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DEPARTMENT STORE MANNEQUINS Changed to Give Nazi Salute…Shoppers Ignore | Is this a case of the left protesting again by doing something so childish? This smells like the left. Calling conservatives Nazis is their latest attempt at using Alinsky tactics to pick a target and attack it. The department store is looking at the camera footage to see who did this.A row of mannequins inside a North Carolina department store were rearranged over the weekend to make it look like they were giving a Nazi salute.A TACTIC OF THE LEFT?A customer spotted the mannequins at Belk department store in Cary, just outside Raleigh, on Sunday after a deadly white supremacist rally was held in the neighboring state of Virginia. The angry shopper posted a photo of the mannequins on Facebook, saying a number of people refused to do anything when they spotted the outstretched arms reminiscent of the Nazi salute.Belk told ABC the store was reviewing its surveillance footage. The department store said they had spotted the customer on surveillance video who took a photo of the mannequins before going along and taking the arms down. Smells like the left Read more: Daily Mail | 1real |
The Beat, and the Bug Spray, Go On in South Beach Despite Zika Threat - The New York Times | MIAMI BEACH — Michal Keren David stood alone amid the confectionery swirl that draws millions to the adult playground of South Beach, clutching not a minty mojito or even a ubiquitous cellphone, but one of the very latest symbols of life here: mosquito repellent. As she spritzed herself next to a sidewalk cafe on Lincoln Road, Ms. David lamented her ill timing. Just Friday morning, as she headed to fly out of New York, bound for a weekend in Miami, she said she learned the latest news about Zika. The virus, which can cause birth defects in fetuses, had found a new, albeit small, home on South Beach. Ordinarily, she said, she might have simply shrugged off the news. “I’m thinking of trying to get pregnant in the next month,” said Ms. David, 32. “We thought maybe about canceling, but we also thought we have to live our lives. This will get to New York City, too. It will be all over the place. ” On Friday, this rollicking southern slice of Miami Beach, a place long accustomed to boom and bust, downtrodden and glamorous, became the second official target zone of the mosquito, Aedes aegypti, in the continental United States. The discovery forced the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to advise pregnant women not to venture into a 1. area from Eighth to 28th Streets on one side and from the beach to the Intracoastal Waterway on the other. But federal health officials also warned them to consider postponing travel anywhere in County. As local government and tourism officials emphasized that the safety of residents, workers and guests came first, it was hard to sidestep the obvious: Would tourists stay away from the island’s alluring beaches, hip hotels and clubs? And if they did, what would it mean for the economy of Miami Beach — the superstar of the county’s $36 billion tourism industry? “As we said before, we will do everything in our power so that people feel safe,” said Miami Beach’s mayor, Philip Levine, stressing that “Miami Beach is having a record summer. ” From one moment to the next, a new protocol has taken root, one gleaned from the lessons learned in Wynwood, the small arts district across the bay that became the virus’s first hub of active transmission in the continental United States. Wynwood has suffered a sharp decline in business. Some hotels here began to slip Zika information sheets under the doors of the guest rooms. Bartenders offered patrons cans of repellent along with their shaken martinis. Electric fans, already in use to soften the suffocating heat and humidity, were cranked up high, all the easier to thwart Aedes aegypti mosquitoes. At Meat Market, a steakhouse on Lincoln Road, a teeming pedestrian mall, citronella candles quickly appeared under a row of outdoor tables on Friday moments after the news broke. Employees were asked to wear bug spray until repellent wristbands arrived. “We never really have a lot of mosquitoes,” said David Tornek, the restaurant’s chief executive, who said he hoped the problem was fleeting. He paused and added, “You hope that people look at this rationally. ” The reaction from tourists here, many of them from Europe and Latin America, seemed to swing from panicked to nonchalant. As she sat on a patch of artificial turf eating pizza and watching her son play paddle ball, Vania Acosta — who is Cuban by way of Naples, Italy, and is visiting South Beach with family — said she quickly became paranoid. “I bought 40 cans of bug spray,” Ms. Acosta said, a turban atop her head. “I am spraying repellent in my room, in my house, right here. What worries me is that they don’t know enough about it. When I heard yesterday, I wanted to leave. ” But she is staying it is too complicated to leave. And, she said, she is enamored of the South Beach vibe, a mix of ethnicities and lifestyles, where women stride past Doc Martens lovers, all to the murmur of palm trees and foreign languages. “Like the woman I saw wearing a long black and a white wedding veil,” she said. “I love it here I love the people here. ” Strolling past Art Deco hotels on Ocean Drive, South Beach’s most crowded stretch, Lorenzo Villa, 24, a graduate student at West Virginia University who arrived Friday morning for a week’s vacation, made one accommodation: He bought bug repellent. Beyond that, he expects his vacation will be worry free. “Honestly, I don’t think it’s an issue,” said Mr. Villa, who was born in Argentina and grew up in Annapolis, Md. “I don’t see any mosquitoes. Maybe it’s only a problem if there’s a big swarm. I’m pretty chill. ” There are mosquitoes on Miami Beach, but, with its strong breezes and saltwater barriers, the chain of islands is less hospitable to mosquitoes than other parts of the county. But it is also dense, with plenty of old buildings full of nooks and crannies. The city is also hampered in turning to a tactic that helped Wynwood reduce its population of aegypti: the aerial spraying of Naled. The area, with its beaches, ocean and buildings, is not suited for it, county officials said. Getting tourists to comply with rules, though, will not be easy. People come here to escape obligations and to strip down to the bare essentials. Long sleeves and admonishments are not really welcome. Sex, though, is often on a list, raising concerns that the virus will spread through sexual transmission. For the most part, those visitors who are not pregnant or pondering pregnancy seemed unfazed and . “There is always something going on,” said Yesenia Medina, 40, a respiratory therapist from Miami who sat at an outdoor bar, Campton Yard, which had installed automatic insecticide misters even before the Zika scare. “Now it’s Zika, and last month, it was something else. ” But, with a laugh, Ms. Medina said she heard a rescue plan was in the works. “Donald Trump is building a net over the beach, and he’s getting the mosquitoes to pay for it,” she said, riffing on the Republican presidential nominee’s plan to erect a wall on the Southern border and have Mexico pay for it. As the sun inched below the horizon and a moon glinted over the ocean, Claudia Iraheta, 21, a hostess, stood nearby at the Penguin Hotel cafe, cradling menus over her pronounced belly. The Zika virus is no casual concern for her. She is five months pregnant. “It’s a baby girl,” she said happily. Friday, she said, was an especially long and worrisome day. She thought twice about going to work, where she stands outside promoting the cafe to . “I was scared, paranoid,” said Ms. Iraheta, who moved to Miami from El Salvador a decade ago. But work is work, so she slathered on mosquito repellent and put on long pants, despite the sweltering heat. On Monday, she will head to the doctor to be tested for the virus. She says she does not think she has been exposed. “In the name of God, I hope not,” Ms. Iraheta said. | 0fake |
Comment on Lemmings and Republicans – Alan Ned Sabrosky by Debbie Menon | Democrats should ask Clinton to step aside ‹ › Since 2011, VNN has operated as part of the Veterans Today Network ; a group that operates over 50 plus media, information and service online sites for U.S. Military Veterans. Lemmings and Republicans – Alan Ned Sabrosky By VNN on November 1, 2016 So why are so many Republican leaders doing all they can do to diminish Trump and give the election to Clinton ? Donald Trump’s Triumph Forces GOP Party Leaders to Make a Decision – Loyalty Pledge
For conservatives and Republicans, a win by Hillary Clinton in November would be a catastrophe — and not just because people like Miley Cyrus and Al Sharpton would not leave the country. Lemmings who vow to leave the U.S. if Trump Wins
It would mean continued assaults on the 1st and 2nd Amendments, especially the latter. Higher taxes and more welfare. More war — Hillary Clinton’s defense secretary-in-waiting, Michelle Flournoy, has openly said as much. And it would mean her appointment of at least one justice to the US Supreme Court, and perhaps as many as four, creating a liberal block of five to seven justices that will put its stamp on the country for a generation or more. Lemmings
So why are so many Republican leaders doing all they can do to diminish Trump and give the election to Clinton, either attacking him openly or withholding support from him? Sure, Trump’s style is often abrasive, and he is a bully, and most importantly to professional politicians, he made fools of the Republican establishment by trashing their best efforts to defeat him.
But all of that has happened earlier, and the party’s leadership have generally rallied around their chosen candidate. So none of the above ought to make so many of the Republican Party’s “leaders” act like lemmings running around in search of a cliff, jeopardizing everything their party has stood for by enhancing Clinton’s prospects.
This type of internal division happened significantly only twice before. In 1860, the Democrats split so badly that the two factions each ran a candidate for president.
The Republican candidate – Abraham Lincoln – won by default, and the outcome was a bloody civil war and poisoned internal relations.
In 1964, the Republican establishment largely rejected their candidate – Barry Goldwater. This gave Lyndon Johnson a win, and America? – well, America got a horribly escalated war in Vietnam we eventually lost, and an even worse “war on poverty” that created a huge welfare class and effectively dismantled the black family.
These precedents are not exactly classified secrets, but much of the Republican “leadership” persists in self-destructive behavior. This is because today, there is one unspoken issue that sets Trump apart from Hillary Clinton, and in opposition to all of the other Republican candidates at the start of the primary season — and, oddly enough, aligns him with Bernie Sanders.
This is that he cannot be counted on to go to war with Iran as soon as possible, which is what Israel wants and what its lobby in the US — AIPAC ( American Israel Public Affairs Committee, the self-described owner of Capitol Hill ) – uses as the litmus test for the legitimacy of a candidate in this election.
Thus, in obedience to AIPAC, many in the Republican establishment throw their core interests to the wind and in effect serve Hillary Clinton. This was especially evident in the open letter signed by many self-described Republican national security experts declaring Trump unfit for the presidency.
Left unsaid in it was that most are Jewish; many have dual Israeli citizenship; all put Israel first; all have been architects of one or more of our “lovely” Middle East wars since 2001; and all want the US to attack Iran, alone or in concert with Israel. Architects of Endless “Regime Change” wars
This ought to give some idea of the sort of debacle awaiting us after the November elections. When the smoke clears, unless Hillary Clinton’s many scandals surface soon and dramatically, perhaps the Republican Party (or whatever remains of it) will replace the elephant with the lemming as the party symbol. I’m just not sure either deserves that fate. | 1real |
ANGRY COMMENTATOR THREATENS TRUMP: “Government’s gonna kill this guy” [Video] | Wow! Open threats that government will kill the president had to be clarified by Jake Tapper. BUT Please listen to this unhinged commentator on CNN and tell us the Deep State doesn t exist:I found the actual for video You guys decide if this is okay or not. Change agents=threats. Words like this on National TV is not right. pic.twitter.com/dQKksW47ef Bobby Axelrod (@SirBobbyAxelrod) August 10, 2017These CNN commentators were discussing the fact that Putin fired embassy employees in Russia. We reported (see video below) that President Trump said it s fine that Putin fired the employees because it saves the U.S. money. These loose cannons went ballistic and said that government will kill him. Even if it s not literally to kill, it s still a very threatening message! The entire commentary is disturbing!Here s what the panel was referring to: This is priceless! President Trump just gave the best response ever to a reporter s question! He said he wanted to thank Russian President Vladimir Putin for reducing his payroll by firing U.S. embassy staff in Moscow. Hysterical and so quick! Watch how Trump doesn t skip a beat with his response:After Sanctions on Russia were put in place in July, Putin ordered 755 embassy personnel out of Russia.President Trump was asked today during a press conference what he thought of the firing. His response was quick and decisive. He said he wanted to thank Putin for the firing: No. I want to thank him, because we re trying to cut down on payroll. And as far as I m concerned, I m very thankful that he let go of a large number of people because now we have a smaller payroll. He continued: There s no real reason for them to go back. So I greatly appreciate the fact that they have been able to cut our payroll for the United States. We ll save a lot of money. THE TRUTH IS THAT THE CNN PANEL KNOWS NOTHING! THE TRUTH IS THAT MOST OF THESE EMPLOYEES ARE RUSSIAN!SOURCE: BBC | 1real |
WATCH HILLARY SQUIRM When Mainstream Media Asks If She Plans To Watch “13 Hours” Movie | Hillary was too busy to be bothered with making Benghazi a safer place for Ambassador Stevens, so it should really come as no surprise that she s too busy to watch 13 HOURS, the true story of Benghazi. By the way, whoever told Hillary that calling the families of the four men killed in Benghazi liars, just as the true story of what really happened under her watch is coming out in theaters nationwide, should be fired One of the enduring mysteries of the Benghazi tragedy is why anyone ever took seriously Hillary Clinton s blaming some obscure maker of a YouTube video for the attack. That mystery, however, is dwarfed by the way the media try to pretend that Hillary s denials of that happening are anything other than bald-faced (that bald-face would be pasty white, wrinkled, and bewhiskered). In testimony elicited by the Benghazi Committee and in released emails, it has become apparent that no one ever thought the video was to blame and Clinton has, herself, attempted to claim that she never blamed the video.Now there is a new wrinkle to the story. Hillary told the families that the video was the cause of the attack that led to the deaths of their family members. Now she is saying they are lying.First, there is her statement when she, shamelessly, stood in the hangar at Dover AFB as the bodies of the dead men returned home:CLINTON: Many others from across the Middle East and North Africa have offered similar sentiments.This has been a difficult week for the State Department and for our country. We ve seen the heavy assault on our post in Benghazi that took the lives of those brave men. We ve seen rage and violence directed at American embassies over an awful Internet video that we had nothing to do with.Then we have the families themselves:Transcript via TownhallTyrone Woods father (who took notes about their meeting): I gave Hillary a hug and shook her hand. And she said we are going to have the film maker arrested who was responsible for the death of my son She said the filmmaker who was responsible for the death of your son Sean Smith s mother: She s absolutely lying. She told me something entirely different at the casket ceremony. She said it was because of the video. Sean Smith s uncle: Mrs. Clinton really has a problem embracing the truth. Glen Doherty s sister: When I think back now to that day and what she knew, it shows me a lot about her character that she would choose in that moment to basically perpetuate what she knew was untrue. On ABC s This Week, Clinton family retainer, George Stephanopoulos, revisited the issue I have no idea why other than some misbegotten effort to set the record straight and got this response:https://youtu.be/jAUDS-aLGjISTEPHANOPOULOS: Did you tell them it was about the film? And what s your response?CLINTON: No. You know, look I understand the continuing grief at the loss that parents experienced with the loss of these four brave Americans. And I did testify, as you know, for 11 hours. And I answered all of these questions. Now, I can t I can t help it the people think there has to be something else there. I said very clearly there had been a terrorist group, uh, that had taken responsibility on Facebook, um, between the time that, uh, I you know, when I talked to my daughter, that was the latest information; we were, uh, giving it credibility. And then we learned the next day it wasn t true. In fact, they retracted it. This was a fast-moving series of events in the fog of war and I think most Americans understand that.So we have Hillary blaming the video at the arrival of the caskets. We have all four families agreeing that they were told it was a video. We have Hillary on record blaming the video in the week after the attack. And now she says it never happened.This woman is a pathological liar. The sad thing is that she could probably pass a lie detector test. Via: Red State | 1real |
JPMorgan passes up chance to counter Sanders' criticism | NEW YORK (Reuters) - JPMorgan Chase & Co has been lambasted by Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, but Chief Executive Jamie Dimon opted not to fire back on Wednesday while reviewing quarterly results and taking questions about his latest failure with regulators. “No comment,” Dimon quickly responded on a conference call with reporters when asked about Sanders’ recent statement that JPMorgan was among companies destroying the moral fabric of the nation. Nor was Dimon willing to respond to a follow-up question about the tone of the U.S. presidential campaign. To drive home the refusal, his top communications adviser, Joseph Evangelisti, stepped in and said, “We’re not going to comment on political statements.” Dimon also turned away from the chance to make his case again that JPMorgan’s size is an advantage. In the past he has argued that JPMorgan, the biggest U.S. bank by assets, is good for customers, shareholders and the country because of the stability and efficiency that come with its scale and diverse mix of business. JPMorgan’s earnings came on the same day that federal regulators gave the bank and four other big banks a failing grade for their plans to show that they can be quickly and safely dismantled in bankruptcy. Dimon said JPMorgan will correct its plan. | 0fake |
Four ways to fix American politics | The roots of gridlock will never be addressed until we stop restating the problem and start focusing on the solutions. The good news is that we not only can bridge this political divide; we already are.
It’s not just young revolutionary Bernie Sanders supporters or angry-as-hell Donald Trump fans who want to “change the system.” It’s also the president of the United States of America.
The future we want “will only happen if we fix our politics,” said President Obama in his 2016 State of the Union address. “If we want a better politics, it’s not enough just to change a congressman or change a senator or even change a president. We have to change the system to reflect our better selves.”
But exactly how do we do that? The president did not say. And when William Jefferson Clinton in 1992 and George W. Bush in 2000 expressed the same noble sentiment, they didn’t tell us how either.
Our last three presidents did not tell us because they don’t know. They are products of the system and clearly are not going to reform much less revolutionize it. They have risen to the top of the leadership pyramid by playing the partisan game. Them telling us how to work together would be like an alcoholic telling us how to get sober: He knows everything about the topic except doing it.
On both sides of the aisle, Democrats and Republicans are recognizing that they are in a long-term political marriage that needs help. But even if both donkeys and elephants want to repair their broken relationship, they still need to learn how. The primary causes of dysfunction that Obama identified — the gerrymandering of congressional districts and the tyranny of money in campaigns — are certainly real. But these and other causes will never be effectively addressed unless we stop restating the problem and start focusing on the solutions.
The good news is that we not only can bridge this political divide; in fact, we already are.
I have recently interviewed and profiled dozens of Americans who know how to solve problems across the divide. They are doing so in state legislatures and on Capitol Hill; in living rooms and town halls; between corporations and anti-corporate activists; with police departments and minority communities; and in almost every sector of our society. When diverse groups connect in constructive dialogue, they make progress on issues ranging from criminal justice reform to internet privacy to education reform
Literally dozens of major initiatives have had concrete successes bringing Left and Right together to break down the partisan wall and find common ground. They have succeeded where Capitol Hill has failed. This movement to reunite America is gaining momentum because it starts with four fundamental shifts that are a vital part of fixing our politics.
From Confirming to Learning. Anyone who thinks that political leadership means thinking that whatever we believe is automatically right — and anyone who disagrees with us is wrong — is not part of the solution. Simply confirming what one already knows is not leadership; it is an addiction to being right. The movement to reunite America is redefining leadership to be about learning rather than about being know-it-alls. (Check out , or as examples of this shift.)
From Control to Relationship. Particularly during elections, winning seems to be everything. “Controlling” the Congress and the White House appears to be the goal. But on the day after the election, whoever won or lost must forge a relationship with the opposition. Making relationships across the divide strong and healthy is today the key to accomplishing anything that endures. (Learn more from or the 2000-member ).
From Position-Taking to Problem-Solving. America has a surplus of leaders with rigid positions and a deficit of leaders who solve problems. It’s time to reverse that imbalance. Across the country, a host of problem-solving organizations are gaining ground. (Examples include No Labels in Washington, D.C., to in San Francisco, from in Tallahassee to the in Kansas City.
From Endless Campaigning to Effective Governance. The line between campaigning and governing used to be clear. Campaigns were brief preludes before Election Day, not never-ending tit-for-tat attacks that became a permanent part of civic life. But today campaigning is benefiting from unprecedented levels of investment, and governing is being paralyzed. Fortunately, from the offices of city mayors to state-level initiatives and even on the edges of Capitol Hill, red-blue coalitions are finding common ground on a wide range of policy issues ranging from criminal justice reform to education to defense spending. ( ’s “Next Generation” project, for example, has convened across-the-aisle collaboration in scores of state legislatures.)
So we Americans do know how to work together. But we have to get past the soaring rhetoric from the right and the left about how they alone can “save America.” We have to get down to the real business of learning and applying boundary-crossing skills. If we actually want a “system that reflects our better selves,” let’s start with what works. Let’s take to scale the scores of projects where that is already happening.
Mark Gerzon, president of Mediators Foundation, is the author of “ The Reunited States of America: How We Can Cross the Partisan Divide .” | 0fake |
Kerry says raised Democrat email hack with Russia's Lavrov | VIENTIANE (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said on Tuesday he raised the issue of the hacking of Democratic Party emails in a meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. Lavrov brushed off accusations that Moscow was behind the hacking ahead of the meeting. Kerry also said he would encourage the Philippines to engage in bilateral negotiations with China to resolve their dispute over rival claims in the South China Sea. Kerry is due to travel to the Philippines later on Wednesday, after a two-day visit to Laos, and he will meet President Rodrigo Duterte while there. | 0fake |
Russia-Gate Was All the Rage Across US Media – Where Did it Go and Why? | 21st Century Wire says Russia-gate was pushed by US media outlets everywhere only to disappear after the highly questionable chemical attack in the Idlib province of Syria. The fact is, the media drums over the Trump-Russia story soon fell silent after a US military strike was ordered on the Syrian government s Shayrat Air Base and a Massive Ordnance Air Blast Bomb (MOAB) was dropped on Afghanistan.The US media had been floating the blame Russia meme for months, and even more conveniently during this past 2016 US presidential election cycle, before morphing into the dodgy dossier that included unverified Trump-Russia claims. Now after two neocon approved US military missile strikes in Syria and Afghanistan, the heavily propagandized and unproven Trump-Russian narrative vanished from headline news as soon as war theater increased in the Middle East.More on the story from Consortium News below Consortium News Exclusive: For five months, there was a daily drumbeat on Russia-gate, the sprawling conspiracy theory that Russia had somehow put Donald Trump in the White House, but suddenly the scandal disappeared, notes Robert Parry.By Robert ParryDemocrats, liberals and some progressives might be feeling a little perplexed over what has happened to Russia-gate, the story that pounded Donald Trump every day since his election last November until April 4, that is.On April 4, Trump fully capitulated to the neoconservative bash-Russia narrative amid dubious claims about a chemical attack in Syria. On April 6, Trump fired off 59 Tomahawk missiles at a Syrian airbase; he also restored the neocon demand for regime change in Syria; and he alleged that Russia was possibly complicit in the supposed chemical attack.Since Trump took those actions in accordance with the neocon desires for more regime change in the Middle East and a costly New Cold War with Russia Russia-gate has almost vanished from the news.I did find a little story in the lower right-hand corner of page A12 of Saturday s New York Times about a still-eager Democratic congressman, Mike Quigley of Illinois, who spent a couple of days in Cyprus which attracted his interest because it is a known site for Russian money-laundering, but he seemed to leave more baffled than when he arrived. The more I learn, the more complex, layered and textured I see the Russia issue is and that reinforces the need for professional full-time investigators, Quigley said, suggesting that the investigation s failure to strike oil is not that the holes are dry but that he needs better drill bits.Yet, given all the hype and hullabaloo over Russia-gate, the folks who were led to believe that the vague and amorphous allegations were bigger than Watergate might now be feeling a little used. It appears they may have been sucked into a conspiracy frenzy in which the Establishment exploited their enthusiasm over the scandal in a clever maneuver to bludgeon an out-of-step new President back into line.If that s indeed the case, perhaps the most significant success of the Russia-gate ploy was the ouster of Trump s original National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, who was seen as a key proponent of a New D tente with Russia, and his replacement by General H.R. McMaster, a prot g of neocon favorite, retired Gen. David Petraeus.Consortium News continues here READ MORE TRUMP NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire Trump FilesSUPPORT OUR WORK BY SUBSCRIBING & BECOMING A MEMBER @21WIRE.TV | 1real |
Cher Goes On Yet Another GLORIOUS Twitter Tirade About Flint’s Poisoned Water (TWEETS) | Cher has certainly used her power, money, and influence to help the people who are suffering from their water being poisoned by Michigan s Republican Governor Rick Snyder. She has already gifted water to the residents of Flint, and now she is using her influence on social media to remind the whole world just what a travesty the whole situation is.First, the superstar singer-turned-activist reminded everyone of her own humble beginnings. You see, Cher wasn t always rich and famous. She was, in fact, quite poor, as she reveals in one tweet. However, she also says that no matter how destitute they were, her mother was never afraid to let her drink or bathe in the water flowing from their taps:I remember my mom crying because she couldn't make ends meet,I was sick & she couldn't afford Dr BUT..SHE WAS NEVER AFRAID OF OUR WATER Cher (@cher) January 23, 2016She also posted picture of the water that the residents of Flint had been assured was safe until this scandal broke, and they are nothing short of absolutely horrifying. It looks more like mud than water, and is clearly unsafe. However, considering that Flint s residents are mostly destitute African Americans, we can be assured that their situation didn t matter to the right, white GOP governor Rick Snyder and his emergency management people who made this nightmare a reality.How would U like 2 wake up Tomm & have nothing but water 2 give your kids 2 DRINK,BATHE IN WASH CLOTHES IN pic.twitter.com/lxhkhSAB72 Cher (@cher) January 23, 2016Cher then tweeted a photo of the water running into a washing machine to wash a family s clothing. It is nothing short of deadly, and that is why people are dying and children who have been drinking and bathing in that water have elevated lead levels in their young bloodstreams, which will likely affect them for the rest of their lives.Cher, Flint s own native son Michael Moore, and many other people in positions of power and influence are just as outraged by this as the rest of us. Luckily, they have the money, power, know-how, and resources to actually do something about it. And they are.Hopefully, the next step will be to get this disgusting excuse for a human being and a governor, Rick Snyder, out of office, and into the dustbins of history with other rightfully disgraced politicians.Featured image via Cher Twitter | 1real |
White House biofuels order would include incentives for ethanol: source | (Reuters) - The White House has assured the Renewable Fuels Association that any executive orders changing the U.S. Renewable Fuels Program would include measures to support use of ethanol and biodiesel, according to a source familiar with the discussions between the White House and the trade group. The source, who requested anonymity, said the group was told the executive order could include a long-awaited waiver that would allow E15 gasoline to be sold more easily during summertime months, a review of how the Environmental Protection Agency estimates emissions impacts of biofuels, and support for a congressional tax credit for domestic producers of biodiesel. A White House official did not respond to a request for comment. | 0fake |
Kosovo prosecutor drops extradition case over alleged Turkey coup links | PRISTINA (Reuters) - A Kosovo prosecutor withdrew his bid on Thursday to extradite a Turkish citizen accused by Turkey of being part of a group linked to a failed coup there in 2016, saying Ankara had not provided enough evidence to back the case. Ugur Toksoy was arrested in October at the request of prosecutors in the Turkish region of Hatay, on charges of working for an NGO in Kosovo linked to U.S.-based cleric Fetullah Gulen, whom Ankara accuses of masterminding a failed coup attempt in 2016. The Hatay prosecutors said Toksoy had participated in the attempted coup. Gulen has denied any involvement in the attempted coup. The Kosovo prosecutor told the judge in withdrawing his case that he had asked the Turkish embassy to provide more evidence but had not received any. He said he could start the case again if Turkey sends more evidence. Justice in Kosovo has won with this verdict because there was no evidence for extradition, Toksoy s lawyer Adem Vokshi said after the session was over. If Turkey had proof about him, they would have sent it by now. Toksoy is one of two Kosovo-based Turks named on a Turkish wanted list of 11 people issued by the public prosecutor in Hatay province bordering Syria and seen by Reuters. The others are listed as living in Austria, Thailand, Mauritania, Romania and Lithuania. Gulen-linked schools and foundations have been facing funding problems and closing in the Balkans and elsewhere. Kosovo has refused to close Gulen schools on its soil, while Turkish government-supported schools are also being opened across the country. Turkey remains one of the biggest supporters of Kosovo s independence and its companies run the country s sole airport, own electricity distribution and have won the tenders to build two highways worth around $2 billion. | 0fake |
Donald Trump: 'I'm not flip-flopping' on immigration | Washington (CNN) It's still undecided whether Donald Trump will continue to support forced deportation of millions of undocumented immigrants living in the US, his campaign manager said Sunday. But Trump himself insisted Monday, "I'm not flip-flopping."
"I'm not flip flopping," the Republican presidential nominee told Fox News on the issue Monday. "We want to come up with a fair but firm process. Fair but firm." He did not, however, provide any specifics or elaborate on his position further.
When asked by repeated questioning by CNN's Dana Bash on "State of the Union" on Sunday whether Trump stood behind the idea of a deportation task force, Kellyanne Conway, Trump's new campaign manager, responded, "to be determined."
Conway was responding to reports about what was said in a meeting Trump held on Saturday with a Hispanic advisory council. Sources in the room told BuzzFeed that Trump spoke about a "humane and efficient" way to work with undocumented immigrants in the country currently, which was characterized by BuzzFeed as a way to legalize some and let them stay.
That would stand in sharp contrast with a central theme of the Trump campaign since the beginning, a hardline position on immigration focused on removing people in the country illegally.
Conway disputed that Trump presented a reversal of his position in the meeting.
"So what Donald Trump said yesterday in that meeting ... varied little from what he has said publicly," Conway said. "What he supports is to make sure we enforce the law, that we are respectful of those Americans who are looking for jobs, and that we are fair and humane to those who live among us."
Bash played a clip of Trump speaking about a deportation force last fall, saying it would be done "humanely," repeatedly asking if that was still the position of the campaign or whether Trump was backing off.
That was when Conway responded: "To be determined."
Early Sunday evening the campaign of Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton released a statement scoffing and Trump's potential change of heart on deportation.
"Donald Trump's immigration plan remains the same as it's always been: tear apart families and deport 16 million people from the United States," said campaign chair John Podesta.
Jose Fuentes, a Trump supporter and the former attorney general of Puerto Rico, was at the roundtable with Trump on Saturday, and said he did not walk away with the interpretation that Trump was open to legalization for some undocumented immigrants.
He said it was Trump who brought up the issue of those who are in the US illegally and asked the group to share their ideas on how to deal with them. Fuentes said that Trump used the language of wanting to handle the issue in a "fair," "humane," and "legal" way, but Fuentes said he didn't automatically take that to mean that Trump was going allow some to stay or have legal status.
"He wanted to hear our ideas on how to deal with it. He requested that we put it in writing," Fuentes told CNN. "But that doesn't mean he's going to take them or that he's changed his mind."
Fuentes, who said he was sitting right across the table from Trump, described the Republican nominee's interest in Hispanic issues as "sincere" and said he was "impressed" by Trump's understanding of the different issues important to Hispanic voters of various backgrounds.
Fuentes said he didn't know why some walked away with the idea that Trump would change his position on deportations. He wondered whether it was because Trump seemed to place more emphasis on dealing with the issue than he has before -- that he was willing to hear different ideas and consider them.
"That was very revealing," he said. "That may have caused the wrong impression."
Beyond immigration, Conway on Sunday also reiterated the long-standing Trump campaign position that the candidate won't release his tax returns, saying they are under audit. She said the campaign would not release his 2008 returns that have already exited an audit, either, repeating the message of Trump's former campaign chairman, Paul Manafort.
Conway also was asked about a 2005 comment she made about Clinton, and whether she was disparaging spouses who reconcile after cheating.
But Conway said Sunday she wasn't making a statement about Clinton's marriage.
"We don't need to conflate the two," Conway said, saying the question is about Clinton's leadership and her ability to stand up to enemies in the world.
"Leaders show up where people in need are, and they hear them, and they help them, and you saw that on full display on Friday," Conway said referring to Trump's visit to Louisiana to tour flood damage in Baton Rouge.
She also said former Fox News chief Roger Ailes does not have a "formal or informal" advisory role with the campaign, but said Ailes and Trump speak and are "old friends."
Conway, on "This Week," also answered questions about the campaign's organization. Particularly ongoing criticism about the campaign's structure and seeming lack of infrastructure in swing states.
As Trump's new campaign manager, Conway said she would assess the situation, adding the Republican National Committee would be continuing to help.
"We're working closely with the RNC, whether it's political, data, fundraising," Conway said. "We've got a great relationship with Chairman (Reince) Priebus. Talk to him daily now. And we at the campaign are going to expect Sean Spicer, the director of communications and the chief strategist at the RNC to spend more time with us."
Conway did not say Spicer was formally joining the campaign.
She also addressed Trump's statement last week -- for the first time -- that he has has "regrets" over certain, but unspecified, statements throughout his campaign. Conway was pressed on whether Trump was specifically apologizing for high-profile controversial statements, including disparaging Arizona Sen. John McCain's military record and comments he made about a Gold Star family that spoke at the Democratic convention.
Conway demurred on who specifically Trump was expressing regret to, and said he hasn't made apology calls to individuals.
