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<p>Jan. 24 (UPI) -- Earth's continents are like a jigsaw puzzle that's constantly being rearranged. Sometimes, during the reshuffling, pieces get misplaced.</p>
<p>According to scientists at Curtin University in Australia, a portion of Queensland is one of those misplaced pieces, having originally been a part of North America some 1.7 billion years ago.</p>
<p />
<p>Researchers first became clued into the mix-up after discovering that rocky deposits a few hundred miles west of the city of Cairns featured geologic patterns similar to rocks found in Canada.</p>
<p>"Our research shows that about 1.7 billion years ago, Georgetown rocks were deposited into a shallow sea when the region was part of North America," doctoral student Adam Nordsvan <a href="http://news.curtin.edu.au/media-releases/curtin-researchers-discover-piece-america-northern-australia/" type="external">said in a news release</a>. "Georgetown then broke away from North America and collided with the Mount Isa region of northern Australia around 100 million years later."</p>
<p>The continental chunk's misplacement occurred during the reorganization of puzzle pieces that yielded the supercontinent Nuna.</p>
<p>"The team was able to determine this by using both new sedimentological field data and new and existing geochronological data from both Georgetown and Mount Isa to reveal this unexpected information on the Australia continent," Nordsvan said.</p>
<p>When Nuna broke up 300 million years after it formed, the Georgetown rocks stayed attached to Australia, while the rest of North America drifted away.</p>
<p>The research suggests the mountains in the Georgetown region are the product of two collisions: an initial collision in North America, between Georgetown and Mount Isa, and a second collision in Australia, between Georgetown and the Australian mainland.</p>
<p>"Ongoing research by our team shows that this mountain belt, in contrast to the Himalayas, would not have been very high, suggesting the final continental assembling process that led to the formation of the supercontinent Nuna was not a hard collision like India's recent collision with Asia," said Zheng-Xiang Li, a professor of earth science at Curtin. "This new finding is a key step in understanding how Earth's first supercontinent Nuna may have formed, a subject still being pursued by our multidisciplinary team here at Curtin University."</p>
<p>The research, which involved the help of scientists from Monash University and the Geological Survey of Queensland, was published <a href="https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/gsa/geology/article-abstract/526080/laurentian-crust-in-northeast-australia?redirectedFrom=fulltext" type="external">in the journal Geology</a>.</p> | Piece of North American continent found in northern Australia | false | https://upi.com/Science_News/2018/01/24/Piece-of-North-American-continent-found-in-northern-Australia/5101516799733/ | 2 |
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<p>The <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Chicago_Bears/" type="external">Chicago Bears</a> came into Nissan Stadium and dominated the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Tennessee-Titans/" type="external">Tennessee Titans</a> from the outset en route to a 19-7 victory Sunday.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Mike-Glennon/" type="external">Mike Glennon</a> engineered a 96-yard scoring drive on the Bears’ first possession, using former Titans wide receiver <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Kendall-Wright/" type="external">Kendall Wright</a> as his favorite target on the march.</p>
<p>Wright, who signed a one-year deal with Chicago in the offseason, caught three passes for 35 yards on the drive, helping to set up a 1-yard touchdown pass to Dion Sims, giving the Bears a 7-0 lead.</p>
<p>Chicago then added points through special teams, when after forcing a Titans punt, Roy Robertson-Harris broke through the middle of the line, blocking Brett Kern’s punt. The Bears recovered but it was out of the end zone, resulting in a safety and a 9-0 lead.</p>
<p>The Titans’ only scoring chance of the first half went by the boards, when <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Ryan_Succop/" type="external">Ryan Succop</a> missed a 40-yard field goal wide left with 3:14 to play.</p>
<p>Glennon later directed another scoring drive for Chicago, taking the Bears 47 yards in 10 plays and getting a 41-yard field goal from <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Connor-Barth/" type="external">Connor Barth</a> that pushed the lead to 12-0.</p>
<p>The Titans left their starting offense on the field for two second-half drives, and finally got points on the first play of the fourth quarter when running back <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Derrick-Henry/" type="external">Derrick Henry</a> scored from 3 yards out on what was ruled a touchdown pass from <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Marcus-Mariota/" type="external">Marcus Mariota</a>, who finished 12 of 21 for 193 yards and one score.</p>
<p>Bears wide receiver Tanner Gentry caught a 45-yard touchdown from rookie <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Mitchell-Trubisky/" type="external">Mitchell Trubisky</a> in the fourth quarter.</p>
<p>Chicago improved to 2-1 overall in the preseason and will close out the preseason Thursday night against the <a href="https://www.upi.com/topic/Cleveland-Browns/" type="external">Cleveland Browns</a>.</p>
<p>The Titans dropped to 1-2 and close out the preseason at Kansas City on Thursday night.</p> | Chicago Bears dominate Tennessee Titans behind Mike Glennon, lose Cameron Meredith | false | https://newsline.com/chicago-bears-dominate-tennessee-titans-behind-mike-glennon-lose-cameron-meredith/ | 2017-08-27 | 1 |
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<p>NEW YORK — To fight what it called a “grave threat” to the country, a watchdog group on Monday filed a lawsuit alleging that President Donald Trump is violating the Constitution by allowing his business to accept payments from foreign governments.</p>
<p>The lawsuit claims that a constitutional clause prohibits Trump from receiving money from diplomats for stays at his hotels or foreign governments for leases of office space in his buildings.</p>
<p>The language in the clause is disputed by legal experts, and some think the lawsuit will fail. But it signals the start of a legal assault on what Trump critics see as unprecedented conflicts between his business and the presidency.</p>
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<p>Trump called the lawsuit “without merit, totally without merit” after he signed some of his first executive actions Monday in the Oval Office.</p>
<p>The watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington filed the lawsuit in the Southern District of New York.</p>
<p>The group is being represented in part by two former White House chief ethics lawyers: Norman Eisen, who advised Barack Obama, and Richard Painter, who worked under George W. Bush. The two have expressed frustration that Trump has refused to take their recommendation and divest from his business, and feel they had no choice but to take legal action.</p>
<p>“As the Framers were aware, private financial interests can subtly sway even the most virtuous leaders,” the lawsuit argues, “and entanglements between American officials and foreign powers could pose a creeping, insidious threat to the Republic.”</p>
<p>At a news conference earlier this month, Trump Organization lawyer Sheri Dillon the so-called emoluments clause of the Constitution isn’t meant to ban fair-value exchanges. They didn’t think “paying your hotel bill was an emolument,” she said.</p>
<p>Trump drew fresh attacks from critics almost the moment he took the oath of office on Friday.</p>
<p>The group behind Monday’s lawsuit also filed a complaint Friday addressed to the General Services Administration, an agency that oversees the lease of the government-owned building that houses Trump’s new Washington hotel. The complaint argued the agency must cancel the lease because it expressly forbids any elected official from benefiting from it.</p>
<p>GSA officials had said they needed to wait until Trump took office before weighing in on the issue. They have yet to issue an opinion, though, and have not responded to repeated requests for comment. Democrats in the House and Senate on Monday sent letters to Acting Administrator Timothy Horne seeking information about what the agency plans to do.</p>
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<p>In the new lawsuit, the group faces several legal hurdles, including making the case that it even has standing to bring the suit.</p>
<p>“There are a lot of issues that have to be litigated for the first time,” said Noah Bookbinder, executive director of CREW. He added, though, that “we have never had a president who has in a significant way accepted foreign payments.”</p>
<p>Bookbinder said his group will argue it has standing because the president has forced his organization to divert all it is resources to this fight rather than other issues, and therefore is harming it.</p>
<p>That line drew criticism from some legal experts.</p>
<p>Its argument for standing “barely passes the laugh test,” said Robert Kelner, chairman of the election and political law group of the firm Covington &amp; Burling and an experienced Republican attorney.</p>
<p>Edwin Williamson, a former State Department legal adviser, said that the group will struggle to prove its case. He agreed with Dillon’s assessment that the emoluments clause does not apply the payment of a “market price” for a stay at a hotel.</p>
<p>Trump said at his news conference earlier this month that he would not sell his ownership in his company, but would hand over management control to his two adult sons. He pledged that his company would strike no more deals abroad and would donate any profits from foreign governments using his hotels to the U.S. Treasury.</p>
<p>Trump’s companies began publicly filing paperwork on Monday to show that they’re now being run by others. For example, Trump International Hotels Management LLC, registered in Florida, updated its paperwork with the secretary of state to list Eric Trump as president.</p>
<p>Although Dillon says Trump has taken “extraordinary” measures, many government ethics lawyers have panned them as insufficient. They note that no modern president has taken office with as much wealth and as sprawling and opaque a business.</p>
<p>His company, the Trump Organization, has stakes in golf resorts, office buildings, residential towers and hotel licensing deals in about 20 countries. Those include ones with which the U.S. has sensitive relations, such as the Philippines, Indonesia, South Korea and Turkey.</p>
<p>With so many business ties, particularly abroad, government ethics experts worry U.S. interests could take a back seat to his personal financial concerns. And even if they don’t, they argue, people will try to curry favor with the new president by buying apartments in his towers or memberships in his golf resorts, raising doubts — fair or not — that U.S. policy is for sale.</p>
<p>The lawsuit on Monday says that Trump’s company is receiving payments from foreign government-owned tenants at Trump Tower in New York, including The Abu Dhabi Tourism &amp; Culture Authority and the Industrial and Commercial Bank of China.</p>
<p>It also argues Trump’s “The Apprentice” could get him in trouble. It says government-owned stations in in the United Kingdom and Vietnam are paying for broadcast rights of versions of the reality TV hit.</p>
<p>Eisen and Painter have urged Trump to sell his holdings and put the cash in a blind trust, following the example of recent presidents.</p>
<p>Trump is bucking another presidential tradition by refusing to disclose his tax returns. He has said he would be happy to release them, but only after the completion of an Internal Revenue Service audit.</p>
<p>A public petition to the White House on Friday demanding he go public with his tax returns gathered more than 250,000 signatures — well over the 100,000 needed to trigger an official response.</p>
<p>“The White House response is that he’s not going to release his tax returns,” senior White House adviser Kellyanne Conway said on ABC’s This Week. “We litigated this all through the election. People didn’t care.”</p>
<p>_______</p>
<p>Bykowicz reported from Washington. Associated Press writers Mae Anderson in New York and Jill Colvin in Washington contributed.</p> | Lawsuit: Trump business ties violate Constitution | false | https://abqjournal.com/933768/lawsuit-trump-business-ties-violate-constitution.html | 2017-01-23 | 2 |
<p>MILAN (AP) - AC Milan twice surrendered the lead and was held to a 2-2 draw at Empoli in an entertaining match in Serie A on Saturday.</p>
<p>Milan took the lead through Carlos Bacca and Giacomo Bonaventura but Piotr Zielinski and Massimo Maccarone each time canceled out the visitors' goals.</p>
<p>"We came here to win, I'm very disappointed because when you go in front twice you have to win the match," Milan coach Sinisa Mihajlovic said. "We lacked cynicism and cunning, we allowed Empoli to come back into the game twice and got the final ball wrong too many times. The final result was right."</p>
<p>Mario Balotelli almost won the match for Milan in stoppage time but scuffed his shot. The forward had already been flagged offside.</p>
<p>"Balotelli was hungry, maybe too much," Mihajlovic said. "He got things wrong that normally he doesn't. What's important is that he continues to train like this, when he gets back to match fitness he will be an extra weapon for us."</p>
<p>Milan remained sixth, provisionally 11 points behind Serie A leader Napoli, and seven behind Inter, which it plays in a derby match next Sunday.</p>
<p>Empoli is a point behind Milan.</p>
<p>Second from bottom Frosinone drew 0-0 against Atalanta. Frosinone is five points below Palermo, which occupies the last position of safety. Atalanta moved nine points off the drop zone, ahead of the rest of the weekend's fixtures.</p>
<p>Milan has never lost a Serie A match in Empoli and it got off to the perfect start. Bacca sprung the offside trap to run onto Luca Antonelli's pass over the top and slotted into the bottom left corner to give his side an eighth-minute lead.</p>
<p>It was Bacca's third goal in as many matches and his sixth in his past eight.</p>
<p>Maccarone thought he had leveled in the 29th but had strayed offside for a glancing header on Zielinski's free kick.</p>
<p>Empoli did equalize moments later when former Milan midfielder Riccardo Saponara delivered a great through ball for Zielinski to run onto and fire between Gianluigi Donnarumma's legs.</p>
<p>Milan restored its lead immediately after the break in fortunate circumstances. Lorenzo Tonelli's clearance hit M'Baye Niang in the face and flew into the path of Bonaventura who drilled the ball into the far bottom corner.</p>
<p>Milan was once again pegged back on the hour when Donnarumma got down well to keep out Manuel Pucciarelli's effort but Maccarone was on hand to tap in the rebound.</p>
<p>MILAN (AP) - AC Milan twice surrendered the lead and was held to a 2-2 draw at Empoli in an entertaining match in Serie A on Saturday.</p>
<p>Milan took the lead through Carlos Bacca and Giacomo Bonaventura but Piotr Zielinski and Massimo Maccarone each time canceled out the visitors' goals.</p>
<p>"We came here to win, I'm very disappointed because when you go in front twice you have to win the match," Milan coach Sinisa Mihajlovic said. "We lacked cynicism and cunning, we allowed Empoli to come back into the game twice and got the final ball wrong too many times. The final result was right."</p>
<p>Mario Balotelli almost won the match for Milan in stoppage time but scuffed his shot. The forward had already been flagged offside.</p>
<p>"Balotelli was hungry, maybe too much," Mihajlovic said. "He got things wrong that normally he doesn't. What's important is that he continues to train like this, when he gets back to match fitness he will be an extra weapon for us."</p>
<p>Milan remained sixth, provisionally 11 points behind Serie A leader Napoli, and seven behind Inter, which it plays in a derby match next Sunday.</p>
<p>Empoli is a point behind Milan.</p>
<p>Second from bottom Frosinone drew 0-0 against Atalanta. Frosinone is five points below Palermo, which occupies the last position of safety. Atalanta moved nine points off the drop zone, ahead of the rest of the weekend's fixtures.</p>
<p>Milan has never lost a Serie A match in Empoli and it got off to the perfect start. Bacca sprung the offside trap to run onto Luca Antonelli's pass over the top and slotted into the bottom left corner to give his side an eighth-minute lead.</p>
<p>It was Bacca's third goal in as many matches and his sixth in his past eight.</p>
<p>Maccarone thought he had leveled in the 29th but had strayed offside for a glancing header on Zielinski's free kick.</p>
<p>Empoli did equalize moments later when former Milan midfielder Riccardo Saponara delivered a great through ball for Zielinski to run onto and fire between Gianluigi Donnarumma's legs.</p>
<p>Milan restored its lead immediately after the break in fortunate circumstances. Lorenzo Tonelli's clearance hit M'Baye Niang in the face and flew into the path of Bonaventura who drilled the ball into the far bottom corner.</p>
<p>Milan was once again pegged back on the hour when Donnarumma got down well to keep out Manuel Pucciarelli's effort but Maccarone was on hand to tap in the rebound.</p> | Milan twice loses the lead in 2-2 draw at Empoli in Serie A | false | https://apnews.com/amp/a1ea4b8023414a3b91c1dc1c1431c8a5 | 2016-01-23 | 2 |
<p>The <a href="" type="internal">referendum</a> to be held in Greece on Sunday is not a political debate. It is a battle in an ongoing war between Greek society and the European Union (EU)&#160;and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which are trying to turn Greece into the most brutal recent experiment in neoliberal social engineering.</p>
<p><a href="http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/schmitt/" type="external">Carl Schmitt</a> once wrote that the only existentialist categories are those of friend and foe. It is exactly this that can explain the tactics of the EU, particularly Germany, during&#160;the Greek crisis. There has never been a negotiation. It has been from the beginning an existential war, in the Schmittian sense, one in which you are not looking for common ground or a compromise in your favor but for the full capitulation of the enemy.</p>
<p>This can account for the refusal to actually negotiate with the Greek side, despite the painful concessions the latter had made and its acceptance of austerity. That is why there were always new terms and new demands arising during the negotiations. That is why they refused any discussion of reducing Greece’s debt burden, exactly because it is debt that has been the most convenient tool for this open and cynical blackmail of an entire society.</p>
<p>The Greek government’s decision to hold the referendum was an act of rupture with the EU. We should remember that the EU is allergic to referendums after the <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/05/29/AR2005052900644.html" type="external">traumatic experience</a> of 2005 and is generally&#160;hostile to any exercise of popular sovereignty that undermines its&#160;neoliberal policies. Moreover, here we have a referendum not on a policy to be adopted but on a policy already implemented — actually for the core of the current version of the disciplinary European Economic Governance. Rejecting the creditors’ proposals equals rejecting the essence of the contemporary form of European integration.</p>
<p>Consequently, for the EU and in particular Germany, the very decision to hold a referendum meant the end of negotiations. In a certain way the German tactic is simple: go through with the referendum. If there is a “yes”&#160;vote, you will get a new harsher austerity package. If there is a “no”&#160;vote, then brace for Greece’s exit from the eurozone (“Grexit”).</p>
<p>In this sense Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras’s idea that after a massive “no”&#160;vote there will be a restart of negotiations is groundless. Even if they still want a humiliating deal and not a punitive forced exit, they will probably take advantage of the current condition (banks with no liquidity, capital controls, market collapse, cash shortages, and probable shortages in basic goods) and prolong it as a means to impose the full version of the politics of social devastation.</p>
<p>The idea of a referendum was correct, and it has liberated social forces and potential in a manner that we had not seen in the past few months. For the first time,&#160;we&#160;can see the forces of the Left — with the exception of the&#160; <a href="" type="internal">Communist Party</a>, which&#160;remains entrapped in its paranoid leftism — giving an actual fight. But the referendum is not a negotiation. It is the beginning of the rupture.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, Syriza&#160;has not been prepared for that. The fact that many Syriza&#160;heavyweights such as <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=Yannis+Dragasakis&amp;oq=Yannis+Dragasakis&amp;aqs=chrome..69i57j69i60.397j0j7&amp;sourceid=chrome&amp;es_sm=91&amp;ie=UTF-8" type="external">Yannis Dragasakis</a>, <a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=Giorgos+Stathakis&amp;oq=Giorgos+Stathakis&amp;aqs=chrome..69i57j0j69i60.420j0j7&amp;sourceid=chrome&amp;es_sm=91&amp;ie=UTF-8" type="external">Giorgos Stathakis</a>, <a href="http://www.europarl.europa.eu/meps/en/28586/DIMITRIOS_PAPADIMOULIS_home.html" type="external">Dimitrios Papadimoulis</a>, and others openly called for acceptance of any deal offered, in defiance of Tsipras’s insistence that there should first be a “no”&#160;vote, is an example of the limits of Syriza. Tsipras has shown courage and determination, refusing to capitulate and giving all his weight in favor of No. Nevertheless, he still presents the “no” vote as a negotiation tactic, making proposals even at the last minute, and not as the beginning of a broader confrontation.</p>
<p>At the same time, we already see a massive polarization of Greek society. The Yes&#160;campaign is combining a&#160;mobilization of&#160;bourgeois and middle-class strata (a very large number of professional associations support Yes) and the deployment of all forms of ideological warfare. The private media&#160;are propaganda machines for the “yes”&#160;vote, and Greek corporations openly threaten their employees with mass layoffs if there is a “no”&#160;vote, using the refusal to pay wages as a means to make the threat credible.</p>
<p>Fear is beginning to become the determining factor. At the same time, you see also signs of radicalization in the No&#160;camp, with people more ready than ever to accept the full cost of rupture if this opens up the prospect of an end to austerity.</p>
<p>The biggest problem is that we still lack what is most urgently needed: a coherent narrative for a rupture that is in fact inescapable. A sincere narrative that will speak about the initial difficulties and the long-term benefits of Grexit, provided that is done in a sovereign manner, and the need for a different developmental paradigm. A militant narrative that could also appeal to the people to support this strategy in an energetic fashion, accept the initial hardship, and fight fear. Syriza&#160;is still unwilling to&#160;face this challenge, and the radical left is still deficient regarding the need to move from slogans to programs.</p>
<p>A “yes”&#160;vote would not only mean that the Greek government would&#160;have to sign a humiliating agreement. It would also mean a broader process of realignment of the political scene, including enormous huge pressure on&#160;Syriza&#160;(some of it exercised from within) to move to the right. Above all, it would be used to change the balance of forces in favor of capital and to preemptively reverse whatever aspirations the subaltern classes had.</p>
<p>A&#160;massive win for No&#160;is the only solution, the only way to release dynamics and put an end to the automatic pilot of austerity and social devastation. But it will not be enough. It is more urgent than ever for the Left to actually face the challenges ahead of it.</p>
<p>The challenge is not to have some temporary breaths of dignity, some moments of victory, and a brief interval of popular sovereignty, before defeat and capitulation. The challenge is to prove that there can actually be a lasting alternative.</p> | The Referendum as Rupture | true | https://jacobinmag.com/2015/07/tsipras-syriza-greece-exit-default-european-union/ | 2018-10-05 | 4 |
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<p>I grew to hate the Sobrietor.</p>
<p>Its siren sounded like an ambulance. Its home was next to my bed. Its purpose was to keep me from drinking.</p>
<p>The first night, it erupted at 11, 11:45, 3 a.m. and 6:30.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>Each time, I had to repeat a series of words to authenticate my voice, then blow into a mouthpiece.</p>
<p>“America,” I’d say, pressing the Sobrietor against my face.</p>
<p>“Speak louder,” the device would respond.</p>
<p>“America!” I’d say.</p>
<p>“Speak sooner,” the device would reply.</p>
<p>And so on – at all hours of the morning and night. Once the device was satisfied that I was, well, me, it would instruct me to take a deep breath and blow.</p>
<p>This was life in Bernalillo County’s Community Custody Program, which provides offenders with an alternative to jail. It was, I’m certain, much more comfortable than sleeping in a cell would have been, but it wasn’t fun.</p>
<p>I participated in the program for five days earlier this month to test the technology and learn how closely offenders are supervised.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>Roughly 270 inmates are in community custody this summer. They end up there on judges’ orders or through a screening process at the jail.</p>
<p>In my case, jail staffers created a fake profile. A judge had sentenced me – Daniel “Kay” – to five days in CCP for the made-up crimes of drunken driving and domestic violence.</p>
<p>Serious staff</p>
<p>I showed up at 9 a.m. on a Monday for booking into the program, which is run out of the old Metropolitan Courthouse at Fourth and Roma NW.</p>
<p>It was a bit like admission into a hospital, with paperwork to be filled out and interview questions to be answered.</p>
<p>Have you ever been sexually abused, an admissions employee asked. What’s your drug of choice? When’s the last time you had a drink? Do you have mental health problems? What medications do you take?</p>
<p>They took my mug shot. No one tells you to say “cheese.” The staff is polite, serious and authoritative.</p>
<p>I sat in waiting rooms, moving from one part of the building to another, preparing to meet my “tracker,” a corrections officer assigned to keep tabs on me for the week.</p>
<p>Admission to the program can take all day, though in my case it took just a morning.</p>
<p>The jail chief, admissions officer and tracker knew I was a reporter participating in CCP for an article. My fellow inmates and some of the other staff didn’t know or care, as far as I could tell.</p>
<p>The lobby had a white board with the quote of the week: “A bad attitude is like a flat tire. You won’t get anywhere until you change it.”</p>
<p>But no one seemed to have a bad attitude the morning of my booking. As I waited, the other inmates – or “clients,” as we were sometimes called – looked on curiously as a Journal photographer took my picture. I was the only one wearing a tie.</p>
<p>One man came up and said he recognized me from the news.</p>
<p>Following rules</p>
<p>I met my tracker, officer Joseph Trujeque, at his desk outside the waiting room.</p>
<p>He attached a heavy bracelet to my right ankle. It would use Global Positioning System technology to track my whereabouts.</p>
<p>He handed me a one-page list of rules, then quizzed me after I said I’d read and understood them.</p>
<p>Among the rules was a requirement for two daily check-ins by phone: I had to call a number between 7 and 8 a.m. and 7 and 8 p.m. each day to check for any messages from Trujeque to his inmates.</p>
<p>If we had to report to the office for a drug test, this was how we’d know.</p>
<p>Trujeque also had me speak into the Sobrietor so that it could identify my voice. This was to ensure I couldn’t have my wife or someone else take the breath tests for me.</p>
<p>The words used for authentication had a patriotic tinge: America, federal, eagle. These are the words I’d be repeating each night to the Sobrietor’s satisfaction.</p>
<p>The device had a sensor that could tell if I removed it after saying the words and passed it to someone else.</p>
<p>Trujeque gave me a written itinerary. I could be at work anytime from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. Otherwise, I had to be in my house.</p>
<p>He said he would review maps of where I had been each day and call if he had questions.</p>
<p>My fake domestic violence history meant I was prohibited from going to the home of my “victim,” which was actually a Journal editor.</p>
<p>After the booking was finished, Trujeque and another corrections officer followed as I drove to my house.</p>
<p>They opened kitchen cabinets, peeked into closets and looked throughout my home for alcohol and weapons. I’d already been warned to get rid of seemingly innocuous household items like Nyquil and rubbing alcohol.</p>
<p>The officers set up the Sobrietor near my bed.</p>
<p>McKay breathes into a Sobrietor while learning how to use the device, which issues random alcohol tests. Corrections Officer Joseph Trujeque programmed the Sobrietor to identify McKay by his voice, ensuring someone else couldn’t take the test for him. (Roberto E. Rosales/Journal)</p>
<p>Failed test</p>
<p>I came to dread the sound of that thing.</p>
<p>It was loud enough to hear on the other side of the house, even with the television and swamp cooler on. It usually went off three times a night – the first time around 11 p.m., then again around 3 and 6:30 a.m.</p>
<p>It was frustratingly touchy, making me repeat the words over and over again. I felt bad for my wife and son, who had to try sleeping through sirens every night.</p>
<p>I failed the voice test once, probably because I was sitting on the bed when repeating the first few words. The corrections officers had warned that my voice would sound different if I didn’t stand, but I’d forgotten.</p>
<p>After the failed voice test – my first night – a corrections officer called within 15 minutes. He walked me through the steps of unplugging and restarting the device. It offered me a new test soon after.</p>
<p>I must have passed because I didn’t hear from the officer again.</p>
<p>Annoying bracelet</p>
<p>The ankle bracelet turned out to be far less burdensome than the Sobrietor.</p>
<p>Still, it was annoying in its own right. I wasn’t permitted to take the bracelet off under any circumstances.</p>
<p>That, of course, meant showering and sleeping with it on. My lower leg above the ankle began to feel a little sore by the fifth day, but it wasn’t terrible. It felt more sweaty than anything.</p>
<p>I wore pants every day, easily covering up the bracelet and hiding it from public view.</p>
<p>Missed experiences</p>
<p>Corrections Officer Joseph Trujeque attaches a GPS bracelet to the leg of Journal reporter Dan McKay, whose movements were tracked as part of Bernalillo County’s Community Custody Program. (Roberto E. Rosales/Journal)</p>
<p>Since the Sobrietor sounded four times my first night, I desperately wanted to sleep in the next morning. But everyone in Trujeque’s group had to report to the CCP office Downtown for a urinalysis at 7:30 a.m. that Tuesday, my first full day in the program.</p>
<p>A dozen or more of us – all men – showed up. A few female clients also sat in the waiting room or arrived to sign in for a work detail.</p>
<p>(I didn’t have to do any community service or attend counseling, presumably because my time in CCP was so short. Also, I had to work at the newspaper each day, leaving me with little unoccupied time. A jail spokeswoman estimates I missed half the experience by skipping counseling and service.)</p>
<p>My fellow inmates looked relaxed. One man spotted me filling out paperwork and told me not to bother because Trujeque would already have my information.</p>
<p>“Hey, hoochie mama,” one man called out before hugging a woman who was signing in for work detail.</p>
<p>Another guy in my group was hooked to a portable oxygen tank, the kind used by long-term smokers, though he wasn’t that old.</p>
<p>Corrections Officer Joseph Trujeque points to an itinerary showing that reporter Dan McKay must be in his home from 8 p.m. to 8 a.m. each night. (Roberto E. Rosales/Journal)</p>
<p>“ODing on heroin will (expletive) you up, huh?” a corrections officer said.</p>
<p>The other inmates and I waited in line. I was at the end. Trujeque, at the front, must have said something funny because everyone in the bathroom laughed.</p>
<p>The line ended at two toilets side by side. A corrections officer I didn’t recognize stood between the toilets, facing us inmates as we peed into plastic cups. One man must have had trouble getting his urine in the container. He complained that he still had the shakes, even after quitting heroin two years ago.</p>
<p>Trujeque looked at my urine-filled cup and told me I could leave.</p>
<p>It was a little after 8 a.m., and it was time to get ready for my real job.</p>
<p>Trujeque checks the kitchen cabinets at McKay’s home to ensure he isn’t hiding alcohol or weapons. (Roberto E. Rosales/Journal)</p>
<p />
<p /> | Testing the bracelet: Surveillance not foolproof | false | https://abqjournal.com/224011/testing-the-bracelet-surveillance-not-foolproof.html | 2013-07-21 | 2 |
<p>(Image public domain)</p>
<p>New Horizons, a program of AIDS Action Baltimore (AAB), was established last November as a way to boost empowerment and break the bonds of homophobia, racism and stigma in same gender-loving (SGL) men in Baltimore. AAB is a non-profit organization that has been providing essential services to people with HIV/AIDS for 30 years.</p>
<p>New Horizons offers networking every first Wednesday of the month, HIV testing every last Wednesday, social events monthly, and an Art Creation Project. Most events take place at the Waxter Center, 1000 Cathedral St. in Baltimore.&#160; &#160;</p>
<p>The July schedule is as follows:</p>
<p>July 5 from 6 to 8 p.m. –&#160; New Horizons Education Group “HIV CURE Research.” The facilitator is AAB founder and President Lynda Dee.</p>
<p>July 12 from 6 to 8 p.m. –&#160; New Horizons Empowerment Support Group “Body Shaming.” The facilitator is Ali Moody.</p>
<p>July 21 from 6 to 9 p.m. – New Horizons Club. Location to be announced.</p>
<p>July 26 from 6 to 8 p.m. – Art Creation Group “Making A Monster Part Two.” The facilitator is Ali Moody.</p>
<p>For more information about AIDS Action Baltimore or the New Horizons program, visit aidsactionbaltimore.org or call 410-837–5573 or contact Ali Moody at 443-822-2367, email <a href="mailto:[email protected]" type="external">[email protected]</a> or <a href="mailto:[email protected]" type="external">[email protected]</a>.</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">AAB</a> <a href="" type="internal">AIDS</a> <a href="" type="internal">AIDS Action Baltimore</a> <a href="" type="internal">Art Creation Project</a> <a href="" type="internal">Baltimore</a> <a href="" type="internal">HIV</a> <a href="" type="internal">HIV/AIDS</a> <a href="" type="internal">Maryland</a> <a href="" type="internal">New Horizons</a> <a href="" type="internal">same gender-loving men</a> <a href="" type="internal">SGL</a> <a href="" type="internal">Waxter Center</a></p> | AIDS Action Baltimore offers New Horizons | false | http://washingtonblade.com/2017/06/29/aids-action-baltimore-offers-new-horizons/ | 3 |
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<p>Childhood images of <a href="" type="internal">Kim Jong Un appeared on a screen during a performance</a> by the Moranbong Band broadcast on North Korean Central Television. The event marked the first meeting of Kim and the North's Air Force soldiers. All of the images of the young leader show him dressed in a military uniform.</p>
<p /> | Kim Jong Un Childhood Photos Revealed by North Korea | false | http://nbcnews.com/news/world/kim-jong-un-childhood-photos-revealed-north-korea-n86676 | 2014-04-22 | 3 |
<p>ROCKY HILL, Conn. (AP) _ These Connecticut lotteries were drawn Saturday:</p>
<p>Cash 5</p>
<p>12-13-15-20-35</p>
<p>(twelve, thirteen, fifteen, twenty, thirty-five)</p>
<p>Lucky Links Day</p>
<p>04-09-13-15-18-19-21-22</p>
<p>(four, nine, thirteen, fifteen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty-one, twenty-two)</p>
<p>Lucky Links Night</p>
<p>03-04-08-09-10-13-17-18</p>
<p>(three, four, eight, nine, ten, thirteen, seventeen, eighteen)</p>
<p>Mega Millions</p>
<p>Estimated jackpot: $40 million</p>
<p>Play3 Day</p>
<p>0-1-0</p>
<p>(zero, one, zero)</p>
<p>Play3 Night</p>
<p>0-4-1</p>
<p>(zero, four, one)</p>
<p>Play4 Day</p>
<p>0-9-3-9</p>
<p>(zero, nine, three, nine)</p>
<p>Play4 Night</p>
<p>7-7-3-7</p>
<p>(seven, seven, three, seven)</p>
<p>Powerball</p>
<p>12-29-30-33-61, Powerball: 26, Power Play: 3</p>
<p>(twelve, twenty-nine, thirty, thirty-three, sixty-one; Powerball: twenty-six; Power Play: three)</p>
<p>Estimated jackpot: $570 million</p>
<p>ROCKY HILL, Conn. (AP) _ These Connecticut lotteries were drawn Saturday:</p>
<p>Cash 5</p>
<p>12-13-15-20-35</p>
<p>(twelve, thirteen, fifteen, twenty, thirty-five)</p>
<p>Lucky Links Day</p>
<p>04-09-13-15-18-19-21-22</p>
<p>(four, nine, thirteen, fifteen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty-one, twenty-two)</p>
<p>Lucky Links Night</p>
<p>03-04-08-09-10-13-17-18</p>
<p>(three, four, eight, nine, ten, thirteen, seventeen, eighteen)</p>
<p>Mega Millions</p>
<p>Estimated jackpot: $40 million</p>
<p>Play3 Day</p>
<p>0-1-0</p>
<p>(zero, one, zero)</p>
<p>Play3 Night</p>
<p>0-4-1</p>
<p>(zero, four, one)</p>
<p>Play4 Day</p>
<p>0-9-3-9</p>
<p>(zero, nine, three, nine)</p>
<p>Play4 Night</p>
<p>7-7-3-7</p>
<p>(seven, seven, three, seven)</p>
<p>Powerball</p>
<p>12-29-30-33-61, Powerball: 26, Power Play: 3</p>
<p>(twelve, twenty-nine, thirty, thirty-three, sixty-one; Powerball: twenty-six; Power Play: three)</p>
<p>Estimated jackpot: $570 million</p> | CT Lottery | false | https://apnews.com/0ec6f3f1c1734aacab3fc515b8983ee8 | 2018-01-07 | 2 |
<p>.......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... ..........</p>
<p />
<p>Sometimes we even use it to make a call.</p>
<p>The smartphone has revolutionized the way we connect, learn, document, work and play. An estimated 171.5 million Americans now own this “staple of everyday life,” according to Nielsen.</p>
<p>But our increasing reliance on smartphones also makes them a valuable tool for identity thieves or other crooks, who can steal information remotely or by physically swiping the device.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>“I think you have to treat your phone like your wallet,” said Rebecca Branch, deputy director of the consumer protection division at the New Mexico Attorney General’s Office. “They steal it, it’s like stealing your credit card. It’s stealing a lot of information.”</p>
<p>Experts say lessening vulnerability starts with awareness. You don’t have to be a Hollywood starlet or millionaire to attract problems.</p>
<p>“Cybercriminals aren’t targeting anybody,” said Jared Logan, former president and CEO of Sage Technology Partners, a New Mexico cybersecurity and IT firm. “They’re targeting everybody.”</p>
<p>(C. Cunningham/Albuquerque Journal)</p>
<p>Start simple</p>
<p>Smartphone users can take some basic measures to protect their devices.</p>
<p>Start by enabling the device’s lock screen, the most basic way to prevent strangers from easily gaining access to personal information. Getting past the screen requires users to enter a pass code, swipe pattern or fingerprint.</p>
<p>Logan says smartphone owners too often ignore this feature.</p>
<p>“If I can just pick up your phone and pick up where you left off, good for me if I’m a criminal,” he said. “Everyone should have some kind of security screen, security lock or access code that can prevent anyone else from picking it up and using it, especially if you’ve got apps connected to your bank or your Facebook or most of the things people are doing (on phones).”</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>Some experts also recommend installing an anti-virus or anti-malware app. Malware can “allow cybercriminals to intercept messages, monitor calls, steal personal information, and even listen in with the device’s microphone,” according to the consumer technology website CNET.</p>
<p>Among the two dominant smartphone operating systems, research has shown Android is a much larger target for malware than Apple’s iOS.</p>
<p>“There’s more malware today being coded and generated for Android operating systems than any other platform there is,” Logan said.</p>
<p>Beware of public Wi-Fi</p>
<p>Regularly hop onto the coffee shop’s free Wi-Fi to run some virtual errands before heading into the office every morning?</p>
<p>Well, stop. Right now.</p>
<p>Using public Wi-Fi is “like swimming in shark-infested water,” Logan said.</p>
<p>“If you want to give away your information, that’s the best way to do it,” he said.</p>
<p>Avoid it for any banking-related or financial transactions, or any task that involves information you want to protect.</p>
<p>Branch recommends checking phone settings to make sure it’s not set to automatically connect to any open networks.</p>
<p>“I hate to sound paranoid but, seriously, I don’t think people understand how risky (public Wi-Fi) is,” she said.</p>
<p>It’s not just that legitimate public Wi-Fi networks can be compromised.</p>
<p>John Floren, who works in cybersecurity at Sandia National Laboratories, said cyberthieves can establish hacked access points in venues where Wi-Fi might be expected, give them names that sound official and then sit back and intercept passwords and other private information.</p>
<p>To reduce the risk, “it’s better to just use your (phone’s) data plan than the public Wi-Fi,” Floren said.</p>
<p>Watch for bad apps</p>
<p>Before downloading a new application onto a smartphone, do a little research – especially for the more obscure apps.</p>
<p>Check ratings, read reviews and do an Internet search to see if any users have reported problems. Try to determine the legitimacy of the app’s creator.</p>
<p>Creators of malicious apps may try to lure victims with promises of programs that “appeal to our worst nature,” Floren said. The app may be advertised as a tool for spying or a way to make some quick cash after installation.</p>
<p>“Some of them are really just trying to trick you into installing them so they can steal whatever information they possibly can,” Floren said, adding that once they’ve been run on the phone, they already may have read emails, copied photos or done something else nefarious.</p>
<p>When it comes to apps in general – even the legitimate ones – experts recommend being stingy with permissions. Don’t give the apps access to any more information than they would need to operate.</p>
<p>“If you’re using Google Maps, they’ll need your location. Are they going to need that for Instagram? Maybe, maybe not,” said Nikki Junker, communications and media manager for the California-based Identity Theft Resource Center. “If you’re downloading Candy Crush, there’s absolutely no reason to have geolocation on there – or access to your phone list or address book or that type of thing.”</p>
<p>When it comes to guarding a smartphone, the old cybersecurity rules still apply. Among those on Logan’s checklist: Avoid pornographic websites and don’t open emails from strangers or messages that seem otherwise suspicious – even if they come from a friend.</p>
<p>Also take special care to protect email passwords. Email accounts tend to offer a great deal of insight into their owners – from where they bank to how they paid for their last online purchase.</p>
<p>To help guard them, Floren recommends using an extra level of authentication during the sign-in process, like Google’s “2-step verification” system for Gmail. In addition to a standard password, the system requires entering another code – which Google will generate and send to your phone, often by text message – to log into email.</p>
<p>Users can determine how often they want to require the second code. To make the process less cumbersome, users can set the system so that it only kicks in when someone tries to access the email account from a new computer or device.</p>
<p>As for passwords, remember to make them complex and change them often. Logan said that means using at least eight characters and a mix of lower- and upper-case letters, numbers and characters like dashes or asterisks.</p>
<p>Lost or stolen phone</p>
<p>Various features and applications allow smartphone owners to track down their device in the event it’s lost or stolen and, if necessary, remotely clear it.</p>
<p>The Find My iPhone app, for example, allows owners to pinpoint where the device is, lock the phone to anyone who doesn’t have a password and even remotely wipe it of personal content and settings. Android Device Manager offers similar protections.</p>
<p>“They’ll still have your phone, sure, but at least they won’t have your information,” Floren said.</p>
<p>Other programs can render the phone completely useless – like a brick – after multiple incorrect password attempts.</p>
<p>Given the amount of information smartphone thieves could be privy to, Branch said to alert the authorities as well as banks in the event of theft.</p>
<p>“If it’s stolen, file a police report. Notify your carrier and any financial institutions where you have accounts that may have been compromised,” she said.</p>
<p /> | Save your smartphone from hackers | false | https://abqjournal.com/465864/save-your-smartphone-from-hackers.html | 2 |
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<p />
<p>Recently, thirty-eight Vermont towns and villages voted to impeach George W. Bush. That led to <a href="http://www.paraeducator.info/doonesbury/" type="external">this</a> truly excellent series of Doonesbury cartoons. <a href="http://www.paraeducator.info/doonesbury/" type="external">Take a gander.</a></p>
<p>The impeachment drive <a href="http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070412/NEWS02/704120303/1007" type="external">got shut down</a> in the state legislature by a Democrat, leading to all sorts of <a href="http://www.vermontguardian.com/local/042007/ImpeachmentMeeting.shtml" type="external">intra-party fighting and tension</a>. Trouble brewing in the Green Mountain state!</p>
<p /> | Lighten Up Your Day with Impeachment Humor | true | https://motherjones.com/politics/2007/04/lighten-your-day-impeachment-humor/ | 2007-04-18 | 4 |
<p>Remember when Vice President Joe Biden stupidly told people to fend off intruders by <a href="http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2013/07/17/man-fires-shotgun-into-air-gets-arrested-cites-biden-s-advice-in-defense/" type="external">firing a shotgun into the air?</a> This is worse.</p>
<p>I’m not a lawyer or a gun owner but as I watched this for the first time, I couldn’t help but wonder how many laws the boy in the video was breaking.</p>
<p>Yehuda Remer of <a href="http://www.truthrevolt.org/news/new-anti-gun-psa-advocates-breaking-law" type="external">Truth Revolt</a> names a few:</p>
<p>New Anti-Gun PSA Advocates Breaking The Law</p>
<p>A new PSA created by director Rejina Sincic shows her irrational fear of firearms in a disturbing new video.</p>
<p>The video shows a boy stealing his mother’s handgun from her dresser, places it in a backpack, brings it to school, and at the end of class gives it to his teacher saying, “Can you take this away? I don’t feel safe with a gun in my house.”</p>
<p>Bearing Arms writes that the video is “advocating that teens commits multiple felonies—several of which could lead to injury or death through negligent discharge of the weapon.”</p>
<p>What Sincic fails to point out as she advocates for this kind of behavior is the multiple felonies that the boy breaks.</p>
<p>“[S]uch an act would result in the boy facing numerous felony charges (exact charges depend on state laws) possibly including weapons theft, unlawful possession of a weapon by a minor, illegal concealed carry of a weapon, carrying a weapon onto school property, assault, and brandishing,” writes Bearing Arms.</p>
<p>Watch it below:</p>
<p />
<p>It’s obvious that the people behind this video have no understanding of gun laws or safety protocols.</p>
<p />
<p>Charles C.W. Cooke of <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/395229/behold-worst-anti-gun-commercial-american-history-charles-c-w-cooke" type="external">National Review</a> offers more analysis:</p>
<p>One can only imagine that the spot’s producers consider their set up to be inordinately clever. “Hey,” you can almost hear them say, “we’ll make it look as if there’s going to be a school shooting, and then he’ll hand it over to his teacher and all will be well!” In fact, it is difficult to imagine a more irresponsible storyline…</p>
<p>Moreover, in the course of his little ploy, the kid breaks pretty much every law on the books. He takes a gun out of his house (not only is this felony burglary, but he’s not old enough to carry a firearm in public); he then takes that gun into a school (that’s against federal and state law); and, finally, he transfers it to a teacher without a background check, thereby breaking the very rule that progressives tell us is necessary to keep us all safe from gun violence. And for what, pray? Typically, anti-gun commercials focus in on a specific safety issue: a lack of trigger locks, or background checks, or safe-storage, for example. This one seems to feature a child who is saying, “I don’t want any guns in the house at all.” This absolute approach is extreme, even for today’s class of wildly incompetent control freaks.</p>
<p>You really have to marvel at the ignorance on display in the ad.</p>
<p>What were the makers thinking?</p>
<p>Featured image via <a href="http://youtu.be/VFOhBAH3zPA" type="external">YouTube.</a></p> | Watch the Worst Gun Control PSA Ever Made | true | http://legalinsurrection.com/2014/12/watch-the-worst-gun-control-psa-ever-made/ | 2014-12-23 | 0 |
<p>PRESS RELEASE</p>
<p>SACRAMENTO, CA – New legislation by Senator Anthony Cannella (R-Ceres) to simplify the process for removing a public official from office for willful or corrupt misconduct in office today received bipartisan support from the California Senate Standing Committee on Public Safety. The committee voted unanimously, 5-0, to advance the bill, SB 1357. Current law is unclear as to whether an accusation should be presented by a civil grand jury or a criminal grand jury. SB 1357 would remove ambiguity in the law and make the responsibility of presenting an accusation to a criminal grand jury.</p>
<p>“District attorneys should have a clear path to prosecute a corrupt public official. They should not have to worry about their case being thrown out because of a procedural error or wasting valuable time and money in the wrong court,” said Senator Cannella. “We must make it easier for district attorneys to do their jobs so those that violate our public trust are brought to justice.”</p>
<p>In the 1970s, appellate courts began dismissing rulings made by specially selected civil grand juries, deeming accusations to be criminal in nature. However, in 1993, the Attorney General opined that criminal grand juries could not handle civil matters. Thus, if an accusation was found to be a civil matter, the ruling from a criminal grand jury could be dismissed.</p>
<p>“I applaud Senator Cannella for taking on this important legislation. As a district attorney, it is frustrating to have the law unclear,” said Monterey County District Attorney Dean Flippo. “This bill will solve the problem now rather than risk years of litigation and expense to settle the issue through the courts.”</p>
<p>Following today’s Public Safety Committee vote, the bill will be scheduled for a hearing in the Senate Judiciary Committee.</p> | Legislation to Simplify Removing Corrupt Public Officials Receives Bipartisan Support | false | https://ivn.us/2012/03/27/legislation-to-simplify-removing-corrupt-public-officials-receives-bipartisan-support/ | 2012-03-27 | 2 |
<p />
<p>Introduction by Tom Engelhardt</p>
<p>See Spot run. See gas prices rise. See Dick dig for oil in Alaska. See well-heads and pipelines in Iraq burn. See Hummers hum down our highways. Hum, hum, hum. See George take on the Axis of Evil. See military bases being built across the oil-lands of the Earth. See the neocons covet Iran. Covet, covet, covet. See the public look away. See an energy crunch loom. See energy terrorism grow. See…</p>
<p>Okay, it could be a First Reader, but sadly it’s not. We seem to be living in a First-Reader, energy-dream sort of world while the actual world is spinning around ever more complexly, ever more confoundingly, ever more nightmarishly. In early 2001, especially if you lived in California, it looked like the ultimate energy crisis was upon us. Instead, upon Western America was the ultimate rip-off corporation, Enron, doing their best to make the lights dim. As Michael Klare indicates below, with a little luck the Bush administration made it through that energy crisis relatively unscathed. The second time around they may not be so lucky.</p>
<p>Klare, long our leading expert on resource scarcity and resource wars, is the author of the definitive book <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0805073132/nationbooks08" type="external">Blood and Oil: The Dangers and Consequences of America’s Growing Petroleum Dependency</a>, a must-have text for the four years to come. Now, he offers us all a peek at the Bush administration’s next energy crisis, one that’s likely to turn Karl Marx’s famous comment, “History repeats itself, first as tragedy, second as farce” on its head. For the Bush administration, farce came first; it’s tragedy that’s like to be upon us now.</p>
<p />
<p>By Michael Klare</p>
<p>When George W. Bush entered the White House in early 2001, the nation was suffering from a severe “energy crisis” brought on by high gasoline prices, regional shortages of natural gas, and rolling blackouts in California. Most notable was the artificial scarcity of natural gas orchestrated by the Enron Corporation in its rapacious drive for mammoth profits. In response, the President promised to make energy modernization one of his top concerns. However, aside from proposing the initiation of oil drilling in Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, he did little to ameliorate the country’s energy woes during his first four years in office. Luckily for him, the energy situation improved slightly as a national economic slowdown depressed demand, leading to a temporary decline in gasoline prices. But now, as Bush approaches his second term in office, another energy crisis looms on the horizon — one not likely to dissipate of its own accord.</p>
<p>The onset of this new energy crisis was first signaled in January 2004, when Royal Dutch/Shell — one of the world’s leading energy firms – revealed that it had overstated its oil and natural gas reserves by about 20%, the net equivalent of 3.9 billion barrels of oil or the total annual consumption of China and Japan combined. Another indication of crisis came only one month later, when the New York Times revealed that prominent American energy analysts now believe Saudi Arabia, the world’s largest oil producer, had exaggerated its future oil production capacity and could soon be facing the wholesale exhaustion of some of its most prolific older fields. Although officials at the U.S. Department of Energy (DoE) insisted that these developments did not foreshadow a near-term contraction in the global supply of energy, warnings increased from energy experts of the imminent arrival of “peak” oil — the point at which the world’s known petroleum fields will attain their highest sustainable yield and commence a long, irreversible decline.</p>
<p>How imminent that peak-oil moment may in fact be has generated considerable debate and disagreement within the specialist community, and the topic has begun to seep into public consciousness. A number of books on peak oil — Out of Gas by David Goodstein, The End of Oil by Paul Roberts, and The Party’s Over by Richard Heinberg, among others — have appeared in recent months, and a related documentary film, The End of Suburbia, has gained a broad underground audience. As if to acknowledge the seriousness of this debate, the Wall Street Journal reported in September that evidence of a global slowdown in petroleum output can no longer be ignored. While no one can say with certainty that recent developments portend the imminent arrival of peak oil output, there can be no question that global supply shortages will prove increasingly common in the future.</p>
<p>Nor is the evidence of a slowdown in oil output the only sign of an unfolding energy crisis. Of no less significance is the dramatic increase in energy demand from newly-industrialized nations — especially China. As recently as 1990, the older industrialized countries (including the former Soviet Union) accounted for approximately three-quarters of total worldwide oil consumption. But the consumption of petroleum in developing nations is growing so rapidly — at three times the rate for developed countries — that it is soon expected to draw even.</p>
<p>To meet the needs of their older customers and satisfy the rising demand from the developing world, the major oil producers will have to boost production at breakneck speed. According to the DoE, total world petroleum output will have to grow by approximately 44 million barrels per day between now and 2025 — an increase of 57% — to satisfy anticipated world demand. This increase represents a prodigious amount of oil, the equivalent to total world consumption in 1970, and it is very difficult to imagine where it will all come from (especially given indications of a global slowdown in daily output). If, as appears likely, the world’s energy firms prove incapable of satisfying higher levels of international demand, the competition among major consumers for access to the remaining supplies will grow increasingly more severe and stressful.</p>
