen because they don't have civil rights laws that would prohibit discrimination against LGBT people in the workplace, housing, and public accommodations (hotels, restaurants, and other places that serve the general public). It's not the religious freedom laws that allow discrimination; it's the lack of civil rights laws.
As a result, in many states an employer can legally fire someone because he's gay, a landlord can legally evict someone because she's lesbian, and a hotel manager can legally deny service to someone who's transgender — without citing religious grounds.
It's not the religious freedom laws that allow discrimination; it's the lack of civil rights laws
Indiana in particular has no statewide nondiscrimination law for LGBT people, although about a dozen cities, including Indianapolis, have local measures.
"That's what's missing in the Indiana debate," Robin Wilson, a law professor at the University of Illinois, said. "If there's a 'license to discriminate,' it's the fact that the state hasn't said this is an unacceptable basis for saying no to people."
But it's not just Indiana. Depending on how you add it up, as many as 33 states don't have full protections for all LGBT people, because a few states with nondiscrimination protections don't protect trans people, and some don't ban all anti-LGBT discrimination in public accommodations.
Currently, 19 states ban discrimination based on sexual orientation and gender identity, while three additional states ban discrimination based on sexual orientation. Some other states protect public but not private employees from discrimination. Many municipalities have nondiscrimination laws that only apply within their local borders. And some companies prohibit discrimination in their own policies.
The protections sometimes vary from state to state. Massachusetts's protections for gender identity and Utah's protections for sexual orientation and gender identity don't apply to public accommodations. Some states, like Utah, also include exemptions for discrimination based on religious grounds.
LGBT advocates argue the Civil Rights Act of 1964 already protects LGBT workers from discrimination, but that interpretation of the federal law hasn't been proven in court. | 1 |
SYDNEY (Reuters) - Three skydivers were killed in Australia on Friday after what authorities believe was a mid-air collision. Two men aged in their 30s and a woman in her 50s are believed to have collided while skydiving near Cairns in northeastern Australia, police said. Their bodies were found about a mile from the designated landing site. | 0 |
SYDNEY, Australia — The two men seeking to emerge as Australia’s prime minister after national elections on Saturday, Malcolm Turnbull and Bill Shorten, have begun a delicate courtship of a handful of lawmakers who are likely to hold the balance of power in the next Parliament. Officials will resume counting votes on Tuesday for about a dozen seats that are too close to call. The Liberal Party, now governing in a coalition with the National Party, said postal and ballots that were yet to be counted would be crucial to its securing a majority in the House of Representatives. As of Monday, neither the Liberal National coalition, led by Mr. Turnbull, nor the Labor Party, led by Mr. Shorten, had won enough seats to form a government outright. Vote counting stopped in the early hours of Sunday with the governing coalition at 67 seats and the Labor Party at 71, the Electoral Commission said. If neither side can form a clear majority government, the party that secures the support of enough lawmakers to control at least 76 seats can form a government. “Australian voters are changing,” said Bob Katter, an independent member whose electorate covers about 193, 000 square miles of central Queensland, an area double the size of Britain. “In the past, I could run around and kiss babies and mouth party platitudes and expect to get ” Mr. Katter said in a telephone interview on Monday. But that was when he was a member of the National Party, he said, adding that now, candidates must be much more responsive to the needs of their constituents. Mr. Katter, the leader of Katter’s Australian Party, easily won his rural seat. The lawmakers viewed as crucial to the next government — five independents, including Mr. Katter, and one from the Greens — have not met to discuss forming a voting bloc, and they are from diverse electorates. Mr. Katter, who once ran a cattle ranch, said he had had “ talks” with both leaders but had not reached an agreement with either. Wooing the swing lawmakers is likely to be troublesome. “They are very different candidates,” said Jill Sheppard, a political scientist at the Australian National University. “Their electorates are spread out and have very different needs. ” Australia has been here before. In 2010, the Labor Party, then led by Julia Gillard, signed agreements with independents and the Greens to secure the seats it needed to form a government. Three of those lawmakers agreed to vote in a bloc if there was a stalemate over legislation. But Andrew Wilkie, an independent and a former intelligence officer who entered Parliament in 2010, tore up his contract with Ms. Gillard two years later when she backed out of a deal with him to introduce restrictions on poker machines. Mr. Wilkie, who is from Tasmania, the most southern state in Australia, described that dispute and his time working with the Labor Party as so traumatic that he said he would not sign on with either side in this election. Mr. Turnbull telephoned Mr. Wilkie on Sunday. “It was as much ensuring that the channels of communications are open,” Mr. Wilkie told ABC television. “I went to this election with a position that I would not enter into any formal agreement with any party to allow them to form a government, and nothing has changed. ” Another independent, Cathy McGowan, a former teacher and farmer from rural northeastern Victoria, said much the same. “I am proudly independent, and I won’t be making any deals,” she said in a statement issued on Monday. Mr. Turnbull and Mr. Shorten had both called her to congratulate her on her victory, she said. Adam Bandt, the Greens candidate, who