"He's expressed his regret publicly and said, 'If I have caused you personal pain -- that can include me, that can include you' -- that he regrets that," Conway said. | 0fake |
Man uses Trump victory as excuse to call ex-girlfriend | Man uses Trump victory as excuse to call ex-girlfriend 10-11-16 A MAN has decided the US election result is sufficiently insane to justify calling his ex-girlfriend. Martin Bishop woke up yesterday to news of Donald Trump’s election, and thought it was a solid excuse to call his ex, Donna Sheridan, and ask her what she thought. Bishop said, “I tried to call her after Brexit but I just got her answer machine. “ Today I got through though, which has nothing to do with the fact I’ve got a new number. “ I asked her if everything was OK and if she’d seen the election result and she said she had. Then there was a bit of a silence so I asked her if she’d come across that cordless drill I couldn’t find when I moved out. “ She said she hadn’t, so then I asked her if that dipshit barman she was screwing now even knew what a Black and Decker was and then she hung up on me. “ Fucking Trump.” | 1real |
Bartender Sets Woman On Fire During New Year’s Eve Trick | A bartender in Santa Ana was trying to do a trick to usher in the New Year when he inadvertently set a female customer on fire. [The incident occurred about 30 minutes into the New Year at Lola Gaspar, which is located on the 200 block of West 2nd Street. According to ABC 7, authorities said a bartender poured alcohol onto the bar … and lit it on fire. ” Police said that “the trick quickly backfired, catching a woman’s face and hair on fire. ” The woman was transported to an area hospital, but no word about the extent of her injuries was released. An investigation by Santa Ana police and the Orange County Fire Authority is under way. New Santa Ana reports there were no other injuries. AWR Hawkins is the Second Amendment columnist for Breitbart News and host of “Bullets with AWR Hawkins,” a Breitbart News podcast. He is also the political analyst for Armed American Radio. Follow him on Twitter: @AWRHawkins. Reach him directly at awrhawkins@breitbart. com. | 0fake |
4 Things The New Hampshire Primary Will Tell Us | 4 Things The New Hampshire Primary Will Tell Us
New Hampshire voters go to the polls Tuesday, and they will resolve a lot of questions. Here are four things the first-in-the-nation primary will tell us:
1. How much damage did the last debate do to Marco Rubio?
Rubio came into New Hampshire with a head of steam. He quickly moved into second place in the polls, and there was even some hope he could overtake Donald Trump in the Granite State. But then, the needle got stuck on his talking points in the ABC debate on Saturday, earning him the worst reviews of his — until now — charmed presidential run.
Eager to dispel the perception that he's "a broken record in an empty suit," Rubio's campaign has been denying the debate was a disaster — and lowering expectations. In an interview with NBC on Monday, Rubio seemed to be giving up on his hope of becoming the clear establishment alternative to Trump and Cruz after New Hampshire, saying the race was going to go for a while longer. Few tracking polls were in the field after Saturday's debate, so it's hard to measure whether Rubio's shaky performance hurt him with voters. We'll find out tonight.
He certainly did in Iowa, where his lead disappeared at the end. Trump has said he wasn't even familiar with the term "ground game," but has now invested more in get-out-the-vote infrastructure in New Hampshire. Still, he is relying most on his own popularity — he's called himself "the product" — and his commanding lead in the polls. No poll has shown Trump's big lead in New Hampshire sliding, but New Hampshire voters are famous for making fools of pollsters — and front-runners.
Clinton expects to lose to Bernie Sanders. Tomorrow's results will tell us by how much. Margins matter. Her minuscule victory in Iowa gave her no momentum at all in New Hampshire. So a big, double-digit win for Sanders would give him a huge boost heading into next week's Nevada caucuses, where the Clinton campaign is hoping its union-based "firewall" is still strong.
If she can close the gap in New Hampshire — even by a little — and hold Sanders' lead to single digits, she will be able to boast that she pulled off a little bit of yet another Clinton comeback.
4. How much (or how little) will the GOP field shrink?
Before Saturday's debate, many people were expecting the GOP field post-New Hampshire to be a three-man race — Trump, Ted Cruz and Rubio. But if one or more of the governors place in the top three, or even four, they may refuse to drop out until after South Carolina.
Ohio Gov. John Kasich, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and New Jersey's Chris Christie all say they are going on to South Carolina, but if they don't place in the top tier, their fundraising will evaporate, and there will be tremendous pressure on them to get out. New Hampshire voters could decide how big the GOP field is going forward. | 0fake |
Germany's Free Democrats forfeit demand for large tax relief | BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany s pro-business Free Democrats (FDP) will have to accept smaller income tax cuts than they had previously wanted, their leader said on Tuesday, signaling compromise in discussions with two other parties on forming a new government. FDP leader Christian Lindner said his party would not be able to push for tax relief totaling 30-40 billion euros ($35-46 billion) and will instead seek to get the Greens and the conservatives to accept an abolition of the solidarity tax introduced after reunification in 1990 to support poorer eastern states. | 0fake |
Rescue ship says Libyan coast guard shot at and boarded it, seeking migrants | ROME (Reuters) - A Libyan coast guard vessel fired shots and boarded a humanitarian ship in the Mediterranean on Tuesday, demanding that the migrants on board be handed over to them, a spokesman for the Mission Lifeline charity said. The Libyan man said: This is our territory, said Axel Steier, a spokesman for the German-based charity that performed its first rescues on Tuesday. After a while, they fired shots, he said, probably into the air or sea. No one was wounded. Afterward two Libyans boarded the Lifeline ship to try to persuade them to hand over some 70 migrants they had just taken off a wooden boat in international waters. We told them we don t return migrants to Libya. After a while, they gave up, Steier said. The two men spent about 15 minutes on board, he said. A Libyan coast guard spokesman in Tripoli declined to comment, saying he was seeking information. Italy s coast guard, which coordinates rescues, did not respond to repeated telephone calls. It was the latest incident reported between the Libyan coast guard and humanitarian rescue ships operating off North Africa. Financed, trained and equipped by Italy, the Tripoli-based coastguard is intercepting a growing number of migrant boats. Last month, the Libyan coast guard ordered a Spanish rescue vessel to sail to Tripoli or risk being fired upon, though it later let it go. The worsening security situation has prompted several groups to halt rescue operations, and those who remain tend to patrol further from shore. This year the Libyan coast guard had stopped 16,567 people before they were rescued and taken to Italy, according to the International Organization for Migration. But overall departures are down more than 20 percent and they dropped more than 80 percent in August after an armed group in Sabratha clamped down on smuggling. Italy is counting on the Libyan coast guard together with the Tripoli and municipal governments to put a halt to migrant arrivals from a country that has been torn by civil war and factional fighting since the ouster of Muammar Gaddafi in 2011. The policy has been harshly criticized by humanitarian groups because of the dire conditions of Libya s detention centers and the inhumane treatment of migrants in general in Libya. Despite recent declines in departures, almost 1,000 migrants were rescued on Tuesday. Save the Children s Vos Hestia ship picked up some 750 people in six different rescues, a spokeswoman said, and the Lifeline had more than 200 on board. SOS Mediterranee s Aquarius ship picked up 20 Libyans on Monday. There is no longer any work in Libya and you risk being attacked, a 26-year-old Libyan rescued told members of the SOS crew. It is impossible to live in Libya, it has become too dangerous. | 0fake |
GWU STUDENTS ASK: Is There A Bias Against Conservative Women On Campus? [Video] | Campus Reform partnered with The Network of Enlightened Women (NEW) to ask students at George Washington University what they think of conservative women and whether or not they re treated differently on campus. The answers are disturbing. While the left preaches tolerance, they don t tolerate conservative women AT ALL! People don t respect conservative women is the comment heard over and over You re an idiot The more conservative you come across the more people will be harsh towards you. Liberal Female College Student This goes against everything the left and feminists claim to be for They re exposing themselves as intolerant and hateful. They are what they say they hate ironic, huh?Caroline Hakes is interviewing the students and gives a first-hand account of what it s like to be a conservative female:I grew up in a suburb of Atlanta, an area that is predominantly red, in a Christian, conservative home. I may come from a staunchly conservative family, but anyone who knows me knows my views are my own, although being raised in a home in which hard work and responsibility are expected has surely been a contributing factor to my beliefs.I found my conservative voice in high school, as I realized many of my friends who had come from the same conservative backgrounds as my own were rejecting those views in favor of the flashy rhetoric of the left, especially the third-wave feminist movement. At a surface level, the feminist movement seemed great; who could be against equality for women? What I quickly discovered, however, was that the feminist message of inclusion and advancement did not apply if I did not share their liberal views. I was seeking a community of women who felt left out by the feminist movement in the same way I did. Tweet ThisI am from Georgia s Sixth Congressional District, and if you follow the news, you will remember that Rep. Karen Handel won a close race and became the first woman to represent Georgia from the GOP. As a female conservative, I was thrilled. The growth of female representation in politics is something to be celebrated. Yet the attacks from liberal women would not stop. Why? Handel s a conservative.So, why am I conservative? Certainly not because it s easy or trendy. I believe in putting what is right over what is popular. I support strengthening our military and making it clear to both our allies and enemies that we will defend freedom and democracy throughout the world. I think the First Amendment was first for a reason; guaranteeing that opposing viewpoints may be heard, that different religions may be practiced, and that protests may be safely organized is vital to preserving the dignity of every human being. I believe free markets should prevail and that hard work should be duly rewarded.Finally, I stand behind the idea of putting America first by prioritizing our country s interests, we can set an example to other nations and truly be the beacon of opportunity and freedom our Founders intended to create.Going into my freshman year at George Washington University in Washington, D.C., I was uncertain about what the campus environment would be like for a conservative like myself. While there s no question that my school is overwhelmingly liberal, I ve found a home in the small but strong conservative community on campus.I joined several conservative groups, but I joined the Network of Enlightened Women specifically because I was seeking a community of women who felt left out by the feminist movement in the same way I did. They are witty, kind, passionate, and inspiring. After spending even just an hour with them at our first meeting, I felt empowered by their character and their boldness.Being a part of NeW has made me less timid about expressing my opinions to other students. In the few weeks I have been on campus, I have engaged in intelligent, thoughtful, and civil conversations with my peers who share opposing views. I m proud to be a conservative woman who can hold her own on a liberal campus and discuss her ideas in a constructive manner.While I will always strive to remain civil and understanding, I will never compromise on what I believe. I am proud that people can look at me and say, She s Conservative. | 1real |
U.S., Germany urge China to release jailed activist | BEIJING (Reuters) - The United States and Germany called on China to immediately release a prominent human rights activist who was jailed for eight years on Tuesday for subversion, the harshest sentence passed in a recent crackdown on activism. Wu Gan, a blogger better known by his online name Super Vulgar Butcher , regularly championed sensitive cases of government abuses of power, both online and in street protests. He was detained in May 2015 and charged with subversion. In a separate case, also on Tuesday, rights lawyer Xie Yang avoided criminal punishment despite being found guilty of inciting subversion, because he admitted to his crimes. We call on the Chinese authorities to release Wu immediately, the U.S. and Germany embassies in China said in a joint statement. As Xie has been exempted from punishment, we urge China to allow Xie to resume his professional activities without preconditions and be free of any restrictions. China s Foreign Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment, but Beijing frequently denounces foreign concern about rights cases as an interference in internal affairs and says China is a country with rule of law. Wu, in a statement released by his lawyers late on Tuesday, said he considered the sentence an honor as it proved that he had not become a slave or accomplice to the China s autocracy . I got eight years, but I feel no grief or despair. This was my choice, because opposing autocracy means you are already on the road to jail, Wu said in the statement. I call on the international community to pay attention to China s deteriorating human rights situation, he added. Wu s sentence was the most severe in what rights groups have called an unprecedented attack on rights activists and lawyers, known as the 709 crackdown, which began in full force on July 9, 2015. The hardline approach has shown no sign of softening as President Xi Jinping enters his second five-year term in office, and has drawn widespread concern in Western capitals. Germany has been particularly outspoken, to China s irritation. Speaking at a daily news briefing on Wednesday, Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying expressed displeasure at comments last week by the German ambassador on China s failure to set up a previously agreed upon cyber consultation mechanism. China had, in fact, invited Germany to send representatives to talks, but the Germans kept putting China off, Hua told reporters. China hoped the ambassador stops saying such irresponsible remarks , she added. | 0fake |
Iceland Carbon Dioxide Storage Project Locks Away Gas, and Fast - The New York Times | For years, scientists and others concerned about climate change have been talking about the need for carbon capture and sequestration. That is the term for removing carbon dioxide from, say, a power plant’s smokestack and pumping it deep underground to keep it out of the atmosphere, where it would otherwise contribute to global warming. C. C. S. as the process is known, has had a spotty record so far. While there are some projects being designed or under construction, only one power plant, in Canada, currently captures and stores carbon on a commercial scale (and it has been having problems). Keeping a lot of CO2 out of the atmosphere would require a costly expansion of the technology to many more power plants and other industrial facilities. Among the concerns about sequestration is that carbon dioxide in gaseous or liquid form that is pumped underground might escape back to the atmosphere. So storage sites would have to be monitored, potentially for decades or centuries. But scientists at Earth Observatory at Columbia University and other institutions have come up with a different way to store CO2 that might eliminate that problem. Their approach involves dissolving the gas with water and pumping the resulting mixture — soda water, essentially — down into certain kinds of rocks, where the CO2 reacts with the rock to form a mineral called calcite. By turning the gas into stone, scientists can lock it away permanently. One key to the approach is to find the right kind of rocks. Volcanic rocks called basalts are excellent for this process, because they are rich in calcium, magnesium and iron, which react with CO2. Iceland is practically all basalt, so for several years the researchers and an Icelandic utility have been testing the technology on the island. The project, called CarbFix, uses carbon dioxide that bubbles up naturally with the hot magma that powers a geothermal electrical generating plant 15 miles east of the capital, Reykjavik (Read more about it here). In 2012, they pumped about 250 tons of carbon dioxide, mixed with water, about 1, 500 feet down into porous basalt. The CO2 was laced with a radioactive isotope and there were other compounds in the water that helped the researchers trace its spread into the rock. Early signs were encouraging: Among other things, a submerged pump that was used to obtain samples of the mixture as it spread underground stopped working after a while because it got gummed up by calcite. And now the scientists have reported more authoritative evidence that their technology works, in a paper published in the journal Science. The scientists found that about 95 percent of the carbon dioxide was converted into calcite. And even more important, they wrote, the conversion happened relatively quickly — in less than two years. “It’s beyond all our expectations,” said Edda Aradottir, who manages the project for the utility, Reykjavik Energy. Rapid conversion of the CO2 means that a project would probably have to be monitored for a far shorter time than a more conventional sequestration site. There are still concerns about whether the technology will prove useful in the fight against global warming. For one thing, it would have to be scaled up enormously. For another, a lot of water is needed — 25 tons of it for every ton of CO2 — along with the right kind of rock. But the researchers say that there is enough porous basaltic rock around, including in the ocean floors and along the margins of continents. And siting a sequestration project in or near the ocean could potentially solve the water problem at the same time, as the researchers say seawater would work just fine. | 0fake |
Megyn Kelly Drops The Hammer On Roger Ailes, Details Sexual Harassment By Fox News Boss | The era of Roger Ailes at Fox News is definitely over after this devastating blow.Earlier this month, former Fox News host Gretchen Carlson revealed that she was no longer with the conservative network. As it turns out, she had been fired by Roger Ailes because she refused to have a sexual relationship with him.Her lawsuit alleges that Ailes relentlessly ogled her and treated her like a sexual object in the workplace. She faced constant sexual harassment from Ailes and her male colleagues and when she tried to get the harassment to stop Ailes told her it would all go away if she would just agree to let him have sex with her. She declined, so Ailes fired her from Fox & Friends and moved her to an unpopular time slot with a pay reduction and more work in order to force her to submit to his demand. After she continued to refuse, Ailes fired her from the network entirely. I have strived to empower women and girls throughout my entire career, Carlson said in a statement. Although this was a difficult step to take, I had to stand up for myself and speak out for all women and the next generation of women in the workplace. But other women on Fox News were not as brave as Carlson. They sided with Ailes and threw Carlson under the bus.But the most powerful woman on Fox News is no longer remaining quiet and that is bad news for Ailes.New York Magazine reports that Megyn Kelly has met with attorneys representing the Murdochs, who own Fox, and told them how Roger Ailes sexually harassed her when she was a correspondent for the network.According to two sources briefed on parent company 21st Century Fox s outside probe of the Fox News executive, led by New York based law firm Paul, Weiss, Kelly has told investigators that Ailes made unwanted sexual advances toward her about ten years ago when she was a young correspondent at Fox. Kelly, according to the sources, has described her harassment by Ailes in detail.As New York Magazine notes, this is probably the reason why Kelly had remained silent in the wake of the scandal, waiting for the right time to strike. And if the sources are accurate, Kelly just delivered the death blow to Ailes career with Fox.Ailes has reportedly been given an August 1st deadline to resign or he will be fired for just cause.And Murdoch s attorneys are not done investigating yet so there could be even more revelations to come.Meanwhile, the Paul, Weiss lawyers are attempting to interview former Fox employees who have stories of harassment but haven t spoken because they signed settlements with Ailes s Fox attorney, Dianne Brandi. 21st Century Fox is now waiving the NDAs to allow women to speak.If this report is correct it could spell the end of Roger Ailes at Fox News and that would be a good thing for everyone. Now let s wait and see how many of Ailes female defenders start attacking Megyn Kelly.Featured image via Wikimedia | 1real |
Truck Attack in Nice, France: What We Know, and What We Don’t - The New York Times | The driver of a large white truck mowed down a crowd gathered to watch Bastille Day fireworks in Nice, France, on Thursday night. Scores of people were killed and injured in what the French government has called a terrorist assault, the third major attack on the country in 19 months. • The truck, a refrigeration vehicle rented by the assailant on Monday, sped down the crowded seaside promenade in Nice around 10:45, going about 1. 1 miles eastward. The assailant exchanged gunfire with three police officers before he was shot to death. • At least 84 people were killed — including 10 children and teenagers — and 303 were wounded. Of those wounded, 121 remain in hospitals, 26 of them in intensive care. Foreigners among the dead included three Germans, two Americans, two Tunisians and a Russian. At least three other Americans were injured. • Government officials identified the assailant as Mohamed Lahouaiej Bouhlel, 31, a driver who was raised in northeast Tunisia and who moved to France around 2005. He had a minor criminal record, but he was not in a government database of radicalized militants. Neighbors in his former apartment building described him as a moody and aggressive oddball who never went to the local mosque. • The Islamic State claimed responsibility Saturday morning for the attack, calling Mr. Lahouaiej Bouhlel a “soldier” in its fight against “crusader states. ” But there are no signs that he had direct ties to any terrorist group. • Contrary to initial reports from Nice municipal officials that the truck was full of weapons and explosives, its cargo hold contained a bicycle and eight empty pallets, or stacking platforms. In the cab, police found an automatic 7. pistol, two fake assault rifles, a nonfunctioning grenade, and a cellphone and unspecified documents. • The French president, François Hollande has extended by three months a state of emergency established after the attacks in and around Paris on Nov. 13. It had been scheduled to expire on July 26. • France began three days of national mourning, starting on Saturday. • Mr. Lahouaiej Bouhlel’s motives for the attack, whether he had accomplices, or whether the Islamic State played any direct role. (Its claim of responsibility must be greeted with caution.) • The extent and adequacy of security preparations for the large crowds attending Bastille Day celebrations on Thursday, especially in cities outside Paris, like Nice. There was extensive security in place for the recent Euro 2016 soccer tournament. • Whether France’s intelligence and security agencies are up to the task. On July 5, a parliamentary inquiry examining last year’s attacks found widespread failures in the collection and analysis of information that could have helped prevent those assaults. | 0fake |
Bounce for Australian PM as voters tire of leadership roundabout | SYDNEY (Reuters) - Embattled Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull received an unexpected boost from an opinion poll on Monday that showed voters want their leaders to govern for their full terms rather than the revolving door that has marked Australian politics. Three sitting Australian prime ministers have been ousted by their own parties since 2010, dumped by their colleagues almost as soon as their popularity began to wane. Turnbull has flirted with becoming the latest victim of this syndrome, his popularity flagging ever since he became leader in a party-room coup in September 2015. However, Monday s Fairfax/Ipsos showed that voters had wearied of the national leadership switches, with 71 percent of 1,400 people surveyed saying they disapproved of changing leaders between elections. It came as some relief for Turnbull, whose centre-right coalition government is clinging precariously to power since a citizenship crisis forced his deputy, along with eight other lawmakers, out of parliament because they were dual citizens. The citizenship crisis left Turnbull presiding over a minority government. If there s anyone silly enough to think that they could overthrow Turnbull, I would think this gives them pause for thought, said Rod Tiffen, emeritus professor in government and international relations at Sydney University. But the state of the polls generally is not good news for him, he told Reuters. The government clawed back one key seat on Saturday when Barnaby Joyce, Turnbull s deputy who was forced by the citizenship crisis to recontest his seat, resoundingly won a by-election to regain his place in parliament. However, another crucial by-election looms on Dec. 19 and the crisis continues to distract from Turnbull s attempts at turning the domestic agenda to voter-friendly issues such as tax reform and housing affordability. The Liberal-National coalition lost a 24th straight fortnightly Newspoll, also published on Monday, since Turnbull ousted his predecessor Tony Abbott. Turnbull seized the leadership after Abbott lost 30 consecutive Newspolls and now finds himself under enormous pressure. A poor showing at a state election in Queensland last month, as well as his handling of a vote to legalize same-sex marriage, prompted disgruntled coalition lawmakers to demand that Turnbull quit last week. He has so far stared down the threat and declared he will lead the coalition to the next election, which is due in 2019. Turnbull has also ordered all politicians to disclose the birthplace of their parents and grandparents on Dec. 5 in a bid to end the citizenship crisis. | 0fake |
Trump’s Foundation OPENLY Admits To Corruption, Breaking IRS Rules | Donald Trump s lawbreaking is probably about to get a lot more blatant now that he s going to be in office. After all, he just told the NYT that presidents can t have conflicts of interest and has already used the office of the presidency for personal business. And as it has just been revealed, the Trump foundation openly admits to corruption and breaking IRS rules about self-dealing.In the 2015 tax return for the Trump Foundation, the organization indicates they transferred funds to a disqualified person in the last tax year Trump, a member of his immediate family, or perhaps a business interest and also indicated they engaged in self-dealing in past years.From Mother Jones:Donald Trump s charitable foundation has admitted to violating an IRS ban self-dealing, the Washington Post reported on Tuesday. The rules prohibit leaders of non-profit organizations from using funds to benefit a disqualified person, which can include the president-elect himself, members of his family, or their private business interests.The news comes just days after Trump agreed to pay $25 million to settle several fraud lawsuits related to Trump University.The foundation also indicated yes to a question regarding whether it had engaged in self-dealing in prior years. And yet conservatives think the Clinton Foundation was corrupt?The form doesn t give any specifics about what, exactly, the corrupt money flowing from the foundation to Trump was spent on. However, we do know that in the past it s been spent on settling personal disputes, a Tim Tebow helmet, two paintings of himself, and settlement money. It s possible that the form was referring to any of those events, but it s also possible there is still more to uncover.Many of the people who voted for Trump will be the ones hurt by his administration, which is rapidly showing itself as a corrupt, quid-pro-quo assortment of rich buddies and high-powered business connections looking to make a profit off the back of the little guy. Donald Trump doesn t care about everyday Americans one iota, and he has no intention at all of playing by the rules. He s going to use the White House to make himself richer at every opportunity.Featured image via Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images | 1real |
WATCH MSNBC LIBERAL HACKS Claim Conspiracy Between Trump and Putin On Syria Attack [Video] | Have these two been watching the news?The Russian President has immediately sent his Admiral Grigorovich frigate armed with cruise missiles and a self-defence system from the Black Sea to dock in Syria later. It will pass through the east Mediterranean waters where the USS Ross and USS Porter fired the 59 Tomahawk missiles that pounded Assad s al-Shayrat military airfield near Homs in the early hours of Friday. Bret Baier tweeted out the news: Putin today called it an illegal act of aggression and also ripped up an agreement to avoid mid-air clashes between Russian and US fighter jets over Syria. In the continuing fight back Russian or Syrian planes also bombed the town of Khan Sheikhoun, the scene of Tuesday s horrific chemical gas attack where 80 died, witnesses in the rebel-held area claimed. The US was also branded a partner of ISIS by al-Assad s spokesman, calling the missile strikes reckless and irresponsible and accused Trump of naively falling for a false propaganda campaign about the Idlib Sarin massacre. Today world leaders praised the US strikes and urged Putin to hold urgent talks with Trump to prevent the Syria crisis escalating into a wider world conflict. Nikki Haley says U.S. took a very measured step last night. We are prepared to do more, but we hope that will not be necessary. .@Nikkihaley says U.S. took a very measured step last night. We are prepared to do more, but we hope that will not be necessary. #Syria pic.twitter.com/asNvxTZMUz CSPAN (@cspan) April 7, 2017 French Foreign Minister Jean-Marc Ayrault, speaking alongside German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel, said: We do not want an escalation. We have to stop the hypocrisy. If Russia is acting in good faith it should stop and negotiate . Read more: Daily Mail | 1real |
null | Because the mission is military.
Not energy, agriculture, etc. | 1real |
Security Politics and the Closing of the Open Society | Email
The increasing symbiosis between the political and the leading mainstream media of the Western world implies that, grosso modo, Russia is blamed for having caused this new situation. While Russia is certainly not innocent and it usually does take two to conflict this blame is rather a sign of diminishing capacity (knowledge) and will (economic and intellectual independence and courage) to ask critical questions that now characterise the corporate media.
Defence and security political news coverage, journalistic processing, editing and commentaries have sunk to an intellectual level that is considerably lower than during the first Cold War. The entire field is given low priority by editors. Domestic issues, sports, entertainment, lifestyle etc. have made it to the top.
Out of sync with the globalising world, most media do with 1-2 pages about global affairs out of, say, 40-50 pages and they base this material on the same handful of Western news bureaus.
The double checking of a variety of sources, versatility and multi-perspective coverage are things of the past and we see more uniformity and more subjectivity in the news media coverage than ever.
Add to this that both Russia and NATO countries engage in media management, or propaganda (tax payers footing the bills) which squeezes out comprehensive knowledge and unbiased analyses as well as critical angles on one’s own policies and actions.
Like hot wars, Cold Wars are fought not only on the battle fields but also in the media, about the souls of the citizens. Fearology, therefore, has become a dominant ingredient in this war as well as in the other – equally counterproductive and self-defeating – war, the War On Terror.
The more people are made to fear, the more they submit to surveillance, authoritarian laws, self-censorship etc and turn away from democratic debate and activism – a trend that will eventually lead to the dissolution of democracy itself.
In short, these international trends and tension-increasing confrontations boomerang back on our societies in ways that are as frightening as under-stated in the debate.
To put it crudely: the new Cold War and the War on Terror both have significant, destructive effects on society, diminish its democracy and creativity, narrows the spectrum of opinions and bring us further and further away from the globally desired goals of freedom, democracy and of living in a more peaceful world.
Security politics has come to mean destruction of the core fibres of what was to be secured. Paradoxically, it promotes the closing of the once open society.
In addition, that is, to squandering absurd US $ 1700 billion (or about 30 times the entire UN budget) worldwide on one more destructive, failed war after the other.
