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Referendum likely on Dutch 'tapping' law | AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - Digital privacy advocates who hope to force the repeal of a law giving Dutch intelligence agencies new surveillance powers said on Monday they have gathered enough signatures to demand a referendum. A range of activists, politicians and media groups oppose the law, which passed by a healthy margin in July and gives agencies the power to gather data covertly from large groups of people at once. The petition for a referendum must now be submitted to the Voting Commission to vet whether it has met the 300,000 signature threshold. If it has, the government is obliged to hold a non-binding referendum on whether the law should be upheld, likely together with municipal elections on March 21. You cross the line when large groups of innocent civilians can be dragged into the sights of secret services with a trawling net, said David Korteweg, a lawyer for online rights group Bits of Freedom, in a statement. The government argues that the expanded powers are needed for spy agencies to counter threats to national security and their use can be tested by an oversight panel. The referendum law is itself controversial and may be repealed. After it was passed in 2015 its first use was to block the Dutch government from ratifying an economic treaty it and other European Union countries had negotiated with Ukraine. A large no vote on the referendum embarrassed The Hague and forced Prime Minister Mark Rutte to seek minor amendments to the treaty. It later emerged that the signatures to hold the Ukraine referendum were gathered via the internet and never vetted. | 0fake |
The Ugly Truth Of Six More Leftist “Heroes” | Earlier I skewered nine dictators, thugs, demagogues, and politicians adored by leftists despite considerable failings in policy, ethics, and hygiene. Here are six more over-hyped figures revered by leftists who always get everything wrong.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt
How the world remembers: FDR led America through the Great Depression and WWII, remembered fondly by seniors who heard his inspiring fireside chats.
The ugly truth: Some economists argue that FDR’s measures prolonged the Great Depression . All the New Deal programs were struck down as unconstitutional, except Social Security. He got the Supreme Court to back off by threatening to pack the Court with more members with views to his liking. That restrained their judicial opinion, though the Constitution doesn’t grant Congress the power to create a Federal retirement system.
Social Security works—though it’s slim pickings if it’s a retiree’s only income—and for decades the surplus has been a cash cow offsetting Congressional overspending . However, the aging Baby Boomers who didn’t have enough children might turn the cash cow into an albatross. Further, the Social Security Number is now a de-facto universal ID number; a convenient database field for monitoring citizens . America’s Founding Fathers would have been appalled at today’s domestic spying , and the Soviet dictators of old would have wept with envy.
FDR pledged to keep the USA out of WWII . Meanwhile, he quietly did everything possible to antagonize Japan, a once-friendly nation, such as (among several items) freezing their assets and cutting off their oil supply. When he got intelligence of the upcoming attack on Pearl Harbor, he didn’t order the base to be locked and loaded.
If that wasn’t bad enough: So nearly a quarter million Americans died in battle, but at least the pivotal intervention came just in time to “make the world safe for democracy”, right? Unfortunately, FDR was far too friendly with the USSR, giving them nearly $11 billion in food, weaponry, and other supplies (about $119 billion adjusted for inflation).
At the Yalta conference, FDR agreed to let “Uncle Joe” Stalin take over Eastern Europe. General Patton wanted to press forward at full speed to keep as much territory as possible away from Soviet tyranny, but politics hampered him every step of the way until he got rubbed out . When the Iron Curtain rose and the Cold War began, Winston Churchill said, “We slaughtered the wrong pig.” If only Roosevelt had listened to his generals!
FDR wasn’t a Communist, but many of his appointees and trusted advisers were. Later, Joseph McCarthy barely scratched the surface trying to get rid of them.
Walter Cronkite
How the world remembers: He was a long-time CBS anchorman, reporting many triumphs and tragedies. A friendly face on living room TVs for decades, he became everyone’s “Uncle Walter”. According to polls, he was the “most trusted man in America”.
The ugly truth: Although a decent fellow in person, Cronkite was the archetypal big-name liberal journalist , spinning the news for decades. Sometimes it was rather subliminal, including his signature subtle sneer. Most of the public then believed journalists were muckrakers and unbiased truth-tellers; as Cronkite’s tagline went, “And that’s the way it is.”
Until Cronkite’s late career, the mainstream media had a veneer of respectability—perhaps like warped plastic barely sticking to crumbling particleboard, but a veneer nonetheless. There once were only three American corporate TV networks. From Manhattan, they were the public’s information gatekeepers; no other broadcast news (besides shortwave radio) was available. Baby Boomer liberals might get a bit misty-eyed remembering those days. Today, six mega-conglomerates own 90% of the media, but at least the Internet lets us present our own perspectives and call out biased reporters .
If that wasn’t bad enough : His biggest whopper was about the Tet Offensive. The Viet Cong launched a desperate all-out assault, suffered very heavy losses, mostly it was over within a day, and ultimately the VC gained no territory. However, “the most trusted man in America” gave them a propaganda victory, reporting that the Vietnam War was hopeless. Public opinion promptly turned against the war. Ho Chi Minh should’ve given Cronkite a medal, an honorary VC generalship, and a dozen roses.
Many forget that the 1973 Paris Accords brought peace. Two years later, though, the shaky Ford administration couldn’t persuade Congress to respond appropriately to a Shit Test by North Vietnam. Then they invaded, and Saigon fell. All that’s a long story, but public opinion from biased reporting certainly didn’t help. That affected America’s prestige abroad, along with the lives of millions of South Vietnamese killed or sent to “reeducation camps” .
Allen Ginsberg
How the world remembers: He was a pioneer of the beatniks, much beloved by the hippies who followed, and lauded with several literary prizes. Some even credit him with basically starting the 1960s counterculture singlehandedly.
The ugly truth: Ginsberg was neurotic and a degenerate. He wrote a so-called poem about his sphincter (yes, really) but the rest isn’t much better. Anyone considering his bathroom wall ravings as “profound” either is educated beyond his ability to comprehend, believed the hype and didn’t read it, or dropped too much acid.
“Howl”, his best-known poem, begins “I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by madness”. A brief excerpt (get some brain bleach) describing these “best minds”:
who burned cigarette holes in their arms protesting the narcotic tobacco haze of Capitalism,
who distributed Supercommunist pamphlets in Union Square weeping and undressing while the sirens of Los Alamos wailed them down, and wailed down Wall, and the Staten Island ferry also wailed,
who broke down crying in white gymnasiums naked and trembling before the machinery of other skeletons,
who bit detectives in the neck and shrieked with delight in policecars for committing no crime but their own wild cooking pederasty and intoxication,
who howled on their knees in the subway and were dragged off the roof waving genitals and manuscripts,
who let themselves be fucked in the ass by saintly motorcyclists, and screamed with joy,
who blew and were blown by those human seraphim, the sailors, caresses of Atlantic and Caribbean love,
who balled in the morning in the evenings in rosegardens and the grass of public parks and cemeteries scattering their semen freely to whomever come who may, …
Even overlooking the lunacy, buggery, and butthurt, Ginsberg’s “free verse” is stylistically lazy. Back when poetry meant Keats and Kipling, it rhymed and had meter.
He was a noted critic of the USA, for example:
America, I used to be a communist when I was a kid I’m not sorry
Ginsberg visited several Communist countries, getting himself deported from some of them for immorality. He abandoned his ancestral faith for Buddhism and had a Hare Krishna phase. What people believe is up to them, of course, but adding these two things up—along with his wretched poetry—reveals a tortured soul. Rejecting everything one belongs to is childish rebellion for rebellion’s sake.
Granted, Ginsberg’s popularity was greatest during the screwed-up “kill your parents” 1960s. Still, what were those who promoted his crapulous drivel smoking? Were the literary gatekeepers pushing cultural Marxism running out of talented writers?
If that wasn’t bad enough: Ginsberg joined the North American Man/Boy Love Association, sometimes speaking kindly on their behalf. Explaining in an accurately titled interview—“Politics, Pederasty and Consciousness”—to the Harvard Crimson :
As I get older, having very specialised sexual tastes, it gets harder to make out… I like young boys. Why?… I’d have more chance at making out with younger guys if I were younger, dewier, dewy-limbed.
The media usually portrays pickup artists as reprobates, and screeched about Donald Trump’s years-old private locker room talk, but the presstitutes (likewise the lefty “intelligentsia”) fawningly praised Ginsberg despite his appetite for young boys .
Ted Kennedy Best friends forever, east and west
How the world remembers: He was “the Lion of the Senate”, representing Massachusetts from 1962 until his death in 2009. This champion of social justice carried on the Kennedy legacy—hailed as America’s nobility—after his two brothers were tragically slain.
The ugly truth: He was as passionate for booze and adultery as he was for social justice, but the suckers kept reelecting him. His lack of character sank way deeper, though; all the way underwater.
After a night of partying on Chappaquiddick Island, Ted Kennedy drove off a bridge. He escaped, but failed to help his passenger, Mary Jo Kopechne. Per one of the investigators, she suffocated slowly in an air pocket for about two hours. If he’d ran to a nearby house for help—rather than waiting nine hours to sober up—she would’ve survived. He got a two month suspended sentence, barely a slap on the wrist for vehicular manslaughter. The judge basically said poor Teddy had suffered enough. (What about how Miss Kopechne suffered?) There’s one set of rules for the elites , and another for us. Shortly thereafter, he tried to spin-doctor it with a “woe is me” shtick. The suckers kept reelecting him, though a Presidential bid was now beyond reach.
As for his many legislative actions, the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 was the most notorious. He promised the public :
First, our cities will not be flooded with a million immigrants annually. Under the proposed bill, the present level of immigration remains substantially the same… Secondly, the ethnic mix of this country will not be upset… Contrary to the charges in some quarters, [the bill] will not inundate America with immigrants from any one country or area, or the most populated and deprived nations of Africa and Asia…. In the final analysis, the ethnic pattern of immigration under the proposed measure is not expected to change as sharply as the critics seem to think… The bill will not flood our cities with immigrants. It will not upset the ethnic mix of our society. It will not relax the standards of admission. It will not cause American workers to lose their jobs .
The “Lion of the Senate” was lyin’ his fat ass off! This population replacement policy threatens America’s future , just as the Coudenhove-Kalergi Plan is doing in Europe. Still, the suckers kept reelecting him.
If that wasn’t bad enough: Besides giving away the country to which the Constitution granted “the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity “, Lyin’ Ted was in cahoots with the KGB . He proposed to help his Soviet pal Yuri Andropov with tidying up the USSR’s image problem during the Cold War’s endgame. The damning documents suggested that Walter Cronkite (see above) and Barbara Walters might be used for this effort. Conservatives often suspect liberals are soft on Communism; little did they know how cozy Ted Kennedy was in bed with Comrade Andropov.
John Lennon
How the world remembers: He was a talented musician, arguably the most prominent of the Beatles. Their story was an archetypal garage band becoming a bar band and eventually breaking out into great fame. Lennon produced dozens of hits that still get air play. He’s remembered as a wonderful man, an embodiment of the 1960s (the good parts , anyway), and the conscience of the world.
The ugly truth: Despite Lennon’s considerable talents, not all his songs were excellent. Things slipped with the White Album . (“Revolution 9”, really?) After the Beatles broke up, he started a solo career, often featuring songs with sophomoric political poses. His last album produced during his life—after dragging himself out of a long heroin stupor—was Double Fantasy . Critics at first agreed that it sucked. After a nut shot Lennon, they felt sorry for him and declared it brilliant.
Lennon was the archetypal leftist celebrity using fame to push politics. Granted, everyone has a right to their opinion, but being able to sing or act confers no special political expertise. His song “Imagine” is particularly telling. As he put it:
Imagine that there was no more religion, no more country, no more politics,’ is virtually the Communist Manifesto, even though I’m not particularly a Communist and I do not belong to any movement.
Being under the shadow of the Berlin Wall back in their bar gig days should’ve precluded sophomoric posturing like this.
If that wasn’t bad enough: His failings are quite troubling, too numerous to fully detail. One item is abandoning his family the way his own father did. A truly wonderful man wouldn’t do that.
Another item was his extensive substance abuse. He spent 1974 guzzling booze, his “lost weekend”. One night, a waitress refused service because he stuck a menstrual pad on his head. Then:
Lennon: “Do you know who I am?”
Waitress: “Yeah, you’re some asshole with a Kotex on his forehead.”
One Lennon biographer asked Timothy Leary, who’d been on hundreds of acid trips, what Lennon’s extreme LSD consumption would do. Leary had no idea! Finally, what kind of inner vacuum caused this highly successful musician, much beloved by the public, to get himself strung out on heroin?
Jimmy Carter In this heart-warming scene, Jimmy Carter and Uncle Fidel stand for the Cuban national anthem in Havana
How the world remembers: Carter is praised as a rare honest politician, exemplifying Christian principles and tolerance.
The ugly truth: The economy tanked during the Carter administration: double-digit inflation and high unemployment. Economists are still puzzled by stagflation; normally, unemployment and inflation are inversely correlated. At least Obama gave economists another data point to study.
Carter’s commendably not corrupt, but exemplified bleeding-hearted liberalism. Despite winning the Nobel Peace Prize for not being George W. Bush (likewise Al Gore and The Lightworker), Carter was a lackluster embarrassment. He was known for TMI statements, for example about his hemorrhoids and committing adultery in his heart (at least Clinton had the balls to do it for real). He ranked lower than Mr. Whipple on a face recognition survey. The Boston Globe reported on one of his speeches with the headline “More Mush From the Wimp”; finally journalists got something right.
Carter’s shining foreign policy moment was the Camp David Accords, establishing peace between Egypt and Israel. America started giving over a billion annually to each party for making peace, which ironically supplies their military. Why? The USA wasn’t even a combatant, aside from the USS Liberty incident which certainly shouldn’t inspire American tribute money. Taxpayers still fund this absurd protection racket.
Worse, he badly bungled the Iran hostage crisis. One Iranian official later stated they would’ve released the hostages if the USA had threatened force in the beginning. Yep, Carter failed Iran’s Shit Test. Consequentially, the USA lost tons of international prestige, and the ordeal of the hostages dragged on unnecessarily.
If that wasn’t bad enough: Carter is often a little too cordial with notorious dictators . Worse, Clinton trusted him to represent the USA during disarmament talks with North Korea. They gave him the Potemkin village show; he bought it hook, line, and sinker. Yet again, Carter was played for a chump—the USA opened its wallet and gave North Korea aid, and they pinky-swore to stop their nuclear program. Now the Norks have nukes—surprise! Awesome job, Mister Nice Guy!
Read More: The Ugly Truth Of Leftist “Heroes”
| 1real |
Suppressed Antigravity - Technology Used By The B-2 STEALTH BOMBER | Suppressed Antigravity - Technology Used By The B-2 STEALTH BOMBER # www.youtube.com 0
According to the electro-gravity research conducted by Tesla and T. Townsend Brown, such as differentiated load space install a force without reaction on the ship, towards the positive pole.
A drive by electro-gravity of this kind could allow the B-2 work with an efficiency propulsion over-drive crossing at supersonic speeds. 9 and March 1992, the weekly magazine Aviation and Space made a surprising destapamiento, the B-2 is loaded electrostatically its current extractor, and the leading edges of your body, like wings.
Those familiar with the investigation of Tesla in the early 20th century, quickly will realize that this is equivalent to indicate that the B-2 cone anti-gravity aircraft can operate. The magazine Aviation obtained its information about the B-2 of a small group of renegade scientists and engineers, on the west coast, who were previously formally associated with black research projects.
Making these discoveries, these scientists broke the code of silence that rivals those of the Mafia. They took the risk because they felt it was important for economic reasons, that efforts be made to declassify certain black technologies for commercial purposes.
Two of these individuals said that their civil rights were clearly abused (in the name of security), either to keep them quiet or to prevent that they left the black tightly controlled research and development community. Although scientists No mention anything about electro-gravity in its destapamiento in the journal Aviation, about the B-2, they admit the existence of very dramatic secret technologies applicable to the control and propulsion of aircraft. Tags | 1real |
Hate Rising with Jorge Ramos | Hate Rising with Jorge Ramos Fusion, October 28, 2016
From the Ku Klux Klan to the so called alt-right movement, white supremacist groups are growing in numbers and influence. In “Hate Rising,” Jorge Ramos shows us how their ideas, usually confined to private and secretive gatherings, are becoming mainstream thanks in part to the rhetoric on the campaign trail this election cycle. [Editor’s Note: An extended version of the interview with Jared Taylor is available here .] | 1real |
Most Embarrassing Mom Liz Cheney Dresses Daughter Up As ‘Hillary’s Emails’ For Halloween (IMAGES) |
It was recently noted that superhero costumes were far outpacing princess ones as children’s Halloween outfits of choice this year . But what would be dead last? Probably the hackneyed political groan-inducer dreamed up by Liz Cheney for her daughter.
For inexplicable reasons, Liz Cheney – daughter of America’s most detestable former vice president, Dick – decided to staple a bunch of pieces of office scrap paper onto her daughter and send her to school as “Hillary Clinton’s deleted emails.” Ugh.
On social media, proud mom Liz even boasted about the costume. Trick or treat? Our daughter Gracie went to school in the scariest of Halloween costumes: Hillary Clinton’s deleted emails. #HappyHalloween pic.twitter.com/Gs33p78FJT
— Liz Cheney (@Liz_Cheney) October 31, 2016
It’s hard to imagine a less “cool” thing to go as than the living embodiment of a manufactured right-wing scandal that only aging conservatives cared about in the first place. Teens, whom already lean heavily liberal, probably won’t spontaneously become registered Republicans because a classmate showed up covered in paper. Making matters worse, the costume’s gimmick isn’t even obvious. Kids will have to go up to Gracie and ask “So what are you supposed to be?” And she will have to respond, time and again, “I’m Hillary Clinton’s deleted emails. Those things your grandfather was yelling about at the family reunion and quite literally nobody else is interested in.”
And because irony died and was buried in a shallow grave this year, Liz Cheney didn’t bother to justify her own father’s carelessness with emails. Forget the 33,000 emails, the Bush Administration “lost” or “deleted” over 22 million. Guess whose emails “disappeared” most often?
Most troubling, researchers found a suspicious pattern in the White House email system blackouts, including periods when there were no emails available from the office of Vice President Dick Cheney. “That the vice president’s office, widely characterized as the most powerful vice president in history, should have no archived emails in its accounts for scores of days—especially days when there was discussion of whether to invade Iraq—beggared the imagination,” says Thomas Blanton, director of the Washington-based National Security Archive.
I guess stapling 22 million emails to her daughter would be a bit impractical, though. Maybe they should have stuck with a superhero costume.
Featured image via Twitter | 1real |
OBAMA AND VALERIE JARRETT Finalize Executive Action Gun Control Proposal | It s almost as though we don t even have a Constitution Never let a crisis go to waste President Barack Obama s advisers are finalizing a proposal that would expand background checks on gun sales without congressional approval.White House adviser Valerie Jarrett says the president has asked his team to complete a proposal and submit it for his review in short order. She says the recommendations will include measures to expand background checks.Jarrett spoke Wednesday night at a vigil for the victims of the Newtown shooting, according to a summary provided by the White House.After the mass shooting in Roseburg, Oregon, Obama said his team was looking for ways to tighten gun laws without a vote in Congress. White House officials have said they re exploring closing the so-called gun show loophole that anti-gun advocates claim allows people to buy weapons at gun shows and online without a background check.The move comes following the deadly terrorist attack in San Bernardino, California, that left 14 people dead. All of the guns used in the massacre were purchased legally. Opponents of new gun control regulations have argued that the proposals being pushed by Obama would not have prevented the tragedy or recent mass shootings. Via: The Blaze | 1real |
From False Alarm to Panic: Inside Kennedy Airport’s Chaotic Night - The New York Times | Jennifer Rosen was scheduled to depart Kennedy International Airport on an 8:55 p. m. flight to San Francisco but instead found herself stuck at Gate C62 in Terminal 2. It was the typical misery of summer airline travel — or so it seemed. A short distance way away, in another terminal, something more unpredictable than the weather had begun to sweep across the New York airport: Panic. It spread quickly and without warning. By the time Sunday night was over, Ms. Rosen, 32, had sprawled out under a table seeking cover, followed a crowd of people who bolted through a secure door onto the tarmac, frantically called her sister to find out what was happening and tell her that she was alive, and, finally, made a mad dash from the terminal to join mobs of travelers who thought they might be living through an episode of terror. In the end, it proved to be a false alarm. While the authorities were still trying to piece together exactly how a report of gunfire at 9:34 p. m. outside the security checkpoint at Terminal 8 led to complete turmoil across one of the nation’s busiest airports, the accounts of passengers in interviews and on social media offered a lesson in the anatomy of fear. It was a night of confusion and dread, informed by the latest headlines — including reports of recent attacks on airports in Brussels and Istanbul — as much as fact. In the absence of official information or instructions, unconfirmed reports from social media fueled the hysteria. Officials said there was no evidence that what took place at Kennedy Airport was the result of a hoax. It was, rather, a sign of the times. “Right now, what is being concentrated on is the investigation into what the catalyst of the incident is,” said Joe Pentangelo, a spokesman for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which runs the airport. Joe Haviland was at Terminal 8 seeing off his family when the first wave of panic hit. People nearby had been gathered watching the Olympics, as Usain Bolt of Jamaica made his bid for a third gold medal in the dash. “We heard a big celebration,” Mr. Haviland told Fox News shortly after being evacuated. He described hearing something like a loud pop, followed by the sight of a herd of people running his direction. “When you see 80 people come running around the corner,” he said, “and they break a door to get out, you think ‘Oh my God, what is happening? ’” He said he saw “people working for the airline taking off their shirts,” and saying, “This is not worth it, I am leaving. ” Within minutes, he said, police officers with their guns drawn were shouting, “Show me your hands!” The bomb squad soon arrived, and the area was evacuated. But inside Terminal 8, by the departure gates, many passengers had no idea anything was wrong. Judy Rothman Rofé, who had been visiting her son in Brooklyn and was waiting for an American Airlines flight back to Los Angeles, was waiting by Gate 33. Around 10 p. m. a passenger nearby was checking the internet and told her it seemed their flight was not delayed because of the weather. “There is a shooter at large,” she was told. Still, she said, as the news filtered out, people around her were relatively calm. “It was business as usual in our section of the terminal,” she said. Until it wasn’t. Shortly after 11, she said, “we heard screaming. ” It was unclear what set off the wave of panic, but suddenly the eerie calm turned to chaos. “Lots of screaming, crying, mass hysteria,” she said. The gate agents, she said, were nowhere to be found passengers threw themselves under counters and huddled under chairs. After several minutes, an announcement came over the public address system, ordering passengers to leave their bags, put their hands above their heads and evacuate. As she left, she said, scores of law enforcement officers, weapons drawn, were heading into the terminal. Around the same time, Terminal 1 was also officially evacuated, sending hundreds of people into the street outside the airport, unsure what was happening. The Port Authority said that those were the only two terminals evacuated, but that the panic spread quickly to the rest of the airport. In Terminal 2, where Ms. Rosen was waiting for her San Delta Air Lines flight, everything seemed normal nearly an hour after the first calls to 911 about a possible gunman. It was around 10:30 p. m. when someone screamed, “Shots!” “Everyone started screaming and yelling,” Ms. Rosen said. “I dove under this desk space like everyone else. “Then this guy came running over,” she added. He was not an airport employee or an official, but he had an urgent warning. She recalled that he shouted: “They’re coming! Let’s go this way!” Not knowing who “they” might be and not wanting to find out, Ms. Rosen and about a dozen others followed the man through a secure door and onto the tarmac, leaving their belongings behind. “There were no announcements, nothing,” she said. All she could hear was an alarm. She waited with about 20 others on the hot, humid tarmac. “I called my sister, freaking out,” she said. “I told her I am on the tarmac, people are saying there are gunshots. I think I am safe. If you see news about this, I am O. K. ” The crowd was searching Google and social media when a man — she thought he was a pilot — finally said they should return. “People were like, ‘I don’t want to go back inside,’” she said. Still, when the man opened the door, they found things just as chaotic as when they left. A flood of people were running in a single direction, she said. Out of the terminal. Once again she followed the crowd. There were “just mobs of people,” she said. She spotted a man in a Transportation Security Administration shirt and asked him what was happening. “You probably have a better idea than I do” was his response, she said. Finally, a little after midnight early on Monday, employees were allowed back inside the airport. Passengers were permitted to collect their belongings. It would take time for operations to fully resume. And thousands of passengers still needed to figure out what to do next. There were no trains running. The Van Wyck Expressway leading to the airport was closed. Cabs were just starting to trickle back. Eventually, Ms. Rosen climbed in a cab with several others and made her way to her twin sister’s apartment in the city. As she prepared to set off for the airport again on Monday morning, she was a bit more leery about the procedures that might be in place in the event of an actual emergency. “I understand situations like this are inherently chaotic, but the lack of communication and guidance just compounded an already tumultuous and traumatic experience,” she said. “At least in our terminal, they should have had enough time to get a coordinated plan together. But they didn’t, and that caused a lot of unnecessary panic and heartache. ” | 0fake |
COL RALPH PETERS: Obama and Politicians ‘Put Happiness of the Saudi Royal Family Above the Survivors of 9/11’ [Video] | Colonel Ralph Peters comments on what he thinks Congress will do regarding releasing the 9/11 Report. Unfortunately, he s correct | 1real |
WATCH: Rubio Uses Canadian City In ‘It’s Morning Again In America’ Ad | The dramatic opening of Marco Rubio s new ad, which is titled It s Morning Again In America, features a city that isn t even in America. It s in Canada.It didn t take long for the Canadian-based Vancouver Sun to spot footage of the Vancouver skyline, which is clearly featured in the opening footage of Rubio s new ad.As the narrator proclaims It s morning again in America, we are treated to a scene that highlights some of Vancouver, Canada s most recognizable landmarks, which includes Harbour Centre, One Wall Centre and the Port Metro Vancouver cranes.The footage is not only of Canada, instead of the United States, but it also features a Canadian Seaspan tugboat. The tugboat appears to be flying the Canadian flag.Watch the video, which was uploaded to YouTube by Marco Rubio, February 14.Marco Rubio wants to be president of the United States, but he can t even find footage of the United States to use in his It s Morning Again In America campaign ad?As bad as it seems, it shouldn t really be a surprise.What else would you expect from a presidential candidate who has been dubbed The Biggest Idiot Running for President? That s quite a distinction, considering the sheer number of idiots hoping to win the GOP nomination this year.Rubio became a household name in 2013, after delivering the GOP s annual response to the President s state of the Union address.While no-one remembers a word then-Senator Rubio said during the speech, the image of him guzzling water from a plastic bottle will never fade from our collective memory.Since then Rubio has won the hearts of republican voters, who appear to love him not just because he is rabidly anti-gay, but also because he repeatedly brags that he is not a Scientist. With the release of his latest campaign ad, I think it is safe to assume that Marco Rubio is also not a geographer.Featured image from video screen capture, via Marco Rubio on youtube | 1real |
Somalia says it requested U.S. air strike that killed 100 militants | MOGADISHU (Reuters) - Somalia s government said on Wednesday it had requested a U.S. air strike that killed scores of suspected militants to help pave the way for an upcoming ground offensive against Islamist group al Shabaab. The U.S. military s Africa Command (Africom) said on Tuesday it had killed more than 100 of the al Qaeda-linked insurgents in the strike on a camp 125 miles (200 km) northwest of the capital Mogadishu. Those militants were preparing explosives and attacks. Operations against al Shabaab have been stepped up, Somali Information Minister Abdirahman Omar Osman told Reuters. We have asked the U.S. to help us from the air to make our readied ground offensive more successful. Al Shabaab spokesman Abdiasis Abu Musab denied the air strike had taken place. It is just... propaganda, he told Reuters. The United States has ramped up operations in Somalia this year after President Donald Trump loosened the rules of engagement in March. Africom reported eight U.S. air strikes from May to August, compared to 13 for the whole of 2016. Including Tuesday s strike, it has reported five this month alone. The Pentagon said the U.S. military would continue to target militants in strikes in coordination with the Somali government. Al Shabaab has lost control of most of Somalia s cities and towns since African Union peacekeepers supporting Somali troops pushed the insurgency out of the capital Mogadishu in 2011. But it retains a strong presence in parts of the south and center. Somali president Mohamed Abdullahi Mohamed, a dual U.S.-Somali citizen, has taken a harder line than his predecessors against the insurgency since he was sworn in earlier this year. But his plans have been undermined by the poor state of the Somali military and political infighting. He has also had to try to mend fences with the powerful Habar Gidir clan, following a raid involving U.S. forces on the town of Bariire in August in which 10 people were killed including three children. | 0fake |
HUH? SENATOR WARREN Wants To Cut Conservatives Open After They Die [Video] | Senator Elizabeth Warren must be doing whatever Nancy Pelosi is doing The very strange comment by Warren must require translation because we hope she didn t mean what she said!What is it anyway with the women in the Democrat Party? Pelosi, Warren and Maxine Waters are all having bizarre moments on camera. Keep it up ladies! It just means more votes for Republicans!https://twitter.com/TEN_GOP/status/858742017521631232Senator Warren is known for her off color and strange speeches Remember the Nasty woman speech?Liz Warren appeared with Hillary Clinton today and delivered a man-hating rant like no other. She was spewing so much hate towards Trump but missed any substance in policy issues. She did parrot the free college mantra and gave a shocked comment on how she couldn t believe people have to pay for an education. Can you say she s way out of touch? Yikes!Elizabeth Warren (@elizabethforma): "Get this Donald: nasty women are tough, nasty women are smart, and nasty women vote. pic.twitter.com/rUIw7Yzxc8 CSPAN (@cspan) October 24, 2016 | 1real |
Lavrov and Kerry discuss Syrian settlement | Lavrov and Kerry discuss Syrian settlement October 28, 2016 TASS
Russian Foreign Ministry Sergey Lavrov and U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry discussed the Syrian settlement as well as the situation in Yemen and Libya by telephone on Oct. 28.
The Russian Foreign Ministry said that the conversation had taken place at the U.S. side’s request.