<p>To further complicate matters, many of the countries the Bush administration considers potential suppliers of additional petroleum, including Angola, Azerbaijan, Colombia, Equatorial Guinea, Iran, Iraq, Kazakhstan, Nigeria, Saudi Arabia, and Venezuela, are torn by ethnic and religious conflict or are buffeted by powerful anti-American currents. Even if these countries possess sufficient untapped reserves to sustain an increase in output, as long as they remain chronically unstable, the desired increases are unlikely to appear. After all, any significant increase in day-to-day energy output requires substantial investment in new infrastructure — investment that is not likely to materialize in countries suffering from perpetual disorder. At best, production in such countries will remain flat or rise sluggishly; at worst, as in Iraq today, it may even threaten to fall. Indeed, the persistence of political turmoil in countries like Angola, Colombia, Iraq, Nigeria, and Venezuela has largely been responsible for the higher gasoline prices still evident, despite recent modest decreases, at the neighborhood pump.</p>
<p>If anything, the potential for conflict in such countries is likely to grow as demand for their petroleum rises. The reason is simple. Increased petroleum output in otherwise impoverished nations tends to widen the gap between haves and have-nots — a divide that often falls along ethnic and religious lines — and to sharpen internal political struggles over the distribution of oil revenues. Because the wealth generated by oil production is so vast, and because few incumbent leaders are willing to abandon their positions of privilege, internal struggles of this sort are prone to trigger violent clashes between competing claimants to national power.</p>
<p>In many cases, these clashes may take the form of attacks on the oil infrastructure itself, further jeopardizing the global availability of energy. As shown in Colombia and Iraq, where raids on oil pipelines and pumping stations have become a near-daily occurrence, such infrastructure — stretched out over miles and miles of jungle or desert — represents an unusually vulnerable and inviting target for terrorism. Not only do such attacks deprive the prevailing regime of vital revenues, but they also constitute an assault on the United States and the large multinational corporations that are deemed responsible for so many of the developing world’s afflictions.</p>
<p>With oil demand regularly outpacing supply and disorder spreading in major producing areas, global shortages and resulting high prices are likely to become the norm, not the exception. Ideally, the United States could compensate for any shortfalls in the global availability of petroleum by increasing its reliance on other sources of energy. When producing electricity, for example, it is often possible to switch from coal to natural gas and back again. But most of our petroleum supplies are used in transportation — mainly to power cars, trucks, buses, and planes — and, for this purpose, oil has no readily available substitutes. Indeed, we have so organized our economy and society around the availability of cheap and abundant petroleum that we are severely ill-equipped to deal with the sort of shortages and supply disruptions that are likely to become the norm in the years ahead.</p>
<p>It is here that the performance of the Bush administration should come in for close scrutiny. In response to the earlier energy crisis of 2001, the President appointed a National Energy Policy Development Group (NEPDG), headed by Vice President Dick Cheney, to analyze America’s energy predicament and devise appropriate solutions. The NEPDG issued its final report, the National Energy Policy (also known as the Cheney Report), in May, 2001. How the group arrived at its final assessment is a matter of some speculation, as the administration has refused to make its deliberations public, but its conclusions are incontrovertible: rather than stress conservation and the rapid development of renewable energy sources, the report called for increased U.S. reliance on petroleum. And because domestic oil production is in an irreversible decline, any rise in American oil usage necessarily entails an increased reliance on imported petroleum.</p>
<p>In a crude attempt to mislead the public about the nature of our oil dependency, the Cheney Report called for increasing U.S. energy “independence” by exploiting the untapped oil reserves of Alaska’s Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) and other protected wilderness areas. But ANWR only possesses sufficient petroleum to provide this country with (at most) 1 million barrels per day for an estimated 15-20 years, a tiny fraction of the 20 million barrels of additional oil that will be needed to supplement domestic output in 2025. What this suggests is that the overwhelming bulk of this additional energy will have to be acquired from foreign sources. To obtain all this imported energy, the Cheney Report calls on the President and his chief associates to place a high priority on acquiring additional petroleum from producers in the Persian Gulf, the Caspian Sea basin, Africa, and Latin America — that is, from regions especially susceptible to instability and anti-Americanism.</p>
<p>As a result, we are more dependent on foreign oil in 2004 than we were in 2001, and all the indicators suggest that this dependency will only become more pronounced during Bush’s second term. Yes, the administration has proposed modest investment in the development of hydrogen-powered fuel cells and other new energy systems; but, at current rates of development, these new technologies will not prove capable of substituting for oil on a significant scale during the next few decades. This means that we will face our looming energy crisis with no viable fallback measures in sight. We remain trapped in our dependence on imported oil. In the long run, the only conceivable result of this will be sustained crisis and deprivation.</p>
<p>When, and in just what form, the United States enters the coming energy crisis cannot be foreseen. Perhaps it will be provoked by a coup d’état in Nigeria, a civil war in Venezuela, or a feud among senior princes in the Saudi royal family (possibly brought on by the impending death of King Fahd). Or it could be thanks to a major act of terrorism or a catastrophic climate event. Whatever the case, our existing energy system, already stretched to its limits, will not be able to absorb a major blow like this without considerable readjustment and pain — or worse. While President Bush is likely to respond to a new energy crisis, as he has in the past, with renewed calls for drilling in ANWR and the further relaxation of U.S. environmental standards, nothing he has proposed to date even suggests a viable exit strategy from perpetual crisis.</p>
<p>Copyright C2004 Michael Klare</p>
<p>Michael Klare is a professor of peace and world security studies at Hampshire College in Amherst, Mass., and the author, most recently, of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0805073132/nationbooks08" type="external">Blood and Oil: The Dangers and Consequences of America’s Growing Petroleum Dependency</a> ( <a href="http://www.americanempireproject.com/" type="external">The American Empire Project</a>, Metropolitan Books).</p>
<p>This piece first appeared at <a href="http://www.tomdispatch.com" type="external">Tomdispatch.com.</a></p>
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<p /> | No Escape from Dependency | true | https://motherjones.com/politics/2004/12/no-escape-dependency/ | 2004-12-08 | 4 |
<p>When Vice President Joe Biden <a href="" type="internal">appeared on The Late Show with Stephen Colbert</a>, he did something few people do in politics today: he showed his soul. Politicians are known for being stone cold, and most times when we see an elected official show emotion it’s when they publicly flip out like a member of the Real Housewives cast. In just twenty minutes&#160;we saw&#160;the reality of who Joe Biden truly is: a loving and caring father, grandfather, and husband. He even went so far to acknowledge&#160;humanity isn’t something politicians usually do when he told Colbert, “I shouldn’t be saying this.”</p>
<p>When the chips are down you see who a person truly is, and in the last several months since the tragic death of the Vice President’s son, we have all seen his heart, his soul, and his humanity. Here are all of those things wrapped into 10 gifs that will remind you why you love Joe Biden:</p>
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<p>There are certainly a lot of jokes about the office of the Vice President, but, as Biden reminded us, the office is only as useful as the President allows for it to be. President Obama has leaned on the VP for foreign policy expertise, to rally the labor community and working Americans, and the Vice President has an uncanny ability to keep our spirits up. But, <a href="https://www.facebook.com/MotivationalBiden/photos/pb.572035449524438.-2207520000.1442842146./609250175802965/?type=3" type="external">as the meme reminds us</a>, Joe Biden is the only American Vice President in over a decade who hasn’t shot another person in the face. Progress, folks. Progress.</p>
<p>Gifs/Featured image courtesy of <a href="https://twitter.com/draftbiden" type="external">Draft Biden Twitter</a>&#160;photo via YouTube.</p> | The 10 Moments That Made Us Love Joe Biden On Colbert | true | http://addictinginfo.org/2015/09/21/the-10-moments-that-made-us-love-joe-biden-on-colbert/ | 2015-09-21 | 4 |
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<p>In the free 11-week course, participants “learn everything from A to Z about how a fire department operates,” said Sandoval County Fire Chief James Maxon. Participants must be at least 18 years old and live anywhere in Sandoval County.</p>
<p>“It’s the first one in this area that I know of,” Maxon said. “… And it’s aimed at showing citizens what we do.”</p>
<p>Anyone interested must fill out the application and liability release forms at sandovalfire.org and turn them in by Aug. 25. They also must submit to a background check.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>The limit is 15 people.</p>
<p>The course meets 7-9:30 p.m. on Wednesdays starting Sept. 10 until the final session from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, Nov. 15, all at Fire Station 21 on Tamaya Road, west of Santa Ana Star Casino.</p>
<p>Topics include:</p>
<p>• Sandoval County Fire Department history.</p>
<p>• Community risk reduction, inspections and fire investigations.</p>
<p>• Dispatch and the emergency operations center.</p>
<p>• Hands-only CPR.</p>
<p>• Self-contained breathing apparatus.</p>
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<p>• Search and rescue.</p>
<p>• Heavy rescue.</p>
<p>• Hazardous materials.</p>
<p>• Vehicle extrication.</p>
<p>• Fire extinguisher training.</p>
<p>• A demonstration of extinguishing a propane fire.</p>
<p>“The program will enhance awareness of the department’s capabilities and limitations, develop realistic expectations of response times from point of dispatch, develop cooperative relationships between firefighters and the citizens of Sandoval County, and encourage participants to become more aware of the dangers of fire and benefits of fire prevention,” according to the department’s website.</p>
<p>The department command staff is slated to teach.</p>
<p>Maxon said classroom and hands-on activities would make up the course. Participants will be able to handle extrication equipment and try on firefighting bunker gear, for example.</p>
<p>If people have medical conditions, they can still attend, Maxon said. They just might not be able to take part in every activity.</p>
<p>The course came about because of Maxon’s desire to show residents what the fire department does for their safety.</p>
<p>“It’s actually something I’ve been wanting to do for quite a long time,” he said.</p>
<p>Maxon said the class is ideal for someone who is interested in a fire services career but wants to know more first, or someone who’s retired and looking for a second career. Participants will also be eligible to train to become volunteer firefighters or volunteer non-emergency support staff after completing the course.</p>
<p>“I think most of all, we know that this will be a lot of fun for people and very rewarding,” Maxon said.</p>
<p>Applications should be hand-delivered to the administration office at 314 Melissa Road in Bernalillo or mailed to Sandoval County Fire Department, PO Box 40, Bernalillo, NM 87004.</p>
<p>For more information, call the department administration office at 867-0245 between 8 a.m. and 5 p.m. Monday through Friday.</p>
<p>James Maxon</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | Free course teaches laymen ins and outs of fire services | false | https://abqjournal.com/441673/free-course-teaches-laymen-ins-and-outs-of-fire-services.html | 2 |
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<p><a href="/profile/profile.asp?user=95868" type="external">By Scott Libin</a></p>
<p>For as many mistakes as bosses make, you'd think they'd be better at saying they're sorry. Somehow, this skill eludes so many people who have authority in the workplace.</p>
<p>That's a shame, because an effective apology can be a powerful thing, as Jill Geisler explained <a href="/column.asp?id=34&amp;aid=43808" type="external">in this space a couple of years ago</a>. Still, participants in Poynter leadership seminars often discover their own lack of expertise in apologizing can greatly limit their influence.</p>
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<p>One such discussion over the summer helped me see more clearly some of the specific disorders that can afflict apology and drain even a well-intended effort of almost all impact.</p>
<p>There's the drive-by apology, a close cousin of the drive-by compliment. That's the classic "good job" comment delivered in passing that's usually as lacking in sincerity as it is in specifics. Recipients of drive-by compliments often suspect that the editors and managers who offer them haven't actually even read, heard or seen the stories they are praising. Worse yet, those who receive drive-by compliments have to guess what it was the boss liked. For these and other reasons, drive-by compliments can do more harm than good.</p>
<p>The drive-by apology works in much the same way: It's delivered on the fly, involves little actual effort and can be over before the recipient fully realizes it's even happening. Often, the drive-by apology is shorter than the title I've given it: "Sorry!" is sometimes the full text. You're lucky if there's an "I'm" attached. This is appropriate when you accidentally jostle someone while not watching where you're walking. It's a lousy way to express remorse that goes any deeper. Generally speaking, the amount of time spent delivering an apology ought to have some relationship to the amount of thought that went into it. Two or three syllables spat out in a split second make it seem the speaker is trying to get a distasteful task over with as quickly as possible, just to put it behind him.</p>
<p>That get-it-over-with approach also underlies the preemptive strike apology. This popular but ineffective form of damage control seeks to get out in front of the situation by apologizing before anybody even has time to assess the full extent of the offense. Actually, that's often the point: The sooner I say I'm sorry, the sooner I can become indignant if you refuse to move on, put the past behind us, look to the future, etc. This is especially handy if what I'm apologizing for is just the tip of the iceberg, and I'd prefer you not look any more deeply into what might lie beneath.</p>
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<p>Listen for this form of apology from public officials who don't want to "dwell on," "drag out" or "beat to death" a situation, as they will tell you journalists are so fond of doing. It's often an indication that your reporting should be just beginning.</p>
<p>Then there's the limited-time-only offer of apology. It is a highly contingent, immediately revocable way to say you're sorry. Its real point is what goes unsaid: the strong invitation for the other party to reciprocate with an apology of her own. Though unspoken, this demand for a response often takes laughably obvious non-verbal form –- raised eyebrows, a tilt of the head, an obvious pause… And should the recipient of a limited-time-only offer fail to seize the opportunity -– well, then, forget it! I said I was sorry. The least you can do is say the same. I have now wrestled aggrieved status away from you, and in the process, I hope, shifted attention away from what I did in the first place to what you have done since then. Or failed to do. So there.</p>
<p>To put it in the parlance of the real estate boom: The limited-time-only offer is the interest-only loan of apologies. It doesn't really require any investment, just an easy installment to get started. There's no actual equity involved.</p>
<p>Almost all of us have encountered one particularly pathogenic apology: the condescension concession, which concedes nothing on the part of the speaker, but saddles the recipient with responsibility for being harmed:</p>
<p>"I'm sorry if you took offense at what I said (or did)."</p>
<p>Now, doesn't that make you feel better? Of course not. A milder form of this disorder manifests itself in variations like, "I'm sorry if I said (or did) something that offended you." At least that takes a tiny bit of ownership of what went wrong, while still implying that the real problem belongs to the other person. The condescension concession is just a slightly gentler way of saying, "Too bad you're so unreasonably sensitive."</p>
<p>Following the phrase "I'm sorry" with an immediate "if" sucks almost all the life out of the expression of regret. Following the phrase "I'm sorry" with the word "but" absolutely annihilates the apology –- and then some. As my Poynter colleague Al Tompkins likes to say, the word "but" can bulk-erase the words that precede it.</p>
<p>That's why the big sorry "but" form of apology is actually no apology at all. Think about the last time you heard someone begin a sentence with the clause, "I'm sorry, but" -– as in, "I'm sorry, but that's not news." Was the person really sorry? I doubt it. In my experience, "I'm sorry, but" almost always is another way of saying, "Never mind what anybody else thinks; I'll have the last word here."</p>
<p>Finally, let us not forget the passive apology, another accountability-free option available to those who want to smooth things over without truly taking any ownership: "Mistakes were made," is the classic case, eternally popular with politicians. At least it's concise. The passive apology takes no responsibility, but neither does it aggressively place blame -- "if feelings were hurt" or "if damage was done."</p>
<p>Two classic examples -- one from the White House, and one from The Washington Post:</p>
<p>Appearing Sept. 15 on ABC's "Good Morning America," Dan Bartlett, counselor to the president, talked to Charlie Gibson about the federal response to Hurricane Katrina. Bartlett acknowledged that the president was well aware "things could have been done differently."</p>
<p>The Washington Post explained on its front page Sept. 12 why two pages of paid obituaries had been missing from Sunday's newspaper: "A robust week of sales by the advertising department... led to two more pages than the production staff had expected," and -- note the following shift to passive voice -- "the decision was made that death notices could run later in the week."</p>
<p>We have 1970's sappy "Love Story" to blame for the notion that "love means never having to say you're sorry." I'm not sure whom to blame for the pathology of apology.</p>
<p>I just know it's not me, and I'm sorry, but that's the last word.</p> | The Pathology of Apology | false | https://poynter.org/news/pathology-apology | 2005-09-12 | 2 |
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<p>Police say two women suicide bombers killed 12 people at two prayer grounds in Damaturu on Friday morning as people were preparing to celebrate the end of Ramadan, the Muslim holy month of fasting.</p>
<p>Hours earlier two bombs killed 50 people buying goods for the holiday at the market in Gombe, according to National Emergency Management Agency spokesman Sani Datti. Another 75 wounded are being treated in two hospitals there, he said.</p>
<p>The blasts are blamed on Nigeria's home-grown Boko Haram Islamic extremist group which has launched a string of attacks that have killed hundreds during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which ended Friday.</p>
<p>The upsurge in attacks followed a directive to create more mayhem during Ramadan from the Islamic State group, to which Boko Haram has sworn allegiance. It also followed the May 29 inauguration of President Muhammadu Buhari, who has sworn to defeat the insurgents.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>Nigeria's new army chief, Maj. Gen. Tukur Buratai, was in Damaturu on a visit to boost troops' morale Friday and prayed at the town's Central Mosque. He was appointed last week when Buhari fired the entire top echelon of the military that he has accused of corruption that prevents what was once Africa's mightiest armed force from curbing the insurgency centered in Nigeria's northeast.</p>
<p>Recent attacks also have included the cities of Jos, Kano and Zaria.</p>
<p /> | Suicide bombs kill 64 in Nigeria on holiday | false | https://abqjournal.com/614521/suicide-bombs-kill-64-in-nigeria-on-holiday.html | 2 |
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<p>CNM’s board is made of seven seats, five of which are up for election.</p>
<p>Michael DeWitte, the current chairman of the board, is not running for re-election following eight years on the board, he said Tuesday.</p>
<p>Michael Glennon, 68, of Albuquerque, and Harold Murphree, 65, of Sandia Park, filed their intent to run for DeWitte’s seat in District 7, an area that includes eastern fringes of Albuquerque and the Joseph M. Montoya campus.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>Glennon served as the president of CNM from 1997 to 2000. Murphree is retired from the armed services and served as an assistant professor of political sciences at the U.S. Air Force Academy.</p>
<p>Pauline J. Garcia, 68, of Albuquerque, a former CNM and Albuquerque Public Schools Board of Education member, is seeking re-election in District 1, an area that includes the West Side campus.</p>
<p>Robert Chavez, 57, of Albuquerque, a retired Albuquerque Police Department lieutenant and current APS employee, also is running for the seat.</p>
<p>Board member Thomas Swisstack, 70, of Rio Rancho, is a former mayor of Rio Rancho and a state lawmaker. He is seeking re-election in District 3, which includes the Rio Rancho campus. He is running unopposed.</p>
<p>Annette Chavez y De la Cruz, 57, of Albuquerque, a former director of the CNM’s South Valley campus who also has held other positions at the school, is running in District 4, a swath of land that includes the South Valley campus. Melissa Armijo, 49, who works at the University of New Mexico, currently holds that seat and is running for re-election.</p>
<p>Nancy Baca, 56, of Albuquerque, a residential property manager and a former journalist who worked in the Albuquerque area, is seeking re-election in District 5, an area that covers much of central Albuquerque and includes the CNM main campus.</p>
<p>She will face Gina Naomi Dennis, of Albuquerque, who the Journal could not reach Tuesday night.</p>
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<p /> | CNM board candidates file papers | false | https://abqjournal.com/913236/cnm-board-candidates-file-papers.html | 2 |
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<p>Companies work hard to get you in the door, but the wooing doesn't stop once you hand over your money. Companies work really hard to get you to come back again and again. You could even say that companies want to get you addicted to their products and services. Starbucks (NASDAQ: SBUX), Alphabet's (NASDAQ: GOOG) (NASDAQ: GOOGL) Google, Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN), and Chipotle (NYSE: CMG) are examples of brands that want to create and feed an addiction.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>It doesn't hurt Starbucks' business that it is selling an addictive substance. But there are many places you can get your <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/04/19/can-you-guess-which-coffee-chain-has-the-most-loya.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">morning coffee Opens a New Window.</a> or <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/09/13/cold-coffee-battle-heats-up-for-starbucks-dunkin-a.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">iced beverage Opens a New Window.</a>, as this cup-of-joe company knows. And that's why it's important to know that Starbucks' mission&#160;is more about creating a welcoming environment than selling coffee. In the company's words, it aims to "inspire and nurture the human spirit -- one person, one cup, and one neighborhood at a time."</p>
<p>Starbucks gets customers to come back by creating a great experience in the store. A friendly greeting, the cashier writing your name on your cup, an employee remembering a regular's order. It's all part of giving customers a feeling of being welcomed. The company has a <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/general/2016/02/26/heres-how-starbucks-corporation-is-changing-its-lo.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">loyalty program Opens a New Window.</a> that gives customers a free drink after $62.50 in purchases. Users of the Starbucks app can easily find a location, <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/05/03/heres-how-starbucks-is-solving-its-biggest-problem.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">order digitally Opens a New Window.</a>, and skip the line. The app also allows personalized marketing based on what you've bought. With same-store <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/07/26/the-market-is-hyper-focused-on-this-1-thing-from-s.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">sales slipping Opens a New Window.</a> in recent quarters, look for the company to double down on ways to get you to be a repeat customer. It's even <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/10/04/why-did-starbucks-shut-down-its-online-store.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">shut down Opens a New Window.</a> its online store as part of bring people back into its locations.</p>
<p>Google was not the first web search company, but it emerged as the market-share leader by making search easier and more valuable for its users. Many noticed Google was different from day one, when the company's search screen was neat and clean, with a single box in the middle of the screen to type in search text. This was in stark contrast to most other search company screens at the time, which were filled with all sorts of links and other distractions.</p>
<p>Google's focus on the user experience with search has been paramount to its growth, but the company has expanded its reach with a set of products that integrate really well. For example, when I search in Google Maps, it shows the hotel where I have an upcoming reservation based on an email found in my Gmail. Add to that that the company is constantly learning from the data provided by its <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/09/14/3-stocks-to-buy-and-hold-for-100-years.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">1 billion active users Opens a New Window.</a>, and it's no wonder that people come back to Google. It's almost addicting.</p>
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<p>Amazon's <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/09/29/amazoncom-is-20-years-old-but-still-an-infant.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">20-year-plus history Opens a New Window.</a>, from starting as an online bookstore to becoming the first place you go for online shopping, has been fueled by its obsession with the customer. The company has constantly been improving the customer experience with innovations such as customer reviews, one-click ordering, and two-day Prime delivery. These features are all commonplace (and expected) now, but when they were introduced, they were revolutionary for the online ordering experience.</p>
<p>I admit that I'm addicted to Amazon because of the time it saves me: I can search on my laptop or phone for an item I want, quickly compare prices and features, and place the order in less time than it would take me to find my keys and walk to my car.</p>
<p>Lastly, the reliable Prime delivery experience of two-day (or quicker) shipping keeps customers coming back. Amazon is estimated to have grown its <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/04/26/how-many-americans-are-amazon-prime-members.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">Prime membership base 38% Opens a New Window.</a> over last year, and these members spend twice as much on Amazon.com as non-Prime members.</p>
<p>Chipotle invented the concept now known as "fast-casual": great food, served quickly, at a reasonable price. For most of the <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/08/01/chipotle-history-everything-investors-need-to-know.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">company's history Opens a New Window.</a>, it could do no wrong. Often, people would wait in lines out the door to get a burrito. But that all stopped thanks to a rash of foodborne illnesses in 2015. The company's reputation was tarnished, customers left, and the company still hasn't <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/02/09/the-1-metric-chipotle-investors-should-be-looking.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">gotten back Opens a New Window.</a> to sales levels from before the incidents.</p>
<p>Chipotle desperately wants its customers to come back, and is pushing for that on a number of fronts. The company is spending significant amounts on <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/06/20/chipotles-turnaround-is-getting-expensive.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">marketing Opens a New Window.</a>, tried a temporary <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2016/07/10/mild-medium-hot-chipotle-targets-repeat-customers.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">loyalty program Opens a New Window.</a>, improved its <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/05/30/chipotle-is-betting-on-digital.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">digital capabilities Opens a New Window.</a>, and introduced <a href="https://www.fool.com/investing/2017/07/14/can-queso-dip-save-chipotle.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">queso Opens a New Window.</a>. Chipotle is trying hard to get people to remember how addictive its food can be.</p>
<p>10 stocks we like better than Alphabet (A shares)When investing geniuses David and Tom Gardner have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the newsletter they have run for over a decade, Motley Fool Stock Advisor, has tripled the market.*</p>
<p>David and Tom just revealed what they believe are the <a href="http://infotron.fool.com/infotrack/click?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.fool.com%2Fmms%2Fmark%2Fe-foolcom-sa-bbn-static%3Faid%3D8867%26source%3Disaeditxt0010449%26ftm_cam%3Dsa-bbn-evergreen%26ftm_pit%3D6312%26ftm_veh%3Dbbn_article_pitch&amp;impression=bb8f3e6e-3a09-487f-96eb-aa202e0c8b35&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">10 best stocks Opens a New Window.</a> for investors to buy right now... and Alphabet (A shares) wasn't one of them! That's right -- they think these 10 stocks are even better buys.</p>
<p><a href="http://infotron.fool.com/infotrack/click?url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.fool.com%2Fmms%2Fmark%2Fe-foolcom-sa-bbn-static%3Faid%3D8867%26source%3Disaeditxt0010449%26ftm_cam%3Dsa-bbn-evergreen%26ftm_pit%3D6312%26ftm_veh%3Dbbn_article_pitch&amp;impression=bb8f3e6e-3a09-487f-96eb-aa202e0c8b35&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">Click here Opens a New Window.</a> to learn about these picks!</p>
<p>*Stock Advisor returns as of September 5, 2017</p>
<p>Suzanne Frey, an executive at Alphabet, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. <a href="http://my.fool.com/profile/TMFBwithbike/info.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">Brian Withers Opens a New Window.</a> owns shares of Alphabet (A shares), Alphabet (C shares), Amazon, Chipotle Mexican Grill, and Starbucks. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Alphabet (A shares), Alphabet (C shares), Amazon, Chipotle Mexican Grill, and Starbucks. The Motley Fool has a <a href="http://www.fool.com/Legal/fool-disclosure-policy.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;uuid=a3d47d7c-a18a-11e7-ab1d-0050569d4be0&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">disclosure policy Opens a New Window.</a>.</p> | These 4 Companies Want to Feed Your Addiction | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2017/10/09/these-4-companies-want-to-feed-your-addiction.html | 2017-10-09 | 0 |
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<p>It’s now up to the Albuquerque city clerk’s office to check whether enough of the signatures are from valid registered voters. Supporters need 12,091 signatures to force the city to hold an election on the proposed ordinance.</p>
<p>Activists want the proposal on the Oct. 8 city ballot, when the mayor and six City Council seats are already going before voters.</p>
<p>The group turned in its latest batch of signatures to the clerk Thursday afternoon.</p>
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<p>“We’re completely blown away by the response of the community,” spokeswoman Tara Shaver told reporters.</p>
<p>Marcella Melendez of the Catholic Coalition of New Mexico said the number of signatures gathered so quickly makes “a big statement” about public support for the measure.</p>
<p>Earlier in the day, the American Civil Liberties Union of New mexico denounced the measure and said it would be struck down by the courts if passed.</p>
<p>“The extremely personal decision whether to have a safe, legal abortion belongs between a woman and her doctor,” said Alexandra Freedman Smith, staff attorney for the ACLU of New Mexico. “This organized effort is all about ignoring the personal circumstances of women and putting the government in the exam room where it doesn’t belong.”</p>
<p>The Southwest Women’s Law Center also criticized the proposal.</p>
<p>“The out-of-state organizations behind this ballot measure are out of touch with New Mexico,” said Pamelya Herndon, the center’s executive director.</p>
<p>City Councilor Trudy Jones, meanwhile, sent a letter to state Attorney General Gary King asking him whether the proposal would be “legally enforceable” if passed.</p>
<p>Shaver said she’s confident the ordinance would survive a court challenge.</p>
<p>More: <a href="" type="internal">— 20-week abortion ban may make ballot</a></p> | Activists claim 27,000 signatures for abortion ballot measure | false | https://abqjournal.com/225680/activists-claim-27000-signatures-for-abortion-ballot-measure.html | 2013-07-25 | 2 |
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<p>NEW YORK — Strong third-quarter results have sent Google’s stock past the $1,000 mark for the first time.</p>
<p>Shortly after the markets opened Friday, Google Inc. shares jumped more than 12 percent to $1,007.40 in heavy trading before edging back down to $1,000 later in the morning.</p>
<p>The stock, which closed at 1,011.41, had never been higher than $928 in regular market trading since Google went public at $85 per share nine years ago.</p>
<p>Late Thursday, Google reported a 36 percent jump in third-quarter net income that beat Wall Street’s predictions. The numbers showed that while the company’s average ad prices continue to decline, they’re being offset by a larger number of people clicking on ads.</p>
<p>Over the years, Google has expanded its reach far beyond the powerful search engine that made it famous. It now includes the video sharing site YouTube, along with the Android operating system that runs on close to 1 billion smartphones and tablets. The company ranks as the No. 1 digital ad company by revenue, leaving rivals such as Yahoo Inc. and Facebook Inc. far behind.</p>
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<p>Google’s stock has climbed steadily in the last five years, more than doubling in value. But the stock slipped slightly in recent months, while the overall market has risen, amid worries about deteriorating ad prices.</p>
<p>Google’s average ad price has fallen from the prior year in each of the last eight quarters, primarily because advertisers aren’t paying as much for mobile ads because the screens on smartphones and tablet computers are smaller than those on laptop and desktop computers.</p>
<p>As more people rely on mobile devices to connect to Google’s search engine and other services, the trend is driving down the company’s average ad price, or “cost per click.”</p>
<p>But the number of so-called “paid clicks” on Google’s ads helped offset the lower prices in the third quarter. The clicking volume increased 26 percent from last year, an indication that Google’s data analysis is doing a good job matching ads with the interests of its services’ users.</p>
<p>Friday’s stock surge takes Google’s market capitalization to about $333 billion, which still pales in comparison to that of technology industry rival Apple Inc. The iPhone and iPad maker ranks No. 1 in the world with a market capitalization of $462 billion.</p> | Google stock crosses $1,000 mark after earnings | false | https://abqjournal.com/283901/google-stock-crosses-1000-mark-after-earnings.html | 2013-10-18 | 2 |
<p>Shares of retailers and other consumer-services companies were flat after a mixed batch of earnings. Shares of department store Macy's rose after it reported quarterly profit in excess of most investors' expectations. Rival department store Kohl's saw its shares tumble after quarterly profit lagged Wall Street targets. Shares of British luxury clothier Burberry Group slid after it said it doesn't expect sales growth until fiscal 2021, despite a rebound in earnings in the latest quarter thanks to Chinese demand. Mattel shares rose after investor Mario Gabelli said he was a buyer of the toy maker's shares, saying recent declines had given it a compelling valuation. A rally in shares of casino operator MGM Resorts in the wake of its earnings was warranted, according to one brokerage. "The upside in the third quarter suggests a market that was in much better shape going into the quarter than many investors were expecting," said analysts at brokerage Nomura Securities, in a research note. Shares of D.R. Horton, the largest U.S. home builder by volume, rose after it posted better-than-expected earnings in its latest quarter.</p>
<p>-Rob Curran, [email protected]</p>
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<p>(END) Dow Jones Newswires</p>
<p>November 09, 2017 16:22 ET (21:22 GMT)</p> | Consumer Company Shares Flat on Mixed Earnings - Consumer Roundup | true | http://foxbusiness.com/features/2017/11/09/consumer-company-shares-flat-on-mixed-earnings-consumer-roundup.html | 2017-11-09 | 0 |
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<p>Okay. I’m going to state the obvious here. After all, somebody needs to say it. In fact, everybody who sees it needs to say it. Are you ready? Then here goes. The men and women calling themselves Democrats and sitting in Congress are the biggest bunch of liars this country has ever seen. Given today’s political situation, what with Bush and Cheney running the White House, that’s a pretty big claim to make. Unfortunately for those who believed those men and women might actually stop the war in Iraq and begin getting the US military out of there, this is the only conclusion one can make.</p>
<p>I mean, take a look. There are more troops in Iraq now than there were when the Democrats won (yeh, won) both houses of Congress a little over a year ago. If my calculations are correct, more than $100 billion have been spent to keep those troops there, keep them in supplies both lethal and otherwise, and to top it off, more troops have died since those elected “representatives” took their places than in any other year of this loathsome war and occupation. Add to this list of calamities the untold numbers of Iraqis killed, wounded and uprooted from their homes. No matter how you look at it, there is no way this can be called ending the war. In fact, not only could it be called enabling this debacle to continue, the more truthful description would be to call what the Democrats have done is conspire to commit murder.</p>
<p>Their partners in the conspiracy-the White House, the Pentagon and their GOP supporters-have been true to their word. They promised that they would stay in Iraq until their goals were reached, no matter how many lives it took. Even without an elected majority in Congress, this element of the conspiracy has received every bit of money, every single GI and marine, and almost every bit of positive media spin they have asked for. This could not have occurred without the collusion of the Democrats.</p>
<p>As I write this, another alleged attempt by Congressional Democrats to begin bringing home a sizable minority of troops from Iraq seems to be going the way of every other previous attempt. That is, to the dustbin of history. The reasons given this time by the Democrats are as pathetic as those provided previously. You know the litany: they don’t have the votes, the GOP is threatening a filibuster if the troop withdrawal limits are attached to the bill, they don’t want to harm the troops in the field, and so on. Now I don’t know about you, but isn’t leaving the troops in the war zone more dangerous than bringing them home? Furthermore, if the Republicans can filibuster a spending bill to prevent the inclusion of elements in the bill that they don’t like, can’t the majority Democrats also filibuster that same bill to make sure those same elements are included?</p>
<p>I mean, we’re not talking about halting funding for the war and occupation and bringing the troops home starting tomorrow here, even though that is what we should be talking about. No, we’re talking about a bill that essentially suggests to Mr. Bush that he take $50 billion more for the war and start thinking about bringing some of the troops home as soon as possible with the idea that a good number of them are no longer in Iraq by December 2008. That’s not a hell of a lot to ask for. Yet, the Democrats are backing off from this lily-livered legislation and planning on giving the White House another $50 billion with no strings attached, not even the silly string of the aforementioned withdrawal suggestion. To top it off, the Democrats are telling the press that it’s the Republican’s fault that they refuse to stand their ground.</p>
<p>“We’ve tried maybe a dozen times” to bring troops home, said Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. “And when we do try and we don’t succeed, we still provide funding for the troops.” In other words, they still provide monies for the war. If the Boston Red Sox had this attitude, they would never have made it to the World Series in 2004 and 2007. But then again, baseball teams don’t conspire with their competition to get to the championship, they play them harder than they are being played because they truly want to win. If the Democrats truly wanted to end the war, they would stand up to the challenges of the war supporters across the aisle and in the White House. Instead, they hedge their bets, blame their opponents for their failures, and vote for more war. All of which makes it harder for those of us who truly oppose the war and occupation to vote for any of them.</p>
<p>RON JACOBS is author of <a href="http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1859841678/counterpunchmaga" type="external">The Way the Wind Blew: a history of the Weather Underground</a>, which is just republished by Verso. Jacobs’ essay on Big Bill Broonzy is featured in CounterPunch’s collection on music, art and sex, <a href="http://www.easycarts.net/ecarts/CounterPunch/CP_Books.html" type="external">Serpents in the Garden</a>. His first novel, <a href="" type="internal">Short Order Frame Up,</a> is published by Mainstay Press. He can be reached at: <a href="mailto:[email protected]" type="external">[email protected]</a></p>
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<p>&#160;</p> | Blank Check Democrats | true | https://counterpunch.org/2007/12/13/blank-check-democrats/ | 2007-12-13 | 4 |
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<p>"And when these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh" The Pretribulation Rapture. NTEB has started a series making the historical and biblical case for the existience of the Pretribulation Rapture of the Church. We believe it is stated time and time again in the bible, in no uncertain terms, and we are proud to take a stand to defend this exciting End Times Bible prophecy. Does the bible teach a Pretribulation Rapture? Yes, we believe it does, and present evidence for proof of a Pretribulation Rapture. It Is Written "Because thou hast kept the word of my patience, I also will keep thee from the hour of temptation, which shall come upon all the world, to try them that dwell upon the earth." <a href="http://www.blueletterbible.org/Bible.cfm?b=Rev&amp;c=3" type="external">Revelation 3:10</a></p>
<p>Scriptural Evidence for the Pretribulation Rapture This section is used by permission from <a href="http://www.raptureready.com/rr-pretribulation-rapture.html" type="external">RaptureReady.com</a> The Unknown Hour When we search the Scriptures and read the passages describing the Lord Jesus' return, we find verses that tell us we won't know the day and hour of that event. Matthew 25:13 says Jesus will return at an unknown time, while Revelation 12:6 indicates that the Jews will have to wait on the Lord 1,260 days, starting when the Antichrist stands in the Temple of God and declares himself to be God (2 Thes 2:4). This event will take place at the mid-point of the seven-year tribulation (Dan 9:27).</p>
<p>Note that some people only see a three-and-a-half-year tribulation. In a way, they are correct because the first half of the tribulation will be relatively peaceful compared to the second half. Nonetheless, peaceful or not, there still remains a seven-year period called the tribulation. When the Jews flee into the wilderness, they know that all they have to do is wait out those 1,260 days (Mat 24:16). There is no way to apply the phrase "neither the day nor the hour" to this situation. The only way for these two viewpoints to be true is to separate the two distinct events transpiring here: 1) the rapture of the Church, which comes before the tribulation; and 2) the return of Jesus to the earth, which takes place roughly seven years later. The Pretribulation Rapture: The Marriage Supper of the Lamb In Luke 12:36, the Word states that when Christ returns, He will be returning from a wedding. In Revelation 19:7-8, we read about the marriage itself. The marriage supper takes place before the marriage. According to Jewish custom, the marriage contract, which often includes a dowry, is drawn up first. The contract parallels the act of faith we use when we trust Jesus to be our Savior. The dowry is His life, which was used to purchase us. When it's time for the wedding, the groom goes to the bride's house unannounced. She comes out to meet him, and then he takes her to his father's house. This precisely correlates with the events according to the pre-trib scenario. Jesus, the Groom, comes down from heaven and calls up the Church, His Bride. After meeting in the air, He and His Bride return to His Father's house, heaven. The marriage supper itself will take place there, while down here on earth the final events of the tribulation will be playing out. After the marriage supper of Jewish tradition, the bride and groom are presented to the world as man and wife. This corresponds to the time when Jesus returns to earth accompanied by an army "clothed in fine linen, white and clean" (Rev 19:14). The Pretribulation Rapture: What They Didn't Teach You in History Class Many groups try to discredit the pre-trib rapture by saying most of the end-time events in the Bible have already taken place. A group of people called preterists claims that the Book of Revelation was mostly fulfilled by 70 AD. If the events described in the Book of Revelation took place in the past, I'm at a loss to explain some of the current situations I see around us: the rebirth of Israel, the reunification of Europe, the number of global wars that have occurred, and the development of nuclear weapons. During history class, I must have slept through the part where the teacher talked about the time when a third of the trees were burned up, 100-pound hailstones fell from the sky, and the sea turned into blood (Rev 8:7-8, 16:21). I think several people would have to question their opposition to the pre-trib rapture doctrine if they knew that the evidence provided to them was based on the understanding that most tribulation prophecies have already occurred. The Pretribulation Rapture: The Time of Jacob's Trouble In several passages, the Bible refers to the tribulation as a time of trouble for the Jews. The phrase "Jacob's trouble" pertains to the descendants of Jacob. Jeremiah 30:7 says that this time of trouble will come just before the Lord returns to save His people. The final week of Daniel's 70th week is yet to take place. An angel told Daniel that, "70 weeks are determined unto thy people" (Dan 9:24). Scripture never mentions that the tribulation is meant to be a time of testing for Christians. However, some post-tribbers try to claim that they are the ones being tested during the tribulation. To make this so, they need to spiritualize the 144,000 Jewish believers in Revelation 7:2-8 who receive God's protective seal. Placing the Church dispensation into the same time frame as the seven-year Jewish dispensation, as the post-tribbers do, raises one good question: Can two dispensations transpire at the same time? In the past, God has only dealt with one at a time. Having both present during the tribulation would have to be an exception. The Pretribulation Rapture: God Hath Not Appointed Us to Wrath In 1 Thessalonians 5:9, Paul assures us that God has not appointed His people to wrath. This wrath is plainly God's anger that will be poured out during the tribulation. Pre-trib believers interpret this as meaning that Christians will be removed from the earth. Post-trib believers tell a different story. They describe this as meaning that God will protect Christians during the tribulation and pour this wrath out on the unbelievers only. This idea runs against the statement made in Revelation 13:7, in which the Antichrist is given power to make war with the saints and to overcome them. A post-trib view would make God's promise of protection from wrath into a lie. In years past, it was possible to think of being protected from the guns and swords of that day. Today, when any major war would involve nuclear and chemical weapons, it's impossible to expect that same kind of protection. When Nagasaki, Japan was bombed during World War II, the bomb exploded over a Catholic church. Everyone who was in the center of the explosion died--both Christians and non-Christians. The only way to validly interpret God's promise of protection from wrath is by viewing 1 Thessalonians 5:9 as the bodily removal of the Church from this world. The Pretribulation Rapture: Noah and Lot as Examples The tribulation period is compared to the times of Noah and Lot by Jesus in Luke 17:28. Most people argue over whether the time frame Jesus was talking about in that passage was pre-trib or post-trib. In doing so, they miss an important point. The two circumstances that the Noah and Lot situations have in common are the removal of the righteous and the judgment of the unbelievers. From these two accounts, we see that God prefers to remove His own when danger is involved. <a href="javascript:;" type="external">source - Rapture Ready</a></p>
<p>The Pretribulation Rapture: The Unknown Hour</p>
<p>When we search the Scriptures and read the passages describing the Lord Jesus' return, we find verses that tell us we won't know the day and hour of that event. Matthew 25:13 says Jesus will return at an unknown time, while Revelation 12:6 indicates that the Jews will have to wait on the Lord 1,260 days, starting when the Antichrist stands in the Temple of God and declares himself to be God (2 Thes 2:4). This event will take place at the mid-point of the seven-year tribulation (Dan 9:27). Note that some people only see a three-and-a-half-year tribulation.</p>
<p>In a way, they are correct because the first half of the tribulation will be relatively peaceful compared to the second half. Nonetheless, peaceful or not, there still remains a seven-year period called the tribulation. When the Jews flee into the wilderness, they know that all they have to do is wait out those 1,260 days (Mat 24:16). There is no way to apply the phrase "neither the day nor the hour" to this situation. The only way for these two viewpoints to be true is to separate the two distinct events transpiring here: 1) the rapture of the Church, which comes before the tribulation; and 2) the return of Jesus to the earth, which takes place roughly seven years later.</p> It Is Written click here | The Pretribulation Rapture Of The Church Explained Understanding the Time of the Pretribulation Rapture Through End Times Bible Prophecy | true | http://nowtheendbegins.com/pages/rapture/the-pretribulation-rapture-explained.htm | 0 |
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<p>Merkel’s decision to open the borders to refugees in 2015 proved to be her most controversial move as chancellor. With an election looming, critics say it has caused discontent in Germany, a split in the EU… and Merkel’s own change of heart.</p>
<p>Just two weeks before the parliamentary election, German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s CDU party is comfortably ahead of all contenders. Her approval rating, however, has not yet fully recovered after going into a tailspin following her handling of the 2015 migrant crisis.</p>
<p>Despite receiving thousands of asylum-seekers annually, Germany has been safeguarded by its geographic location and the Dublin agreement (which regulates asylum procedures in the EU), which left most refugees stranded in the EU’s coastal states, such as Greece and Italy. Berlin, however, began facing a new reality two years ago. As the migrant influx into Europe from the Middle East and North Africa gained momentum, the German chancellor announced a “humanitarian move,” opening Germany’s borders to migrants in August 2015.</p>
<p>Her decision may have been guided by other motives, Professor William Mallinson, a former British diplomat, told RT.&#160;“Germany’s attitude appears to be hypocritical: on the one hand, in October 2010, Angela Merkel announced that multiculturalism has ‘utterly failed.’ Yet, pandering to the electorate – or so she thought – she let in over one million immigrants only six years later,”&#160;Mallinson said.&#160;</p>
<p>The change in Merkel’s rhetoric in the months to follow was merely an attempt&#160;“to jump onto the anti-immigration bandwagon because of the impending elections.”</p>
<p>Read more</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/402257-merkel-hit-tomato-campaign/" type="external" /></p>
<p>And there is more to it, according to Doris Von Sayn-Wittgenstein, a German AfD politician. The decision to open the borders was ultimately not an attempt to deal with the crisis, but rather to give it a ‘let it happen’ option, she told RT, adding that the “the government is going by ‘Yes we can’ and is simply denying the problem.”</p>
<p>Angela Merkel herself, “for historical reasons,” most feared the media images of armed police and Bundeswehr soldiers confronting migrants at the border, Robin Alexander, a German political journalist and author of a best-seller on how the German government has dealt with refugees, claimed in his book. While not challenging the ‘open borders’ policy, Boris Palmer, mayor of Tuebingen, Germany, <a href="http://www.faz.net/aktuell/wirtschaft/afrika-im-umbruch/boris-palmer-veroeffentlicht-buch-er-kann-nicht-allen-helfen-15128326.html?printPagedArticle=true#pageIndex_2" type="external">believes</a>&#160;that Merkel was wrong to turn a decision “which was born from a necessity” into a “moral litmus test” for the nation.</p>
<p>The situation became so chaotic that at some point, authorities managed to “lose” 130,000 asylum-seekers who never turned up at the refugee centers to properly file asylum requests, German media <a href="http://www.sueddeutsche.de/politik/fluechtlingspolitik-mehr-als-jeder-zehnte-asylsuchende-ist-verschwunden-1.2881071" type="external">reported</a>, citing interior ministry figures.&#160;“Until now we have hundreds of thousands of people, where we don’t know the names. It is a breakdown of the state as a system,”&#160;former German Parliamentary State Secretary on Defense and ex-VP of the OSCE Assembly Willy Wimmer told RT.</p>
<p>The general public initially gave broad support for asylum-seekers, with the popular slogan ‘Refugees Welcome.’ However, the mood of the population began to change following allegations of mass sexual harassment during 2015 New Year’s Eve celebrations in Cologne. With 1,200 complaints filed, police were able to <a href="http://www.bpb.de/apuz/239696/die-silvesternacht-und-ihre-folgen?p=all" type="external">identify</a>&#160;over 300 suspects, 109 of whom were asylum-seekers. Although German citizens were also among the suspects, the case triggered mass outrage, as it did not receive widespread coverage and proper reactions from the authorities until days afterward. This resulted in a wide-ranging national debate on refugees in Germany, as well as numerous protests, with the slogan ‘Merkel muss weg’ (Merkel must go) commonly heard.</p>