will occupy the House seat representing the inner city of Melbourne, said he would support a Labor government but would not sign onto a coalition to help it secure the right to govern. The Greens did agree to help Ms. Gillard form a government in 2010. In return, the party asked for almost $10 billion in clean energy investments, a tax on carbon consumption and free dental care for children of families with low incomes. Prime Minister Tony Abbott ended the carbon tax in 2014. The team of Senator Nick Xenophon from South Australia, which appeared to have won one lower house seat and has said a second may fall its way after a recount, said it would negotiate with either party to form a majority government. South Australia, sometimes described as Australia’s Rust Belt state, appears likely to lose its major steel manufacturer and automobile industry. The loss of the steel plant alone could cost 6, 000 jobs, in a state that has a population of about 1. 6 million. In the prelude to the election, Mr. Turnbull announced that South Australia would receive a share of a $37. 5 billion contract to help a French company build Australia’s new fleet of submarines. The terms of an alliance between the Xenophon team and either major party have not been broached. “It is about achieving the best outcomes for the electorates, and the state of South Australia, but also outcomes that are in the national interest,” said Stirling Griff of Adelaide, who will enter the Senate for the first time as a Xenophon team member. Further complicating matters, Mr. Shorten has called on Mr. Turnbull to quit. Some analysts say Australia could be without an effective government for more than a week. Having to negotiate with independent lawmakers over legislation “will be chaotic,” Mr. Katter said. “But it is also what we call democracy here. ” | 0 |
Calling your local lawmaker to express your opinion is generally seen as more effective than sending emails. But legislators have been experiencing such a high volume of calls from constituents recently that their voice mail inboxes have been filled to capacity. High on the agendas of callers: President Trump’s cabinet nominations and the flurry of actions taken in his first week in office. J. P. Freire, a spokesman for Senator Orrin Hatch, Republican of Utah, said on Friday that the office had doubled its voice mail capacity in the past few months when it became clear that, with the new administration, “we were going to play an even larger role. ” “Certainly we have a high call volume,” Mr. Freire said. While he declined to comment on the topics discussed with constituents, he attributed some of the high volumes to Senator Hatch’s position on several congressional committees. With votes scheduled to take place on Jan. 31 on his nominee for education secretary, Betsy DeVos, and his pick for attorney general, Senator Jeff Sessions, Republican of Alabama, online campaigns promoting telephone activism are also picking up steam. Constituents and political activists are organizing to try and influence lawmakers’ votes on the nominations, and are tagging them on Twitter or Facebook if they are unable to reach staff members by telephone. On Thursday, Senator Dianne Feinstein, a Democrat, took note of the feedback in her home state, California, with notes tacked onto her Twitter timeline by people trying to reach her and blaming telephone backlogs. At 10:17 Eastern on Friday morning, for example, no one picked up the telephone at the main number for the senator’s office in Washington. Two minutes later, when a call was placed to Ms. Feinstein’s San Francisco office, a recording said the voice mail box was full. The mailbox was still full at 1:17 p. m. But someone did pick up the phone at her office in San Diego, referring a reporter to a spokesman, said they were aware of the heavy call volume and were working on it. “All office lines in California and Washington are being answered, and voicemails are being taken down as quickly as possible,” the spokesman, Tom Mentzer, said in an email on Friday. “When phone lines are overwhelmed, we also encourage constituents to use the senator’s website to contact her online. ” This week, Concerned Student 1950, a student group named in honor of the year the first black students were admitted to the University of Missouri, promoted a telephone campaign to oppose Mr. Sessions’s nomination. It published on Twitter a register of phone numbers for key legislators whose votes could be pivotal, along with advice on who was picking up the phone and who was not. People urged others on Twitter to use the fax machine, to send emails or to reach out to their local legislators’ offices if phone lines on Capitol Hill were not being answered or if voice mail messages were no longer being accepted. Sometimes, residents expressed their displeasure about the jammed lines. Senator Cory Gardner, a Colorado Republican, was the subject of protests in his home state this week by some constituents over what they said was their inability to contact their elected official by phone, The Durango Herald reported. “I just don’t understand why Cory Gardner is not responding to the people he’s supposed to represent,” said Gail Harriss, a Durango resident who was one of about 50 protesters who converged on the senator’s office. “Especially when time is of the essence with Trump’s nominees,” the newspaper quoted her as saying. Alex Siciliano, a spokesman for Senator Gardner, said in a telephone interview on Friday that in the past week or two, the senator’s office had switched over to a system that has a “virtually unlimited” capacity that sends voice mail messages digitally to an email inbox that make it easier for staff members to work through the calls. Mr. Siciliano said later in an email: “Nothing is more important to Senator Gardner than providing the best constituent service possible to all Coloradans. Since January 1st, our office has received a large volume of emails and phone calls, and we have responded to more than 25, 000 letters and fielded thousands of phone calls. ” The Twitter timeline of Senator Patty Murray, a Democrat from Washington, was littered with messages on Friday