"The foreign policy chiefs continued discussing ways of settling the Syrian conflict, including the normalization of the situation around Aleppo, with account taken of fundamental approaches contained in the previously reached Russian-U.S. agreements. For that, the United States should ultimately separate moderate opposition (in Syria) from terror groups," the Russian Foreign Ministry said.
"Lavrov and Kerry also discussed assistance to the solution of crises in Yemen and Libya as well as separate issues of bilateral agenda," the Russian Foreign Ministry stressed. | 1real |
Re-Branding Libertarianism: The Silver Lining of the 2016 Election | Written by Daniel McAdams Is there a silver lining in the recent presidential election for those who value liberty, peace, and prosperity? The answer is a surprising "yes" - but only if we play our cards right. Mises Institute president Jeff Deist joins the Liberty Report to discuss the pros and cons of the current political landscape: Copyright © 2016 by RonPaul Institute. Permission to reprint in whole or in part is gladly granted, provided full credit and a live link are given. | 1real |
Trump to name National Labor Relations Board chairman: White House | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump intends to designate Philip Miscimarra as the chairman of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), the White House said on Friday. Miscimarra, who currently serves as the NLRB’s acting chairman, joined the board in 2013. | 0fake |
BOMBSHELL REPORT: NSA OFFERED TO GIVE HILLARY’S EMAILS To FBI…James Comey Rejected Them | There s a lot going on in the Hillary Clinton/Donald Trump/Russia investigation that all the highfalutin newspapers that cover politics are still trying to ignore.Well, investors had better know this stuff before it bites them in the assets. So here goes.Numerous reports coming out of the Senate Judiciary Committee last week said that former FBI Director James Comey made the decision not to refer Clinton for prosecution long before he even interviewed key witnesses, including Hillary.Remember, the Republicans now control this committee. So bad news isn t going to be stifled anymore.Clinton, you probably remember, lost her private emails, which she d been storing on a personal computer server. Comey chastised her harshly in a televised speech but then said there was a unanimous decision not to recommend prosecution.Clinton s emails, which were stolen by the Russians, have never been found. But as I ve mentioned numerous times, the messages are still in the possession of the National Security Agency (NSA), which offered to give them to the FBI.Comey turned down that offer, according to a source who has been very reliable.I ve also mentioned that Comey fibbed when he said his agents unanimously agreed that prosecution was unnecessary. In fact, my source says that FBI agents were irate about the decision not to go after Clinton. NYP | 1real |
Fox News Posted A Photo Of Two Gorillas, So Their Racist Fans Trashed The Obamas (SCREENSHOTS) | Once again, conservatives have gone above and beyond to prove that quite literally anything will send them into a racist tirade against the President of the United States.On Mother s Day, Fox News posted photos on Facebook of a gorilla who had recently given birth unexpectedly. The pregnancy was a bit of a shock to the staff at Prague Zoo, who say they had given up hope that Shinda, the 24-year-old primate, would ever have a baby. The gorilla had experienced numerous miscarriages, so staff simply assumed she was overweight. But late last month, Shinda gave birth successfully. After suffering several miscarriages, Shinda was expected to remain childless, Fox News posted. But the 24-year-old gorilla surprised everyone at the Prague Zoo in April when she gave birth to a healthy baby! Almost immediately the nigh-predictable screeching began, with Fox News fans reciting effortlessly their favorite lines, like If Obama had a son. Others decided that their hateful screeds should be directed at Michelle and Malia Obama. Unfortunately, this is the sort of thing sane people are forced to tolerate. Recently, upon hearing that Malia Obama had gotten into Harvard, the Stupid Part of America spewed their hatred in a similar manner. Fox News fans swooped in, calling her a n*gger, an affirmative action parasite, and suggesting that Little Ape (that s their cute little nickname for her) go to college in Africa. In December, Fox News posted a photo of an orangutan in a Santa hat. You can guess what happened.It s easy to be shocked by Donald Trump s popularity. But the secret of his appeal his racism, his narcissism, his Islamophobic hate speech, the (I assume by now) gold-plated, 1,000-foot wall with mounted machine guns every 27 1/2 feet and f*cking lazers, and the fact that he probably wants to f*ck his own daughter is equally simple. He has a built-in audience.For years, Fox News has been catering to the very worst in society. For years, they have been shaping the opinion of the distressingly large percentage of Americans who are unable to use a fork without adult supervision, and for years they have been perpetuating lie after lie after lie after lie after lie after lie after lie after lie after lie after lie after lie about President Obama.Fox News built Donald Trump s audience for him, and he harnessed that hate. It s easy to look at this and say so what, but remember: these people will be voting in November. Be sure to head to the polls, because anyone they would put in office could not possibly be good for America.Featured Image via screengrab | 1real |
Pennsylvania Democrats raise concerns over CP's Norfolk Southern bid | CHICAGO (Reuters) - Democrats from Pennsylvania’s congressional delegation sent a letter to a federal rail regulator on Monday raising concerns over the possible negative impacts of a merger between Canadian Pacific and Norfolk Southern Corp. The letter sent to the Surface Transportation Board raised concerns over the impact it could have on railroad jobs in Pennsylvania and said the merger could lead to “disinvestment” in rail infrastructure in the state. Senator Bob Casey and five members of the U.S. House of Representatives, all Democrats, also wrote that they were deeply concerned about the voting trust structure Canadian Pacific has proposed in its bid for the No. 4 U.S. railroad. The Canadian company in mid-November disclosed its $28 billion offer to buy the Norfolk, Virginia-based railroad. Norfolk Southern has rejected Canadian Pacific’s advances, setting the stage for a possible proxy battle. The Surface Transportation Board would have to review a merger of the two railroads, which would be a test case since the regulator rewrote the rules for approving takeovers in 2001. The review process would include public hearings where rail customers, labor groups and elected officials would be allowed to weigh in. In their letter, the Pennsylvania Democrats wrote that they believe the acquisition could hurt thousands of rail shippers, manufacturers and local communities, as well as rail workers, in the state, and urged a thorough review of any proposed merger. Canadian Pacific has said that a takeover of Norfolk Southern would lead to $1.8 billion in annual savings. In early January, two senior Democrats in the U.S. House of Representatives urged the board to reject any merger of Canadian Pacific and Norfolk Southern. A number of industry groups and rail customers, plus a couple of the unions representing workers at Norfolk Southern have also come out against any merger. Last week, the board posted letters from some rail customers who argue that, on the contrary, a merger of Canadian Pacific and Norfolk Southern would create a transcontinental railroad that would result in better service. | 0fake |
U.S. Republican Rand Paul suspends 2016 White House campaign | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Republican Rand Paul suspended his 2016 presidential bid on Wednesday after his small-government campaign failed to gain traction with voters. The U.S. senator from Kentucky was the second Republican candidate, behind former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee, to drop out of the race since Monday’s night’s Iowa caucuses. That contest launched the parties’ process to nominate candidates for the November election. “It’s been an incredible honor to run a principled campaign for the White House. Today, I will end where I began, ready and willing to fight for the cause of Liberty,” Paul said in a statement. In the Republican race, the libertarian-leaning Paul finished in fifth place in Iowa with 4.5 percent of the vote. U.S. Senator Ted Cruz finished first in Iowa, putting a dent in real estate tycoon Donald Trump’s standing as front-runner to be his party’s nominee. Paul, who is also focused on winning another U.S. Senate term, said he would continue fighting for limited government, criminal justice reform and “reasonable” foreign policy. The heir apparent to the libertarian-minded voters who helped his father gain a standing in the last two presidential elections, Paul struggled to attract support in a crowded Republican field. His withdrawal leaves 10 Republican candidates in the 2016 White House race. | 0fake |
Catalonia asks Spain for dialogue as independence struggle intensifies | MADRID (Reuters) - Catalonian leaders on Friday appealed to the Spanish government for dialogue to avert an impending political crisis over a planned referendum on independence as Madrid took measures to stop state cash being used to fund the vote. Police also intervened to stop a meeting organized by a pro-independence Catalan party, the first public police crackdown on the process. The government of the wealthy northeastern region has pledged to hold a referendum on breaking away from Spain on Oct. 1 in defiance of Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy, who has declared the event illegal and is bringing the weight of the state to bear to prevent it. In a letter released on Friday, regional president Carles Puigdemont and Barcelona mayor Ada Colau wrote to Rajoy and Spain s King Felipe saying the state had mounted an unprecedented repression offensive . The letter called for political dialogue, based on the legitimacy we all have, to make possible something that in a democracy is never a problem and even less a crime: listening to the voice of the people . The government said it had not received the letter. To talk about dialogue when the only thing the Catalan government has wanted for months, years, is a referendum come what may, seems like a threat, government spokesman Inigo Mendez de Vigo told a news conference. Shortly after Puigdemont and Colau s appeal, the Budget Ministry said the uncertainty created by the stand-off could damage the economy and push up sovereign borrowing costs. Some investors sold Spanish government bonds and switched to Italian debt earlier this week. Also on Friday, the government passed measures to gain more control over how the regional administration spends its money in a bid to stop it from using state cash to pay for the ballot. Budget Minister Cristobal Montoro said the Catalan authorities could not be trusted to spend the money on public services rather than the planned vote. The central government made arrangements to take over the funding of most essential public services if Puigdemont failed to guarantee, within 48 hours of the measures coming into force, that public cash was not being used to fund the referendum. In Vitoria-Gasteiz in northern Spain, police interrupted a meeting held by the small pro-Catalan independence CUP party. The CUP meeting in a civic building in the capital of the Basque Country, which also has a separatist movement, finished early after police arrived. Participants waved ballot papers and flags as they left. The planned referendum would be the culmination of many years of campaigning by the independence movement. Most of Catalonia s 5.5 million voters want to have a say on the region s relationship with Spain but the independence cause has lost support in recent years and surveys now indicate less than half the population would choose full self-rule. The referendum would pose the question Do you want Catalonia to be an independent republic? to all Spanish citizens living in Catalonia. Leaders have said the assembly would declare independence within 48 hours of a yes vote. Puigdemont has said no minimum turnout will be required to make the result binding. Rajoy, who is due to attend an event for his ruling People s Party (PP) in Barcelona, Spain s second-biggest city, later on Friday, has said the government would come down with all the force of the law to ensure no referendum goes ahead. Two new laws passed by the Catalan assembly paving the way for the vote have been suspended while state judges consider whether holding it would breach Spain s constitution, which says the country is indivisible. King Felipe was widely quoted as praising Spain s democracy and social harmony at an awards ceremony on Wednesday, saying the constitution will prevail over any rupture in that . Mayor Colau gave a boost to the referendum campaign on Thursday with a message that the vote would go ahead in Barcelona, without civil servants involved risking their jobs. Courts have already suspended from office and leveled millions of euros in fines at Catalan politicians who organized a non-binding referendum in 2014, which returned a yes vote on a low turnout. | 0fake |
Three Basic Exercises To Help You Increase Strength and Mobility | Within the preparedness community, there is a tendency for individuals to place an almost exclusive focus on acquiring the right supplies and tools for survival, and for good reason, but what is too often brushed aside in this pursuit are the tools that every person carries within his or her body, namely the muscular system. Whether due to personal neglect, lifestyle barriers or just plain lacking motivation, there is a tendency to put off strength and endurance training. Being physically fit is equally as important as having the proper resources when disaster strikes. Making sure that we are doing what we can to have able bodies with which to face and survive a major disaster should be a top priority, and this means starting today, doing basic strength training exercises to improve your overall health and mobility. Maybe you don’t consider yourself athletic, and maybe you haven’t worked out in years, but there is no good reason to let that hold you back from doing daily exercises now so that you can help yourself and your family when it counts. Here are three basic exercises that you can implement into your daily routine today (none of which require the use of weights):
Push-ups Push-ups seem fairly straightforward, but many people have been taught an incorrect way to do push-ups that can cause irreversible damage. Wide-arm push-ups, in which your hands are extended outside of shoulder-width, cause a bone in your shoulder called the acromion to rub against the supraspinatus tendon just beneath it, which can cause permanent damage. Avoid damaging your shoulder by placing your hands at or within the width of your shoulder. If it’s been awhile since you’ve done push-ups and you are finding it difficult to push your full body weight, then you can focus on pushing only your upper body weight by placing a pad under your knees and doing push-ups with only your knees on the ground instead of your feet. For someone who is just starting, you can do just 10 push-ups a day and gradually increase that number as you build endurance with this exercise. Push-ups are great for building strength in your chest, core and back.
Body Squats
Arguably one of the most important exercises you can do for overall leg strength, body weight squats are a great exercise that requires no weights. It’s important to maintain a straight posture as you squat down, and this will require that you shift your waist backward considerably as your waistline reaches your knees. Make sure that your knees do not bend over the tip of your toes to avoid injury.
A person’s ability to do a squat can be affected by a number of factors, from overall leg strength to ankle-, knee- and hip-related stress. Those who have not squatted much in their life tend to have a shortened Achilles tendon which impedes full range of motion and only allows these particular individuals to do a partial squat. By doing consistent partial squats, they can eventually form an elongated Achilles tendon and do full squats. As you grow in strength and body weight squats become easier, you can begin to add weight to the exercise by holding a weight in the center of your chest and increasing that weight as you increase in strength and endurance.
Reverse Plank Bridge
The reverse plank bridge is basically the opposite of a push-up; you hold yourself up by placing your hands directly beneath your shoulders in a sitting position and push yourself upward; either extend your legs and keep them straight, balancing on your heels, or bend them and keep your feet flat. Just by holding this position you are working a number of muscles. This exercise is exceptional for building your core, lower back, and arms.
By adding these three simple exercises to your daily routine, you can dramatically increase your full spectrum strength and mobility.
This information has been made available by Ready Nutrition
Originally published November 18th, 2016 See How You Stack Up Against The WW2 Fitness Test 4 Daily Strengthening Exercises That Will Push You to the… Book Review: “You Are Your Own Gym” Ancient Secrets to Relieving Back Pain The Synergistic Effects of Meditation + Exercise on… | 1real |
PUTIN ACCUSES U.S. Of Leaking Flight Path Of Russian Plane Shot Down By Turkey…Turkey Buying ISIS Oil | Countdown until Obama is OUT OF OFFICE: 347 days 8 hours 29 minutes 30 secondsPresident Vladimir Putin said on Thursday that Russia had given prior information to the United States of the flight path of the plane downed by Turkey on the Syrian border. The American side, which leads the coalition that Turkey belongs to, knew about the location and time of our planes flights, and we were hit exactly there and at that time, Putin said at a joint press conference with French counterpart Francois Hollande in the Kremlin. Putin said the Russians had given prior information to the U.S. of the flight path of the plane but the U.S. had leaked the information to Turkey.Ahead of the Hollande talks, Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan traded barbs, with the Russian leader saying he was waiting for an apology and Erdogan ruling out any such move.President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says Turkey s right to protect its borders must be respected, after the military shot down a Russian plane on the Syrian border for allegedly violating its airspace.Putin on Thursday dismissed as rubbish Turkey s claim that it would not have shot down the jet if it had known it was Russian. They [our planes] have identification signs and these are well visible, Putin said. Instead of [ ] ensuring this never happens again, we are hearing unintelligible explanations and statements that there is nothing to apologise about. Putin has also accused Turkey of buying oil from the Islamic State jihadist group, whose financing heavily relies on the sale of energy resources.Putin said there was no doubt that oil from terrorist-controlled territory in Syria was making its way across the border into Turkey. We see from the sky where these vehicles [carrying oil] are going, Putin said. They are going to Turkey day and night. These barrels are not only carrying oil but also the blood of our citizens because with this money terrorists buy weapons and ammunition and then organise bloody attacks, he added.Via: Yahoo | 1real |
Russell Brand’s Back on ‘The Trews’ and He’s Got Quite a Bit to Say About the U.S. Elections (Video) | $23 Russell Brand’s Back on ‘The Trews’ and He’s Got Quite a Bit to Say About the U.S. Elections (Video) Posted on Nov 2, 2016
The comedian and political activist reveals his views on both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, neither of which he thinks should be president, and posits that both of their campaigns, with their ultimately meaningless slogans, are nothing but reality TV. | 1real |
MoMA Protests Trump Entry Ban by Rehanging Work by Artists from Muslim Nations - The New York Times | In one of the strongest protests yet by a major cultural institution against President Trump’s executive order on immigration, the Museum of Modern Art has rehung part of its permanent collection with works by artists from some of the nations whose citizens are blocked from entering the United States. Seven works by artists such as the Sudanese painter Ibrahim the architect Zaha Hadid, and the Los Iranian video artist Tala Madani, were installed Thursday night in MoMA’s galleries, replacing seven works by Picasso, Matisse and Picabia, among other Western artists. Alongside each work is a wall text that plainly states the museum’s intentions: “This work is by an artist from a nation whose citizens are being denied entry into the United States, according to a presidential executive order issued on Jan. 27, 2017. This is one of several such artworks from the Museum’s collection installed throughout the galleries to affirm the ideals of welcome and freedom as vital to this Museum as they are to the United States. ” Except for Hadid and Mr. the other artists are all Iranian by birth or heritage. They are Ms. Madani the sculptor Parviz Tanavoli the draftsman Charles Hossein Zenderoudi the photographer Shirana Shahbazi and the painter Marcos Grigorian. In addition, a large sculpture of aluminum and steel by Siah Armajani, an American artist born in Iran, was placed in the lobby courtyard overlooking the garden. The additions rupture the museum’s traditional narrative of Western modernism before 1945. Only very rarely has MoMA interrupted its succession of art from to Cubism, Dadaism, and after — which still reflects the modernist vision of its first director, Alfred Barr — with works of postwar and contemporary art. Further additions are planned for the weeks ahead. The Museum of Modern Art has also scheduled four screenings later this month of films by directors subject to the travel ban. They include “ ” (1974) an experimental feature by the German director Kais and “Stars in Broad Daylight” (1988) by Oussama Mohammad, a Syrian filmmaker exiled in Paris. | 0fake |
HOT TOPIC: When Exactly Does A ‘Bundle Of Cells’ Become A Human Being? [Video] | Ben Shapiro debates two students on when a baby becomes a human being. A hot topic that stumps pro-choice people but not pro-lifers: I believe, as do most people who feel this way about abortion, that life begins at conception. When sperm meets egg, and the child is conceived, that s when life begins; that is what I believe in. Ben Shapiro It s my body. How about you stay out of it? the student replied. I don t care about your appendix, Shapiro quipped, referencing the student s earlier argument. I don t even care about your uterus. I care about what s in it. And I can take out my appendix if I don t want it. So why can t I take out other parts of my body? the student asked. Because they are not independent living human beings, Shapiro fired back.The student continued to engage in a debate, arguing the fetus is merely a bundle of cells. At what point does that bundle of cells become a human being in your judgement? Shapiro asked her. Um , the student said.Another student chimed in. The concept of body autonomy means that I don t have to give up any part of my body unless I say so, she said. The baby is not part of your body, Shapiro quipped.In general, the fear of calling a baby a baby within progressive circles is an entertaining spectacle, given the amount of intellectual gymnastics that are involved, which almost always ends with some disingenuous conclusion that a woman s life holds more value than that of her child barring any life threatening conditions, or the pro-abortion supporter storming out because folks, like Shapiro, totally own them on the issue. In other words, they feel triggered, so off to the safe space, where like-minded people can sulk and discuss how the patriarchy sucks, or something.Yet, one thing is clear in this exchange, which is that Shapiro is open to debate, and he wants to discuss these issues in which conservatives find themselves in the crosshairs of political correctness in campuses across the country. After going back and forth about the science relating to pregnancy, it becomes clear that the pro-choice wing of the attendees in the room are exasperated to the point where they accuse Shapiro of trying to shut them down; Shapiro aptly noted that he allowed them to speak for almost ten minutes on the subject. Another student asked Shapiro what criteria does he have regarding what defines a life, but then made an aberrant pivot by asking him of he considers semen to be a life, insinuating that Shapiro masturbates a lot because he s a human being (no, I m not making that part up). Well put, sir, said Shapiro, which drew laughter from the audience. I believe, as do most people who feel this way about abortion, that life begins at conception. When sperm meets egg, and the child is conceived, that s when life begins; that is what I believe in. The rest of the question was weird, he added.Indeed, sir.Via: Hot Air | 1real |
Mike Pence’s Response to H.I.V. Outbreak: Prayer, Then a Change of Heart - The New York Times | AUSTIN, Ind. — On the evening of March 24, 2015, Sheriff Dan McClain got an unexpected voice mail: “This is Gov. Mike Pence calling. I would welcome the opportunity to get your counsel on what’s going on in Scott County. ” What was going on was unprecedented in Indiana and rare in the United States: H. I. V. was spreading with terrifying speed among intravenous drug users in this rural community near the Kentucky border. Local, state and federal health officials were urging the governor to allow clean needles to be distributed to slow the outbreak. But Indiana law made it illegal to possess a syringe without a prescription. And Mr. Pence, a steadfast conservative, was morally opposed to needle exchanges on the grounds that they supported drug abuse. As Sheriff McClain called the governor back, the pressure was mounting. The number of new H. I. V. cases in the county was nearing 90. “Don’t give me any political views I want to know your opinion,” the sheriff recalled Mr. Pence saying. Sheriff McClain, who was not a fan of needle exchanges, was quick to reply: “I believe the only thing we can do to stop or slow this thing is to get clean needles out there. ” As the Republican candidate, Mr. Pence brings a long record of social and fiscal conservatism that serves as a counterweight to Donald J. Trump’s frequently shifting views. But rarely have the governor’s principles been tested like they were during Indiana’s worst public health crisis in years. Much as Tim Kaine, the Democratic candidate, had to wrestle with his deeply felt opposition to capital punishment in a death penalty state, allowing 11 executions when he was Virginia’s governor, the H. I. V. outbreak forced Mr. Pence to balance strong beliefs against reality: an epidemic that was growing more dire by the day. In recent interviews, local, state and federal health officials said Mr. Pence initially held firm. So as they struggled to contain the spread of H. I. V. the officials embarked on a effort over several weeks to persuade him to change his mind, using political pressure, research and pleas for help from this remote, poor community. On March 23, more than two months after the outbreak was detected, Mr. Pence said he was going to go home and pray on it. He spoke to the sheriff the next night. Two days later, he issued an executive order allowing syringes to be distributed in Scott County. Tens of thousands of them were handed out over the following months. And the program, along with drug therapy and aggressive outreach, slowed the flood of new H. I. V. cases to a trickle. State Representative Ed Clere, a Republican who was among those pushing the governor to approve the needle exchange, said he was relieved when Mr. Pence finally did so. He also wished it had been done sooner. “It was disappointing that it took so much effort to bring the governor on board,” Mr. Clere said. But Dr. Jerome Adams, Mr. Pence’s health commissioner, said the governor needed certainty that he was doing the right thing. “The governor wanted to make sure if we went this route it was absolutely necessary,” Dr. Adams said. “I believe he was praying on it up until the final decision. ” The debate over needle exchanges, in which clean syringes are given to drug abusers when they turn in a used one, has raged since 1988, when Senator Jesse Helms, Republican of North Carolina, persuaded Congress to ban the use of federal money for such efforts. Mr. Pence, who declined to be interviewed for this article, supported the ban during his six terms in the House. And Indiana was among nearly two dozen states to criminalize the distribution or possession of syringes without a prescription. Even when the H. I. V. outbreak hit, it was hard for Mr. Pence and other Indiana officials to consider lifting the prohibition. “There are people who have real moral and ethical concerns about passing out needles to people with substance abuse problems,” Dr. Adams said. “To be honest, I shared that sentiment. ” Brittany Combs, the public health nurse in Scott County, had the same initial reaction. “Even I, as a public health person, was like, ‘Aren’t we just enabling people? ’” But the H. I. V. crisis in Scott County was swift, severe and extremely troubling to those who glimpsed it. High rates of poverty and painkiller prescriptions had ushered in a wave of opiate addiction. When the makers of the drug Opana, a narcotic, reformulated their pills to make them harder to crush and snort, abusers of the drug began injecting it. “Three or four of us would be using the same needle,” said Melissa Sword, 30, who lives in a neighborhood of sagging homes here known as the North Side. “Someone would pull a needle out of their arm, and I’d take it to the sink, wash it and use it. ” Five people tested positive for H. I. V. in the last seven weeks of 2014 in Scott County, which rarely saw a single new case in an entire year. Then in one week in 2015, eight people tested positive. “Everyone we grew up with got H. I. V. in a matter of months,” Ms. Sword said. Her boyfriend was one of them. Health officials quickly traced its spread through networks of IV drug users and began steering those who had been exposed — either through shared needles or sexual encounters — into testing and treatment. Mr. Clere, a Republican known for bucking party leaders, began drafting an amendment to allow the distribution of clean syringes in Indiana. Studies have shown that needle exchanges do not result in increased drug use among participants or in higher recruitment of drug users, but they do substantially reduce the risk of infection of H. I. V. and other diseases. However, Mr. Clere could not engage Mr. Pence’s staff members on the topic. “They made it clear that he was categorically opposed to syringe exchange, period,” Mr. Clere said. On March 4, county and state health officials got on a conference call with the New York State Department of Health. The agency explained how the spread of H. I. V. among drug users in New York City had been dramatically reduced years earlier. “The first thing they said? ‘You need to have a clean needle exchange program,’” Ms. Combs, the county nurse, recalled. But when the topic came up at a community meeting in Scott County the next week, Dr. Jennifer Walthall, the deputy state health commissioner, made it sound like an intervention of that kind was not possible, Ms. Combs said. “She said, ‘Let’s focus on the mountains we can climb,’” Ms. Combs said. On March 23, Mr. Pence was forced to address the topic at a meeting in the governor’s office with state health officials and doctors from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. “The governor looked to me and he looked to the C. D. C. and said, ‘What do we need to do to respond to this outbreak? ’” Dr. Adams said. He, for one, was no longer resistant. “The C. D. C. felt strongly, and I agreed, that providing syringes was the appropriate response, that this is an extraordinary situation that requires extraordinary measures. ” Mr. Pence found the science convincing, Dr. Adams said. But as the meeting concluded, no one was sure what the governor was going to do. Dr. Adams recalled the governor, who is an evangelical Christian, saying, “I’m going to go home and pray on it. ” The next evening, Mr. Pence and Sheriff McClain talked for nearly half an hour. “The governor didn’t really give his opinion,” the sheriff said. “He just wanted to listen. ” On March 25, Mr. Pence traveled to Scott County to hear from other residents, and many of them echoed Sheriff McClain’s belief that a needle exchange was needed. While the governor was downstate, Mr. Clere was applying pressure in Indianapolis, the capital, holding a hearing with experts who testified about the value of distributing clean needles. Some legislators were confused as to why the governor was not supporting legislation that would allow for a syringe exchange in Indiana, with one Republican lawmaker asking, “He doesn’t recognize this as a crisis?” Dr. Walthall, the deputy health commissioner, testified that Mr. Pence was considering declaring a public health emergency for Scott County and allowing a temporary needle exchange program limited to that jurisdiction. “This is a heroic moment,” she said. “The quickest way to stop H. I. V. spread through needles is to get rid of dirty needles. The only way to do that quickly and effectively is through an emergency needle exchange program. ” The next day, the order came. “I will tell you, I do not support needle exchange as antidrug policy, but this is a public health emergency,” Mr. Pence said at a news conference announcing the order. Ms. Combs was soon traveling the streets of Austin, in Scott County, in an S. U. V. distributing needles to those who did not feel comfortable coming in to get them. At first, the drug users were skeptical. Then, one day, she and a colleague pulled up in front of a house, and a girl rose from her seat on the front porch and walked down to accept a clean syringe. “When we looked up, there were people coming from every house on the street,” Ms. Combs said. “They swarmed the van. ” Since April 2015, more than 270 people have enrolled in the program, and more than 97, 000 syringes have been distributed and returned. Today, the needle exchange program is seen as playing a major role in halting the outbreak. From November 2014 through the next August, 181 people who lived in or used drugs in Scott County tested positive for H. I. V. according to a study of the outbreak published last month in The New England Journal of Medicine. In September and October, not a single person tested positive. Mr. Pence signed legislation in May 2015 that allows for needle exchanges in other counties that can prove they are experiencing an epidemic of H. I. V. or hepatitis C. And this year, Congress lifted most of the ban on federal funding for needle exchanges. Public health experts in Indiana were relieved by the governor’s change of heart, but some wished he had acted faster and done more. No state funding was made available for needle exchange programs. “He made it an uphill battle,” said Beth Meyerson, a health science professor at Indiana University and of the school’s Rural Center for Prevention. But for those who saw the issue as Mr. Pence did, it was a wrenching decision not to be handled lightly. “Before this, I never would have considered needle exchange,” Sheriff McClain said. “But once this outbreak happened, it became clear it was one of the main ways to stop the spread. ” | 0fake |
U.S. Air Force Runs Out Of Bombs To Drop On ISIS…Don’t Worry Though, Barry’s Got This | Bombs a-w oh, never mind Things must be going well in the war on terror, as the US Air Force just admitted that it is fast running out of bombs to drop on ISIS after B-1s have dropped bombs in record numbers. As ZeeNews reports, Air Force chief of staff General Mark Welsh said as America ramps up its military campaign against the Islamist terror group, the Air Force is now expending munitions faster than we can replenish them. The US Air Force is fast running out of bombs to drop on ISIS targets in Syria and Iraq after its pilots fired off over 20,000 missiles and bombs since the US bombing campaign against the terror group began 15 months ago, its chief has said. As ZeeNews reports, B-1s have dropped bombs in record numbers. F-15Es are in the fight because they are able to employ a wide range of weapons and do so with great flexibility. We need the funding in place to ensure we re prepared for the long fight, Welsh said in the statement. This is a critical need, he said.The bombing campaign has left the US Air Force with what an Air Force official described as munitions depot stocks below our desired objective. The Air Force has requested additional funding for Hellfire missiles and is developing plans to ramp up weapons production to replenish its stocks more quickly. But replenishing that stock can take up to four years from time of expenditure to asset resupply, the official told CNN. The precision today s wars requires demands the right equipment and capability to achieve desired effects. We need to ensure the necessary funding is in place to not only execute today s wars, but also tomorrow s challenges, the official said. As The Washington Times concludes, Russia has been bombing ISIS positions sporadically while France and Great Britain are now active in the American-led coalition which could relieve some pressure.Much larger potential adversaries like Russia or China most surely are following this development carefully. If the USAF cannot sustain a trickling battle against a poorly armed, medieval enemy, fighting a superpower military is obviously beyond its capability.Via: Zero Hedge | 1real |