<p>The mass influx of refugees also had a major impact on Germany’s national security situation. Back in August 2016, the head of the Bavarian department of the domestic intelligence agency (BfV), Manfred Hauser, warned that “hit squads” linked to Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) might have infiltrated Germany posing as refugees.</p>
<p>Read more</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/402535-germans-top-concern-terrorism/" type="external" /></p>
<p>His agency looked into “hundreds” of such cases, he <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/355587-refugees-isis-sleepers-germany/" type="external">said</a>. In 2016, jihadists carried out five attacks, while the security services managed to prevent seven others, according to the BfV.</p>
<p>The deadliest incident occurred on December 19, 2016, when a 27-year-old rejected asylum-seeker – a Tunisian man named Anis Amri who had pledged allegiance to IS – plowed a truck into a Berlin Christmas market, leaving 12 people dead and dozens injured. The assailant, who had previously been on the radar of the police, managed to flee the scene and reach Italy, where he was gunned down by police.</p>
<p>Just months earlier, in July, a 27-year-old Syrian refugee detonated an explosive device outside a music festival in the town of Ansbach, killing himself and injuring 12 others. That same month, a 17-year-old Afghan refugee with an axe assaulted train passengers near Wurzburg in central Germany, leaving five people injured. IS claimed responsibility for all of the attacks. The terrorist threat remains high, and the country “must expect further attacks by individuals or terror groups” which “may occur any time,” the head of the BfV, Hans-Georg Maassen, <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/379875-germany-terrorist-attacks-possible/" type="external">warned</a>&#160;this March.</p>
<p>Germany failed to make a necessary assessment of the security situation following the New Year’s Eve incidents in Cologne, political analyst John Bosnitch told RT. He added that the authorities did little to effectively accelerate integration. As “long as the migrants with a different cultural background continue to maintain their own bloc within the German society… the possibility of integrating this group is going to decline, and it is going to become a much worse problem in Germany than it is today,” he said.</p>
<p>It was only after the first terrorist attacks on German soil committed by asylum-seekers and mass anti-immigrant demonstrations with the ‘Merkel must go!’ slogan that the chancellor admitted her political course might be somewhat “flawed.” In September 2016, Merkel publicly acknowledged that her infamous “We can do it!” had become “an empty formula.”&#160;</p>
<p>That came way too late, according to Mallinson. “She is now admitting that she was mistaken,”&#160;he&#160;old RT.&#160;“The damage has, however, already been done.”</p>
<p>Merkel then toughened her rhetoric on issues perceived as related to refugees. In December of the same year, Merkel announced that “the full-face [Muslim] veil must be banned wherever it is legally possible” and stressed that “all Germans that always lived here as well as those who just arrived” should obey the law, apparently referring to the surge in migrant crime. She added that German law “takes precedence” over Sharia law (Islamic law).</p>
<p>[embedded content]</p>
<p>Following the deadly 2016 Berlin Christmas Market attack, Merkel <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/371529-germany-repatriate-tunisians-attack/" type="external">promised</a>&#160;to speed up deportations of failed Tunisian asylum-seekers, as Anis Amri, who plowed a truck into the market crowd, had come to Germany from Tunisia. The Chancellor also reiterated her promise to speed up deportations of all failed asylum-seekers.</p>
<p>The change in rhetoric appears less surprising if one looks at the polls following Merkel’s ‘open borders’ policy. According to <a href="http://www.bild.de/politik/inland/angela-merkel/wie-sind-merkels-chancen-48849788.bild.html" type="external">Bild</a>, in late 2014, Merkel enjoyed 75-percent support among Germans, while by late 2015, it fell by 26 percent and stood at 49 percent. Support continued to fall, reaching one of its lowest points in 2016. Other data provided by German <a href="https://www.welt.de/politik/deutschland/article156891529/Merkels-Beliebtheit-steigt-auf-Zehn-Monats-Hoch.html" type="external">Die Welt</a>&#160;daily in 2016 showed that Merkel’s policy during the refugee crisis resulted in her gradually losing 12 percent of public support.</p>
<p>Angela Merkel is, in fact, now no longer pursuing “a policy of open borders, and that fits perfectly with the mood in the country,” Robin Alexander said. Despite saying that she would “make all the important decisions of 2015 the same way again,” the closer the election approaches, the more it seems that this is no longer the case. In fact, Merkel has been repeating the line: “What happened in 2015 cannot, should not and must not happen again.”</p>
<p>Merkel’s controversial open-border policy also gave a boost to right-wing elements within the country, including the Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, and a popular movement called Patriotic Europeans Against the Islamization of the Occident (PEGIDA).</p>
<p>[embedded content]</p>
<p>The AfD has benefitted greatly from the migrant crisis, and may win as much as 10 percent of the seats in the upcoming Bundestag election, according to opinion <a href="http://www.wahlrecht.de/umfragen/" type="external">polls</a>. The party, despite its brief four-year history, is already represented in many regional parliaments in Germany. The party has on numerous occasions drawn accusations of xenophobia, and even being “Nazi.” This, however, simply indicates that people’s real problems are ignored, Doris von Sayn-Wittgenstein told RT. Essentially, people who complain about migrants nowadays are “called racist and liars,” Sayn-Wittgenstein said, adding that “our system can’t take these people [migrants] anymore.”</p>
<p>“The Germans don’t have the courage to choose another leader,” Iben Thranholm believes, adding that it remains a “mystery” to her.</p>
<p>To somehow fix the situation and “equally” distribute migrants among the EU, Merkel’s government has been pushing (along with Brussels) for specific quotas. The goal of resettling 160,000 migrants was approved by the EU in September 2015.</p>
<p>[embedded content]</p>
<p>Hungarian PM Viktor Orban has become one of the most vocal critics of the quota system, warning that its implementation might result in&#160;“tens of millions”&#160;of migrants coming to Europe. His concerns were strongly echoed by Poland, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Denmark.</p>
<p>Resistance is not only due to quota systems themselves, Wimmer believes, but due to the lack of proper negotiations and the inability of Merkel to consult with anyone before announcing her open-border policy.&#160;“Everything in Europe happened because of the decision of one person – Mrs. Merkel,”&#160;Wimmer told RT.&#160;“That is the reason why the Poles, Hungarians, and others refuse to take Merkel’s migrants.”</p>
<p>Read more</p>
<p><a href="https://www.rt.com/news/402246-politics-raped-european-values/" type="external" /></p>
<p>The European Court of Justice (ECJ) on Wednesday dismissed a challenge by Slovakia and Hungary against the EU’s relocation policy for asylum-seekers, reiterating the EU’s right to force its members to accept the migrant quotas. Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto slammed the decision, <a href="https://www.rt.com/news/402246-politics-raped-european-values/" type="external">saying</a>&#160;“Politics has raped European law.”&#160;</p>
<p>Another measure aimed at “fixing” the migrant crisis was signing the EU-Turkey deal in March of last year. Under the agreement, all “irregular” migrants arriving in Greece – if they do not apply for asylum or get their application rejected – will be returned to Turkey. For each Syrian returned to Turkey, one must be resettled in the EU.</p>
<p>This agreement, however, offers no solution to the problem by merely “outsourcing” it, according to <a href="https://www.oxfam.org/sites/www.oxfam.org/files/file_attachments/mb-migrants-libya-europe-090817-en.pdf" type="external">Oxfam</a> and other humanitarian groups. This criticism focuses in particular on the fears of human rights abuses of people in Turkish refugee camps. Prior to the deal, Merkel hailed the progress made with Turkey on the refugee issue, also envisioning a boost to Ankara’s EU membership process. Since then, relations between Turkey on one side, and the EU and Berlin on the other, have deteriorated, raising serious fears that the deal is falling apart.</p>
<p>With all the twists and turns in recent years, Chancellor Merkel has shown herself to be a political chameleon, political analyst John Bosnitch told RT.&#160;“If she manages to be re-elected, then she will have to find a new shape to take, a new political form, in other words, to be a chameleon once again,” Bosnitch said.</p> | Refugees welcome? Merkel flip flops on migrants as chancellorship at stake | false | https://newsline.com/refugees-welcome-merkel-flip-flops-on-migrants-as-chancellorship-at-stake/ | 2017-09-11 | 1 |
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<p>BERKELEY, Calif. — A speech by conservative firebrand and British writer Milo Yiannopoulos was canceled at the University of California, Berkeley on Wednesday amid violent protests that sparked a fire in a campus plaza.</p>
<p>University officials called off the event about two hours before Yiannopoulos was to speak at the student union, where more than 1,500 people had gathered outside. Some hurled metal barricades and others smashed windows at the student union.</p>
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<p>“This is not a proud night for this campus, the home of the free speech movement,” said Dan Mogulof, a Berkeley spokesman. He noted that the vandalism interfered with the ability of the Berkeley College Republicans — who hosted Yiannopoulos — to exercise their First Amendment rights.</p>
<p>Yiannopoulos, 32, writes for Breitbart News — a popular website among the far right — and he is an avowed supporter of President Donald Trump. He’s also a flamboyant provocateur who has been denounced for propagating racism, misogyny and anti-Islam views, but he styles himself a champion of free speech.</p>
<p>This summer, he gained notoriety for encouraging a barrage of harassment against “Ghostbusters” actress Leslie Jones, which prompted Twitter to ban him from the social media platform.</p>
<p>Controversy, unrest and, occasionally, violence has followed his speaking tour at colleges across the U.S., for which Berkeley was to be the final event. Last month, a man was shot outside a University of Washington hall where Yiannopoulos was scheduled to speak.</p>
<p>Wednesday’s decision by Berkeley officials is the second time in two weeks that rowdy protests have forced the cancellation of one of his lectures. UC Davis also canceled one of his speeches last month.</p>
<p>At Berkeley, police clashed with protesters, and much of the university was placed on lockdown. Campus police repeatedly ordered protesters to leave the area, threatening the crowd with arrest. Most refused to leave.</p>
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<p>On his Facebook page, Yiannopoulos said that “violent left-wing protesters” had broken into a building’s ground floor, ripped down barricades and thrown rocks.</p>
<p>In characteristic fashion, he pointed to the mayhem on campus to highlight his agenda: “One thing we do know for sure: the Left is absolutely terrified of free speech and will do literally anything to shut it down.”</p>
<p>The protesters seemed as much drawn by Yiannopoulos’ platform as by the broader ascendance of far-right politics.</p>
<p>De’andre Bitter, 72, brought a large sign with LED strips that brightly said “No!”</p>
<p>A retired ship worker originally from Fresno, he stood near the rear of those assembled and said he brought the sign to a slew of recent protests, including a recent women’s march, the airport demonstrations over Trump’s travel restrictions and a protest at UC Davis.</p>
<p>“We go anywhere people are opposing Trump and his fascist regime,” Bitter said. He viewed the vast majority of protesters as peaceful and attributed the violence to a handful of anarchists, who wore mostly black apparel.</p>
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<p>Others handed out yellow leaflets, calling Yiannopoulos “a tool of Trump’s possessive fascist government.”</p>
<p>“He has no right to speak at Cal or anywhere else,” the leaflet declared.</p>
<p>By 8 p.m., the crowd had halved to about 800 and spilled into the streets, marching down Telegraph Avenue.</p>
<p>A handful of demonstrators smashed dowels into a bank of ATMs. Photos on social media showed shattered windows at businesses.</p>
<p>The sprawling group halted traffic at Telegraph and Durant avenues, where one driver plowed a white sedan into the crowd. One of the demonstrators grabbed on to the car for a block, then rolled off uninjured.</p>
<p>On Tuesday, Yiannopoulos spoke at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, where the university braced for large protests and stationed more than 100 police officers. About 150 protesters arrived and remained peaceful, and there were no reports of arrests, according to the San Luis Obispo Tribune.</p>
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<p>In his remarks there, Yiannopolous extolled Cal Poly for having a student population that was mostly male, railed against abortion and provided instructions on how to apply to his male-only scholarship fund, the “privilege grant,” according to text of his remarks published by Breitbart.</p>
<p>So far, the UC system has resisted calls to cancel Yiannopoulos’ talks. At noon, just hours before Wednesday’s event, Berkeley administrators issued a statement saying they were committed to tolerance as well as free speech.</p>
<p>In the weeks before Yiannopoulos’ planned Berkeley appearance, administrators received hundreds of letters from faculty, students and others demanding they bar him from speaking.</p>
<p>One letter from a dozen faculty members argued that his talk could be canceled on the grounds that his actions — which they called “harassment, slander, defamation and hate speech” — violated UC Berkeley’s code of conduct.</p>
<p>——</p>
<p>(King reported from Berkeley, Hamilton and Watanabe reported from Los Angeles.)</p>
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<p>——</p>
<p>©2017 Los Angeles Times</p>
<p>Visit the Los Angeles Times at <a href="http://www.latimes.com" type="external">www.latimes.com</a></p>
<p>Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.</p>
<p>———-</p>
<p>PHOTO (for help with images, contact 312-222-4194): CMP-BERKELEY-PROTESTS</p>
<p>_____</p> | Protests force cancellation of speech by Breitbart’s Milo Yiannopoulos at UC Berkeley | false | https://abqjournal.com/941018/violent-protests-force-cancellation-of-speech-by-breitbart-writer-at-uc-berkeley.html | 2017-02-01 | 2 |
<p />
<p>The one thing that might have saved the day (as NR’s editorial notes) would have been expanding our military right after 9/11, when the country would surely have gone along. This is much more than an historical point, and much more than a comment on our current dilemma in Iraq. Even if our Iraq problem were somehow miraculously solved, we would need a larger military. Even without the prospect of strikes against Iran, we would need a larger military. The possibility of collapsed governments in the nuclear states of North Korea and Pakistan, and the likelihood of major subversion of the weak Gulf states by Iran, mean that we simply must have a larger military.</p>
<p>The Iraq experience now leaves us with no excuse. We have been shown in no uncertain terms that our military is far too small to handle the demands of the war on terror. And again, this will hold true in the future, even if we leave Iraq. In fact, the disastrous cascade of strategic problems that would follow a rapid withdrawal from Iraq would likely strain our army far more than Iraq itself is doing now. Even a relatively successful exit from Iraq in a year or two would not solve the problem. Win or lose, Iraq war or no Iraq war, Iran strike or no Iran strike, we need more troops. There are simply too many huge security risks in today’s world to get by on a shrunken post-Cold War military.</p> | Iraq Lessons | false | https://eppc.org/publications/iraq-lessons/ | 1 |
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<p>BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Barcelona can add to its already commanding lead of the Spanish league after both Atletico Madrid and Valencia stumbled in the title race on Saturday.</p>
<p>Atletico Madrid was left eight points behind Barcelona when it conceded a late goal to draw 1-1 with Girona at home.</p>
<p>Valencia wasted a chance to pull level with Atletico when it squandered a one-goal lead at then bottom-side Las Palmas, losing 2-1 and finishing the match in the Canary Islands with nine men.</p>
<p>Barcelona visits Real Betis on Sunday aiming to remain undefeated in the league this season, and to pull even further away from the other 19 teams.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>COSTLY COMPLACENCY</p>
<p>Atletico's formula of a goal from Antoine Griezmann plus an ironclad defense was undone by a Girona side that continues to impress in its first campaign in the top flight.</p>
<p>Diego Costa's headed pass set up Griezmann to put Atletico ahead in the 34th minute.</p>
<p>But Atletico failed to press for a second goal, and a defensive slip helped Girona level in the 73rd. Cristian "Portu" Portugues was free in the area to score when Bernardo Espinosa headed forward a poor clearance by substitute Jorge "Koke" Resurreccion.</p>
<p>"We had control of the game and knew that their chances depended on us making an error," Atletico defender Jose Gimenez said. "And that is what happened. We lost our concentration for a moment and they found their goal."</p>
<p>Girona's equalizer came after Atletico coach Diego Simeone had substituted Griezmann and Costa as the hosts sought to defend their slim advantage. Simeone said Costa came off due to unspecified pain that was bothering the striker.</p>
<p>Regarded as Spain's top defensive side, Atletico also conceded two late goals at home to lose 2-1 at Sevilla in the Copa del Rey earlier this week. It will now have to travel to Sevilla to overturn that defeat in their second-leg quarterfinal on Tuesday.</p>
<p>Simeone said his team had been unlucky.</p>
<p>"We were in charge until their goal arrived in a complicated situation," Simeone said. "There are episodes of the match that sometimes favor you, and sometimes go against you. I take away the sensation that we played well."</p>
<p>It was Portu's eighth goal of the season as Girona rose into eighth place.</p>
<p>"We are a pesky team and go to every ground looking to win, and we showed that again today," Portu said.</p>
<p>Girona played the second half with backup goalkeeper Gorka Iraizoz after starter Yassine Bounou asked to be substituted due to an injury late in the first half.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>VALENCIA IMPLODES</p>
<p>Valencia looked set to add to Las Palmas' misery after Santi Mina struck five minute into the game.</p>
<p>But Jonathan Calleri set up Jonathan Viera to level in the 20th before Calleri put Las Palmas ahead from the penalty spot in the 52nd.</p>
<p>Gabriel Paulista conceded the penalty for handling the ball and compounded the mistake by protesting until he was sent off with a second booking.</p>
<p>"The sending-off completely changed the match," Valencia coach Marcelino Garcia Toral said. "Going down to 10 men was a grave error on our part."</p>
<p>Fellow Valencia defender Ruben Vezo was sent off in the 87th after earning his second yellow card.</p>
<p>Las Palmas moved away from last place with its first victory under new coach Paco Jemez.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>GOALKEEPER SCORES</p>
<p>The best goal of the day was in Spain's second division, where Lugo goalkeeper Juan Carlos Martin scored from an exceptionally long strike.</p>
<p>Martin launched his lob from around 10 meters inside his own half. It caught counterpart Diego Marino off his line as he tried to run back.</p>
<p>The goal in the 80th sealed Lugo's 3-1 win over Sporting Gijon.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>VILLARREAL RISES</p>
<p>Villarreal overtook Real Madrid to go fourth after beating Levante 2-1 at home.</p>
<p>Villarreal has earned 13 of the last 15 available points and moved two points ahead of Madrid, which has two games in hand, in the fight for the final Champions League spot.</p>
<p>Samuel Castillejo stood out for Villarreal, twice hitting the post and setting up Manuel Trigueros to score a penalty in the 26th after he dribbled between two defenders and was tripped by goalkeeper Oier Olazabal.</p>
<p>Denis Cheryshev added a second goal early in the second half. He was substituted shortly after when he failed to recover from a knock to his right leg when he clipped the goalpost while sliding to tap in Enes Unal's pass.</p>
<p>Roger Marti converted a penalty on the last kick of the match for Levante's goal.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>SEVILLA BOOST</p>
<p>Sevilla's 3-0 victory at Espanyol pulled it level on points with Madrid and ended a five-round winless streak.</p>
<p>Franco Vazquez, Pablo Sarabia and Luis Muriel scored for Sevilla.</p>
<p>BARCELONA, Spain (AP) — Barcelona can add to its already commanding lead of the Spanish league after both Atletico Madrid and Valencia stumbled in the title race on Saturday.</p>
<p>Atletico Madrid was left eight points behind Barcelona when it conceded a late goal to draw 1-1 with Girona at home.</p>
<p>Valencia wasted a chance to pull level with Atletico when it squandered a one-goal lead at then bottom-side Las Palmas, losing 2-1 and finishing the match in the Canary Islands with nine men.</p>
<p>Barcelona visits Real Betis on Sunday aiming to remain undefeated in the league this season, and to pull even further away from the other 19 teams.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>COSTLY COMPLACENCY</p>
<p>Atletico's formula of a goal from Antoine Griezmann plus an ironclad defense was undone by a Girona side that continues to impress in its first campaign in the top flight.</p>
<p>Diego Costa's headed pass set up Griezmann to put Atletico ahead in the 34th minute.</p>
<p>But Atletico failed to press for a second goal, and a defensive slip helped Girona level in the 73rd. Cristian "Portu" Portugues was free in the area to score when Bernardo Espinosa headed forward a poor clearance by substitute Jorge "Koke" Resurreccion.</p>
<p>"We had control of the game and knew that their chances depended on us making an error," Atletico defender Jose Gimenez said. "And that is what happened. We lost our concentration for a moment and they found their goal."</p>
<p>Girona's equalizer came after Atletico coach Diego Simeone had substituted Griezmann and Costa as the hosts sought to defend their slim advantage. Simeone said Costa came off due to unspecified pain that was bothering the striker.</p>
<p>Regarded as Spain's top defensive side, Atletico also conceded two late goals at home to lose 2-1 at Sevilla in the Copa del Rey earlier this week. It will now have to travel to Sevilla to overturn that defeat in their second-leg quarterfinal on Tuesday.</p>
<p>Simeone said his team had been unlucky.</p>
<p>"We were in charge until their goal arrived in a complicated situation," Simeone said. "There are episodes of the match that sometimes favor you, and sometimes go against you. I take away the sensation that we played well."</p>
<p>It was Portu's eighth goal of the season as Girona rose into eighth place.</p>
<p>"We are a pesky team and go to every ground looking to win, and we showed that again today," Portu said.</p>
<p>Girona played the second half with backup goalkeeper Gorka Iraizoz after starter Yassine Bounou asked to be substituted due to an injury late in the first half.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>VALENCIA IMPLODES</p>
<p>Valencia looked set to add to Las Palmas' misery after Santi Mina struck five minute into the game.</p>
<p>But Jonathan Calleri set up Jonathan Viera to level in the 20th before Calleri put Las Palmas ahead from the penalty spot in the 52nd.</p>
<p>Gabriel Paulista conceded the penalty for handling the ball and compounded the mistake by protesting until he was sent off with a second booking.</p>
<p>"The sending-off completely changed the match," Valencia coach Marcelino Garcia Toral said. "Going down to 10 men was a grave error on our part."</p>
<p>Fellow Valencia defender Ruben Vezo was sent off in the 87th after earning his second yellow card.</p>
<p>Las Palmas moved away from last place with its first victory under new coach Paco Jemez.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>GOALKEEPER SCORES</p>
<p>The best goal of the day was in Spain's second division, where Lugo goalkeeper Juan Carlos Martin scored from an exceptionally long strike.</p>
<p>Martin launched his lob from around 10 meters inside his own half. It caught counterpart Diego Marino off his line as he tried to run back.</p>
<p>The goal in the 80th sealed Lugo's 3-1 win over Sporting Gijon.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>VILLARREAL RISES</p>
<p>Villarreal overtook Real Madrid to go fourth after beating Levante 2-1 at home.</p>
<p>Villarreal has earned 13 of the last 15 available points and moved two points ahead of Madrid, which has two games in hand, in the fight for the final Champions League spot.</p>
<p>Samuel Castillejo stood out for Villarreal, twice hitting the post and setting up Manuel Trigueros to score a penalty in the 26th after he dribbled between two defenders and was tripped by goalkeeper Oier Olazabal.</p>
<p>Denis Cheryshev added a second goal early in the second half. He was substituted shortly after when he failed to recover from a knock to his right leg when he clipped the goalpost while sliding to tap in Enes Unal's pass.</p>
<p>Roger Marti converted a penalty on the last kick of the match for Levante's goal.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>SEVILLA BOOST</p>
<p>Sevilla's 3-0 victory at Espanyol pulled it level on points with Madrid and ended a five-round winless streak.</p>
<p>Franco Vazquez, Pablo Sarabia and Luis Muriel scored for Sevilla.</p> | Atletico, Valencia stumble in pursuit of leader Barcelona | false | https://apnews.com/amp/9b1cb043f6d640ea8b11391a21ee728b | 2018-01-20 | 2 |
<p>RENO, Nev. (AP) — A Mormon bishop in Los Angeles apologized Sunday for the tone of a blog saying Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was unworthy to enter the faith’s temples, but stood by his criticism of Reid’s stands on some issues.</p>
<p>Mark Paredes’ blog, titled “Good Riddance to Harry Reid, the Mormon Senate Leader,” drew criticism from the church and Mormon Democrats after it was published Wednesday in a Jewish newspaper.</p>
<p>He called Reid an “embarrassment” to the church and expressed his belief that Democrats’ support of same-sex marriage, abortion rights and gambling runs contrary to positions of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.</p>
<p>“I do apologize for the tone of the article, for giving the impression that I was criticizing Sen. Reid in my role as an LDS bishop, and for implying that I am in a position to judge the senator’s temple worthiness,” Paredes told The Associated Press by email.</p>
<p>“However, I can’t apologize for criticizing his advocacy of certain issues and on behalf of certain interests ... Any criticism I had of Senator Reid was based on his actions (e.g., defense of the gaming industry, advocacy of a certain social agenda), not his political affiliation,” he added.</p>
<p>Reid spokeswoman Kristen Orthman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.</p>
<p>Crystal Young-Otterstrom of Salt Lake City, vice chair of LDS Democrats of America, said she accepts Paredes’ apology but does not think it goes far enough. The group has chapters in 10 states.</p>
<p>If the bishop is truly contrite, she said, he should meet with Mormon Democrats and be educated on why they chose their political affiliation.</p>
<p>“’He ought to be apologizing for saying that Mormons and Democrats can’t co-exist when clearly we can,” Young-Otterstrom said. “We are Democrats because of our Mormon beliefs and not in spite on them.”</p>
<p>Many notable Mormon figures, including James E. Faust, Hugh B. Brown, Steven E. Snow and Larry J. Echohawk, chose to be Democrats, she added.</p>
<p>The church, in a statement, said it was “entirely inappropriate” for church officers to use their titles while publishing such political views.</p>
<p>Paredes noted in a disclaimer at the end of his essay that he was expressing his personal opinion, but he identified himself in the blog as a bishop.</p>
<p>Reid will lose his position as Senate majority leader in January after Republicans took control of the Senate in Tuesday’s election. No other Mormon has held a higher elective national office.</p>
<p>RENO, Nev. (AP) — A Mormon bishop in Los Angeles apologized Sunday for the tone of a blog saying Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was unworthy to enter the faith’s temples, but stood by his criticism of Reid’s stands on some issues.</p>
<p>Mark Paredes’ blog, titled “Good Riddance to Harry Reid, the Mormon Senate Leader,” drew criticism from the church and Mormon Democrats after it was published Wednesday in a Jewish newspaper.</p>
<p>He called Reid an “embarrassment” to the church and expressed his belief that Democrats’ support of same-sex marriage, abortion rights and gambling runs contrary to positions of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.</p>
<p>“I do apologize for the tone of the article, for giving the impression that I was criticizing Sen. Reid in my role as an LDS bishop, and for implying that I am in a position to judge the senator’s temple worthiness,” Paredes told The Associated Press by email.</p>
<p>“However, I can’t apologize for criticizing his advocacy of certain issues and on behalf of certain interests ... Any criticism I had of Senator Reid was based on his actions (e.g., defense of the gaming industry, advocacy of a certain social agenda), not his political affiliation,” he added.</p>
<p>Reid spokeswoman Kristen Orthman did not immediately respond to a request for comment.</p>
<p>Crystal Young-Otterstrom of Salt Lake City, vice chair of LDS Democrats of America, said she accepts Paredes’ apology but does not think it goes far enough. The group has chapters in 10 states.</p>
<p>If the bishop is truly contrite, she said, he should meet with Mormon Democrats and be educated on why they chose their political affiliation.</p>
<p>“’He ought to be apologizing for saying that Mormons and Democrats can’t co-exist when clearly we can,” Young-Otterstrom said. “We are Democrats because of our Mormon beliefs and not in spite on them.”</p>
<p>Many notable Mormon figures, including James E. Faust, Hugh B. Brown, Steven E. Snow and Larry J. Echohawk, chose to be Democrats, she added.</p>
<p>The church, in a statement, said it was “entirely inappropriate” for church officers to use their titles while publishing such political views.</p>
<p>Paredes noted in a disclaimer at the end of his essay that he was expressing his personal opinion, but he identified himself in the blog as a bishop.</p>
<p>Reid will lose his position as Senate majority leader in January after Republicans took control of the Senate in Tuesday’s election. No other Mormon has held a higher elective national office.</p> | Mormon bishop apologizes over anti-Reid blog | false | https://apnews.com/b3fc357b2522497eb8b38e575d70771d | 2014-11-10 | 2 |
<p>“I’m up against an array of very powerful forces, including the intelligence services and major newspapers … all of whom confirmed a major lie that was being used for political purposes and a lie that was repeated and repeated in order to undercut our new president.”</p>
<p>— Congressman Dana Rohrabacher, R-California</p>
<p>Does&#160;Dana Rohrabacher really think he’s tough enough to take on the combined power of the US Intelligence Community, the Washington political establishment and the mainstream media?</p>
<p>Good luck with that.</p>
<p>The California Congressman stepped into the limelight last week when he called White House Chief of Staff John Kelly to request a meeting with President Donald Trump.&#160;Rohrabacher, it seems, has some important information to pass along to the president, mainly that he has come across some hard evidence that the Russia hacking story is, to put it mildly, a crock.</p>
<p>Rohrabacher recently met with WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange who assured the Congressman that Russia did not hack Democratic emails and give them to WikiLeaks during the 2016 presidential campaign. Of course Assange has made the same claim many times before,&#160; the difference now is that he’s willing to provide solid evidence to back up his claim (according to the Wall Street Journal) “a computer drive or other data-storage device that Mr. Rohrabacher said would exonerate Russia.”</p>
<p>Naturally, the Intelligence honchos are not going to sit quietly and twiddle their thumbs while Rohrabacher blows holes in their fake narrative about Russia espionage and presidential collusion. Oh, no.&#160; They’re going to act preemptively and do whatever it takes to discredit Rohrabacher, even if it means making him out to be a Putin puppet or a Kremlin stooge. They’re going to attack&#160;Rohrabacher and his so called “proof” which they’ll try to tear apart with some&#160;ponderous, unsourced&#160;counter-narrative that appears on the front pages of the New York Times&#160;and the Washington Post. These people are experts at twisting the truth into unrecognizable, pretzel-like shapes that convince their readership that up is down and black is white.</p>
<p>But Rohrabacher’s no fool. He knows it’s going to be an uphill slog. He even said so:</p>
<p>“I’m up against an array of very powerful forces, including the intelligence services and major newspapers … all of whom confirmed a major lie that was being used for political purposes and a lie that was repeated and repeated in order to undercut our new president….You’ve got people who are obviously just trying to cover their ass for mistakes they have made. They will probably do their best to keep Trump from knowing about this and knowing about his options to expose this.”</p>
<p>And he was right, too.&#160;Rohrabacher made his case to&#160;White House Chief of Staff John Kelly last week saying that he wanted to speak to the President and that he had evidence that proved Russia was not the source of WikiLeaks emails.&#160; Here’s what happened according to the Wall Street Journal:</p>
<p>“Mr. Kelly told the congressman that the proposal “was best directed to the intelligence community,” the official said. Mr. Kelly didn’t make the president aware of Mr. Rohrabacher’s message, and Mr. Trump doesn’t know the details of the proposed deal, the official said.” (Wall Street Journal)</p>
<p>Three things are wrong with this excerpt.</p>
<p>First, the contents of the Kelly-Rohrabacher conversation were immediately leaked to the media which suggests that either the White House is bugged or the Intel agencies have people working for them from inside.&#160; Which is it?</p>
<p>Second,&#160; “Kelly didn’t make the president aware of Mr. Rohrabacher’s message.”</p>
<p>Why? And what does that say about Kelly?&#160; His behavior suggests either willful negligence or divided loyalties. Which is it?</p>
<p>Third, “Kelly told the congressman that the proposal “was best directed to the intelligence community.”</p>
<p>Right.&#160; So Kelly wants&#160;Rohrabacher to take his proof to the people who concocted this wacky Russian farce to begin with.&#160; That’s a great idea. I’m sure the upstanding people at the CIA will be forever grateful to Rohrabacher for his patriotic contribution. What a joke. The congressman will be lucky if he can ever show his face in public again after these cannibals get through with him. Does he really know who he’s messing with? Like Chuckie Schumer said, “These people have a million ways to get to you.” And they will, too.</p>
<p>Naturally, the media is doing its level-best to bury the Rohrabacher story. The media’s strategy, so far, has been to divert attention from&#160;the central issue (proof that Russia did NOT hack the election) to the trivial prospect of a “deal” between Trump and Assange. Assange wants guarantees that the US will not prosecute him if he provides evidence that Russia did not hack the election.&#160; While this “deal” may be meaningful for Assange, it pales in comparison to the possible revelation that the “Russia hacking” narrative is a fraud perpetrated on the American people by elements of the permanent government who are employing a massive propaganda campaign to advance their political agenda. &#160; That, of course, is much more important.&#160; Not surprisingly, virtually 100 percent of the mainstream coverage has focused on the “deal” aspect of the story. Here&#160;are a few of the more than hundred headlines appearing at Google News:</p>
<p>“GOP Congressman Sought Trump Deal on WikiLeaks, Russia”&#160; Wall Street Journal</p>
<p>“Report: Congressman Chats With WH About Potential Assange Pardon”&#160; Daily Caller</p>
<p>“A GOP congressman reportedly offered Trump a deal on absolving WikiLeaks’ Assange” CNBC</p>
<p>“Republican lawmaker ‘sought a deal with Trump to pardon WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange'” International Business Times</p>
<p>GOP rep proposed Assange pardon deal: report” The Hill</p>
<p>“Congressman tries to broker White House pardon for Julian Assange”, New York Daily News</p>
<p>“Lawmaker tried negotiating deal with Trump to help WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange”, Business Insider</p>
<p>Do you see the common thread&#160;here? The media is trying to divert attention from the real story until they get their bearings and&#160;figure out a way to dispose of Rohrabacher. As soon as they settle on an approach, they’ll be off to the races.</p>
<p>Rohrabacher should be applauded for trying to reveal the truth, but he’s&#160;probably bitten off more than he can chew.</p>
<p>I hope not.</p> | Rohrabacher vs. The Machine | true | https://counterpunch.org/2017/09/19/rohrabacher-vs-the-machine/ | 2017-09-19 | 4 |
<p>For the third weekend in a row, a European soccer match was marred by racism.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/may/11/kevin-constant-atalanta-ac-milan-banana" type="external">Atalanta supporters hurled bananas</a> — a now popular symbol for racist soccer fans across Europe — at Milan defender Kevin Constant during a game in northern Italy on Sunday.</p>
<p>The Frnech-born Guineaan player <a href="http://edition.cnn.com/2014/05/12/sport/football/football-milan-racism/index.html?eref=edition" type="external">showed the banana to match officials</a>, who warned fans that if it happened again the match woudl be called off.</p>
<p>"Whoever threw the banana on the pitch deserves to have a coconut thrown back at them," Atalanta manager Stefano Colantuono <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/may/11/kevin-constant-atalanta-ac-milan-banana" type="external">told the Gazzetta dello Sport</a> after the match.</p>
<p>"They've ruined what was a great afternoon."</p>
<p>Atalanta won the match 2-1, but was later slapped with a <a href="http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/sport/football-atalanta-fined/1104308.html" type="external">$55,000 fine over the incident.</a></p>
<p>Two weeks earlier&#160; <a href="http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/europe/spain/140429/barcelona-dani-alves-response-to-racist-banana-thrower-sparks-somostodosmacacos" type="external">Barcelona defender Dani Alves</a> was preparing to take a corner kick&#160;during a game at Villarreal when a spectator threw a banana onto the pitch.</p>
<p>The piece of fruit landed near the Brazilian player. He responded by picking up the banana, peeling it, eating it and then taking the shot.</p>
<p>His actions led to a global online campaign against racism in soccer. Checkout <a href="https://twitter.com/search?q=%23somostodosmacacos&amp;src=hash" type="external">#SomosTodosMacaos</a> on Twitter.&#160;</p>
<p>Watch a video of the now famous incident here.</p>
<p />
<p>Clearly some soccer fans didn’t get the message.</p>
<p>A week later, <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/may/04/papakouli-diop-racism-atletico-levante" type="external">Levante’s Senegalese midfielder Papakouli Diop</a> claimed he heard monkey chants from Atletico Madrid supporters. He responded by dancing on the pitch.</p>
<p>"It's an issue that has affected me a lot. I went to take a corner and part of the Atlético support began doing monkey chants," <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/football/2014/may/04/papakouli-diop-racism-atletico-levante" type="external">Diop said after the match.</a></p>
<p>"To take the heat out of the situation, I started to dance, but I didn't insult anyone. I don't have anything against the Atlético supporters because it was only a section of their support that shouted at me. I think it's disrespectful that it happens at all stadiums. It's a provocation. I don't know if it can be called racism, but the monkey chanting has to be stopped now."</p>
<p>You can see his brief routine here. &#160;</p>
<p /> | The ugly, racist trend of tossing bananas at black soccer players continues | false | https://pri.org/stories/2014-05-13/ugly-racist-trend-tossing-bananas-black-soccer-players-continues | 2014-05-13 | 3 |
<p>Philip Morris International Inc. is reorganizing its geographic regions and executive ranks -- including naming a new chief financial officer -- in efforts to propel the company's shift away from cigarettes.</p>
<p>The tobacco company has previously announced plans to focus on what it calls "smoke-free" products and less on cigarettes amid volume declines. Several major tobacco companies have sought to roll out new, electronic tobacco-heating devices that they say are healthier alternatives to traditional smoking, but feel more like puffing on a real cigarette. The firms have pursued the direction as the once-explosive growth of e-cigarettes recedes.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>Finance Chief Jacek Olczak will be appointed chief operating officer, responsible for global strategy and "the delivery of results for combustible and reduced-risk products," the company announced Thursday. Mr. Olczak joined the company in 1993 and from 2009 to 2012, he served as president of Philip Morris's European Union region.</p>
<p>Martin King, president of Philip Morris's Asia region, will become CFO. Mr. King joined the company in 2003 from Philip Morris USA, now a subsidiary of Altria Group Inc.</p>
<p>The company added that it would operate in six geographic regions, up from its current four. The European Union division and the Latin America and Canada region will remain the same. The Eastern Europe region will be split off from the Middle East and Africa. The other segments will include the East Asia and Australia region, and the South and Southeast Asia region.</p>
<p>"The changes we are announcing today reflect our desire to best equip, empower and support our organization as we transform within a rapidly evolving environment," said Chief Executive Andre Calantzopoulos in prepared remarks, detailing about a dozen new executive assignments in all.</p>
<p>Philip Morris is seeking Food and Drug Administration approval for a heat-not-burn device called IQOS. In a partnership with Altria Group -- which spun off Philip Morris from it in 2008 -- the companies hope to sell IQOS under the Marlboro brand in the U.S. Philip Morris also hopes to market the product as being safer than cigarettes, a claim that must be approved by the FDA.</p>
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<p>Philip Morris has centered much of its future strategy on its IQOS effort, opening dedicated stores in cities such as London and Tokyo to sell the device.</p>
<p>Shares in Philip Morris, up 22% so far this year, rose 0.3% to $111.89 in morning trading.</p>
<p>--Saabira Chaudhuri contributed to this article.</p>
<p>Write to Ezequiel Minaya at [email protected]</p>
<p>(END) Dow Jones Newswires</p>
<p>September 28, 2017 10:54 ET (14:54 GMT)</p> | Philip Morris Reorganizes as It Shifts Focus to 'Smoke-Free' Products | true | http://foxbusiness.com/features/2017/09/28/philip-morris-reorganizes-as-it-shifts-focus-to-smoke-free-products.html | 2017-09-28 | 0 |
<p>I think this is&#160;a fair description of the racial narrative of the shooting of Trayvon Martin by George Zimmerman:</p>
<p>George Zimmerman&#160;(1)&#160;shot Trayvon Martin (2) because a black teenager in a hoodie is frightening (3) to whites, as proven by (4) Zimmerman’s description of Martin as suspicious because he was black, and (5) Zimmerman’s use of the phrase “f-ing coons”, (6) in a classic case of racial profiling, (7) inspired by&#160;a climate of hate stoked by Republican “right-wing” rhetoric.</p>
<p>What is left of this narrative based upon what currently is publicly known?</p>
<p>(1) True, George Zimmerman shot Trayvon Martin.</p>
<p>(2) There is nothing to indicate that wearing a hoodie had anything to do with why Zimmerman considered Martin suspicious.&#160; The reason given by Zimmerman in the initial 911 call, before he possibly could have known how the evening would end or how a racial narrative would develop, <a href="" type="internal">did not mention the hoodie</a>.&#160; The hoodie only was mentioned after the 911 dispatcher asked what the suspicious person was wearing.</p>
<p>(3) Zimmerman’s mother is Hispanic, and Zimmerman <a href="http://freebeacon.com/registered-dem-killed-trayvon/" type="external">self-identified as Hispanic</a>.&#160; That’s not to say that a Hispanic person cannot harbor racial animosity towards blacks, but there is nothing to indicate that Zimmerman harbored such animosity, and in fact, there is <a href="http://dailycaller.com/2012/04/04/zimmerman-demanded-discipline-in-2010-race-related-beating-for-officers-who-investigated-martin-shooting/" type="external">evidence to suggest</a> otherwise.</p>
<p>(4) Zimmerman did not describe Martin’s race in the initial 911 phone call until the dispatcher asked the race of the suspicious person, at which point Zimmerman said he “looks black.”&#160; The audio&#160; <a href="http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&amp;rct=j&amp;q=nbc%20edits%20911%20tape&amp;source=blogsearch&amp;cd=7&amp;ved=0CFkQmAEwBg&amp;url=http%3A%2F%2Fpjmedia.com%2Ftatler%2F2012%2F04%2F09%2Fpjtv-exclusive-how-nbc-editors-made-the-zimmerman-911-call-sound-racist%2F&amp;ei=V_6JT4XnAeTu0gHw6pHjCQ&amp;usg=AFQjCNGMZzEbmzTXxZNyCKk4nCevNvLmZQ" type="external">broadcast by NBC News</a> omitted this intervening question to make it appear as if Zimmerman stated that Martin was suspicious because he was black.</p>
<p>(5)&#160;The assertion that Martin used the racial epithet “coons” is subject to serious doubt.&#160; CNN hired <a href="" type="internal">three audio experts</a>, only one of whom believed the word was used.&#160; In the <a href="https://www.scribd.com/doc/291588254/Zimmerman-Affidavit-of-Probable-Cause-1" type="external">Affidavit of Probable Cause</a>, two state investigators swore under oath that Zimmerman said “ <a href="" type="internal">f-ing punks</a>.”</p>
<p>(6) In the Affidavit of Probable Cause, the State of Florida alleged that Martin was “profiled” by Zimmerman, but did not accuse Zimmerman of profiling Martin based on race.&#160; Given how freely the State exaggerated known facts in the Affidavit (for example, asserting that the 911 dispatcher&#160;“instructed Zimmerman not to” follow Martin, when in fact the dispatcher only said “we don’t need you to do that”), it is reasonable to believe that the State is not comfortable assigning racial motivation to the reason why Zimmerman found Martin suspicious.</p>
<p>(7) Zimmerman is a <a href="" type="internal">registered Democrat</a>.</p>
<p>The net result of a fair assessment of the racial narrative of the case is that there is no racial narrative based on currently known facts.&#160; There are only assumptions and speculation&#160;drawn from historical events and experiences in which George Zimmerman was not involved.</p>
<p>This case is where it always should have been,&#160;about the known fact that George Zimmerman shot Trayvon Martin, and whether that shooting was legally justified, or an unlawful homicide.</p> | Saturday Night Card Game (What is left of the Zimmerman-Martin racial narrative?) | true | http://legalinsurrection.com/2012/04/saturday-night-card-game-what-is-left-of-the-zimmerman-martin-racial-narrative/ | 2012-04-14 | 0 |
<p>.......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... ..........</p>
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<p>El Rancho de las Golondrinas (Ranch of the Swallows), a living-history museum south of Santa Fe, has seen attendance grow dramatically since it began an annual commemoration three years ago called “Viva Mexico!”</p>
<p>“It’s exciting and a lot of fun, and if you haven’t been out to Los Ranchos de las Golondrinas for a while, it will be worth your while to come out,” said ranch spokeswoman Amanda Crocker.</p>
<p>“Viva Mexico!” commemorates Mexico’s contributions to shaping New Mexico, which was a province of Mexico from 1821 until 1848.</p>
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<p>El Rancho de las Golondrinas has always focused on interpreting the Spanish Colonial and Territorial periods in the 16th to 18th centuries in New Mexico.</p>
<p>“A lot of our interpretive focus had been on the Spanish Colonial period, but we decided we should do something to focus on our neighbors to the south because of its deep ties to New Mexico,” she said.</p>
<p>“Viva Mexico!” is staged with the cooperation of the Mexican Consulate and the Mexican state of Veracruz. More than 650 people attended the first year, with attendance last year going over 5,000, Crocker said.</p>
<p>The show is highlighted by Voladores de Papantla, a ritual that consists of a dance and the climbing by five men of a 60-foot pole. The leader, on top of the pole, plays music on a flute and drum to the sun, the four winds and four directions. When he finishes the song, the other four dancers fling themselves headfirst into the “void,” tied to the platform by long ropes.</p>
<p>“They twirl to mimic the movement of flight and to bear their messages of life and birth to the heavens,” a release said.</p>
<p>Three other marquee Mexican entertainment acts will also perform at “Viva Mexico!”</p>
<p>“We are now able to get performers and acts from Mexico and we couldn’t have done it without the support of the Mexican Consulate in Albuquerque and the state of Veracruz, Mexico,” Crocker said.</p>
<p>Other acts will be Cornisa 20, a Mexican traveling comedy troupe, and the Mexican dance company Tierra de Humo, which will present music and dance from Columbian times.</p>
<p>The event includes a mercado (market) featuring artisans from all over Mexico, folkloric dancing, traditional foods, mariachi music, traditional healing ceremonies and piñatas.</p> | Ranch to celebrate all things Mexico | false | https://abqjournal.com/43317/ranch-to-celebrate-all-things-mexico.html | 2011-07-15 | 2 |
<p>In <a href="" type="internal">Fugitive Days</a>, his memoir of the radical wing of the anti-war movement, Bill Ayers describes the competitive practise of “criticism/self-criticism”. It was, he writes, an art of “tripping over one another to be exactly alike, following the sticky rules of congealed idealism”. <a href="#_edn1" type="external">[i]</a> In other words, it wasn’t really self-criticism. It was expression of the “happy safeness” of believing “we and we alone knew the way”. <a href="#_edn2" type="external">[ii]</a></p>
<p>Ayers does not deny the vision of world injustice that drove the Weather Underground to remarkable resistance. Youth understood that a comfortable white life was collusion with mass slaughter abroad, or could easily be so. They went to unusual lengths to gain awareness of their white and class privilege and to resist the protection it offered them. Their intentions were courageous and deserve admiration.</p>
<p>Yet Ayers refers to a “soothing and familiar” story, taken up again and again, which gradually replaced the “wisdom of experience”. The “criticism/self-criticism” sessions were incorporated into that story. Initially, the anti-war movement resolved disagreements through practise. The key was political action. But ideology was an “appealing alternative”. And it ended what had been a “genuinely new left”. <a href="#_edn3" type="external">[iii]</a></p>
<p>Ayers’ message is relevant. Perhaps from modesty, he doesn’t stress it as he might. It matters to today. Self-criticism is easy. One can be disgusted by one’s own pride and self-righteousness. This also is pride and self-righteousness. It is self-absorption. It can’t make me more open to the world and able to feel compassion for others’ frailties. Without “wisdom of experience”, a “soothing story” easily holds sway.</p>
<p>I have seen something like this in university students, and perhaps have unwittingly promoted it. They think that by pursuing ever more diverse and challenging experiences, they become personally enriched, and more open. No one wants to live in a bubble. They know a relatively rich, protected lifestyle can cut them off. And so they are self-critical, seeking awareness of whatever privilege they happen to possess.</p>
<p>They do many things, one after the other. They claim to have lived in this or that way, to have experienced hardship, simplicity, poverty, insecurity. Maybe. But it’s presented as something done and accomplished, a feat to be listed along with other feats. It’s a step on the way to somewhere, usually unrelated to the experience they just had. The “soothing and familiar story” has not been displaced.</p>
<p>Wisdom of experience, properly appreciated, would do that. Sometimes they want credit for experiences abroad. So I have to assess educational, as opposed to, say, entertainment, value. There’s nothing wrong with entertainment but it’s not education. Education is what you are left with after you’ve forgotten what you were told in school. Or so said Einstein. It’s about who you become.</p>
<p>We give them mixed messages, in teaching. Within analytic philosophy of science, philosophers argue that accessing truth is a result of causation. Since shortly after the demise of positivism, around the middle of the twentieth century, philosophers have argued that we know the world dialectically, as a result of the reliable regulation of beliefs by causal relations between the knower and the world.</p>
<p>That means that we learn as the process of knowing acts upon us, changing even our idea of learning and why it matters. And this means that if we want to learn, that is, if we want to discover what was previously unimaginable, we should expect our expectations to be changed. The very goals of our research should change, in some way, as we research, including when that goal is ourselves.</p>
<p>Any process of learning, if it is really discovery, should be like a passage through dark waters, <a href="#_edn4" type="external">[iv]</a> in some sense. Expectations may fail. Indeed, they should, occasionally. It is how we know we have them. This is the picture of knowledge that has arisen out of analytic philosophy in the past half century. It is a causally regulated process that should, to some degree, change who we are, and who we expect to be.</p>
<p>That is the theory. In practise, though, we mostly treat academic success as a series of gains, not a process of becoming. It is about what students acquire: knowledge, recognition, stints abroad. Maybe, this is because we always have to measure it. For whatever reason, we give them the idea that learning is a kind of consumerism, the collecting of goods that can be owned at no cost to who I think I am.</p>
<p>Ayers points to moral superiority as perhaps the fatal flaw in otherwise radical and humanistic opposition to war and aggression. Nonetheless, he writes, it’s so “utterly and universally human”. We all look for “a solid surface or ledge to grab on to in the swirling, slippery shambles of ongoing experience”. We want “clear and definitive answers … something certain in our extraordinarily uncertain world”. <a href="#_edn5" type="external">[v]</a></p>
<p>It may not be “utterly and universally human”. Our “extraordinarily uncertain world” is known to science and has been known to philosophers, for millennia. Unfortunately, though, the philosophers who have been most realistic about “the swirling, slippery shambles of ongoing experience” are now uninfluential. They’ve been buried and lost under and within the globalization of liberalism: the individual over nature.</p>
<p>Some of those who’ve been most thoroughly honest about our uncertain nature, as human beings, were revolutionaries. Knowing imperialism, they had no truck with European certainties. They found more compelling the vision of indigenous peoples and those arriving from Africa. It was a view respecting nature, and its uncertainty. It was a view of human beings as part of that uncertain reality.</p>
<p>Radical independence thinkers, in our own Americas, thoroughly rejected the soothing story of liberalism. <a href="#_edn6" type="external">[vi]</a> It tells us human beings, to be free, impose meaningfulness “from within”, by which is meant the conscious mind. This story remains in place even though both science and philosophy suggest we should let learning happen, even if, and especially because it transforms that conscious mind.</p>
<p>The hard part of that suggestion is loss, which is necessary. Education is at least in part something that happens, not something that is done. I should let it happen although not in the interests of gaining something I wanted before. Rather, I learn if I let it happen for the sake, not of gain, but of loss: the loss of self-satisfaction. This is wisdom of experience explaining how to discover diversity not know before.</p>