These are issues of the greatest importance for humanity’s future, even survival. | 1real |
Donald Trump Finds Himself Playing Catch-Up in All-Important Ohio - The New York Times | COLUMBUS, Ohio — Since the Republican Party’s founding, not one of its nominees has won the White House without carrying Ohio, a most diverse and perennially state. But as Republicans head to Cleveland to nominate Donald J. Trump in two weeks, a convention city chosen with Battleground Ohio much in mind, a vortex of headwinds are rising against Mr. Trump in the state. The barely concealed disdain of Gov. John R. Kasich, a former rival who has not endorsed the presumptive nominee, echoes through the state’s Republican leadership, whose full engagement in the fall campaign will be needed to turn out voters. Images of disunity in Cleveland, where delegates are gathering July in the shadow of local polls showing a majority of Republicans prefer a different nominee, could make it harder for the party to attract activists for the fall campaign. Mr. Trump ignored Ohio for six weeks after clinching the nomination, until a visit last week to coal country, where he spoke to an audience of largely white voters, including some Democrats. It was the group he has performed best with in primaries and polls. But in describing a trade deal during the same visit as a “rape of our country,” his oratory and protectionist policies are turning off other voters, including suburban women and business interests, in a state whose economy depends on global exports. “If you look at the primary and extrapolate, Trump could get of the white working class,” said John C. Green, a political scientist at the University of Akron. That would improve on Mitt Romney’s share of these voters in Ohio in 2012, when the state slipped from his grasp by only 103, 000 votes. “The flip side is Trump’s appeal to white men very well may cost him other kinds of Republican voters,” Mr. Green said. Public polling of Ohio, which has been scant, shows Hillary Clinton with an average lead of about three percentage points. Mrs. Clinton and her supporters are already spending heavily in the state on ads to define Mr. Trump negatively, and last week Mrs. Clinton visited Cincinnati with Senator Elizabeth Warren, who electrified the crowd by mocking Mr. Trump for running a campaign no deeper than the slogans on his “goofy” hats. A recent Quinnipiac Poll of Ohio, showing the race deadlocked, indicated women were moving toward Mrs. Clinton while Mr. Trump’s strength among men was unchanged. Bob Seszko, a school bus mechanic from rural Bellaire, Ohio, said he voted for Senator Bernie Sanders in the Democratic primary but planned to vote for Mr. Trump in November. In the 1980s, he had made good money at a steel plant in the Ohio River Valley — until it closed. “Overseas was selling it cheaper than we could make it, so I lost my job,” he said. “I think Trump’s more sincere than Hillary is. She’s riding on the coattails of her husband. ” Mr. Trump’s appeal to such voters is likely to be strong, especially in the industrial region around Youngstown and Akron. That he has kept the race tight even after weeks of negative news — about his visit to Scotland, his firing of his campaign manager and his congratulating himself after the nightclub shooting in Orlando, Fla. — is a testament to the strength of Mr. Trump’s appeal with his base, as well as the polarization of the electorate. To counter the threat, Mrs. Clinton and her supporters began a barrage of television ads in Ohio and other swing states in May, and for the Fourth of July weekend, they planned a $13 million blitz mostly in Ohio and Florida. Mr. Trump, who is skeptical of TV ads and short on campaign cash, has not bought any general election ads in the state. The first ad supporting him from an outside group, the National Rifle Association, featuring a survivor of the terrorist attacks in Benghazi, Libya, was just rolled out. “I’ve gotten to the point where I feel so much of this is on the Trump campaign,” said Matt Borges, chairman of the Ohio Republican Party. He said Mr. Trump recently called him after reading that Mrs. Clinton was far ahead in hiring field staff members in Ohio. In March, Mr. Borges and other Republican leaders in the state bluntly warned that if Mr. Trump were the nominee, he could not carry their perennially state. “We want to distance ourselves from the kind of rhetoric that Donald Trump is using to divide Americans,” Mr. Borges said at the time. “If Donald Trump is unfortunately our choice and our nominee, it could imperil not only the race for the White House but many other candidates . ” The state’s Republican leaders, who supported their native son Mr. Kasich before his withdrawal from the race, no longer openly scorn Mr. Trump. But they pick their words carefully, withholding full support. “A great many people in Ohio are watching Mr. Trump closely to see if over the weeks and months he will emerge as an individual of presidential stature,” said Brad Sinnott, chairman of the Republican Central Committee of Franklin County, which includes Columbus, the capital. “There is some work to be done. ” Mr. Trump, who has signaled a strategy of outsourcing organizing to the national party, hired a state director only late last month. The Republican National Committee, which promised last year to hire more than 200 field staff members in the state, has about 50 now, and has yet to open its first Ohio office. The Clinton campaign, which declined to say how many staff members it has in Ohio, is also coordinating with state and national Democrats, who collectively have more than 100 people in the field, said Kirstin Alvanitakis, a state party spokeswoman. The Clinton campaign plans to open offices across the state in the coming weeks. Mr. Trump’s appeal helped drive record turnout in the primary in March. “I told him we had a million new Republicans,” Mr. Borges recalled of a conversation he had with Mr. Trump. “He asked, ‘Is that because of me? ’” “I told him yes,” he said. What he did not say is that many Republican primary voters came out to vote against Mr. Trump, who received nearly 36 percent of the vote in the contest, which Mr. Kasich won. “You don’t have a movement without Trump,” Mr. Borges said. | 0fake |
TEACHER QUITS JOB After 5th, 6th Grade Muslim Students Threaten To Behead Her [VIDEO] | You re never to young to commit jihad Teachers at a primary school in Sydney, Australia have been threatened with beheading and other violence from young Islamic students, prompting one of them to quit her job.Students as young as those in Year 5, according to the Daily Telegraph, are making the violent threats and pressuring others to read the Koran at Punchbowl Public School in Sydney.Documents given to the newspaper allege that three staff members have taken a leave of absence owing to stress, received counselling and been awarded compensation after bullying from Islamic students.One female teacher reportedly quit her job after it got too much for her. She claims she quit after receiving death threats to her family from her year 5 and 6 students, with some saying they would behead her.The teacher also said she made numerous complaints back in 2014 about the extraordinary behavior in the class. For example, she said, she was abused by students after she stopped them from hanging a Syrian flag in the classroom.In another example, she claimed she was pushed into a corner by students who began marching around her chanting the Koran.The bullying wasn t restricted to teachers. The woman also reported an incident where children bullied other students by saying that someone had betrayed his religion by not going to Muslim scripture . In another incident, she said a group of boys had stood around a girl and called her horrible names like dog . HeatstreetWATCH here:Meanwhile in Australia Teachers Quit Job After 5th & 6th grade Syrian MUSLIM Students Threaten to Behead them! #NationalTeachersDay pic.twitter.com/tIK9A4boJv Amy Mek (@AmyMek) May 9, 2017Oakland County Undersheriff Michael McCabe said Brodie allegedly told an acquaintance Sept. 4 he was fearful Gorcyca would not rule in his favor in a custody battle with his his ex-wife, Kelsey Dyson. | 1real |
House Republicans Forcing Fetal Tissue Researchers To Reveal Identities Despite Risk Of Violence | Using the long-debunked Planned Parenthood videos that were heavily edited to show the sale of fetal tissue, House Republicans have decided that if they can t punish PP, they would terrorize researchers instead:WASHINGTON A special House committee empaneled to investigate fetal tissue research is preparing to issue 17 subpoenas to medical supply companies and laboratories, seeking the names of researchers, graduate students, laboratory technicians and administrative personnel.The House investigation into how some of the nation s most prestigious universities acquire fetal tissue has prompted charges of intimidation and coercion, escalating a battle that some researchers fear could shut down studies seeking cures for Parkinson s disease, the Zika virus and a host of other conditions.Republicans know full well that the donation of aborted fetal tissue is perfectly legal and vitally necessary to life-saving research. But this is an election year, so they re willfully putting that same life-saving research in jeopardy just to feed red meat to their idiot base.If you listen carefully, you can already hear the so-called pro-life movement flexing their fingers, ready to start typing death threats to any researchers that have their names revealed. But don t call them domestic terrorists! They re just using fear and violence to get their way.Keep in mind, these researchers are literally saving millions of lives by curing diseases and discovering ways to fix traumatic damage to the human body. But once their names are forced into the public square, they will be called murderers and monsters by people who think the height of morality is screaming at teenage girls trying to get rid of their rapist s fetus.Even worse, if Republicans get their way, it s only a matter of time until some crazed, but somehow still responsible, gun owner goes on a rampage and shoots up a research facility to save the murdered babies or some such stupidity. Or maybe someone will just set the lab on fire. Or try to blow it up. The fact that they could be killing the person that cures cancer or destroying the research that could have ended birth defects won t even occur to them.This kind of short-term irresponsibility is all Republicans know how to do anymore. Exposing these people s names to the violent pro-life movement is a recipe for disaster but a surefire way to get votes. But it s not like they ll ever accept responsibility for the consequences, anyway.Featured image via AI archives | 1real |
Trump’s Win Wasn’t Ideological. It Was Brilliant. | Eric Zuesse. Eric Zuesse CNN explained well “5 surprising lessons from Trump’s astonishing win” , and the historic crushing failure of traditional Presidential-year American politics, but it really boils down to one simple fact: In the battleground states, where most of the advertising dollars and get-out-the-vote money was being spent, the Trump organization made use of the Republican-Party organization in those portions of the campaign-operation that benefited from those established contacts and its tried-and-tested methods and techniques, but not in the portions of the campaign-operation that needed to be improved and to function better than in all prior U.S. Presidential elections. The simple fact is that Trump’s understanding of U.S. national politics was transcendent, better even than that of the candidate whom all of the polls during the political primaries showed to be the most preferred by the most people and thus to be able to beat any of the other contestants in a one-on-one electoral choice against any of the others: Bernie Sanders. (See this and this for the evidence on that.) (And if there were any remaining doubt as to why he was, consider this report from Reuters near 3AM on Wednesday November 9th, right after the voting: “U.S. voters want leader to end advantage of rich and powerful – Reuters/Ipsos poll” . For example, this poll of 10,000 people leaving their polling-places showed: “75 percent agree that ‘America needs a strong leader to take the country back from the rich and powerful.’” That had been Bernie Sanders’s message, too. Trump’s campaign brought people like that out to vote.) Sanders may have been right to think that highest net approval-rating is generally the biggest single predictive factor determining a Presidential candidate’s winning the White House (and he had the highest net-approval rating), but he (like his opponent Hillary Clinton) missed the importance of the emotional-intensity factor, which Trump made virtuosic use of . (This can be seen clearly when you look further at the exit-poll results: the actual people who went to the polls — the people sampled in the exit-polling — were fundamentally different from the cross-section of America’s ‘likely voters’ that were sampled in the pre-election polling! Trump trumped all traditional politics. This achievement is simply astounding.) Whereas Sanders failed to recognize that in Democratic Party primaries there was more emotional intensity for the existing, Clinton-Obama, anti-FDR, Democratic Party, than there was for ideological progressivism (FDR’s legacy, which dominated the Democratic Party prior to Bill Clinton’s win in 1992) (and Hillary’s understanding of that turned out to have been correct), and so the incompetent but aristocracy-backed politician Hillary Clinton was able to steal the Democratic Party nomination from him, Trump was able easily to garner the most primary votes in a crowded 17-candidate field and so to become the nominee of one of the two major political Parties and go on to face the incompetent Hillary in the general election. From Bernie Sanders’s standpoint, such a general-election contest, between two candidates both of whom had hugely net-negative approval-ratings, couldn’t have made much political sense, and so he chose to endorse the thief Hillary and become a non-entity in the post-1992 and profoundly corrupt Democratic Party, instead of to found an authentically independent political movement — not political Party but political movement — which would honestly and without partisanship cherry-pick which candidates, from which of the two political Parties, will, on balance, as against the given candidate’s opponent, provide the highest benefit and least harm toward advancing the progressive cause. (That was the only constructive path forward for him after Hillary robbed him.) He chose the stick-in-the-mud route. Sanders opted to become just a cog in an ugly greasy pro-aristocracy machine, the Democratic Party wing of the U.S. aristocracy. After the Republican Party’s nomination was won by Trump (which he did honestly), he went on to build on that success an authentic anti-aristocracy (or ‘anti-Establishment’) movement, beside and outside the Republican Party. His basic anti-aristocracy message remained unchanged, and he, as the Republican nominee, faced the biggest decision-point in his entire campaign: whether now to reach out to the millions of Sanders’s voters (i.e., the largest of all voting-segments) by joining with now Hillary’s — the post-1992, Bill Clinton’s, Democratic Party’s — emphasis upon both race and gender over economic class as what’s posing the biggest barrier to achieving equality of economic opportunity in America (in which case, Trump would have adopted Hillary Clinton’s basic campaign message), or, instead, to stay with his original message that economic class (and the elite’s “corruption” behind that) poses the biggest barrier against achieving “the equal-opportunity society.” Trump — wisely, as it now turns out — chose the latter path (the original Bernie Sanders’ basic message): he was determined to retain the intensity-advantage (the ‘populist’ thrust), so as to be able to bring the largest numbers of voters to the polls on Election Day in the toss-up states and crush his opponent who was looking to win a ‘coalition’ of voting- segments : women, Blacks, Hispanics, Muslims, etcetera. She thought that those people’s personal group-identification would sufficiently surmount any negative feelings they might have regarding her long history of corrupt use of public office to advantage her financial supporters, so that she would beat ‘the bigot’, Donald Trump; she turned out to be wrong . What will be the important consequences of Trump’s win? I, a Bernie Sanders voter, voted for Trump against Hillary, for the reasons that I have earlier stated, describing the consequences that a Trump win would have. (See: “I’m a Bernie Sanders Voter: Here’s Why I’ll Vote Trump ” .) I summed up, on that occasion: Trump is rapidly moving America’s political center in the opposite direction from the direction that Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, and Hillary Clinton, did, which was toward conservatism, away from progressivism: those conservative Democratic Presidents and (now) would-be President, have moved America’s political center considerably toward the right ( the international-corporate agenda ). A President Trump would reverse the political direction that this country has been heading in ever since 1993. If we progressives don’t help Trump to do that, we shall be throwing away the only such opportunity that the U.S. oligarchy (slipped-up and) allowed us to have. A President Hillary Clinton would have the support of almost all congressional Democrats no matter how right-wing her proposals are, and her big-money financial backers will buy enough congressional Republicans to make her the most effective most conservative Democratic President in decades if not centuries. The prospect is chilling. The biggest objection I hear to that from my fellow progressives is: “But think of the people he’ll appoint to the U.S. Supreme Court!” And my answer to that is: “This Is No ‘Cold War’; It’s Far Worse Than That.” Hillary Clinton has been intensely committed to completing Barack Obama’s drive toward nuclear war against Russia, and even the question of the Supreme Court is trivial in comparison to that. Furthermore, as I argued in “I’m a Bernie Sanders Voter: Here’s Why I’ll Vote Trump ” , Trump might actually turn out to be a far more progressive President than he is expected to be. But, even if that turns out not to be the case, Trump is thoroughly committed to halting America’s aggression against Russia: the biggest loser in this Presidential election is George Herbert Walker Bush, the person who in 1990 secretly established the U.S. plan to conquer Russia, which plan every U.S. President since has been carrying out , and Hillary Clinton was expecting to complete that operation. This was thus a historic U.S. election: finally, the U.S. government will turn away from the path toward war against Russia, upon which path the United States has been leading the world ever since 1990. I am shocked, and enormously relieved, at the result — even if Trump turns out to be a bad (i.e., a conservative, the opposite of a progressive) President on all other matters (including the Supreme Court). Even in the worst-case scenario, Trump will be a much better President than would the neoconservative , Hillary Clinton. Thank you, Donald Trump! Without your achievement here, the likely result now would be catastrophic, even worse than what Hillary Clinton did as U.S. Secretary of State . | 1real |
4 Of 8 DETROIT MAYORAL Candidates Are Felons…Two Convicted Of Assault With Intent To Commit Murder: “Black marks on your record show you have lived a little…” | Half of the eight mayoral hopefuls on Detroit s primary ballot next week have been convicted of felony crimes involving drugs, assault or weapons, a Detroit News analysis shows.Three were charged with gun crimes and two for assault with intent to commit murder. Some of the offenses date back decades, the earliest to 1977. The most recent was in 2008.Political consultant Greg Bowens said there are candidates with past hardships in every election cycle. It s not something unique to Detroit or the political arena in general, he said. Black marks on your record show you have lived a little and have overcome some challenges, said Bowens, a former press secretary to Detroit Mayor Dennis Archer and NAACP activist. They (candidates) deserve the opportunity to be heard, but they also deserve to have the kind of scrutiny that comes along with trying to get an important elected position. Tuesday s Detroit mayoral primary election is the first since the city exited bankruptcy in 2014. The field of eight will be narrowed to two who will face off in the fall.Under state election law, convicted felons can vote and run for office as long as they are not incarcerated or guilty of certain fraud-related offenses, or crimes involving a breach of the public trust. The Detroit News reviewed the backgrounds of all the mayoral contenders. Detroit News | 1real |
Virginia governor signs order restoring voting rights for felons | RICHMOND, Va. (Reuters) - Virginia Governor Terry McAuliffe signed an order on Friday restoring the voting rights of more than 200,000 convicted felons who have completed their sentences, in a move that could help the Democratic nominee in November’s presidential election. By using his executive powers, the Democratic governor is circumventing the Republican majority in the state General Assembly. Many of the convicts affected by the order are African-Americans or Latinos, two groups that have voted overwhelmingly for Democratic candidates in the past. “Virginia will no longer build walls and barriers to the ballot box - we will break them down,” McAuliffe said in a message on his Twitter account. Advocates of restoring voting rights say it is a way of promoting racial justice, as African-Americans are convicted of crimes and sent to prison at about twice the rate of the overall U.S. population. Stephen J. Farnsworth, a political analyst at the University of Mary Washington in Fredericksburg, said a majority of the convicted felons who regained their voting rights were likely members of minority groups. Of the 5.8 million Americans banned from voting, 2.2 million are African-American, according to the Sentencing Project, a prison reform advocacy group. In three states - Virginia, Florida and Kentucky - more than a fifth of black residents outside of prison are barred from voting. About 13 percent of the U.S. population is African-American. McAuliffe’s order drew immediate criticism from John Whitbeck, chairman of the Republican Party of Virginia, who said the governor should have excluded those convicted of violent crimes. “His decision to issue a blanket restoration, without regard to the nature of the crimes committed doesn’t speak of mercy. Rather, it speaks of political opportunism,” Whitbeck said in a statement. Nationwide, restoration of voting rights is an issue that has drawn support from both Democrats and Republicans as a way to improve reintegration of prisoners into society. About two dozen states have eased restrictions on felons casting ballots over the past two decades, according to the Sentencing Project. But the move carries political implications as well. Virginia is considered a key swing state in the 2016 election, and the governor’s order could tip the balance in favor of the Democratic candidate who wins the party’s nomination. While Democrat Barack Obama took Virginia both in the 2008 and 2012 elections, Republican presidential candidates have a history of dominance in the state. Before Obama’s victories, Republicans carried Virginia in every presidential election since 1952 except one. In 1964, Democrat Lyndon Johnson won in Virginia as he defeated Barry Goldwater in a national landslide. The governor, who said on Friday Virginia has had some of the most restrictive laws in the country for restoration of voting and civil rights, has made the issue a high priority during his administration. Previous efforts have resulted in the restoration of voting rights to 18,000 Virginians, he said. The order will restore the rights of every Virginia felon who completed his or her sentence and all other requirements as of April 22, affecting 206,000 people immediately, the governor said in a press release. Before the order, Virginia felons would have to petition the governor, who had broad discretion in ruling on any request. | 0fake |
Second House panel approves Obamacare replacement plan | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A Republican plan backed by President Donald Trump to overhaul the U.S. healthcare system passed through a second congressional panel on Thursday, despite controversy among lawmakers, hospitals and insurers about its unknown costs and impact on coverage. The House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee approved the proposal to repeal and replace former President Barack Obama’s “Affordable Care Act” by a vote of 31-23, after debating the draft legislation for more than 24 hours. The plan had been approved early on Thursday by the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee. | 0fake |
Magazine's anti-Trump editorial spurs Republican debate | DES MOINES (Reuters) - An influential conservative magazine’s rejection of Donald Trump’s presidential candidacy triggered a fire storm on Friday, with Republican rivals saying it is validation of what they have been saying all along: that Trump is not a conservative. With Iowa to kick off the Republican search for a presidential candidate with its Feb. 1 caucuses, Trump and his aides reacted with scorn to the editorial in National Review, which was signed by 22 prominent conservative intellectuals. The “Against Trump” editorial by National Review, a New York-based magazine founded in 1955 by famed conservative thinker William F. Buckley Jr., was scathing. “Trump is a philosophically unmoored political opportunist who would trash the broad conservative ideological consensus within the GOP (Republican Party) in favor of a free-floating populism with strong-man overtones,” National Review said. Trump’s opponents in the nomination fight pounced quickly. “I don’t think Donald is running as a movement conservative,” Republican candidate Marco Rubio told Fox News. “I don’t think he’s ever said that. It’s clear he’s not. I mean, what he’s running [as is] someone who’s a populist, who’s upset about the direction of this country.” Republican candidate Jeb Bush told Fox that National Review was “just telling the truth.” “This transformation (to conservative) that he claims he’s done needs to be tested,” Bush said. The Republican National Committee, concerned that the magazine was taking sides, dumped National Review from co-sponsoring a candidates’ debate on Feb. 25 in Houston. The National Review editorial emerged as some establishment Republican figures debate whether Trump is a preferable standard-bearer for the Nov. 8 election instead of the other leader in the Republican race, Texas Senator Ted Cruz. Trump, anxious to put his stamp on the race with a victory in Iowa, tweeted that the National Review is a dying magazine and a ghost of its past. His campaign manager, Corey Lewandowski, said the publication’s conclusion is irrelevant. “The bottom line is nobody cares,” he told CNN. “The average voter in Iowa doesn’t care. The average voter in New Hampshire doesn’t care.” Trump is currently in position to seize control of the race. Polls show he could win not only Iowa’s caucuses, but also New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation primary on Feb. 9, which would put him on a strong path to the presidential nomination. A CNN/ORC poll on Thursday said Trump had taken a solid lead over Cruz in Iowa, with 37 percent to 26 percent for Cruz. Cruz has led other polls in Iowa. Both men will campaign in Iowa on Saturday, the same day that the influential Des Moines Register newspaper will announce its endorsements for the caucuses. Trump’s campaign released a TV ad accusing Cruz of being weak on illegal immigration. “Against Trump” began trending on Twitter in the United States by Friday morning. Most of the response on the social media site was negative toward “National Review,” with several Twitter users expressing dismay over the publication’s decision to criticize the front-runner. “National Review is leading a coalition against Trump,” wrote Jeff Fogle (@jefffogle342). “We the people will get him in office if we push hard. Stick together! We can do it!!!” “Without any sense of self awareness @nro [National Review] ignores [its] attacks on conservatives last 2 cycles,” tweeted Madlaw (@madlaw1071). (Additional reporting by Doina Chiacu in Washington; Editing by Dan Grebler) SAP is the sponsor of this coverage which is independently produced by the staff of Reuters News Agency. | 0fake |
Russian with ties to former Trump aide wants immunity for testimony: NYT | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A Russian oligarch once close to Paul Manafort, President Donald Trump’s former campaign manager, has offered to testify to congressional panels investigating Russian meddling in the 2016 election, but lawmakers are rejecting his conditions, the New York Times reported on Friday, citing congressional officials. The offer by aluminum magnate Oleg Deripaska comes amid growing attention to his ties to Manafort, one of several Trump associates under scrutiny by the Federal Bureau of Investigation over possible collusion with Russia during the presidential campaign. Manafort and Deripaska did business in the mid-2000s, when Manafort, a Republican operative, was providing campaign advice to Ukrainian politicians backed by Moscow, but their relationship later deteriorated, resulting in a lawsuit, the Times said. Representatives for Deripaska in the United States did not respond to the Times’ requests for comment. Manafort has denied any impropriety with his ties to Russia and has turned over documents a Senate intelligence panel had requested. Deripaska, who is close to Russian President Vladimir Putin, recently offered to cooperate with congressional intelligence committees in exchange for full immunity, according to three congressional officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the issue publicly, the Times said. However, the Senate and House panels rejected his offer because of concerns that immunity agreements create complications for federal criminal investigators, the officials said, according to the Times. The congressional investigations into Russian interference in the election is separate from a probe into the matter being led by a special counsel appointed last week by the Justice Department, former FBI Director Robert Mueller. Trump’s administration has been dogged by concerns about its ties to Russia and questions over whether Trump associates may have cooperated with Russians as they sought to meddle in last year’s election on Trump’s behalf. U.S. intelligence agencies concluded in January that Moscow tried to sway the November vote in Trump’s favor. Russia has denied involvement, and Trump has denied any collusion between his campaign and Russia. Controversy has engulfed Trump since he fired FBI Director James Comey on May 9 as Comey oversaw an investigation into possible collusion between his presidential campaign and Russia. | 0fake |
Walker’s anti-union law has labor reeling in Wisconsin | At the old union hall here on a recent afternoon, Terry Magnant sat at the head of a table surrounded by 18 empty chairs. A members meeting had been scheduled to start a half-hour earlier, but the small house, with its cracked walls and loose roof shingles, was lonely and desolate.
“There used to be a lot more people coming,” said Magnant, a 51-year-old nursing assistant, sighing.
The anti-union law passed here four years ago, which made Gov. Scott Walker a national Republican star and a possible presidential candidate, has turned out to be even more transformative than many had predicted.
Walker had vowed that union power would shrink, workers would be judged on their merits, and local governments would save money. Unions had warned that workers would lose benefits and be forced to take on second jobs or find new careers.
Many of those changes came to pass, but the once-thriving public-sector unions were not just shrunken — they were crippled.
Unions representing teachers, professors, trash collectors and other government employees are struggling to stem plummeting membership rolls and retain relevance in the state where they got their start.
Here in King, Magnant and her fellow AFSCME members, workers at a local veterans home, have been knocking on doors on weekends to persuade former members to rejoin. Community college professors in Moraine Park, home to a technical college, are reducing dues from $59 to $36 each month. And those in Milwaukee are planing a campaign using videos and posters to highlight union principles. The theme: “Remember.”
[ Questions linger over Walker’s college exit as he mulls White House bid ]
But recalling the benefits that union membership might have brought before the 2011 law stripped most public-sector unions of their collective-bargaining rights is difficult when workers consider the challenges of the present.
“I don’t see the point of being in a union anymore,” said Dan Anliker, a 34-year-old technology teacher and father of two in Reedsburg, a tiny city about 60 miles northwest of Madison.
The law required most public employees to pay more for health insurance and to pay more into retirement savings, resulting in an 8 to 10 percent drop in take-home pay. To help compensate for the loss, Anliker said he took an additional 10-hour-a-week job.
“Everyone’s on their own island now,” he said. “If you do a good job, everything will take care of itself. The money I’d spend on dues is way more valuable to buy groceries for my family.”
Sean Karsten, a 32-year-old middle and high school reading instructor in his first year of teaching in Reedsburg, said the unions are “just not something I concern myself with.”
“I just look to keep improving my teaching in the best way I can and try to keep my nose out of the other stuff,” he said.
Walker has pointed to the unions’ membership troubles as a victory — presenting himself as a conservative warrior unafraid of taking on big battles against liberal interests.
Walker’s administration has said forcing public employees to contribute more to retirement plans and health insurance helped local governments save $3 billion. The governor also has credited the 2011 law with saving homeowners money on property taxes while giving school districts the ability to make reforms that increased third-grade reading levels and high school graduation rates. And the law has emboldened Republican state lawmakers to further challenge Wisconsin’s labor movement this year by pushing right-to-work legislation that would allow private-sector workers to opt out of paying union dues — a measure Walker has said he would sign.
“We took the power away from the big-government special interests and put it firmly in the hands of the hard-working taxpayers,” Walker told Iowa Republicans recently. “That is what we need more of in this great country. The liberals don’t like that.”
Union officials declined to release precise membership data but confirmed in interviews that enrollment is dramatically lower since the new law was signed in 2011.
The state branch of the National Education Association, once 100,000 strong, has seen its membership drop by a third. The American Federation of Teachers, which organized in the college system, saw a 50 percent decline. The 70,000-person membership in the state employees union has fallen by 70 percent.
The decline is politically significant in Wisconsin, a presidential battleground where the unions have played a central role in Democrats’ get-out-the-vote drives.
John Ahlquist, a University of Wisconsin political scientist who specializes in labor movements, said Walker had “effectively dismantled the financial and organizing structure of unions in Wisconsin.”
“Although it is too early to tell if unions are near the end of their political power here, they are in a very vulnerable position,” Ahlquist said.
The mass protests that gripped the state Capitol have subsided, but anxiety remains high in union halls across Wisconsin.
At Magnant’s meeting in King on a frigid February afternoon, union members finally began trickling in, one by one, filling a few of the empty seats.
A groundskeeper at the veterans home complained that supervisors were no longer assigning overtime based on seniority because “there was no union.” Others complained that there were no longer enough nursing assistants on shifts, while management positions seemed to grow.
“This is what we are trying to live with,” Magnant said. “But we can’t continue like this.”
Dean Johnson burst through door with a big grin on his face. Johnson, 55, told the story of how he felt so bold at work that he yelled “Join the union!” in the middle of the veterans home. A stalwart union supporter, he vowed he’d do anything to keep the movement going.
But Johnson said he could no longer do it as an employee. He told the group he was retiring — prompting a discussion about the new mantra for those choosing to leave union work: “Goodbye tension, hello pension.”
While some union members have been energized by the fight, they say they notice a new, more vocal animosity toward them. It has been particularly pronounced in rural areas, where public-sector jobs were some of the most prized gigs in town.
In King, population 1,700, Magnant said she couldn’t change a sign at the union hall without someone giving her the finger. Farther west, in Stanley, prison workers said they ditched their favorite pizza pub because the owner stood by while other customers called them “leeches.”
In Reedsburg, that tension surprised Ginny Bourgeois, 52, who clerks at a local Kwik Trip. The community had always been divided, defined as much by the factories manufacturing car parts as it was by cornfields now blanketed in snow. Still, it was a place where the community got together for spaghetti and corn feeds and filled bleachers to watch the Reedsburg Beavers play. Now, she said, people were fighting over politics at gas stations.
Still, she felt unions needed to sacrifice.
“Everyone knows teachers’ insurance was some of the best you could get,” Bourgeois added.“They do fairly well around here, and they do a good job teaching. But everyone in this town has had to tighten their belts. They should too.”
Judy Brey, a 58-year-old speech therapist who taught in the community for 22 years, said such sentiment hurt teachers’ morale. She said she grew up admiring her dad, who put six children through college on his union-supported job as a forester. “ ‘I don’t make a lot, but we’ll be okay with retirement,’ ” she said he told her. That, she was taught, was the reward for public service in Wisconsin.
“Now I’m always nervous that everyone will think they’re moochers,” Brey said. “That I’m a moocher.”
While some union members across the state knocked on doors to court members, Brey tried another strategy: finding more allies.
A day before Magnant opened the doors for a meeting at the union house in King, Brey went to a local restaurant to call to order the meeting of the Reedsburg Area Concerned Citizens.
On the top of Brey’s list was deciding guests for a planned panel discussion on the state of public education. Someone raised a hand.
“Are we getting any interest from the schools in this?” one man asked. “I haven’t seen any of the teachers out here since we were marching with them on the streets four years ago.”
At the meeting, the husband of the columnist called Walker “a pig” — which prompted the board supervisor to wonder why he was insulting pigs. They debated whether or not it’s worth it to invite Republicans to the education event, but Brey insisted it’s important to keep things balanced. Eventually, the group agreed.
“We’re getting somewhere,” Brey said as a waitress handed out checks.
But were the unions? Brey vowed not to give up on them. Two days later, she attended a union meeting that had been called to discuss possible changes in teacher retirement. Ten of the district’s 192 teachers had gathered at the meeting. They appreciated that the superintendent had previously met with union leaders even though he didn’t have to. Still, they grew agitated when discussing his proposal to reduce retirement benefits.
Another teacher, Linda Zauner, 58, said she was working to build a case that teachers wanted to keep benefits the same, but she had struggled to get teachers to respond to a survey. She said she wanted to emphasize that teachers still thought of health care as a “bargained right.”
“This is the closest thing we’re going to get to negotiations,” Zauner said.
“You have to be mean,” she said. “We never got anything by being nice. We’ve had to walk out. We got things when we banged our fists on tables.”
“Sometimes I think,” she stopped to collect the words delicately.
“Sometimes, I think, . . . that’s . . . why they came after us, Jenny. Because they thought these teachers were too demanding.”
“No, we have to fight,” Fish responded. “It’s for our students.”