As sanctions bite, North Korean workers leave Chinese border hub | DANDONG, China (Reuters) - North Korean workers have begun to leave the Chinese border city of Dandong, following the latest round of sanctions seeking to restrict Pyongyang s ability to earn foreign currency income, local businesses and traders say. Almost 100,000 overseas workers, based predominantly in China and Russia, funnel some $500 million in wages a year to help finance the North Korean regime, the U.S. government says. Dandong, a city of 800,000 along the Yalu river that defines the border with North Korea, is home to many restaurants and hotels that hire North Korean waitresses and musicians. Their colorful song and dance performances are a tourist attraction. Thousands of predominantly female workers are also employed by Chinese-owned garment and electronics factories in Dandong, with a significant proportion of their wages going straight to the North Korean state. The Wing Cafe used to advertise its beautiful North Korean waitresses on its shopfront by the Yalu. The sign is now gone, and cafe staff said the waitresses had returned home in recent weeks after their visas expired. There have been changes in government policy, the manager of another restaurant said. It s not convenient to say more. Recent videos circulating on Chinese social media appear to show hundreds of North Korean women waiting in line to clear immigration at Dandong s border gate. A Reuters reporter saw a group of around 50 North Korean women waiting to cross the border on Friday morning. Four traders, who deal in goods ranging from iron ore and seafood to ginseng and alcohol, told Reuters the sanctions had all but crippled the usual trade. More stringent customs checks and patrols by Chinese border police have also made it harder to smuggle goods across the border, according to the traders, who declined to be named due to the subject s sensitivity. The impact has been huge. Dandong s economy has always counted on border trade, said one Chinese trader. In response to Pyongyang s sixth and largest nuclear test last month, the U.N. Security Council on Sept. 11 passed a resolution prohibiting the use of North Korean workers, strengthening an Aug. 5 resolution that put a cap on the number of workers allowed overseas. Successive rounds of U.N. trade sanctions have now banned 90 percent of the North s $2.7 billion of publicly reported exports. The Sept. 11 sanctions also ordered the closure of all joint business ventures with North Korea and added textiles to a list of banned exports, which already included coal, iron ore and seafood. In a statement on Thursday, China s Ministry of Commerce ordered the implementation of the new sanctions across the country within 120 days. The sanctions allow workers to serve out existing contracts. Business people in Dandong, through which most of trade between the two countries flows, said contracts could not be renewed and new visas were not being approved. A Chinese supervisor at a factory making electronic wiring for automobiles said while most of its 300 North Korean workers were on multi-year contracts expiring at different times, those who arrived in Dandong after Aug. 5 had already been forced to leave. He did not say how many. The sanctions have come as a rude jolt to Dandong businesses and traders who had long rolled with North Korea s unpredictability but believed their neighbor s economic reliance on China would keep its belligerence in check. Dandong is one of the larger cities in Liaoning province, whose rustbelt economy has struggled under national campaigns to curb industrial overcapacity and ease pollution. Liaoning was China s worst performer in the first half of 2017, registering GDP growth of 2.1 percent, compared with the national rate of 6.9 per cent, according to official statistics. The economy hasn t been doing well here for the past two years, said one trader. This is making a bad situation worse. | 0fake |
Andrea Mitchell SLAMS Donald Trump For Being A Complete Idiot On Foreign Policy (VIDEO) | When NBC News Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent Andrea Mitchell calls a presidential candidate uneducated on foreign policy, we should listen.Because that s precisely what she had to say about Republican front-runner Donald Trump on Sunday during an appearance on Meet The Press.Mitchell has been NBC s foreign affairs expert for over 20 years so she knows what she is talking about. So whenever Trump has opened his mouth to talk about international affairs, she is taken aback. He cannot stick to a subject. It is remarkable, Mitchell told Chuck Todd. And when he doesn t know something, he just changes the subject, and makes it all about himself. Todd had just referenced an interview where Trump changed the topic rather than answer a question about whether he would use a nuclear weapon against ISIS.Chuck Todd mentioned that national security talk is especially noticeable to people like Mitchell who have literally spent their careers keeping up with foreign policy. He would cancel defense treaties with Japan and South Korea against North Korea, Mitchell said in reference to a Trump interview with the New York Times. He would be okay if Japan and South Korea go nuclear. American policy for decades since World War II has been trying to keep nukes out of that arena. Then Mitchell explained how Trump would hurt America by cutting off our oil supply from Saudi Arabia if the Saudis refuse to pay the United States more money for defense, which would likely hit our economy like a ton of bricks as oil prices rise and the price of gas skyrockets. If we re going to make America less dependent on foreign oil, we have to do so gradually because all at once would be a disaster.But she was particularly concerned about the fact that Trump doesn t seem to understand that Iran isn t allowed to buy American planes, nor does he know that China is North Korea s biggest trading partner. He is completely all over the lot Mitchell said. On Iran, he complains that Iran isn t buying our planes. It had to be pointed out to him that Iran is still under sanctions and cannot buy American planes. He thinks North Korea and Iran are the biggest trading partners, when North Korea s biggest trading partner is China. And then she finished slaying Trump with a single line that should worry every American. He is completely uneducated about any part of the world. Todd went on to consult Katy Tur about what she has learned about Trump s lack of foreign policy chops, and she mentioned that Trump doesn t understand the function of US military bases around the world and why they are there, which would be a very important thing to know to be an effective commander-in-chief of our armed forces.Here s the video via YouTube:Donald Trump is an idiot when it comes to domestic policy and foreign policy, but considering the issues we face internationally whether it be terrorism, rising tensions in the Middle East, competing with China on the world economic stage, and dealing with a refugee crisis, the last thing America needs is a leader who doesn t know anything about any of these issues beyond campaign rhetoric that lasts a full sentence before the subject is changed.Presidents cannot just change the subject rather than deal with a foreign policy crisis. They have to figure out a solution to the problem and being uneducated about the situation to begin with doesn t exactly build confidence that the problem will be solved competently.And since Trump has proven that he can t do that, it doesn t make any sense whatsoever to elect him to the highest office in the land with a greatest responsibility in the world.Featured image: screenshot | 1real |
NFL GIVES BEYONCE Super Bowl Half-Time Slot To Promote Cop Hate, Racial Division…Race-Baiting Hubby, JAY Z Makes $1.5 MILLION Donation To #BlackLivesMatter Terrorists | We reported about Beyonce s half-time Super Bowl appearance, where she ll be performing her anti-cop, anti-White song. For a preview of the song she ll be performing, click HERE to see the video. The latest, and equally disturbing news is that her race-baiting husband, Jay Z has just dumped a huge sum of money into the #BlackLivesMatter terror groups coffers. Anyone who believes in racial harmony and healing the racial divide that Barack Obama and his racist wife have caused, should never give this power couple another cent of their hard earned money. Jay Z s global music and entertainment platform Tidal in association with Roc Nation is donating $1.5 million to Black Lives Matter and several other local and national social justice organizations, Tidal announced exclusively to Mic on Friday the same day Trayvon Martin would have turned 21-years-old. The streaming service raised the $1.5 million at the first Tidal X: 10/20 charity concert in Brooklyn, New York, featuring Beyonc , Nicki Minaj, Jay Z, Lil Wayne and Nick Jonas.Tidal s group of artist owners, which includes several of the musicians who performed in October s sold-out show including Beyonc , Nicki Minaj and Jay Z, took part in deciding which organizations would receive funding, the streaming service told Mic. The majority of the groups to benefit are social justice activist groups and organizations, with a large portion of these specifically committed to ensuring the nation understands that black lives matter.Tidal s grants will be administered through the New World Foundation, which funds several civil rights groups and social movements. The nonprofits Tidal will fund include Opportunity Agenda, Hands Up United, Sankofa.Org, as well as local organizing groups in California: Community Coalition; Florida: Dream Defenders; Illinois: Black Youth Project; Maryland: Baltimore Justice Fund; Empowerment Development Corporation; New York: Million Hoodies; NY Justice League and Ohio: Ohio Students Association/Organizing Collaborative.According to Tidal, donations will also be given to organizations created by the families of victims of police brutality, including the Trayvon Martin Foundation, the Michael O.D. Brown We Love Ours Sons and Daughters Foundation and the Oscar Grant Foundation.Via: Music.Mic | 1real |
Republicans Humiliated As John McCain Slams Their Latest Attempt To Repeal Obamacare (VIDEO) | The Republican Party still hasn t learned that their wildly unpopular repeal of Obamacare just isn t going to happen. Even after failing miserably the first several times they tried to get their alternative to the historic health care bill passed, they are still willing to get pummeled again.One of the senators who has been extremely outspoken against the GOP s alternatives is speaking out again and it s a member of their own party. Sen. John McCain has just signaled that he is once again ready to shoot this health care plan down. In an interview with John Dickerson on Face The Nation, McCain made it perfectly clear that he would not be supporting the GOP s latest effort to get rid of Obamacare. Instead, McCain said he would rather be supporting the bipartisan amendments to the Affordable Care Act that are currently taking place in the Senate.During the interview, Dickerson asked McCain about Trump s current outreach to the Democrats. He asked, The President is working on bipartisan approach, what do you make of that? McCain actually took the side of Trump and nailed the Republican Party for continuing to do its own thing: I m interested in that, of course. We this President is always full of surprises. But the problem is, John, it shouldn t be bipartisanship. It should be both Republican, Democrat and the President. So, yes, he surprised the Republicans with the deal that he made with Chuck and Nancy with Chuck and Nancy. What it should take place is the three of them, both leaders Republican and Democrat and the President sit down and say, okay, we got a problem here. We need to fix it. And that means that we can come up with all three of us in one solid proposal. Why did why did Obamacare fail? Obamacare was ram through with Democrats votes only. Are we going to ram through our proposal with with Democrats and the President? That s not the way to do it. We got to go back, if I could just say again, the way to do this is have a bill, put it through the committee. We have Patty Murray and Lamar Alexander doing fine, bring it to the floor. Have debate, have amendments, we passed our bill twenty-seven to nothing for the Armed Services Committee. McCain is firmly stating that he will not support a healthcare bill that the GOP is imply trying to shove down everyone s throats without following any sort of legislative protocol.This is bad the Republicans are rushing to get this healthcare bill passed so they can strip millions of Americans of their health insurance, and they are doing it without the endorsement of the president or some of their most prominent members. This will only continue to be a massive embarrassment for conservatives. You can watch McCain rip the GOP below:Featured image via Mark Wilson/Getty Images | 1real |
CNN’s Chalian: ’There are People in This Government’ Who Are ’Pretty Committed’ to Taking Trump Down - Breitbart | While discussing the New York Times’ report that President Trump called FBI Director James Comey a “nutjob” and told Russian officials that firing Comey relieved “great pressure” on Friday’s broadcast of CNN’s “Situation Room,” CNN Political Director David Chalian argued the Trump White House does have a point about leaks, and that while “It’s not going to save them from their real legal and political troubles,” “there are people in this government who seem pretty committed to taking him down. ” Chalian began by saying, “We saw that the White House tried to explain what he meant by pressure was that the grandstanding and politicization of Comey put such pressure — nobody is going to buy that excuse. … They — clearly, the president is saying here that he felt pressure was alleviated on this investigation by getting rid of Comey. So, that’s going to be legal problem one, potentially. ” He continued, “Secondly, think about this, Wolf. This is extraordinary. This is the official government document of a meeting of the president of the United States and Russian officials inside the Oval Office, and it’s being read to a New York Times reporter. They have a point about leaks. It’s not going to save them from their real legal and political troubles, but it is extraordinary to see and another warning sign to Donald Trump that there are people in this government who seem pretty committed to taking him down. ” Later on, Chalian added that Trump has “gone back and forth” about his rationale for firing Comey. Follow Ian Hanchett on Twitter @IanHanchett | 0fake |
STUNNING BETRAYAL! 43 REPUBLICANS, In Dark Of Night Vote To Approve Obama’s Transgender Bathroom Decree | Who knew a President could do so much damage in one year? Who knew he would have the support of so many Republicans we fought so hard to elect, as our last hope to stop Obama s fundamental transformation of America Many are asking what Republicans plan to do to stop Obama s executive war on culture and religious liberty in pursuit of cultural Marxism. Now we know that not only will this party do nothing to stop Obama, they will use their control of Congress to codify Obama s agenda into law.Late Wednesday night, Republicans allowed a vote on an amendment from Rep. Sean Maloney (D-NY), which codified Obama s executive order 13672 making transgenderism the law of the land. Obama s executive order, promulgated in July 2014, instructed bureaucrats to sever contracts with companies that don t follow the Obama mandated sexual identity agenda. This could include companies that don t allow men into female bathrooms in their private corporate offices. The Maloney amendment to the $37.4 billion FY 2017 Energy &Water Appropriations Bill (H.R. 5055) codified that unilateral act into law.The amendment passed 223-195 with 43 Republicans supporting it. The GOP House just supported arguably the most radical Democrat agenda item in the dead of night.Enshrining Obama s specific edict into law and then passing vanity language reaffirming the general importance of religious liberty is like doing CPR on a dead body. GOP leaders are always twisting arms to get conservative members to vote for bad bills. Somehow we are to believe they were impotent in ensuring moderate members (what is moderate about transgenderism?) adhere to the party s platform?The reality is that Paul Ryan has long been a supporter of ENDA (Employment Non Discrimination Act), the legislative vehicle for enshrining transgenderism into law and mandating adherence to its dogma on private businesses. That is why he s been absent in this fight. Moreover, Republicans have failed to allow a single anti-religious bigotry bill to the floor since the illegal gay marriage decision was issued by the Supreme Court, despite the ubiquitous threats against private businesses, states, and private property.Clearly, whipping against this vote was not a priority.Once the Maloney amendment passed with GOP votes, Republicans proceeded to do what they always do so well. They offered side-by-side amendments in an attempt to cover up the damage.They passed the Pitts amendment as a second-degree by voice vote to affirm the constitutional importance of religious liberty. Then they passed the Byrne Amendments to reaffirm that RFRA is still in place and the government cannot discriminate against religious individuals. Well, as we all know, the Constitution and RFRA (Religious Freedom Restoration Act) have been in place for the entire Obama administration, yet he is still able to get away with anti-religious bigotry edicts by claiming they don t interfere with religious beliefs.To begin with, this entire spending bill was something that should never have come to the floor. It increased spending and retained a number of green energy programs for a department that shouldn t even exist.Now that leadership has loaded this already sub-par spending bill with transgenderism, conservatives should vote against final passage on Thursday. It s bad enough that a Republican House cannot be used as a tool to go on offense against cultural Marxism and anti-religious-liberty initiatives. To pass a bill placing an exclamation mark on that agenda is unforgivable.Via: Conservative ReviewHere is the list of Republicans who voted to assist Obama in his fundamental transformation of America:Amash (MI)Brooks (IN) Coffman (CO) Costello (PA) Curbelo (FL) Davis, Rodney (IL) Denham (CA) Dent (PA) Diaz-Balara (FL) Dold (IL)Donovan (NY) Emmer (MN) Fitzpatrick (PA)Frelinghuysen (NJ) Gibson (NY) Heck (NV) Hurd (TX) Issa (CA)Jolly (FL)Katko (NY) Kinzinger (IL)Lance( NJ) LoBiondo (NJ)MacArthur (NJ)McSally (AZ) Meehan (PA) Messer (IN) Paulsen (MN) Poliquin (ME) Reed (NY) Reichert (WA) Renacci (OH) Rooney (FL) Ros-Lehtinen (FL) Shims (IL) Stefanik (NY) Upton (MI) Valadao (CA) Walden (OR) Walters, Mimi (CA)Young (IA) Young (IN) Zelda (NY)Via: Conservative Review | 1real |
Islamic State Teen Jailed For Attacking Jewish Teacher in France | (REUTERS) — A teenager who attacked a Jewish teacher in France with a machete was sentenced to seven years in jail on Thursday by a French juvenile court, judicial sources said. [The was convicted at a trial for slightly wounding the teacher who was wearing a traditional Jewish skullcap, or yarmulke, while walking to school in January 2016 in the southern city of Marseille. Prosecutor Brice Robin said shortly after the attack that the teenager, who has not been identified because of his age, said he had acted in the name of the Islamic State militant group. The teenager, a Turkish citizen of Kurdish origin, was 15 at the time of the attack. He was charged with attempted murder in connection with a terrorist attack, with the aggravating factor of . (Read more from Reuters here) | 0fake |
Nomi Prins: The Left/Progressive Case Against the Fed | Charles Burris https://www.lewrockwell.com/lrc-blog/nomi-prins-leftprogressive-case-fed/
Excellent Jeff Deist interview/discussion with Nomi Prins, author of All The Presidents’ Bankers: The Hidden Alliances That Drive America Power (an excellent companion volume to Murray N. Rothbard’s definitive primer on power elite analysis, Wall Street, Banks, and American Foreign Policy ).
Every listener should both purchase and carefully read and reflect upon the magisterial detailed history these two powerful books present. This is not stagnant antiquated dry facts but vital background information which effects our world each and every day.
Especially illuminating in this discussion are Prins’ laying out the elite background of the creation of the Fed at Jekyll Island, how the Fed enables war and the military-industrial complex, and how the systemic nature of central banking and its allied credit card industry promotes inequality.
Nomi Prins is a national treasure, for her wide-ranging authoritative knowledge of these important subjects, and her lucid and engaging ability to present this information verbally to the attentive public. 5:07 | 1real |
Lawsuit opens new front in Obama immigration legal fight | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Immigration advocates on Thursday mounted a long-shot effort to revive part of U.S. President Barack Obama’s plan to shield millions of immigrants from deportation by filing a lawsuit challenging the national scope of a court order that blocked it. With favorable court rulings, the lawyers filing the lawsuit say it has the long-term potential to unravel decisions that blocked Obama’s November 2014 plan nationwide. The White House program, if it had been fully implemented, could have allowed up to four million people with no legal immigration status to obtain work authorization. The lawsuit was filed in federal court in New York on behalf of Martin Batalla Vidal, 25, an immigrant from Mexico who has lived in the United States since he was seven and has benefited from the program. He initially received a three-year work authorization, which has now been revoked due to a Texas judge’s ruling in February 2015 that blocked Obama’s plan. Texas and 25 other states had challenged it. Vidal would still be eligible for a two-year work authorization under an earlier program, which has not been challenged and was not covered by the injunction. Vidal’s lawyers at the National Immigration Law Center say that if he wins, the ruling could have broad implications because it could help to eventually reinstate Obama’s program for up to 60 percent of potential applicants in parts of the country not covered by the Texas ruling. The Texas judge’s ruling was upheld on appeal. On June 23, the Supreme Court deadlocked 4-4 on the case, leaving the appeals court decision in place. The court is currently one justice short following the death of Justice Antonin Scalia in February. The Supreme Court is currently considering whether to rehear the case once it has a full complement of justices. | 0fake |
British PM May says Mugabe's resignation gives Zimbabwe a chance to be free | LONDON (Reuters) - British Prime Minister Theresa May said on Tuesday Robert Mugabe s resignation gave Zimbabwe the chance to forge a new path, free from oppression. The resignation of Robert Mugabe provides Zimbabwe with an opportunity to forge a new path free of the oppression that characterized his rule, May said. In recent days, we have seen the desire of the Zimbabwean people for free and fair elections and the opportunity to rebuild the country s economy under a legitimate government. May added in a statement that Britain, as Zimbabwe s oldest friend , would do all it could to support the country. | 0fake |
Helicopter mistakenly fires on parked vehicles in Russia war games: media | MOSCOW (Reuters) - A military helicopter on a rural training exercise in western Russia mistakenly fired rockets at a group of parked vehicles, knocking at least one person to the ground, footage posted by Russian news sites and on social media showed. A video clip published on Tuesday by the independent news site Fontanka.ru showed a helicopter firing a salvo of rockets at a military truck covered in camouflage netting in open countryside, with three vehicles with no military markings visible, parked a few meters away. A man in civilian clothes who had been standing close to the truck was engulfed in a cloud of dust. The person filming the clip, who was slightly further away, could be seen sprawled on the ground. Russia is currently staging the Zapad 2017 war games in the area, major exercises on NATO s eastern flank that were inspected on Monday by Russian President Vladimir Putin. Fontanka.ru said the incident occurred on Sept. 18 and left one person with concussion. It did not give details on the source of the video. A second video from the same location, which was posted on social media by Russian investigative bloggers Conflict Intelligence Team, showed the aftermath, including a smashed window in a white jeep nearest to the truck, and shrapnel damage to the military truck. Reuters could not independently verify the videos. The Russian Defence Ministry s western military district, in a statement cited by Interfax news agency, said that during a training exercise a helicopter s targeting system had mistakenly acquired a target, but denied anyone had been injured. The representative cited by Interfax did not say when the incident happened, or where, or if the exercise was part of the Zapad-2017 war games. As a result of a strike by an unguided rocket, a cargo vehicle with no people on board was damaged, Interfax quoted a representative of the military district as saying. The Western military district includes north-western Russia and the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad, all areas where the Zapad-2017 exercises are focused. Russia s defense ministry in Moscow did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. Asked by reporters about the incident, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov referred questions to the defense ministry. (The online version of the story has been corrected to fix a typo in the second paragraph.) | 0fake |
China reiterates support for Spanish government amid Catalonia crisis | BEIJING (Reuters) - China understands the Spanish government s efforts to protect national unity and opposes any actions to split the country, the Chinese foreign ministry said on Monday, after the Catalan parliament voted to unilaterally declare independence last week. China generally takes a dim view of independence or secessionist movements around the world, while saying it adheres to a policy of non-interference in other nations internal affairs. On Friday, Spain s Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy assumed direct control of the Catalan region, sacked its secessionist government and called a snap election for Dec. 21. China s position on the issue was clear and consistent, said Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying, reiterating support previously offered to the Spanish government. We think this is an internal affair for Spain, and understand and support the Spanish government s efforts to protect national and ethnic unity and territorial integrity, and oppose actions to split the country and damage the rule of law, she told a daily news briefing on Monday. We believe that Spain has the ability to protect social order and guarantee citizens rights under the framework of the law. Beijing has expressed more openness to independence votes agreed by both sides, such as Scotland s unsuccessful 2014 referendum to leave the United Kingdom, and South Sudan s 2011 vote in favor of independence from Sudan. At home, China contends with what it says are separatist movements in its western regions of Tibet and Xinjiang, and also claims the self-ruled island of Taiwan as a wayward province. | 0fake |
At Scalia funeral, led by son, U.S. court battle in recess | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia’s memorial service on Saturday provided a brief respite for official Washington from the fierce battle over his succession, with political and legal leaders and many others in attendance. At the blue-domed Basilica of the National Shrine of the Immaculate Conception, the nation’s largest Catholic church, dozens of priests took part in the funeral mass, led by one of the justice’s nine children, Reverend Paul Scalia. More than 3,000 people looked on, including other family members, the court’s remaining eight justices, lawmakers, Vice President Joseph Biden and former Vice President Dick Cheney. “God blessed Dad with a deep Catholic faith,” the younger Scalia told the gathering inside the cathedral. “He loved the clarity and coherence of the church’s teachings.” He fondly remembered an outburst one day after his father realized he was waiting for confession at church in a line that would have led him to his son. The justice jumped out of the line. “‘Like heck if I’m confessing to you,’” the father said later to the son, who remarked: “The feeling was mutual.” A staunch conservative and the court’s longest-serving member, Justice Scalia died last Saturday at age 79 at a Texas hunting resort, sparking a political struggle that promises to reshape the 2016 election campaigns. Presidential candidate Ted Cruz, a Republican senator from Texas, was among those at the service. Like other Republicans, he has said that President Barack Obama, a Democrat, should not choose Scalia’s replacement. Rather, Republicans are saying no one should be named until after the presidential election in November, hoping that one of their own will be elected and get to choose the next justice. Under law, the U.S. president is responsible for nominating Supreme Court justices to their lifetime appointments, subject to Senate review and confirmation. Appointing a justice to the court is one of the biggest decisions a U.S. president can make. Obama has vowed to select a successor to Scalia. If he does so, Senate Republicans have threatened to block any nominee put forward by Obama, a stance likely to become an issue in the presidential race and in election year contests for seats in the Senate and the House of Representatives. According to a recent Reuters/Ipsos poll, a majority of Americans believe it should be up to Obama to nominate the next justice, with opinion divided along ideological party lines. This year the normally nine-justice court is set to decide its first major abortion case in nearly a decade, as well as cases on voting rights, affirmative action and immigration. The new justice’s politics could tilt the court’s balance. After Scalia’s death, it has four conservative and four liberal members. Appointed by Republican President Ronald Reagan in 1986, Scalia became known as a brilliant jurist in an era of conservative court dominance. He opposed abortion and same-sex marriage and supported the death penalty and gun rights. | 0fake |
Voting Machine Caught Swapping Republican Ballot For Democrat | posted by Eddie A voting machine has been caught on camera casting a ballot for a Democrat after the voter selected a Republican. Donald Trump thinks Hillary Clinton and the Democrats are going to steal the next election. “ I’m afraid the election is going to be rigged, I have to be honest ,” he told a campaign rally last week. The mainstream media are trying to portray him as mad, but take a look at this evidence:
This is attempted election theft through manipulation of the computerized voting machines – and it must be stopped. The party in power in a given state controls the programming of the voting machines. When the establishment asked Trump if he would accept the outcome of the election a whole three weeks before the event, it was like asking a sports coach if he thinks the game was refereed fairly before the game is played. And the Democrats are now attempting to cover all bases. They are sueing the RNC over Trump’s election rigging claims, and also suggesting if any evidence of voter fraud does emerge, then it is probably Russia’s fault. Do not believe that voter fraud does not exist. It’s real, the numbers are huge, and it’s undermining true democracy in the United States. We must fight to eradicate it. If you notice any sign if possible voter fraud or election rigging, call the Trump Ballot Security Project toll free on 1-855-245-4634 or email [email protected] source: | 1real |
China says position on THAAD system in South Korea has not changed | BEIJING (Reuters) - China s foreign ministry said on Tuesday that China s position on the deployment in South Korea of the U.S. Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) anti-missile system is consistent and has not changed. China has repeatedly opposed the deployment, but earlier on Tuesday Beijing and Seoul agreed to work swiftly to get relations back on track following a year-long standoff over THAAD. | 0fake |
How the polls, including ours, missed Trump's victory | NEW YORK/LONDON (Reuters) - Two days ago, pollsters and statisticians gave Hillary Clinton odds of between 75 and 99 percent of winning the U.S. presidential election. How did so many get it so wrong? In hindsight, the polling consensus went astray in two major ways. The media, including Reuters, pumped out two kinds of poll stories. Some were national surveys designed to estimate the entire country’s popular vote, but not the outcome in individual states, where the contest is actually decided. These polls actually got the big picture right: Clinton won more overall votes than President-elect Donald Trump - but not by as much as the polling averages predicted, and not where she needed to. News organizations also produced a blizzard of stories meant to calculate the probability of victory for the two candidates. These calculations were predicated on polls of individual states. In hindsight, though, the stories seem to have overstated Clinton’s chances for a win by failing to see that a shift in voting patterns in some states could show up in other, similar states. In part, this is because polling analysts got the central metaphor wrong. U.S. presidents are chosen not by the national popular vote, but in the individual Electoral College contests in the 50 states and Washington D.C. In calculating probable outcomes, election predictors generally treated those 51 contests as completely separate events – as unrelated to one another as a series of 51 coin tosses. But that’s not how elections work in the United States. Voting trends that appear in one state - such as a larger-than-expected Republican shift among rural voters - tend to show up in other states with similar demographic make-ups. And that’s what happened Tuesday: The election models calculated the probabilities of a Clinton win that turned out to be high, because they viewed each state too much in isolation. The Reuters/Ipsos States of the Nation project projected Clinton to win the popular vote 45 percent to 42 percent, and gave her a 90 percent probability of winning the 270 electoral votes needed to secure the election. In the end, Clinton won the popular vote by 47.7 percent to 47.5 percent, by the latest count, and Trump could win the Electoral College by as many as 303 votes to Clinton’s 233 when the tally is final. The state races were not akin to a string of coin tosses but more like 51 rolls of a set of weighted dice. In many states, it turned out, the side of the dice representing white voters in suburban and rural counties carried a heavier weight, and the side representing urbanites a lighter one. The problem, said Cliff Young, president of Ipsos Public Affairs US, the polling partner of Reuters, came down to the models the pollsters used to predict who would vote - the so-called likely voters. The models almost universally miscalculated how turnout was distributed among different demographic groups, Young said. And turnout was lower than expected, a result that generally favors Republican candidates. In 2000, when Republican George W. Bush beat Democrat Al Gore, for example, the turnout was about 60 percent, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Eight years later, turnout was 64 percent when Democratic nominee Barack Obama won his first presidential election against Republican Arizona Sen. John McCain. This year, “whites with lower levels of education came out in greater relative numbers than younger, more-educated and minority voters,” Young said. “A point here or a point there can really change an election.” Ultimately, missing that shift in the state polls tripped up the predictions. It also highlights how the otherwise empirical process of polling rests on a subjective foundation. Each pollster must make a decision about turnout. Their decisions are informed by historical voting patterns. But the actual turnout in each state is unknowable before election day. Among the questions pollsters grappled with this year: Will the electorate look like the won that gave Obama his 2008 victory - or George W. Bush in his 2000 victory? Would black turnout fall after the historically high turnout enjoyed by Obama, the nation’s first black president, and by how much? “Key for me is turnout in explaining this year’s polling miss,” Young said. The Reuters/Ipsos model anticipated turnout for white men, for example, at around 67 percent, which appears to have been too low, and for black women at 61 percent, which was probably too high. Demographic breakdowns aren’t available yet. Drew Linzer, a pollster and creator of the Daily Kos Elections forecasting model, which forecasts the Electoral College result by aggregating large numbers of state polls, said prediction models like his try to estimate the possibility of an unexpected turnout shift. But ultimately, he said, the effectiveness of the models came down to the accuracy of the underlying state polls’ likely-voter models. Linzer’s model predicted a large win for Clinton in the Electoral College, 323 to 215. And because those polls missed the mark, it created an illusion of a near-certain Clinton win. Beyond the calculations of the candidates’ odds of winning the Electoral College, there was a near constant stream so-called “horse race polls,” or tracker polls, that focused on the distribution of the national vote between the major candidates. Here, too, pollsters — and the media that co-sponsored or covered the polls — stumbled, largely because the popular vote metric itself is of limited utility and cannot, of itself, predict the outcome of the Electoral College. As of Wednesday morning, Clinton led the popular vote by slightly less than 1 percentage point. The McClatchy-Marist poll released on Nov. 3, for example, had Clinton up by one point - one of the most accurate calls of the popular vote. But even that headline number missed the point a bit, because she lost the election in the Electoral College. A few polls correctly pegged Trump as the winner. The International Business Times/TIPP poll had Trump leading on Nov. 7. That poll put him ahead in the popular vote by two percentage points, which in the end overstated his share by about three points. In one sense, most polls were relatively accurate: The Real Clear Politics average of polls, for example, had Clinton leading by about 3.3 points, little more than two points above the actual outcome. A polling error of two or three percentage points is not uncommon in modern politics. Popular vote polls, however, also exaggerate the influence of massive states, such as New York and California, in the outcome of the election and mask trends that might be occurring outside those left-leaning states. The Electoral College system reduces the influence of big states by distributing a disproportionate number of votes to smaller states. North Dakota, for example, has about a quarter of one percent of the U.S. population but double that proportion of Electoral College votes. Conversely, Californians make up 12 percent of the population but only 10 percent of the Electoral College votes. Young said both pollsters and journalist described the results of the national polls and predictions with a false precision by presenting the result as near absolutes. “The forecasting models, which assign probabilities or chances to candidates, are no better than the polls themselves,” he said. “If the polls are off, the forecasting models will be off, too.” The Reuters/Ipsos States of the Nation project website did offer an interactive tool that allowed users to adjust the poll’s estimate of turnout and play pollster themselves. It also included one fixed scenario that showed how Trump could win - with a higher-than-expected Republican turnout and a lower-than-forecast Democratic turnout. That scenario, as it happened, better reflected what actually happened Tuesday. “We need to recognize that there can be a range of possibilities,” said Young. “The trick of course is how to communicate that with the larger public.” | 0fake |