<p>Precisely the wisdom of experience is needed to learn from anti-imperialists in the South. They weren’t concerned about personal identity. They wanted human identity. They knew it had to be discovered. The logic of imperialism meant it couldn’t be taken for granted. Such philosophers can’t just be studied. Knowing them involves loss, or it should. Knowing them displaces the soothing story.</p>
<p>When students return from abroad with, “I’ve been there, done that”, I wonder about educational value. They went abroad to learn respect for other cultures. But they come back like conquering heroes. This means they may not have experienced unexpected human connection. And they may not know, because we may not have taught them, that undergoing such experience is destabilizing. It is humbling.</p>
<p>We may have misled them. The self-indulgence of academic identity politics is well-discussed. Recent discussions of “epistemic injustice” may follow along. Both address privilege within a framework that essentially denies the causal interdependence of human beings and our environment. More helpful philosophers, those not enthralled by the liberal “myth of the self-made man”, are still relatively absent.</p>
<p>In the sixties and seventies, as Ayers describes, student activists were good at self-criticism. But it ended up explaining, not diminishing self-centredness. A story was still in place. It was political ideology, as he notes. But it was also culture. There’s a cultural story about needing control, about self- realization, self- fulfillment – a false story about freedom, involving false belief in thingish identity.</p>
<p>It needs also to be displaced. But it needs first to be recognized for what it is: ideology. It gets assumed in myriad ways, including (but not restricted to) the “been there, done that” approach to education. Those who point it out are misinterpreted. Inevitably. If critique is radical, it won’t be understood without loss, and the “been there, done that” approach doesn’t accommodate loss. It’s not expected.</p>
<p>If we don’t want to be “tripping over one another to be exactly alike”, we might pay attention to philosophers who have pursued the truth about human existence: its uncertainty. José Martí, who led Cuba’s last independence war against Spain, went so far as to say that inequality between north and south was an issue about a false view of education. <a href="#_edn7" type="external">[vii]</a> He may be right. There’s a lot at stake.</p>
<p>Notes.</p>
<p><a href="#_ednref1" type="external">[i]</a> Fugitive Days (Boston: Beacon Press, 2001) 160-1</p>
<p><a href="#_ednref2" type="external">[ii]</a> 165, 292</p>
<p><a href="#_ednref3" type="external">[iii]</a> 165-6</p>
<p><a href="#_ednref4" type="external">[iv]</a> V.I. Lenin 1961 ‘ Conspectus of Hegel ’ s Science of Logic ’ , in Stewart Smith (ed.), Collected</p>
<p>Works, Vol. 38 . Clemens Dutt (Trans.). London: Lawrence and Wishart (Originally published 1930) 114</p>
<p><a href="#_ednref5" type="external">[v]</a> Fugitive, 293</p>
<p><a href="#_ednref6" type="external">[vi]</a> E.g. Sor Juana Inés, José Martí, José Carlos Mariátequi, Che Guevara, Paulo Freire, Frantz Fanon</p>
<p><a href="#_ednref7" type="external">[vii]</a> “The government must be born from the country. The spirit of the government must be the spirit of the country… The battle is not between civilization and barbarity, but between false erudition and nature”. Our America, 1891.</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | Self-Criticism and a Further Danger of Identity Politics | true | https://counterpunch.org/2016/09/09/self-criticism-and-a-further-danger-of-identity-politics/ | 2016-09-09 | 4 |
<p>Conflicting reports have emerged about the final hours of a woman who was found hanging dead in a mango orchard on Sunday in Bihar, India.</p>
<p>The 32-year-old woman was initially reported to have been gang-raped and killed, though reports have now surfaced suggesting that she was not sexually assaulted, and that her death may have been a suicide.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.muslimnews.co.uk/news/news.php?article=24577" type="external">According to the Muslim News</a>, before her death the woman was traveling from Alipore to Delhi by train with her 10-year-old son and two relatives, to join her husband in the city.</p>
<p>Muslim News wrote that the woman was "gang raped, killed and her semi-naked body hung from a tree in a mango orchard in Kahalgaon."&#160;</p>
<p>The region's senior superintendent, K.S. Napalm, <a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-01-14/new-suspected-cases-of-gang-rape-show-threat-facing-indian-women.html" type="external">told Bloomberg Business Week</a> that the woman was found hanging by her sari and that there was "evidence that she was sexually assaulted and that the attack was carried out by more than one person."&#160;</p>
<p>The woman reportedly tried to get off the train at Sahibganj but was stopped by her fellow passengers, the Indian <a href="http://www.indianexpress.com/news/jalpaiguri-woman-travelling-to-delhi-gangraped-murdered-in-bihar-body-hung-from-tree/1059031/" type="external">Express reported</a>.&#160;</p>
<p>She is thought to have jumped off the train when it slowed down between stations, though there are conflicting reports as to whether she was fleeing from attackers or not.&#160;</p>
<p>Police investigating the case have now said that the unidentified woman may not have been raped, and instead committed suicide, <a href="http://www.ndtv.com/article/india/woman-who-was-found-hanging-from-tree-in-bihar-was-not-gang-raped-reveals-post-mortem-report-316864" type="external">NDTV reported</a>.&#160;</p>
<p>GlobalPost senior correspondent in New Delhi Jason Overdorf said that Indian media have reported nearly every rape case filed with police since the tragic death of a 23-year-old rape victim, in an effort to illustrate the pervasive nature of violence against women in the country.&#160;</p>
<p>"Apart from pressuring the central and state governments to take actions to protect women and strengthen laws, the persistent reports are shaking Indians from every walk of life out of the condition of willful blindness that has in the past insisted that this kind of violence doesn't happen in 'modern India,' or in its mythically idyllic villages, or in its 'good families," says Overdorf.</p>
<p>"The hope is that this will make victims more willing to come forward, make their families more willing to support them, and make the police more vigilant in pursuing their attackers," he added.</p>
<p>In another recent incident, a <a href="http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/asia-pacific/india/130113/new-india-bus-rape-case-leads-six-arrests" type="external">29-year-old woman was attacked and raped</a>when she was traveling alone on an illegally operated bus in the northern state of Punjab. Police are investigating the case.</p>
<p>More from GlobalPost:&#160; <a href="http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/news/regions/asia-pacific/india/130113/new-india-bus-rape-case-leads-six-arrests" type="external">New India bus rape case leads to six arrests</a></p>
<p>Jason Overdorf contributed reporting from New Delhi. Follow him <a href="https://twitter.com/joverdorf" type="external">@joverdorf</a>.</p> | Conflicting reports surface over alleged gang rape in Bihar, India | false | https://pri.org/stories/2013-01-14/conflicting-reports-surface-over-alleged-gang-rape-bihar-india | 2013-01-14 | 3 |
<p>July 12 (UPI) — Australian police released security camera footage of an unidentified suspect doing a motorcycle burnout in an unusual place — an elevator.</p>
<p>The video shows the biker, whose face is concealed by a helmet, riding into the elevator at the Munno Para Train Station at 5:50 p.m. July 2 and leaving a streak on the floor of the elevator after riding a few floors down.</p>
<p>The man then backs the motorcycle into the elevator again and rides back up, filling the enclosed space with smoke as he does a burnout.</p>
<p>Police said they are asking members of the public for any information on the “thoughtless hoon” in the video.</p> | Australian police seek man who did motorcycle burnout in elevator | false | https://newsline.com/australian-police-seek-man-who-did-motorcycle-burnout-in-elevator/ | 2017-07-12 | 1 |
<p>ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — An Arizona man whose behavior aboard a flight earlier this year forced an emergency landing in New Mexico has pleaded guilty to charges that he assaulted and intimidated crew members and flight attendants.</p>
<p>Federal prosecutors say 55-year-old Robert Tomblin of Phoenix entered his plea during a hearing Friday in Albuquerque. Sentencing has yet to be scheduled.</p>
<p>The charges stem from an August flight between Roswell, New Mexico, and Phoenix.</p>
<p>According to court documents, a flight attendant reported to the captain that Tomblin, who was seated in an emergency exit row, appeared to be intoxicated and was acting belligerent.</p>
<p>Attendants asked him to move to another seat due to safety concerns but he refused.</p>
<p>Tomblin was accused of head-butting two police officers before being carried off the plane after the flight was diverted to Albuquerque.</p>
<p>ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. (AP) — An Arizona man whose behavior aboard a flight earlier this year forced an emergency landing in New Mexico has pleaded guilty to charges that he assaulted and intimidated crew members and flight attendants.</p>
<p>Federal prosecutors say 55-year-old Robert Tomblin of Phoenix entered his plea during a hearing Friday in Albuquerque. Sentencing has yet to be scheduled.</p>
<p>The charges stem from an August flight between Roswell, New Mexico, and Phoenix.</p>
<p>According to court documents, a flight attendant reported to the captain that Tomblin, who was seated in an emergency exit row, appeared to be intoxicated and was acting belligerent.</p>
<p>Attendants asked him to move to another seat due to safety concerns but he refused.</p>
<p>Tomblin was accused of head-butting two police officers before being carried off the plane after the flight was diverted to Albuquerque.</p> | Arizona man pleads guilty to intimidating flight crew | false | https://apnews.com/amp/97c33004b11f4defa8818c3c99e09980 | 2017-12-29 | 2 |
<p>TRACK 2</p>
<p>“Lookin’ for You”</p>
<p>From Gurf Morlix’s Gurf Morlix Finds the Present Tense</p>
<p>ROOTBALL</p>
<p>Liner notes: “You know I like it dark and hot/Torn and twisted, tied in a knot,” mutters Gurf Morlix, hitching his weary rasp to eerie organ riffs in this tale of unrequited desire.</p>
<p>Behind the music: Morlix, a producer and guitarist for Lucinda Williams, has also collaborated with the likes of Jerry Lee Lewis and Warren Zevon.</p>
<p>Check it out if you like: Eloquent troubadours like Kathleen Edwards, Richard Thompson, and Steve Earle.</p>
<p />
<p /> | Music Review: “Lookin’ for You” by Gurf Morlix | true | https://motherjones.com/politics/2013/03/music-review-lookin-you-gurf-morlix/ | 2013-03-05 | 4 |
<p>.......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... ..........</p>
<p />
<p>No one is saying that, exactly. But with this weekend’s grand opening of SITE’s redesigned and expanded space, its managers hope their exhibitions in the Railyard will be more accessible to everyone, even as the building’s capabilities for bringing in cutting-edge art have been enhanced.</p>
<p>Irene Hofmann, director and chief curator at SITE Santa Fe, poses on SITE’S new mezzanine, part of a $6 million makeover. (Eddie Moore/Albuquerque Journal)</p>
<p>Irene Hoffmann, SITE’s director and chief curator, said re-introducing SITE to the community is something she has looked forward to for years.</p>
<p>The new building represents “greater openness of the institution,” she said during a recent tour.</p>
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<p>Part of SITE will now be open daily and year-round, with expanded hours for a lobby that offers a new coffee and snack bar, seating areas for people to eat, drink or hang out with friends and a gift shop that won’t require admission.</p>
<p>“That, I hope along with a lot of other things, signals our desire to be more accessible and open the institution to more people,” said Hoffmann. The building was previously open to the public only during main gallery hours Thursday-Sunday.</p>
<p>Also, a new 2,000-square-foot exhibit space adjacent to the lobby, SITElab, allows for smaller shows to come in and out, and is free for visitors.</p>
<p>This Saturday and Sunday, SITE Santa Fe will debut its new spaces, with free admission for the entire facility. There will be multi-language tours of “Future Shock,” the new-look SITE’s first major exhibition, along with free food and three artist talks.</p>
<p>More from ABQJournal.com</p>
<p>Installations tackle contemporary issues, as well as a personal future shock about death, afterlife… continue reading »</p>
<p>To expand on the future theme, visitors can participate in an interactive project to send their future selves a postcard, donate items for a time capsule and try to learn about their own coming days from fortune tellers. Tonight, there’s a party for paying customers.</p>
<p>The rehab project, which broke ground last August, kept the contemporary art space’s approximately 15,000 square feet of gallery space – now with climate control for art pieces that need more sensitive holding and exhibition areas – as well as the expanded lobby, a multi-use auditorium with a seating capacity of about 200, a larger education lab for student visitors and a “sky terrace” mezzanine.</p>
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<p>The construction cost more than $6 million, according to external relations director Anne Wrinkle.</p>
<p>SITE began a capital campaign last year to raise $11.5 million that goes toward the expansion and SITE’s endowment.</p>
<p>The aluminum-clad, 36,000-square-foot building was redesigned by New York-based SHoP Architects, which had never designed a museum space before partnering with SITE.</p>
<p>“We will always still push the envelope here and show challenging work, what’s new in contemporary art, but now the way we have the spaces will provide more of a balance,” said Hoffman.</p>
<p>A major exhibition, “Future Shock,” also opens this weekend and runs until May 1 (see sidebar story).</p>
<p>Light boxes by Kota Ezawa are on display as part of a show called “The Crime of Art” in SITE Santa Fe’s new SITElab space next to the lobby, which will be admission-free. (Eddie Moore/Albuquerque Journal)</p>
<p>The first show in the smaller SITElab space is “The Crime of Art” by Kota Ewaza, featuring about a dozen painting and video installations that tell the story of some of the world’s most famous museum heists.</p>
<p>A new addition that Hoffmann said turned out better than she expected is the sky terrace, an outdoor area overlooking the Railyard Park that can either be rented out for special events or visited whenever the main gallery is open Thursday-Sunday, according to Wrinkle.</p>
<p>The terrace has loaned art, such as an aluminum bench by late architect Zaha Hadid and, for now, vinyl wall installations of insects made by artist Regina Silveira for the “Future Shock” show.</p>
<p>“We always wanted outdoor space with this project,” said Hoffmann. “We always wanted to do something with this building expansion that takes advantage of where we are in this world.”</p>
<p>According to Hoffmann, SITE’s changes will affect the view of contemporary art in Santa Fe. SITE will now be able to bring in pieces it couldn’t before because of its climate control limitations.</p>
<p>And the institution – whose past biennial shows have attracted attention from both the East and West coast art worlds – wants to change how everyday citizens feel about the art.</p>
<p>The new-look SITE Santa Fe includes a gift shop and a coffee and snack bar as part of an expanded lobby area that will be open daily. (Eddie Moore/Albuquerque Journal)</p>
<p>By opening up more spaces and showing different kinds of exhibitions, it wants to prove that modern art can attract interest from a broad range of viewers.</p>
<p>“My hope is that more people will be interested in contemporary art and feel that it can be for them, too,” she said.</p>
<p>A party tonight called “The Reveal” is for ticketed attendees only. Tickets range from $20 (or $25 at the door), for entry at 9 p.m., to $300 – $250 for members – to come at 6 p.m. for a more private celebration and viewing of “Future Shock.” The $100 tickets are good for entry at 7:30 p.m.</p>
<p>Tonight’s fete with a DJ, food and dancing will also include a performance by indigenous hip hop musician “Supaman.”</p>
<p /> | A more balanced space | false | https://abqjournal.com/1074149/a-more-balanced-space-ex-newlook-site-santa-fe-offers-more-accessible-open-spaces-as-well-as-updated-capabilities.html | 2017-10-06 | 2 |
<p />
<p><a href="http://freepatriot.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/151-fema.jpg" type="external" /></p>
<p>What if our worse fears are confirmed? We’ve been watching as the criminal forces within the U.S. government slowly work their way into a more entrenched position in the machinery of power. What if the reason we have so many of our troops overseas, including our national guardsmen, is to remove them from the scene of an American coup?</p>
<p>Could that be the real ultimate motive behind the foreign wars? There is a lot of information contained in this video and the accompanying text from&#160; <a href="http://www.thesleuthjournal.com/fema-preparing-major-event-region-iii/" type="external">thesleuthjournal.com</a>. Added together, there is more than a little cause for concern. We should all pray that it is just a conspiracy theorist’s nightmare. If there is more to it, it will be a real life nightmare for the whole world.</p>
<p>Following the bread crumb trail of FEMA orders, retired State Senator Sheldon R. Songstad of South Dakota issued an “Emergency Fema Region 3 Alert!!!,” on August 13th.</p>
<p>Region three is comprised of; Washington DC, Delaware, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and West Virginia.</p>
<p>Songstad’s research turned up some very interesting facts. Each item on its own could go unnoticed, but the collective facts may be worthy of your attention and scrutiny. The U.S. government appears to be preparing for a major event. It appears that this event is being staged for approximately Oct. 1st. Let’s look at the numbers and dates.</p>
<p>UN Peacekeepers began training the 4th&#160;week of July and will complete their nine week training by October 1st. They are learning English, as well as US weapon systems and Urban Warfare training.</p>
<p>How many troops are training? 386,000 troops!</p>
<p>The Center of Disease Control ordered $11 million worth of antibiotics. Where are they going? FEMA Region lll. When are they due? October 1st. This coupled with the fact that the World Health Organization held an emergency meeting, its second such meeting in its&#160;history,&#160;to discuss MERS Corona virus. This is quite unsettling. The WHO determined that a vaccine MUST be in place by October 1st.</p>
<p>Periodic testing of GPS and Communications satellites is normal, but coordinating their testing for the first time, with a testing date of September 29th, is noteworthy.</p>
<p>All DHS agents MUST now qualify with sidearm, shotgun and AR 15’s by September 28th. Less lethal qualifications are not mentioned. Has one eye brow risen? The DHS will receive 2800 Mine-Resistant Ambush Protected vehicles (MRAP’s) that must be delivered by October 1st.</p>
<p>All National Guard units will complete their annual two week training in riot control and disaster assistance. All units MUST have their training complete by September 30th. However, the Eastern-based Coast Guard units will not be performing their usual training in the Gulf, this year they will be trained in Virginia and Delaware for 10 days beginning September 26th.</p>
<p>Coincidently, the Emergency Broadcast System will begin daily testing beginning on September 25th thru October 2nd. All of this kind of reminds me of the bomb sniffing dogs being trained at the Boston Marathon for the first time ever.</p>
<p>FEMA purchase orders deserve a little attention too. They ordered over $14.2 million for MREs and heater meals and 22 million pouches of emergency water, to be delivered to Region III by October 1st. An additional order of $13.6 million worth of MRE’s and heater meals will be delivered to Austin by October 1st.</p>
<p>Our U.S. military will not be permitted leave from September 28th thru November 5th. NORCOMM’s yearly training for civil unrest is suspended until September 27th. To be performed in northeast coastal areas. Date for release of QE3 report has been moved to October 16th.</p>
<p>Over 300 school systems will be issued a 3 day emergency kit for each student in September.</p>
<p>The retired Senator’s national preparedness research was sparked by a comment Donald Trump made during a recent appearance on Fox News’ “On the Record with&#160;Greta&#160;Van Susteren.” Songstad included a video version of his findings with his notice.&#160;His video is going viral.</p>
<p>How concerned should we be? Or perhaps the question is….How prepared should we be? Perhaps the answer is……Better prepared than the government.&#160;</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | I don’t mean to alarm anyone, but this isn’t the first time I have heard this. Just passing it along. This comes from a retired US Senator…. | true | https://powderedwigsociety.com/i-dont-mean-to-alarm-anyone-but-this-isnt-the-first-time-i-have-heard-this-just-passing-it-along-this-comes-from-a-retired-us-senator/ | 2013-09-19 | 0 |
<p>(Editor's note:&#160;Electric Japan is a two-part series on Japan's efforts to help its struggling consumer electronics industry. Read more about the size of the Japanese <a href="http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/japan/091209/japan-yen-digital-tv" type="external">business opportunities</a>, particularly in Latin America.)</p>
<p>TOKYO, Japan – The Japanese government has a longstanding policy of supporting its exporters wherever they do business abroad, whether or not they need the help.</p>
<p>So it’s no surprise to hear Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications bureaucrats waxing poetic about the technical standards that Latin American countries use for digital TVs. “The Japanese standard is good at high definition broadcasts and very detailed images,” enthuses Yasushi Furukawa, deputy director for international relations in the broadcasting technology division.</p>
<p>MIC, as the ministry is known, is handling Japan’s campaign to convince Latin American countries to sign up with the Japanese digital TV standard. Since 2006, when Brazil, the continent’s largest economy, adopted the Japanese ISDB-T specifications, Japan has been chasing an opportunity to sell TVs to 400 million South Americans. With 80 percent of households living in countries that have announced plans to mandate Japanese-standard TVs — Peru, Argentina, Chile, and Venezuela have all signed on since the spring — the Japanese bureaucrats appear to be winning this fight.</p>
<p>The question now is whether their prize is more TV exports, or just the modicum of prestige that comes with having their standard widely adopted. TV manufacturers tend to make products for all the competing standards, not just their own national ones, so the Japanese won’t have the field to themselves even if the rest of Latin America does choose ISDB-T.</p>
<p>At stake is an elusive edge in both digital TVs and the HD shows that make them better than their analog ancestors. Because Japan developed ISDB-T, its own machines ought to be the best at operating under the standard, the government thinking goes. Japanese broadcasters are also poised to begin exporting TV shows developed for HD, Furukawa said. The most likely candidates: anime and other cartoons, already beloved by a cult of followers worldwide.</p>
<p>Japanese TV manufacturers desperately need markets like Latin America to save them from their withering customer base at home. Demographics are working against Japan; the country has too many old people and too few babies, and skittish workers are afraid to spend money freely in a downturn. South Korean competitors like LG and Samsung, as well as increasing numbers of Chinese TV makers, are already in all the same places where Japanese TVs are sold.</p>
<p>Under the Liberal Democratic Party, the monolithic bloc that controlled Japan throughout nearly the entire postwar period, industrial policy was what kept the Japanese economy going. Spurred on by government policies and pressure, big banks lent to big conglomerates and their affiliates. These companies spent the money on wages, employing as many people as possible and keeping unemployment at artificially low levels. They also invested heavily in production, allowing the economy to concentrate on exports and driving the Japanese recovery.</p>
<p>But this August’s <a href="http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/japan/090830/japans-opposition-wins-historic-landslide-victory" type="external">historic LDP defeat</a> after years of economic stagnation means those policies could finally be changing. Under new prime minister Yukio Hatoyama, the Democratic government has promised to spend more money on individual voters, which must mean spending less on companies. Consumer-focused stimulus plans include cash payments to <a href="http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/japan/090915/pay-procreate-cash-kids" type="external">families with kids</a> and free public high school tuition. Hatoyama’s party has also said it intends to defang the vast and powerful bureaucracy, which controls policy-making. If the Democrats succeed, Japan Inc. will lose one important advocate at home and overseas.</p>
<p>For the moment, the bureaucrats are still on the case.</p>
<p>Once the Latin American campaign is over, the next stop will be the Philippines, which uses the same broadcast frequencies as Japan and hasn’t yet said which standard it will use. The final skirmish in the standards war will be Africa, where the few countries who have selected a standard have gone with Europe’s. Although African digital TV sales there won’t take off for many years, any expanding market is a good thing for shrinking Japan.</p> | Electric Japan: Can politicians save the electronics industry? | false | https://pri.org/stories/2009-12-21/electric-japan-can-politicians-save-electronics-industry | 2009-12-21 | 3 |
<p />
<p>U.S. health care spending grew by the slowest rate in more than a half-century last year, government analysts said Wednesday. But a speed-up is coming as the economy gets traction and the new health care law covers more people.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>The nation's health care tab grew by just 3.6 percent in 2013, nonpartisan economic experts with the Health and Human Services department said in their report. That's the lowest annual increase going back to 1960, when the government began measuring.</p>
<p>The slow growth is mainly due to an uncertain recovery from the deep economic recession, the analysis suggested. Employers shifting workers to health plans that can expose them to higher out-of-pocket costs also played a part.</p>
<p>President Barack Obama's health care law was not yet fully implemented in 2013. It seems to have had a push-and-pull effect on spending that year, holding costs down in some areas and nudging them higher in others.</p>
<p>"The key question is whether health spending growth will accelerate once economic conditions improve significantly," said the report from the Office of the Actuary, a numbers-crunching unit of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. "Historical evidence suggests that it will."</p>
<p>Overall, the nation spent $2.9 trillion on health care in 2013, from hospital and doctor bills, to prescriptions and nursing home care. That worked out to $9,255 per person, said the report, a figure well above what any other economically advanced country spends.</p>
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<p>In practice, a small fraction of people - those who are the sickest - account for the majority of spending. Roughly 30 percent of Medicare spending goes for patients in their last year of life, a share that does not seem to change much over time.</p>
<p>The report found that health care spending in 2013 remained stable as a share of the total U.S. economy, accounting for 17.4 percent. That finding is important, because if health care returns to a pattern of outpacing economic growth, programs like Medicare, Medicaid, and the new health care law will become harder to pay for. Private insurance could also become cost prohibitive.</p>
<p>Growth slowed in several key areas, including hospital care, doctors' services, Medicare spending, private health insurance, and out-of-pocket spending by consumers, including deductibles and copayments. Hospital care and physician services are the two biggest items in the spending column.</p>
<p>Spending growth accelerated for prescription drugs and for Medicaid. New brand-name medications and specialty drugs accounted for much of the speed-up. Medicaid enrollment increased, as several states took advantage of an option under Obama's law for early expansion of the health insurance program for low-income people. The Affordable Care Act also temporarily increased Medicaid payments to primary-care doctors.</p>
<p>The Medicaid example helps illustrate the competing effects of the health care law. Although it pushed Medicaid spending up, the law's Medicare cuts to hospitals and private Medicare Advantage plans helped pull spending growth down. A 2 percent across-the-board Medicare cut as a result of the federal budget sequester also tamped down spending.</p>
<p>The analysts said they did not calculate the net impact of the health care law.</p>
<p>With an estimated 10 million people gaining health insurance just this year as the law's big coverage expansion got underway, there's little doubt that spending will pick up going forward. The question is by how much. Growth rates approaching double digits would be widely seen as unsustainable.</p>
<p>The report said "the balance of (many) factors over the next few years will determine how the historically low health spending growth from 2009 to 2013 is viewed: as the temporary aftermath of the great recession or the beginning of a new era."</p>
<p>The study was published online by the journal Health Affairs.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>Online:</p>
<p>Health Affairs article - http://tinyurl.com/ojx24d8</p> | Growth for U.S. Health Tab May Have Hit Bottom | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2014/12/03/us-health-spending-grew-36-percent-in-2013-lowest-rate-on-record-govt-forecasts.html | 2016-03-09 | 0 |
<p>Ford’s Chariot, app-based shuttle ride-sharing service is expanding, here’s where</p>
<p>Ford’s (NYSE:F) shuttle service, Chariot, will expand to New York City this summer, the automaker announced on Thursday.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>Earlier this year, Ford said it planned to bring Chariot to eight new cities in 2017, as the company continues to explore new transportation services. The ride-sharing shuttle already operates in San Francisco and Austin, and Chariot added Seattle in June.</p>
<p>When it arrives in New York, Chariot will run two pre-planned routes in the boroughs of Manhattan and Brooklyn for a flat rate of $4 per ride. Additional routes will be crowd-sourced once Chariot’s Ford Transit vans hit the road. Chariot maps out routes based on the locations of its users, who use a mobile app to book rides.</p>
<p>Ford expects to have 60 Chariot vans in New York by the fall. Each Chariot vehicle can carry more than a dozen passengers at one time.</p>
<p>“We know how important it is for everyone to be able to get around effectively – especially in densely populated places like New York,” said Jessica Robinson, director of Ford City Solutions. “Chariot is one way we’re trying to help cities accommodate their residents and ensure people aren’t sacrificing their needs as a result of limited mobility options.”</p>
<p>Chariot says many passengers use the service to travel to or from public transportation. In San Francisco, one of every five Chariot rides start or end at a public transit stop, according to the company.</p>
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<p>Chariot noted that its service has partnered with commuter benefits programs, so New York riders can pay for rides with pre-tax dollars.</p>
<p>In addition to its consumer service, Chariot will offer transportation for businesses and charters.</p>
<p>Ford has accelerated investments in new transportation services, especially in urban areas where fewer people own cars and public transportation routes are congested. The company’s Ford Smart Mobility unit, launched more than a year ago, acquired Chariot in September 2016.</p> | Ford expands Chariot shuttle service to New York | true | http://foxbusiness.com/features/2017/07/27/ford-expands-chariot-shuttle-service-to-new-york.html | 2017-07-27 | 0 |
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<p>ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. — Highway closed both ways between Moriarty and Tucumcari.</p>
<p>New Mexico State Police shut down Interstate 40 between Moriarty and Santa Rosa in both directions around 11 a.m. due to snowy, wintry weather and hazardous driving conditions, and recently extended the closure from Santa Rosa to Tucumcari in both directions, said State Police Lt. Jimmy Glascock.</p>
<p>Glascock said traffic was getting so congested in Santa Rosa it was decided to stop people further on up the interstate at Tucumcari.</p>
<p>The worst of the weather — and the traffic congestion — was in an area around and east of Clines Corners, Glascock.</p>
<p>Numerous accidents were reported in the area this morning, Glascock said.</p>
<p>Glascock said it was difficult to estimate how long that portion of I-40 would remain closed, saying it depends on how quickly the fairly fast-moving weather system moves out of the state.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p> | 2:05pm — Wintry Weather Shuts I-40 | false | https://abqjournal.com/22408/205pm-wintry-weather-shuts-i-40.html | 2 |
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<p>(Breitbart) –&#160;Just minutes after the Washington DC police chief said that two shooters might still be on the loose in the Navy Yard mass murders, President Obama held a previously scheduled event to defend his economic record.</p>
<p>The president opened his remarks by condemning a shooting that has reportedly left six dead and as many as 10 injured.</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">FAX BLAST SPECIAL: Impeach Obama NOW!&#160;</a></p>
<p>President Barack Obama is mourning what he called “yet another mass shooting” in the United States that he says took the life of American patriots.</p>
<p>Obama promised to make sure, quote, “whoever carried out this cowardly act is held responsible.”</p>
<p>The president then went into a lengthy and familiar defense of his economic record as events surrounding the Navy Yard murders continued to unfold. Obama criticized Republicans in advance of the upcoming budget battle, mocked Mitt Romney as having lost after calling for a repeal of ObamaCare, and talked about the economy he inherited from George W. Bush:</p>
<p>President Barack Obama says the nation’s financial system is `safer’ five years after the collapse of a Wall Street giant plunged the nation deeper into a recession.</p>
<p>Obama marked the fifth anniversary of the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers by surrounding himself with Americans the White House says have benefited from the administration’s economic and banking policies.</p>
<p>Obama says his administration has laid a “new foundation” for a stronger economy. But he admits that the benefits are not being felt by many middle class Americans.</p>
<p>While the president spoke, law enforcement officials just a few miles away took care of the wounded and dead, and attempted to track down two additional shooters suspected of being involved.</p>
<p>http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/09/16/Obama-defends-economy-as-dc-attack-unfolds</p> | Obama Defends Economic Record, Rips GOP as DC Attack Unfolds | true | http://teaparty.org/obama-defends-economic-record-rips-gop-as-dc-attack-unfolds-28455/ | 0 |
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<p>These fishermen will soon head out fishing on multi-day expeditions, and they've lived this way for centuries. But the fish docks are disappearing, so some are looking to the oil rigs that are starting to pop up offshore. All along the coast, expectations are building and at this school, students dream of a country enriched by oil resources. There are also fears borne of experience. This economist is an advisor to the outgoing president. He estimates oil could bring in millions of dollars every year but he wonders who will benefit. He grew up in a fishing village himself, and says the local communities must benefit from their resources and if they don't, it could lead to agitations. Violence, corruption and crime have grown in neighboring Nigeria and the locals there complain that they have nothing to show for their nation's oil wealth. The company running the show in Ghana says that won't happen here and that they've already started to engage with the local communities. This government committee chair acknowledges the risks and Ghana's own struggles with corruption, but he's relying on Ghana's relative stability and political maturity to see it through any tensions that arise. He says the government has tried to manage expectations as much as anything. The oil is scheduled to start flowing in less than two years. But with no clear plans in place and fewer fish in the seas, these villages face an uncertain future.</p> | Ghana's new riches | false | https://pri.org/stories/2008-12-26/ghanas-new-riches | 2008-12-26 | 3 |
<p>Todd Gitlin seems more worried than I am about the political impact of English departments and art galleries. To my delight, however, on most other issues we seem to agree: that the achievements of group-specific movements are many and overdue, that multiculturalism is politically important for reasons of equity, that movements should avoid being hostage to leaders, and that opposing issues of recognition to issues of economic and health equality sets up a false dichotomy.</p>
<p>We also agree that political good will is worth little if it does not accomplish change. Clearly, not enough energy on the left in recent years has gone to promoting visions and projects that might bring together a majority. I think the problem has less to do with ideas and rhetoric than with organization. The progressive public responses to the health care debate and welfare repeal were weak partly because there was little organization in place that could begin mobilizing people. In both cases organizational capacity had to be built after the issues hit the national public agenda, where they moved very quickly.</p>
<p /> | Response | true | https://dissentmagazine.org/article/response-6 | 2018-10-07 | 4 |
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<p>It's all but official now: Lockheed Martin (NYSE: LMT) has lost, and Raytheon (NYSE: RTN) has won -- just as I <a href="http://www.fool.com/investing/2016/11/19/lockheed-loses-and-raytheon-could-gain-as-navy-dis.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">predicted one month ago Opens a New Window.</a>.</p>
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<p>Demonstrating its stealth characteristics, USS Zumwalt emerges from hiding behind a tree. Image source: <a href="http://www.navy.mil/ah_online/zumwalt/" type="external">U.S. Navy Opens a New Window.</a>.</p>
<p>The U.S. Navy's new <a href="http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2015/09/20/will-the-us-navy-torpedo-its-most-lethal-warship.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">Zumwalt Opens a New Window.</a> <a href="http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2015/09/20/will-the-us-navy-torpedo-its-most-lethal-warship.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">-class destroyer</a> is a marvel of engineering. Bigger than any destroyer currently in the fleet -- bigger even than our Ticonderoga-class cruisers -- USS Zumwalt was built with angled features that give it a stealth profile. On enemy radar screens, it appears no larger than a fishing boat(and is correspondingly harder to locate and target). Zumwalt packs aboard as many as 80land-attack, anti-ship, and anti-aircraft missiles, but perhaps its most remarkable weapons are its twin 155-mm Advanced Guns System (AGS) cannons (the two snow-covered bumps in the image above).</p>
<p>Initially designed to fire Long Range Land-Attack Projectiles (LRLAP) manufactured by Lockheed Martin, Zumwalt was stripped of its main offensive weapon last month when the Pentagon called a halt to purchases of LRLAPs, citing their sky-high cost. But this left the Navy with a dilemma. It couldn't afford the $1 million-a-shot cost of firing LRLAPs -- well and good. But without something to shoot, the ship's AGS would be useless.</p>
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<p>Enter Raytheon's Excalibur-guided munition. Last week, the Navy revealedplans to buy Raytheon's Excalibur rounds to replace Lockheed Martin's LRLAPs, requesting funds for the former (but not the latter) in its fiscal year 2018 budget submission to the Pentagon.</p>
<p>Designed to strike targets 30 miles away, Excalibur lacks the range for which LRLAPs were designed (60 miles). Still, Excalibur is uber-accurate, able to land shells within two meters of its target when fired from a Paladin self-propelled gun ( <a href="http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2014/06/30/raytheon-has-a-70000-magic-bullet-thatll-knock-you.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">for which it was designed Opens a New Window.</a>). What's more, each round costs "only" $70,000 at current production rates. While that's not exactly "cheap," it is still 15 times cheap-er than Lockheed was selling LRLAP for.</p>
<p>(Note: Some sources indicate Excalibur will cost much more than $70,000 -- but I believe this is mistaken. <a href="http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2013/08/26/us-army-doubles-down-on-raytheons-excalibur.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">$70,000 was the unit cost Opens a New Window.</a> the U.S. Army was paying two years ago, and these costs tend to come down over time with increasing volume. One factor that could add cost, however, is the need to modify the Zumwalt class's AGS to accommodate the smaller Excalibur round -- a modification estimated to cost $250 million across three ships).</p>
<p>From an investor's perspective, the Navy's decision to switch from LRLAP is more a feather in Raytheon's cap than coin in Raytheon's purse. Here's why:</p>
<p>Each Zumwalt-class destroyer is expectedto carry upward of 1,000 rounds in its magazine. Times three warships, times $70,000 per Excalibur round, that works out to a potential revenue opportunity of $210 million to "fill up" a Zumwalt. That sounds like a lot, but the Army actually uses a lot more Excaliburs than the Navy ever will. Equipping all of the Army's 975 Paladin self-propelled guns with a full load of Excaliburs would require 38,000 rounds of ammunition -- an addressable market 13 times as large as the Navy's Zumwalt fleet.</p>
<p>Additionally, Excalibur can be fired from American M198 and M777 howitzers, from Germany's Panzerhaubitze 2000 and the U.K.'s AS-90 self-propelled guns, and Sweden's Archer Artillery System. When you consider how many "platforms" can use Excalibur in Western armies, the addition of the Zumwalt platform in America's navy is relatively insignificant. That said, it does give Raytheon an entry into an entirely new market -- naval artillery -- to which Excalibur had not been previously exposed, and that fact is not entirely insignificant.</p>
<p>Consider: The more tubes Excalibur gets stuffed into, the better its chances of becoming the standard smart munition for all 155 mm-size weapons employed by Western militaries, and not just in these nations' armies, but now their navies as well. And the more places Excalibur is used, and the more rounds of it are produced for use, the greater Raytheon's economies of scale producing it -- lowering Raytheon's cost of production, raising its profit margins, and at the same time making the munition more attractive to buyers.</p>
<p>Zumwalt is just one part of this process, true. But every little bit helps.</p>
<p>10 stocks we like better than Raytheon When investing geniuses David and Tom Gardner have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the newsletter they have run for over a decade, Motley Fool Stock Advisor, has tripled the market.*</p>
<p>David and Tom just revealed what they believe are the <a href="http://infotron.fool.com/infotrack/click?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.fool.com%2Fmms%2Fmark%2Fe-foolcom-sa-bbn-dyn%3Faid%3D8867%26source%3Disaeditxt0010449%26ftm_cam%3Dsa-bbn-evergreen%26ftm_pit%3D6312%26ftm_veh%3Dbbn_article_pitch&amp;impression=ab3bdbdd-bb41-45a2-8c78-eeb165e1c0ef&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">10 best stocks Opens a New Window.</a> for investors to buy right now... and Raytheon wasn't one of them! That's right -- they think these 10 stocks are even better buys.</p>
<p><a href="http://infotron.fool.com/infotrack/click?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.fool.com%2Fmms%2Fmark%2Fe-foolcom-sa-bbn-dyn%3Faid%3D8867%26source%3Disaeditxt0010449%26ftm_cam%3Dsa-bbn-evergreen%26ftm_pit%3D6312%26ftm_veh%3Dbbn_article_pitch&amp;impression=ab3bdbdd-bb41-45a2-8c78-eeb165e1c0ef&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">Click here Opens a New Window.</a> to learn about these picks!</p>
<p>*Stock Advisor returns as of Nov. 7, 2016</p>
<p><a href="http://my.fool.com/profile/TMFDitty/info.aspx" type="external">Rich Smith Opens a New Window.</a>does not own shares of, nor is he short, any company named above. You can find him on <a href="http://caps.fool.com/" type="external">Motley Fool CAPS Opens a New Window.</a>, publicly pontificating under the handle <a href="http://caps.fool.com/ViewPlayer.aspx?t=01002844399633209838" type="external">TMFDitty Opens a New Window.</a>, where he's currently ranked No. 346 out of more than 75,000 rated members.</p>
<p>The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services <a href="http://www.fool.com/shop/newsletters/index.aspx?source=isiedilnk018048&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">free for 30 days Opens a New Window.</a>. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that <a href="http://www.fool.com/knowledge-center/motley.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">considering a diverse range of insights Opens a New Window.</a> makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a <a href="http://www.fool.com/Legal/fool-disclosure-policy.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">disclosure policy Opens a New Window.</a>.</p> | "Naked" Zumwalt Destroyer Will Now Wield Raytheon's Excalibur | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2016/12/24/naked-zumwalt-destroyer-will-now-wield-raytheon-excalibur.html | 2016-12-24 | 0 |
<p>NEW YORK (AP) — Suspended reliever Jenrry Mejia and the New York Mets have agreed to a one-year contract worth $1,729,000, money the pitcher will not receive because of his three positive drug tests.</p>
<p>Even though Mejia was banned from baseball for life in February 2016, the Mets retain his rights as a player on their restricted list. The deal is the maximum 30 percent cut from his 2016 salary of $2.47 million. He was cut the maximum 20 percent last year to $1,976,000. Under baseball's drug agreement, players serving suspensions do not get paid.</p>
<p>Mejia was suspended for 80 games on April 11, 2015, following a positive test for Stanozolol, a drug popular among bodybuilders, and admitted then he took a banned substance.</p>
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<p>More AP baseball: <a href="" type="internal">https://apnews.com/tag/MLBbaseball</a></p>
<p>NEW YORK (AP) — Suspended reliever Jenrry Mejia and the New York Mets have agreed to a one-year contract worth $1,729,000, money the pitcher will not receive because of his three positive drug tests.</p>
<p>Even though Mejia was banned from baseball for life in February 2016, the Mets retain his rights as a player on their restricted list. The deal is the maximum 30 percent cut from his 2016 salary of $2.47 million. He was cut the maximum 20 percent last year to $1,976,000. Under baseball's drug agreement, players serving suspensions do not get paid.</p>
<p>Mejia was suspended for 80 games on April 11, 2015, following a positive test for Stanozolol, a drug popular among bodybuilders, and admitted then he took a banned substance.</p>
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<p>More AP baseball: <a href="" type="internal">https://apnews.com/tag/MLBbaseball</a></p> | Mejia, Mets agree to contract in formality, despite ban | false | https://apnews.com/amp/44b76720079a42e3b888af3dbbad6cc8 | 2018-01-08 | 2 |
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<p>On the Philippine islands of Leyte and Samar that were shattered by Typhoon Haiyan, there is no doubt about it: the U.S. military has been a godsend. “It is awesome to see this,” says one grateful villager. “They are saving us.”</p>
<p>But while U.S. military support can be critical when disasters like Haiyan strike, staging massive humanitarian relief missions for allies in need isn’t just about being a good neighbor. They can be a strategic and publicity gold mine for U.S. troops whose presence in Asia isn’t always portrayed in such a favorable light – and a powerful warning to countries that aren’t on board.</p>
<p>“These disasters are not unique only to the Philippines. It will send a signal to all of Southeast Asia, to Asia, that the U.S. is serious about its presence here,” said Philippine political analyst Ramon Casiple. “It’s easy to translate this capability for disaster handling into handling warfare. This is the new orientation of the task forces.”</p>
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<p>From the military perspective, humanitarian missions like the ongoing Operation Damayan in the Philippines offer concrete benefits – the chance to operate in far-flung places, build military-to-military alliances and get realistic training – that they may later apply to their primary mission, which will always be fighting and winning wars.</p>
<p>“Crisis response planning is a skill set for the military, so when you have an opportunity to execute crisis response it’s good for your planning team,” said Rear Adm. Mark C. Montgomery, who commands the George Washington strike group, stationed offshore in the Gulf of Leyte. “So, sure, there is a benefit there. But in reality the reason we do this mission is because in the Navy’s list of missions this is one of the significant efforts we plan for.”</p>
<p>In the week since the disaster, the Philippines has started to receive support from military forces around the region. Australia, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan have sent aircraft or personnel and more support is expected soon from Brunei, Great Britain, New Zealand and Thailand.</p>
<p>But none has come close to matching the U.S. Equally important, America’s regional rival China has not sent any military personnel, and contributed relatively tiny financial aid.</p>
<p>“This is being done in a big way that highlights the meager response of China – that’s the politics there. They’re saying China is not actually your friend in the region,” said Casiple</p>
<p>“I’m sure China is watching and assessing,” he said. China announced Sunday it is ready to send rescue and medical teams to the Philippines, but did not say when the teams would depart.</p>
<p>For U.S. allies like the Philippines, Vietnam, South Korea, Thailand and to some extent Indonesia, it is an affirmation of the U.S. commitment. For others – Cambodia, Laos and Myanmar who are more closely aligned with China – he said the mission is a not-so-subtle message that the U.S. remains the biggest power in the region.</p>
<p>Within hours of the typhoon, U.S. Marines were on their way from their bases in Japan to assess the damage and plan out their response. Within days, the George Washington was pulling out of Hong Kong to lead its half-dozen ship battle group to the Gulf of Leyte. By the time they arrived, the U.S. Air Force was already in action.</p>
<p>According to the Marines, U.S. military aircraft have put in nearly 480 flight hours in 186 aircraft sorties, moved nearly 1,200 relief workers into the devastated city of Tacloban and have airlifted nearly 2,900 displaced people from the affected areas. On Saturday alone, they delivered more than 118 tons of food, water and shelter items to Tacloban, Borongan and Guiuan – some of the hardest-hit regions.</p>
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<p /> | Disaster aid can also be show of power | false | https://abqjournal.com/303059/aid-can-also-be-show-of-power.html | 2013-11-18 | 2 |
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<p>The Bank of Japan (BOJ) held off from expanding monetary stimulus on Thursday, defying market expectations for action even as soft global demand, an unwelcome yen rise and weak consumption threatened to derail a fragile economic recovery.</p>
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<p>The yen soared and Japanese stocks slumped as the BOJ's inaction caught investors off-guard. The dollar shed some 3 percent to fall below 109 yen, while the Nikkei share average tumbled 3.6 percent.</p>
<p>The BOJ decided to maintain its pledge to increase base money at an annual pace of 80 trillion yen ($732 billion) via aggressive asset purchases. It also left unchanged a 0.1 percent negative interest rate it applies to some of the excess reserves that financial institutions park at the BOJ.</p>
<p>"At today's meeting, the majority have voted to maintain its pledge to increase base money at an annual pace of 80 trillion yen ($732 billion) via aggressive asset purchases," BOJ Governor Haruhiko Kuroda said at a news conference after the meeting.</p>
<p>In a separate move, the BOJ created a 300 billion yen loan programme offering funds at zero interest to financial institutions in areas hit by this month's earthquake in southern Japan.</p>
<p>In a quarterly review of its projections, the BOJ cut its inflation forecasts. It also pushed back the timing for hitting its 2 percent price target by six months, saying it may not happen until March 2018 at the latest.</p>
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<p>But the BOJ maintained its optimism that the economy will expand moderately as a trend.</p>
<p>"With the understanding that developing nations will escape from its stagnant economies, exports will gradually increase. This country's economy will gradually expand as it the country's growth will exceed the potential growth rate," said Kuroda at his post-meeting news conference.</p>
<p>The decision came in the wake of data that showed consumer prices slipping in March at the fastest pace in three years and household spending falling at the fastest pace in a year, adding pressure on the BOJ to do more to spur growth.</p>
<p>Kuroda has been in a bind. Many central bankers were worried about the gloomy outlook, but were also growing reluctant to use their diminishing policy ammunition.</p>
<p>The BOJ stunned markets in January by adding negative rates to its massive asset-buying to prevent external headwinds threatening the achievement of its price goal.</p>
<p>But January's move has failed to boost stock prices or arrest an unwelcome yen rise, keeping the BOJ under pressure to do more to revive an economy verging on recession.</p>
<p>Kuroda also said they are still assessing how much impact the recent earthquakes would have on the economy.</p> | Yen Soars, Stocks Slump as Bank of Japan Holds Policy | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2016/04/28/yen-soars-stocks-slump-as-bank-japan-holds-policy.html | 2016-04-28 | 0 |
<p>By Bill Wilson</p>
<p>Which do you live by: Clock or compass?</p>
<p>If the clock dictates, your life is consumed with the immediate and pressing issues of the moment. Clock life is focused on short-term results. If the clock rules, you find yourself racing from event to event in a mad scramble to meet expectations and deadlines. When the day ends, you are exhausted and dismayed to find that tomorrow has another long to-do list awaiting you. Life that is dictated by the clock is high-speed intensity. It produces, but at a high price tag.</p>
<p>Clock life is the American way. Clock life accurately describes much of modern congregational and clergy life.</p>
<p>Compass life is about direction more than speed. Life that takes the compass seriously is focused on meaning more than the moment. It is life that sees beyond the immediate and seeks to anticipate rather than respond. The compass is about trajectory before it is about efficiency, reflection rather than reaction. The compass life considers the journey, not just the daily agenda. Far too often, the compass is forgotten in our rush to meet expectations and demands. Many churches and clergy have clocks at every corner, but seemingly do not own a compass.</p>
<p>Which did Jesus live by, the compass or the clock? From the beginning, he seemed to have a different orientation to time than others did. At age 12, he found it more important to remain at the Temple in deep conversation than to accompany his parents on their journey home. His first act after his baptism was to withdraw into the wilderness for 40 days of reflection and testing. Weren’t there needy people he could have helped? What’s up with that stepping back from the limelight that pops up again and again in the Gospels? Jesus seemed to withdraw from the crowds when most of us would have scheduled extra services to accommodate them. He arrives late when someone is dying, only to bring unimagined healing and hope. He regularly interrupts his schedule to stop along the way to interact with those his disciples had rushed past. He calls men out of trees and takes them to lunch when his handlers certainly had other plans for him. He cautions his disciples against their rush to coronate him and constantly downplays their desires to create a plan for his kingdom’s establishment.</p>