Brey nodded. As long as there were teachers, she said, she’d be fighting along with them. | 0fake |
U.S. House approves disaster funds as Trump criticizes Puerto Rico | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A new package of U.S. disaster assistance sailed through the House of Representatives on Thursday, despite President Donald Trump expressing impatience with having to devote federal resources for hurricane-ravaged Puerto Rico’s recovery. The Republican-controlled House voted 353-69 to approve $36.5 billion in emergency relief for Puerto Rico and other areas hit by recent disasters. Senate approval is expected in coming weeks. Trump and his aides on Thursday suggested that there would be a limit to how much help Puerto Rico could expect from Washington to solve some of its longer-term problems, although Trump is expected to sign the latest emergency package. The White House on Thursday evening issued a statement saying the Trump administration was “pleased” that the House had approved the relief funds and pledged to work with Congress going forward to provide resources to recover and rebuild. Puerto Rico has been grappling with a bankruptcy crisis and owes $72 billion to creditors. Devastation from hurricanes Irma and Maria was exacerbated by dilapidated infrastructure, including a power grid largely destroyed by the storms. In a morning tweet, Trump warned that the United States “cannot keep FEMA, the Military & the First Responders, who have been amazing (under the most difficult circumstances) in P.R. forever!” FEMA is the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which oversees disaster response in the United States. Presidential aides later on Thursday provided assurances that Washington will not abandon Puerto Rico, a Caribbean U.S. territory with a population of 3.4 million. All 69 votes against the aid package came from Trump’s fellow Republicans. Congress is expected to consider additional aid in the coming weeks but the debate could grow more contentious. House Speaker Paul Ryan is scheduled to lead a bipartisan congressional delegation to Puerto Rico on Friday. Some conservatives displayed early signs of spending fatigue. Republican Representative Tom Cole, a senior member of the House Appropriations Committee, said some lawmakers have urged him to find ways to offset the costs of disaster relief. Besides the latest aid package, Congress last month approved $15.25 billion to help with earlier storm damages, including Hurricane Harvey’s impact in Texas, and wildfires. “There is some concern about can we couple some of this (disaster aid) with reform measures,” Cole told Reuters on Wednesday. That could include savings to a national flood insurance program or other steps, he added. Besides helping Puerto Rico recover from Maria, the bill would also provide funds for storm-struck areas of Florida, Texas and the U.S. Virgin Islands, and fire-ravaged California. Cole said the price tag could rise as relief efforts transition from emergency response to rebuilding. Republican Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, which has a sizeable Puerto Rican community, told Reuters he had urged Trump to create a high-level task force to provide advice for rebuilding Puerto Rico, and that the president was receptive to the idea. Much of Puerto Rico remains without electricity or running water three weeks after Maria’s landfall. “They’re basically three weeks now living in the 19th century,” Rubio said. White House Chief of Staff John Kelly told reporters the Trump administration would “stand with those American citizens in Puerto Rico until the job is done.” But Trump’s top legislative aide warned against expecting Washington’s help for long-term infrastructure problems. “The president is committed to helping to make sure that we do what is necessary to help to rebuild the island, but there are some elements that pre-existed the hurricane,” Marc Short said on CNN. The House bill includes $18.7 billion for FEMA’s disaster relief fund. Of that, $4.9 billion is earmarked for loans to local governments to ensure Puerto Rico can keep government programs operating beyond Oct. 31. Other funds include $576.5 million for wildfire control. Some $16 billion would go to help the National Flood Insurance Program cover claims after reaching its borrowing limit. In its statement, the White House said it urged Congress to adopt reforms to the program to ensure its “long-term financial viability.” Democratic Representative Nydia Velazquez of New York, which has a large Puerto Rican community, chastised Trump. “The president of the United States is tweeting out threats to withdraw assistance, that is an outrage, that is an insult,” Velazquez said. | 0fake |
Austria ex-finance minister goes on trial accused of corruption | VIENNA (Reuters) - An Austrian former finance minister went on trial on Tuesday accused of bribery and embezzlement in one of the biggest corruption cases in the country s recent history. Karl-Heinz Grasser and 15 former high-ranking politicians, managers and bankers are charged in connection with the privatization of state housing company Buwog in 2004. Grasser, 48, was one of Austria s most popular politicians and became the country s youngest finance minister in 2000 when he was appointed aged 31 to serve in a coalition between the conservatives and the far right Freedom Party. He is accused of embezzling part of a commission for the sale of 60,000 federal apartments. He denies the accusations and said in a television interview on Monday he was glad the trial was starting so he could prove his innocence. Defense lawyers say the case is politically motivated at a time when conservatives and the far-right are working to form a government to replace a coalition led by social democrats. Investigators spent eight years gathering evidence and working on an indictment that runs for more than 800 pages. It says he under-priced the biggest ever sale of state-owned flats. The tender came down to two bidders and the contract was awarded to a financial consortium that offered just 1 million euros ($1.2 million) more than its competitor. After the sale, millions of euros in commissions flowed to two Grasser associates suggesting insider dealing, according to prosecutors. Grasser, who is married to socialite Fiona Swarovski, the heir of the Swarovski crystal manufacturers, says he is a victim of prejudice from the media and the judiciary. The trial is the latest to stem from the tenure of Chancellor Wolfgang Schuessel who took power in 2000. Others have concerned the telecoms and real estate sectors. The court rejected a petition by Grasser s defense lawyer Manfred Ainedter to remove the chief of the four judges, Marion Hohenecker, due to conflict of interest because of tweets critical of Grasser sent by her husband who is also a judge. | 0fake |
Amazon Deforestation, Once Tamed, Comes Roaring Back - The New York Times | COLONIA BERLIN, Bolivia — A few months ago, a representative from Cargill traveled to this remote colony in Bolivia’s eastern lowlands in the southernmost reaches of the vast Amazon River basin with an enticing offer. The American agricultural giant wanted to buy soybeans from the Mennonite residents, descendants of European peasants who had been carving settlements out of the thick forest for more than 40 years. The company would finance a local warehouse and weighing station so farmers could sell their produce directly to Cargill the man said, according to local residents. One of those farmers, Heinrich Janzen, was clearing woodland from a plot he bought late last year, hustling to get soy in the ground in time for a May harvest. “Cargill wants to buy from us,” said Mr. Janzen, 38, as bluish smoke drifted from heaps of smoldering vegetation. His soy is in demand. Cargill is one of several agricultural traders vying to buy from soy farmers in the region, he said. Cargill confirmed the accounts of colony residents, and said the company was still assessing whether it would source from the community. That decision would depend on a study of the area’s productivity and land titles, said Hugo Krajnc, Cargill’s corporate affairs leader for the Southern Cone, based in Argentina. “But if a farmer has burned down its forest we’ll not source from that grower,” he said. A decade after the “Save the Rainforest” movement forced changes that dramatically slowed deforestation across the Amazon basin, activity is roaring back in some of the biggest expanses of forests in the world. That resurgence, driven by the world’s growing appetite for soy and other agricultural crops, is raising the specter of a backward slide in efforts to preserve biodiversity and fight climate change. In the Brazilian Amazon, the world’s largest rain forest, deforestation rose in 2015 for the first time in nearly a decade, to nearly two million acres from August 2015 to July 2016. That is a jump from about 1. 5 million acres a year earlier and just over 1. 2 million acres the year before that, according to estimates by Brazil’s National Institute for Space Research. Here across the border in Bolivia, where there are fewer restrictions on land clearance, deforestation appears to be accelerating as well. About 865, 000 acres of land have been deforested, on average, annually for agriculture since 2011, according to estimates from the nongovernmental Bolivia Documentation and Information Center, an area nearly the equivalent of Rhode Island in size. That figure has risen from about 366, 000 acres a year, on average, in the 1990s and 667, 000 acres a year in the 2000s. Now, a new study by an environmental advocacy group points to fresh indications of by Bolivian and Brazilian farmers who trade soybeans with Cargill. That organization, Mighty Earth, used satellite imaging and mapping information from the Stockholm Environment Institute, an environmental think tank, to identify deforestation in Brazil where two food giants, Cargill and Bunge, are the only known agricultural traders. The mapping by the environmental institute uses customs, shipment and storage data, as well as production data from Brazilian municipalities to trace agricultural exports back to producers. According to Mighty Earth’s analysis, the Brazilian savanna areas in which Cargill operates, a region called the Cerrado, saw more than 321, 000 acres of deforestation between 2011 and 2015. Mighty Earth also linked Bunge, the other agricultural giant, to more than 1. 4 million acres from 2011 to 2015. In Bolivia, where mapping is not available, Mighty Earth sent employees to areas where Cargill operates. The organization used drones to record the clearing of forests and savannas in areas where Cargill operates silos. The study was funded by the Norwegian Agency for Development Cooperation and a nongovernmental organization, Rainforest Foundation Norway. A reporter for The New York Times independently traveled to remote areas of Bolivia described in the environmentalists’ report and interviewed farmers engaged in deforestation who said they sold soy to Cargill. The farmers described what they called Cargill’s push to increase its purchases of locally produced soy and its attempts to enhance bonds with local producers. The reports of fresh deforestation come despite a landmark deal signed three years ago by Cargill and other companies that included a target of “eliminating deforestation from the production of agricultural commodities like palm oil, soy and beef products by 2020. ” Experts at the time said the deadline, laid out in the New York Declaration of Forests, would require companies to start straightaway to make their sourcing more sustainable. Both Cargill and Bunge said the report seemed to inflate its role in the region’s deforestation. Cargill’s share of soy in the Bolivia municipalities in which it operates came to about 8 percent, Cargill said. Meanwhile, in Brazil’s Matopiba region, Bunge’s share was about 20 percent, the company said. And soy is just one crop behind deforestation, said Stewart Lindsay, Bunge’s vice president for global corporate affairs. “One company alone cannot solve this issue,” Mr. Lindsay said. “A positive step would be for more companies to adopt zero deforestation commitments, apply controls to block crops grown in illegally cleared areas from entering their supply chains, report publicly on progress and invest millions of dollars to support sustainable land use planning efforts, all of which Bunge has done. ” (Bunge, however, is not a signatory to the New York Declaration of Forests.) In an interview, Cargill chief executive David MacLennan said the company was studying the allegations of deforestation in Bolivia and Brazil linked to the company. “If there’s something there, if it’s substantiated, we’ll do something about it,” Mr. MacLennan said. “If that’s accurate, it’s not acceptable. “We’re going to honor our obligations and our commitments,” he continued. “We’ve committed to ending deforestation and to do our part in ending deforestation. Our word is our bond. ” Forest loss is detrimental to the earth’s climate. The clearing of woodlands and the fires that accompany it generate of all global warming emissions, according to the Union of Concerned Scientists, making the loss of forests one of the biggest single contributors to climate change. Only about 15 percent of the world’s forest cover remains intact, according to the World Resources Institute. The rest has been cleared, degraded or is in fragments, wiping out ecosystems and displacing indigenous communities, scientists say. Behind the rise in deforestation is a strategy by multinational food companies to source their agricultural commodities from ever more remote areas around the world. These areas tend to be where legal protections of forests are weakest. The Brazilian Amazon, a poster child for the global movement, has enjoyed increasing protections, like a moratorium announced in 2006 on forest clearing for soy production. Between that time and 2015, Brazil reduced Amazon deforestation by almost according to estimates by Mongabay, the environmental news site, based on data from the Brazilian National Institute of Space Research and the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization. The uptick in forest loss since then, however, has raised concerns that the progress is far from secure. Brazil was aware of the challenge of keeping deforestation at bay, Everton Lucero, the secretary of climate change and forests of Brazil’s Ministry of the Environment, said in an interview. “We are very uncomfortable with the bad news that we had a rise in deforestation, and we are taking every possible measure to reverse it next year,” Mr. Lucero said. Budget shortfalls amid Brazil’s recent economic and political turmoil, he said, had wreaked havoc with its policing of its rain forests. When traveling to remote regions, “Sometimes our command and control units were without fuel for helicopters,” he said. “Hopefully we are on a recovery path. ” Bolivia, on the other hand, presents a different situation. President Evo Morales, a socialist, has made securing “food sovereignty” a major part of his agenda, driving Bolivia’s agricultural expansion. There are relatively few forest protections, and the government’s Forestry and Land Authority is tasked with the potentially conflicting roles of regulating land use, forestry and agriculture, and issuing concessions for logging and farming. The landlocked country has declared that it expects to clear almost 14 million more acres of forest by 2025, to convert into farmland. Bolivia’s greenhouse gas emissions levels per capita exceed that of many European countries, despite having a far lower per capita income. Deforestation is responsible for more than 80 percent of Bolivia’s total carbon dioxide emissions, according to a recent study by researchers at Insead, a graduate school based in Fontainebleau, France. A major culprit is the cultivation of soy, which has jumped more than 500 percent in Bolivia since 1991, to 3. 8 million hectares in 2013, according to the most recent agricultural censuses. Little of that soy is consumed domestically. The vast majority is processed and exported as animal feed in a commodities trade that serves a global appetite for hamburgers, chicken and pork. “The forest is seen as useless land that needs to be made useful,” said Nataly Ascarrunz, executive director of the Bolivian Institute of Forestry Investigation, a Bolivian nongovernmental organization that monitors and researches the country’s forests. “There’s a lot of pressure for economic development,” Ms. Ascarrunz said. “When resources are flowing, production is happening and people have work. It’s very hard to argue with that. ” Victor Yucra, the director general of Bolivia’s forest and land management at the Forestry and Land Authority, stressed the need for the Bolivian government to balance the protection of its forests with the needs of its agricultural sector. “Our concern is in ensuring that intensive agricultural production takes place within a framework that also provides for sustainable forestry and protection for standing forests,” Mr. Yucra said. Mr. MacLennan, the chief executive of Cargill, described a business trip to Brazil last year, during which he saw the Amazon from a plane window. “You look down and you see this beautiful forest,” he said. “Kilometers and kilometers of forest. But you also see these big chunks of dirt. “The brown really contrasts with the green,” he continued, comparing the forest and deforested areas. “When you see it, it’s like, ‘Holy cow. That’s what’s happened.’ It just hit me when I saw it in broad daylight — the impact the deforestation has. ” Mr. MacLennan initially garnered praise among environmentalists for pledging to extend the pledge it had made regarding palm oil to cover every commodity the company handles. Cargill’s commitment was called one of the most sweeping environmental pledges ever made by a large agricultural company. It earned Mr. MacLennan a photo opportunity with Ban the United Nations secretary general at the time. Even before the New York Declaration, Cargill had made significant efforts to buy palm oil sourced only from land not linked to fresh deforestation, according to a expert with extensive experience working on Cargill’s global sustainability efforts. The expert spoke on the condition of anonymity, saying that to do so openly would jeopardize professional relations with the company. Cargill continued to invest millions of dollars adding extra staff members and hiring auditors to verify that the palm oil was coming from established fields, not farmland freshly carved from the forest, he said. But Cargill has been less aggressive with other commodities, he said. Part of the issue was Cargill’s decentralized setup, the expert said. Another problem was the resistance from commodities traders, whose incentive is to seek supplies from as many sources as possible in order to drive down costs. Buying only sustainably grown commodities would mean a more limited supply. Now, environmental groups accuse Cargill of backtracking on its 2020 deadline. In recent statements, Cargill has adopted a 2030 deadline for elimination of deforestation from its supply chain — a separate deadline, mentioned elsewhere in the New York Declaration, that was meant to apply to ending all forms of deforestation, not just those related to agricultural commodities. “They’re willfully misinterpreting the Declaration,” said Glenn Hurowitz, chief executive of Mighty Earth. “They’re breaking their own pledge. ” Cargill is committed, Mr. MacLennan said, to eliminating by 2020 deforestation from its production of palm oil, a commodity widely used in food, detergents and cosmetics. But, he said, Cargill had always understood the declaration to give all signatories until 2030 to tackle deforestation. “I don’t think I or others appreciated the vast complexity of the task,” Mr. MacLennan said. “Let’s say that we are trading or buying and selling soybean meal. Where did the soybeans come from? And did they come from deforested land? Maybe we weren’t buying the soybeans directly. I don’t know. ” Holly Gibbs, an expert in tropical deforestation and agriculture at the University of called the 2030 deadline interpretation devastating. “If we were to wait until 2030,” Ms. Gibbs said, “there would be no forest left. ” In Mr. Janzen’s newly cleared field, a long strip of land flanked by vivid vegetation, smoke drifted from a smoldering landscape. The Mennonites, who live amid buggies and farmhouses that wouldn’t look out of place in rural Ohio or Pennsylvania, trace their origins to Protestant reformists who migrated to Russia, the United States, Canada, Belize and Mexico in search of farming opportunities and religious freedom. Some moved to Bolivia in the last century, and about 57, 000 Mennonites now live in 55 secluded settlements here, eschewing some aspects of 21st century technology, like modern cars, but enthusiastically embracing others, such as tractors and genetically modified seeds. Their trade with companies like Cargill has transformed their communities into a bloc of relatively prosperous landowners. But in recent years, they have also been targeted by land reforms enacted by Mr. Morales, who has pledged to reverse the centuries of subjugation of Bolivia’s indigenous majority. The farmer, Mr. Janzen, with the help of two laborers, spent the day digging roots from the earth, between smoking woodpiles. There was a brown jumble of slender trees, saplings, shrubs, bushes, vines and roots. Occasional larger trees showed gashes where the bulldozer first made contact, pushing them to the ground. Farther downfield lay more long, neat cordons of debris, waiting to be burned. “If the rain holds off, I’ll burn the rest tomorrow,” he said. | 0fake |
House Democrats will stage sit-in until they get gun control bill: Pelosi | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. House of Representatives Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said on Wednesday a sit-in on the House floor by Democrats will continue until a gun control bill is brought to the floor of the chamber for debate. “We are in for the long haul here,” Pelosi said. | 0fake |
Barristers ‘Gaming System’ to Block Muslim Rape Gang Deportation | Britain’s most senior immigration judge has slammed barristers who have blocked members of a Muslim rape gang being stripped of British citizenship, accusing them of playing the system as they earn substantial fees at the taxpayer’s expense. [The lawyers have been treating the immigration tribunal with “sustained and marked disrespect” and there have been “multiple recent examples of similar conduct and misconduct” Mr. Justice Bernard McCloskey said, according to The Telegraph. The Rochdale gang was convicted in 2012 of preying on girls as young as 13 in the town, plying them with drink and drugs before they were “passed around” for sex. They are appealing against a decision made by then Home Secretary Theresa May to strip them of British citizenship as the first step towards deporting them. The case, which is being funded by legal aid, raises fears that dangerous criminals and their lawyers are and obstructing the courts in an attempt to delay deportation from the UK for as long as possible. Gang ringleader Shabir Ahmed, 63, has already lost an appeal against his possible deportation in the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) during which he claimed his convictions were a conspiracy by police and members of the jury to “scapegoat” Muslims. Mr. Ahmed, who has been married three times and has five children, is being represented by barrister Rajiv Sharma. Three other men convicted of child sex offences in the same case, Abdul Aziz, Adil Khan and Qari Abdul Rauf, are represented by immigration and human rights barrister Zainul Jafferji, and Burton Burton Solicitors, a Nottingham firm headed by senior partner Mohammed Mahruf. All of the men making the appeal are originally from Pakistan. They hold dual citizenship, and will not be left stateless if they are stripped of British citizenship. In a damning ruling, Justice McCloskey said the men’s barristers and solicitors had failed to submit the necessary papers to the court and had repeatedly asked for adjournments. Tim Loughton MP, a member of the Home Affairs Select Committee, which has investigated delays in deportation cases, accused immigration lawyers of “playing the system” with some cases being spun out over months and even years. “We are seeing lawyers going through all sort of procedural measures to delay and delay on their client’s behalf,” he said. “In some cases the Home Office simply gives up and let these people go rather than incur any further expense in detaining them pending deportation. ” | 0fake |
Brazil Supreme Court allows Congress last word on removal of lawmakers | BRASILIA (Reuters) - Brazil s Supreme Court on Wednesday decided to grant Congress the final word on decisions to remove a sitting politician, conceding a victory to lawmakers fighting to shield themselves from prosecution for corruption. The narrow 6-5 decision will allow the Senate to vote next week to revoke a top court ruling that suspended Senator Aecio Neves who is being investigated in seven corruption cases. A majority of the justices decided to back off from confrontation with Congress in the midst of Brazil s biggest political corruption scandal, which has even implicated President Michel Temer and his inner circle of cabinet ministers. The lower house of Congress is expected to vote later this month to shelve charges against Temer in a corruption case involving meatpacker JBS SA, saving him from trial by the Supreme Court. More than 110 politicians are targeted by the sprawling Car Wash graft investigation that has uncovered since 2014 a massive network of bribes and kickbacks paid by companies seeking to win government contracts and influence legislation. Congress has pushed back against judicial action by the Supreme Court since the justices ordered the removal of the former speaker of the lower house, Eduardo Cunha, who was arrested last year, convicted of corruption and sentenced to more than 15 years in prison for corruption. One third of the politicians in Brazil s Congress - more than 230 - including more than half of its senators, are being investigated for breaking the law and face trial by the Supreme Court, the only court that can try lawmakers and ministers. Those being investigated include the presidents of the Senate and the lower house, and many of the leaders of Temer s governing coalition. In another gain for the political class, the Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday that no one can be charged merely on the basis of plea bargain testimony by just one witness if no evidence is provided to back up the accusation. Plea deals have been the main tool used by anti-corruption prosecutors to track the network of political kickbacks and dismantle graft schemes discovered at oil company Petrobras and other state-run enterprises. The ruling was part of a decision to throw out corruption and money laundering charges against Senator Renan Calheiros, the former president of the Senate who faces seven other graft investigations. | 0fake |
Clinton's charity confirms Qatar's $1 million gift while she was at State Dept | NEW YORK (Reuters) - The Clinton Foundation has confirmed it accepted a $1 million gift from Qatar while Hillary Clinton was U.S. secretary of state without informing the State Department, even though she had promised to let the agency review new or significantly increased support from foreign governments. Qatari officials pledged the money in 2011 to mark the 65th birthday of Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton’s husband, and sought to meet the former U.S. president in person the following year to present him the check, according to an email from a foundation official to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign chairman, John Podesta. The email, among thousands hacked from Podesta’s account, was published last month by WikiLeaks. Clinton signed an ethics agreement governing her family’s globe-straddling foundation in order to become secretary of state in 2009. The agreement was designed to increase transparency to avoid appearances that U.S. foreign policy could be swayed by wealthy donors. If a new foreign government wished to donate or if an existing foreign-government donor, such as Qatar, wanted to “increase materially” its support of ongoing programs, Clinton promised that the State Department’s ethics official would be notified and given a chance to raise any concerns. Clinton Foundation officials last month declined to confirm the Qatar donation. In response to additional questions, a foundation spokesman, Brian Cookstra, this week said that it accepted the $1 million gift from Qatar, but this did not amount to a “material increase” in the Gulf country’s support for the charity. Cookstra declined to say whether Qatari officials received their requested meeting with Bill Clinton. Officials at Qatar’s embassy in Washington and in its Council of Ministers in the capital, Doha, declined to discuss the donation. The State Department has said it has no record of the foundation submitting the Qatar gift for review, and that it was incumbent on the foundation to notify the department about donations that needed attention. A department spokeswoman did not respond to additional questions about the donation. According to the foundation’s website, which lists donors in broad categories by cumulative amounts donated, Qatar’s government has directly given a total of between $1 million and $5 million over the years. The Clinton Foundation has said it would no longer accept money from foreign governments if Clinton is elected president and would spin off those programs that are dependent on foreign governments. Foundation officials told Reuters last year that they did not always comply with central provisions of the agreement with President Barack Obama's administration, blaming oversights in some cases.(reut.rs/2fkHPCh) At least eight other countries besides Qatar gave new or increased funding to the foundation, in most cases to fund its health project, without the State Department being informed, according to foundation and agency records. They include Algeria, which gave for the first time in 2010, and the United Kingdom, which nearly tripled its support for the foundation’s health project to $11.2 million between 2009 and 2012. Foundation officials have said some of those donations, including Algeria, were oversights and should have been flagged, while others, such as the UK increase, did not qualify as material increases. The foundation has declined to describe what sort of increase in funding by a foreign government would have triggered notification of the State Department for review. Cookstra said the agreement was designed to “allow foreign funding for critical Clinton Foundation programs” to continue without disruption. The State Department said it has no record of being asked by the foundation to review any increases in support by a foreign government. Asked whether Qatar was funding a specific program at the foundation, Cookstra said the country supported the organization’s “overall humanitarian work.” “Qatar continued supporting Clinton Foundation at equal or lower levels” compared with the country’s pre-2009 support, he said. He declined to say if Qatar gave any money during the first three years of Clinton’s four-year term at the State Department, or what its support before 2009 amounted to. In another email released by WikiLeaks, a former Clinton Foundation fundraiser said he raised more than $21 million in connection with Bill Clinton’s 65th birthday in 2011. Spokesmen for Hillary Clinton’s campaign and Bill Clinton did not respond to emailed questions about the donation. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has said that major donors to the Clinton Foundation may have obtained favored access to Clinton’s State Department, but has provided little evidence to that effect. Clinton and her staff have dismissed this accusation as a political smear. Last month, New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman ordered the Donald J. Trump Foundation to stop fundraising in the state, saying it had not registered to solicit donations. | 0fake |
Fresh Off The Golf Course, Trump Lashes Out At FBI Deputy Director And James Comey | Donald Trump spent a good portion of his day at his golf club, marking the 84th day he s done so since taking the oath of office. It must have been a bad game because just after that, Trump lashed out at FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe on Twitter following a report saying McCabe plans to retire in a few months. The report follows McCabe s testimony in front of congressional committees this week, as well as mounting criticism from Republicans regarding the Russia probe.So, naturally, Trump attacked McCabe with a lie. How can FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, the man in charge, along with leakin James Comey, of the Phony Hillary Clinton investigation (including her 33,000 illegally deleted emails) be given $700,000 for wife s campaign by Clinton Puppets during investigation? Trump tweeted.How can FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, the man in charge, along with leakin James Comey, of the Phony Hillary Clinton investigation (including her 33,000 illegally deleted emails) be given $700,000 for wife s campaign by Clinton Puppets during investigation? Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 23, 2017He didn t stop there.FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe is racing the clock to retire with full benefits. 90 days to go?!!! Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 23, 2017Wow, FBI lawyer James Baker reassigned, according to @FoxNews. Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 23, 2017With all of the Intel at Trump s disposal, he s getting his information from Fox News. McCabe spent most of his career in the fight against terrorism and now he s being attacked by the so-called president. Trump has been fact-checked before on his claim of his wife receiving $700,000 for her campaign.Politifact noted in late July that Trump s tweet about Andrew McCabe is a significant distortion of the facts. And the implication that McCabe got Clinton off as a political favor doesn t make much sense when we look at the evidence. His July tweet was rated mostly false. But Trump repeats these lies because he knows his supporters will believe them without bothering to Google. It s still a lie, though.Photo by Zach Gibson Pool/Getty Images. | 1real |
That’s Not the Burglar Growling. It’s His Stomach. - The New York Times | The Office of Chief Medical Examiner, which operates New York City’s DNA laboratory, tests all manner of objects for microscopic evidence that could link a suspect to a crime. This is a story about a small and bizarre subset of those objects, evidence left by criminals feeding that most basic of human appetites. Literally feeding. Criminals who eat in the act. “Partially eaten apple,” a spokeswoman for the medical examiner’s office wrote when asked for examples. “Sunflower seed shells. chocolate cake. Chewed gum. ” When she got to “ biscuit,” the list was not yet half over. “Chicken bones. Chicken wing. Pizza crust. Fruit pit. ” For the victim of a home burglary, it would seem to be yet another affront after the crime: the violation of the kitchen and the discovery, while perhaps seeking simple comfort in the stress, of a lowly pit where once there was fruit. That violation was last seen in this space earlier this month, in the tale of a Brooklyn man whose attempt to rent his apartment to a stranger went terribly awry. But the phenomenon of the hungry burglar is timeless. An article in The New York Times on May 17, 1886, described the theft of nearly 100 pieces of flatware from the Poughkeepsie mansion of a fallen general’s widow. “After completing their pillage,” the story noted, the burglars “went down to the kitchen and brought upstairs to the parlor cooked meats, bread, cake, eggs and milk, and partook of the banquet there and then. ” The peculiar act of eating at the scene of the crime occurs often enough to warrant mention in police textbooks like “Criminal Investigation: A Method for Reconstructing the Past. ” A burglar may take food from the kitchen, the authors, James W. Osterburg and Richard H. Ward, write, “or display other forms of aberrational behavior that help establish a modus operandi. ” It is far from uncommon in New York City. “Happens all the time,” Detective Anthony Barbee in Brooklyn told me a few years ago. “One of the questions we always ask people, ‘Look in your refrigerator. Is there anything open?’ Maybe they’re neat freaks and they notice something moved around. They look at you like you’re crazy. ” The act defies criminal logic. “I would assume, you’re a burglar, you have an adrenaline rush, you want to get in and out,” Detective Barbee said. “But some people make themselves at home. They get comfortable. ” Others take their refreshments to go. Last year, a tenant in an apartment in the Hell’s Kitchen neighborhood of Manhattan came home to discover that someone had stolen a credit card, a laptop, sunglasses — and a bottle of alcohol. A man in Queens answered a knock at his door last August, let in two women who were pretending to need a bathroom and even offered one of them a slice of cake. After they left, he realized he had been robbed. Officers quickly found the women, who had cash from the man’s home, among other things. “In stopping the vehicle,” prosecutors later said, “police allegedly recovered cake. ” In 2011, a woman in Fort Greene, Brooklyn, came home to find a large hole in her window screen, and her electronics and watches missing. There was a note: “Thanks for the O. J.,” it read in part. “Have a nice day. ” Steve Panagopoulos, a retired Brooklyn detective, said he associated food theft with addiction: “These guys are junkies. ” “Think about it,” he said last week. “They don’t really even care about getting caught. Taking their time, sitting there opening refrigerators, that’s pretty crazy. ” That sort of behavior was the undoing of one serial thief he remembered. “He had taken out a thing of cheese, crackers,” Mr. Panagopoulos said. “He left them behind on the table. That was processed for DNA. ” A former detective in Chinatown once shared the story of an epic intrusion visited upon the apartment of a woman who had left for a week to care for her mother. “They came in and used the pots and stove and cooked,” the former detective, Jose Santiago, said. “They hung out, smoked a couple joints, ate. ” Soon they had company. “Word got out in the building,” the detective said. “One person would go in and take a TV. Literally couches, everything. She was cleaned out. ” Cleaned out, but no one cleaned up: “There was food in the pots when she got home,” he said. Perhaps the pots were sent to the laboratory of the medical examiner. There, they would have found company in the other evidence left by criminals who eat at the scene. “Candy wrappers, lollipop,” the spokeswoman’s list read, finally ending with a New York City flourish. “And, of course, a bagel. ” | 0fake |
Turkey wants to bring wounded from Syria's Ghouta for treatment | ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Turkey is working with Russia to evacuate around 500 people from the besieged Damascus suburb of eastern Ghouta, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Sunday. There are around 500 people, including 170 children and women who need urgent humanitarian aid, Erdogan said ahead of his departure on an official visit to Sudan. He said he had discussed the issue with Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin. Ankara aimed to bring people in need of assistance to Turkey to provide treatment and care. The Russian and Turkish chiefs of staff would discuss the steps to be taken in operations that would also involve the Turkish Red Cresent and Turkey s Disaster and Emergency Organisation (AFAD), Erdogan said. In November, the U.N. humanitarian adviser for Syria called the situation in eastern Ghouta a humanitarian emergency. | 0fake |
U.S. attorney general vows to examine Eric Garner case: rights groups | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. civil rights leaders said Attorney General Jeff Sessions promised on Tuesday to examine the status of a federal probe into the case of Eric Garner, an unarmed black man whose 2014 death at the hands of New York City police sparked protests. Garner died in July 2014 after a white police officer put him in a chokehold. The Justice Department’s probe into his death has been stalled by internal disagreements over whether federal investigators have enough evidence to proceed, according to news reports. The Rev. Al Sharpton, a civil rights leader from New York, urged Sessions to “move aggressively” on the case, Sharpton told reporters. Garner, a father of six, was accused of illegally selling cigarettes on a sidewalk when an officer put him in the chokehold from behind and brought him down with the help of other officers. Garner complained repeatedly that he could not breathe. The city medical examiner ruled Garner’s death a homicide, with asthma and obesity as contributing factors. The Garner case was the only issue on which Sessions promised to take action during Tuesday’s 45-minute meeting with six civil rights advocates who raised concerns over his stance on police reform, voting laws and minority rights, the advocates told a news conference. The Justice Department declined to comment on the meeting. Sessions called three civil rights groups about a week after he was confirmed on Feb. 8 to express his interest in talking with them, Sharpton said. Sessions declined to comment when the advocates urged him to advise President Donald Trump against creating a voter fraud task force, said Sherrilyn Ifill, president of the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. The advocates cited numerous studies showing such fraud was rare in the United States, she said. The civil rights leaders said they also expressed disappointment with the Justice Department’s recent decisions to reverse Obama administration efforts to challenge a Texas voter identification law and allow transgender students to use the bathroom of their choice. | 0fake |
Palestinian envoy says U.S. recognition of Jerusalem is 'declaring war' | LONDON (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump would effectively be making a declaration of war if he recognizes Jerusalem as Israel s capital, the Palestinians chief representative to Britain said on Wednesday. If he says what he is intending to say about Jerusalem being the capital of Israel, it means a kiss of death to the two state solution, Manuel Hassassian said in a BBC radio interview. He is declaring war in the Middle East, he is declaring war against 1.5 billion Muslims (and) hundreds of millions of Christians that are not going to accept the holy shrines to be totally under the hegemony of Israel, Hassassian added. Senior U.S. officials said on Tuesday that Trump will recognize Jerusalem as Israel s capital on Wednesday and set in motion the relocation of the U.S. embassy to the city. | 0fake |
Blog: If Donald Trump Pardons Me, I Would Be Honored To Serve As Secretary Of Agriculture | Email
One year ago, I was arrested for both statutory rape and possessing child pornography, and I deeply regret my disgusting crimes. Since that fateful day, I’ve been serving a 16-year jail sentence, using every second of that time to reflect on, and repent for, what I have done. I’ve truly learned a lot about myself as a person, and if our president-elect, Donald Trump, were to recognize my transformation and to pardon me, I would be honored to serve as his Secretary of Agriculture.
In the event Donald J. Trump pardons and then appoints me to his future Cabinet, I, Jared Fogle, current federal inmate and former Subway spokesperson, could think of no greater privilege than to serve our commander in chief, and our country, as the head of our Department of Agriculture.
It is the Secretary of Agriculture’s sworn duty to provide assistance to our nation’s farmers, as well as to protect farmland and enforce food safety, and if I am let out of jail, I believe I am ready for the task. To have Donald Trump both forgive my child-sex crimes and recognize how useful my deep knowledge of lettuce, tomatoes, onions, peppers, hot Italian peppers, olives, and other sub toppings could be to his administration would make my heart swell with pride.
To serve our farmers at the federal level would be greater than any Subway sandwich I ever ate, greater than any Subway commercial I ever made, and greater than any large pair of pants I ever wore.
As someone who has sold hundreds of millions of Subway sandwiches to the American people since the year 2000, I know the burden of working for the public, and I would not let our new president, nor the American people, down. It would be an immense privilege to serve for a full four years, and pending Donald Trump negating my seven federal counts of production of child pornography, I would start that process immediately.
I lost over 245 pounds and ate thousands of Subway sandwiches before I was arrested for paying for sex with a minor, and I do hope that President-elect Trump considers that fact when making his decision whether or not to pardon and appoint me secretary of agriculture. To serve our farmers at the federal level would be greater than any Subway sandwich I ever ate, greater than any Subway commercial I ever made, and greater than any large pair of pants I ever wore.
So, hopefully, the next time I address you, it will be not from my prison cell in Englewood Federal Correctional Institution but from the National Mall, in Washington, D.C. Believe me, the next four years would be incredible not just for me, but for you, should our president-elect look deep into his heart and give the department the spokesperson it deserves! | 1real |
Only Demented Imbeciles Want A Killary Reign Of Terror | in: Government Corruption , Special Interests , US News The cross section of Hillary Clinton voters is a mixture of walking dead zombies, power hungry influence peddlers, money cartel thieves and establishment diehards willing to start a global confrontation to postpone an inevitable economic collapse. As for the first category; welfare recipients, government bootlickers and mentally deranged utopians survive in a subsistence existence or in a fantasy illusion. The corruption purveyors simply want to maintain their elitist system of institutional inequality. As for the tribe of international finance, their objective always remains the same. Pick the next stooge who can be controlled. Finally, for globalist who are frantic to continue their New World Order of worldwide oppression, the elevation of Hillary Clinton to the position of the mad hatter to achieve the mutual assured destruction that these Illuminati’s masters of the universe require to purge the “Little People” from the planet. Any opposition to this band of desperate and deranged desperados is portrayed as racist, xenophobic and defiant of the “Politically Correct” secular humanism culture. Here is the fundamental point of the conflict. The abandonment of the cannons of natural and common law has produced a didactic ineptness that thrusts humanity into a technocratic prison of a meaningless existence. Dante’s Inferno of basic extinction is the ultimate society that a capitulation to the rigged electoral fraud seeks to achieve. The bloody record of Killary Clinton earns her an especially prominent place in hell. Take your choice. She may descend into Level 7 , for “The violent, the assasins, the tyrants, and the war-mongers lament their pitiless mischiefs in the river, while centaurs armed with bows and arrows shoot those who try to escape their punishment” or Level 8- the Malebolge where “The magicians, diviners, fortune tellers, and panderers are all here, as are the thieves”. Of course this allegory of punishment falls on deaf ears for the Clintonistas . For them this blameless role model for social justice warriors can do no wrong. All the evidence and proof in the world is ignored or dismissed when your patron saint of the occult wears pants suits. The reason HRC is better known as Killary has a lot to do with the body count that follows her around. THE CLINTON BODY-COUNT and the ‘CLINTON DEATH LIST’: 33 SPINE-TINGLING CASES lists several of her enemies that dared defy the queen of mean. Now are these suspicious circumstances of such deaths just another right-wing conspiracy to bring down the Arkancide crime syndicate? To an objective investigator, engaging into an in-depth probe might just get one added to this long list. But why would a Clinton supporter care, she is the epitome of the liberated woman and placing her on the throne of feminism is far overdue. Accepting, if not savoring a little reign of terror is a small price to pay as long as the body count does not include your own person. During the French Revolution the sanguinary women, known as Tricoteuse, who sat and knitted while attending public guillotine executions have more in common with Robespierre than Marie Antoinette. These devotee libbers identified with the symbol of equality, while their crowned head of elitism disdainfully admonish the peasants: “Qu’ils mangent de la brioche”. Queen Marie Antoinette may not have really said, “Let them eat cake” but the regnant of the House of Clinton demonstrates throughout her entire life revealed her true sentiments; despise and contempt for the “Little People”. The knitting culture of the zombies cult of progressive authoritarianism is at the center of the public psychosis that follows the dictates of Hillary Clinton. Their identity is so caught up in the myth of collectivism that the very spirit of individual liberty is a necessary causality to join the Clinton demon worship. Look to the fictional character of Madame Defarge penned in A Tale of Two Cities for a synopsis of all that is wrong with Killary and her followers. Charles Dickens presents this viewpoint of the quintessential monster. “Her problem, it seems, is that Madame Defarge just doesn’t know where to draw the line. As far as she’s concerned, “justice” for the fate of her family isn’t just that the Marquis gets murdered. Justice should, she thinks, include the “extermination” of all of the Marquis’s family. Given her druthers, Charles, Lucie, and even little Lucie would fall under the sharp blade of La Guillotine. As Madame Defarge exclaims to her husband, “Tell the Wind and the Fire where to stop; not me!” (3.12.36). “It was nothing to her that an innocent man was to die for the sins of his forefathers; she saw, not him, but them. It was nothing to her that his wife was to be made a widow and his daughter an orphan; that was insufficient punishment, because they were her natural enemies and her prey, and as such had no right to live. To appeal to her, was made hopeless by her having no sense of pity, even for herself.” (3.14.33) So it comes as no surprise that when “The meeting between Lucie and Madame Defarge makes this absolutely clear: Lucie falls on her knees, begging for mercy on behalf of her child. Madame Defarge stares at her coldly. She doesn’t even stop knitting.” This example of the dark side of human nature is particularly relevant and applicable when analyzing the gender iniquity of the wicked witch. For femininity enablement to champion such abuse from a coldhearted degenerate is the biggest disappointment of this election cycle. Society should never condone or provide consent for anyone, male or female; who is such a habitual sociopath. The influence hucksters do not pretend to be altruistic . They would support Lucifer if they thought they would gain the riches of this world. As for the money changers, they are already archfiends in the Synagogue of Satan. Lastly, the globalist’s warmongers covet the mass eradication of billions to satisfy their lust for world transcendence. These three factions are the true irredeemables. The masses of the walking dead need to politically repent and seek civic redemption. This objective is not possible by voting for Hillary Clinton. If you do nothing else before the November 8, 2016 election watch the video, A Vote For Hillary is a Vote For World War 3 . No matter your ideological propensities, we all share a mutual objective. Prevent a nuclear war that will destroy all civilized life on the planet. After watching this presentation, every rational person must come to deal with the prospects of putting a psycho in command of the launch codes. Folks; Donald Trump is not the mad man. The schizoid is a systemic and immoral lunatic, who is ready to drop the beheading blade on all of America. Her similarity with Madame Defarge bleeds over to her decadent boosters, who are willing to sacrifice their family, friends and community for the joy of destroying our planet. For all the dissatisfied and frustrated citizens, who understand the colossal stakes of national survival intervene with any fellow acquaintance that has been indoctrinated to the propaganda of Hillaryland . Confront the zombies attitude and appeal to their individual self-interest. Put forth the prospect of not voting for Clinton, even if Trump would not be an option. Citizens will not be the only people voting. Non eligible people are being ushered into a ballot booth with predisposed programming to put Killary into the oval office. The establishment is revealing their real tyranny for any person, who is still alive and has the ability to assess the actual nature of this election. The power structure in ready to collapse and the global elites are prepared to start a world war to keep and protect their feudal system of coercion. Those who might survive will be the special and the anointed. The masses will be served up on the plate of expediency and necessity. Hillary Clinton has always been part of the gang of criminals, protected by the intelligence community, insider politicians and the legal system of corrupt lawyers and judges. Voting for her is a clear validation of pure mental illness. The fact that the discredited FBI is endeavoring to regain their credibility by reopening the criminal investigation into Killary Clinton’s attempt to hide her family’s pay to play scheme to sell out our country is dramatic. This development should provide ample reason to put any notion of voting for the diva of sleaze on hold. Thanks to the Wikileaks release of the illicit emails from the Clinton cabal, only a fool can vote for her. Come to grips with the prospects of knowingly elevating this lifelong criminal to become the commander-and-chief. Genuine national security cannot be scarified to allow a distrustful and compromised agent of foreign interests to become President. Killary is dead meat. She could never gain the confidence of the nation and her continued nihilistic conduct and her kleptocrat criminal violations cannot be tolerated or ignored any longer. If you really want to save the planet, you cannot cast your ballot for this known traitor. | 1real |
Marks and Spencer to turn High Street stores into Bingo Halls | Tuesday 8 November 2016 by Fat Jim Marks and Spencer to turn High Street stores into Bingo Halls
Marks and Spencer have announced it will convert all clothing and home shops to highly profitable bingo halls and high stake slot machine centres.