Trump shoves fellow NATO leader aside on his first summit | BRUSSELS (Reuters) - U.S. President Donald Trump muscled himself to the front of the world stage in Brussels on Thursday, firmly pushing aside the leader of soon-to-be member Montenegro at a NATO summit. Footage showing the leaders caught Trump pushing his way past Prime Minister Dusko Markovic, then confidently adjusting his suit as he emerged in the front of the group, closer to NATO head Jens Stoltenberg. Video of the incident went viral and came as Trump delivered a tough message to NATO allies to dramatically increase their defense spending to ease financial burden to the United States. White House spokesman Sean Spicer, asked about Trump moving past Markovic, said he had not seen the video but assumed the U.S. president was moving to his designated spot. The NATO mission of Montenegro, which is joining the Western military alliance against stiff opposition from Russia, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The small Balkan country will formally become NATO’s 29th state in June but Markovic joined the Brussels summit, Trump’s first, and a ceremonial opening of the alliance’s new headquarters. During the leaders’ joint photo shoot in the new building, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau encouraged his counterparts to wave for the cameras. Some did as Trudeau requested, but Trump did not raise his arm. Trump smiled briefly, but otherwise kept a serious expression on his face for the brief session. | 0fake |
MASS INTEGRATION: The Race to Capitalize on a Virtual Future | Randy Johnson 21st Century WireDigital technology has increasingly and exponentially become a part of our lives. Virtual worlds and reality, as humanity has known it to be for millennia, appear to be on ever-converging paths. Will humanity and digital reality be on a path of integration or a collision course?While the direct application of Virtual Reality was difficult to see in everyday life following the 1992 Hollywood film Lawnmower Man, the reality of such technology is now coming into focus.Augmented Reality and Virtual Reality technology (also interchangeably known as either AR/VR or VR/AR) are ideas that have been hammered out in the digital sphere with regards to concepts and applications of use. Along with the steady advancement of digital computing power, an AR/VR future might better be portrayed in certain episodes of Black Mirror, such as Fifteen Million Merits or Playtest. Black Mirror s, Playtest: Season 4, Episode 2. A stare-down between perception and reality (Image Source: Polygon)The possibility and potential of the technology has made it a magnet for investment. There are profits to be made in this growing realm, and the implications of what these emerging technologies could do for (and to) humanity is staggering.So before delving into some current developments in AR/VR technology, let s take a quick look at historically new technologies which are now a part of our real world, everyday, lives: the smartphone and the motor vehicle.The Smartphone StratosphereOn one hand, the smart phone is merely synthetic material with touch screens and circuitry. Now in less than two decades, there are those whose daily lives are hindered without one. The attachment is almost as emotional as it is literal in some instances. Many need them to communicate, be entertained, figure out where they are, purchase products, or even socially interact with others or the avatars of others. To many teenagers across the world and Generation Y Millennials, the smartphone has always been there.It can be argued that society as a whole is becoming dependent and addicted to smartphones and other smart devices. In fact, with over 2.5 billion smartphone subscriptions world wide in 2016, corporations and marketers are counting on it.Seeing a person interacting with any number of touch-screen devices does not garner much of a second look. Oftentimes, the person without the smart phone is the person who stands out in a crowd, as they are sometimes seen reading one of those archaic things we call a book. It is now commonplace that people can interact with thousands of different applications on countless versions of technological devices.Hooked: Not only can we take the physical work out of travel on mass-transit, we can also be oblivious to the journey along the way, as well as the work involved to make it all happen. (Image Source: ne-asia.com)After a few generations, many technologies simply become integrated as it were. They become a part of us and our day-to-day lives, and are a part of the real world.For comparative analysis, let s take a look at the evolution of another well-known technology, the motor vehicle From Engines to ElectricIn roughly 100 years, humanity has essentially integrated itself with motorized vehicle technology. The motor vehicle and all the industries that come with it, has shaped the world as we know it.Driving a vehicle, and everything that comes with it such as such as its design, manufacture, delivery, sale, gas and oil production, road ways, traffic laws, law enforcement, theft, accidents, smog, fighting over oil resources, etc., has effected nearly everyone.The sales pitch and appeal of the motor vehicle have always gone together. From its early days, to current-day advertisements, automobiles have been marketed with the promise of freedom on the open road. In fact, the evolution of vehicular technology is a good indicator of how a specific type of technology can transform humanity in a very short amount of time. Technological Bliss: A promise of open roads and freedom (Image Source: NBC.com)The promise of anything good always seems to have a catch. Ease of movement with the automobile is not without its environmental impact. Without the automobile in particular, we would not have terms such as gridlock, traffic jam, or road rage for instance.Progress is not without its side effects. (Image Source: kerma.wordpress.com)The motor vehicle is a technology and a part of our world to such an extent that where we are dependent on it.The environmental and health concerns of gas and oil extraction and production, as well as geopolitical maneuvering and even warfare based on assumed resource scarcity, the deep infrastructure roots and dependence of commerce is in place. To stop the flow of motor vehicles, would inhibit the freedom of people to travel, commute to work, and utterly stop industry and commerce in its place.Electrically Re-energizing the AutomobileThe current slow-but-eventual transition from gasoline engines to hybrid or fully electric ones is just an evolution of the technology. While electric car technology is believed to have been discovered in the mid-1800 s, it has only recently made inroads to the industry on a potentially large scale with the Roadster by Tesla Motors.The Tesla Model S, has a 2017 manufacturer s suggested retail price (MSRP) of $69,200 dollars, while the most recent (2015) US Real Median Family Income was listed as $69,929.With the success of Tesla, the amount of established gas and oil engine automakers is lining up to diversify their portfolio for their consumers, is who s who list of the auto-industry. BMW, Chrysler-Fiat, Daimler (Mercedes), Ford, General Motors, Honda, KIA, Mitsubishi, Nissan, Volkswagen, and Volvo, all have their own hybrid or electric car lines. After decades of profit, these industry giants can t wait to show the consumer that they too are environmentally conscious. Likewise, the consumer appears ready to accept guilt free and environmentally responsible driving as the electric car continues to improve, lowers in price, and becomes more widely available.Emerging Patterns: AR/VR technologyWith many integrated technologies in our lives such as smart devices or motor vehicles, if it feels like we ve seen this pattern before, it is because we have.First the technology is new. Next commercialism, industry, education systems, entertainment, pop culture, and the government, all conspire to get in on the action; during this time, the race to integrate and capitalize on a technology in the name progress can induce a Gold Rush type of feeding frenzy. Then pre-established corporations are already pre-positioned, with the ready capital, assets, and resources to pounce on the next big thing. And finally, over a generation or so of different improvements and variations, it is hard to remember a world without said technology for those who inherit a world with it. Whether real or imagined it becomes a necessity.The likely integration of Virtual Reality and Augmented Reality (AR/VR) into our daily lives will likely follow the same pattern as other technological advances. Similarly, with regards to forecasting its future integration in our lives, the saying follow the money applies.First though, what exactly is AR/VR as it is currently understood to be?Augmented Reality (AR) uses the world around you, but a device introduces virtual items, characters, etc., into the real world that a person interacts with. This is popularly seen with the downloadable application for smart phones, with the game Pok mon GO.Virtual Reality (VR) is the glasses/headset set-up where you are visually, and often audibly, immersed. Put on the glasses/headset, or similar gear such as Oculus Rift, or VIVE and you are in a whole virtual world.Both technologies are primed for upward momentum.Although economic forecasting has not always been an exact science, the monetary forecast for AR/VR technology seems to point upward.Business Wire notes: worldwide revenues for the augmented reality and virtual reality (AR/VR) market to reach $13.9 billion in 2017, an increase of 130.5% over the $6.1 billion spent in 2016. AR/VR spending is expected to accelerate over the next several years, achieving a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 198.0% over the 2015-2020 forecast period and totaling $143.3 billion in 2020. It is important to note that the above figures are amounts projected to be spent by companies to further advance AR/VR technology. So the expectation for profit is most likely in the trillions.Does this sound far-fetched? For a real world success story with regards to these emerging technologies in terms of profit, then Pok mon GO has been there, done that, and cashed the checks.By some estimates, Pok mon GO has made Niantic over 900 million dollars in 2016.Using Pok mon GO as a barometer of future profits, the potential is huge. Especially when you consider that in the ever-changing gaming world, many already considered outdated, requiring updates, fixes, and new features by many of it s users. If Pok mon GO calls it a career or not, the fortune has already been made.Virtual scavenger hunts are fun!That kind of money has already inspired a similar styled brand-supported game in its early stages, called Snatch. Besides the puzzle and scavenger hunt aspects of Snatch, players will be immersed into an augmented reality with a commercialized, brand name, token-based, application where you can snatch items from other players to win prizes.If you do not fully get it perhaps the below video can help explain what it s all about.You heard it hear first; if it hasn t happened already, playing Snatch is likely to start at least one physical, real world, fight over the potential of having a prize snatched by a player nearby.Immersion, Entertainment & InvestmentAll of the AR/VR technology is still finding its sea-legs so to speak and is still in transition with more immersive worlds. Along the way, AR/VR has been undergoing a natural progression and fusion with the gaming world. Gaming, and entertainment, appears to be the seductive gateway application for AR/VR technology development and profit potential.As games and game consoles have become more immersive over the years, it appears that AR/VR is expected to advance with it.The addictive element to immersive games is often literal in some cases as seen in the WebMD.com article Video Game Addiction No Fun: The lure of a fantasy world is especially pertinent to online role-playing games. These are games in which a player assumes the role of a fictional character and interacts with other players in a virtual world [according to Kimberly Young, PsyD] an intelligent child who is unpopular at school can become dominant in the game. The virtual life becomes more appealing than real life. Also, let there be little doubt that any psychological aspect of marketing to churn out profit will be used, as the video-gaming world is a 100 billion dollar industry globally. That s hardly child s play.The greater the entertainment immersion and the technological bliss, the bigger the hook to the consuming public will become. So despite a slow-yet-increasing public acclimatization with regards to AR/VR, investments keep pouring in.According to Digi-Capital, the investments for AR/VR start-ups in 2016 came in at a cool $2.3 billion dollars.These numbers for start-ups are in addition to previous acquisitions such as Facebooks Mark Zuckerberg s now famous $2 billion dollar purchase of Oculus Rift.Investments also include such companies as NextVR that can deliver live events in a VR format. The investors are a who s who of present day media empires in the United States.We see the following from nanalyze.com: Laguna Beach California startup NextVR has taken in $115 million in funding so far from investors that include Time Warner, Comcast, and The Madison Square Garden Company. In addition to these strategic investors, FOX Sports, Live Nation, NBC Sports, HBO/Golden Boy, Turner Sports, and CNN have all partnered with NextVR .The object for up-and-running companies like Next VR, or their investor Live Nation, is to bring entertainment events such as concerts or sporting events to the masses.In addition to the actual gate at a sporting event or concert of say, 50,000 people, you could also charge a virtual gate, if you will, for another million people who were never even there.Another company starting to make some real world profits is Utah s THE VOID. The company is in continually advancing their Dream Park in Utah. They have themed virtual reality (or hyper reality as they refer to it) type of experiences in New York and Dubai.Below is a trailer for their Ghostbusters hyper-reality experience in New York City.That s right you too can don a nuclear power pack and save New York from the giant Stay Puft Marshmallow Man.To be fair, besides entertainment purposes, there will be benefits of AR/VR technology. Uses for design, training, and experimentation within a multitude of industries, science, and research and development, can all be enabled by VR. Medical students can practice on fake patients, soldiers can train in virtual combat with no casualties, researchers can get inside of a molecule, designers or architects can better visualize or display their concepts, and so on.For example, in April 2016, the United Kingdom s Medical Realities used its product The Virtual Surgeon, which is a learning program developed for head mounted displays such as the Oculus Rift and Samsung Gear VR . The live-stream was a first of its kind showing a live surgery allowing for a 360 degree view, and was witnessed live in places as far as China and Tunisia according to their site.Virtual Medicine (Image Source: Medical Realities)The other side of the AR/VR coinKeep in mind, however, that there this is likely a trade off for well-intentioned purposes realized by the implementation and advancement of AR/VR. These same advancements in AR/VR will also almost undoubtedly have profit, control, surveillance, and culture-shaping, as drivers for its very implementation and integration to our lives.AR/VR, like art, books, pamphlets, magazines, newspapers, graffiti, radio, television, and the internet, is a medium which can be utilized. With social norms, economies, and forms of government to influence the masses thrown into as variables, the acclimatization to AR/VR by society is likely to be many things to many people. Even today, we have News and Fake News. President; not my President. Facts and Alternate Facts. All of these types of psychological shaping of reality could be further jammed into Virtual Reality.Even within education. Subjective topics, or viewpoints on historical events made to be realistic for experiential learning purposes could be abused. No different then a book or website, a VR lesson will have an author, a bias, and will be an area rife with the potential for politicization or propaganda infusion.Like motor vehicles or smart devices above, AR/VR also has society-changing potential. The possibilities for mass-level use, consumption, and integration of virtual technology could very well change our reality; literally and figuratively; shared and personal. The implications go beyond the industry and commercial implications of its use and delve into what makes us human and into what is real.We hear it all the time, but social engineering is what it sounds like. The direct implication of the phrase is that aspects of society can be engineered and designed towards a desired effect or result.The outcome desired for those at the top of our current power structures and institutions might entail use of technology to socially engineer with a nefarious slant: to conform the masses, infuse propaganda, create thoughtless compliance, and degrade critical thinking in favor of living a blissful other life, elsewhere in another digital reality.As the great celluloid philosopher, Morpheus, from the Hollywood blockbuster The Matrix, once pondered, What is real? How do you define real ? If you re talking about what you can feel, what you can smell, what you can taste and see then real is simply electrical signals interpreted by your brain. Might the world literally become whatever anyone wants to make of it?Are we choosing for ourselves, or are we all merely like fish in the ocean being swept up unawares in a tide of social engineering?A technologically controlled, artificial, designed, and immersive environment could possibly redefine reality, and what it means to be human along with it.READ MORE ABOUT TECHNOLOGY: 21st Century Wire Technology Files | 1real |
Robert Frank Talks ‘Radical Pragmatism’ and the Economy | Robert Frank Talks ‘Radical Pragmatism’ and the Economy Posted on Oct 31, 2016
By Kathy Kiely / Moyers & Company Economist Robert Frank. (Robert Frank)
Robert H. Frank is one of America’s leading economists. In addition to reams of textbooks, he has written a number of books looking at the impact of the nation’s widening income gap and the habits of the people who inhabit the economic stratosphere. The most recent is Success and Luck: Good Fortune and the Myth of Meritocracy . Recently, he stopped by the offices of BillMoyers.com for a conversation about the economic challenges facing the nation and the issues that he thinks the next president will have to address. This transcript has been edited lightly for length and clarity.
Kathy Kiely: So tell me a little bit about, Robert Frank, your intellectual history. How did you come to be so interested in income inequality?
Robert Frank: I started writing about competition for rank back in the early 1980s, late 1970s. The standard economic models assume that people care only about their absolute levels of consumption — you know, how big is their house, how fast is their car — in absolute terms. But those kinds of evaluations are almost always heavily context-dependent, so if you ask yourself, “Is my house okay?” the answer to that question would depend really on the context that you’re in.
I was a Peace Corps volunteer before I went to graduate school and I lived in a two-room house with no electricity, no plumbing, in rural Nepal. Never once during the two years I lived in that house did it ever occur to me for an instant that the house was unsatisfactory in any way. It was a really quite nice house actually, in the context where I was living then. If I lived in a house like that in Ithaca, or any US city really, my kids would’ve been ashamed for their friends to see where we lived. It would’ve been shameful for me to have people know that we lived in a house like that. It would be a clear signal that I’d failed in some spectacular way to meet even the minimal expectations of society.
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And so, you know, is my house okay? The answer is that depends, and it depends on context and the context is very local.
So if context matters, then the standard economic models that assume it doesn’t matter lead you to many wrong conclusions. So I’ve been writing about that now for 35 years. And the entry point for inequality is that, as I say, context is local, but for technological reasons, which I’ve written about elsewhere too, we’ve seen a move to markets that Phil Cook and I call winner take all markets .
These are — I mean, in your industry it’s very prominent. You don’t need the local newspaper columnist or radio reporter. Everything is available on the internet to everyone at any moment, and so whoever is best at the particular task at hand, that person gets the whole market. It’s not quite that exaggerated, but that’s the trend that we’ve been seeing, and with that have come many benefits. It’s better to consume the best than the third best.
The Winner-Take-All Effect
But at the same time, it’s led to an enormous concentration of economic rewards in the hands of the people who are judged to be best. They’re often best by only a barely perceptible margin. Maybe they’re not even best. Maybe they just got a lucky break and came to people’s attention before the truly best performer did and then the initial success built on itself.
But anyway, the trend has been for income to concentrate at the top of the ladder, and when that happens — you know, people at the top of the ladder are normal. They do what you and I do, what everyone else does when they have more income. They spend it and they build bigger houses, they buy more expensive automobiles, they take more expensive vacations, the diamonds they get for their partners are bigger. All those things are normal, and there’s no indication I’ve ever seen that people in the middle class get angry about that. If anything, they’re interested. They want to see pictures of the mansions and the yachts and read about what the rich people do.
Kiely: Then why are people so angry in this election?
Frank: The translation of what the people at the top do to the people in the middle is indirect. The people in the middle, as I say, don’t seem to care that the people at the top have a lot. You’re right, now there does seem to be some concern that people like Donald Trump, who claims to have billions, also admits to not having paid any federal income tax for a long time. That I think does arouse anger and concern across a pretty broad spectrum of the population. But in terms of the actual things rich people buy, I think most people feel that the people at the top earned their money fair and square—that’s true in some cases, not true in others.
But the people just below the top, they travel in the same social circles as the people at the top. They go to the same weddings, the same parties, the same gatherings, they belong to the same clubs. When they see that the very richest people are now hosting their daughters’ wedding receptions at home rather than in a hotel or country club, they then feel, “We need a ballroom,” so they build a bigger house.
Then there’s a group just below them, maybe it’s the custom now to have dinner parties for 24, not 18: “We need a bigger dining room.” They build bigger, and one step at a time, it cascades all the way down the income ladder. And unless you invoke something like that spending cascade is what I call it, you can’t really make sense of the fact that the family in the middle, the median earner, whose real income is essentially the same as it was four decades ago, why is that family buying a house that’s 50 percent bigger than what the median family bought four decades ago? What’s driving that? It’s not that they have more money. That’s not the reason for it.
Kiely: Is it keeping up with the Joneses on steroids?
Frank: I’ve never liked that term. Somebody who’s trying to — but, yes, in a manner of speaking, it is that. The term to me evokes a deep human frailty. Somebody is trying to appear richer that he is. He’s insecure, he’s trying to mimic a standard that he’s not really entitled to on the merits of his own income.
So, yes, that a pejorative term in my experience of how people use it, and the phenomenon I’m trying to call attention to would exist even if there were none of that. So the median family, it’s gone into debt to buy a house that’s at least 50 or 75 percent more expensive than what the median family was spending in 1970.
Why Context Matters
The reason it’s done that is much less because they envy the houses of other people like them. It’s because unless you spend as much as other people like you are spending on a house, your kids will go to bad schools. The link between school quality and neighborhood house prices in the school areas is very strong and direct. The better schools are located in the neighborhoods where the houses are more expensive. So if you’re the family in the middle and it’s your aim to have your kids attend a school of just average quality — you know, we would judge harshly a parent who wasn’t at least that ambitious — then what do you have to do? You have to buy a house that’s roughly near the price of what people like you are spending on houses.
When all the families in that middle of the income distribution do that, what do they achieve? Nothing. You know, they just bid up the prices of the houses in the better school districts. Still half of all kids go to bottom-half schools, the exact same as before. But now families are in debt, they’re not able to meet their bills month by month. Many of them file for bankruptcy. It’s just been an enormous squeeze on the people in the middle, and that’s driven by the spending at the top. And the reason we see more of it now is that the spending on the top is so much greater in relation to spending elsewhere in the income distribution.
That’s happened before. You know, when do you read about luxury? You read about it when the people at the top have been pulling away from everyone else. We read about it in the Gilded Age, the great fortunes of the late 19 th century. You notice it when there’s that contrast. But it’s still going on under normal circumstances. Right after World War II, incomes were growing at about the same rate for families up and down the income ladder and it was still true that what the family in the middle spent on a house depended on what the people at the top spent, but it wasn’t — there was growth in balance up and down the line, so we didn’t notice that families were getting squeezed relative to last year. Those stories didn’t break through.
Again, it’s context. If you saw a seventh grader in the third grade, everybody would notice and remark on that. If you see a seven-footer at an NBA game, it’s normal. | 1real |
Voters illegally removed from Ohio rolls may cast provisional ballots: judge | (Reuters) - A federal judge in Ohio laid out a plan on Wednesday for the state to restore voting privileges for people who were illegally removed from the state’s voter rolls over the past five years. The ruling stems from a case in which the ACLU and other plaintiffs sued, saying Ohio’s process for removing people who had died or moved away from voter rolls was illegal because it purged people simply for not voting and not responding to a letter from the state. Voting rights cases have become pivotal battlegrounds ahead of the Nov. 8 election between Democrat Hillary Clinton and Republican Donald Trump. The American Civil Liberties Union and others have challenged laws in Wisconsin, Michigan and North Carolina over voting rights issues. In the Ohio case, the 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Cincinnati said Ohio’s process for removing inactive voters was illegal, reversing an earlier ruling by U.S. District Judge George C. Smith. In response, Smith on Wednesday ordered the state to allow people who had been removed from the rolls to cast provisional ballots on election day. Those ballots will be checked against voter rolls, and if people were purged in the years 2011, 2013 or 2015, their votes will be counted and their registration restored. “They’ll have to put a provisional ballot which will take a little more time but if they do that, that vote will count,” said Stuart Naifeh, an attorney with Demos, a voter rights and income inequality advocacy group that was among those suing over the policy. Joshua Eck, a spokesman for Ohio Secretary of State Jon Husted, said the solution was a workable one because it did not require the wholesale restoration of voting privileges to people who had moved away, died or otherwise become ineligible to vote. | 0fake |
Canada proposes health warnings, child-proof packs for legal pot sales | OTTAWA (Reuters) - The Canadian government proposed on Tuesday mandatory health warnings and child-proof packaging as well as a licensing regime for all cannabis products in legislation ahead of the July 2018 legalization of recreational marijuana. The proposals, which will be open for public consultation for 60 days, include restrictions on packaging to ensure the products are not enticing to children as well as legal standards for quality control and potency, Health Minister Ginette Petitpas Taylor told reporters. The government is on track to legalize recreational marijuana by July 2018, making it the first Group of Seven country to do so. Petitpas Taylor said the government wants to set strict guidelines for the safety of cannabis products, but ensure micro-producers and big companies alike will have access to the market as long as they are licensed. We want to make sure the market will be open to everyone. Some people will be small businesses and they can certainly apply for a license in order to have a micro-industry, if you will, she told reporters, adding there is no limit to the number of licenses that will be available. The proposed regulations address the licensing, tracking, packaging and labeling of recreational and medical marijuana practices, and include a permitting regime for the cultivation, processing, sale, testing and import and export of cannabis. The federal government earlier this month proposed splitting with the provinces income from excise taxes on recreational marijuana, drawing criticism from Ontario, which is concerned it will face higher costs associated with the new law. The federal government said it wants an excise tax on all cannabis products, including medical marijuana, of C$1 per gram (0.04 ounce), or 10 percent of the retail price, whichever is higher. Some provinces have asked the government to delay legalization, saying they need more time to set up a sales system and train police officers who will be enforcing the new rules. Prime Minister Justin Trudeau made the issue part of his 2015 successful election campaign and the Liberal government says regulating marijuana will keep it out of the hands of underage users and reduce drug-related crime. Shares of licensed producers, such as Canopy Growth, have soared in anticipation of legalization but the stocks are expected to face a bumpy ride in 2018. | 0fake |
Congo naval boats battle rebels on Lake Tanganyika | BUKAVU, Democratic Republic of Congo (Reuters) - Naval boats fended off attacks by rebels on Lake Tanganyika in the east of Democratic Republic of Congo on Thursday as heavy fighting spread close to the lakeside city of Uvira, sources in the area said. Fighting between the Mai-Mai Yakutumba militia and Congo government forces broke out at the weekend on the outskirts of Uvira, close to the Burundi border. Unrest has mounted across Congo since President Joseph Kabila refused to step down when his mandate expired last December. Since 5 a.m. (0300 GMT) there has been an exchange of gunfire between the army and the Mai-Mai in Uvira, said Lubungula Dem s M Sato, a member of a peacebuilding advocacy group in Uvira, the second largest city in South Kivu province. Congo s navy also repelled an attack by five rebel boats on the lake, military spokesman Louis-Claude Tshimwanga said, adding that the navy had sunk one of them and that government forces remained in control of Uvira. Lake Tanganyika is hundreds of kilometers (miles) long and also borders Burundi, Tanzania and Zambia. Mai-Mai Yakutumba, formed in 2007 by local militiamen opposed to integration in Congo s national army, has well-established gold smuggling networks on the lake. In an audio statement this week that was shared on social media, its leader William Yakutumba said his forces were rebelling against Kabila s mismanagement of the country s natural resources and failure to quit power last year. Militiamen believed to be aligned with Yakutumba in a coalition opposed to the Kinshasa government also clashed on Thursday with army troops in Kasongo in neighboring Maniema province, said Modeste Shabani, the director of a local radio station. Meanwhile, the Congolese army s chief of staff, Didier Etumba, arrived in South Kivu s capital of Bukavu in the afternoon en route for Uvira, a Reuters witness said. Congo s mineral-rich eastern borderlands are a tinderbox of ethnic tensions and for more than two decades have been racked by violence that has often spilled across the country s borders. The region is the world s biggest source of coltan, used in mobile phones and other electronic products. Operations at Banro Corp s Namoya gold mine near the border between Maniema and South Kivu remained suspended for a fourth day on Thursday due to nearby militia activity, Banro vice president Desire Sangare told Reuters. The company s mines in the two provinces have been hit by a series of attacks and kidnappings in recent months. Congo s U.N. peacekeeping mission, MONUSCO, said it had deployed troops around Uvira to protect civilians although the recent elimination of a 100-person riverine unit as part of sweeping budget cuts across U.N. missions limited its options. I urge the armed groups to immediately cease this hostility including all forms of violence against constituted authority and innocent civilians, MONUSCO head Maman Sidikou said in a statement. | 0fake |
One chart that shows why the Republican Party was ready for Donald Trump | Immigration reform used to be an issue that split both parties: Pro-business Republicans faced off against cultural conservatives, while within the Democratic Party Latino advocates faced off against labor.
But over the past 10 years, immigration has become a partisan issue.
This change isn't just a shift in where politicians take certain policy questions. It's also a change in whether Americans think that immigrants, in general, are a good thing for America:
To a certain extent, polarization on immigration in Washington and polarization among voters reinforce each other.
In 2005, when comprehensive immigration reform was a key priority of President George W. Bush, Republicans and Democrats were about equally likely to think that immigrants strengthened America. Once Bush's successor, Barack Obama, started stressing the need for comprehensive immigration reform, though, Republicans were much less likely to look favorably on immigrants — according to Pew's findings, Republican attitudes changed precipitously between late 2009 and summer 2010.