<p>Jesus lived by the compass. His life stands as an indictment of our race to do more, succeed more, make more and build more. Jesus was about living a life that mattered. The race to build bigger barns and accumulate more and more prestige, power or possessions held no interest for him. Jesus knew that if his followers were going to make any difference in the world, they would need a laser-like focus on a compass, not on a clock. He tried to tell us that early in his greatest sermon: “Seek first the kingdom, and all these things will be added.”</p>
<p>It is stunningly sad to see congregations and clergy abandon one of the central teachings of our founder. Our aversion to reflection, planning, thoughtful conversation and a vision that casts further than next Sunday is an indictment of our addiction to the clock. We actually believe that we can build the kingdom, and we can do it by the end of the month. How do we shift our attention from the clock to the compass?</p>
<p>Here are three critical moments when healthy ministers or congregations can vow to value the compass over the clock:</p>
<p>•&#160;When there is a transition in leadership. In congregations, comings and goings of leaders are an invaluable moment to stop, take stock, recalibrate and refocus on our essential calling. For clergy, transitions are your chance to realign yourself with your call and your driving passion.</p>
<p>•&#160;When there is conflict, it is the wise congregation or minister which moves beyond blaming to humble diagnosis. Find someone to help you make sense out of what has happened and is happening. Conflict is always more complex than we initially think. Pausing to learn from it will enrich your life and likely save you more pain in the future.</p>
<p>•&#160;Strategic visioning or thinking is increasingly critical for congregational survival. Our identity, mission and vision were formerly dictated to us by denominational entities. No more. Every local church must come to grips with the hard but necessary work of discerning what God’s mission is for its unique setting and collection of believers. If you never pull back and thoughtfully address all of the opportunities before you, you will end up frustrated from being spread a mile wide and an inch thick.</p>
<p>The very last thing we want to do as ministers and congregations is spend our life climbing some ladder of success, only to discover that the ladder has been leaning against the wrong wall all along. Can we be more like Jesus, and use our compass more than our clock?</p>
<p>Pause, take a moment and carefully answer. Your future depends on it.</p> | Life by the clock or life by the compass? | false | https://baptistnews.com/article/life-by-the-clock-or-life-by-the-compass-2/ | 3 |
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<p>A graduate student at USC came forward Thursday with claims of sexual harassment from a professor overseeing her dissertation at the university's School of Social Work. Karissa Fenwick, 34, sued the university Wednesday saying in the Los Angeles Superior Court lawsuit that the professor propositioned her sexually and the university was more interested in covering up the harassment rather than protecting her.</p>
<p>The accused professor is Erick Guerro and Fenwick even alleges he threatened her against speaking out about. Fenwick told reporters from her attorney's office Thursday the university was "prioritizing keeping things quiet and protecting him (and not) protecting me and other students." She went on to say, "I don't feel very strong. It's just that every time I think about (it), I think about this is happening to somebody else, and that's what makes me feel like I have to say something. The university claims they "took the complaint of sexual harassment very seriously. The university is reviewing the recent legal filing to determine if additional action is warranted." The university conducted a five-month long investigation after which he was fined, barred from leadership positions and from contact with students but was not fired.</p>
<p>Kenwick says Guerro "told me that if I ever told anybody about what happened that it would ruin both of our careers and he would take down anybody that I told, and that the dean would never take my side or let anything happen to him. I was terrified because he controlled not only my dissertation, but my ability to graduate and my reputation in the field I wanted to get a job in."</p>
<p>On Twitter:</p>
<p><a href="https://twitter.com/ErvinProduction" type="external">@ErvinProduction</a></p>
<p>Tips? Info? Send me a message!</p>
<p>Source: <a href="http://www.nbclosangeles.com/news/local/Lawsuit-Targets-USC-for-Retaining-Professor-Accused-of-Sexual-Harassment-453479873.html" type="external">nbclosangeles.com/news/local/Lawsuit-Targets-USC-for-Retaining-Professor-Accused-of-Sexual-Harassment-453479873.html</a></p> | USC Professor Threatened Student After Sexually Harassing Her | true | http://thegoldwater.com/news/10436-USC-Professor-Threatened-Student-After-Sexually-Harassing-Her | 2017-10-27 | 0 |
<p>These are the songs played between segments on The World for Tuesday, August 5, 2014:</p>
<p><a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00KR6ZW1Y/ref=dm_ws_sp_ps_dp?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1407262839&amp;sr=8-1" type="external" />&#160;&#160;&#160; SONG: Alemitu&#160;&#160;&#160; ARTIST: Zvuloon Dub System&#160;&#160;&#160; CD TITLE: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00KR6ZW1Y/ref=dm_ws_sp_ps_dp?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1407262839&amp;sr=8-1" type="external">Anbessa Dub</a>&#160;&#160;&#160; CD LABEL: Zojak World Wide&#160;</p>
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<p><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Camino-Gustavo-Santaolalla/dp/B00K20QTVC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1407263035&amp;sr=8-1&amp;keywords=gustavo+santaolalla" type="external" />&#160;&#160;&#160; SONG: Seguir&#160;&#160;&#160; ARTIST: Gustavo Santaolalla&#160;&#160;&#160; CD TITLE: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Camino-Gustavo-Santaolalla/dp/B00K20QTVC/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1407263035&amp;sr=8-1&amp;keywords=gustavo+santaolalla" type="external">Camino</a>&#160;&#160;&#160; CD LABEL: Sony&#160;</p>
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<p><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Wild-Goats-Unmarried-Women-Shekoyokh/dp/B00J0LIO30/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1407263140&amp;sr=8-2&amp;keywords=Wild+Goats+Unmarried+Women" type="external" />&#160;&#160;&#160; SONG: Beregovski Sher/Honga/Freilicher Yontov&#160;&#160;&#160; ARTIST: She'Koyokh&#160;&#160;&#160; CD TITLE: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Wild-Goats-Unmarried-Women-Shekoyokh/dp/B00J0LIO30/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1407263140&amp;sr=8-2&amp;keywords=Wild+Goats+Unmarried+Women" type="external">Wild Goats &amp; Unmarried Women</a>&#160;&#160;&#160; CD LABLE: Riverboat Records&#160;</p>
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<p>And be sure to listen to The World's Clark Boyd and his piece: <a href="" type="internal">Why you should proudly wear your love of Australian rockers AC/DC on your sleeve</a>.&#160; I played this cover tune of an AC/DC classic performed on cello as a cutaway! &#160;</p>
<p><a href="http://www.amazon.com/Uncovered-Maya-Beiser/dp/B00M7R1JFY/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1407263249&amp;sr=8-2&amp;keywords=Maya+Beiser+Uncovered" type="external" />&#160;&#160;&#160; SONG: Back in Black&#160;&#160;&#160; ARTIST: Maya Beiser&#160;&#160;&#160; CD TITLE: <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Uncovered-Maya-Beiser/dp/B00M7R1JFY/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&amp;qid=1407263249&amp;sr=8-2&amp;keywords=Maya+Beiser+Uncovered" type="external">Uncovered</a>&#160;&#160;&#160; CD LABEL: Innova</p> | Music heard on the air for August 5, 2014 | false | https://pri.org/stories/2014-08-05/music-heard-air-august-5-2014 | 2014-08-05 | 3 |
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<p>RENO, Nev. — Over the course of 24 hours, President Donald Trump gave one speech in which he tore into the media and members of his own Republican Party, and a second urging national unity and love.</p>
<p>The about-face seemed to reflect an internal debate between calls for moderation and his inclination to let loose.</p>
<p>Trump weighed in Thursday in a pair of tweets — which he had to edit several times for spelling mistakes — that attacked the press and opposition Democrats.</p>
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<p>“The Fake News is now complaining about my different types of back to back speeches. Well, there was Afghanistan (somber), the big Rally…….(enthusiastic, dynamic and fun) and the American Legion – V.A. (respectful and strong). Too bad the Dems have no one who can change tones!” he wrote.</p>
<p>On Wednesday, he had spoken in measured tones and stuck to his prepared remarks at an American Legion conference in Nevada. He praised veterans as examples for a nation yearning to set aside its differences.</p>
<p>“We are here to hold you up as an example of strength, courage and resolve that our country will need to overcome the many challenges that we face,” Trump said.</p>
<p>The night before, the president had cut loose in Arizona. Ignoring pleas from aides to stick to the script, he renewed his fight over coverage of his comments about the race-fueled violence in Charlottesville, Virginia.</p>
<p>The push-and-pull in Trump’s message mirrors the internal dynamics at the White House, where new chief of staff John Kelly has organized and regimented the West Wing staff but has been unable to rein in the president’s tendency to veer off course.</p>
<p>The president’s speech in Reno was full of the calls for patriotism and national healing that would not have seemed out of the ordinary had they come from his predecessors.</p>
<p>But the Phoenix rally was uniquely Trump.</p>
<p>He opened with a talk of unity but quickly erupted in anger, blaming the media for the widespread condemnation of his response to the violence in Charlottesville at a protest organized by white supremacists.</p>
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<p>Trump read from his three responses to the racially charged violence, becoming more animated with each one. He drew from his pocket the written statement he’d read the day a woman was killed by a man who had plowed a car through counterprotesters. But he skipped over the part that he’d freelanced at the time: his observation that “many sides” were to blame.</p>
<p>That, as well as his assertion days later that “both sides” were to blame for the violence that led to the death of Heather Heyer and two state troopers, caused Democrats and many Republicans to denounce Trump for not unmistakably calling out white supremacists and other hate groups.</p>
<p>By the time he arrived at the American Legion conference, Trump seemed more congenial. He even thanked Sen. Dean Heller, a Nevada Republican with whom he has openly and repeatedly feuded. He discussed his early efforts to restructure and improve the Department of Veterans Affairs.</p>
<p>Later in the speech, Trump said Americans aren’t defined by the color of their skin, the size of their paycheck or their political party.</p>
<p>Since Kelly took over last month as chief of staff, he has ousted chief strategist Steve Bannon and communications director Anthony Scaramucci. He has limited dissenting voices, restricted access to the president and steered the president toward a desired outcome on key decisions.</p>
<p>He has urged Trump to more closely follow a game plan. But Trump’s broadside against the “damned dishonest” media, which he says is out to get him, was one of several detours he took from remarks prepared for the Phoenix rally. Trump unabashedly acknowledged that his own advisers had urged him to stay on message, and that he simply couldn’t.</p>
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<p>Lemire reported from New York. Associated Press writers Jill Colvin and Alan Fram in Washington contributed to this report.</p> | Within 24 hours, a pair of wildly different Trump speeches | false | https://abqjournal.com/1052671/within-24-hours-a-pair-of-wildly-different-trump-speeches.html | 2017-08-24 | 2 |
<p>The US Department of Justice released its 163-page report on&#160;the <a href="http://www.vox.com/2016/8/10/12418428/baltimore-police-investigation-justice-department-report" type="external">racist, violent, and unconstitutional practices</a>of the Baltimore Police Department. It’s everything people have been saying for years, but still, <a href="https://cdn0.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/6915773/DOJ_Baltimore_Police_Department.0.pdf" type="external">please read it.</a></p>
<p>In response to the lack of action and attention to state violence against Black women, Black Feminist Future is <a href="https://m.mic.com/articles/151051/altars-for-korryn-gaines-other-black-women-killed-by-police-pop-up-in-several-cities#.gbf8AfjwW" type="external">leading the call</a> to “Defend Black Womanhood” with altars and healing spaces around the country.</p>
<p>Remember the two undocumented teenagers who revealed their status on their graduation days? NPR <a href="http://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2016/08/08/487479658/what-its-like-to-be-undocumented-and-college-bound" type="external">followed up</a> with these college-bound Latinas.</p>
<p>Mapping technologies are hardly apolitical and affect people’s understanding of the world. The fact that Palestine is not on Google Maps—and that <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/aug/10/google-maps-accused-remove-palestine?utm_content=bufferf3fac&amp;utm_medium=social&amp;utm_source=bufferapp.com&amp;utm_campaign=buffer" type="external">the West Bank and Gaza were recently deleted</a>—shows how terrifying this is.</p>
<p>Breakthrough is offering <a href="http://us.breakthrough.tv/campaigns/fellowships/" type="external">one year paid fellowships</a> for U.S. based students to fight gender violence on campus.</p>
<p>We love this: <a href="http://buff.ly/2aVKiQN" type="external">22 amazing photos of female olympians screaming their heads off</a>.</p>
<p>We love this&#160; <a href="https://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/20160803/west-harlem/activists-offer-free-subway-swipes-protest-of-broken-windows-policing" type="external">example of regular folks doing something</a>even more: activists in New York offer free subway swipes in protest of ‘broken windows ‘policing.</p> | Daily Feminist Cheat Sheet | true | http://feministing.com/2016/08/10/daily-feminist-cheat-sheet-850/ | 4 |
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<p>I admit that while watching Sarah Palin in action at the Republican convention, I was mesmerized.&#160; On the surface, it seemed that she actually was a strong, positive, female role model.&#160; She reminded of some of the best characteristics of the powerful women in my own life. &#160;Palin has it all — and she has it all at once.&#160; I found my woman-self feeling proud and impressed.</p>
<p>But when I listened to Palin speak on the radio, without being bombarded by visuals, I was jolted back to my senses and was reminded of something I, and every other progressive American woman knows well: &#160;that the media image of this would-be-maverick, tough-girl reformer was all style over substance.</p>
<p>Sarah Palin may be the only person in America who believes that George W. Bush is a wimp. &#160;She doesn’t represent 4 more years of his failed policies, she would move us so much farther to the right, that we might just fall off the edge of her flat earth, which is not warming due to human activity or the fossil fuel economy, but was created in 7 days; after Alaska seceded from the Union; abortion was outlawed; everyone abstained from sex, but still gets pregnant; Dwight Eisenhower was a founding father; Jesus had no actual responsibilities; Hillary supporters voted McCain/Palin and the polar bear lived happily ever after.</p>
<p>Abortion Rights</p>
<p>As a long-time advocate of women’s issues, I have concluded that you can judge any society, organization, government, religion or person by the way they treat their women.&#160; And any such group or individual who would deny a woman the fundamental right to choose safe and legal abortion, is at base, simply attempting to control women and strip them of their personal autonomy and dignity.</p>
<p>Anti-choice executive, Sarah Palin is advocating a position more retro-grade than any our nation has ever seen.&#160; Yes she wants reform, but any change she seeks on the issue will hurl women backwards in time and erase the hard-fought gains of the feminist movement since Palin doesn’t even believe in allowing abortion for victims of rape or incest.</p>
<p>I know from vast, personal and political experience in the trenches on the abortion issue that “Feminists for Life,” a group in which Palin claims membership, is an extremist group and certainly not the people that American women and families want making national policy on the abortion issue.&#160; Palin thinks so highly of zygotes, that she wants them to have more rights than those of us who came successfully through the birthing process and developed into self-actualized women.</p>
<p>Abstinence Education</p>
<p>Palin supports “Abstinence Education,” in which the curriculum is:&#160; “Just say ‘No’ to sex.”&#160; While any concerned parent might hope abstinence is the path chosen by their teenager — the abstinence-only sex ed curriculum does not educate young people to make informed choices about how to protect themselves from sexually transmitted diseases and unwanted pregnancies, in situations where they do not abstain from sexual activity.</p>
<p>Palin’s 17 year old daughter is living proof of the fact that abstinence-only education does not prevent pregnancy and it doesn’t work as a public policy.&#160; In order to believe that abstinence ed is anything but a failed concept, Palin would have to believe that her daughter did abstain from sex and still got pregnant.&#160; Uh, didn’t that happen about 2008 years ago to a woman named Mary?</p>
<p>The truth is, when uneducated young people engage in sexual activity, without protection, there are adverse consequences that reverberate throughout their lives and the lives of children and family.</p>
<p>Her daughter’s pregnancy is a private, family matter according to Palin and her handlers.&#160; That’s what abortion rights advocates have been saying for decades, but apparently we haven’t convinced Palin.&#160; Her daughter’s pregnancy may be a private matter, but Palin’s approach to sex ed is not — especially when she is asking to lead our country and wants to inflict her stone-age policies on our children.</p>
<p>Climate Change and Endangered Species</p>
<p>The International Panel on Climate Change, the world’s scientific authority on climate change, has concluded that climate change is caused by human activity on the earth.&#160; Sarah Palin, a nemesis to environmentalists, has said, “I’m not one though who would attribute it [global warming] to being man-made,” &#160;&#160;She’s out of step with other Evangelicals on this issue.&#160; Even John McCain believes that people are causing global warming.</p>
<p>In the face of a fossil fuel economy that is driving us to war, destroying our environment, exacerbating global warming and jeopardizing our national security, all that Palin can say is “Drill, drill, drill.”</p>
<p>And she doesn’t want those pesky polar bears in her way of her insatiable search for oil.&#160; That’s probably why she helped Alaska sue the Fish and Wildlife Service to remove the polar bear from its endangered species list.&#160; The charismatic polar bear is swimming until it drowns in warming, rising waters, exacerbated by global warming, driven by the fossil fuel economy.</p>
<p>Palin’s disrespect for science does not stop with the denial of the biggest climate emergency humanity has ever faced, and ignoring the threats to endangered species, it extends to her desire to dumb-down our children with “Creationism,” which belongs in Bible school, not public school.</p>
<p>Her respect for other forms of wildlife is dubious at best as she reportedly advocates helicopter hunting in which the hunter pursues the hunted to exhaustion in a helicopter and then kills them.&#160; Oh wait, Alaska says they are not “hunting” wolves and bears from helicopters, they are “managing” them.&#160; I don’t think that makes them any less dead.</p>
<p>The Pledge of Allegiance and Country First</p>
<p>When asked in a 2006 Alaska Eagle Forum questionnaire, “Are you offended by the phrase ‘Under God’ in the Pledge of Allegiance,” she replied, “Not on your life. If it was good enough for the founding fathers, its good enough for me and I’ll fight in defense of our Pledge of Allegiance.”</p>
<p>The Pledge of Allegiance was written by Francis Bellamy in 1892, long after the time of our founding fathers.&#160; Bellamy’s original Pledge read, “I pledge allegiance to my Flag and the Republic for which it stands, one nation, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.” President Dwight Eisenhower signed the bill amending the Pledge of Allegiance to include the phrase “under God,” on Flag Day, June 14, 1954.</p>
<p>An advocate of “Country First,” Palin and her husband Tood have reportedly dabbled in secessionist politics.&#160; Does she really want Alaska to form its own country?&#160; It’s alright with me as long as she stays in Alaska — but which country is it that is supposed to come first?</p>
<p>The Best-Ever Community Organizer</p>
<p>During the Republican Convention Sarah Palin said, “Before I became governor of the great state of Alaska, I was mayor of my hometown.&#160; And since our opponents in this presidential election seem to look down on that experience, let me explain to them what the job involves.&#160; I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a “community organizer,” except that you have actual responsibilities.”</p>
<p>You would think that a “reformer” and major Jesus freak such as Palin would recognize that J.C. was one of the most effective community organizers to ever live and not take such a condescending tone toward those unmoved prime movers of reform — the grassroots political organizers — like her opponent Barak Obama.</p>
<p>Ms. Christian, whom we’ve already discovered is no student of history, probably doesn’t see the irony in the fact that the dude who tried Jesus and presided over his crucifixion, Pontius Pilate, was a Governor.</p>
<p>Hillary Voters Going for McCain/Palin — Are You Kidding Me?</p>
<p>To those in the media who keep asking whether Palin will attract disaffected Hillary voters, and to John McCain for his cynical hope of manipulating women voters I say:&#160; Sarah Palin, you are no Hillary Clinton.&#160; Women voters understand the profound differences.&#160; Implications to the contrary are insulting.&#160; And Sarah is indeed Palin by comparison.</p>
<p>KARYN STRICKLER is a writer and political organizer living outside of Washington, DC.&#160; Contact her at <a href="mailto:[email protected]" type="external">[email protected]</a> .</p>
<p>Copyright KARYN STRICKLER 2008.</p>
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<p><a href="" type="internal">Your Ad Here</a> &#160;</p>
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<p>&#160;</p> | Palin by Comparison | true | https://counterpunch.org/2008/09/06/palin-by-comparison/ | 2008-09-06 | 4 |
<p>I am now in Texas, the culmination of our current 1000-mile/1600 km trip, having made overnight stops in Knoxville, Nashville, and Memphis on the way.</p>
<p>Americans, and foreigners who have lived here for a long time, know of the great pride Texans have in their state.&#160; My first experience of this was back in the UK in the early 1980s.</p>
<p>The late John Clayton was an American teaching theology at the University of Lancaster.&#160; I’d met John several times, and we drank beer as part of a small group at academic gatherings.</p>
<p>At an academic conference in the UK which took place on the Fourth of July, I asked John, casually, if he was going to do anything to celebrate America’s Day of Independence that evening.&#160; John, the most amiable of men, growled back at me: “I’m Texan, our independence was from Mexico, not you Brits, so I celebrate that day (March 2nd, 1836, John informed me), not this shit on the Fourth of July”.&#160; Umm.</p>
<p>Texan exceptionalism is of course embedded within a wider American exceptionalism, though tensions exist between the two– there are Texans who wish to secede from the US because they regard most of the rest of the US as “too liberal”!</p>
<p>So, what do Texan secessionists– who are overwhelmingly conservative, white, and overtly racist in some quarters– need to know in order to make a considered judgment about secession?</p>
<p>The ideological base of the secessionist movement also dominates the Texas State Board of Education, which has attracted recent controversy for its patently anti-intellectual stance on school textbooks.</p>
<p>In 2014 the board adopted new history textbooks (mis)informing students that Moses and biblical law are the inspiration for the American Constitution.</p>
<p>The “World Geography” textbook called African slaves “workers” and “immigrants”, until a public outcry forced the publisher, McGraw-Hill, to edit this part of the textbook.</p>
<p>A Mexican American studies (part of the state’s curriculum) textbook describes Chicanos as people who “adopted a revolutionary narrative that opposed Western civilization and wanted to destroy this society”.&#160; Donald Trump would purr approvingly at another part of this textbook, in which Mexican Americans are linked to undocumented immigration. The textbook alleges that illegal immigration has “caused a number of economic and security problems in the United States”, and that “poverty, drugs, crime, non-assimilation, and exploitation are among some of these problems. Studies have shown that the Mexican American community suffers from a significant gap in education levels, employment, wages, housing, and other issues relating to poverty that persist through the second, third, and fourth generations”.</p>
<p>Not surprisingly, the textbook fails to mention that of the estimated 189 men who died at the Alamo, only six were native Texans, and their last names were Abamillo, Badillo, Espalier, Esparza, Fuentes, and Navatwo. &#160;Likewise, only two of the signatories of the Texas Declaration of Independence were native Texans, and their last names were Navarro and Ruiz.</p>
<p>The textbook fails to say that until the 1954 US Supreme Court decision in&#160;Hernandez vs Texas, Hispanics who were put on trial were denied a jury that had any other Hispanics, or other persons of colour or women.</p>
<p>A <a href="https://stateofobesity.org/adult-obesity/" type="external">study</a> by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation in 2016 placed Texas in the top 10 states with the highest rates of obesity.</p>
<p>A <a href="" type="internal">report</a> by the Annie E. Casey Foundation showed that in 2013 Texas had the second-highest percentage of uninsured children in the US (13%). &#160;Only Mississippi did worse. In 2013 a quarter of the state’s children lived below the poverty line. The same report found that more than a quarter of the state’s children (1.9 million) are “food-insecure”, that is, living in families which had to “choose between food and other necessities”.</p>
<p>According to the <a href="https://www.texmed.org/uninsured_in_texas/" type="external">Texas Medical Association</a>, in 2016 Texas had the highest rate of uninsured citizens in the US, with 32% of its inhabitants having no health insurance.</p>
<p>The same TMA report also said that according to “2015 estimates from the America Community Survey, Texas had a lower percentage of high school (82.4 percent vs. 87.1 percent) and college graduates (28.4 percent vs. 30.6 percent) in the 25-and-older-population compared to the national average”.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.usnews.com/news/best-states/rankings/education" type="external">&#160;U.S. News &amp; World Report</a> placed Texas in the bottom 10 in its 2017 Best States in education ranking.</p>
<p>The USNWR also placed Texas next to the bottom in its ranking on infrastructure quality (only Mississippi did worse).</p>
<p>Texas is also among the top 10 most gerrymandered American states, says <a href="" type="internal">RanttNews</a>, using data provided by the Washington Post.</p>
<p>Texas has highest maternal mortality rate in developed world.&#160; This does not imply that the rest of the US does significantly better in this regard– the US is the only developed country in the world where maternal deaths increased between 1993 and 2013, according to the World Health Organization.</p>
<p>California&#160;has 12% of the US population and produces&#160;6.9%&#160;of the country’s total greenhouse&#160;gas emissions.&#160;Texas, by contrast,&#160;has 8.5% of the population and produces&#160;12.8% of US greenhouse gas emissions.</p>
<p>The secession of Texas is almost certain to entrench the states of affairs mentioned above, not ameliorate or remove them.</p>
<p>In fact, it would be inadvisable to bet against a secessionist Texas school textbook claiming that the pregnant mother of Jesus rode into Bethlehem on a dinosaur.</p>
<p>Interestingly, at a hotel in Texas, belonging to a nationwide chain, the United States Army flag flies below the Stars and Stripes instead of the customary state flag.&#160; Out of curiosity, we asked why this was so at the reception desk, and the clerk said it had been like this ever since she worked there. &#160;There was no military base nearby, and no military convention was taking place at the hotel.</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | Bigger in Texas | true | https://counterpunch.org/2018/01/12/bigger-in-texas/ | 2018-01-12 | 4 |
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<p>For the Record: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated the New Mexico Air National Guard participated in World War II. While other branches of the New Mexico National Guard were in World War II, the New Mexico Air National Guard was not recognized until 1947, after the war’s end.&#160;</p>
<p>The New Mexico Air National Guard has a long history of heroism high above the rest of us.</p>
<p>The 188th Fighter Bomber Squadron was federally recognized in 1947.</p>
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<p>From there, the unit served as fighters in the Korean and Vietnam conflicts and in the Middle East.</p>
<p>Today, now known as the 150th Special Operations Wing, it has been left without its own aircraft and without an operational flying mission.</p>
<p>Brig. Gen. Ken Nava, the New Mexico National Guard’s adjutant general, has made it his mission to see them both restored.</p>
<p>“The 150th Special Operations Wing, the ‘Tacos,’ they have a long legacy of service to our nation,” Nava said. “They’ve done incredible service to our nation in every conflict since their inception.”</p>
<p>In 2010, the 21 F-16s flown that belonged to the unit were retired.</p>
<p>Their main mission became supporting Kirtland’s 58th Special Operations Wing, maintaining its aircraft and assisting in training pararescuemen for the Air Force.</p>
<p>While Nava said that partnership is “very, very rewarding,” the lack of an operational flying mission means the unit misses out on training opportunities overseas and is unable to be deployed in combat.</p>
<p>Support personnel help bring an F-16C back to the flight line at Kirtland AFB following a training mission in 2009. (Dean Hanson/Albuquerque Journal)</p>
<p>The New Mexico Air National Guard is the only one in the country without an operational flying mission and one of three without its own aircraft.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>A few of NMANG’s smaller units are able to deploy, including the RED HORSE, acronym for Rapid Engineer Deployable Heavy Operational Repair Squadron Engineer squadron, which performs construction, and Intelligence Squadron.</p>
<p>One of the Air National Guard’s Capstone Principles provides that each state’s Guard have a unit-equipped wing and flying squadron to enable the Guard “to deploy and employ as complete warfighting packages, not just augmentation personnel.”</p>
<p>Nava said that, although he would love to see the Tacos return to a fighting mission, he is willing to take on whatever the Air Force needs them for.</p>
<p>In June testimony to the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Defense, Sen. Tom Udall, D-N.M., questioned Secretary of the Air Force Heather Wilson on a path forward.</p>
<p>Her answer wasn’t exactly optimistic.</p>
<p>“As you well know, I have kind of a close affiliation and affection for the Tacos, and we’d all like to see them have a flying mission again,” said Wilson, a former U.S. representative for New Mexico. “But the reality is the budget we have and the size of the force we have doesn’t support it and we need to fix it.”</p>
<p>The Air Force has 30 percent fewer Airmen and 37 percent fewer aircraft than it did in 1991, according to Air Force data.</p>
<p>“… 26 years of continuous combat operations and ongoing budget uncertainty have taken a toll on our Airmen, our readiness, and our equipment,” reads the Air Force’s Fiscal Year 2018 budget overview.</p>
<p>Nava acknowledged that acquiring new or used aircraft would be extremely expensive.</p>
<p>An F-16 fighter banks as it takes off from Albuquerque’s Kirtland AFB in 1997. (Jake Schoellkopf/Associated Press)</p>
<p>But the Guard already has 24 empty canopies and access to munition storage on Kirtland Air Force Base, he pointed out.</p>
<p>“It (the cost of aircraft) would be minor compared to a facility that doesn’t have what we have right now,” he said.</p>
<p>Nava said he has been working with Air Force leadership, the congressional delegation and the Governor’s Office to find a path toward accomplishing the two goals.</p>
<p>“New Mexico is a perfect location for additional aircraft,” Sen. Martin Heinrich, D-N.M., said in a statement. “I look forward to working with Maj. Gen. Nava in identifying the right aircraft for the New Mexico Air National Guard to operate and to working with the rest of the congressional delegation in seeking aircraft that makes sense for New Mexico, the Air Force, and the National Guard.”</p>
<p>In the meantime, Nava said the NMANG is happy to continue assisting the 58th Special Operations Wing.</p>
<p>But he worries the lack of an operational flying mission and aircraft is hurting morale and retention for the unit, which has traditionally had the opportunity to train in Italy and the Philippines along with being deployed to conflicts around the world.</p>
<p>“We have the New Mexico Air National Guard men and women that are ready, willing and able to accept an operational flying mission,” he said. “They are ready to accept the challenge of an aircraft, of an airframe, here that they’ll learn and maintain and take care of.”</p>
<p>Nava was named adjutant general in July. He said he hopes to make progress on the goals by the end of his five-year term.</p>
<p />
<p /> | Off the radar: NM Air National Guard lacks mission, aircraft | false | https://abqjournal.com/1061250/air-national-guard-unit-redefines-itself.html | 2 |
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<p>Justice Clarence Thomas at his 1991 Supreme Court confirmation hearing, where his former employee Anita Hill accused him of sexual harassment. Greg Gibson/AP</p>
<p />
<p>On October 7, the Washington Post published a leaked <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-recorded-having-extremely-lewd-conversation-about-women-in-2005/2016/10/07/3b9ce776-8cb4-11e6-bf8a-3d26847eeed4_story.html" type="external">Access Hollywood</a> tape of Donald Trump boasting of groping and kissing women without their consent. As the fallout from the tapes began, Moira Smith, a 41-year-old attorney, took to Facebook to recount her own allegation of being groped by a powerful man—Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, who was accused of sexual harassment by Anita Hill during his Supreme Court confirmation process in 1991.</p>
<p>According to the <a href="http://www.nationallawjournal.com/id=1202770918142/Young-Scholar-Now-Lawyer-Says-Clarence-Thomas-Groped-Her-in-1999?mcode=0&amp;curindex=0&amp;curpage=ALL" type="external">National Law Journal</a>, Smith posted the following on her Facebook page the night the Trump tape came out:</p>
<p />
<p>Smith has deactivated her Facebook account since publishing this post. She recounted additional details of her alleged interaction with Justice Thomas to the <a href="http://www.law.com/sites/almstaff/2016/10/27/young-scholar-now-lawyer-says-clarence-thomas-groped-her-in-1999/" type="external">National Law Journal</a>.</p>
<p>A 1997 Truman Scholar&#160;studying at Georgetown University’s School of Foreign Service, Smith stayed in Washington, DC, to work for the Truman Foundation as a resident scholar through August 1999, helping to coordinate various foundation projects. In that capacity, she helped her boss, Louis Blair, host a dinner party at his home in suburban Virginia, which was attended by Justice Thomas, according to Smith and several others who were there. The justice was set to present David Adkins, then a Kansas lawmaker, with an award the following day at the Supreme Court. While she helped to prepare appetizers and set the table, Smith says she approached the table where Justice Thomas was sitting.</p>
<p>“I was setting the place to his right when he reached out, sort of cupped his hand around my butt and pulled me pretty close to him,” Smith told the National Law Journal. “He said, ‘Where are you sitting?’ and gave me a squeeze. I said, ‘I’m sitting down at the garden table.’ He said, ‘I think you should sit next to me,’ giving me squeezes. I said, ‘Well, Mr. Blair is pretty particular about his seating chart.’ I tried to use the seating chart as a pretext for refusing. He one more time squeezed my butt and he said, ‘Are you sure?’ I said yes, and that was the end of it.”</p>
<p>Three former roommates of Smith’s, as well as a former colleague from the Truman Scholar program, told the National Law Journal that they remembered Smith recounting this event to them shortly after it happened. Blair as well as Adkins said they had no memory of Smith telling them about the incident. The National Law Journal contacted Justice Thomas, who replied, through a Supreme Court spokeswoman, “This claim is preposterous and it never happened.” When contacted by Mother Jones, Justice Thomas’ office declined to offer further comment and referred to the Journal‘s story.</p>
<p>When contacted by Mother Jones to ask if the flurry of allegations against Trump affected her decision to come forward with her claim, Smith replied in an email, through a spokeswoman: “As the mother of a young daughter and son, I am coming forward to show that it is important to stand up for yourself and tell the truth. When powerful men commit sexual assault, they count on their victims keeping it a secret. When Justice Thomas touched me inappropriately and without my consent, I was 23 years old—and felt there was nothing I could do. Seventeen years later, it is clear that sexual harassment, misconduct and assault continue to be pervasive, having an impact on all women.”</p>
<p /> | Lawyer Accuses Justice Clarence Thomas of Groping Her in 1999 | true | https://motherjones.com/politics/2016/10/lawyer-accuses-groping-justice-clarence-thomas-trump-effect/ | 2016-10-27 | 4 |
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<p>UKHIA, Bangladesh — The soldiers arrived, as they often did, long after sunset.</p>
<p>It was June, and the newlyweds were asleep in their home, surrounded by the fields of wheat they farmed in western Myanmar. Without warning, seven soldiers burst into the house and charged into their bedroom.</p>
<p>The woman, a Rohingya Muslim who agreed to be identified by her first initial, F, knew enough to be terrified. She knew the military had been attacking Rohingya villages, as part of what the United Nations has called ethnic cleansing in the mostly Buddhist nation. She heard just days before that soldiers had killed her parents, and that her brother was missing.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>This time, F says, the soldiers had come for her.</p>
<p>The men bound her husband with rope. They ripped the scarf from her head and tied it around his mouth.</p>
<p>They yanked off her jewelry and tore off her clothes. They threw her to the floor.</p>
<p>And then the first soldier began to rape her.</p>
<p>She struggled against him, but four men held her down and beat her with sticks. She stared in panic at her husband, who stared back helplessly. He finally wriggled the gag out of his mouth and screamed.</p>
<p>And then she watched as a soldier fired a bullet into the chest of the man she had married only one month before. Another soldier slit his throat.</p>
<p>Her mind grew fuzzy. When the soldiers were finished, they dragged her naked body outside and set her bamboo house ablaze.</p>
<p>It would be two months before she realized her misery was far from over: She was pregnant.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>The rape of Rohingya women by Myanmar’s security forces has been sweeping and methodical, the Associated Press found in interviews with 29 women and girls who fled to neighboring Bangladesh. These sexual assault survivors from several refugee camps were interviewed separately and extensively. They ranged in age from 13 to 35, came from a wide swath of villages in Myanmar’s Rakhine state and described assaults between October 2016 and mid-September.</p>
<p>Foreign journalists are banned from the Rohingya region of Rakhine, making it nearly impossible to independently verify each woman’s report. Yet there was a sickening sameness to their stories, with distinct patterns in their accounts, their assailants’ uniforms and the details of the rapes themselves.</p>
<p>The testimonies bolster the U.N.’s contention that Myanmar’s armed forces are systematically employing rape as a “calculated tool of terror” aimed at exterminating the Rohingya people. The Myanmar armed forces did not respond to multiple requests from the AP for comment, but an internal military investigation last month concluded that none of the assaults ever took place. And when journalists asked about rape allegations during a government-organized trip to Rakhine in September, Rakhine’s minister for border affairs, Phone Tint, replied: “These women were claiming they were raped, but look at their appearances — do you think they are that attractive to be raped?”</p>
<p>Doctors and aid workers, however, say that they are stunned at the sheer volume of rapes, and suspect only a fraction of women have come forward. Medecins Sans Frontieres doctors have treated 113 sexual violence survivors since August, a third of them under 18. The youngest was 9.</p>
<p>____________</p>
<p>The Associated Press reported this story with a grant from the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting.</p>
<p>____________</p>
<p>The U.N. has called the Rohingya the most persecuted minority on earth, with Myanmar denying them citizenship and basic rights. Hundreds of thousands of Rohingya refugees now live in sweltering tents in Bangladesh, where the stifling air smells of excrement from a lack of latrines and of smoke from wood fires to cook what little food there is. The women and girls in this story gave the AP their names but agreed to be publicly identified only by their first initial, citing fears they or their families would be killed by Myanmar’s military.</p>
<p>Each described attacks that involved groups of men from Myanmar’s security forces, often coupled with other forms of extreme violence. Every woman except one said the assailants wore military-style uniforms, generally dark green or camouflage. The lone woman who described her attackers as wearing plain clothes said her neighbors recognized them from the local military outpost.</p>
<p>Many women said the uniforms bore various patches featuring stars or, in a couple cases, arrows. Such patches represent the different units of Myanmar’s army.</p>
<p>The most common attack described went much like F’s. In several other cases, women said, security forces surrounded a village, separated men from women, then took the women to a second location to gang rape them.</p>
<p>The women spoke of seeing their children slaughtered in front of them, their husbands beaten and shot. They spoke of burying their loved ones in the darkness and leaving the bodies of their babies behind. They spoke of the searing pain of rapes that felt as if they would never end, and of dayslong journeys on foot to Bangladesh while still bleeding and hobbled.</p>
<p>They spoke and they spoke, the words erupting from many of them in frantic, tortured bursts.</p>
<p>N, who says she survived a rape but lost her husband, her country and her peace, speaks because there is little else she can do — and because she hopes that somebody will listen.</p>
<p>“I have nothing left,” she says. “All I have left are my words.”</p>
<p>_____</p>
<p>Two months after the men came quietly in the night for F, they came boldly in the daytime for K.</p>
<p>It was late August, she says, just days after Rohingya insurgents had attacked several Myanmar police posts in northern Rakhine. Security forces responded with swift ferocity that human rights groups say left hundreds dead and scores of Rohingya villages burned to the ground.</p>
<p>Inside their house, K and her family were settling down to breakfast. They had only just swallowed their first mouthfuls of rice when the screams of other villagers rang out: The military was coming.</p>
<p>Her husband and three oldest children bolted out the door, fleeing for the nearby hills.</p>
<p>But K was nearly 9 months pregnant, with swollen feet and two terrified toddlers whose tiny legs could never outpace the soldiers’ strides. She had no place to hide, no time to think.</p>
<p>The door banged open. And the men charged in.</p>
<p>There were four of them, she thinks, maybe five, all in camouflage uniforms. Her young son and daughter began to wail and then, mercifully, scampered out the front door.</p>
<p>There was no mercy for her. The men grabbed her and threw her on the bed. They yanked off her earrings, nose ring and necklace. They found the money she had hidden in her blouse from the recent sale of her family’s cow. They ripped off her clothes, and tied down her hands and legs with rope. When she resisted, they choked her.</p>
<p>And then, she says, they began to rape her.</p>
<p>She was too terrified to move. One man held a knife to her eyeball, one more a gun to her chest. Another forced himself inside her.</p>
<p>When the first man finished, they switched places and the torture began again. And when the second man finished, a third man raped her.</p>
<p>In the midst of her agony, she thought of nothing but the baby inside her womb, just weeks away from emerging into a world that would not want him, because he was a Rohingya.</p>
<p>She began to bleed.</p>
<p>She blacked out.</p>
<p>As she awoke, her great aunt was there, tearfully untying her. The elder woman bathed her, clothed her and gave her a hot compress for her aching thighs.</p>
<p>When K’s husband returned home, he was furious: not just at the men who had raped her, but at her. Why, he demanded, had she not run away?</p>
<p>She was pregnant and in no condition to run, she shot back. Still, he blamed her for the assault and threatened to abandon her, because, he told her, a “non-Muslim” had raped her.</p>
<p>Fearful the men would return, she and her family fled to her father’s house in the hills above the village. When they saw soldiers setting fire to the houses below, they knew they had to leave for Bangladesh.</p>
<p>K was too crippled by pain to walk. Her husband and brother placed her inside a sling they fashioned out of a blanket and a stick, and carried her for days.</p>
<p>Inside her cocoon, she wept for the baby she feared was dead.</p>
<p>_____</p>
<p>A few days after the men burst into K’s house, 10 soldiers arrived at R’s.</p>
<p>She was just 13 years old, but R had already learned to fear the military men.</p>
<p>Her parents had warned her to steer clear of them, yet it was her father who first fell prey to their wrath. One day last year, R says, soldiers stabbed him in the head with a knife, killing him.</p>
<p>Yet R’s family had nowhere else to go. And so they stayed in the village. R busied herself by learning Arabic, doting on her chicken and its hatchlings and caring for her two younger brothers.</p>
<p>And then one day in late August, R says, the soldiers barged into her house. They snatched up her little brothers, tied them to a tree outside and began to beat them. R tried to run out the front door, but the men caught her.</p>
<p>Her body is barely pubescent, her limbs still gangly like a child’s. But her youth could not protect her.</p>
<p>R fought back against the men, but they dragged her out of the house. The skin tore away from her knees as her legs scraped along the ground.</p>
<p>The men tethered her arms to two trees. They ripped off her earrings and bracelets, stripped off her clothes.</p>
<p>R screamed at them to stop. They spit at her.</p>
<p>And then the first man began to rape her.</p>
<p>She froze. She was a virgin. The pain was excruciating.</p>
<p>The attack lasted for hours. She remembers all ten men forcing themselves on her before she passed out.</p>
<p>One of her older brothers later found her on the ground, bleeding.</p>
<p>R’s two little brothers were missing, but their mother had no time to search for them. She knew she had to get her daughter over the border and to a doctor quickly to get medicine in time to prevent a pregnancy.</p>
<p>R was barely conscious. So her two older brothers carried her across the hills and fields toward Bangladesh. R’s mother hurried alongside them, terrified for her daughter, terrified that time was running out.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>That R’s family sought treatment for her at all is an anomaly. Despite still suffering pain, bleeding and infections months after the attacks, only a handful of the women interviewed by the AP had seen a doctor. The others had no idea free services were available, or were too ashamed to tell a doctor they were raped.</p>
<p>In a health center overflowing with women and wailing babies, Dr. Misbah Uddin Ahmed, a government health officer, sits at his desk looking weary. He pulls out a stack of patient histories for those treated at his clinics and begins to flick through them, reading the case summaries out loud:</p>
<p>Sept. 5, a patient 7 months pregnant says three soldiers burst into her home 11 days ago and raped her. Also Sept. 5, a patient says she was asleep at home when the military broke in 20 days ago and three soldiers raped her. Sept. 10, a patient says the military came to her house one month ago and beat her husband before two soldiers raped her.</p>
<p>Ahmed says the women who manage to overcome their fear and make it to his clinics are usually the ones in the deepest trouble. So many others, he adds, are suffering in silence.</p>
<p>Though the scale of these attacks is new, the use of sexual violence by Myanmar’s security forces is not. Before she became Myanmar’s civilian leader, Aung San Suu Kyi herself condemned the military’s abuses. “Rape is rife. It is used as a weapon by armed forces to intimidate the ethnic nationalities and to divide our country,” she said in a 2011 videotaped statement to the Nobel Women’s Initiative.</p>
<p>And yet Suu Kyi’s government has not only failed to condemn the recent accounts of rape, it has dismissed the accounts as lies. In Dec. 2016, the government issued a press release disputing Rohingya women’s reports of sexual assaults, accompanied by an image that said “Fake Rape.”</p>
<p>Ahmed seems bewildered that anyone would ever doubt these women. Look at what I have just shown you, he says, gesturing toward his stack of files chronicling one atrocity after another.</p>
<p>Gynecologist Arjina Akhter has witnessed the results of those atrocities. Since August, so many women began showing up at her two clinics, she stopped asking them to fill out patient history forms so she could treat them faster. Among other women, she estimates between 20 to 30 rape survivors visited her clinics in September and October.</p>
<p>She ticks off the injuries: Two women with lacerations to their cervixes they said were caused by guns shoved inside their bodies. One woman with horrific tearing she said was caused by a nail driven into her vagina. Several women with severe vaginal bleeding.</p>
<p>More recently, she says, women who were raped months ago have been coming to her in a panic, asking for abortions. She has to explain to them that they are too far along, but reassures them that officials will take the babies if they cannot care for them.</p>
<p>Still, for some Rohingya women, giving up the babies they never asked for was not an option.</p>
<p>Which is how it was for F.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>More than three months had passed since the men burst into F’s home, and her despair had only deepened.</p>
<p>Neighbors had taken her in and cared for her. But her house was gone, her husband was dead. And the timing of the attack left little doubt that the baby growing inside her belonged to one of the men who had caused all her grief.</p>
<p>She could only pray that things would not get worse. And then, one night in mid-September, they did.</p>
<p>F was asleep along with the neighbors — a couple and their 5-year-old son — when the men broke down the door, jolting everyone awake.</p>
<p>There were five of them this time, she remembers. They quickly grabbed the boy and slashed his throat, and killed the man.</p>
<p>Then they turned to the man’s wife, and to F. And her nightmare began again.</p>
<p>They stripped off the women’s clothes. Two of the men noticed the swell of F’s stomach and grabbed it, squeezing hard.</p>
<p>They threw the women to the floor. F’s friend fought back, and the men beat her with their guns so viciously the skin on her thighs began to peel away.</p>
<p>But the fight had gone out of F. She felt her body go soft, felt the blood run between her legs as the first man forced himself on her, and then the second. Next to her, three men were savaging her friend.</p>
<p>When it was finally over and the men had gone, the two women lay immobile on the floor.</p>
<p>They lay there for days, so crippled by pain and catatonic from the trauma that they could not even lift themselves to use the toilet. F could smell the blood around them. As the house baked under the punishing sun, the stench from the decaying bodies of her friend’s husband and son finally overwhelmed her.</p>
<p>She would not die here. And neither would her baby.</p>
<p>She reached out for her friend’s hand and clasped it. Then F hauled herself to her feet, pulling her friend up with her. Hand in hand, the women stumbled to the next village. They spent five days recovering there and then, alongside a group of other villagers, began the 10-day journey to Bangladesh.</p>
<p>The monsoon season had begun, but there was nowhere to shelter. So F kept walking through the downpours. She was starving, and her battered body ached with each step. Generous strangers offered her sips of their water, and one man gave her a few sweet rolls.</p>
<p>One day, she came across a 9-year-old boy lying along the side of a road, wounded and alone. He had lost his parents, he told her, and the soldiers had tortured him. She took him with her.</p>
<p>Together, the two made it to the shores of the Naf River and boarded a boat to Bangladesh.</p>
<p>Which is where they live now, in a tiny bamboo shelter between two filthy latrines. And it is here that F prays her baby will be a boy — because this world is no place for a girl.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>For now, the women are left to wonder how long they will live in the bleak limbo of Bangladesh, and if they will ever return to their homeland.</p>
<p>R, the teen, is not pregnant. Her mother sold all her jewelry and got her to the hospital in time. But R can’t stop thinking about her little brothers, and her sleep is plagued by nightmares.</p>
<p>Since the rape, she has struggled to eat, and her once-curvy frame has shrunk. Before the rape, she says softly, she was pretty.</p>
<p>K, who feared the baby inside her had died, gave birth to a boy on the floor of her tent in a dizzying rush of relief. She had kept her son alive through it all.</p>
<p>But her trauma persists. The thrum of a helicopter hovering over the camp sends her into a panic and she recites the Muslim prayer for the moments before death. She is convinced the aircraft is Myanmar’s military, coming to kill them all.</p>
<p>When told she is strong, she looks up with tears in her eyes.</p>
<p>“How can you say that?” she asks. “My husband says he is ashamed of me. How am I strong?”</p>
<p>F, whose body is starting to ache under the strain of her pregnancy, finds her mind often drifts toward how she will care for the child in the future. She believes God has kept them both alive for a reason.</p>
<p>Her parents, her brother, her husband are gone now. This baby will be the only family she has left. For her, the most haunting reminder of the agony she endured also, somehow, represents her last chance at happiness.</p>
<p>“Everybody has died,” she says. “I don’t have anyone to care for me. If I give this baby away, what will I have left? There will be nothing to live for.”</p> | AP: Rohingya methodically raped by Myanmar’s armed forces | false | https://abqjournal.com/1104957/ap-investigation-rape-of-rohingya-sweeping-methodical.html | 2017-12-10 | 2 |
<p>Thom rants on Donald Trump’s Tax scam and how it exemplifies the role of the media, the one percent and others in disenfranchising and angering voters and non voters alike. If they continue to turn America into a third world country, we are going to see resistance like we’ve never seen.</p>