saying her phone lines were jammed. Ms Murray replied with an announcement telling people to send emails, instead. Taylor Haulsee, a spokesman for Senator Lamar Alexander, a Republican from Tennessee, said on Friday that the office was busy fielding a high volume of calls from constituents with opinions about the nominees. Bryan Watt, a spokesman for Senator Maria Cantwell, a Democrat from Washington State, said in a telephone interview that the office has received about 6, 000 calls this week and 5, 000 more voice mail messages, between the Washington, D. C. offices and the Seattle office. “Most of them are coming in about the nominees,” he said. “We have seven phone lines. If they are currently busy, then that person will be kicked to voice mail. ” He added, “For the most part, we are able to keep up and listen to as many people as possible. ” Perhaps the calls had some effect. Senator Cantwell announced on Thursday that she would not back Ms. DeVos’s nomination for education secretary. | 0 |
Pope Francis has delivered a strong message to corporate types who exploit people for profit and attempt to cleanse their souls by donating to the church, telling them: we don t want your blood money.During his general audience in Vatican City on Wednesday, in which he railed against the exploitation of working people by feckless employers, the Pope said: The people of God and the church don t need dirty money. They need hearts that are open to the mercy of God. It is far from the Pope s first intervention on the matter of unrestrained and crony Capitalism that has come to define (at least) the last thirty years of human history. Last Summer, the Pope referred to the global dominance of Capitalism s 1% as the new colonialism in a speech in Bolivia pointing to the removal of liberty, human rights and opportunity created by gross inequality and the resulting centralization of wealth and power. He continued: In this third world war, waged piecemeal, which we are now experiencing, a form of genocide is taking place, and it must end. Throughout his time as Pontiff, Pope Francis has continued to exercise the message of New Testament Jesus. A personal show of compassion, and a determination to enable poor and vulnerable people to make the best possible lives for themselves, and the widest possible contribution to their communities.What is so interesting about this though, is that the political party that considers itself the party of God on earth, the Republican Party, asset there delivering the opposite message.Somewhere along the line, Young Republicans confused Atlas Shrugged with the Bible and it s radical right-wing author Ayn Rand for Jesus. Republicans don t worship Jesus, they worship Ayn Rand. Republicans don t preach the gospel, they preach The Fountainhead. Instead of restraining the power of big business to hold unique influence over public and personal life, the Republican party has devoted itself to the opposite.Things have come to such a head, that Republican leaders are now openly denouncing the Pope and his interpretation of the Bible, rather than taking instruction from his leadership and questioning their own. In doing so, they are by their own definition, committing the sin of Pride and we all know what pride comes before. A Fall.You can see how The Young Turks handled Pope Francis assault on crony capitalism in the video below: Featured image via Flickr Creative Commons | 0 |
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. | 1 |
Wow! This is one of the most powerful speeches you will ever watch. A Hispanic American, who is now a Trump supporter, lays bare his emotions for everyone to see, as he gets choked up explaining to a crowd how he used to be the guy who would beat up Trump supporters . In his speech, he exposes the leftist media and how through deceptive editing they are able to make their viewers believe that President Trump and his supporters are racists .This brave Hispanic man tells how before he saw the truth , he used to be hard-core anti-Trump and if he was still the old me , he would beat up all of the Trump supporters listening to hi speak. He recalled how he used to see a Trump bumper sticker on a car and would wait for the person who owned the vehicle so he could confront them. He went on to explain that if the Trump supporter he confronted would debate him, he would beat their ass up .Watch, as this passionate Trump supporter explains how he was stunned to see how welcoming Trump supporters were when he attended his first Trump rally, and how the whole Trump and his supporters are racists narrative put forth by the media and by the Left is a complete lie:Credits to @Cernovich -it feels good when a @realDonaldTrump supporter mentions your name on a press conference! @Harlan @seanhannity #MAGA pic.twitter.com/3hpHPlfFTD Marco Gutierrez (@MarcoGutierrez) August 27, 2017 | 0 |
Did Target really believe that 99.8% of Americans were going to be silent in the face of a decision that puts the safety of our women and children in jeopardy in order to satisfy the desire of a percentage of the .2% of Americans who consider themselves to be transgender? I cancelled my debit card with Target and lodged a complaint with their headquarters in Minneapolis. I would urge anyone who reads this to do the same. Here is the number to their corporate office: I called 612-304-6073 to cancel my #Target debit card.Stand up to companies who put political ideology before customers #targetmissedthemark 100% FED UP! (@100PercFEDUP) April 25, 2016More than 1,000,000 people have signed the boycott pledge against Target, following the secretive decision by executives to open all of their stores bathrooms and changing rooms to people of both sexes. That s a million families who are going to spread the word about Target, so they may not get those customers back, or their money, said Tim Wildmon, president of the American Family Association, which has hosted the boycott.Here is the link to sign the AFA petition to Boycott Target: https://www.afa.net/action-alerts/sign-the-boycott-target-pledge/Just reached 1 million signatures! #BoycottTarget pic.twitter.com/V8SZc0hTtR American Family Assc (@AmericanFamAssc) April 29, 2016Target s management is just going to have step up here [and] say We re selling hammers and hats, we re not into social engineering, he said.The boycott was announced April 20 by the association, one day after Target revealed its decision to favor its few transgender customers and staff over the rest of the population. A study of the 2010 census data suggests that only about 1 in 2,400 adults change their names to match names used by the other sex.