But this isn't the whole story, because the debate in Washington over comprehensive immigration reform has always had a tenuous relationship to how Americans actually feel about immigrants.
Historically, even the "anti-amnesty" politicians who opposed comprehensive immigration reform stressed that immigrants were welcome in America as long as they came (and stayed) legally. For most Americans, though, the difference that matters isn't between legal and unauthorized immigrants — it's between immigrants they find likely to assimilate into "American culture" and those who (they believe) cannot.
Americans are much more ambivalent about immigrants, in general, than you might expect from listening to politicians talk about immigration — or than you might guess by looking at polling for various immigration reform proposals.
For many white Americans over the past couple of decades, that ambivalence has hardened into a constellation of stereotypes: associating "immigrant" with "illegal immigrant," "illegal immigrant" with "Latino immigrant," and "Latino immigrant" with "criminal."
This is the genius of Donald Trump's presidential campaign: His rhetoric homes in directly on the things that actually worry many Americans about immigrants, rather than using economic or legal arguments as a way to gesture toward cultural fears.
But as the chart shows, Trump wasn't just exploiting a sentiment among American voters — he's exploiting a sentiment among specifically Republican voters.
The changes shown in the Pew chart don't just reflect Democrats or Republicans changing their minds about whether immigrants are good for America. (In fact, most of the people changing their minds are embracing immigrants; overall, the most recent Pew poll found 59 percent of Americans agree that immigration strengthens the country, which is the highest level of support in 20 years.)
They reflect changes in who identifies as a Republican or a Democrat.
Over the past 20 years, the Democratic Party has gotten markedly more ethnically diverse...
...as white voters have increasingly identified with Republicans:
Not all of the white voters who have switched parties are motivated by anti-Latino sentiment. But the voters who are motivated by anti-Latino sentiment are particularly likely to have switched parties.
Before 2000, there was a correlation between negative feelings toward Latinos and identifying as strongly Republican. But that was just a side effect; how people felt toward black Americans was a much better predictor of how strongly they identified with the GOP.
In the 21st century, the two have diverged. All else being equal — even sentiment toward African Americans — a white American in 2008 who felt negatively toward Latinos was likely to be more strongly Republican (one-third of a point on a seven-point scale from strong Republican to strong Democrat) than someone who felt positively toward them.
There's no indication that the trend has abated since 2008. Indeed, the Pew polling shows that sentiment toward immigrants among Republicans hit new lows in May 2015, with only 27 percent of Republicans saying immigrants strengthened America. That was just before Donald Trump launched his presidential campaign.
While Donald Trump didn't make Republicans wary of immigrants' effect on America, though, he does appear to have made the remaining skeptics in the Democratic Party embrace them.
In May 2015, on the eve of Trump's campaign launch, 62 percent of Democrats said that immigrants strengthened America. In March 2016, 78 percent said they did — a 16-percentage-point jump.
That's the biggest reason pro-immigrant sentiment is at a 20-year high: The Democrats who hadn't already embraced immigrants are doing so now.
If that holds, it will complete the last phase of the partisanization of immigration. Republican voters are already fairly united in their distrust of immigrants, and many Republican politicians are following their lead. Democratic politicians, meanwhile, are fairly united in their support of immigrants. And now, Democratic voters appear to be embracing their identity as the pro-immigrant party. | 0fake |
Comment on Donald Trump To Replace Filipina White House Chef With Paula Deen by Mitch Jalandoni | adobochron 1 Comment Comerford, left, and Deen
WASHINGTON, D.C. ( The Adobo Chronicles, Washington Bureau) – When Donald and Melania Trump officially move into the White House, there will be no pancit or chicken adobo on the family menu, just potato tot casserole and pumpkin pie.
The president-elect has informed The Adobo Chronicles that he is firing Filipina White House Executive Chef Cristeta Comerford. She will be replaced by Paula Deen, American celebrity chef and former TV cooking show host.
Paula Deen made headlines when a video surfaced in which Deen, in a deposition, admits to using the N-word and making racist and anti-semitic jokes. She also allegedly described her interest in hiring black waiters dressed to look like “slaves” at a wedding.Jun 19, 2013.
Trump himself has been criticized for racist remarks during his presidential campaign.
Birds of the same feather… Rate this: | 1real |
NANCY PELOSI Just Went After Trump’s Grandchildren And It’s Disgusting! [Video] | During Nancy Pelosi s remarks regarding President Trump s decision to pull out of the Paris Accord, Pelosi questioned whether President Trump s grandchildren breathe air! I kid you not! Can you imagine if a Republican had spoken like that about Obama s children? The snark coming from Pelosi is palpable RUDE! How is he [Trump] ever going to explain to his grandchildren what he did to the air they breathe? Assuming they breathe air. And I have to assume that is the case. We all do, right? Pelosi released a garbage statement after President Trump s announcement: San Francisco Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi issued the following statement after it was reported that the Trump Administration will pull out of the landmark, 195-signatory Paris Climate Accord that would significantly slow the progress of global warming: President Trump s decision to pull the United States out of the Paris Climate Accord is a stunning abdication of American leadership and a grave threat to our planet s future. In walking away from this agreement, the President is denying scientific truths, removing safeguards that protect our health and our environment, protecting polluters and their dirty energy agenda, and threatening our national and global security. The Paris Accord honors our collective moral responsibility to leave future generations with a planet that is clean, healthy and sustainable. The agreement deploys the full force of governments around the world to halt the rise in carbon emissions that cause extreme climate events, including record droughts, horrific famines and devastating floods, in addition to thousands of deaths each year from asthma attacks and other air pollution-related diseases. Rejecting the pact also sends a strong message to the marketplace to direct innovative, entrepreneurial investments in the clean energy economy elsewhere. The majority of Americans in both parties know that climate change is real, and want clear, decisive action to arrest its dire effects. Democrats will continue to support the strong action of states, cities and the private sector to halt the march of climate change, no matter how destructive and short-sighted the decisions of this Administration continue to be. | 1real |
DISGUSTING! UNEMPLOYED, RACE-OBSESSED Colin Kaepernick Will Be Added To Smithsonian Black History Museum, While Conservative Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas Is BLACKLISTED | Few people, if any, keep track of ratings or public approval numbers for the Smithsonian. However, if they did, those numbers would soon go down dramatically. Why? Because the man who single-handedly accomplished the nearly impossible feat of turning America against its favorite game, is about to get his own exhibit.Most fans were not impressed with Kaepernick s disrespect of our American flag and of our national anthem. According to curators at the museum, currently unemployed NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick is about to get his own display at the Smithsonian s National Museum of African American History and Culture on the National Mall.In fact, museum officials have already begun requesting various items of significance from Kaepernick s protests of last year.According to the Washington Examiner, Artifacts from former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick s national anthem protests will reportedly soon be on display at the Black Lives Matter collection at the Smithsonian s National Museum of African American History. The National Museum of African American History and Culture has nearly 40,000 items in our collection, said Damion Thomas, the museum s sports curator, to USA Today. The Colin Kaepernick collection is in line with the museum s larger collecting efforts to document the varied areas of society that have been impacted by the Black Lives Matter movement. Incredibly, as pointed out by IJR and The Washington Times, the museum extends Kaepernick this honor while only mentioning African-American Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, in connection with the sexual harassment charge brought against him by Anita Hill. BrietbartI was opposed to welfare because I had seen its destructive effects up close in Savannah. Most of the older people among whom I had grown up felt as I did, sharing Daddy s belief that it would be the ruination of blacks, undermining their desire to wor & provide for themselves. I added that my own sister was a victim of the system, which had created a sense of entitlement that had trapped her and her children. I went on to say that I opposed busing, preferring to give school vouchers to poor children. Source: My Grandfather s Son: A Memoir by Clarence Thomas, p. 132-3 , Oct 1, 2007Quotes like the one above from Clarence Thomas have made him a target of the left. It really doesn t matter what color you are, if you don t tow the entitlement line that keeps you in the good graces of the Democrat Party, you will be punished. In Clarence Thomas case, the punishment is that he will likely never see himself featured in the Smithsonian Black History museum.Here is a short biography of Clarence Thomas, that illustrates the unimaginable odds he overcame to become a US Supreme Court Justice:Clarence Thomas was born in the tiny coastal town of Pin Point, Georgia, on June 23, 1948. As a very young boy he lived in a one-room shack with dirt floors and no plumbing. When Thomas was two years old, his father walked out on the family. As a result, at the age of seven he and his younger brother were sent to live with their grandfather, Myers Anderson, and his wife in Savannah, Georgia. Anderson, a devout Catholic and active member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP), sent Thomas to a Catholic school staffed by nuns.In remarks reported by Jet magazine, Thomas has said that he grew up speaking Gullah, a creole dialect spoken by African Americans on the coastal islands of the southeastern United States. Unlike other Supreme Court justices, he rarely asks questions from the bench during court proceedings. He has said that he developed this habit of silent listening when he was young because he found it a struggle to speak standard English correctly in school. Nevertheless, he was always a strong student.Clarence Thomas went on to become a US Supreme Court Justice and champion of our Constitution.Apparently, the Smithsonian can t find space in their museum for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, a highly accomplished conservative black man, who was born into poverty, and through sheer determination and hard work, became the longest serving black Supreme Court Justice in America s history. | 1real |
Judge proposes May 7 trial date for former Trump aide Manafort | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A federal judge on Friday proposed a May 7 trial date for former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort and associate Rick Gates, who were indicted on charges including money laundering, according to a court filing. U.S. District Judge Amy Berman Jackson set a Monday hearing to address the proposed trial date in the case, which stemmed from special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into whether Russia interfered in the 2016 presidential election. | 0fake |
Russia Preparing for Nuclear World War III with NATO USA Breaking News November 5 2016 | November 6, 2016 at 10:31 pm
humans are stupid, especially Amerikkkans. while the sheep continue to consume irrelevant trinkets in there capitalistic society like sheep grazin on grass in an enclosed field, Russia is preparin to crush Amerikkka with a iron gauntlet. China, N.Korea, and Iran will play there parts too. it wont be this year, it wont be next year, and likely not even 2018, but by 2019, somethin really bad is goin to happen. mark my words. | 1real |
WATCH: Cornell University Holding 'Cry Ins' To 'Mourn' Trump Win | On Tuesday night, President-elect Donald Trump pulled off one of the greatest upsets in political history, defying all odds and abundant mockery to become the next leader of the free world. | 1real |
Trump says Israeli-Palestinian deal may be impossible | SUMTER, S.C. (Reuters) - Donald Trump, who has argued his experience negotiating tough real estate deals makes him best qualified to be U.S. president, said on Wednesday it might be impossible to forge a lasting peace agreement between the Israelis and the Palestinians. During a televised town hall session hosted by MSNBC in South Carolina, Trump, the front-runner for the Republican presidential nomination, said he believed getting a deal done would be “very, very tough.” The remarks were notable not only because Trump rarely discusses Israel or the Mideast peace process on the campaign trail, but also because they seemed to show a shift in Trump’s views on the feasibility of a deal. Trump said in December he would start working on a deal between the two sides within the first six months of taking office if elected. In those earlier comments, he also said he thought a deal would be hard to make, but added he thought it depended whether the Israelis really wanted to make one. In his comments on Wednesday, Trump said he’d heard from an Israeli that “the other side has been trained from the time they’re children to hate Jewish people,” and that was why a deal might not work. “You have one side in particular growing up and learning that these are the worst people,” he said. “I would say if you can do that deal you can do any deal,” he added. “That’s probably the toughest deal in the world right now to make and it’s possible it’s not makeable.” The town hall was part of Trump’s final push to translate his substantial lead in the South Carolina polls to a victory in the state’s Republican primary election, which takes place on Saturday. He also appeared before South Carolina audiences on Wednesday in the towns of Bluffton, Walterboro and Sumter. Trump said he’d still try to get a peace deal done, even if the odds for success were slim: “I’m going to give it a shot.” (Reporting By Emily Flitter in Sumter, South Carolina; Editing by Michael Perry) SAP is the sponsor of this content. It was independently created by Reuters’ editorial staff and funded in part by SAP, which otherwise has no role in this coverage. | 0fake |
German foreign minister says Trump dangerous for the world | BERLIN (Reuters) - A series of controversial remarks by U.S. Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump show that the world should be concerned if he is elected president, a spokeswoman for German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said on Wednesday. Trump, a billionaire businessman seeking his first public office, has courted controversy with a string of inflammatory statements about women, Mexicans, Muslims and war veterans, among others. Steinmeier, unlike Chancellor Angela Merkel who has said she will not comment on the U.S. election, is not neutral on the issue because he believes it is important to draw attention to the dangers posed by Trump, said spokeswoman Sawsan Chebli. “He is indeed not neutral on this question because he thinks that if you follow what Trump is saying then you need to be really anxious about what could become of this world ... if (he) does in fact become president,” Chebli told a regular government news conference. Steinmeier is from the centre-left Social Democrats, the junior partner in Merkel’s conservative-led ruling coalition. A spokeswoman for Merkel said the chancellor did not wish to interfere in the U.S. election campaign. On Monday 50 prominent Republican national security officials, including a former CIA director, described Trump as unqualified to lead the country and said he would be “the most reckless president in American history”. Trump is currently in the firing line after suggesting on Tuesday that gun rights activists could act to stop Democratic rival Hillary Clinton from nominating liberal U.S. Supreme Court justices. | 0fake |
FBI's Comey defends Clinton email probe announcement, but feels 'nauseous' | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - FBI Director James Comey said on Wednesday it made him “mildly nauseous” to think his announcement of the reopening of an investigation into Hillary Clinton’s emails affected the 2016 presidential election, but he had no regrets and would make the same decision again. In four hours of testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee, Comey delivered his most impassioned defense yet of a decision that many Democrats believe cost them the White House: telling Congress 11 days before the Nov. 8 election that the FBI had uncovered a new trove of Clinton-related emails. Comey said he felt he had to speak out at that time because he had repeatedly told lawmakers the Clinton email probe was over. “To not speak about it would require an act of concealment in my view,” Comey said. “Concealing, in my view, would be catastrophic.” He told the panel one reason for the FBI’s renewed interest in Clinton’s case was that investigators had found emails, some of them classified, forwarded by Clinton’s assistant Huma Abedin to her husband, who was not authorized to see such information. “It makes me mildly nauseous to think that we might have had some impact on the election, but honestly, it wouldn’t change the decision,” Comey said. The FBI, which is supposed to remain politically neutral, said a few days later that the new emails did not change its decision not to recommend criminal charges against Clinton, but many Democrats believe the political damage was done. Clinton said on Tuesday her election bid was derailed in part by Comey’s announcement about the renewed probe of her use of a private email server while she was secretary of state. She said her effort also was damaged by the WikiLeaks release of her campaign chairman John Podesta’s emails, allegedly stolen by Russian hackers. Senator Dianne Feinstein, ranking member on the committee, led the Democrats in hammering Comey with questions about why he went public with the Clinton probe but kept silent on an investigation related to the Republican candidate, Donald Trump. “It’s still very unclear - and I hope director that you will clear this up - why the FBI’s treatment of these two investigations was so dramatically different,” she asked. U.S. intelligence agencies in December accused Russia of hacking of Democratic emails in an effort to tilt the election to Trump. Comey confirmed in March the FBI was investigating possible collusion between Trump surrogates and Russia. Comey said on Wednesday the probe into whether Russian hacking activities and American citizens was a classified investigation in its early stages – far different from the almost completed email probe. Comey declined to comment on whether Trump, or anyone else, had been ruled out as a possible subject. Moscow has denied the hacking allegations. The FBI director acknowledged recent months have been difficult. “But I think I’ve done the right thing at each turn. I’m not on anybody’s side. It’s so hard for people to see that,” Comey said, adding later, “I don’t have any regrets.” | 0fake |
OOPS! DOCTOR DRAGGED Off United Airlines Flight Has Dark History [VIDEO] | Is it possible the good Dr. Dao was simply setting himself up to be the benefactor of a massive lawsuit against United Airlines? You be the judge First underreported fact:Initially, United insinuated that flight 3411 was overbooked. However, United spokesman Jonathan Guerin told USA Today that was not the case. He said that all of the 70 seats on the plane were filled, but that didn t make it over capacity.Instead, a regional affiliate that was operating the flight Republic Airlines opted to move four of its passengers because four crew members were considered must-ride passengers. Second underreported fact: The airline said its agents were left with no choice except to call Chicago Aviation Police to get Dao off of the flight. When they arrived, security officers were unable to get Dao to cooperate with their instructions and physically removed him through the aisle.In the scuffle, Dao s face struck an arm rest and his mouth became bloodied. A short time after officials got him off the plane, he returned to the cabin and ran to the back, holding onto an object and pled to let him go home.Is Dr. Dao playing to the crowd on the flight or is he truly traumatized after being physically removed from his seat?#flythefriendlyskies my husband was on that flight. Screw you United!! @united pic.twitter.com/4EcxrMy5jZ Kaylyn Davis (@kaylyn_davis) April 10, 2017Watch the short video taken by a passenger here. It appears that the good doctor is either very good at drama or has some sort of disorder which causes him to violently scream when touched:@United overbook #flight3411 and decided to force random passengers off the plane. Here's how they did it: pic.twitter.com/QfefM8X2cW Jayse D. Anspach (@JayseDavid) April 10, 2017Here s some of the background on Dr. Dao, the passenger who was physically removed by airline cops from the United flight leaving from Chicago:The passenger hauled off a United flight is a lung doctor with a taste for gambling, a history of angry outbursts and a conviction for trading narcotics prescriptions and cash for gay sex in motels.Dr. David Dao of Elizabethtown, Ky., confirmed Tuesday that he was the inadvertent star of a viral video stirring outrage around the globe and said he was undergoing hospital treatment in Chicago.In an interview from his bed, Dao, 69, told Louisville TV station WLKY that he wasn t feeling well.In 2003, Dao was charged with 98 counts of illegally prescribing and trafficking prescription painkillers such as hydrocodone, Oxycontin and Percocet. You can read the criminal complaint above, along with other documents related to the case and Dao s medical license.David Dao by Heavy on ScribdHe was a co-defendant in the case along with Brian D. Case, who was indicted on 33 felony drug charges.Dao was caught on surveillance video meeting patients and supplying them with painkillers, mainly hydrocodone.According to a criminal complaint on at least one occasion, Dao received $174 in exchange for the pills in an unlabeled bottle. From 2001-2003, Dao unlawfully prescribed controlled substances to patients, court documents said.The criminal complaint in the case went onto say that Dao would solicit homosexual relations with a male patient in exchange for a prescription for hydrocodone. The meetings occurred at motels and it was found that Dao had written out personal checks to the patient on more than one occasion.The patient was arrested at a Walgreens Pharmacy and brought in for an interview, where he confessed about his and Dao s relationship. The man was brought into police custody because he was calling the pharmacy to order prescriptions and saying that he was in fact Dao, picking up prescriptions under numerous aliases.Dao was eventually arrested by police at a hotel room in Jefferson County on July 25, 2003. The room was under surveillance by the Louisville Police Department and Dao was seen with the male patient without a shirt on and with his pants undone. The patient gave Dao money for a bottle of pills and police stormed the room to arrest him upon the exchange.Dao was officially charged with unlawful prescribing, trafficking in a controlled substance and complicity in obtaining drugs by fraud and deceit and pled not guilty to the charges.Some of those charges ended up being dismissed, but Dao was eventually convicted on six counts. He was found guilty of complicity in obtaining a controlled substance (hydrocodone) by fraud and sentenced to two years, eight months in prison, a sentence that was suspended, and was ordered to pay a $5,000 fine. HeavyOn the day he was busted, Dao was secretly videotaped with Case in a Red Carpet Inn in Jefferson County, Ky., with his shirt off and his pants undone, the records say.Dao was convicted after a trial and sentenced to five years probation after the judge agreed to suspend a prison term of two-plus years recommended by the jury.He agreed to surrender his medical license in 2005, but had it provisionally reinstated in 2015 so he could work one day a week for another doctor in Elizabethtown.The licensing records also reveal how Dao was the subject of many complaints while working at Hardin Memorial Hospital.The Medical Executive Committee there took a strong stance in 2002, and put [Dao] on a corrective action plan due to his disruptive behavior and referred him for evaluation and anger management, the papers say. NYP | 1real |
China says no excuses for foreign officials meeting Dalai Lama | BEIJING (Reuters) - Foreign leaders can t think they can get away with meeting exiled Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama just because they are doing it in a personal capacity, as they still represent their government, a senior Chinese official said on Saturday. China considers the Dalai Lama, who fled into exile in India in 1959 after a failed uprising against Chinese rule, to be a dangerous separatist. The Nobel Peace Prize winning monk says he simply seeks genuine autonomy for his Himalayan homeland. Visits by the Dalai Lama to foreign countries infuriate China, and fewer and fewer national leaders are willing to meet him, fearing the consequences of Chinese anger, though some have tried to placate Beijing by saying they are meeting him in a personal not official capacity. Zhang Yijiong, who heads the Communist Party s Tibet working group, told reporters on the sidelines of a party congress that there could be no excuses to meeting the Dalai Lama. Although some people say, the Dalai is a religious figure, our government didn t put in an appearance, it was just individual officials, this is incorrect, said Zhang, who is also a vice minister at the United Front Work Department, which has led failed talks with the Dalai Lama s representatives. Officials, in their capacity as officials, attending all foreign-related activities represent their governments. So I hope governments around the world speak and act with caution and give full consideration their friendship with China and their respect for China s sovereignty, he added. China took control of Tibet in 1950 in what it calls a peaceful liberation and has piled pressure on foreign governments to shun the Dalai Lama, using economic means to punish those who allow him in. China strongly denies accusations of rights abuses in Tibet, saying its rule has brought prosperity to what was a remote and backward region, and that it fully respects the religious and cultural rights of the Tibetan people. China also insists that Tibet in an integral part of its territory and has been for centuries. Zhang, who worked in Tibet from 2006-2010 as a deputy Communist Party boss, said that Tibetan Buddhism was a special religion born in our ancient China . It s a Chinese religion. It didn t come in from the outside, he said. | 0fake |
Facebook will help investigators release Russia ads, Sandberg tells Axios | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Facebook Inc (FB.O) Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg said on Thursday the company was committed to helping U.S. congressional investigators publicly release Russia-backed political ads that ran during the 2016 U.S. election. “Things happened on our platform in this election that should not have happened,” Sandberg said in an interview in Washington with Axios news that was broadcast on its website. “We told Congress and the intelligence committees that when they are ready to release the ads, we are ready to help them.” Axios asked Sandberg what the world’s largest social network knew about the extent of Russia’s use of its platform and if ads on Facebook that had been placed by Russian accounts and Donald Trump’s presidential campaign had overlapped in terms of target audiences. She appeared to sidestep the questions and said only that targeting on Facebook was often very broad. The interview was the first by a senior Facebook executive since the company disclosed last month that it had found some 3,000 politically divisive ads believed to have been bought by Russia before and after the presidential campaign. U.S. intelligence agencies have concluded that Russia used cyber-enabled means in an attempt to help Trump win the White House, an allegation the Kremlin has denied. Sandberg was in Washington for meetings with U.S. lawmakers. Sandberg told the Congressional Black Caucus on Thursday that Facebook planned to add an African-American to its board of directors, a source familiar with the closed-door meeting said, but she offered no details. The board has been criticized for its lack of diversity. She and two other Facebook executives, Erin Egan and Elliot Schrage, also met privately with Representative Jackie Speier, a California Democrat and member of the House Intelligence Committee. Facebook and other major internet companies including Alphabet’s Google (GOOGL.O) and Twitter (TWTR.N) are on the defensive as they try to limit fallout from a torrent of revelations about how Moscow sought to use their platforms to sow discord in the United States and influence the election. Sandberg told Axios that Facebook began hearing rumors around Election Day last November of Russian attempts to use the platform to spread propaganda but did not give a precise timeline about when the company began its review. Sandberg said she supported the public release of those ads, and the pages to which they were connected. Information about how the ads targeted specific types of users would also be released, she said. Asked if Facebook contributed to Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton’s defeat last year, Sandberg, an open Clinton supporter during the campaign, did not answer directly but said it was important the website was “free from abuse” during any election in any country. Congressional committees and special counsel Robert Mueller are investigating Russian interference in the election, including whether there was any collusion between Trump associates and Moscow. Trump has denied that there was any collusion between his campaign and associates and Russia. Sandberg acknowledged that the company had erred in how it handled the issue of foreign interference last year. “It’s not just that we apologize. We’re angry, we’re upset. But what we really owe the American people is determination to do a better job of preventing foreign meddling,” she said. “We don’t want this kind of foreign interference” on Facebook, Sandberg said. She said the company had been too permissive at times in terms of how advertisers were allowed to target users. Sandberg said it was important to protect “free expression” on Facebook and that if the Russian ads had been bought by legitimate accounts instead of fraudulent ones, many would have been allowed to run on the site. She criticized Twitter’s decision this week to remove a campaign video from Republican Representative Marsha Blackburn, who is running for a U.S. Senate seat in Tennessee. Twitter took down the video, saying a remark Blackburn made about opposing abortion was inflammatory. Twitter later reversed its decision. “In that ad, there are a lot of things that people don’t like, that I don’t like. ... But the question is, ‘Should divisive political or issue ads run?’ Our answer is yes because when you cut off speech for one person you cut off speech for all people,” she said. Sandberg said Facebook wanted other internet companies to work toward making ad purchases more transparent, and she said Facebook was talking with lawmakers who want to introduce legislation on the issue. Representatives from Facebook, Google and Twitter are expected to testify about Russian influence at hearings before the Senate and House intelligence committees on Nov. 1. | 0fake |
THE CLINTON/VATICAN/TEHRAN AXIS | Robert Spencer
Breitbart reported Saturday that among the many revealing and damning emails that WikiLeaks has revealed from Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta, one has “White House chief of staff Denis McDonough responding favorably to an email forwarded to him by Podesta from a leftwing ‘Catholic’ organization that said it was arranging meetings with Catholic prelates to urge them to press U.S. senators to vote for the Iran Treaty.”
This plan was apparently hatched by Fred Rotondaro, chairman of the far-Left and Catholic-in-name-only Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good (CACG), as well as a senior fellow with Podesta’s Soros-funded “Islamophobia” propaganda organ, the Center for American Progress.
Rotondaro wrote to Podesta and others in the Clinton camp:
John,
I thought you might be interested in this report from the CACG exec director Chris Hale on efforts to have the Catholic org community promote the Iran Treaty. There is a tremendous amount of potential in these inter Faith orgs including the ability to reach some working class voters,
Fred
Hale wrote in his report:
Our advertisement began running on National Catholic Reporter and Commonweal yesterday. Right now, when you click the advertisement, the link takes you to MoveOn’s 60 Day to Stop A War Take Action website. From there, you are able to dial into your Member of Congress and request them to support the Iran Deal.
At some point today, that link will change to our own website, which will list all the groups’ names, simple talking points, and give people a chance to dial in three elected officials (their one US Representatives and two Senators). While the MoveOn site is very effective, ours will ensure that people calling into the offices identify as a person of faith, which is important in both our narrative creation (Catholics support the deal) and coalition building (the God Squad takes action).
Hale wrote about contacts with other legislators as well. According to Breitbart, “Podesta forwarded the report to McDonough at the White House, who
FOR ENTIRE ARTICLE CLICK LINK | 1real |
Can I have one girlfriend without you bastards f**king it up? asks Harry | Can I have one girlfriend without you bastards f**king it up? asks Harry 08-11-16
PRINCE Harry has asked the world’s media if he could just have one relationship that is not immediately ruined by bastard journalists.
The prince has released a letter to the media asking if they could just one time not steam straight into a new girlfriend’s life and bollocks it all up.
He continued: “Seriously you fuckers, the prince thing only gets you so far when she’s getting a hundred texts her day about her mum being followed by stubbly, fag-scented photographers.
“And I do not need every newspaper in Britain muttering words like ‘Compton’ and ‘ghetto’ like a horrendously prejudiced grandparent. Especially as I already have a horrendously prejudiced grandparent.
“Stop saying I could do better. You might think so, but by any realistic measure she’s already way out of my league, okay?”
Following the letter, newspapers agreed that what would be lovely is getting out the family album to show this new girl photos of Harry dressed as a Nazi.