The struggling retailer announced its turnaround plan as it seeks to address the changing needs of British customers.
The move will also see an end to low-cost child labour exploitation as the company can now exploit an entirely new and untapped demographic, right here in this country.
The retailer’s main customer base was found to be the over 60’s, many with a walking frame or one of those upright shopping bags with wheels. This core support still likes M&S, but only because they have lost most of their faculties and are not in a position to realise how awful it has become.
M&S retail executive, Simon Williams, told us, “I looked at these customers of ours and thought ‘Bingo’, we already have a captive audience of people that want to throw their pensions away on unachievable lifestyle marketing – it’s the logical next step.”
Chief Executive Steven Roe said, “We thought the British public wanted moderately affordable clothing in classic styles, but it turns out they actually want to throw their money into betting machines and to pay extortionate amounts for the thrill of ticking numbers off on a piece of paper.
“If the referendum taught us anything, it’s that when the people speak, we must listen.” Get the best NewsThump stories in your mailbox every Friday, for FREE! There are currently witterings below - why not add your own? | 1real |
Поражение под Алеппо стало концом «единого фронта» против Асада | Новое восточное обозрение | Страна: Сирия Как отмечает в своей новой статье пакистанский исследователь Салман Рафи, попытка контратаковать правительственные войска под Алеппо привела к тому, что войска боевиков были смяты и отброшены назад. Теперь окончание битвы за Алеппо уже не за горами, что сразу же отразилось на моральном состоянии противников Асада. Информационные агентства сообщили, что бойцы яро поддерживаемой Вашингтоном Свободной сирийской армии устроили бой с боевиками Джабхат Аль-Нусры за контроль над рядом пропускных пунктов на сирийско-турецкой границе. Более крупные бандформирования по всей Сирии начали поглощать мелкие, отбирая «их» земли и добычу, что в итоге приведет к коллапсу всех поддерживаемых Западом сил в Сирии. Автор отмечает, что та неясность, которая воцарилась после победы Дональда Трампа на президентских выборах, лишь ускоряет процесс разложения «оппозиционных сил». С полной версией статьи вы можете ознакомиться здесь . Популярные статьи | 1real |
Oklahoma lawmaker apologizes for linking Native Americans to alcoholism | TULSA, Okla. (Reuters) - An Oklahoma state legislator has apologized after saying in the legislature last week that Native Americans are pre-disposed to alcohol abuse, officials said on Thursday. State Representative Todd Russ, a Republican, made the apology in a statement issued by his office this week, his office said on Thursday. During floor debate last week on a measure to amend Oklahoma’s liquor laws, Russ said: “The white man took advantage of the Native American people at the rim of an alcohol bottle. “We see the effects of that today in society because they are predisposed physically. Scientifically we know the truth that they cannot process that like other people,” he said. Russ, whose western Oklahoma district includes a portion of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes’ jurisdictional area, urged members of the legislature’s Native American Caucus to vote against the bill, which would allow supermarkets and convenience stores to sell beer and wine. Instead, he received a rebuke for his comments. “He may not have intentionally done this, but disparaging Native Americans is an uncalled for, inappropriate comment on the House floor,” Representative Dan Kirby, a Republican and a citizen of the Muscogee (Creek) Nation said during the debate. In his apology, Russ offered contrition “for the unintended pain I have caused Native Americans by my statement that was based upon outdated information.” | 0fake |
Donald Trump Seeks to Delay Action on Spending Bills Until His Term Starts - The New York Times | WASHINGTON — Donald J. Trump is making his influence felt on government funding deliberations in Congress, pressing Republican leaders to postpone action on spending bills until after he takes office. Speaker Paul D. Ryan said on Thursday that the House would go along with the incoming administration’s request and pass a stopgap spending bill that would keep the government running at current spending levels until March. “I think they would like to have a on how money’s going to be spent going into the next year,” he told reporters. But Republican leaders in the Senate did not immediately sign on to the plan, reflecting their desire to get contentious spending battles out of the way this year. Congress had been working toward agreement on spending bills by Dec. 9, when the current funding agreement expires. Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, left open the possibility of an agreement with the House. “Discussions are also ongoing about how to fund the government and for how long,” he said on the floor on Thursday. But signaling that the longstanding tensions between the House and Senate may not abate under a more unified Republican government, some Senate Republicans expressed concern that waiting until early next year could distract them from other legislative priorities. “My opinion is that it would be better to get this year done now,” said Senator Roy Blunt, Republican of Missouri and a member of the Appropriations Committee. “My preference is to do it now and not get bogged down early next year. ” The issue flared as both parties on Capitol Hill continued to adapt to Mr. Trump’s victory and his promise to shake up the way Washington works. Vice Mike Pence visited the Capitol to meet with Republican and Democratic leaders, as well as House Republicans. And the House Democratic leader, Nancy Pelosi of California, drew a challenger on Thursday in her campaign to retain her post, as Representative Tim Ryan of Ohio said the election outcome required Democrats to take a new approach. Startled by the number of voters in states like Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania that shifted their support to Republicans — particularly Mr. Trump — Democrats have spent the week contemplating how to recapture those voters. Mr. Ryan, 43, who represents the quintessentially Rust Belt area of Youngstown, Ohio, said he believed he could help Democrats reach them. “The American people need to know we understand that they elected us to fight for economic opportunity for all,” he said in a statement. “We need to create America 2. 0 — a multicultural, progressive and innovative country that fights every day for ordinary people. ” Not selecting new leadership, Mr. Ryan said, would lead to “more disappointment in future elections. ” Ms. Pelosi, 76, has led House Democrats since 2003. In a letter to Democrats on Wednesday, Ms. Pelosi announced her bid for and issued a warning to potential challengers, arguing she already had the support of of House Democrats. And that was before she had even asked for any votes, Ms. Pelosi said on Thursday. “When somebody challenges you, your supporters turn out,” she said. “It almost did me a favor. ” Ms. Pelosi’s confidence is not without basis. A prodigious and effective negotiator, she has a strong and vocal base of support that on paper should help her easily defeat any challenges. However, members have noted a restlessness in recent days within the conference, where Mr. Ryan’s message seemed to be resonating, which could end up blindsiding the leader. Further, her loss in a similar, far struggle two years ago demonstrated cracks in her power. In 2014, a proxy battle between Ms. Pelosi and Representative Steny H. Hoyer, Democrat of Maryland, broke out over a top spot on the Energy and Commerce Committee. Ms. Pelosi’s pick, Representative Anna G. Eshoo of California, was defeated by Mr. Hoyer’s choice, Representative Frank Pallone Jr. of New Jersey, stunning Ms. Pelosi. But Mr. Trump’s early intervention on spending issues also highlighted the many challenges facing the Republican majority as it adapts to the priorities of a new administration. Referring to Mr. Trump’s desire to “drain the swamp,” Mr. Ryan halted an effort at a procedural meeting on Wednesday that would have lifted a ban on earmarks — the practice of allowing lawmakers to allocate money to specific projects in their states or districts — promising instead to hold a vote on the proposal early next year. It has been several years since lawmakers passed a spending bill in time for the beginning of the fiscal year. Since Congress passed a stopgap measure in September, appropriators have been working to wrap up an agreement that would extend through the end of the government’s fiscal year next Sept. 30 before the new Congress assembles in January. Senator Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, another Republican on the Appropriations Committee, was critical of continued reliance on spending bills, which have become a regular fallback as lawmakers have failed to cobble together legislation palatable to both President Obama and the right wing of their own party. They are “a really lazy way to govern,” Mr. Alexander told reporters. “I would think the last thing the Trump administration would want to do is spend time cleaning up an appropriations bill that was supposed to have been passed in the previous year under Obama,” he said. | 0fake |
Polish president signs judicial overhaul bills into law | WARSAW (Reuters) - Polish President Andrzej Duda has signed into law two bills overhauling the judiciary, he said on Wednesday, in defiance of European Union criticism that the legislation undermines the rule of law in central Europe s largest economy. I have taken a decision to sign these bills, Duda said in a statement broadcast on public television. Earlier on Wednesday, the EU executive launched an unprecedented action against Poland over its reforms of the judicial system. | 0fake |
PRESIDENT TRUMP’S NEW CHIEF OF STAFF Wants His Boss To Stop Tweeting…But Only About One Thing | Right before eighth grade, Trump s father sent him literally up the river to New York Military Academy in the Hudson Valley. Trump would spend the next five years there.Retired Col. Ted Dobias remembers the tall, lanky kid who showed up at his dormitory. I put [him] down at the end of the hall. He didn t know how to make a bed. He didn t know how to shine his shoes. He had a problem, you know, with being a cadet. You know, being a cadet, you gotta take care of yourself, Dobias said.And Trump the cadet didn t quite know how, at first. Dobias had a reputation for being one of the school s toughest instructors. He was a hardened World War II veteran who made it clear to Trump he didn t care who his daddy was. When he got out of line, he got the same treatment like everybody else. His name was Donald Trump, like Johnny Jones. It was all the same, Dobias said. Nobody was different. We treated everyone alike. Back in Trump s day, cadets would wake up near the crack of dawn, hurry into their uniforms and march in formation to breakfast. First-year cadets had to eat their meals squared-off lifting their forks in a right angle path into their mouths. And after breakfast, they d scurry back to clean their rooms for inspection. Dobias said it was a place where kids who didn t like following the rules learned to like it. It s a hell of a thing for a kid to go to a military school especially when you have to say, Yes sir, No sir, have to learn how to salute, how to do about-face, how to march, how to carry a gun, said Dobias.But instead of recoiling from the discipline, Trump thrived under it. In her book The Trumps: Three Generations of Builders and a Presidential Candidate, Gwenda Blair notes how Donald seemed to welcome being in a place with clear-cut parameters, a place where he could focus on figuring out how to come out on top and get what he wanted. Mike Kabealo, one of Trump s roommates at NYMA, said in the confines of the school s rigid rules, Trump wanted to be a standout. Cocksure, positive and anything-you-can-do-I-can-do-better kind of stuff you know, he was very competitive, Kabealo said.And friends say Trump channeled that competitiveness into everything at military school. When he was in charge of the rifle rack, he cleaned the rifles obsessively. He was meticulous about his uniform. When it was his turn to do inspections in the barracks, he whipped other cadets into shape. NPRGiven his success in the military academy, is it any surprise then, that President Trump would choose a former general to be his chief of staff?White House Chief of Staff John Kelly aims to stop President Trump from making policy announcements on Twitter, according to a report Friday night.While Kelly acknowledges he can t stop Trump from tweeting, the new chief of staff would like to know what the president plans to tweet before he does so. He would prefer big policy decisions not be announced on Twitter.The goal is pushing the tweets in the right direction, Politico reported, citing a White House official.Trump made waves on July 26 when he announced on Twitter that he would ban transgender people from the military:After consultation with my Generals and military experts, please be advised that the United States Government will not accept or allow Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 26, 2017 .Transgender individuals to serve in any capacity in the U.S. Military. Our military must be focused on decisive and overwhelming .. Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 26, 2017 .victory and cannot be burdened with the tremendous medical costs and disruption that transgender in the military would entail. Thank you Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) July 26, 2017The Defense Department has since said it won t execute a policy based on Trump s tweet until it would receives formal guidance, which the White House has not provided yet.Politico reported that White House and Defense Department lawyers had warned Trump against the transgender military ban, fearing the legal backlash that would follow. The lawyers only learned about Trump s decision when he tweeted it. Washington Examiner | 1real |
Limbaugh on Trump: ’This Was One of the Most Effective Press Conferences I Have Ever Seen’ - Breitbart | Thursday following President Donald Trump’s press conference to announce his pick for Labor Secretary, Alexander Acosta, conservative talker Rush Limbaugh applauded Trump’s performance on his nationally syndicated radio show. Limbaugh said while the media still won’t warm up to Trump, it was what his supporters wanted to see, which was a willingness to tout his achievements and take on some of the claims from the media. “You know it is hard to say — you get caught up in the moment,” Limbaugh said. “But this was one of the most effective press conferences I have ever seen. The press is going to hate him even more after this. Don’t misunderstand. When I say effective, I’m talking about rallying people who voted for him to stay with him. He made a point — ‘What chaos? You’re reporting chaos. We’re not in chaos. We’re a machine. We got one of the smoothest running machines in the history of machines. We got one of the best administrations in the history of administrations. ’” “And he rattled off the achievements they’ve had here that the media is not reporting because they’re so focused on whether or not Trump worked with Russia to screw Hillary out of the presidency,” he continued. “And he was reassuring the people he’s on top of everything. Nothing has changed. Everything he campaigned on, he is doing. All he is doing is fulfilling campaign promises. And of course, the Democrats don’t like him. Of course, the media don’t like him. It isn’t going to stop him. ” ( Daily Rushbo) Follow Jeff Poor on Twitter @jeff_poor | 0fake |
Julian Assange – “Everything that he has said, he’s standing by.” | 21st Century Wire says Judging by Julian Assange s Twitter page activity, it appears as though he may follow through with his promise to agree to US extradition if Obama grants Manning clemency.Assange s Lawyer, Melinda Taylor, was quoted in a Wikileaks Tweet (below) that Everything that he has said, he s standing by. Assange lawyer @themtchair on Assange-Manning extradition 'deal': "Everything that he has said he's standing by." WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) January 18, 2017Anyone following the WikiLeaks Twitter account will surely remember this proposal of a deal by Assange back on January 12th where he noted that even though there is a clear unconstitutionality in the DoJ case against him that he would agree to US extradition if Obama granted Manning clemency.If Obama grants Manning clemency Assange will agree to US extradition despite clear unconstitutionality of DoJ case https://t.co/MZU30SlfGK WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) January 12, 2017READ MORE US NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire US NewsSUPPORT 21WIRE SUBSCRIBE & BECOME A MEMBER@ 21WIRE.TV | 1real |
Trump Raises Concern Over Members Of Urban Communities Voting More Than Zero Times - The Onion - America's Finest News Source | Nation Puts 2016 Election Into Perspective By Reminding Itself Some Species Of Sea Turtles Get Eaten By Birds Just Seconds After They Hatch WASHINGTON—Saying they felt anxious and overwhelmed just days before heading to the polls to decide a historically fraught presidential race, Americans throughout the country reportedly took a moment Thursday to put the 2016 election into perspective by reminding themselves that some species of sea turtles are eaten by birds just seconds after they hatch. Cleveland Indians Worried Team Cursed After Building Franchise On Old Native American Stereotype CLEVELAND—Having watched in horror as their team crumbled after a 3-1 World Series lead, members of the Cleveland Indians expressed concern Thursday that the organization has been cursed for building their franchise on an incredibly old Native American stereotype. Report: Election Day Most Americans’ Only Time In 2016 Being In Same Room With Person Supporting Other Candidate WASHINGTON—According to a report released Thursday by the Pew Research Center, Election Day 2016 will, for the majority of Americans, mark the only time this year they will occupy the same room as a person who supports a different presidential candidate. Nurse Reminds Elderly Man She’s Just Down The Hall If He Starts To Die DES PLAINES, IL—Assuring him that she’d be at his side in a jiffy, local nurse Wendy Kaufman reminded an elderly resident at the Briarwood Assisted Living Community that she was just down the hall if he started to die, sources reported Tuesday. | 1real |
U.S. tax debate employing more than half of Washington's lobbyists: report | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - More than half of the registered lobbyists in Washington have worked on tax issues in 2017, a report showed on Friday, as lawmakers in the U.S. capital scramble to conclude a year-long effort to pass a tax reform bill before Christmas. About 6,200 lobbyists, or 57 percent of those who reported activity in 2017, have been listed on disclosure forms as working on issues involving “tax” this year, the advocacy group Public Citizen said in the report. Twenty companies and trade groups each hired 50 lobbyists to work on tax issues, the report said, with U.S. Chamber of Commerce hiring 100 and the Business Roundtable, an association of chief executives at big U.S. companies, employing 51 lobbyists. The Republican bill would be the biggest overhaul of the U.S. tax system since the 1980s and its ultimate shape and success are crucial to U.S. corporate profits over the next 10 years. As drafted, the Senate bill would cut the U.S. corporate tax rate to 20 percent from 35 percent after a one-year delay and reduce taxes for some businesses and individuals, while ending many tax breaks. Democrats have been united in their opposition to the bill, calling it a giveaway to the wealthy and corporations. U.S. companies have a vested interest in nearly every aspect of the Republican tax plan, saying they would use a tax reform windfall to buy back shares, retire debt or invest back into their business.[nL1N1NQ15C} Five large U.S. companies have hired at least 15 lobbying firms for tax issues in 2017, the report said. Comcast Corp (CMCSA.O) hired 23 firms, Anheuser-Busch brought on 19 companies, Verizon Communications (VZ.N) hired 17, Microsoft (MSFT.O) hired 16 and Altria Group (MO.N) has engaged 15 lobbying firms. | 0fake |
The Apps That Make Keeping Up With Soccer Easier - The New York Times | How do New York Times journalists use technology in their jobs and in their personal lives? Rory Smith, chief soccer correspondent for The Times, who is based in Manchester, England, discussed the tech he’s using. As a soccer reporter, you must be savvy about apps and gear like antennas. What are your favorite tools for staying on the ball, so to speak? The ones I use the most are Virgin Anywhere and Sky Sports Mobile TV, the two official apps from the two major cable networks in the U. K. Sky holds the rights to most Premier League games subscribing to Virgin means I can watch the rest of the major European leagues, too. I have friends, more technologically minded than me, who prefer streaming matches through a Kodi box (a device that runs an media app that can be used to stream pirated content, including illegal sports streams). I can see why they’re tempted: The cost of subscriptions is considerable. I can justify it — to my wife, and to myself — as a professional necessity, but many can’t. It is worthwhile only because of the apps, though: I use them not only when I travel, but increasingly often at home, too. My wife, Kate, would rightly regard herself as something of a soccer (well, a soccer journalism) widow being able to watch a game on an iPad while she reads or watches something else has soothed a regular source of domestic disharmony. What do you like about the tools, and what could be better? The Virgin app, certainly, needs work to iron out various bugs. In the early days of streaming — before these apps were commonplace — I’d quite often have to find matches on websites of dubious provenance and even more uncertain reliability. It was always kind of a crapshoot as to how much of the game you’d actually see in between all of the buffering and and losses of connection. Virgin has not yet quite escaped at least two of those problems Sky is better, but not perfect. I would imagine that’s a problem that applies to whatever the United States equivalents of those apps are, too. Do you think it’s feasible for avid sports fans to cut the cable cord or is cable still the way to go? It’s feasible, but it depends on how avid you are and how patient you are prepared to be. I know Kodi and its equivalents are becoming ever more popular, and there are plenty of people I know who consume as much soccer as they want without paying very much, if anything at all, for the privilege. I can’t condone doing things that aren’t entirely legal, of course, but at the same time the cost of watching sport is rising all the time, and if there comes a point where that is out of reach for a substantial number of people, you almost have to accept that they will try to find ways around it. That said, the Premier League — like the N. F. L. and others — are doing all they can to combat streaming, so it remains, by all accounts, somewhat and not entirely reliable. It is definitely easier to have cable, but I’m not sure, especially to a younger, digital native generation, that it is still an absolute necessity. What tech product are you currently obsessed with using in your daily life? In my I’ve found that I’ve pared down the tech I use to what I’m comfortable with. Twitter and Instagram, but not Snapchat. An iPhone and iPad, but only occasionally Apple TV (we still watch DVDs in our house, on a PlayStation 3, like cave men). Lots of my friends use Strava or wear a Fitbit, but I lack the competitive instinct for the former and the inflated sense of for the latter. The last thing to be added to my little tech bubble was Spotify that’s the one that may have made the biggest difference. About 10 years ago, I found that discovering new music had become almost impossible. Music stores were becoming rarer and rarer, and ever harder to navigate, because they were full of achingly hip teenagers the radio offered nothing but indecipherable millennial pop. This sounds extreme, but Spotify has stopped — well, delayed — my journey into middle age. I’ve not decreed that all music nowadays is terrible yet without Spotify, I’m pretty sure I was on course to do so by 2014. What do you and your family do with Spotify? Together with a welter of podcasts, it provides the soundtrack to our lives. I drive a lot — to and from games, interviews, stories — and fly a lot, too. It keeps me awake and sends me to sleep (respectively). It sounds a little excessive, but it’s helped both me and my wife do something we had forgotten how — or been disenfranchised from being able — to do. I would never have found the Rural Alberta Advantage without it, or been able to relearn the words to “Regulate,” and what sort of world would that be? What could be better about it? I’m not sure I’d be able to pinpoint any one thing. I’m sure it’s not perfect. And there are times when the recommendations list makes me think someone in some West Coast lair is judging me. Oh, you liked this? Well, maybe you should be listening to Mansun then, you recidivist throwback. Apart from soccer, what is your favorite sport and what tech do you use to stay on top of it? Twitter keeps me across my other fleeting passions — cycling, cricket and rugby — though to be honest, they fade in and out. I’ll read anything on any subject, though, and some of the stuff that the likes of Vice do on sports is fascinating. | 0fake |
OBAMA CRITICIZES TRUMP For Comments About Illegals And Muslim Refugees…But What About THIS Video Of Obama’s Top 5 Most Violent Quotes About AMERICAN CITIZENS? | President Obama, who as a candidate once urged supporters to bring a gun to the knife fight of his campaign, on Tuesday decried vicious rhetoric from Republican presidential candidates.Here is a great compilation of Obama s top 5 hits on his opponent (50% of America). Can you imagine the comments that haven t been recorded, like at the recent meeting with Black Lives Matter terrorists who were invited guests of Barack Obama s, coincidentally just prior to the organized Chicago Trump rally riots?During the annual Friends of Ireland luncheon at the U.S. Capitol, Mr. Obama told a bipartisan group of lawmakers that he is more than a little dismayed about what s happening on the campaign trail lately. Never one to miss out on the opportunity to bash his enemies our very un-statesman like Community Organizer In Chief took the opportunity when speaking in front of the Prime Minister of Ireland to not talk about relations with Ireland, but instead, to bash Donald Trump. He made it clear to this group who has absolutely nothing to do with our elections, that he is watching his every move Trump makes and will use every opportunity, no matter how inappropriate, to damage his reputation. Probably the most sickening and dishonest part of this video is when Obama begrudgingly tells Speaker Of The House, Paul Ryan (R) that, I know you are a great father and a great husband and that, We can have political debates without turning on each other at the 7:45 mark: We have heard vulgar and divisive rhetoric aimed at women and minorities at Americans who don t look like us, or pray like us or vote like we do, Mr. Obama said in an obvious reference to Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump. We ve seen misguided attempts to shut down that speech, however offensive it may be. In response to those attempts, we ve seen actual violence, and we ve heard silence from too many of our leaders. As he has increasingly in recent days, Mr. Obama lamented any effort to spread fear or encourage violence, or to shut people down when they re trying to speak, or turn Americans against one another. As a citizen who will still be leading this office, I will not support somebody who practices that kind of politics, the president said.But as a candidate for the White House in 2008, Mr. Obama was no stranger to violent rhetoric. He encouraged the notion that he was a product of Chicago s particularly tough brand of politics.At a campaign event in Philadelphia in June 2008, Mr. Obama told supporters, If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun. Because from what I understand, folks in Philly like a good brawl. I ve seen Eagles fans. Later that year, as polls showed a close race between Mr. Obama and Republican nominee John McCain, Mr. Obama urged a crowd of about 1,500 at a campaign rally in Elko, Nevada, to get confrontational in their community for him. I need you to go out and talk to your friends and talk to your neighbors, Mr. Obama said. I want you to talk to them whether they are independent or whether they are Republican. I want you to argue with them and get in their face. The president on Tuesday seemed to be referring to such comments of his own when he remarked, All of us can recall some intemperate words that we regret. Certainly, I can. And while some may be more to blame than others for the current climate, all of us are responsible for reversing it. Via: Washington Times | 1real |
Transgender Politics: NC Keeps Core of HB2 Sexual Privacy Law While Ending Sports Boycott - Breitbart | groups are furiously protesting North Carolina’s political deal that will protect the sexual privacy of adults and children in public bathrooms and shower rooms while likely ending the university sports boycott of the state. [The compromise deal, titled HB142, ends economic threats to the state’s business groups by sunsetting the state’s sole authority to decide who is male and who is female in December 2020, just after the next gubernatorial election. After that date, cities and counties will regain the power to write new legal rights for gays and for “transgender” people who want to live as members of the opposite sex, ensuring renewed political fights over the role of the “gender,” and over distinctions between the male and female sexes. But the state will keep sole control of privacy rules for men’s and women’s use of public restrooms and shower rooms unless judges decide to create new rights for people who want to live as members of the opposite sex. Also, the state preserves its sole authority over the process by which people can formally change their legal sex. That is a political defeat for the gay groups and the progressives in Charlotte who ignited the “transgender bathroom” fight in February 2016 by erasing any legal distinction between men and women in public bathrooms. They erased the distinctions by declaring that men who merely say they are “transgender women” could use women’s public bathrooms and shower rooms, and effectively eliminated bathrooms in the city. In March 2016, conservatives defeated the Charlotteville challenge by passing HB2, titled the “Public Facilities Privacy Security Act. ” The popular law limited cities’ ability to impose social legislation on citizens, conserved the normal legal and civic recognition of the male and female sexes, protected sexual privacy in shared public bathrooms, and reaffirmed rules for how people can legally switch between the two sexes. Gay and progressive groups, aided by the established media, then organized a national campaign against the HB2 law. For example, they persuaded their allies in companies and universities to withdraw investment and sports tournaments from the state. The economic threat, although only partly effective, helped the 2016 defeat of the GOP’s effective governor, Pat McCrory. The business pressure also pushed GOP leaders to approval the compromise deal with the new Democratic governor, Roy Cooper. Senate passes H142 for second time on voice vote. Now goes to House. #hb2 #wral #ncga one more vote to go. — WRAL Gov’t Coverage (@NCCapitol) March 30, 2017, On Thursday, the deal was approved 32 to 16 in the state Senate’s vote and by 70 to 48 in the state House’s vote, as many GOP and Democratic legislators voted no. The deal was approved just before a deadline set by the NCAA, which threatened to withhold valuable sports events from the state from 2018 to 2022. Many polls also show the transgender agenda is supported by only voters, partly because there are so few transgender people. Since the 2016 election, former President Barack Obama has twice blamed the transgender fight for Hillary Clinton’s loss. In for example, Obama told NPR that voters “may know less about the work that my administration did on trying to promote collective bargaining or overtime rules. But they know a lot about the controversy around transgender bathrooms. ” The extension is also only a temporary win for conservatives, who will have to build assertive public support for the civic distinctions between men and women if they want to ensure that the legislature and the courts preserve the many facilities in the state. The state’s conservative Lt. Gen. Dan Forest opposed the deal, citing the state’s need to resist economic blackmail from business groups: If HB2 was right to begin with, which I believe it was, then why are we repealing it? If it is wrong, then why wait four years to fix it? Such ambiguity undercuts the legitimacy of a law that we have fought so hard to defend. We are yielding the moral high ground and giving in to a new form of corporate extortion from an unaccountable, out of state, organization (NCAA) and for what? … a ballgame? Why are we allowing them to dictate to us, laws that govern the protection of our people? We should have the backbone to tell them to take a hike. Tami Fitzgerald, the director of the NC Values Coalition, denounced the pressure from economic interests and predicted a renewed political battle in 2022: These chambers were filled today with men and women who have been under a press by the NCAA and the business community for months, and today, the leaders of our State have let the people of North Carolina down. The truth remains, no basketball game, corporation, or entertainment event is worth even one little girl losing her privacy and dignity to a boy in the locker room, or being harmed or frightened in a bathroom. Today each member cast a vote based on what they believed was in the best interest of their constituents and North Carolina. HB2 was a compassionate, reasonable law that guaranteed that [loss of privacy] wouldn’t happen, and provided sensitive solutions for transgender individuals as well so that everyone’s privacy was protected. NC Values Coalition remains committed to advocating for a standard on privacy protections in bathrooms, locker rooms and shower facilities in our schools and public buildings. Our municipalities should never erode our State’s climate by empowering cities to create a patchwork of regulations across the state to force business owners to violate their beliefs or be subject to fines and frivolous lawsuits. I am grateful for the lawmakers who remained steadfast to these principals and the thousands of coalition members that today urged them to vote against the repeal. Today’s repeal vote maintains separate facilities for men and women and leaves regulation of facilities to the state however, it leaves the state without a statewide public policy on privacy and safety in bathrooms, locker rooms and showers and simply kicks this debate three years down the road. I hope that our state will learn from this and stand stronger in the future against the bullying and intimidation tactics of groups like the NCAA, the NBA, and billion dollar corporations who care more about their political, hypocritical agendas than the and dignity of the people in our great state. The period until 2020 is also only a temporary defeat for advocates of the transgender ideology. Those groups are demanding that the state forcefully require Americans to validate the claims of “transgender” people, regardless of the cost to the roughly 99. 7 percent of normal Americans who do not wish to live as members of the opposite sex. In practice, that unpopular ideological demand requires changes in society to remove any legal or civic recognition of the two sexes. For example, in the “genderless society” sought by the transgender groups, women would be forced to accept biological males in their shower rooms, biological males in girls’ sports leagues, and curricula in their kindergartens. People, including scientists and doctors, would also be legally pressured to use incorrect female pronouns — “she” — when referring to men and teenage boys who merely say they are women, even in science classrooms or in hospitals. These requirements also would allow easy lawsuits against any practice or organization in the state, including civic groups that cater to kids. The groups denounced the compromise deal in a morning press conference and demanded full submission to their demands. “Let me express my heartfelt disdain and disappoint for what we are seeing,” said Chris Sgro, the director of Equality N. C. The deal is “ hasty, bad legislation … [which] will continue to actively discriminate against the transgender community,” he complained, adding that people in the state are “obsessed with where transgender people use the restroom. ” The deal “sold out” the lesbian, gay and transgender groups in the state, said Cathryn Oakley, the senior legislative counsel for state and municipal advocacy at the Human Rights Campaign. #RepealHB2 @equalitync ”there will be a continued fight if this passes, and there will be continued conversations with @RoyCooperNC” pic. twitter. — PP South Atlantic NC (@PPSATNC) March 30, 2017, The activists declined to tolerate any compromise. Full repeal of HB2 “is the compromise … . anything else is a terrible deal” said an ACLU staffer, Sarah Preston. “If you are a vote for this bill, you are not a friend of the LGBT community, you are not standing on the right side of the moral arc of history,” claimed Sgro. The text of the pending bill is short: Preemption of Regulation of Access to Multiple Occupancy Restrooms. § . Preemption of regulation of access to multiple occupancy restrooms, showers, or changing facilities. State agencies, boards, offices, departments, institutions, branches of government, including The University of North Carolina and the North Carolina Community College System, and political subdivisions of the State, including local boards of education, are preempted from regulation of access to multiple occupancy restrooms, showers, or changing facilities, except in accordance with an act of the General Assembly. SECTION 3. No local government in this State may enact or amend an ordinance regulating private employment practices or regulating public accommodations. SECTION 4. This act is effective when it becomes law. Section 3 expires on 19 December 1, 2020. To read more Breitbart coverage about the “gender identity” ideology, click here. | 0fake |
HILARIOUS! Random French People Say They’d Gladly House A Refugee Until Interviewer Surprises Them With Refugee To Take Home [VIDEO] | Watch this hilarious video from our British conservative friend Paul Joseph Watson (Twitter name:@PrisonPlanet) who does a brilliant job exposing the hypocrisy of the left: Pro-migrant French welcome more refugees! But when asked to house one, their enthusiasm suddenly disappears. https://t.co/GQMwUZZOAp pic.twitter.com/DHH4R6hyPK Paul Joseph Watson (@PrisonPlanet) May 5, 2017 | 1real |
BREAKING: HISPANIC MEN (Cowards) BEAT WOMAN IN FRONT YARD…Steal Yard Sign…Post Sickening Video Online | Leftist pigs inspired by the hateful rhetoric of Hillary and Obama s party So this happened A group of Hispanics drove around their city to steal Trump signs.One young woman resisted their thievery so they beat her in her front yard.Obama s America.https://twitter.com/AusAesthetics/status/782140974847832064 | 1real |