<p /> | The Lies Republicans Tell To Keep Control In The Hands Of A Small Group Of Billionaires – Thom Hartmann Program | true | https://trofire.com/2017/09/29/lies-republicans-tell-keep-control-hands-small-group-billionaires-thom-hartmann-program/ | 4 |
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<p />
<p>As the Democratic presidential candidates’ positions on health care policy reform have solidified, the <a href="/washington_dispatch/2007/12/obama-clinton-afscme-mandates.html" type="external">issue of mandates</a> has become increasingly important as it is one of the few differences between the various plans. While the right has towed the free market company line on health care, and while the Democrats’ paths differ from the Republicans’, the destination is the same: a huge payday for insurance companies. According to Shum Preston of the California Nurses Association (CNA), “Individual mandates are a step backward…Insurance companies support individual mandate plans because they guarantee them more customers, revenues, and influence over medical decision making. What’s not for them to like?” Any health care proposal that includes mandates without addressing the problems that corporate health care and insurance companies pose maintains the status quo. <a href="http://www.barackobama.com/issues/healthcare/" type="external">Barack Obama’s</a> and <a href="http://www.hillaryclinton.com/feature/healthcareplan/summary.aspx" type="external">Hillary Clinton’s</a> plans differ in that Obama’s plan doesn’t include mandates, while Clinton’s does. What remains identical between the two candidates’ plans is the desire for universal health insurance, which is not to be mistaken for universal health care. <a href="http://johnedwards.com/issues/health-care/health-care-fact-sheet/" type="external">John Edwards’</a> populist message includes a mandate and an option between public and private care, which detractors say will compromise the public option in the end.</p>
<p>Mandates, say Preston, “Force patients to sign up for expensive, wasteful, for-profit insurance products without guaranteeing care or protecting them from cost increases.” The <a href="http://www.calnurses.org/" type="external">CNA</a> and its national wing, the National Nurses Organizing Committee, are a major lobbying force in the health care debate, one of the only organizations pushing for a universal single-payer model.</p>
<p>In a whirlwind past couple of weeks, CNA and NNOC placed advertisements in 10 Iowa newspapers that made national news, went on a two day strike in Northern California, and organized a national protest against the health insurance company Cigna HealthCare, which let a young woman die by refusing to cover her liver transplant. The message they are trying to convey in all of these actions is that the problem with the health care system isn’t just that not everyone is covered; it is that the companies that run it succeed financially by denying access and care. Mandated care doesn’t solve this problem.</p>
<p><a href="http://blog.washingtonpost.com/sleuth/2007/12/nurses_union_defends_cheney_de.html" type="external">The advertisement</a> shocked many media outlets around the country as it declared that were he not on the government’s health care plan, Vice President Cheney “would probably be dead by now.” According to the union, <a href="http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/12/09/politics/main3596110.shtml?source=search_story" type="external">his past medical history</a>—which includes four heart attacks, quadruple bypass surgery, angioplasty, an implanted defibrillator—would disqualify him from signing up for any insurance plan other than the government’s. A Cheney spokeswoman <a href="http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2007/12/07/nurses-health-care-ad-takes-aim-at-cheney/" type="external">responded</a> to the ad by calling it “outrageous.”</p>
<p>Much of CNA’s lobbying for single-payer care falls in line with its actions as a union. The <a href="http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/12/15/BUV2TUU1M.DTL&amp;hw=sutter+strike+cna&amp;sn=001&amp;sc=1000" type="external">recent strike at Sutter Hospitals</a> in Northern California was in response to nurses at those hospitals working without a contract for several months, and to press Sutter to meet statewide safety standards. The company is also attempting to close three Bay Area hospitals that have traditionally served the underserved.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-transplant22dec22,1,500306.story?ctrack=1&amp;cset=true" type="external">tragic death</a> of 17-year-old Natalie Sarkisyan on December 21st illustrates many of these issues and the immediate need for reform. Sarkisyan’s liver had shut down after chemotherapy treatments for two bouts of cancer at the UCLA Medical Center. On December 11th Cigna denied her treatment while she was in critical condition. Four doctors wrote to Cigna that same day saying that she was ready for the transplant and that there was a good chance that her other organs would recover on their own if she had a new liver. On December 14th Cigna replied that a healthy liver was available, but insurance wouldn’t cover it and the family would have to make a $75,000 down payment on the liver, which they could not afford. The CNA and the NNOC organized a massive protest and put enough pressure on Cigna to force it to capitulate on December 20th. It was too late, however, and Sarkisyan died soon after. Rose Ann DeMoro, president of CNA, <a href="http://www.calnurses.org/media-center/press-releases/2007/december/rn-s-statement-on-death-of-nataline-sarkisyan-cigna-should-have-listened-to-her-doctors-and-approved-the-transplant-a-week-ago.html" type="external">called</a> it “a horrific tragedy that demonstrates what is so fundamentally wrong with our health care system today. Insurance companies have a stranglehold on our health. Their first priority is to make profits for their shareholders—and the way they do that is by denying care.”</p>
<p>While CNA will only actively support a single-payer model, “any plan without mandates is better than any with mandates,” says Preston. Obama has <a href="/washington_dispatch/2007/12/obama-clinton-afscme-mandates.html" type="external">taken heat</a> from the Clinton camp for not mandating health care for adults, but in lieu of a single-payer plan, Obama’s is the only plan that doesn’t bow completely to the insurance companies. Edwards suggests that people have the option of choosing public or private plans, yet according to Preston, “if we allow [insurance companies] to compete with public health programs, they’ll cherry pick the best customers and shuffle high risk patients on to the public dime. The idea that we can hope and regulate them to become good people isn’t going to work.” It seems as though while health care is supposedly a major issue in this upcoming election, there won’t be significant reform, no matter who comes out on top.</p>
<p>—Andre Sternberg</p>
<p /> | Why the Dems Won’t Fix Health Care | true | https://motherjones.com/politics/2007/12/why-dems-wont-fix-health-care/ | 2007-12-26 | 4 |
<p>India's exports fell 1.1% from a year earlier to $23.1 billion in October, government data showed Tuesday.</p>
<p>This was the first time in 14 months that exports have declined and marked a significant turnaround from September's 25.7% increase.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>Imports rose 7.6% to $37.12 billion, widening the trade deficit in October to $14.02 billion from $11.13 billion a year earlier.</p>
<p>The data would worry Indian policymakers as they try to counter criticism that disruptions caused by a new tax on goods and services have hurt businesses and pulled down economic growth to a three-year low.</p>
<p>Write to Anant Vijay Kala at [email protected]</p>
<p>(END) Dow Jones Newswires</p>
<p>November 14, 2017 07:22 ET (12:22 GMT)</p> | India's Exports Fall in October | true | http://foxbusiness.com/features/2017/11/14/indias-exports-fall-in-october.html | 2017-11-14 | 0 |
<p>Shares of <a href="" type="internal">Tyco International</a> (NYSE:TYC) rallied Friday morning amid renewed chatter that France’s Schneider Electric is eyeing a $30 billion buyout of the parent of ADT.</p>
<p>According to the New York Post, Schneider is in talks with private-equity firms about teaming up for a bid to acquire Princeton, NJ-based Tyco.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>Talks are at an early stage and it hasn’t been decided which firms Schneider would partner with and how they would divide Tyco’s assets, the paper reported.</p>
<p>The report comes after The <a href="" type="internal">Wall Street</a> Journal said last month Schneider had tabled a preliminary buyout offer for Tyco. Schneider said at the time it was not “currently in discussions with Tyco International regarding a potential strategic transaction.”</p>
<p>It’s also possible several private-equity firms will make their own run for Tyco, which also has flow control , fire protection services and safety products businesses, the paper reported.</p>
<p>"[CEO] Ed Breen has made it pretty clear Tyco is for sale and he wouldn't object to a bid," a source told the Post.</p>
<p>Boosted by the renewed buyout speculation, Tyco’s stock climbed more than 7% in Friday’s premarkets before retreating. Tyco gained 3.82% to $51.39 as U.S. markets opened.</p>
<p>Advertisement</p> | Schneider, PE Firms Reportedly Mull $30B Tyco Bid | true | http://foxbusiness.com/features/2011/05/13/report-schneider-pe-firms-mull-30b-tyco-bid.html | 2016-01-28 | 0 |
<p>HERRIN, Ill. (AP) — An American Legion post in Southern Illinois is getting ready to restore a 90-year-old statue honoring those who fought in World War I.</p>
<p>The Southern Illinoisan reports Herrin American Legion Post 645 received a $10,000 grant from Landmarks Illinois, a private not-for-profit historic preservation group.</p>
<p>The money will go toward restoration of Herrin’s “The Spirit of the American Doughboy” monument, which was erected in 1927.</p>
<p>The monument is one of 140 doughboy statues created by Ernest Moore “Dick” Viquesney.</p>
<p>Charles Parola, president of the Herrin Doughboy Committee. He says restoration will be scheduled for next year and cost about $30,000. The group has raised about $23,000.</p>
<p>The work will include stripping patina off the statue, fixing holes, reapplying the patina and applying wax to protect it.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>Information from: Southern Illinoisan, <a href="http://www.southernillinoisan.com" type="external" /> <a href="http://www.southernillinoisan.com" type="external">http://www.southernillinoisan.com</a></p>
<p>HERRIN, Ill. (AP) — An American Legion post in Southern Illinois is getting ready to restore a 90-year-old statue honoring those who fought in World War I.</p>
<p>The Southern Illinoisan reports Herrin American Legion Post 645 received a $10,000 grant from Landmarks Illinois, a private not-for-profit historic preservation group.</p>
<p>The money will go toward restoration of Herrin’s “The Spirit of the American Doughboy” monument, which was erected in 1927.</p>
<p>The monument is one of 140 doughboy statues created by Ernest Moore “Dick” Viquesney.</p>
<p>Charles Parola, president of the Herrin Doughboy Committee. He says restoration will be scheduled for next year and cost about $30,000. The group has raised about $23,000.</p>
<p>The work will include stripping patina off the statue, fixing holes, reapplying the patina and applying wax to protect it.</p>
<p>___</p>
<p>Information from: Southern Illinoisan, <a href="http://www.southernillinoisan.com" type="external" /> <a href="http://www.southernillinoisan.com" type="external">http://www.southernillinoisan.com</a></p> | Illinois group gets $10K to restore WWI ‘doughboy’ statue | false | https://apnews.com/c369b594aaca4e87b5fdda80c1ba8b60 | 2017-12-31 | 2 |
<p>Image From <a href="https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2017/08/20/world/boston-counterprotest-overwhelms-cuts-short-free-speech-rally/#.WZmUBz6GPIU" type="external">The Japan Times</a></p>
<p>The group, Free Speech Coalition, had been organizing the rally since July, but after the recent events in Charlottesville, a massive march to counter the rally had been organized in only a few days.</p>
<p>In the past week, as the calls to march were being made by not only individuals, activists, and left organizations (ISO and Socialist Alternative), but also major unions like the Massachusetts Teachers Association (the biggest union in the state), it became clear that the counter protest was gaining steam.</p>
<p>Image From <a href="https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/3235700" type="external">Taiwan News</a></p>
<p>A few days prior to the "Free Speech Rally" organizers, such as Augustus Invictus, one of the headline speakers at the white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, backed out of the Boston rally.</p>
<p>White Nationalist Rally at Boston Image From <a href="http://www.wbur.org/news" type="external">WBUR News</a> Leading up to the rally in Boston, there had been a call to reach out to the governor in a final plea to revoke the permit or shut down the white supremacists rally. Despite public backlash, the Governor approved the permit and allowed the rally to take place.</p>
<p />
<p>The "Free Speech Rally" was short lived as the massive crowd of counter protesters ascended onto the Boston Commons overwhelming the small rally with chants of "No fascists, no KKK, no racist USA!"</p>
<p>Today's events demonstrate that we cannot rely on the government and politicians to take on these right wing groups. Instead, it requires a mass movement taking to the streets to stop white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups from continuing to have a platform to spread racism and xenophobia.</p>
<p />
<p>Related</p>
<p><a href="Boston" type="external">Boston</a>&#160;&#160;&#160;/&#160;&#160;&#160; <a href="White-Supremacists" type="external">White Supremacists</a>&#160;&#160;&#160;/&#160;&#160;&#160; <a href="Virginia" type="external">Virginia</a>&#160;&#160;&#160;/&#160;&#160;&#160; <a href="racism" type="external">Racism</a>&#160;&#160;&#160;/&#160;&#160;&#160; <a href="United-States" type="external">United States</a></p> | Boston Fights Back Against White Supremacy | true | https://leftvoice.org/Boston-Fights-Back-Against-White-Supremacy | 2017-08-20 | 4 |
<p>I honestly never thought this would happen. This gig is huge. I mean, the <a href="http://www.billboard.com/articles/columns/latin/6723088/buena-vista-social-club-white-house" type="external">Buena Vista Social Club playing at the White House</a>!? In Washington, DC? For so long, Cuban musicians have been unable to do things like this.</p>
<p>And a US President would never have invited them. After all, there was an <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-12159943" type="external">embargo that's been in place since 1960</a>.&#160;</p>
<p>But since last December's thawing between the&#160;two countries, cultural events like this are happening more frequently.&#160;</p>
<p>It also helps that Buena Vista Social Club is a global brand.</p>
<p>That's what guitarist Eliades Ochoa told me when I met him recently in Los Angeles.&#160;He said, "Traditional Cuban music isn't going to die, especially now, because,&#160;since the Buena Vista Social Club, there are a lot of small groups, everywhere in Havana, in Cuba playing. You&#160;can ask them, do you know 'El Cuarto de Tula?'&#160;Do&#160;you know 'El Carretero?'&#160;Do you know 'Chan Chan?'&#160;Do you know 'Candela?'&#160;And everybody knows the songs. And all the small groups have learned all of these tunes, and they picked it up from the Buena Vista Social Club."</p>
<p>In regards to the easing of US-Cuba relations,&#160;Ochoa said&#160;"the joy that we get from such an agreement is always going to be good for everybody. I would love to be able to share and record with American musicians that, because [of] the previous political situation, could not go to Cuba."</p>
<p>I don't know anyone who is going to the concert Thursday, but believe me — that is one place I'd like to be!</p>
<p />
<p />
<p>Betto Arcos' new music <a href="http://cosmicbarrio.podomatic.com/" type="external">podcast is called "The Cosmic Barrio."</a></p> | The next big gig for Cuba's Buena Vista Social Club? The White House. | false | https://pri.org/stories/2015-10-14/next-big-gig-cubas-buena-vista-social-club-white-house | 2015-10-14 | 3 |
<p>LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) _ The winning numbers in Saturday evening's drawing of the Nebraska Lottery's "MyDaY" game were:</p>
<p>Month: 1, Day: 22, Year: 80</p>
<p>(Month: one; Day: twenty-two; Year: eighty)</p>
<p>LINCOLN, Neb. (AP) _ The winning numbers in Saturday evening's drawing of the Nebraska Lottery's "MyDaY" game were:</p>
<p>Month: 1, Day: 22, Year: 80</p>
<p>(Month: one; Day: twenty-two; Year: eighty)</p> | Winning numbers drawn in 'MyDaY' game | false | https://apnews.com/amp/a451dce281134e2b968ee8c88cb7206c | 2018-01-07 | 2 |
<p />
<p>The slowdown of economic growth in China has had a major impact on commodity prices, as well as the stock prices of commodity producers. As the following chart shows, both copper kingpin Freeport-McMoRan and iron ore leader Vale have been hard hit over the past year:</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p><a href="http://ycharts.com/companies/VALE" type="external">VALE</a> data by <a href="http://ycharts.com" type="external">YCharts Opens a New Window.</a>.</p>
<p>While both stocks are down sharply over the past year, they've also rebounded resoundingly off their bottom earlier this year. That rally might not be over if commodity prices continue to rebound.</p>
<p>Here's a look at the bull and bear case for the primary commodities these companies produce as well as why that outlook gives one of these stocks the edge as the better buy.</p>
<p>The bull case for Freeport-McMoRanThe case for buying Freeport-McMoRan is very simple: If copper rises, this stock should rebound sharply. That's because it's highly levered to the price of copper, with just a small rebound in its price driving significant cash flow growth:</p>
<p>Image source: Freeport-McMoRan investor presentation.</p>
<p>Advertisement</p>
<p>Most recently, the price of copper was right about $2.09 per pound, or about $4,640 per tonne, which is above Freeport-McMoRan's base case for 2016 at $2.00 per pound. That higher price is due in part to some improvement in the economic data coming out of China, which is the commodity's top consumer. Because of this improvement, some analysts see copper's price improving to as much as $5,000 per tonne by the end of the year based on potentially tightening market conditions given that producers like Freeport-McMoRan have curbed some of their production and China's economy could regain its footing.</p>
<p>The bear case for Freeport-McMoRanHaving said all that, not all analysts are convinced copper is going higher. Analysts at J.P. Morgan, for example, see copper falling to as low as $4,000 per tonne due to the lack of additional production cuts. Meanwhile, the bank only sees the upside in copper being $4,800 per tonne over the next two years because of its view that the "production adjustment is expected to be a slow and long process lasting two years."</p>
<p>Worse yet are <a href="http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2016/04/07/heres-why-teck-resources-ltds-stock-is-spiraling-l.aspx?source=eptfxblnk0000004" type="external">recent reports Opens a New Window.</a> that China is contemplating increasing its copper exports because it has a glut of inventory. If it started dumping copper onto the market, that would weigh on its price.</p>
<p>This downside has the potential to hit Freeport-McMoRan very hard because its balance sheet is weighed down by more than $20 billion in debt. It's debt the company is trying to address by not only generating free cash flow from higher copper prices but by selling assets, which would be harder to do if copper's price started to slip.</p>
<p>The bull case for ValeMuch like the copper market, there's a lot of disagreement on the direction of iron ore prices over the short and long term. Iron ore has been on fire this year, surging 23% last quarter to as high as $63.74 a tonnene, though it has given back some of those gains and was recently at $55.60 a tonnene. Vale thinks that the best is still yet to come, with CEO Murilo Ferreira saying that the long-term price should hold between $65 and $80 per tonnene. That's because Vale believes in the Chinese market and expects its sales there to rise by 40% to 250 million tonnene in the future as it aims to become the largest supplier of iron ore to the country.</p>
<p>Image Source: Vale.</p>
<p>The bear case for Vale Analysts, however, aren't quite as bullish on iron ore. McKinsey, for example, is expecting it to trade between $45 and $50 a tonnene this year because it sees no real improvement in steel consumption in China. Worse yet is Goldman Sachs' view, which is pegging its price at just $30 to $40 for the rest of this year. Meanwhile, Citi sees it averaging $38 this year and just $35 for the following two years. In fact, there weren't any big banks that painted a bullish picture of iron ore in the short term.</p>
<p>While analysts aren't always right and tend to be more pessimistic when times are tough, they do seem to have a more realistic view than Vale. That's not a surprise because commodity producers tend to be much more bullish on the commodities they produce, which can get them into trouble when they take on a lot of debt to act on that view.</p>
<p>Investor takeawayPurely based on the outlooks, there's a bit more optimism in the copper market right now among analysts. That gives Freeport-McMoRan a leg up over Vale, because it has the potential to rally if that positive outlook comes to fruition. Not only would those higher prices significantly improve its cash flow, but it would remove some of the weight from its balance sheet, which has been pulling down this stock.</p>
<p>The article <a href="http://www.fool.com/investing/general/2016/04/12/better-buy-freeport-mcmoran-inc-vs-vale.aspx" type="external">Better Buy: Freeport-McMoRan Inc. vs. Vale Opens a New Window.</a> originally appeared on Fool.com.</p>
<p><a href="http://my.fool.com/profile/TMFmd19/info.aspx?source=eptfxblnk0000004" type="external">Matt DiLallo Opens a New Window.</a> has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool owns shares of Companhia Vale Ads and Freeport-McMoRan Copper &amp; Gold. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services <a href="http://www.fool.com/shop/newsletters/index.aspx?source=eptfxblnk0000004" type="external">free for 30 days Opens a New Window.</a>. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that <a href="http://wiki.fool.com/Motley?source=eptfxblnk0000004" type="external">considering a diverse range of insights Opens a New Window.</a> makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a <a href="http://www.fool.com/Legal/fool-disclosure-policy.aspx?source=eptfxblnk0000004" type="external">disclosure policy Opens a New Window.</a>.</p>
<p>Copyright 1995 - 2016 The Motley Fool, LLC. All rights reserved. The Motley Fool has a <a href="http://www.fool.com/help/index.htm?display=about02" type="external">disclosure policy Opens a New Window.</a>.</p> | Better Buy: Freeport-McMoRan Inc. vs. Vale | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2016/04/12/better-buy-freeport-mcmoran-inc-vs-vale.html | 2016-04-12 | 0 |
<p>The details of the massive Equifax data breach are jaw-dropping.</p>
<p>The personal data&#160;of 143 million Americans — names, Social Security numbers, birth dates, and in some cases driver’s license and credit card information — were exposed to criminals. Equifax waited weeks before saying anything. The company tried to charge consumers to lock down their data, before reversing course under withering criticism. Its website crashed; its phone representatives offered little more than sympathy.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>Those are the sad and frustrating facts — and they make a lot of misinformation easier to believe. Some rumors we might want to be true, because they’d save us hassle.</p>
<p>But beware, these are just plain wrong:</p>
<p>How great would it be for Equifax to call and offer to freeze your credit or sign you up for monitoring, saving you the trouble of trying to get through its phone menu or crashing website?</p>
<p>You may already know you have to give some identifying information to verify that it’s really you. Scammers know you know this, too.</p>
<p>Advertisement</p>
<p>The Federal Trade Commission is warning consumers not to fall for callers pretending to be Equifax. Don’t believe it even if caller ID says it’s Equifax, because scammers can “spoof” their numbers.</p>
<p>Rule of thumb: Don’t give information to someone who calls you. Initiate the call so you can be sure where your call is going. If you’ve already given your information to a suspected scammer, <a href="https://www.consumer.ftc.gov/blog/2017/09/equifax-isnt-calling" type="external">report it to the FTC.</a></p>
<p>Not being able to use credit cards would create major inconvenience and disruption in many lives. But <a href="https://www.nerdwallet.com/blog/finance/pros-and-cons-freezing-credit/?utm_campaign=ct_prod&amp;utm_source=syndication&amp;utm_medium=rss&amp;utm_term=fox-business&amp;utm_content=443198" type="external">freezing your credit</a> is not like the old advice to literally freeze your credit card in a block of ice to avoid overspending. It affects your credit files, not your existing credit cards.</p>
<p>Freezing closes access to your credit files to those who don’t already have access. You and your current creditors can still access them. But scammers won’t be able to open new accounts in your name. Lenders won’t open new accounts if they cannot see your credit history.</p>
<p>Important note: A freeze stops new accounts — but it won’t keep anyone with your current credit card information from using it. Keep an eye on current accounts so you can spot fraudulent charges right away.</p>
<p>Yes, Equifax had the breach. But thieves may now have the key to your finances, and Equifax is just one of the doors that information can open. Freezing your credit at all three major bureaus — Equifax, Experian and TransUnion — is the best way to keep anyone from accessing your credit.</p>
<p>Tip: If you can’t freeze your credit right now — for instance, you’re mortgage or car loan shopping — consider <a href="https://www.nerdwallet.com/blog/finance/difference-between-fraud-alerts-and-credit-freezes/?utm_campaign=ct_prod&amp;utm_source=syndication&amp;utm_medium=rss&amp;utm_term=fox-business&amp;utm_content=443198" type="external">a fraud alert.</a> For 90 days (longer if you are active-duty military or have been an identity theft victim), applications in your name receive extra scrutiny.</p>
<p>You’re not, at least not yet. Unless scammers are already using your information to open new accounts, the damage isn’t done. While taking the necessary steps to lock down your data is a time-consuming hassle, it is nothing compared with the frustration of unwinding new accounts set up in your name.</p>
<p>Be an informed consumer: The bureaus are pushing “credit locks” hard as an alternative to freezes. These may carry a fee, and still let the bureaus sell you onto lists for promotional offers from businesses. Read the terms and conditions before you choose any freeze, lock or credit monitoring service.</p>
<p>Learn more about protecting your financial life</p>
<p>The article Equifax and Fiction: 4 Data Breach Myths to Dismiss originally appeared on NerdWallet.</p> | Equifax and Fiction: 4 Data Breach Myths to Dismiss | true | http://foxbusiness.com/features/2017/09/15/equifax-and-fiction-4-data-breach-myths-to-dismiss.html | 2017-09-15 | 0 |
<p>.......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... .......... ..........</p>
<p>BOSTON (AP) — A senior at Harvard University is earning praise – and an honors degree – for his debut rap album.</p>
<p>Harvard officials say Obasi Shaw is the first student in the university's history to submit a rap album as a senior thesis in the English department.</p>
<p>Shaw is from an Atlanta suburb and describes his album as a moody take on what it means to be black in America.</p>
<p>The album draws on Geoffrey Chaucer's 14th-century classic “The Canterbury Tales” and other literary works. It received the equivalent of an A-minus grade, enough to guarantee Shaw will graduate with honors next week.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>Shaw says he was surprised by the positive response from Harvard.</p>
<p>Rap and hip-hop have drawn growing academic interest from colleges, some of which now offer minors in hip-hop studies.</p>
<p><a href="#b25cc38d-b137-4d07-8636-f8db2fd2886e" type="external">© 2017 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.</a> Learn more about our <a href="http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/privacy" type="external">Privacy Policy</a> and <a href="http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/terms" type="external">Terms of Use</a>.</p> | Harvard student submits rap album as his senior thesis | false | https://abqjournal.com/1005406/harvard-student-submits-rap-album-as-his-senior-thesis.html | 2 |
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<p>To watch Donald Trump and his fellow Republicans blatantly try to re-write history is quite remarkable. Especially considering that with a simple Google search, anyone can easily debunk their ridiculous attempts to push some fabricated version of fairly recent history.</p>
<p>Take for instance Trump and the GOP’s rhetoric about the Iraq War, Libya and ISIS. To listen to them, they’re quick to tell everyone how everything is President Obama’s fault.</p>
<p>If you listen to Trump, he’ll say he opposed the Iraq War, didn’t support a regime change in Libya&#160;and President Obama’s decision not to leave American troops in Iraq was a mistake that’s directly responsible for ISIS rising to power. Even most of the Republican party puts the blame for ISIS right at the feet of this president.</p>
<p>Of course, they’re all full of crap.</p>
<p>But you don’t have to believe me. I don’t need to “spin” anything to debunk Trump and his party’s propaganda — I can just use their own words and actions.</p>
<p>Let’s start with Trump’s claims that he’s always been against the war in Iraq.</p>
<p>Here are <a href="http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2016/jun/22/donald-trump/trump-still-wrong-his-claim-opposed-iraq-war-ahead/" type="external">his words</a> from <a href="" type="external">September 11, 2002</a>&#160;when he was asked by Howard Stern if he thinks we should go into Iraq:</p>
<p>Yeah, I guess so.&#160;I wish the first time it was done correctly.</p>
<p>So, no, he hasn’t always opposed the war in Iraq because when he was asked if he supported the idea Bush had been pushing around that time to go to war, he said he agreed with it, just that he wished it had been done right the first time.</p>
<p>Then Trump has frequently said that he opposed the removal of Gaddafi from power in Libya. Once again,&#160;his own words&#160;completely debunk his lie:</p>
<p>I can’t believe what our country is doing. Gaddafi in Libya is killing thousands of people, nobody knows how bad it is, and we’re sitting around we have soldiers all over the Middle East, and we’re not bringing them in to stop this horrible carnage and that’s what it is: It’s a carnage.</p>
<p>You talk about things that have happened in history; this could be one of the worst. Now we should go in, we should stop this guy, which would be very easy and very quick. We could do it surgically, stop him from doing it, and save these lives. This is absolutely nuts. We don’t want to get involved and you’re gonna end up with something like you’ve never seen before.</p>
<p>But we have to go&#160;in to save these lives; these people are being slaughtered like animals. It’s horrible what’s going on; it has to be stopped. We should do on a humanitarian basis, immediately go into Libya, knock this guy out very quickly, very surgically, very effectively, and save the lives.</p>
<p>For the record, those are comments&#160; <a href="" type="internal">he made on his own blog&#160;in 2011</a>.</p>
<p>I can’t forget <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9tSstkZa7M" type="external">this interview</a> he did with CNN’s Wolf Blitzer in 2007 where he said we needed to immediately pull American troops out of Iraq:</p>
<p>You know how they get out? They get out. That’s how they get out. Declare victory and leave, because I’ll tell you, this country is just going to get further bogged down. They’re in a civil war over there, Wolf. There’s nothing that we’re going to be able to do with a civil war. They are in a major civil war.</p>
<p>Then there’s <a href="https://www.buzzfeed.com/andrewkaczynski/trump-cites-iraq-withdrawal-he-passionately-supported-to-say?utm_term=.ylbQ36Wqd#.rbRONDrdP" type="external">this interview</a> he gave to British&#160;GQ&#160;in 2008 where he said he’d “get out of Iraq right now” and said he wished Sen. John McCain would have pushed to “get us out of Iraq faster.”</p>
<p>As&#160;a quick recap, Donald Trump:</p>
<p>Yet, to listen to him talk now, he seems to act as if he didn’t say any of that. Not only does he deny supporting the Iraq War or saying we should remove&#160;Gaddafi from power, he cites American troops leaving Iraq as the reason why ISIS exists —&#160;when he was advocating for removing troops before Barack Obama was even elected.</p>
<p>But even when it comes to the removal of U.S. troops from Iraq, <a href="" type="internal">that wasn’t President Obama’s fault</a>, either. All he did was enforce a Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) that George W. Bush signed in 2008.</p>
<p>Don’t believe me? <a href="https://georgewbush-whitehouse.archives.gov/news/releases/2008/12/20081214-2.html" type="external">Here’s the proof</a>&#160;from Bush’s own presidential archives.</p>
<p>However, if that’s not enough evidence to prove that it was Bush, not Obama, who ultimately set the date when American troops would leave Iraq, here are former <a href="" type="internal">Vice President Dick Cheney’s own words</a> he said during an interview with Face the Nation&#160;where he called&#160;the SOFA a sign that the war in Iraq had been successful:</p>
<p>We’ve entered in to a strategic framework agreement with the Iraqis that calls for, ultimately, the U.S. completion of the assignment and the withdrawal of our forces from Iraq. All of those things I think, by anybody’s standard, would be evidence of significant success.</p>
<p>Again, to do a quick recap about the removal of U.S. forces from Iraq, we have:</p>
<p>Yet, these are the same people and members of the same party who now say that pulling troops out of Iraq, which facilitated the growth of ISIS in Iraq, is entirely the fault of President Obama.</p>
<p>Oh, and don’t even give me the whole, “Well, Obama could have kept troops there anyway” nonsense. While this&#160;was&#160;a possibility, <a href="http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2015/may/18/jeb-bush/obama-refused-sign-plan-place-leave-10000-troops-i/" type="external">the truth is</a>, the Iraqi government didn’t want us there and never agreed to change the terms of the original SOFA to allow Americans troops to remain in the country.</p>
<p>Then there’s also the indisputable fact that ISIS began in 2004 — before Bush had begun his second term as president.</p>
<p>The bottom line is this: I don’t have to twist words, distort facts or do much of anything other than use the&#160;exact words and actions&#160;of people like Bush, Cheney and Trump to prove that all this anti-Obama rhetoric concerning Iraq and the rise of ISIS is nothing but pure fiction based on Republicans trying to re-write history. Meanwhile, I can literally do nothing more than&#160;quote Donald Trump&#160;verbatim&#160;to prove that, not only did he support both the Iraq War&#160;and&#160;removing Gaddafi from power in Libya, he was a staunch advocate for removing U.S. troops from Iraq — which he now attacks President Obama and Hillary Clinton for happening.</p>
<p>I absolutely cannot wait to see the messages and comments I’ll certainly get from Republicans trying to claim what I’ve said here isn’t true.</p>
<p>Be sure to check out the videos of these various comments below.</p>
<p>Trump’s Howard Stern Interview in 2002:</p>
<p>iframe&amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;gt; &amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;gt;Trump&amp;amp;amp;#8217;s 2007 interview with CNN&amp;amp;amp;#8217;s Wolf Blitzer about removing troops from Iraq:&amp;amp;lt;/p&amp;amp;gt; &amp;amp;lt;p&amp;amp;gt;&amp;amp;lt;iframe width="420" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/U9tSstkZa7M" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen&amp;amp;gt;</p>
<p>Dick Cheney calling Bush’s SOFA agreement a sign of “significant success” in Iraq:</p>
<p />
<p />
<p><a href="" type="internal">10 Ridiculous Republican Facts That Are So Absurd They Seem Like They're Made Up</a></p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">Donald Trump Embarrassed as Top Surrogate Completely Contradicts His Claim</a></p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">Jon Stewart Hammers Republican Hypocrites for Attacking President Obama on ISIS (Video)</a></p>
<p>0 Facebook comments</p> | Here’s the Truth About ISIS and the Iraq War that Trump & His Supporters Don’t Want to See | true | http://forwardprogressives.com/truth-about-isis-iraq-war-trump-supporters-dont-want-see/ | 2016-08-22 | 4 |
<p>Journalists aren’t allowed inside Moria refugee camp on the Greek island of Lesbos. So, I probably never would have met Kamal Hassan if it hadn’t been for the fire.</p>
<p>In September, refugees protesting the deplorable conditions in the camp <a href="" type="internal">set much of it ablaze</a>. The 4,000 people living inside were forced to evacuate to the road outside the gates.</p>
<p>I was in the midst of the chaotic crowd with some other reporters when someone tapped me on the shoulder. A young man with friendly dark eyes introduced himself as Kamal Hassan. He told me he was a journalist from Somalia.&#160; He and two other Somali journalists had come to Greece to seek asylum, he said, because they have each been targeted by the extremist group, al-Shabab, in Mogadishu.</p>
<p>But now they were stuck in Moria. And he urgently wanted to tell me their story.</p>
<p>Several days later, I returned to the camp, where Hassan introduced me to Yassin Abuukar and Kowthar Adraman.</p>
<p>The three journalists eagerly showed me their press IDs from Somali media outlets — Kalsan TV, Horn Cable TV and Radio, TV Mantaa&#160;and others. They were all under 30 and had been working as journalists in the Somali capital since their late teens. They had all been attacked by al-Shabab multiple times, they said. Their lives were in danger, so they had fled Somalia and come to Greece in hopes of getting asylum in Europe.</p>
<p>Syrians, Afghans and Iraqis make up the majority of the refugee population of 16,000 currently stuck on Lesbos and other Greek islands; African refugees are often overlooked. But in addition to the Somalis, Moria contains migrants from Sudan, Eritrea, Ghana, Congo, Sierra Leone, Cameroon, Morocco, Egypt, Algeria, Mali, The Gambia and Uganda. Their desire is to gain permanent status as refugees or economic migrants in some European country — but their chances are slim.</p>
<p>Adraman is only 21. She says she's also the only female Somali journalist to have built and run her own news website — <a href="http://kowtharmedia.com" type="external">Kowtharmedia.com</a>, complete with her own <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dMpBRPhTkgM" type="external">theme song</a>.</p>
<p>Working as a journalist in Somalia since she was 16 has made Adraman tough. Al-Shabab is known for targeting journalists in their homes, so to protect herself and her family, she lived in a safe house with other female journalists for the last five years. She would only see her mother once or twice a year.</p>
<p>“Now [I'm fleeing] Somalia but before I left I had already had to flee from my family to keep them safe,” she said.</p>
<p>But these precautions haven’t shielded her from frequent death threats from al-Shabab by phone and text. She narrowly escaped injury in two bombing incidents, one at a cafe and one at a hotel in Mogadishu.</p>
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<p>Kamal Hassan, Yassin Abuukar and Kowthar Adraman are pictured here at Moria refugee camp.</p>
<p>Jeanne Carstensen</p>
<p>Somalia is one of the <a href="https://rsf.org/en/somalia" type="external">most dangerous places</a> in the world to be a journalist. A failed state where extremists and criminal gangs operate with impunity, the country is ranked near the very bottom of the Reporters Without Borders' World&#160;Press Freedom Index.</p>
<p>The Committee to Protect Journalists ranks the country No. 1 on its <a href="https://cpj.org/reports/2016/10/impunity-index-getting-away-with-murder-killed-justice.php" type="external">Global Impunity Index</a>, because so many journalists there are threatened and killed.</p>
<p>“Somalia is extremely dangerous for anyone who conveys an opinion or a message that does not conform to the people with the guns,” said journalist Murithi Mutiga, the Guardian’s correspondent in Nairobi and the East Africa representative for CPJ.</p>
<p>Hassan was also threatened by al-Shabab. Like Adraman, he couldn’t live at home. But one day, on a rare occasion when he was trying to visit his mother, he noticed suspicious men following him. They fired at him as he ran. He wasn’t injured, but it was the last straw. He fled Somalia for Turkey, where he paid a smuggler to cross by dinghy to Greece.</p>
<p>In the boat, Hassan met Yassin Abuukar.</p>
<p>Abuukar’s troubles started in 2008 when al-Shabab kidnapped him after he refused to work for their media outlet, Radio Koran. He was freed eventually, after his family paid a ransom. Later, he was captured again. He managed to escape the night before he was told he would be executed.</p>
<p>In 2012, he narrowly escaped death again, <a href="https://rsf.org/en/news/another-journalist-gunned-down-day-after-three-killed-suicide-bombing" type="external">targeted by militants</a> in Mogadishu while he was working alongside prominent journalist Hassan Absuge. Abuukar got away; Absuge was murdered. Then last year, al-Shabab bombed the house where Abuukar’s wife and child were living. Abuukar wasn’t there, but his wife was injured, and his baby boy was killed.&#160;</p>
<p>That’s when he decided to flee Somalia for good.</p>
<p>Abuukar, Hassan and Adraman hope to return to their country one day and continue working as journalists. Until then, their dream is to make it to London, which has a thriving Somali media scene. It’s unlikely, though, that anyone here other than Syrians will be granted asylum.&#160;</p>
<p>For now, the journalists are stranded in Moria awaiting their asylum hearings. Under the European Union-Turkey deal on migrants, they can’t leave the island until their cases are decided. They may face eventual deportation back to Turkey, deemed a safe third country for migrants, but a place they can’t work legally. In Somalia, they would face certain danger.</p>
<p>In spite of all the unknowns, Adraman’s ambitions haven’t flagged a bit. When she can get a good internet connection at the camp, she still manages to update her website with video reports from other Somali journalists. “I need to tell my people everything that’s going on in the world,” she said. “I want my website to be famous.”</p> | Three Somali journalists on Lesbos hope for the best — asylum in Europe | false | https://pri.org/stories/2016-12-06/three-somali-journalists-lesbos-hope-best-asylum-europe | 2016-12-06 | 3 |
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<p>DANVILLE, Ky. — Authorities say a Kentucky teenager who fled the state after her stepmother’s death has pleaded not guilty to charges including complicity to murder.</p>
<p>Multiple news organizations report 15-year-old Jenna Oakley’s attorney entered a not-guilty plea Tuesday on the charges, which also include theft by unlawful taking in the death of 52-year-old Rhonda Oakley.</p>
<p>The teen was reported missing after Rhonda Oakley’s body was found in the family home Sept. 1. Two days later, police said they discovered Jenna Oakley in her stepmother’s car in New Mexico. Her boyfriend, 20-year-old Kenneth Nigh, was in the passenger seat, they say.</p>
<p>Authorities said Nigh attempted to hang himself in custody and later died at a hospital.</p>
<p>Jenna Oakley was indicted as an adult in October.</p>
<p>Police haven’t said how Rhonda Oakley died.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p> | Kentucky teenager pleads not guilty in stepmother’s death | false | https://abqjournal.com/904155/kentucky-teenager-pleads-not-guilty-in-stepmothers-death.html | 2016-12-07 | 2 |
<p>A new report has found that millennials don't consider themselves adults until they reach the age of 30.</p>
<p>Yes, you read that correctly.</p>
<p>According to <a href="https://www.thewrap.com/millennials-adults-30-tv/" type="external">The Wrap</a>, research compiled by David Poltrack, CBS' chief research officer and their ratings expert, as well as Nielsen Catalina Solutions, found that millennials consider themselves adults at age 30 because that's when they typically are completely responsible for themselves – they no longer reside with their parents and pay entirely for their own bills.</p>
<p>A key reason for this shift is economic: the job market has been sluggish since the 2007-2009 recession, worsened by <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2016/06/16/inflation-consumer-prices-rising-housing-energy-costs/85974172/" type="external">the rising cost of housing</a>. The employment situation has also been particularly tough for recent college graduates who are drowning in student loan debt.</p>
<p>When dealing with these economic challenges, staying with one's parents has become rather alluring. Poltrack told The Wrap that in a way, parents have "coddled" millennials, encouraging many of them to stay at home.</p>
<p>"They’ve made it too good for them," Poltrack said. "Why would you leave?"</p>
<p>Conservative Review's Chris Pandolfo offered a concise and precise thought on the matter:</p>
<p>The widespread parental "coddling" — reinforced in the <a href="" type="internal">educational system</a> and progressive nanny state policies — in conjunction with a largely stagnant economy and onerous student loan debt, has helped produce a generation accustomed to a state of dependency. Let's hope that future generations can reverse this trend so Americans can start growing up a little earlier and get on with their lives.</p>
<p><a href="https://twitter.com/bandlersbanter" type="external">Follow Aaron Bandler on Twitter.</a></p> | At What Age Do Millennials Consider Themselves Adults? The Answer Will Stun You. | true | https://dailywire.com/news/14747/what-age-do-millennials-consider-themselves-adults-aaron-bandler | 2017-03-24 | 0 |
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<p>Young people have been warned by Pope Francis. The Pope said that young people should battle the temptation of false versions of life that are presented on reality TV shows and on social media.</p>
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<p>The Pope suggested that the Internet generation should spend more time writing their own histories.</p>
<p>He also urged the young to become masters of their destiny and establish real connections with their past.</p>
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<p>The 80-year-old pontiff was speaking in a video message for World Youth Day, on April 9.</p>
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<p>He emphasized that we should acknowledge the need to reflect on our lives and direct them into the future.</p>
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<p>The Pope said that faces of young people appear on social media as they recount more or less real events. However, he added that it's not clear how much of the content is really history or an experience that can be shared and gifted with meaning and purpose.</p>
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<p>Francis blasted the reality TV shows. He said that they are not real stories, but only moments that have been passed before a television camera by characters living from day to day without a greater plan in life.</p>
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<p>He therefore urged the youth not to let themselves be led astray by the false image of reality. He recommended that the youth should be the heroes of their history by deciding their future.</p>
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<p>The comments that Pope Francis gave reiterated a speech he gave to teens. He urged the teens not to allow themselves to become couch potatoes.</p>
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<p>Social media culture that has cause concern to psychologists. This includes the photo-shopping of images to selective editing of events recorded online to project images of happiness and success that are false.</p>
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<p>Francis said that having a past is not the same as having a history. He said that it's important for the young people to recognize the memories that are really significant in relation to the past.</p>
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<p>He emphasized that the memories should be significant to our hearts and that they should help to give meaning to our lives.</p>
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<p>Pope Francis said that young people could be in a better position to make more sense of their lives and past by spending time with grandparents. He also said that keeping a daily journal on which one could contemplate on in the evening was also important in making sense of one's life.</p>
<p>Francis pointed out that the young people should draw inspiration from the example of Mary the mother of Jesus.</p>
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<p>SOURCE: <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/tech/pope-tells-young-resist-false-reality-social-media-165048243.html" type="external">yahoo.com/tech/pope-tells-young-resist-false-reality-social-media-165048243.html</a></p> | Social Media's False Reality Slammed By Pope Francis | true | http://thegoldwater.com/news/1892-Social-Media-s-False-Reality-Slammed-By-Pope-Francis | 2017-03-22 | 0 |
<p>It was just a normal day in Munich, Germany. Muslim male refugees were aggressively harassing German women in a subway at the height of rush hour. When elderly German men, sick and tired of the abuse sprang into action and confronted the sexual deviants the refugees attacked back with force.</p>
<p>Here is a video of the vicious attack:</p>
<p>“The clip was shot on a mobile phone and uploaded to Facebook by local man Tom Roth after the incident in Munich, Germany,” <a href="https://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/6902157/Shocking-moment-refugees-attack-pensioners-who-defended-woman-from-harassment-on-busy-subway.html" type="external">reports</a> The Sun. “He said the fight broke out after one of the asylum seekers, who he described as being of ‘Arab origin,’ was rejected by a woman after placing his hand upon her.”</p>
<p>In response to the sexual assault, an elderly German gentleman decided to intervene. He paid a heavy price for his chivalry, getting violently choked by a Muslim migrant</p>
<p>“In the footage, one man is seen climbing on to a subway seat before grappling with one of the pensioners,” <a href="https://www.thesun.co.uk/sol/homepage/news/6902157/Shocking-moment-refugees-attack-pensioners-who-defended-woman-from-harassment-on-busy-subway.html" type="external">adds</a> The Sun. “He then confronts another elderly passenger and grabs him by the throat as fellow commuters shout at him and the other refugees to stop.”</p>
<p>On that subway, a few good men were caught in the crossfire of a civilizational struggle between the free and democratic West and the misogynistic and repressive Islamic world.</p>
<p>Since Chancellor Angela Merkel opened the floodgates to Muslim migrants from Islamic theocracies, Germany has seen an uptick in migrant-related crimes, namely sexual assault and harassment.</p>
<p>Germany’s multiculturalist project is reversing years of advancement on women’s rights. Apparently, it’s no longer safe to be a woman on a subway.</p> | WATCH: Muslim Refugees Attack Old Germans Protecting Women From Harassment | true | https://dailywire.com/news/3126/watch-muslim-refugees-attack-old-germans-michael-qazvini | 2016-02-03 | 0 |
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<p>FLAGSTAFF, Ariz. - Coconino County authorities are offering emergency response training for teenagers in various area communities next month.</p>
<p>The Coconino County Sheriff's Office and county emergency managers plan to hold training sessions throughout January.</p>
<p>The Community Emergency Response Team Training will be provided for teens in the Williams, Tusayan and Parks areas.</p>
<p>Teens will learn how to assist others immediately after a natural disaster and suppress small fires.</p>
<p>Teens can attend a six-hour session, which will be held during the first three Saturdays of the month.</p>
<p>Chief Deputy Sheriff Jim Driscoll says there is a growing trend nationwide to prepare teens for emergency situations.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p> | Coconino County to teach teens emergency preparedness | false | https://abqjournal.com/693679/coconino-county-to-teach-teens-emergency-preparedness.html | 2 |
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<p>The conventions of the two major parties have ended and they have picked their candidates for the November general election.&#160; The choice between them is a stark contrast in style.&#160; You get to choose if you want&#160; <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Huey_Long" type="external">Huey Long</a>&#160;in an orange clown suit or <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cruella_de_Vil" type="external">Cruella de Vil</a>&#160;in a pantsuit.&#160; If you don’t like the candidates of the two major parties, you can vote for a third-party.&#160; Or can you?</p>
<p>The challenges to third-party candidates are immense.&#160; Once a candidate achieves a spot on the ballot, the propaganda from the&#160; <a href="" type="internal">two-party duopoly begins</a>,&#160;they seek to keep their stranglehold on the election process and hence the government itself.&#160; Specious charges that a third-party won’t be able to govern because of a lack of party infrastructure or the lack of experience by their presidential candidates are common, but usually, you’re told that you are wasting your vote.&#160; <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Johnson" type="external">Gary Johnson</a>&#160;has said:</p>
<p>“When someone tells you your wasting your vote, recognize that they don’t care about you.&#160; It’s a selfish statement.&#160; They are saying your beliefs aren’t worth being represented.&#160; That you should silence your voice so theirs can be louder.&#160; Vote your conscience, not someone else’s politics.”</p>
<p>Like the many-headed Greek <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lernaean_Hydra" type="external">Hydra</a>, the two-party duopoly rules with an iron fist.&#160; The biggest difference is that the Hydra was a myth, but the duopoly is real.&#160; The duopoly extends throughout the US, operates in 50 states and the District of Columbia and makes life difficult to all those who seek to challenge it.&#160; It’s all done in the name of freedom, so what’s the objection?&#160; Anybody reading this article knows that we don’t have direct election of the president, we vote for members of the Electoral College and they cast their vote for president.&#160; Who are these electors?&#160; The two wings of the duopoly pick the electors and will tell you they are citizens doing their patriotic duty.&#160; What they’re not going to say is that they are just some of the many duopoly politicians scattered throughout the country.&#160; Men and women whose sole interest is maintaining the status quo by keeping the duopoly in power.</p>
<p>Over the years, many of these politicians have been involved in crafting ballot access restrictions that make it hard, if not impossible to get on the ballot in that particular state.&#160; Many states have restrictive ballot access that requires court challenges.&#160; The challenges aren’t just by one party.&#160; <a href="" type="internal">&#160;The Green Party, The Libertarian Party, and the Constitution Party have sometimes united to hire lawyers to challenge the ballot access laws of many states.</a>&#160; These parties have radically different political views and ways to carry out their policies, yet they unite to challenge state ballot access laws.&#160; Could it possibly be the politicians of the duopoly have done their job?</p>
<p><a href="" type="internal">Recently, in Georgia, one of the most restrictive ballot access laws in the nation was struck down by a court order</a>.&#160; This wasn’t the first time a trip to court was needed to remove a restrictive ballot access law and it probably won’t be the last.&#160; Ralph Nader ran for president four times and was never listed on the Presidential ballots of Georgia, Indiana, North Carolina, or Oklahoma.&#160; <a href="" type="internal">Pennsylvania’s oppressive law was removed by court order after lawyers fees and many trips to court</a>.&#160; States do have a right to protect its citizens from fraud and to avoid confusion on ballots, but these regulatory interests do not include limiting voter access and inhibiting voter choices, but somehow they do, on a regular basis. Strange how that happens!&#160; Anyone who questions this is usually ignored or dismissed as a conspiracy theorist.&#160; Most people really don’t care what happens after the election is over and the duopoly is counting on that.&#160; Some people are genuinely concerned with the lack of a third-party and wonder how to change things, but others just assume the air of condescending arrogance, still more have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo.</p>