Share: | 1real |
Police fire tear gas to halt opposition protests in two Kenyan cities | NAIROBI (Reuters) - Kenyan police used tear gas to disperse opposition protesters on Monday in the capital Nairobi and another city as demonstrations against a presidential vote re-run continued despite a government ban. Kenya s supreme court nullified the presidential election result in August, citing procedural irregularities and voiding the victory of President Uhuru Kenyatta. The ruling opened the way to a repeat vote on Oct. 26. But opposition leader Raila Odinga has refused to take part, saying the re-run should not happen until major reforms are introduced to prevent another failed vote. The election board has said the polls will go ahead anyway, pitting Kenyatta against six other candidates, none of whom polled more than 1 percent in August. The standoff has spooked investors in the region s most advanced economy and is slowing growth. Last month, Kenya lowered its 2017 economic growth forecast to 5.5 percent due to drought and political uncertainty. On Sunday, Odinga repeated his call for more protests, which authorities banned in the central business districts of Nairobi, the coastal city of Mombasa and the opposition stronghold of Kisumu in western Kenya. The events in Kenya have raised confusion among voters and fears that politically-driven violence might escalate. At a political rally on Monday, Kenyatta accused the opposition of seeking to wreak chaos and force a coalition government, allegations the opposition has denied. At least 33 people died in Nairobi during a police crackdown on opposition supporters after the August election, including a child and a pregnant woman, Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch said on Monday. The national police disputed the report, saying it was totally misleading and based on falsehoods. | 0fake |
Sean Spicer HILARIOUSLY Branded As Chickensh*t After He Bolts From Briefing (TWEETS) (VIDEO) | Oh, Mr. Spicey. Our favorite press secretary because we love to hate him. His gymnastics around Donald Trump s antics and gaffes (along with his own) are already the stuff of legend, and not in a good way. It makes his relationship with the press acrimonious, and he may well have just about had it with that. Today, he turned chickenshit, tucked his tail between his legs, and ran away from his own press briefing, leaving the White House Press Corps absolutely stunned.Cries of, Sean! Hey Sean! Seeeeeean! Ah come on, Sean! He walked away! are among just a few of the loud and disappointed protests coming from a press corps that undoubtedly had a squillion uncomfortable questions for him.Watch below:.@PressSec literally fled press questions today pic.twitter.com/S9uIapiBn4 American Bridge (@American_Bridge) May 2, 2017Near the end of the video, you can hear someone say, Really? Yes, really, apparently. And people on Twitter are going at Spicey for being a coward with gleeful abandon:@American_Bridge @PressSec Live feed on sean spicer running out the WH.. pic.twitter.com/wt4J2Q45WE diane1261 (@diane1261) May 2, 2017@American_Bridge @PressSec pic.twitter.com/pqz03w8WhL Jas (@barteej) May 2, 2017@American_Bridge @glasgowdick @PressSec @PressSec Quick, the press are here. Run! Hide! pic.twitter.com/y2Jib6YrZB Sean Callaghan (@keanespirit) May 2, 2017@American_Bridge @PressSec Moments before: pic.twitter.com/U2XzJwewlF Judge Steve Reinhold (@Galileo908) May 2, 2017@American_Bridge @wycam1 @PressSec Maybe Spicey had to GO POTTY ??? pic.twitter.com/KeSHWDnYsM NY Justice Seeker (@NYJusticeSeeker) May 2, 2017Just in, footage of Sean Spicer at today s presser pic.twitter.com/BNVX2m9CmA Tynisa Walker (@Kalarigamerchic) May 2, 2017@American_Bridge @PressSec pic.twitter.com/lClJnDpGBt L M J (@ViewFrom14thFlr) May 2, 2017@American_Bridge @PressSec Damn Sean. At least do it with a little style. pic.twitter.com/YTB8hEt05Z Bob Parker (@BobusParkorum) May 2, 2017@American_Bridge @Marengel4 @PressSec I wouldn t put it pass you @seanspicer smh pic.twitter.com/6K8jCnqKgl R?G (@lastbreath8) May 2, 2017@American_Bridge @PressSec pic.twitter.com/6DMtkNi0W9 Allbizness (@TerniValentine) May 2, 2017@American_Bridge @PressSec A coward dies a thousand deaths pic.twitter.com/X0hCvrpzkn Erin Larkin Foster (@larkster_Erin) May 2, 2017Live look at Sean Spicer ghosting the WH press pic.twitter.com/W9vmc2Ef4g Andi Zeisler (@andizeisler) May 2, 2017@JakeTurx The childish nature of this Administration never ceases to amaze me. I honestly wish they would stop. pic.twitter.com/Z7uCwa8aaJ ACTIndivisible (@ACTIndivisible) May 2, 2017Scaredy Spice @PressSec is too much of a coward to face the free press reps in White House press briefing! @maddow #Spicer #100DaysOfShame pic.twitter.com/xNTmw4xYeQ Daniel Quinn (@MightyQuinnUSA) May 2, 2017Actual pics of Sean Spicer fleeing the press briefing today pic.twitter.com/NnogAnWC5w Prubjot Kaur (@prubjotkaur) May 2, 2017Sean Spicer fleeing the WH press corps like pic.twitter.com/S1jns97dfN Jenn Lerner (@JenniferLerner1) May 2, 2017Poor @seanspicer he s such a huge pussy that @realDonaldTrump is going to be grabbing him all day long. https://t.co/pJ9Ej1TMw1 Pretty Hat Machine? (@PrettyHatMech) May 2, 2017What s the rush? Sean Spicer leaves WH press briefing without fielding questions https://t.co/U1rd4B6cZ2 All American Girl (@AIIAmericanGirI) May 2, 2017Sean Spicer leaving that press conference was not shocking to me. That looks me putting my kids to bed everynight pic.twitter.com/BHwAJhOYGw Lulu Chatter (@LuluChatter1) May 2, 2017Sean Spicer leaves White House briefing without taking questions from the press Where s Spicer? pic.twitter.com/afi8EMgIqf Mangoman (@69mangoman) May 2, 2017Actual footage of Sean Spicer at today s press briefing. pic.twitter.com/2xHZdKhTkm (@slickvandal) May 2, 2017Some of the media are unhappy with this development, too, and really not afraid to say so. Mother Jones called it the soundtrack for a presidency. The Hill said that Spicer stunned reporters. Market Watch noted that the press was left volleying questions toward an empty podium: Sean? Sean? Hey, Sean, come on! What about the Putin call, Sean? The caption under their photo reads, It just like concluded. The Root had its own take: Perhaps Spicer needed some time to compose the alternative facts he knew he d have to present after Salmon-Skin Stalin said Tuesday that the new budget has enough money for a down payment on the wall, and Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.), the Senate Appropriations Committee s ranking Democratic member, responded on Twitter with, To be clear, there is NO funding in this bill for ANY kind of down payment on construction of a new border wall. Or, maybe Spicer was nervous about responding to Trump s tweets from earlier Tuesday insisting that the government needed a good shutdown.' While some blindly loyal Trump supporters are saying that he just owned the press, unfortunately for their narrative and for Spicey here, answering questions he doesn t necessarily like or want to answer is part and parcel of his job. He doesn t get to run away when he doesn t want to talk, or without explaining that his time is getting cut short for something else. Really, Spicer just got owned here.Featured image via screen capture from embedded video | 1real |
T-REX SMOKES THE LEFTY MEDIA After Rude Questions On Trump: ”How’s your relationship with the President right now?” [Video] | It s no secret that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is a tell-it-like-it is kind of guy. So when he was bombarded with rude questions ( Are you committed to staying in your position as Secretary of State? How long will you stay for? How s your relationship with the President right now?) from the press during a welcome with the Qatari Foreign Minister, he resounded in true T-Rex style:TRANSCRIPT OF THE EXCHANGE BETWEEN THE PRESS AND TILLERSON:SECRETARY TILLERSON: His Excellency, welcome. FOREIGN MINISTER AL-THANI: Thank you very much.SECRETARY TILLERSON: Great to see you again at the State Department.FOREIGN MINISTER AL-THANI: Thank you for receiving us. Thank you and great to be here.SECRETARY TILLERSON: Thank you.QUESTION: Secretary Tillerson, have you committed to staying in your position as Secretary of State?SECRETARY TILLERSON: I m not going anywhere.QUESTION: How long will you stay for?SECRETARY TILLERSON: As long as the President lets me.QUESTION: How s your relationship with the President right now?SECRETARY TILLERSON: It s good.WE LOVE THIS GUY!!! | 1real |
Trump officials to unveil plan to cut factory rules this week | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Trump administration intends to unveil this week a plan to trim regulations it believes constrain U.S. manufacturing growth, potentially affecting environmental permits, worker safety and labor rules, an administration official said. The U.S. Commerce Department’s regulations “hit list” recommendations follow more than three months of study and consultation with industry on ways to streamline regulations and ease burdens on manufacturing firms. A Trump administration official with knowledge of the recommendations to be sent to the White House said the Environmental Protection Agency’s complex permitting rules will be a key focus, echoing comments to Reuters by Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross last month. The 171 public comments submitted by companies and industry groups offer a strong hint to priorities for Commerce’s streamlining efforts, with numerous industry groups and firms complaining that EPA air quality permit rules for new facilities are often redundant. The report will analyze the submissions and “will identify a lot of problems and lay out ways to take responsible actions,” said the official, who declined to be identified by name. The process has looked at many regulations finalized under Trump’s predecessor, President Barack Obama. A common demand from industry was that the Trump administration should reject a planned tightening of ozone rules under the U.S. Clean Air Act’s National Ambient Air Quality Standards, with several groups arguing this would expose them to increased permitting hurdles for new facilities, raising costs. 3M Co (MMM.N) said other permitting requirements under the Clean Air Act contained “overlapping rules, redundant requirements, conflicts between rules and undue complexity.” The National Association of Manufacturers said the EPA’s review requirements for new sources of emissions such as factories can add $100,000 in costs for modeling air quality to a new facility and delay factory expansions by 18 months. It added that EPA should find ways to ease burdens for smaller projects and smaller firms. Also drawing complaints from construction groups and iron foundries is an incoming Occupational Safety and Health Administration rule reducing by 80 percent the amount of crystalline silica dust that can be inhaled. The dust, common on construction sites, can cause lung cancer, according to OSHA, but industry groups say reducing it to those levels will be prohibitively expensive. “To meet these much lower levels, new engineering controls and other measures will become necessary within the roofing industry,” said the National Roofing Contractors Association. Trump has already taken steps to roll back some not fully completed Obama-era environmental regulations such as restrictions on coal-fired power plants and a clean water rule greatly restricting runoff into small streams. But the Commerce list may target some rules already on the books. “We are at the outset of what we think will be a very intense deregulatory agenda from the Trump team,” said Amit Narang, regulatory policy advocate at Public Citizen, a consumer watchdog group. “We are concerned that they are looking to gut regulations that benefit workers and benefit consumers.” Another OSHA rule that drew industry complaints is one that further reduces worker exposure to beryllium, another potential carcinogen, that became effective on May 20 after a decade-long rulemaking effort. Manufacturing groups including auto parts makers have also targeted labor rules that make it easier for unions to organize workers, expand the number of employees eligible for overtime and govern the reporting of workplace injuries. The range of industry complaints is vast. Mining giant Freeport-McMoRan (FCX.N) argued that planned EPA financial responsibility requirements for hard rock mining operations costing billions of dollars were based on inadequate study and “will have disastrous consequences for the mining industry.” Guitar maker Taylor Guitars said that permits needed from the Fish and Wildlife Service for mother-of-pearl used to decorate instruments was unnecessarily raising its costs. “This declaration requirement does not seem to serve any conservation or other purpose. The shell is not a species that is protected under law,” the company said. | 0fake |
CNN IS EVIL: Carol Costello FAILS When Benghazi Dad Flips Script On Her…#BoycottCNN | Charles Woods, father of U.S. Navy SEAL Tyrone Woods, who was killed during the Benghazi attack, appeared on CNN Tuesday. CNN Newsroom host Carol Costello repeatedly badgered him about Donald Trump s feud with Khizr Khan, and whether Trump should apologize. I know who should apologize, and that would be Hillary Clinton, for lying to the American families who lost their loved ones as well as to the American public, Woods said. | 1real |
James Comey: I Documented Meeting with President Trump Because ‘He Might Lie’ - Breitbart | Fired former FBI Director James Comey said during his appearance before the Senate Intelligence Committee on Thursday that he documented what was said in his meetings with President Donald Trump because the president ‘might lie’ about their discussions. [“I was alone with the president of the United States, or the soon to be president,” Comey said when asked why he documented his meetings with Trump. “The subject matter … I was talking about matters that touch on the FBI’s core responsibility and it related to the personally and then the nature of the person, I was honestly concerned he might lie about the nature of our meeting so I thought it [was] important to document … that combination of things. ” Comey also said that he did not feel the need to document his conversations about intelligence with former Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama. “As I said in my written testimony as FBI director, I interacted with President Obama and spoke only twice in three years and didn’t document it,” Comey said. “When I was deputy attorney general I had one meeting with President Bush about a national security matter. “I didn’t document that conversation either,” Comey said. | 0fake |
In stinging attack, France's Macron says Poland isolating itself in Europe | VARNA, Bulgaria/WARSAW (Reuters) - French President Emmanuel Macron said on Friday Poland was isolating itself within the European Union and Polish citizens deserve better than a government at odds with the bloc s democratic values and economic reform plans. Macron said Warsaw, where a nationalist, eurosceptic government took office in 2015, was moving in the opposite direction to Europe on numerous issues and would not be able to dictate the path of Europe s future. Poland rejected the accusations, saying Macron was inexperienced and arrogant. Europe is a region created on the basis of values, a relationship with democracy and public freedoms which Poland is today in conflict with, Macron said in Bulgaria on the third leg of a trip to central and eastern Europe to generate support for his vision of a Europe that better protects its citizens. He described Poland s refusal to change its stance on a revision of the EU s directive on posted workers - cheap labor from eastern countries posted temporarily to more affluent western countries - as a mistake. Macron has said the practice leads to unfair competition. In no way will the decision by a country that has decided to isolate itself in the workings of Europe jeopardize the finding of an ambitious compromise, he said. In a scathing attack that could drag relations between western EU powers and the European Commission in Brussels on one side and Poland s Law and Justice Party (PiS) government on the other to a new low, he said the Polish people deserved better. Poland is not defining Europe s future today and nor will it define the Europe of tomorrow, Macron said at a joint press conference with Bulgarian President Rumen Radev in the Black Sea resort city of Varna. In response, Poland s Prime Minister Beata Szydlo said Macron, 39, a former investment banker elected in May as France s youngest president, lacked political experience and accused him of undermining the EU. I advise the president that he should be more conciliatory ... Perhaps his arrogant comments are a result of a lack of (political) experience, Szydlo said in a statement emailed to Reuters. I advise the president that he should focus on the affairs of his own country. Perhaps he may be able to achieve the same economic results and the same level of security for (French) citizens as those guaranteed by Poland. Her comments were an indirect reference to her government s insistence that it will not accept migrants from the Middle East, despite pressure from Brussels, because it believes they pose a threat to national security. France has been hit hard by deadly Islamist militant attacks in recent years. The Polish Foreign Ministry said in a statement it had urgently summoned the French charg d affaires to express the Polish government s indignation about the arrogant words of Macron. It quoted Deputy Foreign Minister Marek Magierowski as saying Poland expects that France will abandon language that is divisive and which damages the unity of the EU . Relations between Szydlo s Law and Justice (PiS) party and the French government deteriorated soon after it won election in late 2015. In October 2016, Poland abruptly canceled a nearly $4 billion military procurement deal with Airbus. Macron s election deepened the rift, with the French globalization advocate fanning worries in Warsaw that his vision of a multi-speed Europe would undermine Polish influence within the European Union. French officials have expressed concerns about Poland, and Hungary, drifting towards authoritarianism and said Macron would also make a defense of the rule of law and democratic principles one of the priorities of his mandate on the European stage. On his three-day tour Macron sought backing for his plans to tighten EU rules on the employment abroad of labor from low-pay nations. Poland strongly opposes this initiative. While posted workers comprise less than 1 percent of the EU work force, it is a political hot potato that has exacerbated the divide between the bloc s poor east and rich west for years. Macron managed to enlist the broad support of Czech Republic and Slovakia, and the lukewarm backing of Romania, all countries which fear being sidelined in a multi-speed EU, whereas Poland and Hungary remain defiant of what they see as an out-of-touch EU elite based in Brussels and Western capitals. Poland is at loggerheads with the European Commission, the Brussels-based EU executive, over issues ranging from its refusal to accept EU migrant relocation quotas to the ruling conservatives tightening grip on the judiciary and media. Macron shunned both Poland and Hungary on his trip through the region. He said he wanted Bulgaria - like Poland, Hungary, Romania, the Czech Republic and Slovakia a former communist state that joined the EU much later than western counterparts - to be at the negotiating table on European integration. On the posted worker rules, Bulgaria s Radev said the EU needed to balance the interests of countries in the rich west and the poor east. It is important that changes are made in a way that unites rather than divides Europe, he said. Current EU rules allow workers to be posted from low-salary countries to other EU states on contracts that must guarantee the host country s minimum wage, but under which taxes and social charges are paid in the home nation. Poland and Hungary say increased restrictions on such contracts would flout the principles of the European single market and cost hundreds of thousands of jobs. | 0fake |
Turkey's talks with U.S. on visa crisis going in 'good direction', Erdogan spokesman says | ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Turkey s talks with the United States over an on-going visa crisis are headed in a good direction , President Tayyip Erdogan s spokesman said on Wednesday. Visa operations were mutually suspended by the two countries on Oct. 8, in a widening diplomatic row over Ankara s arrest of Turkish national employed by the U.S. consulate in Istanbul. A delegation from the United States arrived in Turkey on Tuesday to discuss the resolution of the crisis. Erdogan s spokesman, Ibrahim Kalin, made the comment in an interview broadcast by state channel TRT Haber. | 0fake |
Howard Dean: ’We Have to Completely Change the Way We Approach Race in This Country as Democrats and as a Nation’ - Breitbart | .@GOVHOWARDDEAN: We have to completely change way we approach race in this country as Democrats and as nation #AMJoy https: . Former DNC chairman Gov. Howard Dean ( ) said Saturday on MSNBC’s “AM Joy” that Democrats, as well as the rest of the United States, need to “completely change the way we approach race in this country. ” “We have to completely change the way we approach race in this country as Democrats and as a nation, and that will get us back into the power which we deserve and where we can benefit the country,” Dean told host Joy Reid. Follow Trent Baker on Twitter @MagnifiTrent | 0fake |
Republican lawmakers shift to 'yes' on healthcare bill with changes | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Three U.S. Republican House lawmakers threw their support behind their party’s healthcare overhaul plan on Wednesday after crafting changes to provide $8 billion over five years to shore up coverage for people with pre-existing conditions. Representatives Fred Upton and Billy Long, who had rejected an earlier bill to roll back the 2010 Affordable Care Act, told reporters after a meeting with Trump at the White House that they could now vote for the plan with their proposed changes. Upton said the revised bill could come up for a vote on Thursday, although both he and Long said they did not know whether there were enough votes to pass it. Representative Michael Burgess also said he could back the legislation. | 0fake |
May, Macron, Gentiloni push for quick removal of extremist online content | UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - Leaders of France, Italy and the United Kingdom urged social media companies on Wednesday to more swiftly remove terrorist content from the internet, with the aim of stopping it from being uploaded in the first place. The tech companies have made significant progress on this issue, but we need to go further and faster to reduce the time it takes to remove terrorist content online, British Prime Minister Theresa May said in a speech to the United Nations General Assembly of world leaders in New York. She said there was a need to increase significantly the efforts to stop (extremist content) being uploaded in the first place. French President Emmanuel Macron and Italian Prime Minister Paolo Gentiloni later pushed in a separate event hosted by May for such content to be removed swiftly. This is what must be done. In one hour the content must be identified, analyzed and withdrawn to avoid it being broadcast widely. Experience shows that this is possible, said Macron, speaking through an interpreter. We have a real battlefield for hearts and minds and (it) is the web, Gentiloni said. He said economic and privacy issues were a hurdle in this process, but we also have to know, if we are aware of the fact that this battlefield is so relevant, that we can t reduce our ambition because of the difficulties. Several websites across the internet list ingredients for making bombs or instructions on how to use vehicles to attack pedestrians. Online retailer Amazon.com said on Wednesday it was reviewing its website after an investigation found it could help users buy the ingredients to make a bomb using its Frequently bought together and Customers who bought this also bought features. The European Union has threatened legislation if internet companies do not better police what is available on the web. Removing all of this content within a few hours - or indeed stopping it from appearing on the internet in the first place - poses an enormous technological and scientific challenge, said Kent Walker, general counsel for Alphabet Inc s Google. The haystacks here are unimaginably large and the needles are both very small and constantly changing. Walker spoke on behalf of Facebook Inc, Microsoft Corp, Google subsidiary YouTube and Twitter Inc, all members of the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism created in June under pressure from governments in Europe and the United States after a spate of militant attacks. Its aim is to share technical solutions for removing extremist content and work more closely with counter-terrorism experts. Walker said between August 2015 and June 2017, Twitter had suspended almost a million accounts for the promotion of terrorism, and that the use of technology and artificial intelligence had allowed Facebook to root out terrorist clusters. | 0fake |
Trump’s Right-hand Man Threatens ‘BLOODBATH’ If Election Is Hijacked From Trump (VIDEO) | Donald Trump has already been giving hints that he might back out of debating Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton over claims that the political system is rigged against him even though we all know it s really because he s terrified of her. While most of us think Trump s attempts to blame outside forces for his incompetence are pathetic, some of his most prominent minions are coming to his rescue to further spread his conspiracy theories.Roger Stone, one of Trump s closest confidantes, spoke to Breitbart bigot Milo Yiannopoulos recently and warned that there would be a bloodbath if Trump didn t win the election. After several recent polls have suggested that Clinton is pulling ahead of Trump, Stone was more than happy to declare voter fraud. Stone said: I think we have widespread voter fraud, but the first thing that Trump needs to do is begin talking about it constantly. If there s voter fraud, this election will be illegitimate, the election of the winner will be illegitimate, we will have a constitutional crisis, widespread civil disobedience, and the government will no longer be the government. Of course, Yiannopoulos was right on board with this theory and the men had some horrific advice for Trump continue to be as offensive as possible and push those buttons so that he can gain enough rabid support from racists and bigots to make up for any supposed rigging that might happen. Stone also suggested that Trump should vow to shut the government down if Clinton was elected in November. As if this interview couldn t get any crazier, delusional Stone issued this warning: If you can t have an honest election, nothing else counts. I think he s gotta put them on notice that their inauguration will be a rhetorical, and when I mean civil disobedience, not violence, but it will be a bloodbath We will not stand for it. Trump s allies are just like him they love to encourage violence and are incapable of acting like adults when things don t go their way. The amount of stupidity going on in this interview is unfathomable. You can listen to it below:Previously, Roger Stone had encouraged Trump supporters to go stalk and visit anti-Trump delegates in their hotel rooms if they tried to take the GOP nomination away from Trump.Featured image via Alex Wong / Getty Images | 1real |
Fate of Obama legacy initiatives in hands of courts, successor | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - When President Barack Obama leaves office on Jan. 20 after eight years, several of his major initiatives will still hang in the legal balance, meaning the U.S. courts and his successor will play a major role in shaping his legacy. Ongoing legal challenges by Republican-governed states and business groups are targeting Obama’s signature healthcare law, his plan to combat climate change, a key immigration initiative, his transgender rights policy, his “net neutrality” internet rules, overtime pay for workers and other matters. Most of the cases are awaiting rulings by trial judges or regional federal appeals courts and could be bound for the U.S. Supreme Court, but are unlikely to get there until after the winner of Tuesday’s election, pitting Democrat Hillary Clinton against Republican Donald Trump, is sworn in. Unless the U.S. Senate changes course and confirms Obama’s nominee, appellate court judge Merrick Garland, to fill the vacant ninth seat on the ideologically split Supreme Court, the next president would be responsible for selecting a new justice who could cast the deciding vote in these cases. The Supreme Court has already agreed to decide a major transgender rights case. Obama’s administration is backing a female-born transgender high school student named Gavin Grimm, who identifies as male and sued in 2015 to win the right to use the school’s boys’ bathroom. A ruling, which also could resolve similar litigation around the country, is not due until the end of June. In another transgender rights case, a number of states challenged the Obama administration’s May guidance to public schools nationwide to let transgender students use bathrooms of their choice. A federal judge blocked the policy in August while the litigation continues. Because Obama during much of his presidency has faced a Republican-controlled Congress hostile to his legislative initiatives, he has often bypassed lawmakers and used executive power to advance policy goals. “Despite having majorities in both houses of Congress, Republicans have refused to govern. Instead, this litigious Republican Party has rushed to the courts with partisan lawsuits,” White House spokesman Eric Schultz said. Those challenging Obama have vowed to fight on unless his successor changes course. “Should a new administration rescind those policies and respect the bounds placed before it, we will happily direct our energies elsewhere,” added Republican Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton, who has helped spearhead various legal challenges to Obama. Clinton, backed by Obama in her White House bid, could be expected to leave in place or even expand on his initiatives and to defend them in court. Trump, if elected, could quickly reverse Obama executive orders as promised. But undoing large-scale regulations like power plant emissions rules could be more complicated. “It’s not at the stroke of a pen,” said Sean Donahue, a lawyer representing environmental groups that backed Obama administration climate rules known as the Clean Power Plan. Trump would have to undergo a new, lengthy rule-making process, according to legal experts. The case with the biggest potential long-term impact is the challenge by states and industry groups to Obama’s Clean Power Plan, which would curb greenhouse emissions mainly from coal-fired power plants. The rules are an important legacy issue for Obama. They also are vital to U.S. obligations under last year’s international climate change treaty. A federal appeals court heard oral arguments in September. A ruling is not due for months. The case is likely to go to the Supreme Court on appeal. The Supreme Court put the regulations on hold in February while the litigation continues. Republicans and conservative groups have launched numerous challenges to the 2010 Affordable Care Act, known as Obamacare. The Supreme Court in 2012 and 2015 issued rulings preserving Obama’s top legislative achievement. Now, another Republican-led legal challenge is making its way through the courts. The administration has appealed a district court judge’s May decision that the federal government cannot spend billions of dollars to provide subsidies under Obamacare to help individuals buy policies from private insurers without congressional approval. Separately, the administration is seeking in federal court in Texas to revive Obama’s 2014 executive action to protect millions of immigrants in the country illegally from deportation and give them work permits. The plan, challenged by Texas and other states, has been barred by the courts. The Supreme Court, split 4-4, in June left in place lower court orders blocking the plan, and in October declined to revisit that ruling. Other Obama regulations have been targeted by business groups. A federal appeals court in June upheld Obama’s landmark “net neutrality” rules barring internet service providers from obstructing or slowing down consumer access to web content. The case remains under appeal. In September, states and business groups filed a legal challenge to an administration rule to extend mandatory overtime pay to millions of workers. A ruling is not due until after Obama leaves office. Graphic: Courts weigh Obama legacy - here | 0fake |