BERNIE SANDERS Makes A Promise To All Americans That You Really Won’t Believe [Video] | This guy is crazy! The last thing Americans needs is higher taxes! | 1real |
Labour Turfs out Cabbie After Accusation He ’Liked’ Islam-Critical Posts | Labour has sacked a general election candidate who campaigns for workers’ rights after allegations the prospective MP for a safe Conservative seat had ‘liked’ a series of ‘Islamophobic’ posts on Twitter over the years. [The former Labour candidate, Trevor Merralls, is the general secretary of cooperative United Cabbies Group (UCG) and a black cab driver in London. He previously penned an article published in The Guardian in which the black cab driver slammed taxi firm Uber for “eroding one of the only paths London’s kids still have to get a stable job at a time when social mobility has screeched to a halt”. The decision to ditch Mr. Merralls as the candidate for Old Bexley and Sidcup followed an investigation by Labour which centred around a Twitter account with the handle @wellingboyblue. According to the Independent, the account “‘liked’ a number of racist and Islamophobic messages over the course of the last few years”. Merralls, who denies the account belongs to him, said in a post on social media: “Already the smears and fake tweets have begun. I’ve been through this before. I’m standing in a safe Tory seat. What are they so afraid of?” “Uber accessed highest level of government and used ministers like paid up lobbyists. Made up, cropped, and photoshopped tweets wont shut me up. ” He added: “That’s categorically not me. ” Activists have pointed to the fact @wellingblueboy identified themself as “trev” and said it was a taxi driver in London and campaigner with the UCG as evidence that Merralls is behind the account. One of the account’s posts which the Independent highlights is a message dating back to March 2014, in which @wellingblueboy said Europe should “eradicate Islam from our continent”. Another aspect of the account the left wing website identified as having been offensive to Labour Party officials was how, at one point, @wellingblueboy identified themself as a supporter of the correctness BlueHand movement. The organisation’s website says: “Free Speech is a fundamental right, one that is given. Sadly, it is also a right that our politicians are attempting to take from us, thanks to the appeasement of Islamism coupled with the constant of certain minority groups. ” | 0fake |
U.S. lawmakers offer bills to counter Obama Guantanamo plan | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Republican lawmakers introduced legislation on Tuesday to counter President Barack Obama’s bid to close the Guantanamo detention center, underscoring the difficulty he faces keeping a promise to close it before leaving office next year. Republican Representative Ed Royce, the chairman of the House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee, introduced a measure that would force the Obama administration to publicize plans for transfers from Guantanamo. Currently, the administration must inform Congress of plans for any transfers, but those notices are classified. Public notice of plans to move detainees would allow opponents more time to marshal opposition and potentially stop any transfers. “This legislation will bring much needed public scrutiny to the administration’s mad rush to transfer detainees out of Guantanamo Bay before President Obama leaves office,” Royce said in a statement. Four other Republicans, Senators Richard Burr, Kelly Ayotte, Tom Cotton and Marco Rubio, a 2016 presidential hopeful, introduced a bill late on Monday that would bar Obama from returning the naval base at Guantanamo to Cuba without authorization from Congress. A similar bill was introduced in the House by Republican Representative David Jolly. “It’s clear that the threats to the United States are increasing, not decreasing, and we need every available military asset. As President Obama continues to court the Castro regime, I believe it is important that Congress makes clear that he cannot give up our base in such a strategic location,” said Burr, the chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee. “President Obama’s aggressive push to close the detention facility at Guantanamo Bay is dangerous,” Burr said. | 0fake |
Reuters: Largest 10 ’Sanctuary Cities’ May Lose $2.27 Billion in Federal Funding - Breitbart | The ten most populous cities where local leaders shield illegal immigrants from federal law could lose $2. 27 billion in federal funds, a Reuters analysis has found. [New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, and other large cities could lose federal funding for housing, education, airport improvements, HIV treatment, and more. “The [funding] numbers do not include federal money for law enforcement, which was excluded in the executive order, and programs like Medicaid, which are administered by state governments,” Reuters states. One estimate found 300 “sanctuary city” jurisdictions exist where state or local officials refuse to cooperate with federal law enforcement officers, and which order cops not to discover arrestees’ immigration status. Nationwide, at least 11 million illegal immigrants live in America’s towns and cities. President Donald Trump issued an executive order Wednesday instructing Department of Homeland Security Secretary John Kelly to look at all channels of federal funding for sanctuary cities and determine how they can be changed by the administration. Trump’s actions could shrink local government workforces and indirectly bring some city operations to a grinding halt. The Port of Seattle depends on federal dollars to operate, for example. In response to the threat of lost funding, Democratic mayors like Rahm Emanuel in Chicago and Bill de Blasio in New York have made make declarations about taking the Trump administration to court. But the sanctuary city policies also create risks for local politicians. Under former mayor Rudy Giuliani, New York City forbid city employees from sharing information about immigrants and aliens to defend his sanctuary city policy after losing a Supreme Court battle. “Six days later, several participated in the most devastating attack on the city and the country in history,” on conservative commentator Heather MacDonald pointed out. The families of Kate Steinle and Sarah Root lost their daughters when illegal aliens in sanctuary jurisdictions killed them. Trump plans to increase the pressure on local politicians — he’s ordered deputies to collect and publicize data about crimes by illegal immigrants in sanctuary cities. | 0fake |
YOUNG BLACK MAN WHO SAYS BILL CLINTON Is His Father Blames Hillary For Keeping Them Apart…Just Like Slavery When Wives Banished Husband’s Black Offspring [VIDEO] | Danney Williams has been begging for Bill Clinton to acknowledge him for decades. In the video below, he tells a heartbreaking story of living in poverty and being moved from foster care home to foster care home. He also tells of a time when Bill Clinton secretly sent money to his mother and state troopers delivered Christmas gifts to their home. His mother was a prostitute during the time that Bill Clinton was Governor of the state of Arkansas. Williams says he was told he was conceived after Bill Clinton and his mother were together 13 times. I guess this is one black life that the Clinton s didn t think mattered so much | 1real |
This North Dakota Bike Trail Is Stunning. Just Hope You Survive It. - The New York Times | It had been decades since I’d flown over a pair of handlebars. One moment I was bouncing along, in sagebrush, mind reeling from all the natural beauty zipping by, and the next I’d caught a wheel on a rock and gone sailing into that familiar somersault: butt rising from the saddle, shoulders twisting violently, hips lurching heels actually clicking midair, sunglasses and water bottle and Clif Bar hurtling into the trees, the ground closing in. Because I was aimed steeply downhill, partway into a gully, I landed more or less on my feet, like a gymnast, before flopping onto my stomach with an “Ugh!” and briefly bodysurfing. Miraculously unscathed, I dusted myself off and glanced around. Out here, alone in the wilderness, at least nobody was watching. Looking back, it seems strange that I kept going. I was just of the way into a trip with an old friend, Dacus, whom I had abandoned an hour earlier with a broken chain. It wasn’t even my first wipeout. My shins were already pulped after crashing through a wall of thistle. Most alarmingly, I had scant cellphone reception. But the thought of returning the way I had come — wading a murky creek and huffing up a rutted cow path choked with wood ticks — was more depressing. Besides, it had been my idea to cycle the Maah Daah Hey Trail, the longest and arguably most grueling mountain biking route in the United States. I was an unlikely candidate for the trip: I had never ridden a mountain bike before, or even camped much. But I’d read about the trail — a doorstep to the lush, vertiginous, sunstruck vastness of the North Dakota Badlands, which Theodore Roosevelt called “a place of grim beauty” — and was sold. Dacus, a neophyte living in New Orleans, took some convincing. But in early June, we arrived in the striving tourist town of Medora, a point for the trail. At Dakota Cyclery, an excellent bike shop and outfitter, we rented sturdy mountain bikes, trail maps and bike bags for carrying our gear, and booked a shuttle ride to a northern trailhead, all for a reasonable $375 apiece. With four days of food and clothing lashed to our bikes, and with the vaguest notion of what awaited us, we started pedaling. Something I didn’t know about mountain biking, at least on a trail this challenging: You cannot look up. Even for a second. To do so is to court ruin. Forget about the scenery, all that peripheral beauty gone by in a flash, the profound silence, the bliss of seclusion. Was that a bull elk up ahead or merely a juniper? Oh, how the rings of morning light smolder over that ridgeline . .. Wake up! Dial it in, man! Head down! Eyes locked on the trail! Let your mind drift and you are toast. Unfortunately for me, on the Maah Daah Hey, the temptation to look up is endless. The North Dakota Badlands are sometimes compared to the loping greenery of New Hampshire’s White Mountains — but that’s apt only if the greenery had been painted on top of canyon land. At its edges, the Badlands flatten into farm country, but their heart is the swaying, steppe of the Little Missouri National Grassland: more than a million acres of astonishingly beautiful, infernally punishing terrain. At every turn, it induces a wandering eye. Bridging the north and south sections of Theodore Roosevelt National Park, the Maah Daah Hey is 144. 7 miles all told, but Dacus and I were tackling only the first 96, departing from Bennett camp, just outside the north section. From the very start, it was all up, up, up. With an elevation gain of 8, 600 sidewinding feet, it began to feel Dantean. Everywhere were wonderful reminders of our mortality: sheer drops into river bottoms eroding hillside ledges that slid away in our wake cows with a knack for materializing around blind turns and at road crossings, careening oil trucks. Had I been in a morbid frame of mind, I might have chucked it all at Mile 3, when Dacus’s chain broke. The plan at that point was to reconnect farther along, after Dacus had hiked back to the trailhead, called Dakota Cyclery for help, and had them drop him off around Mile 10. I rolled on, feeling abruptly, utterly alone. We’d seen no one else all morning, and our first campsite was still 22 miles away. My prevailing concern, however, was staying on my bike. Before my acrobatic dismount, I’d narrowly missed being brained by a lolling branch. Later, I had screeched to a halt at the lip of a sharp declivity and, unable to find a foothold, simply timberrrrrrrrred into the sagebrush. But it was a warm day, in the low 80s, with a delicious tailwind. Wildflowers crowded my wheels: blue flax and sego lily, golden pea and spiderwort. Prairie grasses of muted yellows and olives bristled under a heartbreakingly blue sky. I startled a pronghorn, a relative of the antelope, which took off, kicking up sparks of dirt I trailed it across several hundred yards of upland meadow, until it was a bead in the distance. I had been reading a biography of Sitting Bull, the great Lakota holy man, and knew that far to my left was a siltstone butte called Killdeer Mountain, where in the summer of 1864, the United States Army attacked a peaceful Indian encampment, killing around 150 Santee and Lakota Sioux, though Sitting Bull survived. As they retreated and regrouped for the Battle of the Badlands — fought later that summer at the trail’s midsection near Medora — the Sioux very likely passed not far from where I was riding. Straddling a $2, 000 mountain bike, and with three liters of cold water in my insulated hydration pack, it was humbling to think of Sitting Bull, a fugitive in his own home, short on water and horses, trying to lead his people to safety over this broken ground. Onward I slogged, from tabletop plain to forests of pinyon and juniper to gravel culvert and back again. Where the trail crossed County Road 50, the outfitter’s van appeared with Dacus grinning in a window. A doctored chain, a and we were off again. And then, within minutes, we were lost. While mostly well marked, with signposts placed every 500 feet or so, the Maah Daah Hey can devolve into a latticework of tracks — some of them cow paths, some blazed by backcountry regulars — forking this way and that, and ebbing into voids. I the map and scanned its stupefying squiggles for a clue. Which way was north again? And then there it was, in the dirt at my feet: Some benevolent soul had scrawled an arrow with a fingertip, pointing the way ahead. We soon crossed Beicegel Creek, where petrified cedar stumps stood in the shallows, a reminder that western North Dakota had once been subtropical wetlands, like today’s Everglades. I gazed down at fossilized abalone and nautilus shells. Toward dusk, we found ourselves flying through an immense pasture, scattering herds of black cows and calves, the light running out behind us. It felt like a reward for a very patchy first day, perched in our pedals and roaring across the beautiful emptiness, tilted slightly downhill with the wind in our faces. After 25 hard miles, our campsite was just minutes away. Now I got this whole mountain biking deal. We were ripping! Until Dacus went airborne. He lacked the luck I’d had earlier and bounced off his head before crashing onto his tailbone. Somehow he walked away, but with the air of a sky diver whose chute had only partly opened. We inspected his helmet. It had a crack down the middle. “Wow,” I said. “You O. K.?” “I think so,” he said, woozily. “What happened?” “It was so beautiful, I decided to look around for a second. ” “Big mistake. ” We camped that night next to creek called Magpie, in a copse of ash and cottonwood. It was shady down in there, so cool and quiet. I crawled on all fours into my tent and sat plucking ticks from my legs. I was spent, my body a factory of pain. But as I stared into the woods, into the fields beyond, I felt . The Maah Daah Hey was a long time in coming. Originally conceived as a horseback trail, it took the Forest Service a decade to stitch together the inaugural 96 miles in 1999 — a patchwork of federal, state and private lands — and in 2014 they finished a second section, called the Deuce, which tacked on 48. 7 miles (there are more miles to come, pending federal financing). For mountain bikers, who caught wind of the trail early on and now make up the vast majority of its 15, 000 annual users, the wait was worth it. The Maah Daah Hey ranks with the storied Slickrock Trail in Utah and the McKenzie River Trail in Oregon as among the country’s greatest . It laps both by more than 100 miles. But the landscape of the Maah Daah Hey has a deeper meaning. The trail happens to run straight through what until the late 19th century had been home to scores of Badlands tribes, principally the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara, but also the Assiniboine, Blackfoot, Chippewa, Crow, and Oglala and Lakota Sioux (“maah daah hey” is Mandan for grandfather). In fact, the trail is part of an ancient, intertribal trading and hunting network that once stretched all the way to South Dakota, Montana and the Knife River Indian villages near Stanton, N. D. where in 1804, Lewis and Clark met Sacagawea while wintering among the Mandan. On the heels of Lewis and Clark’s visit, the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara were nearly wiped out by smallpox. The survivors banded together and endured, but like all Badlands natives, they were eventually forced to forsake their ancestral lands for reservation life. Before arriving in North Dakota, I had spoken to Gerard Baker, a and former superintendent of the Mount Rushmore National Monument. It was Mr. Baker who had named the trail — at the Forest Service’s request — partly inspired by stories his late father, Paige Baker Sr. had told him about the longstanding presence there. “I wanted to name it ‘maah daah hey’ because grandfathers are always supposed to be around,” Mr. Baker said. “From a clanship standpoint, we Indians have a lot of grandfathers, and whether you’re having hard times or good times, they’re supposed to be there for you. That’s what the trail means. You can go out there by yourself and cry and nobody will hear you except the spirits, and they’ll help you. ” Mr. Baker had little interest in mountain biking, and saw the trail more as a symbol of his secular and spiritual bond with the Badlands. “This is an area that the associate with our spirits and our history,” he said, adding that the trail’s northern end is a short drive from the Mandan, Hidatsa and Arikara reservation at Fort Berthold. “The Badlands were closed off to us for so long. Now they’re open to us again. We have a lot of spirits that still live out there, and we feel an ownership to the land. Deep in our hearts, it’s still ours, man. ” At Mr. Baker’s suggestion, I had placed a clump of tobacco on the trail as Dacus and I had set out, praying to the four directions — North, South, East, West — for our safe delivery. Whether or not it was working seemed to be an open question. Each morning we wondered what the day would bring. The wind was constantly at our backs, like a gentle hand pushing us. Rain that had churned the ground into impassable sludge days earlier was nowhere to be seen. Pronghorn sprung from crowns of gamagrass and foxtail barley. Western meadowlarks and bobolinks shot over the fields. At a place called Devils Pass, we gingerly negotiated a gangplank of shattered stone as the trail narrowed over a shadowy gorge. But then the Maah Daah Hey mellowed into flatlands, veering southwesterly and roughly paralleling the Little Missouri River. We crossed the shallows carrying our bikes on our shoulders, wading the reddened, sluggish water up to our thighs. Dacus, hankering for a swim, plopped down in the middle and flapped his legs, style. We cruised into a maze of huge cottonwoods, a rare length of shade where the grass grew up past our saddles. This was the best part of the trail. The air was stunningly crisp, birdsong flaring and fading. The going was easy. I found a deer antler, a tiny forked thing that I stuffed into my pack, and a little farther on, a hawk feather, fluted rustling across the grass. We headed up again, a dizzying climb in equatorial heat, past the tree line, then stopped for lunch on an alcove with amphitheater views. Miles and miles of rough country rolled to the horizon, a leafy sandstone valley sprouting interior courtyards and alleyways, the swollen sun overhead. Scattered incongruously on distant bluffs were several pumpjack oil drilling rigs, most of them inactive, poised over the earth like herons. Western North Dakota has some of the richest oil and natural gas reserves in the world — part of the vast Bakken Formation, a geologic superfund of sorts holding billions of barrels of oil, almost all of it reachable only through controversial fracking. During the height of its oil boom from 2006 to 2012, North Dakota produced over a million barrels per day, more than any state besides Texas. When the price of oil dropped in 2014, many rigs went idle. By 3 p. m. we had put 22 miles behind us. Whooping and shouting, we rode a rushing swell of grass, birds in orbit all around, then dropped into a draw, snaking through shoals of boulders. One boulder turned out to be a dead cow, its face and hindquarters eaten away. It was hard not to think of it as an omen. Our camp was a wide basin a mile or two from Elkhorn Ranch, where a young Theodore Roosevelt lived from 1884 to 1887. Roosevelt loved the Badlands. He came to rely on their restorative qualities after wearying stints back East. As an avid hunter, partly what he loved was the chance to shoot the bison, elk and bighorn sheep. Evenings, he’d sit on his veranda with a rifle close at hand. But the Badlands eventually changed Roosevelt, giving shape to a conservationist credo. Sickened by the ravages of hide hunters, he protected 230 million acres of public land during his presidency, including a stunning parcel of North Dakota Badlands. My notes from Day 3 are mostly unprintable here. miles of blistering, infuriating, jackknifed rock. We pushed and pulled and lugged our oppressive, bikes over nearly every inch of ground, cursing and sputtering. We couldn’t get enough water. I have an image of Dacus slumped on the trail, febrile and panting, handkerchief covering his face, madly gulping from his water bottle while turkey vultures circled overhead. We decided to ration the four liters apiece we carried, just in case. When we reached a spot with some shade, Dacus lay down for a nap and I scrambled to the top of a butte, that I’d check my cell reception to see if I could call for a medevac. As I sat there, a mule deer clomped into the clearing below me twitching its big khaki ears. Far off, wavering on the thermals, two golden eagles swung into view. With twilight approaching, we found ourselves in a petrified forest, swerving wildly to avoid the blackened stumps. Camp had to be close by, we reasoned. But our map showed we were still an hour out. We weren’t quite in tears, but we were close. Sooner or later, the Maah Daah Hey Trail, we had to admit, turns grown men into simpering mama’s boys. It’s a place for stern, bushwhacking cyclists and not for city kids after a fleeting nature fix. Dacus put our problem succinctly: “I think what we’re finding is our skill levels just aren’t very high. ” It was almost dark when we arrived in camp, plumb out of water and near the brink of physical and emotional collapse. By good fortune, four experienced mountain bikers were riding the trail that week, and they greeted us with restorative beers and a dinner. It was a deciding to wimp out on the last day. A shortcut via a graded service road, we realized, would put us back in Medora by lunchtime, nearly halving the trail’s last 28 miles. With a cloud of dust in our wake, we were in town by noon, sharing a large Hawaiian pizza and guzzling pints of beer. As we sat toasting our accomplishment, I felt a twinge of pride. It hadn’t been pretty, and I was glad it was over, but we’d ridden the Maah Daah Hey Trail, or a good chunk of it anyway, and lived. “Thanks for inviting me along,” Dacus said. “It was amazing. One of the most incredible trips of my life. And I’ll never do it again. ” But I thought happily of our last night in camp, of those gifted cans of Canadian beer, and of some Maah Daah Hey advice that Gerard Baker had given me: “Don’t just look, but listen. Stand out there in the middle of the night and listen. Listen to the trees and to the grass, because you’ll hear a lot in those Badlands. ” And I did. I stood in the darkness sipping beer and missing my wife, listening to the chirr of summer insects while the stars brightened, trying to tune my ears to the unknown. | 0fake |
DEA Official Spills the Beans on the Clinton Foundation |
Rules for thee, but not for me.
Without much comment or fanfare, I am going to present a note sent to me by a DEA informant who I had a great amount of contact with over two years ago. My long-time readers may recall that during the Central American immigration invasion, I had contact with two DEA agents working independently. The information provided to me has stood the test of time.
Everyone has to make up his/her mind as to the authenticity of this account. However, I want reiterate, I have had extensive contact with this person and their information has always been first rate.
Dear Mr. Hodges,
As you will recall, I had intermittent contact with you during the so-called Central American immigration crisis during May-July of 2014 in which I shared my experiences with you as a result of my work with the DEA.
I am sure you will recall that I introduced you to the inner workings of terrorist training base camps operating in El Salvador as well the planned influx of MS-13 trained assassins into the United States which was accomplished with the oversight of DHS. These forces will soon come into prominence in the coming weeks and months. We are going to see violence in this country on an unprecedented scale just as we are seeing in Europe with the Muslim immigration, the local police will be powerless to act because they are ultimately controlled by federal agencies like DHS who will roadblock normal law enforcement. I am telling you it is hard to not believe that the real goal is to perpetuate massive civil unrest so that more formal uses of governmental power can be brought to bear against and potential American dissident movement which has really mushroomed since the beginning of the Trump candidacy
My purpose for writing to you today is to let you know that I have contact with DOJ and in particular many FBI officials as a result of daily activities. I have to watch my ass and it is not as it was two years ago when we first communicated. I am determined to see the release of certain information prior to the election because I believe you and others are correct when you say, the criminal cabal that seems to have taken over key positions in our government are poised to change America and my children and yours will have to try and survive what is coming and then they will have live in this shit hole. I am playing this very close to the vest. Responding to this email will be pointless as all of our future conversations will have to remain one-sided but I am not writing anything that I do not want released. Please release everything I am sending to you.
To a person my colleagues feel betrayed by the present FBI Director and Attorney General, but I am telling you that Obama is controlling the activities through his appointed CIA operatives who have infiltrated the DOJ as well as military, generally, and the FBI, specifically. The tone of the influence is decidedly pro-“Radical” Muslim and anti-American in the traditional sense. This undue influence often seeks to perpetuate the activities of those people of privilege who seem to be beyond the reach of traditional law enforcement. Their activities include gun running and drug dealing. This has reached into your area because Maricopa County Sheriff Joe will be/is the victim of election fraud because the certain people want him out because he will not look the other way when it comes to cartel drug activity in Arizona which is key because Arizona is a border state.
Your reporting of the corrupt voting machines in your area seems to be correct but Arpaio is more of a target than Trump because he is an impediment to drug trafficking in your area. You have to remember that your Sheriff was at one time one of us, so we know what we are seeing. Yes- I am saying that Obama’s DOJ is protecting the drug dealers by going after Arpaio. The persecution of the Sheriff has nothing to do with the violations of the civil rights of immigrants and has everything to do with his refusal to cooperate with the Obama administration by looking the other way when it comes to both cartel and the intertwined activities of terrorists that have crossed our borders in great numbers since 2010.
Most will never know who these people are until they act. They live among us, work with us and their children even go to school our children. When they are arrested, DHS shows up to intervene and the issue is cloaked under the guise of racial prejudice and border agents and local law enforcement who are over-stepping their bounds. The police are so discouraged that they have basically given up. This is actually a case of thinly disguised criminal enterprise corruption and DHS always runs the interference. This is a lot of what you see in these inexplicable catch and release activities. The bigger the drug and gun fish that is apprehended, the quicker they are released to repeat the same actions.
A case in point from the past: Do you remember when Congressman Bridenstine tried to enter a holding facility for immigrants at Ft. Sill during the 2014 immigration crisis and he was told by DHS to come back and make an appointment? DHS was attempting to shield what was truly going on which was the introduction of foreign operatives into mainstream America. West African terrorists are also coming across our border with bad intentions, not just people from Central America and the Middle East. I have every indication that these forces are ready to unleash massive waves of destruction in our country as their drug activities have increased exponentially in the past several months. They are raising money for purposes that extend far beyond mere living expenses.
You have written that you expect the left to unleash terror attacks should Mrs. Clinton not win the election through whatever means is at her disposal. You are correct, but I think this may be a moot point. Speaking of Mrs. Clinton, the Foundation is the most criminal enterprise organization on the face of the earth. They avoid detection because of the use of their shell corporations which gives them at least 2-3 degrees of separation.
When the President of the Philippines executed thousands of drug dealers he was upsetting the balance of trade in the drug industry and I believe he was cutting into Foundation activities. This is why Obama was going to Manila to personally speak with him until Obama was attacked with a tirade of insults and name-calling by this newly elected President. This politician will not be in power for long. The CIA has a way of taking the massive protests that we see in the news and turning it on whomever they want to displace. The people of the Philippines are protesting the military presence in the Philippines today but this could be turned into revolutionary force tomorrow. This is why this rogue President is moving towards aligning with China and you have picked up on that in an arti0cle I read. This President is looking for protection and he should be.
The world war that is coming has a lot to do with drug wars, not just Syria. There are clear divisions in the world that are firming up along these lines and it would be a mistake to ignore these developments.
The DEA is just as corrupted as the FBI, as we are still honoring our under-the-table agreement with the Sinolas in which we agree to only interdict 20% of the drug shipments into the United States in exchange for some unknown amount of intelligence information. How many terrorist cells do you think we are knowingly letting in along with the drugs? It was during the same time frame that you and I were talking that Judicial Watch came across the ISIS and drug cartel base camp near El Paso. I am sure you asked yourself how many facilities like this one exist and if there are any inside of the United States? There are and they are now working with foreign entities inside the United States. When we make our token busts, we frequently come upon the involvement of Russian and Chinese national who are in this country and they are immediately released by DOJ and DHS. It is starting to look like one big and happy criminal enterprise family that is international in scope but does enjoy the protection of the Obama administration.
Your article about a multi-pronged attack including a Red Dawn element is close to what I know to be a real possibility and this is the advanced force designed to disrupt command and control in the coming war. The sad thing is that many agents suspect this and we are powerless to expose it. Congress has been tipped off and they show no interest. A lot of the reason that I think you are correct about what you have recently written, are the paramilitary base camps in and around San Salvador which have now spread to Honduras. this is a growing problem and growing concern. These terrorists have been trained on stingers and 50 cal weapons. They are also serving as drug transport entities.
In the past couple of days since Director Comey announced he was reopening the investigation on Mrs. Clinton, I have had several advanced warnings of what was coming. The Clintons have fallen into disfavor with important entities- groups.
My colleagues believe that more than Mrs. Clinton is being targeted and that there are unknown actors looking to commit a hostile takeover of the Clinton Foundation because the Clintons have stepped on important toes in the international drug and gun trade, in particular, in Peru, which is the conduit between Middle East terrorists and the cartels. As I have told you before, my associates on the FBI drug task force(s) tell me that this reopening of the investigation is not the result of Director Comey being pressured to act against Mrs. Clinton from within the FBI, as many publications have insinuated. The sudden turning of Director Comey against Mrs. Clinton is motivated by forces outside of the FBI. At least that is what we are being led to believe and I think it is so. Any agent that would launch an investigation into any of the areas that I have mentioned here would be finished or worse.
I have spoken with some who participated in the original email investigation. When the emails led to guns and drugs, the emails were destroyed and this line of the investigation was reduced to a series of meaningless leads. I know this for a fact because we had some of the same information.
Everyone of the agents will privately admit that the first FBI investigation was designed to produce exoneration for Mrs. Clinton. My people are aware of this because some of the subject matter involved money laundering from drug and gun operations. Don’t make the mistake in believing that this present investigation is any more or any less honest that the last one. Of course, you should also not believe what you are reading and seeing in the press. The Clinton duo is being taken down for reasons that are unknown to me by forces that I have to come to believe control Director Comey and AG Lynch. In one of your most recent articles you talked about Clinton being elected and then indicted. This opens an endless universe of possibilities about how the transition of power will be handled in January.
Many of us believe that the United States is about to become a thinly veiled narco terrorist state, the biggest in the history of the world. I could see cartel members, of their representatives visiting the White House in this next administration. At present in the DEA, we are most often cast into the role of blocking legitimate investigations in these areas. Some fear that we will soon become facilitators. To date that role has always been fulfilled by the CIA. However, we think it is going to permeate the ranks of my agency. By the way Dave, you have claimed to have contact with another DEA source during the time we were speaking. Be careful, trolls abound with false information.
I strongly believe that Hillary could be indicted. I think that what you have written about the possible scenarios following an indictment is possible, but that part is unknown and unconfirmed from my perspective. I do know that the FBI investigators with our assistance are still being limited in what they can look at. I have been contacted for information related to past drug investigations only to have the requests prepared and the FBI no longer shows any interest in the information, particularly if it is drug related. Any investigation that includes drug trafficking and money laundering seems to still be out of bounds. The Weiner angle is laughable but they may make it stick. It appears to some that it is open season on Hillary Clinton at the Bureau with regard to these emails.
It is my belief that if Mrs. Clinton survives this latest round, and I do not think she will, we are going to see a massive purge in the government like this country has ever seen. I have given you a lot to digest so I am going to close for now.
Based on what we already know, is this information that earth-shattering. I look at this as business as usual and our election process and ultimately the welfare of our country is up for grabs and money is the ultimate reason why.
| 1real |
BREAKING: OBAMA APPOINTED JUDGE Demands RNC Reveal Trump’s Plans To Prevent Voter Fraud | Just look away. The Democrats don t have any plans to steal your vote. If you don t believe us, ask this Obama appointed judge who s making it his business to make sure Republicans don t get involved protecting the sanctity of the vote for every American A federal judge is ordering the Republican National Committee to detail any agreements it has with Donald Trump s campaign to engage in ballot security efforts in connection with next week s election something the national GOP has been banned from doing for decades without court approval.The order also instructs the RNC to explain by 5 p.m. Tuesday what Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway and GOP vice presidential nominee Mike Pence were talking about in recent comments when they said that Trump s campaign was working closely with the RNC to make sure there is no fraud at the polls. Newark, N.J.-based U.S. District Court John Vazquez issued the order Monday after the Democratic National Committee went to court last week to allege that the RNC was violating consent decrees from the 1980s settling a case alleging that GOP pollwatchers sought to intimidate minority voters in a practice then known as caging. The agreements allow the RNC to organize poll watchers, but prohibit any effort to intimidate voters as they enter a polling place or to challenge individual voters, except as part of a program approved in advance by the court.Here s a little reminder (video below) of how the New Black Panthers intimidated voters outside of a polling place in Philadelphia. But by all means, the RNC and the Trump campaign should just look away The RNC insists it has worked to ensure compliance with the agreement and submitted to the court a series of memos sent to its personnel, national committee members and others from August through this month reminding them about the consent decree and the need to remain at arms length from all ballot security efforts. The memos tell RNC workers, officials and volunteers not to engage in poll watching efforts at all, not to take video or audio recordings at polling places and not to mention ballot fraud concerns on social media sites like Facebook and Twitter.However, in August, Pence appeared to indicate there was a joint effort by the Trump campaign and the RNC to combat voter fraud. The Trump Campaign and the Republican National Committee are working very, very closely with state governments and secretaries of state all over the country to ensure ballot integrity, Pence said at a town hall meeting in Denver in August.In addition, Conway reportedly told the Washington Post last month that the Trump campaign is actively working with the national committee, the official party, and campaign lawyers to monitor precincts around the country. Politico | 1real |
Megyn [sic] Kelly BTFO by Newt: “You are Fascinated with Sex” | The prophecy is coming true.