#BoycottTarget who discriminates against 99.8% of non-transgender Americans who want safe restrooms 4 women & girls. pic.twitter.com/UKwuVtfCZJ 100% FED UP! (@100PercFEDUP) April 29, 2016Wildmon s association wants to affirm people s privacy in bathrooms and changing rooms, but also to block the progressives multi-front push to stigmatize and outlaw any recognition of the average differences between women and men, and between boys and girls. The LGBT agenda is being rammed down people s throats, and people are losing their jobs because of it, and it is becoming so that you can t think differently from these people or you re [called] a hater or a bigot, he said.Since the decision was announced, numerous comments, articles, and videos protesting the store s one-sided decision have gone viral. Public opinion has moved and hardened in opposition to the previously bizarre notion of dual-sex bathrooms and changing rooms, and Target s brand as a family friendly store has taken a hit, as the online conversation shifted from its claim of cheap chic to worries of privacy, sexual predators, and the anger at the company s disregard for the reasoned judgement of its middle-class customers.Target, however, is not responding to customers opposition. We certainly respect that there are a wide variety of perspectives and opinions. As a company that firmly stands behind what it means to offer our team an inclusive place to work and our guests an inclusive place to shop we continue to believe that this is the right thing for Target, company spokeswoman Molly Snyder said April 25.Amid the turmoil, the company s stock edged down from $83.98 per share on April 19 to roughly $81.33 in April 28.That s a loss of $2.65 per share, which chops the company s stock market value by $1.5 billion, down to $48.8 billion.For entire story: Breitbart News | 0 |
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The US Supreme Court is set to decide the first major abortion case in nearly 10 years as well as critical decisions on immigration, affirmative action and voting rights. Will the Republican party have the spine to stand up to these reprobates and demand that we wait until after the election to appoint a new US Supreme Court Justice? Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said Saturday that the Senate should wait until a new president is elected to confirm a replacement for Justice Antonin Scalia, whose sudden death Saturday shook Washington and threatened to reshape the 2016 presidential race.Democrats said that with 11 months left in Mr. Obama s tenure, the Senate has enough time and indeed an obligation to confirm a replacement. The American people should have a voice in the selection of their next Supreme Court Justice. Therefore, this vacancy should not be filled until we have a new president, the Kentucky Republican said in a statement.News of Scalia s death was just hours old before the debate heated up.With the court now divided between four Republican-appointed justices and four Democratic picks, Mr. Obama would have a chance to tilt the bench decidedly to the left, and liberal lawmakers said he should have that chance.Via: Washington Times | 0 |
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. State Department official said on Tuesday that Washington has no plans to change a Cold War-era law granting special immigration benefits to Cubans, despite President Barack Obama’s moves toward normalized relations with the island country. “There continues to be a large migration flow out of Cuba. It reflects the difficult economic and human rights conditions in the country,” Francisco Palmieri, principal deputy assistant secretary in State’s Bureau of Western Hemisphere Affairs, told a Senate subcommittee hearing. “We have no plans to change the Cuban Adjustment Act at this time,” Palmieri said. The Cuban Adjustment Act provides Cubans with benefits granted to migrants from no other country. Once they enter the United States and ask for asylum, virtually all are granted the right to stay, can apply for work permits and, later, green cards, which convey lawful permanent residency. Some U.S. lawmakers have been demanding a fresh look at Cuban immigration policy since the surprise December 2014 announcement from Obama and Cuban President Raul Castro that the two countries would move toward ending decades of estrangement. They argue that most of the Cubans coming to the United States are coming for economic reasons and are not refugees from its Communist government. Fear of an end to their benefits has fueled a surge in departures from Cuba, many via third countries, which has left large groups of Cubans stranded in Central America. Earlier this year, thousands were airlifted from Panama and Costa Rica to northern Mexico, where they crossed the border into the United States. Senator Marco Rubio, the subcommittee chairman, asked Palmieri about reports that Panama might be planning to send more Cuban migrants north. “We have not told them not to do their airlift,” Palmieri said. | 1 |
Hillary Fan SLEEPS At Rally! Snoozy Smurf Steals Show! (ABC News) Coconut Creek FLA Tweet
HILLARY SUPPORTER (PAID OR UNPAID?) SLEEPS THRU HILLARY’S RALLY IN COCONUT CREEK, FLA. UNFORTUNATELY, THIS SNOOZING FAN IS POSITIONED OVER HILLARY’S SHOULDER ON LIVE TV.
NOBODY COMES TO HILLARY CLINTON RALLIES — BECAUSE SHE’S BORING AND MENTALLY ILL. WHO WANTS TO WATCH A COMMUNIST WITH DEMENTIA SCREECH ABOUT ROADS AND BRIDGES?
HILLARY HAS FINALLY EMERGED FROM HIDING, JUST IN TIME TO STEAL ELECTION 2016 VIA VOTER FRAUD. BUT WILL THE AMERICAN PEOPLE BELIEVE SHE “WON” AFTER SEEING HILLARY’S PATHETIC TINY RALLY CROWDS? BEFORE SHE RIGS THE ELECTION, SHE’D BETTER DO A BETTER JOB RIGGING HER RALLIES.