Obama signs North Korea sanctions bill into law: White House | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama on Thursday signed into law legislation broadening sanctions to punish North Korea for its nuclear program, human rights record and cyber crimes, the White House said. | 0fake |
U.S. sanctions individuals, entities for Iran-linked counterfeiting | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Treasury Department on Monday sanctioned a network of individuals and companies it said counterfeited Yemeni bank notes potentially worth hundreds of millions of dollars for Iran Revolutionary Guard s Qods Force. The network circumvented European export restrictions in order to provide the counterfeiting supplies and equipment, according to a Treasury statement. President Donald Trump last month declared Iran s Revolutionary Guard a supporter of terrorism and authorized Treasury to impose tough sanctions limiting its access to goods and funding. Republican Trump has been critical of the 2015 agreement his predecessor, former President Barack Obama, a Democrat, reached with Iran and said the United States must take stronger steps to ensure the country does not acquire nuclear weapons. The counterfeiting scheme exposed the deep levels of deception that the Qods Force, a Revolutionary Guard unit carrying out missions outside the country, employs against companies in Europe, governments in the Gulf, and the rest of the world to support its destabilizing activities, said Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin. According to Treasury, Pardavesh Tasvir Rayan Co. is a printing operation controlled by businessman Reza Heidari and owned by Tejarat Almas Mobin Holding that procured equipment and materials to print counterfeit Yemeni rial bank notes. Qods Force used the currency to support its activities. Heidari used front companies and other methods to keep European suppliers in the dark about their ultimate customer. He coordinated with Mahmoud Seif, Tejarat s managing director, on the logistics of procuring materials and moving them into Iran, Treasury said. Treasury sanctioned both men and both companies, as well as ForEnt Technik GmbH, which Heidari owns, and Printing Trade Center GmbH for serving as front companies in the operation. | 0fake |
Why Do Hillary And Barack Choose Islam Over Christianity Every Time? | The always brilliant Ben Shapiro answers that question in well, a brilliant way On Tuesday, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the American woman most responsible for the current refugee crisis in the Middle East, blasted Republicans for not wanting to accept unvetted Syrian Muslim refugees in the aftermath of last week s Paris terror attacks.She tweeted:We've seen a lot of hateful rhetoric from the GOP. But the idea that we'd turn away refugees because of religion is a new low. -H Hillary Clinton (@HillaryClinton) November 17, 2015 This, to be sure, is odd. Hillary decrying hateful rhetoric smacks of irony she despises Republicans so much that she labeled them her enemies during the first Demoratic debate. Furthermore, Hillary is no fighter for religious freedom. In April, she told the Women in the World Summit that deep-seated cultural codes, religious beliefs and structural biases have to be changed to allow for abortion. And in the aftermath of the Supreme Court s egregious same-sex marriage decision in June, Hillary explicitly called for the government to force churches to sanction homosexuality, explaining, Our work won t be finished until every American can not only marry, but live, work, pray, learn and raise a family free from discrimination and prejudice. Pray as in attend church free from discrimination and prejudice. But she s sure hot and bothered about what she terms discrimination against Muslim refugees. This isn t particularly surprising the entire left has a peculiar soft spot for Islam.That seems weird, given Islamic countries fundamental rejection of leftist values ranging from same-sex marriage to abortion to women driving. But it isn t so weird when considered in the context of Marxist philosophy, which sees Islam not as a religious philosophy of its own, but as a sort of bizarre cultural outgrowth of poverty. Impoverished people believe weird things, say the Marxists; if we just gave ISIS jobs, they d stop all this nonsense and start behaving like members of the ACLU. Leftists see Islam not as an ideological force converting millions, but as a knee-jerk response to lack of basic living standards.In fact, leftists see all religion this way: as the refuge of the weakminded underclass. As Marx wrote, Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people. Barack Obama agrees: as he said back in 2008, poor people get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren t like them. The view that all religious practice is essentially the domain of the exploited would cut in favor of seeing all religious practices as equally worthy of dismissal.But the left prefers Islam to Christianity. They ll fight against anyone drawing pictures of Mohammed, but they ll lose their minds if Christians complain about an artist soaking a statue of Jesus in urine.Why do leftists treat Christianity and Islam differently, if both are merely chimerical responses to the vicissitudes of life? Because leftists see Christianity as the creator of Islam s rise, and Christians as the victimizers of Muslims. The Obama State Department won t recognize Christians as victims of incipient Muslim genocide in the Middle East, but President Obama will equate ISIS violence in 2015 with the Crusades and the Spanish Inquisition. President Obama believes, like many on the left, that Western civilization was founded in racism, sexism, homophobia, and other bigotry and that Christianity, as its wellspring, provided that impetus.Furthermore, Obama believes that Western civilization has exploited the rest of the world, and that it therefore bears culpability for the poverty that gave rise to the Islamic wave. Muslims are benighted victims of poverty; Christianity made them victims of poverty in the first place. Christianity thus bears blood guilt for the sins of Islam, but Islam bears none of its own. As Dinesh D Souza puts it, Obama is an anti-colonialist and believes that the rich countries got rich by looting the poor countries, and that within the rich countries, plutocratic and corporate elites continue to exploit ordinary citizens. Taken one step further, those rich countries Christian countries exploited non-Christian countries, impoverishing them and opening them to the opium of Islam.How else to explain the left s romance with Islam and simultaneous dismissal of Christianity? How else to explain the left s preoccupation with allowing Muslim refugees into the Christianity-founded West while demanding nothing of Islamic countries which are murdering Christians en masse?Hillary Clinton says it s hateful for Western countries to discriminate in choosing refugees based on religious philosophy. It s far more hateful to suggest that Christianity must bow and scrape before Islam, particularly when Islamic terrorists target non-Muslims the world over. Via: Breitbart News | 1real |
LOVE HIM OR HATE HIM…HERE ARE 7 WAYS TRUMP HELPS THE SPINELESS GOP | The GOP doesn t know it yet, but they need Trump more than he needs them Donald Trump will not be the Republican presidential nominee in 2016. He does not have the infrastructure, he does not have the organization, he does not have the discipline. So why are so many Republican ThoughtLeaders intent on casting him from the race like a leper?Why does Senator Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) say that Trump should be disqualified from the race? Why does Governor Rick Perry (R-TX) say that Trump is a cancer on conservatism that must be discarded, a barking carnival act ? Why does Senator Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) deride Trump s supporters as crazies, while the rest of the Republican establishment nods silently?Is any of this smart?The answer, of course, is no. Alienating Trump s voting base will lead Trump to run third party, destroying any opportunity for Republicans to beat Hillary Clinton. Establishment characters calling curses from the heavens down upon Trump grants him credibility with the same group of conservatives who believe that establishment attacks are a badge of honor. If those conservatives feel Trump is treated unfairly, it will widen the gap between the donors in the Republican Party and the base of the Republican Party.Republicans should, instead, see Trump s presence in the race as a grand opportunity. That s because it is an opportunity. Here are seven reasons why:Trump Is A Stalking Horse. Let s imagine that you could design a candidate who would draw nearly 100% of the media attention at the beginning of a race, long before polls mattered or primaries were scheduled to take place. Let s also imagine that this candidate had no real shot at winning any of those primaries, and that the candidate would eventually either blow himself out or fade away after the curiosity factor worked its way through the public system. Wouldn t you, as a rival candidate, beg for such a candidate to enter the race? After all, it would give you the ability to raise money quietly, do grassroots work without media scrutiny; it would force the media to lavish its attention on your rivals across the political aisle while spending their focus on this Big Name Candidate. That candidate is Trump. According to polls from Colorado, Iowa, and Virginia this week, Hillary Clinton loses to Rubio, Governor Scott Walker (R-WI), and former Governor Jeb Bush (R-FL). Does that happen if the media spend all their time and effort debunking those three candidates? Or does it happen because the media are so distracted by Trump that the other three get an opportunity to fly under the radar? Barack Obama was able to use Hillary Clinton s high name recognition in 2008 to fly under the radar all the way to the nomination; by the time Hillary tried to define him, it was too late. Other Republicans could do the same here.Trump Generates Attention. Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani recently pointed out, Trump is in that debate, it s going to get three times the audience. That s exactly right. Primary debates aren t exclusively designed to help Republicans pick their candidate the debates are also designed to allow future general election voters to get first impressions of the other candidates. The more direct contact between voters and candidates without the filter of the media, the better. Furthermore, Republicans have been caught in the vice of media malpractice when it comes to issues like illegal immigration: the media won t cover such issues unless a Republican makes a mistake, in which case the cameras descend en masse. Trump solves that conundrum: he says outrageous things, the media show up, and the other candidates get a chance to speak rationally on topics the media nearly always ignore. Never underestimate the benefit of someone who can bring busloads of media down to Laredo, Texas just to listen to him talk.Trump Draws Contrast With Other Candidates. So, you don t like Trump. Then you should love Trump in the race, given that he offers the greatest opportunity to his rivals to draw a contrast. Senator Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) is charmless and vanilla as a politician and even he has become likeable in response to Trump. If Governor Rick Perry (R-TX) seeks to become a beloved figure in mainstream media circles, all he has to do is continue to attack Trump. If Jeb Bush doesn t like Trump s position on immigration, Trump provides him a painless opportunity for a Sister Souljah moment. Free debate is the essence of primary season. Embrace it, or fall to the power of Trump.Trump Attacks The Media. In 2012, Newt Gingrich played the designated anti-media attack dog. He did it well, and he did it effectively: it moved him to the top of the polls. Trump does the same now. He has rhetorically punched members of the media ranging from CNN s Anderson Cooper to MSNBC and Telemundo s Jose Diaz Balart. He seems uncowed by media pressure in fact, he embraces it. Were Trump not attacking the media, someone else would have to do it. Thankfully, other Republicans like Carly Fiorina have jumped on the anti-media bandwagon, and are punching just as effectively or even more effectively than The Donald.Trump Channels Anger. Republicans seem pathologically fearful of the anger of their base. Taught by the media that angry white men cannot fuel a party, they instead insist that they will out-compassion the left, a foolhardy proposition given that the left s only calling card is compassion. Never mind that the left has consistently fueled its campaigns with rage against George W. Bush, white privilege, sexism, and other built-up monsters. The right has internalized criticisms that it must never humor the justified anger of its base. Not Trump. Trump embraces the feeling of frustration from the base, and does so in unapologetic fashion. That unapologetic nature is attractive to conservatives who feel as though they have elected Republicans, then watched those same Republicans surrender again and again. Other Republicans should watch Trump s outrage-channeling and take notes.Trump Doesn t Buy Into Foolish Demographic Arguments. For years, the establishment Republicans have been telling the base to shut up on immigration; if they don t, the argument goes, then Hispanics will vote heavily Democrat, shutting Republicans out of political power. Immediately after the 2012 election, for example, Charles Krauthammer wrote, They should be a natural Republican constituency: striving immigrant community, religious, Catholic, family-oriented and socially conservative (on abortion, for example). The principle reason they go Democratic is the issue of illegal immigrants. This is nonsense. Hispanic immigrants lean heavily left on most major issues. More importantly, running from the immigration issue, and thereby alienating the Republican base, doesn t move Republicans closer to victory: Mitt Romney could have won 69 percent of the Hispanic vote in 2012 and still have lost. Romney lost not because Hispanics didn t vote his way, but because white turnout was too low, and because he didn t drive outsized turnout from Evangelical Christians, among others. As Sean Trende of RealClearPolitics told Politico today, Certainly the GOP shouldn t be antagonistic to Hispanics, but the big question is how much outreach should they do before they start to turn off working-class white voters. Because from an Electoral College numbers perspective, the net gain in embracing some form of immigration reform just isn t there. Trump Doesn t Suck Money Out Of The Race. For all the talk of Trump as a distraction, he certainly doesn t suck money out of the Republican race: in his last FEC filing, filed last week, Trump had drawn just over 60 donors. He s self-funding.Trump is doing a lot of good for the Republican Party in terms of exposure, media misdirection, and issue-raising; he s firing up the base, allowing his opponents to draw contrasts with him, and he s doing it all without tapping out those who want to give cash. If Republicans can t beat him, what chance do they have of touching Hillary Clinton? They ought to stop whining and start taking notes or at least making hay while the media sun shines on The Donald.Via: Ben Shapiro Brietbart News | 1real |
Iran summons Swiss envoy over U.S.' 'irresponsible' missile claim: Tasnim | ANKARA (Reuters) - Iran summoned the Swiss ambassador on Tuesday to condemn what it called an irresponsible claim by the U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. that Tehran supplied a missile fired at Saudi Arabia from Yemen on Nov. 4, Iran s Tasnim news agency reported. The Swiss embassy represents U.S. interests in Tehran, where Washington has had no mission since 1980, when Iranian students took 52 Americans hostage for 444 days. Iran s strong protest at (Nikki) Haley s baseless and provocative claim was conveyed to the Swiss ambassador, Foreign Ministry spokesman Bahram Qasemi was quoted as saying by Tasnim. | 0fake |
Republican Party chairman calls meeting with Trump a step toward unity | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus said a meeting on Thursday with presumptive presidential nominee Donald Trump and U.S. House Speaker Paul Ryan was a step toward unifying the divided Republican Party. “The meeting was great. It was a very positive step toward party unity,” Priebus posted on Twitter after the meeting. | 0fake |
North Korea says rockets to U.S. 'inevitable' as U.S. bombers fly off North Korean coast | UNITED NATIONS/WASHINGTON (Reuters) - North Korea said on Saturday targeting the U.S. mainland with its rockets was inevitable after Mr. Evil President Donald Trump called Pyongyang s leader rocket man , further escalating rhetoric over the North s nuclear weapons and missile programs. North Korean Foreign Minister Ri Yong Ho s remarks to the United Nations General Assembly came hours after U.S. Air Force B-1B Lancer bombers escorted by fighters flew in international airspace over waters east of North Korea in a show of force the Pentagon said showed the range of military options available to Trump. Ri s speech capped a week of rising tensions between Washington and Pyongyang, with Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un trading insults. Trump called Kim a madman on Friday, a day after Kim dubbed him a mentally deranged U.S. dotard. On Saturday, the mudslinging continued with Ri calling Trump a mentally deranged person full of megalomania and complacency who is trying to turn the United Nations into a gangsters nest . Ri said Trump himself was on a suicide mission after the U.S. president had said Kim was on such a mission. President Evil is holding the seat of the U.S. President, Ri said, warning that Pyongyang was ready to defend itself if the United States showed any sign of conducting a decapitating operation on our headquarters or military attack against our country . Now we are finally only a few steps away from the final gate of completion of the state nuclear force, Ri told the annual gathering of world leaders. He said sanctions would have no effect on Pyongyang s resolve to develop its nuclear weapons, with the ultimate goal being balance of power with the U.S. Trump announced new U.S. sanctions on Thursday that he said allow targeting of companies and institutions that finance and facilitate trade with North Korea. Earlier this month the U.N. Security Council unanimously adopted its ninth round of sanctions on Pyongyang to counter its nuclear and ballistic missiles programs. The U.S. bombers flight was the farthest north of the demilitarized zone separating North and South Korea that any U.S. fighter jet or bomber has flown in the 21st century, the Pentagon said. This mission is a demonstration of U.S. resolve and a clear message that the President has many military options to defeat any threat, said Pentagon spokeswoman Dana White. We are prepared to use the full range of military capabilities to defend the U.S. homeland and our allies. North Korea has launched dozens of missiles this year, several flying over Japan, as it accelerates its program aimed at enabling it to target the United States with a nuclear-tipped missile. Pyongyang conducted its sixth and largest nuclear test on Sept. 3 and has threatened to test a hydrogen bomb over the Pacific. Ri met with U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres after delivering his speech. Guterres expressed concern to Ri over the escalating tensions and appealed for de-escalation, the United Nations said in a statement. The Pentagon said the B-1B bombers came from Guam and their U.S. Air Force F-15C Eagle fighter escorts came from Okinawa, Japan. Previous shows of force with bombers have stayed south of the demilitarized zone. The patrols came after officials and experts said a small earthquake near North Korea s nuclear test site on Saturday was probably not man-made, easing fears Pyongyang had exploded another nuclear bomb just weeks after its last one. China s Earthquake Administration said the quake was not a nuclear explosion and had the characteristics of a natural tremor. The CTBTO, or Comprehensive Test-Ban Treaty Organization, which monitors nuclear tests, and officials of the South Korean meteorological agency also said they believed it was a natural quake. The earthquake, which South Korea s Meteorological Agency put at magnitude 3.0, was detected 49 km from Kilju in North Hamgyong Province, where North Korea s known Punggye-ri nuclear site is located, the official said. All North Korea s nuclear tests registered as earthquakes of magnitude 4.3 or above. The last registered as a magnitude 6.3. Tensions have continued to rise around the Korean Peninsula since Pyongyang carried out its sixth test, prompting a new round of U.N. sanctions. Trump told the United Nations on Tuesday the United States would totally destroy North Korea if it threatened the United States or its allies. North Korea s nuclear tests to date have all been underground, and experts say an atmospheric test, which would be the first since one by China in 1980, would be proof of the success of its weapons program. The United States and South Korea are technically still at war with North Korea because the 1950-53 Korean conflict ended with a truce and not a peace treaty. The North accuses the United States, which has 28,500 troops in South Korea, of planning to invade and regularly threatens to destroy it and its Asian allies. (For graphic on Nuclear North Korea, click tmsnrt.rs/2lE5yjF) (For graphic on a tally of nuclear tests, click tmsnrt.rs/2xWf6jA) | 0fake |
FATHER OF STUDENT Released From N. Korean Prison Slams Obama…Uses ONE WORD To Describe President Trump That Will Make Liberals Cringe [VIDEO] | Another consequence of weak leadership NYP The father of the American who was recently sent home from North Korea praised the Trump administration on Thursday after his son was released and said the Obama administration s results speak for themselves. Fred Warmbier spoke to the media about his son Otto s comatose state and imprisonment by the North Korean regime.After thanking Sen. Rob Portman (R., Ohio) for his support and assistance, Warmbier recounted how his son was freed. When Otto was first taken, we were advised by the past administration to take a low profile while they worked to obtain his release, Warmbier said. We did so without result. Earlier this year, Cindy and I decided the time for strategic patience was over, and we made a few media appearances and traveled to Washington to meet with Ambassador Joe Yun at the State Department. He said it was his understanding that Ambassador Yun, at the direction of President Donald Trump, aggressively pursued resolution of the situation. They have our thanks for bringing Otto home, he said.He described his son s return as bittersweet. Relief that Otto is now home in arms of those who love him and anger that he was so brutally treated for so long, he said.Warmbier also said he received a phone call from President Trump late Wednesday that he described as kind. The last thing liberals want to hear the father of Otto Warbmier is that he was grateful for President Trump s help in bringing his son home or that he would describe him as being kind. WFB Warmbier had this to say about the North Korean regime at a news conference at Wyoming High School where Otto graduated in 2013 as class salutatorian: They are a pariah regime They re brutal and terroristic. The University of Virginia student returned to Ohio late Tuesday and hospitalized after being detained for 18 months in the Hermit Kingdom after being convicted of stealing a propaganda poster from a hotel.His father said he is stable, but has suffered a severe neurological injury. Warmbier took questions from the media, including from one reporter who asked more about the Obama administration s handling of Otto s imprisonment. You thanked President Trump and then you also said that the past administration didn t do enough, so do you feel like then-President Obama should have been doing more to help? the reporter asked.After restating the question for other reporters who could not hear it, Warmbier gave a quick answer. The question was, do I think the past administration could have done more? I think the results speak for themselves, Warmbier said.Watch: | 1real |
Britain's U.S. ambassador discussed Trump retweets with senior White House staff: source | LONDON (Reuters) - Britain’s ambassador to the United States discussed a row over retweets sent by President Donald Trump with senior White House officials on Wednesday, a British government source said on Thursday. The source, who asked not to be named due to the sensitivity of the issue, did not give further details of the discussion. Trump has sparked outrage in Britain’s political establishment with a sharp rebuke of Prime Minister Theresa May on Twitter after she criticised him for retweeting British far-right anti-Islam videos. | 0fake |
Western Banking System COLLAPSE | Jim Willie | Podcast: Play in new window | Download
The western banking system is broken. With U.S. treasuries selling off, the banking system will be caught on the wrong side of the trade when it comes to derivatives on interest rate swaps. As the U.S. banks collapse, get ready for foreign banks to take their place. This and much more with a viewers’ questions edition of the Silver Doctors’ podcast with the one and only Dr. Jim Willie!
CLICK HERE to SUBSCRIBE for free to the Silver Doctors’ YouTube channel so you do not miss part 3! | 1real |
Pope Francis delivers message of 'hope and healing' in address to Congress | Pope Francis, in the first-ever papal address to a Joint Meeting of Congress, delivered a simple but passionate plea for humanity -- urging lawmakers to protect "every human life" and calling for a united response of "hope and healing, of peace and justice" for a world racked by violence and unrest.
Speaking at the center of American power Thursday morning, the pontiff tackled urgent topics spanning immigration, family, the death penalty, climate change, extremism, religious freedom and the refugee crisis. Specifically, he joined American bishops in urging the abolition of capital punishment, and said Congress has a "role to play" in addressing global warming.
But he also issued a broader and more fundamental appeal, saying lawmakers are tasked with pursuing the "common good," and citing the "Golden Rule" as a starting point for how countries should respond to all these challenges.
"The rule points us in a clear direction," he said, after receiving loud applause and a standing ovation.
Francis cited the "Golden Rule" while discussing immigration and the refugee crisis and in making a reference to abortion, a subtle theme during the address.
"The Golden Rule also reminds us of our responsibility to protect and defend human life at every stage of its development," he said, after earlier urging policymakers to use the law to protect "the image and likeness fashioned by God on every human life." Touching on the marriage debate, Francis also said he's concerned about "the family," and said "fundamental relationships are being called into question, as is the very basis of marriage and the family."
Looking beyond social issues, though, the pope bluntly addressed religious violence and the refugee crisis that has resulted. While urging the world to safeguard religious freedom, he warned Thursday of rising "fundamentalism" of all kinds.
"Our world is facing a refugee crisis of a magnitude not seen since the Second World War," the pope said, while referencing immigration to the U.S. as well. "... We must not be taken aback by their numbers, but rather view them as persons, seeing their faces and listening to their stories, trying to respond as best we can to their situation. To respond in a way which is always humane, just and fraternal. We need to avoid a common temptation nowadays: to discard whatever proves troublesome."
After speaking in the House chamber, Francis visited the Capitol's Statuary Hall and its statue of Father Junipero Serra, the 18th-century missionary whom Francis elevated to sainthood Wednesday in the first canonization on U.S. soil. He then briefly stepped out onto a Capitol balcony to address the cheering crowds on the West Front.
"Thank you very much, and God bless America," he said in English to the crowd, and waved.
Even in a chamber accustomed to receiving foreign dignitaries, the pontiff's historic address stirred an energy and enthusiasm rarely seen at the Capitol, with huge crowds showing up outside to catch a glimpse of him and some lawmakers inside showing up early for a good spot -- despite a warning from leaders to refrain from trying to shake the pope's hand.
Several lawmakers, including House Speaker John Boehner, were visibly emotional during the pope's visit and address. Boehner also met briefly with the pope before he took the podium. The House chamber was packed with Supreme Court justices, Cabinet officials, diplomats, lawmakers and their guests.
During his address, the pope said, "Our efforts must aim at restoring hope, righting wrongs, maintaining commitments, and thus promoting the well-being of individuals and of peoples."
Francis also declared during the address that he sides with U.S. bishops calling for the abolition of the death penalty, saying he believes in "rehabilitation." The pontiff who has been outspoken on the issue of climate change also said the "environmental challenge we are undergoing and its human roots concern and affect us all." He said the U.S. and Congress "have an important role to play."
Some of his strongest remarks, toward the end of his address, concerned the arms trade. "Why are deadly weapons being sold to those who plan to inflict untold suffering?" he asked. "Sadly, the answer ... is simply for money, money that is drenched in blood." He said "it is our duty to confront the problem and to stop the arms trade."
The address was one of the pope's last engagements in Washington before leaving for New York on his three-city visit to America that also includes Philadelphia.
He spoke at the dais where the president delivers the annual State of the Union address and monarchs and heads of state have addressed Congress. Behind sat Vice President Joe Biden and Boehner, R-Ohio, the first and second in line to the presidency, both Catholics.
Ahead of Francis' remarks lawmakers of both parties busily sought political advantage from his stances, with Democrats in particular delighting in his support for action to overhaul immigration laws and combat global warming and income inequality. One House Republican back-bencher announced plans to boycott the speech over Francis' activist position on climate change, which the pontiff renewed alongside President Obama on Wednesday.
But Boehner, a former altar boy who invited Francis to speak after trying unsuccessfully to bring his two immediate predecessors, John Paul II and Benedict XVI, to the Capitol, has dismissed concerns that the politically engaged Francis would stir the controversies of the day.
"The pope transcends all of this," Boehner said.
For Congress and Boehner, the pope arrives at a moment of particular turmoil, with a partial government shutdown looming next week unless lawmakers can resolve a dispute over funding for Planned Parenthood related to the group's practice of providing fetal tissue for research. For members of Congress, his visit may prove little more than a brief respite from their partisan warfare, offering moments of unusual solemnity, uplift and pomp, but without fundamentally shifting the intractable gears of the U.S. political system.
After visiting St. Patrick's Catholic Church and the Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of Washington, the pope will depart later Thursday for New York for more prayer services and a speech to the United Nations.
Separately, Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, who is battling cancer, said he received a blessing from the pope Thursday. The blessing reportedly was given during the event at the Catholic Charities of Washington.
"It was an incredible honor to meet His Holiness Pope Francis today in Washington and receive his blessings on behalf of all cancer patients," Hogan wrote on Facebook. "My faith, like the faith of countless other patients like me, gives me strength to defeat this disease, and continue to be the best public steward I can be for the people of this great state."