Every cuck loser who enters Trump’s proximity turns into a mega-shitlord.
Newt Gingrich just taught the slut Megyn [sic] Kelly how to shut her whore mouth.
Wow.
Washington Post :
Gingrich, on Fox in his role as a Donald Trump surrogate, had questioned the stories of women whoâve come forward to accuse Trump of sexual assault â and the relative importance of the controversy itself, relative to Hillary Clintonâs alleged misdeeds.
Kelly pushed back. âAs a media story, we donât get to say that 10 women are lying. We have to cover that story, sir,â said the Fox anchor.
âSure. Okay,â Gingrich said. â So, so itâs worth 23 minutes of the three networks to cover that story, and Hillary Clinton had a secret speech in Brazil to a bank that pays her 225,000 [dollars], saying her dream is an open border where 600 million people could come to America â thatâs not worth covering ⌠â
âThat is worth covering,â interjected Kelly. âAnd we did.â
Gingrich was still speaking: â ⌠I mean, you want to go back through the tapes of your show recently, you are fascinated with sex, and you donât care about public policy. â
âMe? Really?â she said, laughing.
âWell, thatâs what I get out of watching you tonight,â Gingrich said.
Cue crosstalk.
KELLY: âYou know what, Mr. Speaker, Iâm not fascinated by sex. But I am fascinated by the protection of women âŚâ
GINGRICH: âOkay.â
KELLY: â ⌠and understanding what weâre getting in the Oval Office âŚâ
GINGRICH: âOkay.â
KELLY: â ⌠and I think the American voters would like to know âŚâ
GINGRICH: âAnd, therefore, weâre going to send Bill Clinton back to the East Wing, because after all, you are worried about sexual predators.â
âYeah, listen, itâs not about me,â Kelly said. âItâs about the women and men of America. And the poll numbers show us that the women of America, in particular, are very concerned about these allegations and, in large part, believe that they are a real issue. And donât dismiss the women âŚâ
And: resume crosstalk.
GINGRICH: âYou want to comment, you want to comment âŚâ
KELLY: â ⌠donât dismiss the women summarily.â
GINGRICH: â ⌠on whether the Clinton â do you want to comment on whether the Clinton ticket has a relationship to a sexual predator.â
KELLY: âWe on âThe Kelly Fileâ have covered that story as well, sir. I will tell you, the polls âŚâ
GINGRICH: âNo, I just want to hear you use the words. I want to hear you use the words âBill Clinton, sexual predator.â I dare you. [At that point, Gingrich was smiling slightly. Kelly was not.] âSay âBill Clinton, sexual predator.ââ
KELLY: âMr. Speaker, weâve covered â excuse me, sir âŚâ
GINGRICH: âDisbarred by the Iowa, by the Arkansas bar.â
KELLY: âExcuse me. excuse me.â
GINGRICH: âDisbarred by the Arkansas bar. Eight hundred fifty thousand dollar penalty.â
KELLY: â ⌠excuse me, sir. We on âThe Kelly Fileâ have covered the Clinton matter as well. Weâve hosted Kathleen Willey âŚâ
GINGRICH: âWell, try saying it.â
KELLY: â ⌠weâve covered the examples of him being accused as well, but heâs not on the ticket. And the polls also show that the American public is less interested âŚâ
GINGRICH: âHeâll be in the, heâll be in the East Wing.â
KELLY: â ⌠in the deeds of Hillary Clintonâs husband than they are in the deeds of the man who asks us to make him president, Donald Trump. Weâre going to have to leave it at that, and you can take your anger issues and spend some time working on them, Mr. Speaker. Thanks for being here.â
GINGRICH: âAnd you, too.â
I haven’t seen a bitch get shut down like this since the 80s. I thought he was going to reach through the screen and start slapping her around, OLD SCHOOL.
I hate this bitch so, so much.
She alone is proof that women should never, under any circumstances, be allowed to leave the kitchen or speak with men who are not their husbands, fathers or brothers.
Because really, as funny as this exchange was, it isn’t really about sex. If it was about sex, as Newt mentions, she could easily focus on Bill, who is a literal rapist.
It is about sexism.
Anti-male sexism by a feminist whore.
Megyn [sic] Kelly should be in prison. | 1real |
Re: The U.S. Will Lose Global Reserve Status, Expect 80-90% Devaluation Of the U.S. Dollar | Email
In the following interview with the X22Report Spotlight report, Dr. Jim Willie unleashes with both guns blazing on a subject I’ve been warning about for about for over two years now, which is the loss the U.S. Dollar’s status as the World’s Global Reserve Currency.
For the simple fact that no one under the age of 70 has never known a planet earth where the U.S. Dollar has not been the World’s Reserve Currency, most Americans in particular have no idea what it will mean when we lose that status.
The subject is not one that is taught in schools until well into the graduate school level in most cases, so unless a person has done independent research on the subject, the average American cannot comprehend how painful it will be for individual American families not IF, but WHEN the inevitable finally happens.
Losing the World Reserve Currency status is a process, just like losing the world’s faith in the U.S. was a process. Both are processes that have been well underway for the better part of the last two decades, especially this past decade. Roughly ten years ago, 75% of global trade was denominated in U.S. Dollars, and that makes sense. After all, we’ve been the Reserve Currency.
Over the last ten years, that figure has dropped to roughly 35% of all global trade which is now settled in U.S. Dollars, because countries are rushing to distance themselves from the U.S. for many of the reasons Dr. Willie outlines in another interview from earlier today titled, Dr. Jim Willie: Unprecedented Bond Dumping Means U.S. Dollar Collapse Ahead .
The bottom line is this: The U.S. has grossly abused its privilege of being the World Reserve Currency, largely because we've adopted the practice of monetizing our debt by printing money out of thin air. Giving that process a fancy name like Quantitative Easing, doesn't change the reality of what it is. We print money out of thin air, and rip-off every country we've borrowed from when we pay them back with Dollars worth less than the ones we borrowed.
Now, the world has lost all faith in the only thing that backs the U.S. Dollar in the first place: The Full Faith and Credit of the United States Government. In the interview, Dr. Willie gives a BLISTERING account of what to expect. He begins the first 30 seconds of the interview by explaining how once the U.S. Dollar is finished being phased out, a process that as I’ve said is well underway, he expects the Dollar to experience a massive currency devaluation of 30% almost instantly.
After the initial devaluation of 30%, Dr. Willie expects there to be another another 30% devaluation six to eight months down the road, followed by a long series of 20% devaluations over the next several years, until we reach a point in about 4-5 years when our currency is completely devalued, and worth about 10% of what it is today.
For a country with a trade deficit of over $500 BILLION, and as a country that imports over 50% of our food… that means conditions Americans once considered to be unthinkable here in the United States, will soon become ordinary. Let that sink in for a moment. The unthinkable will become ordinary. The time to prepare is now. Brace yourself for a very intense interview… one of Dr. Willie’s most intense ever!
DO NOT MISS THE SECOND VIDEO BELOW WITH CANADIAN BILLIONAIRE NED GOODMAN, AS HE LECTURES ON THE COMING COLLAPSE OF THE U.S. DOLLAR!
As individual Americans or as families, in the past when we’ve heard news from pundits or politicians talking about issues like trade deficits, bad trade deals, or the federal debt, many times what we hear goes in one ear and out the other, because many of us cannot SEE or FEEL how those reports affect our families on a daily basis, or in our every day lives.
The loss of the Reserve Currency is not something that might happen. It’s not something that could happen. It’s an eventually that there’s no chance of avoiding. That ship set sail far too long ago to fix the damage already done, and what lies ahead. It’s not an event where a vote is taken, and we’ll lose the status over night thanks to anything done by a U.N. vote, or by our own politicians in Washington. What's done is done, now it just has to play out.
As explained, it’s a process, and it’s well underway. I could not be more serious when I say that conditions Americans once considered to be unthinkable in the United States, will soon become ordinary. If you’re fortunate enough to still be working, and you have an income, do not squander your opportunity to protect your family. Begin preparing. There is a reason Peter Schiff has said: The Collapse of the Dollar Will Be the Single Biggest Event In All of Human History .
How The Coming Dollar Collapse Will Leave Americans Destitute
An increasing number of financial experts are saying the United States dollar is no longer a reliable and dependable currency – and that its downfall is inevitable. There are even some experts who think the dollar is so unstable that the Chinese Yuan will soon become the world’s reserve currency, or currency of choice.
“Our addictions to debt and cheap money have finally caused our major international creditors to call for an end to dollar hegemony and to push for a ‘de-Americanized’ world,” investment advisor and financial strategist Micheal Pento wrote in an op-ed piece for CNBC .
Others agree.
“In my view the dollar is about to become dethroned as the world’s defacto currency basically,” Canadian billionaire investor Ned Goodman said. “We’re headed to a period of stagflation , maybe serious inflation , and the United States will be losing the privilege of being able to print at its will the global reserve currency.”
Goodman believes the US already is in another recession. The unemployment numbers are understated and the “real” unemployment number likely is closer to 15 percent, he said.
Over half of 200 international institutional investors surveyed by the Economist think that the Yuan will eventually replace the dollar as the world’s reserve currency. The reserve currency is the money most commonly accepted for international trade.
Why Reserve Currencies Matter
Having money with a reserve currency status enables a nation to dominate and control the world’s financial markets, as their currency is used for international trade and transactions. The US has the ability to maintain a $17 trillion national debt largely because the dollar is the reserve currency.
A nation with a reserve currency can simply print money to pay its debts.
In past centuries nations such as Britain, France, Spain, the Netherlands, and Portugal lost their status as super powers in part when their money lost reserve currency status. Reserve currencies collapse because people no longer trust or believe in the governments that issue them.
Goodman says that the US dollar became the reserve currency in the 1970s because Saudi Arabia agreed to only accept only the dollar as payment for oil. Goodman noted that at least one major producer, Russia, is now accepting Yuan in payment for oil.
Goodman was referring to a deal that Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian leader Vladimir Putin made last May. Under the terms of deal, Russian companies can borrow money directly from China in exchange for oil.
The US dollar once was backed by gold and silver, Goodman said, but now is “backed by nothing.”
Australia Starts Using Yuan
One of America’s oldest and closest allies may have taken the first step to ending the dollar’s reign as the reserve currency. CNBC reported that the Yuan will now be traded in Australia’s financial markets. Among other things that will let Chinese customers pay Australian firms in Yuan. China is the biggest market for Australia’s exports such as iron and coal.
Story continues below video
The Australian government has endorsed the deal because China is Australia’s biggest trading partner. Arthur Sinodinos, Australia’s Assistant Treasurer (treasury secretary) even went on CNBC’s Asia Squawk Box show to endorse the deal.
“It’s a big vote of confidence by both countries in the future of the relationship,” Sinodinos said. Not even recent economic problems in China seemed to dampen Sinodinos’ enthusiasm for the arrangement.
“There’s no doubt that the Chinese authorities are having to manage issues in the financial sector to make sure that growth is sustained, but they’ve shown great skill at that in the past they were very adept at the fallout from the global financial crisis,” Sinodinos said. In other words, Sinokinos believes the Chinese are doing a very good job of managing their economy and their currency is reliable.
How will the Dethroning of the Dollar Affect You?
Observers disagree widely on how the end of the dollar’s reign as reserve currency would affect the US economy and average Americans. Retired neurosurgeon and pundit Dr. Ben Carson thinks it would turn the US into a third world nation and lead to unrest that would lead to martial law, as Off The Grid News recently reported.
Goodman believes there will soon be a massive sell off of US dollars that will lead to inflation. He also suggested a way for people to protect their assets.
“The Chinese have three and a half trillion US dollars and they’re spending these dollars as quickly as they can, and it will not be long before the rest of the world and the US will be thinking likewise. I do.” Goodman said.
In the 1930s, everyone wanted US dollars, he said, but today they’re trying to get rid of them. He thinks that many investors are trying to spend all of their dollars to buy hard assets in order to avoid losing money invested in dollars.
That means average people might be able to protect themselves by investing in hard assets such as gold, real estate or silver, Goodman said.
Article posted with permission from The Last Great Stand shares | 1real |
Boiler Room #108 – Who’d Win in a Fight? Boiler Room vs. Hitler vs. Dracula | Tune in to the Alternate Current Radio Network (ACR) for another LIVE broadcast of The Boiler Room tonight 6:00 PM PST | 8:00 PM CST | 9:00 PM EST for this special broadcast. Join us for uncensored, uninterruptible talk radio, custom-made for bar fly philosophers, misguided moralists, masochists, street corner evangelists, media-maniacs, savants, political animals and otherwise lovable rascals.Join ACR hosts Hesher and Spore along with Jay Dyer from Jays Analysis, FunkSoul (21WIRE & ACR contributor), Randy J (ACR contributor) and Andy Nowicki, author of Conspiracy, Compliance, Control & Defiance, for the hundred and seventh episode of BOILER ROOM. Turn it up, tune in and hang with the ACR Brain-Trust for this weeks boil downs and analysis and the usual gnashing of the teeth of the political animals in the social reject club. This week on the show we re side stepping politics and talking about movies, Hollywood, Aliens, Elf-men and paradigm shifts brought on be technological innovation!Direct Download Episode #108Please like and share the program and visit our donate page to get involved!Reference Links: | 1real |
EU refugee court ruling triggers new east-west feuding | LUXEMBOURG/BRUSSELS (Reuters) - The EU s highest court ruled on Wednesday that member states must take in a share of refugees who reach Europe, dismissing complaints by Slovakia and Hungary and reigniting an east-west row that has shaken the Union s cohesion. The Mediterranean migrant crisis which prompted mandatory quotas in 2015 for relocating asylum seekers from Greece and Italy has receded, easing immediate pressure to force compliance on nationalist leaders who are making electoral capital from lambasting the EU while benefiting from Brussels subsidies. But defiant rejection from some ex-communist states that the EU accuses of slipping on democratic standards - Hungary called the judgment a political rape of EU law - indicated no let-up in tensions that are testing the Union s internal cooperation. In Germany, where Chancellor Angela Merkel is fighting for re-election against opponents who criticize her for taking in over a million migrants at the height of the drama, the interior minister threatened legal action against countries which fail to take in their allotted share of Syrian and other refugees. But Hungary, where outspoken Prime Minister Viktor Orban has built border fences and made keeping out migrants a key plank of his re-election campaign for next year, branded the European Court of Justice ruling appalling and irresponsible . This decision jeopardizes the security and future of all of Europe, Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto said. Politics has raped European law and values. Italy, now the main destination for migrants taking to the sea following measures to block the route from Turkey to Greece and from Greece northward, has been prominent in calling for the wealthier Western states to cut EU subsidies to poor neighbors which do not show solidarity in taking in migrants. European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has echoed that threat, warning Orban solidarity is not a one-way street . But the EU executive is also anxious to calm tensions ahead of negotiations on a new seven-year EU budget that will be all the harder because of a hole left by Britain s imminent departure. The Commission said on Wednesday it may seek fines at the ECJ within weeks for Hungary, Poland and the Czech Republic if they do not start or resume taking people from the south. Poland and Hungary, which argue Muslim immigration is a threat to their national security and stability, have in two years taken in none of their respective quotas of about 6,200 and 1,300 people. However, the executive, which is separately considering trying to suspend eastern heavyweight Poland for undermining the independence of its judiciary, stressed it wanted solutions that would unite the 28-nation bloc. Slovakia s prime minister said he still rejected quotas but was willing to help in other ways. And as the Union digests a Brexit vote last year that was partly driven by concern over migration, many states that backed the quota system in 2015 and are increasingly exasperated by Polish and Hungarian hostility to Brussels are also reluctant to force through new policies that may bolster eurosceptics across Europe who say the EU is trampling on national sovereignty. If we push it through above their heads, they will use it in their anti-EU propaganda at home, one EU diplomat said, while noting that, with the migration crisis dropping out of the headlines, all sides might find a way to resolve the issue. The Commission is working on reforms to the so-called Dublin rules under which people arriving in the EU must stay to claim asylum in the first country they reach. A mechanism to help the likes of Greece and Italy in emergencies has proved elusive. However, governments may find it easier to negotiate now that the migration is not quite so prominent in local politics. The Luxembourg-based ECJ dismissed in their entirety the arguments advanced by Hungary and Slovakia with backing from Poland and endorsed the Commission s solution which eventually ordered states to take in nearly 100,000 Syrians and others. The mechanism actually contributes to enabling Greece and Italy to deal with the impact of the 2015 migration crisis and is proportionate, the court said in statement. Difficulties in identifying candidates for relocation - and a reluctance of refugees to settle other than in the wealthier west of Europe - saw fewer than 30,000 people relocated in two years, but the Commission noted an acceleration in the program this year and said it would continue to move people northward. Among the gravest problems the migration crisis caused was member states reimposing controls on internal EU frontiers. That had jeopardized one of the Union s most cherished achievements and for a time appeared to threaten to disrupt internal traffic. EU Migration Commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos said special exemptions that have allowed the likes of Germany, Austria, Denmark and Sweden to control their borders with EU neighbors should now end when they expire in two months time. | 0fake |
In slap at Trump, some wealthy Republicans campaign for Clinton | NEW YORK/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Groups of wealthy Republicans unhappy with Donald Trump have been privately courting prominent peers to join them in backing Democrat Hillary Clinton’s U.S. presidential bid, several people involved in the effort told Reuters. They say they are seeking money and endorsements from other Republicans disillusioned by Trump, their party’s candidate for the Nov. 8 presidential election. Some have received encouragement from Clinton and members of her campaign staff. “I made the decision that I wouldn’t be able to look at my grandkids if I voted for Trump,” said Dan Webb, a former federal prosecutor and a self-described “Republican for decades” working to win over prominent Republican business people in Chicago. Trump, a New York developer making his first run at public office, has made traditional Republican donors uneasy with inflammatory statements about women, Mexicans, Muslims and war veterans, among others. Big-name Wall Street donors can make a difference for Clinton. They could inject big money into a campaign. They might influence moderate Republicans to switch sides. Their support of Clinton challenges Trump’s assertion that his business successes make him a better candidate for president. With the political conventions barely over, the Republican effort to fundraise for Clinton is at an early stage. Some of the groups have yet to receive contributions because they must still file paperwork under campaign finance rules. Trump spokeswoman Hope Hicks declined to comment for this story. Clinton spokesman Jesse Ferguson said business leaders are supporting Clinton because of her economic plan and because Trump “cannot be trusted to lead our economy.” Groups formed to support Clinton include Republicans for Her 2016, run by Republican lobbyist Craig Snyder; a grassroots organization called R4C16, led by John Stubbs and Ricardo Reyes, officials in former President George W. Bush’s administration; and the Republican Women for Hillary group co-led by Jennifer Pierotti Lim, an official at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The first two groups are acting independently of Clinton’s own effort. The third is acting in concert with her campaign. “We wanted to go out there and be the voice for Republicans who were feeling wary about Trump and weird about publicly endorsing Hillary,” said Pierotti Lim, who spoke at the Democratic National Convention at the Clinton team’s invitation. Webb, a partner at law firm Winston & Strawn, said he began his outreach after being approached by billionaire investor J.B. Pritzker and longtime Clinton associate Lanny Davis. Pritzker and Davis could not be reached for comment. On Wednesday, billionaire hedge fund manager Seth Klarman said he would work to get Clinton elected because of comments by Trump he found “shockingly unacceptable.” Although Klarman, who is the president and chief executive of The Baupost Group, is a registered independent, a review of filings shows his political giving has largely benefited Republicans over the years, including some of Trump’s rivals in the state-by-state nominating contests this year. Jim Cicconi, a former Reagan and George H.W. White House staff member and lifelong Republican, said he went public with his decision to support Clinton “to encourage others in my situation to do the same thing.” “I feel like I need to do something more than quietly pulling the lever,” he said. “I’m willing to assist the campaign in any way that they want me to help.” Spearheading in part the Clinton effort to woo Republicans on Wall Street is Democratic strategist Leslie Dach, a former Walmart executive and aide to Bill Clinton, sources close to the Clinton campaign said. People familiar with the Clinton drive say the Democratic nominee herself has spoken to Republican business leaders, including Hewlett Packard Enterprise Chief Executive Meg Whitman, who endorsed Clinton on Tuesday. Clinton deputies courted former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg ahead of a rousing speech he gave at last month’s Democratic National Convention that urged Wall Street to support her. Whether Bloomberg, a self-made billionaire media mogul and an erstwhile Republican, will play a role in courting other Republican business leaders has yet to be determined, a source close to the discussions said. While some major donors are hesitant to back Trump, the candidate over the last month has pulled in millions of dollars in small-money donations to boost total contributions to more than $80 million for Trump’s campaign and the Republican Party, nearly matching Clinton’s $90 million haul during the same period. | 0fake |
Losing immunity, German anti-immigrant party's co-head may face perjury charge | BERLIN (Reuters) - A regional parliament has lifted the immunity of the best known politician in the anti-immigration Alternative for Germany (AfD) party, opening the way for prosecutors to pursue possible perjury charges against her. Frauke Petry, who is the AfD s co-chairwoman, has been dogged by allegations that she lied under oath to a committee of the Saxony parliament about how the party s campaign for the 2014 election in the state was financed. The ending of her immunity from prosecution adds to the right-wing party s problems less than four weeks before a national election. Weakened by infighting, it has bled support over the last year as voters concerns about immigration have eased. Prosecutors have pursued the case against Petry, who denies the allegations, for more than a year. Her immunity as a member of the Saxony s parliament ended at midnight, a spokesman for the assembly said. A spokesman for prosecutors in the state capital Dresden said they would await written confirmation of that from the parliament s president before any further proceedings could be agreed upon. The AfD is polling between 7 and 10 percent in opinion surveys - well down from a high of 15.5 percent at the end of 2016 but still clearing the 5-percent threshold needed to enter the federal parliament in the Sept. 24 national election. Petry cuts an increasingly isolated figure in the AfD, which she transformed from an anti-euro party at its founding in 2013 into a group that taps into voters concerns about migration. The party soared in the polls after Chancellor Angela Merkel s decision in 2015 to open Germany s borders to migrants fleeing war and poverty in the Middle East and beyond, of whom more than a million have since arrived. At a party conference in April, Petry suffered a humiliating defeat when delegates refused to discuss her plan to shift the party towards the mainstream. | 0fake |
Nancy Pelosi Caught on Hot Mic to Dem Rep Carson: ‘Tell Them You’re A Muslim’ - Breitbart | Monday night in front of the Supreme Court at a Democratic leadership news conference about President Donald Trump’s immigration executive order, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi ( ) was heard on a hot mic encouraging Rep. Andre Carson ( ) to tell the crowd he is a Muslim. Partial transcript as follows: CARSON: Greetings from the great state of Indiana. I’m Congressman Andre Carson. PELOSI (OFF MIC): Tell them you’re a Muslim. Tell them you’re a Muslim. CARSON: Not only do I represent Indiana’s seventh congressional district very proudly, but I happen to be a Muslim and a former police officer. ( Free Beacon) Follow Pam Key on Twitter @pamkeyNEN | 0fake |
New York State Senate confirms Vullo as top financial regulator | (Reuters) - The New York State on Wednesday confirmed Governor Andrew Cuomo’s pick to become the state’s top financial regulator. The confirmation vote for Maria Vullo, Cuomo’s nominee for superintendent of the New York State Department of Financial Services (NYDFS), was unanimous. Cuomo, a Democrat, nominated Vullo in January. Her appointment is effective immediately. Earlier on Wednesday, the New York Senate Finance Committee held a hearing on Vullo’s nomination and recommended that she be confirmed. Last week, the New York Senate’s banking and insurance committees also held separate hearings about Vullo. Vullo, a lawyer who represented banks, described herself during recent state legislative committee meetings as “pro-business and pro-consumer.” She has been running the NYDFS as its acting superintendent since February. Vullo will succeed former NYDFS Superintendent Benjamin Lawsky, who left the agency last year. Under Lawsky, NYDFS earned a reputation as an aggressive regulatory body that extracted hefty fines from global banks and other financial institutions. The regulator, created in 2011 by consolidating the state’s banking and insurance agencies, had been in flux since before Vullo’s arrival in March. | 0fake |
SEAN HANNITY TAKES OFF THE GLOVES After “Hillary Supporter” Megyn Kelly Makes On-Air Crack About Him [VIDEO] | Sean Hannity is taking a page from Trump s playbook. When a member of the mainstream media or a person pretending to be a conservative commentator intentionally misrepresents you you strike back.That s exactly what Hannity did.@megynkelly u should be mad at @HillaryClinton Clearly you support her. And @realDonaldTrump did talk to u. https://t.co/vsQiNMgHut Sean Hannity (@seanhannity) October 6, 2016Maybe Megyn forgot about this EXCLUSIVE interview with Donald Trump:https://youtu.be/UGPvwdrlzCMFrom USA Today: This election has sparked some heated exchanges between family, friends and co-workers and now between Fox News hosts.Conservative pundit Sean Hannity leveled what he might consider the worst insult imaginable at anchor Megyn Kelly in a tweet Wednesday night, which said she clearly supports Hillary Clinton.The tweet was apparently in response to Kelly comments earlier in the evening on The Kelly File when she accused both presidential candidates of avoiding tough interviews. They re both in their own version of a presidential protection program, Kelly said. She said Clinton makes sure she is not in a place where she feels uncomfortable or anything unexpected could come at her, which is why she sat for a half an hour with Mary J. Blige, the singer, which is why she did Entertainment Tonight this evening. But, Kelly didn t stop there. And Donald Trump, with all due respect to my friend at 10 o clock, will go on Hannity, and pretty much only Hannity, and will not venture out to the unsafe spaces these days, which doesn t exactly extend the tent. Trump has made several appearances on Hannity s show and the Fox News personality has been a vocal supporter of Trump.h/t GP | 1real |
Leaked Emails Show Government Corruption in Approving Aspartame | by Dr. Mercola
Artificial sweeteners such as aspartame are typically used to sweeten so-called “diet” foods and beverages in lieu of sugar or high-fructose corn syrup (HFCS). The idea is that reducing your calorie consumption will result in weight loss.
However, research has completely demolished this notion, showing that artificial sweeteners actually have the converse effect; they actually lower appetite suppressant chemicals and encourage sugar cravings and sugar dependence, thereby raising your odds of unwanted weight gain. [1],[2]
Research has repeatedly shown that artificial sweeteners promote insulin resistance and related health problems just like regular sugar does, including [3],[4],[5] cardiovascular disease, stroke [6],[7] and Alzheimer’s disease .
While poor diet is a major driver of Alzheimer’s in general (the primary culprits being sugar/fructose and grains, especially gluten ), the key mechanism of harm here appears to be methanol toxicity — a much-ignored problem associated with aspartame in particular.
In a previous interview, toxicology expert Woodrow Monte, Ph.D., (author of the book “While Science Sleeps: A Sweetener Kills” [8]) explains the links between aspartame and methanol toxicity and the formation of toxic formaldehyde. Newly Leaked Emails Discuss Rumsfeld’s Involvement in Aspartame Approval
John Podesta’s leaked emails have turned up a number of damning pieces confirming the collusion between the soda industry and high level officials within the U.S. government, including Hillary Clinton.
In a recent batch of leaked emails, Donald Rumsfeld’s [9] involvement in the approval of aspartame is discussed. [10] Rumsfeld served as White House chief of staff from 1974 to 1975. He was also secretary of defense from 1975 to 1977, and again from 2001 to 2006.
In 1976, Rumsfeld became CEO of the drug company G.D. Searle & Company, which was trying to get aspartame approved by the FDA.
To put the email chain into context, in 2013 the International Dairy Foods Association (IDFA) and the National Milk Producers Federation (NMPF) filed a petition with the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) requesting the agency “amend the standard of identity” for milk and other dairy products.
This change would allow them to add aspartame to chocolate milk, which is a primary milk product served with school lunches, without labeling it as a low-calorie drink. I wrote about this in my article, “ Big Dairy Petitions FDA to Allow Unlabeled Use of Aspartame in Dairy Products .” Former Head of FDA Reveals His Concerns About Aspartame
At that time, Wendy Abrams, founder of Cool Globes Inc., an organization dedicated to raising awareness of climate change, forwarded correspondence to Podesta that she’d received from Don Kennedy.
Kennedy is a former head of the FDA [11] and current editor-in-chief of Science Magazine. In his email correspondence with her, he shares his concerns about aspartame’s potential toxicity: [12],[13]
The whole sweeteners issue has interested me since my early time at FDA … A little later, still during my time as Commissioner I was called on by Don Rumsfeld, who introduced himself as the CEO of Searle …
[W]e told him that we would look carefully at the evidence and rely on our expert committee structure as usual.
Aspartame continued to attract concerned critics, and we at FDA saw no resumption of Searle’s effort to get it approved. I looked up one piece on that history, which I append below. Not a very nice story.
‘In 1985 Monsanto purchased G.D. Searle, the chemical company that held the patent to aspartame, the active ingredient in NutraSweet.
Monsanto was apparently untroubled by aspartame’s clouded past, including a 1980 FDA Board of Inquiry, comprised of three independent scientists, which confirmed that it ‘might induce brain tumors.’
The FDA had actually banned aspartame based on this finding, only to have Searle Chairman Donald Rumsfeld … vow to ‘call in his markers,’ to get it approved’ … Aspartame ‘Blew Holes in Their Brains’
In her correspondence with Kennedy, Abrams also noted her own adverse reactions to NutraSweet, noting that:
… I think it is poison … Doctors will swear to me it is fine, and I will tell them, maybe I’m the only person in the world who reacts like this, but clearly it affects me, and then they’ll tell me again, it is fine. They are so brainwashed by the propaganda, they refuse to believe anything contrary.
I also have a friend who worked for the researchers at University of Chicago (which has a top rated neurology dept [sic]) and the doctors there said when they gave NutraSweet to lab mice, it literally blew holes in their brains.
In a subsequent email, Kennedy tells Abrams that: “Rumsfeld has a lot to answer for in his next life.” Children Are at Increased Risk
As is often the case, children are particularly susceptible to damage from artificial sweeteners.
A recent study [14] evaluating how much artificial sweetener is actually absorbed into the blood when consumed by children versus adults found that children had DOUBLE the concentration after drinking a 12-ounce can of diet soda compared to the adults. As reported by Science Daily: [15]
The same research team previously found that these artificial sweeteners were also present in breast milk when mothers ingested foods, drinks, medicines or other products that contained artificial sweeteners.
Since infants have less ability to clear substances from their blood stream via the kidneys (lower glomerular filtration rate up to age 2 years), the authors speculate that the infants’ artificial sweetener blood levels may be proportionately even higher.
These results are important because early life exposure to artificial sweeteners may influence a child’s future taste preferences, diet and metabolic fate. Research Reveals Surprising Mechanism of Harm
Research published in the journal Nature [16] in 2014 revealed a previously unknown mechanism by which artificial sweeteners make you pack on unwanted pounds and disrupt your metabolic function. Most importantly, this study proved causation.
In recent years, we’ve learned that gut microbes play a significant role in human health. Certain gut microbes have been linked to obesity, for example, and as it turns out, artificial sweeteners disrupt your intestinal microflora, [17],[18],[19],[20],[21] thereby raising your risk of obesity, diabetes and other related problems.
Specifically, the researchers found that artificial sweeteners alter metabolic pathways associated with metabolic disease. Decreased function was observed in pathways associated with the transport of sugar in the body.
Artificial sweeteners were also found to induce gut dysbiosis and glucose intolerance in otherwise healthy people. Of the artificial sweeteners tested, saccharin (Sweet’N Low) had the strongest impact, followed by sucralose and aspartame.
Glucose intolerance is a well-known precursor to type 2 diabetes, but it also plays a role in obesity, because the excess sugar in your blood ends up being stored in your fat cells.According to the authors of this widely publicized study: [22]
[W]e demonstrate that consumption of commonly used non-caloric artificial sweeteners formulations drives the development of glucose intolerance through induction of compositional and functional alterations to the intestinal microbiota …
Collectively, our results link non-caloric artificial sweeteners (NAS) consumption, dysbiosis and metabolic abnormalities, thereby calling for a reassessment of massive NAS usage.