HILLARY’S EYEBALL GONE WILD: | 1 |
While Hillary Clinton was busy tearing Donald Trump orange limb from orange limb on the debate stage, Elizabeth Warren made the world her stage as she masterfully kicked him while he was down via Twitter.Trump didn t have a good night Sunday. Not only did he fail completely to explain away his open admission that he sexually assaults women by grabbing them by the pussy (and gets away with it because he s rich), but Trump managed to cause the room to erupt in laughter when he called himself a gentleman, openly admitted that he doesn t pay his taxes, and even threatened to jail his opponent if he is elected because some people want him to.Warren hit him HARD on taxes:.@realDonaldTrump's tax plan is to cut taxes for rich & powerful guys like Donald Trump & leave everyone else behind. #debate Elizabeth Warren (@elizabethforma) October 10, 2016.@realDonaldTrump is PROUD that he doesn't pay his taxes. He thinks he's smart and you're stupid for paying yours. #debate Elizabeth Warren (@elizabethforma) October 10, 2016 and reminded us that no matter how much distance the GOP tries to create, they are still blocking Obama s Supreme Court nominee so Trump can nominate one of his choosing:Remember: @SenateGOP are running away from @realDonaldTrump this weekend, but they're holding a Supreme Court seat hostage for him. #debate Elizabeth Warren (@elizabethforma) October 10, 2016She even agreed with Trump on something I am sure we can all agree upon Clinton is a fighter:I agree with @realDonaldTrump: @HillaryClinton is a fighter. She's dealt with bullies like Donald for 25+ yrs & she never gives up. #debate Elizabeth Warren (@elizabethforma) October 10, 2016Then she delivered the knockout blow:.@HillaryClinton doesn t whimper, whine, or run to twitter at 3am. She keeps fighting for those who need her. That s why #ImWithHer. #debate Elizabeth Warren (@elizabethforma) October 10, 2016Trump himself was silent on Twitter after the debate, though he did retweet Mike Pence congratulating him for winning (was Pence watching the same debate?).Congrats to my running mate @realDonaldTrump on a big debate win! Proud to stand with you as we #MAGA. Mike Pence (@mike_pence) October 10, 2016The Donald doesn t stand a chance at this point but just to make sure, head to the polls on November 8 and join the nation in rejecting him.Featured image via Getty Images (Ethan Miller) | 1 |
DUBAI (Reuters) - Iran said on Wednesday it had test-fired a new ballistic missile, prompting a tough response from a senior adviser to U.S. President Donald Trump. Iran’s defense minister said the test did not breach the Islamic Republic’s nuclear agreement with world powers or a U.N. Security Council resolution endorsing the pact, Iran has test-fired several ballistic missiles since the nuclear deal in 2015, but the latest test was the first since Trump entered the White House. Trump said during his election campaign that he would stop Iran’s missile program. “The recent test was in line with our plans and we will not allow foreigners to interfere in our defense affairs,” Defence Minister Hossein Dehghan told Tasnim news agency. “The test did not violate the nuclear deal or (U.N.) Resolution 2231.” Trump’s national security adviser, Michael Flynn, said the United States was putting Iran on notice over its “destabilizing activity” after it fired the missile. “As of today, we are officially putting Iran on notice,” Flynn said, without explaining exactly what that meant. Flynn said the missile launch defied the U.N. resolution that called on Iran not to undertake any activity related to ballistic missiles designed to be capable of delivering nuclear weapons. A U.S. official said Iran had test-launched a medium-range ballistic missile on Sunday and it exploded after traveling 630 miles (1,010 km). The Security Council held an emergency meeting on Tuesday and recommended the missile testing be studied at committee level. The new U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, Nikki Haley, called the test “unacceptable”. Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif said on Tuesday that Tehran would never use its ballistic missiles to attack another country. Some 220 Iranian members of parliament reaffirmed support for Tehran’s missile program, calling international condemnation of the tests “illogical.” “The Islamic Republic of Iran is against weapons of mass destruction, so its missile capability is the only available deterrence against enemy hostility,” the lawmakers said in a statement carried on state media on Wednesday. The state news agency IRNA quoted Ali Shamkhani, head of Iran’s National Security Council, as saying Iran would not seek “permission from any country or international organization for development of our conventional defensive capability”. The Security Council resolution was adopted to buttress the deal under which Iran curbed its nuclear activities to allay concerns they could be used to develop atomic bombs, in exchange for relief from economic sanctions. The resolution urged Tehran to refrain from work on ballistic missiles designed to deliver nuclear weapons. Critics say the resolution’s language does not make this obligatory. Tehran says it has not carried out any work on missiles specifically designed to carry nuclear payloads. The test on Sunday, according to U.S. officials, was of a type of missile that had also been tested seven months ago. Iran has one of the Middle East’s largest missile programs but it has been dogged by a poor record for accuracy. However, Hossein Salami, deputy head of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, said on the day of the test that the country was now one of the few whose ballistic missiles were capable of hitting moving objects. This would enable Iran to hit enemy ships, drones or incoming ballistic missiles. Some of Iran’s precision-guided missiles have the range to strike its regional enemy Israel. On Monday, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called Iran’s new missile test a “flagrant violation” of the U.N. resolution. He said he would ask Trump in their meeting in mid- February for a renewal of sanctions against Iran. | 1 |