Fox News' Chad Pergram and The Associated Press contributed to this report. | 0fake |
Ben Carson Goes Off Teleprompter And Invokes Satan In CRAZY RNC Speech (VIDEO) | Tuesday night, retired neurosurgeon and former GOP presidential candidate Ben Carson delivered an unusual speech at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland.Carson, one of Trump s biggest (and worst) supporters, arrived on stage with far more energy than he usually has (he actually looked awake) and launched into a predictable attack on Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton. He encouraged Republicans to dispel the notion that a Hillary Clinton administration wouldn t be that bad, and said: It won t be four or eight years because she will be appointing people who will have an effect on generations, and America may never recover from that. But then things got really weird. Carson accused Clinton of idolizing liberal radical Saul Alinsky, who according to Carson is somebody who acknowledges Lucifer in his book Rules For Radicals. Of course, no Republican s speech is ever complete without some bizarre, over-the-top religious reference, so it probably wasn t too shocking that Carson said: Are we willing to elect as president someone who has as their role model somebody who acknowledges Lucifer? If we continue to allow (secular progressives) to take God out of our lives, God will remove himself from us. We will not be blessed and our nation will go down the tubes We don t want that to happen. If that accusation seemed strange or out of place, that s because it wasn t supposed to happen. Carson had derailed and gone completely off the teleprompter for that part of the speech, according to several reporters at the convention.Carson s main point, somewhere within his baffling rant, was that America shouldn t be standing behind a presidential candidate that loves Satan. And further proving to America that he s still batsh*t crazy, Carson actually tried to make the argument that Trump could be America s savior because he understands that the blessings of this nation come with the responsibility to ensure that they are available to all, not just the privileged few. You can watch the speech below, courtesy of CNN:Featured image via screen capture | 1real |
U.N. Security Council condemns excessive violence in Myanmar | UNITED NATIONS (Reuters) - The United Nations Security Council expressed deep concern on Wednesday about violence in Myanmar s Rakhine state, where about 400,000 Rohingya Muslims have been forced to flee to Bangladesh. In a statement, the 15-member council expressed concern about reports of excessive violence during the security operations and called for immediate steps to end the violence in Rakhine, de-escalate the situation, re-establish law and order, ensure the protection of civilians. British U.N. Ambassador Matthew Rycroft said it was the first time in nine years the council had agreed a statement on Myanmar. | 0fake |
Border Patrol Agents Arrest Smuggler After Rollover Crash | Border Patrol agents from the Yuma and El Centro Sectors teamed up to arrest a human smuggler. The suspect fled and eventually crashed — rolling the vehicle and injuring his passengers. [At about 4:25 a. m. on January 16, the agents observed six illegal aliens scale the international boundary fence located by a plant in southern California, information obtained by Breitbart Texas from U. S. Customs and Border Protection officials revealed. The illegal entry was detected and witnessed by agents utilizing a monitoring camera system. The six migrants climbed into a white Acura Integra alongside Interstate 8. The responding agents observed the suspected smuggler driving eastbound on the interstate. The driver of the white Acura suddenly took the Greys Well exit and abruptly under an overpass. One of the agents from the Yuma Sector attempted to stop the Acura. The driver failed to yield and sped off. The agents from the Yuma Sector and the Calexico Stations eventually lost sight of the suspect’s vehicle. A continued search revealed the suspect had lost control of his car and rolled over. While the driver of the Acura refused medical attention, the six illegal aliens were transported to an area hospital. The migrants sustained minor, threatening injuries. The driver, a U. S. citizen, was arrested and could face prosecution for human smuggling. The six illegal immigrants were turned over to the Yuma Sector agents. They will be processed according to the guidelines of the Yuma Sector, CBP officials stated. While the illegal aliens were able to scale the fence near the plant, technology enabled agents respond tactically. The use of fencing and camera technology enables agents to more efficiently be dispatched to actual illegal border crossings and drug smuggling incidents. Bob Price serves as associate editor and senior political news contributor for Breitbart Texas. He is a founding member of the Breitbart Texas team. Follow him on Twitter @BobPriceBBTX. | 0fake |
WATCH: Donald Trump Is OBSESSED With His Desire To Use Nuclear Weapons | The prospect of Donald Trump becoming president just got a whole lot scarier.The Republican nominee has been receiving foreign policy briefings, which almost certainly include information on the places in the world that are hostile towards the United States.But the only solution Trump cares about pursuing is one that would unleash nuclear war upon the globe.According to Trump s once upon a time BFF Joe Scarborough, the Republican nominee repeatedly asked the foreign policy expert briefing him why America just doesn t use nukes to wipe out our enemies or anyone else who disagrees with us. Three times he asked about the use of nuclear weapons, Scarborough reported on MSNBC on Wednesday morning. Three times he asked, at one point, If we have them, why can t we use them? That s one of the reasons he doesn t have foreign policy experts around. And even more frightening is that if Trump happened to somehow become president, he could order a strike as soon as he is inaugurated without debate or approval from Congress. The system is designed for speed and decisiveness, it s not designed to debate the decision, former CIA Director Michael Hayden informed Scarborough when asked if Trump could be stopped from starting a nuclear apocalypse. Hayden also said that Trump being so erratic is also of great concern to national security.Here s the video via Twitter.This seems big: From @Morning_Joe: 3 times during a natsec briefing Trump asked Why can t we use nuclear weapons? https://t.co/voJ0RlgnCw Glenn Thrush (@GlennThrush) August 3, 2016This proves that Donald Trump is the greatest threat to our country right now. He is in position right now to destroy America from within by starting World War III with nuclear bombs.And this isn t the first time Trump has talked about using nuclear weapons. During an interview with Chris Matthews Trump refused to rule out using nuclear weapons in Europe and the Middle East. The fact that he is now seriously asking about using nuclear weapons should frighten every American and the entire world.Let s not forget that the Republican Party is responsible for making Trump the leader of their party. They built this. So they should be horrifyingly reminded that if we fire nukes at a country, someone is likely going to fire them back at us.Featured Image: CNN | 1real |
It Begins! Ten Kushner Scandals: Media Ramp Up Attacks on President’s Democrat Manhattanite Son-in-Law | If Jared Kushner did not realize that the establishment press and Democrats will never give him or President Donald Trump a free ride after Democrats politicized Trump’s firing of FBI Director James Comey, he is now learning how viciously the antagonistic press can pile on when seeking to destroy their opposition. And it looks like the establishment media are just getting started. [After the Washington Post named Kushner as the “person of interest” in the FBI’s Russia investigation, Kushner, in just a matter of days, as Fox News’s Howard Kurtz wrote, “has become the media’s biggest target — that is, right after his . ” Kushner may have thought firing Comey would be a “win” for Trump because Democrats blamed Comey for costing Hillary Clinton the election. But the media never granted Trump a honeymoon period and will not give him automatic “wins” because they consider him an illegitimate outsider. And, as Kushner is finding out, because he is regarded as Trump’s top adviser, Kushner will always be in the media’s crosshairs no matter how much he tries to “moderate” Trump or court and charm the media. After media outlets initially reported that a White House official in Trump’s inner circle was a “person of interest” in the FBI’s Russia investigation, the Washington Post last Friday dropped a supposed “bombshell” report naming Kushner as the “person of interest” who allegedly wanted a “back channel” to communicate with Russian officials. But as Breitbart Joel Pollak noted, nothing in the Post’s article was new: “The meeting with Kislyak was reported nearly three months ago. The meeting with the banker was reported two months ago. And stories about a potential ‘back channel’ were reported almost two months ago. ” In fact, Kushner is reportedly not even a “target” of the investigation. There is also no smoking gun proving Kushner colluded with Russia or did anything illegal, for that matter, as former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper emphasized on Sunday. But the media have treated Kushner, like they do with nearly every Republican who does not have favored status with them, as if he is guilty until proven innocent. The establishment press have largely brushed aside the notion that Kushner may have wanted to set up the “back channel” to discuss Syria policy, especially if he feared that the Obama administration may have been spying on Trump’s campaign team. Fox News reported that the idea for a “back channel” was not even Kushner’s idea in the first place. The media have also downplayed the fact that Russians often embellish things to engage in disinformation campaigns. Take CNN’s report, based on leaks from two anonymous former intelligence officials and even a congressional source, about the Russians having potentially “derogatory” information on Trump and his top aides. CNN reported that the Russians believed they had “leverage” on Trump’s inner circle, especially regarding financial issues. It is only until after the sensational claims are made that the outlet points out that this information “could have been exaggerated or even made up” because “the Russians could be overstating” things. There are certainly more questions that need to be answered — like whether Kushner met with Russian banker Sergey Gorkov as a representative of his private company or as a representative of Trump’s transition team. But the controversy surrounding Kushner, which the media have ginned up with their anonymous leakers from the Deep State intent on undermining Trump, has given the media an excuse to damage Kushner politically. As if the media had many of these stories in their back pockets for the perfect time, the media immediately blitzed Kushner with an onslaught negative pieces. Here are ten ways the antagonistic press, with help from Deep State officials, have recently ganged up on Kushner. 1. Romney Redux: Kushner Depicted as Soulless Slumlord, The establishment media never investigated Obama’s top confidante and adviser Valerie Jarrett’s real estate holdings to depict her as a slumlord despite a body of evidence that was right in front of them. But nearly four months into Trump’s presidency, the media suddenly had the resources and the wherewithal to find former tenants who lived in Kushner’s properties to depict Trump’s as a seedy slumlord. ProPublica and the New York Times collaborated on an extensive story about Kushner’s real estate holdings and depicted Kushner as a seedy and greedy slumlord. The piece was titled, “The Beleaguered Tenants of ‘Kushnerville. ” They found former tenant Kamiia Warren, who reportedly moved out of her East Baltimore townhouse when a neighbor started acting strangely — like shouting through and banging on the walls at night, which often woke up her child. According to the report, “Warren sent a letter reporting the problem to the complex’s property manager” and “submitted the requisite form giving two months’ notice that she was transferring her Section 8 voucher — the federal subsidy that helped her pay the rent — elsewhere. The complex’s manager signed the form a week later, checking the line that read ‘The tenant gave notice in accordance with the lease. ’” Three years later, according to the report, she was sued for $3, 014. 08 by JK2 Westminster LLC, Kushner’s real estate company, and the lawsuit “claimed she owed the money for having left in advance of her lease’s expiration, though she had received written permission to leave. ” The establishment media are at their best when depicting Republicans (or even Democrats like Kushner who are now associated with Republicans) as heartless (see: Mitt Romney). The report points out that “Warren was raising three children alone while taking classes for a bachelor’s degree in health care administration” and paints Kushner and his associates as villains who preyed on an innocent single mother. According to the report, Warren lost her first appeal because “she did not have a copy of the form the manager had signed. The judge ruled against Warren, awarding JK2 Westminster the full sum it was seeking, plus court costs, attorney’s fees and interest that brought the judgment to nearly $5, 000. ” Kushner’s company has reportedly pursued such actions against “hundreds” of past tenants over the last five years. When Warren could not afford to pay the judgment, Kushner’s company “filed a request to garnish her wages from her elder care job. Five days earlier, Warren had gone to court to fill out a handwritten motion saying she had proof that she was given permission to leave Cove Village in 2010 — she had finally managed to get a copy from the housing department. ” But since she did not know that she had to attach a copy of her form to the motion, it was denied. Warren’s bank account was ultimately “zeroed out” and when she returned to court with all of the proper paperwork, her case was reportedly dismissed again without explanation. One of Kushner’s lawyers reportedly told her, “This is not going to go away. You will pay us. ” Soon after, according to the report, “the court sent notice of a $4, 615 lien against Warren. ” 2. Kushner Threw Trump Under Bus, Claimed Thinks GOP Base Is ‘Stupid’ When a former Kushner employee ( York Observer editor) claimed that Kushner once told her that Trump was promoting “birtherism” even though “he really doesn’t believe it” because “he knows Republicans are stupid and they’ll buy it,” the press jumped on the comments as proof that Trump is a “man with no real morals, no real beliefs, but who is willing to peddle any sort of hatred or monstrous thought if he thinks that it will help him toward the nebulous goal of ‘winning. ’” 3. Media Report Trump ‘Angry’ at Kushner, Relationship Showing ‘Unmistakable Signs of Strain’ Though Trump went on the record to publicly support Kushner, the media did their best to undercut Trump’s comments with stories about how Trump was losing confidence in Kushner’s judgment and political acumen. Trump explicitly told the New York Times that “Jared is doing a great job for the country” and “I have total confidence in him. He is respected by virtually everyone and is working on programs that will save our country billions of dollars. In addition to that, and perhaps more importantly, he is a very good person. ” Yet, media outlets pointed out that Trump was not that close to Kushner before Kushner joined his campaign and quoted anonymous sources who said that Trump has yelled at Kushner in recent meetings. The Times reported that Trump has even made snide and disparaging comments about Kushner’s family after Kushner’s sister reportedly tried to peddle her brother’s access in the White House and “dangled the availability of visas to the United States as an enticement for Chinese financiers willing to spend $500, 000 or more” to invest in Kushner’s real estate holdings. 4. Huffington Post: Marrying Ivanka on Calculating Kushner’s ‘Checklist’ to ‘Rehabilitate’ Family Name, According to the Huffington Post, “when Charles Kushner was heading to federal prison in 2005 for illegal campaign contributions, tax evasion and witness tampering, his son Jared got some advice from Howard Rubenstein ― the dean of New York damage control ― on how to rehabilitate the Kushner name, Charles would later tell a family friend”: Step one: Buy a New York newspaper. Don’t be too particular, Rubenstein told Jared, according to the family friend’s recounting of their conversation with Charles. Any newspaper will do. Step two: Buy a big Manhattan building. Any building will do. Step three: Marry the daughter of a rich New York family. Anyone will do. The Huffington Post notes that Jared Kushner “went on to do just that. He bought the New York Observer in 2006, made a $1. 8 billion purchase of 666 Fifth Ave. in 2007 and married Ivanka Trump in 2009. ” “Whether or not Kushner was indeed working through a checklist, his actions during those years have served him well,” the “story” points out. “They also laid the groundwork for the meticulous public relations strategy that has made possible Kushner’s current paradoxical role in the press, as a blameless yet uniquely powerful member of the Trump administration. ” Kushner’s spokesman reportedly denied the account and Rubenstein told the outlet that the account was “preposterous” and “I never said that or anything like that. ” But when it comes to making Trump’s look bad, such a story is too good for outlets like the Huffington Post not to print. 5. Former Kushner Employees Smear Jared: ‘Vindictive Sh*thead’ Media outlets who were uncurious for eight years about former employees of top Obama administration officials suddenly started interviewing former employees and editors of Kushner’s newspaper — the New York Observer. Of course, the media found those who were all too eager to smear Kushner. An “anonymous” editor described to the Washington Post that Kushner was insistent on getting a “hit job” on a banker who would not help Kushner refinance one of his buildings. Kushner was reportedly still upset when the paper’s editors — even after assigning three different reporters to find dirt on the banker — decided that “there’s no story there. ” Politico spoke to another former Kushner employee — Harleen Kahlon — who claimed that Kushner asked her to “take one for the team” and forego her performance bonus based on meeting “agreed upon metrics on page views and audience growth. ”: Kahlon abruptly quit. Ever since, whenever she sees him on TV or on the streets of New York, she points him out to people as: “the guy that stole my money. Just before the election, Kahlon described her former boss on Facebook thusly: “We’re talking about a guy who isn’t particularly bright or doesn’t actually know anything, has bought his way into everything ever (with money he got from his criminal father) who is deeply insecure and obsessed with fame (you don’t buy the NYO, marry Ivanka Trump, or constantly talk about the phone calls you get from celebrities if it’s in your nature to ‘shun the spotlight’) and who is basically a shithead. ” 6. Officials Claim Kushner Guilty of Espionage, May Even Be Russian Agent, Though Obama’s former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said that his “dashboard warning light was clearly on” when he found out about Kushner’s dealing with Russian agents, he emphasized that there is “no evidence of collusion. ” But the media rushed to get former Deep State officials who were all too eager to slam Kushner. Former intelligence agent Malcolm Nance suggested Kushner may be guilty of espionage and called for Kushner’s security clearance to be revoked immediately. Former double agent Naveed Jamali went as far to say he thought Kushner was actually a Russian agent, a comment which even shocked an MSNBC host. 7. Media Suggest Kushner Family Want to Profit off Trump Presidency, Media outlets hinted that Kushner and his family may be more interested in using Trump’s presidency to pad their bottom lines and enhancing their images. They pointed to the fact that a day before Kushner’s sister sought funding from Chinese investors through the investor visa program, Trump extended the program when he signed the most recent spending bill, “raising many eyebrows. ” Even the suggestion that Kushner and his family may be trying to profit off Trump’s name has made Trump livid, according go the Times. The Times pointed out Kushner’s sister’s pitch to Chinese nationals “violated two major rules: Politically, it undercut his immigration crackdown, and in a personal sense, it smacked of profiteering off Mr. Trump — one of the sins that warrants expulsion from his orbit. ” 8. Kushner Is ‘Naive,’ ‘Unqualified’ and Dumb … Establishment media outlets used comments from former intelligence officials to push the narrative that Kushner was “in over his head” and naive to handle foreign affairs. When asked about Kushner’s alleged action, Michael Hayden, the former CIA and NSA Director, told CNN, “right now, I’m going with naïveté, and that’s not particularly comforting for me. ” “What manner of ignorance, chaos, hubris, suspicion, contempt would you have to have to think that doing this with the Russian ambassador was a good or an appropriate idea? ,” he asked. Former KGB spy Jack Barsky told CNN that Kushner was “naive” and “completely unqualified” to deal with the Russians because of the “inexperience he has in international affairs. ” He called Kushner’s alleged actions “ . ” 9. … Or Maybe ‘Desperate’? The Atlantic’s David Frum suggested that perhaps Kushner was not naive but rather desperate to get financing for his family’s Manhattan tower. “Maybe Kushner was desperate, not dumb … His family faced a huge hike in its debt servicing costs in December 2016. ” Frum wrote. He cited a Bloomberg News report that claimed a Manhattan tower that Kushner’s family “has been losing money for three years and faces increasing loan fees in 2017, which may explain why the family has been negotiating with Chinese insurance behemoth Anbang on new financing”: The fees, at 666 Fifth Avenue, kicked in last month and escalate with each payment until the loan is repaid, a 2011 refinancing agreement shows. December brings another hurdle: Interest paid on the bulk of about $1. 1 billion of loans jumps to 6. 35 percent, more than double what it was after the debt was refinanced in 2011. And as the city’s biggest office construction boom in a quarter century creates a glut of supply, the property’s occupancy rates are falling. Seventy percent of the building was filled as of September, filings by LNR Partners, the loan managers, show. This is well below 91 percent for the New York metro area reported at year’s end by Reis, the firm, said Bloomberg Intelligence analyst Jeffrey Langbaum. 10. Media: ‘Miserable,’ ‘Unhappy’ Distraught Kushner May Want to Go Back to NYC, After Kushner was named as the “person of interest,” the media quickly reported that Kushner has been “miserable,” “unhappy” and “frustrated” with his job as he has come under more scrutiny. It is as if they had these paragraphs already written, ready to be fired off at the best possible moment. The Times cited anonymous “friends” who told the outlet that Kushner “and his wife, Ivanka Trump, have made no commitment to remain by Mr. Trump’s side, saying they would review every six months whether to return to private life in New York. ” Politico reported that there is a “sense of uncertainty about how long Kushner and Ivanka Trump — who associates say likes, but doesn’t love, Washington — are planning to stick it out. Some have noted that they rent their Kalorama mansion, which allows them to keep their options of moving back to Manhattan more open. ” On Wednesday, the Times reported that Trump “has not ruled out the possibility” that Kushner and Ivanka “would return to New York this year. ” Writing in the Guardian, Walter Shapiro predicted that Kushner’s “life in the coming months and maybe years will be a study in misery” because “he will probably spend more time with his personal lawyer, Clinton justice department veteran Jamie Gorelick, than with Ivanka or his children. Whether it is an appearance under oath on Capitol Hill or the inevitable FBI interview, every sentence Kushner utters will bring with it possible legal jeopardy. ” Shapiro, citing Kushner’s sister’s visa exploits, wrote that perhaps “Kushner just calculated that all the hype surrounding his White House role was a family branding opportunity. ” He also suggests that Kushner may end up behind bars, if he is not careful, like his father: “the worst thing that can happen to an real estate investor (as Trump himself knows well) is bankruptcy. When the FBI and special prosecutor Robert Mueller get involved, the penalties can theoretically involve steel bars locking behind you. ” If Kushner did not realize it already, he should be well aware by now that the Democrats, the institutional left, and the establishment media seek to destroy, do not give an inch, and play for keeps. And they may just be warming up. | 0fake |
Defying Trump, Senate panel approves funding for U.N. climate body | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The U.S. Senate Appropriations Committee passed a spending bill on Thursday evening that includes $10 million to help fund the United Nations’ climate change body that oversees the Paris Climate Agreement, despite President Donald Trump’s decision to stop funding it. The 30-member Senate panel, which allocates federal funds to various government agencies and organizations, approved a $51 billion spending bill for the State Department and foreign operations, which included an amendment to continue funding the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change as well as the scientific body the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The amendment passed even though the 2018 budget proposal that Trump, a Republican, introduced earlier this year eliminated support of any mechanism to finance climate change projects in developing countries and organizations. The United States is still a party to the 1992 UNFCCC, which oversees the Paris agreement, although Trump announced in June that he would withdraw the nation from the global climate pact and cease funding the Green Climate Fund, which supports clean energy and climate adaptation projects in vulnerable countries. The United States has usually contributed to around 20 percent of the UNFCCC budget. Democratic Senator Jeff Merkley of Oregon, the amendment’s author, said on Twitter on Thursday: “Despite @RealDonaldTrump’s dangerous #ParisAgreement decision & unwillingness to act, we can & will fight back to combat #climatedisruption.” The amendment passed 16-14. Republican Senators Susan Collins of Maine and Lamar Alexander of Tennessee voted in favor, as did all committee Democrats except for West Virginia’s Joe Manchin. Although the United States announced it would no longer be a party to the Paris Climate Agreement, a pact that nearly 200 countries approved in 2015 to combat global warming, it has said it will continue to observe the ongoing negotiations. In a diplomatic cable that Reuters obtained last month, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said U.S. diplomats should sidestep questions from foreign governments on how the United States plans re-engage in the global Paris climate agreement. The cable also said diplomats should make clear that the United States wants to help other countries use fossil fuels, which have been linked to global warming. [L1N1KU0UP] | 0fake |
Tillerson: Russia Either ’Complicit or Simply Incompetent’ on Syrian Chemical Weapons - Breitbart | Secretary of State Rex Tillerson had some tough words for Russia on Thursday on the matter of Syrian chemical weapons. [Speaking from President Trump’s estate in Florida, where Trump is meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Tillerson referenced Russia’s 2013 agreement to oversee the destruction of Syria’s chemical arsenal and said Russia has “clearly failed in its responsibility” to eliminate those weapons. “Either Russia has been complicit or Russia has been simply incompetent on its ability to deliver,” he said. Tillerson stated that Russia’s permission was not sought for the strike, but warnings were given to reduce the risk of Russian casualties. “Our target in this attack was not Russia. Our target was this airfield and the Syrian regime. ” He also said the White House consulted with American allies in Europe and the Middle East, and their response was “overwhelmingly supportive. ” “I think it does demonstrate that President Trump is willing to act when governments and government actors cross the line,” Tillerson said of the U. S. military action. “It’s clear that President Trump made that statement to the world tonight. ” NBC News notes that Tillerson is scheduled to fly to Moscow next week “for meetings with Russian officials on a trip originally intended to turn a new page in the U. S. Russian relationship. ” With masterful understatement, a senior State Department official said the Syrian situation was certain to “color” Tillerson’s talks. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov provided some of that color on Friday, by stating that Russian President Vladimir Putin “considers the U. S. strikes against Syria an aggression against a sovereign country violating the norms of international law, and under a pretext at that. ” | 0fake |
RACE-BAITING COP HATERS Dealt Major Blow: Baltimore Judge Finds No Evidence Of Crime Committed Against Freddie Grey | This is the second major blow today to Obama and his plans to fundamentally transform America. The first blow to Obama was today s US Supreme Court ruling against his unlawful executive amnesty proclamation. Both of these decisions are victories for Americans who are sick and tired of watching our nation being torn apart and divided by racist hate mongers, whose only goal is to build a coalition of Democrat voters A judge explained why he found a police driver not guilty in the death of Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old black man whose neck was broken on the way to the station: He didn t see any evidence of a crime.Baltimore Judge Barry Williams ruled Thursday that the state failed to prove Officer Caesar Goodson committed murder, manslaughter, assault, reckless endangerment or misconduct in office. There has been no evidence that this defendant intended for a crime to happen, Williams said. The state had a duty to show the defendant corruptly failed in his duty, not just made a mistake. Goodson s acquittal is the worst blow yet to efforts to hold police accountable in a case that triggered riots in the troubled city. The state s third failure to convict also casts doubt on whether any of the six indicted officers will be found guilty.Baltimore s police union president, Gene Ryan, called on State s Attorney Marilyn Mosby to reconsider her malicious prosecution, since he s certain the remaining officers also will be found without guilt.The case became a rallying cry for the growing Black Lives Matter movement and sparked more outrage nationwide over how black people are treated by police and the criminal justice system.But the case hasn t fit quite so neatly into the American narrative of white authorities imposing justice unfairly on black people. In this case, the defendant, trial judge, state s attorney and mayor are African-American; at the time of Gray s death, so was the police chief.After the verdict, Black Lives Matter activist and Baltimore native DeRay Mckesson aimed his criticism at the entire system. Today is a reminder that there is a set of laws, policies and police union contracts across the country that will protect any form of police behavior, he said.Goodson was the only one of the six officers charged in Gray s death to be accused of murder. He s the second to be found not guilty, and another officer s case ended in a mistrial.Mosby appeared crestfallen as she hurried out of the courthouse and sped away in a black SUV. When she confidently announced the charges last year, she reflected the anger of many people who saw the case as open-and-shut. Via: AP | 1real |
Japan's Abe may have won election, but many don't want him as PM | TOKYO (Reuters) - Japan s Prime Minister Shinzo Abe may have won a major election victory on Sunday, but half the people surveyed post-election by the Asahi newspaper don t want him to stay prime minister. It seems the election victory has boosted the approval rating for Abe s administration, but not him. Public support rate for Abe s administration grew to 42 percent in the survey, conducted between Oct. 23 and 24, up from 38 percent in its previous survey in mid-Oct. But 47 percent of respondents don t want Abe to continue as prime minister, exceeding 37 percent who want him to stay, said the survey published on Wednesday. Abe s disapproval rating slipped to 39 percent from 40 percent, according to the Asahi s survey. Abe is due to remain prime minister until September 2018 when his tenure as Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) leader ends and a new vote for LDP leader is held Abe s LDP-led coalition won a combined 313 seats in Sunday s national election, keeping its two-thirds super majority in the 465-member lower house, local media said. Several experts noted the ruling bloc s win was less a victory for the long-ruling LDP than a defeat for a divided opposition. The Asahi s survey also showed 51 percent of respondents said the number of seats the ruling bloc s won was too many , while 32 percent expressed the seat number was good. And 54 percent of respondents said they were concerned about Abe s policies, exceeding 29 percent who said they have positive expectations, the Asahi said. A Yomiuri newspaper survey on Wednesday showed the approval rating for Abe s administration was up at 52 percent from 41 percent in its previous survey early this month. Asked reasons for the LDP s winning majority on its own, only six percent said it was high hopes for Abe , 10 percent said appreciation of ruling parties achievements while 44 percent cited fragmentation of opposition, the Yomiuri said. | 0fake |
SEC approves budget of independent accounting board | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday approved the budget for the auditing watchdog that oversees the work of leading U.S. accounting firms. The SEC staff recommended approving the budget of the Public Company Accounting Oversight Board (PCAOB) and SEC Commission Chair Mary Jo White and Commissioner Kara Stein endorsed the $257.7 million budget. Commissioner Michael S. Piwowar voted against, saying he was skeptical of the nearly 3 percent increase in the PCAOB budget from a year ago. He also said he was not persuaded that the additional burden on accounting firms and broker-dealers, which fund the PCAOB through fees, was merited. “The Commission represents the only safeguard to an otherwise unilateral ability to impose the accounting support fee on companies and broker-dealers,” said. The SEC controls the budget and assigns members of the PCAOB, which was conceived to prevent future accounting scandals like the one that brought down energy company Enron in 2001. The SEC has two vacant seats and the Senate Banking Committee is due on Tuesday to consider two nominees put forward by the White House. Commission Chair Mary Jo White has said she intends to wait until the agency once again has its full, five-member panel before moving forward to appoint a new PCAOB chief. Current PCAOB Chairman James Doty’s term expired last fall. | 0fake |
Trump: ’I Inherited a Mess’ - Breitbart | During his Thursday press conference naming Alexander Acosta his nominee to be Secretary of Labor, President Donald Trump discussed the state of the country when he entered office, saying he “inherited a mess. ” “To be honest, I inherited a mess,” Trump said in front of reporters. “It’s a mess … at home and abroad. A mess. Jobs are pouring out of the country. You see what’s going on with all of the companies leaving our country, going to Mexico and other places. Low pay, low wages, mass instability overseas no matter where you look — the Middle East, a disaster, North Korea. We’ll take care of it, folks. I just want to let you know I inherited a mess. ” Follow Trent Baker on Twitter @MagnifiTrent | 0fake |
Willing to oppose Trump, some Senate Republicans gain leverage | WASHINGTON (Reuters) - It is no surprise that Democrats in the U.S. Congress will oppose Donald Trump but the most important resistance to fulfilling the president-elect’s agenda is beginning to emerge from Republicans on Capitol Hill. A small number of influential Republicans in the Senate are threatening to block appointments to Trump’s administration, derail his thaw with Russia and prevent the planned wall on the border with Mexico. The party held onto control of the Senate at the Nov. 8 election but by only a thin margin, putting powerful swing votes in just a few hands. That empowers Republican Senate mavericks such as Rand Paul of Kentucky and Ted Cruz of Texas. Both were bitter rivals to Trump in the 2016 Republican presidential primary. Paul, a libertarian lone wolf, says he will block Senate confirmations if Trump nominates either former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani or former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton to be secretary of state. South Carolina’s Lindsay Graham has started publicly outlining places he might be willing to oppose Trump. He is against the Mexican border wall and is delivering warnings against Trump’s intention to revoke legal status for undocumented immigrants brought here as children - although that would not require congressional approval. Graham, a traditional Republican foreign policy hawk, strongly disagrees with Trump’s attempt to improve ties with Russia. “I am going to be kind of a hard ass” on Russia, Graham told reporters recently. “We can’t sit on the sidelines” and let cyber attacks blamed on Russia “go unanswered.” The early stirrings of opposition from Senate Republicans are a sign that the New York businessman, who has never held public office, might run into harsh political realities soon after taking office on Jan. 20. Other Senators who might defy Trump are Arizona’s John McCain and Jeff Flake, Nebraska’s Ben Sasse, Florida’s Marco Rubio, Maine’s Susan Collins and Alaska’s Lisa Murkowski, said senior Senate aides and lawmakers. These lawmakers have ruffled feathers in the past and some have a good political reason not to fear Trump: Paul, McCain, Murkowski and Rubio do not have to run for reelection until 2022. Graham, Collins and Sasse will have to face the voters in 2020; Cruz and Flake have an earlier election, in 2018. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, whose job is to keep the Republicans in line, knows the challenges ahead. A senior Republican aide said McConnell is “loathe” to spend time trying to move bills that lack the needed Senate votes. McConnell is aware he will not have the support of some of his own lawmakers on bills that could pass the Republican-controlled House of Representatives, such as appropriating money to build the Mexican wall and further abortion restrictions, the aide said. But Trump has a history of taming what appear to be well-entrenched Republican opponents. He won the party nomination against all the odds and some of his staunchest opponents like Rubio and Cruz ended up endorsing him. And swing votes in the Senate cut two ways. The Democrats have their own potential renegades such as West Virginia’s Joe Manchin, who has already declared his support for Trump’s nomination of Republican Senator Jeff Sessions as attorney general. Such swings by Democrats toward Republicans may be likelier ahead of the 2018 elections, when Democrats must defend more vulnerable Senate seats than Republicans. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer must deal with this. Trump said over the weekend he and Schumer “always had a good relationship.” Republicans are likely to control only 52 seats in the 100-seat Senate, meaning three defections within the party are enough to block cabinet appointments which only require 50 votes. Vice President-elect Mike Pence would break 50-50 ties. The task for McConnell gets more difficult when it comes to passing legislation, which requires 60 votes, known as cloture, to allow a bill to move forward. If Trump plans to sign a bill while in office, perhaps one that will change immigration law or restrict abortions, McConnell will have to keep all Republicans in line and win over an additional eight Democrats. Trump could deliver on campaign promises that do not require legislative approval like blocking the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal or ending the Iran nuclear pact. The repeal of the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare, enjoys robust Republican support and would be done through a legislative maneuver that does not require any Democratic support. Collins and Murkowski have a history of crossing the aisle to join Democrats and could shy from abortion restrictions. Cruz has never feared disrupting Senate business to prove a point or seek concessions in legislation. Sasse did not waver from his staunch criticism of Trump through the campaign. Flake has said he is “eating crow” after Trump’s win, but he could defect on immigration and border security, issues he has previously joined with Democrats on. Paul was asked last week on MSNBC if he would put a hold on Giuliani or Bolton. In the Senate, a hold allows a single senator to delay a confirmation. He left open the possibility of such a move, saying, “I feel pretty strongly about it.” He said: “We have a 52-48 majority, all it would take is two or three Republicans to say they can’t go along with Giuliani and can’t go along with Bolton.” | 0fake |
FBI AGENT Who ‘Found Nothing’ on Huma and Anthony Weiner’s Laptops in Record Time Right Before Election is Same Agent FIRED by Mueller for Anti-Trump Texts | Holy moly! We ve been covering the FBI agent who was fired for his anti-Trump tweets but now this BOMBSHELL:The agent is the one who quickly looked over thousands of emails from the Weiner computer and said there was nothing there! You can bet this is now a big problem for the FBI. President Trump is correct when he says the FBI is in tatters Reddit reported:OUR PREVIOUS REPORT ON THE FIRED ANTI-TRUMP FBI AGENT: This is an interesting development in the Mueller investigation because we don t trust the FBI. Is this new news from the New York Times an effort to make Mueller and McCabe appear unbiased? We re not buying it because this guy was the lead investigator in the Hillary email case Really??? Talk about compromised! Please see our previous report below on the FBI giving special status to Hillary s email investigation.Robert Mueller kicked a top FBI agent off the special counsel investigation this summer over potential anti-Trump texts he sent, per a new report today.According to The New York Times, Peter Strzok not only helped lead the investigation into Hillary Clinton s emails, but he played a major role in the Trump-Russia investigation.But he is no longer on the investigation:Mr. Strzok was reassigned this summer from Mr. Mueller s investigation to the F.B.I. s human resources department, where he has been stationed since. The people briefed on the case said the transfer followed the discovery of text messages in which Mr. Strzok and a colleague reacted to news events, like presidential debates, in ways that could appear anti-Trump.ABC News reported back in August that Strzok had left the investigation, but said at the time it s unclear why Strzok stepped away from Mueller s team of nearly two dozen lawyers, investigators and administrative staffers. And The Washington Post s report today on Strzok contains some rather, well, personal details:During the Clinton investigation, Strzok was involved in a romantic relationship with FBI lawyer Lisa Page, who worked for Deputy Director Andrew McCabe, according to the people familiar with the matter, who spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.The extramarital affair was problematic, these people said, but of greater concern among senior law enforcement officials were text messages the two exchanged during the Clinton investigation and campaign season, in which they expressed anti-Trump sentiments and other comments that appeared to favor Clinton Officials are now reviewing the communications to see if they show evidence of political bias in their work on the cases, a review which could result in a public report, according to people familiar with the matter. Via: mediaiteFBI INVESTIGATORS GAVE SPECIAL STATUS TO HILLARY:Friday on Fox News Channel s Fox & Friends, Rep. Matt Gaetz (R-FL) said evidence had been uncovered showing that the FBI gave the investigation of 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton s improper use of an unauthorized email server while secretary of state a special status. According to the Florida Republican, who is also a member of the House Judiciary Committee, the process afforded to Clinton was different than it would have been for any other American. We now have evidence that the FBI s investigation of Hillary Clinton did not follow normal and standard procedures, he said. The current deputy director of the FBI Andrew McCabe sent emails just weeks before the presidential election saying that the Hillary Clinton investigation would be special that it would be handled by a small team at headquarters, that it would be given special status. GOETZ CALLED FOR AN IMMEDIATE INVESTIGATION: I am immediately calling for an investigation into the special treatment that the FBI gave Hillary Clinton. Rep. Gaetz: "I am immediately calling for an investigation into the special treatment that the FBI gave Hillary Clinton." #IngrahamAngle pic.twitter.com/EHkQfyeWDK Fox News (@FoxNews) November 22, 2017Ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee Goetz is calling for an investigation into why Hillary Clinton s FBI case was labelled special by the FBI s Andrew McCabe:The Hill reports:Shortly before last year s election, FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe wrote an email on his official government account stating that the Hillary Clinton email probe had been given special status, according to documents released Wednesday.McCabe s Oct. 23, 2016, email to press officials in the FBI said the probe was under the control of a small group of high-ranking people at the FBI s headquarters in Washington. As I now know the decision was made to investigate it at HQ with a small team, McCabe wrote in the email. He said he had no input when the Clinton email investigation started in summer 2015, while he was serving as assistant director in charge of the FBI s Washington office. [The Washington office] provided some personnel for the effort but it was referred to as a special and I was not given any details about it, he wrote.FBI officials on Wednesday night refused to answer what McCabe meant by calling the Clinton email probe a special or why it was restricted to a small team at headquarters when it began. We don t have anything to add to the documents that were released, bureau spokeswoman Carol Cratty wrote The Hill.The note was contained in more than 70 pages of emails the FBI released on its public records site known as The Vault.The emails chronicled McCabe s efforts to address a separate controversy involving his wife s 2015 campaign for political office.McCabe s references to a special status for the Clinton probe are likely to be used as ammunition by Republican lawmakers critical of former FBI Director James Comey s handling of the Clinton investigation.Remember that the DOJ s Loretta Lynch also wanted Clinton s case to be called an incident and not an investigation. It looks like all intel agencies were doing all they could to protect Clinton. Was it to save themselves from exposure in the Uranium One case or something else? | 1real |
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