Another study, published in PLOS One, [23] also found that when rats were fed aspartame, it shifted their gut microbiota, causing it to produce propionate — short-chain fatty acids (SCFAs) involved in sugar production — which resulted in elevated blood sugar. Diet Soda May Impact Your and Your Child’s Fertility
Recent research [24] also suggests artificially sweetened drinks may affect your fertility. It found a connection between saccharin and sucralose consumption and reduced fertility rates among women undergoing in vitro fertilization (IVF) treatment. These artificial sweeteners also raised the risk of a woman’s embryo having at least one deformity. Professor Dr. Adam Balen, chairman of the British Fertility Society (BFS), told The Daily Telegraph: [25]
This is a very interesting study that suggests the false promise of artificial sweeteners that are found in soft drinks and added to drinks, such as coffee, may have a significant effect on the quality and fertility of woman’s eggs and this may further impact on the chances of conception. These findings are highly significant to our population. There should be more scrutiny of food additives and better information available to the public and, in particular, those wishing to conceive. ‘Diet’ Soda Is a Fraud
False advertising is prohibited by federal law, and the term “diet” is only permitted on brands or labels when it is not false or misleading. In light of the research demonstrating that artificial sweeteners actually raise your risk of obesity rather than combat it, the consumer group U.S. Right to Know (US RTK) has asked the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) and the FDA to investigate Coca-Cola Co., PepsiCo Inc. and other companies for false advertising. [26],[27]
In its 2015 citizen petition to the FDA, [28],[29] US RTK asked the agency to issue warning letters to Coca-Cola and Pepsi, concluding that the beverages are misbranded because the use of the term “diet” is false and misleading. In another letter, [30] the group urged the agency to stop Coca-Cola Company from making “illegal claims that its artificially sweetened sodas prevent, mitigate or treat obesity,” noting that Coca-Cola has made such claims on at least eight occasions.
For example, Coca-Cola Company announced that its No. 1 “global commitment to fighting obesity” is to “offer low- or no- calorie beverage options in every market.” [31]
However, if artificially sweetened beverages promote obesity rather than fight it — which research clearly indicates — then Coca-Cola’s commitment is anything but helpful. Nor is it supported by science. I listed a sampling of studies clearly refuting the industry’s “diet” claims in my previous article, “ Aspartame Update: Coke Illegally Claims Diet Soda Can Combat Obesity .”
Most recently, The New York Times [32] reported on a new study [33] showing water clearly beats diet soda for weight loss. Eighty-one overweight women diagnosed with type 2 diabetes ate the same diet, with one exception. Half drank diet beverages five times a week while the other half drank plain water.
Six months later, the group that drank water had lost an average of 14 pounds. The diet soda group lost an average of 11.5 pounds. The water group also saw greater improvements in measures of diabetes severity, such as fasting insulin and postprandial glucose. All of this is right in line with previous research showing artificial sweeteners promote weight gain and worsen diabetes . Expect More Artificial Sweeteners in Pepsi Products
PepsiCo is now vowing to reduce the amount of sugar they add to their drinks. [34] According to a recent announcement, at least two-thirds of its drinks will contain 100 calories or less from added sugar per 12-ounce serving by 2025. But while this may sound like good news, it simply means that more artificial sweeteners will be used.
Indeed, the company has stated it will achieve this sugar-reduction goal by introducing more artificially sweetened drinks and reformulating existing beverage recipes. Considering artificial sweeteners are more damaging than sugar, this means the company’s products will become even more harmful than they already are.
As you may recall, just last year Pepsi announced it would stop using aspartame. The decision came on the heels of declining diet beverage sales following a string of bad press discussing mounting health concerns.
Alas, by September 2015 the company reintroduced aspartame, claiming consumers were demanding more choices. Whether that’s true or not is impossible to tell, but another, and more likely incentive, is that PepsiCo is simply trying to hedge their bets should a tax on sugary beverages actually go through. Reclaim Your Health by Ditching ‘Diet’ Drinks and Snacks
When you add together the various routes of harm — from confusing your body with sweet taste without calories, altering your gut bacteria for the worse, impairing your fertility and, who knows, maybe even “blowing holes in your brain” — it becomes easy to see how artificial sweeteners have likely played a role in worsening the obesity and diabetes epidemics since their emergence in our food supply, and how they may be undermining health in a myriad of unsuspected ways.
I strongly recommend avoiding ALL artificial sweeteners, and to read food labels to make sure you’re not inadvertently consuming them. They’re added to some 6,000 different beverages, snacks and food products, so there’s no telling where they might be hiding.
As for safer sweetener options, you could use stevia or Lo Han, both of which are safe natural sweeteners. Keep in mind, however, that if you struggle with high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes or extra weight, then you have insulin sensitivity issues and would probably benefit from avoiding all sweeteners, including natural ones.
Read the full article at Mercola.com.
Sources and References | 1real |
Soyinka shreds U.S. greencard in anger over Trump victory | JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Nigeria’s Nobel Prize-winning author Wole Soyinka has torn up his United States green card and renounced his American residency in protest at Donald Trump’s U.S. election win, the writer told news channel eNCA on Thursday. “I’ve done it,” said Soyinka, 82, when asked if he had followed through on an earlier vow to leave the United States if Trump triumphed in the race for the White House. “When I was ready, when I’d finished, I negotiated my departure,” the Nigerian born author said in Johannesburg on the sidelines of a university conference. Soyinka has had regular teaching stints at America’s ivy league universities since the mid 1990s following his Nobel Prize for Literature in 1986. He was the first African writer to win the award. A frequent and fierce critic of his own government, particularly over the carnage being inflicted by Boko Haram militants in northeastern Nigeria, Soyinka said he felt ill at ease in the wake of Trump’s shock victory. “We on the African continent could boast that we had a contemporary descendent ruling the United States,” Soyinka said referring to outgoing President Barack Obama, whose father was a Kenyan. “Suddenly, somebody is making speeches which are meant to reverse those gains.” | 0fake |
Fallece guionista de 'Los Simpson' | Fallece guionista de 'Los Simpson' 43 GMT
El ganador de seis premios Emmy colaboraba con la serie de animación desde 1998. Amanda Edwards AFP
El guionista de 'Los Simpson' Kevin Curran ha fallecido este martes a la edad de 59 años en Los Ángeles (EE.UU.) tras una larga lucha contra el cáncer, informa la BBC . El ganador de seis premios Emmy colaboró 17 años con la serie de animación, desde 1998.
"Kevin Curran era un hombre amable, brillante, que dijo muchas cosas divertidas, algunas impublicables, otras que van a vivir siempre en dibujos animados para niños", destacó Al Jean, el productor ejecutivo de 'Los Simpson' en un comentario para ' The Hollywood Reporter '. | 1real |
MIT Technology Review: Google’s A.I. ’Hate Speech’ Detector ’Erratic’ - Breitbart | The MIT Technology Review recently published an article demonstrating that Google’s new comment detection system, Perspective, seems to have difficulty differentiating offensive words or controversial subjects from actual hate speech. [Breitbart previously reported on the “hate speech” detection software, designed to help online publications clear their article comment sections of any offensive content that could potentially be applied to other Internet platforms. The MIT Technology Review decided to test the accuracy of the software, which analyzes comments on a scale of for “toxicity. ” Toxic comments are defined by the program as “a rude, disrespectful, or unreasonable comment that is likely to make you leave a discussion. ” “Trump sucks” scored a colossal 96 percent, yet codeword “ ” only scored 5 percent. “Few Muslims are a terrorist threat” was 79 percent toxic, while “race war now” scored 24 percent. “Hitler was an ” scored 70 percent, but “Hitler was not an ” scored only 53% and “The Holocaust never happened” scored only 21%. And while “gas the joos” scored 29 percent, rephrasing it to “Please gas the joos. Thank you. ” lowered the score to a mere 7 percent. (“Jews are human,” however, scores 72 percent. “Jews are not human”? 64 percent.) The MIT Technology Review believes the system is designed to detect particular words and phrases in a sentence that may be deemed offensive but does not account for the meaning behind these words. In an example, the word “rape” scored a toxicity rating as high as 77 percent when detected by the program, but a statement such as “rape is a horrible crime” actually rated higher at 81 percent. Curse words receive similar treatment: “I fucking love this” was rated at a 94 percent on the toxicity scale, which is supposed to indicate if a comment is “rude, disrespectful, or unreasonable. ” We may say “Trolls are stupid” (toxicity score 96 percent) but the language of toxicity and harassment is often rich in ways that systems can’t handle. The comment “You should be made into a lamp,” an allusion to claims that skin from concentration camp victims was used for lampshades, has been thrown at a number of journalists and other public figures in recent months. It scores just 4 percent on Perspective. But best not reply by saying “You are a Nazi,” because that’s an 87 percent. Read the full article by MIT Technology Review here. Lucas Nolan is a reporter for Breitbart News covering issues of free speech and online censorship. Follow him on Twitter @LucasNolan_ or email him at lnolan@breitbart. com | 0fake |
Trump pushes U.S. labor board toward Republican control | (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump said on Tuesday he had picked an employment lawyer who has represented companies and business groups for a vacancy on the National Labor Relations Board. The selection of William Emanuel, 75, to fill one of the two vacancies at the agency brings it closer to having a Republican majority, which is expected to undo a series of recent decisions seen as favoring unions. The five-member NLRB oversees union elections and disputes between workers, unions, and employers. Emanuel, a Los Angeles-based partner at law firm Littler Mendelson, has worked with Republicans in Congress and major trade groups from an array of industries, and has for decades defended employers in cases before the board. He is a member of the conservative Federalist Society, an influential group of lawyers credited with pushing Trump to nominate U.S. Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch to the high court. Emanuel said in a statement that it is an honor to be nominated. Industry groups such as the National Retail Federation and the National Restaurant Association hailed Emanuel’s nomination, saying he would help repair damage done to businesses by rulings from the NLRB during the Barack Obama administration. Trump last week said he intended to nominate fellow Republican Marvin Kaplan, a lawyer with the federal Occupational Safety and Health Review Commission, to another vacancy on the board. The positions require confirmation by the U.S. Senate. The NLRB has been controlled by Democrats for nearly a decade and they currently have a 2-1 majority. When it has no vacancies, the board typically includes three members from the president’s party and two from the opposing party. Under Trump, lawyers and business groups expect the board to roll back a series of policy changes adopted during the administration of former President Barack Obama. They include rules designed to speed the union election process and a 2015 decision that made it easier for companies to be held liable for legal violations by contractors, staffing agencies, and franchisees. It was not clear when the Senate could vote on Trump’s nominees but several lawyers and other experts said the process could stretch into the fall. Kaplan previously worked for Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives crafting employment-related legislation. | 0fake |
ESPIONAGE ACT VIOLATION? HILLARY EXPOSES Names Of Hidden Intelligence Officials In Emails Through “Gross Negligence” | America keeps waiting for word that Hillary will be indicted. Is Obama waiting for the right moment or will the FBI be allowed to do their job and put Hillary behind bars? Are Joe Biden and Elizabeth Warren standing by in the wings? One thing we know for sure, with this corrupt administration, anything could happen. Obama seems to have mastered the art of punishing America. Will the most corrupt President to ever occupy our White House, be the one responsible for finally putting end to the Clinton Crime Syndicate or does she know too much?Hillary Clinton posted and shared the names of concealed U.S. intelligence officials on her unprotected email system. Federal records reveal that Clinton swapped these highly classified names on an email account that was vulnerable to attack and was breached repeatedly by Russia-linked hacker attempts. These new revelations reminiscent of the Valerie Plame scandal during George W. Bush s tenure could give FBI investigators the evidence they need to make a case that Clinton violated the Espionage Act by mishandling national defense information through gross negligence. Numerous names cited in Clinton s emails have been redacted in State Department email releases with the classification code B3 CIA PERS/ORG, a highly specialized classification that means the information, if released, would violate the Central Intelligence Act of 1949.The State Department produced a document to Judicial Watch in April 2014 that identifies different types of (b)(3) redactions, including CIA PERS/ORG, which it defines as information Specifically exempted from disclosure by statute Central Intelligence Act of 1949. That s what it suggests, Judicial Watch president Tom Fitton told Breitbart News, referring to the indication that Clinton disclosed the names of CIA-protected intelligence sources, based on the B3 redactions.The CIA justifies (b)(3) redactions with this description: (b)(3) Applies to the Director s statutory obligations to protect from disclosure intelligence sources and methods, as well as the organization, functions, names, official titles, salaries, or numbers of personnel employed by the Agency, in accord with the National Security Act of 1947 and the CIA Act of 1949, respectively. The State Department declined to comment. Per the colleague who handles this issue, we are not speaking to the content of emails, State Department spokeswoman Nicole Thompson told Breitbart News.Here are some examples of (b)(3) redactions;Naming the defense attach in MaltaOn October 16, 2011, recent U.S. Ambassador to Malta Douglas Kmiec sent an email to Cheryl Mills with the subject line TIME SENSITIVE AND CONFIDENTIAL Malta Trip Backgrounder for the Secretary Confidential. Kmiec wrote to Mills, I know from current events that your life must be a whirlwind. I know that if there ever was someone who could tame the whirlwind, it would be you. Just read the news report of the Secretary s stop in Malta next week. Thank you for arranging this. This letter and the accompanying clips I believe will help make the Secretary s visit a highly successful and well received one. In the memo, Kmiec revealed the name of a top defense attach in the country. That name was later classified by the State Department with three different classifications: 1.4 (D) to connote Foreign relations or foreign activities of the US, including confidential sources, B1 to connote Information specifically authorized by an executive order to be kept secret in the interest of national defense or foreign policy, and B3 CIA PERS/ORG. The largest part of our US team in the embassy is the navy/coast guard/ ncis contingent that has established a Maritime training program with the AFM to good success. The defense attach there now is new [REDACTED] beloved and hardworking and to good effect, patrolling the waters and the ports for [illegible] traffickers and terror related figures, Kmiec wrote.Mills forwarded the memo directly to Clinton s private email account at clintonemail.com with the note Fyi background. Clinton replied to Mills and CC ed Huma Abedin with the confidential information, writing, I need enough time there to meet. Hague is there today and doing all the right meetings. So, I m copying Huma to reinforce my desire to squeeze more out of a too quick trip. When he sent the memo to Mills, Douglas Kmiec had been out of his Ambassador to Malta job for several months. Kmiec was a big supporter of President Obama. He garnered criticism in a 2011 inspector general report for ignoring directives from Washington and for spending too much time writing articles about religion. Iran Insights On September 2, 2009, Jackie Newmyer of Long Term Strategy Group in Cambridge, Massachusetts sent an email directly to Clinton s private account with the subject line Iran Insights From [Redacted] that included the B3 redaction code:Secretary Clinton,Last week I traveled to Israel [REDACTED] in an Iran-related seminar and simulation exercise with the IDF general who is likely to become Israel s next chief of military intelligence and his team and, separately, [REDACTED]. Yesterday, [REDACTED] Iran workshop in Washington involving DoD and think tank experts. Despite the fact that the meetings were with defense [REDACTED] personnel, there was universal sentiment that a strike on Iran s nuclear facilities would be counterproductive, on the one hand, and that incremental measures would be perceived by Iran as an indication of weakness, on the other.The email included sensitive information including the following:If Iran acquires a nuclear capability, no single American/allied countermeasure will be adequate. Something like the flexible response posture from the Cold War will be required, necessitating a range of actions from enhancing the US deterrent presence nuclear submarines carrying ballistic missiles in the Arabian Sea to bolstering regional actors defenses.Israeli leaders should be able to contain the damage to the Israeli population s morale from an Iranian bomb, but this will require careful management of public statements. There is a tension between building up support for action against the Iranian nuclear program now and delivering the kind of reassurance that will be necessary once the capability has been acquired.Clinton replied that she would like to discuss the matter with Jackie.Jackie replied:I will be in Washington for a day-long meeting on Thursday this week [B3 REDACTED] and my travel plans are flexible, so I could meet you any time on Wednesday afternoon, after 5 pm on Thursday, or any time on Friday morning. If those times do not work, I would be happy to come down at your convenience.Clinton and Jake Sullivan then set up a meeting with Jackie.For entire story: Breitbart News | 1real |
Trump’s Moronic ‘FAKE NEWS’ Attacks Accidentally Send New York Times Subscriptions ‘Though The Roof’ | Donald Trump may be trying to destroy the failing New York Times, but it seems that his rhetoric has just made the publication more popular than ever, sending subscriptions though the roof according to an editor.These days, any publication that prints something Trump doesn t like is anything ranging from fake news to FAKE NEWS to VERY FAKE NEWS (Trump has never provided a guide to how he defines each of the terms) and the New York Times is one of his favorite targets for criticism what with all the truth-telling and whatnot.Over the weekend, Trump said the New York Times which has won more than 100 Pulitzer Prizes is failing. But the newspaper s executive editor Dean Baquet says it s actually quite the opposite and Trump is helping immensely. Trump is the best thing to happen to the Times subscription strategy, Baquet says. Every time he tweets it drives subscriptions wildly. Our digital subscriptions are through the roof, our print subscriptions are up. But he warns that it is important to realize the motivation behind Trump s statements, no matter how much The Donald is driving subscriptions: If you look at the pattern of the president s tweets, they re actually designed to minimize the institutions who are charged with holding him accountable, and I think that s dangerous. Baquet also hit back at Trump s recent demonization of anonymous sources: In an administration that has expressed so much distaste for the press and so much distaste for our role, are you surprised that some of the people who want to criticise the administration want to do it without their names attached? I m not. He s been an anonymous source throughout his career, especially when it helped him and when it burnished his reputation, he added, referencing Trump s habit of providing information true or not under fake names.On Monday, Sean Spicer clarified that all press isn t, as Trump says, the enemy of the American people. Only the New York Times and Politico and all the other organizations Trump calls fake news in other words, those who criticize him are the enemy. It is clear what Trump is doing. It is clear that he needs to be stopped. Let s make that happen.Featured image via Getty Images/Chip Somodevilla | 1real |
Factbox: U.S. Congress investigates links between Trump and Russia | (Reuters) - Republican leaders in the U.S. Congress have refused Democrats’ calls for a special prosecutor or select committee to investigate Russian meddling in the 2016 presidential election, including possible links between President Donald Trump’s campaign and Moscow, saying investigations by congressional committees are sufficient. U.S. intelligence agencies said in January that Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered hacking of the Democratic National Committee and the chairman of Hillary Clinton’s Democratic campaign to influence the election on behalf of Trump, a Republican. Russia has denied this. The Central Intelligence Agency, National Security Agency, Federal Bureau of Investigation and the Justice Department all launched investigations under President Barack Obama. Following are some ways Congress is looking into the matter: HOUSE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE - The House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence began its investigation of potential Russian influence on the 2016 presidential race before Trump took office on Jan. 20. The panel’s chairman, Republican Representative Devin Nunes, a close Trump ally, recused himself from the investigation last month. Before he stepped aside, Democrats had questioned whether the committee could conduct a credible investigation after Nunes received information at the White House about surveillance and discussed it with Trump before briefing Democrats on the committee. Nunes was replaced as leader of the House investigation by Republican Representative Mike Conaway, an intelligence panel member. The committee held a high-profile public hearing on March 20 with testimony by FBI Director James Comey and NSA director Admiral Mike Rogers. But Nunes canceled another planned public hearing with former Obama administration officials James Clapper, who was director of national intelligence, former Deputy Attorney General Sally Yates and ex-CIA Director James Brennan, causing committee Democrats to accuse him of political motivations. The two parties reached a solution last week, announcing a closed hearing with Comey and Rogers for May 2, and a public one with the Obama administration officials for an as-yet-to-be-determined date. SENATE INTELLIGENCE COMMITTEE - The U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence is conducting its own investigation, which also started before Trump took office. Staffers have begun interviewing intelligence analysts involved in the report announced in January that charged Russia with seeking to influence the election on Trump’s behalf. Its chairman, Senator Richard Burr, was re-elected in November in the Republican sweep that carried Trump into office and preserved Republican control of Congress. He and Senator Mark Warner, the committee’s Democratic vice chairman, have pledged that their investigation would be bipartisan despite questions over Burr’s close ties to the White House. But far fewer staff members have been assigned to the panel’s investigation than previous high-profile intelligence probes in Congress, according to sources and a Reuters review of public records. SENATE JUDICIARY COMMITTEE - Republican Senator Lindsey Graham, chairman of the panel’s subcommittee on crime and terrorism, and Sheldon Whitehouse, the subcommittee’s ranking Democrat, are looking into Russian attempts to influence the election. The subcommittee announced on Tuesday that it would hold a public hearing on May 8 with testimony by Yates and Clapper. Its chairman of the full Judiciary Committee, Chuck Grassley, and top Democrat Dianne Feinstein also have had officials brief panel members. SENATE APPROPRIATIONS COMMITTEE - The Appropriations subcommittee that oversees U.S. government spending for the State Department, which is also chaired by Senator Graham, has also held hearings on Russian attempts to influence elections. HOUSE OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE - Representative Jason Chaffetz, the committee’s Republican chairman, has resisted calls to investigate the Trump administration. But he and Representative Elijah Cummings, the top Democrat on the committee, said on Tuesday Trump’s former national security adviser Michael Flynn likely broke the law by failing to get permission to be paid for a trip to Russia in 2015. Chaffetz announced last week that he would not run for re-election in 2018, and said he might leave office even before the end of his term. | 0fake |
U.N. rights boss urges U.S. Congress to give 'Dreamers' legal status | GENEVA (Reuters) - The top U.N. human rights official voiced concern on Monday at the Trump administration s decision to end the DACA program for immigrants who arrived illegally as children and urged the U.S. Congress to give them lasting legal status in the country. Referring to a move to end the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program in six months, affecting nearly 800,000 young migrants known as Dreamers , Zeid Ra ad al-Hussein told the United Nations Human Rights Council in Geneva: I hope Congress will now act to provide former DACA beneficiaries with durable legal status. I am disturbed by the increase in detentions and deportations of well-established and law-abiding immigrants. | 0fake |
Arab League to hold emergency meeting on Jerusalem on Saturday | CAIRO (Reuters) - The Arab League is to hold an emergency meeting on Saturday on U.S. plans to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, the head of the Palestinian delegation to the body said on Wednesday. The Palestinians and Jordan had requested the meeting which will take place at 3 p.m. (1300 GMT), Ambassador Diab al-Louh told Reuters by phone. | 0fake |
Conservative Commentator Uses Nancy Reagan’s Death To Launch Racist Attack On Michelle Obama (TWEETS) | When news of the death of former First Lady Nancy Reagan came through on Sunday, the majority of liberals and conservatives put aside their differences to send condolences to the family and reflect on her contribution to the nation. But for one conservative commentator, it was the perfect opportunity to attack First Lady Michelle Obama.Conservative blogger and trollumnist Debbie Schlussel struck out on Twitter on Sunday with this pathetic assault on the First Lady.Nancy Reagan brought style & glamour back to the White House & Then Michelle Hussein Obama Took It Away. RIP #tcot #gop #NancyReagan Debbie Schlussel (@DebbieSchlussel) March 6, 2016Schlussel is a what one might refer to as an ultra-Zionist, a hardliner on Israel who sees no issue with the collective imprisonment and punishment of non-Jews in Israel-Palestine in order to create Jewish Supremacist Apartheid state. To argue on behalf of human rights, democracy and pluralism of race and faith in Israel, is to Schlussel, an anti-Semitic attack.As an example of just how far Schlussel is willing to go to pursue that agenda, check out her response to the murder of American hostage Kayla Mueller by ISIS last year. In a blog post entitled Dead ISIS Hostage Was Jew-Hating, Anti-Israel Bitch, she wrote that Mueller was:a Jew-hating, anti-Israel piece of crap So, it s poetic justice that Mueller spent her last months as a hostage of the Islamic terrorists with whom she thought she had some sort of kinship and sisterhood. And that she died in their hands.She concludes her piece with the sentence:Buh-bye, Kayla. Have fun with your 72 Yasser Arafats.What evidence was there that Mueller was jew-hating ? The aid worker s list of previous humanitarian efforts included escorting Palestinian children to school in Hebron in the occupied West Bank, to protect them from violent Jewish-Israeli settlers. The video below is an example of the sort of violence from which the school children need protecting. Schlussel s attacks on the First Lady and the President are based not on the fact that they are black, but on the presumption that they are Muslim, and that by virtue of being Muslim, they are evil, anti-Semitic and dangerous.Unfortunately for Schlussel, Twitter users were not up for drinking her particular brand of Kool Aid. One person summed it up quite neatly @DebbieSchlussel I bet Mrs. Reagan is spitting on your head from Heaven. AAmom (@AVD911) March 6, 2016And another @DebbieSchlussel you're actually racist scum dmbrandon!! (@juiceDiem) March 6, 2016While this person made a rather helpful suggestion.@DebbieSchlussel let some light into your hateful heart Chuck Daly (@ChuckDaly) March 6, 2016Former Will and Grace star Debra Messing drew attention to Schlussel s tweet, condemning it openly.Shame on you https://t.co/GPNI7EbqBs Debra Messing (@DebraMessing) March 6, 2016So Schlussel spent the rest of Sunday hate-tweeting Messing (getting no response) for the crime of speaking out against racism. Stay classy Schlussel. Featured image via Flickr | 1real |
China customs handles 2,773 cases of smuggling from January-October: paper | SHANGHAI (Reuters) - Chinese customs authorities handled 2,773 cases of smuggling in the first 10 months of this year, part of a nationwide crackdown, the China Daily reported on Friday citing a senior official. The 2017 Sword Guarding the Country s Gate campaign netted 233 smuggling cases involving weapons and ammunition, 474 cases related to illegal drugs and 86 related to endangered species, according to Huang Songping, a spokesman with China s General Administration of Customs. He said 56 of the cases involved rice smuggling, with traders trying to avoid paying duties on imports worth a total of 1.6 billion yuan ($242.09 million). Previous cases this year involved the import of Thai white sugar, with nine arrested for trying to evade customs inspections by disguising their ship as a domestic vessel and entering the port of Yancheng, which is not open to overseas traffic. China also cracked down on an oil smuggling ring in which a criminal gang bought 400 million yuan worth of overseas oil products and sold it to gas stations in Zhejiang province, the customs authority said in a notice last month. China s environment ministry said this week that as many as 259 people had been arrested this year for smuggling more than 300,000 tonnes of foreign waste into the country for recycling and reprocessing. | 0fake |
FORMER SPEAKER JOHN BOEHNER Goes Low…Calls Two Republicans ‘A–holes’ | What s gotten into John Boehner? He gave a strange interview to left-leaning Politico and unloaded on former colleagues. During the interview he claimed he held no grudges against his former colleagues yet he called a few of them a holes . Was he drunk? He also got into it on twitter with Sean Hannity and Hannity shot back questioning whether Boehner had been drinking Perhaps Hannity is on to something.John were you sober when you said this? That conversation never happened. I m sorry you are bitter and u failed! https://t.co/SLquw7rXZv Sean Hannity (@seanhannity) October 30, 2017Boehner gave a lengthy interview and even went after other conservative talk radio hosts: I always liked Rush. When I went to Palm Beach, I would always meet with Rush and we d go play golf. But you know, who was that right-wing guy, Levin? He went really crazy right and got a big audience, and he dragged Hannity to the dark side. He dragged Rush to the dark side. And these guys I used to talk to them all the time. And suddenly they re beating the living s out of me. TRUE COLORS?Why is John Boehner suddenly attacking his fellow Republicans? Jordan is a valued member of Congress and isn t a RINO so maybe Boehner has it out for him.Former Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) said in a new profile from Politico on Sunday that Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) and former Rep. Jason Chaffetz(R-Utah) are a holes. The former speaker made the comment while discussing Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) likely becoming the chair of the House Oversight Committee, a position Gowdy eventually earned.Chaffetz, the previous chair, had recently announced his resignation from Congress at the time of the interview. Jordan, who was also on the committee, was reportedly considering going out for the chairmanship. Gowdy that s my guy, even though he doesn t know how to dress, John Boehner told Politico. F Jordan. F Chaffetz. They re both a holes. Boehner also called Chaffetz a total phony who was obsessed with promoting himself while in Congress. With Chaffetz it s always about Chaffetz, Boehner told Politico.Chaffetz resigned from Congress in June and joined Fox News as a contributor.Boehner also criticized Jordan, who helped found the House s Freedom Caucus, which was part of the movement to push Boehner out as speaker: Jordan was a terrorist as a legislator going back to his days in the Ohio House and Senate, Boehner told Politico. A terrorist. A legislative terrorist. Last July, Boehner also spoke out against Jordan:Former House Speaker John Boehner assailed GOP House arch conservatives led by Rep. Jim Jordan as the knucklehead caucus, calling them anarchists who are for nothing. In a speech from a private gathering in Las Vegas casino/resort, the West Chester Republican took aim at the conservatives who pushed him from office at the end of 2015. Among those was Jordan, R-Urbana, who revolted against Boehner, even though he was the first speaker from Ohio since Republican Nicholas Longworth in 1931.Boehner was asked to explain why House Republicans did not support House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., to succeed Boehner as speaker. The knucklehead caucus decided they weren t going to vote for him, Boehner said. Now these are the guys in the Republican Party you could call right of right. They are anarachists. They re for nothing. The video of Boehner was obtained by The Washington Post. Although he did not mention Jordan by name, it was clear Boehner was referring to him.Read more: The Hill | 1real |
Italy presents low-key budget ahead of 2018 elections | ROME (Reuters) - Italy s government approved on Monday a low-key 2018 budget which includes measures to raise youth employment, tackle poverty and encourage investments ahead of an election in the spring. The financial package aims to lower the budget deficit to 1.6 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) from a targeted 2.1 percent this year, while avoiding painful pre-election belt-tightening measures. Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni s task has been made easier by stronger-than-expected economic growth and low interest rates which reduce the cost of servicing Italy s huge public debt the highest in the euro zone after Greece s. The budget certifies that the Italian economy is at a turning point and it contains resources aimed to reinforce the turnaround, Economy Minister Pier Carlo Padoan told reporters. The package will now be sent to the European Commission for review and at the same time begin its passage through parliament, where it must be approved by the end of the year. It is likely to be one of the last pieces of legislation passed by parliament before the president dissolves the upper and lower houses and calls the election. Last month the government increased its GDP growth forecast for this year to 1.5 percent from 1.1 percent, and hiked next year s outlook to 1.5 percent from 1.0 percent. The debt-to-GDP ratio is targeted to edge down in 2018 to 130.0 percent from a targeted 131.6 percent this year. Overall, the budget is expansionary because, according to the Treasury s estimates, if current policies had been left unchanged the deficit would have fallen to 1.0 percent of GDP next year rather than 1.6 percent. However, Italy is constrained by its massive debt which precluded a give-away pre-election package. Most of the resources available were used to avoid increases in sales tax which had been previously pencilled in for next year. Padoan said the measures might seem modest, but were well targeted, while Gentiloni, in typically understated tones, called it a slim budget that will be useful for our economy. The European Commission is expected to sign off on the package even though Italy hiked the deficit target previously agreed with Brussels, as it has done repeatedly in recent years. Public finance disputes with Brussels may intensify after next year s election. All the main parties say they will raise the budget deficit rather than reduce it as the European Union s fiscal rules prescribe. In an effort to tackle a youth unemployment rate of almost 40 percent, the budget offers a 3-year reduction in the pension contributions of companies that hire people under the age of 35 on regular, open-ended contracts. It also offers tax breaks for firms that invest in new machinery, increases income support for the poor, and sets aside funds to raise public salaries for the first time in almost a decade and hire 1,500 university researchers, Padoan said. Extra revenue for the state will come from a partial amnesty for people who settle tax disputes with the authorities by paying a discounted sum. Gentiloni appealed to parliament to show a sense of responsibility in approving the budget, after a leftist group last week said he could no longer count on its support following a political row over a new electoral law. However, a majority is likely to be found to back the budget to clear the way for elections now widely expected in March. | 0fake |
Fox News Host Calls GOP Out On Voter ID Laws And Conservatives Go INSANE (VIDEO/TWEETS) | It s always a good day when a conservative acknowledges how hateful and racist their own party has become, and decides to go anti-GOP for a few moments. Yesterday, that s exactly what Fox News host Shepard Smith did while he was reporting about how the Supreme Court ruled it would not to restore North Carolina s voter ID law for this upcoming election a move that would undoubtedly be bad news for Donald Trump.As if that weren t a hard enough blow for conservatives, Smith didn t mince his words as he spoke about why the voter ID law existed in the first place to prevent minorities from being able to vote. In a frustrated voice, Smith called out the Republican Party for its racist election strategy: North Carolina had put in one of those You have to show an ID rules which so often in Republican states are designed to keep some minorities from being able to vote, and they tried to reduce the number of voting days. The US Supreme Court says that will not happen. You can watch that brilliant moment below: You can only imagine how conservatives on social media reacted to this. Many of them accused Smith for being a LIEberal (liberal) and standing in the way of Donald Trump becoming president. Many of these tweets are so belligerent, it s hard to even read.TwitterTwitterTwitterTwitterTwitterTwitterConservatives have every right to be afraid after the Supreme Court smacked North Caroline s voter ID law down after all, Trump is polling HORRIBLY with minorities (he s currently at ZERO percent with African Americans). Now that the Republican party s plan to prevent minorities from getting to the polls has been ruined, conservatives are obviously terrified that Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton is going to win this election by a landslide.Featured image via screen capture | 1real |
TRANSPARENT? HILLARY CLINTON Asked About Terrorist’s Dad As VIP Rally Guest [Video] | So what do you think the transparent Hillary did when asked about a terrorist s dad being a VIP guest at her rally? She ignored the questions typical! | 1real |
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