Dinesh D Sousa warned us about Obama s reduction of our nation s nuclear stockpile in his movie, 2016, Obama s America. Shortly after his blockbuster movie appeared in theaters across America, Dinesh D Souza was charged with violating federal campaign finance laws and was sentenced to five years of probation, a $30,000 fine, and eight months in a San Diego community confinement center where he was forced to undergo therapeutic counseling. Here is what Dinesh D Souza predicted:Driven by the alleged anti-colonialist ideology of a father he barely met, President Barack Obama systematically is undermining America economically and militarily leaving it vulnerable to financial collapse, and even as unlikely as the possibility may seem, nuclear attack.And it charges as he slashes the defense budget, Obama is simultaneously pushing to reduce the nation s nuclear stockpile to as low as a few hundred missiles even as other countries like China, Russia and North Korea are modernizing and expanding their arsenals, and Iran widely believed to be close to developing nuclear weapons is threatening to annihilate Israel. From Dinesh D Sousa s controversial 2010 book, The Roots Of Obama s Rage WNDHere is what is actually happening today:The United States cut its nuclear stockpiles by 20 percent between 1996 and 2013, with more reductions likely to come, according to recently declassified information released by the White House.Stockpiles of highly enriched uranium, or HEU, which is used to fuel a nuclear weapon, were cut from 740.7 metric tons to 586.6 metric tons from 1996 to 2013, according to recently declassified information made available by the Obama administration. This reflects a reduction of over 20 percent, the White House announced. Moreover, further reductions in the inventory are ongoing; the U.S. Department of Energy s material disposition program has down-blended 7.1 metric tons of HEU since September 30, 2013, and continues to make progress in this area. The stockpile reductions are part of an effort by the Obama administration to eliminate nuclear materials and move away from these types of weapons.The move comes as countries such as Russia and North Korea move to increase their nuclear stockpiles. Russia, for instance, has made several announcements about its intent to boost its nuclear stockpile and number of weapons.However, the United States is moving in the opposite direction.Via:WFB | 0 |
An ABC Post poll released on Sunday found that President Donald Trump only had 42% approval from Americans, the lowest since 1945 — but that 96% of Trump supporters say that they would vote for him again. Moreover, the poll indicates that Trump could win the popular vote if the 2016 electorate were to vote a second time. [The poll comes as Trump looks to finish his first 100 days later this week on a high note, with new legislative initiatives on tax reform and health care. Unlike his predecessors, Trump had no “honeymoon,” with the media and the Demcoratic opposition — a. k. a. “Resistance” — determined to maintain a bitter antagonism from the very first day. But the “resistance” has its own major problems. (67%) of Americans say that Democrats are out of touch with their concerns, while 62% say the same about Republicans and 58% say that about President Trump himself. Americans also support Trump’s approach to foreign policy, with a plurality saying that he is dealing with North Korea correctly and a majority approving of the recent missile strikes in Syria. But it is with his own supporters that Trump is strongest: As noted, this poll finds no evidence of buyer’s remorse among Trump supporters. Among those who report having voted for him in November, 96 percent today say it was the right thing to do a mere 2 percent regret it. And if a rerun of the election were held today, the poll indicates even the possibility of a Trump victory in the popular vote among 2016 voters. Trump might win a second version of the 2016 election because while 96% of Trump supporters would vote for him again, only 85% of Hillary Clinton voters say they would do so, “producing a percent result in this hypothetical among 2016 voters,” the poll says. Other former Clinton voters would support a third party instead. The poll was conducted by land and cellular phone among 1, 004 adults, with a margin of error of 3. 5%. Another poll, conducted by NBC News and the Wall Street Journal, found that 54% of American adults disapprove of the job President Trump is doing, while only 40% approve, a gap that has increased by 4 points since February. Joel B. Pollak is Senior at Breitbart News. He was named one of the “most influential” people in news media in 2016. He is the of How Trump Won: The Inside Story of a Revolution, is available from Regnery. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak. | 0 |
Widely hailed as the most beautiful girl in the world, 10-year-old Kristina Pimenova is no ordinary child, not by any measure of the word. She has already appeared in photographs by heavyweights in the modeling industry such as Vogue Italia, Dolce & Gabbana, Robert Cavalli, Armani, and others. She also just landed a lucrative contract by the ultra-prestigious agency LA Models, and will be relocating to Los Angeles to further her modeling career at a faster pace than probably any child ever has before.On Instagram Kristina has over 1.2 million followers, and on Facebook she s fast approaching 4 million. But, with success, comes consequences. Already Kristina is being objectified by grown men claiming among other things, that they ll be waiting for her. Considering her tagline is Remember beauty is inside, it doesn t appear everyone is that deserving.Last year her mother was accused of posting provocative and sexualized photos of little Kristina, but her mother Glikeriya Pimenova says such accusations are baseless. If anything, people were paedophiles if they think her photos made her look like a babe. We d have to agree with her. It s not uncommon to go to a swimming pool and see little girls swimming in their bathing suits, or wearing things that little girls simply wear. This is just another example of men accusing beautiful women of being at fault, merely because they find them attractive.It s pretty sick and it s this type of double standard that men have that really needs to be called out especially because this is a child. Kristina is only ten-years-old and already getting the kind of attention normally reserved for adult women, and it s only going to get worse from here. That s why society needs to be aware of it, and men need to know it s not okay. Let a 10-year-old girl be a kid. Be aware of your inner prejudices that are prone to attack or vilify simply because of your own inner issues, not theirs.#kristinapimenovaA photo posted by Kristina Pimenova (@kristinapimenova2005) on Jun 7, 2015 at 7:35pm PDTPic via Instagram.Pic via InstagramKristina is now represented by @lamodels and @newyorkmodels A photo posted by Kristina Pimenova (@kristinapimenova2005) on Feb 3, 2016 at 10:24am PST#portosbakery we love this place A photo posted by Kristina Pimenova (@kristinapimenova2005) on Nov 25, 2015 at 4:09pm PSTWhile we will admit, adults need to be careful of what images they upload of their children, it s not her fault she s beautiful.Featured image from Instagram. | 0 |