<p>Do not accept consensus reality and vote for candidates of the duopoly!</p>
<p>The Green Party is more than thirty years old and places a priority on the environment and social justice.&#160; The Jill Stein candidacy is just as valid as that of Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump.&#160; To me, the biggest difference is a vision for the future, instead of just irresponsible pandering.&#160; As Jill Stein has said:&#160; “Forget the lesser evil, stand up and fight for the greater good like our lives depend on it – because they do”.</p>
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<p>&#160;</p> | Challenges to Duopoly Control | true | https://counterpunch.org/2016/08/02/challenges-to-duopoly-control/ | 2016-08-02 | 4 |
<p>ROME (AP) - Rome's mayor, indicted on charges that she lied about a City Hall appointment, is seeking a trial procedure that will likely postpone any hearing until after her 5-Star Movement guns for national office in Italy's March 4 general election.</p>
<p>In a Facebook post Wednesday, Mayor Virginia Raggi said she had asked for an "immediate judgment" procedure because she wanted to "determine the truth as soon as possible."</p>
<p>But the procedure would allow her to skip the Jan. 9 preliminary hearing and proceed directly to trial at a later date. The move will likely delay the start of trial until after March 4 election, where Raggi's anti-establishment 5-Stars are hoping to wrest control of the Italian government for the first time.</p>
<p>Raggi has been the movement's highest-profile office-holder, but her administration has been bedeviled by the appointment scandal and Rome's continued decay under her watch. Having Raggi on trial while the 5-Stars are actively campaigning could cost them dearly.</p>
<p>Raggi stands accused of lying to Italy's anti-corruption czar about the appointment of Renato Marra as director of Rome's tourism department. Marra's brother, Raffaele Marra, headed city hall's personnel office until he was arrested in a corruption probe.</p>
<p>Raggi has said that she alone decided the appointment, but text messages uncovered by investigators suggest that Raffaele Marra was involved in getting his brother the job and a significant salary raise.</p>
<p>In her Facebook post Wednesday, Raggi said she was innocent and trusted Italy's justice system.</p>
<p>Lawmakers from Italy's Democratic Party said Raggi had every right to choose her own legal strategy.</p>
<p>"But don't try to paint this as a great act in search of the truth," said lawmaker Franco Vazio. "The only truth is that by doing this she bypasses the electoral campaign."</p>
<p>ROME (AP) - Rome's mayor, indicted on charges that she lied about a City Hall appointment, is seeking a trial procedure that will likely postpone any hearing until after her 5-Star Movement guns for national office in Italy's March 4 general election.</p>
<p>In a Facebook post Wednesday, Mayor Virginia Raggi said she had asked for an "immediate judgment" procedure because she wanted to "determine the truth as soon as possible."</p>
<p>But the procedure would allow her to skip the Jan. 9 preliminary hearing and proceed directly to trial at a later date. The move will likely delay the start of trial until after March 4 election, where Raggi's anti-establishment 5-Stars are hoping to wrest control of the Italian government for the first time.</p>
<p>Raggi has been the movement's highest-profile office-holder, but her administration has been bedeviled by the appointment scandal and Rome's continued decay under her watch. Having Raggi on trial while the 5-Stars are actively campaigning could cost them dearly.</p>
<p>Raggi stands accused of lying to Italy's anti-corruption czar about the appointment of Renato Marra as director of Rome's tourism department. Marra's brother, Raffaele Marra, headed city hall's personnel office until he was arrested in a corruption probe.</p>
<p>Raggi has said that she alone decided the appointment, but text messages uncovered by investigators suggest that Raffaele Marra was involved in getting his brother the job and a significant salary raise.</p>
<p>In her Facebook post Wednesday, Raggi said she was innocent and trusted Italy's justice system.</p>
<p>Lawmakers from Italy's Democratic Party said Raggi had every right to choose her own legal strategy.</p>
<p>"But don't try to paint this as a great act in search of the truth," said lawmaker Franco Vazio. "The only truth is that by doing this she bypasses the electoral campaign."</p> | Rome mayor moves to delay start of trial on lying charges | false | https://apnews.com/amp/2f35abe938864659b5feb7e53a87d618 | 2018-01-03 | 2 |
<p>I began and ended my column last week by rhetorically conjuring Handel’s ghost, but had no idea then that his house in Brook Street was actually haunted.&#160; A Counterpunch reader informs me that in the summer before reopening as a museum&#160; to the composer in November of 2001, a ghost was sighted twice in Handel’s bedroom.&#160; A&#160; number of London newspaper’s reported that one Martin Egglestone, a fundraiser for the Handel House Trust, claimed to have had a two encounters with the unidentified spirit:&#160; “Suddenly, the air got very thick and I saw a shape, higher than me, like the imprint on the back of your retina when you close your eyes, having been looking at the sun for too long,” the London’s Daily Telegraph quoted Eggelstone as saying. One might wonder whether the testimony of someone who stares at the sun for any time at all is reliable, but Egglestone went on: “It seemed to be that of a woman. There was no malevolent feeling. It felt like the pressure you get when you brush past someone in the Tube and they are too close to you.”</p>
<p>The <a href="" type="internal">Telegraph</a> <a href="" type="internal">story</a> from 15 July 2001 went on to say that other staff members at the Handel House repeatedly detected a whiff of perfume in the same room. This, too, sounds more than a bit suspect given that the Handel’s residence, next door to the Jimi Hendrix’s House in London, is at the end of South Molton Lane with its Prada and Gucci franchises and other upscale boutiques. At the intersection air is always thick over-priced scent.</p>
<p>This fellow Egglestone hypothesized that among the very few women to visit the male-oriented Handel at home, the most likely candidate for the ghost was one of the Italian divas, Faustina Bordoni and Francesca Cuzzoni, whose personal rivalry and rabid partisans so enlivened the opera scene in the London of the late 1720s.</p>
<p>In light of some of the recent scholarly work on Handel’s sexual inclinations, research I surveyed in a column kicking off this year of <a href="" type="internal">Handel celebrations</a>, I’m surprised that no one seems to have made the much more obvious inference from these supernatural comings and goings:&#160; Handel’s ghost is a cross-dresser with a taste for expensive perfume and for feeling people up in the subway.</p>
<p>The Telegraph story also relates that a Catholic Priest was called to perform the exorcism rite, in case the apparently benign ghost might have discouraged visitors from coming to the museum. To the contrary, I’d think that they’d be queuing around the block for a roll in the hay with Handel’s ghost in full lady’s rig.&#160; The Handel House is in the middle of Mayfair after all, where the quaint red phone booths are filled with calling cards for the district’s niche prostitutes servicing every imaginable fetish. The Westminister Council tried to crack down on this form of advertising in the 1990s, but the smutty cards flourished again under the aegis of “Red” Ken Livingstone’s London ma.&#160; Still without a cell phone, I am forced to use these old-fashioned phone boxes now and again in London, and at those times of telephonic need I stoke my puritanical outrage by I perusing the offerings. My favorite over the years is “Have a Cruel Yule: Leather Rumpus with Madame Misteltoe.” Here’s the way to kick-start the chronically underfunded&#160; Handel House: “Hallelujah! Let Saxon Slave Make the Crooked Straight.”</p>
<p>But more distressing than the fundraising opportunity missed by the fundraiser Eggelstone, was the commission of Roman Catholic Priest to rid the place of the ghost.&#160; What an affront to this unwavering Lutheran—not to mention that he was also a loyal parishioner at his local Church of England outlet, St. George’s Hanover,and committed anti-Jacobite—to have a papist cleric in his house! The Anglican church has its own religious procedures for chasing away demons. Consider this paragraph an open letter of complaint to the Handel House Trust from the Musical Patriot on behalf of Handel’s kinky spirit!</p>
<p>Fortunately, the spirit of his music will not be exorcised from modern culture with the ease of his ghost’s apparent removal from its former dwelling. There are no recent sightings. It seems Handel in drag is now made to the walk the streets instead.</p>
<p>A renowned visitor to the hotspots of European entertainment in the 18th-century when the opera stage was the equivalent of the big screen, Handel would turn up in search of star material in Naples, the Hollywood of his day. Glamorous Dresden was also a key destination, as were rehab centers for the rich and famous, from England’s Bath and Tunbridge Wells to the continent’s Aix-la-Chapelle. Unafflicted by the demeaning body searches of modern travel, the spirit of his music now flits about with the ease of celebrity.</p>
<p>Just this week one of Handel’s most famous arias turned up on the red carpet at Cannes in the company of Danish director Lars von Trier. “Lasica ch’io pianga,” from Handel’s first London opera, Rinaldo of 1711. According to scornful reports emanating from the French Rivieria, the song, whose first line translates as “Let me weep over my cruel fate,” accompanies the opening scene of the middle-aged enfant terrible’s latest movie, demurely entitled, Anti-Christ. In that scene a child accidentally falls to his death in slow motion to the plaintive, indeed heart-wrenching, strains of Handel’s aria. The movie then chronicles the descent into sexual degradation and what looks like insanity of the dead child’s parents. After Monday’s screening for critics, many heaped scorn on the movie, guffawing throughout, and booing its conclusion. The showing for general audiences that followed on Tuesday was punctuated by shocked gasps and bizarre laughter. Von Trier remained unfazed, calling the movie the most important of his career.</p>
<p>Marooned in the wilds of Upstate New York, I hastened to the film’s official website to watch the trailer, which is itself introduced by Handel’s soaring aria and then follows Willem Defoe (“he”) and Charlotte Gainsbourg (“she”) as they hike up towards an isolated cabin, the site of their subsequent tortures. The movie then seems to twist itself into a supernatural horror-pic descended into the bowels of nature.</p>
<p>Would Handel’s ghost want one of his greatest hits exorcised from the Anti-Christ? I doubt it.&#160; Like von Trier, Handel was a master at manipulating his audiences. If in his lifetime, the private Handel, didn’t hold to the current truth that all publicity is good, his ghost can certainly adapt to the relentlessly self-promoting entertainment culture of the 21st century.</p>
<p>Handel was also an inveterate recycler of his own material, and plagiarist of other composer’s music, so I don’t see that he’s got much of a claim to plant his own stake on the moral high ground when others go using his music for their own purposes, however dubious.</p>
<p>“Lasica ch’io pianga” is a perfect example of Handel the recycler. It began life as instrumental piece in Handel’s very first opera composed for Hamburg in 1705. A few years later this music was heard in an Italian oratorio, where it was shifted from the minor mode to the major and fitted with a text about the thorns and perfume of roses. Perhaps this was the same scent detected three hundred years later in the Handel House. Not long after its performance in Italy, the music got still another set of words— “Lascia ch’io pianga”—for the London stage.</p>
<p>Possessed of a towering ego and outsized ambition, Handel nonetheless had a gift for self-deprecation. One well-known anecdote relates how Handel was strolling through Covent Garden, when his walking companion complained that the buskers were playing drivel.&#160; “I agree,” came Handel’s response. “And I thought so when I wrote the music twenty years ago.” This latest von Trier appropriation would doubtless have elicited a similarly ironic shrug.</p>
<p>In its first form, the Hamburg music for what eventually became “Lascia, ch’io pianga,” was a dance interlude; its halting rhythm and poignant dissonances became the perfect vehicle for conveying the currents of despair and hope swelling in the character Almirena, who sings the piece in Rinaldo.&#160; At that point in the opera she is imprisoned by the Saracens, and the aria comes as a plea for freedom. But a happy ending awaits her, and she is duly rescued by her betrothed, the title character, Rinaldo.&#160; The infidels are converted and everything comes up, well, roses.</p>
<p>Not so in von Trier’s films, which unfailingly sound depths only he can hear. The “Lascia ch’io panga” getting some play on the Riviera and in the showbiz world sends a timely message to the Handel House on Brook Street to summon back its guiding spirit!&#160; While Handel didn’t shy away from the dark side in his own theatrical oeuvre—the terrifying Witch of Endor scene from his oratorio Saul, or the suicide of Bajazet in his opera Tamerlano come to mind—he never did a full-on horror flick. Until now.</p>
<p>DAVID YEARSLEY teaches at Cornell University. A long-time contributor to the Anderson Valley Advertiser, he is author of <a href="" type="internal">Bach and the Meanings of Counterpoint</a>His latest CD, “All Your Cares Beguile: Songs and Sonatas from Baroque London”, has just been released by <a href="http://www.musicaomnia.org/index2.htm" type="external">Musica Omnia</a>. He can be reached at <a href="mailto:[email protected]" type="external">[email protected]</a></p>
<p>&#160;</p> | Handel’s Ghost … Again | true | https://counterpunch.org/2009/05/22/handel-s-ghost-again/ | 2009-05-22 | 4 |
<p>By Alan MinskyThis is the first of a two-part series on the Iowa caucuses and the 2016 run for the White House.</p>
<p>In the week before the first contest of the 2016 American presidential election, the pundits have arrived at a consensus: This is the year of the anti-establishment. Bernie Sanders’ meteoric rise in the polls since New Year’s Day means he can no longer be ignored. Now it’s not just the crazy GOP. Both parties are under siege from radical insurgents previously assumed to be outside the bounds of national politics. It’s a delicious moment. America’s corrupt political class is in a panic.</p>
<p>Of course, “anti-establishment” is an anodyne term, sufficiently vague to satisfy a wide range of interpretations. The democratic rebellion of 2015-16 is defined by something singular, however: a widespread loss of faith in the central myth of American society. For most people, the American Dream is dead or dying.</p>
<p>Only a few years ago, new-home ownership was easily attainable, albeit through a Ponzi scheme that ended in disaster. Nowadays the American economy feels like a trap, a spider’s web of debt servitude, a labyrinth of dead ends, longer work hours and ever-limiting horizons. Thirty-five years after the Thatcher/Reagan revolution, we have to consider whether this economic system, this variation of capitalism, can generate even the illusion of working for the average person.</p>
<p />
<p>Fortunately, people don’t readily abandon “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness” when they’ve been promised them their entire lives. So, given the opportunity to support candidates who not only say the word “change” but may actually mean it and who are advocating policies that run counter to the current order, Americans are staging a rebellion using a weapon the oligarchs thought they’d neutralized: democracy. After six months of prologue, voting begins Monday—and all eyes are on Iowa.</p>
<p>In so many ways, Iowa is not reflective of contemporary America. It is too white, too non-urban, too non-suburban, and far too many of its small towns maintain a semblance of cohesion. Regarding the first example, there’s no escaping how Iowa’s oversized role in selecting the next president diminishes the influence of people of color in the process, sending a clear signal that white supremacy remains a signature component of American democracy. Indeed, at the very moment the presidential race gains definition, the greatest endemic problems in our society—those rooted in our race/class system of exploitation—have little influence. This truth should never be forgotten when reflecting on the Iowa caucus; it is a de facto mechanism to secure the maintenance of white supremacy.</p>
<p>In one way, however, Iowa is just like the rest of 21st century America: The people of Iowa work very hard, but their gains tide them over only until they’re back in the fields. While others make big profits from their labor, what they produce magically morphs into a financial instrument that can generate spectacular gains for—guess who? The 1 percent. Iowa does provide a unique window into these dynamics.</p>
<p><a href="http://www.iowa.gov/" type="external">The Hawkeye State</a> is, of course, a land of spectacular agricultural efficiency. Viewed from space, it is the centerpiece of the best-operating and most important mass production “factory” on earth, annually generating the most bountiful harvests in human history. As such, it is one of the — if not the — most important assets of the American imperium. So, how have Iowans been doing farming the land, which, unlike manufacturing, cannot be off-shored?</p>
<p>The past five years have been generally good for Iowa farmers, as cheap oil and record-low interest rates have kept overheads down, resulting in profits. American farmers long ago adjusted to the era of corporate domination following the great crisis for family farmers in the late ’70 and early ’80s. So while things have been OK for the farmers themselves, most of the gains go to Big Agro.</p>
<p>Beyond farming, Iowa is no slouch. The state hosts a healthy manufacturing sector, as well as a slice of the insurance industry. Given all that, it’s no surprise that unemployment is well below the national average.</p>
<p>So, things are working out well for Iowans, right? Guess again. Just like the rest of the country, in the words of University of Iowa professor Stephen Vlastos, “There’s long-term income stagnation; and people feel they are working too hard, with too little security, for too little.”</p>
<p>Where does all the wealth that Iowa generates go? As mentioned, agricultural profits flow mainly to corporations. And then there’s the role that the breadbasket of the world plays in speculative finance. If we once again imagine looking down from space, we can see Iowa as a linchpin of the 21st century global economy, much like the massive <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foxconn" type="external">Foxconn factories in China</a> that produce an avalanche of digital devices. And like virtually every part of that global economy, Iowa’s production becomes financialized, as both a salable commodity and an instrument for speculation. In 2007-08, Goldman Sachs was accused of causing a global food crisis by manipulating the price of wheat on what was then called the Goldman Sachs Commodity Index (since renamed the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S%26P_GSCI" type="external">S&amp;P GSCI</a>)—and, you might recall, the Arab Spring of 2011 was largely sparked by higher prices for food staples, due to financial speculation in food commodities. Tragedy and geopolitical instability? Goldman Sachs could not care less. The company made a killing.</p>
<p>Back in Iowa, there’s little awareness of these specific episodes, but there is a general sense that the wealth produced on Iowa farms—like all wealth in the 21st century—winds its way upward, generating massive returns for someone who never plowed a field and does not have a conscience. So, add resentment to the dismay over stagnant wages, and in the words of professor Vlastos, there’s widespread “discontent with the status quo.” Not surprisingly, this has translated into support for Donald Trump and Sanders.There is, of course, a world of difference between Trump and Sanders. One is a truly reprehensible, if comically boorish, bigot; the other is a serious legislator who sincerely tries to work for the common good. But until we are past this political season, they will frequently be discussed together, primarily for their parallel success and shared status as outsiders. But I see an even more important similarity: They both challenge the status quo by rejecting the logic of the prevailing economic order—the very bedrock of contemporary American social organization—although Trump does so selectively while Sanders’ rebellion is systemic.</p>
<p>Trump is an exploitative capitalist, proudly among the 1 percent of the 1 percent. His political beliefs are grounded in an America-first jingoism reminiscent of militaristic patriots in the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s. Guided by this John Wayne worldview, he will “make America great again.”</p>
<p>While the stated reason the GOP establishment rejected Trump during the summer and fall of 2015 was for his vulgar bigotry (anything more than dog-whistle bigotry could not be tolerated by a party that needs support from people of color if it ever hopes to win a national election again), perhaps the real reason Trump was deemed persona non grata was that he rejected the free trade deals that are the foundation of the global neoliberal order. Instead Trump called for old-fashioned national protectionism. He told his working- and middle-class constituents that he would deploy his masterful deal-making skills on their behalf; “tell the Chinese how it’s going to be”; and bring back well-paying manufacturing jobs, the very type that have poured out of the country in the era of free trade.</p>
<p>While Trump received nonstop coverage in the summer and fall of 2015, commentators consistently skipped this essential aspect of his appeal. Working- and middle-class Americans, even ones stupid enough to be unreconstituted bigots, understand the game is rigged against them. Trump speaks directly to this economic anxiety, as he promises to dismantle the global economic order and once again “put America’s interests first.” Of course, Trump’s nativism and xenophobia are constitutive elements of his “protectionism.”</p>
<p>It’s crass, hateful bigotry, but it also represents a break with the neoliberal economic order that has been devastating to American workers, and of course it makes him unacceptable to the status quo. In these two ways, and these two ways only—the break with neoliberal logic and the challenge to the status quo—he is similar to Sanders.</p>
<p>In November 2014, I wrote an <a href="" type="internal">article</a> for Truthdig that, among other things, considered Sanders’ prospects as a Democratic presidential candidate. Not to brag, but it is the most prescient article on Sanders that I’ve seen—very optimistic about the impact he could make by running. Yet even I am astonished at what Sanders has achieved over the past couple of months, and I’m equally amazed that friends and I have seriously discussed what he could accomplish in the White House.</p>
<p>But first, praise. In his mid-70s, Sanders is truly beginning to resemble his lifelong hero, <a href="http://www.history.com/topics/eugene-v-debs" type="external">Eugene Debs</a>, who spoke to overflow audiences across the country as he ran for president as a Socialist in the early 20th century. In recent weeks, Sanders has been taking a star’s turn on the stage of history in the role of hero. It suits him, which shouldn’t be a surprise. Unlike many prominent Democrats, Sanders has a backbone; he believes wholeheartedly in the programs he proposes and defends them with passion—and he never pulls any punches when calling out the mendacity of the oligarchs, nor does he turn a blind eye to the problems people face daily in America. He is their champion and he sincerely wants what is best for them. The crowds feel this, and as he grows more comfortable in the limelight, his playful humor and common decency become more apparent, further cementing the adoration of his millions of supporters.</p>
<p>When Sanders announced his candidacy, expectations were low. Supporters were grateful that his scathing critique of America’s economic inequality would get a hearing, but few thought his proposed solutions would attract attention, offhand dismissal being the norm for progressive policies. But right away it became evident that something was different. Sanders’ catalog of American social ills was surprisingly well received; and you could hear its echo not only from Trump but from other Republicans (who were happy to blame Obama), and Hillary Clinton frequently joined the chorus, too.</p>
<p>But only Sanders had been on this agenda for decades—and herein the seeds of his momentum were sown: Only he could explain the depths of the domestic crises; only he would fully direct his ire at the rich and powerful (who funded the other candidates, save Trump, who was rich and powerful himself) and, lastly, only Sanders had solutions that addressed the full scope of the problems. So, up he went in the polls, rising spectacularly through late summer, until Clinton had her good week in October and then Islamic State pushed domestic concerns into the background for much of the fall. Still, Sanders kept on his game. Flying under the radar, Bernie mania kept growing, and by the dawn of 2016, Clinton had a hauntingly familiar problem: A charismatic candidate was closing the gap, just as in ’08.</p>
<p>By mid-January, Sanders was ahead in New Hampshire and neck and neck with Clinton in Iowa.</p>
<p>Then, suddenly, a couple of days ago the campaign entered a new phase. What seemed like unstoppable momentum only last week must now clear the significant hurdle of Iowa at the very time that Sanders must counter scathing criticism from two formidable adversaries: Clinton herself, and what a Marxist would call representatives of Capital but in America are known as liberal intellectuals.These days, Clinton can seem like an anachronism. The 2016 campaign is the first presidential race without an incumbent since the Wall Street collapse sparked the Great Recession. Goldman Sachs and investment bankers in general are now frequently seen as social pariahs. Yet Clinton does little to hide her strong Wall Street ties.</p>
<p>Of course, the Clintons burst onto the national scene in 1992 as New Democrats who felt their party needed the support of a significant portion of corporate America if it was ever going to wrest the White House away from the GOP. Wall Street and Silicon Valley had loads of money, as well as socially liberal values more in tune with Democrats than the reactionary Republicans. A de facto coalition resulted that has defined the party establishment to this day. What was novel, and perhaps necessary, for victory 24 years ago, however, does not sit so well with many Democrats today, who tend to resent (or worse) Wall Street and probably feel that demographic shifts favor Democrats nationally to such a degree that there’s no need to rely on shady alliances, no matter how much money results.</p>
<p>Yet, both Clinton’s attacks on Sanders and those from prominent liberal intellectuals such as <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/23/opinion/health-reform-lives.html" type="external">Paul Krugman</a> and <a href="http://www.vox.com/2015/1/16/7552657/republican-obamacare-replace-plan" type="external">Ezra Klein</a> remain grounded in the logic of the New Democrats that consistently prioritizes the need to work cooperatively with corporations over the need to rectify social injustices. Nowhere is this more clear than in the current health care debate between the two campaigns and their surrogates. Clinton, Krugman and Klein all herald Obamacare and advocate for working to make incremental improvements within its structure. This not only guarantees that for-profit private insurance companies remain at the center of the American system, it mandates that they will get ever more business, even though premiums continue to fluctuate erratically and deductibles are often outrageously high, both of which would be absent in a single-payer system.</p>
<p>It’s difficult to hear Clinton and Krugman promote Obamacare over single-payer when neither will ever be in the position of millions of Americans struggling to afford the cost of health care in this for-profit system. It’s even more troubling when the attacks on Sanders stray into slander with suggestions that he would readily sacrifice Obamacare’s gains or even every aspect of government support (Medicare, Medicaid, etc.) in pursuit of his perfect vision.</p>
<p>On the eve of the Iowa caucus, it doesn’t feel as if these late attacks have damaged Sanders, but they do raise perhaps the most fundamental question about a left-wing insurgent candidate in the era of neoliberalism: Is it possible to transform the economy, to make it more equitable, through the democratic process? Sanders certainly believes it is, while Clinton feels only incremental improvements are possible. In part two of this essay, we’ll address this question and consider the degree to which Sanders’ version of democratic socialism is truly anathema to corporate America—the most powerful institutions in the land—as well as whether the “political revolution” he acknowledges as necessary for the economic change he advocates is truly being developed. We’ll also analyze the results of Monday’s Iowa caucus.</p>
<p>Some final, pre-caucus thoughts from Ames, Iowa:</p>
<p>While the combined power of Clinton, Krugman and Klein may not impact Sanders, a winter storm could prove devastating to the man from northern Vermont. Snowfall is scheduled to hit the state Monday evening, and inclement weather is considered to favor the “establishment” candidates.</p>
<p>It’s great to be in Iowa this weekend, the unrivaled capital of the political universe. With two competitive races, the drama is high, the tension palpable. Of course, Iowa has consistently been a bellwether on the Democratic side, but it has far too much evangelical influence to have the same significance for the GOP (Rick Santorum, Mike Huckabee and Pat Robertson are recent winners). That said, a Trump victory over Ted Cruz, the evangelical choice, would be a significant victory for Trump and a bitter loss for Cruz.</p>
<p>Lastly, I wish I could have spent a week in western Iowa to witness Republican candidates—or perhaps even Sanders—campaigning at evangelical churches in January. I’d love to know more about those communities, to discover if I could deeply relate to any of the adults. I’m no fan of American conservative Christianity, but what I find truly appalling is whom the conservative Christians of Iowa vote for. I wonder if their kids are for Bernie?</p> | Neoliberalism's Zero Hour in the Heartland | true | https://truthdig.com/articles/neoliberalisms-zero-hour-in-the-heartland/ | 2016-02-01 | 4 |
<p>Mexico is capping&#160;an eight-year effort to transform its justice system.</p>
<p>On Saturday, the country is going from a mostly closed system of written proceedings to one that opens up trials to the public and grants people accused of a crime more rights.</p>
<p>The nationwide reform was passed as a constitutional amendment by Mexico’s congress back in 2008. Its goal is ambitious — to combat the country’s high rate of impunity. A study from the Inter American Commission on Human Rights finds that 98 percent of crimes in Mexico go unsolved.</p>
<p>Mexico’s old judicial system was outdated and ineffective. Critics claimed it put more innocent people in jail than it punished true criminals. Trials for misdemeanor crimes dragged on for years and the golden ticket to a conviction was often a confession obtained through torture. Police were subject to bribes and the accused wasn’t always guaranteed access to a proper defense. Judges made rulings based off arguments and evidence submitted in writing, typically in an office space that wasn’t set up to receive the public.</p>
<p>The new system inserts accountability into the process. Trials now require oral arguments before a judge and are open to the public in newly constructed US-style courtrooms. The burden of proof falls on the government, meaning the prosecution must convince a judge that the person accused of a crime is truly guilty. Proof must come in the form of witnesses and scientific evidence.</p>
<p>The US&#160;has given millions in federal dollars to help Mexico undergo this transformation. Most of it has gone to train lawyers and judges. A smaller amount has gone to train police, which is the part of the reform that’s most behind schedule. That’s a problem because good police work is the foundation of the system. If police don’t collect the necessary evidence to make case, or collect evidence improperly, criminals could walk free.</p>
<p>Some states, like Chihuahua, are further along than others. Police there have gone to trainings in US&#160;cities like El Paso, Santa Fe and Chicago. The state has two DNA labs, whereas 15 years ago it had none. &#160;&#160;</p>
<p>But the new system faces some of the same challenges as the old system, namely outside interference from both political forces and organized crime. Judges who have made unpopular rulings have been forced to resign under pressure from political leaders. Organized crime can influence the outcome of a case with bribes or threats.</p>
<p>In the long run judicial reform is meant to help Mexico strengthen its rule of law, which could result in building greater trust with the United States. That would allow for deeper binational collaboration on shared issues such as drug trafficking or trade. It could result in the US&#160;lifting travel warnings in Mexico, making Americans more comfortable about traveling there and businesses more confident about investing there.</p>
<p>If successful, judicial reform could make for a safer, more prosperous Mexico.&#160;</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | Mexico's justice system gets an extreme makeover | false | https://pri.org/stories/2016-06-18/mexicos-justice-system-gets-extreme-makeover | 2016-06-18 | 3 |
<p>On Friday, the Obama administration dropped another health care implementation bombshell.</p>
<p>In a&#160; <a href="https://s3.amazonaws.com/public-inspection.federalregister.gov/2013-16271.pdf" type="external">606-page regulation</a>, issued the Friday after July 4, the administration announced that income and employment verification in the state-run exchanges in 2014 will be based on the “honor system.” That is, the state exchanges will not be required to secure independent verification of the household incomes of the applicants, nor will they have to track down whether or not applicants were offered qualified coverage by their employers. On both counts, the state exchanges can simply accept whatever is claimed by the applicants as accurate, and then pay out subsidies accordingly.</p>
<p>This announcement is another indicator—as if we needed one—of the complete fiasco that is Obamacare implementation.</p>
<p>The application process was not supposed to work this way. The administration has had three and a half years to build the “data hub” that was supposed to be the repository of real-time income information that the state exchanges would tap to administer benefits. The Department of Health and Human Services has spent hundreds of millions of dollars on contracts and federal personnel to build the data hub. Now, at the eleventh-hour, in a regulation they hoped no one would notice, the administration announces that, due to the large amount of “systems development” work necessary to pull this off (you think?), the verification system they were telling everyone for months would be ready on time is now, well, not ready on time, with no prospect that it ever will be operational.</p>
<p>There is no excuse for this whatsoever. The administration had more than enough time to do this, if it could be done at all. The problem is a combination of sheer incompetence and liberal blindness to the limits of the capacities of the federal government.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, the victims of the bungled implementation of Obamacare will be taxpayers. The administration’s solution to the problem is to pretend that the income and employment verification system wasn’t really needed at all in 2014, and that applicant “attestation” will suffice. This approach serves the administration’s interests in two ways. First, it downplays the political significance of what was announced. The administration is trying to portray the change as a small adjustment in an otherwise inevitable implementation of the law when what was announced completely discredits what the administration had been telling everyone for months. The real story here is that the exchange roll-out has reached the point of administrative collapse, and the administration is doing everything it can to hide that fact.</p>
<p>Second, moving to the “honor system” is consistent with the administration’s larger objective at this point, which is to salvage Obamacare by shuffling as many people as they can into the subsidized insurance program. Hence the outreach to professional sports leagues, librarians, and others to help publicize enrollment in Obamacare. The abandonment of income verification allows the administration and the states to move to a “sign ‘em up now, answer questions later” approach, with the likelihood that erroneous payments made in 2014 will be gone forever. Why wouldn’t the administration find a way to waive collection of overpaid subsidies? They’ve waived everything else that is inconvenient.</p>
<p>This latest announcement from the administration, along with the delay of the employer mandate, makes it clear that now is the moment for the House GOP to begin fighting back. The Obama administration has already delayed the employer requirements for a year. How could Democrats possibly oppose putting that delay into statute, which is the only real way to relieve employers of their obligations? And why should the individual mandate remain in place in 2014 when the employer mandate has been delayed? More fundamentally, why should the exchanges be allowed to begin signing up people for coverage in 2014 when systems are not in place to protect taxpayers from waste and fraud?</p>
<p>There’s a political opening for the GOP to begin making the case that Obamacare is failing, as the party said it would from the beginning. At a minimum, the utter collapse of the implementation process cries out for a year-long delay, before real and perhaps irreversible damage is done.</p>
<p>James C. Capretta is a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center.</p>
<p>&#160;</p> | The Fiasco That Is Obamacare | false | https://eppc.org/publications/the-fiasco-that-is-obamacare/ | 1 |
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<p />
<p>Perk up the back-to-work grind with a special dinner, but one that only takes</p>
<p>Linda Gassenheimer/TNSGlazed garlic ginger steak and potatoes are quick enough for a weeknight dinner.</p>
<p>minutes to make. Garlic, honey and fresh ginger give this steak a hint of Asian flavor. Sautéed golden potatoes make an easy side dish.</p>
<p>Complete the meal by opening a bag of ready-to-eat salad and adding some croutons and low-fat dressing.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>Sesame oil is expressed from sesame seeds. It has a nutty flavor. I like to use toasted sesame oil. It has a deeper flavor. It’s available in most supermarkets.</p>
<p>GARLIC AND GINGER-GLAZED STEAK</p>
<p>Serves 2</p>
<p>¾ pound strip steak</p>
<p>2 medium garlic cloves, crushed</p>
<p>2 teaspoons fresh chopped ginger</p>
<p>2 tablespoons honey</p>
<p>1 tablespoon low-salt soy sauce</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil</p>
<p>Salt and freshly ground black pepper</p>
<p>Remove visible fat from steak. Mix the garlic, ginger, honey, and soy sauce together. Heat oil in a medium-size nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add steak to skillet and brown 3 minutes. Turn and sprinkle cooked side with salt and pepper to taste. Brown second side 3 minutes. Lower heat to medium. Spread garlic mixture over steak and cover with a lid. Cook 3 minutes. A meat thermometer should read 145 degrees for medium-rare, 160 degrees for medium or 170 degrees for well done. Remove, carve across the grain and serve.</p>
<p>PER SERVING: 312 calories, 9.1 g fat, 96 mg cholesterol, 40.2 g protein, 19 g carbohydrates, 0.2 g fiber, 354 mg sodium.</p>
<p>SAUTÉED GOLDEN POTATOES</p>
<p>Serves 2</p>
<p>¾ pound gold or yellow potatoes</p>
<p>1 cup fat-free, no-salt-added chicken broth</p>
<p>2 teaspoons toasted sesame oil</p>
<p>Salt and freshly ground black pepper</p>
<p>Wash potatoes, do not peel, and cut into ½-inch pieces. Place in a medium-size saucepan with chicken broth and sesame oil. Cover and simmer 15 minutes, or until potatoes are soft and liquid is absorbed. Season with salt and pepper to taste.</p>
<p>PER SERVING: 169 calories, 4.7 g fat, no cholesterol, 5.7 g protein, 27.6 g carbohydrates, 2.9 g fiber, 106 mg sodium.</p>
<p /> | Fast feast perks up the grind | false | https://abqjournal.com/920103/fast-feast-perks-up-the-grind.html | 2 |
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<p>NEW YORK — General Motors will take a $7 billion write-down in 2017 tied to the U.S. tax overhaul, but expects strong sales in North America and China to sustain its profit through 2018.</p>
<p>The Detroit automaker on Tuesday reaffirmed its 2017 expectations for adjusted profit between $6 and $6.50 per share and said it expects similar results in 2018. The company also cited cost cutting and growth in other units, including GM Financial, as factors in maintaining profit.</p>
<p>Like others that have announced a hit from the new tax law, GM expects the changes will be favorable to the company and the industry as a whole.</p>
<p>Two of the nation’s biggest banks, JPMorgan Chase and Wells Fargo, announced a combined $5.75 billion tax hit, but shares of both surged higher because of more favorable tax benefits going forward for corporations.</p>
<p>ADVERTISEMENT</p>
<p>Shares of General Motors Co. rose 12 cents to close Tuesday at $44.19.</p>
<p>GM enters into 2018 with lowered costs and ongoing strength in U.S. pickup truck sales. In 2017, GM sold its Opel/Vauxhall and GM Financial European units and cut business in parts of Africa and India.</p>
<p>Overall, U.S. auto sales fell 2 percent industrywide in 2017, according to Autodata Corp., ending an unprecedented seven-year expansion. Still, 2017 marked the fourth-best sales year in U.S. history, after 2000, 2015 and 2016, according to Kelley Blue Book.</p> | General Motors sees sustained profits through 2018 | false | https://abqjournal.com/1119907/general-motors-sees-sustained-profits-through-2018.html | 2018-01-16 | 2 |
<p>In the last year's Arab-Israel crisis,&#160;most Of US on the democratic Left supported the Israeli cause. Our justification for this had little, if anything, to do with Zionist sentiment. The existence of a small democratic state (whose every action we did not necessarily approve) was clearly endangered. The Arab nations had announced their intent to "wipe out" Israel; aided by the Russians, they had mobilized substantial forces; in closing the Gulf of Aqaba, they had taken warlike actions. Under similar circumstances, we ought to defend the right of any threatened people to exist.</p>
<p>The six-day Blitz transformed the Near Eastern picture; most of all, it changed the relation between Arabs and Israelis within Israel itself. The Jewish state now incorporates about 1 million new Arabs plus the 300,000 already there. The ratio of Jew to Arab has been reduced from 8 to 1 to 2 to 1. Given the substantially higher Arab birthrate, the Arab population could draw even with the Jews within 20 years. This alone gives a new urgency to the need for a permanent solution.</p>
<p /> | Israel Now - A Few Questions | true | https://dissentmagazine.org/article/israel-now-a-few-questions | 2018-03-01 | 4 |
<p>LONDON (AP) — Misfiring Chelsea missed the chance to climb into second place in the English Premier League by drawing 0-0 at home to 10-man Leicester on Saturday.</p>
<p>It was a third straight goalless draw involving Chelsea in all competitions — and a fourth in the team’s last seven matches.</p>
<p>Leicester dominated at Stamford Bridge until Leicester left back Ben Chilwell was sent off after receiving a second yellow card in the 68th minute for a lunge at Victor Moses.</p>
<p>Chelsea applied pressure after that but rarely threatened Kasper Schmeichel, who easily clawed away a free kick from Marcos Alonso in injury time.</p>
<p>Chelsea stayed in third place, behind second-place Manchester United on goal difference and 15 points off leader Manchester City.</p>
<p>Its other goalless draws in the past seven days came against Norwich in the FA Cup and Arsenal in the first leg of their League Cup semifinal.</p>
<p>Gary Cahill came off in the 33rd minute for Chelsea with an apparent hamstring injury.</p>
<p>LONDON (AP) — Misfiring Chelsea missed the chance to climb into second place in the English Premier League by drawing 0-0 at home to 10-man Leicester on Saturday.</p>
<p>It was a third straight goalless draw involving Chelsea in all competitions — and a fourth in the team’s last seven matches.</p>
<p>Leicester dominated at Stamford Bridge until Leicester left back Ben Chilwell was sent off after receiving a second yellow card in the 68th minute for a lunge at Victor Moses.</p>
<p>Chelsea applied pressure after that but rarely threatened Kasper Schmeichel, who easily clawed away a free kick from Marcos Alonso in injury time.</p>
<p>Chelsea stayed in third place, behind second-place Manchester United on goal difference and 15 points off leader Manchester City.</p>
<p>Its other goalless draws in the past seven days came against Norwich in the FA Cup and Arsenal in the first leg of their League Cup semifinal.</p>
<p>Gary Cahill came off in the 33rd minute for Chelsea with an apparent hamstring injury.</p> | Chelsea misfires again in 0-0 draw against Leicester in EPL | false | https://apnews.com/16cd8091bad348319c6ce5f4fcc64072 | 2018-01-13 | 2 |
<p />
<p />
<p />
<p /> PAUL JAY, SENIOR EDITOR, TRNN: Welcome to The Real News Network. I'm Paul Jay in Baltimore. Eddie Conway was lieutenant of security for the Black Panther Party from 1968 to mid 1970.
<p />
<p />…
<p />
<p />Incarcerated in 1970, Eddie served nearly 44 years in prison after being convicted of shooting at two police officers. (One, Officer Donald Sager, died.) He was released six months ago today.
<p />
<p />…
<p />
<p />He declared his innocence ever since his arrest and points to the absence of any direct evidence, his inability to secure a legal defense of his choice during his trial, and the extent to which a jailhouse informant--I should say, a notorious jailhouse informant's testimony was relied on by the prosecution for his conviction. While incarcerated, he earned three college degrees, organized a literacy program, and ran an education and conflict resolution group for gang members, although--to use word Eddie's words, street organizations. He continues now in Baltimore to work as an activist, and we're pleased and privileged to have him here in the studio.
<p />
<p />Thanks very much for joining us.
<p />
<p />EDDIE CONWAY, FMR. BLACK PANTHER PARTY MEMBER, BALTIMORE CHAPTER:
<p />Thanks for having me.
<p />
<p />...
<p />
<p />JAY: And we're pleased and honored to have you here in the studio.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Thanks for having me here.
<p />
<p />JAY: So I should have said as well you are the author of a book. It's called--I have it here--it's Marshall Law: The Life &amp; Times of a Baltimore Black Panther.
<p />
<p />...
<p />
<p />I feel like we could do about 15 segments of interviews here, your history is so rich and it's such an important learning experience for people that are trying to change the world today. I didn't, in your introduction, say that you were a revolutionary, and as far as I can make out, you still are. You're someone that wanted transformational change, and, to use your words, you put your body on the line to do it. But what struck me most in reading your book--and I'll tell everyone honestly, I have read most of the book, but not all of it--but the theme that I think comes out most strongly for me is the fight to maintain your humanity. And it wasn't just a fight in prison. It's a fight that happens out in the community as well. I guess it's a more intense fight in prison. But the force of this society's culture, this politics, economics, it's very dehumanizing.
<p />
<p />Your book begins with your childhood experiences and becoming aware of the extent of systemic racism and white supremacy. Talk about some of your early events that formed the way you came to look at the world.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Well, I think probably the initial thing that happened was when I was in the fourth grade. I attended a school on Mount and Riggs street. A hundred and thirty-two it was named. And we put on a play for Christmas, and we didn't have an auditorium, and we were allowed to go across into the white community to their elementary school to use their auditorium, so that our family members could come and see us act in the Christmas play.
<p />
<p />JAY: This would be about 1954 or '55?
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Yes, somewhere around there. Huge school. It was impossible--you could have set almost our whole school into their auditorium. And, I mean, the science lab, outside track, swimming pool--I mean, it was devastating for, like, a little eight-year-old.
<p />
<p />After that, coming back into the black community and going back to that school, it damaged us so much we acted out that whole year. In fact, I failed the fourth grade as a result of that experience. I think that was my first contact with institutional racism in Baltimore.
<p />
<p />JAY: You grew up initially in a community that was mostly black, but then you moved to a community in downtown Baltimore, but it was still mostly white.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Yes.
<p />
<p />JAY: And then you start to see white people started to leave.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Yeah. Yeah. As a matter of fact, that experience was kind of extended to us moving to East Baltimore. We moved to East Baltimore, up around Preston and Milton Avenue, and there was very few black families in the community at the time. And within six or eight months, white families were fleeing the community right and left. It basically became an integrated community, and then, eventually, an all-black community.
<p />
<p />And the encounters that we had during that period was, like, really negative and hostile, people not wanting us in the community. And it was--obviously, that was a more adult-like experience, because I was at that time a teenager, and we still had the segregation and racism in the city.
<p />
<p />…
<p />
<p />JAY: Here's a quote from Eddie's book about that period.
<p />
<p />Baltimore is south of the Mason-Dixon line, and in 2011 is probably more Southern than Mississippi in 1962 in terms of segregation. But there was always the safety of numbers back then. Up until my early teens, my parents kept me away from those places where black and white intersect and sometimes conflict. My parents tried to hide the reality of second-class citizenship, so they never talked about the violence of the South, beatings and lynchings. So I was forced to figure out some things myself. And by that time we were living among whites, and now they were the minority.
<p />
<p />As you become a teenager, you write in the book of getting involved with some of the activity of young people, which was striking out in anger against those conditions. What kind of stuff?
<p />
<p />CONWAY: We obviously--at that age we there were no gangs, but there were groups of guys that would hang together. It wasn't an, officially, gang. So you might want to call them crews or something like that, or just neighborhood gatherings. And we would come in contact with other neighborhood gatherings that--they weren't gangs. That West Side Story thing is bogus, probably, right? But there were conflicts at the edge and the borders of our communities between us and them around the use of the baseball fields.
<p />
<p />JAY: This is black and white.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Black and white--around the use of the baseball fields or football fields, etc., even to the point--and it's probably not good to say this, but even to the point of young black people taken away material things from young white people as they passed.
<p />
<p />JAY: Like bicycles and so on.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Bicycles, bats, gloves, skates, radios, things that they brought through our community that we didn't have. And I guess we kind of had an understanding that those things should have been things that we should have had and didn't have for whatever reason, and, to a great degree, that probably white people were responsible for that. And so we did take those things back through force, violence, interaction, etc.
<p />
<p />JAY: So this idea that there's something fundamentally unjust growing up black in Baltimore, by the time you're a teenager, that's clear to you? I mean, and clear to you not just in sort of a--in a somewhat political way.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: It's clear--I don't think we understood the politics. We understood the oppression. We understood that we were treated differently in our community. Friday, Saturday, Sunday nights, the enforcement agencies in our community treated us differently. They didn't bring us home. I mean, it wasn't a case of officer-friendly. It was always a case of either putting us in the trunk of a car, or taking us somewhere and hitting us upside of the head, or just intimidating us. So we knew that and we knew what the general presentation was, that these are your friends, these are people that are supposed to look out and serve and take care of you, and that wasn't our reality in our community. So we knew there was something there. But we also knew that anytime we ventured outside of our community, we had negative encounters, either with other community people or law enforcement, etc. So we knew that there was something seriously wrong there, even when we went downtown, say, for instance.
<p />
<p />JAY: Your father, if I remember correctly from the book, worked for the city?
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Yes.
<p />
<p />JAY: And your mother worked?
<p />
<p />CONWAY: No, actually, she didn't.
<p />
<p />JAY: She didn't.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Yeah.
<p />
<p />JAY: But you've got a stable income.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Yeah.
<p />
<p />JAY: And you write that you were poor, but you never wanted for food and basics. But what were the politics? What was the conversation at home about why things were the way they were?
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Well, I don't think we--and I'm speaking now as a young teenager discovering girls, hanging out, partying, running in the streets. I don't even think I paid too much attention to the conversations that were taking place in the house. And I'm pretty sure there was, like, hostility, and I'm pretty sure there was some anti-white kind of attitudes that would take place in the house among the adults. At some point, I think, probably not then, but earlier, I think we had lost some uncle in Korea and there was not any compensation for his loss. The family was devastated by that. So there was always some things going on in the background. But there was a party Friday night or there was a party Saturday night, or we wanted to go and hang out in the movies or something. So I didn't really have an interest in that stuff and missed most of it quite honestly.
<p />
<p />JAY: So we're talking into the late '50s and then the very early '60s. Baltimore didn't look the way it looks now. I mean, I heard you talking to a mutual friend of ours, Marc Steiner, what it was like when you got out of prison and actually saw rows and rows and rows of boarded-up housing. And some people call these--some of the communities look like they'd been war zones or something. But that isn't what--growing up here, that wasn't what it was like.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Yeah, communities were actually intact. There were people throughout the community from different class levels--middle class, working class, even some close to upper-class people lived in the community. You had doctors, you had lawyers, you had garbage men, you had street hustlers, you had teachers, you just had regular people going to work at Sparrow's Point, and they were all mixed in in a space in the community, including the person that might own the store down the street or the person that owned the bar. You know, up the street there might be a Cadillac, down the street there might be a Volkswagen.
<p />
<p />But there was never any abandoned houses. I mean, there might occasionally be a vacant house where somebody's moved out, and somebody might move in there in a week's time. So seeing the city with the houses boarded up, some of the houses decaying and collapsing, empty lots, all of that's shocking to me, because I've never seen any place that look like that.
<p />
<p />JAY: Yeah, just to remind everybody--
<p />
<p />CONWAY: I mean, it's a city of decay.
<p />
<p />JAY: --Eddie was in jail for 44 years, so he hadn't seen the city for all of that time.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Yeah.
<p />
<p />JAY: By the time you're getting to be 15, 16, are you angry at the injustice of it?
<p />
<p />CONWAY: I'm not sure consciously that--I mean, I knew there was injustice, but at the same time, I guess my desire was, to be honest, to have fun, to party, to enjoy life, and to try to see if I could find a way to make a life for myself. So I was looking forward to becoming independent, looking forward to becoming self-sufficient.