Two anti-abortion activists are facing 15 felony charges after they secretly filmed themselves trying to buy aborted fetal tissue from Planned Parenthood. (In case you missed it, these attempts were unsuccessful because, duh. But that didn t stop them from editing this video footage and then using it to claim that the women s health provider was selling baby parts. They weren t.)State Attorney General Xavier Becerra announced the charges against David Daleiden and Sandra Merritt on Tuesday. The Associated Press reports:The allegations say the pair filmed 14 people without permission between October 2013 and July 2015 in Los Angeles, San Francisco and El Dorado counties. One felony count was filed for each person. The 15th was for criminal conspiracy to invade privacy.According to Becerra, Daleiden and Merritt created a fictitious biomedical research company, which they then lied about in order to convince representatives of Planned Parenthood to meet with them and then they secretly recorded them without their knowledge.Daleiden claims these charges are bogus and are only being brought against him because of Planned Parenthood s political cronies. Naturally. The public knows the real criminals are Planned Parenthood and their business partners, Daleiden said. (For the record, the women s health care provider has committed zero crimes.)Last April, Daleiden claimed on social media that his home had been raided by agents from the California Department of Justice who confiscated all his video footage, among other things. There had been no word on the investigation since then until the charges were filed with the San Francisco Superior Court on Tuesday.In January of 2016, Daleiden and Merritt were both indicted on similar charges by a grand jury in Texas. That grand jury had originally been convened to investigate Planned Parenthood, but not only did they find no wrongdoing on the part of the women s health care provider, they also ended up indicting the filmmakers for their bogus video. Unfortunately, these charges were dropped because the prosecutor said the jury had overstepped since this was not why they were convened.Featured image via Eric Kayne/Getty Images | 1 |
It is becoming increasingly difficult to separate leftists from Islamic terrorists as both destroy monuments, statues, and seek to eliminate freedoms we enjoy. On a day in which an Islamic terrorist killed over a dozen people in Barcelona, senior editor Wilber Cooper has the audacity to publish an article for VICE Magazine urging the left to destroy Mt. Rushmore just like ISIS would.In his article Let s Blow Up Mount Rushmore, Cooper attacks the Founding Fathers and calls for a demolition of the monument. His call to erase historical markers, such as statues, echoes the recent movement from left-wingers for a culture war that would decimate Americans political traditions and heroes. Those targeted heroes include Thomas Jefferson, former president and chief author of the Bill of Rights such as the First Amendment and General and President George Washington, who declined offers to become a dictator after winning the Revolutionary War.Cooper argues that these historical monuments and statues help preserve a system of racial exploitation and inequality, and should be erased to help build a new society. He says, It s going to be impossible to improve America if we can t be honest about its origins and its past. He insists that Trump and his white supremacist cohorts believe the reverence some Americans have for these statues is simply respect for history, and that tearing them down is tantamount to ripping pages out of a textbook. But monuments built by the state are not history they are manifestations of power. Upon acknowledging the insensitivity of the article s title given the tragic events which occurred earlier today in Spain, VICE Magazine deleted the original article and wrote an editor s note: The headline and URL of this story have been updated. We do not condone violence in any shape or form, and the use of blow up in the original headline as a rhetorical device was misguided and insensitive. We apologize for the error. They have since changed the title to Get Rid of Mount Rushmore. Wow. What an improvement. Leftists continue to contradict their self-proclaimed peace-seeking objectives and prove that they are actually seeking to burn down the United States by getting rid of every trace of this great country s history. And you can bet they are coming for the Constitution next.Read more: Breitbart | 0 |
Regulators released rules on Thursday morning that aim to restrict how big financial institutions can pay their top executives. The new limits on banker bonuses would make the employees at the biggest banks wait at least four years to receive parts of their annual pay. If the proposals are completed in the coming months, banks would also have to reclaim bonuses from bankers who take risks that lead to big financial losses. The regulators are responding to an uproar of criticism over Wall Street’s pay practices after the biggest American banks had to take government bailout money during the 2008 financial crisis. That public anger has been rekindled during the 2016 presidential campaign season, putting pressure on regulators to tighten their oversight of Wall Street. The new rules on executive pay grew out of the 2010 financial overhaul, but it has taken years to put them into practice, even though President Obama has pushed regulators to complete them. The administration is running out of time to get rules approved before a new president is elected. Rick Metsger, the vice chairman at the National Credit Union Administration — one of six agencies responsible for drafting the rules — said on Thursday that politicians and the public “want senior executives at large financial institutions held accountable if their desire for personal enrichment leads to that results in material losses. ” The structure of executive pay packages before the financial crisis was blamed for encouraging bankers to take unnecessary risks. In some cases, pay was set up in ways that motivated bankers to seek gains even if their actions led to losses over the longer term. The new rules will force many banks to withhold pay for longer than they have in the past, to ensure that top employees can be held accountable for the consequences of their . The proposals leave many financial firms, including large asset managers and hedge funds, shielded from the new restrictions because of the way the regulators have defined which institutions are subject to them. Young Wall Street workers, and potential recruits who might once have aspired to jobs in the industry, are already decamping for less regulated corners of finance and corporate America, including Silicon Valley. For those institutions subject to the rules, the new restrictions are broadly in line with changes that many banks have already been making since the financial crisis. For instance, it is already an industry standard to wait three years to release bonuses. The new rules aim to push that to four years. There has been less consistency in how banks have approached seizing pay from employees if their actions lead to losses. The new proposal makes bankers’ pay vulnerable to clawbacks for seven years after the pay is received, if they are found to have engaged in misconduct or taken actions that led to big losses. Steven Eckhaus, an expert on executive compensation at Cadwalader, Wickersham Taft, said he did not see the new rules “having a big impact except around the margins. ” “This largely codifies the practices that have evolved over the last eight years,” he said. The regulators were supposed to propose the new rules within 90 days of ’s passage. Instead, the regulatory agencies delivered a first draft of the rules in 2011, but that draft was widely panned as being too weak. In the previous draft, the largest banks had to hold back at least 50 percent of all pay for three years. Under the new proposals, the same banks will have to withhold 60 percent of that pay for four years. The new draft also applies the limits to a broader set of “material ” at big banks, not just top executives. Marcus Stanley, the policy director at the advocacy organization Americans for Financial Reform, said the new version was stronger than the 2011 proposal, but did not push the banks to go far enough beyond already accepted practices. He said, for instance, that he had hoped that banks would have to hold back pay for more than four years because big losses on bank investments can often take longer than that to materialize. In Britain, by contrast, banks are now forced to hold back some pay for at least seven years. European countries have generally imposed stronger restrictions on executive compensation since the financial crisis, including some hard caps on salary and bonuses. The new American rules would apply only to compensation — generally bonuses — which varies according to the performance of the bank and the individual executive. Even without the rules, banks have faced steady pressure from regulators and shareholders since the financial crisis to change the way they pay their employees and tie more compensation to a firm’s rather than success. JPMorgan Chase, for instance, recently announced that it was altering the pay package of its chief executive, Jamie Dimon, so that he is compensated primarily with stock that he will receive only if the firm achieves certain levels of future profitability. Mr. Dimon will get the stock after five years, which is longer than the new rules propose. Banks and other financial institutions have generally been cutting pay in recent years because of their lagging performance, and other parts of the legislation have limited their ability to take big risks and earn the big profits that were common before the financial crisis. This week, Goldman Sachs said that the pool of money it had put aside so far this year for employee compensation is 40 percent smaller than it was at the same time last year. The new rules were debated and described for the first time at a meeting on Thursday of the National Credit Union Administration, the first of the six agencies to take up the proposal. The public will have until July to comment on the new rules, and it will likely be months after that before they go into effect. | 0 |
TOKYO (Reuters) - A typhoon roared towards Japan s main island on election day on Sunday, killing at least two people, prompting a warning for tens of thousands to evacuate and the cancellation of hundreds of flights. One man was killed under scaffolding that collapsed in high winds and a fisherman was killed as he tended to his boat, Kyodo news agency said. There were a handful of minor injuries. Typhoon Lan, classified as an intense Category 4 storm by the Tropical Storm Risk monitoring site, was south of Japan and moving northeast at 50 kph on Sunday night, speeding up slightly, the Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) said. Lan appeared to have weakened slightly from its peak, but it was still a powerful storm that could pound parts of Japan with more than 80 mm (3 inches) of rain an hour, an agency official told reporters. It is set to make landfall on Japan s main island of Honshu, possibly near Tokyo, early on Monday, at which time it is likely to have weakened to a Category 2 storm. The wind and rain will grow stronger as the night goes on, so take measures as needed as early as possible, preferably before it gets dark, the official said. The agency issued warnings for heavy rain and flooding on the Pacific side of Japan including the Tokyo metropolitan area, even though the typhoon is likely to be downgraded. More than 70,000 households in various parts of Japan were advised to evacuate, with more than 5,000 ordered to do so, NHK public television said. I live alone and at night it s scary, so I came here as early as I could, one elderly woman told NHK at a evacuation center in western Japan. Wind gusts of up to 180 kph (111 mph) were possible across central and eastern Japan early on Monday, the JMA said, possibly hampering the morning rush hour even after the rain is expected to have largely dissipated. Several small landslides had occurred and rivers were rising close to the top of their banks. One part received more than 600 mm (23 inches) of rain in 48 hours, twice the usual amount of rain for the whole month of October. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe told reporters he had called on the government to take steps to minimize any threats to life. More than 300 flights were canceled and rail services were interrupted across the country, in one case due to a power outage. Toyota Motor Corp said it was cancelling the first shift at all of its assembly plants and that it would decide on a later shift around Monday noon. Abe s ruling bloc was headed for a big win in the election, exit polls showed, potentially reenergizing a push towards his cherished goal of revising the post-war, pacifist constitution. It was not immediately clear how the storm and warnings to evacuate affected voting. | 0 |
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