<p />
<p />JAY: But you're getting involved in some kind of nutty stuff.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: I'm getting involved in all kinds of nutty stuff. But I'm not getting involved in nutty stuff because--one of the things is I dropped out of school. I dropped out of school at 16. I was already working then, and I was guess I was operating under the illusion that I was doing well. I had a job, I had been working since I was 13, so by the time of 16, I was pretty secure in the sense that I could get the stuff that I wanted to get, I could buy the things that I wanted to buy, and I made a decision not to go back to school. I was really having fun. And my mother confronted me and basically--.
<p />
<p />JAY: "Fun" means partying and--.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Yeah, fun, partying, enjoying hanging out, etc. And my mother confronted me and basically said, like, if you're going to live here, you've got to go to school, you're going to have to finish school. And I'm like, okay, well, I got a job. I don't have to live there. I'm moving out.
<p />
<p />And so at 16 I moved out, and I moved into a living arrangement in which we had a three-story house, and it was about six of us. And right away I discovered that all of the fun that I was having had something to do with Mom and Pop paying the rent and them buying food and them paying for the electricity. I didn't realize all of that stuff had to happen. And I couldn't stay up [till] three o'clock hanging out with my buddies and partying, even though we had a house, we had a three-story house, and it was, like, wild parties in there all the time. I had to be in the bed at ten o'clock because I had to get up at five or six o'clock in the morning and go to work, because you can't keep a job if you're partying all night. So I had discovered the hard way that all the partying and all that stuff was--kind of, like, had to go on the back burner and it had to be kind of like a weekend warrior with that and I had to take care of myself. But a lot of my friends continued to do wild stuff.
<p />
<p />JAY: Yeah. In the book you write about one of the guys getting involved in a fight with some New York drug dealers and some shooting takes place.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Yeah. And that stuff eventually continued to happen to the point where I realized that, well, okay, I need to--people were going to jail. The house was being raided. Things were happening. And to me it was like, okay, I can't continue along this path, because if I do, I'll end up in jail.
<p />
<p />JAY: Right.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Yeah.
<p />
<p />JAY: Are you at this point in your life conscious, at a conscious level, of this idea of systemic racism, white supremacy, that there's something basically unjust the way African Americans are dealt with in America?
<p />
<p />CONWAY: No, I was completely apolitical, apathetic, didn't give a darn, for use of a better word. I didn't actually care. I was still enjoying life. I was still doing stuff. I mean, I knew, I was fully aware that there was problems. The civil rights movement was in its heyday or better. The civil rights bills were coming up.
<p />
<p />JAY: [crosstalk] we're now into the early '60s [crosstalk]
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Yeah, we're in the early '60s, so, you know, the March on Washington, I mean, all of that stuff was taking place. There was radical talk going around from Malcolm X, etc. You know.
<p />
<p />JAY: So it's in the air, but--.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: It's in the air, but we're having a wonderful time in this house.
<p />
<p />JAY: But you decide things are getting out of control, the house, and you'd better do something, and you join the U.S. Army.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Yes, and I decided that it was time for me to relocate. Yes.
<p />
<p />JAY: Here's another quote from in Eddie's book. And by the way, this book's available in all the normal places people buy books.
<p />
<p />I was ready to serve the nation, Eddie writes. There was no place I would not have gone, nothing I would not have done at that point for the good old U.S. of A.
<p />
<p />What did it mean to be American to you? What was Americanism?
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Well, at the time I thought that we all had the opportunity to advance, to move forward, to make progress. I kind of felt like, okay, well, maybe I dropped the ball dropping out and partying, etc. Maybe I could pick the ball back up, reengage.
<p />
<p />JAY: You write that you still believed the American dream.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: I still believed that the American dream was possible.
<p />
<p />JAY: For black people.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: For black people. For all people, in fact. And I just--I really--I guess, looking back, hindsight now, I guess I really thought that whatever wasn't happening correctly was my fault. You know. I blamed the victim, so to speak. It was like, okay, well, I'm just not putting forth enough; I'm not going--I should've went to college, I should have did this or I should have did that; given a better effort, I could do better, and I can make it, I can survive. And toward that end, I think, I looked at the American dream as the reality that would change the world.
<p />
<p />JAY: So that starts change for you, and I think in the next segment--.
<p />
<p />…
<p />
<p />So that dream started to shatter for you when you were in the Army. What happened?
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Well, I think initially one--being gung ho--because I was when I went in the Army, I was gung ho. I--.
<p />
<p />JAY: And you joined the Army in '64?
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Yeah, I joined the Army in '64, and I went through the training, I went through the advanced training. And I end up in Europe and I end up as a medic.
<p />
<p />JAY: In Germany.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: In Germany. And they put me in a unit, and there was 25 people in the unit. There were three black guys and 22 white guys. And one of the black guys was a sergeant, and one of the black guys were a private. And, of course, I was a private myself, right? And the first thing I realized was that there was just a tremendous--and for the first two weeks--tremendous amount of racism in the Army. Every single day, the two people that were selected to go on KP--that's duty--or to dig ditches or to pick up garbage were the two black guys, me and the other guy. And it happened every day for, like, two weeks. And at some point it stuck to my craw, so to speak. And the one morning they came out and they said, like, we need two people from each platoon. And as they were going up the list getting the black guys from each platoon, before they got to my platoon, I yelled out in the rank, which is, like, a no-no, "Let Conway do it." You know? Because I knew they was going to pick me anyway. They'd been picking me for two solid weeks, you know? And so it shocked the whole formation, because, like, soldiers don't do this. You know, you stand there, you're at attention, and you keep quiet, they give you an order, you go do it. You know. So I'm, like, rebelling right there.
<p />
<p />So, in fact what they did was they took me to the company commander's office and said, well, why did you do that? Why are you doing that? And so I explained and I said, look, I've been here for two weeks, and every single day--there was 25 of us--every single day, only the two black guys get picked; none of the white guys have been picked I've been here. What kind of fair deal is that? And it was from that point there that, one, they started leaving me alone, but, two, I started looking at the environment and realized that the structure of the Army itself was Southern white sergeants that didn't have any other way of getting a job and had no other way of being professional.
<p />
<p />JAY: Clan meetings.
<p />
<p />CONWAY: Yeah. And pretty much what--they were taking in, there was a huge influx of blacks then, but it was like they were preparing for Vietnam. They knew Vietnam was going to happen. And it was just sucking in black guys and kind of, like, programming them to get ready to be cannon fodder. And it started dawning on me then that, well, there's a problem here in the Army. And I started working to kind of, like, with the other brothers, and we started--by '65 we were organizing--it was just like they were organizing in Vietnam and so on--against the racism.
<p />
<p />The clan was there in full-hooded body. They were holding meetings and whatnot. And so, eventually we decided to find out where they were holding their meetings, and we went and we beat the shit out of them, for the want of a better term, you know, because they were, like, putting little lynch--lynching symbols on the wall and stuff like that. You know. And so, in the day, because of their sergeant and their--the sergeants and their support system, they pretty much ran the Army bases. At night, we ran the Army bases.
<p />
<p />JAY: In the next segment of the interview, we're going to talk more with Eddie Conway about how he went from someone who, in his words, couldn't care less to someone who became a fighter. In fact, that would become the defining thing about his life, I would say, the fight for the defense of his humanity.
<p />
<p />Please join us for part two on Reality Asserts Itself with Eddie Conway.
<p />
<p />End
<p />
<p />DISCLAIMER: Please note that transcripts for The Real News Network are typed from a recording of the program. TRNN cannot guarantee their complete accuracy. | 44 Years in Prison, Still a Revolutionary - Eddie Conway on Reality Asserts Itself (1/10) | true | http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option%3Dcom_content%26task%3Dview%26id%3D31%26Itemid%3D74%26jumival%3D12344 | 2014-09-07 | 4 |
<p />
<p>Perhaps the most remarkable thing about the “War on Terror” is that, almost a decade after September 11, the most powerful nation in the world still hasn’t captured or killed the men behind the attack, Osama bin Laden and his No. 2, Ayman al-Zawahiri.</p>
<p>Colorado native Gary Brooks Faulkner is trying to change all that. Faulkner, like bin Laden, is on a kidney dialysis regimen. But that didn’t stop him from traveling deep into Pakistan earlier this year, armed with a samurai sword and a pistol, to try to do what the US military and CIA haven’t been able to:&#160;kill bin Laden. Pakistani security officials arrested him in the remote district of Chitral&#160;and returned him to the US. Faulkner says that God ordered him to kill the terrorist leader—but whether it was religious inspiration or his own know-how, some experts suspect he may have been close. The New York Times‘ Dexter Filkins <a href="http://atwar.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/15/call-him-crazy-but-bin-laden-bounty-hunter-wasnt-far-off/" type="external">explains</a>:&#160;</p>
<p>Whatever else we might conclude about Gary Faulkner, our arrested American bounty hunter, we should give him this: He was looking in the right place.</p>
<p>Or at least the place where many intelligence analysts think he is: the mountainous high-altitude district of Chitral. For me, the mere mention of the place evokes the image of the Saudi terrorist.</p>
<p>Last December, early on a Sunday morning, I sat at a long table in the basement of the Pentagon talking with an American military officer about the situation in Afghanistan. As the meeting ended, another man approached, wearing plain clothes and a plainer face.</p>
<p>“Chitral,” he said, half-smiling.&#160;“If&#160;you’re looking for Osama, you might try Chitral.”</p>
<p>He muttered something else, then walked away. The man didn’t identify himself, but he didn’t have to. He was almost certainly an intelligence analyst. If I had to guess, I’d say, given our location, that he worked for the Defense Intelligence Agency.</p>
<p>Why Chitral? Well, for one thing, it’s remote. Chitral is a mountainous district of Pakistan’s North-West Frontier Province, in the far end of the country, abutting an Afghan region called Wakhan, notable because it’s shaped like a panhandle. In other words, it’s a long way from the Federal Administered Tribal Areas, or FATA, where many other intelligence analysts believe Mr. bin Laden is probably hiding.</p>
<p>There is one other reason. As he walked away, my plain-faced Pentagon acquaintance said one other thing: “We have a hard time putting Predators up there.” Apparently, the drones cannot stay up long, because their bases are so far away. In a funny kind of way, he was asking for help.</p>
<p>Faulkner recently told the <a href="http://www.denverpost.com/news/ci_15810330" type="external">Denver Post</a> that he hopes for another shot at bin Laden. (He claims to have already made eight trips.) Next time, he’ll try to use a balloon or a glider to access Chitral, he told the newspaper—a move that he presumably hopes will allow him to elude Pakistani authorities. Good luck with that, dude. Don’t get yourself killed.</p>
<p>If you want to know more about Faulkner and his quest, there’s a profile of him in the latest GQ.&#160;The article isn’t online yet.&#160;</p>
<p /> | Another Shot for Amateur Bin Laden Hunter? | true | https://motherjones.com/politics/2010/08/gary-brooks-faulkner-bin-laden/ | 2010-08-30 | 4 |
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<p />
<p>Clinton, appearing on the campaign trail for the first time with first lady Michelle Obama, urged voters to stay engaged and vote because the outcome remains uncertain.</p>
<p>“Let’s go out and win this election!” Clinton exclaimed at a rally at Wake Forest University in front of about 11,000 people. “Let’s make sure we vote early. Vote as soon as you can. Vote this afternoon!”</p>
<p>Obama also warned supporters to remain engaged, accusing Republicans of actively seeking to suppress turnout by making the election “so dirty and ugly that we don’t want any part of it.”</p>
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<p>The first lady then told the crowd: “When you hear folks talking about a global conspiracy and saying that this election is rigged, understand that they are trying to get you to stay home. They are trying to convince you that your vote doesn’t matter, that the outcome has already been determined and that you shouldn’t even bother to make your voice heard.”</p>
<p>With less than two weeks to go, Clinton holds a six-point edge over Trump among an electorate fixated on the campaign and nervous about their candidate losing, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News national tracking poll.</p>
<p>More than 3 in 4 Clinton and Trump supporters say that they are “very anxious” at the thought of the other candidate becoming president, fears that underscore perceptions of the election’s high stakes and stark contrast between the contenders.</p>
<p>The Post-ABC poll finds that 57 percent of registered voters are following the election “very closely” and that 85 percent say they are absolutely certain to vote or have already cast ballots. Both measures are similar to four years ago, and nearly identical percentages of Clinton and Trump supporters are reporting high attention to the race.</p>
<p>The poll underscores how widespread concerns about Clinton make it difficult for her to expand beyond a single-digit edge over Trump, as well as Trump’s continuing challenges in appealing beyond a core base of supporters.</p>
<p>Clinton and Obama’s joint appearance came on a day when Trump made three stops in another battleground state, Ohio, where he sought to build on a reed-thin lead. The race has tightened in several battlegrounds in recent polls, notably in Florida, Nevada and North Carolina.</p>
<p>In Toledo, Trump jokingly suggested that the election should be scrapped because Clinton would make such a poor president.</p>
<p>“We should just cancel the election and just give it to Trump, right?” the Republican presidential nominee asked supporters while campaigning in this Midwestern industrial city. “What are we even having it for? Her policies are so bad!”</p>
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<p>Trump also said he would work on “the ghettos” of America if he is elected.</p>
<p>Campaigning in Springfield, Ohio, Trump renewed his attacks on Clinton’s stamina, claiming that she appeared “tired” after the last two debates and implying that she was on the verge of needing physical assistance.</p>
<p>At an afternoon rally in a sprawling barn, Trump called Clinton “a low-energy person.” Then, without presenting evidence, he claimed that she was in bad shape after their most recent debates.</p>
<p>“I watched after the last debate and after the second debate. She was tired, wow. She walked off that stage, of course she had a lot of people around; they had a lot of people around her, which was smart,” Trump said.</p>
<p>No evidence has emerged that Clinton was suffering physically during or after the debates.</p>
<p>For Clinton, Thursday was all about borrowing from Obama’s star power. When the current and past first ladies took the stage together here, it was a moment of mutual admiration that the country had never seen before.</p>
<p>“First ladies, we rock,” Obama said, turning to Clinton as the arena roared its approval at the sight of two women, previously supportive spouses and now political forces in their own right.</p>
<p>Obama delivered a resounding endorsement of her predecessor in the East Wing, who is seeking to succeed her husband in the White House. Obama championed Clinton as the most prepared and qualified person to ever seek the office.</p>
<p>“Yes, more than Barack, more than Bill,” she said. “So she is absolutely ready to be commander in chief on Day One.”</p>
<p>She then added: “And yes, she happens to be a woman.”</p>
<p>Clinton is hoping that some of Obama’s magnetism and support among young people and African Americans can help consolidate a lead in North Carolina. The first lady has emerged as perhaps the Democrats’ most powerful and effective voice opposing Trump, and Clinton frequently quotes the first lady’s admonition to “go high” when critics “go low.”</p>
<p>In a sign of the power of Obama’s appeal, the Clinton campaign booked a huge stadium for Clinton’s first in-person campaign event with the first lady. The campaign cited a local fire marshal for the crowd estimate of 11,000 people at Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum, more than twice the size of most of the recent events Clinton has held alone.</p>
<p>Clinton appeared to joke about President and Michelle Obama’s reputation as a “cool” couple and the contrast with herself. She noted that she had enjoyed seeing the first couple dance.</p>
<p>“Ahhhh, one can only hope,” Clinton added in a wistful tone.</p>
<p>Aside from Clinton’s health, Trump also took aim at the Clintons’ charitable foundation and financial dealings, pointing to private communications released by the anti-secrecy group WikiLeaks, including a memo by top Bill Clinton aide Doug Band.</p>
<p>“The more emails WikiLeaks releases, the more lines between the Clinton Foundation, the secretary of state’s office and the Clintons’ personal finances, they all get blurred,” Trump said.</p>
<p>Band’s memo detailed what he called “Clinton Inc.,” a web of lucrative business ventures and overlapping charitable work. The memo was discovered in hacked emails from John Podesta, who is now chairman of Hillary Clinton’s campaign.</p>
<p>In an interview published Thursday by Billboard magazine, Bill Clinton weighed in on Trump’s criticisms, saying that the attacks on his foundation are frustrating.</p>
<p>On Friday, both candidates are scheduled at different times to be in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.</p>
<p>Trump’s running mate, Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, visited Omaha and western Iowa on Thursday. Later in the evening, his campaign plane slid off the runway at New York’s LaGuardia Airport, according to Pence’s traveling media pool report. Emergency crews were on site, and the governor checked on the press corps at the back of the plane to make sure everyone was OK.</p>
<p>Sen. Tim Kaine (Virginia), the Democratic vice-presidential candidate, campaigned Thursday in Ohio. He told supporters in Lorain that the state could seal the election for Clinton.</p>
<p>“You guys are more than a battleground. You are a checkmate state,” Kaine said. “If you win it, you done won it. If we win Ohio, the race is over.”</p>
<p>Polling released Thursday afternoon by Quinnipiac University showed the ticktock nature of the race in the closing days. According to the poll, Trump holds a one-point edge over Clinton in Georgia – 44 percent to 43 percent – but they’re tied at 44 percent in Iowa. In North Carolina, Clinton holds a four-point advantage (47 percent to 43 percent), while she holds a 12-point edge in Virginia.</p>
<p>In a sign of how competitive the race remains in Florida, Clinton is scheduled to campaign Saturday night in Miami alongside the singer Jennifer Lopez.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, Clinton’s already-robust fundraising ratcheted up even more this month, according to new campaign finance reports filed Thursday with the Federal Election Commission.</p>
<p>The Democratic nominee’s campaign and two joint fundraising committees with the party together pulled in $101 million in the first 19 days of October. That’s an average haul of $5.3 million a day, up from $5.1 million a day in September.</p>
<p>At the same time, her campaign shelled out $54 million – a slower spending rate than the previous month.</p>
<p>That gave Clinton a hefty stockpile of cash as she headed into the final weeks of the campaign: more than $153 million.</p>
<p>As of Thursday evening, Trump and his affiliated committees had not filed their reports, which were due to the FEC by midnight.</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>Sullivan reported from Ohio. O’Keefe reported from Washington. Scott Clement, Anne Gearan and Emily Guskin in Washington contributed to this report.</p>
<p>—</p>
<p>VIDEOS:</p>
<p>1) At a rally with Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton in Winston-Salem, N.C., Oct. 27, first lady Michelle Obama gave a passionate speech where she reminded supporters that Americans “sacrificed their lives” for the right to vote. (The Washington Post)</p>
<p>— <a href="http://wapo.st/2fbMcU1" type="external">http://wapo.st/2fbMcU1</a></p>
<p>—</p>
<p />
<p>2) At a rally in Springfield, Ohio, Oct. 27, Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump said the release by WikiLeaks of a hacked memo written by a former Bill Clinton aide shows the lines “all get blurred” between the Clintons’ public and private activities. (The Washington Post)</p>
<p>— <a href="http://wapo.st/2eRclnO" type="external">http://wapo.st/2eRclnO</a></p>
<p>—</p>
<p />
<p>campaign-4thld-writethru</p> | Clinton, first lady campaign in N.C. | false | https://abqjournal.com/876444/clinton-warns-supporters-against-overconfidence-as-trump-focuses-on-tight-race-in-ohio.html | 2016-10-27 | 2 |
<p />
<p>Apple (NASDAQ: AAPL) isn't the growth stock it used to be. With over $200 billion of revenue per year -- twice as much as five years ago -- top line growth simply doesn't come as easily for the company anymore. But along with lower growth potential comes more excess cash for shareholders, which can be paid out in dividends. This has turned Apple into quite the dividend stock. Indeed, Apple arguably now shines just as brightly as a dividend investment as it did a growth investment five years ago.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>To show just how strong of a dividend stock Apple is, consider how the tech giant's payout could very well double in just seven years.</p>
<p>Image source: Getty Images.</p>
<p>When Apple initiated a quarterly payout in 2012, the company instantly became a major dividend player. With a cash hoard that had ballooned to over $100 billion, and its $40 billion in annual free cash flow at the time, Apple was a strong choice for income investors despite lacking dividend history.</p>
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<p>But the four years that have passed since then have provided more insight into what dividend investors might expect next from Apple. In particular, Apple has proven to be a great contender for long-term dividend growth. During this short period, Apple has increased its dividend every year, averaging an annualized increase of about 10.7%. Further, management has explicitly declared an annual dividend increase to be a priority for the company.</p>
<p>"The Company also plans to increase its dividend on an annual basis," Apple said in a 2014 press release about its dividend increase that year. And management has continued to emphasize its commitment to annual increases.</p>
<p>But can the tech behemoth continue delivering dividend increases as it faces headwinds with growing its business?</p>
<p>A quick overview of Apple's annual dividend payments as a percentage of its earnings and cash flow suggests it can. As it turns out, Apple is only paying out a small portion of its annual free cash flow (cash from operations less capital expenditures) in dividends.</p>
<p>In the past 12 months, for instance, Apple's free cash flow was an impressive $52.3 billion. Yet during this same period, the tech giant paid out just $12.2 billion in dividends. Similarly, its currently paying out only 25% of its annual net income.</p>
<p>Apple store. Image source: The Motley Fool.</p>
<p>Clearly, the company still has considerable room to continue increasing its dividend. Indeed, it would be realistic for it to maintain the annual increase rate it has averaged for the past four years into the foreseeable future. And an average 10.7% annual hike would double Apple's dividend in just seven years.</p>
<p>This analysis illustrates how powerful dividend growth can be over time. While investors who buy Apple stock today will get a dividend yield of just 2%, it's very possible its annual dividend payments seven years from now will amount to 4% of its stock price today.</p>
<p>10 stocks we like better than Apple When investing geniuses David and Tom Gardner have a stock tip, it can pay to listen. After all, the newsletter they have run for over a decade, Motley Fool Stock Advisor, has tripled the market.*</p>
<p>David and Tom just revealed what they believe are the <a href="http://infotron.fool.com/infotrack/click?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.fool.com%2Fmms%2Fmark%2Fe-foolcom-sa-bbn-dyn%3Faid%3D8867%26source%3Disaeditxt0010449%26ftm_cam%3Dsa-bbn-evergreen%26ftm_pit%3D6312%26ftm_veh%3Dbbn_article_pitch&amp;impression=665899a9-0c81-4a0d-817e-6312345311c7&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">10 best stocks Opens a New Window.</a> for investors to buy right now... and Apple wasn't one of them! That's right -- they think these 10 stocks are even better buys.</p>
<p><a href="http://infotron.fool.com/infotrack/click?url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.fool.com%2Fmms%2Fmark%2Fe-foolcom-sa-bbn-dyn%3Faid%3D8867%26source%3Disaeditxt0010449%26ftm_cam%3Dsa-bbn-evergreen%26ftm_pit%3D6312%26ftm_veh%3Dbbn_article_pitch&amp;impression=665899a9-0c81-4a0d-817e-6312345311c7&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">Click here Opens a New Window.</a> to learn about these picks!</p>
<p>*Stock Advisor returns as of Nov. 7, 2016</p>
<p><a href="http://my.fool.com/profile/TMFDanielSparks/info.aspx" type="external">Daniel Sparks Opens a New Window.</a> owns shares of Apple. The Motley Fool owns shares of and recommends Apple. The Motley Fool has the following options: long January 2018 $90 calls on Apple and short January 2018 $95 calls on Apple. Try any of our Foolish newsletter services <a href="http://www.fool.com/shop/newsletters/index.aspx?source=isiedilnk018048&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">free for 30 days Opens a New Window.</a>. We Fools may not all hold the same opinions, but we all believe that <a href="http://www.fool.com/knowledge-center/motley.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">considering a diverse range of insights Opens a New Window.</a> makes us better investors. The Motley Fool has a <a href="http://www.fool.com/Legal/fool-disclosure-policy.aspx?&amp;utm_campaign=article&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_source=foxbusiness" type="external">disclosure policy Opens a New Window.</a>.</p> | Apple Inc.'s Dividend Could Double in Just 7 Years | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2016/12/21/apple-inc-dividend-could-double-in-just-7-years.html | 2016-12-21 | 0 |
<p />
<p>This week the <a href="http://youtu.be/kKAFBfvdktI?list=PLY_tRVFFAzBJtSw_JtXb-6Jh2Z_07hDMq" type="external">3TechGuys Show Opens a New Window.</a> with (Brent Leary, Gene Marks and Ramon Ray) – discussed parking, potato salad and Wi-Fi in cars. What might these all have in common? Each represents innovation at its finest. You can catch all the action in the video below.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>Monkey Parking: The Parking App that has the City of San Francisco Up in Arms</p>
<p>Ever had a hard time finding parking in a major city? Well a new app, Monkey Parking, which allows its users to notify other users when they are leaving a space and then auction it off to the highest bidder, is now providing a solution to this problem, but not everyone is happy about it.</p>
<p>The city of San Francisco issued a cease-and-desist order to the Rome-based startup based on a current police code that prohibits anyone from buying, selling or leasing on street parking. Monkey Parking CEO, Paolo Dobrowoiny is refusing to halt operations and criticized the order saying, “I have the right to tell people if I am about to leave a parking spot, and they have the right to pay me for such information.”</p>
<p>Anything that spurs that kind of innovation and has the aspect of people sharing items like this, just like Uber and Airbnb, is fringing on long standing organizations and rules and disrupting them. Gene said, “I think we need to find a better way to evaluate these types of situation versus just trying to squash them. “. Technology and society are changing and we need to figure out what’s better for the population.</p>
<p>The 3TechGuys feel that the CEO of Monkey Parking said it best,&#160; cities and localities should be in the business of regulating and encouraging innovation, but they shouldn’t stifle it. If you are an entrepreneur and innovator, these are the opportunities that the internet and apps have brought us. We don’t want scammers and we want these types of services to be safe, so regulate, but don’t make it illegal.</p>
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<p>The $23K Potato Salad on Kickstarter</p>
<p>Speaking of innovation, <a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/" type="external">Kickstarter Opens a New Window.</a> and many of the crowd funding sites like them, have recently relaxed their rules and are now welcoming projects for just about anything – as long as it’s not illegal or harmful.</p>
<p>Example: On July 3rd, Zach Brown of Columbus, OH <a href="https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/324283889/potato-salad?ref=nav_search" type="external">started a campaign with a goal of $10 to make Potato Salad Opens a New Window.</a>. &#160;Four days later, he had raised upwards of $23,000.</p>
<p>Brent said, “If people are willing to donate to these types of projects, and he’s not doing anything illegal or misleading people, then more power to him. This is America and Capitalism at its best!”</p>
<p>The lesson to small business: With the rules being relaxed a bit, the doors are wide open for small businesses and entrepreneurs to find funding for innovative ideas, who some may think are crazy, but some may not!</p>
<p>GM Announces All Automobiles Will Include Wi-Fi by 2015</p>
<p>General Motors recently announced that by 2015, all automobiles will include options for Wi-Fi technology.</p>
<p>It’s hard to tell if this is a dangerous innovation or one leading to better productivity.</p>
<p>However, it turns out Gene said that it’s big step towards self-driving cars and it provides a great way to monitor maintenance and repairs.</p>
<p>Overall, if GM is filling our incessant need for bandwidth, it’s a smart move by GM, Brent feels.&#160; He does caution that we might be giving too much power to the ‘big guys’ who control the services.</p>
<p>3TechGuys wrapped up with a quick nod to human resource (HR) applications that are booming and having an impact for small business, big businesses and startups.&#160; Gene recommends three of them, <a href="http://www.zenefits.com/" type="external">Zenefits Opens a New Window.</a>, <a href="https://zenpayroll.com/" type="external">ZenPayroll Opens a New Window.</a> and <a href="http://www.work4labs.com/" type="external">Work4 Opens a New Window.</a>.</p>
<p>Many businesses, including large corporations, are going to online HR and HR management applications to help them manage everything from payroll to benefits to recruiting and these solutions are providing a lot of value and money savings.</p> | Is San Francisco Stifling Innovation By Shutting Down A Parking App? | true | http://foxbusiness.com/features/2014/07/07/is-san-francisco-stifling-innovation-by-shutting-down-parking-app.html | 2016-04-07 | 0 |
<p>TIMELINE OF EVENTS TODAY…</p>
<p>10.20AM BST <a href="http://wp.me/p3bwni-4HW" type="external" /></p>
<p><a href="http://wp.me/p3bwni-4HW" type="external">21st Century Wire</a> says…</p>
<p>Fears are that the United States, or another party, could have already launched missiles towards Syria early this morning, following reports out of Moscow that two possible ballistic or cruise missiles were launched from positions said to be that of US naval military assets currently placed the west of the island of Cyprus.</p>
<p>As yet, there is no comment from Syrian government about possible nature, or impact of these launches…</p>
<p>This just breaking of the wire this morning from <a href="http://rt.com/news/ballistic-launch-eastern-mediterranean-343/" type="external">RT</a>:</p>
<p>Russia’s early warning radars have detected the launch of two ballistic rockets in the eastern Mediterranean, Russia’s Defense Ministry stated. The launch reportedly took place at 06:16 GMT Tuesday.</p>
<p>The trajectory of the missiles is reported to have been from the central part of the Mediterranean Sea towards the eastern landmass.</p>
<p>The Syrian embassy in Moscow currently has no information on the incident.&#160;</p>
<p>Armavir, an early warning system against missile attack, is situated in southern Russia. It is run by the Russian Aerospace Defense Forces. They provide radar coverage of the Middle East. There are two radars there, with one of them facing southwest and the other southeast.&#160;</p>
<p>Update 10:50AM BST</p>
<p>Both rockets have allegedly fallen into the sea, RIA Novosti news agency reported.&#160;</p>
<p>Russia’s President Putin has already been informed about the incident by Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu…</p>
<p>There were no rocket attack signals or blasts in Damascus, the Russian embassy in Syria noted.&#160;</p>
<p>The Israeli military apparently have no data on the launch either.&#160;</p>
<p>No American ships or planes stationed in the Mediterranean have launched any missiles, US officials told CBS News.&#160;</p>
<p>A NATO spokesman said the alliance was trying to verify the reports. Until then, the bloc will not comment on the incident.&#160;Armavir, an early warning system against missile attack, is situated in southern Russia. It is run by the Russian Aerospace Defense Forces. They provide radar coverage of the Middle East. There are two radars there, with one of them facing southwest and the other southeast.</p>
<p>Update 11:05AM BST</p>
<p><a href="http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2013/09/03/syria-ballistic-launch-mediterranean.html" type="external">CCB Canada Reports</a>:</p>
<p>A Defence Ministry spokesman told Russian news agencies the launch was detected at 10:16 am Moscow time by an early warning radar station at Armavir, near the Black Sea, which is designed to detect missiles from Europe and Iran.</p>
<p>“The trajectory of these objects goes from the central part of the Mediterranean Sea toward the eastern part of the Mediterranean coast,” Interfax news agency quoted the spokesman as saying.</p>
<p>The spokesman did not say who had carried out the launch and whether any impact had been detected, but RIA later quoted a source in Syria’s “state structures” as saying the objects had fallen harmlessly into the sea.</p>
<p>The Russian Defence Ministry declined comment to Reuters.</p>
<p>Update 11:30AM BST</p>
<p>RT news wire: Israel claims joint US missile launch in Mediterranean for ‘target practice’.</p>
<p>The UK has stressed that they“have nothing to do”&#160;with the launch.</p>
<p>Update 1:30PM BST – Missile launch was a joint Israel–US missile “project”</p>
<p>Syria’s missile warning system has not detected any rockets landing on their territory, a Syrian security source told Lebanese channel al-Manar TV.&#160;</p>
<p>Initially, the Israeli military apparently had no data on the launch either…</p>
<p>However, later Israel claimed a joint missile launch with the US in the Mediterranean Sea. Israeli authorities pointed out that they tested an “anchor” target missile used to check how well the anti-missile system known as “Arrow-2” functions.&#160;</p>
<p>US Navy Forces haven’t fired any missiles from vessels deployed in the Mediterranean, according to a spokesman.&#160;</p>
<p>A NATO spokesman said the alliance was trying to verify the reports. Until then, the bloc will not comment on the incident.&#160;&#160;</p>
<p>The missiles launched from the central part of the Mediterranean Sea fell 300km from the eastern shore, RIA Novosti reported citing a source in the aerospace industry.</p>
<p>DETAILS TO FOLLOW&#160;</p>
<p>READ MORE SYRIA NEWS AT: <a href="" type="internal">21st Century Wire Syria Files</a></p> | Russians Detect Two Israeli Missiles Launched from Mediterranean Towards Syria | true | http://21stcenturywire.com/2013/09/03/russian-ministry-of-defense-two-missiles-launched-from-mediterranean-towards-syria/ | 2013-09-03 | 4 |
<p>Mother Jones illustration</p>
<p>For Californians, legal cannabis is right around the corner. But we have questions. And as it turns out, many of you do, too. A couple weeks ago we wanted to know what <a href="" type="internal">questions you had about pot</a>, and the responses were overwhelming. So we went through them and weeded out the most common questions.</p>
<p>First, let’s be clear about what the law says. On November 8th, 2016, Californians passed the Adult Use of Marijuana Act, or Proposition 64. That law went into effect immediately, but licensed cannabis businesses aren’t allowed to start selling recreational weed until January 1. On a basic level, <a href="http://vig.cdn.sos.ca.gov/2016/general/en/pdf/text-proposed-laws.pdf#prop64" type="external">Prop 64</a>:</p>
<p>Still, the law leaves a lot of questions unanswered. Here’s what you, Mother Jones readers, wanted to know:</p>
<p>Just because you’re allowed to possess weed in California doesn’t mean that cities and counties will let businesses sell it. So far, only a few places have passed legislation allowing the sale of cannabis—and even fewer have started handing out licenses to pot shops. That means there will only be a small number of places you’ll be able to buy recreational weed in California on January 1. Some of those places include <a href="http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/science/sd-me-marijuana-qanda-20171108-story.html" type="external">San Diego</a>, <a href="https://www.mercurynews.com/2017/12/14/californian-issues-first-licenses-to-sell-recreational-marijuana/" type="external">San Jose</a>, and <a href="https://aca5.accela.com/bcc/Cap/CapDetail.aspx?Module=Licenses&amp;TabName=Licenses&amp;capID1=DUB17&amp;capID2=00000&amp;capID3=000QF&amp;agencyCode=BCC&amp;IsToShowInspection=" type="external">Oakland</a>.</p>
<p>To find out if your city or county does allow&#160;recreational sales, you should check your local laws. The San Francisco Chronicle has spent months building a local law lookup tool. You can try it out <a href="http://projects.sfchronicle.com/2017/embed-pot-lookup/" type="external">here</a>. (While the tool is updated regularly, the best way to look up&#160;your area’s rules is on your city or county’s website.)</p>
<p>At a basic level, Prop 64 allows those convicted with cannabis crimes to get out of jail—though not immediately—and have their records cleared in accordance to what the laws read now. It also makes a lot of crimes that were felonies now misdemeanors. For example, under Prop 64, the possession of weed with the intent to sell (previously a felony) is <a href="http://www.drugpolicy.org/sites/default/files/prop64-resentencing-guideoctober2017_0.pdf" type="external">now a misdemeanor</a>. So yes, a lot of those convicted with pot crimes could eventually get out of jail or have their sentences reduced.&#160;</p>
<p>Mother Jones’ Brandon E. Patterson&#160;wrote <a href="" type="internal">a&#160;much longer piece</a>&#160;about how Prop 64 will affect people with weed charges, and how existing pot laws (e.g. the law prohibiting smoking in public) may still continue to disproportionately affect people of color.&#160;</p>
<p><a href="http://www.courts.ca.gov/prop64.htm" type="external">Here’</a>s more information on how to get a weed-related charge removed from your record.&#160;</p>
<p>This is the million-dollar question, and nobody really knows the answer. But other states like Washington and Colorado, which have already legalized recreational pot, may give us a clue about what to expect.</p>
<p>Recreational cannabis sales began <a href="https://www.denverpost.com/2014/01/01/worlds-first-legal-recreational-marijuana-sales-begin-in-colorado/" type="external">January 1, 2014</a> in Colorado, and between then and July 2017, weed prices dropped from about $1,900 per pound to about $1,300 per pound—a decline of about 30 percent, according to data from the <a href="https://www.colorado.gov/pacific/tax" type="external">Colorado Department of Revenue</a> and <a href="https://www.fitchratings.com/site/re/902035" type="external">analyzed</a> by research firm Fitch Ratings. Prices are similar in California, where the average wholesale cost of weed was <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/debraborchardt/2017/09/26/california-cannabis-retail-market-revealed-big-data-tells-all/#441e471839e3" type="external">$1,525 per pound</a> for the first half of 2017, while the national average was $1,614 per pound, according to industry data firm <a href="https://www.cannabisbenchmarks.com/about-us.html" type="external">Cannabis Benchmarks</a>.</p>
<p>While this price decline may be good for consumers, without an increase in demand for cannabis, states will see a loss of tax revenue as the price of pot drops. “A long-term decline in prices may ultimately be the greatest risk for state cannabis revenues,” according to the Fitch Ratings report.&#160;</p>
<p>Yes, under Prop 64, employers still have the <a href="http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-drug-testing-marijuana-20161206-story.html" type="external">right to a drug-free workplace</a>. Even medical cannabis users aren’t exempt from workplace drug tests.</p>
<p>You’re right. State economists <a href="http://www.dof.ca.gov/Forecasting/Economics/Major_Regulations/Major_Regulations_Table/documents/20170203FinalMCCPSRIA.pdf" type="external">estimate</a> that&#160;Golden State&#160;farmers produce about 13.5 million pounds of cannabis per year while residents only consume about 2.5 million. That leaves a whooping 11 million pounds of weed that <a href="http://www.dof.ca.gov/Forecasting/Economics/Major_Regulations/Major_Regulations_Table/documents/20170203FinalMCCPSRIA.pdf" type="external">probably</a>&#160;gets shipped to the rest of the country. And even with legalization, economists predict about half of that 2.5 million pounds of cannabis consumed by Californians will still be bought from non-licensed sources.</p>
<p>The effect of California’s legalization on the rest of the country’s pot supply is uncertain. If taxes on legal cannabis are too high, researchers <a href="https://www.fitchratings.com/site/re/902035" type="external">predict</a> that growers and buyers may choose to stay in the untaxed black market, which means, in theory, the out-of-state price of cannabis wouldn’t change.&#160;But, legalization&#160;could also make it a lot harder to grow and sell pot illegally. For example, California’s cannabis cultivation licensing office in the Department of Food and Agriculture is developing a system where anyone can report illegal operations, the San Francisco Chronicle <a href="http://www.sfchronicle.com/news/article/Even-with-legalized-weed-California-s-black-11737954.php" type="external">reports</a>. And some local law enforcement agencies&#160; <a href="http://www.sacbee.com/news/local/article185974313.html" type="external">plan</a>&#160;to use&#160;revenue generated from recreational sales to fund illegal pot busts, which would drive black market prices up.</p>
<p>While there is no physical difference between recreational and medical pot, California’s recreational cannabis will be <a href="http://vig.cdn.sos.ca.gov/2016/general/en/pdf/prop64-title-summ-analysis.pdf" type="external">taxed</a> in three major ways: (1) a 15 percent excise tax on cannabis retail sales; (2) a cannabis cultivation tax of $9.25 per ounce of flowers and $2.75 per ounce of leaves; (3) local and state taxes ranging from about <a href="https://www.fitchratings.com/site/re/902035" type="external">7.75 percent to 9.75 percent</a>. All of this adds up to what <a href="https://www.fitchratings.com/site/pr/1029632" type="external">experts predict</a> will be an effective tax rate of about 45 percent on recreational pot. That’s more than twice as much as Oregon and Alaska tax&#160;their non-medical cannabis.&#160;</p>
<p>California’s medical marijuana patients will have to pay these new taxes as well, but are&#160;exempt from paying any sales tax.&#160;</p>
<p>This will make medical cannabis more expensive, but could ultimately be a good thing for the state of California.</p>
<p>If recreational pot is taxed at a significantly higher rate (making it more expensive) than medical pot and&#160;it’s easy to obtain a medical cannabis card, many consumers would just choose to buy weed in an untaxed, medical market—and the state would miss out on millions of dollars in tax revenue. That <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/recreational-marijuana-washington-state-tax-revenue-2015-7" type="external">happened</a> in Washington following the beginning of retail sales in <a href="https://lcb.wa.gov/mj2015/faqs_i-502#Retail-Stores" type="external">2014</a> (though, in the first year of legalization, the state still raked in&#160; <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/recreational-marijuana-washington-state-tax-revenue-2015-7" type="external">$70 million</a> in tax revenue from legal weed sales).</p>
<p>Other states, like <a href="https://www.colorado.gov/pacific/cdphe/qualifying-medical-conditions-medical-marijuana-registry" type="external">Colorado</a> and <a href="http://www.oregon.gov/OHA/PH/DISEASESCONDITIONS/CHRONICDISEASE/MEDICALMARIJUANAPROGRAM/Pages/Physicians.aspx#role" type="external">Oregon</a>, have chosen to fix this problem by enforcing strict laws&#160;on who can obtain a medical cannabis card. Since California laws <a href="https://ballotpedia.org/Laws_governing_the_initiative_process_in_California#Legislative_tampering" type="external">prevent</a> the state from&#160;making it harder for medical patients to access marijuana, lawmakers decided to tax both markets nearly the same.&#160;&#160;</p>
<p>On January 1, it will still be illegal to drive “ <a href="http://vig.cdn.sos.ca.gov/2016/general/en/pdf/text-proposed-laws.pdf#prop64" type="external">while impaired by marijuana.</a>” However, law enforcement agencies in California haven’t started using pot breathalyzers to enforce that law—yet. That’s because they don’t have a reliable method of measuring how much weed&#160;is&#160;in someone’s system. While most breathalyzers work by measuring a person’s blood alcohol content, or BAC, the compounds found in weed take <a href="http://clinchem.aaccjnls.org/content/59/3/519?ijkey=a927bcbbeb53d8ef57c60ba692526a411dcfa19d&amp;keytype2=tf_ipsecsha" type="external">much longer</a> to dissolve in our bodies, so the same kind of blood test won’t work. Oakland’s&#160;Hound Labs&#160; <a href="https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/Oakland-Company-Develops-Breathalyzer-Test-Marijuana-465180253.html" type="external">is finalizing a breathalyzer</a> that&#160;can measure (in parts per trillion) the amount of THC, an active ingredient in cannabis, on a person’s breath. Still, it’s unclear what the state will set as a legal limit, if anything all.&#160;</p>
<p>In terms of motor vehicle accidents—we don’t really know what the effect of legalization will be on this. Here’s what other states can tell us: In one <a href="http://www.iihs.org/iihs/news/desktopnews/legalizing-recreational-marijuana-is-linked-to-increased-crashes" type="external">study</a> conducted by the&#160;Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, researchers noticed a three percent increase in the number of insurance claims filled for auto collisions following recreational weed legalization in Washington, Colorado, and Oregon, compared to nearby states that did not legalize cannabis. Another <a href="http://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/abs/10.2105/AJPH.2017.303848" type="external">study</a> published in the American Journal of Public Health around the same time found that legalization had no effect on the number of fatal car crashes in Colorado and Washington following legalization. While the two studies may seem to contradict each other, they were actually measuring two different things: the&#160;first measured the number of insurance claims filed and the second measured the number of fatal car crashes. This suggests&#160;that legalization may lead to an increase in only non-fatal crashes. Both studies concede, however, that future research is warranted.&#160;&#160;</p>
<p>First, here’s some background: <a href="http://vig.cdn.sos.ca.gov/2016/general/en/pdf/text-proposed-laws.pdf#prop64" type="external">Prop 64</a>, as passed by voters in 2016,&#160;originally restricted licensed&#160;cannabis farms to one acre in size. That measure, set to expire in 2023, was intended to give small-scale farmers a head start in the new recreational market. Last month, however, a set of <a href="https://static.cdfa.ca.gov/MCCP/document/Proposed%20Emergency%20Regulations%20Final_12.12.17.pdf" type="external">emergency regulations</a> issued by the state changed that. The new regulations now&#160;allow farmers to seek an <a href="http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-pot-rules-20171117-story.html" type="external">unlimited</a> number of small-farm licenses, beginning in January 2018—opening the market to Big Ag.</p>
<p>“California only has one chance to get this right, and it is already on the wrong path with this last-minute change that flies in the face of what the backers of Prop. 64 promised,”&#160; Hezekiah Allen, executive director of the <a href="http://www.calgrowersassociation.org/" type="external">California Growers Association</a>, a group that lobbies for cannabis farmers,&#160; <a href="http://www.latimes.com/politics/essential/la-pol-ca-essential-politics-updates-lawmakers-pot-growers-say-california-s-1513626513-htmlstory.html" type="external">told</a> the LA Times earlier this month. “This single decision will hand over the California marketplace to multinational corporations and a wealthy few at the expense of thousands of growers who are&#160;ready to&#160;play by the rules and provide&#160;economic opportunity in communities that until recently were criminalized or—at the very least—marginalized.”</p>
<p>Still, all cannabis grown in California will subject to the same quality standards as small-scale growers. If you do wish to support small business, we recommend asking your local budtenders (the folks who work at pot shops) about which farms to support.&#160;&#160;</p>
<p>Yup, but only CBD-infused ice cream (CBD is a non-psychoactive chemical found in hemp). For people with a medical card, THC-infused ice cream has been around for years (Ben &amp; Jerry’s founders even <a href="http://time.com/3731728/ben-jerrys-founders-think-pot-ice-cream-makes-sense/" type="external">considered</a> making pot ice cream in 2015), but in 2018, that <a href="https://www.cdph.ca.gov/Programs/OLS/CDPH%20Document%20Library/DPH-17-010E_TEXT_FINAL-ADA.pdf" type="external">won’t be the case</a>. There are places, however, that sell THC-infused goodies including cookies, brownies, candy, <a href="http://www.7x7.com/new-marijuana-infused-cold-brew-uses-ritual-coffee-beans-2219330114.html" type="external">coffee</a>, nuts, teas, granola, potato chips, olive oil, butter, peanut butter, and <a href="https://www.shape.com/healthy-eating/healthy-drinks/cannabis-infused-sparkling-water" type="external">water</a>.</p>
<p>In states that&#160;already&#160;have legalized pot, the market for edibles is <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/mikemontgomery/2017/07/19/edibles-are-the-next-big-thing-for-pot-entrepreneurs/#73c17561576b" type="external">booming</a>&#160;as more non-smokers get into cannabis. Across Washington, Colorado, and Oregon, edibles ranked third in terms of market share (after <a href="https://www.leafly.com/news/cannabis-101/5-differences-between-cannabis-concentrates-and-flower" type="external">flowers and concentrated cannabis products</a>), with 12 percent of the $2.33 billion weed market across all three states, according to cannabis market research group <a href="http://www.bdsanalytics.com/edibles-2/" type="external">BDS Analytics</a>.&#160;</p>
<p>Image credit: kazatin/Getty</p> | A Quick Guide to Legal Pot in California | true | https://motherjones.com/politics/2017/12/a-quick-guide-to-legal-pot-in-california/ | 2017-12-26 | 4 |
<p>Harley-Davidson CEO Matt Levatich on President Trump's tax plan, the outlook for demand, sales and the company's expanding line of motorcycles.</p>
<p>Harley-Davidson (NYSE:HOG) is closely watching developments in Washington, D.C., as President Donald Trump and Republicans in Congress seek major reforms to corporate taxes.</p>
<p>Continue Reading Below</p>
<p>Executives from the motorcycle maker traveled to the White House last week to meet with President Trump, Vice President Mike Pence and administration officials. Harley-Davidson CEO Matt Levatich said the president wanted to get the company’s input on the issues, from tax reform to trade.</p>
<p>“It was a great meeting, mostly because of the way the president and the administration really engaged with us on issues of importance to great American manufacturers like Harley,” Levatich said Wednesday during interview on the FOX Business Network’s “Mornings with Maria.”</p>
<p>“They really listened. They want to hear what we have to say because, as you can imagine, there are a lot of complicated things to figure out, whether it’s tax reform or trade issues.”</p>
<p>Levatich said a tax cut—possibly to 20%—would allow Harley-Davidson to reinvest in its business. The Milwaukee-based company pays an effective tax rate of around 35%, matching the current federal rate.</p>
<p>The company also stands to benefit from the potential border adjustment to the tax code, which is being debated on Capitol Hill and would exempt U.S. corporate export revenues from tax, but at the same time prevent companies from deducting the cost of imported goods and services. Some retailers, car dealers and oil refiners – who depend heavily on imports—argue this would force them to hike prices.</p>
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<p>On the other hand, domestic manufacturers—especially companies that export goods from the U.S.—stand to benefit from such a tax. Harley-Davidson has faced stiff competition in the U.S. from Japanese competitors that offer lower-priced models.</p>
<p>“Harley has been heavily invested in American manufacturing since day one, and we’re a great representation of American manufacturing,” Levatich said.</p>
<p>Harley-Davidson is also struggling to jumpstart demand at home, where the company’s core customers are getting older. During an earnings call last week, Levatich said Harley-Davidson will <a href="" type="internal">invest in a long-term strategy to “build the next generation of Harley-Davidson.”</a> The company has already increased sales to young adults, women, African-Americans and Hispanics.</p>
<p>Over the next five years, Harley-Davidson plans to launch 50 new bikes that make a significant impact on the market.</p>
<p>“Fifty is just a number,” but “what matters is what they say” to existing riders, new riders and potential customers who are interested in switching to Harley-Davidson from a competing brand, Levatich said.</p> | Harley-Davidson CEO on Trump Meeting, Corporate Tax Reform | true | http://foxbusiness.com/markets/2017/02/08/harley-davidson-ceo-on-trump-meeting-corporate-tax-reform.html | 2017-02-08 | 0 |
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